From: "David Hearne" <ottercrk@sover.net>
Date: Wed, 13 Sep 2000 12:16:01 -0400
Subject: xfc: Slip-Stream (10 of 12)
Source: xfc

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (10 of 12)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART TEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

One of the first things they did was get me some clothes. Then the woman
whose name was Agent Scully drove me to the hospital. The man whose name was
Agent Mulder stayed behind. "We need to find out just how she got in here,"
he said.

The woman didn't ask me any questions as she drove me through the crowded
streets of a city. I was the one with the questions. As I looked out at the
buildings and monuments passing by, I felt something familiar about them.

"Where am I?" I asked.

"You're in Washington, D.C."

I mulled over that name. "I think...I think I know somebody here."

The woman glanced at me.

"Or somebody who used to live here. I'm not sure."

"Don't worry about that now. Just relax."

Actually, I did feel relaxed. My memory loss didn't scare me. Instead, it
just numbed me. I was content to do whatever Mulder or Scully wanted me to
do.

After forty-five minutes of driving through the "damn D.C. traffic" as
Scully called it, we arrived at the hospital. They did a lot of tests. Blood
was taken from my finger and they put me in this machine which could examine
my brain. The tests took up most of the day. Afterwards, I was given my own
hospital room.

Scully came to see me. Mulder was with her. "How you doing?" he asked.

"I'm well. I guess." I looked to Scully. "Am I?"

There was just the slightest hesitation on her part before she answered.
"Yes. There is nothing physically wrong with you."

Mulder noticed the hesitation as well. He said to me, "I'm going to talk
with Agent Scully in private. Do you need..." He frowned. "You know, it
would be better if we could use a different name than 'you.' Is there a name
you prefer?"

I thought about it, then said, "Jane."

Mulder nodded. "Jane it is."

"Jane Williams."

He blinked. "Why 'Williams?' Do you think that might be your real name?"

"No, it's...it's not."

"Might it be someone you know?"

I stared at the white spaces in my mind again, but nothing became clear. I
shrugged at Mulder.

"Well, Jane...you just rest now," Scully said, then left the room with
Mulder.

I watched them leave, feeling a deep need to know what they going to say
about me.

("What did you find out?")

My heart almost stopped. I found myself looking out of the eyes of Agent
Scully. I could see the other people in the hospital hallway. Agent Mulder
was facing me...her...both of us directly. His expression was subdued, but
you could see an excited curiosity in his eyes. Throughout this whole
conversation, I held my breath.

("Just what I told her. There is nothing physically wrong.")

("I can hear a 'but' coming.")

("But...there are some unusual biological aspects to her.")

("Let's hear it.")

("Well, it's nothing we can define precisely. At least, not yet. However,
there is unusual activity in parts of her brain. We also found some
abnormality in her blood. Further tests are going to be needed before any
conclusions can be drawn. What did you find?")

("More mystery. There is nothing -- and I mean, nothing -- that indicates
how this young woman got into Bureau Headquarters. Nothing on the
surveillance tapes, no hints of a security breach. You would think a naked
woman would attract more attention than that.")

There was a little smile on Mulder's face. I felt Scully's wariness, but
also her interest.

("What are you thinking, Mulder?")

("Oh, all kinds of things. We've got elements here that correspond with a
lot of different X-Files. It's now a question of narrowing it down.")

("Well, we have to find a way to account for this woman. She is our
responsibility.")

("You don't think I know that?")

("What I mean is that Skinner will want answers. And he's obviously under a
lot of pressure to keep us in line.")

("Meaning he's getting his chain yanked. He's been on us ever since Eugene
Tooms got out of his prison. And just who the hell is that smoking
chump...")

("Mulder...please focus. Let's help this woman. And I think we should start
by looking for 'Jane Williams.'")

("Not much of a start, Scully.")

("On the way here, she said that she might have known somebody here in
Washington. We can look for Jane Williams here.")

("Sounds good. Why don't we go check on our mystery woman?")

I released my breath just as Mulder and Scully stepped back into the room.
Scully said, "Jane, I think...are you all right?"

"I...I feel a little dizzy." What could I tell them? I didn't want Mulder
and Scully to be as confused as I was. I needed them to be sure and strong.

At that moment, I depended on them more than anyone else in the world.

"I'll be all right," I assured Scully.

"Well, let me know if you feel bad in any way. In the meantime, you will be
staying here in the hospital until..."

"No!" The panic in my voice surprised the two agents as much as myself.

"What's the problem?" Scully asked.

"I...I want to stay with you."

Her blue eyes became nervous and uncertain. "Uh, Jane...you're better off
staying here. The hospital can..."

I grabbed her hand. She fought off the urge to pull away. "No," I insisted.
"I need to stay with *you*."

Scully just stared at me in incomprehension.

With a gentle voice, Mulder said, "Is there any medical need that requires
her to stay here?"

Scully shot him a testy look. He rolled his shoulders in an expression of
discomfort, yet his eyes did continue their plea. They were remarkable eyes,
capable of looking like a lost child's.

Having both of us looking so pitiable was too much for Scully. "All right,"
she sighed.

"You'll stop by, won't you, Agent Mulder?" I said.

"Of course."

You didn't need to be telepathic to know what was on Scully's mind then.
Great, she must have been thinking. Now I have to clean up after both of
you.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A tall pointed monument...a building with white pillars on its front...an
enormous statute of a man sitting in a chair...

Scully and I were seated at a table in her apartment. She was flipping
through a photo book of sights in Washington, hoping it might stir my
memory.

"There," I said. "That place." I pointed at one photo.

"The FBI Headquarters?"

I leaned forward and examined the photo. "Is that what they call it?"

"Yes."

"I seem to remember it being...something else." I touched the smooth page of
the book. "It changed. But then it changed back." I looked up at Scully. "I
think the person I knew used to work there."

Scully just nodded. I continued to look through the photos.

"Something is missing," I said.

"What?"

I pushed and pushed against the white spaces. Finally, they gave me a few
small gifts.

"There was a building. A large brown building. All the people in charge of
the country had their meetings there. There was also a..." I thumped my hand
on the table as if I was trying to shake out my memories. "...a wall. A
giant wall that kept the city divided."

"Jane...there is no wall like that here. There used to be one in Berlin..."

"No, you're right. This wall doesn't exist anymore. It's in the past. So was
the large brown building. They tore them down after..."

The white spaces overcame me. Placing my elbows on the table, I covered my
face with my hands.

I felt Scully's touch on my shoulder, giving it gentle rubs. "Take your
time, Jane."

A person knocked on the door to her apartment. She gave me one last squeeze
on the shoulder and left to answer the door. I lowered my hands to watch
her. When she opened the door, Mulder was seen.

"Hello," he said. "Did somebody order a strip-o-gram?"

Scully tried to look irritated, but she couldn't help smiling. I noticed
that they looked...right together. His long, lanky body complimented her
short, petite figure. The comical size of his hefty nose provided a
counterpoint to her austere face. They were different, yet able to blend
together.

"No?" he said, hearing nothing in reply. "Then how about a pizza?" He held
up a long cardboard box.

After we all dined on cheese and bread, Scully told Mulder that 'Jane
Williams' might have been an FBI agent.

"Really? Well, I've just finished a check on the population of D.C. and
there was a Jane Williams who used to..."

"No," I said. "Jane Williams...she's not the person here that I knew. I
think it was a man."

"Oh. I see. Then who is Jane Williams?"

I rubbed at a piece of cheese stuck to my fingers. It took me a minute to
retrieve an answer. "A friend of my family. In fact...my parents named me
after her."

"So your name *is* Jane Williams."

"No."

Mulder and Scully looked at me. I squirmed in my chair. "I'm sorry, I just
can't...there are some things that I just feel sure about and...I don't know
why..."

"Don't worry," Mulder said, giving me a brief squeeze on the arm. "It will
come back to you. I promise."

He smiled at me and I found myself smiling in return. I could see what
Scully found irresistible about his mouth.

"The truth is out there," Mulder assured me. "Somewhere 'in the dark
backward and abyss of time.'"

"The what, Mulder?" Scully said.

"Oops. Sorry. Got all literary there. 'The dark backward' is a quote from
'The Tempest.' Actually, it's one of Shakespeare's more awkward phrases,
though not as clumsy as 'But, sir, methinks you walk like a stranger.'"

"How does one 'walk like a stranger?'"

"I do," I said. "I feel like nothing but a stranger in..."

That's when I heard the song.

("If I should venture into the slip-stream...")

I looked around, trying to locate its source. When Scully asked me what was
wrong, I realized that I was the only one who could hear the song.

("Between the vine-dex of your dream...")

The music was as clear as the voices of Mulder and Scully, yet it went no
further than the space between my ears. I pressed my hands against my
forehead. I wasn't sure if I wanted the music to stop.

("Where the mobil-steel runs crack...and the ditch in the back roads
stop...")

The man singing was so intense as if nothing mattered more than this song
and the person he was addressing. Who was he singing for?

("Could you find me...would you a kiss a my eyes...")

Was it for me?

("And lay me down in silence easy...")

I felt a strange sensation in my fingers. There were flexing and bending as
if they wanted some activity. "Jane, tell me what's wrong," Scully insisted,
concern rising in her voice.

("To be born again...")

I looked at her and said, "Do you have a piano I could use?"

Naturally, the question took her and Mulder back. However, after a moment's
pause, she said, "I'll be back." She left the apartment. Mulder kept silent
while she was gone. He just looked at me with fear and fascination
struggling in his eyes.

Scully returned. She carried a portable electronic keyboard. "I borrowed
this from the family next door," she explained as she placed it in front of
me. She switched it on and put it in 'piano' mode.

I looked at the keyboard. Then I held my hands over it as if it was a hot
fire. I lowered my hands, slowly. When my fingers touched the plastic
keys...

("...in another world, in another time...")

...I played the melody whispering in my consciousness, keeping rhythm on
the lower keys and my right hand moving with a fluidness that surprised me.

("...got a home on high...ain't nothin' but a stranger in this world...")

I kept my eyes on the keyboard, but I could tell Mulder and Scully were
looking at me. Out of the corner of my vision, I saw Scully place her hand
on his shoulder. He reached up to touch her hand.

("...in another time...in another place...")

I closed my eyes. I no longer needed to watch my fingers. In the darkness
behind my eyelids, I saw a woman.

("...and another face...")

She was my age. It hurt me just to look at her because I knew she needed me
and there was no way I could...

I jerked my fingers off the keyboard. Keeping my eyes closed, I said, "That
was a message. I need to get back somewhere. I need to..."

A sob overcame my voice.

I spent the night at Scully's apartment. So did Mulder. They took turns
comforting me until I fell asleep.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (11 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART ELEVEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I was seeing things through Mulder's eyes. He was sitting in a chair. Two
men were watching him. One was seated behind a desk, looking at Mulder
through glasses. He was bald-headed and looked as hard as a brick wall. He
also seemed familiar -- another clue that merely hinted at the truth. The
other man...

He frightened me. I knew this man as well. He had hurt me. I was sure of it.
As his heavy face studied Mulder, I wanted to run off, but I was trapped in
another person's head.

"You still have no idea who this woman is?" the bald-headed man asked.

"No, sir. Jane...that's what we call her...has only a recollection of stray
details from her life and we're not sure if those are accurate."

"What do you plan to do next?"

"Take her around D.C. and see if that stirs her memory."

The bald-headed man gave Mulder a slight nod, then said, "And her mysterious
appearance in your office? How do you explain that?"

Mulder glanced towards the man standing near the window. Smoke from the
man's mouth dirtied the sunlight passing through the glass.

"I have no theories at this time, sir," Mulder told the bald-headed man.

This got another slight nod from the bald-headed man. "You are dismissed
then, Agent Mulder."

Mulder stood up from his chair. He was about to head for the door, but then
stopped. "Sir, did you read my report about Eugene Tooms?"

"Yes, Agent Mulder. I did."

"What was your evaluation?"

The bald-headed man looked at the smoking man. He received a cool look, then
turned back to Mulder. "I thought it was an interesting story...but one
meant for a select audience."

Mulder said nothing. He turned to the door.

I woke up. The vision was gone, but I felt cold as if the eyes of the
smoking man were still on me.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Just as he had said, Mulder took me out on a guided tour of Washington, D.C.
I ended up learning more about him than myself.

As we walked together through a district full of stores, I asked. "How long
have you known Agent Scully?"

"Oh...getting close to a year now, I guess. Why do you ask?"

"Just wondering. You two seem...very close."

A tiny smile lifted Mulder's lips. "But for a cup of root beer..."

"What?"

"Nothing. No, we've learned to trust each other. And we've been through some
tough times." He paused, then added, "I suspect the toughest have yet to
come."

"Um...if you don't mind me asking...what exactly do you do for the FBI?"

Mulder gave me a grin. "Sometimes, I ask myself that very question.
Officially, my job is investigating X-Files. These are cases with unusual
elements that often require explanations beyond the confines of acceptable
knowledge."

"You mean, like me."

"Yes. Exactly like you."

"How did you get chosen for a job like that?"

"I sort of...chose it for myself. The Bureau doesn't exactly enjoy having
this section active. They don't think it gives the FBI a good reputation. At
least, that's their official position."

"But you're still working on them."

"More like clinging onto them with bloody fingernails," he sighed.

"They must be important to you."

It took awhile before he could reply to that.

"I'm not sure what's important to me," he said. "I don't know where my
priorities should be."

"Well...there has to be a reason why you chose this work in the first
place."

Mulder looked at me, his face neutral.

"I'm sorry. I don't mean to..."

"No, no, it's..." He seemed to be thinking over something, then he reached
into his pocket and pulled out a wallet. He took a photograph from the
wallet and handed it to me. A young, dark-haired girl smiled from the photo.

"She's my sister," Mulder told me. "Her name was...her name is Samantha."

"She's beautiful," I said, handing back the photo.

Mulder nodded, tucking the photo back into the wallet. "When I was twelve,
she disappeared. Awhile back, I went under hypnotic regression. What I
learned has convinced me that she was abducted by aliens."

Naturally, I was unable to say anything at first. Then I told Mulder,
"Considering what has happened to me...I can't dismiss that out of hand."

He nodded.

"So, you are looking for her through the X-Files?"

"Again, I have to say...I don't know what I'm looking for."

We continued to walk in silence until I spotted a bookstore. I told Mulder
that I wanted to go inside.

"Why?"

"I want to look up 'The Tempest.'"

"Oh. Well, sure, why not?"

The store was small but well-stocked. I found myself wandering around the
shelves, just taking in the titles. I notice Mulder was doing the same thing
and pointed it out to him.

"I haven't been in a bookshop for quite awhile," he said. "Well, not a
'normal' bookshop anyway." He reached out and ran his hand across the
bindings. "There's something about seeing all these books together..."

I had the same indefinable feeling. There they were, all lined up and ready
to speak to you. 'Bleak House.' 'Vanity Fair.' 'The Duchess of Malfi.' "Moby
Dick.' 'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.' 'Ender's Game.'

Ender...another name so distressingly familiar...

For no apparent reason, I found myself thinking about all these books
vanishing. I imagined an inferno devouring every last piece of written
paper. What if all of this would be forgotten? What if even the greatest of
writers would disappear into a void -- the same void into which my own
memory had fallen? The thought left me sad.

And a little frightened.

I found 'The Tempest.' I flipped through its pages as Mulder browsed through
the anthropology section.

Here we are, I thought. "What seest thou else in the dark backward and abyss
of time?" Prospero asked. "If thou rememb'rest aught ere thou cam'st here,
how they cam'st here thou mayst." "But that I do not," replies...

I dropped the book.

I stood there in the store, trembling.

Then I yelled, "Agent Mulder!"

He bolted towards me. "What? What is it?"

I lifted the book off the floor and opened it. I pointed at one of the words
inside. "That's my name," I whispered.

Then we heard footsteps -- heavy and determined. We looked up and saw four
men approach us. They all wore dark clothes and sunglasses as inexpressive
as their faces.

"What do you..." Mulder started to say before two of the men grabbed him and
slammed him up against a bookshelf, knocking paperbacks from their secure
positions. The cashier clerk and other customers look upon this, too stunned
and afraid to intervene. Mulder yelled and cursed, but was held tight.

The other two men each grabbed one of my arms. "Don't make trouble," one of
them advised me.

I didn't.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A blindfold kept me from seeing where I was taken. The car ride was long and
the engine was the only sound I heard. When the car stopped, I was led from
the car, still blindfolded. At first, I felt the air of the outdoors on my
face. Then a door opened and the footsteps of me and my company echoed
against narrow hallways. Then another door opened. I was forced to sit in a
chair. I heard my captors leave. The door closed.

My hands were unbound, but I was too scared to take off my blindfold. I just
sat there and waited, counting my breaths.

A thousand breaths later, the door opened, then closed. The blindfold was
gently removed from my eyes.

I found myself in a grey room with no windows. Standing over me was an old
man in a suit. He had a strained smile on his face as if he was trying to
give me as much kindness as he could.

He reached into his coat pocket and said, "This might be a little
condescending to someone your age, but..." He pulled out a thin object
wrapped in brown-and-silver paper.

"Candy bar?" he offered.

I took it and ripped off the wrapping. I was feeling very hungry. The man
watched me devour the candy bar, pleased by my enjoyment of it.

When I finished off half of it, I stopped and looked up at the man with
suspicion. "Who are you?"

The man cleared his throat. "Believe it or not, that's one of the hardest
questions for me to answer."

"All right. Can you tell me why I'm here?"

"You're here..." The man tucked his hands into his pockets. "...because no
one knows who you are and that bothers certain people to a painful degree."

"Why should that bother them?"

"Because these people pride themselves about being in control and not
letting any details slip by them."

"Does that make me dangerous?"

"That makes you an unknown factor. And that could be dangerous."

I rolled the candy bar in my hands. "What about Agents Mulder and Scully?"

"I'm afraid they can't help you."

"Then what about you? Are you here to help me?"

The man considered that question for a long time before he answered it.

"I can try. But I need to have a better understanding of who you are."

A bitter laugh popped out of my mouth. "Then I'm in trouble. Because I don't
know who I'm supposed to be, either."

"Yes, I know. That is a problem. But what can you tell me?"

I opened my mouth.

Then I saw the man at my feet. He was lying on black asphalt. Above us was a
night sky. I dropped to one knee and opened up his jacket. I saw a red stain
spreading across his shirt.

The man croaked a word. I placed a hand behind his head and raised it.

"Trust...no one," he whispered. Then his eyes turned blank and one last
breath flew from his lips.

"What happened?" the man asked.

I pressed my lips together. He stepped forward and repeated in a forceful
voice, "What happened?"

"I...I've been having these visions. I just had one with you in it."

The man took a step back. "Did you now?"

"Yes."

"And...what did you see?"

I swallowed and said, "Your death."

He looked at a corner of the room for a few seconds, then turned back to me
and asked, "I suppose it would be impolite of me to ask for details."

"I didn't see many details. But it looks you were killed."

"Ah." The man let out a breath. "Well...that is to be expected, I guess."

He took another few moments to consider everything, then said, "Do you
remember anything of the events right before your memory loss?"

Again, I probed my fractured memory. I managed to find an answer and it
smelled of cigarettes.

"I was trying to get away from someone."

"Did it work?"

"Yes. I think I did."

The man looked behind him at the door, then got down on one knee before me.
"Whatever you did the last time," he whispered. "do it now. My people have
intercepted the lab reports Scully did on you. They reveal the presence
of...something in you that shouldn't exist. Not yet. So, whatever magic
you've got, I suggest you use it now or..."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I was sitting on a couch. I looked around and saw that I was in an
apartment. The lights were out, though some illumination came through a
lampost shining through a window. I noticed a desk, a television, an
aquarium.

The front door opened. A man walked with slow movements through another room
and into the living room. He turned on the light.

Agent Mulder saw me on the couch. He had the appearance of a man who hadn't
slept in weeks.

"Oh," he mumbled. "It's you."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (12 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART TWELVE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"I see you remembered your clothes this time."

I did. I was wearing the same clothes that Mulder and Scully had gotten for
me.

"I suppose you can't tell me where you've been," Mulder said in a
dispassionate voice.

"I was... taken by some men..."

"I know. I saw that."

"One of them told me that I was in danger. That I had to escape. And then I
was here."

"Hm."

Mulder sat down on the couch, looking like he had been struck in the stomach
with a baseball bat. I realized what could hurt him like this -- what could
leave him looking so desolate.

"Did something happen to Scully?" I asked.

He didn't answer. He didn't even look at me.

"Mulder...?"

"They couldn't let me have her," he said as if he was talking to himself.
"Everything good in my life they take away. The one person who could..."

He covered his face with his hands, elbows pressed on his knees. I touched
him on the shoulder.

The moment I did that, he jumped from the couch, suddenly full of some
violent energy. "Why are you here?" he shouted. "Why have you come back
now?"

"Mulder, I...I don't know..."

"Don't give me that! I'm tired of all these fucking mysteries! I want a
clear answer for once in my goddamned life!"

My nervousness evaporated in a flash of anger. "How do you think I feel?" I
shouted. "At least you can stay in one damn time period! At least you know
who you are!"

Our anger vanished as quickly as it had risen. Mulder's face softened as he
apologized. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it, I know..."

I didn't let him finish. I ran across the room to embrace him. He wrapped
his arms around me in return. "I just want her back..." he said.

"I know."

Then I heard the music again.

...in another time...in another place...

The woman's face appeared to me, still sad and anguished. Who are you? I
asked as I held Mulder. Then I realized that I was no longer in his
apartment. Mulder was not standing, but lying across my lap. Around us both
was nothing but a landscape of ice and snow. An enormous crater was cracked
open in the ground next to us. As a lock of red hair brushed over my eyes, I
realized that I was in someone else's body and this person was so confused
yet so grateful to be with Mulder.

The apartment reformed around me. I was back in my own body. I didn't feel
frightened by this vision. In fact, I was glad because I could look up at
Mulder and say with confidence, "She will come back."

In his eyes, I saw the uncertainty but also the willingness to believe. "How
do you know?"

"I know."

...if I should venture into the slip-stream...

I was sitting in the front passenger seat of a car. Before I could adjust
myself to my new surroundings, the door was flung open. I looked up to see a
black man with the most uncaring eyes I've ever seen.

"Who are you?" he demanded in a voice like distant thunder.

Nothing could come out of my mouth. The only thoughts in my head were
"Please don't hurt me" and "He's going to hurt me."

Then his face became less threatening, though no less wary. "I recognize
you," he said. "We had you contained for awhile, but then you vanished."

"I...I guess you did."

The black man looked around him. The car was located in a parking lot next
to a large grey building. Seeing no else around, he got behind the driver's
wheel and drove the car into the street, taking us far away from the
building.

"Why are you here?" he asked.

There was only one reply I could say. "Do you know Mulder or Scully?"

He glanced at me, then said, "Yes."

"Is there...anything strange happening to them now?"

"Well, Agent Mulder is locked in a train car with a bomb. Of course, that's
not a particularly strange event for him."

After pausing to take that in, I said, "You have to help him."

"No."

"Why the hell not?"

"Because he serves my purposes. I don't serve him. I will not risk myself to
save him from his own recklessness."

"But you have to save him!"

"Give me a reason why I should."

I said the first thing that came to mind. "Because I'm from the future and
Mulder is very important."

With a squeal of rubber and metal, the black man jerked the car to the side
and parked it. He turned to me and said in a blunt tone, "Really?"

I managed to look him back in the eye. "Yes. Really." I have no idea if what
I said was true or if I was just making it up. The words just came out.

"Where is your proof?"

"I'm your proof. How else do you explain me?"

He turned towards the engine and gripped the wheel with his hands. He
remained still as a rock for a long time.

Finally he said, "All right."

...between the vine-dex of your dream...

The woman wanted something from me. I didn't know what it was, anymore than
I understood the tears on her face.

I saw another woman's face. It was pale and wan. I realized that I was
looking at the face of Scully. She was lying in a hospital bed, looking like
she would never wake up again. I reached over to touch her cheek.

...could you find me...

Then I was back on the couch of Agent Mulder's apartment again. This time,
he was sitting next to me, so deep in thought that he didn't notice me at
first.

When he finally noticed me, he smiled. "Hi. It's been awhile."

I held back a shudder. "I'll take your word for it."

"You know, the last time I saw you, I wasn't sure if you had been there. I
thought maybe I was going insane."

"I know the feeling." I leaned back on the couch, very tired.

I saw a piece of paper in Mulder's hand. "What is that?" I asked.

"This? It's a message from a...person I know. I think it's telling me to
take up an old cause -- one that I abandoned."

"Why did you do that?"

"Because I stopped believing in it." He frowned. "No. Deep down, I never
stopped believing in it. What happened is that someone next to me was being
hurt and I could have been the one hurting her."

I grabbed onto his arm. "Scully...is she all right?"

He patted my hand. "To quote her, she's fine. Or as well as she can be under
the circumstances. What about you?"

...could you find me...

I screamed at the crying woman. What did you want from me? I demanded.

My screams were overwhelmed by the screaming of other people. These
people -- men, women, children -- were being set on fire. A circle of large
men surrounded them, holding long rods in their hands. When the rod touched
a person, flames exploded all over his body. The red light of the fires
illuminated the attacker's faces. I saw mouths and eyelids mutilated into
closed slits.

I dropped to the floor and held my hands over my ears, begging for the
screams to stop. High Priestess, please save me.

High Priestess? Who...

...in another time...in another place...

The screaming did stop. In its place, I heard the hiss of a slight wind and
a distant hum. Instead of cold cement under me, I felt dirt and leaves.
Sunlight touched upon my neck.

"Miranda!"

I looked up. I saw a forest around me. Mulder was calling out to me from the
door of a steel shelter.

"Get inside now! The swarm is coming!"

The hum was getting louder. I turned and saw a dark cloud filtering through
the trees. I had a vague idea of what was going to happen.

I turned to Mulder and shook my head. He gripped the edge of the doorway,
not knowing whether to go inside or rush towards me.

"Mulder!" a voice yelled from inside the shelter. That forced his decision.
He gave me one last pained look, then closed and locked the door.

The cloud was twenty feet away. Its hum sounded like a drill big enough to
carve a hole in the world. I saw the tiny little dots inside the cloud
circling and turning around each other. A rain of yellow pollen covered the
ground.

I closed my eyes. I crossed my arms over my chest.

...could you find me...

Well, you can guess what happened.

I didn't die. However, I didn't open my eyes, either. Sight just came to me.
I was now looking in a mirror and seeing a face not my own.

The face belonged to a young woman, maybe twelve or thirteen. The first
signs of growing breasts could be seen under her shirt. Her skin was
hovering between the softness of youth and the hardness of adulthood. The
same could be said for her eyes which showed both innocence and experience.

She studied her face, turning its reflection left and right. Then she looked
right into her eyes.

They changed from the color blue to the color brown.

She smiled.

...would you a kiss a my eyes...

A larger mirror and a woman in her early twenties appeared before me. She
was undressing and so was the man seen behind her in the mirror. Even though
the woman had a different shape of nose and color of hair, I knew that this
was the same person as the younger woman I had seen before.

...would you...

A man was facing me, shifting on his feet and turning his hat in his hands.
His suit looked more expensive than the apartment he was visiting.

"We represent...a certain group of Joined who are and are in need
of...certain services," he said, not looking at me.

"Do they?" I heard myself say.

"Yes." The man raised his head and gave me a meaningful look. "This job will
have to be done in the strictest secrecy."

"That's fine. Secrecy is what makes it good."

The man looked away again.

...in another world, darling...

A quick procession of images and sensations flowed over me...velvet
cushions, candles, a scent of jasmine and ginger...faces of people nervous
at first, then flushed and excited...my body changing to meet a hundred
different needs...men and women entwined around me, a whole crowd...

I could feel myself slipping away. The memories I had gained were tearing
apart. I was being reduced to a parasite in another woman's mind.

...from the far side of the ocean...

Then I was in another crowd, silent and still. An old woman was talking to
us. She had a shaved head with symbols carved into her skin. Her voice was
low, but with so much intensity that I was fixed on every word. My host was
experiencing a feeling as great as sexual arousal.

I almost didn't recognize the old woman. Then her blue eyes made me recall a
younger woman with a kinder face.

...I put the wheels in motion...

I was closer to the woman now. We were in a room full of discarded
scientific equipment -- microscopes, beakers, electronic scanners -- molded
into surreal sculptures. She was holding a chain wrapped around the neck of
an elderly one-armed man. He was done on all fours, his tongue lapping at a
bowl of water.

"So...you wish to join the Church," she said.

"Yes."

"What use would we have for a whore?"

"I'm a whore who can do this..."

My skin turned to liquid and then solidified.

The old woman raised an eyebrow.

"Yes," she said. "That can be useful."

...in another time...in another place...

Two men appeared, one after the other. I was making love to them both. The
first was a white man ravaged and beaten by age. He barely moved and didn't
open his eyes as I dragged his penis inside me. I didn't recognize him until
he moaned the word "Scully..."

The other man called me different names -- slut, whore, cunt. He was a
nineteen-year-old black man. I came close to recognizing him as well. The
name couldn't come to me, though. However, his physical contact made me very
uneasy.

That uneasiness was the last bit of myself left. The visions were flowing
over me like water over a rock. I had become hollowed out, bereft of memory
and identity. I simply felt whatever this woman felt. I was a nameless
phantom floating through her life.

...if I should...

I walked down a flight of stairs into a basement. Music greeted me as I
descended. The music's source was a young woman sitting at a keyboard. Her
right hand played a jaunty tune while her left hand beat down the rhythm.
(Professor Longhair-style, I found myself thinking.) The keyboardist had
skin of a dark tinge, sharp green eyes and a long, graceful neck. She
stopped playing when she noticed my arrival.

"Hey, I'm here to audition for the bass-player job," I said.

The keyboardist nodded and held out a hand as she reached into her shirt
pocket for her cigarettes. "Miranda Rush," she introduced herself.

"Nora Konsinki," I respond. "You know, you shouldn't smoke."

Miranda lifted an eyebrow. "What are you, some kind of goddamned doctor?"

I smiled. So did she.

...could you find me...

There was a series of firsts.

The first shared look as Miranda's fingers danced over the keys and I
thumped my bass.

The first confession.

The first kiss, quick and fleeting.

The first night spent in each other's arms.

...would you kiss a my a eyes...

I felt envious of Miranda. Who wouldn't want to have that kind of love? Who
wouldn't want to feel what she felt in Nora's arms? I had seen this kind of
love rarely -- between Mulder and Scully, sometimes between my mother and...

...and lay me down in silence easy...

...my father?

...to be born again...

I am more than a parasite, I thought. I have a mother and a father. I have a
past which was stolen from me.

I have a lover.

...in another time...

The woman cried. "Come back to me," she pleaded. A song was being played
just for me.

...in another place...

I looked up at the woman. She caught her breath when she saw my eyes focus
on her tear-streaked face. We were both in the back seat of a car. My head
was resting in her lap. Van Morrison sang on the tape player.

"Got a cigarette?" I asked.

New tears burst from her eyes as she bent down to touch her forehead against
mine. I started to cry, too.

"Got a home on high," Morrison sang.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (13 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART THIRTEEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

We spent a lot of time just crying and holding each other. When he had
finally spent ourselves, we sat up in the back seat, wiping our eyes and
holding hands.

"We thought we had lost you," Nora told me.

"I was lost. For a long time." I looked outside the window. I saw a night
sky revealed in all of its wide glory without the impediment of a city
skyline. I also saw a desert full of stiff bushes and smooth rocks. It
stretched out in all directions from our car.

"Where are we?"

"Near the Arizona border."

"And why are we here?"

"You had just...collapsed during practice. Nobody could get you to wake up.
And then..." She took a breath. "...the Stabilizers came. For you."

"Why?"

"Your father..." She cleared her throat. "Theyo told us about your visions.
And about Senator Matheson. It looks like the senator wanted to know how
exactly your father was getting his information. Somehow theyo must have
found out about your visions so theyo sent the Stabilizers after you and
everybody else."

"When you say 'everybody else...'"

"You, your mother, your father...of course, you were the important one so we
and we had to get you out of town. You were carried to our car and we drove
you out of L.A. as fast as we could. We stopped for a rest here."

I looked to the tape recorder where Van Morrison was singing to his sweet
thing. "I see you didn't forget your tunes."

"The tape was just in there when we and you escaped. We thought that...we
don't know...if we played some music..."

I brushed my hand across her cheek. "In this case, it wasn't just mystic
shit."

She kissed my hand as it passed over her face. "We missed you so much."

"I missed you...Julia."

Her hand almost escaped mine, but I held on tight. I looked into her shocked
eyes and said in a calm voice, "I saw many things when I was gone. I saw
your past. I know about your relationship with my father. You're a
shapeshifter, aren't you?"

She nodded.

"Hm. Interesting. You seem to be able to change your age as well."

"Sort of," she whispered. "After the Message, we bonded with the Second
Mind. It gave us the ability to take on younger forms. But a part of us
still ages. One day, we will die."

"Yeah. We all gotta do that."

It took a long time before anything else was spoken.

I said, "Are there any other secrets you want to tell me?"

She let out a breath and turned her face to me. It shifted and aged until I
was looking at the face of Mrs. Knight. She allowed me to look at it for a
second, before she changed back.

"Don't that beat all," I commented. "So, it was you who formed the
Messengers."

"We did. We wanted to honor the memory of the High Priestess and what she
did for the world."

"I imagine. And just what happened to me back on the studio lot? What did
you do to me?"

"We didn't do that much. We just bonded our Second Mind to your
consciousness and guided you to a better understanding of your gift."

"You've been watching me for some time, haven't you?"

Nora looked away.

"Haven't you?"

"We should have known what they were doing to Arthur," she said. "It was
happening right under our nose, but... when we learned about it...we just
had to make sure our mistakes wouldn't turn into a disaster."

"Did my father know you were watching me?"

"No. Theyo never knew who we are."

"Well, I think he has a right to know."

Nora was silent.

"Nora?"

"We...we can't tell themo."

"Why not?"

Nora turned to me with new tears leaving her eyes. "Your father are dead."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

There was this one song my father always played on the stereo. It was a good
tune but it drove me nuts to hear it so often.

"If no one else believes in you...I'm completely yours...I've got so much
faith in you...Whatever life puts in front of you...you can save this
world...I've got so much faith in you..."

My father danced with me once to that song. Actually, he just picked up my
two-year-old body and held me gently to his chest as he swayed to the beat.
I remember how safe I felt in his arms.

This was the memory filling my mind as I looked up at the stars. I had
walked away from Nora. Silence and space kept us apart. In that moment, I
felt closer to the stars than anyone else in the world. Those bright sparks
were just as solitary as I was, though. Great black expanses isolated them
even as their light touched upon your face.

Nora couldn't just leave me out there alone. After several minutes had
passed, she got out of the car and walked up to me. Before she could speak,
I said --

"I wonder if you can see them."

"What are you...oh. Yes. Them."

"What day is it?"

She told me.

"Hell," I said. "I've been out for over twenty-four hours."

"Yes. The colonists should reach us by late night tomorrow."

"So they should be visible in our skies by now, I would think."

"Yeah."

"You know, I once read this quote by a science-fiction writer. I forget his
name. He said that the greatest pain doesn't come from space. It comes from
our own hearts. Of course, both things could happen. Your wife could leave
you *and* the Martians could attack."

"We guess...that's what's happening right now."

I nodded, then looked away from the sky towards Nora. "Was the sex just a
side-benefit?" I asked. "Just something that came out of your surveillance
of me?"

"No!" Nora shot back. "That wasn't..."

"I've seen your past. Looks like to me you just gotta have it."

She flinched. "That may have...that was true once. We saw ourselves as...we
don't know...someone who was bringing back love to the world. But..." She
looked straight at me. "...we didn't understand love until we met you. We'll
never stop loving you. We..."

Her mouth shut up and she looked down at the dry land. I was silent for two
or three seconds, then said --

"I'll never stop loving you, either."

She looked back up at me, not sure if she really heard that but hoping it
was true. My voice was very calm as I continued to speak. I didn't even
touch her. I meant everything I said, though.

"What we have is above everything that might come between us. I know this
because...I've seen it elsewhere.  Whatever lies and misdeeds might get in
the way, there are things that transcend everything rotten and demand
forgiveness simply because of what they are. That is what we have."

She swallowed and said, "Thank you." I never seen her look more beautiful
than at that moment. I suppose that I should have hugged her. Instead, I
said, "Let's go."

"Where are we going?"

"Back to Los Angeles."

"But...Senator Matheson..."

"If he kills me, then he'll be killing himself. Because I know what the
Ticking Crocodiles are. I know what their connection is to the colonists. We
have to go back and warn him."

She wanted to say something that would change my mind, but couldn't find the
words.

"It isn't just love that transcends us, Nora. There are certain causes, too.
I don't know if I was given this responsibility through fate or design, but
I have to fulfill it.

"Now...let's go."

Before we headed back to the car, I looked at the sky. I wondered if one of
the brighter stars had just moved.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (14 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART FOURTEEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

We met in a garage. Figures.

Los Angeles was completely under Stabilizer control when we arrived at the
city limits. It didn't taken long for Nora and I to get pulled over by a
Stabilizer unit and for my description to be matched to an all-points
bulletin.

"Ma'am, would you step out of..."

"No."

The Stabilizers froze, definitely not used to being addressed like that.
Nora squirmed on the seat next to me.

"You go send a message to Senator Matheson. Tell him I want to arrange a
meeting. Tell him if he doesn't show up with my mother, I'm going to let
everyone know what the Crocodiles are. And tell him if he wants to keep from
making the biggest mistake of his stinking, worthless life, then he should
listen to what I have to say. Tell him that *now*."

I must have sounded really pissed-off because the Stabilizers backed off.
They also relayed my message.

That's how I ended up in a garage around noon on possibly the last day of
humanity. Coming to this garage, I had been struck by how quiet the city had
gotten, except for the rumble of tanks and the occasional voice heard over a
Stabilizer radio channel. The world does not end with a bang or a whimper, I
thought. The end makes no sound at all.

When the senator's car showed up, I caught a glimpse of my mother's face
before the car pulled into a shadow-covered space. Matheson got out of the
car and walked towards me, his bright shoes sounding loud on the concrete.
And he had this *look*...this tense, worried expression...as if he was
actually concerned about my welfare.

Have I mentioned this man made me sick?

"We know you won't believe this," he said. "but what happened to your father
and Robbie Turner was an accident."

I said nothing.

"When the Stabilizers came, they and they were...caught a little off-guard
by how vigorously Mister Rush and Mister Turner reacted. We are sorry that
it happened."

Still, not a word from me.

"We can only imagine what you think of us, Miss Rush. Sometimes, we don't
know what to think. However...we are all trying to work our best within the
restraints of the past. We have to learn from history. My grandfather was a
senator in the pre-Joining days. He had to chose whether or not to stand by
a certain man. In the end, he..."

"Oh, shut the Smoke up, will you?"

Matheson's face tightened as if he had just tasted a sour fruit.

"I'm not interested in hearing your story. You're going to stand there and
hear me tell my story."

That's what I did. I told him everything -- the experiments on my father,
the visions, all of it. After I was done, I said, "Any questions?"

Matheson cleared his throat twice. "Well...yes, quite a lot. For instance,
are you saying that you can actually interact with the past and not just
observe it?"

"I don't know how I do it, but...yeah."

"Amazing. You have become quite a wonder. Have you considered that you might
be very useful against the..."

"I'm not going to be your secret weapon, Senator. Besides, you've already
got one of those, haven't you?"

The cold soul of Matheson could be seen in his eyes now. "How much do you
know?"

"Enough, I believe. I know what you've been breeding. And I know how it got
started."

"Well, tell me, Miss Rush. It's your story."

Indeed. And for you to understand it, you have to go back to the days of the
Joining. The spread of the virus created the Joined, but in some cases, it
fulfilled the original purpose of colonization. It mutated and gestated into
a new extraterrestrial biological entity. These new creatures were the
larvae stage of the new alien race -- a very mean and very tough breed.
However, they were not so tough as to withstand the extermination of them by
the Joined.

"Not all the Errors were killed, were they?" I said. "A few must have found
some hiding places. Maybe they went into hibernation or spread a few seeds
around. In any case, the leaders of the Irregulars found a nest of
them...and they began to breed a new crop of Errors."

Matheson nodded slowly.

"It was a plan of last-resort. Breed and train the big grey buggers, then
set them loose on the Joined. But the Irregulars never got to that point.
Skip a few years later. Your people find the body of the smoking man. You
also find evidence that leads you to...I don't know, some remnants of the
old breeding program..."

"Some tissue samples in cold storage, to be exact."

"Whatever. Anyway, you get the idea to take up the program again. Only this
time, you would create your army of trained creatures to be used against
anyone considered an enemy."

"Against the colonists. We have been planning for their return..."

"I'm not interested in your excuses. I'm just here to prevent you from
fucking the planet over."

He put his hands in his pockets. "And just how are we doing that? The
Ticking Crocodiles are our and our ace-in-the-hole. If the colonists manage
to get through our and our defenses and put one skinny grey foot on Earth,
then they will receive quite a rude shock when the Crocodiles attack them.
As for what people might think about breeding them in the first place, we're
sure any doubts will be eliminated once their effectiveness is seen."

"Maybe. But there's one problem, Senator."

"We know what you're thinking. Can we and we control the Crocodiles? We
assure you that they are under the strictest..."

"You won't be able to control them. You don't control them now."

"Oh? And who does?"

"The smoking man."

He looked at me. I wanted to slap the condescending, weary expression off
his face.

"Miss Rush, unless you haven't heard it by now...well, we'll repeat it
anyway. The smoking man are dead."

"You just found the body. The mind lives on."

Matheson closed his eyes and rubbed them. "Miss Rush...we have believed your
story up until now, but now we..."

"I entered the minds of the Ticking Crocodiles. There is some force joining
their brains together. When I encountered this force, it tried to kill me.
My only means of escape was fleeing to another time. It's that nasty."

Matheson gave me another look. "And you're saying...that force was the
smoking man?"

"Here was a man who figured out how to defeat old age. Could we put it past
him to discover a way of implanting his consciousness in the genetic samples
you found?"

"Well...actually, yes, it is possible, but..."

"Just how did your people find the smoking man's body? What lead them to it
and the data on the breeding program?"

"We...we don't know. We haven't..."

"Consider this, Senator. What if the smoking man had been watching you? What
if he knew that you couldn't resist the opportunity to get your own secret
weapon? What if he played you step-by-step towards creating this army? Now,
consider this. What if the colonists invade? And instead of fighting them,
the Crocodiles turn on us. Would we be able to survive against both of
them?"

The Senator turned a little pale. Then he shook his head and said, "No. This
is all conjecture. You only have the proof of your so-called 'visions.'"

"What about those signals being transmitted from Earth? Where are they
coming from? I suggest you get started on tracking them. My bet is...they're
coming from your own breeding center."

Matheson pulled his head down to his shoulders. "We...and we...have several
centers actually."

"Go check it out, Senator. And you'll find out that you've been the victim
of history's sickest practical joke."

Matheson swayed on his feet. He looked like he was ready to fall over.

"My mother," I said.

"What?"

"What about my mother?"

He shook himself, then he made a quick motion towards the car. A door opened
and my mother pulled herself out. As she walked towards me, her body was
stiff and her expression blank. She embraced me like a wrench grabbing onto
a bolt.

Matheson walked to the car.

"You do what I said, Senator," I yelled at him over my mother's shoulder.
"You find out just what you are dealing with."

He didn't look back. The car left the garage with him.

"Theyo are dead," my mother whispered.

"I know."

"Our husband are dead."

It was just me and her in that garage for a long time, holding onto each
other.

Then she said, "We are sorry."

"Why?"

"Because your father and we didn't give you a better world to live in."

"You gave me all you could. That's all that matters."

We pulled away, still holding each other by the arm. "What are you going to
do now?" she asked.

"The only thing I can do left." I smile. "I'm going to get as funky as I
want to be."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (15 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART FIFTEEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Located in downtown Los Angeles, The Preserver didn't stand out as a club.
Its capacity was around two-hundred people. It served cold beer and cooked
mediocre food. The inside walls were decorated with old road signs and the
writings of vistors in magic markers. However, on the day of the colonists'
arrival, it had a unique standing in L.A. It was one of the few public
places still open for business.

When I arrived there at five o'clock, Tom was waiting. He did something that
I had never see him do before. He hugged me. He didn't say anything; the hug
was all he needed to say.

Virginia was there and, of course, she had plenty to say. "They're going to
pay for what they did, Miranda. I promise you. They're not going to get away
with what they..."

"Virginia...stop. There's nothing you can do. Besides, why are you talking
as if there is going to be a tomorrow?"

Virginia lit up a cigarette with trembling fingers. "Because these things
count, even in the face of armageddon. I'm tired of seeing my friends die."

"I understand. But, tonight, let's think about the living."

She looked at me with her familiar suspicious expression. "Did something
happen to you? You seem...different."

"Let's just say that I've been talking with a lot of ghosts."

Her mouth shifted to the side, pointing the cigarette in a new direction.
"Hm. Well..." She plucked out her cigarette and pointed at the empty club.
"...I think you won't be playing for anybody but ghosts tonight."

"No," I said. "They'll come."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

They did.

They arrived, either talking too loud or not talking at all. They came in
large groups who seemed to be on the look-out for danger or as a solitary
person who stayed in the back like a shadow. I saw young men and old ladies;
Armani suits and sweaters pulled out of a trash can; races of every kind. I
even saw parents with their children. However, one thing they all had in
common was an air of desperation. They came because they heard the place was
open and they didn't know where else to go.

Soon The Preserver had exceeded its crowd limit. Some of the customers were
out at the street, just hanging around and trying to listen to the sound
inside. Virginia was in charge of handling this crowd. The club owner had
ducked out of town along with the bartender staff. She stood behind the
counter and dispensed the drinks and bowls of chips. Many customers were
outraged that they had to actually pay for the refreshments, but their
complaints were cut short by a comment Virginia reserved for any displays of
temper --

"Don't...fuck with me."

It worked surprisingly well, especially when she indicated the guitarist
tuning up on stage. The belligerent customer would look at Tom and Tom would
look back with the ice cubes in his eye sockets.

Still, if The Channel Surfers didn't get its music started up, then the
crowd was going to lose control. Unfortunately, our singer hadn't arrived
yet. Tom was there, I was there, Nora was there and Alonzo was there, albeit
already drunk. Leonard was nowhere to be seen. We could have tried to play
straight instrumentals, but we would have had no idea where to begin. When
we had played before, we had always done it around Leonard's vocals. If we
had tried to perform without him on that night, we would have probably
fallen apart and this night had been demanding quality from us.

So we waited.

And we waited.

When it reached ten minutes past our official show time, the crowd was
getting a mite testy. "Start the fucking show!" and "Play, goddammit" were
phrases frequently heard. The desperate faces in the dim lighting of The
Preserver looked like apes in a cave. My mother was standing in a corner,
looking as frightened as I felt. Virginia stared at the silent band on the
stage, demanding that we take action *now*.

Tom walked up onto the stage. He had just gone to make a call to Leonard,
attempting to find out just where the hell our singer was. He shook his head
at us. We were facing the possibility that our lead singer had met some
obstacle (a Stabilizer, some citizen maddened by doomsday) or he had just
skipped town. We were now faced with two options. We could try to play and
do our best. Or we could flee out the back door. Neither option felt
particularly welcome as the crowd began to stomp its feet, shake its fists
and make a din no sound could penetrate.

Except for the wail of a saxophone

It was like a cannon had been fired behind them. The crowd silenced itself
and I saw a hundred heads turn at the same time.

Another fat note burst from the saxophone, then spiralled down into a quiet,
improvised melody. Then a man moved towards the stage, eyes closed and the
horn of his saxophone leading the way like the prow of a steamer.

The audience cleared a way. Somehow, enough space was created in the tightly
packed club for a path. Leonard walked at a slow, casual pace. This big man
played the saxophone as if he was alone on top of a building and had the
whole city listening (which was possible.) The air came out of his lungs in
intricate patterns of sound, breaking down a musical idea into the complex
symphony contained inside. Notes-within-notes, Dizzy Gillepsie would have
called it.

Everyone watched, hypnotized by his calm. He took their fascination in
stride as he got closer and closer to the stage.

Without pausing in his music, he placed one boot on the stage, stepped up,
turned and completed the symphony he was creating.

He lowered his saxophone and looked over the audience, apparently coming to
a decision. The audience looked back at the singer towering over them.

He snapped his fingers in front of his microphone. The snap came out loud
and short over the speakers.

Then he leaned forward to the mike and sang --

"At first, I was afraid...I was petrified..."

What the Smoke? I thought. I looked to the others and they were as confused
as I was. Leonard was singing *this* song? To *this* audience? Again, I was
considering a quick escape with my mother.

Then I looked at the faces of the audience. They were completely fascinated
by this enormous man singing an old disco tune. That's when I realized that
I was hypnotized, too. Leonard was singing as quietly as I had ever heard
him. His eyes were closed, his shoulders were hunched and his mouth was
almost touching the microphone. He sang the lyrics at half the original
beat. His voice still had that deep rumble, but it was a strength fighting
against a terror. The words "I grew strong...I learned how to get along..."
became a mantra spoken to himself and not a rebuke to a careless lover. It
was a prayer for strength.

He fell silent, his final note cut short. With his eyes still closed and his
body as immobile as a rock, he waited for...what?

Then Nora tapped the strings of her bass, quickening the tempo just a little
bit. The heavy sound was joined by Leonard's equally heavy voice, now
gaining a confidence in the face of his terror. He straightened out his
shoulders and held his saxophone to him like a rifle. And when he sang "And
so you're back from outer space," we all knew whom he was addressing. A few
cheers broke out when he snarled "I should have changed my stupid lock...I
would have made you leave your key." I had also joined in the song,
punctuating each of  Leonard's defiant statements with a short chord.

"If I'd have known for just one second..."

A brief pause from him. Then he came back with --

"You'd be back to bother meeeeeeeee...."

He drew out that final note and the Leonard Suderman we knew was back, full
of confidence and swagger. As he hung on that note and raised his fist in
the air, he opened his eyes. He looked at the audience as if he was the
leader. From the sound of cheers now coming from every throat, there seemed
to be no doubt that he was. Alonzo grinned as he rattled his cymbals under
Leonard's voice, letting everybody know that the shit was going down *now*.

And it did.

The Channel Surfers crashed into full up-tilt boogie. It sounded like disco,
but disco by way of punk. I leaned to the right and saw Tom playing rhythm,
but rhythm full of feedback -- big ol' power chords a la Pete Townshend. He
actually had a little smile on his face.

That son-of-a-bitch Leonard. He knew just what to do that night and what to
give the crowd. As the audience jumped, waved their arms and screamed, he
looked up at the ceiling and shook his fist. "Oh, now go," he shouted. "Walk
out the door...Just turn around now...You're not welcome anymore." As I
watched this, I was convinced that Leonard should lead our armies against
the colonists. I was also convinced that The Channel Surfers was the best
damn band in the world.

Leonard looked back to the audience. "I will survive!" he declared. "As long
as I know how to love, I'll know I'll be alive..." Nora turned to me and
smiled. As I smiled back, I thought --

I forgive you.

I forgive you and mother and father and everybody.

I don't care anymore about the mistakes that were made.

I don't care anymore about what was not said.

I only care that I love you.

Those thoughts must have been written on my face because Nora crossed over
to me. When Leonard sang "I've got all my life to live...I've got all my
love to give", she leaned across the keyboard and I stood up. Without
missing a single note, we kissed each other.

The audience went nuts.

"Cor!" Alonzo shouted out as he played more tightly than ever before in his
life. "Lesbian love! This band has got everythin'!"

At this point, the time had come for Leonard's sax solo. However, as he
lifted a reed to his lips, a most peculiar and wonderful noise shot out of
the speakers. Imagine Stevie Ray Vaughn playing disco. Rapid-fire notes
followed each other in smooth patterns like a school of fish. We stared in
amazement as the fingers of our introverted guitarist ran a pick up and down
his strings.

"That's what I'm fucking talking about!" Leonard declared.

Tom just smiled.

I didn't just think we were the best band in the world. At that moment, it
was a fact. I couldn't imagine anywhere else I wanted to be and any other
people I wanted at my side. This is my defense, I thought. This music is my
shield against evil and destruction.

There's one problem with music, though.

It has to stop.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Ever since the world ended
"I don't go out as much.
"People that I once befriended
"Just don't bother to stay in touch."

The audience laughed. Even my sad, tired mother showed a smile. It was yours
truly who suggested that we do this song. After "I Will Survive," we segued
into "Without a Doubt" (Leonard was a pretty good rapper for a white guy),
"The Gang's All Here" (Oi! Oi! Oi!), "Thank You For Letting Me Be Myself
Again" ("Lookin' at the devil...grinnin' at his gun...") and then kicked
things up again for "My Generation" (on which Alonzo almost destroyed his
drum kit.) After expending a lot of energy on that number, I motioned
Leonard over and whispered that we should try a quieter number. "Got any in
mind?" he asked.

This old Mose Allison tune seemed appropriate. Its sardonic viewpoint went
over well with the crowd which had reached the point where it just didn't
care anymore. They didn't care about the colonists, the war, the apocalypse,
nothing. They were just dancing and drinking and sweating and cheering for
us. They were ecstatic even as Leonard delivered the song with the weariness
of a soldier sitting in a trench.

"Things that used to seem so splendid
"Don't really matter today.
"It just as well the world ended.
"It wasn't working anyway."

He then did a nice solo which was supposed to be followed by my own turn on
the keyboard. It was going to be my first public solo and I was all ready
for it.

However, just as Leonard blew his last note, something interrupted.

It went pop.

If the music had been louder, we wouldn't have noticed it. The noise came
from a distant point. It was indefinable and rather unthreatening. You would
have wondered what it was, but not gotten worried.

I stopped playing, though. So did the rest of the Channel Surfers. Virginia
stopped pouring drinks. My mother looked up. So did everybody else.
.
Pop.

So, *that's* the sound of the world coming to an end, I thought. Not a bang
or a whimper.

Pop.

Then...whoosh.

No one went outside. We just stared at the ceiling as if we could see
through it. What would we have seen? What was now flying in our skies?

I heard a louder sound, more recognizable. Jets and helicopters were rushing
overhead. They sounded full of purpose.

Pop.

Both of my hands were grasped. My mother had my left and Nora was holding my
right. I held onto those hands as tightly as they held mine.

I closed my eyes. I thought about everything that had happened to me. What
had been the purpose of my visions and my time travelling? Did they have any
connection to what was happening now? Was there anybody who could explain it
to me?

Would it surprise you to know that I stopped feeling the hands of my mother
and Nora?

Of course not. I was no longer in The Preserver. Before I opened my eyes, I
was aware of a bizarre smell. It reminded me of grass after a rainstorm, but
mixed with the scent of burning rubber. I wouldn't describe it as being
pungent -- just odd.

Opening my eyes revealed a long metal corridor. The walls and floor were
green. They gave off a glow to light your way. Rust and rot seemed to be
covering the walls, but they didn't seem to weaken the metal.

It didn't take me long to realize that I was on a goddamn alien space
ship -- one of the very ships orbiting my planet right now.

When I heard footsteps, I didn't run. Where could I go? Besides, I knew
there had to be a reason why I was here right now.

I was right.

She came around the corner, dressed in a grey uniform. Her stride was quick
but not confident. She had an anxious look in her eyes as if she had a task
to be performed immediately. When she saw me, she jumped back a step and
gasped. She stared for just a moment, then turned to run.

That's when I recognized her face. I had seen it in a photo. This woman had
been younger then; fifteen years younger from the look of her now. She had
also been smiling in the photo. She didn't look like she could smile now.

"Samantha?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (16 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART SIXTEEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"How...how did you know my name?"

What else could I say? "I knew your brother."

The pain which appeared on Samantha's face was like a knife cutting my
flesh. I had to look away from her. I was seeing too much in her eyes -- too
many years spent in captivity, too much time separated from her loved ones,
too many days spent in this world of iron and darkness.

"How is he?"

She spoke so quietly and so meekly, giving a depth of fear to her banal
question. I forced myself to look back at her.

"I don't know. I met him...a long time ago. I haven't seen him since."

She looked down at the green floor. "He's probably dead by now," she said.

I made no response. I just waited for her to speak.

When she lifted her head, she said, "You still haven't explained how you got
here."

I sighed. "You wouldn't believe how difficult it is to answer that
question."

Samantha looked both ways in the corridor. "Come with me. We need to talk in
private."

She led me through another few corridors. Luckily, we met no one else on the
way. I don't want to think about  who (or what) we could have encountered.

She stopped before an iron door and pressed her hand against it. Despite its
size and weight, it slid out of the way without a sound. After we walked
through the doorway, Samantha touched her hand against the wall. The door
moved back into place.

The room looked like a cell. A cot jutted out from one green wall. A table
was shoved into one corner with a plate and utensils sitting on it. There
was a tall alcove which I assumed could be used to clean yourself.

She sat down on the cot and said, "Now what is so difficult to explain?"

"Let's just say...that while I'm here, I'm also somewhere else."

"And where is 'somewhere else?'"

"Earth."

Samantha paused.

Then she said, "Oh."

"Yeah," I replied. I looked around the cell. "I take it this is one of the
colonists' ships."

Samantha nodded. "One of many ships."

"All of them circling my planet right now. Excuse me, our planet."

"Earth hasn't been my planet for a long time," she said with the tiniest of
smiles.

We both fell silent. A faraway hum occupied our silence.

Then I spoke up. "Can you explain something to me?"

"I can try."

"Just why the hell do the aliens want to take over Earth anyway?"

Samantha took a breath, then said, "Pride."

"Hm?"

"It's being done for the pride of their whole species. When colonization was
first planned, there was a power struggle going on for control of their
government between the leaders and a rebel faction. To quell rebellion, a
project was created to raise the reputation of the leaders. They would
reclaim the 'homeworld' -- the origin of their species. Earth became a
symbol to them. It was used to diffuse rebellion and to distract other
members of their species from more urgent problems."

It was a long, long time before I could make any comment.

"You mean," I said. "they are out to massacre and enslave billions of people
as a *publicity stunt*?"

"That...is essentially their intent. Yes."

I wanted to hit something. I want to kick over the table, pound the walls,
find the aliens and stand on their heads. My feelings showed in how I
started to pace and clench my fists.

"It's not behavior far removed from what humans have done," Samantha said in
a quiet voice. "How many politicians have arranged executions to save their
political campaigns? How many kings have waged wars just to keep the
weapon-makers rich and their population distracted?"

"That's...that's nothing compared to what...to what they're doing!" My
throat was tight and strangled. I could feel the pulse hammering in my neck.
"This is...this is beyond..."

"Evil is evil. Sometimes, scale doesn't matter."

For a moment, I wanted to attack Samantha. How dare she speak so calmly
about this? I thought. Then I looked at a woman who had been to the far end
of the universe and had lived with a race of beings as distant from her as
humans were from bugs. I turned away and gripped the edge of the table,
pushing down my rage.

After I had calmed myself down enough, I said, "Well...the results of the
first colonization didn't go as planned. Why have they come back again?"

"After the failed colonization, a final war broke out between the leaders
and the rebels. The leaders won, but their empire is broken and weak."

"So they're using Earth for the same reasons as before. As a distraction."

"That's right."

I turned back to her. "They have help this time."

Samantha's expression had been subdued throughout this conversation. It must
have been the expression she usually showed to her masters. Now, however,
her eyes brightened with anger. "Yes," she said. "The smoking man."

"Do you know about him and the..."

"I know."

"How did he do it?"

"Does it matter? He always finds a way to do what he wants. He always finds
a new plot or a new angle. It's what he exists for."

"And he would send so many people to their death because...why exactly?"

"Because it's his will. That's all you need to know."

I let out a breath and sat down next to Samantha on the cot. "Well...if
we're lucky, then one-half of his battle plan has been dismantled."

Samantha almost jumped off the cot. "What do you...what are you talking
about?"

"It's a long, long story. Let's just say that I may have convinced somebody
to stop the smoking man. If that happens, then the colonists will find their
ground troops have been eliminated."

"But...if that's true, then that means..." A hopeful look rose on Samantha's
face, but then she sunk back into her gray demeanor. "No. The colonists are
not going to turn back now. They have too much at stake."

"So I figured. But, at least, Earth has a fighting chance this way." I
paused. "Doesn't it?"

"It does."

"Only...what?"

"The colonists were frightened off when the virus became a new sentient life
form. They are prepared this time."

I had no optimistic words with which to contradict her. I leaned back
against the green wall and closed my eyes while Samantha sat at the cot's
edge with erect posture. Again, it became quiet.

This time, it was Samantha who broke the silence.

"I'm sorry, but...what is your name?"

I smiled. "Miranda. Miranda Rush."

"You know, you don't look quite old enough to have known my brother."

"Yeah, well, you're looking pretty well-preserved yourself."

"The aliens have done this to me. They've kept me alive and young so I
can...I can serve them better."

I reached over and held one of her hands. She squeezed back.

"Ow!"

"Oh, I'm sorry," she apologized, easing her grip. "The aliens gave me..."

"Advanced strength. I noticed."

For yet another time, both of us became silent. Just being on that
ship...something about it just sapped your will. You started to feel
helpless. I could only imagine what decades spent on it could do a person.

"Do they hurt you?" I asked.

She shook her head. "Not anymore. I'm just their servant now, not their test
subject."

"What do you do for them?"

"Cleaning. Maintenance." She shrugged. "I'm essentially a maid." She looked
at me. "You must be thinking -- if she could escape, would she?"

"Something like that."

She let out a long breath. "I don't think about that. Because I doubt I'll
ever get the choice. Besides...this is the only life I know. My memories of
Earth are so faint now."

"Including your brother?"

Her head sank. For a moment, she looked close to breaking out into tears.
Then she lifted up her head and said, "No. I still think about him." She
cleared her throat. "When you last saw him...how was he?"

At first, I didn't know what to say to her. How could I explain that my
knowledge of her brother was fragmented and non-linear? What could I say
based on the little I knew?

I needed a better answer.

I got one.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A cool wind blew in through the open window. It touched my head as softly as
the hand that was stroking my hair. I took pleasure in the comfort given by
the wind and the woman sitting next to my bed.

She was an old woman. Despite her cracked skin, bony hands and a head with
only a sparse clump of grey hair, she was beautiful. It was the look in her
blue eyes that warmed your heart. They were looking at me with so much love.

And sadness.

"I have a regret..." I said. My voice was small and weak.

"What's that?" the woman asked, her voice stronger but lowered to match
mine.

"I never got a chance...to see your red hair again..."

The woman smiled in a embarrassed way. She brushed a hand through the grey
locks on her head. "Does it matter?" she asked. "You're red-green deficient,
aren't you?"

"I always knew...it was red..."

Her hand strayed from my hair and rested on my cheek. I felt my eyelids
start to fall, but I wanted to keep looking at her.

"Thank you," she whispered.

"For what...?"

"For these last few years."

I shook my head, just a slight movement. "I could have given you...more..."

"One day would have been more than enough."

Tears blur my eyes. "No. I should have..."

"Shhh. Don't think about that. We were just confused back then. We were
facing a world we didn't make."

Despite the tears, I find myself smiling. "How...how can you say that?
You've made...the world twice."

She shook her head. "I was just a tool."

"Whose tool? God's?"

"If you like. But the world doesn't obey a single will. We are all part of a
story much larger than any..."

"Scully?"

"What?"

"I get it. You don't need to...make a speech."

She smiled, then bent over and kissed me on the cheek.

My eyelids were almost closed now. Except for the hand on my cheek, all the
other sensations in my body were distant and numb. "I always... wondered how
I would...would feel...when my time came. I wondered if...I would be scared.
But I'm not. I'm not...scared at all..."

"I won't be scared, either," the old woman said, her voice choking. "Because
I know you'll be waiting for me."

"Scully, I don't know...if there is a place..."

"There is, Mulder. There is."

I sighed. "There you go again. Always...second-guessing me..."

My eyes were now closed. I felt Scully's hands leave me. I wanted to cry out
for their return. Then I realized that they were still there, but I just
couldn't feel them. My ears had become deaf and my mouth could taste
nothing. I felt like a hollow tube. The only connection I had with the world
was the air I continued to breath. That was slipping away as my lungs
weakened. I became conscious of every mouthful of air entering and leaving
me. I counted them.

One...two...three...

And four.

Scully.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Miranda?"

I hesitated before I said, "Yes?"

"Is something the matter? You looked so strange for a moment."

"I imagine." I looked Samantha right in the eyes. "Fox was very, very happy
when I saw him. And he was with someone he loved."

She stared at me, judging my truthfulness. When she accepted my words, she
sighed. "Good. That's something they can't take away from me."

I nodded. "No. They can't. Because they don't understand..."

When I didn't complete my sentence, Samantha said, "What is it?"

I just sat and looked at the wall for a full minute before I said, "Maybe
it's time they do understand."

"What does that mean?"

"It means I know why I'm here. Why I've been...seeing certain things. I
don't know who has been responsible for what's been happening to me, but
there has been a purpose to it all. And this is it."

With that, I stood up, my hand still touching Samantha's. "Get up," I told
her.

She did, not knowing what I had in mind. No one could have.

I sighed. "Man, I can't believe I'm going to say this..."

"Say what?"

"Take me to your leader."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (17 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART SEVENTEEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Intellects vast, cool and unsympathetic.

Mister Wells, you didn't know the half of it.

Imagine eyes that only show your own reflection. Imagine a face as white and
cold as the moon. Imagine a sensation in the air like a poisonous fog -- the
same feeling a man might get if he laid his head on a chopping block.

It was like looking into the face of God.

I glanced away from God for a moment to the face of Samantha Mulder. She did
not look scared even though she was risking punishment by bringing me to the
heart of the spaceship. Maybe she was that brave. Or maybe she had reached
the point where she didn't care anymore.

Then I was asked why I was here.

I turned back to those facing me. I had one brief moment to consider my
answer and to comprehend everything that was riding on it.

I said --

"I've come to show you something."

And why should we look at it?

"Because you'll learn an important thing about humans."

What would we gain?

"What could you lose?"

It was a long time before I got a reply. The answer was --

Show me.

I knew what I wanted to do. I just didn't know how to do it. My assumption
was that it would just happen for the same reason everything else did.
Because it was supposed to.

As it turned out, this moment was no exception. I felt the back of my head
open.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The world came charging through it.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

History followed.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The two sons find it so hard to keep still. They are too jittery with the
rash energy of youth. However, the stern yet quiet face of their father is
enough to prevent them from doing anything foolish. They wait in the bushes
which barely provides cover for them from the antelope's eyes. This fast and
alert creature just has to know that they're stalking it. Their father has
told them beforehand that no human cannot sneak up on any animal.

"Then how do we kill it?" one of the sons asks.

The father smiles and said, "Humans are the only creatures which can hide
their intentions."

As they watch their father move away from the bushes, they wonder how he is
hiding his own intentions. The spear is in his hand. His movements are slow
and careful, his shoulders are arched, his arm is raised. They can see that
he is ready to kill, but the antelope remains in its spot and chews on the
grass.

After the spear is thrown and the animal is dead, the father gathers his
sons around the animal. He leads them in a prayer to the antelope's soul so
that it might understand why it had to die. Then the father leads his sons
back to their village, carrying tonight's dinner over his shoulders.

"Father?"

"Yes?"

"How did you do it?"

The father just smiles.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She sits in a hut with the cold wind blowing outside. The wind has been
blowing for months now, streaking across the ice which never leaves the
land. A satchel lies on the fur-covered ground. She has made it herself and
has filled it with food and clothing. She is wondering if she should pick it
up, leave the hut and then walk far away from her village.

Soon her husband will come. Well, he's not her husband yet. Their marriage
has yet to be consecrated by the elders. There is still time to leave.

She wants to leave because she can no longer stand the disgust in her future
husband's eyes. She is tired of him thinking what an ugly witch she is. He
accepts that the marriage is necessary to bring together two families, but
he wonders if the spirits are punishing him.

Running out on him and her family would be a foolish choice. The land of ice
around the village is without mercy. She has only a crude knife to protect
her from the wolves. Wouldn't it better to live in the security of this
arranged marriage? Isn't living with another man's disgust a small price to
pay?

She looks at her satchel and wonders.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Do you accept Jesus Christ as your lord and savior?"

The question is asked in a quiet voice. An answer is waited for in patience.
However, the dark-skinned soldier says nothing to the pale-skinned priest.
The soldier doesn't look back with anger. His eyes just say that a new faith
cannot be exchanged for an old one as easily as you change your clothes.

The priest looks back, also not in hatred. He regards the captive as a
problem to be solved and not to be despised. He motions to the pale-skinned
soldiers surrounding the prisoner.

They hold the dark-skinned soldier down and place a hot metal rod to his
chest. The prisoner screams out to Allah as his dark skin sizzles. His
torturers do not have the cool face of the priest. They are enjoying this.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The crowd is yelling and cheering and shaking their fists. Every person in
the crowd has lost their personal identity. They're now one organism at the
command of the man shouting back at them. The man is bald with a pointed
beard. "Workers of the world, unite!" he declares. The crowd roars back its
approval, ready to do anything.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The businessman is waiting for a taxi when he sees the boy. He looks to be
five years old and he has that aimless quality children have when they walk
unattended; like a cork floating on water. The boy moves across the sidewalk
on his chubby legs.

The man notices that the boy is heading for the street. His path will take
him right between two parked cars. Another car is rushing down the streets,
its driver unable to see the boy.

It is doubtful that the thirty-five-year-old businessman has ever moved so
fast or will ever move so fast again.

When the driver finally sees the boy, brakes squeal but it's too late to
stop. Then the boy is yanked out of the way.

A woman runs out of the store. She's crying. So is the boy in the
businessman's arms. So is the businessman.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

And there were a billion other stories just like those.

It should have hurt -- all that history and all those people rushing through
my head and into the collective mind of the colonists. Yet it flowed as
easily as water through a spigot. I just closed my eyes and let them all
pass through me. I saw Aztecs building pyramids, Puritans sailing across the
Atlantic, Muslims and Hindus fighting in the streets, Africans being put in
chains, Englishmen riding horses. There was Fyodor Dostoyevsky dictating to
his wife, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk talking long into the night, Napoleon
Bonaparte leading an army, John Adams scribbling in the margins of a book,
Jimi Hendrix burning his guitar. Every act of kindness ever performed, every
cruelty ever done, every night of loneliness and every crowd cheering in the
theater was fed to the colonists. I made them suck every last drop of my
world's history.

I saw my father. From his first bondage with the Second Mind to the bullets
than ended his life, the moments of his existence poured over me. I
experienced his days as a Stabilizer -- those days when he never doubted his
purpose in life. Then he met a man named Fox Mulder and everything changed.
The world was turned upside-down. He began to have dreams he couldn't
explain. He pulled away from the Second Mind until he turned revolutionary
and bedded down with a shape-changing whore. He was later captured after
shooting an old friend. He linked again with the Second Mind, but he still
had no certainty about his purpose.

A message was given. The world changed.

That's when Arthur Rush found a new purpose in life; something that gave it
meaning. He held a newborn baby in his arms and knew that he would do
anything to protect her. Yes, he made mistakes. Yes, there were things he
should have told her. The greatest damage done, however, was that these
secrets kept his daughter from knowing just how much he loved her.

You can't really blame me for crying.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"It's time to go back, Miranda," Samantha said. "You've done well. Peace be
with you."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Nora reached up and brushed a tear off my cheek. I turned to her. The look
on my face surprised her. She was even more surprised when I said, "It's
over."

I let go of their hands. I walked off the stage and passed the audience to
the door. My mother and Nora watched me, too confused to follow.

They were still hanging in the sky when I stepped outside. Those great metal
discs remained up there for a few more seconds.

When they left, they became tiny sparks among the stars, becoming fainter
and fainter with each passing second until they disappeared.

"Good-bye, Samantha," I whispered to the stars.

I just stood there, looking up at the sky with a chilly wind streaking
across me. It took awhile for the others in The Preserver to realize what
was going on. One by one, they stepped outside. They looked at the sky with
me, seeing nothing but the stars and planets.

When it became apparent that the colonists had left, no one cheered. We just
stood on the street -- some alone, some holding hands with another person.
They could have walked away in a dozen directions, but no one could believe
they had the freedom to do so. The reward of another day to live was too
bewildering.

My mother found me. The moment I saw her, I embraced her. "I wish Dad could
be here," I said.

She said nothing. She just embraced me in return.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

I like to think that I had found the conscience of the aliens. I want to
believe that I had shown them the evil of what they were attempting to do.
However, I don't think that was the reason they returned to their world.

It was the enormity of the act that frightened them. I showed them the
entire history of my planet. I forced upon them the accumulation of every
human life that had existed there. They realized that exterminating us would
render that collective story into nothingness. In theory, they could do
that. Yet when they saw the real thing, they hesitated.

I don't know if they have their own gods. However, they must have wondered
if some kind of judgment was waiting for the kind of sin they wanted to
perform. This was a risk they balked at taking.

So I guess I kinda saved the human race.

That sounds pretty blithe, doesn't it? Well, there are two reasons for that.

One is that I still don't know if I was guiding myself to that moment on the
spacecraft or...well, pick the transcendent force of your taste. Was I being
directed by someone else and being shown the knowledge I had to understand
in order to save us all? Or did I sense on an unconscious level what needed
to be done?

I have no answer there. What I hope is that whatever means helped me achieve
my goal hasn't deserted me.

This brings me to my second reason. You see, it isn't over yet. Even as I
tell this story, another threat has risen.

Want to guess what it is?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

TITLE: SLIP-STREAM (18 of 18)

AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

PART EIGHTEEN

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

We had barely started celebrating when the first reports came in. There were
stories of something coming out of Tunisia...then South
Korea...Brazil...Australia...New Mexico, U.S.A....

The stories were about a band of animals invading towns and attacking anyone
in sight. It didn't take us long to find out they were more than just
animals. When we realized what was on the loose, everyone felt chilled to
the bone. Our fear got worse when we heard that the invaders knew how to use
guns and were as well-organized as any army. And when we heard that they
were using human carcasses as incubation chambers, everybody started to
panic. Where was Senator Matheson? some asked. Why isn't he doing something
about this?

Senator Matheson was dead -- killed by his own creation. The Errors, on the
other hand, were alive and well.

When all this started up, I decided to pay someone a visit.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Oh. It's you again."

"Yeah. It's me. Don't try anything. I'm ready this time."

"I figured you would be." He reached into his coat pocket, looking at me as
if he was memorizing every pore on my skin. "Your name is...Miranda, right?"

"Yes."

The man nodded and pulled out a packet of cigarettes. He extracted one,
placed it in his mouth and lit it, all done with a casual familiarity. He
offered the pack to me. "Want one?"

"I just quit."

A little smile rose on his face. "I once knew a Miranda," he said as he blew
out a plume of smoke.

"Her name was Jane."

The casual arrogance on his face hardened into caution. "How did you know
that?"

"She lived with my parents during the final days of her life. They named me
after her."

His hand tightened around the cigarette. "You're Arthur Rush's daughter," he
said in a grim voice.

"Yep."

"So...how is Arthur Rush?"

"He's dead. Senator Matheson had him killed."

"Ah." He pressed the cigarette into his mouth again. The tiny smile returned
to his lips. "Tit for tat, then."

"Oh, so you blame my father for Jane leaving you?"

"I treated her like she was my only daughter. Arthur poisoned her mind
against me."

I looked at the man for a long time, then said, "You know the colonists have
left?"

"Yes. I'm not sure why."

"They finally understood the consequences of what they were doing. They
couldn't handle it."

"Hmmm." The man blew out another cloud. "Yes. Figures. Really, colonization
was based on very short-sighted goals -- the temporary placating of their
own empire. They never understood the full implications."

"You do."

The man nodded, still giving me that smile I wanted to rip off his face.

"So now you've unleashed your own little army," I observed.

"Matheson thought he controlled the Ticking Crocodiles. Imagine his
surprise."

"I imagine it will be just as big as yours when I stomp your freak show into
the dirt."

It became silent in that dark ether where we both stood. It was awhile
before the smoking man broke the silence.

"You know...I was told once there would always be someone in my way, no
matter what I was planning. Are you that person now?"

I crossed my arms over my chest.

"How disappointing," the smoking man said. "You don't look like much."

I still didn't say anything. The man tossed away his cigarette and walked
towards me. I stood my ground even when he was just a few inches away from
my face.

"I've been playing this game for far longer than you can imagine, young
lady. I don't care what special gifts you have. It's nothing against my
means and my motivation."

"What is your motivation?"

"Weariness. Weariness of the human race. A long time ago, I tried my best to
preserve it. And what did I get in return? Nothing. Just misery and
condemnation. I've become a hated icon in a religion, you know that?"

"Did you ever consider that you got what you deserve?"

"No. I haven't considered that at all."

"Well, then...I want you to consider my motivation..."

"Yes, yes. You want to save the human race."

"And I'm going to get you for what happened to my father."

"Huh. Revenge. So maybe you do understand me."

"No. But there's one thing we both understand."

"What's that?"

I lifted up my middle finger and said, "Payback's a bitch, motherfucker."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

She was kneeling at a grave when I appeared. I didn't say anything to her
until she heard my breathing and turned. She smiled, not too surprised to
see me.

"Hello, Miranda," she said. "It's been awhile."

"Not for me, actually."

I knelt down at the grave with her. Roses were laid across the long mound of
dirt.

"He died a happy man," I said.

"I'm glad," she replied. "I'm also glad that I can die happy, too."

I sighed.

"What's the matter?"

"I've just been given...this huge responsibility. I really don't know if I'm
up to it."

"Is that why you've come to me? Do you want advice?"

"I guess so. You handled your own responsibility well."

She shook her head, still smiling. "It wasn't mine to handle."

"But you..."

"It was too big for one person to take on. I tried to shape the world
according to my will, but that only created new problems. It was only when I
told others to take responsibility that the problem was solved. I reminded
the world that it had a choice."

"Does it? Do any of us have a choice in anything?"

She turned to me and said, "We can choose whom to love."

She plucked a rose off the grave and handed it to me. I took it. She pressed
a hand to my cheek and said, "A leader is just another tool. Surrender
yourself to the path life creates for you. But you can chose who travels on
the path with you. I think that's the difference between good and evil.

"Do you know who is travelling with you, Miranda?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yes. I think I do.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It was at a local Church of the Message that the meeting was held. A lot of
people came, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised. The word had gone out
that somebody was taking charge. In a situation like this, anybody who just
steps up and plays the leader is given the benefit of the doubt.

As I looked at the desperate faces in the church, I hoped that I could teach
them not to depend on me. I would give them guidance, but I had to make them
understand that this struggle and this story were bigger than any one
person.

I stood by the front podium. I turned to look at my mother. She was nervous,
but I still remember the words she told me beforehand --

"Your father would have been proud of you."

I looked at Nora, my lover, my father's lover, the woman who had created the
religion this church represented. She had been the servant of so many other
people's desires. As she smiled at me, I was humbled by the fact that I was
the first person she could truly love -- the first person who made her feel
human.

Then I looked behind me at the stained glass window. The High Priestess
looked back at me. I touched the rose pinned to my sweater.

I turned to the people and said, "All right. This is what we have to do..."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Nowadays, I expect every hour to be my last. The smoking man is a hard
opponent. All it will take is one small opportunity for him to kill me.

He can't kill what I represent, though.

Something you should know about the Ticking Crocodiles. They got their name
from an old children's tale. A crocodile has swallowed a clock and its
presence is announced by a ticking sound. In the story, the crocodile longs
to eat the villain, but only because it has acquired a taste for him. The
ticking crocodile is a force without morals. It simply destroys what it
longs to destroy.

Hope is a ticking crocodile.

And one of these days it's going to bite the smoking man on the ass.

He can't take away hope from me. This is a part of the human soul he can't
reach. He couldn't destroy the love between Mulder and Scully. He couldn't
take away the love Samantha had for her brother. And he can't stop the love
I have. My mother, Nora, the memory of my father -- these people all live in
the house of my heart. This is the home no evil can ever penetrate.

I got a home on high.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX


AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Among the songs used were "I Can See for Miles" and "My Generation" by The
Who,  "The Gang's All Here" by Dropkick Murphys, "Faith in You" by PM Dawn,
"Thank You For Letting Me Be Myself Again" by Sly and the Family Stone,
"Ever Since the World Ended" by Mose Allison, "I Will Survive" by Gloria
Gaynor and "Astral Weeks" by Van Morrison.