From: mort@morts-lair.com
Date: 19 Feb 2004 15:30:00 -0800
Subject: [atxc-pi] NEW: Dancing In The Shadows -NC-17- (05/14)
Source: atxc

Dancing In The Shadows 
by Mort 
mort@morts-lair.com 
 
Part 5
See part 0 for story information.


"Krycek's given you a damn good, almost impossible to disprove,
explanation of why the DNA test showed a relationship with me. But he
also said the results were faked in regard to your DNA, Sir."

Skinner nodded. "He explained that. I'm the one with the nanos in my
blood. He knew he could force me to oppose you if you attempted to
gain custody of the girl."

Mulder gave a wry smile. "What a nicely tied-up case, except for an
obvious problem. That's the funny thing about Krycek," he said
lightly. "He's so good at wrapping you up inside his little fantasy
worlds that sometimes you can't see the wood for the trees. Neither of
you can see it, can you?"

"See what?" Scully demanded, with a frown of irritation.

"A hole in his story big enough to drive a truck through," Mulder
scoffed. He shook his head at their blank expressions. "Tell him what
you said to me, Scully."

"About what?" she asked.

"I'll quote you, shall I? `No one has the science to falsify half a
DNA test. Either she's related to you both, or she most probably isn't
related to either of you.' That is what you said, isn't it?"

Skinner shook his head in bewilderment. "What is your point, Mulder?"

"That Krycek's been leading all of us by the nose, Sir. We've been
wading blindly through a web of lies, unable to see the truth, because
we've been looking for the wrong truth. It's my fault. You've always
accused me of being self-centered in my obsessions. In this case, I
think I have been. You see it doesn't really matter whether Storm is
Samantha's daughter or Jeffrey's. Either  way, she is your
granddaughter."

"Impossible," Skinner snapped.

"Yes," Mulder agreed. "That's what we were all supposed to believe. We
accepted  the impossibility of you having a relationship to Storm as
an obvious smokescreen to throw doubt upon her relationship to me. Too
obvious. Krycek's always been good at sleight of hand. He knows me far
too well. He's also a hell  of a lot smarter than I ever gave him
credit for. He's been using my own paranoia against me." He gave them
both a wry, embarrassed smile. "Krycek used you, Sir, to show that
Storm's DNA had been tampered with in order to fool me into believing
she was Samantha's daughter. With the revelation of that
tampering, I was supposed to see her as a typical Consortium trap and
walk away. God knows, I've been fooled by enough fake Samanthas in the
past that I should have learned my lesson by now.

"But Krycek overplayed his hand. By introducing the idea of Jeffrey as
Storm's father, he's inadvertently confirmed that I wasn't supposed to
find her. He's admitted she doesn't exist simply as a trap for me. I
was never supposed to know she even existed. And if that's true, if I
found her by complete coincidence, then there never would have been a
reason to tamper with her DNA in the first place."

Scully sucked in a breath. "You're saying that you found Storm by
accident, and  the only deceit here has been a deliberate attempt by
Krycek to conceal the fact that Storm is exactly what her DNA says she
is?"

"Yes," Mulder agreed, with a smile of satisfaction.

"My grandchild," Skinner scoffed. "I hate to rain on your parade,
Mulder. But like I said before, it's impossible."

"No," Mulder corrected. "It's simply highly improbable. I think it's
time we investigated it as an extreme possibility. Particularly since
you're going to the judge in two hours and claiming custody of Storm
Redlum."

"I am?"

"Let's keep Krycek happy for now. Let's not give him any reason to
believe we doubt his story about Jeffrey being Storm's father."

Skinner stared at the veins on the back of his hands and shivered
involuntarily. "I don't have any issue with keeping Krycek off my back
for the moment," he agreed dryly. "But the fact remains that there's
no way Storm is related to me. I don't have any siblings and I'm
medically incapable of having children."

"So is Scully," Mulder pointed out, with an apologetic glance in her
direction.

Skinner gave a bitter laugh. "It's not quite the same situation,
Mulder. My `problem' relates to the injuries I received in Vietnam."

"In which case, you could have fathered a child," Mulder pointed out
reasonably. "I assume you did have relationships as a teenager."

Skinner looked momentarily startled, then blushed deeply. "Not that
it's any of  your business, Agent Mulder," he snapped, "but in those
days `nice' girls weren't quite as . liberal minded as they are these
days. I.um. well, let's say  none of the girls I dated were the kind
who ended up `having' to get married."

Mulder quickly hid a grin at the AD's obvious embarrassment. He tried
to catch Scully's eyes but she was busy looking at an invisible scuff
mark on her shoes.  "Well...um." he said, "were you. um. sexually
active in Vietnam before your injury?"

A vein began to throb prominently on Skinner's forehead, and his face
stilled into a repressive mask of quiet fury, but when he spoke his
voice was quiet and  sad.

"I have absolutely no intention of answering that question, Agent
Mulder. What I will say is this. If there had been any feasible chance
that I had fathered a  child, I would surely have known about it. I
would have accepted my responsibility towards that child. If I. if I
had had a child, that child would  have been part of my life. I would
have. I would have welcomed a child, under any circumstances. I don't.
I can't imagine that I. Oh god. What if I did? What  if I never knew?
"

"So it is possible that you." Mulder began.

"Sir," Scully interrupted quickly. "It may be relevant to point out
that Storm's DNA is 100% Caucasian."

Skinner's blush deepened but he closed his eyes and sighed with
obvious relief.  "Then no. Even in the highly improbable event that I
fathered a child, that child could be no relation of this girl."

"Then the answer has to be closer to home," Mulder stated firmly. "Is
it possible that the doctors who operated on you after Vietnam took
sperm samples from you?"

"Without my consent or knowledge?" Skinner demanded incredulously.

"Well, if they knew you'd be left infertile by your injuries, they
might have.well. I mean they do that for cancer patients, don't they?"
Mulder demanded, then winced awkwardly at the pinched expression on
Scully's face.

"The phrase `grasping at straws' comes to mind," Skinner growled.

"I just think." Mulder started.

"The problem with you, Mulder, is you frequently don't think at all,"
Skinner interrupted. "I'll request a copy of my medical records. I'll
do that much."

"Thank you, Sir."

"Don't thank me, Mulder. I'm not doing it for you."

***

The old man's eyes were rheumy and opaque, yet they still sparked
with intelligence within his wizened face, and his voice was a little
breathless as he motioned to the chair beside his bed with a shaking
hand.

"Don't get many visitors," he said. "Sit down, Walter. Tell me your
news."

Skinner sat down, his substantial frame casting a dark shadow over the
frail old man. "It's a nice place," he said awkwardly.

Rushton snorted rudely. "It's death's waiting room, Walter. The
pretty furnishings and pretty nurses are window dressing. It's still
just a place for old farts like me to wheeze their last breath."

Skinner winced a little although, since Dr Rushton was on the wrong
side of ninety, it was pointless to argue the point. He was relieved,
at least, that Rushton was evidently still firing on all cylinders
mentally.

"Okay, just spit it out, Walter," Rushton snapped into the awkward
silence. "I haven't seen you in twenty years, so I know you didn't
come here to chew the fat. Out with it, boy. At my age, I don't have
time for people to beat around the bush."

Skinner nodded. "Why can't I have children?"

He saw a flash of something like guilt in the old man's eyes before
Rushton smiled at him awkwardly. "We've been through this before,
Walter. Your sperm count is too low."

Again Skinner nodded. "But why? You never specifically explained to me
why it's  so damned low."

Rushton sighed and picked at his bedcovers, averting his eyes as he
replied. "Well your injuries in Vietnam were extensive, Walter. Your
intestines were virtually shredded and your groin suffered significant
trauma. Whoever performed the surgery in the Military hospital that
put you back together performed nothing less than a miracle."

Skinner shook his head impatiently. "I know that," he snarled. "I've
spent the best part of thirty years being grateful that I'm not
limping around with a colostomy bag strapped to my thigh, let alone
the fact that I'm sexually active. So damned grateful that it never
occurred to me to question why my sperm count is so low. Specifically,
I mean."

"Specifically, I can't answer you," Rushton admitted.

"I didn't think you would," Skinner replied angrily. He slapped a file
down on the old man's lap. "I finally requested a copy of my medical
records. They make  interesting reading, even for a lay person like
me. I showed them to a colleague of mine, a doctor. She says that it's
a miracle I'm not impotent, but  that in and of themselves the
injuries wouldn't have affected my sperm count."

"If you're finally asking me to be completely honest with you, I will
be. Your sperm count isn't low. It's non-existent. You don't appear to
have any gonocytes. They're the germ stem cells that produce sperm.
Without them you can't reproduce. So, to be frank, I had always
sincerely doubted whether you could have had children anyway," Rushton
admitted heavily. "There just seemed little point investigating that
suspicion. By the time the subject came up, you'd been injured in
Vietnam. You were always satisfied that it was the shrapnel that
rendered you infertile, so it seemed pointless for me to suggest
that the problem pre-dated that injury."

"You're telling me you suspected I'd be infertile even before I went
to `nam?" Skinner demanded.

"I tried to raise the subject with your parents," Rushton replied,
with an awkward shrug. "They refused to discuss it. I had every
intention of telling you the truth when you were an adult but, like I
said, your injury made the subject moot."

"The truth about what?"

Rushton looked intensely uncomfortable. "Sometimes it's better to let
sleeping dogs lie, Walter."

"Just tell me."

Rushton sighed and closed his eyes momentarily, as though gathering
strength.

"Something happened when you were twelve, Walter. You never remembered
the incident. You didn't even have nightmares about it. I was always
worried the amnesia wouldn't be permanent and that it would do more
harm than good to brush  the whole thing under the carpet, but your
parents insisted and.well, they seem  to have been right because you
never did remember what happened to you."

"What did happen to me?" Skinner growled.

"You were abducted."

"WHAT?"

"Someone took you from your house in the middle of the night. No one
ever found  out who took you or why. You were missing for a week. The
sheriff found you wandering naked in the woods near Bear Lake. You'd
been.assaulted. You had extensive bruising, lacerations and. well, a
lot of internal damage."

"You're saying I'd been raped?" Skinner demanded.

Dr Rushton shook his head, his expression both haunted and perplexed.
"The injuries weren't anal, Walter. The damage was centered on your
groin. You had incision marks and stitches. As far as I could tell,
someone had performed a form of bizarre vasectomy on you."

"I don't.I don't remember."

"You never did," Rushton agreed, with a sigh. "You were pretty spaced
out for a  few weeks, and then you just `snapped out of it' and acted
like nothing had ever happened. I kept an eye on you for a while. Like
I said, I was sure you were just suppressing the memories. Besides, I
was concerned the `operation' might have other side-effects. Tell the
truth, you were so messed up internally  that I wasn't sure whether
you'd been effectively castrated but your parents refused to send you
for more extensive tests. They just wanted to pretend the
whole thing had never happened. Naturally, I was worried about you,
but then you entered puberty normally. From your growth, it was clear
that you were producing more than enough testosterone. So.well, I
decided to leave well alone  unless you came to me as an adult and
queried your inability to have a child."

"But then I went to `nam and got half my insides blown up, so you
never bothered to tell me the truth," Skinner growled.

"You never asked, so I didn't see the point," Rushton admitted. "Why
risk opening up that kind of wound? The way I figured it, if you had
been capable of  handling the memory of your abduction, you would have
remembered it by then. So  I thought it best to."

"Let sleeping dogs lie," Skinner interrupted bitterly.

Rushton flushed and nodded. "I'm sorry, Walter. Perhaps I should
have."

"It wouldn't have made any difference," Skinner admitted, with a
ragged sigh. "It was already too late."

***

"Just let me talk this through with you, Dana. What's the difference
between my  gonocytes being removed and your eggs being stolen?"

"Essentially, only that my eggs were, and possibly are, still viable.
Someone could fertilize my eggs, but no one can use your gonocytes to
create sperm. Well, not unless they found a way to somehow integrate
them into another man's testes which I'm pretty sure is scientifically
impossible. So, even if the same  people were responsible, the only
common factor between us is that we're now both incapable of
conceiving a child naturally. The fact that they may be using 
my eggs for their own purposes is a different thing altogether."

"So it seems the important thing was to ensure that neither of us
could have a child."

"Except that, somehow, I had William," she reminded him. "And as much
as I hate  to admit it, and I'll deny this conversation if you repeat
it to Mulder, I suspect that the only way that could have happened was
because they somehow impregnated me."

"Because the IVF didn't work and you never actually slept with
Mulder."

Scully flushed but nodded.

"I believe, somehow, that *I* have a son too," Skinner said, his voice
little more than a whisper.

"I think it's far too early to conclude that."

Skinner interrupted her impatiently. "Storm Redlum is apparently my
grand-daughter and I'm certainly not related to Mulder. So somehow I
have to be  the father of Storm's father."

"Only if you're assuming that Storm is Samantha's daughter rather
than Jeffrey's."

"Just because I'm currently open to a particularly bizarre, extreme
possibility, doesn't mean I'll buy every damned bridge I'm being
offered. There's one constant in my life that never changes. Krycek
may not be the devil, but he's certainly the father of all lies. So we
can safely assume Jeffrey's involvement in this situation was never
anything more than a red herring. That leaves us with Samantha as
Storm's mother and my hypothetical son  as her father."

"I don't want to be indelicate, Sir, but are you absolutely certain
you didn't.um. simply impregnate some girl before your gonocytes were
removed?"

Skinner shook his head. "I was twelve. I don't think I was even
physically capable, let alone that promiscuous. Besides, I don't
believe in co-incidences.  It's a big world, Scully. If my son knocked
Samantha Mulder up I think we can be damned certain that he was
`meant' to do it. Which means that my DNA is somehow important.
Important enough for someone to steal it then ensure I never 
had any other children."

"You think someone took your sperm, to artificially create a child,
then rendered you infertile?"

"Why not? That's what they did to you, Scully."

"But you were twelve years old. That's forty years ago. The technology
to create test tube babies didn't exist back then."

"The *human* technology didn't," Skinner replied darkly. "But, Mulder
was born in 1961. If we take a leap of faith and accept Mulder's
assertion that he's a hybrid, then that would mean the Consortium had
the ability to perform genetic slicing several years before I was
abducted."

"Possibly," she allowed, her expression troubled. "But even if you're
right about having had a son, there's a high probability he's dead,"
she pointed out softly. "Most of the consortium family members were
killed by the Rebels."

Skinner rubbed his face tiredly. "I don't know what's worse; refusing
to believe he ever existed at all, or accepting I had a child who died
without ever knowing I was his father. If Mulder's right about a
breeding project to create a supersoldier and my son was just part of
that program, what kind of life do you think he led, Dana? Did they
even treat him like a human being, or was he just `merchandise' to
them? Maybe his body is lying in one of those buried box cars, with
the other refuse of their experiments. Maybe he lived and 
died as no more than a lab rat to those bastards."

"Don't, Walter," she pleaded, tears slipping down her face, discarding
any semblance of professional distance in the face of his palpable
grief. "Don't do  this to yourself. You're grieving for a child that
may never have even existed."

"I know," he admitted stiffly, stepping away from her, deliberately
refusing the offer of her open arms, unable to accept her comfort for
fear her soft touch would shatter him. "But I feel him, Dana. I feel
him in here." He tapped his chest for emphasis. "And I have to know
the truth."

She wiped her eyes and straightened herself, smoothing her suit,
accepting his need for distance. "How are you going to find it?"

"I'm not sure, but I know where to start. I'm going to see the girl.
See her with my own eyes."

***

She was beautiful. There was no denying that much. A fine-boned face,
with wide-set emerald eyes. She had Mulder's mouth, full-lipped and
generous, but she'd mercifully been spared his nose. Lustrous chestnut
hair flowed down to brush the top of her slender, seemingly endless
legs. She rode the dappled gray  like a centaur, her body moving so
effortlessly with each fluid pace of the horse that it seemed the two
flowed into each other, muscles and sinews blending into one creature
of grace.

He found himself blinking furiously, sneaking a finger under the rim
of his spectacles to remove the moisture pooling in his eyes. And he
blamed the wind and the bright sunlight for the embarrassing leakage,
but could find no equally  comforting excuse for the aching sensation
inside his chest.

If she was aware of his silent scrutiny, she didn't acknowledge it.
Lost in a world in which only she and her horse existed, she continued
to ride in endless, complicated patterns over the dusty covered arena,
executing dressage maneuvers so effortlessly that an ignorant onlooker
would have mistaken skill for ease. But though it had been years since
he'd ridden, and the mounts of his  youth had been rough beasts in
comparison with the expensive gray, Skinner was knowledgeable enough
to be both awed and saddened by her ability.

Saddened because it made him abruptly aware that Krycek was right,
damn him. Mulder had been wrong to seek custody of her. Even putting
aside the possible threat from the aliens, to steal this child away
from her life of obvious privilege and luxury would be almost a
criminal act in itself.

Neither Mulder nor himself had anything to offer this girl, except the
loss of the life she knew and the gaining of knowledge she'd be better
off without. What excuse did either of them have to shatter her
complacent world with their tales of conspiracies and invasions? What
justification was there for proving this innocent child no more than
the product of a machiavellian breeding program?

Yet, selfishly, he couldn't bear to simply walk away.

Already, just the fact of her existence was filling a hole inside him
that had been empty for so long that it ached with her sudden
presence. She stripped his  pretense of indifference, peeling away the
layers of self-protection that had been laid bare and vulnerable by
his aborted role as Scully's protector. His long abandoned yearnings
of fatherhood, reawakened by Scully's pregnancy then cruelly dashed by
Mulder's return, were consuming him once more and this time
he didn't know whether he could survive the pain of another
disappointment.

And so it barely surprised him, when Storm finally dismounted and led
her horse  back towards the shelter of the barn, that he turned to
follow and saw the old crone standing within the eaves of the doorway,
her eyes sharp and knowing within a face too wrinkled for expression.

::Is she the secret I have to protect?::

But she remained silent and inscrutable, not even moving when Storm
hesitated at the doorway and did a slight double-take, her eyes
flicking towards the apparition, her face paling slightly. Skinner
followed her gaze and almost stopped breathing.

"You can see her, can't you?" he demanded urgently.

His voice made the girl whip around in fright, the shocked expression
on her face confirming she'd been completely oblivious to his
presence. "Who are you?"  she demanded, her voice warbling with
panic.

Abruptly realizing the presence of an unidentified middle-aged man
might naturally startle a teenaged girl, Skinner produced his ID in a
smooth gesture,  "Walter Skinner, FBI," and Storm relaxed a little,
though her eyes deepened with a different type of wariness."That
Mulder guy send you?" she asked.

Her directness stunned him for a moment, then he shook himself angrily
and met her cool gaze with a deliberately friendly smile. "I know
Mulder," he agreed. "But he doesn't know I've come here to meet you.
Why do you ask?"

"The school had a letter from the Court. He's apparently applied for
custody of  me."

"And how do you feel about that?" he asked carefully, deciding it best
not to mention the change of plan that had now put his name on the
custody papers.

She pointedly tapped a forefinger on her temple. "The guy's obviously
off his nut," she announced, her face twisting into an incredulous
pout. "He thinks I'm  his long-lost sister or something."

"He has reason to believe you're the daughter of his sister," Skinner
corrected  gently.

"Because I look like her, right?" the girl scoffed. "Does he make a
habit of this kind of thing, or am I the only lucky victim?"

Skinner cleared his throat, to buy time, as unwelcome countless
memories of similarly bizarre Mulder theories jumped to mind. "You do
look like her. But, more to the point, the blood test proved a
relationship with you."

"Big deal," she spat. "By the rules of `Seven Degrees Of Separation'
I'm probably related to enough people to populate a small country."

A laugh barked out of Skinner's throat. "You definitely remind me of
Mulder," he snorted. "That's exactly the kind of wise-ass comment he'd
make."

She shrugged and shouldered past him, leading her horse towards its
stall and muttering under her breath, "So I remind you of a nut-case.
Thanks for nothing."

Skinner waited silently until she untacked and turned to him, hands on
hips, face set into a scowl.

"So what do you want?" she demanded.

"You didn't answer my question," he reminded her.

"What question?"

"You can see her, can't you?"

She met his gaze with wide, guileless eyes. "See who?"

"The old woman standing by the door. You can see her, can't you?" he
insisted.

She half-turned, so that she was staring directly at the apparition,
then gave a shrug and turned back to face him. "There's no one here
but us," she replied,  and there was something hauntingly familiar
about the way she blinked her huge green eyes at him with deceiving
innocence as she spoke what he was sure was a blatant lie. "Are you
sure you're feeling alright, Mr. Skinner?" Her lips twitched, as
though she was trying not to laugh, but the expression seemed more 
nervous than humorous, and there was something uncomfortably familiar
about that mannerism too.

"You remind me of someone," he blurted.

"Yeah, this Mulder guy. You told me," she drawled with a classic
Mulder pout.

Skinner shook his head. "No. Someone else but I can't think who." He
rubbed his  face fretfully, sure he was on the brink of understanding
something important, but too distracted by the old woman's mocking
gaze to follow the rapidly disappearing thought to its conclusion.

Storm rolled her eyes in a typically teenage expression of
exasperation. "Are you sure you're okay? You really do look pale, Mr.
Skinner."

"I don't know what she wants," he whispered.

Storm shrugged and looked suddenly bored of the conversation. "Why
don't you ask her?" she asked petulantly. "She's your ghost."

The girl's words cut through Skinner's haze of confusion like a sharp
knife. He  swung around to face her, his expression triumphant.

"So you can see her!" he exclaimed.

She blushed, then sighed heavily. "Yeah," she admitted. "I see your
ghost, so what?"

"You aren't frightened of her?"

"Should I be?"

"I don't know," he answered honestly.

"Well you should know," she retorted. "She's your ghost, isn't she?"

"What do you mean? How is she mine?" he demanded.

"Of course she's yours. You must have brought her back with you.
That's usually  how it happens. Some kind of connection gets made on
the other side and when you come back you open a doorway that allows
your beloved dead to come visit with you."

"Come back from where?"

"From being dead, of course," she said impatiently. "You really don't
know anything, do you?"

"About the afterlife?"

"About us," she snapped, with another roll of her eyes.

"What about `us'?"

Storm paled, then flushed, her eyes flaring with alarm. "I just meant,
well people in general, you know? That's all," she blurted hurriedly.

Skinner shook his head slowly. "No, I don't' think that's what you
meant at all," he said, and though he couldn't put his finger on what
she'd said that was so significant, he recognized the body language of
someone trying desperately to conceal a secret.

"Okay," Storm huffed. "I meant people who see ghosts, all right?"

"Fox Mulder sees ghosts," he pointed out, sure that obvious similarity
would crack her cool faade.

But she didn't even blink.

"So?" she countered. "You do too."

And that was the point at which his previously vague attempt to make
sense of the situation began to take form and substance. Mulder saw
ghosts. He saw ghosts, well one ghost anyway. And Storm saw ghosts. It
was the one point of commonality between them, the one thing that set
them apart from other people, the one thing that gave credence to the
idea that he was as much a part of the Consortium's genetic
manipulations as the Mulders were.

It explained nothing. What possible use could the ability to see the
dead be to  a `Supersoldier'? Yet, strangely, he was sure that if he
asked that question of  Storm, she'd know the answer.

But he was equally sure she wouldn't tell him.

He felt like he was walking on eggshells. Whoever or whatever Storm
was, it was  clear she wasn't naturally deceitful. Her lies were
clumsy and unpracticed and she blushed far too easily. But she was
still smart enough to back away from a trap and clearly determined to
protect her secrets.

He glanced over at the apparition of the old woman. Was he supposed to
help Storm protect them or was Storm the secret he was supposed to
protect? Or had the old woman materialized simply to make him aware of
Storm's ability to see ghosts too?

"I don't mean you any harm, Storm," he said, and suddenly it felt like
the most  important thing in the world that she should believe him.

Her answering smile was surprisingly warm, if a little sad. "I know,"
she said softly. "But you know what they say about good intentions,
don't you?"

Storm's comment clarified his belief that she knew far more about the
`truth' than either he or Mulder did. While nothing shook his
conviction that she was an innocent in the situation, he could no
longer fool himself that she was ignorant of her origins. She knew
exactly who and what she was. And she was far  too smart to willingly
give up those secrets to a stranger, no matter how trustworthy they
proved themselves to be.

"I think.I think there's a possibility I might be your Grandfather,"
he blurted.

He didn't know what reaction he expected. Shock, startlement, denial,
even a panicked run to the schoolhouse as she decided he was an
escapee from a lunatic  asylum. Instead she stared at him with an
unnatural calmness, the same cool poise with which she'd reacted to
his comment that Fox Mulder saw ghosts.

And all she said was, "Do you smoke?"

Unbidden, the image of Spender popped into his head and he shuddered
at the thought that she was comparing him to that cancer-lunged
bastard. Her other grandfather. So his voice was a little sharp as he
snapped, "No."

"Bummer," she said, kicking the ground in irritation. "I'm gagging for
one."

His mouth dropped open in surprise, and when he spoke his voice was
gruff. "It's not a good habit to start. It stunts your growth."

"Good. If I get any taller, I'll never get a date," she laughed.

Skinner frowned repressively. "I'm serious. Smoking is an unattractive
and unhealthy habit, particularly in a young lady," he stated, then
colored a little at how old-fashioned that had sounded even to his own
ears.

She gave a most unladylike snort. "God, you actually might be my
Grandfather. You sure as hell sound enough like my dad."

A wild hope spiked in Skinner's chest, as stabbing and sharp as any
assault of the nanos in his bloodstream, because her words, her tone,
had unthinkingly been present tense. She spoke of her father as though
he was still alive.

"Storm, who is your dad?" he asked, over the thudding of his own
heart.

She collapsed with laughter. "Don't you know? How many women did you
knock up, Gramps?"

Skinner had an insane urge to grab the girl and shake her until she
understood just how serious the situation was. Then he shuddered, a
wave of shame filling him, at the idea of attempting to bully his
grandchild into betraying her father. His son.

// My god. I have a son //

And the old hag raised her eyes to him, the wrinkles on her face
smoothing and fading, the deeply lined skin unfurling and tightening
to reveal the high, Slavic cheekbones of a remarkably beautiful woman.
A woman he'd only ever seen in long-faded sepia photos.

`I wasn't always old, Walter,' she laughed, her voice no longer husked
with age  but soft with the brightness of youth.

"I know you," he gasped, his eyes wide with shock. "I *know* you."

`Of course you do,' she agreed gently. `How could you have ever
imagined you didn't?'

// So Mulder was right about you. You only ever wanted to protect me
//

`A grandchild is a blessing to be cherished.'

// Yes //  he agreed, glancing at Storm then returning his gaze to the
ghost of  his own Grandmother. // But my son. Who is he? Where is he?
You must know //

She smiled gently but shook her head. `The truth is a delicate thing,
Walter. It has its right time and place. For now, your granddaughter
needs to hold fast  to her secrets.'

His hands clenched into fists, his nails biting into his palms, as he
struggled  to control the frustration that coursed through him. Both
women, one barely more than a girl, the other a long-dead ghost, knew
the answer to the question that was shredding his heart, and both were
taunting him with the refusal of that knowledge.

So his voice was slightly bitter as he turned his attention back to
his granddaughter.

"Will you at least tell me your real name? I mean your real first
name."

"Don't you like Storm?" she teased.

"It's a great name. I can see why you chose it," he replied dryly.

She frowned at him, her eyes flashing with Mulderesque-defiance for a
moment, then a smile quirked her lips. "No you can't," she argued.
"Come with me." She strode back to the stable door and whistled the
gray gelding. "Meet Dancer, short for Storm Dancer."

Skinner blinked with open astonishment. "You named yourself after your
horse?"

"Why not?" she challenged. "It's a cool name."

"And your real name?"

"Isn't cool at all."

She grinned at him with unrepentant defiance, but Skinner just waited
patiently  until she sighed with irritation and gave up.

"It's Lisita," she pouted.

"That's a pretty name."

"But not a cool one," she pointed out.

"Do you know what it means?" he asked.

She shrugged her shoulders. "It's just a name."

"It's Russian for a female Fox."

***

"She reminds me a lot of you," Skinner began. "She's definitely a
Mulder. It's not just her looks, but her mannerisms. She's beautiful,
charming, intelligent,  and unbelievably irritating."

Scully laughed out loud, her eyes sparkling with appreciation.

"All right," Mulder agreed, ignoring Scully's outburst and nodding in
Skinner's  direction. "But do you think she's related to you?"

"Yes," Skinner admitted simply. He didn't attempt to explain why he
was certain. In Scully's presence, he was hardly going to mention that
his grandmother's ghost had appeared in Lisita's presence to confirm
the relationship.

"So if your son is Storm's..."

"Her name's Lisita," Skinner interrupted quietly. "It means vixen."

Mulder looked momentarily stunned as the significance sank in, but he
recovered  his composure quickly. "Okay, as I was saying, if your son
is Lisita's father, that explains her DNA results."

"I'm glad you think so," Scully muttered rebelliously. "Try to
remember that this is all hypothetical."

"Sure," he agreed, with a casual shake of his head. He turned his gaze
back on Skinner. "Let's take it one step at a time. The existence of
your hypothetical son depends on the theory that he was created by the
Consortium. That makes sense considering Lisita's father must have
ended up working for the Consortium  in some way. How else would he
have met Samantha? She grew up as Spender's daughter. There's no way
Spender would have allowed her to get involved with anyone who wasn't
under his thumb," Mulder said.

Skinner and Scully both nodded.

"So we're agreeing that the Consortium were involved in his
conception," Skinner said. "And he was probably brought up by one of
the Elders, like we believe Samantha was. But for what possible
reason?"

"It's possible he was always intended to father Samantha's children,"
Scully suggested carefully. "It seems too much of a co-incidence,
otherwise, that you should end up here, as Mulder's supervisor on the
X-files."

"I find that co-incidence far more comfortable than the idea that the
Consortium abducted me at 12 years old and conceived a child from my
body in the full knowledge that over thirty years later I'd be
supervising the brother of my son's wife. That suggests an amount of
predestined fate that no-one would  feel comfortable with."

"I think it's a combination of both," Mulder interrupted. "The bottom
line, the  thing that both of you are avoiding, is that there has to
be something particularly important about your genes, Sir. For some,
as yet unknown, reason,  the Consortium decided that your child was
critically important to them. Just as they later decided that the
conception of William was equally important. To that extent, I don't
think there's any co-incidence at all in the idea of your
son and my sister having children together. Neither was it left to
chance that Scully and I met. And, the more I think about it, I
believe the fact that I failed to make.um. romantic moves towards
Scully when she was first partnered with me is the true reason for her
abduction."

"What?" Scully demanded.

"Think about it, Scully. If I'd knocked you up the natural way, there
never would have been a reason to abduct you at all."

"You're suggesting that everything has always been about some kind of
consortium breeding program?" Skinner asked.

"It's certainly beginning to be the most likely hypothesis, Sir. A
very `specific' kind of breeding program, though, where the chosen
`breeders' were rendered physically incapable of accidentally having
unplanned pregnancies. You  were only ever supposed to have one
particular child, who was intended to only impregnate my sister.
Scully was only supposed to have one child, fathered by
me."

"And what about you, Mulder?" Scully sniffed. "Presumably you're
allowed to have as many children as you want?"

Mulder grinned self-consciously. "Believe me, Scully. The idea of me
having any  unplanned progeny would `definitely' be an X-file."

Skinner frowned at him in bemusement, but one of Scully's eyebrows
arched in a definite expression of understanding. "Of course. How
stupid of me," she muttered, in a less than friendly tone.

(Continued in part 6)

Part 6
See part 0 for story information.


Mulder couldn't find it in himself to blame her, considering he'd just
admitted  his suspicion that she'd only been abducted because of the
extreme improbability of them ever conceiving a child naturally. And,
of course, he'd chosen exactly the wrong person to prove that
particular quirk of his personality to. Damn Krycek, anyway.

"Let's stick with specifics," Skinner suggested. "Our current
hypothesis is that my son was brought up inside the consortium and
deliberately introduced to  your sister for the purpose of this
`breeding program'."

"My sister knocked up by your son, the Consortium lackey," Mulder
agreed, with a derisive sneer. "Still so pleased with the idea of
being a `dad'?"

"Whatever happened wasn't his fault," Skinner retorted angrily.
"Brought up in that nest of vipers, he wouldn't have known any
better."

"You should have gone into law after all, Skinner. He's probably going
to need a good defense attorney once I've gotten my hands on him,"
Mulder spat.

Skinner bridled. "From what you've told me, when you met her Samantha
was perfectly happy to stay with Spender. She didn't exactly jump at
the chance of going back to her old life and she was eight when she
was taken. My son was in a fucking test tube. You tell me which one of
them is more culpable of the choices they made."

"Stop it, both of you," Scully snapped, jumping between the two men.
"While it does you credit, Sir, to display some paternal feelings
towards this man who may or may not be your son, I think it's far too
early to be jumping to any conclusions about his motivations. And as
for you, Mulder, the fact that Samantha seemed content with her life
when she met you suggests that the father  of her children meets with
her approval. Why don't the pair of you shelve your testosterone until
we at least have some facts?"

"How do we begin to look for him?" Skinner demanded. "We have no idea
what he looks like. We don't even know how old he is. They could have
frozen my sperm for years."

"I don't think so," Scully replied thoughtfully. "There would have
been inherent risks to that. It's more likely that they'd use it
quickly to reduce the chances of something going wrong. After all,
they couldn't come back to you  for another sample. It's also
reasonable to assume that he's close to Samantha in age."

"So if he's still alive he's what? About thirty-eight to forty? And
chances are  he's going to be tall, probably dark-haired.if he's not
already going bald," Mulder added, with a snicker.

"The genes for male pattern baldness come from the mother," Scully
corrected. "It's far more likely he has a full head of hair."

"Thank god for small mercies," Skinner muttered, rubbing his scalp
self-consciously.

"And his coloring could have come from his mother too," she pointed
out. "He could be a blue-eyed blond for all we know."

"No," Mulder said, his brow creasing in thought. "He's dark-haired. My
mom was blonde so if he was blond then it would probably have come out
in Lisita. And I  think his eyes are green. In fact.oh my god.he's
about thirteen years younger than you, dark-haired, green-eyed and
works for the Consortium. You don't think." he looked at Skinner with
mixed horror and sympathy.

Skinner had collapsed into his chair, the color bleeding from his
face. He shook his head desperately. "It can't be," he whispered.

"Maybe I'm wrong. I mean shouldn't the DNA test have brought up
Krycek's FBI file if it was true?"

"What file?" Skinner replied. "I doubt even his real fingerprints are
still in the computer, let alone his DNA."

Scully looked awkwardly between the two men. Mulder looked, if
possible, even sicker than Skinner.

"What was it I said about co-incidences," Skinner mumbled. "Do you
think that was Spender's idea of humor? Setting me up to hate and kill
my own son?"

"You didn't." Mulder began.

"I called him that the other day, you know? Son. And he looked like
I'd slapped  him. I didn't understand his reaction, at the time, but I
guess it really hurt him to hear it from my mouth. Considering we'd
both already killed each other at that point."

"You're saying Krycek knows you're his father?" Scully asked.

"This isn't possible," Mulder suddenly blurted. "Krycek can't be
Lisita's father. He's.he's.look, he's gay, okay?"

"So?" Scully snapped. "You're William's father, aren't you?"

Skinner reeled in his chair and his eyes bugged wide at the sudden
flush on Mulder's face. "You're gay?" he demanded.

Mulder just swallowed heavily.

"And you know Krycek is gay too because?" Skinner continued, his voice
a quiet dangerous rumble.

Mulder's blush deepened and he dropped his eyes from Skinner's gaze.

"So my son is not only a murderous, treacherous, amoral, lying
rat-bastard but he's also gay?" Skinner asked, stressing the last word
as though it was the most damning statement of all.

Mulder shook himself angrily and forced himself to meet Skinner's
horrified expression. "It's not a dirty word, Sir," he hissed.

"And you two were playing hide the baloney for how long?"

Mulder drew himself up to his full height and met Skinner's eyes
proudly. "Alex  and I had a. a relationship when we were partners. It
ended abruptly the night I discovered he was a rogue agent."

"You decided the rules about fraternization didn't apply to you?"
Skinner snarled. "Of course you did. You never believed any other
rules applied to you."

"I didn't see you having a problem when you thought I was sleeping
with Scully," Mulder countered hotly. "Or is it just the idea of me
fucking your son  that bothers you?"

Skinner surged to his feet, a vein throbbing prominently in his
forehead. "What  bothers me, Agent Mulder, is the idea that between
the two of you, you still somehow managed to knock up both Scully and
your sister."

Mulder turned green and sat down abruptly, as though his legs couldn't
hold him. "Fucking ratbastard scumsucking shit fucked my sister?"

"I'm glad the reality of the situation has finally sunk in," Skinner
growled.

"Even if he did, given Lisita's age, it happened a few years before he
met you," Scully pointed out dryly.

"He came here, joined the X-files, and screwed me knowing I was
Samantha's brother?"

"I thought you said it was you doing the screwing," Scully pointed
out, with a wicked smirk.

Both men stared at her as though she'd grown horns. She shrugged. "I
think you're both missing the whole picture here."

"Enlighten us," Skinner growled.

"If Alex Krycek is your son, and the father of Samantha's children, I
think we have to re-evaluate everything we've ever assumed about his
motivations. For one thing, we always assumed the only person he cared
about was himself. That he did everything out of some selfish desire
for power. What if his real motivation was simply to protect his
children?"

"From what?" Mulder demanded.

Scully smiled at him apologetically to soften her words. "From you,
Mulder. Everything you did was based on your need to find Samantha.
But perhaps Samantha never wanted to be found. She told you she had
two children, didn't she? So it's probable that Lisita has a brother
or sister. Where's that child? Hidden in a boarding-school like Lisita
or given over to the Consortium?"

"Krycek wouldn't." Mulder blurted, then stopped as though shocked by
his own thought.

"Krycek wouldn't let one of his children be taken," Scully said. "That
is what you were about to say, isn't it?"

"Yes," Mulder admitted weakly. "I hate the bastard, but he's.shit he's
nothing like Dad. I didn't know he was a father, but I know him. He'd
rip someone apart  before they made him give in over something like
that."

"He was always changing allegiances within the Consortium, playing one
against the other," Skinner interrupted. "Working with us sometimes,
working against us  other times. I thought he was just playing the
field, looking for the angle, trying to be a player instead of a
lackey. I thought it proved he was an immoral little shit. But maybe
he needs to be a player. Maybe that's the only way to keep his family
safe."

"My dad was a `player'," Mulder reminded him acerbically. "It didn't
help Samantha."

***

"Maybe if I talked to Fox," Teena suggested hesitantly.

"Yeah, I can see that working," Alex snorted. "You could turn up at
his apartment in the middle of the night like the ghost of Christmas
Past and warn him of the error of his ways. I'm sure that would work a
treat."

"There's no need to be nasty, Alex," she sniffed. "If I went to see
him, explained everything, told him the truth then."

"Then he'd be on the next plane here and he'd bring a whole fucking
alien fleet  to our doorstep."

"If Lisita just disappears out of school, he'll never stop looking for
her," Teena pointed out. "It will be like Samantha all over again.
And, quite apart from the risk to us, it will distract him from what
he should be doing. We're running out of time, Alex. The date's set,
remember?"

"How the hell could I forget?" Alex snarled.

"Lisita's going to have to die again, isn't she?" Samantha asked, her
eyes dull.

"It's got to look natural," Alex agreed. "I don't have the resources
for anything dramatic. We'll just go for a car accident, I think.
Something cut and  dried. Something that won't scar her too badly. A
basic autopsy and a quick burial. I don't want her waking up before
we've retrieved her."

"Then what?" Teena demanded. "Another new identity for her? She's
fifteen, Alex. She needs friends, stability, a decent education. You
can't keep erasing her past and re-inventing her every couple of
years."

"Fuck it, Teena. You think I like this? You think it's easy for me to
kill my own daughter?"

"I think you've died so many times yourself you're inured to the
horror of waking up buried alive," she snapped.

"Shit. How many times are you going to rub my face in it?" Alex
snarled. "It wasn't my fault. It was your fucking darling Fox. He was
the one who decided to  stand vigil over your grave for three fucking
nights. I could hardly dig you up  while he was sitting there, could
I? He'd probably have put a stake through your heart. Come to think of
it, that wouldn't have been such a bad idea."

"Alex," Samantha interrupted warningly. "Don't take it out on Mom.
It's not her  fault."

"Really?" Alex sneered. "It wasn't her fault she handed you over to
Spender? It  wasn't her fault she let Mulder grow up a self-obsessed,
guilt-ridden maniac? It wasn't her fault she decided to fake her own
death when all her old lies started to box her into a corner?"

Pale faced, Teena's mouth narrowed into a thin-lipped grimace.
Samantha flinched as she looked between her mother's expression of
pain and the angry hurt in Alex's eyes.

"She had no choice about what happened to me. She kept silent to
protect Fox from the same fate," Samantha said, familiar words, old
argument.

"What is it with you Mulders anyway? You all think you're so lily
white. Well, I've got news for you darlin'. Roll in shit and you all
start to smell just like the rest of us."

"I wasn't running away from Fox. I just wanted to be with my
grand-children," Teena interrupted with quiet pride. "You were the one
who wouldn't let me come here unless I could guarantee Fox wouldn't
come looking for me."

Alex sighed heavily and closed his eyes, forcing his anger to pale
back to his usual more manageable feelings of mere resentment.

"I don't understand any of you Mulders," he finally admitted. "All
three of you  hate with passion but your love is cold."

Samantha moved to wrap her arms around him, resting her head against
his shoulder and pressing her face into his neck.

"We do love you, Alex," she murmured, squeezing her arms tighter
around him for  emphasis. "We all do, in our own way, and I know
that's not the way you want or  need but it's the best we can do."

***

Mulder whooped, dropped the phone back into its cradle, and punched
the air in triumph.

"Yes!" he exclaimed loudly, rocking his chair back onto its back legs
and swinging his feet up onto his desk, before gracing the room with a
smug grin.

"I take it the judge awarded in favor of Skinner?" Scully asked.
Despite her own personal misgivings, her lips twitched a little at
Mulder's obvious exuberance.

"That was the clerk of court," he agreed. "Giving me the `bad' news
that I lost  my own petition. It's official. Skinner's got custody of
Lisita."

"So what happens now?" she asked carefully.

"We call the school and tell them to pack her bags, of course. Damn.
I'd better  look for a bigger apartment."

"Better look for a house," Doggett drawled. "Unless you're plannin' to
keep a horse on a balcony."

"Shit," Mulder said, his mouth drooping into a pout. "I'd forgotten
about the damned horse. Where the hell am I supposed to find the money
to feed a horse?"

"Where are you gonna find the money to feed a teenager?" Doggett
mocked.

"Hang on a minute. I thought you were going to leave Lisita at her
school. That's what you told Skinner," Scully reminded him, with a
suspicious frown.

Mulder shrugged and rolled his eyes. "He was having second thoughts
about applying for custody," he explained unrepentantly. "And it's
what Krycek wanted  to hear. He thinks Skinner's going to leave her
there, so he's off-guard at the  moment. I need to take advantage of
that and get Lisita moved while Krycek still thinks he's in control of
the situation."

"What about Lisita?" Scully reminded him carefully. "Do you really
think it's in her interests to be ripped out of the life she knows to
live with a complete  stranger?"

"I'm not a stranger," he growled. "I'm her uncle."

"Poor kid," Doggett grunted. "You're a self-centered bastard,
Muldhar."

Scully flashed him a repressive frown, though she was pretty much of
the same opinion. As far as she could see, Mulder wasn't giving any
consideration to the  girl's welfare.

"Tell me something, Mulder," she said, her expression deliberately
bland. "Who exactly are you hoping to flush out by kidnapping Lisita?
Samantha? Or Krycek?"

She knew she'd struck a bulls-eye from the immediate flush of angry
color that suffused Mulder's cheeks.

"Kidnapping? She's my niece," he snapped defensively.

"She's Skinner's grand-daughter," she countered. "He's not going to
agree to let you use her like a pawn."

Then she flinched guiltily at the look of abject misery in Mulder's
eyes and his sad expression of wounded betrayal, as he straightened in
his seat and answered her with careful dignity.

"You're right in a way, but you're so damned wrong too. I.I guess I
never really understood how little faith you have in my integrity,
Scully. Do you think so little of me? Do you think the fact I'm gay
means I'm incapable of real emotions?"

"Gay?" Doggett interrupted, his expression more satisfied than
surprised.

Mulder ignored him, his attention fully on Scully. "Yes, I'm hoping -
praying even - that both Samantha and Krycek turn up on my doorstep
and explain this whole fucking mess to me. But that's not why I want
Lisita. She's my niece. She's the only member of my family that I know
for sure is still alive. And if you can't understand what that means
to me, what that makes me feel, then you aren't the person I always
thought you were."

Scully dropped her eyes to hide the tears that were threatening to
spill. She felt suddenly ashamed of herself for her suspicions. In the
face of Mulder's obvious sincerity they seemed preposterous.
Except.except she knew Mulder, perhaps better than he knew himself,
and it was hard to shake the feeling that regardless of his avowed
feelings of love for Lisita, that love was still basically selfish.
This was all about Mulder's wants, Mulder's needs, and not
once, in his heartfelt speech, had he even tried to suggest that his
intentions  were in Lisita's best interests."What about the
Consortium?" she reminded him carefully. "What about the aliens? What
if Krycek was right when he said she'd be abducted if you claimed her?
How are you going to protect her, Mulder? And how the hell are you
going to cope if she is abducted while she's under your
care? Can you honestly say you could handle that?"

Mulder paled slightly, his eyes growing dark and haunted. He chewed
his lower-lip fretfully and swallowed several times, as though
reluctantly digesting her words.

"Skinner's got a big apartment," Doggett interrupted suddenly. "And
enough money to keep a kid and stable a horse."

Mulder glared at him, but Scully nodded in decisive agreement. "He's
right, Mulder. It's the best solution. Lisita could live with Skinner,
and you could visit her there whenever you wanted."

"It's not the same," he grumbled petulantly, but his shoulders slumped
as though in preparation for an impending capitulation.

"Of course it's not the same," she agreed. "But it makes sense, and
it's the safest option if you're determined to bring Lisita to DC."

He nodded reluctantly. "I guess."

"Good," Doggett grunted. "So, now that's decided, is there any chance
either of  you are gonna get some work done today?"

***

Throwing the swathe of cloth down in disgust, Skinner frowned
repressively at his insufferably camp visitor.

"I told you I didn't want pink," he growled, in the voice that usually
sent FBI  agents running for cover.

Gordon `but you can call me Gordy' McAllister just simpered with
obvious delight at the show of temper. "Mauve, darling. It's mauve.
It's absolutely in this year. Just look at this divine fabric I found
for the drapes."

Skinner had a sudden urge to throw the sample book and the interior
designer off his balcony. But that image just reminded him
uncomfortably of the night he'd cuffed Alex to the railings.

// My own son. I did that to my own goddamned son.//

".would be absolutely perfect. A young lady needs a beautiful boudoir.
A place of her own considering the.well, rather Spartan masculinity of
the rest of your  apartment. Perhaps you'd consider a touch or two in
this living room.just a hint of personality."

"What?" he asked absently.

"I was thinking, perhaps a little color here and there? Something warm
like orange or red."

// I told him to `think warm thoughts'. Oh Christ. What the hell am I
going to do?//

".a few sketches for your approval, of course."

"What?" he demanded again, realizing he'd tuned out almost the entire
conversation.

"I said I wouldn't do anything without your final approval, of
course."

"Just do it," he snapped. "Do whatever you want and send me the bill.
Just make  sure her bedroom's finished by the weekend."

"The weekend?" Gordy screeched, his eyes fluttering in horror.
"Absolutely impossible, darling."

Skinner surged to his feet and grabbed him by his designer lapels. "I
said I want it done by the weekend," he growled into Gordy's face.

Looking like he was going to faint, though not necessarily with
fright, the little man nodded his absolute agreement to Skinner's
demand.

"Damned queer," Skinner snarled, as Gordy made a swift mincing retreat
through the front door.

// Alex is queer // an unwelcome little voice chirped up inside his
head.

He winced, and made a mental note to himself that he'd handle Alex
pointing a gun at him, hitting him, even using the nanos against him,
but if Alex ever behaved like that poncing little queen McAllister,
he'd break his goddamned neck.

He was still considering that unwelcome image when the telephone
rang.

***

"FUCK!" Doggett slammed his fist into the wall so hard he sent a
flurry of plaster into the air. Then, cradling his now throbbing hand,
he turned to his sobbing girlfriend. "I don't fuckin' believe it. He's
a walkin' goddamned CURSE."

Dana just buried her face in her hands and wept harder.

Mentally slapping himself, Doggett crossed the room and put his arms
around her, holding her until she turned and pressed her face into his
neck. And as she sobbed in his embrace, her tiny ribcage heaving, her
tears dripping down his chest, he closed his own eyes in pain, hating
the fact that a huge portion of his misery wasn't the news itself but
the inescapable fact that Dana was crying for Mulder, rather than the
girl.

He waited until she quietened a little before daring to say the
immediate suspicion that had leaped into his mind the moment he'd
heard the news.

"What if it's not true?"

"What?" she gasped, her swollen eyes blinking in confusion.

"Skinner makes a move to bring her to DC, and the very next day she
dies in some car crash? Doesn't that strike you as kinda
`convenient'."

"I wish," she whispered, her voice ragged with grief. "But Walter flew
straight  down to Kansas. He saw her body for himself. He didn't tell
Mulder until.until he was sure."

"What the hell was she doin' in a car by herself. She's only fifteen,"
he groaned. "Just a goddamned baby."

"It was just an accident. A tragic, senseless accident. The weather
changed suddenly, and she lost control on a bad bend in the road. She
was killed instantly. And.and I.I never even met her," Scully cried.

"Shit," Doggett cursed. "Krycek's gonna go crazy. He's gonna blame
Skinner and Mulder."

Scully's face snapped up in surprise, but her frown quickly turned to
comprehension. "Damn. Of course he is. He's going to think they led
the Consortium to her."

"Maybe they did," Doggett muttered darkly. "Like I said, it's a pretty
damned convenient accident."

"Oh god," Scully breathed. "Don't say that to them. Don't even suggest
it. I don't think either of them could handle. God, what if you're
right?"

"I think we need to get down there. You can check the coroner didn't
miss anything. I'll talk to the local cops, find out the details of
the accident."

She angrily wiped at her tears and nodded decisively, pulling herself
quickly together now that her grief had been given a focus.

"And." Doggett added reluctantly, "Mulder probably. well he probably
needs you right now. You should be with him."

Scully closed her eyes momentarily, thanking God for the strong,
generous man he'd given her. "Thank you," she said fervently. "Thank
you for understanding."

Doggett shrugged awkwardly, wishing he felt as sanguine as he was
pretending. The truth was, the idea of Scully and Mulder sobbing in
each others arms, of Scully comforting Mulder, felt like a hand
reaching inside his chest and savaging his heart.

But he wasn't selfish enough to admit it.

"Let's go," he said quietly. "Pack a couple of bags, while I book us a
flight."

***

"It should be raining."

Doggett's face creased into momentary folds of confusion at the first
words Skinner had uttered that morning. Unlike Mulder, whose grief was
audible and angry - a wild mix of tears and curses - Skinner's sorrow
was silent and dignified. His face was a stony emotionless mask. The
only visible marks of his  mourning was the paleness of his features
and the way he seemed almost shrunken  into himself. Somehow he seemed
shorter. His whole presence seemed diminished, as though the death of
the girl they were burying had sapped his own life-force. He wasn't
broken, exactly, but everything about his posture and mannerisms
suggested a defeat from which he wouldn't ever recover.

Mulder was at the head of the grave, tears rolling down his cheeks as
the pastor droned incessantly about `eternal life', Scully clutched to
his side so closely that they looked like a pair of Siamese twins. A
throng of schoolgirls and teachers from Blakemore twittered at the
side of the gaping hole, like a crowd of nervous blackbirds.

Doggett rubbed his eyes and angrily told himself they were only
watering because of the sunlight.

And then he understood what Skinner had said.

"Yeah," he said, his heart heavy with remembered grief. It should
rain, when a child was buried. The whole fucking world should weep for
the loss of such promise and hope.

After a long silence, Skinner spoke again. "I keep expecting Alex to
appear."

// With an Uzi // Doggett agreed silently. Aloud he said, "Maybe he
doesn't even know, yet."

"Maybe," Skinner said, though his tone didn't suggest agreement.

"I've been over and over the accident report," Doggett continued, in a
low voice. "There's nothin' to suggest."

"Thank you, Agent," Skinner snapped repressively.

Doggett took the hint and lapsed into awkward silence. It wasn't the
time or the place. Perhaps there wasn't a right time or place. Scully
had concurred with the original autopsy. His own investigation of the
accident had turned up nothing new. Even Mulder had accepted their
improbable conclusion that Lisita's  death had been an accident.

Or maybe not. Maybe he was just too shell-shocked for his usual
paranoid tendencies to have kicked in yet. Doggett had the feeling
that it was only a matter of time before Mulder's grief turned into a
crazed need for revenge and,  proof or not, he'd choose to blame the
Consortium for Lisita's death.

He sighed sadly, feeling abruptly weary of the whole damned business.

***

He waited at the Holiday Inn at Forbes Field for three days, leaving
instructions with the reception that if anyone asked after him they
were to confirm he was staying there. He wasn't sure what he expected
exactly, though he suspected his first warning of Alex's arrival would
be the immediate activation of the nanos.

He certainly didn't expect to leave Kansas alive.

And that was okay because, whatever Doggett and Scully said, he knew,
in his heart, that he was somehow responsible for his granddaughter's
death. Maybe it hadn't been a carefully constructed consortium murder.
Maybe. Maybe it had just  been an inexperienced driver's momentary
distraction as everyone said.

But what no one was saying was why Lisita might have been distracted.
No one had mentioned the glaringly obvious fact that the most likely
thought in her mind, as she'd lost control of the car, was that she
was about to be torn away from her life and sent to live in a strange
city, with a complete stranger. It was no fucking wonder she hadn't
been paying attention to the road.

So he couldn't find it in himself to care if Alex demanded his own
life in compensation for the loss of his daughter.

Yet, despite his acceptance of Alex's right to demand revenge, by the
third morning, after the third sleepless night, he found himself
unable to sit in his  hotel room any longer and just passively wait
for death to arrive.

At five, he climbed out of bed, packed his case and put it in the
trunk of his rental car. Then he called an all-night florist and paid
a ridiculous amount for someone to courier over a small posy of
flowers. He used the phone in the lobby to confirm a noon flight, left
a message at the reception saying he was returning to DC, and then
climbed into his car and drove in the direction of Blakemore to say
his final goodbye to his grand-daughter.

At six-thirty, knowing he was going to arrive far too early, he
stopped at a Diner to kill time with an early breakfast. But the place
was too stark, too real, the garish lights and plastic tables
assaulting his senses, the harsh voice of the surly waitress grating
on his ears, and he found himself staring blindly at the menu, the
words blurring into each other, incomprehensible and alien. The smell
of the coffee, as she splashed it carelessly into his cup,
made him so nauseous that he just slapped a bill onto the white
Formica and raced back to his car, where he sat, shaking, until the
blood stopped rushing through his ears.

So he pulled back onto the road and drove on until he arrived at the
cemetery. It was only a little after seven, and the posted sign on the
gates stated they wouldn't be unlocked until 8.30.

He contemplated seeking another Diner for a caffeine fix, but his
stomach immediately threatened a protesting back-flip. So he just
turned off the engine  and sat there, radio off, feet slowly turning
to ice, and watched the early morning fog lifting as the horizon
slowly lightened. He waited maybe twenty minutes, though it felt like
an hour, then he climbed out of the car and walked  towards the heavy
metal entrance gates. He pushed against them, without force,
simply responding to a subconscious urge to prove they were locked
against him.

So when one of the gates groaned rustily and swung open, he just stood
there for a moment, mouth open in surprise, body frozen in place. He
shook himself, a  gesture that began as self-irritation and ended as a
full-body shiver of something that felt strangely like dread.

// Of course it's dread. You're visiting the grave of your
fifteen-year-old granddaughter.//

He returned to the car to retrieve the posy of white roses and gyp
from the back seat. He paused there a moment, an unwelcome memory of
Krycek lurking, dark and dangerous, on a similar beige leather seat
flickering through his mind. Then, with another angry shake of his
head, he snatched up the flowers, slammed the car door shut and strode
back towards the entrance, his overcoat flapping behind him like a
vampiric cloak.

The fog was heavier inside the cemetery, roiling thick and white
around the gravestones, distorting those closest to him and completely
obscuring any object more than ten feet away. It was as surreal as the
set of a horror movie,  yet it struck Skinner that, unlike the day of
the funeral, the cemetery was finally revealing its true face to him.
Its formal rows, and the carefully cultivated beauty of its flowers,
had disappeared under the fog and the gravestones now jutted with
jagged inconsistency from amongst the swirling, unsubstantial mist.
They stood starkly rude, revealed randomly where the natural
undulations of the earth rose above the low-lying rolling fog,
creepily  suggestive of teeth rising out of death's gaping maw.

Though dawn had already broken, the cemetery was strangely void of
any bird-song. Perhaps their chorus was simply muffled by the wet
banks of mist, but their absence still chillingly suggested that
nothing living belonged in the presence of the lonely graves. And,
though he tried to laugh at himself, a grown man spooked by nothing
more than a natural phenomena of nature, he couldn't totally ignore
the growing certainty that he wasn't alone.

Then he heard, faint and muffled, a wet, rhythmic thudding. It was
impossible to judge the direction the sound was coming from, or even
hazard a guess as to its distance from his position, but his spine
chilled as he became abruptly certain he was hearing the impact of
bare feet on damp soil, and a thousand images from countless late
night movies assaulted him, visions of walking corpses with rags and
flesh hanging from their exposed bones.

He mentally slapped himself.

// Pull yourself together, Marine! //

And with that admonishment, a lot of his instinctive panic faded
because he realized the true source of his discomfort had less to do
with cheap budget horror movies than previously suppressed memories of
early mornings in `nam, where certain death had lurked within
mist-shrouded trees.

Yet still the sound continued, with the eerie rhythm of a heartbeat. A
wet slap  of something solid striking dirt. Like.like the sound of
digging. He almost laughed his relief out loud. Of course. He was in a
cemetery. What sound was more natural than that of someone digging a
grave? That was why the gate had been open. One of the cemetery
laborers was already at work.

Smiling wryly to himself, he continued down the pathway that led to
Lisita's resting place. Perhaps one day, when neither of them were so
raw, when they could actually discuss Lisita's death with some
rationality, he would admit his  momentary panicked imaginings to
Mulder. Or perhaps not. He could already imagine the look of
incredulous amusement on Mulder's face.

Although the fog was still too heavy for clarity, he began to identify
a vague,  indistinct shape of piled earth near Lisita's grave, and
then, as he walked closer, he saw the form of a man bent over a
shovel, his bottom half obscured within the hole he was digging.

It saddened him that no more than three days had passed and already
the earth next to Lisita's grave was being disturbed in readiness for
a new occupant. Yet, at the same time, it seemed right that she would
no longer be lying there alone.

But as he approached, his meandering thoughts suddenly coalesced into
fury. Lisita's floral tributes had been roughly displaced. They were
scattered like refuse, and the mound of freshly dug earth was sprawled
almost as far as the walk-way, spilling rudely over the ground,
obscuring her grave. Desecrating it.

"HEY!" he roared, his stride lengthening into a near-run. "What the
hell do you  think you're doing?"

The grave-digger jerked in shock then swung around to face him,
raising the shovel like a weapon against Skinner's fury.

And Skinner's head-long charge faltered into a skidding, horrified
halt. Despite the dirt and sweat smeared over his face, the man in the
grave was unmistakably Alex Krycek.

He didn't make a conscious choice to draw his weapon. It was in his
hand and pointed in Krycek's face before he'd even fully processed the
fact that the reason he couldn't see Lisita's grave had nothing to do
with the mound of earth. He couldn't see it because Krycek was
standing waist-deep in it.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" he barked, waving his gun
wildly in Krycek's direction until he lowered the shovel to his
waist.

"What the fuck does it look like?" Krycek snarled, his eyes blazing
with defiance.

Skinner blinked at him in disbelief, warring between the urge to shoot
and the far more satisfying image of dragging the little bastard out
of the grave and beating him senseless with his own shovel for his
desecration.

And then his own guilt, and the terrible pathos of the situation,
struck him.

This was Krycek's daughter. The poor, insane bastard was trying to dig
his own daughter up out her grave.

"She's dead, Alex," he said gently, lowering his weapon. "Lisita's
dead. Let her rest in peace."

Krycek's face twisted into a feral snarl. "This is none of your
goddamned business, Skinner. Fuck off and leave us alone."

"I can't, son," Skinner said, with a sad shake of his head. "I can't
let you do  this."

"You can't fucking stop me," Krycek countered. "But I tell you what.
Turn around and fuck off home and I'll let you live. Don't make me
kill you, Skinner."

Skinner shook his head again, certain that if Krycek had the palm
pilot on him he would already have used it. "This isn't going to
happen, Alex. Put the shovel down. I know you're grieving, but this
isn't going to help. She's dead."

Krycek's face twisted with indecision, as though he was desperately
trying to judge what would be the worst of two evils, and when he
finally spoke his expression was oddly defeated despite the angry tone
of his voice.

"She's not fucking dead, okay?" he spat.

Skinner sighed heavily, convinced now that Lisita's death had pushed
Krycek over the edge of his already questionable sanity. "I understand
you don't want to believe it, but I visited her in the morgue, Alex.
It's senseless and it's cruel, but it's true. Your daughter's dead.
She's at peace now."

"Oh spare me the goddamned platitudes," Alex snarled. "Save your
`let's humor the lunatic' speeches for Mulder. Liss isn't dead, but
she's soon going to wish  she was if I don't get her out of this
fucking casket."

For a moment, Skinner's heart leaped in hope. Perhaps Krycek had faked
Lisita's  death. There were drugs that could. But then reality crashed
down once more. He'd seen her body himself. He'd even seen the
incision scars from her autopsy.

"Alex. Even if she'd survived the accident." he began carefully.

Krycek rolled his eyes in disgust. "Fuck it, Skinner. Do I have to
spell it out  for you? She's no more dead than I am. She's no more
dead than Mulder was. And she's no more dead than you were when they
put you in that fucking body bag in `nam."

Skinner's legs gave way, and he sank to his knees in the wet,
dirt-strewn grass. "'When you come back you open a doorway that allows
your beloved dead to  come visit with you'," he whispered.

"What?"

"Lisita said that to me. She said that's why people like `us' could
see ghosts.  I didn't understand what she was saying to me, at the
time. But she meant.she was talking about a belief in the ability to
come back from the dead, wasn't she?"

Instead of answering, Krycek raised the shovel and slammed it into the
dirt that was still covering the casket.

"STOP," Skinner demanded.

"Fuck it, Skinner. Either shoot me, or get the fuck out of my way,"
Krycek snarled.

The sound of Skinner cocking the trigger snapped almost as loud as a
gunshot between them, and Krycek flinched, his eyes widening with
surprised alarm. Skinner inched forward on his knees, his eyes never
leaving Krycek's, until the  muzzle of his weapon was barely a breath
apart from the sweat-stained t-shirt and he could see the individual
beads of sweat pearling on Krycek's forehead.

(Continued in part 7)
 
Part 7
See part 0 for story information.


"Give me the shovel," he snapped.

"Fuck you."

"Give me the goddamned shovel, Alex. The cemetery's going to open in
less than an hour. We're running out of time. I'm fresh, I'm stronger
than you, and I've got two fucking arms."

Krycek winced at the brutality of Skinner's comment, but his eyes
carefully gauged the sincerity of Skinner's expression. "You believe
me?" he asked wonderingly.

"I don't know what to believe," Skinner admitted. "But this is the
only way I'll know for sure."

Alex took a deep, shuddering breath, nodded once and then handed the
shovel over. Skinner reholstered his weapon, shrugged off his overcoat
and slipped down into the grave, pointedly not watching Krycek's far
less dignified scramble back out.

He slammed the shovel into the dirt. A deep, hollow thud assured him
there was less than a foot of earth still to be shifted, and he
settled into a steady pace. Swinging the shovel easily, dirt flying
over his shoulder with each sweep  of the blade, until the bare wood
and brass fastenings of the casket were revealed.

"How are we going to raise it?" he asked, pausing for breath, sweat
trickling down his back and adhering his shirt to his armpits.

"Just open it up," Krycek retorted, his tone confident. "Liss can
climb out by herself."

Skinner dropped to his knees and unscrewed the first bolt, his heart
thudding in his chest, his fingers awkward and nerveless. What if
Krycek was insane? What if he opened the casket and found nothing more
than Lisita's decaying corpse staring back at him? What would Krycek
do faced with that terrible reality? What would he do?

"I don't know whether." he began, only to gasp in shock as a wave of
agony ripped through his body.

He threw back his head and looked up, to see Krycek standing at the
head of the  grave with a snarl of satisfaction on his lips. "Just a
small reminder, in case  you change your mind," he smirked.

Skinner cursed himself for a fool. While he'd been digging, Krycek had
taken the opportunity to sneak back to wherever he'd parked his car
and retrieve the palm pilot.

"This isn't necessary, Alex," he gasped, as his veins bubbled like hot
lava.

"You know me, Skinner. I like to hedge my bets. Now either get Liss
the hell out of that fucking casket or join her in it."

Skinner blinked in hurt confusion. "Do you honestly still think you
need to threaten me?"

"Yes," Krycek stated, his expression cold.

"You're wrong, Alex. Lisita's my grand-daughter."

"And I'm supposed to believe you give a fuck?" Krycek laughed
bitterly. "What happened, Skinner? You finally grew a fucking
conscience or something? Give me a break."

Looking at Krycek's face, Skinner felt a jolt of pain in his heart
that was more agonizing than any assault of the nanos. Gone was
Krycek's usual taunting smirk and supercilious air of superiority. In
its place was an expression of complete and unmistakable loathing.

"You hate me," he gasped. "You really hate me, don't you?"

"I fucking despise you," Krycek snarled.

"Why do you hate me so much, Alex?"

"Jeez, Dad, I dunno. Could it be something to do with the fact that
you bought your cushy life by selling your own son?"

Krycek's words felt like a knife in his chest. Krycek's hatred of him
was so intense, so absolute, so undeniable, that his earlier
ambivalence over learning  his son's identity was crushed under the
weight of the sudden knowledge that Krycek's torture of him had never
been impersonal. Every blow of Krycek's fists  in that stairwell,
every activation of the nanos, had been aimed with the precision of
pure, unadulterated rage. Kryc..Alex. hated him. Not as an enemy,
but as a father.

Alex hated him because he was his father.

Presumably because he hadn't been his father. Because Alex had grown
up as a lonely, unloved little boy who was unable to comprehend how
his own father could have abandoned him into the brutal hands of the
Consortium.

If he was right, if Alex's hatred was in direct correlation to his
experiences as a child, then that loathing gaze spoke of a suffering
almost beyond Skinner's comprehension.

And he knew, in that moment, that he forgave Alex completely and
absolutely for  the agonies he'd suffered at his hands. Forgave him,
even, the pulsing pain that was charging through his veins as they
spoke. In that sudden, blinding revelation he accepted that this
pitifully damaged, possibly insane, indisputably dangerous man was his
son; his child, flesh of his flesh, blood of  his blood, and with that
acceptance he understood that, while he might never learn to like
Alex, he'd already lost the battle not to love him.

Even if that love tasted like bitter ashes in his mouth.

"I didn't even know I had a son," he explained sadly, apologetically,
guiltily,  trying to express, in just those few words, how much he
regretted that ignorance. "If I'd known, everything would have been
different."

"Yeah, sure, Pop," Alex sneered. "It's just co-incidence, huh? I mean,
yeah, I can see it now. A hybrid like you just happens to stumble
across a hybrid like my mother, has hot monkey sex, produces `exactly'
the genetic link the Consortium needs, and waltzes off into the sunset
none the wiser. Yeah, sure."

"Just how damned old do you think I am, boy? Forgive me for pointing
out the obvious, Alex, but I was twelve years old when I apparently
`fathered' you. The  nearest I came to your mother was a test tube. I
knew nothing about it or you, or even the consortium at the time you
were conceived."

Alex looked stunned for a moment, as though he'd never stopped to do
the math, but he quickly rallied. "Yeah?" he challenged. "So it's just
co-incidence you ended up as an AD in the FBI, in charge of Sam's
brother? I don't think so."

"I'm beginning to doubt there's any such thing as co-incidences,"
Skinner admitted, "but I didn't know you were my son. I didn't know I
had a son. How the hell could I know?" Skinner shook his head angrily,
then his eyes narrowed.  "And what the hell did you mean when you
called me a hybrid?"

Alex sneered again. "Oh, I'm supposed to believe it's a shock, huh?
How many people do you know who regularly come back from the dead? You
telling me you got blown to pieces in `nam, woke up in a body bag, and
didn't catch a clue?"

Skinner reeled with shock, as a dozen disparate pieces of the puzzle
slotted seamlessly together to form a picture he didn't want to
accept. He'd told Scully there had to be something `important' about
his DNA, something that would make his child crucial to the
consortium's breeding plans. Was it possible that peculiarity of his
genetic code had something to do with.

"Immortality," he breathed.

Alex snorted with dark humor. "That's one term for it," he snorted.
"Though it's a hell of a nice name for such a fucking curse, isn't
it?"

"A curse?"

"Struldbruggs," Alex retorted, spitting on the ground in a gesture of
disgust.

Skinner frowned in confusion. The word struck an echo in his mind, but
he couldn't pin-point why the word sounded familiar.

"And I always took you for a well-read man," Alex mocked.

With a gasp of recognition, Skinner raised his eyes to Alex's
prosthetic hand and his stomach churned. "Gulliver's Travels," he
said, his voice a pained whisper.

" `.the Question therefore was not whether a Man would choose to be
always in the Prime of Youth, attended with Prosperity and Health, but
how he would pass a perpetual Life under all the usual Disadvantages
which old Age brings along with it,'" Alex quoted, his eyes dark with
contemplation. Then he smirked at Skinner's look of sudden horror.
"You understand what I'm saying?"

Skinner nodded reluctantly, his face paling several degrees. "A
curse," he repeated quietly. "Yes. I understand."

"We scar, we suffer all mortal disease and pain. We grow old and
incontinent and senile. We even leave pieces of ourselves rotting in
overgrown Russian forests. We watch the people we love die, and then
they haunt us perpetually - as though our inability to join them locks
them into this plane of existence. And we pray, every time the
suffering is too much to bear, that this time we won't wake up again.
But we do, Skinner. We almost always do. Ask Jeffrey whether he
believes we're cursed, " Alex spat.

"Oh god," Skinner gasped, his head reeling as he fought against the
nausea Alex's words had evoked. As he understood the ultimate
pointlessness of the `immortality' Alex was describing. As he realized
that the question of how it was possible, was even less important than
the why.

Perhaps Alex saw that question in his tortured eyes and sought to
answer it, or  perhaps he spoke simply to voice his own despair in the
strangely perfect setting of the lonely, fog-bound cemetery.

"Human DNA's an endless playground of possibilities," Alex explained.
"Imagine it, Skinner. Consortium scientists isolating the genes for
longevity, the genes  that make some people less susceptible to
cancers and other diseases, and of course there were the mutated genes
for them to play with. The real fun genes. The genes that make
monsters like Leonard Betts possible. Remember him, Skinner? Do you
remember your scorn and incredulity at Mulder's insistence that 
a man could be decapitated and simply regrow himself a new head?"

Skinner's eyes flicked automatically to Alex's prosthetic arm and,
seeing the look, Alex laughed bitterly. "Unfortunately, they hadn't
isolated that genetic anomaly when they made the second gens. I missed
out on that particular fun modification."

"You're saying our `immortality' is because of manipulation of our
*human* genetic code rather than the introduction of alien DNA?"
Skinner demanded incredulously.

"It's both. Only certain human genomes react positively to the
introduction of Purity. There are different degrees of `immortality'.
So the term's deceptive anyway. We can *all* die permanently, given
sufficient injury. But some people are more `immortal' than others.
That's how Spender ended up in such a position  of power inside the
Consortium. He was naturally genetically compatible with
the alien DNA. Being a first gen, like you, he was more vulnerable to
permanent  fatality. But it still took a rocket launcher and half a
mountain falling on top of him to finally send the fucker to hell."

Skinner shook his head in sudden denial. "This is crazy. It can't be
true. The whole concept is preposterous."

"Truth is a flexible concept, Skinner. It stretches like taffy to fit
anything we want it to fit. The only unarguable truth you need to
believe is that if you  don't fucking move your ass and get Liss out
of that grave, I'll give you a first hand demonstration on just how
vulnerable a first gen is."

***

It was like waking from a deep sleep. A momentary confusion, as she
blinked her  eyes and mentally chased a dozen dream fragments that
faded so rapidly into the  distance that she immediately doubted her
brief certainty that a craved knowledge was almost at her fingertips.
A sudden pain in her chest, followed by  a wave of sensation through
her whole body like pins and needles, as though her  veins had
suddenly surged to life. A single gasping choking breath, and her
lungs abruptly remembered how to breathe. A tingling, itching feeling
along her  breast-bone, as fresh scar-tissue pulled against tender
flesh. Then she was sitting up, coughing and spluttering, her mouth
almost agonizingly dry, her nostrils filled with the damp smell of wet
dirt.She was aware of being cold, and hungry and.and.

And her father's face was looming over her, his eyes brimming with
relieved tears.

"Daddy," she sobbed, reaching her arms up towards him, scrabbling to
her knees,  then to her feet, and feeling his hands, one real, one as
strong and cold as steel, pulling her out of the darkness and into the
light, and then she was pressed against his chest, her face buried in
his neck, their hearts beating together in a wild, primitive rhythm.

"You okay, baby?" her father husked, in a rough growl that sounded
like the most wonderful music she'd ever heard.

"I'm fine," she said, laughing and crying with relief. "I'm FINE."

He squeezed her tighter, almost crushing her in his need to affirm she
was all right, and then he released her slowly and stepped back a
little so he could look down into her tear-streaked face.

"I'm fine," she repeated, and the creases at the edge of his worried
eyes relaxed a little.

"Here," he said gruffly, wrapping his jacket awkwardly around her
shoulders, then pressing something metallic into her fingers.

She looked down in confusion at the car key in her hands.

"Take my truck and go home, honey," he said, then gave her another
brief hug and a gentle push as he turned her towards a gravel path
leading, through the Cemetery, down to the exit gates.

She hesitated, gnawing her bottom lip in uncertainty. "What about you?
Aren't you coming too?"

"I'll follow you," Krycek said over her shoulder. "Just go honey,
don't turn around."

So she had to turn. Couldn't not turn. Couldn't refuse the curiosity
and the knowing that something was terribly, horribly wrong.

And that was the first moment she became aware of the man still
standing in the  grave her father had hauled her out of. The man whose
face was streaked with dirt and tears, and whose expression was a
distorted canvas of relieved disbelief and unmistakable agony. Her
attention riveted on the dark pulsing veins spider-webbing over
Skinner's flushed face.

"Don't, Daddy," she begged quietly. "Please don't hurt him. He won't
tell anyone I'm alive." She fixed her pleading eyes on Skinner's. "You
won't tell, will you?"

Skinner shook his head slowly.

"Please, Daddy?" she begged, and for a moment she was sure he wavered.
His deep, unfathomable green eyes flickered with grief and
self-loathing, and his mouth curled into a snarl that was as much pain
as it was anger.

But then the moment passed, and he was suddenly cold and unreachable.

"Get in the car and go home, Liss," he growled. "NOW!"

***

She jumped at his shout, tears sheening her eyes, her expression as
tragic, wounded, frustrated and ultimately powerless as any Skinner
had seen on Mulder's face. There was fear too in her huge, emerald
eyes, but, even through his pained haze, he was sure that her fear
wasn't for herself but for him.

Then, she stretched her right hand and swept a light, stroking caress
down her father's bare right arm.

"Please, Daddy. We can just take his car, can't we? By the time he
tries to follow us, we'll be gone and he won't know how to find us. We
can disappear. All of us. Don't do this, Daddy. Don't hurt yourself
like this. He isn't worth it."

She cast a look in Skinner's direction that was as hot and hate-filled
and full  of loathing as her father's earlier expression.

Skinner gasped with an agony that had nothing to do with the tiny,
deadly machines surging through his bloodstream but everything to do
with the knowledge that Lisita cared nothing for *his* pain after all.
She looked at him  and saw nothing but a man she believed had caused
her father immeasurable grief. She saw his death as nothing other than
another guilty burden for her father to bear. And, strangely, despite
the despair that struck him like a physical blow, that knowledge just
ratified his belief that, right or wrong, Alex truly believed he
himself was deserving of the pain he was suffering. That 
Alex truly believed his death was necessary to ensure Lisita's
safety.

So, as Alex moved the stylus upwards on the palm pilot to drive the
nanos to killing intensity, as he felt his heart swelling like an
over-inflated balloon,  as he opened his mouth in a silent scream and
collapsed lifelessly into Lisita's casket, the final words that
thundered through his brain weren't curses or pleas. The only words
that he tried to utter, as his heart exploded within his chest, were,
"I love you both".

And then, blessedly, there was nothing.

***

He kicked the basement door shut behind him with a violence that made
both Scully and Doggett jump. As he made his way to his desk,
Doggett's eyes tracked  him warily, his face carefully set in the kind
of bland mask he usually offered  gun-wielding lunatics, but Scully's
expression, while still careful, was genuinely concerned.

"What did he say?" she asked.

In response, he punched a filing cabinet hard enough to buckle its
metal front.  Then, wincing, he dropped into his chair and stared
morosely down at his swelling knuckles.

Scully's lips pursed for a moment and she exchanged a look with
Doggett before sighing softly and saying, "I'll go get us some
coffee."

Mulder snorted rudely. "Yeah, that'll help."

Scully ignored his sarcasm and slipped out of the room, returning
several minutes later with three cups. She offered one to Mulder and
waited until he took an obedient mouthful before handing one to
Doggett and perching on the edge of Mulder's desk with her own.

"This tastes like crap, Scully," Mulder pointed out. But his voice was
slightly  subdued, as though the act of sipping the bitter, lukewarm
beverage had given him a moment to control his earlier outrage. As
Scully had no doubt counted on.

Doggett wisely kept his own opinion to himself.

"So what did Kersh say?" Scully asked again, and this time, although
temper flared in Mulder's eyes, it just manifested itself in a sullen
pout rather than  physical violence.

"A pile of fucking bullshit," Mulder spat.

Scully arched an eyebrow. "What *specific* fucking bullshit?"

Doggett looked mildly shocked at her language, but Mulder's lips
twitched with reluctant appreciation.

"He said Skinner had taken indefinite compassionate leave. Kersh said
I should be prepared for the possibility he might not be coming back,"
he explained.

Scully frowned, her eyes troubled, and she nodded slowly. "It doesn't
sound right," she agreed. "Even the morning Sharon was buried, he was
back in his office by lunchtime."

"Exactly," Mulder said, his eyes burning with suspicion. "Something
must have happened to him and Kersh is covering it up."

Doggett stared at the two of them in disbelief, then threw his hands
in the air  in a gesture of exasperation. "What you sayin'? You think
he's been abducted by  aliens or somethin'? Jesus, Dana. I can't
believe you're buyin' this BS. I talked with the man and I'm tellin'
you, he was *gutted* by the girl's death. Why the hell do you think he
stayed in Kansas after the funeral? He was grievin'. Really
grievin'."

"He checked out of his hotel two days ago," Mulder countered. "He
booked a flight to return to DC. He checked in his rental car at the
airport. But he never checked in at the flight desk. He just
disappeared."

"Maybe he just changed his mind," Doggett drawled. "He could have just
thought `what the hell' and caught a flight anywhere."

"Or maybe Krycek was waiting for him at the Airport," Mulder muttered
darkly.

"Krycek?" Scully repeated, her eyes widening in alarm. "You've got
some evidence to suggest he."

Mulder slapped his desk angrily, his face contorting with frustration.
"NO," he  snapped. "I don't have any goddamned `evidence', Scully. I
don't have any nice convenient CCTV footage of Krycek kidnapping
Skinner at gunpoint. I don't even,  as Kersh so helpfully pointed out,
have anything other than Skinner's word that  Krycek is still alive.
But I know he's behind Skinner's disappearance somehow.
I just KNOW."

"Like you 'know' he killed your father?" Scully said, with a
despairing shake of her head.

Mulder glared at her defiantly. "Yeah," he agreed. "Like I know he
killed my father. I know you don't understand it, Scully, but there's
a. a connection between us. I can't explain it, but it's there."

"Yeah?" Doggett drawled, his mouth curling with distaste. "Well we
already know  about the `connection' between the two of ya. Spare us
the sordid details."

Scully blushed and shot Doggett a death-glare until he shrugged and
looked slightly ashamed of himself. Mulder barely even noticed. He
didn't give a shit what Doggett thought about him, or Krycek, or him
and Krycek. His gut was telling him Skinner was in serious trouble,
and that time was running out.

"I'm going to Forbes Field," he announced. "It's the last place anyone
saw Skinner."

Scully shook her head. "You can't, Mulder. Kersh will never approve
it."

"So? What makes you think I'm planning on telling him? I'm feeling the
need for  a little indefinite compassionate leave of my own."

After a moment's indecision, Scully quietly announced, "I'm coming
with you."

***

"Tell me what really happened," he insisted firmly.

For a moment he looked almost frighteningly like their father and she
felt herself responding automatically to the demand of his intense,
teal-green gaze.  Then his overlong hair flopped down over his
forehead, breaking the illusion, and, as he swiped his hand irritably
through his unruly bangs, she reminded herself he was only eleven
years old.

"You need a hair-cut," she laughed.

He shrugged and sneered with disgust. "You sound like Nan."

"Oh," she said, not liking that comparison. Their grandmother wasn't
the most.well, likeable.person. Or maybe, to be fair, she was old
enough now to understand her perception of the old woman was
unfavorably colored by her father's behavior. He never even pretended
to like Nan, so it was hard for her to be objective.

"Dad had his hair long like that once," she said.

"He did?" Nicki asked, his face glowing with sudden happiness.

"Yeah. You were just a baby at the time, but I remember. You look just
like he did."

"Cool," he said, grinning with satisfaction.

And though some part of her was amused by his obvious hero-worship of
their father, she knew, far more than Nicki ever would, that their
father had more than earned that respect. At least she prayed he
didn't know. That he'd been too young to remember. Just as she herself
denied the memories whenever her mother cautiously brought up the
subject of her early childhood.

"What happened, Liss? Why's he so.so." his voice trailed off, his
eyes glistening suspiciously, his lower lip beginning to tremble.

"Daddy. Daddy had to. to kill a bad man," she explained carefully.

Nicki shrugged his confusion. "So?"

She closed her eyes in pain, acknowledging for perhaps the first time,
the terrible cost they had all paid for their survival. //He's just a
little boy, really // she reminded herself. // It's not his fault he
doesn't understand. Death isn't real to him yet //

"Don't ever say that," she said firmly. "And never say that in front
of Mom and  Dad. Just because, sometimes, Dad has to kill people,
doesn't mean he believes killing people is right."

Nicki rolled his eyes. "I know that, Liss," he exclaimed. "Dad says
life's sacred and killing is wrong, but that it's a man's duty to
protect his family."

"That's right," she agreed.

"So, when *Dad* kills someone, it isn't wrong," he said loyally.

"But it still hurts him," she explained softly. "Especially if the bad
person he killed is someone he cared about."

"How could he care about a bad person?" Nicki demanded, with an
incredulous laugh.

Lisita shook her head in frustration, rubbing her forehead fretfully
as she tried to find a way to explain the inexplicable to a boy who
was still young enough to worship their father as some kind of living,
infallible Rambo.

"Imagine *I* did something awful. Imagine I decided I was tired of
running and hiding and I decided to make a deal with *them*," she
started.

"You wouldn't," he said staunchly, his face paling at even the
suggestion.

"Of course I wouldn't," she said. "But imagine I did. Can you do
that?"

"Uh huh," he agreed doubtfully.

"And in that imaginary scenario, I'm going to let them take you and
William."

Nicki gulped, but nodded.

"So, what do you think Daddy would do?" she asked.

His eyes widened with horror. "He'd.he'd have to.he'd." and he burst
into tears.

She threw her arms around him, pulling him to her chest, rocking him
gently as he cried out his miserable understanding.

"He'd have to make a choice. A terrible choice," she said softly. "But
he'd make it, because that's the kind of man Daddy is. That's why
we're all alive, Nicki. Because Daddy makes the kind of choices that
no-one else could live with."

Nicki sniffed and nodded. "So.so that's why he's sad? Because he had
to make a choice like that when he killed the bad man?"

"Yes," she agreed. "That's why he's so sad."

***

"The keys were just posted through the door of the rental office,"
Mulder announced, with a satisfied grin, as he rejoined Scully in the
main terminal.

"Perhaps he was in a hurry," she pointed out.

"So much of a hurry that he didn't collect his deposit?" he demanded.

"Perhaps he forgot," she suggested hesitantly.

"Mr. Anal?" Mulder scoffed.

Her eyes creased with worry. It was becoming increasingly impossible
for her to  remain objective. While she was determined to remain the
voice of reason in the  absence of anything except circumstantial
evidence, she was beginning to believe Mulder's theory was the most
likely explanation for Skinner's disappearance.

"I've shown his photo at every check-in desk," she admitted. "No-one
remembers seeing him."

"Perhaps because he was never here," he suggested. "Krycek got to him
after he left his hotel, then dropped his car off here to make it look
like he'd arrived  at the airport okay."

"We still don't know Krycek had anything to do with it," she reminded
him, but she didn't argue with his assessment that Skinner had been
abducted en route to  the airport.

"Let's go to the hotel. If Skinner didn't leave there directly for the
airport,  there might be a clue there as to where he went."

"Okay," she agreed.

***

She stared morosely into the empty paddock and sighed. While she
fully understood her father's insistence they used a circuitous route
to bring Storm Dancer home, she couldn't help feeling miserable about
his absence. According to the itinerary she'd read, the horse was
currently somewhere in Saudi Arabia,  having the tattoo inside his
mouth altered to match his new equine passport. He'd then be `sold' to
England before having his identity changed once more, and it would be
at least a further three months before he finally arrived in
Arizona. It was costing her father a small fortune, so she felt guilty
about even feeling resentful about the necessity for such detailed
subterfuge.

But she missed him. Missed him so much she'd been quite unforgivably
rude when her grandmother had said she didn't know what all the fuss
was about and couldn't Alex simply buy her another horse. And it was a
measure of how strained and strange things were in the house at the
moment, that her father had told her to apologize to Teena. Usually he
just smirked under his breath whenever she or Nicki back-talked their
grandmother and he left their mother to  smooth any ruffled-feathers
over.

She didn't understand why her father would suddenly start caring about
Teena's feelings.

`Oh, I think you do.'

The unexpected voice made her swing around in shock and her eyes
widened with frightened disbelief.

"Why are you here? What do you want?" she asked shakily.

The deep wrinkles of the old woman's face folded into a gently
admonishing smile.

`You know why I'm here.'

Lisita shook her head angrily. "This isn't happening. You're his
ghost."

The apparition smiled gently, her expression soft and full of loving
understanding. `He's your grandfather, Lisita, and I'm his
grandmother. That makes us family. That makes me your ghost too.'

"He's dead."

`Yes,' the ghost agreed. `But it's not too late yet, Lisita. He hasn't
crossed over. There's still time to bring him back.'

"No," Lisita spat, her eyes panicked. "I can't do it. Daddy would
never forgive  me if I betrayed the family."

`If Walter dies, will your father ever forgive himself?'

"Mr Skinner's one of THEM," Lisita cried, her face crumpling into
tears. "He'll  find us and tell them where we are. It's not just me
Daddy's trying to protect.  It's Nicki and William too. Don't you
understand?"

`If he really was one of *them*, do you think your father would be
grieving for  him?'

"Yes. Because he isn't grieving for him. He's grieving for what his
father *should* have been."

`What he wanted to be, if only Alex had given him the chance,' the old
woman said, with a sad shake of her head.

Lisita's face twisted with confusion. "Daddy would never have killed
him if he hadn't been sure it was necessary."

`Of course he wouldn't,' the ghost agreed. `Alex believes a man who
would sell his child to the Consortium wouldn't hesitate to sell his
grandchildren too. But what if your father's wrong? What if all that
pain he feels over his abandonment is just a terrible misunderstanding
? What if Walter loves him? What  if all Walter really wants is to
protect your father, just the way your father wants to protect you?'

"No," Lisita said, shaking her head in denial. "Even if you're right,
it's still too late. Daddy killed him. And I helped Daddy bury him.
Even if we brought him back, he'd hate both of us now."

The ghost smiled gently. `Oh no, Lisita. He could never hate either of
you.'

"Even if you're right, there's nothing I can do about it," Lisita
sobbed. "Daddy won't take the chance. He'd rather live with being
wrong, than take the chance of Mr. Skinner betraying us."

'So help Walter yourself,' the old woman suggested.

"Me? You think Daddy's going to let me jump on a plane and fly back to
Kansas?"

The ghost laughed gently. 'I'm not suggesting you go to the cemetery,
Lisita. Just send a message to Fox.'

"What?"

`Tell your Uncle Fox. He can help.'

"Then tell him yourself instead of asking me to betray my father,"
Lisita demanded. "Mr. Skinner said Fox can see ghosts too. Go talk to
him yourself, and leave me out of it."

`I can't. This is something you have to do, Lisita. It has to be
you.'

"He wouldn't believe me anyway. What the hell am I supposed to say?
`Hi, Uncle Fox. My granddad is buried alive in my grave? Oh and, by
the way, I'm fine'?"

Instead of taking offense, the old woman simply chuckled at her
sarcasm.

`Just send him this message; `Sometimes we bury our dead alive'.'

"Just that?" Lisita asked doubtfully.

`Trust me. It will be enough.'

***

Mulder switched off his cell phone, and gave Scully a triumphant
smile. "He went to the cemetery."

"How do you know?"

"That last number he called from his room was an all-night florists.
He ordered  a posy of white roses and paid for it in cash. That's why
we didn't find a record of it on his credit card bill."

"You think Krycek was waiting there for him?"

"Maybe. Or maybe he was just there to see Lisita's grave, and Skinner
simply arrived at the wrong moment."

Scully nodded. That made a horrible kind of sense. Skinner arriving at
the Cemetery, stumbling across a grief-stricken Krycek. Then the color
drained out of her face. "You think Krycek killed him there, don't
you?"

Mulder swallowed heavily. "I don't want to believe it. but it's
looking like the most likely scenario. But I don't think.I don't think
Krycek meant to do it."

"You don't want to believe it," she retorted angrily, furious that
despite everything Krycek had done and his passionate avowals of
hatred for the man, Mulder still didn't want to accept Krycek was
capable of cold-heartedly planning Skinner's murder. And a spiteful
voice inside her head snickered that Alex Krycek must have been one
hell of a good lay.

"For god's sake, Scully, I'm not trying to defend him," Mulder spat.
"I'm saying that Krycek would have planned it better than just sitting
in a cemetery  in the hope that Skinner might turn up. If he killed
him there, it was more likely to have been a sudden impulse. And that
means he probably made a mistake."

Scully's brow smoothed and she offered him an apologetic smile.
"You're saying we might find forensic evidence at the cemetery."

"That's what I'm saying," he agreed, his expression so cold she knew
he hadn't forgiven her yet.

"Let's go," she suggested, hoping the drive would be long enough for
his mood to lighten again.

***

"So you didn't find anythin'?"

"Just another dead end," she agreed tiredly. "We think he did go
there. There was a posy on Lisita's grave that matched the description
of the one Skinner ordered. But there were no signs of a struggle or
anything to suggest Krycek had ever been there."

"So you comin' home tomorrow?"

"Yes. There's nothing else we can do here. Mulder just wants to speak
to. no, never mind."

"Moldhar wants to what?" he demanded.

"If I tell you, I don't want any sarcastic comments, all right?"

He laughed softly. "I promise to behave myself, ma'am."

"He wants to talk to the cemetery groundsmen. He says all the wreaths
on Lisita's grave are out of place."

"He what?"

"He.well, he thinks the grave might have been disturbed," she
admitted reluctantly.

"Someone moved the goddamned flowers around and now he thinks Lisita's
a vampire or somethin'?"

"John, you promised."

He sighed. "Did it occur to him that Skinner might have simply moved
`em around  to make room for his own flowers?"

"Of course it did. I'm not saying he's gone off the deep end or
anything. He's just `bothered' about it."

"One of his famous hunches?" he scoffed. Then, when her only answer
was a stony  silence, he quickly changed the subject. "I got an
interestin' email today."

"Oh?" she asked, her voice still chilly.

"Yeah. The litter was born last night. There's three boys and four
girls. They're askin' whether we still want one."

She gave a small squeal of excitement. "Of course we want one, John
Jay Doggett. Email them right back."

"Yes, ma'am," he chuckled.

"Speaking of email, my laptop's playing up. Can you check my account
for me? It's set up on Mulder's PC."

"I can't believe you let the bastard steal the only desk again,"
Doggett grumbled, but walked over to the PC and logged into the email.
"There's a couple from your mom."

"Don't read *those*."

"And one from Johannsen. He says he's got a couple of problems with
some test results. Load of scientific mumbo-jumbo. Want me to print it
out and fax it to you?"

"That'd be great."

"Okay. I'll just check whether Spooky's got anythin' interestin'."

"Don't open anything from a mailing-list," she warned quickly.

"I won't," he agreed with feeling. "I've just ate my dinner."

(Continued in part 8)

Part 8
See part 0 for story information.


She rolled her eyes and smothered a smirk.

"Oh.this one's weird. No subject. No return address. How the hell did
someone manage to spam an FBI computer?"

"What does it say?"

"Nothin' that makes sense. Just says 'Sometimes we bury our dead
alive'."

***

Alex slammed his whiskey glass down in fury. "What the fuck do you
want now?"

Teena jumped in her seat, her eyes widening with alarm. Samantha took
a careful  look at her husband and rose off the sofa. "Let's start
dinner, mom," she said quietly.

"Who's he talking to?" Teena demanded. "Is it your father?"

Samantha flinched and her eyes narrowed with barely contained fury.
"Don't you ever mention that man in this house," she spat. She grabbed
her mother by the arm and propelled her, less than gently, out of the
living room.

Mannerly wandered over to the half-empty bottle on the mantelpiece and
tutted sadly. `Glenfiddich, Alex? Feeling somewhat maudlin, are we?'

"Get the hell out of my house," Alex snarled.

`I never took you for a drinker, Alex. Your vices always used to be
more. shall  we say... interesting.'

Alex opened his mouth  to retort,  but immediately changed his mind
and just sighed wearily instead. "Leave me alone."

`But I have such interesting news for you,' Mannerly chuckled."I don't
care what you've got to say. I really don't care."

Mannerly did a slight double-take, assessing Alex's unshaven cheeks,
dark-rimmed eyes and air of complete dejection. 'I actually think you
mean that, dear boy. What on earth has happened to you? Where's your
spark? Where's your `fuck-the-world' attitude? Do I suspect this has
something to do with the recent demise of a certain Walter Skinner?'

"Fuck you," Alex replied, with another tired sigh.

Mannerly shook his head sadly and tutted again. `Take it from me,
Alexander. Self-pity is a highly unattractive look for you.
Vulnerability is only sexy if it has an edge of bite.'

"Yeah?" Alex snarled. "Then why don't you piss off and find sexy piece
of ass to haunt."

`That's more like it,' Mannerly smirked. 'That little feral snap to
your voice.  Quite unique.'

Alex rubbed his eyes and groaned. "Just fucking say whatever the fuck
you've come here to say and fuck off back where you fucking came
from."

Mannerly rolled his eyes. `Whereas that kind of pointless,
unemotional profanity is just pathetic.'

"Whatever."

`But I'm sure I can inspire you to some genuinely emotional cursing,
Alexander.'

"Oh?" Alex asked disinterestedly.

`Been keeping track of your lover-boy recently? No. I didn't think so.
Would it  surprise you to learn he's at Blakemore?'

Alex straightened abruptly in his seat, his slight alcoholic haze
extinguished instantly by Mannerly's sobering words. "What the hell's
he doing at Blakemore?  Fuck, I knew it was a mistake to move the
horse so soon."

`Oh, not the school,' Mannerly chuckled. `The cemetery. Seems he's
managed to bully a local judge into giving him an exhumation order for
Lisita's body. As we speak, he's arranging a JCB for tomorrow
morning.'

"Shit," Alex breathed. "Fox Mulder's like the fucking walking curse of
my life."

Mannerly looked highly disappointed. `That's all you've got to say?'

Alex shrugged. "It is what it is."

`You've still got time to stop him,' Mannerly pointed out urgently.
`You could still catch a flight. Kill Mulder, then open the grave
yourself and finish Skinner off properly.'

"Yeah," Alex agreed, making no move to rise out of his seat.

`Don't you understand? Skinner hasn't crossed over yet. If Mulder
exhumes him tomorrow, he's going to revive.'

"Yeah," Alex agreed.

`He not only knows about you and Lisita, he's going to be living proof
to Mulder that the project worked. Unlike Mulder's resuscitation,
there won't be any alien viruses to conveniently explain Skinner's
ability to rise from the dead.'

"I know."

`So what are you going to do about it?' Mannerly demanded.

Alex's face screwed up in intense thought.

`Well?' Mannerly prompted.

Alex's face cleared and he nodded decisively. "I know what I'm going
to do," he  said.

`What?' Mannerly asked eagerly.

Alex's mouth widened into a feral smirk. "I'm gonna pour myself
another drink."

***

"What the hell's taking so long?" Mulder demanded, pacing up and down
the corridor, his eyes glaring furiously at the closed doors to the
morgue. "Can't you go in there and hurry them up or something?"

Scully rolled her eyes. "The exhumation order was quite specific," she
reminded  him. "The judge only agreed to the original coroner being
present for the opening of the casket. I'm sure he'll tell us, soon
enough, if there's anything  that warrants an FBI investigation into
Lisita's death."

Mulder scowled furiously but nodded his reluctant acceptance. Since
he'd only managed to get the judge's signature by spinning a wild tale
that Lisita might have been murdered after all, there was no point in
him chaffing at the legal restrictions that were consequently being
imposed.

"These things always take time," she pointed out.

"How much time does it take to notice there's more than one body in a
casket?" he retorted mulishly.

"If you're right," she reminded him.

"Where the hell else could he have hidden Skinner's body? He killed
him in a Cemetery and buried him in Lisita's grave. It's the only
thing that makes sense."

"I just can't see him throwing Skinner on top of his daughter's body,"
Scully replied, her expression troubled. "It seems too." She fished
desperately for the right word. ".distasteful."

Mulder gave a reluctant chuff of agreement. It did sound pretty
damned `distasteful' but he still couldn't imagine a practical killer
like Krycek losing too much sleep over the idea.What he didn't want to
admit, what he hadn't even dreamed of saying to her yet, was that he
suspected Skinner hadn't even been dead when Krycek buried him.
Considering Skinner's physical strength,  he'd have to have been
pretty badly injured for Krycek to overpower him enough, 
but, between the email he'd received and his own understanding of
Krycek's warped need for revenge, he fully expected the coroner to
discover the corpse of a man who had suffocated to death while
attempting to claw his way out of the casket.

And since just the thought of it made him feel sick to his stomach, he
wasn't going to share his suspicions with Scully until the evidence
proved him right.

His ghoulish musings were disturbed by a commotion at the far end of
the corridor. He had a quick flash of uniforms and running feet, then
the morgue doors swung open behind him and he turned so see the
white-faced coroner quickly beckoning, "In here! He's in here!"

"What's going on?" Scully gasped, as the paramedics ran past them.

"He's alive!" Mulder yelled, grabbing her by her arm and racing into
the morgue  after them. "He's still fucking alive, Scully."

"Impossible," she stated firmly, trying to plant her feet and stop
Mulder's headlong rush.

But as his strength and momentum carried both of them through the
swinging doors, she realized the idea of Skinner being alive wasn't
impossible, after all.

Because he was.

***

There was a reason intimidation was called an art rather than a
science, Mulder  decided. Because by the rules of Scullyish sense and
reason, no man could retain enough dignity to be intimidating  while
he was sitting in a hospital bed in a paper gown with an oxygen tube
up his nose.

Obviously, no one had ever explained that fact of life to AD Walter
Skinner.

Not even the fact he was so hoarse his voice was little more than a
whisper, aided constantly by rapid sips of water, deflected from his
air of dignified self-control. Old stoneface was alive and well.

And except for being pissed as hell at the hospital's insistence on
keeping him  overnight for observation, seemed none the worse for
having been buried alive for three days.

Which was an X-file in itself.

"And you're sure you don't remember being in the casket?" he demanded
suspiciously. It was all very well for Scully to say Skinner was
simply dehydrated, but Mulder would have sworn the ragged rasp to
Skinner's voice was the after-effect of several days of screaming for
help.

Skinner shook his head and took another sip of water before replying.
"No. I didn't become aware of anything until I woke up in the morgue,"
he said firmly.

Mulder frowned with confusion.

"That correlates with what the coroner said," Scully pointed out. "He
said he thought Walter was dead when they removed him from the casket.
It wasn't until several minutes later that he suddenly took a breath
and sat up."

"A breath," Mulder repeated thoughtfully. "Maybe that's it. Maybe as
long as you were buried, without any air, you would have remained
dead."

"He wasn't dead," Scully snapped. "He was in some kind of coma."

"Like the coma *I* was in for three months?" he mocked.

"Exactly," she said, and glared at him as though defying him to
produce evidence that would prove otherwise.

"Then explain Lisita," Skinner interrupted quietly. "You going to
stand there and say she was just in a coma too?"

Scully's brow furrowed in thought. "Are you absolutely certain you
weren't hallucinating?"

Skinner grunted with disgust. Mulder stared at her in disbelief for a
moment and then, surprisingly, burst out laughing.

"What's so funny?" Scully demanded.

"Is this the new scientific method, Scully? When faced with
unpalatable truths,  clutch desperately at any straw you can find?"

"Excuse me if I think a hallucination is far more believable than a
tale of genetically enhanced immortals," she sniffed.

"Struldbruggs," Skinner corrected.

Mulder smiled with appreciation. "Never would have taken Krycek for a
reader," he admitted, "but it's a damned good analogy."

"What is a damned Struldbrugg, anyway?" Scully demanded.

"You never read `Gulliver's Travels'? Shame on you, you illiterate
woman," Mulder laughed.

"I've seen the film," she countered defensively, and this time Skinner
laughed too.

"We're not talking about the sweet Disney tale of Lilliputians,"
Mulder explained finally, when her annoyed look threatened to become
lethal. He really  wasn't in the mood for her to shoot him again. "In
the original book, Gulliver visited a lot of different islands and
encountered a multitude of strange people including a race that had a
small proportion of immortals, the Struldbruggs."

Skinner took over the tale. "At first Gulliver assumed he'd found
something extraordinary, something to be envied. The idea of being
able to live forever sounded like any man's dream come true. But the
truth turned out to be a nightmare." He coughed suddenly, reaching for
his water and waving at Mulder to  continue.

"The Struldbruggs aged like normal people. They suffered the same
diseases and frailties. And when they reached the age of eighty, they
were disenfranchised. Their marriages to mortals were dissolved. Their
rights as citizens were revoked. And from then on they just continued
getting older and frailer, as their minds and bodies failed, but they
still were unable to die."

"And that's what Krycek claims to be?" she demanded.

"What Krycek claims he and Walter and I all are," Mulder corrected.
"Not literally, of course. He's suggesting that the Consortium
scientists somehow pinpointed the genome for longevity and then used
Purity to turn that natural ability to survive into something very
unnatural.  The good news is we can somehow recover from 'fatal'
injuries. The bad news seems to be that we only recover to a limited 
extent."

"The question is how limited," Skinner mused thoughtfully. "We must
have the ability to regenerate damage to our internal organs,
otherwise I wouldn't have recovered either time Alex killed me with
the nanos, but we clearly don't have the ability to regenerate
external injuries."

"As Krycek said, we scar," Mulder agreed. "And, let's face it,  he
obviously can't re-grow his arm. Just like you couldn't re-grow your
gonocytes."

Skinner winced. "Next time I send you on a team-building seminar, make
sure you  attend the lectures on tact," he growled.

"Never has been one of my best qualities," Mulder admitted, with an
apologetic shrug.

"Alex said the Consortium scientists did isolate the genomes for
regeneration. He implied he was simply born too early to receive that
particular genetic modification," Skinner continued.

Mulder absorbed his words and nodded decisively. "So the later
generations like  Lisita, and maybe William, are new and improved
designs, based on an original template of basic 'immortality'. I
wonder how much of that improved design was based on the work of
Doctor Joseph Ridley. "

He saw a momentary spark of recognition in Scully's eyes, as though,
just for a  moment, she was accepting the connection and making the
mental leap with him. But then her face shuttered back into an
expression of denial.

"Think about it, Scully. It makes sense. What's the common denominator
between Spender, Jeffrey, me, Krycek and Walter? Every single one of
us has died, at least once, and then somehow come back to life. What
more evidence do you need?"

Scully was still standing there, gaping like a beached fish, when
Walter interrupted again.

"Alex called Spender and I `First Gens', and said that made us more
vulnerable than he is. He refers to himself as a `Second Gen'. I
assume that makes Lisita a `Third Gen', which presumably means she's
even more of a `Struldbrugg' than he is. Perhaps she has the ability
to regenerate external injuries."Mulder shook his head. "I think she's
too old. Even if the consortium eventually got their hands on Ridley's
files, they couldn't have done so until well after she was born. But
it's possible William has those modifications."

"I'm not listening to this," Scully said. "William is a perfectly
normal child."

Mulder rolled his eyes impatiently, but didn't pursue the subject.
Instead, he quickly returned the conversation to the relatively
neutral ground of Lisita.

"Lisita definitely has some extra modifications," Mulder agreed.
"Think about the reason I went looking for her in the first place.
Lisita apparently has psychokinetic abilities.  We have to assume all
the Third Gen children are more  than just the sum of their original
genes. The question is whether they're the culmination of the breeding
experiments or just another step on the way of producing the perfect
supersoldier. How many generations do you think are necessary to
produce a perfect template?"

"Given the proposed invasion date, it can't be more than four,"
Skinner replied  thoughtfully. "There won't be time for a fifth
generation."

"Of course! That's why Lisita is so important," Mulder said, with a
triumphant grin. "And maybe that's why William wasn't.  Maybe it had
nothing to do with him being 'normal', Scully. Maybe the reason the
replicants left him alone was simply the fact he's a boy.  If a fourth
generation is necessary, the most important third generation child is
obviously going to be a girl. Lisita is the  potential mother of the
savior of the human race. That's why Alex will do anything to prevent
the aliens learning of her existence. He knows how vital
she is to the resistance.""Birds and bees," Skinner grunted.

"What?"

"It takes two to make a baby, Mulder. A boy and a girl."

Mulder frowned in thought for a moment, then his face cleared and he
gave a satisfied nod. "We know there's at least two male third gens,
Gibson and William. But how many girls are there?  When you play with
genetics, you open up a whole can of worms. What if the traits the
consortium were breeding for were gender-specific? What if, by the
third generation, all the successful progeny were boys except for
Lisita?  Maybe she's the only girl."

"It's a big 'maybe'," Skinner pointed out.

"So call it one of my hunches," Mulder said, with a confident,
self-satisfied grin.

Scully smiled strangely.

"What?" Mulder demanded.

"Assuming all of this isn't just science fiction; even if you're right
about Lisita being the only girl, and I'm not necessarily saying you
are, I think you're still way off base over Alex's motivations," she
said, with a sad shake of her head. "And, I suspect, that's exactly
why he thinks you're so dangerous to him, Mulder."

"I don't understand."

"I'm not sure you ever will," she said reluctantly. "I don't think
it's only the aliens he's hiding her from. He's hiding Lisita from the
resistance too. It's the only thing that makes sense. Alex is trying
to prevent the 4th generation from being created at all."

"That's crazy," Mulder snarled. "If Lisita's the key, why the hell
would Alex hide her from the Resistance? Forget any damned vaccines;
he already has the ultimate solution to stopping the invasion in his
hands, Scully.""He doesn't have an 'ultimate solution'," Skinner
barked. "He has a daughter!" "Who has been genetically engineered to
produce the ultimate solution," Mulder countered  doggedly.

"I don't think he cares," Skinner said, his expression sad but
strangely understanding. "That's the difference between him and the
Consortium. He doesn't accept that any price is worth the sacrifice of
one of his children."

"But.but we're talking about a chance to save the whole goddamned
planet," Mulder argued.

"It's funny," Skinner mused. "But I never saw it before."

"Saw what?"

"Any possible similarity between yourself and your father."

Mulder blanched and staggered, his eyes widening with horror. "How
fucking dare  you say that to me?" he howled. "I'm nothing like him."

"I hope not," Skinner agreed. "For the sake of Alex's children, I
sincerely hope not."

***"

Everybody at school's got one," Nicki announced.

"I think I'll go check on the dessert," Samantha said, scraping her
chair back and rising to her feet.

"Coward," Alex snorted. "Go on, run out on me. See if I care."

She grinned wickedly, gathered all the dinner plates except William's,
and quickly exited the room.

"I finished too," William announced.

"You haven't eaten your vegetables," Teena pointed out sternly.

William pouted at the mountainous pile of peas, carrots and corn
still remaining on his plate.

With one eye on Alex to make sure he wasn't listening, Teena quietly
but firmly  said, "Good boys eat their dinner, and only good boys get
dessert."

William's face screwed up with misery, his lower lip began to wobble
and she quickly amended the threat to, "You've got to at least eat a
little bit of everything, okay?" before his tears alerted her
son-in-law to her ultimatum.

"Okay, Nana," William agreed miserably.

Nicki, meanwhile, was pursuing his argument with typical stubbornness.
"I said everyone at school's got one."

"So?" Alex asked, his face expressionless.

Nicki deliberately pouted his lower lip into the trembling expression
that usually made his father's eyes soften. "So I don't wanna be
different. You're the one who always says I've gotta blend in," he
added, with a sly grin.

Alex chuffed softly. "Blend in, huh? So, if everyone at school jumped
off a cliff, would you follow them just to `blend in'?"

"That's stupid," Nicki grumbled. "It's not the same thing."

"It would certainly cost me less," Alex agreed.

Nicki narrowed his eyes and stared at his father suspiciously. Sure
enough, he saw a tiny twitch of humor jerk the corner of Alex's mouth.
"It's not that much," he wheedled. "And it's so cool."

"How cool?" Alex demanded. "As cool as taking the garbage out every
night? As cool as doing your homework without your mother having to
confiscate your TV remote? As cool as being grown up enough to let
William."

"Okay, okay, I get the point," Nicki interrupted quickly. "I promise.
Please, Dad. I'll do my chores and my homework and I'll. damn, I'll
even let William have my old PlayStation."

William gave a whoop of excitement and kicked his legs against his
chair. "Wanna go play now!" he announced.

"Finish your dinner first," Teena said.

"Don't wanna," he muttered defiantly. He looked hopefully in his
father's direction, hoping he'd intercede. "Don't like veggies," he
said plaintively.

Alex frowned at William's plate, shrugged and said, "If you eat your
peas, you can leave the rest."

With a smugly triumphant grin at his Nana, William began quickly
shoveling peas  into his mouth.

Alex grinned at Nicki. "See how happy you've made him? And I was only
going to suggest you let him use it occasionally."

Nicki's face fell.

"But since you've just been so generous," Alex continued. "I guess you
can have  this." He reached under the table and produced a black box.

Nicki's eyes lit up. "You really bought me an iPod?"

Alex nodded, his eyes twinkling.

Nicki reached out eagerly for the box, only to suddenly pause as he
realized that since his father had already bought him the gift, he'd
given away his PlayStation for nothing. "I've been had," he grumbled.

Alex winked at him. "Count it a lesson learned. If you approach a game
assuming  the other guy has a better hand, you're always going to
lose."

Nicki pushed his hair back out of his eyes and smirked at his father.
"Really? I thought the lesson of the day was if the `other guy' is
you, just cut my losses and fold."

"Well, that too," Alex laughed.

Nicki surged to his feet.

"Ask before you leave the table," Teena snapped.

Nicki sighed and rolled his eyes. "Please, can I leave the table?"

"Do your homework before you start." Teena began.

"Yeah, yeah," Nicki agreed, with another dramatic roll of his eyes.

Alex hid a smirk. "I can still take it back," he warned half-heartedly
.

"Yeah," Nicki agreed, then offered his father a cheeky full-wattage
grin. "But you won't."

Alex just shook his head in mock despair as Nicki grabbed the iPod and
raced quickly from the room.

"You spoil him," Teena said, her mouth pursed with disapproval. "You
spoil all of them."

"Wha's spoil?" William piped up.

"SAMANTHA?" Alex called.

She poked her head through the dining room door. "Yes?"

"Would you kindly tell your mother that how we raise our kids is none
of her GODDAMNED business?"

"Daddy cussed!" William announced, with a wide grin.

Samantha shook her head tiredly. "I swear, it's like having five
kids," she groaned. "Would you help me fetch the dessert, Liss?"

"Sure, Mom," Lisita agreed and rose to her feet.

"Good boy," Teena said, as William shoveled the last pea into his
mouth.

"Good boys get dessert," William grinned proudly.

Alex's face darkened dangerously. "Who told him that?" he demanded,
eyeing Teena suspiciously.

William frowned suddenly, his little face folding into misery. "So
Lissy can't have no dessert."

Lisita paled suddenly, her fingers whitening on her chair back as she
clutched it for balance.

"Why do you say that?" Samantha asked carefully.

"Cos Lissy did a Bad Thing," William said, his lower lip quivering.

"Really?" Alex asked coolly, his attention focused purely on Lisita's
face. "What did you do, honey?"

Tears welled up in Lisita's eyes. William was too young to know what
he was saying. He could only have `sensed' her guilt, not understood
the reason for it. But she could no more bring herself to lie to her
father than grow wings and fly.

"It was me," she said simply.

Alex just nodded, his face an expressionless mask. Then he turned to
William. "Why don't you go ask Nicki for your PlayStation?"

The little boy smiled eagerly, his dessert forgotten.

"And tomorrow, we'll have a conversation about listening to other
people's thoughts."

William's face collapsed into a comically guilty pout. "Oops," he
mumbled, and bolted quickly from the room.

Alex turned his attention back to Lisita and glowered at her silently
until she  burst into tears.

"What did you do, Liss?" Samantha said, looking worriedly between her
tearful daughter and her dangerously quiet husband.

"I.I sent Uncle Fox an email about Mr. Skinner," Lisita said, starting
to cry in earnest.

"Why?" Samantha demanded.

"B.be.because.because she said he loved Daddy," Lisita sobbed.

"Who did?" Teena snapped.

"The ghost. Mr. Skinner's ghost. I mean his grandmother's ghost."

"She said Uncle Fox loves your Dad?" Samantha asked carefully,
wincing sympathetically at the brief flash of pain that flickered in
her husband's eyes.

"No," Lisita said, shaking her head. "She said Mr. Skinner loved Daddy
and that.that Daddy wouldn't forgive himself if he let his father
die..Please, Daddy. I just.just couldn't bear to see you so sad." She
reached a hand out towards him beseechingly, but he didn't even seem
to see it.

"I can't believe you'd do something so stupid," Teena said. "Do you
have any."

"Which computer did you use?" Alex interrupted suddenly, his voice
ice-cold.

Lisita gulped guiltily. "Yours," she whispered.

"Mine," Alex said thoughtfully.

"Yes."

"My `pass-worded' computer, in my locked office?"

Lisita gulped again, her eyes wide with dread as she nodded her head.

"What does it matter what computer she used?" Teena asked, her voice
strident with panic.

"Because, you stupid cow, if she used my computer, the email will be
virtually untraceable," Alex snarled. He turned his attention to
Lisita again. "I'm assuming you did have the sense to send it
anonymously, via the satellite relays?"

"Yes, Daddy," she agreed eagerly.

He sighed with audible relief and looked at Samantha. "What do you
think, Sam?"

She shook her head fretfully. "I don't know," she admitted. "I don't
want to run again if we don't have to. Like you said, it's virtually
untraceable. He might not find us."

"He's like a fucking human bloodhound," Alex spat. "And now Skinner's
going to be looking for us too. Neither of them are going to give up.
It's just a matter  of time."

"Then maybe it's time we stopped running. Made a stand," she said
staunchly. "Maybe Jeffrey's right. Maybe we do have to consider a
permanent solution."

Alex staggered slightly, and sank weakly into his chair. "I don't know
whether I can do it, Sam. Not even for you and the kids. I.I
just.I.oh, shit." He buried his head in his hands.

"Daddy?" Lisita sobbed.

"Go to your room, Liss," Sam said, her voice gentle. "It's alright.
Daddy isn't  mad with you. This is something else."

"But it's my fault, isn't it?"

Samantha closed her eyes for a moment, gathering strength, then she
took her daughter in her arms. "What you did was wrong, Liss. You
should have come to us, talked to us about it. Your dad.your dad isn't
unhappy that Mr. Skinner's alive. He's just scared you've given our
location away."

Lisita nodded miserably, turned on her heel and slouched morosely
towards the door.

"Liss?"

She swung around, her expression a mix of relief and dread. "Yes,
Daddy?"

"Tomorrow, we're going to have a conversation about how you got into
the computer, okay?"

She flushed guiltily. "Yes, Daddy."

As she watched her daughter flee from the room, Samantha's eyes
narrowed with sudden understanding. "You think she pushed?"

"She must have. There's no other way she could have gotten through my
security."

"She knows she's not allowed to use her abilities like that," Samantha
sighed. "I thought she was more responsible than this."

"What do you expect?" Teena interrupted, with a sneer. "The way you
both indulge them, it's no surprise they're growing up willful and
disobedient. Take  it from me, the only thing worse than having a wolf
at your door is knowing your own child sent an engraved invitation."

For a long moment, Alex remained quiet and still. Then he raised his
face and caught Teena's eyes before speaking in a low, deadly tone.

"What Liss did was stupid and irresponsible," he said. "And she'll be
punished for it. But I know my own daughter. She didn't act out of
willful disobedience.  She did it out of good intention. What she did
proves we're managing to bring our kids up believing that parents love
their children. That family is the most  important thing in the world.
So the only thing wrong about her belief that Skinner is capable of
giving a shit about us, is the fact it's going to break
her heart when she finds out he's just as fucking cold-hearted and
selfish as you, you old witch!"

Teena bristled with offense, her face stiffening into a mask of
hatred. "What the hell do you know about `families', Alex? What kind
of role model do you think you are for your children? You pretend to
be this wonderful father, but you're just a little escaped lab-rat
who's built himself a little fantasy world  around my daughter and
every time your illusion of control is threatened, you fall back on
your gun."

Samantha stepped in quickly, physically inserting herself between Alex
and her mother. "I think you should apologize, Mom" she suggested, her
voice cold.

"He started it," Teena spat.

"Mom, I think you'd better go to your room."

"I'm not a child, Samantha, and I won't be spoken to like one."

"Then don't act like one," Samantha retorted. "And if you ever speak
to Alex like that again, I'll pack your suitcase myself."

"You always take his side."

"He's my husband."

"Let's hope he remembers that, if Fox turns up on your doorstep."

Samantha paled several degrees and grabbed hold of Alex's arm as he
surged to his feet with a growl of fury.

"I'm going to fucking kill her," he snarled, struggling against
Samantha's hold.

Teena rose and offered them both a supercilious sneer. "As I said,
hardly a role model for his children, is he?" she said, with
considerable satisfaction, then walked out of the room.

"Fucking BITCH!" Alex yelled after her retreating back. Then he turned
to Samantha, his expression miserable. "I really, really want to kill
her, Sam. I could do it quick and painless."

She shook her head and laughed softly. "Alex, if it comes to it, I'll
kill her myself," she snorted. "And it's gonna be as painful as
hell."

"Why the hell do we put up with her?" he asked, his face genuinely
puzzled.

"Well you put up with her because I asked you to," she said, with an
apologetic  smile. "But, I must admit, I'm starting to wonder why the
hell I bothered."

***

At some point during the middle of the night, Skinner gave up even
pretending to try and sleep. His efforts had been damned by the way
the nurses insisted on  checking his vitals every hour. No matter how
carefully they tried to slip the blood-pressure sleeve over his arm,
he always woke up with a panicked start.

But that was only the reason why he couldn't sleep, rather than the
far more important reason why he didn't want to sleep.

It wasn't just that, in his dreams, he found himself buried alive once
more. Though he'd be damned before he admitted it to either Mulder or
Scully, he had woken up several times while trapped inside the wooden
casket, struggling wildly for impossible escape, only to `die' again,
almost immediately, in the dark, airless tomb. He finally understood,
first hand, why Alex had been so desperate to get Lisita out of the
grave before she woke up.

The reason he didn't want to sleep, was the same reason he hadn't told
Mulder or Scully the true horror of his experience. Somewhere out
there, unknown miles  from the hospital, Alex and Lisita - his son and
his granddaughter - were alive!

Every fiber of his being, every molecule and atom of his body, were
yearning to  find them. Not in revenge for the nightmare they'd put
him through, though he accepted rationally that should have been his
foremost emotion. Not because Lisita was supposedly the key to
preventing the alien invasion, though he accepted that Mulder's theory
made a hell of a lot more sense than any previous  explanations.

He simply wanted the opportunity to prove to Alex and Lisita that he
wasn't the  kind of man they so clearly believed him to be.

And it hurt. Oh, god, it hurt. Just remembering the look of loathing
on their faces was enough to make him glad of the oxygen tube still
feeding his lungs. Not because he was the focus of such hatred, though
he imagined that should have been his rational reaction, but because
he'd met enough shell-shocked victims in his life to recognize the
despair underlying that kind of passionate  hatred. Emotion like that
didn't spring to life by itself. It was built, brick by painful brick,
through years of suffering and adversity.

// What happened to you, Alex? What kind of hell was your life? And
what kind of hell are you trying to save Lisita from? //

He could only guess at the answers, based on his own experiences with
Spender and the evidence Mulder had uncovered of the Consortium's
inhuman experimentation. Until the day he could meet Alex, face to
face, and demand an explanation for his behavior, he could only
believe his suspicions were true.

And that, essentially, was the problem.

Maybe he only wanted to believe.

Maybe Alex was just a soulless, murdering monster and, growing up in
his shadow, Lisita was another immoral sociopath in the making.
Perhaps they had `killed' him and walked away without ever giving him
a second thought. Maybe he  was no more to them than another
`road-kill', buried and immediately forgotten as they rampaged through
life on their own selfish agenda.

(Continued in part 9)

Part 9
See part 0 for story information.


But he didn't think so.

And though introspection wasn't his strong point, he was as certain as
he could  be that he wasn't just finding excuses for their behavior
because of his own desperate need to acknowledge them as his family.
He wasn't the kind of fool who'd turn a blind eye to evil, simply
because his own blood pumped inside its veins.

No. He'd seen Alex's face at the moment he'd activated the palm pilot
and it hadn't been sneering with satisfaction, or cruelty, or even the
blandness of a man emotionlessly acting out of mere expedience. He'd
looked into Alex's face and had seen, just for a moment, a bleak,
terrible despair in those soulful green eyes. An expression so near to
grief, that recalling it still took his breath away.

// You just had to make a choice, didn't you, boy? Me or Lisita, and
of course she won. Do you really think I can't understand that? //

He hadn't shared any of those thoughts with Mulder or Scully. He'd
settled for pointing out that since only Alex and Lisita had known
what had happened to him, one or both of them had to be the source of
the anonymous email. It had been enough, at least, to make them both
halter their incessant cursing over what Alex had done to him. If only
because they immediately launched into a heated discussion about how
they could safely attempt to track the email to its  source.

He was glad of the respite. His thoughts were personal business;
things to be explored only between himself and his son. One day, God
willing, Alex and he would share a long and painful journey of
discovery. Unearthing a whole plethora of emotions and misunderstandin
gs and explanations, and perhaps, at the end, they would find some
common-ground on which to build a relationship. Or perhaps Alex would
simply turn his back and walk away again. Either way, he
had no intention of airing that kind of dirty linen in public. His
private emotions, his secret dreams, would be safely guarded against
all prying eyes, regardless of their supposed good intentions.

He found Mulder's passionate demands for him to explain his feelings
exhausting, pointless, and rudely obtrusive.

"He's my son," was all he'd said, when Mulder had pressed him to file
a report on the assault in the graveyard.

"But I'm sitting here talking to you," had been his bland reply, when
Mulder had howled that Alex had killed him.

"A man capable of loving his daughter so much, is capable of loving
anyone," he'd pointed out, when Mulder had accused him of protecting a
sociopathic, homicidal maniac.

And that, finally, had stopped Mulder's tirade.

// Because the real reason you hate Alex so much, is the fact you
can't stand the idea he walked away from you, isn't it, Mulder? You'd
rather believe he's incapable of loving anyone. //

***Mulder rubbed his eyes tiredly and peered over the man's shoulder.
"Any luck  yet?"

`No more luck than last time you asked me,' Frohike snapped irritably.
`I told you it would take some time.'

"I know, but I forgot you dead guys think in terms of eternity. Try
and remember I'm planning to find Krycek during my lifetime."

Frohike scowled, bristling at Mulder's careless reminder of his own
dead status. His irritation allowed him to finally say the thing that
had been on the tip of his tongue for hours.

`So he's Krycek again, huh? So much for your `I'd give anything to
have him back' speeches. Don't you think it's kinda pathetic you could
only get it up for him when you thought he was dead?'

Mulder's wounded pout made the ghost feel slightly guilty, but not
enough to regret his words. It was about time Mulder wised up to the
source of his conflicted emotions.

"The attractive thing about a dead Krycek," Mulder retorted grimly,
"is the reduced likelihood of him leaving a trail of corpses in his
wake. Unlike Skinner, I'm not allowing my personal feelings to get in
the way of apprehending a dangerous killer."

`Bullshit,' Frohike snorted. `Since it's becoming clear that the only
people in  danger from Krycek are those who threaten his family,
primarily members of the Consortium, you'd be standing on the
sidelines cheering him on except you're pissed because you found out
he shagged your sister.'

"He used me," Mulder said, his voice ragged with angry grief. "All
those years I told myself he couldn't really have been faking it all;
that despite his betrayal he did actually feel something for me, and
now it turns out he isn't even fucking gay. It was *all* a lie. Even
the way he reacted when I touched him. Remember me saying he used to
shiver when I walked into the room? How the fuck do you think I feel
to find out that, what I always believed was desire, was really
revulsion?"

Frohike's face folded into lines of compassion. `You don't know that
for certain,' he pointed out softly. 'Just because he's married with
kids, doesn't necessarily mean he's straight. You're bi yourself,
Mulder.'

Mulder shook his head angrily. "You don't understand. The Alex I
knew.the Alex I slept with wasn't bi. He wasn't even. shit. I thought
he was a natural bottom, you know? The kind of guy who couldn't even
fuck a woman if he tried. He never even got it up until I was inside
him. He said.he said it was the only  thing that turned him on.being
fucked, I mean. And, of course, I fell for it big time. Forget the
Skippy rat act. Take off his suit and he was pure sex on
legs. The first time he undressed in front of me, I thought I'd died
and gone to heaven. I'd always had this weird belief he was smaller
than me. Something in the way he walked and held himself, maybe. But
that first night, when I saw how built he was, was the first time I
realized he was a hell of a lot more powerful than me.

"I.shit.I can't explain how good that made me feel. Knowing he was
easily capable of taking charge, knowing he was willingly letting *me*
take all the control. It was addictive, Frohike. All that muscle and
sheer animal power just  lying down and spreading his legs for me,
shivering and writhing and fucking *begging* me to fuck his ass."

'Whoah!' Frohike exclaimed, licking his lower lip frantically. 'Sounds
hot.'

"Yeah?" Mulder laughed bitterly. "He played me like a fucking violin.
All the times he stood there with a limp dick, begging me to fuck him
until he came, and it turns out the only reason I gave him a hard-on
at all was the fact I was  pounding the fuck out of his prostate."

`Oh,' the ghost said glumly, as he caught Mulder's point.

"So excuse me if I've decided the only thing I want to do to Krycek's
ass is kick it."

***

"They're not happy," Scully said, "but they've signed your discharge
papers."

Looking at her smug smile, Skinner had a sudden image of her waving
her weapon around in reception until the cowed doctors had given in.
He quickly stifled a grin, although he knew perfectly well she'd only
used her badge and her own qualifications to secure his release.Probab
ly.

He holstered his own weapon, pulled on his jacket, folded his somewhat
creased overcoat over his left arm and strode purposefully towards the
door. As they headed down the corridor, Scully almost running to keep
up with his long, powerful strides, he tried, desperately, to contain
the excitement that was making his heart pound as frantically as if
the nanos were jumping back to life  inside his veins.

// Yeah, well, get used to the feeling // he told himself sourly,  // 
because if Mulder's right, the chances are you are going to have a
real up-close and personal reunion with that damned palm pilot. //

"I'm surprised Mulder restrained his enthusiasm long enough to pick me
up," he remarked dryly, as they entered the elevator and Scully
pressed the button for the ground floor.

Except for a brief flush of color in her cheeks, Scully managed to
look almost convincingly confused by his comment. "Kansas is on the
direct flight route from Washington to Arizona," she pointed out. "It
was easy to arrange a connecting flight. We wouldn't have dreamed of
checking out the address without  you, Sir," she said primly.

"Hmmm," he growled, wondering whether she'd threatened Mulder with
bodily harm until he agreed to stop off and collect him en route. "How
sure is he?"

She shrugged lightly. "As sure as he can be under the circumstances,"
she admitted. "He didn't dare run the address through the FBI computer
in case he alerted anyone to its whereabouts. So all we know is it
might be the origin of the email."

"Might be?"

"Well, it apparently bounced several times around the world via
various satellites and appeared to dead-end at a number of
international addresses. He finally narrowed it down to four
possibilities in Switzerland, Russia, Germany and Arizona. Since you
said Krycek told Lisita to `drive home', Mulder's convinced the
Arizona address is the genuine one."

"Lisita's school fees were paid via a Swiss Bank," he reminded her,
his heart sinking slightly.

"That's exactly why Mulder thinks that address is a red-herring.
Besides, he says that the email was virtually untraceable. No one
alive could have cracked Krycek's security systems and, knowing that,
he's certain the Arizona address is the right one. He says Krycek
wouldn't have bothered to hide it so well if it wasn't his address."

Skinner rubbed the bridge of his nose as it began to throb with an
impending headache. Since he didn't want to know the answer, it seemed
barely worth asking the question, but he still forced the words out.
"If no one alive could trace the email, how the hell did Mulder do
it?"

Scully blushed fiercely and dropped her eyes from his gaze.

"I'm waiting, Agent," he growled.

Picking at some invisible lint on the hem of her jacket, Scully
mumbled into her chest, "He said.um. Melvin Frohike helped him."

Skinner rolled his eyes heavenward. "Lord, give me strength," he
groaned.

***

Wearied by the flight, they disembarked at Tucson International and
waited in a  ridiculously long queue to collect their pre-booked
rental car. It appeared the  city was hosting some kind of convention,
from the numerous people thronging the Arrivals lounge, and almost all
of them seemed to have booked a car with Hertz.

As the harried desk clerks desperately tried to deal with the sudden
influx of customers, Mulder began fidgeting constantly, hopping from
foot to foot, and gnawing his lower lip in silent distress at the
delay. Scully struggled with a wicked urge to ask him whether he
needed the bathroom.

Skinner's face was so expressionless it could have been carved from
stone, but Scully could see a small vein ticking so prominently on his
forehead that the Doctor in her wanted to check his blood-pressure.
But she wasn't feeling particularly suicidal and, for a man who had
apparently been dead only 24 hours  earlier, Skinner was undoubtedly
looking remarkably well.

"I've had enough," Mulder snarled suddenly, pulling his badge from his
jacket and pushing through the crowd to the front of the desk. "Fox
Mulder, FBI," he announced loudly. "I've got a car booked and I'm on
official FBI business."

"So much for a low profile," Scully sighed.

Skinner's mouth twitched as he watched the blonde at the desk
glowering at Mulder with an expression of annoyance. "If you'd just
wait a moment," she said, with forced politeness, "I'll serve you
next."

Mulder brandished his badge like a weapon. "Serve me now."

"But I'm already half-way through booking these gentlemen into the
computer," she replied. "If I stop now, I'll lose all the data I've
input."

Mulder just glared at her until she muttered angrily under her breath
and gave in.

"That's the much-vaunted Mulder charm at work?" Skinner snorted. "No
wonder I spend half my working life pacifying the people he pisses
off."

"He just gets a little intense when he's focused on a case," Scully
explained hurriedly. "He always wants to get from A to B in the
fastest possible time."

"We'll be going from A to B in a super-compact from the look on that
poor woman's face," Skinner pointed out dryly.With a loud sigh of
exasperation, he shouldered through the displaced customers. "Thank
you, Agent," he snapped. "I'll take over." He flashed his badge and a
charming smile over Mulder's shoulder towards the clerk then, elbowing
Mulder ungently out of the way, he spent the best part of twenty
minutes soothing the woman's ruffled feathers before emerging
triumphantly with the keys to a Cherokee Laredo.

He waved them in Mulder's face. "I'll drive," he announced, and
Mulder's face fell even further.

"We going on Safari?" Mulder grunted ungraciously, as he threw their
cases in the back of the huge SUV. "It's a damned good job you sign
off your own 302's."

"Mulder?" Scully said sweetly. "Shut up."

As she scrambled up into the front seat, she wished she were wearing
pants. The  Laredo wasn't designed for a short person in a skirt to
enter with dignity. But  her momentary embarrassment was more than
made up for by Mulder's angry grumbling about being relegated to the
back seat.

Skinner climbed in, started the engine and checked the map. "I think
the quickest way is if we take route 10 through Benson, then turn down
route 191. Fallow Point is about 25 miles north of Douglas."

"Not to mention, it's twenty miles east of Tombstone," Mulder snorted.
"Wonder who Alex inherited his sense of humor from. Certainly wasn't
you, Sir."

Skinner ignored him. "It's already 6.20, and it's going to take at
least three hours to get there."

"The way you drive," Mulder grunted.

"So," Skinner continued smoothly, "I suggest we'll stop for something
to eat, book ourselves a motel for the night, and approach the
location in daylight."

Scully nodded her agreement.

"You've got to be kidding," Mulder protested angrily. "We're nearly
there!"

"As you yourself just pointed out, Agent. I don't have a sense of
humor," Skinner retorted. "This isn't going to be one of your usual
unprepared headlong  rushes into the unknown. We do this one
by-the-book."

"Exactly what part of the book covers this situation, Sir?" Mulder
drawled sarcastically.

"He's right, Mulder," Scully interrupted, turning enough to give him a
quelling  glare. "It's only common-sense to reconnoiter the address.
This is Krycek we're  talking about. God only knows what kind of
weaponry he's got in his house."

"Et tu, Scully?" Mulder mumbled, his eyes dark with betrayal, then he
lapsed into a sulky silence and pretended to be absorbed by the
scenery as Skinner drove with implacable slowness down the dark
highway.

When they finally reached the outskirts of Benson, Skinner pulled the
Jeep up outside a Steak House and turned off the engine.

"We'll eat here," he announced.

"I'm not hungry," Mulder pouted.

"I am," Scully said, which earned her another of Mulder's death
glares.

But it was the truth and, besides, spending an hour eating now would
reduce the  amount of time she'd spend later, listening to Mulder
pacing up and down his motel room in frustration at the enforced
delay.

Despite Skinner's decision to stop at the restaurant, it was soon
evident that he had even less of an appetite than Mulder. He ordered a
steak, then just pushed it around his plate disinterestedly until
Mulder, who'd petulantly refused to order at all, started stealing his
fries. At which point, Skinner told Mulder to order `his own damned
food' and then the two men just sat and glowered at each other while
she munched doggedly at her salad and fervently wished she was
anywhere else at that moment.

She had a feeling that, whichever way things played out at Krycek's
place, it was all going to end in tears.

Skinner clearly wanted Krycek's actions to be vindicated somehow, and
Mulder. well, though she hated to admit it, she didn't think Mulder
was going to be satisfied until he'd permanently wrung the little
rat's neck himself. Mulder wasn't even mentioning the fact that he
might find Samantha alive. For the first time in her memory, his quest
for his sister had taken a clear back seat.

And it occurred to her, sadly, that on top of all of Krycek's other
crimes, he'd now done the absolute unforgivable. He'd tarnished
Samantha in Mulder's eyes.

***

It was gone ten when they found a small motel on route 191, about 15
miles from  Fallow Point.

Skinner killed the engine, opened the trunk, pointedly pocketed the
keys and told Mulder to get their bags while he checked them in. He
booked two connecting rooms; a single for Scully and a twin for
himself and Mulder, since he didn't trust Mulder out of his sight.

But Mulder seemed oddly subdued as he let them into their room, dully
asking whether Skinner minded if he took the first shower. So,
although Skinner had driven and consequently considered himself to
have first dibs, he graciously nodded his agreement. "But leave me
some hot water," he warned, as Mulder disappeared into the bathroom,
toilet bag in tow.

With a sly grin, he hid the car keys under his mattress, before
removing his jacket and tie and sitting down on the edge of his bed
with a sigh of weariness. He felt sick with tension yet contrarily
bone-tired enough to sleep like the dead. Which he thought was pretty
ironic, given the last few days.

His maudlin thoughts were disturbed by the sight of a wet, naked
Mulder stumbling tiredly back into the bedroom in search of his sleep
pants. His stomach did a lazy back-flip as, for the first time in his
life, he found his cheeks burning with embarrassment at the sight of
another man's body.// But it's not just any body, is it? It's the body
of the man who slept with your son.//

Skinner swallowed convulsively, desperately trying to repress his
sudden feelings of revulsion. Hell, he had several gay.well, not
friends, but certainly acquaintances, and as long as they weren't
camp, like McAllister, and  didn't rub it in his face, he had no
particular feelings about their chosen lifestyle. So, maybe Mulder had
been right. It wasn't the fact that Alex was gay that bothered him, as
much as the idea that Mulder had slept with him. Was it just too
close, too personal for comfort, to imagine a man he knew so well
in bed with Alex? Or were his feelings of distaste more to do with
the relationship that had later developed between the two men?

Could Sharon have ever done anything to him that would have inspired
the kind of hatred Alex sparked in Mulder? Could he have ever wanted
to strike her and punch her, as Mulder had so often beaten Alex? Could
he have let someone chain her on a freezing balcony? Could he have
ever stood and watched someone kill her without even flinching?

The answer was no. A definite, absolute no. No matter what she'd done,
even if she'd proven herself to be evil incarnate, he would never have
been capable of truly hating her. And didn't that prove, in and of
itself, that whatever relationship that had existed between Mulder and
Alex had been in no way comparable to the love between a man and a
woman?

Or maybe, just maybe, it proved what Sharon had always said. He'd
never really loved his wife. Because if love and hate were opposite
sides of the same coin, could love also be the opposite side of
indifference? That was how their marriage had ended, a sad wasteland
of indifference with both of them trapped on either side of a
barricade of their own making.

"Did you ever love him?" he found himself blurting, only to flush
hotly at his own words.

For a long time, Mulder pretended not to hear him. Pretended for so
long that he was half-way to the bathroom before Mulder's sad
thoughtful voice answered him.

"I loved him," Mulder admitted, his eyes dark and wounded, "and, for a
while, I  believed he loved me." Then he barked a wild chuff of
laughter. "But then, I believe in vampires, werewolves and
liver-eating mutants too, Skinner. So draw your own conclusions."

***

She wasn't sure what drew her to the window. Perhaps, subconsciously,
she'd heard the soft snick of a door closing, or the furtive sound of
feet sneaking over the parking lot. Whatever it was, she pulled the
drapes aside just in time  to see Mulder climbing into the Cherokee
and starting the engine. By the time she raced to the door, he'd
already left in a squeal of brakes and all she could see were two red
tail-lights disappearing into the distance.She pounded on the locked
inter-connecting door until Skinner wrenched it open and stood
there, dripping water, wearing nothing except a towel around his
hips.

For a split-second she did a double-take, swallowing compulsively,
wondering suddenly whether she'd have been so quick to turn her back
on his gentlemanly advances if she'd had any idea he looked like that
without his clothes on. Then  she forced the thought away, reminding
herself that she loved John, and quickly  told him the situation.

Though, from the furious look in his eyes, it was clear he'd already
worked it out for himself.

Uncaring of her reluctantly interested eyes, he started throwing his
clothes on. Cursing all the while under his breath about keys,
mattresses and kicking Mulder's ass. Then he grabbed the phone and
started dialing.

"I'm going to kill that stupid, self-centered, egotistical
son-of-a-bitch," Skinner growled several minutes later, slamming the
phone down in frustration. "There isn't even a 24hr taxi service in
this godforsaken town."

Although Scully's own face was pursed with annoyance, she gave a
half-shrug and  reached for her FBI badge. "So we just commandeer a
vehicle off another guest,"  she said matter-of-factly.At Skinner's
look of surprise, she cracked a small smile. "I've been ditched by him
so many times, I've learned to take a pragmatic approach."

***Samantha walked into the Sitting room, grabbed the newspaper off
Alex's lap,  rolled it up and used it to swipe the top of Alex's
head.

"What did I do now?" he asked, looking up at her with a good-natured
smile.

"Guess who didn't take the garbage out tonight?"

"Damn," he groaned. "For god's sake don't tell your mother. I'll never
hear the  end of it."

"Don't yell at me, but maybe she's got a point. Nicki's got to learn
if he makes a promise, he has to keep it."

"He's only eleven," Alex countered. "It's not the end of the world if
he's forgotten to take out the goddamned garbage."

"It's the principle."

"What do you want me to do? Go haul his ass out of bed, make him get
dressed and do it now?" Alex demanded, with an exasperated sigh.

"Of course not," she soothed. "I'm just saying you need to have a talk
with him  in the morning."

"Okay."

"And.um.maybe you should hide the evidence from Mom," she added, with
a grin.

"I've already set the alarms, Sam," Alex groaned.

She shrugged. "Fine. If you can't be bothered to get up that's okay.
Just don't  blame me when Mom finds the trash can full and feels the
need to remind you of your fatherly obligations. Don't expect me to
interfere, when she's giving you chapter and verse on your failure to
adequately discipline the children."

"Alternatively, I could solve the entire problem by just shooting her
and burying her in the back yard," he pointed out, with an evil
smirk.

"That'd make a hell of a mess. I think it would be easier all round if
you just  put out the garbage," Samantha said solemnly, though she was
clearly struggling  to keep a straight face.

Alex rose to his feet with a sigh. "I'm a highly trained assassin,
Sam," he grumbled. "I know at least 57 ways to kill her without making
a `mess' in the house."

"I know," she said. "I was talking about the mud she'll track into the
carpet when she finally claws her way back out of the ground."

Alex snorted with laughter, pecked her lightly on the cheek, and
headed for the  kitchen to collect the garbage.

***

Mulder couldn't believe his luck.

He'd parked the Jeep at the end of the drive, deciding it best to make
his way up to the house on foot, and years of experience of breaking
into military enclosures had instinctively frozen him in place
fifty-feet from the front door  when a glint at the corner of his eyes
had revealed what had turned out to be the tiny winking laser of a
sophisticated perimeter alarm.

That hadn't been lucky, except for his failure to trigger it, because
that had just left him cold and exposed and realizing he was totally
unequipped for circumventing the alarm system. After ten minutes of
freezing his balls off, convinced by the alarm alone that this was the
right house, he reluctantly decided he might as well return to the
motel and face Skinner's wrath.

What was lucky, was the fact that he'd no sooner made that decision
than the tiny laser stopped blinking, the house's porch lights came
on, the front door opened and none other than Alex Krycek himself
stepped out. Carrying not an Uzi, or a rocket launcher or even a plain
old fashioned pistol, but just an honest-to-goodness black garbage
bag.

In front of Mulder's incredulous eyes, Krycek blithely walked down the
porch steps and headed casually towards a large refuse container at
the far end of the enclosed front yard.

For a moment, Mulder seriously wondered whether it was a trick. He'd
get half-way across the lawn, and then the garbage bag would transform
miraculously  into some deadly weapon and he'd be cut down
mid-stride.

But, being Mulder, his weapon was in his hand and he was already
running impulsively across the grass towards the white-picketed
enclosure before the thought occurred to him and, by the time it fully
registered in his brain, he'd  already leapt over the low fence and
was less than twelve feet from his quarry.  And it was only then that
the noise of his running feet, or maybe just sheer animal instinct,
alerted Krycek to his presence.

He didn't have time to delight in the expression of complete shock on
Krycek's face, but he subconsciously registered the way Krycek lowered
into a defensive crouch rather than reaching for a weapon of his own,
and that gave him the confidence to slow down, instead of barreling
straight into him. Even with one-arm, Krycek was stronger than him and
Mulder wasn't fool enough to believe Krycek would sustain his usual
habit of letting Mulder hit him with virtual impunity. Here, in his
own home, Krycek would undoubtedly fight like a cornered 
rat unless Mulder took full advantage of the gun in his hands.

"Freeze," he spat breathlessly, coming to a shuddering halt just out
of Krycek's reach, and pointing the muzzle at Krycek's heart.
"Hands.oops, sorry, hand in the air."

"Asshole," Krycek snarled, his eyes flashing with dangerous fury.

"I said put your fucking hand up," Mulder yelled, cocking his
trigger.

Krycek flinched minutely at the tiny sound, his eyes flicking
worriedly between  Mulder's face and the house.

"Yeah," Mulder agreed coldly. "A shot might bring Lisita out, mightn't
it?" he taunted. "Do you really want to take that chance?"

Krycek paled, which only made his angry eyes burn brighter, but he
slowly raised his good hand to prove it was empty.

"Now, turn around, and put your arms behind your back," Mulder said.
"Slowly."

Krycek swallowed visibly, dropped his head slightly and turned around.
Mulder waited until Krycek's arms were in the middle of his back, then
leapt forward and slammed the muzzle of his weapon against the back of
Krycek's neck. Using his left hand to grab Krycek's wrist and twist it
painfully upwards, Mulder turned him sideways and increased the
pressure in his right hand until Krycek threw his head back in a
desperate attempt to escape the bruising pressure of the gun against
his throat.

"Fuck it," Krycek gasped. "I'm not fighting you, Mulder."

Mulder considered his comment, then smiled nastily. "No, you're not,
are you?"

He pulled the gun away from Krycek's throat, waited for him to take a
gasping breath of relief, then smashed the barrel across Krycek's
right cheek so hard that the skin tore and a spurt of blood landed on
Mulder's own face.

"FUCKER," Krycek howled.

Mulder released Krycek's arm, swapped his gun to his left-hand, jammed
it quickly against Krycek's neck and used his whole body-weight to
drive his right  fist into Krycek's gut. The way Krycek grunted and
doubled over was so damned satisfying, he immediately did it again.

His fist, already hot with impact bruises, then drove towards Krycek's
stomach a third time. But, before it could connect, the unmistakable
sound of a rifle being cocked behind his head made his arm freeze
mid-swing.

"Drop the gun and step away from him, hands in the air."

The voice was as cool as the night-air and just as familiar.

Of their own volition, his fingers released his weapon and it dropped
into the dirt with a dull thud. He swung around eagerly, barely even
aware of Krycek collapsing heavily to his knees behind him.

His sister, his honest-to-god sister, was standing on the patio,
pointing a rifle at his face.

"Samantha?" he gasped, and stumbled towards her.

Only to freeze, once more, as a bullet kicked into the dirt at his
feet.

"I told you to put your hands up," she reminded him coldly.Her
attention flicked briefly towards Krycek, visually assessing the
damage Mulder had wrought, and when she turned her eyes fully onto
Mulder once more, he was stunned by the burning anger blazing in their
depths.

"Samantha?" he pleaded, his expression bewildered by her expression of
pure  hatred. "It's me, Fox. Your brother."

"I know who you are, Fox," she said. "You're the coward who just held
a gun to my husband's head while you beat him up."

"Coward?" he repeated disbelievingly.

"What else do you call someone who hits someone, knowing that person
is too damned stupid to even try and strike him back?" she demanded,
her angry eyes flicking towards Krycek as he struggled to his feet.

"Leave it, Sam," Krycek grunted, swiping the back of his right hand
over his torn face before limping slowly towards her, carefully giving
Mulder a wide-berth. He reached her side, turned to face Mulder, sat
down heavily on the  porch steps and hissed at the resultant jolt to
his bruised ribs.

"You okay?" she asked Krycek gently, while Mulder simply gaped at them
in confusion.

"I'll live," he snapped, jerking his head away irritably when she
tried to check the damage to his face.

"I think that might need stitches," she said, frowning worriedly at
the bleeding tear across his cheekbone.

Mulder took advantage of her momentary distraction to take another
step towards  them, only to immediately find himself staring down the
barrel of Samantha's rifle once more.

"Don't push it," she warned. "I'm already pissed with you, Fox. I
think you've scarred Alex's face."

Shaking his head, Mulder grinned with total disbelief. "You aren't
going to shoot me," he said confidently.

"Want to bet?" she asked sweetly, her lips twisted into a
frighteningly Krycek-like smirk. She lowered the rifle until it was
sighted on his groin. "Maybe I won't kill you," she purred. "But I
sure as hell feel tempted to geld that nasty temper of yours."

"Samantha, stop waving that gun at your brother."

The color drained from Mulder's face, and he swayed as he turned in
the direction of the impossibly familiar voice. "Mom?" he gasped
weakly.

"What's up, Mulder?" Krycek snorted. "Seen a ghost?"

Mulder ignored the mocking voice, his entire attention riveted on his
mother. "Mom? Is that really you?"

Walking across the porch towards him, Teena Mulder offered him a
tentative smile. "It's really me, Fox," she said, cautiously opening
her arms to invite his hug.

But, instead of moving forward to greet her, Mulder's face contorted
with fury,  and he swung towards Krycek  with a roar of outrage."You
FUCKER," he howled. "You stole my sister AND my fucking mother?"

Krycek's bruised face twisted into a wry grin. "It was kinda one of
those buy-one, get-one-free deals. Believe me, it wasn't a bargain."

Mulder gaped at him in momentary disbelief. Then, with a howl of fury,
he launched himself at the seated man, his hands fixing around
Krycek's neck in a choke-hold. He squeezed his fingers tight until
Krycek's eyes began to bulge from lack of oxygen.

With a loud curse, Samantha flipped the rifle in her hands and brought
it down,  butt-first, on the back of Mulder's head.

Coughing and wheezing for breath, Alex stared down at Mulder's
crumpled body, then looked up at his wife.

"Well, that went well," he said, and smirked.

***

"Are you sure this is the right place?"

Skinner just grunted, as though the question wasn't worthy of an
answer. He swung the truck off the road past what was unmistakably
their abandoned rental car and parked up in front of the house.

"It's very quiet inside," she pointed out, her brow furrowed with
confusion.

"What were you expecting? The gunfight at the OK corral?"

"Something like that," she admitted.

"There's at least one child in the house," he reminded her. "Surely
even Mulder's got more sense than to go bursting inside with his
weapon drawn."

Scully looked less than convinced. "I don't know, Sir. He gets
pretty.well, crazy, where Krycek's concerned. Can you really see him
knocking politely on Krycek's door and being invited inside for a cup
of tea?"

Skinner shook his head.

"It's really quiet," Scully repeated. "Too quiet."

"I know," he agreed reluctantly.

"I think we ought to call for back-up."

"And say what, exactly? That Mulder's possibly been taken hostage by a
dead assassin and his recently-deceased daughter?" Skinner snapped.

"I'm sure I don't need to remind you that Krycek responds to any
threat to his family with lethal force," she retorted.

"Which is exactly why I have no intention of surrounding the house
with a SWAT team," he barked. "Alex's children are in that house."

"So what do you suggest? We just ring the doorbell and ask him to
invite us inside?"

Skinner ignored her sarcastic tone. "That's exactly what we're going
to do," he  said decisively. He reached inside his jacket for his
weapon, unloaded it and placed it in the glove compartment. "Yours
too," he said, when Scully just blinked at him in disbelief.

"You're proposing we go into a potentially hostile situation without
back-up and unarmed?" she gasped.

"Why not?" he asked dryly. "Mulder does it all the time."

***

"Do you want me to let them in?" Samantha asked hesitantly, as the
door chime sounded for the second time.

"Sure," Alex mumbled through the ice-pack on his face. "Hell, why not
call a few of the neighbors around and we can have a party!"

"They aren't going to go away," she snapped.

"So shoot `em already," he drawled.

Spitting muffled curses around the cloth gagging his mouth, Mulder
began to struggle wildly against the ropes that were binding his
wrists and ankles to a heavy dining chair.

Samantha sighed heavily."He's joking," she assured her panicked
brother. "If he'd wanted them dead, he could have activated the mines
in the driveway."

"Shows what you know," Alex muttered, with a dark scowl. "Maybe I just
want to see the whites of their eyes as I take `em out."

As she walked into the room with a wet compress, Teena's face was
pinched with distaste. "Don't tease Fox, Alex. You're worse than the
kids." She walked up to  Mulder and pressed the compress against the
back of his head.

Mulder glared at her furiously, mouthing various obscenities into the
gag and pulling hard enough at the ropes to rock the chair. "Can't I
untie him, now he's awake?" she asked.

"If you untie him, he'll take the gag off, and if he's not gagged,
he'll talk. Knowing Mulder he'll talk incessantly, and then I'll have
to kill him just to get him to shut the fuck up," Alex snarled. "So,
no, you can't fucking untie him, you stupid cow."

Teena flinched, her expression tightening with offense. "Are you going
to let him talk to me like that, Samantha?" she demanded stridently.

Samantha rolled her eyes with obvious boredom. "Alex, don't speak to
mom like that."

Alex just smirked.

The door chime sounded again and Samantha sighed. "We'd better let
them in before they wake-up the kids."

Alex nodded, reaching into the crease between the seat and arm of the
sofa for the gun he'd concealed earlier. He laid it across his lap,
its muzzle pointed towards Mulder.

"Go let `em in, Teena."

"Me?" Teena asked, her expression vaguely horrified.

"They might grab Sam as a hostage," he explained patiently.

"They could grab me," she pointed out.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Gosh. What a choice. Sam and the kids or the
mother-in-law from hell. Jeez. Dunno how that one would go, Teena."

"Alex," Samantha hissed warningly, as Teena straightened her spine,
cast Alex a  supercilious glare, and stalked out of the room.

"You're terrible," she said.

"I am?" Alex replied, with an innocent look.

Then, in front of Mulder's stunned eyes, both Samantha and Alex
collapsed into giggles like a pair of naughty children.

***

"Any more bright ideas?" Scully snapped.

"Ring the bell again. If he was planning to shoot us, he'd have done
it by now."

(Continued in part 10)