>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Subject: So Shall You Reap 5 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> DAY TWO. Thursday 23rd May The Lygon Arms. 7.45 am. "Hi". Scully looked up with a bright smile as Mulder emerged from the bedroom wearing his robe. She was dressed, eating breakfast which had been delivered to the room, and looking at an Ordnance Survey map of the area. "Want some coffee? I warn you, though, it's pretty grim!" He sat down next to on the sofa, and stared at the map she was studying. The coffee was, indeed, disgusting. Scully pointed at the map. "There," she indicated, "is where the car was found. And here is where Mrs Matheson and her son turned up." Mulder chewed on a piece of cold toast, thoughtfully. "There's no way they could possibly have walked that far. Even across country..." "And especially not with a sick little boy. No, they were taken there and left by someone." "Or something.." Mulder said this last cautiously, giving Scully a sideways glance. It was part of the game between them. He would be deliberately provocative in his conjectures and Scully would respond with her 'Don't start, Mulder' patented gaze. But he was unsure how she would react this morning. When he had woken up, he had found no trace of the wine glasses by the bedside, and folded up and lying neatly on the pillow on Scully's side of the bed were her usual blue pajamas. It didn't take a genius to figure out what that meant. Now Scully was behaving as if nothing had happened. Well, he mused, nothing *had* happened. Was she attributing his reluctance to share the bedroom with her as merely his fear of disturbing her. He would like to think that: it would make him feel better - but he didn't really believe it. "Mulder," she interrupted his reverie, "I'll need to go to London to talk to Jonathan Matheson's doctors; do you know if Mrs Matheson is going up to the hospital anytime soon? If I go with her, it might make it easier to get the information I need." "We can go up to the Manor after we've seen George Hedley. I'd like to take a quick look at the field where the car was found, and the road from which Mrs Matheson said she was the object in the sky....thought we might do that first this morning." "Okay - as soon as you're ready." Scully turned back to her papers. Mulder studied her profile. "Scully, about last night...." "Right." She looked back up at him. "Did you find out anything useful?" He returned her steady gaze. Dana Scully was in denial mode, he recognized. She really was going to say nothing about it, pretend it never happened, that she hadn't been waiting for him like a bri... he told himself. "I'll fill you in on the drive to the field." He watched her as she moved to gather up the map and papers, folding and organizing into neat piles. Should he tell her what had happened - well, what nearly happened? Unburden his guilty conscience - now that would be a selfish thing to do. How would it help Scully to know that Phoebe still had the power to turn him on with the touch of her fingers? On the other hand, they would be coming back to this room - to this bed - tonight. Mulder closed his eyes briefly. It had seemed a damned good idea sitting on that airplane, but now......he'd rushed them into this situation and it looked like it had been a big mistake. He had things he needed to work though himself before he should even begin to consider trusting himself to lie in that bed next to Dana Scully. And then she looked up at him, and gave him that blessed smile. "Off your butt, G-man! We've got places to go, people to see." ***************************. 10.30 am. It was a grey, cool overcast morning, and the pair walked around the outer perimeter of the two fields. There was little left to see. The two fields had been shaved bare - all that was left was stubble a few inches high. The earth in the middle of the larger field was churned up where the car had been removed: there were gaps in the hedges, but there was little evidence left that this had been the centre of an investigation four weeks previously. Scully unfolded the map, and leaned it in against the trunk of a tree to prevent the wind catching it. She looked puzzled, started to say something, and then stopped. "What?" Mulder leant in close to look at the map. "If this," Scully pointed, "Is where she was when she 'saw' the lights, and she's right about the direction, then the object she says she saw was hovering right over this field. Look at the way the road twists right round on itself here." They walked back to where they had left the car parked on the grass verge, next to a gap in the hedge. "Hey, Scully, take a look at this." Mulder gestured at the ravaged bushes. Climbing down into the ditch, Mulder examined the broken branches and twigs, and the scarring on the muddy banks. "What does this look like to you?" Scully knelt down and examined the area. Chewing her lips, she looked at him. "It certainly looks like something's been in this ditch recently, and then been hauled out. But to wreck those bushes...." "It would have to have impacted into the ditch with some force," Mulder finished. "Didn't Mrs Matheson say the Range Rover ended up in a ditch?" Scully's response was dry. "Among other things she said , Mulder. But the fact remains that it was *found* in the middle of the field, and we have photos to prove that.." "All the pictures prove is that the jeep was in the middle of the field when the photos were taken," he responded stubbornly. "Mulder," she said, exasperated, "Isn't it much more likely that one of the rescue or retrieval vehicles ended up in the ditch in the confusion? Or maybe they tried to drag it out that way?" But Mulder wasn't listening. He jumped up the other bank, and pushed past the remaining branches till he stood in the field again. "Scully, we need pictures of this. - oh, and go through the gate - there's water in the ditch." Sure enough, Scully saw when she had made her way round to him, his feet and turnups were covered in mud. "That'll impress 'em up at the *great house* " she teased . His only response was to point at the bush. "You can see the way the branches have been broken, and .." he gestured the earth around their feet "You were right. A vehicle was pulled through this gap. But not *out* of the field, but *into* it. Look at the way the branches and twigs have been snapped." " Why would anyone do that? The ditch is too deep to drive off the road and into the field." "Someone's gone to the trouble of winching the vehicle out and into this field. And ten to one it was Mrs Matheson's car that they then dumped in the middle of the field." "That makes no sense, Mulder, none at all. No apparent benefit for a great deal of effort! There must be another explanation." Mulder turned his back on her, and shrugged. "It makes more sense than saying the driver suddenly detoured into the middle of field for no apparent reason." Scully fired off several more shots of the hedges on both sides of the road, as they returned to their rental car. "Of course there was a *reason*, Mulder - we just haven't found out what it was yet." He grinned at her. "That's why they put the 'I' in 'FBI', Scully". "Ha ha." But she smiled back, comfortably. "Did the medical examiner come up with anything interesting regarding the driver's body?" Scully leaned into the back of the car for the relevant folder, and then riffled through the papers before replying.. "No. Cause of death has been noted as a blow to the head sustained during the crash, but there's no suggestion in the medical report as to why the vehicle might have crashed in the first place." "The car checked out clean for mechanical failure, too, according to Phoebe," said Mulder. They both looked around at the quiet road. Nothing had driven past then in the twenty minutes they had been in the field. "Well, if I'm right, something caused the driver to put the car in a ditch. If we could find out what it was, we might be some way to finding a handle on this thing." "Where next?" "A word with the farmer might be in order. Let's see if it's true that he harvested those crops because he was paid off." On the drive out, Mulder had given Scully the highlights of his conversation with the crop-circle enthusiasts. "Paid off by whom?" "Ah, that will be worth finding out, Agent Scully," he smiled, as he handed her into the car. " Next time we come to examine an English field, remind me to bring some green wellingtons?" Mulder ruefully examined his muddy shoes and filthy pants. "'Green wellingtons'?" Scully raised an eyebrow at him, but Fox Mulder merely grinned. ************************************** The rental car jolted slowly back down the farm-track, accompanied by a large brown dog of indeterminate breed, which ran alongside, barking. "Well, that didn't get us much further," sighed Scully. "You don't think so?" Mulder stole a look at her. "Since he wouldn't let us past the front door, no I don't think so, " she responded crossly. "But didn't you notice what he said when we arrived.....before we'd had a chance to more than say our names?" Scully thought back. The farmyard had seemed deserted apart from the yapping dog, and no-one had answered to their knock at the front. So they had walked round to the rear and tried the back door, which was flung open before Mulder had a chance to knock again. Of course, they had been speaking to eachother, and not especially quietly. And the farmer, rotund and florid, had barely let them introduce themselves before saying......"Not more bloody yanks. I done what you arsked and pretty damned silly it was. Now clear off." and had slammed the door in their faces. Suddenly comprehension dawned. "Well, who were the other 'bloody yanks' then? The investigation was carried out by the British police..." Mulder frowned, as he crunched the gears. He'd never been able to understand the enthusiasm in this country for the shift-stick. "From the airforce base? Didn't you say the boy told you the farmer was paid off by two......" "But there's no *US* airforce base here, Scully. There are several British bases close by, but no US base - officially." His tone was dark. "So who are our interesting compatriots who seem to have annoyed the good farmer. Something else we need to find out." ************************* Stoke Easton Centre For Crop Circle Research 2.30 pm George Hedley put two mugs of steaming hot tea down on his desk, and gestured to the agents to sit down. A man of medium stature, with thinning brown hair and glasses, he looked like the accountant that he was. But appearances were deceptive. He was passionate on the topic of crop circles. But not blinded by his passion, Dana Scully observed. There was a fair degree of cynicism in what he saw saying - or was it paranoia? Mulder, who had asked a few general questions, settled back into his chair with his eyes half-closed. He looked for all the world, thought Scully, as if he had tuned out of the conversation completely. But that, too, was deceptive. If called upon to do so, Mulder would be able to recite the dialogue almost word for word. She sighed and shifted her position a little, and continued to make notes in her spiral-bound pad. So that it looked 'by the book' - even if it wasn't. "I believe there are true crop-circles, Mr Mulder, and we can have a healthy debate about how they appear. But if Robin says they were faked, then I'm sure they were. He's a young lad, and his head's easily turned by a pretty woman.." he gave Mulder a hard look....".but he's no fool." Scully frowned. She had not failed to notice the tension in Mulder's posture in response to Hedley's last comment: there were some cross-currents here that she did not understand, and that made her tone more abrasive than she had intended. "Why would anyone go to the trouble of faking crop-circles, Mr Hedley?" The man turned to Dana Scully, and his lips moved into a smile that did not touch his eyes. "Let me tell you something, Agent Scully. We get three types of frauds round here. We get those people who fake circles and pretend they are real." He caught Dana's faint look of surprise." Oh yes, I'm prepared to admit that we get plenty of those, and many of the crop- circles in past years were no doubt fakes. But we've now got people who make circles in order to fool us - experts - and then later reveal them as fakes to make us look like laughing - stocks." He paused, and took a sip of tea. " There was a lot of that in 1992, as I believe my colleagues told Agent Mulder last night." Mulder nodded, slightly. "There are - groups , shall we say - who seem to have as their agenda rubbishing the whole phenomena by tricking those of us who have some reputation as prominent cereologists. I count myself among those, and yes, " with a wry smile, "I was fooled too. But what we seem also to have now are people claiming to have faked crop circles who didn't." Scully felt her head was spinning. "Again, Mr Hedley, I'm not sure that I understand why you think anyone would do this?" "In war, Agent Scully, you counterfeit large quantities of your enemy's currency to devalue it. No-one can tell the real from the fake, so it becomes worthless. There are those who have started such a campaign of disinformation against the crop- circle phenomena. As to *why* anyone would do it - well, it's a very good way of disarming a powerful threat." Scully worked very hard, and managed to keep her face blank. She didn't even bother considering why this man believed crop-circles were a powerful threat. No doubt Mulder would tell her later. But why they were wasting their time listening to this........ Mulder spoke. "How would one go about creating a convincing fake?" Hedley leaned back and steepled his fingers, thinking for a minute or two. then he gestured to several pictures along one wall. "In 1992 a Circle-making competition was held near here. The top photo shows some of those produced, and you can see that diligent fakers can produce impressive results. However, the man-made circles generally lack the - shall we say, fluidity, flow of the 'real thing'." Scully wondered briefly how he knew what the 'real thing' was, but kept her head down, taking notes. "The most successful fakes used a substantial amount of equipment, and at least half the teams left behind small items after they'd finished. In *every* case the flattened crop in man-made circles was broken or buckled, which isn't generally the case in 'genuine' formations. So faking requires diligence, intelligence, considerable effort, and some equipment. But there is no sure-fire way of distinguishing fake from real. This for instance..." He walked over to a filing cabinet, and, after a brief struggle with one of the drawers, extracted a glossy black-and-white photo which he handed to Mulder..."Is probably the best know and best of the known fakes. It's called the Froxfield Fake. Magnificent work. " He shook his head, more in sorrow and admiration than anger, Scully thought. "How do you know they're not *all* fakes?" Mulder rolled his eyes at Scully, who looked back at him placidly. Hedley caught the look and grinned, which made him look much younger. Scully smiled back at him "I'm a natural-born skeptic. Mr Hedley. Don't mind me..." ."Well, there are different degrees of .............. Look at it logically." "That should appeal to you, Scully," Mulder interposed, and she gave him a filthy look. "To accept that all crop-circles were fakes would presuppose an invisible army of unseen hoaxers, never caught, never acknowledged, and never known to abandon their handiwork incomplete. Not only that, we enthusiasts have watched night after night and never seen hoaxers - yet there have been formations in the fields the next morning nevertheless." "So, Mr Hedley....." "Ah, the $64,000 question - who makes the genuine circles? Well, for what it's worth, Agent Scully, I don't think we're alone in the universe. Let's leave it at that." "But you have no other information about the circles in those two fields?" "As I said to you on the telephone, Agent Mulder, I've seen the same picture you have. And I spoke to Robin today. He seems very convinced that they were all fakes, except maybe for one of them. The picture in the newspapers wasn't detailed enough to tell any more. But I'll ask around to see what I can turn up - and if you can come up with any better pictures than the one in the newspapers, I'd be happy to look at them with you." Mulder stood up, and held out his hand to Hedley. "You've been very helpful, sir, and thank you for your time. We'll be in touch." ***************** The pair returned to the police station, Scully taking her leave to go down to the lab and get the pictures she had taken that day developed as soon as possible. "What are you going to do?" queried Scully, at the very moment that Inspector Green poked her head out of a door. "I'd like to go over the finding of the car with the officer who reported it." "Well aren't you just in luck," said Phoebe, moving up to him, "I'm just on my way to traffic control myself. I'll show you the way....." It was past his time to knock off: his shift had begun at six in the morning, and PC Graham Johnstone was none too happy to go over again the details of his finding the ambassador's Range Rover in the middle of a field. "Like I said, soon as I saw it, I radioed it in. I didn't think nothing much of it to start. I were on my way to work, and I hadn't heard nothing about them people being missing. I just thought it were another bloody lunatic London driver." Phoebe Green gave the young constable an icy glare. "Sorry, ma'am." He stood up a little bit straighter. "But we get so many of 'em, and the paperwork is such a bl... flaming nuisance". "Did you notice anything at all unusual about the scene as you first came upon it?" asked Mulder. "Sorry, no, nothing I can think of that's not in my report." "Was the gate into the field open, or did you have to unlatch it?" Mulder queried. The constable rolled his eyes. "The farm gate were unlatched and banging on the post, and that's why I looked into the field. And I saw out of the corner of my eye the car in the middle, laying on its side." He paused. "As it says in my report." Mulder ignored the man's obvious annoyance, and Phoebe's amusement. "You didn't see a car in the ditch next to the field?" he queried. The constable started to bristle, then caught himself. " Well, I did notice a great gap in the hedge, and there were mud all over the road, but I didn't pay it no further mind when I saw the vehicle in the field. After all, there weren't no car in the ditch..." Mulder was relentless. "But it looked like there might have been." "All right, it looked like there might have been. But there weren't. There were just a car in the field on its side wi'a dead man inside it. I'll tell you something," he said bitterly, " All these bloody City wide-boys down from London for the weekend, trying to impress their snooty friends in them Four by Fours.....most of 'em have never been nearer a field than Hampstead Heath. And after a few drinks they think they can drive up the side of Snowdon... I came down here because the missus wanted to get out of London, and I thought I'd get a nice, peaceful backwater to see out my retirement. But we have more road traffic accidents here in a month than there were in my old district in a year, and that were on one of the busiest stretches of roads in the country!" Mulder's eyes narrowed. "Thank you, PC Johnstone. That will be all." Phoebe waved him out of the room. "I want statistics for RTA's for the last twelve months within a ten mile radius of here. Can you do that?" Mulder asked her. She raised an eyebrow. "Well, yes, but whatever for, Mulder." "Because if he's right, and the incidence of traffic accidents is much higher than average in an area where you would expect exactly the opposite, there may be some connecting or causal factor at work here. Its *just* possible that this crash may be linked to others." Phoebe walked over and very deliberately closed the door which led to the corridor. "I stopped by your hotel and left a message for you this morning." "Was it important? You should have called. We have these..." he waved his loaned cellphone toward her..."now." "I thought you might like to have lunch with me. And Agent Scully, of course", she added as a deliberate afterthought. "But I discovered something very -surprising." Mulder moved to open the door. Whatever game Phoebe was trying to play, he wanted none of it. "I've got work to do." " Does the FBI know that you and your *partner* are sleeping together?" she asked, with a look of innocence. "No wonder you didn't want to come and stay in the Manor. You *are* a dark horse Agent Mulder." "Leave Scully out of this......." "Out of what, Mulder? Out of you and me? I'd be delighted to leave her out!" Mulder took a step towards her. "There is no you and me, Phoebe. There's nothing between us. You mean nothing to me any more. I came here to do a job, and I intend to do it. Any relationship Agent Scully and I may or may not have is none of your damned business." Phoebe tilted her face up to his. " I think you're protesting too much, Fox. Nothing between us....that's not what it felt like last night. I wonder what Agent Scully would say if she knew you'd gone back to her all hot and excited from me......ah, Buchanan!" she continued smoothly, as the door opened, and the dour Inspector entered. "Agent Mulder needs to see the old Road Traffic Accident reports. Can you show him where to find them? I must get back to Holbrook Manor. The Ambassador is having guests tonight. See you later, Agent Mulder. Maybe we can all go for a drink this evening - I'll call you....." And with a wicked smile at the two men, she left. ************************************* When Mulder returned to the hotel room after four hours searching through old files in the dusty Stacks, Scully was already there. She had changed out of her formal suit into leggings and a long shirt, and looked showered, cool and fresh. Mulder pulled loose his tie, rolled his shoulders. She looked up at him and smiled. "I spoke to Mrs Matheson, and she's agreed to come up to London with me tomorrow to see Jonathan's doctors. We're catching the 7.45 train from Castle Cary." "Was there any problem about it," Mulder queried, recalling Annelise Matheson's rather extreme reaction to Scully when they had discussed her statement with her. "None at all, surprisingly. I got the distinct impression that she was glad to have an excuse to get out of the house without her husband. And having her with me when I see the consultants will mean they 'll give me information they might otherwise have been reluctant to disclose. Plus I'll get another chance to talk to her...." "To see if she's delusional you mean!" Mulder gave her a wry grin. "What've you got there?" Scully eyed suspiciously the pile of folders tucked under Mulder's arm . "Traffic reports. We may well be, Scully, in the accident blackspot of the United Kingdom. There have been eighty three fatal road accidents in this small area in the past year - that's over four times the national average." "Your point being...?" "I'm not sure yet. I want us to analyze all of them, to the various factors. Lets start with location......" Scully spread the map out on the table, and picked up red felt pen. They worked steadily through the accident reports, correlating the information under various headings. By the time they had finished, it was half past nine, and Scully suddenly realized she was very hungry indeed. She was sitting on the floor, surrounded by brown folders. She took off her glasses, and leaned back against the sofa as she looked up at him. "We need to eat, Mulder. And I don't think this is the kind of place where we can get a pizza delivered! Maybe we can grab a sandwich downstairs?" "We could order room-service?" Mulder queried. "Lets save that - indulgence - for when we're not working." Mulder turned to Scully quickly as she said this, but she was looking back down at the folder in her lap, and a bright fan of hair concealed the expression on her face. He stood up, stretching, and held out his hand to her. She did not let go after he had helped her up, and nor did he as he led her down to the dark-panelled bar. Scully found a seat close to the log fire which was burning in the grate, despite the relatively mild night. Mulder watched her from the bar as he waited for his order to be taken; she settled onto the high-backed wooden bench-seat she had chosen, and he saw her sigh, lean back and close her eyes. "Do you know what this is called?" Mulder sat down beside her on the bench, and placed their drinks on the table in front of them. She shook her head, not entirely sure what he was referring to. She beat down the urge to reach out and brush away the dark lock of hair falling across his forehead, to lean into him and feel his warmth and strength. "It's a love-seat." His eyes were soft as he held her gaze. He wondered how he had ever thought to compare the effect that Phoebe Green had on him to what this woman could do to his soul and his body. "And why is it called that?" Scully felt a heat that was nothing to do with the fire burning a few feet away: she was sure she must be blushing. "Because the two lovers could sit together spooning, and the high back meant that they were somewhat sheltered from the prying eyes around them." He spoke softly, so that Scully had to lean forward to hear him. She looked up at him, her colour slightly heightened, her eyes glowing in the reflection from the fire. "Dare I ask - what was 'spooning'?" "This," he said simply. His hand caressed the side of her cheek and he leaned forward and kissed her very gently on the mouth. A tiny moan escaped Scully's lips as her instincts took over and she deepened the kiss. Mulder's hand moved up to tangle in her hair and pull her closer. Then Scully pulled back, and looked at him with huge, liquid eyes. "Mul-der", she whispered, shakily, "Love-seat or no love-seat, I think we should stop." "Perhaps you're right," he responded throatily, as he pulled her to him again and their mouths met, hot and hungry for eachother. "*How sweet*". Scully jerked back from the embrace at the sound of that cutting voice, and Mulder looked round in shock to meet Phoebe's annoyed stare. She pulled up a chair next to Mulder and sat down. Looking at the woman sitting next to Fox Mulder, her copper hair slightly tousled from his fingers, her full lips red and still moist from his kiss and with a viciousness prompted by envy, Phoebe continued, "Mulder, you're a beast." Leaning across him she addressed Dana in a stage-whisper, "I had the same pleasure myself last night, Agent Scully." Turning to Mulder she then continued, "I had hoped to finish what we started ....but it seems you're otherwise occupied at the moment." She leaned forward and kissed him quickly and hard, unfazed at his lack of response. Standing up, she addressed her parting remark to Dana, "Keep him warm for me, Agent Scully!" And Phoebe Green was gone before Scully could formulate her retort. she thought, dispassionately as the world seemed to swim slightly in front of her. Scully forced herself to breath deeply and steadily. She turned to look at Fox Mulder. He was watching Phoebe Green's departing back with burning eyes. Mulder struggled for self-control, violent anger with Phoebe warring with a desire to cling to Dana Scully and weep in her lap. He felt Scully's eyes on him and turned around, forcing himself to meet her gaze. "Scully, I...." She cut him short. "Is it true, Mulder. Last night did you....?" She waited a long heartbeat for his reply, but the sadness in his eyes gave her the answer before a word was spoken. "I'm sorry...." Scully stood up just as their food was brought to the table. " I seem to have lost my appetite. I've an early start in the morning, Mulder, and I'm going to bed now. I'll see you in the morning." Fox Mulder stayed a long time down in the bar of the Lygon Arms, looking into the fire and thinking. When he finally made his way back up to their suite, the folders had been neatly stacked up on the table, and a blanket and pillow placed on the couch. He got undressed and folded his clothes as neatly as he could manage on the back of the chair, then lay down on the couch and pulled the blanket around him. This time, no quiet voice and cool hand roused him in the middle of the night and led him to the comfort of the double bed. ************************** . Subject: So Shall you Reap 6 DAY THREE AM Friday 24th May 7.15 am. Heart pounding, limbs stinging with the effort, Fox Mulder finally allowed himself to slow down to a jog as he rounded the corner to the front entrance of the Lygon Arms. Glancing at his watch, he saw that he had been running for nearly an hour, pushing himself harder and harder, as if the physical exertion might mask the emotional turmoil. He had somewhat lost track of the time...... He had come to no conclusions the night before, except that Dana Scully deserved better than he seemed capable of giving, and the gracious thing - the loving thing- would be to stop the madness now.. A taxi was pulling away from the hotel entrance, and Mulder caught a fleeting glimpse of Scully's pale face through the window, and a wing of bright hair. He'd gone running to try and straighten out his thoughts, hoping that they might be more lucid in the morning's clear light. Returning to the room, he looked around for a note from her, but there was nothing. He noted that Scully had straightened up and tidied away his makeshift bedding. Plugging his laptop into the room's telephone socket, he set up an automatic session to download his e-mail then stripping his sweaty gear off he went to get cleaned up His shower was cold and unpleasant - another one of the delights of England. In these older buildings the plumbing rarely functioned adequately - if you were lucky enough to have private facilities at all..... Suddenly a picture of his room at Oxford flashed into his mind. Early one morning, standing by the window looking at the quadrangle. Sunshine slanting into the room. Turning to look at Phoebe stretching in his bed languorously, amid the tangled sheets. She had seen him watching her and she stretched out her naked limbs into the posture of an artist's model, and then laughed at him as his eyes darkened in desire and he took a step towards her. "Time for a show..." she had purred. As he leaned over her she had taken his face between her hands and kissed him deeply. He had moved on top of her, his excitement rising again. "Greedy boy!" She had pushed him away with the palm of her hand, snagged his robe from the back of a chair, and fastened it carelessly around her. She had smelt of sweat and sex, Mulder remembered, and her own special musky scent...... Then she had taken him by the hand, and led him down the corridor to the showers, past the envious eyes of several fellow students, and had kept him shut in the shower-room with her, pleasuring her, until the hammering on the door became too forceful to ignore. Throwing Mulder the robe, she had wound his hand-towel around her like a minuscule sarong, and then flung the door open. Taking Mulder by the arm, she had swaggered nonchalantly out, and smiled into the red face of the angry young man outside. "You've been in there for fucking hours..." he had snarled. Phoebe had been as tall as the lad. Letting go of Mulder's arm, she had touched her fingertip to the other youth's nose. "Fucking in there for hours, I think you mean. Your turn now." She indicated the empty bathroom with the sweep of her arm. "I would offer to help, but you look like you've had plenty of practice solo." And she had bundled Mulder back into his room, and fallen, laughing onto the bed. "God, I love messing with their heads!" And now, looking back on that moment with the benefit of his years Mulder suddenly realized that he understood. Leaning back against the cold, tiled wall under the sting of the water he allowed himself a small laugh. How could he have been so stupid - a fucking Oxford Psychology graduate, one of the best deviant-profilers the FBI ever had.......Phoebe wasn't about love, she wasn't even about sex. She was only about control and power. Hell, he wondered if she even enjoyed the sex much. For ten years he had refused to allow himself consciously to think about the woman. Then she had swept though his life again and almost reduced him to ash. And again he had not allowed himself the space to understand what had happened to him - why he had permitted her back into his heart and mind. He flicked his hair back, and allowed the water to wash over his face, down the length of his body - let the thoughts and feelings flow. The time for fear was over. He had hurt the woman who meant the most to him in the world because he was afraid to face the past. He would do that, would do it for Dana - and for himself. He didn't love Phoebe....but now he understood that he didn't even like her. He *would* think about what had happened two years ago, when, despite ten years of resolutions to be contrary, he had been willing to let himself fall into her bed at the first offer. He *would* understand it - and it would not happen again. Sure - when she had kissed him he had responded. She was a sexy woman, practised in the erotic arts, he had an eidetic memory - and he had been drinking. But she only had the power to disturb him if he let her. She was clever and manipulative. But he could get inside her head - what a very dark place that was going to be - just like he had done with Patterson, and those others when he worked for VCS. Whatever kind of game she thought she was playing with him this time, she wasn't going to win. The stakes were too high . The reinvigoration he felt as he towelled himself dry had nothing at all to do with the shower he had just taken. ************************************ "I'm sorry, Mr Mulder's line is still engaged." Ambassador Richard Matheson banged the receiver angrily back into its cradle. What the hell was Mulder doing? And Annelise had taken herself off up to London for the day without telling him. He didn't want the woman out of his sight at the moment. God only knew what she might say next to bring ridicule down on him. His backers in the States were antsy enough without another fiasco from Annie. Sometimes he wished he could send her packing and never have to look at her stupid face again. he upbraided himself. Annie was a sweet woman and he was truly fond of her. She was just not very bright, and not very exciting any more. Phoebe wanted him to divorce her. But that was *not* an option under the circumstances - not if he wanted to have a hope of getting a shot at the nomination in four years time. He'd already been divorced once - he wasn't a film star, he couldn't get away with more than that. And the American public had suddenly become very concerned about moral rectitude in their leaders over the past few years. No, he couldn't afford any hint of unpleasantness. He needed to find out what had happened to Annie and Jonathan - needed to so that any necessary damage limitation could be undertaken. Fox Mulder could do that for him - would find out who was responsible- and, Matheson hoped, proved discreet. Matheson had been a good friend to Mulder - well, when he could. And if Mulder helped him out now, when the time came, there would be plenty of ways he could return the favour.. Phoebe. Another problem. Now there *was* exciting and desirable. And dangerous - part of the attraction. But what a woman. There was something going on , though, between her and Fox Mulder - some unexpected and unpleasant undercurrent, and Matheson was not pleased. He dialed an internal number. A few seconds later, there was a light tap on the door, and Phoebe Green entered. "Richard? Is there a problem?" She stepped over to his desk. Matheson's annoyance at her began to ebb away as she rested her hands on his shoulders. He breathed in her scent as slowly and gently at first she kneaded the tense muscles in his neck and shoulders. He allowed her for a few minutes, then put a firm hand on one of hers and stood up to face her. "Phoebe - what's going on with you and Fox Mulder?" She looked at him with an expression of teasing innocence. " Richard, what *are* you suggesting?" The she smiled. "I told you, we were - very good friends - at Oxford, and we ran across eachother in the States a couple of years ago. " "Well, he didn't seem very pleased to see you when he came here on Wednesday, and I particularly asked you to ensure that he came to lunch with us yesterday. I need Mulder's help on this. I thought you were going to be able to help me with that. It doesn't look like that's going to be the case." Phoebe considered him from under her eyelashes. "I don't want you to think badly of Mulder", she said after a pause. "Go on." "Mulder and I had a - thing - at Oxford. We were very close. He was in love with me, Richard. I think he still is - I don't think he's ever got over it. And it's hard for him when he sees me, and I have to be very careful not to hurt him, because I *am* very fond of him. Fox can be rather cynical and hard, but it's a defense mechanism...." "It's too early for paperback psychology, Phoebe. And from my understanding..." he looked at her quizzically..."..he's rather too fond of Agent Scully for you to be on the menu. If you want to play games with him, my dear, that's up to you - but please leave him alone until he's finished here. ". "Now Richard," she came and stood very close to him. "You wouldn't be jealous of Fox, would you?" she purred. "You know I'm not interested in anyone else. Let me show you." Hell, she was close, she was available - she was a very sexy woman. Who cared if she's been round the block a few times. So had he, Richard Matheson. In many ways they were well- suited, he thought, and he took her face in his hands and kissed her deeply. Brown eyes looked into brown, challenging. "Lock the door, Inspector Green. We have important work to do". Matheson loosened his tie as Phoebe Green came back to kneel in front of him. They were done, and Matheson straightening his clothes when the telephone rang. Answering it, he waved Phoebe out of the room and began skimming through the papers on his desk. But Phoebe took her time. Picking up a pen, she wrote in her flowing cursive, and pushed the note in front of Matheson, then, touching her hand to his lips, mouthed 'see you later' before she withdrew, leaving behind a lingering trace of her heady fragrance. Matheson read the note: 'Don't worry about Mulder - I can keep him in line. Just think about us!' Crumpling it, he dropped it dismissively in the bin. ************************************* Dana Scully shivered a little as the early-morning mist swirled round the up-line platform of Castle Cary railway station. No doubt later on the haze would burn off, but she was grateful for the scalding cup of coffee which she sipped from a Styrofoam cup. She had not stayed for breakfast at the hotel, explaining to the staff that she had an early train to London to catch. she thought cynically . Mulder had been out when he awoke - running, she had guessed correctly - and she had just managed to slip out before he had returned. Dana caught a flurry of movement out of the corner of her eye, and turned round to greet Annelise Matheson. "Good morning Agent Scully!" The woman seemed genuinely pleased to see her, thought Dana in surprise. "Mrs Matheson," Scully juggled the hot coffee and her bag to shake the hand that Mrs Matheson proffered. "Train should be here any minute now." "Ah, well, one thing you learn if you've been here a while is never to rely on the timetable." Peering into Scully's cup, she grinned "Bad as usual, is it?" At Scully's nod, she continued, "Excuse me while I get some tea then". Scully watched her retreat to the cafeteria. She was certainly more relaxed and friendly than at their last meeting, but she carried herself stiffly and moved slowly. Perhaps her good-humour was due to the fact that she would be seeing her son soon. Mrs Matheson appeared with her drink and several daily newspapers just as the train pulled into the station. The rolling stock was of the old-fashioned compartment type, and the two women were lucky enough to find themselves alone. As the landscape slid past Scully found it hard to keep her thought from slipping back to her partner and what had happened the night before. She shook herself mentally, and looked across at Annelise Matheson who sat reading one of the tabloids, The Times untouched on the seat beside her. Scully examined the woman critically. She did not look well. Her eyes were puffy and bloodshot, and her complexion pallid. Her hands trembled slightly as she held the paper. "My husband only takes The Times at home, but I love to read these..." Annelise gestures guiltily to the paper she was holding, mistaking the reason for Scully's scrutiny. Scully raised and eyebrow." Then why buy The Times at all?" Mrs Matheson leaned forward confidentially. "He'd be very annoyed if he found out, so I buy the other one and carry it about with me all day, so that he thinks......" Her voice trailed off, and she sighed. "Oh I know it's pathetic, Agent Scully, but anything to keep the peace. It's been so - difficult - at home recently, and especially after what happened." She swallowed, and looked out of the window. Her good mood seemed to have dissipated. "Would you like to talk about it, Mrs Matheson?" Scully offered, quietly. "Not, really, no." Mrs Matheson turned back to her newspaper. Scully accepted the rebuff with equanimity, opening her attachi case and retrieving a folder she intended to work on during the journey. She could wait a while for another opportunity for conversation. In a few minutes she was engrossed in her work, and was therefore startled when the carriage door was rattled energetically open by a young conductor pushing a cafeteria trolley. "Morning, ladies. Tea, coffee, sandwiches, biscuits, chocolates...," he recited his litany. Annelise Matheson pulled her purse from her large shoulder- bag "I'll have a cup of tea and a bacon-and-egg sandwich." She turned to Scully. "These are quite good....why don't you try one?" Smiling, Scully shook her head, as Mrs Matheson handed over her money. "No thanks. I have to be real careful about what I eat these days. Just *thinking* about a bacon-and-egg sandwich and I've probably put on three pounds," she said ruefully. Annelise Matheson looked surprised. "I wouldn't have thought you had a problem there, Agent Scully?" "Yeah, well, I never used to...." She did not continue. She rarely said even this much on the subject. Nobody -with the possible exception of Mulder - knew what a struggle she had had since her abduction. And it was so trivial compared to all the other trauma, and she was so cross with herself and ashamed for caring so much about it. But when she had come round in that hospital she had found that whatever drugs she had been pumped full of, whatever violations of her body there had been, had altered her metabolism such that she had gained so much weight during her absence she had felt a stranger in her own body. The feeling of the extra flesh, the way it rolled over the tops of her skirts and trousers, and under her brassiere if she didn't sit up straight - the fact that *none* of her work clothes had fitted and she had been forced to go out and buy two new suits before she could even return to work - disgusted her and was a constant intimation of something she couldn't bear to recollect. But only two suits. Because she had been determined to get her body back. It was a part of recovering herself that she had needed to do. And she had worked out a plan and stuck to it. Mostly. But she had felt frightened about never being able to get herself back, because of what that symbolized for other parts of her life. And sometimes, when she hadn't been able to stick to the plan - because on the road they had to eat where they could - the fear was such that she would start to skip meals, although the doctor within was screaming at her for being so stupid. And one time, when she had had a particularly bad week, and she was sure that she had gained weight rather than lost it, and her skirt was uncomfortable, they had stopped at a roadside cafe and Mulder had come back to the table with hot chocolate and marshmallow instead of black coffee. "Hey Scully, thought you needed cheering up!" He had grinned at her as he pushed it across the table, and she had been so angry...... "Have you any *idea* how many calories there are in that....."she had hissed at him, and then as Mulder had looked up at her with concern, "Leave me alone!" she had pushed past him and rushed outside, to lean against the wooden railing, breathing deeply and feeling deeply humiliated. There was no way she had wanted Mulder to know she was struggling with this. Or even to know that she cared about it. But she had heard footsteps behind her, and had sighed. Mulder had touched her arm lightly. "It doesn't matter, Scully." "It does to me," she had replied fiercely. It's not important to anyone who loves you," she had heard him say quietly. "Remember that, Scully." And tears had sprung unbidden into her eyes. It had taken a long time - many months- but she had done it in the end. And on the day she had been able to fit into her favourite blue pants-suit again for the first time, Mulder had looked up as she entered the office. "You look great, Scully.", and she had been both pleased with him for noticing and cross with him for noticing, and she had recognized that within herself, bestowing on him one of her radiant smiles. With a start, Scully realized that Annelise Matheson was staring at her, and she dragged her thoughts back to the present. "Sorry...." "Your partner knows Inspector Green well." It was a statement, not a question. "Had you met her previously?" "We worked on a case together once in New England." . "What do you think of her?" " She seems - competent." Although he had wanted a chance to talk to Mrs Matheson, Scully was not keen to pursue this particular conversation. "Did your partner know her well?" the other woman persisted. Scully felt herself flushing slightly. "You really would have to talk about that with him, " she replied testily, then, "I'm sorry, that was rude. " She took a deep breath. "I believe they were very close at one time." Mrs Matheson looked thoughtful. "That was kind of what I gathered. " She took a deep breath as if coming to a decision. "Agent Scully.....may I call you Dana? - I want to apologize for my manner when we first met. I really do want to find out what happened to me. It's just that you came at that woman's suggestion, and...." Suddenly, Scully knew what Annelise Matheson was going to say next. "My husband and that woman have been having an affair for the past six months. " She spoke in a flat voice, seemingly without emotion, as if she had practiced saying this over and over. "Well, at least six months. That's when I found out about it. So - I was suspicious of you and your partner. But when he spoke to me, it seemed - I don't know - almost as if he -*understood* what I had been through." Giving a bitter laugh, Mrs Matheson continued. "Though I don't know how that could be, since I hardly believe it myself, and I was there. There's a whole day I have no recollection of; I don't have any idea how I got to Glastonbury Tor with my little boy. You have no idea how frightening that is, Dana." "Believe me, Mrs Matheson, I have..." "And I feel so guilty for what happened. I know my husband blames me..." Scully's face reflected her surprise. "Whyever should he?" "I'm telling you this, Dana, because I think there's another agenda here. And I think you may appreciate how I feel about. that woman.." She didn't continue, but Scully flushed again. . "Richard didn't want me to bring Jonathan down to the Manor that weekend. In fact we had a row about it. He....he didn't even know I was coming down until quite late in the evening, apparently. And..." she swallowed, "when they couldn't find us, he thought at first.....that I had taken Jonathan away." Well, that explains some things, thought Scully. Why the search was kept quiet to start off with - no major media alerts if Matheson thought it was just a domestic problem he *would* want to keep it quiet. "And I'm still not sure he believes what I say - maybe he still thinks I was going off somewhere...leaving..." "Mrs Matheson, has he said anything to indicate that's what he thinks?" "No." She hesitated. "But he hasn't said that he believes me, either.." There's something wrong with this picture, thought Scully. "Mrs Matheson - excuse me if I offend - but you seem keen on doing what your husband approves of. If he was so against you bringing Jonathan out of hospital, why did you do so?" The older woman chewed her lip for a moment. "Sometimes I think Richard won't accept quite how sick Jonathan is, how little time we might have left with him. He's about to receive a bone-marrow transplant, Dana, which as you probably know they only do if the prognosis for his disease is poor. " "Who's going to be the donor? Your other son?" "Yes. And , of course, before the transplant, Jonathan has to have intensive drug therapy and Total Body Irradiation to kill the cancer cells, and then the replacement bone marrow. I brought him down because it was the last chance to be together as a family before the intensive treatment started. He seemed well enough, and the doctors weren't against it. I just wanted the boys to be together, and something to remember....if...if he didn't ever recover after the transplant." She swallowed hard. "I knew it was a risk, but I was willing to take it. Richard didn't agree, but my boys....they mean everything to me, especially now - now that I'm losing Richard." "Mrs Matheson, even if you're right about your husband and Inspector Green - it doesn't mean it's anything permanent. I believe.....Inspector Green.....I don't think any of it means much to her. " Dana sat back. "Maybe I'm not a good judge, but I know what I saw when I saw her with my partner. She'll move on to someone else, and then you'll need to decide whether you want to pick up the pieces." "Oh, I've seen her in action with *men*, Dana. I know what she's like. She's been with us for eighteen months, and I've watched her. It's just a game, most of the time, you're right. But....I think it's different with my husband. " She shrugged. "Maybe I'm too close to it, but I think she actually cares about him. But more to the point, I think she'd like to marry him." Scully's jaw slackened in surprise. "Oh yes. You know, of course, that Richard is considering standing as a candidate next time? " Scully nodded. "Well all this...publicity...has come as a huge embarrassment to him. I think if he could get rid of me....and she's there....she's so beautiful and clever....whereas I...." The woman gestured to her homely build. Scully didn't know what to say to the woman, who was now revealing such private details. "I'm sure your husband loves you, Mrs Matheson.." "Ah love! I don't think my husband ever *loved* me as such, Dana. But his first wife couldn't have any children. So when I got pregnant....he divorced her and married me. He's very grateful for the children, but he doesn't need me any more. I'm just an embarrassment. But if I left, he'd never let me take my boys, so I have to stay. But that woman...makes it so difficult. She talks to me as if *I* were a child, especially now....She knows that I know about her and my husband, I'm sure she does. The things she says - you know, small things - Richard doesn't even notice - but it's as if she's taunting me. And then I think 'what if I'm imagining it' - I can't seem to trust what I know, anymore...." Annelise Matheson's eyes were suspiciously bright, hers twisting together in her lap. Scully leaned across and laid one cool hand atop hers pulling her thoughts back to the case. "Mrs Matheson, we'll do our very best to find out what happened to you, and why. And believe me..." this was more than she meant to say......"I do understand how you feel about Phoebe Green." The train slowed down, and Scully realized that they were pulling into the station. The journey wasted! See what happens, she thought to herself angrily, see what happens when you get personally involved in a case. There was so much she had wanted to go over with Annelise Matheson, and she had blown her chance. ******************************************* Glastonbury - the name resonates through English legend and literature. Mulder had arranged an appointment that morning with the editor of the local paper. They had been the first with the story - they had the only aerial photograph of the crop circles. He was hoping to get a copy and find out where they had got it from. As he drove along the narrow, winding country lanes Glastonbury Tor rose up ahead of him out of the clearing mist. He rounded a corner, and the little town was laid out in front of him. He was just parking his car opposite the ruins of the abbey when his borrowed cell-phone chirped. "Agent Mulder." The clipped Bostonian tones of Ambassador Matheson. "I should be glad of a few moment of your time. Away from the house. May we have lunch together today." It was an order, not a request. "Sir, I'm in Glastonbury at the moment. I have an appointment set up, but it should be over by lunchtime..." "That's good. 'The George and Pilgrims' then. Twelve o'clock." The phone went dead. Mulder looked at it quizzically for a moment, pulled a face, and glanced at his watch. It had taken him far less time to get there than he had expected, and he had nearly an hour to kill. After he had wandered up the little high street and back own the other side, ventured into several tiny shops crammed with mineral rocks and gems, New Age music and fey clothes, esoteric literature and silver jewellery the air in each one redolent with incense and musk, he found himself in a little courtyard off the main street. He looked around. Glastonbury Romantics - framed and unframed pictures from the Victorian and pre-Raphaelite school- he gave a small snort of laughter Then, for the second time that morning, an unbidden and unwelcome memory of a tall, slender woman pricked at him. Not Phoebe Green this time - but Melissa Scully. Of the knowing eyes and rich, flame hair. The flowing, floral skirts and the scent of patchouli. And a crystal on a fine black ribbon dangling from her fingers. The amusement died on his lips. How she would have loved this place, he thought. And he was glad that Scully wasn't with him. For she would have felt it too - and the death of her sister had cut in the very deepest part of her, and the wound was still raw. Mulder wondered if it would ever heal. The death of Luis Cardinale and no justice in this world..... His eyes were suddenly caught by a picture away and off to the side of the window. An unframed print - he leaned forward. It was labeled, in beautiful black gothic script: 'Girl Reading: Charles Edward Perugini. Original - Manchester Art Gallery.' And he went inside. *************************************** Subject: So Shall you Reap 7 *************************************** Phoebe Green studied herself in the mirror. Very nice. And it needed to be, too. It was a very careful line she was treading here. She still found it difficult to believe how powerful her feelings for Richard Matheson really were. . She's finally gone and done it - fallen head-over- heels, totally out-of-control in love with him. Except, of course, that she could not afford to be out of control. She needed to play the long game, and to be very sure of herself. So this was what it was like - she forced herself to smile at her reflection. This was what Fox Mulder had felt all those years ago - and still? She shrugged a little. Maybe not, now - but she could still stir him up. He was still a sexy man, still a challenge (even more so, because of his little partner) and could still be extremely useful. Jade earrings to match the jade silk suit? Well, if this was love - she was not at all convinced that it was fun. Now, the expression on Dana Scully's face last night - that had been fun. However, looking back on it she wasn't sure that it hadn't been a tactical error. Mulder had been very cross with her. She grinned. He was so easy to provoke - nothing between them indeed! But this constant worry about what someone else was feeling for you, whether they cared about you back, whether they would be there forever.....no, Phoebe didn't enjoy that insecurity. She liked to be in charge. And so she would be. A little flirting with Mulder at lunchtime. Make Richard jealous. Smooth Mulder's ruffled feathers and remind him of what he's missing - get him to help Richard and Richard would be grateful. Very grateful. Deep breath - okay, off we go! Time to play the game. *************************************** Friday 24th May DAY 3 PM The Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick children is an imposing old building with a recently constructed new annex. Annelise Matheson, evidently very familiar with it's warren- like layout, led Scully up and along a tangle of corridors to a bright ward on the seventh floor. "Mrs Matheson!" She was greeted as a friend by a smiling dark-haired nurse, "Jonathan is surely looking forward to seeing you. If you'd like to go in, Dr Leiper will be free in a minute. She's just finishing her round." "Thank you, Orla. Agent Scully, this is Orla Brennan, who had day-to-day care of Jonathan. Orla, Agent Scully is from the FBI in the United States..." The nurse's eyes widened. "She may need to ask you some questions about Jonathan's condition, and she will want to speak to Dr Leiper too. You have my consent to talk to her freely - I can put that in writing if required." "To be sure, Miss Scully, you ask away." She led them into a small room with half-glazed partition walls . A fair-haired boy of about eight was sitting up in bed, reading a comic. "We're much better today, aren't we, Jonathan? And here's your Ma -and- " she lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper, "A lady from the *eff. bee.eye* to talk to you!" She winked at Scully, who stepped forward. "Cool!" The boy's eyes lit up. "Can I see your gun?" Scully smiled back at him. "We don't carry them while we're here, but..." she reached into her pocket, "Here's my badge." She flipped the wallet open and showed him. "Hi darling." Mrs Matheson bent down and exchanged a long hug with her son. "Agent Scully is going to ask you about that night when we got - lost, and she's going to talk to the doctor. How are you doing, baby?" "I'm doing great, mom, ... and don't call me *baby*. I am doing great, aren't I..." "He's doing very well..." Scully turned to look at the owner of this new voice, to see a woman as small as herself, but dark, in a doctor's coat. "We're exceptionally pleased, Mrs Matheson. It's really quite extraordinary. If you'd like to come with me now, we can discuss it." The woman looked coolly at Scully when she rose to accompany them. "And you are...." As they moved down the corridor to the doctor's room Mrs Matheson explained what Scully would require. Dr Leiper's quiet, modulated tone did not change. "You are quite welcome to look at all Jonathan's medical records, since you have Mrs Matheson's consent. I will answer what queries I can, but you understand I am very busy here." Scully nodded. When they had seated themselves in a private room, Dr Leiper began. "Mrs Matheson, you are aware that we have been giving your son high dose chemotherapy for the past three weeks and that we intended to commence the Total Body Irradiation in order to eliminate the cancer cells in his blood." Annelise nodded. "I have the result of the bloodwork here," she looked at Scully, "You may examine it later. But basically, it would seem that the irradiation will not be required. The malignant cells appear to have been eradicated, and the immune system sufficiently suppressed to go ahead with the bone-marrow transplant immediately." "Immediately?" "Within the next few days. As soon as we can prepare your other son. This is why I asked you to come today - to give you the news so that you can make the necessary arrangements to have your other son admitted." Annelise Matheson looked dazed. "Isn't that most unusual?" queried Scully. "Quite frankly, I've never known anything like it before." Dr Leiper leaned back and ran a hand through her thick, dark hair. " The test results are what we would expect *after* the TBI - in fact, of a magnitude better than we would expect to see. It augers very well for the marrow transplant." The woman finally smiled. "I'm at a loss to explain it, but let's just thank Heavens. The prospects for your son's recovery are really better than at any time since we first saw him. And now lets get started on the transplant!" Mrs Matheson turned a beaming smile to Scully. "I'll have to leave you here. I'll catch the next train home - " She looked at her watch..."If I leave now, I'll just make it....and tell Richard - and we'll pack to bring David up here - when?" She turned back to the doctor. "Have him here next Tuesday morning." "Okay." As she stood up, the little colour that there was in Annelise Matheson's cheeks drained away, and she swayed on her feet. "Are you all right?" Scully jumped up and took her arm to steady her. The woman's eyes fluttered open and she took a deep breath. "Yes, I'm fine. It's just the shock of the good news." She smiled again. "Maybe things will be all right after all." Scully walked with her down to the street, where Mrs Matheson was lucky enough to pick up a taxi immediately. "I'm going to call Agent Mulder at lunchtime......" Scully smiled at the other woman. " But I won't spoil your good news - don't worry!" Although Jonathan Matheson was only a little boy, his medical records were copious. It was two hours before Scully had finished going through them, and what she had found left her puzzled and a little disturbed. When Jonathan Matheson had returned to G.O.S after his disappearance his records showed that they had found traces of the drug scopolamine in his system, the powerful anaesthetic/hallucinogen that had been used on the teenagers in Delta Glen, Wisconsin. Not only that, there was a high level of radioactivity. Time to call Mulder. She reached into her purse and pulled out the cell-phone "How are you doing?" Scully looked up to see Orla Brennan standing in the doorway. "If you'd like something to eat, I can show you where the visitor's canteen is! I'm going down that way myself! And I'm afraid you can't use that...." she gestured to Scully's cell- phone "..in here, anyway. Mobile phones are banned in these units - because of all the equipment." Scully raised an eyebrow. "That makes a difference?" "Who knows!" Orla shrugged, watching Scully gathering up the notes she had been making. "Rules, rules.....don't we just love 'em. But you can use it downstairs." Scully looked at her watch. It was nearly two o'clock anyway - lunch sounded good. "So," Orla held the open the heavy double doors that led to the stairwell, "Is your job really as exciting as that TV show 'Feds' makes it out to be?" ********************************* Manuscript notebook entry:- Mendip Daily News. Journalist - Watson, Ray. Night of Friday April. Working. Stop-press last possible time 3.30am. No note in nightly log of source of info. re missing A.M. No person recalls source of information. Watson verified by call to local police. Source of photo - unknown (!) Action - query call time with police. Mulder rubbed his chin thoughtfully, brow furrowed. Something was very wrong with the timing here. If the last printing time for the paper was 3.30 in the morning, Annelise Matheson hadn't been missing more than six hours at that point. Yet it was clearly stated in the paper that she had been missing for twelve hours - which of course would have been the case by the time the paper was being read the next morning. Someone had known she wasn't going to be found before then. Not only that, but there seemed to be no information about the origin of the photograph which had been sold to the paper and then syndicated to the nationals. Pulling his cellphone out of his pocket, he pressed the memory keys to dial the police-station and confirm the time of the verification call. He also hoped to speak to the desk-sergeant who had undoubtedly fielded it. Before the phone had connected, however, he saw Richard Matheson making his way past the crowded bar. "Thank you for coming, Fox. I prefer to meet in a place like this. It makes it harder for our ....'friends'." Mulder's expression was guarded. He was not at all sure where Matheson was coming from on this. The man had asked for him specifically, risking the wrath of the British police force, and bringing him to England where he had no jurisdiction. Yet he had seemed very anxious that the questioning of his wife be curtailed, and his whole attitude that first afternoon had been rather wary. "First, let me say how sorry I was not to have been able to help you further in that matter of the - what shall we call it - the package on the train. By the time I was advised that Agent Scully was trying to contact me, matters had already - ah - been resolved in your favour." Scully had told him angrily of her repeated efforts to solicit the Senator's aid. It was no thanks to Matheson that Mulder was sitting here today. But on the other hand, he had provided useful information in the past - when it suited him. Mulder would never forget that Matheson had refused to even see him when Scully had disappeared for those terrible three months. And though it seemed they had smooth matters over between them since, Mulder - whatever Scully thought - had not relied on the man since. He recognized him as an opportunist - and accepted that . It was his game, it was politics. But if there *was* such a thing as a politician with principles, Mulder thought that the man was sitting opposite him. "Have you found anything yet?" Matheson nodded his thanks to the waitress who brought them their food. Given a receptive audience, and without Scully's restraining influence, Mulder felt free to explain to Matheson what he felt was the significance of their discoveries s far.".......and it seems to me that, far from being driven into the field where the vehicle was found, something caused the driver to crash into the ditch. That ties in with your wife's statement. At some point during that night, the car was hauled out through the hedge into the field and deliberately placed there." Matheson said nothing, his face expressionless. Mulder continued, "I have spoken to a witness who states that the so- called crop circles in the field were in fact nothing but poor fakes. It also seems that the farmer was bribed to harvest the crop, such as it was, in order to remove any trace evidence, and prevent further inquiry into who made the markings in the field and when." "As to what caused the car to crash - Agent Scully and I have ascertained a pattern of similar accidents in the area, and I intend to interview some of those involved later this afternoon. Agent Scully is speaking to your wife again today about her statement, but I believe your wife is telling the truth about what she remembers, sir. Something happened to her out there, something which has happened to people before on several occasions - and someone has tried to cover their tracks about that quite carefully. " Matheson finally spoke. His voice was calm, but his eyes were chilly. "Agent Mulder, what I require from you - and I wanted to speak with you yesterday to make this quite clear - is an explanation which will allow my wife to retain some dignity. I do not want you or Agent Scully feeding her fantasies about being abducted by aliens and making me the laughing stock of Capitol Hill. When Detective Chief Inspector Green suggested that you be called in to advise I agreed because I knew" he paused to emphasize the last word, "that your report would be that this matter was nothing but a delusion brought on by the stress and physical trauma of the accident. If you of all people were to be convinced of this fact, no-one would call it into question again. " Fox Mulder was a man of few illusions about the cynical nature of political life. But the anger in him burned cold and righteous. "Am I to understand, sir, that you do not wish this investigation pursued at all. That our presence here is a - a charade?" "I wouldn't put it quite like that, Agent Mulder." "Then quite how *would* you put it? Something happened to your wife, sir! She needs to know what that was. " "Agent Mulder, we both have enemies. My enemies are trying to prevent my nomination in four years time. I have powerful backers , but they have been - how shall we say - upset by all this. I believe my wife was taken as part of that attempt to thwart my political career - a career, which, I might remind you, could be very useful to *you* in your search for the truth. You can be sure that I will be extremely grateful for your co- operation here." "But don't you see - if we could prove what you say, we could let the people know exactly what those who oppose you are prepared to do...." "I have no intention at all of telling the People, as you quaintly call them, anything. It will be enough that the attempt fails. They will not try it again. Yes, you find me the proof of who did this - but you then write the report as I have stated, and my wife becomes a victim of a terrible accident in the course of a kidnap attempt gone wrong which temporarily disoriented her mind. You write that report, Agent Mulder, and let me take care of the people who did this to her." Mulder leaned across the table to the older man. "I will not be a party to this." He spoke softly. "Either I pursue my investigation to uncover the truth of what actually happened and make the appropriate report to my Bureau head .....or Agent Scully and I return to Washington immediately." "That would be a mistake, Agent Mulder. "Is that a threat, *sir*?" He was startled and annoyed to find Phoebe Green standing next to him. "Excuse me -.". Mulder pushed past her, and out into the courtyard. "Well.....what *have* you been saying to him, Richard!". "Sit down, my dear. Mulder is not being very co-operative after all. I may need you to be at your most persuasive for me. I'm sure you can use your undoubted - talents - to ensure that he doesn't do anything foolish. I think we're both fond of Agent Mulder." A sudden noise startled them both. Phoebe fished in Mulder's jacket which he had left draped over the back of his char and pulled out his cell-phone from the pocket. "Hello?" A sly grin tugged at her lips. "No, I'm frightfully sorry, Agent Scully. Mulder's - not available at the moment. I'll get him to call you back when we've finished......" She pushed the disconnect." Oh what a shame, Richard......we got cut off. I hope Agent Scully didn't have anything urgent to say!" ************************************ Fox Mulder sat on the low, cotswold stone wall, forcing himself to practice controlled breathing until his anger had subsided somewhat. Once again they were being manipulated - expected to participate in a cover-up. It was just like that business at the Cumberland State correctional facility with the infected prisoners again. Only this time, there was the enticement of the only future reward that might have possibly tempted him - access to the knowledge that Matheson had, and that he might have as President. Hr *really* needed to talk to Scully - the light of calm logic on the situation. His first thought was to say , "Fuck you," to Richard Matheson and fly straight back to Washington DC. But what would that accomplish? He might just as well hand in his FBI badge on the plane, since even if he didn't get fired they'd haul his ass back to white-collar crime and split him and Scully up again. On the other hand, expediency was anathema to him. A slight breeze ruffled his hair - it was a beautiful afternoon. Sitting on the grass enjoying a lunchtime pint and sandwich were men and women from the estate agencies and small businesses of the town. There was even a smattering of tourists, though this was quite early in the season. A little rivulet ran along the bottom boundary of the pub garden, and beyond that, Mulder's gaze was drawn to the mound of Glastonbury hill, and the Tor. And his thoughts went to Annelise Matheson - who really did deserve to know what had happened to her. And then back to Matheson himself. Hell, he had put himself close to the line a couple of times for the X-Files. Supporting Fox Mulder wasn't the smartest thing he could do. Could even be downright dangerous Didn't Mulder owe him some debt of loyalty? But not - *never* - to the extent of compromising what he knew to be right. He would not let them do that to him. Quite apart from anything else - he allowed himself a wry smile - he doubted if Scully would play along with anything that smacked of deceit or a cover-up. She had been even more angered by the F.Emasculata business than he had - had even talked, one wild night, of taking matters into their own hands, of blowing Pink Pharmaceuticals to bits as a savage kind of justice. The sun warmed his back through the thin cotton dress shirt. He would go in and tell Richard Matheson that they would continue with their investigation, that they *would* find out the truth of what happened, and that he, Fox Mulder, would make his report to Matheson. The it would be up to Matheson himself what he chose to do with the information, and what he chose to tell the Bureau. It seemed very dark inside the pub after the brightness outside. Matheson and Phoebe Green were still at the table. Mulder walked over and retrieved his jacket. He did not sit down again. " If you don't wish me to pursue the matter, ambassador, you can send me home now. What I am prepared to do is make my final report to you, and leave you to square matters in Washington. But I need your assurance that my investigation here won't be hampered by you in any way. And," he paused, "I can't of course speak for Agent Scully." Richard Matheson knew this was as good as it got. "Fox, I'm glad we've been able to reach an understanding here. I'm have every faith that you will be able to make Agent Scully understand that this is the best course of action for everyone." "And talking of agent Scully," Phoebe interposed sweetly, "she called on you mobile -phone a while ago, and I told her you were otherwise engaged. " "I'm sure you did, Phoebe", Mulder replied with a smile. "You never fail to live down to my expectations. " ******************************* Dana Scully snapped the cellphone closed in frustration. Either these British 'mobile' phones weren't up to much or - more than likely - Phoebe Green had disconnected on purpose. She's just have to try again later ...maybe Mulder would be 'available' then - whatever the hell that meant. She looked round at the cheerless room which housed the Great Ormond Street hospital canteen. They'd done their very best to make it agreeable - painting the walls in white and pastels, with murals of the characters from 'Peter Pan' - but nothing could disguise the fact that it was a basement with no outside windows. Suddenly someone tapped her on the shoulder, and she turned to see a face she recognized but couldn't immediately place. "Agent Scully, isn't it? Are you looking for me?" "Mr Hedley?" Scully's voice reflected her surprised recognition. "I'm here visiting with Jonathan Matheson," she explained, and caught what seemed to be a flash of relief on his face. "And you?" The man sighed. "Ah, I seem to haunt this place, Agent Scully. My daughter has aplastic anaemia , and we have to come up for regular blood transfusions and tests." He hesitated. "Look - I could do with some company. I've just had some disappointing news. Will you come to lunch with me? This place is really depressing - I know somewhere round the corner that's much better." And indeed, Scully thought, the man had a haunted look around his eyes. "Sure. Lead the way." Round the corner from the hospital is a narrow pedestrianised street little more than a passageway between two more important thoroughfares. Lamb's Conduit Street looked very picturesque in the May sunshine. George Hedley led her between the narrow, old houses to a pub - The Lamb and Flag - bedecked with baskets of spring flowers, and tables with parasols, continental-style, on the pavement "Inside or out?" Scully squinted in the sunlight. "Inside I think." While Hedley went to the bar to order their sandwiches, and buy the drinks, Scully examined her surroundings. The place was somewhat shabby - the bench-seats well-worn, the vinyl repaired in places - ring marks and the odd cigarette burn on the table. There was a large TV screen in the corner, showing an Australian soap opera, though none of the customers seemed to be taking much notice. It was a little stuffy inside, but Scully had the beginnings of a headache, and this was preferable to the brightness outside. She pondered the coincidence of both children being at this hospital at the same time. But then - it was the best children's hospital in the UK - for very many diseases it was one of the centres of excellence in the world. Wondering idly if Hedley's wife was back with his daughter, she watched him make his way back to the table carrying the two glasses of soda. "To be truthful", Hedley passed her glass to her, "I'm glad to get out of there. Susie's having another transfusion, and she gets so upset I can't bear to watch. Pathetic, isn't it." His face twisted. "Your wife..?." "Yes, she stays. Women are better at that kind of thing than men, don't you think?" Scully wisely chose not to respond. "Has your daughter been ill long?" Hedley sighed. "For two years now. She was involved in an accident - she was in a car driven by the mother of one of her friends, and they were coming home from a ballet class one evening. It all seems to have started after that, though nobody has been able to explain why. Maybe the shock to her immune system....." "What happened to the other people in the car?" "They were all killed." He did not look as her as he replied. Scully thought back to the reports they had spent the previous going through. evening Maybe one of those dry statistics was this man's daughter and her dead friends. Impulsively she leaned over and touched his arm. "I'm sorry. And you said you'd had some bad news? If you'd rather not talk about it....." Hedley sighed. "We got the results of the bone-marrow typing back. We don't have any other children, and neither my wife nor I, it seems, is histocompatible. It was a very long shot, anyway. Parents rarely are - but we've been on the list for such a long time - it seemed to be the last hope. She just keeps getting weaker and weaker, and the transfusions hardly seem to be doing any good any more." He seemed to pull himself together. "Let's talk about something more cheerful. Is this your first visit to the UK?" The ploughman's sandwich - cheese and pickle in a large French stick - had arrived, and Scully was trying rather unsuccessfully to break hers into manageable sized pieces. "Uhhhuh," she replied with her mouth full, nodding affirmative. "Well, I'm sure you've heard how eccentric the English are - and now you've seen it first-hand!" Scully grinned at him. For a UFO nut, the guy was okay - normal even, compared to most of Mulder's friends. They sat for a while companionably, eating, until Hedley uttered a stifled gasp, and Scully saw his attention was riveted to the television screen. She looked up to see the screen filled by the aerial photo of the field in which Ambassador Matheson's wrecked Range Rover had been fou nd. Hedley got swiftly up and moved closer to the TV and Scully followed. The picture faded, to be replaced by two middle-aged men, and an interviewer. The caption read 'Bill Higgins and Bob Flowerdew'. The piece began with the interviewer recapping the story of Annelise Matheson's disappearance, and what she has said to the newspapers, and then, speaking directly to the ca mera she said:- "GMTV PM has the scoop for you - this afternoon we talk to the two men who claim to have faked the crop circles in the picture you saw earlier - and many of the others as well. Bill Higgins and Bob Flowerdew - welcome...." Scully made a dive for her mobile phone. "Mulder?" Thank god this time he answered at once. "Mulder... are you anywhere you can see a television? No? Right - well there's an interview being broadcast right now by two people who claim to have faked those crop-circles....yes, those....... no, I can't....I'm in a pub.......what? With George Hedley.....never mind that..." Scully's tone was exasperated. "Hang on a minute, Mulder..." She tapped Hedley's arm to get his attention. "What station is this?" "It's a London station. Looks like it's a live interview." "Mulder... are you still there? I haven't got time to explain more, but I'm going to try and go to the TV station to see if I can talk with them....yes it is odd, now.....look, we need to talk, but later. I'll call you back as soon as I can. I need to tell you about what I found out at the hospital too......" She rang off. The barman was very helpful, explaining that the GMTV studios were not that far away - in Camden Town - if she took a taxi she might be lucky and be there in twenty minutes. Taking a swift farewell of George Hedley, Scully was on her way. ************************************* Subject: So Shall You Reap 8 ************************************* Lygon Arms 7pm Fox Mulder loosened his tie, slipped his shoes off and stretched out on the bed in the hotel room. He had spent a wearying and basically fruitless afternoon trying to track down people who had survived those road accidents which Scully and he had determined the previous evening seemed to fit the pattern into which Mrs Matheson's belonged. None of the survivors - and there were few enough of those - remembered anything of use....basically because they were all small children. No adults at all. No-one who could tell him anything about the circumstances causing the accidents. All he knew what what they had correlated from the police reports the previous evening: in none of the cases were there any mechanical faults evident on the vehicles to account for the crashes.And then on the way back to the hotel he had finally received another call from Scully, who had informed him that Bill and Bob had managed to slip out of the television studios before she could track them down, and that she was having real trouble persuading the studio boss to release a videotape of the broadcast to her. "Mulder, your paranoia is catching," she had fumed. "If I didn't know better, I'd think they were being deliberately obstructive" In the end, she had told him, only Detective Chief Inspector Green's intervention had persuaded the man that it would not be a breach of journalistic privilege to hand over the tape, but by then it was too late for anything to be done that afternoon. So the upshot was, Dana Scully was going to have to spend the night in London. "Damn it, Scully," Mulder slowed down on a blind corner," I need you here..." "Believe me, Mulder, I'd rather be there." Staring now at the filmy white hangings of the four-poster Mulder thought back to the tone of voice she's used. Was he fooling himself into believing that there was more than professional frustration there? So.....she was going to call him later, when she'd found a hotel. He closed his eyes as a wave of lethargy swept over him. The last few days had been draining to say the least. Maybe it was a Good Thing that Scully wasn't going to be here tonight - it would give him a chance to get a few things sorted out in his head. For the first time in two years he made himself think back to the Cecil L'Ively case. He had been stunned at Phoebe's unannounced arrival, and angry with her for scaring Scully and himself with the trick tape in the car. He'd felt mesmerized by her like a small mammal caught in a snake's beady glare but he had been determined to resist her. He pondered - when exactly had that changed, so that he had found himself sitting on the bed in a hotel room not at all unlike this one......oh God! His eyes snapped open, he sat, up, looked around him and laughed dryly. Perhaps it was some kind of cosmic joke. The same kind of four-poster bed - even the drapes were similar. He wondered if Scully had noticed. Probably - but she wouldn't have said anything to him even if she had. He remembered the telephone call from her just as he was settling himself into that Boston hotel room, and how guiltily he had started to his feet. He had known then that Scully wouldn't approve - and had also known, though not in formulated words, that he didn't want her to find out because she would think less of him - and not just professionally. Less of him for being so pathetic that he couldn't resist Phoebe. He made himself search for that moment of weakness when he had again allowed Phoebe to start dictating his life. He remembered. He and Phoebe had gone to the Boston Mercy Hospital to interview the woman who had been burnt when L'Ively had set fire to the bar. He had still been angry and resistant, but by the time they had left he was agreeing to spend the night at the hotel with her, knowing full well - yes even eager for - the inevitable consequence. Settling back again, he closed his eyes. This time, his eidetic memory would be of benefit to him as he replayed the scene for himself. She had been complimenting him on his interrogatory technique, he recalled - the woman hadn't wanted her boyfriend to know that she was hanging out in bars trying to pick up other men. "Deftly done, Agent Mulder. Casually disregard her indiscretion. A polite but firm manner until she accedes to co-operate." He had replied woundingly unable to keep his feelings of bitterness from surfacing in his comments," It's a technique I refined in my relationship with you." And he had finally succeeded, it seemed, in touching her, for a hurt expression had flickered across Phoebe's face. "Ah." She had looked away. "Yes, well...I see you haven't lost your sense of humour after all". And in that moment, when she had seemed vulnerable to him, when it seemed that he did indeed have the power to hurt her, he had been lost again. He had needed to have her think well of him. He had needed to have her affection. He sought her approval, just like he had always sought the approval of everyone who meant anything to him and who had withdrawn their love. Just like his father, so like Phoebe. And how could he not have given his father another chance on that April night a year ago, when half out of his mind with drugs he had heard only part the tale his father had wanted to tell. And how could he not have given Phoebe another chance when she looked so injured. And so Phoebe had her victory and she had known it, and had crowned it with a reminder of their erotic pleasures: "Don't tell me you've forgotten a certain youthful indiscretion atop Arthur Conan Doyle's tombstone on a misty night in Windlesham".. He could see now, looking back on it, that it had been a stunning performance. Phoebe was clever and persistent. Since sparks and smart-talk weren't working, try another tack - vulnerability. Play the guilt card - always a winner with him. He didn't want to think about what had happened after that but it was truth-time, and he forced himself to remember. Actually, it made him even more chagrined than succumbing again to Phoebe's seduction. They had been walking back to the car. Mulder had been speaking of pyrokinesis. "I don't think this is the IRA, Phoebe. I think this guy is far more exotic." Striding along side him, Phoebe had responded, "I should say so. If he can light himself afire....." and then stopped, as Mulder had halted and stared at her. "What?" He had smiled at her, and the words he had said now burned in his brain, "Nothing. I'm just not used to someone so quick to agree with me on these things." Never again. What he and Scully had ,such friendship and such caring, was a treasure that Phoebe would never likely experience. Mulder knew he had those for always. And he knew now that he wanted the rest, too. A man would have to be dead from the waist down not to be sexually stimulated by Phoebe at her most determined. But how could he have been so foolish as to think that had anything to do with love? Phoebe was no more to him than those women in the pictures and on the films he kept under the couch in his apartment. Two-dimensional sexual fantasies to get off on. And he didn't need them any more - and he didn't need her. He knew what he needed. Whether he could ever have it - well, that was something that he and Scully would have to work out between them. And tomorrow they would make a start on it. Splashing his face with water, he caught sight of his reflection in the bathroom mirror. God knows what Scully saw in him, anyway. Dark shadows under his eyes from too many nights on the couch - nose much too big for his face - hair often refusing to be mastered. He was hardly a catch! Scattering files and papers in piles all over the living-area he plugged in his modem and connected to his service provider to do some web-research. Might as well make a night of it - the sooner they were done here the better. ************************* Dana Scully shrugged off the jacket of her business suit, shucked off her shoes and sank down gratefully on the bed in her small single room in the gables of the Hotel Strand Carlton. Finding hotel space at short notice in central London in May is not an easy task, and she was lucky to have even such meager and expensive accommodation as this. A picture of Mulder stretched out on that bed in the Lygon Arms flashed unsought in front of her eyes, and her heart bumped. she admonished herself sternly She had tried to call him a couple of times since finding a place to stay for the night, but each time the room was engaged. And she thought she knew why - Mulder was probably surfing the internet, playing Dungeons and Dragons with Frohicke or downloading huge binaries from Celebrity Skin OnLine. She smiled involuntarily. He was such a mass of contradictions - incredibly sensitive and yet at time obtuse to the point of - what, stupidity? The bravest man she had ever know, yet afraid of revealing himself even to her for fear of rejection. . Ah, God, it was happening just like she knew it would from the moment she had sat in Skinner's office and he had ordered her to England to work with Mulder and Phoebe Green. He didn't seem to understand that she *knew* him, his demons, knew the bad as well as the good. If she was going to leave him she would have done it long time ago...when? Sometimes she felt that she had no choice from the very first moment she had walked into his basement lair and he had looked up at her with that insolent smirk - wearing those glasses........... She had thought he was quite mad on that first case, but she had never for a moment doubted his honesty, his integrity . And from the very first she had admired his relentlessness in pursuit of the truth, in the face of scorn and mockery. His shining intellect, his erudition, his capacity for the intuitive leap into darkness - ah, she felt so dull, sometimes. Felt that she was holding him down, binding him to the earth when he wanted to soar away. But leave him - never. She could no more do that than stop breathing. Even after her abduction she never considered leaving - even during the terrible time after Missy had died. And even during those long winter months when he had been trying his best to drive her away. She would stand by him in the face of death - had done so. So what, she suddenly thought, what am I doing now? Suddenly the room seemed stifling, and she pushed at the rusty catch until it finally gave way and she could shove the sash window up and lean out into the hot, London air. Sitting on the window sill, she listened to the sounds floating up from the streets below, and thought about was happening in her life. Mulder was her best friend. He was trying to make an important decision about the direction he wanted his life to take. If it were anything but this....would she have cut him adrift to make that decision by himself? Or would she have stood at his side, made him talk it through, shown him all the options, argued stubbornly with him about which was the most sensible.....because what happened to him mattered to her. So why had she withdrawn herself this time? Dana Scully was not a cowardly woman, nor a stupid one. So she looked into the face of her pride and saw it for what it was. She wanted him to choose her freely - she wanted the victory to be magnificent, wanted Phoebe to be routed utterly. And while she was doing this, while she was standing back from the fray, arms folded, Phoebe was working all her magic to draw Mulder back to her! While she, Dana Scully, was sulking in a hotel bedroom, Mulder was having to face the beast alone. She laughed a little at her own analogies, but saw that they contained a grain of truth. She wanted Mulder to be strong with this - wanted him to be perfect and adamant in his love for her. But she knew that wasn't fair. He needed her help and she should be strong enough to give it. He needed her to remind him why he loved her, needed her not to be judgmental about what was past - needed especially perhaps to know that she thought he was worth fighting for. Maybe she could give him a reminder of what his choices were. She powered up her own laptop and logged on. Yes! Mulder was still on-line. To Fmulder@fbi.net >From DSCully@fbi.net >Mulder - you there? To DSCully@fbi.net >From Fmulder@fbi.net >Hey Scully - why didn't ya call? Where are you? To Fmulder@fbi.net >From DSCully@fbi.net >Ha ha! You've been on-line for hours, Mulder. I hope you know what the hotel charge for these calls is likely to be. You're paying, remember :-) To DSCully@fbi.net >From Fmulder@fbi.net >Shit, Scully. Thanks for reminding me. Where are you? When are you coming back? To Fmulder@fbi.net >From DSCully@fbi.net >Hotel Strand Carlton - delightful broom-cupboard. Back tomorrow - lunchtime. Catch up then. >Oh Mulder......... To DSCully@fbi.net >From Fmulder@fbi.net >Scully? You still there? To Fmulder@fbi.net >From DSCully@fbi.net >Mulder... keep yourself warm tonight....for *me* ;-) And sleep well. You don't want to be worn out tomorrow night. Dana Scully logged off with a smile on her lips as soon as she had sent the message. She was looking forward to the next day. Phoebe was *not* going to have it all her own way. *************************** Fox Mulder stared at the message blinking innocuously on his screen and felt the heat grow . Then he shut the laptop down and went to have his second cold shower of the day. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Subject: So Shall You Reap 9 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> DAY FOUR Saturday 25th May ************************* Lygon Arms 12.45pm Scully slammed shut the hotel door and then leaned back against it in relief. It had been a difficult morning. It wasn't just that she had had to argue with four different people before she actually had the tape of the Bill and Bob TV interview in her hands. Nor that she didn't have a change of clothes and the undies she had washed out in the hotel the night before were still slightly damp when she had come to put them on in the morning. Nor was it even that the heat and grime of London had got to her - after all she was a veteran of Washington DC in August. She and Mulder had a long talk on the telephone before she left to go to the GMTV studios - filling him in on what she had found out from Jonathan's medical records, and listening with growing anger as he recounted his discussion with Ambassador Matheson - and Mulder had offered to meet her off the train, so that they could travel to Holbrook Manor to view the tape with Phoebe Green. Then, on arrival at Paddington Station she had discovered to her dismay that her train had been cancelled, and it would be mid-afternoon before she arrived in Castle Cary. She had called Mulder to let him know that she's get a taxi to Holbrook Manor with the tape and meet him there........and then she'd found out that she could make a connection. By this time she had been so fed up that she decided not to call Mulder, but to go back to the hotel first, and then on to the Manor and meet him there as arranged. He'd just have to manage as best he could on his own! Now she stood in front of her wardrobe in clean bra and panties. She flicked the hangers back and forward. Not a lot of choice, and she really needed to remember to put some stuff into the hotel dry-cleaning... She pulled a cream blouse out and held it up next to the suit, critically. "Knock 'em dead, Red." Scully gasped and spun round. Mulder was leaning against the door-frame watching her with dark eyes. Suddenly she felt shy: instinctively she held the blouse in front of her. Then she just felt silly and let the blouse slip from her fingers to the floor. She turned to face him full on, and took a deep breath. "Hi." A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "Um, Scully......this is a surprise...... I thought you were going to be late." "A nice surprise I hope?" How she managed to keep the trembling from her voice, Dana never knew. She felt lightheaded - as if at the slightest brush of air she would float away. But she tipped her chin up: held his gaze. My god - she could lose herself in those eyes. She shivered with longing for him to touch her, and he saw the slight trembling. "Hey Scully, you're cold..." And with the fates singing in her ears, Dana Scully took all her courage, and all her hopes for the future, stepped towards him and held out her hand. "Then warm me up, Mulder". Her voice was husky - from desire or fear, she didn't care. All she knew was that she wanted this man - she had wanted him for so long - and if she didn't have him now she was going to shatter into little pieces. His hand was warm and strong meeting hers, they moved close...so close... and it was as if all her senses were on fire. From the feel of the carpet beneath her bare toes sensation tingled up her body till it seemed like the very hair on her head was alive and burning with desire for this man in front of her. He looked down at her as she slowly closed the space between them until her length was pressed against his, until her arms snaked round him to hold him and feel the strength and warmth of him........."Scully...do you think that this is a good idea?" She was half-mesmerized by his lips, that mouth...and in the only reply she was capable of making, she pulled his head down towards her with both hands and kissed him hard. "Jesus Christ, Scully....." And then he was holding her so tightly that she was pulled up on tiptoe, his hands roaming up and down her back, cupping her buttocks, smoothing across the plane of her stomach an finally coming to rest around the smooth fullness of her breast. She could feel the strength of his desire pressed hard against her belly, as she rocked and moaned against him. "I don't want to wait any longer, Mulder..."she murmured into his mouth... "Please, Mulder, please...." And then they were on the bed, and his clothes were pooled on the floor, and she was carried away savage joy as he settled his weight down on top of her and in her. As they thrust in unison with the fierce rhythm of nature, thought fled: the only thing that mattered was the aching in her groin, and the building, agonizing, wonderful, agonizing pleasure of it - and neither of them could last for long, because this moment had *been* so long in coming. Her world splintered into shards of pleasure, and Dana Scully eventually came back to find herself lying in the arms of the man she loved, searingly familiar and utterly new.. He was staring down at her, and she could not read the expression on his face. She reached up, and stroked his bottom lip with her finger, then traced the contour of his marvelous cheekbones. She wondered if it was sadness she saw there....or disappointment.......something she couldn't identify. Then he closed his eyes and rested his head on her chest, and for long moments she held him like that, protectively, running her fingers through his hair. ********************************** Lygon Arms 12.45pm As soon as Mulder entered the hotel suite he knew that Scully was already there, but he wasn't prepared for the sight that met him as he walked quietly to the bedroom. There she stood, clad only in her underwear and a little frown, contemplating the contents of the wardrobe. He watched silently as she reached in and pulled out that red suit and hung it on the doorknob - and then the cream silk blouse. She chewed her lip a little as she looked at it, tilting her head to one side. She looked so...intense, so self-contained. Her pale skin and soft curves - the flaming hair - she looked like a fiery spirit, and Mulder was shaken with a wave of such love and such desire that he had to fall back a little against the door frame for support. He said the first thing that came into his head - "Knock 'em dead, Red!" - then watched as here eyes widened and she spun round, clutching the garment to her in defense. He saw the shyness there, the nervousness - then saw her chin come up - she slowly let the silken material slip from the fingers to the floor and looked him straight in the eyes - and Mulder had never seen anything so erotic in his life. He was mesmerized by her mouth, as he tongue darted out to lick her lips, but though he wanted nothing but to crush her in his embrace, he forced himself to remain still. "Hi." Her voice was husky, low, and he nearly lost it right then. "Um., Scully...this is a surprise.....I thought you were going to be late." His mouth was so dry he was amazed he could speak at all. The air between then seemed to be electric, charged with possibilities... "A nice surprise I hope?" She titled her head and gave him that secretive half-smile. And then he saw that her body trembled - so small, so delicate and pale she seemed, and he started forward -" Hey Scully, you're cold..." And she was moving towards him, her small strong hand held out to him, "Then warm me up, Mulder", and thought fled and only sensation mattered as he drew her to him into a fierce embrace, pulled her against him so tightly "Do you think this is a good idea?" and not waiting for the answer as she kissed him hard , "Jesus Christ, Scully"... She was murmuring something into his mouth as she drew him to the bed. And it was fast and fierce, and he couldn't make it last because he'd been waiting for this fulfillment for *so* very long....and her mouth was hot on him, and she was soft and tight and welcoming..and he was home at last.......and then it was over and he sank down, and down into her arms. He felt her sigh beneath him, and moved to look at her. She was still flushed, and her eyes when they fluttered open were soft. She looked back up at him, questioning, and suddenly he couldn't look at her honesty any more, afraid of what he might see....regret...sadness, and he pillowed his head on her breasts and let her comfort him for a while like a child. Eventually he rose and dressed himself, leaving her in privacy. He was ashamed at his loss of control: sad that their first time should have been such a fierce and urgent coming together. He had wanted to woo her, to seduce her slowly, to drive her mad with pleasure, to make love to every inch of her.....he had not wanted such a violent coupling to be their first time. That they could have had so many times before. He sat unseeing as the videotape Scully had brought back from London played in front of his eyes. Eventually she came out to him, dressed, calm and self-contained again, ready for work. She made no reference to what had just happened, and neither did he. He would not deny her the space she so obviously needed - would not make her talk about it until she was ready. ********************************* Dana watched Mulder out of the corner of her eye as he piloted the car round the narrow lanes which led to Holbrook Manor. She wondered just exactly what he was thinking...feeling. He had been so quiet in the aftermath of their lovemaking : she had held him for a while, then he has kissed the top of her head gently, got up, dressed quickly and gone out to the sitting room where she had found him twenty minutes later, after she had cleaned herself up and dressed in the red suit, watching the tape of Bill and Bob's interview. Did he regret what they had done? All she knew was, caught up in the frenzy of the moment, he had wanted it as much she had. But there was no doubt in her mind that she had impelled him, and maybe he felt that she had taken advantage of him, had seduced him into doing something he wasn't yet ready for...something he didn't want to deal with yet, if ever. Why wasn't he talking to her? She sighed, and looked out of the window. Why *had* she behaved in such an extraordinary way? But really, she knew the answer. She had felt, in that moment when she had dropped the blouse she was holding and turned to face him, that if she didn't make a move now, then neither of them ever would. There would always be a reason not to. It would never be quite the right moment. So her heart had held sway for once....and she was not sorry. Not at all. Even if they never made love again she would remember till the day she died how it felt to have him inside her, how it made her complete, how soft his skin was, the comfortable weight of him on top of her....how safe he made her feel. She sighed again. In those moments she had felt more alive than she had ever done in her life before. And she wouldn't regret that. ******************************** God, but she's feeble, thought Phoebe Green, as she made her way down to the library where the two FBI agents were waiting to brief her on the previous day's activities. Taken to her bed *again* in the middle of the day when she was meant to be travelling up to London for an official reception with Richard. When he's married to *me* - might as well he positive about this, she grinned inwardly - that's just the kind of thing I'll love. She took a deep breath to centre herself. She had a job to do now: she needed to work Fox Mulder so that he did exactly what Matheson has wanted him to - find out the truth, so that no-one could swing any unpleasant surprises at a later date, and then make damned sure no-one else found out about it. Because whatever the truth was, it was unlikely to be good public relations for an aspirant president - even if it was just that his wife cracked under the pressure. Who would want a woman like that in the White House? And Matheson's involvement in the SETI project - his open-mindedness about some of Mulder's ridiculous theories - they were, Phoebe considered, his Achilles heel. Would the American people really vote in as President a man who could hold those kinds of beliefs? Phoebe was at odds with herself over all this. She needed to do a good job - and she wanted to please Richard, by ensuring Mulder's absolute co-operation. On the other hand, if Richard could see that his wife was a complete flake and a total liability who was continuing to damage him with her off-the-wall remarks and eccentric behavior, he was much more likely to quietly dump her. And that would be very good news for Phoebe. For she had discovered that Matheson was like her in so many ways. He was a user, too. A user of people. maybe you had to be in order to be a successful politician, Phoebe neither knew nor cared. But it was much harder to get Richard to do what she wanted - and this time, she really, really wanted it - than it had ever been with any of her previous encounters. As soon as she walked into the library, Phoebe knew that something had changed in the way Mulder and Scully were behaving with eachother. There was a tension, a sparking in the air. Mulder was explaining something about a videotape the were all going to watch, but Phoebe was fascinated by Dana Scully. The woman positively glowed. She sat on the couch, hands demurely folded in her lap, not looking at Fox Mulder, but when she looked up to greet Phoebe, her eyes shone. . Phoebe sat down next to her on the couch, as Mulder set the tape going. But only half her attention was on the revelations of Bill and Bob, crop-circle fakers extraordinaire. The other half was analyzing the scene that was playing out in front of her. Well, they had either had the mother of all rows - or wild sex. Whichever it was, it ratcheted the stakes up a notch. The game was now afoot indeed! ****************************** Dana Scully forced herself to concentrate on the tape in front of her, pulled her mind way from that recent memory of the taste of Fox Mulder's mouth on hers, the electric touch of his fingers. Damn - she could feel that she had been smirking and hoped that no-one was looking at her. She looked down so that her hair fell like curtain round her face, and allowed herself a small smile. Then she took herself very sternly in hand. If they were going to be able to make this work, both she and Mulder needed to be able to keep their private lusts in the bedroom she stifled a giggle, and accidentally caught Mulder's glance, as he caught the slight sound and turned round to stare at her. And she couldn't help it - didn't want to help it. He looked oh - so *Mulder* sitting there, leaning forward a little, glasses .....God, she loved him in those glasses, he looked so sexy....! It wasn't fair - she just looked like a librarian in hers! She suddenly found herself giving him a long, slow smile, as she stretched back into the couch. Mulder's eyebrows raised, and a laugh gleamed in his eyes too as she blushed, realizing what she must have looked like, practically thrusting her chest at him. Then he smiled back, leaned forward and touched her knee lightly. "Let's take it from the top again Scully!" The double-entendre wasn't lost on either of the woman present, as he had intended. "There's something here, and I'm just not seeing it." "Oh come on, Mulder. This is just a waste of time. So what if the circles are fakes - we knew that, anyway....they're *all* fakes." Phoebe has seen the last exchange between the two of them, and much as she liked a challenge she did not appreciate being totally excluded from their interaction. Dana Scully was having all to much of a good time, and Foxy was paying her far too much attention. But Mulder had rewound and started the tape again. This time, having re-established their connection, Scully had no trouble in concentrating on what was in front of her. As she had seen when watching with George Hedley the clip began with the photograph of the field showing the markings in the corn with the Range Rover in the middle of it. They watched in silence as the voice-over related Annelise Matheson's statements and then the camera switched to the studio, and the two men. Bob and Bill were florid and middle- aged. Bob sported a dark beard, and Bill an earring in his left lobe. They gave the impression of being exceptionally pleased with themselves. "Yes, Anthea, we've been responsible for many of the so- called crop-circles you've been hearing about over the past few years. It all started one night in the pub nearly twenty years ago...... " And the two men went on to claim that they had been responsible for nearly 200 circles over the past years, throughout the Wiltshire - Somerset area. "The more keen those so-called experts got, the more fun we had!" "And why is it," the vacuous blonde interviewer queried, "that you are only coming forward now, when you've been doing this for years?" "Well," Bill leaned forward earnestly, "Basically we've been doing it for a bit of a lark, but with this business with the Ambassador's wife and all this cobblers about little green men we thought it was time we spoke up before anyone started to take this nonsense too seriously." "Not only that," Bob interposed, "But my wife found out. She started to wonder where I was all these nights! " He grinned at the camera. "Hello, Elsie! Believe me now, love, do you?" Bob then elaborated on the actually method of faking the circles - "Actually, we call them pictograms" - using ropes, planks, and a baseball cap with a strange wire construction attached to it which they said they had used to help them create the straight lines. No, they didn't have any proof of the other circles - unfortunately, Bob's Elsie had been a bit upset when he'd confessed to her, and had taken the lot down the local tip - but they did have pictures of this latest escapade that all the fuss had been made about. They held one of these pictures up and the camera focused in on it. It wasn't very different from the one in the newspapers, a copy of which Scully has seen in the file. "We always like to have a - memento- of our handiwork, see? So we usually goes back in the morning at first light to take a few snaps for the family album. And we shinned up a tree...." "And we saw that car there in the middle of our lovely pictograms, so after we'd got a few piccies we legged it." "Mulder.." Something was tugging at the back of her mind. "Wind it back and freeze-frame....." She turned to the Englishwoman. "Apart from the fact that the farmer ploughed his fields, do you know if he has done any other work since?" Phoebe gave her a condescending look. "Really Agent Scully, its hardly my job to keep track of what the local yeomen are doing!" "I guess that's a 'no' then. Okay, we'll try this another way. " She reached for her briefcase and pulled out the prints she had developed from the reels of film she had shot at the scene, and then spread the pictures out cross the large reading table. "Yes!" "What'cha got, Scully?" Mulder leaned over her shoulder, very close. She was vaguely aware of his presence, the scent of him, but her mind was busy with other kinds of extreme possibility. She indicated the screen. "There's no way those photographs could have been taken as they've just said, Mulder." She pointed at two of the 8 x 10 black-and-white glossies. "Look at the angle of vision...." "They were taken from up a tree, Scully. He said so." "But there are no trees from which those shots could have been taken. See? The shadow's the same as in this other aerial photo - they must have been taken at almost the same time. And nothing's been chopped down, either - the aerial photo shows the same vegetation as I've got here" And it was true. The men were lying. They couldn't possibly have taken those photos - the supposed 'proof' of their involvement - as they had stated. "And if they're lying about that, what else are they lying about", mused Phoebe. "And why" Mulder added. "And who *did* take the pictures. And that other one" Scully touched the original photo, the one that had been reprinted in newspapers across the world alongside the mocking stories of Annelise Matheson's supposed abduction by aliens. " - any luck on tracking that down, Mulder?" In response to Scully's comment, Mulder pulled out the print which had been reluctantly handed over to him by the Mendip Daily News. He turned it over with his long fingers and pointed to a printed inscription. "MBF - that's all. It's a press agency. I couldn't get anything else useful out of the editor. He said they'd never used them before." "We checked up on that, Mulder. It was a complete dead-end." Phoebe sounded rather exasperated. " We couldn't find anything on them. We could only find two companies with those initials. One's a knitwear manufacturer up in Scotland, and the other's a research and development laboratory in Shepton Mallet. Nothing helpful at all." Scully frowned. " Shepton Mallet? I saw that name on road-signs when we drove down. It must be near here?" "Well, yes, but they're certainly not a press agency, and they didn't know anything about this picture." Mulder rubbed his jaw. "Well, they're the closest thing we've got to a lead at the moment. " He turned to Scully. "See what you can dig up on them, Scully, and about this Bill and Bob. Try our paranoid friends back home - if there's anything there, they should be able to find out - as well as the Bureau resources. Phoebe ?" The tall brunette gave him a slow smile. "How can I help, Mulder" He was all business. "Show Scully where the phone point is. I'm going to take this tape to the SCCR - they may pick up on something we haven't." Holbrook Manor. 5pm Phoebe Green stood, arms crossed in front of her, and watched as the smaller red-head logged on to the FBI intranet. Not only had the bloody women solved the Cecil L'Ively case and made her look a fool before, now she had come up with what might be their first solid lead in this whole wretched case. And it wasn't fair, because they'd only just found out about those two bucolic idiots. Now that *was* a point. Why just now? Determining to mention it to Mulder when they saw him again - it would appeal to his paranoid tendencies - she considered what needed to be done about Dana Scully. What was it about the woman she found so provoking? It wasn't *just* that she was screwing Fox Mulder, though that was extremely irritating when she, Phoebe Green, had banked on that diversion for herself. She was sure that, given enough time, she could win Mulder round, but she wasn't sure she cared to expend that much effort on him. Not only that, but she had to be a bit careful not to push Richard Matheson too far. Trying to make him a little jealous was one thing - but she didn't think he'd take very kindly if he were to find out she'd actually been laying Mulder, which well might happen if she had to become too overt. . Phoebe ran an inventory of Dana Scully's features. Hair - okay, quite attractive. Skin too pale - bet she goes red in the sun. Nose too small: chin too pointed. Looks like a hamster when she smiles. Nice eyes, though....when you can see them. Dana Scully had put her glasses on, and was intent on the screen in front of her, making notes, chewing her lip, occasionally flicking back a lock of red hair that persisted in falling in her eyes. Perhaps that was what attracted Mulder - her coolness, her cleverness, It certainly couldn't be her looks. And she's so .....short! Barely reaches his chin...that must make for some interesting maneuvering. Odd, too, since Mulder likes 'em tall and slim. Yes, must be an intellectual attraction. Madam super-cool Scully. Well, we'll have to see about that. She leaned forward over Scully's shoulder and pretended to take an interest in what she was doing. "Agent Scully - Dana." Scully looked up, surprised. "Let's face it - we haven't exactly hit it off, have we? " She smiled disarmingly. Scully's expression remained inscrutable. "You didn't make it the other night. Let me introduce to the delights of an English pub and we can get to know eachother better. I'm sure we must have lots of Foxy stories to swap! I'll call Mulder and tell him to meet us at the White Lion - it's the local for the detectives on the case too...... and I think the time's come for a serious pooling of information. I'm sure you want to get this sorted as soon as possible." It would have been churlish to refuse this olive branch. Scully knew it. Phoebe knew it. Dana Scully gave Phoebe Green a small smile, "Okay". ********************************** Finally Phoebe Green left the room to call Mulder at the SCCR and Scully was able to relax. She stretched a little: God, it had been a long day - so much had happened. She smiled softly, for a brief pause allowing herself the indulgence of remembering Mulder in her arms. A door slammed in the distance and Dana heard a masculine voice - Matheson had returned. The screen beeped at her "Timed out waiting for a response. Host has disconnected." Dammit, she thought. But she needed to use the bathroom anyway, so she slipped out of the library, hoping that she's be able to find her way in this rambling place. And so it was that Dana Scully stumbled on a scene that was almost an exact replica of what her partner had seen two years before - Phoebe Green in a passionate embrace with the man she was meant to be protecting. "Excuse me!" Scully flushed with embarrassment and anger as she withdrew swiftly from the room she had accidentally entered - Matheson's study, it appeared. "Agent Scully!" Dana turned, surprised at the sound of Matheson's clipped tones. He had followed her out into the hall, and gave her an appraising look as if to decide which was the best way to approach this problem in order to secure a favourable outcome. "Agent Scully, I'm sure that in your work you understand the necessity for discretion on occasion." Dana titled her chin to look up at him as he came to stand rather close to her. "This is one of those occasions. I would be disappointed to learn that you had spoken of this incident to anyone, including Agent Mulder. This has absolutely no bearing on the case and is an entirely private matter between myself and Inspector Green." "And your wife, sir." "I expect to be able to rely on your discretion. Agent Scully. It would be most unfortunate if I were not able to help Agent Mulder pursue his interests at a future date because there had been - unpleasantness - between us over this small matter. Is that clear, Agent Scully?" "Crystal clear, sir. And no perhaps you would tell me where the bathroom is. I wouldn't want to cause any more unpleasantness in my attempts to locate it." No, she wouldn't tell Mulder, but not for the reasons Matheson gave. She agreed about one thing - it had no bearing on the case - and what purpose would telling Mulder serve, except to upset him. No need to rub his nose in what a bitch Phoebe Green really was. She groaned inwardly. The prospect of spending an evening socializing with Phoebe Green was now even less appealing than before. she told herself. At least she had another couple of hours peace before they had to leave.