Date: 27 Jul 1998 04:36:33 GMT
Subject: Repost: Elan Vital (1/6)

TITLE: Elan Vital (1/6)
AUTHOR: Taygeta 
E-MAIL ADDRESS: taygeta@juno.com
SPOILERS: None
RATING: PG
DISCLAIMER: The characters of Agent Fox Mulder and Agent Dana Scully are
not my own.  Such characters and any other reference to the X-files
belong to its creator Chris Carter and its owners, 1013 Productions and
FOX Television, a unit of 20th Century FOX, Inc.  No copyright
infringement is intended.
FEEDBACK: Please send
POST: anywhere one might find it appropriate or might like it to be, just
tell me first.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Elan Vital #1
By: Taygeta

LOGVICK, OKLAHOMA
THE OLD WICKERDALE FARM
03/05/98 4:45 p.m.

	Tommy Turkinfeld walked along the dusty road alongside Roger
Thomas.  Roger glanced at the old Wickerdale farm, a ruined and faded
edifice in the middle of the middle of nowhere.  It was the greatest
place to play hide-and-seek when they were younger, but nowadays with all
the stories going on, Roger usually kept his distance.

	"Hey, Roger, there's the old Wickerdale farm, I dare ya to go
into the house and out the other way," Tommy said with his mischievous
smile that he was notorious for.

	Roger glanced at Tommy quickly and his eyes fell to the dirt
road, again.  It was a dare, and Roger knew he had to do it.  The
unwritten Kid's Code of Logvick made sure of that.  Despite Roger's
hesitation to even try, he sighed and said confidently, "That's easy,
Tommy, I can get in and out like a second!"

	Tommy kept his distance as he saw the brown-haired boy walk
proudly to the sagging, ancient house.  Roger hesitated once he reached
the door, which was oddly wide open.  He managed to find a little courage
in him and ran in.  Tommy waited and waited and waited for Roger to come
out the other way, but after more than 10 minutes, Roger was not to be
seen.  

	Tommy began to worry and decided to go to the spooky house,
despite all of the fear he had in his heart.  His friend was probably in
trouble and he didn't want to leave him there, alone.  He crept to the
house and slowly peered into the door and Tommy could hear himself intake
breath as he saw the sight before his widened eyes.  Roger feared for his
life and nothing was there.  He glanced around the room and his eyes fell
to a piece of broken glass in the house and there he saw what Roger saw
with his eyes, a woman in white within the glass, the notorious glass
woman...

WASHINGTON D.C. 
FBI HEADQUARTERS
04/04/98 2:46 p.m.

	Fox Mulder sat lazily back against his office chair, his worn
black leather shoes were propped on top of his desk, and the brown-red
soles were scuffed and worn as most of his shoes were.  He was staring
idly up at his white plaster ceiling, where a few spitwads, darts, and
the occasional no. 2 yellow pencil could be seen.  This was how Dana
Scully found her partner when she walked into his office.  It wasn't an
unusual sight for her; she had seen her detached partner in worst states
of thought.

	"Mulder?"  Scully asked closing the door and knocked on his desk
to get his attention.

	"Huh - wha-?"  Mulder said dropping his feet quickly and glancing
up with widen eyes at the redheaded woman that had just come into his
office.

	Scully shook her head and smiled as she eyed his usually rumpled
exterior.  He, as usual, was in a wrinkled striped dress shirt and dark
dress pants, his work clothes, as he called them.  His reading glasses
were on the top of his head and caused his disheveled hair to look even
more so.  Of course, Scully couldn't help but silently think that neat or
tousled, his exterior was notably attractive.

	"Scully, hi," said Mulder with one of his sheepish smiles,
pulling the glasses off of his head, "What are you doing here?"

	Scully closed her eyes and took a deep breath, thinking she must
answer this question every day.  She opened her eyes and glanced at her
partner, "Mulder, you asked me to come here, no more than ten minutes
ago."

	"Oh...right," he said snapping his fingers in recollection and
then he dove into the clutter that he called his desk.  He found a manila
file and handed it to her.

	Scully opened the file and peered at it.  There were various
black and white photos and a few eyewitness accounts about an incident in
rural Oklahoma, and she asked Mulder, looking up from the file, "What is
this?"

	"In 1972, in Logvick, Oklahoma, there were many eye-witness
accounts that there was something strange in an ancient farmhouse,
Wickerdale.  The family that had moved into the house, the Rosenbergs,
moved out the next day, and no one knew why.  It was only until it was
sold three years later in 1975 to a young couple, the Potters, that
everyone found out why.  Apparently, an apparition could be seen in every
glass in the entire house and the following day the husband died under
mysterious circumstances," said Mulder as if it was the most natural case
in the world.

	"Mulder, come on, a ghost?"  Scully said shaking her head in
disbelief, "Besides, what does it have to do with now?"

	"A month ago, a little boy, Roger Thomas, entered the house on a
dare and when that boy didn't come out, his friend, Tommy Turkinfeld came
in after him.  Roger was found in a scared state and Tommy saw nothing
that might have provoked that state.  He looked around and saw a woman in
one of the glass fixtures.  He was able to drag Roger out of the house,
and then run for help.  When help came, they found Roger, or at least
what was left of him.  Something had seemingly drained almost all the
life out of him, and he later died at a nearby hospital from unknown
causes," said Mulder, thinking that he hated cases where kids died.

	"So, you think that this apparition, this woman in the glass,
caused the death of Roger Thomas?  How can we prove that?" asked Scully
who was first and foremost a skeptic.

	Mulder opened the top drawer of his desk, pulled out something
from his desk, and waved it as he smiled.  Scully sighed and replied,
"When does the plane leave?"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Elan Vita #2
By: Taygeta

A FEW MILES OUTSIDE OF LOGVICK, OKLAHOMA
TURKINFELD HOME
04/05/98 2:55 p.m.

	Scully slammed the door to the rented black luxury car, wishing
she were slamming the door to a red corvette...in Hawaii.  The rural town
of Logvick was not exactly on her list of places she wanted to go to. 
Mulder, on the other hand, it seemed like the perfect spot in the world. 
Put that man where there was an X-files mystery, some decent food, and an
X-rated video store and he'll be happy.

  	Scully and Mulder walked up the concrete path that led up to
the Turkinfeld home and Mulder knocked on the screen door.  A middle-aged
woman with slightly gray hair walked up to the door in a pair of jeans
and a gray sweatshirt.  She smiled lightly and opened the screen door
cautiously; unsure if these two strangers were safe.

	"Yes, can I help you?" she asked as she peered at the redheaded
woman and the dark-haired man carefully.

	"Yes, I'm Agent Mulder and my partner is Agent Scully.  We're
with the FBI," Mulder as he and Scully showed their I.D.  "Are you Mrs.
Barbara Turkinfeld, Tommy Turkinfeld's mother?"

	"Yes, that's me," said Mrs. Turkinfeld nodding her head, "Are you
here to investigate the death of Roger Thomas?"

	"Yes, that's right, Mrs. Turkinfeld," said Scully nodding her
head, "The police deemed it unsolvable and so the FBI took over."

	"Please come in," said Mrs. Turkinfeld, opening the door wider
and Scully and Mulder walked into her house.  

	"Did you know Roger Thomas well, Mrs. Turkinfeld?" asked Scully
as she and Mulder sat down on the couch.

	"Dear me, yes!  I knew Roger Thomas since he was a little baby of
two and the Thomases moved in across the way," said Mrs. Turkinfeld with
a sigh, "It's a rather bad that a nice young boy like Roger had to die so
early."

	"Your son was there when he died, is that correct?" asked Scully,
wondering how long this woman was going to carry on, and Mulder was
silently wondering the same thing.

	"Yes, my poor Tommy," said Mrs. Turkinfeld with a sigh, "Roger
was his best friend, you know."

	"Did your son see anything or hear anything?" asked Mulder.

	"He's been rather quiet lately and I don't encourage him to speak
all that much when he's in such a state," said Mrs. Turkinfeld, gazing at
her orthopedic shoes.  "Would you two like to talk to him?  He opens up
very well with strangers, more so than with his own mother."

	"Please, we'd love to talk to Tommy," said Mulder nodding his
head and Mrs. Turkinfeld left the room.

	"Is this case going anywhere, Mulder?" asked Scully glancing at
him with a sigh.

	"Scully, we just got here, what do expect?  This case is
thirty-some odd years old and you think it's just open and shut?" asked
Mulder, who was beginning to wonder how much sense, was actually in
Scully.

	"Of course not Mulder, but you can't possibly think that Roger
Thomas just suddenly died for no reason, do you?" asked Scully, but
before Mulder could reply, someone replied for him.

	"Roger did die all of a sudden, I saw it!"  Tommy said rushing
towards them.

	"Tommy, what exactly did you see in that house that day?" asked
Mulder walking towards the boy who looked up at him carefully.

	"I walked into the house to see if Roger was all right," said
Tommy thinking back on that horrible day.  "And he was lying on the floor
all scared like.  And I couldn't see what made him so scared and so I... 
I looked around the room and I saw a few pieces of glass on the floor. 
That's when I...I...I saw...I -" Tommy hesitated.

	"What did you see, Tommy?"  Mulder said looking into the boy's
uncertain eyes carefully.

	Tommy glanced at the skeptical redheaded detective and at the
trusting dark-haired man as he chewed nervously on his lower lip, before
answering, "I saw a ghost..."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Elan Vital #3
By: Taygeta

LOGVICK, OKLAHOMA
THE LOGVICK INN
04/05/98 5:03 PM

	Scully began to unpack her things in her room at the Logvick Inn,
the only motel in town.  She hated these places now.  Incidentally, she
had always loved little towns and little motels, but she had been to so
many through the X-files cases that all the little towns and their little
motels, despite the different cases that brought them there, were
beginning to look the same.  The same cream colored walls, the same dull
wooden dresser, the ugly paintings that lay above the headboard of the
uncomfortable beds...everything was so repetitious.  She was beginning to
think she was going to become as crazy her partner could be at times.

	KNOCK!  KNOCK!  Scully turned to the open the door as she heard
the familiar rapping of her partner.  She saw that he had wasted no time
and was clearly refreshed by a shower and a new change of clothes, which
were black...of course.  

	"God, Mulder, you act as if we're in Bermuda," said Scully noting
his rare smile.

	"In Bermuda with Dana Scully, hmm..." said Mulder with a laugh as
Scully gave him a look and a smile.  "Come on, Dana, it can't be all that
bad."

	"A ghost, Mulder?" said Scully who, despite the little boy's
positivity, wasn't convinced.

	"Okay, Dana, I admit, it's a little far-fetched, but something
killed Roger Thomas and I'm not about to rule out a ghost, not yet,
anyway," said Mulder, which caused Scully to begin to wonder why Mulder
still didn't believe in the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus or the tooth
fairy.

	"Yes, Mulder, the truth is out there," said Scully tiredly as
Mulder stifled a laugh.

LOGVICK, OKLAHOMA
THE OLD WICKERDALE FARM
04/06/98 10:42 am

	"This is the place, Agent Mulder, Agent Scully," said Sheriff
Jerry Hunter, who Scully had noticed and Mulder had noticed Scully
noticing, was a rather handsome man.  Sheriff Hunter had decided to show
the FBI agents the way to the Wickerdale farm, which was not part of the
main dirt road that ran through out the town.  At least that's what he
told them, but Mulder had noticed that the sheriff smiled a little too
much when he said, Agent Scully.  

	"Thank you, Sheriff Hunter," said Mulder with a smile and he
roamed the dry yard area of the, its once fertile land was dry and
cracked from lack of nutrients, care, and the heavy winds that blew
through this part of the state.

	"Can you tell us about this place, Sheriff?" asked Scully, in a
manner, which Mulder couldn't help but say was flirtatious.

	"Yes, Agent Scully, of course," said Sheriff Hunter with a
charming smile.  "This house was originally built in 1910 by Henry
Wickerdale who had just married Gertrude Rosalyn and wanted to farm.  Mr.
Wickerdale had a lot of money, so even when his crops went bad, he didn't
care.  He had the cash to back up anything that could have gone awry. 
Ten years later in 1920, Gertrude died of a heart attack, and Henry
Wickerdale was known to be very upset, until he re-married a few years
later in 1926.  He married a very young-looking woman he had met while in
New York, a Diane Peterson, who was a 45-year-old widow but looked as if
she could have been 25.  A year or two past by and then Henry Wickerdale
died, a hemorrhage or something, no one ever knew why, that's just what
Diane had told them.  Diane got married about 3 times after that and she
suddenly disappeared around 1930, two years after the mysterious death of
her 6th husband."

	Mulder looked at the sheriff in surprise and said, "Sheriff
Hunter, are you telling us that this Diane woman married 3 times in
4years and had husbands before that?"

	"Yes, for some reason that woman kept on marrying and men kept on
falling.  Rumor has it that she was quite a looker," said Sheriff Hunter,
who knew about a lot of the oddities in their small town, but wasn't very
bright enough to find suspicion in anything.

	"Um, excuse me?" a woman's voice said from behind them all and
Mulder and the Sheriff eyed the owner of that voice carefully.

	She was about 25 and had thick, shiny brown hair that fell in
waves against her shoulders.  She wore a classic white top and matching
white shorts, clothes that Scully wouldn't be caught dead in, but she had
to admit the strange woman actually looked good in such clothing.  She
also noticed that her partner and her ex-charmer sheriff were drooling
over this strange woman.

	"Yes, can we help you?" asked Mulder in a flirtatious and suave
tone of voice, of likes Scully had never heard before.

	"I'm a little bit lost," the woman said in an almost sultry tone
and manner, as she bit her lower lip, "This is the Wickerdale house,
right?"

	"That's right," said Sheriff Hunter, turning on his charming
smile for the new woman in their midst.

	"Oh, okay," she said in such a manner that Scully noted was very
awkward and in a phony airheaded manner, "Then I'm at the right place."

	"Really?" asked Scully, who was getting annoyed with Mulder's
drooling, "And why is it that this is the right place?"

	"The Wickerdale house belongs to me," she said with a frown as if
it was the strangest question in the world, "My name's Diane Peterson
Wickerdale..."

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Elan Vital #4
By: Taygeta

LOGVICK, OKLAHOMA
MAIN STREET
04/06/98 12:24 PM

	"See, Mulder, there's nothing special going on, just your regular
homicide," Scully said with a sigh as she and her partner walked away
from the police station.  "She's their great-great granddaughter, and not
some ghostly phenomena.  We're just wasting our time here."

	"Dana, that boy saw something I know it, and I don't know how or
why, but that Diane Wickerdale has something to do with it," he replied
while stuffing his hands in his pockets.

	"Gee, Mulder, you're sixth sense sure is working today," she said
sardonically.

	"What's that suppose to mean?" he retorted glancing at his
redheaded partner.

	"I could have told you that Diane Wickerdale was a suspicious
character," Scully said meeting his glance exasperatingly, "I mean this
woman comes out of nowhere-no car, no mode of transportation to go and
see a rundown farm?  Her story doesn't quite add up."

	"Wait a minute, Dana, you just got finished telling me that she
wasn't some ghostly phenomena and that it was just a regular homicide,"
Mulder spoke with a tone of disbelief.

	"Just because I told you that she wasn't a ghostly phenomena
doesn't mean I didn't think it strange that she was there," she replied
thinking that it was a wonder at all that he had paid any attention to
detail while he was drooling over the pretty face.

	"I give up trying to understand you, Dana Scully," he replied
when they reached the black luxury car.

	"It's about time.  I gave up trying to understand you years ago,"
she said with a smile as she opened the car door.  

WICKERDALE FARM
04/06/98 9:45 PM

	"It was so kind of you to drive me here, Sheriff," Diane said
with her hypnotic smile as she got out of the police car.

	"No problem at all, Miss Wickerdale," Sheriff Hunter replied
closing her door as a flirtatious grin crossed his face.

	"But I feel as if I should repay you some how," she said with a
sigh as she fiddled with the top button of her blouse, "I mean, for all
your kindness."

	His eyes were drawn to the white button of her shirt as he
quickly looked up and repeated, "No problem at all, M-miss Wickerdale, no
need to repay me for a-a-anything."

	"Please, Sheriff," Diane said as she walked closer too him, and
she was so close to him that he heard the button of her shirt snap open,
"Call me Diane."

	"I-I-I rather not, M-m-miss W-w-w-" he stuttered as her face was
mere inches away from his, so that he felt her breath against his skin.

	"Please do, Sheriff Hunter," she said and she muffled his
stuttering by pressing her lips against his and then she pulled away, as
her eyes locked onto his widened-eyed stare, "I'd like to be on a first
name basis with all of the men I kill-"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Elan Vital #5
By: Taygeta

LOGVICK, OKLAHOMA
OFF MILLER ROAD
04/06/98 10:00 PM

	Deputy Greene slowed his patrol car as he noticed the sheriff's
truck along the side of the road.  He picked up the mouthpiece of the
ancient system as he peered at the vehicle suspiciously, "Joe, ya there?"

	"Yeah Tom?" Joe Riley's voice crackled out of the speaker, making
the nearly-30 deputy sound as if he were an old man.

	"Sheriff's truck's on the side of-um-Miller Road-I'm gonna go
check it out," he responded and when he heard Joe reply a short, okay,
and mumbled something about arriving there ASAP, he stepped out of his
vehicle.

	He approached the truck with much care and pulled his flashlight
out promptly.  His free hand twitched slightly as it hovered
apprehensively above his gun holster.  The truck was empty and the doors
unlocked, and when Deputy Greene opened the creaking door the first words
out of his mouth was, "Oh my God-"

LOGVICK INN
04/06/98 10: 25 PM

	A loud knock on her room's door made Agent Scully woke with a
start and make her way blindly towards the door, where she met her
smiling partner, "Good morning, Sunshine."

	"Mulder-it's after ten-I'm tired-  What do you want?" she
responded with a sigh, half in aggravation and the rest in exasperation.

 	"Sorry to wake you Scully, but duty calls," he said with a
sympathetic smile, knowing how tired she must have been, "It seems that
our Sheriff Hunter  is missing, and he might have been found- dead in his
car-" 

OFF MILLER ROAD
04/06/98 10: 45 PM

	The deputies glanced at the rented luxury car as it drove to a
slowing stop in front of the yellow tape.  Despite the seriousness of the
matter and their concern over the sheriff, they started to take off their
hats and smoothed their hair, much to Mulder's dislike, when they saw
that Agent Scully was approaching them.  The police department was a
collection of very young, eager to succeed deputies, most of them men,
with male tendencies.  Especially when it concerned a pretty, redheaded
agent from the FBI, this too wasn't to her partner's liking. 

	"Agent Scully," Deputy Riley said with a wide grin, that reminded
Mulder a little too much of a sick puppy.  His grin faded when he saw the
serious and annoyed demeanor of the agent beside her, "Um-Agent
Mulder-what we have here is kind of strange.  It's much like we saw of
Roger Thomas' body, except this one is so far in the state of
decomposition that its face isn't even visible.  We think it is the
sheriff, but we're really hoping that it's not."

	The agents followed him towards the car, which had already been
dusted for prints before they had arrived, but the body had not been
disturbed in any manner.  Mulder and Scully both winced and took a few
step backs at the look of the decrepit figure.  It had been determined
that the first victim had looked hollowed and rather pallid, but this
victim, looked as if he were in the last stages of decomposition.

	"Oh, God-that smell," Mulder commented backing a few steps, "It's
like that body's been rotting for weeks"

	Scully pulled a pen out of her pocket and walked towards it,
despite the smell, and probed the specimen carefully, "Yeah, I'd make
that estimate, except-why would a rotting body be in the sheriff's car?"

	"And a question to add to that-where is Sheriff Hunter?"  Mulder
said as she walked back to where the deputies and him dare to stand and
at that question, all eyes fell to the mass of decay on the truck's
leather interior.

	Deputy Greene approached them and explained, "Well, you see, the
sheriff was suppose to report back to the station after he gave Miss
Wickerdale a ride home-but he never said a word after-never came back-"

A FEW MILES FROM MILLER ROAD
04/06/98 11:46 PM

	The car was engulfed in silence and it was Scully, who spoke
first, "I told you so."

	Mulder, who was driving the car, tapped his fingers against the
steering wheel and shook his head as a smile formed on his lips, "I knew
you wouldn't be able to resist saying that for long!  So, Diane
Wickerdale, is somehow connected into all of this, but how?"

	"Don't ask me-you're the psychoanalyst," she said with a sigh,
but she continued, "Do you think she killed them?"

	"It's a possibility," he said nodding his head, "I mean, she was
the last one to see the sheriff alive-assuming the body was him, and
those boys were around the Wickerdale property.  What I'm wondering is
how she did it?"

	"Rotting corpses-  Roger Thomas, was concluded to have died of
heart failure," she said recalling that the unknown causes Mulder had
referred to in Washington DC had been inconclusive wording on the report
and was really heart failure with unknown causes.

	"Heart failure-the kid was no more than ten-how does this all tie
in?  A rotting corpse, a kid that dies from heart failure-looking pallid
and drained, and Diane Wickerdale-who had an ancestor by the same
name-that always looked young-" he trailed off suddenly as if a light
bulb had been turned on, "Elan vital-.  Why didn't I think about it
before?"

	"What are you rambling about now, Mulder?" she asked as she
glanced at expression.  

	Suddenly, he pulled on the side of the road, and looked at her,
"Elan Vital-means vital force, or life force, and it's something that
Henri Bergson hypothesized.  In Bergsonian philosophy, this vital
force-or elan vital-is the source of efficient causation and evolution in
nature.  It's a dualistic philosophy about two opposing tendencies, the
life force and the resistance of matter against it."

	"Okay-" Scully said slowly, "but what does this have to do with
anything?"

	"Don't you get it?  Diane-she's not named after her ancestor, the
woman of a thousand marriages-she *is* Diane Peterson Wickerdale-"

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Elan Vital #6
By: Taygeta

A FEW MILES FROM MILLER ROAD
04/06/98 11:54 PM

	"Oh, come on, Mulder-you cannot possibly expect me to believe
that the Diane Wickerdale we met this morning is the very same Diane who
lived nearly 50 years ago?" the redheaded agent said in disbelief.

	"That's precisely what I'm telling you," he replied, "It all
makes sense, now.  Somehow she has found the capability to live and be
young by draining others, and from what her history has shown, men, of
their life force.  As if she's a vampire, but instead of blood, she
absorbs their elan vital."

	Scully was still skeptical, "If this were true, and I'm not
saying it is, but if it were, what do you suppose she is?

	"Ghostly phenomena," he said with a matter-of-fact tone of voice,
"I don't even think she's human, it's just that what she absorbs makes
her into what we think is human.  You heard what Tommy Turkinfeld said, a
woman in white-he couldn't even see her-an image.  It must have been that
she had lacked so much energy, that she couldn't even procure a form."

	"That doesn't explain why she took Roger's-as you call it-elan
vital," she persisted, "I mean, he was just a little boy and from what
Tommy said, he was afraid of her."

	"It was probably that she lacked so much of her energy that she
had to retrieve it from the closest living human source, being Roger
Thomas," he said, again, using the same tone that Scully despised.  "As
far as I can tell, when she has the energy to do so, she uses attraction
to lure the men to her-and - "

	"Remember the last time you thought something was a vampire?" she
said interrupting him as she remembered his analogy of how this "woman in
white" absorbed energy.

	"But they were vampires," he replied, "Excuse me if modern-day
folklore wasn't as detailed as they thought they were."

	"Yeah, but it almost got you and me killed in the process,"
Scully replied and as she thought of the situation, "And why do I get the
feeling that this is going to be one of those processes?"

THE OLD WICKERDALE FARM
04/07/98 10:30 AM

	Scully shaded her eyes from the rising sun and said to her
partner, "Well-it doesn't look like she's around-she can't stay here,
this place is in shambles."

	"Yeah, I guess you're right," he said kicking a knurly stick that
lay on the dirt, "She'll be back-so we'll be back."

	As the agents entered their car and drove away, a figure in
classic white clothing appeared to watch them leave.  A smirk fell on her
face and as she transformed into her original form to conserve her
energy.  Her blonde hair had altered into green tubes with energy
retaining tips, her grotesque face had a wide mouth with spiked tiny
teeth, and her translucent skin had energy absorbing enzymes running
through her "blood stream."

	"Yes-do come back to my humble abode-agents-or rather Agent
Mulder-"

LOGVICK INN
MULDER'S ROOM
04/07/98 8:35 PM

	"Agent Mulder-Agent Mulder-" a soft voice whispered into his ears
overtaking the sound of the blaring television, "come to me-my
darling-come to me-"

	As if in a trance, the agent automatically stood up from the
chair where he sat and came out of his bedroom, following the sound of
the voice.  He approached the rented vehicle that was parked in front of
Scully's room and preceded to get in it and drive with the keys that he
carried in his hand.  

	Scully peered out of her hotel room with the sound of the engine
starting and her jaw dropped slightly as she saw her partner.  Noting
that he looked as if he were in a dream-like state, she quickly opened
the door.  He drove off in a fury before she even got outside.

	"Deputy Greene," she said into the walkie-talkie that was on loan
from the Logvick Police Station, "You there?"

	"A-agent Scully-um-yes-what's the problem?" the deputy stammered
in surprise.

	"I need someone to drive me to the Wickerdale Farm," she said
simply.

	"W-what about A-agent Mulder?" he continued to stutter.

	She took a deep breath and said simply, "Agent Mulder-he went on
ahead-apparently."

THE OLD WICKERDALE FARM
04/07/98 8: 42

	"Well, I'll be damned," she muttered as she saw the transparent
and glowing figure and the familiar form of her partner approaching it.

	"Agent Scully-what's going on?"  Deputy Riley said as his eyes
widened at the sight in the near distance.

	"Deputy Riley, I suggest that you leave the premises
immediately," she said and although he gave her a strange look he nodded
before she got out of the car.  Scully heard the car drive off and she
approached Mulder and the figure with caution.  

	"Come to me, Agent Mulder," a voice drifted from the glowing
apparition.

	"Mulder-don't get any closer!" she shouted to him, but his mind
and hearing was closed from her shouts.

	In her frustration, she ran towards him and practically tackled
him.  He shook his head in confusion as he came out of the hypnotic
state, "What's going on?"

	"That's what's going on," she said as she pointed to the
manifestation, "Diane Wickerdale, I believe."

	"You *believe*?" he questioned feeling strange to hear the word
come from her.

	"You know what I mean," she said with a sigh, "Y'know, being a
Ghostbuster was never on the job description -among other things."

	"Funny," he said with a sigh, "Hey, you have a mirror?" 

	She rummaged through her pockets and pulled out a small hand
mirror, "Here-what are you going to do?"

	"You ever heard of Medusa?" he said with a smile as he took it
from his hand and walked towards the ghost.  "Hey, Diana, you want me? 
Come and get me."

	"Silly human-" she laughed as he stood in front of her, "If that
is your wish-than so be it."

	Her face changed to its actual state, Mulder flinched slightly at
the ugliness, and he pitied the Sheriff for having this be his last image
before his death.  The energy receptors started to absorb energy from
him, but before they could, he flashed the hand mirror at her eyes and a
loud scream echoed in the night as her glow became brighter, brighter,
and exploded against the starry-lit sky.

	Mulder smiled in satisfaction and walked towards his partner,
"Now, what were you saying about believing?"

OKLAHOMA CITY, OKLAHOMA
04/25/98 10:30 PM

	Charles Parker drove to the side to pick up the attractive
hitchhiker and when she came into his car he said, "So where ya headed?"

	She smiled at him, "No where in particular, anywhere I guess.  My
name's Diane, by the way-"