From: "David Hearne" Date: Mon, 4 Dec 2000 10:54:27 -0500 Subject: xfc: Tread Lightly (1 of 1) Source: xfc TITLE: TREAD LIGHTLY (1 of 1) AUTHOR: DAVID HEARNE CLASSIFICATION: Post-ep for "Invocation" RATING: PG SPOILERS: Invocation, Christmas Carol/Emily, All Souls Send feedback to ottercrk@sover.net Website is located at http://members.dencity.com/hearne AUTHOR'S NOTE: I want to publicly welcome my website caretaker Jintian Li back from Australia. She managed to avoid the dingoes and beer in order to return safely. Without her, I could never bring order to my corner of the fanfic universe. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX "Her name was Emily. "She was my daughter. "Don't say anything. Just let me finish. "When I was abducted, the men who experimented on me took my ova and used it to breed a child. Emily was that child. "I discovered her three years after my abduction. It will only make things more difficult by trying to explain the circumstances. "She was a sick child when I found her. "She was dying. "I tried to save her, but nothing I did could help her. Eventually, I stopped trying. I was only prolonging her agony. "I... "I would see her again. Months later. I had these...visions of her. I believe she came to me in order to tell me something. "She told me to let her go. "When I did that... "The circumstances there are also difficult to talk about. Let me just say that...what you achieved in this case feels more meaningful than what I did. "Let me also say that I came close to leaving the FBI after that. There had been too much to handle even before I found Emily. Her death almost damaged me irreparably. "I'm telling you this as a warning. Investigating the X-Files doesn't just mean thinking about extreme possibilities. It can take you to places which resemble Hell. "But I'm telling you this because I think you're strong enough to face the future, whatever that might be. "And I'm telling you this because I want to. "You didn't find any mention of Emily in the X-Files because it never seemed right to make her one. I couldn't reduce her to just another folder in Mulder's cabinet. I didn't want anyone to just pluck her out and remind me of that loss. There is territory in my life which cannot and should not be easily entered. "But I guess you could say that about anybody, couldn't you?" Dana Scully pulled a photo of a little girl from the fingers of John Doggett. She tucked it inside her jacket and turned to the airplane window. Doggett watched her as she watched the clouds roll under the airplane. Several times on the plane trip to D.C., he opened his mouth to say something. But he didn't. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX