From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: RE-REPOST: Phile-adelphia 1/? Date: 16 Aug 1995 16:09:03 -0400 Mulder, Scully, Skinner, and the rest are all property of The Big Karterhuna, his numeric company, and the broadcasting service named after a fictional FBI agent. If you figure out a way to make money off of it, cuz I can't, you have a criminal mind and should be congratulated. Will Chandler and Nick Bradley belong to me, if you want to use them please ask nicely and remember not to rest your elbows on the table. I don't know who coined the phrase Doc Ice but I thank you for it! I really should have been working on a sequel to Fridges, but Monty calls, and I must obey. "Ours is not to reason why..." This came to me in a burst of enthusiasm after reading Trepanning Opera, X-Files comic #7, which deals with reality and what it is. We know so little about what reality really is, whether it's quarks and dark matter, solid atoms, or just imagination. Doesn't that sound philosophic? Wish to god I knew what it meant. It's weird, but hey, it's X-Files. Pay attention to dates, everyone. The Phile-adelphia Experiment 1/? J. Edgar Hoover Building VCS, third floor; Office of Chandler and Bradley 9 am, Mon., July 23 "Man, you're so weird." Special Agent Will Chandler looked up from his coffee and grinned. "Whaaaaat?" "Every time I see you with that coffee mug I want to call you Spooky." "So...?" "I give up." Nick Bradley rolled his eyes at his partner. "Will, I swear..." "It was a gift, kay? Don't blow this up to some sort of weird obsession." Nick snickered. "And don't *you* tell me you aren't sitting home every Friday night with a bowl of popcorn getting the crap scared out of you." Will took another sip of his coffee. "So...If I'm Spooky, does that make you Doc Ice?" "Whereinhell'd you get that nickname?" "Ah." Will drained the last of the coffee from the black mug. "If I told you, I'd have to kill you." "Fine, fine. What's up for today?" Nick crossed the room and checked his email. "We got your choice--murder, serial killings in east Vermont, or some weird military murder up Massachusetts way." "Oh, come on, Massachusetts!" Will said scornfully. "We can do serial killings any day and I'm pretty damned sick of murder, plain and simple. I want some action!" "You been watching too much TV, my friend." "Massachusetts." He stated stubbornly. Nick sighed. "Mass. it is, then. And no, we're *not* going to--" "I wasn't even thinking it." Nick left to make travel arrangements while Will called up some info. on the case. A couple investigations into killings near a military base. "Now if I were the paranoid type..." he murmured, "I'd say it was a cover up." He picked up his coat, headed for the door. Hesitating, he decided he'd piss Nick off and take his hat with him. He exited the room, carrying the black baseball cap with 'trust no one' emblazoned across the back and a large slashing X on the other side. ___________________________ Okay, I ask you, how many people saw it coming? How many of you thought these guys would turn out to be jerks like all the rest of the agents on the show? And how many of you now want to continue? Feb. 23, 1996 Same time, different universe J. Edgar Hoover Building X-Files Section, offices of Mulder and Scully "The Philadelphia Experiment." Mulder said succinctly as Scully entered the room, carrying a bagel for breakfast. "The Lone Gunmen. Massachusetts." "Yomf haff ta be gidding." Scully mumbled through the bagel. "The Philadelphia Experiment?" "A prime testing ground. The middle of nowhere, a military base, and three deaths. Tourists. The papers have been keeping it quiet but I just got a tip from Frohike that there's more to Stonewall Base than meets the eye." "Stonewall Base?" "Yeah, top secret military 'testing facility' for new aircraft. Or so the great unwashed masses think." He handed her a printout. "But something isn't quite right in the placid little town of Stonewall, Massachusetts. Weird blue lights, reports of missing time, and an unusual amount of base personnel have reported in either ill or mentally unbalanced. *Thirteen* people have been committed to the temporary section at the nearby mental facility. None with previous histories." Scully sighed and disdained to argue with him. She could see it wouldn't do any good--he was high on an idea and there was no stopping him now. It was like a disease. Three hours earlier, when he heard about it, she might have been able to cure him. Not now. "When do we leave?" "Four hours. Gives you time to go home and pack. Meet me at gate sixteen, I've already arranged for car rental and accommodations." "And I haven't even had breakfast yet." She muttered, re-packing her portfolio case and picking up the half-eaten bagel. It promised to be one of those days. ________________________ July 23 12 am Somewhere over Massachusetts "Attention, this is your captain speaking. We will be landing in about half an hour. Smooth sailing until then, folks. A point of interest, if you look to your right you can see beautiful Martha's Vineyard. Now on your left..." "Hey, Will, what d'you think you're doing?" "I'm looking at Martha's Vineyard." "You're psychotic. Obsessed. I would add paranoid to the list. And slightly insane." "Sounds like Mulder to me." Will leaned back and munched on the airplane lunch that was being served. "Think of it this way, we're doing what most people only think about every Friday night." "We're not exactly chasing aliens, Chandler." "No, but we *are* FBI agents and we travel more in a month than most people do in two years." "True." Nick conceded. The landing was routine; the two veterans grabbed their carryons and exited the plane, looking around for the car rental. "Hey, how come we get the crummy cars?" Nick asked as they squeezed into a tiny Golf. "Because this is real life and that is fantasy. You can't expect the Bureau to shell out for Lexuses and BMWs the whole time." "All right, all right, so sue me, but I like to sit in cars that are built for people with actual *legs*." Nick shifted his feet. "What a bum rap." "You think *you* got problems. Lookit me!" Will grouched. Being head and shoulders taller than Bradley, he had much longer legs. Nick may be short, but he was built like a linebacker and few people had ever taken him down. Chandler, on the other hand, was tall, lanky, and prone to trip--usually trip *up* other people. "So we got three murders, lots of insane people, and a very angry base general." "General Sidler. Mean SOB. I think we'd best keep out of his way. He doesn't like civilians." "You know him?" "Not personally. Thank god." Will started the car. "You wanna check the crime scenes first or check into the motel?" "Let's give the local police chapter a call before we head out. They might be able to shed some light on it." __________________________ Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence...it would make all fiction with it's conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable. Sir A. C. Doyle, A Case Of Identity =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: REPOST: Phile-adlephia Experiment 2/? Date: 16 Aug 1995 16:09:03 -0400 Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, ect, belong to The Big Karterhuna, his numeric company and a broadcasting station that knows genius when it sees it, durn it! Will Chandler and Nick Bradley belong to me, but don't tell them that. The concept behind it belongs to Monty. I keep telling him to leave Anik alone until she gets some free time and he decides to be sadistic to me instead. Anyone out there interested in purchasing one slightly used reticulan? Maybe he's the one messing up my posts. Rrgh! The Phile-adelphia Experiment 2/? May 24, 8 am Stonewall Motel Chandler was shaving when he heard a tapping from the other room. Looking in, he saw Bradley had set up his laptop. "What do you think you're doing, Nick?" "Ah, the joys of the internet." Nick smiled at Will's stern look. "Come on, Will, I gotta get the latest off the atxc!" "And you call *me* obsessed." Will leaned over his shoulder. "What you got?" "Um...a few new five parters, some shorts, the You Know You're An X-Phile thread, and...a spoof, I think." "Save 'em. We gotta run." Bradley shoved a disk into the laptop, saving the stories for later, and dropped the disk absently into his pocket. Will pulled on his X-Files hat and held the door. "I think, Will, that we both really, really need a life." Nick tapped the hat brim. "Wouldn't wear that to the base if I were you." Will sighed and snapped it onto his belt behind his holster. "Whatever you say, Nick." ___________________________ "Agents Chandler, Bradley." General Sidler grinned mirthlessly at them. "Good to have you here." "Wish we could say it's good to be here. Can we see where the bodies were?" Bradley asked pointedly. "I've been ordered to give you a tour of the base first." Sidler waved his hands. "As a show of...good faith, if you will." Chandler suddenly regretted their decision to meet with the general. The hour-long tour could have been conducted in half that time--all it was a bunch of barracks and the mess hall. The base was laid out with the mess hall facing north, the barracks spreading out next to it to form a sort of hexagon around a central, domed structure. "If...I can ask." Chandler broke in to the general's lecture about the importance of nutrition, "What is that?" he pointed to the domed building in the center. "That's our next stop, actually." The general led them out of the hall. "I must ask you gentlemen to sign a clearance form stating total denial of the existence of this building, should you be asked. Can't have the word of what we're doing here get around too much." "I understand completely." "Wonderful. Now, if you'll just sign on the dotted line, we can go in." Bradley shrugged, signed, and handed the pen to Chandler. He read over the document briefly before signing himself. Two soldiers hauled the door open on it's track--three feet thick, made out of steel, it looked. The whole thing was empty. "Now this is the actual test chamber itself." Sidler's bootsteps echoed on the shiny reflective floor. "You can see the control area if you look up there." He pointed to a small windowed-in room in one of the corners. "If you'd like a demonstration..." At Chandler's curt nod the general left them there, and climbed the steps to the control room. "Stay there, it's perfectly safe." He grinned. "Do you feel like a sucker?" Will asked quietly as the general began to push buttons. Nick nodded. "What's he doing?" "Good luck, Agents!" Sidler yelled into the mic before the chamber began to spin. The last thing Will noted before passing out was the floor pulling out from under him, and the walls fading... _____________________ Time/date unknown Outside Stonewall Military Base Will regained consciousness in stages--first the fact that he was still alive, followed by the fact that he could move, followed by the overwhelming fact that his head hurt. He shoved himself up, his fingers encountering dirt instead of the expected steel. He finally opened his eyes and looked around him. He was sitting on the dirt, inside a small copse of trees just beyond the base. He could see the officers walking around, and hear voices. A groan from behind him told him that Nick was up. "Hey Nick, do you get the feeling..." he trailed off as another headache pang hit him. "...We were duped?" "Yeah." Nick shook his head. "Where are we?" "Outside the base. Here." Will stood and held out his hand. "We have to get up. If the general did this for a good reason, it's lost on me." "Same here." Nick rubbed his neck. "What time is it?" "Hm." Will checked his watch. "Watch stopped. You?" "Mine's still going. Says it's nine am. Where did yours stop?" "Nine. How weird. What happened..." He stumbled unsteadily out of the trees. Everything looked normal. The police, the soldiers, the suits.... The Suits? "Nick." Will grabbed his arm. "Wha--Jesus." Nick looked at the two in shock. "Will, is it me...No, we must be hallucinating or something." "What the hell are *they* doing here?" "I don't know. Shooting an episode?" "No cameras. Nick, this is gonna sound insane--what if we got zapped?" "Zapped?" "Yah. Zapped. And those aren't..." "And instead they're...you're right, it's insane." Will rubbed his chin. "Look at it though. Now I know we didn't invite any other agents to tag along, and those two aren't exactly easy to impersonate." "Well." Nick grinned. "One way to find out." _____________________________ Feb. 24 4 pm Mulder knelt and stared at the dirt. It was, most definitely, dirt. But he hated to look like he didn't know what he was doing. Maybe they thought he was looking for distinct traces of something or other. "Find anything?" Scully asked, coming up from behind him. "No. Lots of mud. One very angry general. Trouble. All of the above." "Let's go. We can come back tomorrow." "We need to get into the base, Scully. Whatever is going on, that's what the tourists saw. That's why they were killed." "Look, Mulder, the autopsies show the weapon wasn't military issue. They weren't executed--" "The autopsies can go to hell, Scully, of course they wouldn't be stupid enough to shoot them with a military issue. They want us to think it's a sniper." He ran his hand over the damp dirt. "But they forgot one important thing." "Oh?" Scully had the polite let's-humor-Mulder look on her face. "They took the film out of all three cameras. They should have just taken the cameras themselves. Or left the film in and exposed it. You won't pull any prints off any of them, but I can guarantee all three are missing film." Scully called for the police report on it and flipped through. "You're right, Mulder." "Of course." He stood and brushed his hands on his pants. "That's why the call me Spooky." She turned to go when someone stopped her. A tall man looked down at her, his sandy brown hair falling into his eyes. Next to him a shorter man was openly staring. "Agent Scully?" The tall one asked. "Agent Mulder?" "Depends on who's asking." Mulder replied. Oh great, more official agents to escort them off the premise and follow them back to Washington. Perrrrfect. "I'm agent Will Chandler, that's Agent Bradley. We're with the VCS from the bureau." Chandler held out his ID. *More bureau people* Scully thought. *Mulder will insist they were sent as spies.* "We...have, some vital information to your case." The one called Bradley murmured. "Can we go somewhere where we could talk?" The two agents exchanged uncertain looks, telegraphing for a minute before looking back at Bradley and Chandler. "We can go back to the motel. Follow us--" "Uh...we don't exactly...have, a car." Chandler stammered. Mulder sighed. "Fine. Come with us." _________________________ =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: NEW-The Phile-adelphia Experiment 3/? Date: 18 Aug 1995 15:59:25 -0400 Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and the rest of the wonderful cast of characters of The X-Files belongs to The Great Karterhuna, his numeric company, and the broadcasting company that showed its good taste the minute it signed them on. Will Chandler and Nick Bradley belong to me. If, however improbably, you would like to use them, just ask me first. I'll say yes, I promise. Or go ask Monty and I'm sure he'll oblige too . The Phile-adelphia Experiment 3/? Feb. 24, 4:30 pm The Traveler's Motel Mulder unlocked the door to the motel room and held it for the two agents. There was something weird about the two men. They looked...bewildered. Maybe even lost. But if they could help in any way... "I'm sorry for the inconvenience." Bradley began. "We...had a bit of an accident." "At the base?" Scully asked. Will gulped and nodded. "Um...you're gonna think we're crazy." "Don't bet on it." Mulder sat on the couch. "But we weren't notified any other agents were going to be in the area." "Neither were we." Bradley smiled. "We managed to get a tour of the base...and we got into some sort of military time experiment. We think." "You lost time?" "My watch is running at nine am. But the sun's either really late rising or really early setting." Nick waved to the sunset outside the window. "If I can ask...what's the date?" "February twenty-fourth. It's four-thirty." Scully consulted her watch. "Uh...year?" "1996." "Oh shit." Will rubbed his forehead. "Our last date on them is April 95, Nick." "I know..." "Date on us?" Mulder asked politely. Will and Nick exchanged looks. Will took a deep breath. "You see...Agent Mulder...I think we lost a little more than time. In...our world?...you two don't exist." "Your world?" Scully choked. Mulder stood up. "I mean...you exist, but you...don't exist." Nick blurted. "We...oh shit." Both agents were looking at them in shock. "I assume you can prove this somehow?" Mulder finally asked. "Well...we really are agents! We work for Violent Crimes. But...the X-Files don't exist, not at the bureau." He looked nervously at Scully, who was still sitting in shock. "You're...Jesus, you're a TV show." "Us? On TV?" Mulder grinned. "That's a new twist." "I'm sure you'll excuse me if I find it a little hard to believe." Scully managed. "Yeah...we're still working on it ourselves." Will dropped his hands into his lap. "I think--" "The building you were in was a testing ground for the Philadelphia experiment. Manipulating time and space!" Mulder paced the room. "If you can prove it." "The hat!" Nick said suddenly. "Will--" Will had already snapped the hat off his belt and held it out to them. Mulder took it and held it in his hand. "Trust No One...The X-Files. Could be faked." "We wouldn't know what you've been doing recently--our series is stopped at the boxcar in New Mexico." Scully's head snapped up. "New Mexico?" "You could have read our records." Mulder pointed out. "Tooms?" Nick asked Will. He nodded. "Records." Mulder said, misinterpreting it. "3." Will told Nick. Nick shook his head and replied, "One Breath." "One Breath?" Scully asked curiously. "It's...the episode dealing with your hospitalization." "Which one?" Mulder asked. "The coma." Will watched as both agents paled. "Scully...we know what you saw. Starbuck." "No." She looked from one to the other. "This isn't the first time. Mulder, you can't believe them--" "Boggs." Will and Nick said in unison. "Kilar." Nick ventured. Mulder stopped pacing. "The Gunmen." "Alex Krycek." "Cancerman." "Duane Barry." The men started to reel off names. Mulder waved his hands. "You could have been given this information." "Samantha." Nick said quietly. "The Gregors." "Still..." Scully cut in. Mulder sat down again. "F. Emasculata." Will almost shouted. "That was completely covered up!" "You could have gotten the account from Skinner. Cancerman." "The conversation in the car." Nick said suddenly. "Nobody would know about that." "The what?" Scully asked. "It's getting a little rank in here Mulder, don't you think?" Will asked Nick. "Pine scented." Nick said. "Better? I sat through a Phillies game, an Orioles game, and four hours of Ba-Ba-Booey. When it got dark I took a walk around the block. Do you have the sandwich I asked you to bring?" "Liverwurst." Will grinned. "Fox--" Mulder winced at the use of his first name. "Mulder." Nick corrected. "I even make my parents call me Mulder. So...Mulder." "Mulder. I wouldn't put my life on the line for anyone but you." "If that's an ice tea in that bag...could be love." Nick concluded. "Must be fate." Will grinned optimistically. "Root Beer." Both men looked at the other two. Scully was clasping her hands until they turned white. Mulder's face was completely drained of color. "I...knew we were being watched." He said slowly. "I had no idea it was that extensive. Who put you up to it? X? Cancerman? Skinner?" "Nobody!" Nick yelled. "Somehow we've crossed wires and ended up in some sort of parallel universe. No Skinner, No X, no Krycek. We saw it...on the television." "Scully." Will begged. "When you were in the coma, you saw your father. You were on...the boat, and you could see Nurse Owens and Melissa. And the rope broke..." "He's right, Mulder." She looked at Will. "I didn't tell anyone that. Not even my sister." "And Mulder." Nick whirled on him. "When you were in LA--Kristen Kilar. The explosion. We know what happened before she died--" "Nobody knew that!" Mulder exploded, then looked miserable. "Nobody knew about Kristen." "Who?" Scully asked. "A case when you were...gone." Nick explained. "When the Visitors took you. We saw that, too. And I know where they took the Erlenmeyer Flask." "Where?" Mulder asked, momentarily distracted. "Where they put the implant from your first case together--a basement stockroom in the pentagon. Cancerman takes them there himself." The X-Files agents looked at each other. "Mulder, what if they are...?" "You have to believe us. Why would we lie?" "I don't know that, either." Mulder ran a hand through his hair. "A TV show, you say?" "On the Fox network. Fridays at nine. But the season finale ended on April of 1995. With Mulder stuck in the burning boxcar." Mulder shuddered. "Hey...how'd you get out?" Will asked. Mulder shrugged. "Storage hatch." "Cool." Nick grinned. "And the bodies?" "Destroyed." Mulder threw up his hands. "Scully, how could they...you couldn't know all that." "But we do." Will said stubbornly. "Uh...Nick, you saw Ice." "Yeah?" "I don't trust them. I want to trust you." Will mimicked Mulder's voice. "How would we know about that?" "Can we talk for a minute?" Mulder asked them. Will nodded and went into the adjoining room. "Mulder...I didn't tell anyone about the coma. I barely told you." Scully managed. "And nobody knew about...Kilar." He choked slightly. "What if they're telling the truth?" "That's a pretty long shot. Hard to believe people would voluntarily watch us crawl through slime." Scully smiled. "If this is a fake...why? There must be an easier way to kill us off or get rid of us or whatever They wants to do to us." "Have you had any contact with X recently?" He shook his head. "Not since the incident with the papers after the boxcar." "That's as far as their knowledge extends. So they say." Scully looked down. "Hard to accept that complete strangers know the intimate details of your life." "Part and parcel of the whole paranoia business we specialize in." "So what do we do?" "I don't know." He sat on the bed. "For now, I guess we believe them." =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Subject: Phile-adelphia Experiment 4/? Date: 25 Aug 1995 15:53:56 -0400 Hi everyone, sorry for the wait, my aol program crashed and went byebye for a week. Doncha just love computers? Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and their universe belong to Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen productions, and Fox Broadcasting. No infringement intended, and since I don't see any money or any lawsuits for this story I assume they don't mind. There actually is a story like the one called The Faith Theory but I don't remember what the title was or who wrote it. Will Chandler, Nick Bradley, and their universe, however, are copyrighted to me, Ra Enright, as is this story. I don't care where it goes as long as my name goes with it. If you can figure out how to make money offa it, please send half to me. I could use it. The Phile-adelphia Experiment 4/? Tues., Feb. 24, around 4:30 pm The Traveler's Motel "Do you think they believe us?" Will asked as he washed his face in the other room, splashing cold water on it in an attempt to wake himself up. "I don't know. Would you? If two total strangers showed up on one of your cases and claimed you were nothing but a fictional TV show?" "Guess not." Will reached for a hand towel. "What if it brought them here...like to our universe?" "Improbable. We're the ones who got zapped in the spin chamber or whatever it was. There's one way to find out...call the bureau." "What if we exist in this universe too?" Nick asked. "Good lord, I sound like an extra on Star Trek." Will had already taken out his cellphone. "Hey...there's no dial tone!" "It isn't registered in this galaxy." Nick grinned. Will sighed and picked up the bedside phone. "Hi, Agent Chandler, badge number CJA-0567-079333--no, Chandler. No? What about Bradley? Violent Crimes. Are you sure? OK, thanks anyway. Yeah, I must." He hung up. "They have no records of a Will Chandler or a Nick Bradley in the VCS unit records. They suggest we might have the wrong law enforcement agency." "Try calling one of the series characters. Skinner?" "We don't know his number." "So call the bureau back and ask." "Yeah, right, and risk getting my butt kicked on crank calling charges? I don't think so." "Well, I guess that settles where we are." "Maybe this is some unconscious fantasy or something." Will suggested. "Here--ouch." He rammed his leg into the side of the bedframe. "Well, that rules that out." "The Faith Theory?" Nick suggested. "The what?" "The Faith Theory. It's a science fiction story I read a while back." "At this point, why not?" Nick thought for a minute. "It's about this man who decides to go on television and spend the night in a 'haunted' house with only a bible and a bowl of holy water. Chained to a bed. He set it up to look like a huge monster came but his faith in God drove it off." "Failing to see the significance of this." Will ran a hand through his hair. "After it was over, there were thousands of people sitting in their living rooms, believing this monster had come up out of a pool of sludge and tried to eat him. Their faith was so strong that something actually appeared. And killed the poor sucker." "Sounds like an episode from the Twilight Zone." "Didn't some critic say the X-Files was Dragnet in the Twilight Zone?" Nick pointed out. "So look at it this way...so many people want to believe, want to think this show is real, that they made some sort of...physical fabrication out of it. They created a new universe." "Like in the fanfic club." Will snapped his fingers. "If we can find that newsgroup, we'll know this is some sort of a ruse or a weird dream." "I've got the disk with the fanfic on it." Nick patted his pocket. "That's how we prove to *them* that we really are out of place." Will knocked swiftly and poked his head in the door. "Agent Scully? Can we use your laptop? I think we have a way to prove ourselves." Scully, looking slightly more collected than before, shrugged and pointed to the computer sitting on the table. Nick turned it on and popped the disk in. "In our universe...or whatever," He began, "You guys have a cult fan following. And that includes fan fiction." "Fan *fiction*?" Mulder asked, incredulous. "Yeah, people write their own stories about you." Nick grinned. "Here we go!" Accessing the disk, he scrolled down the list of titles. "I downloaded these this morning, before we left. I must have put them in my pocket without thinking." "Thread: You know you're an X-Phile when...what the hell is an X-Phile?" "A fan of the show." Will responded. "Catchy, huh?" Mulder squinted at the small screen. "This is about *us*?" "Uh-huh." Nick responded. "All about you two and the cases you work on. Most of it's pretty good, too." He selected one and opened it. "This one looks interesting...about poltergeists. I think you get beat up, Mulder." "What else is new?" he asked cynically. "And this is on the internet?" "Not in this world." Will mumbled. "Not if all of you actually exist." "We can check." Nick said brightly. "Here." He plugged in the modem. "Scully, can you get us in?" She reached over and typed the password in. Nick watched as the sign-on format came up. "We can enter the address...alt.tv.xfiles.creative." The computer screen flashed: NO MATCH. A list of close addresses came up: alt.tv.archfiles.creative alt.tv.sliders.creative alt.tv.startrek.creative alt.tv.starwars.creative alt.tv.twinpeaks.creative "Archfiles?" Will asked. "Never saw that one before." "This world's equivalent of the X-Files?" "Maybe." Nick selected it. "Here's the list." "I saw that, I think." Mulder said. "Once. I think I fell asleep." "Only one way to find out." Nick opened one of the text files. -- Subj: New Short-Might Be From: ArchRunner@aol.com Date: 2-12-96 11:21:00 EDT Message ID: Hi everyone! Well, I was kicking around the creative soccer ball with some friends and I thought up this little short. Mostly it's a filler for all those 'off-hours' our heroes seem to take, and what they do in them. Comments, corrections, and flames are welcome! The ArchFiles, Will Chandler, and Nick Bradley all belong to Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen Productions(I made this!) and Fox Broadcasting. I merely use them without permission. The story, however, belongs to me. Enjoy! Might Be... An ArchFiles Fanfic by Arch Runner -- "Will..." Nick said shakily. "I see, I see!" Will muttered. "The ArchFiles. Nick--it's us." "Surprise surprise." Mulder said. "It looks like none of us exist." "I am *not* a fictional character." Nick exclaimed. "Actually..." Will trailed. "It makes a sort of twisted sense. But look who created us, Nick." "Chris Carter?" "Uh-huh." Will nodded. "The same man. And I bet if we took a look at program credits we'd see Morgan and Wong somewhere." Nick gulped and switched the computer off. "The ArchFiles." Mulder rubbed his forehead. "So. How did you get from *there*," he gestured to the now blank computer screen, "To *here?*" "We got a tour of the base. General Sidler showed us the central building. Suckered us into asking for a 'test' of the new technology. The next thing we knew, the room was spinning and we woke up outside the base. Right near you." Nick pointed at them. "In your world." Scully said. "That's right." Will shook his head. "But you're just fictional." "I seem pretty real to me." Mulder looked at his hands. "Yeah, I'm definetely real in this universe, anyway. If anything, you two are fiction. You're the ones with a newsgroup devoted to you." "So what do we do?" Nick asked in a small voice. "It's too late to go back to the base tonight." Scully stood up. "And I'm hungry." After a few seconds of frantic telegraphing, Nick and Will both nodded. "We can explain more of our situation over dinner." =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Subject: Phile-adelphia Experiment 5/? Date: 25 Aug 1995 15:54:11 -0400 Mulder, Scully, and their universe belong to Chris Carter et cetera, and are used without his permission. I couldn't find his phone number. Nick Bradley, Will Chandler, The ArchFiles, and their universe belong to me, as does this story. I don't care who reads it as long as my name goes with it and no money is made off of it(At least, without sending half to me!). A recommendation-read Trepanning Opera. It's like calisthenics for the mind. I think I pulled a lobe... The Phile-adelphia Experiment 5/? The city of Stonewall was stereotypically small, no more than one of any sort of shop, supported almost entirely by soldiers from the base. The small restaraunt was homey. Will liked it from the start. The waitress brought their menus, took their orders, and left them staring at each other. "You don't believe us, do you?" Will asked. "Really can't blame you." "It's a little far-reaching." Mulder nodded. "But we don't have much of a choice. For now." "Is there anything you can think of that nobody else might know?" Nick took a sip of his water. "Odds are it might have been on the show." Mulder and Scully exchanged looks. "I don't suppose mentioning Deep Throat or Mr. X would do any good." he sighed. "Who are Morgan and Wong?" Scully asked suddenly. "And...Chris Carter? You mentioned them when we accessed your newsgroup." "Chris Carter--in our world--created The X-Files. Morgan and Wong were writers for it." "And now they're working for you." Mulder said. "It seems we've switched places. What are the ArchFiles, anyway?" "You got me." Will played with a saltshaker. "We're plain Violent Crimes agents. No Arches. Unless you count the McDonalds across E street." "The mystery deepens." Nick took the shaker from him before he broke it. "I assume you actually *do* work in the basement? Under Skinner?" Scully nodded as the food arrived. "Who do you work for?" "Section Head Miles." Mulder shook his head. "Never heard of him." "Well, that makes sense. The shows are both based in reality, but the characters created by someone. Both by Chris Carter." "And you're saying our movements in this world and yours in your world are dictated by some writers?" Mulder took a bite of his hamburger. "I find *that* hard to believe. Sounds like something you talk about in philosophy class." "It does, doesn't it?" Will asked. "But that doesn't explain our current problem. And it puts you at a disadvantage." "How's that?" "We're both fans of your show. You've never seen ours. For us, it's like we've known you for three years. Maybe longer." "Good point." "And we know your weaknesses." "Oh really." Mulder frowned. "Such as...?" "Well, there's the obvious--Samantha. And the serial killer--who was the guy who knocked you down the stairs, Scully?" "Pfaster." "Right. Anyway, there's the hallucinations involved with *that*. We even know that all those tapes in Mulder's desk don't belong to him." Scully smiled slightly as Mulder blinked. Will leaned forward. "Look, why would we care about that sort of thing if we were just watching you? If Cancer Man had put us up to it? Who would bother?" "Will." Nick bit into his sandwich, shewed thoughtfully, and swallowed audibly. "Do you think he knows about his father?" "What about my father?" Mulder stared at the man. "What do you know about him?" "You may already know. The night he called you...earlier in the day he had a conversation with Cancer Man." "With *who*?" Scully asked. "Cancerman came to his house. Talked with him. They worked together years earlier. That's all we know." Nick said tersely as Mulder kept staring. "We don't know if you ever found out. His name was in the Navajo-encoded papers you took to New Mexico." "The ones that were stolen when Scully left the motel." Mulder said, not taking his eyes off Nick. "That's why they wanted him dead." "They sent Krycek to kill him, and then they sent him after you." Will distracted him. "They couldn't have known how much he told you." "Sons of bitches." Mulder said softly. "Damned sons of bitches lied to him." "The papers were stolen?" Nick asked Scully. "Right after connection was broken. We went to the ravine...when we got back, they were all gone. The bodies burned. All evidence destroyed." She answered. "They talked about the papers you had--he told your father to lie to you. To deny everything." Will continued. Mulder rubbed his forehead. "I'll be right back." He stood and headed for the bathroom. Scully watched him for a few minutes before turning back to the two men. "That wasn't smart." She said angrily. "But you have to understand, we need you to believe us." Nick pleaded. "Look, I don't fancy spending the rest of my life in the Twilight Zone of the nineties. Not that it isn't tempting," He grinned, "but we don't belong here." "You certainly don't." She retorted, still angry. Will cringed. *Never thought I'd be on the recieving end of Dana Scully's wrath.* Scully got up and followed Mulder, leaving the two men to stare blankly at each other. _____________________________ Mulder splashed a little cold water on his face and pulled a paper towel out of the slot. He dried himself off and looked at his reflection. Same face...same hair...dark circles under his eyes attesting to the fact that his father's death hurt him more than he let on. And the comments from Bradley and Chandler had cut him to the quick. His dad? And Cancer Man? Bad enough if they knew each other, worse if they'd worked together...but how much did he know? How much had his father known about his activities over the years? If Cancer Man followed his movements, and he was sure he did, then had he told Bill Mulder what his son was doing? Defiance of Bureau regulations, black marks on his record, official reprimands, menial surveillance work--no wonder his father wasn't proud of him. If he'd known all that went on, why should he be? Too many questions and not enough answers. And the two agents. Could he believe them? Could he afford to? Or not to? Tossing the paper towel in the garbage, he opened the door. Scully was standing there, her hand raised to knock. "I was just going to check on you." She said, lowering her hand. "Are you all right?" "It caught me by surprise. I'm fine." He responded coldly. "Let's go. We have a lot to go over." _________________________ The ride back to the motel was quiet, the two ArchFiles agents smarting from Scully's scoldings, and the two X-Files agents caught up in their own thoughts. "We can give you one of the rooms." Mulder handed the key to his room to Will. "We need to talk privately." Will nodded, subdued, and opened the door. Nick followed him in and it shut behind them. Scully opened the other door and held it for him as he brushed past her inside. "Do you think we can trust them?" She asked carefully. He shook his head. "If they're telling the truth, Scully, if they're telling the truth--could be a huge cover-up involved. And if they're lying, they must have a link to that bastard. Either way, we don't have much of a choice." "And if they are connected to him, what do we do?" "We wait it out. If they are, they most likely know where Krycek is." His eyes glittered. "And if they do, I swear I'll find him." Scully just sat on the bed. It was going to be a long night. =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Subject: Phile-adelphia Experiment 6/? Date: 28 Aug 1995 12:18:55 -0400 The X-Files universe belongs to Chris Carter. I can handle that. I don't have his permission to use these characters so if he wants to sue me he can. Free publicity, and since I'm a minor and didn't make any money off of it I'll probably win, and then I get money from the book and movie deals. So I don't mind. HOWever, the ArchFiles universe belongs to me. Monty put this in my head so if you have any complaints about character assassination or any other silly thing like that take it up with him. Also thanks to Peregrine Craig, very nice person who helped me edit it. The Phile-adelphia Experiment 6/? Feb 25, 10 am Headed towards Stonewall Military Base "What are we going to tell the general? Hi sir, two fictional characters are here to see you?" "And what if he watches the show? And if someone sees us..." "Keep quiet and let us do the talking." Mulder finally said. Will and Nick smartly did as he said. "They have a point, Mulder." Scully looked out the windshield. "It's going to be like traveling with two celebrities." "We aren't that popular." Will protested. "Uh...are we?" "We're here." Mulder ignored the question. A man in a private's uniform ran up to the car. "Sirs, ma'am...I'm afraid General Sidler can't see you right now. He sent me to ask you to come with me." A puzzled look crossed his face. "Sirs...? No, I'm sorry. This way, please." "How much you want to bet he was wondering if they were who he thought they were?" Mulder murmured to Scully as they followed the young man. "General Sidler said I was to give you a tour and answer any questions you may have." The young man, whose nametag read 'V. Gilligan', smiled amiably. "Where would you like to start?" "Ah, we've already seen most of the base." Will cut in. "We were wondering if we could possibly tour that building." He pointed to the same central domed structure. Gilligan shrugged. "Sure. Come on." Mulder shot the two agents a questioning look and cocked his head to one side. Nick looked at him blankly and shrugged. "I really don't know why you'd want to see it. It's just where we store all the food for the mess hall. The non-perishables." Gilligan continued, crossing the compound. Halfway there, Nick began to feel nauseous. He glanced at Will, who was pale, his fists balled at his sides as if he was straining to keep in control. Mulder and Scully walked on, oblivious. The closer he got, the harder it hit him. Dizziness, and a growing knot in the pit of his stomach. His mouth went dry and he began to cough, quietly at first. Will was shaking his head in confusion. *What's going on?> They were maybe ten yards from the building when Will collapsed, dropping to his knees in the dust. Nick yelled and grabbed his arms, waving for Mulder to help him before he fell too. Scully grabbed the fallen agent by the armpits and eased him to the ground. He continued to cough, and bile was rising in his throat. Gillgian stood by helplessly. Scully took his pulse, shook her head, examined his eyes. "He's having some sort of seizure. Give him room." Nick stumbled backwards, into Mulder. "It's something in the building. We've got to move him." Mulder looked indecisive for a minute--do I believe him?--and then pulled Scully back. "Something from the base...help me move him." He grabbed Will by the shoulders. Carrying him would be impossible, but if Scully took his legs..."Private! Could we get a hand here?" Mulder barked. Gilligan's jaw was hanging open, but he nodded. Scully moved away and he took Will's legs. "Move him to the barracks. Over there!" The wind whipped the dust into his eyes, obscuring Nick's view of where they were headed. He felt Scully grab him by the back of his jacket and pull his arm over her shoulder. Greatful for the assistance, he leaned on her and kept an eye on Mulder and the private. Once inside the barracks, the private ordered two men off their bunks and helped Mulder dump Will onto the nearest one. The convulsions had stopped some time in transit, but his breathing was still erratic. "Sir? Sir, are you all right?" another private asked Nick. He nodded and sat at the foot of the bed. "Holy Christ." He breathed. "What happened?" "A tear in reality...two universes crossing over--manipulation of space..." Mulder was muttering to himself, pacing back and forth in front of the bunk. Finally he pulled out his phone and tried to make a call. The line was dead. "Electrical problems. We have interference all the time." Gilligan answered smoothly. Another soldier brought two cups of water. Nick smiled greatfully and accepted the cup. "I'm sure you'll be able to call once you get off base." Mulder just shot the man an okay-I'll-play-along look and replaced the phone. "Of course. Agent Bradley...?" "M'fine." Bradley managed. "Go on, I just need a few minutes." Scully nodded. "Private Gilligan, if we could see the storage area..." "Well..."Gilligan looked thoughtful. "We should restrict the area. Wouldn't want anyone else getting hurt. I think it would be best if nobody went too near until we can check it for radiation, toxic fumes, anything like that." The walkie-talkie on his hip scratched to life. "Come in, Private." Gilligan flipped the machine off his hip and answered. "Yessir!" Mulder's eyes narrowed. Walkie-talkies worked, but advanced technology cellular phones didn't? He strained to hear what the other man was saying, but he could only hear Gilligan's side. "Yes sir--oh, you saw? Yes...I think so, cordon off the area. No, just one. Agent...?" Gilligan shot Mulder a questioning look. "Chandler. And Bradley." "Agent Chandler, sir. Agent Bradley appears to be a tad disoriented." Gilligan smiled suddenly. "No sir, I don't think so. Yes, it might at that." With a decisive movement he thumbed the thing off and replaced it. "General Sidler says he feels awful. He's coming down to extend his apologies in person." "Very...kind of him." Nick said from the bed. "Don't suppose I could get some asprin?" "I'll check at the infirmary." And Gilligan was gone. ___________________ Sidler was a large man, imposing even in informal khaki combat clothes. He had piercing eyes and rather longer than standard cut grey hair, though he didn't look to be more than forty, at the harshest estimation. He smiled widely, and his broad face was friendly, certainly more friendly than private Gilligan's had been. "Agents Mulder, Scully, I'm sorry we had to meet under these conditions." He held out his hand. Mulder took it. "As are we, General. Our...associates, seem to have had an unfortunate reaction to you food storage unit." "Most of the men around here have unfortunate reactions to the *food*." Sidler grinned. Scully rolled her eyes at Mulder from her seat on the bed, behind the General's back. Mulder nodded gravely. "Sorry about the inconvenience, but we have had to close off the area until we figure out what's wrong." Sidler waved his hands helplessly. "And if you were to collapse, who would carry you back?" Nick, who had been leaning against the bunk frame, eyes closed, shifted uncomfortably. Will still hadn't regained consciousness, though his heart rate and breathing had steadied. Apparently he'd fallen asleep. Nick opened his eyes for a minute...that voice sounded familiar...but that was *not* general Sidler. General Sidler didn't joke. General Sidler was a short, brown-haired man with a mean face and stern disposition. That was NOT him. He concentrated through the haze that covered his vision--he must be delerious, or sick like Will. Who was that guy? Sidler turned to face him for a minute and started when he saw him watching him. He got a full face view before the man quickly turned back and shook agent Mulder's hand again. Then he ran off, apparently in a hurry to get out of there. *Well, no wonder,* his mind thought sluggishly. *Man must have lots to do. Bet people are always pestering him anyway for autographs and such.* Only natural...everyone who watched the X-Files knew who he was. Of course--that wasn't the base commander. That was Chris Carter. What was he doing in Stonewall Massachusettes? =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Subject: Phile-adelphia Experiment 7/? Date: 28 Aug 1995 12:19:19 -0400 Me again, yeah, the weirdo who writes this stuff... Standard disclaimer...Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, et cetera, belong to Chris Carter, who I assume belongs to himself...yeahhhh, he's in this...Nick and Will are taken from reality, names have been changed, not to protect the innocent(they aren't) but to keep it mysterious...you guys know who you are. The Phile-adelphia Experiment 7/? Feb 25, 2 pm Traveler's Motel Will, for the second time in as many days, woke up with a headache and the memory of the base. Something was being dribbled into his mouth. Ah...bless the man who invented straws... He blinked and opened his eyes. "Whr m'I?" he mumbled. "Hell. Time has come to an end as we know it and we're trapped in the afterlife with no way out." A familiar voice answered him. Nick's face hung above him. "Nick, you jerk." He enunciated clearly. "He'll be fine." Nick said to someone he couldn't see. "He's just going to have an attitude for a while." "I have a headache that would kill Godzilla and you talk about attitudes. Give me some asprin and go away." "It'll fade." Nick replied, leaning back and handing him a small white pill. "Agent Scully made sure you were okay." "To whom I am indebted." Will tried to push himself up. "What happened?" "You collapsed." Scully said from the couch. "I kind of figured that." Will touched his temples lightly. "We must have had a reaction to the...whatever it was." "The closer we got, the worse it felt." Nick looked at him glumly. "You took a dive, man." "Are you okay?" "Yeah...I think so." Nick shook his head. "Really weird." "What?" "I'll tell you later." "Where's Mulder?" "Phoning the Gunmen." "Cool." _____________________ The phone rang three times before someone finally picked up. "Lone Gunmen!" "Byers, turn the tape recorder off." "Mulder? Hang on a minute." There was a small click and a short pause before he came back on the line. "What can we do for you, Mulder?" "Listen." Mulder lowered his voice on the cellular phone to keep Chandler and Bradley from overhearing in the next room. "I need you to do a background check for me in any law enforcement database you can find. Two men, one about six one, blonde hair, green eyes, the other around five six, dark brown hair, brown eyes, built like a linebacker for the Redskins. Names of Will Chandler and Nick Bradley, but that might not be their real names." Byers chuckled. "Why, Mulder, starting a fan club?" "I'm sorry?" "You just described the ArchFiles stars." "Yeah, I know, just do it." "Do you want us to check their *real* names too?" "Real names?" "Mulder, how much sleep did you get last night? You're moving kind of slow." Frohike broke in on the conversation, picking up the other phone. "Not nearly enough. What do you mean, real names?" "As in, the actors who *play* them? Daniel Duke and George Andurs?" "Oh...yeah, that too. Can you get into the CIA records? DEA, covert actions, maybe even CSIS?" "They do film in Canada." Frohike said. "We can check. Is this for an investigation?" "Ung...sort of." Mulder said noncommitally. "And dig up anything you can on time/space manipulation." "Just what did you fall into, Mulder?" Frohike asked. "Time/space manipulation and cult science fiction shows? Please don't tell me you zapped Scully into a TV set." "Actually it's more of the other way around." Mulder cracked. "Call me once you get it." "Mulder--" Byers tried before Mulder disconnected. He turned to Frohike. "Did he just say what I thought he just said?" Frohike shrugged. "With Mulder you never know. You get started on the time/space stuff. I'll see what I can hack into for him. Maybe he'll get us some hard evidence this time." ____________________________ Nick cleared his throat. "Uh...Agent Scully...can I talk to Will for a minute?" Scully started, and realized she'd been staring off into space. "Sure. Call if anything happens." "Will do." Nick gave her a fake grin and a mock salute. "What's up?" Will asked as soon as the door shut behind her. "Chandler, you will not believe who I saw at the base." "So...?" Nick's eyes were intense, no hint of joking. "When you went down General Sidler came down to apologize. We hauled you over to the barracks and we both took it pretty hard. But I could swear that I saw Chris Carter." "You're crazy." "Yeah, that's what I thought. So I asked Mulder, just to be sure, what the guy looked like. He described a tall, grey-haired guy. Now that could be a lot of people, but it's awfully suspicious, don't you think?" "But...he doesn't...jeez, I wish someone would explain what's going on." Will moaned. "Somebody give me a script or *some*thing." "Agent Bradley." Mulder leaned in the door. "We dug up a digitally scanned photo of General Sidler for you." He gestured to the other room. There, on Scully's screen, was indisputable evidence. It could have been autographed by him and it wouldn't be any more obvious. General Sidler, was, undoubtedly, Chris Carter. ___________________________ After another thorough explanation to Mulder and Scully, who were at this point resigned to listening to insane concepts, they spent the afternoon trying to figure out what to do next. Calling the gereal seemed fruitless...what more could they learn? And if they gave him the wrong impression, they lost any chance of investigation in the future. "The way I see it, we can do one of three things." Will ticked them off on his fingers. "We can resign ourselves, go back to Washington and build new identities..." "We still have a triple murder case to solve." Mulder put in. "Two, we can call Sidler direct and explain everything, hope he understands and doesn't have us committed..." "Not my favorite option." Nick said dryly. "Three, we can try to figure out how the spin chamber works and get into it without killing ourselves." "Which would most likely require breaking into the base and covertly activating it." "Sounds like fun." Mulder deadpanned. "Do we get to dress all in black and play SWAT-team?" "Well, it's obvious *we* can't do it." Nick retorted. "Mulder..."Scully motioned to the screen. "Look at this." She highlighted a line of text in the background report on the general. "A severe case of amnesia reported in 1993--apparently psychological, no recognizable symptoms--complete personality change, seven months spent in the hospital. Assigned to Stonewall base shortly after." "Chris Carter was zapped too?" Will asked. "That would explain it...if he took over Sidler's job. But then he's still on the other side. So maybe we are too? No, but everyone would notice, they looked nothing alike." Nick went off on a verbal tangent. "Sidler looks a lot different. And--hey...wait a minute. Scully, run a background check on--" "Chris Carter!" Will caught on. "Can we get photo ID?" "Working on it." "I'll be damned." The screen scrolled down with a page on Chris Carter, creator/producer of The ArchFiles. Short, with dark brown hair and a mean face--a blast from Nick and Will's world. General Sidler. _______________________________ Traveler's Motel Feb 25, 8 pm. After much consideration, Nick decided that the whole day had blown his mind and declared he was going to go lie down. Mulder agreed that none of them were operating at full capacity, and ordered Will to go with him. He could stand another night on the couch in Scully's room. Will was randomly flipping channels on the TV set--sound off, Nick *was* trying to sleep, but he was much to wound up--when he came across the Prevu™ channel. Hypnotised, he watched program choices scroll past. This universe wasn't so different from his after all, he supposed. Aha! There it was! "Nick, wake up, wake up!" Nick rolled over, tangled his legs in the covers, and sat up. "What! Who? Where?" "Check this out!" Will punched the channel into the remote. Suspensful synthesizer music filled the room as the mute went off. Two men with guns burst through the door. The ArchFiles. Starring Daniel Duke. Co-Starring George Andurs. Created by Chris Carter. Pack Your Gun. Nick sat up straight. "What the hell kind of slogan is that?" "Look at that! It's us!" "I know, Will. I could have guessed that." The two men sat, fascinated, watching the final credits roll across the screen. The last shot showed their office--true to form--with the arch over the doorway highlighted. "Of course! That arch that's been there since Hoover!" "Ugh, the art deco thing?" "The *ARCH*Files!" "They couldn't think of anything better?" The door opened and Scully looked in, wrapped in a bathrobe. "What's going on?" "It's our show!" they chorused. Her head disappeared, and Mulder leaned in instead. "Your show?" "The ArchFiles!" The post-theme-song commercials ended and Nick waved them quiet. There they were, on the screen. That sounded awfully familiar. Nick looked at Will. "Didn't we solved that one about six months ago?" "Yeees...Now be quiet." __________________________ At the end of the hour they were confused, but not much the wiser. For the ArchFiles agents it was like a rerun of their life...televised and with dramatic music added. They all exchanged looks--Nick rolled over and switched the lamp nearest him off. Mulder and Scully silently left. Will shook his head. *The morning.* he said firmly to himself. *We'll talk about it in the morning.* In the morning...Mulder was gone. With the car. As Alice would say, curioser and curioser. Hang in there, part 8 is on the way. It doesn't look like this is gonna stop short of ten parts at least, so if you don't like looong stories with many multiple parts, I'd suggerst you bail out now. Seeya!! =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Subject: Phile-adelphia Experiment 8/13 Date: 30 Aug 1995 16:19:49 -0400 Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and The X-Files universe belong to Chris Carter. Chris Carter belongs to himself. I merely borrow these people. No money has been made so I don't see a problem. Nick Bradley and Will Chandler belong to me, however, as does the ArchFiles universe. And I'm darned proud of it! The Phile-adelphia Experiment 8/? 3 am Outside Stonewall Base Mulder gritted his teeth and thanked whatever particular guardian was watching over him for making the soldiers at this particular base forget to lock the service door to the mess hall. He thought, at first, he'd just been strung out, hyper, and after a few hours he'd be able to get some sleep. Around 2 am he realized he wasn't going to fall asleep anytime soon. Might as well put his insomnia to good use. So here he was, sneaking through the mess hall, to the General's office. To see what the hell was going on. He felt a light breeze blow in from the door and his shoulders twitched involuntarily. He grimaced and lifted the latch carefully to gain entrance to the compound. The General's office was above the infirmary, across the center of the base. Under the floodlights. But if he snaked around back-- In! The general's door was locked, but a quick jerk of the wrist showed it was the doorknob. First thing he learned from life at college--how to unlock a doorknob from the outside. Well, he really was getting to play SWAT team. He slid easily into the general's chair and punched the computer on, careful not to displace anything. The screen came up--the military used Windows 95. Figured. He wasn't familiar with the program, but how hard could it be? Okay...so how did he access top secret data? Hard copy? Naw. Hard disk? Gotta be kidding. Which left only floppies. A drawer full of them. This guy was a classic inept officer--he *labeled* his disks Top Secret? Mulder chuckled to himself. "Cake walk." Warning: Files Password Protected. Enter password. The cursor blinked. Okaaay... _________________________ Password accepted. What a maroon, he thought. Come on, using Carter as a password? Who was this guy? But he was in. Only one file: Loc.txt. Loc? What was Loc? Communique from Lieutenant Vlahos. 9/28/95 General-- Lab tests are back--rift opening is no problem, sir, but the closure is. We can get it open from this side--we can even send men through. But...nobody's come back. What's going on on your side of the universe? Communique dated 2/25/96 Yeah! General, you are NOT going to believe this. Colorado!!! Sorry, sir, but it's a big breakthrough for our side. Your men--all of them--are showing up in *Boulder*! How do you like them apples? We've got our top men on it, sir, but we could use some...well, some funding. We've got to build another base on this side. Locals are suspicious and all that. You should too--our men say they can reverse the problem of distortion if you can send from the vicinity. And sir...none of your men have survived. I'm sorry. So--here's how it's going to work? We can send to you through Stonewall--but you have to send *back* through Boulder base. You guys got a base there in that universe? Hope we can iron out our mutual problems. Until then officers are standing by. --Vlahos. "Oh my god." Mulder grabbed the disk from the slot--no time to make a copy, suddenly adrenaline rushed to his brain and he had to get out, before Sidler or Vlahos came back, never mind that it was three in the morning... The computer--switch it off. Shove the disk back in the drawer and GET THE HELL OUT!!! He ran for the car, for the hotel...no, he should go to the airport--Sidler was on his way to Colorado, he was sure of it. The communique was dated today, no, yesterday, which menat Sidler(Carter?) couldn't have that much of a head start. Twelve hours? Maybe less. Was there a base in Boulder? He couldn't remember. He...they...had to catch up with him. Carter/Sidler was the key to getting Chandler and Bradley back to their world-- He hoped. __________________________ 7am, Feb 26 The Traveler's Motel Dana Scully was used to barging into motel rooms unannounced. It was part of her job, and as often as not it was her partner who was doing the barging as well. She never even thought about it anymore--if she had something important to say, Mulder wouldn't care if he was in his boxers or not. Wasn't like she'd never seen him in them before. The problem with a mindset like that is that it's all too easy to forget you aren't going to see your partner on the other side of the door if your partner is missing. Which is exactly what she did when she found out both Mulder and the rental car were gone. The door to the adjacent room banged open--Will sat up in his bed like he'd been shot and looked around, confused but instantly alert. Nick, in the bathroom, dropped his razor. "Jesus, give a guy a chance to get decent!" Will exclaimed, pulling the blanket around his hips, clad only in boxers. "Scully--" "Hey, she can see me indecent anytime she wants." Nick said, emerging from the bathroom with a towel around his waist. "Our suits are smelling a bit rank anyway." He sniffed as he picked up his shirt. When he saw her expression, he sobered. "What's up?" "Mulder's gone. So is the car. Did he tell either of you--" "Gone? As in, ran off, or as in kidnapped?" Will reached for his pants. "I don't know. I think we would have heard it if he'd been kidnapped; Mulder isn't one to go silently...but he should have at least left a note--" "Like...um...this?" Nick had wandered into the other room and was holding up a slip of paper. "Taped to your laptop? Scully, went on a food run. Be back soon. Mulder." Scully reddened and took the note from him. "He done this before?" Will surmised. "Like in the arctic circle?" "Hey, don't worry about it. The best of us freak out when our partner vanishes. And Mulder has a knack for doing that." Nick comforted. "Give us some time to get dressed and I bet he shows up." As he spoke a car screetched outside and all three heads turned. Mulder charged into Scully's room, barely stopping to look around. "Scully?" "In here Mul--what's wrong?" He was running around the room, grabbing his overcoat, his phone, and his ID. "Get your stuff. Sidler's on his way to Colorado and we have to get there soon." "Sidler's where?" Nick gaped. "He's on a flight, right now, bound for Boulder. If we don't get there soon it may be your last chance to get home." He tossed Will's tie to him. "Come on, we're already booked on the next flight out. We have twenty minutes." ________________________ Fifteen minutes later, a half-shaved Bradley and groggy Chandler followed Mulder and Scully, both looking more than a little scruffy, to the entrance gate. "Delayed! Damn!" Mulder whirled. "He could *be* there by now!" "Mulder! Calm down!" Scully grabbed his sleeve. "Slow down. Use words containing no more than two syllables. What is going on?" He took a few deep breaths. "I broke into the General's office. He recieved a communiqué from a man named Vlahos telling him that the transfer point *back* from this world was in Boulder. It was dated late yesterday, so we have to assume he has a least six to ten hours head start over us. That's enough time to be there already." "So why are we hurrying?" Scully reasoned. "Because I don't think he left immediately. He'd ahve to tie up matters at the base and gain a leave of absence, which can take time. I don't think he left more than four hours ago." _______________________ the plot is thickening...tho thickening I thould thop right here. What do you thay? No? Okay, you talked me out of it. Part nine is not required reading--it's my own little comedic flight of fancy and details the flight from Mass. to Boulder, CO. But I gurantee it's the funniest part of this whole awful thing. =========================================================================== From: RaEnright@aol.com Date: Wed, 13 Sep 1995 19:37:30 -0400 Subject: Phile-adelphia 9 and 10 The Phile-adelphia Experiment 9/13 Massachusetts int'l airport 7:30 am, Feb 26 Flight delayed. Every minute, General Sidler(Or was it Carter?) got further and further away. Every minute was a potential loss. Every minute he could be trapping them here forever. Will was, undramatically, flipping through Esquire. Nick was reading the latest Punisher comic next to him at the airport gift shop. People stared. One man almost approached, but suddenly thought better of it when he saw the gun hanging off Nick's hip. TV star or not, people don't bother men with guns in airports. He nudged Nick suddenly and pointed to a magazine in the corner. Nick stared and slowly picked it up. "The stars of the dynamic new show, The ArchFiles, tell what it's like to be ArchRivals." The two men exchanged a grin and opened to the article. There was a full page spread of...them!...in snazzy tuxes, grinning like idiots. Nick--er, George Andurs--was wearing a hat that said "I'm an Archer." "What do you know, Will, we're famous." Nick skimmed the article. "Oh listen to this--Andurs, much quieter than the dynamic character he plays--hey, I'm 'dynamic!--says Nicholas Bradley is a constant challenge. 'I just never know what Chris will pull. And he's a complex character--a joker, but he's very concerned with his work. And he's got weird idiosyncracys...Hey, no I don't. What gives?" "I think he's talking about your whole football thing?" Will said gently. "You know you don't take it well." "Jesus, though, that's not an idiosyncracy! Just because the damned scout was blind--oh. I see what you mean." Nick grinned. "Okay, I'll concede. What does it say about your character?" "Witty, intelligent Daniel Duke constantly jokes about William Chandler, his dark horse character. 'Will's a great guy, but he's got this sick sense of humor that both Chris and I have to watch out for, or we can offend the audience. We've had some censorship there...I don't have a sick sense of humor, do I?" Nick smiled at him. "I don't know if sick is the word I'd use--maybe twisted. But there have been times, William, when you have said things that would offend the general public." "Name three." "Oh, let's see--" "That's okay, I take it back." Will tossed the magazine on the cashier's counter and pulled out the meager amount of cash he had left. The woman's jaw dropped, but she rung up the purpose. As he was leaving, she tapped him on the shoulder. "Um...sir? Could you--autograph this for me?" she held out a copy of the magazine. Will exchanged an amused look with Nick and took the proffered pen. "To who?" "Annie--thanks awfully." After Will signed it Nick took a turn, and handed it back to her with a grin. "Shh. We're not supposed to be here." He held his finger to his lips. "Glad we could be of service." Annie looked down at the magazine--gee, they'd even signed it Nick and Will. She sighed and carefully slipped it into a bag for protection. __________________________ 10am eastern time somewhere over the midwest Scully was trying to nap, still tired even after a full night's sleep. Nick and Will laughed over the magazine two rows back, and flirted with the waitresses. She just leaned against the window and closed her eyes, using her coat as a pillow. After a few minutes, she heard a soft snicker from next to her. Mulder was laughing? Mulder didn't laugh. Especially if he was wired out, like he had been in the airport. Worrying for her partner's sanity, she opened one eye. "Mulder?" "Yeah?" he looked up from the screen of her laptop. "Are you okay?" "I'm fine...why?" "When my partner starts laughing after almost having a nervous breakdown in the airport lobby, I sometimes get worried." "No..." he waved a hand at the screen. "Do you remember when Bradley showed us the fiction he'd downloaded?" "Vaguely." "I was reading it." "And it's funny?" "Hysterical." He said dryly. "Here. Look for yourself." She leaned forward and read the highlighted title. "The Basement, a Mulder/Scully NC-17--you can't be serious." "Ah, but I am. We seem to be an item on this group." He grinned as she made a face. *Mood swing*, she thought silently. Mulder could switch emotional states faster than anyone else she knew. "Not all of them are like that. But the prevailing theory seems to be that either we're suffering from extreme unresolved sexual tension or I worship the ground you walk on. Well, I'd hate to disillusion them, but..." he scrolled down the titles. "And there's some woman who keeps popping up named Jackie. Now *I* don't remember anyone named Jackie, let alone anyone who can do what she does. You?" Scully shook her head. "What's this one?" "Um...people seem to be very interested in my home life growing up. The trend is my father chasing me down with a baseball bat." She expected him to close up after that, but he just smiled. "I guess they don't do much on our personal lives. Appears your last televised date was while we were chasing beastwoman three years ago. But this 'Basement' story..." he shook his head. "I think I want a copy of these." "Count me out." "Oh, Scully, don't you want to hear your own body described in detail by a complete stranger?" "Not particularly." She leaned back again. "And don't get any ideas." "Wouldn't dream of it." He transferred a copy of the story to the hard drive on the laptop. "Oh, you'd like this one, Scully. It's a spoof, I think. Something about the Surfing Calusari." "Thrilled, Mulder. Can I go to sleep now?" "Was I keeping you awake?" he asked innocently. Scully just snorted and closed her eyes. ___________________ Okay, now that I'm done with that, we return you to our regularly scheduled plot... Fox Mulder and Dana Scully belong to Chris Carter or General Sidler or whoever the hell he really is and the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me god... But Nick and Will and the ArchFiles and this story are mine. Mine, d'you hear? Though why anyone would want to take credit for them is beyond me... This part isn't really necessary either. I lied. But if you skip both this one and part nine you really miss some of my better stuff. Please? Grit your teeth and dive in, and I gurantee it won't kill you... The Phile-adelphia Experiment 10/13 Around 10 am Somewhere over the midwest Scully had been trying to sleep, prevented from doing so by Mulder's tapping on her laptop, when Will leaned over from the aisle. "Agent Scully? Can we switch? Nick won't keep you awake..." "Sure, why not." She muttered, and slipped out past Mulder. Will stepped over him and dropped into the window seat. Mulder watched him. After a few minutes, Will shrugged. Mulder's lips twitched upwards. "Well?" "Well what?" Will asked. "It's obvious you wanted to ask something." Mulder tapped thoughtfully on the laptop. "You may as well do it." "Not a very good liar, am I?" Will shook his head. "Yeah, I wanted to ask a couple things." "So ask." "I don't want to intrude--" "You already know almost everything there is to know about us." Mulder said sharply. "So I don't see how much more intrusive you could be." "Um...what I want to know is what's happened since--last April. I want the insider scoop. I mean, you're here so you've obviously survived..." he trailed. "Yeah, I survived." "And what happened?" Mulder shifted slightly. "You know already that the evidence was destroyed. We were both still in trouble, me for assaulting the director and Scully for taking off without notice and taking me with her." "Did you find Krycek?" "No." Mulder's eyes turned hard. "No, we didn't. We were both served with official reprimands--Scully's first ever, as far as I know. Suspension for a few days--unpaid--and then we went back." "So what happened after that?" "A few odd cases, nothing life threatening--more than the usual." Mulder smiled. "Scully almost got nuked by a kid who took on magnetic powers after getting hit by lightening, and her laptop got wiped. I..." he trailed for a second. "Around July I went a little crazy...no LSD this time. Started getting intense flashbacks, which were probably the aftereffects of the drug." "How did you get rid of them?" Will tilted his head. Hard to imagine Mulder freaking out. But then, it was hard to imagine that all this was real anyway. "I didn't, not for about a month. But it got so bad, I couldn't continue work. Finally, Skinner booted me out. Told me to get some sedatives and come back when I could function normally again." "I'm sorry." Will said sincerely. "Didn't mean to bring up anything painful." "You wouldn't have known. We ran into a man--Scully was slipping me files when Skinner wasn't around." He grinned at the memory. "And he claimed he was psychic. We didn't believe him until he picked up a flashback and almost tried to kill me. After that..." he shrugged. "They stopped. Something to do with his ability to absorb brainwaves." "What did you...hallucinate...about?" "Everything. From rampant paranoia to Deep Throat." "To Samantha?" "To Little *Green* Men trying to take over the world. That was memorable. Little green men with purple spots." "What a trip." "Tell me about it. I was there." Mulder waved his fingers. "Spooky old basment man finally went around the bend and lost it." "I guess I'll see it in a few months." Will didn't add *If we make it home*. "There's food for thought. Better make sure I don't do anything stupid everyone out there in TV land would see." "It's a little too late for that, actually, after we saw you give that environmentalist the last of the kerosene when the little green bugs were after you." Mulder put his head in his hands. "They televised that?" "In living color." "Wait until Skinner reads the report on this one." ______________________________ "All I want is a little nap..." Scully muttered to herself. "And of course, I'm too wired to sleep." "Insomnia?" Nick asked solicitously. "No, just nervous energy." She smiled. She really did have the nicest smile, Nick thought. "Is there anything I can do to help?" "Not unless you have some Prozac on you." "Sorry, fresh out." He smiled back. "But if you're bored, I'd love to hear about your life..." "Beg pardon?" "Well, remember, we lost contact back in April last year. And they never did show much of your past or your private life..." "What private life?" she deadpanned. "Oh come on, I don't believe a person like you hasn't had a date in three years." "No, but they've been few and far between." She popped a peanut in her mouth. "And rather unpleasant, sometimes." "Okay, we can change the subject." He thought for a minute. "Oh, I know, what was the verdict on the OJ Simpson trial?" She rolled her eyes. "Guilty on both counts." She blinked. "Hey, OJ Simpson exists in your world?" "I was surprised to find he exists in yours." Nick replied. "Who won the Super Bowl?" "The Chargers." She answered absently. "The *Chargers*?" he asked, incredulous. "Well, after Young moved to Miami, and Bo Jackson came out of retirement to play for the Chargers...and then Michael Jordan took a position as a running back--" she shook her head at his incredulous expression. "Okay, the last one was a joke." Nick blinked. "All right, *my* money's on the Chargers. I didn't think you liked football." "Why would I go to all those games with Mulder if I didn't?" "All those games?" Nick ran a hand through his hair. "The only time we ever saw you is the time you got called back in the middle of the game by Moe Bocks." "Really?" she looked interested. "We go at least once a month. Mulder has a friend who give us tickets every now and then. They don't show that?" "Hm." Nick mused. "Chris Carter always says that there's no chance any romance will ever be on the show. Maybe you two going to games together is a little closer than he'd like to come. Uh, Scully...you and Mulder aren't," he waved his hands suggestively, "Are you?" "Good god, no." She looked shocked. "You must be kidding." "Because there are a lot of people out there that think you are..." "I know. Mulder was reading your fanfic files." She brushed some hair out of her face. "No, not now, and probably not ever." "Probably?" Nick picked up on her word choice. She blushed. "Well, that's the thing with TV shows." She said softly. "They don't ever show what a person is thinking, do they?" Nick just sat there in silence for the rest of the flight. =========================================================================== From: RaEnright@aol.com Date: Wed, 13 Sep 1995 19:38:22 -0400 Subject: Part 11 The Phile-adelphia Experiment 11/13 Boulder, Colorado 11am eastern--9am mountain Feb 26 They were off the airplane almost before the gates opened--Mulder in the lead, the nimble Chandler behind him, Scully next, and Bradley, not the most agile of passengers, bringing up the rear. But people made way for the men with the guns and the FBI badges. Mulder had called ahead--you can do wonderful things with cellular phones--and secured a rental car for them. Skinner wasn't going to like the expense list, but at this point it hardly mattered. They would have checked the passenger lists if time wasn't of the essence; but they had to get to Carter...Sidler? before he could acticate--or deactivate--whatever it was that was creating the rift between worlds. "There's a military base right outside Boulder. Creek Airfield." Scully read the map while Mulder drove at speeds that were unwise, even for race car drivers. Nick dug his nails into the seat fabric as they took another turn at sixty. "Mulder, we'd really like to survive long enough to get home." "He can't hear you." Scully replied. "Mulder gets behind a wheel and goes instantly deaf. It's a common trait among FBI agents." "I notice I can hear *you* perfectly fine." He responded, gripping the steering wheel. "In fact, a little too well--" Nick smirked. Will glanced at him and tilted his head questioningly. Nick shook his head and mouthed 'later'. Will glanced at the two bickering--excuse me, debating--in the front seat, back at Nick, and scratched his head. All this was giving him a headache. He'd ask Nick about it some other time. If they survived. ______________________ Tires screetched as Mulder hit the brakes hard, about two inches before they would have hit the barrier. A MP approached, pulled his sunglasses off. "Where you going, mister?" Mulder flashed his badge. "We have business on-base." "You got a permit?" "Now, think about this." Mulder kept a straight face. "Do you think I'd carry hard copy on me?" "Sir, unless you have a permit." "I have securty clearance level 8: alpha-delta-H." Scully supplemented. The man looked at her for a minute. The two in the backseat held up their ID. "I'd check you, but the computer is down. Security eight alpha-delta? What you do, sleep with the general?" the man grinned. "Go on. Nobody with level 8 needs me backin' em up." "How do you *do* that?" Will asked. "Security 8-alpha-delta-H?" Nick echoed. "Didn't I see that in a Star Trek episode?" "I think so." Scully deadpanned. "Your improvisational skills are improving, Scully. We didn't even need the Gunmen this time." "We're just damned lucky their computer was down." Nick said sensibly. "Otherwise..." Scully noticed, in passing, that the MP's nametag read D. Morgan. Hadn't Nick said something about a Morgan? ______________________ The man whirled around in his chair and smiled. "Sir? It's Morgan." "Go ahead, Darin." He said into the speaker phone. "Sir, they just passed. The woman said something about security clearance alpha-delta-H." He sounded amused. "She's something, isn't she? Mulder's got his hands full with her." "And vice versa, from what I've seen." Darin rejoined. "Shall I leave them alone?" "Clear the compound--quietly, calmly, slowly. Call Glen and James. Oh...and Darin?" "Yes, Mr. Carter?" "Leave them in the chamber. I want to meet them personally--for once." "Yes sir." Darin's voice was rich with humor. "You going to drop on one knee and propose to the lovely agent Scully?" "She's got enough trouble with Frohike. You have a lot to learn, young Darin." "I try, sir." ________________________ "So." Nick shoved his hands in his pockets. "Act casual. Right?" "We're just out on a stroll." Mulder replied. "Anyone looks at you wrong, fiddle with your badge and look important." "Okay, yeah, I can do that. Is that what these guys do all day?" Will coughed as dust blew in his face. "I don't see any sort of building." Nick noted. "Not one that could hold something of that size. How do we find it?" "Like this." Mulder buttonholed a young private hurrying across the road. "Excuse me, where can we find the--oh, what's it called..." "Don't look at me." Nick stepped in. "You had the paperwork." "You know." Mulder waved his hands vaguely. "The thing we're supposed to inspect." "Oh." The private smiled. "You mean the accelerator? Second building on your right past the mess hall." "I should move to Colorado." Mulder murmured to Scully as the private walked away. "Even the military are nice out here." "No, you just haven't had the chance to piss them off yet." _____________________________ The setup must have been jury-rigged; it was a small room, not at all like the echoing chamber Nick and Will had been in before. A small, metal lined room with an even smaller cubbyhole on the other side of a glass window. There was a laptop sitting on the table in the smaller room. Nick and Will took their positions in the room and Mulder leaned over the laptop. This seemed so...pat. Simple. Was military security really this lax that they could get into top secret government experiments without even hacking fake ID? Will and Nick watched his brow crease as he turned the laptop on. Now what? "Oh no, Nick, we're in the hands of IBM." Will cracked, noting the logo on the computer. "God save our souls." Mulder was about to turn and ask Scully what the odds of this being a fake were when the room went dark with a metallic ______________________________ Nick jumped for the door seconds before the metal plate slammed down in front of it. He whirled to see the window covered with a similar plate. The lights went out. After a few seconds of darkness, Will coughed quietly. "Nick?" "I'm here, Will. Are you okay?" "That's a hell of a question. Okay in the literal sense or okay in the emotional sense?" "I don't what to hear about you psychopathic tendencies. Are you hurt?" "No." "What happened?" "We got suckered." Will said bluntly. "Again." "Again." Nick agreed. He felt for the crack where the door had been. "Will, about where in this room are you?" "Right by the window, or what *was* the window. Why?" "Can you follow the walls to where I am? With both of us we might be able to lift it." "Yeah, but if we lift the window covering we can get to Mulder and Scully." "Good point." Will traced the wall with his hand. "I'm coming over." All of a sudden, the lights came back on. The window cover slid up by itself, scaring Nick, who had had a hand resting on it. A rather shocked looking pair of agents met their eyes. Mulder shrugged in apology. The floor began to move. Not in a circular motion, but it began to rumble quietly. A hole appeared in the middle of the floor. Looking exactly like a character out of Star Wars, Chris Carter and two other men in army uniforms came up through the floor. "Mr. Chandler. Mr. Bradley." Carter nodded to the two shocked agents. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you in person." There was a crash behind them and the glass window shattered. Mulder held up a coat-wrapped arm. "Mind if we join the party?" "Not at all. Mr. Mulder, Ms. Scully, I've been waiting to meet you two as well." Carter held out his hand. "If I could have your guns, please. Handle first, if you don't mind." The two men behind him held up large, very powerful looking black guns. Mulder considered for a minute. Anything shot in this room would ricochet off the walls and hurt one of them. Nick and Will were already handing theirs over. "You want our cellphones too?" Nick asked bitterly. "They don't work." Will added helpfully. "Keep your phones, gentlemen...and lady. The gun, Mr. Mulder?" Mulder sighed and handed it over. Carter handed it to the taller of the two men. "I have a lot to explain, and I need to make sure that if tempers rise, no-one gets hurt." Carter grinned. "I've seen too much of your temper, Mulder, to dismiss it calmly. Or yours, Bradley." "I'm flattered." Bradley muttered. "Oh, you should be. You have the distinction of being one of the only men to actually make it this far." Carter smirked. "But before we get into that, let's go into my office." One of the other walls slid up--just like in an old SciFi movie--and the General gestured to a few comfortable chairs. " Now, we can get down to business." The two men with the guns held them up and grinned. =========================================================================== From: raenright@aol.com (RaEnright) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: Phile-adelphia Experiment 12/13 Date: 11 Sep 1995 19:34:10 -0400 Æ! There. That's my new disclaimer. Says it all, doesn't it?Æ. It means Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and the X-Files universe belong to Chris Carter. I borrow them for my own satanical uses. No infringement of copyrights is intended and I haven't made any money off of it so what does he care? Æ! Nick and Will are mine, as is this convoluted plot and theory. Funfunfun! The Phile-adelphia Experiment 12/13 "James! Glen!" Carter snapped. "Put those damned things down!" "yes sir." The two men shouldered their weapons. Carter faced the four agents. "I apologize, Glen and James are into theatrics." "Glen and..." Nick trailed. "Glen Morgan and James Wong?" "That's us." Wong pushed the glasses up on his face. "In the flesh." "You guys, can you take a seat in the corner or something?"The general, if he really was one, leaned back against his desk and faced his audience again. "First of all--" "*First* of all," Will interrupted, "Why don't you explain what the hell is going on here?" "Oh, that takes a little history." Carter shook his finger. "Slow down, Will." "Why don't you start with the boat?" Morgan suggested. "Good point." Carter took a deep breath. "I assume you are all familiar with the Philadelphia Experiment? I know you are, Mulder, Scully." "I think we know enough to get by." Will said suspiciously. "Good. Now, in...oh, hell. Ah..." "Mid 1948?" Mulder suggested. "Yes, thank you, Mulder. In mid-1948, I forget when exactly, there was a battleship called the...oh, the something or other. A lot of good men on that boat..." "And it vanished from radar, reappearing minutes later and miles away, we know this." Mulder interrupted. "But what you don't know is what happened on that boat." Carter pointed a finger at him. "Over a hundred good men died or went insane. One of the passengers on that boat was myself. Lieutenant Christopher Carter. I was the second mate.' "Right before we were scheduled to make the jump, something went wrong in the experimental room--a lead lined safety room we were using to test the effects of the portals on inanimate objects. The jump countdown couldn't be stopped, and I went in to fix the problem.' "They made the jump before I could get out--ugh, I wouldn't go through that again for anything." Carter made a face. "I wonder what you would think, any of you, if you saw your arm lengthen and wrap around itself. Or if your feet suddenly disappeared?' "The others, of course, took it a lot worse. Do you know, since then, all of them have either died or been 'committed' to base hospitals? I'm the last one." "If that were true." Scully said thoughtfully, "You'd be over fifty." "One of the side effects of being the lone *sane* survivor, among other things. Like this." Carter waved at his feet...which began to disappear. When it was halfway to his thigh, he stopped it, and they started reappearing. "I age very slowly.' "I was honorably discharged--barely." Carter continued. "In fact, I even joined the bureau for a while. And I helped Hoover open the first X-File." Mulder nodded. "You're listed as assisting agent." "Good memory, Mulder." "Photo--" "Photographic, I know. Anyway, it was a few years before I quite realized my full...abilities. And when J. Edgar found out...well, he didn't like it.' "He tipped me off to the military and I had to go on the run. Very useful thing being able to turn invisible is. So I went my way, and they went theirs. They're still looking for me, you know." He grinned. "They want me bad.' "They closed the experiment after that--but I didn't. I managed to find someone who would work with me on the effects of jumping. We managed to get it down to mere discomfort. You two chould feel lucky. You were unconscious for the worst part." "Oh, that's comforting." Will said. "If I can continue? A few years ago they re-opened it--and I saw my opportunity. I had discovered I could shift through without using a portal--another handy tool. But it takes a lot out of me." He shrugged. "I took over Sidler's job in this universe." "You don't look like him." Nick pointed out. "No, he looks like me. In this world, Mark Sidler really does look like this. And I really look--" he features shifted, "Like this." The man that stood before them had to be a foot shorter than he'd been a moment before. His face was smoother, more clean cut. His hair was a deep auburn color instead of blonde-grey. "You killed Sidler?" Mulder asked. "God no!" The man looked horrified. "I wouldn't do that! No, he had a heart attack. I was in the right place at the right time." Nick suddenly realized he was in shock. He shook his head to try to clear it. Carter contniued. "We made contact with the base on the other side using my shifting skills. We actually knew about the transfer problem long before the date on that message you read, Mulder. And we agreed to call you up there for three 'murders'. But those people all died naturally before we even shot them." "You manipulated us!" "We didn't do anything to hurt you." Carter looked slightly distressed. "And we had to have you there when Bradley and Chandler made the jump." "I have a few questions..." Will stood up. "Even supposing we believe you--which is hard not to, but I think I could find some way--what about the TV shows? Are you saying you manipulate us, using what you film?" "The other way around. I follow you--yes, I've been watching all four of you, and let me tell you it's no picnic--and record what you do. Later, I rewrite them into scripts. James and Glen helped me out a lot." The two men in the corner grinned. "Why?" Nick asked. "Because I like to. I like entertaining people. But up until you two," he gestured to Mulder and Scully, "I wrote really awful stuff. I wrote for The Nanny!" he shivered. "And then I discovered that there was a young uppity agent who was reopening the X-Files. And his beautiful partner. It was too good to resist." "The actors?" Will grilled him. "Clones. The military affords you some wonderful opportunities for scientific learning. Actually, we only cloned the main parts. The rest is computer generated." "I can't imagine someone programming Skinner's parameters into a computer." Mulder murmured to Scully. "At any rate, once I found a good thing, I stuck with it, which resulted in The ArchFiles in this universe. I don't shift much anymore, except between your two worlds." "Even then, he get to be a pain in the ass when he's tired." Morgan put in. "Thanks, Glen." Carter shot him a look. "So I started producing both shows, in two different realities. It hasn't excatly been easy, but...there you have it." "So why are *we* here?" Nick asked. "It's not like we weren't perfectly happy with the jobs we had." "That's what I'm getting to. We finally worked the kinks out of the program, and we needed some men to try it out. You two came to mind." "So why not Mulder and Scully? They're more used to weird stuff." "They have more important things to do." Carter shot Mulder a significant look. "No offense, Bradley." "None taken. But I still don't see what you're saying." "What I'm saying is that first and foremost, we need two men to run extensive testing on the new program. And also," Carter grinned, "Your ratings were slipping, so we had to reformat the show." "And we won't be around to help the old fart out anymore." Wong said. "We found our own universe to write for." "Space, Above and Beyond." Will confirmed. "That makes sense." "And what I'm offering is complete freedom for five years. You'd be shifting every two weeks or so, depending on where you came out." Carter tossed a thin booklet to Nick. "There's the full deal. You can ever go back and wrap things up, if you want." "And if we don't accept your offer?" Will leaned over Nick's shoulder to read the first page. "We return you, no questions asked. But we would have to delete your memory..." Carter shurgged. "We don't need you two getting institutionalized because you came back with some insane story." "Mulder and Scully *were* better adjusted for this sort of thing, but then I know they wouldn't even consider it." Morgan tilted his head. "Unlike you two, they have a *quest*." "They know it all, Scully." Mulder deadpanned. "And you told me *I* was being paranoid." "What do you say?" Carter watched the two ArchFiles men carefully. "It's up to you, gentlemen." ______________________________________ =========================================================================== Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: REPOST--Phile-adelphia Experiment 13/13 Date: 13 Sep 1995 20:28:07 -0400 There. My disclaimer. This really is the absolute last part. Thanks go, in alphabetical order, to Anik, Aviva, Eva, Juliet, Keri, and Rory, for...well, you'll see soon enough. The Phile-adelphia Experiment-13/13 Picking up a tad before where we left off: "And what I'm offering is complete freedom for five years. You'd be shifting every two weeks or so, depending on where you came out." Carter tossed a thin booklet to Nick. "There's the full deal. You can ever go back and wrap things up, if you want." "And if we don't accept your offer?" Will leaned over Nick's shoulder to read the first page. "We return you, no questions asked. But we would have to delete your memory..." Carter shurgged. "We don't need you two getting institutionalized because you came back with some insane story." "Mulder and Scully *were* better adjusted for this sort of thing, but then I know they wouldn't even consider it." Morgan tilted his head. "Unlike you two, they have a *quest*." "They know it all, Scully." Mulder deadpanned. "And you told me I was being paranoid." "What do you say?" Carter watched the two ArchFiles men carefully. "It's up to you, gentlemen." "Think it over, carefully." Wong advised. "One of the advantages to shifting is that once you've shifted all other 'incarnations' of you in alternate universes cease to exist. We can forge paperwork for you allowing you to access secured areas, but other than that you're on your own. And it also means leaving family and friends behind. Are you up to that?" Nick exchanged a look with Will. "Sounds fun...Will?" "I suppose so." Will said thoughtfully. "But there's one condition..." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The screen went blank as Will said the final words. 'To Be Continued' appeared in large while block letters on the darkness. Seven soda cans flew at the TV at once. "Man!" Aviva, sitting at the foot of the couch, began to pound her head against the armrest. Eva, seated next to her, tried to stop her. "Why do they *always* do that!!" Keri asked, taking another bite of her pizza. "I don't know." Ra began to pick up the empty soda cans. "But come on, it's only for three months. We can survive that long...right?" "Surrrreee...." Juliet began to convulse, knocking the popcorn bowl over. "W-w-w-withthththdraw-w-w-l? N-n-not usss!" "Oh please." Anik said from the recliner. "If you're that desperate, I'll dub you a tape. I dub them for everyone else..." "For which we are eternally greatful." Keri handed her another slice of pizza. "And I still say that the plane scene proves that they're in love..." Anik sighed. "Not anythime this century." Rory replied. "What do you think, Aviva?" "Flame them!" Eva and Aviva said in unison. "Let's go hunt him down." Eva finished. "Right." Ra replied. "Death to Carter!" she hit the rewind button. "So...who wants to watch it again?" THE END 6ree at last, free at last, thank god almighty I'm free at last! So, what do you think? A little too surreal? Aw, go watch Dod Kalm and try to poke holes in my theory. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- grandmat grandmat@biddeford.com Computer literate; spelling impaired