From: Cindy Pipka Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 13:02:57 -0500 (EST) Subject: Story Submission Source: direct Achived yes Disclaimer - c carter: DON'T SUE ME! Feedback - YES please!!! If Mulder was a Seagull By: cpipka Scully stepped into the bread-crumb littered office and dropped an X-File onto the desk. Mulder skittered forward on his chair and flipped the cover of the file. "What's this?" Scully sat across from him on the desk as he began pecking at the bread crumbs on the desk, popping them in his mouth and swallowing them in one gulp. "Mulder, before I tell you, I need you to know that this might not be a good case for you to go on." "Why not?" "I don't know how objective you can be concerning the nature of the situation." "Come on Scully. You know me better than that." She leaned forward to put her elbows on the desk. "Well, a fisherman was found dead on his shrimp boat in the Atlantic. He was found by a passing cruise ship captain as they were heading to their next port. Captain saw him lying on deck and called it in. We'd be flying out to the ship to avoid loss of evidence during the time it would take to bring the ship in to dock." She watched for his reaction to her synopsis as she spoke. He remained placid. "Mulder, are you sure you can handle this?" "What's to handle, Scully. I can do this. I've been an agent for a long time. The only thing you need to worry about is seasickness." She took his response in with a tired glance. "We leave in an hour. I'm going to go home and grab a few things. I'll meet you at the airport." "See you later alligator," he mocked. The noise was deafening as the helicopter descended towards the ship. There was no space to land on the boat, so she was being harnessed to a line that would drop her down to the deck. Mulder watched as they clipped her to a multitude of different lines and tested each one with a tug which jostled her around the helicopter. When they had secured her, they gave her a quick rundown on the procedure of landing and disengaging herself from the contraption before giving her a brief nod signaling they were ready when she was. She looked out the side of the helicopter, took a deep breath and stepped onto thin air and was lowered to the deck of the boat. Once she had disconnected herself, the brought the line up and then lowered her belongings and the forensic analysis equipment they had brought along with them. She hoped they hadn't forgotten anything. Mulder landed beside her moments later and looked up at her with beady eyes. She looked down at him. "Ready?" "Ready." They went to the other end of the boat where the body lay and Scully pulled out her kit. She looked around for Mulder only to find he had taken off. "Mulder!" He had dove head first into the salty water and then swung back up on her cry. "Uh -- sorry." He had a morsel of minnow in his mouth which dripped down to the railing of the boat. "Mulder, I told you to keep focused. Can you check the perimeter of the ship for evidence?" He nodded. She had just turned her head to examine the markings on the body when a loud screech interrupted her. She rolled her eyes. She knew this had been a terrible idea. The moment she had seen the case she had been inclined to demur it, but Skinner had insisted that there were no other agents available to take the case since it was time sensitive. She had argued that it was in no way an X-File, but was persuaded when Skinner informed her of the fact that the man had been traveling alone, and the cause of death was a complete mystery considering calm skies and the relatively safe aspect of his work. Although she had not fully understood why this would constitute as an X-File, his insistence was enough to persuade her into taking the file. And now Mulder was distracted by the salty air, and the promise of a fresh fish dinner. Scully shook her head and continued her examination of the fisherman. She removed his arm from his shirt to get a closer look at a gash along it and stopped. "Mulder? I think you should come have a look at this." A beaked head popped above the railing. "What?" "I think you should see this Mulder." He flew over to her to take a look at what she was looking at. A dead fish had been under the man's arm, and some peculiar bite marks ran its side. Mulder blinked at it. No, he thought. There was no way that -- "Mulder, what is it?" Scully had noticed a change in his demeanor and his feathers ruffled involuntarily at the sight before him. "Scully, it can't --" he could hardly finish the sentence as his claws clenched the flooring. There was no way it could be her. Not after all this time, could it be "Samantha?" he gulped. Scully whipped her head around at him and then back at the fish. "What do you mean Mulder?" His eyes smoothed over the familiar bite marks on the fish's flanks. "When we were kids, Samantha and I, we used to accidentally take each other's food -- well, not always accidentally -- so mom put together a system for us so that she wouldn't have to hear us squawking over our food. See these marks here, Scully?" He motioned to the dispersement and angles of the bite marks, "Samantha ate her food from right to left or from head to tail, and I ate just the opposite." He hopped up on the corpse's stomach, "Do you know what this means Scully?" he didn't wait for an answer, "It means she's alive. That she's still out there." He thought back to the night to when Samantha was abducted. They were perched on the mast of their yacht and he was babysitting her while her parents visited the neighboring park. They were playing dive and go. He was the rainbow fish, she was perch. The trout migration was on at seven and he was anxious to watch it. It was then when they saw it. A bright light shone directly at them and he became paralyzed. He watched as his sister was drawn into it by forces unknown. He had tried to reach for a fish to draw her back, but he couldn't move his beak. He had lost her. Guilty that he hadn't done anything to stop it, he had devoted his life to finding her. Scully stroked his head. "How can you be sure Mulder?" "It's her Scully, I know it is." Scully looked at her troubled partner. Mulder's quest to find his sister was at times overpowering. His claims that aliens had abducted Samantha were hardly plausible. She had done some research behind his back a few years ago and discovered a lighthouse situated just across the water where Mulder had been perched that fateful night long ago. Lighthouse records showed that at the exact time Mulder would have been perched upon the mast that night, the light was pointing directly at them. Her theory was that Samantha, while diving for perch had been blinded and confused by the light, and had flew straight into a ship pulling out of port and rendering her unconscious. She'd tried to explain her theory to him, but he wouldn't hear of such an outrageous story, and dismissed her attempts to reason with him. As she eyed the dead fish carcass, she wondered if Mulder had indeed found his sister's snack remains. If so, now all that was left was to find his sister.