Letters
of Transit (0/14)
***Intro
only - story begins in Part 1/14*** By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*,
but you don't have to have seen it to
understand
this.
International
readers: US4 spoilers for "Herrenvolk" and
"Tunguska/
Terma." Everything thereafter has been ignored.
Rating:
NC-17, for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If
you are
under-age, please do not read this.
SHIPPERS:
Although I regard this as a romantic piece, it's
not an
MSR in the usual sense--our heroes don't ride off
into
the sunset locked in each other's arms.
Summary:
It's 1999--"The Date" has come and gone, the
"Project"
is under way, and deadly bees have been unleashed
on
North America. With the world coming apart and people
scrambling
to get away from the swarm, Mulder faces fateful
decisions
about his own role in events to come--and about
Scully.
CHARACTER
DIES: Cancer Man doesn't make it out of this one.
Couldn't
happen to a nicer guy. :-) On the other hand, in
this
timeline, Pendrell's still alive. Not a bad trade-off,
huh?
AUTHOR'S
NOTES: Although I didn't read past the
introduction
of *A Notorious Affair* (I'm not a Hitchcock
fan), I
must give a nod of thanks to Nicole Perry. About
four
hours after I read that introduction, I suddenly had a
very
vivid mental image of David Duchovny and Gillian
Anderson
dressed up in those gorgeous 1930s-'40s movie
clothes.
And thus this was born. Only - call me crazy - I
ended
up not putting them in those clothes, for the most
part.
While I
have the same reservations other fans do about the
season
four conspiracy arc - a totally separate and
distinct
creature from the conspiracy arc of the first
three
seasons - this particular story only works in the
context
of season four's conspiracy. Consequently, this
probably
won't make much sense to anyone who hasn't seen
*Tunguska/Terma*.
DISCLAIMER:
This is intended as an homage, not a rip-off.
These
characters and the X Files universe were created by
and/or
are the property of Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen and
Fox
Broadcasting, all of whom are smarter and richer than
I.
Likewise, all references express or implied to the film
*Casablanca,*
screenplay by Julius J. Epstein, Phillip G.
Epstein
and Howard Koch. No infringement is intended.
Anybody
who sues me is wasting a lot of time and effort,
because
I'm broke and this story is actually *costing* me
money
to produce.
MISCELLANEOUS:
Do not use if seal is broken. Contains 0
calories
derived from fat. No animals were harmed in the
making
of this fanfic.
(Yes,
there is a story - it begins in part 1.)
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (1/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (1/14) By Loch Ness
"I'm
no good at being noble, but it doesn't take much to
see
that the problems of three little people don't amount
to a
hill of beans in this crazy world." - Rick Blaine,
*Casablanca*
July
17, 1999
As
little as a month ago, the causeway across to Galveston
Island
would have glittered like a string of Christmas
lights
in the night-time sky. But that was before the bees
had
swarmed into Houston, and the lights had gone out all
along
Interstate 45, including on the causeway.
The
bridge was still passable. If one had the proper papers
and a
working vehicle with sufficient fuel, one could still
cross
it in either direction. But few people would want to
go
across to the mainland. The bees were on the mainland.
Getting
to the island didn't guarantee safety,
either--there
was no real safety to be had, not so close to
the
bees, not within reach of the Special Emigration
Bureau.
But the bees had not been seen in Galveston.
Not
yet. And for now the concrete-and-steel roadway still
loomed
up out of the water like the desiccated, twisted
spine
of a long-dead, giant snake, standing out dully in
the
moonlight as Alex Krycek crept toward it in the dark.
Krycek
hadn't heard any reports of bees farther south than
Clear
Lake. Still, he had taken no chances. He was wearing
a black
nylon wind-suit with all its cuffs and openings
carefully
sealed with duct tape, leather gloves, and a
beekeeper's
hood, also sealed with tape. The getup was
miserable
in the midsummer heat of the Texas coast, but
better
to be sweaty than to be hit with multiple, toxic bee
stings.
He couldn't afford the delay in his mission he'd
have if
he got stung.
He drew
his gun as he approached the darkened guard house
at the
end of the causeway. One of the sentries stepped
outside
the hut and stood there, his submachine gun
shouldered,
and glanced at his watch. Krycek threw a glance
inside,
looking for the second guard. Sitting in the hut,
eyes
half-closed, nodding in the heavy evening heat.
Drawing
a long, silent breath, Krycek set himself to his
task.
He
whipped around the edge of the hut and put two silenced
rounds
into the chest of the standing guard, who gasped and
fell,
dead before he hit the ground. The sentry inside died
without
ever waking up. Krycek took the guard outside the
hut by
the feet and dragged him into the building, dropped
him
untidily in the corner and left, the murders already
forgotten.
Krycek never killed out of malice, and he never
allowed
himself any remorse. He looked at his own
watch--ten-oh-seven
p.m. Right on schedule.
He
secured a rope harness to the bridge railing, careful to
avoid
the strands of wire strung along the
bridge, each
wire
attached to an explosive charge underneath the
roadway.
The Galveston city fathers had declared that if
the
bees reached as far south as Dickinson, about ten miles
to the
north, the road would be destroyed to keep the bees
from
being able to use it. The theory was that the bees
couldn't
fly far enough to reach the island without landing
on
something--something like the causeway--and that they
would
grow exhausted and drop into the sea before they made
it to
the island. There was no real evidence to show it was
true.
Krycek
made sure that the end of the rope hung near the
Zodiac
raft he had tied under the causeway, then turned to
wait
for the convoy. It didn't take long. After no more
than
ten minutes he felt more than heard the approaching
trucks
coming across from the island--a low rumble through
the
concrete he stood on. He smiled. They were punctual
tonight,
too. This bunch was made up of "officials"--the
city-sanctioned
pirates who drove up from Galveston to
ravage
Houston's wrecked, abandoned corpse twice a week.
Refugees
fleeing Houston had taken a lot, had burned and
destroyed
a lot. But there was still canned food in the
city,
stocks of fuel and clothing, building materials and
auto
parts, with no police to stop anyone from taking what
he
liked. At the outset of the bee invasion, somebody had
estimated
that Galveston could live off Houston's remains
for two
years. But that had not factored in that
Galveston's
population would quadruple almost overnight as
refugees
fled to the island.
Refugees
were still straggling in. The causeway from the
mainland
was closed to all but the "officials" now, but
escapees
came by boat, by raft, by every conceivable sort
of
aircraft--some just barely air- or seaworthy.
Everybody
who
could get off the mainland was leaving. Their numbers
had
begun to dwindle as the bees killed more and more who
couldn't
escape fast enough--but refugees were coming
nonetheless.
Krycek
waited, hunkered down in the dark, as the convoy
approached
him. The trucks ran without headlights
to avoid
drawing
attention, but they would stop at the barricades
before
the guard post. And though the men driving the
trucks
were city "officials" he doubted they'd risk much to
interfere
with him. Not even the local cops wasted any love
on the
feds.
Krycek
didn't really care about the trucks. He was after
the
federal car he knew would be traveling with them for
the
safety of numbers. A pouch carried by the government
courier
in that car was his target. In the pouch, Krycek
knew
there were two letters of transit signed by the
governor
of Hawaii and by Lawrence Sherrill, director of
the
emigration bureau. Sherrill, the almighty guru of
escape
from the country, who in effect determined who would
live
and who would die. Letters of transit were reserved
for
diplomats, and no local authorities could prevent
individuals
carrying them from leaving the continental U.S.
on any
basis whatever.
Oh,
yeah--those letters were Alex Krycek's ticket to better
latitudes. He'd use one of them to get out himself and
sell
the other one for a fat price. He'd ship out for the
port of
Tampico, Mexico, and from there to Hawaii, which
people
said was safe from the bees. He could
do a lot
worse,
he figured, than to be stuck for life in Honolulu.
The
convoy pulled up at the barricades, the driver of the
first
truck peering warily at the guards' hut. Staying low
and in
the shadows, Krycek approached the federal car from
the passenger
side.
*Five
bucks says the dumb cocksuckers are so arrogant they
haven't
bothered to lock the doors,* he thought.
He was
right. The door swung open when he pulled the
handle,
and before the two men inside had time to register
what
was happening or shout, he had put two more
well-placed
bullets into them. He heard the "officials" in
the
trucks come toward him, but he didn't look up. He used
a third
round to smash the handcuff lock on the courier's
briefcase,
then stood up--hands in the air, the case in one
hand
and his gun in the other, held loosely to indicate he
was all
done shooting.
He'd
guessed right again. None of the "officials" wanted to
drill
him just for offing a couple of feds. They stood
there,
warily, submachine guns pointed at him, but as long
as he
made no move to harm any of them, they weren't going
to
fire.
Krycek
backed toward his rope harness, hands still up. When
he
reached the railing, he shifted the gun to his other
hand--the
prosthesis--and slid down the rope into his raft.
The
"officials" never even looked over the side. As Krycek
untied
the raft, he heard them drive off.
****
July
19, 1999
The
Galveston airport was small, and like everything else
on the
island had suffered considerably from lack of
supplies
with which to conduct maintenance work. Paint
peeled
on the steel hangars, and most of the aircraft
crammed
onto one end of the tarmac field, some wrecked or
dismantled
and cannibalized for parts, would never fly
again.
Many had never been intended to go any farther than
the
island, and in any case, there wasn't much aviation gas
to be
had any more.
It was
hot, the blinding Texas sun beating down like the
rays in
a microwave oven and bouncing off the pavement in
visible
waves. Walter Skinner, feeling slightly parboiled
in his
light gray suit, stood waiting for a plane. Skinner
had
learned in the army that physical comfort was not a
thing
to be taken lightly, and so he had found a patch of
shade
to stand in, just inside an open, broken-down hangar.
The
hangar's windows were mostly busted out, but no air
moved
inside the ramshackle building. Just heat, and the
faintly
metallic scent of engine oil. He wondered what had
become
of "ocean breezes." None blew this day, that was for
damned
sure.
*Vietnam
wasn't this fucking hot,* Skinner thought, though
he was
pretty sure it had been. He'd just been younger,
more
resilient then. And it was hard to care about the
climate
while dodging mortar shells.
Skinner
hadn't intended to come to Galveston. The bureau's
offices
had moved twice, farther south each time, to get
away
from the bees, ending up in Miami. The swarm's entry
into
Florida had been ugly, people reacting in panic
because
they were trapped between the sea and the insects.
Skinner
didn't like thinking about it. He had lost four
agents
in a riot, and the local cops had been even more
decimated
than that. Things had gotten crazier and crazier,
until
in the pandemonium, only about six of the twenty
bureau staff
in Miami had escaped.
Skinner
had made it as far as New Orleans, and then had
been
dispatched to Galveston after a visit from an older
man
smoking Morley cigarettes and suddenly brandishing the
omnipotent
authority of the Special Emigration Bureau. Then
Skinner
had arrived in Texas to find he had no staff on the
island,
no offices, no nothing. He had commandeered and
deputized
some local police officers, Old-West-style, by
simply
handing them badges.
When
Fox Mulder had appeared out of nowhere, like a revisit
from a
nightmare long-forgotten, Skinner had offered to
forgive
his having gone AWOL in Washington fourteen months
earlier
and put him back to work. And Mulder had laughed.
An
insane laugh that lived somewhere in the shadows between
cynicism
and despair. Skinner hadn't asked again.
Anyway,
Mulder would've been wasted on the sort of cases
Skinner's
bureau was working now. Petty import violations
and the
occasional tax evasion would've bored Mulder
shitless,
and Skinner suspected boredom just would've made
him
unendurable. As it was, he and Mulder had established
an
unspoken, uneasy truce. And besides, Mulder had taken up
altogether
a different line of work these days.
Anyway,
there wasn't much left in the way of federal
authority,
except for the heavily protected SEB, in its
high-tech
underground bunker in Colorado. Hell, there was
nothing
left to administer on a national level...except who
got out
of the nation and why, and where they went. On
Galveston
Island, Walter Skinner was all the federal
authority
there was left. And he liked it that way. He
could
call the shots here--for once in his life, he had no
need to
check with somebody upstairs or engage in petty
internal
politics or, worst of all, play two ends against
the
middle, as it had always been in Washington.
The
arrival of the smoking man might change all that, and
all
because some son of a bitch had made a bloody mess of
two
federal couriers. Hell, it hadn't even happened on the
island,
wasn't Skinner's problem, as he figured it.
Everybody
knew going back to the mainland was a
risk--apparently
somebody in the SEB had considered that
sending
the couriers to the mainland was an *acceptable*
risk.
But no.
The smoking man was annoyed, and so the world would
stop until
he was satisfied.
Finally
Skinner heard the roar of jet engines overhead. The
parties
he was waiting for were traveling first-class.
Skinner
had never known exactly what agency, if any, the
smoking
man worked for. CIA? NSA? It had been explained to
Skinner,
long ago, that he simply didn't need to know.
Neither
had he ever known the man's real name.
But he
knew the man, all too well. His arrival boded ill,
and
Skinner was none too pleased to have him on the island.
Skinner
approached the plane, a neat, white LearJet, as it
taxied
up to the small, empty terminal. Before the plane
had
even completely stopped moving, the door opened,
dropping
a short stairway that almost touched the ground.
And off
stepped the smoking man, with an entourage of two
toadies
in dark suits and dark glasses, radio earphone
cords
curling down their necks, both of them lugging
briefcases
and computers. Skinner did not have to check out
the
tailoring of their jackets to know they had guns on
their
hips.
The
smoking man paused long enough to cup his hand against
the hot
wind stirred by the jet's engines while he rasped
the
wheel on his Zippo lighter. His heavily lined face
sagged
briefly as he bent to light his Morley. When he
straightened,
he blew a plume of smoke and got right to the
point.
"I
want those papers back," he said bluntly, as they headed
toward
Skinner's waiting car. "The classified material the
couriers
were transporting when they got hit."
"The
letters of transit?" Skinner said coolly. *What did
you
think, that I wouldn't bother trying to find out what
they
were carrying?*
The
smoking man's dark eyes narrowed. "Efficient as ever,"
he said
softly, the words coated with menace. "Do you know
who
took them?"
"Yes.
But in your honor, I rounded up twice the usual
number
of snitches," Skinner said, unable to resist the
temptation
to aggravate the smoker.
The wry
humor seemed lost on the other man. "Who?" he
demanded.
"Old
friend of yours. Alex Krycek."
The
smoking man hesitated, then chuckled. "*That* son of a
bitch,"
he murmured. "He's had it coming for a long time."
On this
point, at least, Skinner agreed. He had a score to
settle
with Krycek himself, but the little rat was clever.
Even in
the confined space of the island, Krycek had eluded
arrest.
But Skinner had him, now.
"What's
your plan?" the smoking man asked.
"If
he means to sell the letters, there's only one place
he'll
go. We'll get him there, at the
Casablanca Club."
The
smoking man held a silence for a moment. "Mulder's
place,"
he said finally.
"Yes."
"Your
boy Mulder has an appreciation of history," the
smoker
said.
"He's
not 'my boy' anymore. And the Casablanca Club is
about
money, not history. He's making a mint, and
technically,
it's all legal. Nobody can touch him."
"Have
you ever seen *Casablanca*, Mr. Skinner?"
He
shrugged. "Not in years. I don't really remember much of
it."
The
smoking man nodded. "Mulder does."
He
dropped his cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it
out
with his foot. "As long as he's still legal, you might
tell
him for me that it's a dangerous fantasy."
Skinner
had no idea what he was talking about. The smoking
man got
in the car, then looked up at Skinner just before
he shut
the door.
"Mulder's
got more lives than a fucking cat," the smoking
man
said. "But he's about used them up. And
*Casablanca*--that
fantasy's liable to get him killed."
Continued
in Part 2.
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (2/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (2/14) By Loch Ness
July
19, 1999
New
Orleans, La.
The
bees were moving in from the east, along the coast from
Mississippi.
There'd been two deaths in Biloxi the day
before
yesterday, and if the swarm kept up its usual pace,
no one
would be left alive there by tomorrow. The
Interstate
10 bridge across Lake Pontchartrain was closed,
and the
city was talking of closing the toll road from
Chinchuba
to Metairie.
It was
oppressively hot, and afternoon monsoon rains
threatened
from the west. Dark gray clouds, rimmed with
snowy
white, prickled with lightning. But in New Orleans
itself
the air hung motionless, heavy and damp as a wet
towel.
Dana
Scully lifted her auburn hair off the back of her neck
wearily,
gathered it into a thick hank and twisted a rubber
band
around it to hold it off her skin. The power company
turned
the electricity off at six every evening to conserve
fuel--only
an hour later the tiny apartment she shared with
Special
Agent Ted Pendrell was unbearably stuffy. Scully
opened
windows to set up a cross-wind through the
apartment.
Rain would be welcome tonight; it would cool
things
off at least a little. It was still light enough to
work,
though the charge in her laptop would only hold out
for
about four hours.
She
opened the computer and turned it on. She wanted the
projections,
the elaborate plots of the bees' spread that
she had
so carefully charted. She guessed they'd reach New
Orleans
within a few days, but she wanted to be sure before
having
to be uprooted. Scully and Pendrell had been working
to
develop an antivenin to the bee stings for nearly two
years
now, but it seemed every time they made a little
progress,
they had to move again. It didn't set them back
completely,
but it was disruptive, and it had slowed down
the
work. Scully was hoping the computer would tell her
they
could put off another move for a week or so.
A peal
of thunder sounded, so close it startled her. Her
hand
jumped, and when she looked at the computer screen,
what
was coming up was her old Eudora Light e-mail program.
She
hadn't used e-mail in more than a year. The delicate
network
that had been the Internet had come apart quickly
after
the bees had arrived.
Eudora
had launched before she collected herself
sufficiently
to cancel it, then a gray dialogue box
appeared.
"Error getting network address for
'pop.fbi.gov,'"
the computer reported. "Cause: requested
entry
not found (11004)." Scully clicked "OK," and the
dialogue
box disappeared. She blinked. What was left open
after
she closed the dialogue box was a mailbox she had
labeled
"Mulder," in a time that now seemed a million years
in the
past.
Her
heart thudded hard. There was one message sitting in
the
queue from "fwmulder@fbi.gov," with a subject line that
read
"Lunch on Thursday?" She didn't click on it. That was
a very
old wound, one she dared not reopen. Besides, she
didn't
have to read it--it might as well have been engraved
on her
brain.
*How
about Casper's, around 11?*
It
hadn't been about lunch at all. It had been Mulder's own
weird
code, telling her that if he hadn't made it back to
D.C. by
Thursday, she should leave without him. The bees
had
come into Washington that morning, and Mulder hadn't
showed.
She almost hadn't gotten out of the city herself.
She had
driven out of Washington at a crawl because the
bees
had swarmed so thickly around her car that even
flailing
windshield wipers couldn't sweep them off quickly
enough
for her to see well through it. With all the vents
closed
up tight, terrified that somehow one would get into
the
car. She had pulled over at an abandoned automatic car
wash in
Fredericksburg, Va., and had run the car through
the
steamy water five times to wash them all off.
Then
she had doused herself with gasoline from a can she'd
been
keeping on the floor of the front seat and run like a
mad
thing away from the car, in a panic, afraid that some
of the
bees would have lived through the car wash and would
come
after her.
She
didn't know what had happened to Mulder. She was sure
that if
he had survived, he would have tried to contact
her. He
would've found her. Bloodhound to the bone, that
was
Mulder--if it had been humanly possible for him to
rejoin
her, he would have. But he hadn't come to her.
That
meant it had not been humanly possible for him to
rejoin
her. Because he had gone to Connecticut to get his
mother.
Because he had gone where the bees were.
Because
he was dead.
Mulder--fearless,
reckless, quixotic, charismatic.
Dead.
Scully
knew the kind of torture the bees inflicted before
they
took their victims. In the two years since the swarm
had
reached Washington, she had never been able to picture
him
like the bodies she had examined. Her mind simply would
not
yield that picture, the muscles torn and the bones
broken
from the agonizing spasms induced by the bees'
venom.
The tongue and throat hideously swollen, the black
film on
the eyes. She couldn't--wouldn't--see him like
that.
She still saw Mulder in her mind's eye as clearly as
if he
were standing right before her, intensely alive. The
fine,
full mouth, the long, straight limbs. An
unmistakable,
almost feline fluidity in his motions. Clear
hazel
eyes, alternately bright green or deep brown, the
colors
of Druids and magical forests. And the last time
they'd
been together, finally, the warm, slightly salty
taste
of his mouth on hers.
Lightning
flared outside, and Scully started again. She
drew a
long breath to steady herself. What was she
thinking?
Druids? Well, that at least was a metaphor Mulder
himself
would have appreciated.
*He's
gone,* she told herself, and much had changed since
then.
Nearly everything had changed, in fact.
The
nature of her work, for one--she was still doing
pathology,
but not to solve crimes or determine what had
killed
people. She knew what had killed the people whose
bodies
she examined now: the bee stings. The only question
was
whether their experimental antivenin formulas had
changed
anything at all, whether it had had any effect.
And
though she was, technically at least, still a sworn law
officer,
the FBI hardly existed any more. Neither she nor
Pendrell
had drawn a paycheck from the U.S. government in
nearly
a year. They were living off their combined savings
and
what little she could make working at the nearby
hospital.
She'd felt strange, at first, treating the living
again
after so long, but she'd gotten used to it.
Then
there was the biggest change--she and Pendrell.
Mulder's
disappearance had hit her hard, but she'd had no
time to
dwell on it. And every time she had lifted her head
and
looked around, there'd been Ted Pendrell. He'd been a
great
comfort to her, keeping her focused on her work, on
what
there might be left to save. Working so closely with
him,
she had developed a real affection for him. And so,
when he
had proposed to her, she hadn't been able to think
of a reason
to turn him down. He was a good man. She wasn't
happy
with her life--these days, hell, who was?--but she
was
content.
She
wondered whether she would've been content with Mulder.
No way
to know. Not now.
She
exited out of Eudora. She clicked on the folder that
contained
her projection program and began typing in the
newest
reports of bee activity.
The
program was still running when she heard the front door
open.
"God," Pendrell's voice called, "how can you be
working
in this heat?"
She
smiled up at him as he came in and kissed her forehead
lightly.
"It's not as bad now as it was before I opened the
windows,"
she said.
He sat
at the table beside her, then noticed something
lying
next to the computer and picked it up. Her wedding
ring,
the plain gold band he had put on her hand six months
ago.
"You're
going to lose that," he complained good-naturedly.
"I
can't type with it on," she said. "It gets in my way.
And I
won't lose it. Anything new?" She suspected there was
good news
tonight--he was in a playful spirit; she could
see it
in his eyes.
"I
think we're close, Dana, really close. One of the test
cases
from Hattiesburg is still alive, and the other two at
least
died peacefully."
"No
spasms?"
"No."
She
frowned, thinking hard. "I'm still not convinced we
have
the dosage right," she said. She glanced back at the
computer
screen and drew a sharp breath. "Oh, my God," she
said.
"What
is it?"
"I
don't think we're going to be able to wait for the test
case
from Hattiesburg."
The
computer projection showed the bees would reach the
outskirts
of New Orleans in less than forty-eight hours.
Pendrell
sighed heavily in resignation. "Where do we go
now?"
he asked.
"Galveston,"
Scully said. "There's still one ship that
sails
for Mexico once a week."
He
inclined his head, his look skeptical. "We need lab
equipment--we
can't take everything with us. And we haven't
got
much money left. How are we going to arrange that in
Mexico?
The exchange rate'll kill us."
"We'll
have to find a way across to California. We can't go
straight
west--the bees have already cleaned out Houston.
It was
drier there; they made good time on their way
south."
"So
we can't go by land," he said.
"No.
We go by sea."
****
July
20, 1999
Scully
had planned their escape from New Orleans well in
advance,
knowing the bees would drive them out eventually
and
wanting to be ready when the time came. She had hidden
the twelve-foot
power boat, the same one they had used to
get out
of Miami with A.D. Skinner and four other agents,
in a
dark branch off a bayou well to the west of the city.
She had
kept the gas tank empty and the engine partly
dismantled
to discourage anyone who accidentally happened
on the
boat from stealing it.
There
wasn't much in the apartment that was worth taking
with
them, and in any case, they needed the space in the
boat
for the lab samples and what equipment they could
take.
All she had to pack was a little clothing, a little
food,
bottled water. She had calculated the trip would take
them a
good eighteen hours if they could make thirty miles
an hour
during the night, if the weather held and the sea
wasn't
too rough. She would hug the coastline as much as
she
could--the boat wasn't really designed for the open
sea,
and if they wandered too far out they would attract
the
unwelcome attention of a U.N. blockade standing off the
coast
to keep escapees from carrying the bees to other
nations.
The sun
had dipped toward the horizon. Scully made a last
sweep
of the apartment, making sure she hadn't overlooked
anything.
As she turned through the kitchen, out of the
corner
of her eye she noticed a man standing in the shadows
between
two old storefront buildings across the narrow
street.
Powerfully built, he had light brown hair and dark
eyes.
He was looking straight at her, and when he noticed
her
looking back at him, he turned away and stepped farther
back
into the darkness.
Scully
froze. She'd seen that man before, earlier in the
day,
when she had gone to the lab. He had been lounging in
front
of the closed-up convenience store, reading a
newspaper.
She hadn't thought anything of it at the
time--there
were a lot of people in New Orleans these days
who
didn't have much to do but lounge around. But every
fiber
of her now screamed that this man wasn't watching her
because
he had too much time on his hands.
She
left the two small suitcases where they were on the
floor
beside the front door and slipped downstairs, out the
back of
her building, circled around through the alley to
come up
behind him. She reminded herself that she had to
conserve
ammunition. After Miami she had only two magazines
left
for her service weapon. But when she got to where the
strange
man had been standing, he was gone.
"Dammit,"
she murmured. Whatever he was up to, it looked
like he
was getting away with it. God, what if he had drawn
her off
so that he could break into the apartment? Suddenly
fearful
for what few possessions remained to them, she
hurried
back upstairs. But nothing had been touched.
She
sighed heavily, holstered her gun again, then picked up
the
cases and headed for the lab, locking the door behind
her for
the last time.
Pendrell
was waiting for her, sitting on the big case he
used to
carry the microscopes. "I was starting to worry,"
he
said, his voice ringing with relief.
"There
was somebody outside the apartment. I don't think he
was
just hanging in the 'hood."
Pendrell
had never been a field agent; it took him a moment
to get
it. Then he frowned and asked, "What do you think?"
"I'm
not sure what to think, but the sooner we're away from
here,
the happier I'll be. Let's go."
They
finished loading the car. "How much gas have we got
left?"
she asked.
"About
half a tank. Just enough."
She
nodded and got in, and they were off.
They
could only drive to within about a quarter mile of the
boat.
Beyond that, it was back into the thick trees that
lined
the bayou. Rooting around in the bush, Pendrell found
the
sledge he had used to unload the boat when they had
first
arrived from Miami, and they hefted the suitcases and
lab
equipment onto it before setting off into the forest.
Scully
pulled her flashlight and her gun, and went ahead of
him.
She wanted to be ready if they had the bad luck to
encounter
an alligator or a Louisiana panther back in the
bush.
A
little fog rose. The forest sang to them out of the
trees,
out of the mucky ground--frogs, crickets, cicadas,
the occasional
mournful call of an egret. Mosquitoes whined
in the
air. She heard something splash in the water ahead
of them
and hoped it was nothing more threatening than the
slap of
a fish biting on an insect. Scully was tired, and
the
dank darkness of the bayou weighed on her. The quarter
mile
seemed like an endless, exhausting trek. She knew how
early
explorers must have felt, venturing into God knew
what
with nothing to protect them but a flickering torch.
She
walked on, claustrophobic, following the small circle
of
light from her flash.
Finally
she reached the water line and froze in horror. No
boat.
She swung the flashlight. God, where was it? Had
someone
stolen it after all? Had it taken some damage she
hadn't
noticed on the way from Miami and sunk in the bayou?
"There,"
Pendrell whispered, pointing off to her right. She
turned
the flash, and sure enough--the boat's dirty white
side
gleamed dully about fifty yards away.
They
slogged over. Scully climbed aboard and took the gas
can
when Pendrell handed it up. She filled the boat's tank
while
he transferred the equipment, then went to work on
the
engine, carefully replacing the parts she had removed.
"Ready?"
Pendrell called breathlessly. He scooped a
bullfrog
off the rail and stood poised on the bow to cast
off.
There
was a loud pop, back in the trees, and suddenly, the
glowing,
hissing tail of a flare going up. Another pop, and
a
blinding light bathed the whole area. "Freeze!" a voice
shouted.
"This vessel has been impounded by the Special
Emigration
Bureau!"
Scully
drew her badge and flipped it open. "We're federal
agents!"
she shouted back. "FBI! We have clearance to move
about
freely."
"All
clearances canceled by order of Executive Director
Sherrill!"
She
couldn't see the man calling to them; the light was too
bright.
With her free hand, Scully flipped on the switches
for the
boat's engine and prepared to turn the key.
"Why?
Since when?" she yelled.
"Come
out of the boat! No one is to leave the parish, by
order
of Executive Director Sherrill!"
"You
don't have that authority," Pendrell called to the
unseen
voice back in the trees. Scully glanced at him and
caught
his look--he had finished untying the line on the
boat.
*Oh,
well done,* she thought. *Beautifully done.* She had
only to
hope he wouldn't lose his balance when she started
the
engine and swung the boat around. If it started--it had
been
sitting out here for almost a year. She turned the
key.
The starter whined, then ground, but there was silence
from
the engine.
*Hail
Mary, mother of God...* She'd known it wouldn't start
the
first time, no way. She tried again. Still nothing.
Pendrell
seized a boat hook and began pushing them away
from
the bank.
"Freeze!"
the voice shouted again. Over the whine of the
starter,
she could hear footsteps crashing through the
brush
toward them. "We have been authorized to use deadly
force!
Come out of the boat, or we will open fire!"
Deadly
force? What the hell for? There was something very
strange
going on--Scully decided she didn't want to wait
around
to find out what. She turned the key again, and this
time,
the engine gave an asthmatic cough. It sputtered
briefly,
then died.
A
flash, then the crack of a gunshot. Scully turned the key
again with
one hand and drew her own gun with the other.
Pendrell'd
had the same idea, and she heard him fire first,
so she
turned her full attention back to the engine.
Everybody
who'd been an FBI agent had taken the same gun
instruction,
but she knew him for an indifferent shot. In
the
dazzle of the flare, he couldn't see what he was
shooting
at anyway. But then, she had no real wish for him
to kill
anybody--she just hoped he'd keep them down until
she
could get the damned engine going. She heard him fire
off three
rounds before she lost count, focused on the
engine.
It
finally caught and roared, and she swung the rudder
around,
praying the shots from the shoreline wouldn't hole
the
hull. A rattle of machine-gun fire sounded. Pendrell
had
finished off the magazine in his gun, so Scully tossed
him
hers and he resumed firing to hold the others down.
The
flare above them flickered and went dark. Scully shoved
the
throttle forward, hoping they could get out of range
before
the SEB recovered enough to send up another one. It
was a
narrow channel, but Scully didn't dare shine the
flashlight--it
would've made an unmistakable target. All
she
could do was hope they didn't hit anything.
Piloting
by instinct, she drove the boat forward, then
cringed
in momentary terror when she heard it scrape the
opposite
bank. Another flare went up, but they were already
hidden
by trees.
She
felt Pendrell jump down beside her. "Shit," he said,
"that
was close."
"Yeah."
"I
don't I think I was cut out for this kind of stuff."
She
chuckled bitterly. "I don't think anybody is. You did
all
right."
The
channel had widened now--the tree canopy no longer
blotted
out the faint moonlight overhead, and she could
vaguely
see ahead.
"Why
the hell do you think they'd want to stop us?"
Pendrell
asked.
She
shook her head. "I don't know. Especially not badly
enough
to try to kill us. Maybe it was a mistake--screwed-up
paperwork."
But she
didn't believe it. Screwed-up paperwork didn't
explain
how the SEB had found them. The man outside the
apartment
probably did, but how?
And
why?
Continued
in Part 3.
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (3/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (3/14) By Loch Ness
July
21, 1999 Galveston
At the
Casablanca Club, Fox Mulder sat at the table that
was
always reserved for him, playing Windows Solitaire on
his
battered old laptop computer. Periodically a waiter
would
interrupt him so he could sign a voucher for somebody
who was
cashing in his chips from the roulette or craps
tables.
So far, the cards on the computer had not been kind
to Mulder
this evening, but then, they rarely were, which
was why
Mulder left the gambling to his customers.
The
Casablanca Club stood on a dock that extended a good
hundred
feet out into the Gulf of Mexico, supported by
heavy
wooden pilings. It was garish outside, painted purple
with
orange trim, and hung with wind-battered Chinese
lanterns.
At first sight, it had conjured for Mulder an
image
of a cheap brothel. Not so bad, inside--the walls
were a
pale, muted blue-green, and the round tables had
come
with white linen cloths; the decor included live,
leafy
plants and crystal-globed candles. Big, ornate wooden
bar,
and a private gaming room overlooking the ocean. When
things
were quiet, Mulder had found he could stand still
and
hear the surf beat against the pilings.
Mulder
had bought the club, then named Jack's Shrimp Shack,
from a
man who had been desperate to get his family to
Mexico.
Initially, Mulder had thought of the purchase as a
kind of
charitable act--just give the guy the money so four
more
people could escape. At the time, he'd had no
intention
of actually running the place himself. But the
longer
Mulder had hung around on the island, the more the
idea of
opening up the club had appealed. If nothing else,
it gave
some purpose to the fact that he was spending a lot
of time
standing in the casino staring out to sea. He was
acutely
vulnerable to seasickness, but he had always liked
watching
the ocean. He'd grown up near the sea--there was
something
about the musky smell of saltwater meeting land
that
had soothed the emptiness in him just a little.
After
the bee invasion, Mulder had found himself without
any
real purpose for the first time in his life. The
conspiracy
had won, and there wasn't a damned thing he
could
do about it. He hadn't been good enough, hadn't been
fast
enough, to stop them. And everybody he'd cared about
was
gone. By the time he'd landed on Galveston, he'd been
stagnant,
defeated, exhausted. Unwilling to devote the
energy
to finding a new purpose. So what the hell--why not
just
run the damned bar until the bees forced him out?
His
friends the "Lone Gunmen," who had come to Galveston
with
him, had joined in, unasked. One day they'd just
showed
up and started working, Langly at the bar, Byers as
maitre'd
and bookkeeper, and Frohike playing deejay,
chatting
up the ladies and putting his paranoia to work
keeping
track of who was snitching for whom. Mulder
couldn't
decide whether they reminded him more of the Three
Stooges
or the Three Musketeers.
There
was a noisy bunch in the casino tonight--the incident
on the
causeway had everybody churned up with excitement.
Rumor
had it the couriers had been minions of the Special
Emigration
Bureau, and everybody was wondering what it
would
mean, whether the SEB would crack down. It was hard
enough
now to get off the island and go south or west, to
areas
where the bees hadn't arrived yet--a blockade of U.N.
warships
standing off the coast had orders to turn back
anyone
trying to leave the country, in an effort to stop
the
spread of the bees to other nations. The warships
weren't
kidding, either. They'd sunk dozens of vessels in
the
last two years, everything from freighters to dinghies.
The
only way to get past that blockade was either to run
one
Christ-almighty risk or to have the right papers.
If the
SEB tightened up on emigration requests even more
than
they had, that could make things hellish on the
island.
The crowding was miserable already, driving the
cost of
housing stratospheric. Supplies were sparse
expensive.
Mulder couldn't remember the last time he had
eaten a
real egg.
And for
the SEB to tighten up was likely to drive up the
crime
rate, too. Mulder knew that a motley array of
cutthroats
and thieves sold papers in the darker corners of
the
island, including at his own Casablanca Club, both real
documents
stolen from God knows where and
forgeries, some
painstakingly
accurate, some criminally sloppy. Mulder was
out of
the law enforcement business, and he didn't care
what
his customers did as long as they were discreet enough
not to
leave any blood and guts on the bar. He suspected he
would've
looked the other way even if he had been still
carrying
a badge--people were desperate to get out, and
with
reason.
Mulder
knew all too well how good a reason. So he just
stayed
away from that group of tables over there beyond the
roulette
wheel. It was none of his business who bought or
sold
what, or what assignations were made in whispers and
for
what purpose. He had scrupulously avoided getting
involved
in illegal papers himself. His former boss, Walter
Skinner,
was basically the only law left on the island, and
Mulder
was careful not to provoke him in a way the A.D.
couldn't
ignore. Skinner had been reasonable enough to
define
his jurisdiction narrowly, regarding such
peccadilloes
as gambling as beneath his notice. But he
would
only overlook so much.
Mulder
moused a card down on the computer screen, then
looked
up at the sound of a voice louder than the
background
noise. Someone at the door into the casino room
was shouting,
giving the doorman trouble. And while Casey,
the
bouncer with arms like King Kong's, was trying to
deflect
the man doing the shouting, Mulder saw someone else
ooze
past into the casino.
*Shit,*
Mulder thought, looking at the lithe, dark man who
had
slipped through the doorway.
It was
Alex Krycek.
Mulder
sighed. He got up and went to the door. "What's the
problem?"
he asked Casey.
The man
who had been shouting made a flourish of
withdrawing
a calling card from the inside jacket pocket of
an
immaculate black tuxedo.
Mulder
only saw three words: Special Emigration Bureau. He
closed
his fist around the card, crumpling it into a ball.
"This
is a private room," he said.
"Now,
look here," tuxedo said, "I represent--"
"I
know what you represent," Mulder said coolly. "It's a
private
room. You want a drink, pay cash at the bar.
Federal
scrip's no good here. You don't like it, take a
hike."
"I'll
report this," tuxedo hissed.
"You
do that." Mulder turned his back and headed for his
table.
As he
passed Krycek said, "A casual observer might think
you'd
been doing this all your life."
Mulder
shrugged. "I'm likely to be doing it the rest of my
life."
He sat down.
Krycek
signaled a waiter and ordered a Scotch-and-water.
"Join
me?" he asked. There was an almost-manic gleam in
Krycek's
blue eyes.
Now
what the hell was he so good-natured about? Mulder gave
him a
steady, expressionless glare that meant "not only no,
but
hell, no."
Krycek
shrugged. He grinned. "Why don't
you just kill me,
Mulder?
We both know you want to."
How
true. Mulder allowed himself a tiny, cold smile. "Too
public,"
he said. "Besides I'm taking too much pleasure in
watching
you crawl on your belly trying to survive the
living
hell you helped create." When Krycek had first
showed
up, Mulder had wanted to tear him limb from limb,
but
over the intervening months his anger had worn
down--these
days he and Krycek were just two rats who had
happened
to end up in the same cage. But he had no desire
to
socialize with the man who had murdered his father.
Krycek
laughed. "I know you hate me," he said.
Mulder
felt a tingle of annoyance flare at the back of his
neck.
*You don't know shit about me, Alex.* He squelched
it.
Krycek was up to something, and he wanted to know what
it was.
He held his silence, waiting the other man out
while
the drink was served.
"Hear
about those poor bastards on the causeway?" Krycek
asked
over the rim of his highball glass.
Mulder
turned back to his computer, feigning indifference.
He
dragged a black seven down onto a red eight. "Somebody
saved
them the bee stings," he said.
"Hell,
they were just doing their job."
"Dirty
job."
"Filthy,"
Krycek agreed. "You really hate what I do, don't
you?
Look, these people are desperate to get off this
island.
I get them off of it."
"Yeah,
you're a saint. Your going rate these days is
what...a
quarter million a head?"
"No
ups, no extras. Same rate for kids. Hey, I'm getting
out
people the SEB would never let go of."
"So
they get to Mexico, but they're broke when they ground.
They
can't afford to go any farther, and it's just
postponing
the inevitable--the bees will get there
eventually."
"Well,
I'm getting out," Krycek said, his face suddenly
darkly
moody. "I'm getting out for good. And not just to
Mexico,
either. I'm about to make a deal that'll have me
surfing
in Hawaii inside a week."
"Hey,
maybe I will kill you, then--while there's still
time."
Krycek
grinned wolfishly. "You don't have the ice in your
belly
for murder," he said. "The truth is, Mulder, you're a
fucking
boy scout. You're not going to kill me.
You've got
New
England prep-school morality oozing out your ass."
Mulder
allowed himself a mental image of the satisfying
crunch
of bone and tooth his fist would cause if it slammed
into
Krycek's mouth. He smiled icily and said nothing.
"That's
the reason why you're the only living soul on this
island
I trust," Krycek said.
"Fuck,"
Mulder said, annoyed. "I had a very tasty shrimp
dinner
over at Matheson's, Krycek. Make me throw it up, and
I'll
cancel your credit at the roulette table."
"No,
it's true. You don't take federal scrip, you don't let
the SEB
come in here and eavesdrop on the innocent, you
don't
move contraband--and you could launder some major
shit
through this place, without attracting any notice. You
flirt
with sin, but you're still a virgin."
"Maybe
it just looks that way to a slut like you." He was
losing
patience. "What do you want, Krycek?"
Krycek
slid some folded sheets of paper across the table.
"Ever
seen one of those? Diplomatic letters of transit.
Can't
be questioned by any local authority, personally
signed
by Sherrill himself."
Mulder
resisted the temptation to give a low whistle. The
papers
in his hand were worth gold by the ton. "I heard the
guys on
the causeway were carrying letters of transit," he
murmured.
"Really?"
Krycek said, wide-eyed. "Where'd you hear that?"
"Around,"
Mulder said carefully. "You know how rumors are
on the
island."
"Yeah.
I want you to keep them for me for a couple of days.
Just
'til the heat dies down a little."
Mulder
crooked an eyebrow. "And I suppose I've got your
word
that you won't roll over on me if you get busted?"
"Absolutely,"
Krycek said earnestly.
Mulder
laughed. "Fuck you, Alex. I've had my gullible
moments,
but I'm not that stupid, not anymore. Find
yourself
another pigeon."
"What
good would it do me to roll on you, Mulder? At best,
I'm
still an accessory. If we both keep our mouths shut,
nobody's
got anything on either of us. We can spend the
rest of
our lives slurping rum on the beach in Honolulu."
"What
makes you think I want to leave?"
"Shit,
everybody wants off this island."
Mulder
slid the letters back across the table to Krycek. He
turned
off the laptop. "Not this time, Alex." He went out
to see
what was going on in the bar, leaving Krycek to his
drink
and the roulette table.
Full
house, tonight, Mulder noted with some satisfaction as
he
walked through the bar. People were out in force,
probably
because they suspected trouble and wanted to be
able to
see it coming. Or because they already knew the
causeway
incident had screwed the pooch and were even more
desperate
to get away than they had been before. Mulder
himself
was still considering what Krycek had revealed to
him--but
more than he cared about the overall result, he
was
wondering what really had moved his former partner to
confide
in him. Overconfidence? Desperation? Did he figure
Mulder
was only the guy left on the island who had enough
cash to
meet his price for one of those letters?
If so,
he had miscalculated. Unlike most on Galveston
Island,
Mulder was in no great tearing hurry to leave, and
he
already had an escape pod for when the time came.
He went
to the bar and saw Langly leaning on it, his long
blond
hair tied back loosely in a pony tail hanging down
one
shoulder. Mulder inclined his head to see who Langly
was
scoping, then sighed. Angela White, formerly a police
detective
in a small New England town, who Mulder had first
met
while on a case. Strange case, and one he did not much
care to
reflect on.
Langly
caught sight of him and motioned, and Mulder
approached,
groaning inwardly. He was in no mood for
Angela.
She had short, frosted blonde hair, and she was
almost
as tall as Mulder, with an athletic figure and broad
shoulders.
She was dressed to the nines, tonight, in a
body-hugging
gown prickled with white sequins. She wasn't
bad in
bed, but then, in bed he had ways of keeping her
from
talking. When she talked, she whined a lot, and Mulder
would
as soon have avoided her tonight. But Langly was
waving
a piece of paper--a personal check, from the look of
it.
Mulder took it from him, glanced at the signature and
drew a
pen from the pocket of his white tuxedo jacket.
Angela
caught his wrist. "Where were you last night?" she
demanded
breathlessly.
Mulder
smelled whiskey on her breath. A lot of it. "Busy,"
he said
tightly. He scribbled, "OK, FM" on the check. Dick
Matheson
could cover a check for a few drinks.
"Will
I see you tonight?" she asked.
"I
don't know."
She let
go and turned her back on him coldly. "I'll have
another,"
she said to Langly. The thin bartender shot
Mulder
a glance from behind his glasses.
Mulder
shook his head.
Langly
shrugged. "He's the boss," he said.
Angela
slammed her shot glass on the bar. "I said I'll have
another,"
she said.
"Not
here, you won't," Mulder said. He
took her by the
elbow,
and as she half-fell from the barstool, he caught
her
around the waist and propelled her across the club
toward
the door.
"You
can't do this to me," Angela gasped.
Mulder
kept pushing her out the door, out to the street. He
whistled,
and a pudgy Asian teen-ager with a bicycle cab
pedaled
up. "You're going home," he said to Angela.
"You
bastard," Angela raged. "I won't be back!"
He
handed the kid a fifty-dollar bill. "See she gets home
safely,"
he said.
"Shit,"
the Asian kid said. "For fifty bucks, you can have
the
bike."
"Just
see that she gets there."
The kid
rang the bell on his bike and drove off.
"You'll
be sorry!" Angela yelled.
Mulder
forced her out of her mind. He turned to go back
into
the club, and as he swung around, he caught the
moonlight
glinting off the lenses of Walter Skinner's
glasses.
Continued
in Part 4.
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (4/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (4/14) By Loch Ness
July
21, 1999 Galveston
Mulder's
former boss sat in a courtyard the other patrons
had
abandoned because of the heat. Angela was still yelling
as the
bicycle cab drove down the boulevard.
"How
long you figure it'll take her to find another?"
Skinner
asked dryly. "Twelve hours? Eighteen?"
"Psychology
teaches that sexual urges take on an air of
desperation
when animals are under intense stress." Mulder
shrugged.
"She'll have that kid upstairs inside thirty
minutes."
"You're
not suffering any desperate urges?"
"I'm
not feeling stressed." He studied Skinner's practiced,
apparently
nerveless cool. He knew the A.D. well enough to
see
that there was something simmering underneath. "But you
are."
He hooked a thumb eastward along Seawall Boulevard.
"She
lives at the Gulfstream Apartments. Go for it."
Skinner
shook his head. "No time," he said. He grinned.
"Too
much stress."
Despite
himself, Mulder chuckled. He didn't trust Skinner,
never
had. But occasionally he found he liked the man.
"You
got a minute?" the assistant director asked.
*Shit.*
This was not likely to be good news. Mulder
shrugged
again and strolled over, sat opposite the bald
man.
When he sat down, he could see what Skinner had been
sitting
outside in the dark watching--the freighter from
Tampico,
steaming sluggishly toward the dock, its lights
blinking
against its black, rust-streaked sides. Once a
week,
the freighter sailed in with a load of supplies and
then
back out again three days later, carrying about a
hundred
lucky people who had found some way to beg, buy or
steal
the necessary paperwork.
"You
ever want to be on that ship?" Skinner asked.
Mulder
doubted Skinner had beckoned him just to share the
sight
of the freighter, no matter how appealing and
romantic
it might be to watch a ship glide in off the
ocean.
And the older man rarely beat around the bush when
there
was something on his mind. But Mulder decided to play
along.
"No.
I've got no complaints about where I am."
"There's
not much future here. Not in the long run."
"There's
no future anywhere."
"Don't
bullshit me, Mulder," Skinner said softly. "You made
six
runs through the blockade carrying Malathion into
Georgia.
That's not the act of a man who's succumbed to his
own
bitterness."
"It
didn't work, did it?"
Skinner
shrugged.
"Besides,"
Mulder said, "I was well-paid by the state of
Georgia.
How do you think I came up with the cash to buy
this
place?"
The
older man fell silent for a moment. Mulder waited him
out.
Finally
Skinner said, "You never turned in your service
weapon.
You still carrying?"
He was.
Both of them--the .40 caliber Sig-Sauer 226 that
had
been authorized and the Walther PPK in an ankle holster
that
hadn't been. "Why would I?" he asked.
"The
smoking man is in town," Skinner said.
Mulder
blinked in surprise. "You want me to kill him?" he
asked
dryly. "Not that I'd object to the assignment."
"I
want you to stay out of it."
"Out
of what?"
"He's
after Krycek, not you. Leave it alone. Let me handle
it."
Mulder
considered this, his thoughts whirling like startled
bats in
a dark cave. After a moment he said, "You think
Krycek
pulled the job on the causeway?"
"I
know he did. And I know he's here."
"He
is?"
Skinner's
look was dour--*don't play me for a fool.* "The
place
is already surrounded," he said. There was steel in
his
tone.
The
freighter was disappearing as it headed for the port of
Galveston,
around the other side of the island. Still
debating
with himself, Mulder watched its lights wink out,
one by
one. He got up. "Don't make a mess of my bar, okay?"
he
said, then went back inside the club.
It took
all the control he had not to run back into the
casino.
When he got there, Krycek was playing roulette, and
losing
at it, judging from the scowl on his face. Mulder
scanned
the room. There was no one here he didn't know, and
he
would've known if any of them were snitching for
Skinner.
He sauntered over as casually as he could manage,
then
leaned down and murmured, "Come and have a drink with
me,
Alex," and walked on, back to his table.
After a
moment, Krycek followed, his look wary.
"I've
changed my mind," Mulder said. "Give them to me."
The
younger man's dark brows knit in suspicion. "What's
happened?"
he asked.
"Skinner's
here, and Cancer Man's not far behind him. They
had the
club surrounded before I knew anything about it."
Krycek
had gone a little pale at Cancer Man's name.
Mulder
leaned into his former partner's face. "Listen to
me,
Alex," he whispered. "I don't give a shit what happens
to you.
If they pull your guts out through your asshole,
I'll
make sausage out of them and feed it to the gulls down
on the
beach. But I don't see any reason to let the Cancer
Man get
what he wants. You give me the letters, and I'll
keep my
mouth shut."
Much as
Mulder found the idea of helping Krycek
distasteful,
he really wanted, just this one time, to make
the
smoking man squirm. Cancer Man wanted those papers
badly
enough to come down here himself--just as badly,
Mulder
wanted to thwart him, even in a small thing. Just
once.
After all Cancer Man had put him through, even a
small
victory...he deserved that, didn't he?
He sat
back in his chair. "I won't turn you in, Alex. But I
don't
know what they've got on you. So maybe you beat the
charges.
Or not. If you do, you get to leave the island. If
you
don't...well, like I said, I just don't give a shit.
Anyway,
the way I figure it, you don't have much choice but
to
trust me."
Krycek
studied him for a long moment. Then,
expressionlessly,
he drew the letters of transit out of the
inside
pocket of his jacket and slipped them across the
table
again.
Mulder
put them in his own pocket.
Krycek
gave him a wan smile. "I'll give you twenty minutes,
then
I'll go out front," he said. "That way your customers
don't get
involved."
A
magnanimous gesture from a man not known for his
generosity.
But then, he had little to gain now by
taking
anyone
else with him, or by doing anything to piss Mulder
off.
Krycek
got up, heading back to the roulette table. "See you
in
Hawaii, partner."
****
Skinner
sat outside the club for a few more minutes,
waiting
for the smoking man's arrival, gripped by a
foreboding
he couldn't identify or drag himself out of. He
had an
uneasy feeling about what was coming--he wasn't sure
why,
but he couldn't shake it.
Shit,
it was hot. He decided to wait inside. As he rose to
go into
the club, the breeze eddied around the corner of
the
building, and he caught a whiff of cigarette smoke.
He turned
to see the smoking man standing on the deck, in
the
shadows at the corner of the building. *Son of a
bitch,*
Skinner thought grimly. *How long have you been
watching
me?*
"Interesting
place," the smoking man said. He drew on his
cigarette,
and the ash went from a dusky red to a bright
orange.
Skinner
held his silence. What was he supposed to say?
*Glad
you like it?*
The
smoking man gestured, the glowing ash describing a lazy
arc
toward Seawall Boulevard at the end of the dock.
"There's
someone I'd like to be introduced to," he said.
"I
don't know everybody on the island," Skinner said
tightly.
*And I'm not the social director.*
"I'm
sure you remember Agent Pendrell," the smoking man
said,
smiling.
Skinner's
head swiveled in astonishment before he thought
to try
to control it. *What the hell were Pendrell and
Scully
doing on the island?* He couldn't imagine. Yet there
they
were--just coming up the dock toward the club.
The
smoking man tossed his spent cigarette over the railing
onto
the beach below. "I would really like to make Agent
Pendrell's
acquaintance," he said. He lit another Morley.
Skinner
ground his teeth. The last thing he wanted was for
the
smoking man to get his hooks into Scully or Pendrell.
On the
other hand, maybe it'd be better for them if they
could
see the bastard coming.
He
inclined his head and led the smoking man toward them.
****
Mulder
busied himself, waiting Krycek out. He fetched ice
for
Langly at the bar, made an elaborate show of helping a
waitress
make change for a hundred-dollar bill. The Gunmen
could
run the place all by themselves, and usually did,
leaving
Mulder as the tuxedoed frontman for an operation
that
really didn't need him for anything but a symbol, a
target
for any trouble that cropped up. But he had an act
to put
on tonight. *I'm just running my club. Yessir, I'm
way too
busy for anything else. Got no time for any
ee-legal
activity, not me.*
The
front door got busy just then, as if fate had taken a
hand
and sent out some subliminal signal for twenty or
thirty
people to show up at the club right at that moment.
Mulder
knew better than to question a sudden turn of good
luck.
He just got to work helping Byers seat customers.
But
then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a
familiar
yellow flare, and despite his better judgment, he
turned
to find himself facing the smoking man, standing in
a small
knot of people waiting for tables.
"Well,
well," the older man said, smiling through a haze of
gray
smoke. "Mr. Mulder."
Skinner
stood at his elbow. Mulder stomped down his
resentment
of the smoker, clamped his teeth hard and asked
the
A.D., "Table for two?"
"Four,"
the smoker said. He waved off to his left.
Mulder
turned around and saw them and went into freefall.
Pendrell,
his eyes wide, flushing deeply across the
cheekbones.
And beside him, Scully.
Scully.
Mulder
felt gut-shot. As if the whole universe had suddenly
canted
thirty degrees off level and left him sliding
downhill,
flailing desperately for balance as the blood ran
out of
his head. Scully was dead, or at least she was
supposed
to be. Pendrell had told him she was, almost two
years
ago, and he'd had no reason not to believe it.
But
there she was, alive. As radiantly alive as ever. He
drank
her in with his eyes. She had let her hair grow--it
hung
down her shoulders, even longer than it had been when
he had
first met her seven years ago. And she was thinner
than he
remembered, as if she hadn't been eating well,
which
had only heightened the ethereal quality of her tiny,
delicate
features. Her eyes had gone wide, too, staring
back at
him. She looked every bit as stunned as he felt.
Back in
a corner of his mind, he was dimly aware of how the
tableau
must have looked to someone outside himself. He and
Scully
gaping at each other like two mesmerized lab mice;
Pendrell
clearly dismayed, bristling slightly and exuding
testosterone
like some kind of banty rooster prepared to
drive
off a rival. Skinner and the Cancer Man, clueless but
fascinated.
Oh, yeah. This was a classic moment, all right.
Engrave
this one on the old eidetic memory. Proof positive
that
the human condition was nothing if not absurd--as if
he
hadn't already been painfully aware of that.
Skinner
cleared his throat quietly. Mulder forced himself
to
breathe. How long had he been staring at her?
"I
think you're already acquainted with Raul Bloodworth,"
the
A.D. said, inclining his head toward the Cancer Man.
Mulder
blinked. *Raul?* Who did they think they were
kidding?
He glared at the smoking man and said nothing.
"And
you'll remember Agent Pendrell," Skinner went on.
*Yeah.
I remember.* Mulder gave him a curt nod.
"And
my wife," Pendrell said, his tone a little strident.
"Dana."
His
wife. Why yes, of course. That explained damned near
everything.
Mulder had known Pendrell had a crush on Scully
almost
from the first moment it had ignited, but he had
never
suspected the red-headed lab geek had the balls to
clear
the field for himself with a blatant, outright
deceit.
Mulder
forced his expression and his tone into neutral.
"Mrs.
Pendrell," he said evenly, then glanced back at
Skinner.
"This way, please," he said, and led them into the
club.
Continued
in Part 5.
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (5/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (5/14) By Loch Ness
TWO
YEARS EARLIER
September
7, 1997
Washington,
D.C.
The
Hoover building had an empty ring as Dana Scully walked
through
the halls. There were only two kinds of people left
in
Washington as the bees approached from the
northwest--those
who didn't have the resources to leave and
those
who had been ordered to stay. Scully fell into that
latter
category. She had spent the last four days helping
the
bureau pack up delicate pieces of forensic evidence
stored
at Quantico in preparation for moving the whole FBI
operation
south to the Carolinas.
The
bees had moved south from Canada, through the northern
central
plains and slowly southeastward, decimating
everyone
in their convoluted, seemingly aimless path. They
were
aggressive and deadly--Scully had never heard of
anything
that had the sort of 100-percent-guaranteed
mortality
rate these bee stings carried. They attacked in
numbers,
in swarms. They attacked anything that moved or
made
sound. Unlike honeybees, they didn't lose their
stingers
and die after striking, but could sting again and
again.
Over the last few months they had moved rapidly and
inexorably
through the Great Lakes states, then into
Pennsylvania,
and now were heading into West Virginia,
toward
to the capital.
Latest
projections showed the bees would arrive at the
outskirts
of D.C. inside 48 hours. Most of the government
big
shots were already gone, leaving their frightened
staffs
to ship office contents south or west and get
themselves
and their families out as best they could. The
bureau
was not quite as deserted as Capitol Hill--but at
the
moment most of its personnel were engaged in local
functions
like crowd control at the airport, at the port,
along
the highways. As the city had emptied out, those
agents
were being gradually transferred south.
Scully
had thought her partner, Fox Mulder, was in that
same
"essential personnel" category. But Mulder had pulled
one of
his trademark disappearing acts two days ago,
leaving
the basement office at Hoover virtually untouched
except
for taping up and marking the file cabinets for
transfer,
with a mere four boxes of miscellaneous stuff he
regarded
as important stacked on top of them. Scully had no
idea
where he had gone or what he was doing. She knew only
that he
had taken off--likely tilting at windmills
somewhere--and
left her holding the bag for packing up the
remaining
mountain of paperwork, photos, equipment and just
plain
junk that had mounted up over the years. She gave him
credit,
at least, for the fact that what he had bothered to
pack
was all of *her* things.
Each
day since his disappearance, Scully had hoped to come
back to
Hoover and find him down there. She had been
disappointed
each time. No answer at his home, "no service"
on his
cell phone, his parking space at work and at home
vacant.
No sign of him. She hoped Skinner wouldn't find
out. He
would've been likely to regard it as dereliction of
duty.
Scully doubted that was Mulder's intent--he had just
chosen
to interpret what his duty was according to his own
rules.
Fortunately, Skinner had been too busy to notice. So
far.
Tonight
she opened the door to the office, looked inside at
the
mammoth task that still awaited, and decided she just
didn't
have the strength to do any more. What the hell--if
the
stuff wasn't that important to him, why should she
care?
She closed the door again and retraced her steps
through
Hoover's empty, echoing halls and went home.
She
didn't go past his place this time. He would come to
her
when he was ready, and it would only add to her
frustration
to drive by and see his car still missing. What
she
craved tonight was a moment of normalcy, of peace and
quiet,
however temporary or illusory it might be. A long,
hot
bath, maybe. An old movie in the VCR. Nothing too
frenetic--maybe
something gently humorous and optimistic,
like
*Singing in the Rain*.
Yeah,
that was what she needed. A little R-and-R, something
to take
her mind off things.
****
Fox
Mulder had been on the road for four solid days,
driving
to Ohio and back, only catching a few hours' sleep
now and
then, parked beside the highway and curled up on
the
front seat of his Buick. The last time he'd pulled over
for a
nap, he'd awakened to a Pennsylvania highway
patrolman
thumping his night stick on the side window,
demanding
to know what Mulder thought he was doing there.
Didn't
he know the bees were coming?
Yeah.
He knew.
Now he
was driving back into a Washington that looked more
than
ever like one tomb after another - Lincoln, Jefferson
and
tens of thousands of Joe Blows whose names weren't
imprinted
on any building but who nonetheless were leaving
behind
their ruins, monumental and otherwise. As he rolled
along a
deserted Rockville Pike, it occurred to Mulder that
Washington,
D.C., was a much safer place tonight than it
had
been in decades.
He
stopped off at his apartment just long enough for a
shave,
shower and change of clothes. He didn't have to
check
his answering machine to know that it held about a
dozen
messages from Scully, wanting to know where he was
and
what he was doing. He had no special desire to spend
any
extra time at home, and in any case, he meant for his
stay in
Washington to be brief. He would go to Scully, this
time,
despite his discomfort with the idea.
He
hated going to her place. Her apartment had the same
shiny,
newly minted neatness she fairly exuded. It held her
smell,
her clean, sweetly spicy fragrance, in its every
corner.
She smelled the way Earl Grey tea tasted--of
warmth,
of distant, indefinable flowers. And her place had
a
softness, a homeyness that one would never guess from
watching
Scully slice competently and scientifically into a
mutilated
corpse. There was nothing unfeminine about Dana
Scully--her
very breath spoke of femininity--but her home
was
*womanly*.
Being
there made Mulder sweat. It made his heart race.
*It
makes your cock hard, you testosterone-drenched
schmuck*,
he thought. That was the truth, of course. Just
thinking
about it was making him stiff.
And he
hated that.
Not the
erection itself, but the idea that what he and
Scully
shared really could be that simple. He and Scully
were
more emotionally and intellectually intimate than he
ever
would have believed possible between two human souls.
He knew
people who had been married for decades who had
never
*fit* together the way he and Scully did. Did he want
her?
Hell, yes. Who wouldn't? But he treasured the
*special*
nature of what they had, so much so that the loss
of it
was unthinkable, terrifying. To turn it into
something
sexual would've normalized it, made it
susceptible
to loss, in a way he felt bound to resist, to
the
extent that he could without driving himself mad.
But of
course, *that* was the problem, wasn't it? Trying
not to
go mad while the most delectable woman he had ever
known
stood so close to him he could hear her heartbeat,
while
she slept in the hotel room next door, when it
would've
been the easiest, most natural thing in the world
just to
reach out, to caress...
*Knock
it off.* He was torturing himself with it. *Fucking
masochist.*
Still, it was a more pleasant torture than
most.
He had a whole menu of things with which he might've
tormented
himself, and of them, sexual fantasies about his
partner
were by the far the least painful.
At some
level, he knew it wasn't his fault that the bees
were
poised to destroy the world. But he had known the bees
were
coming, and he had not been able to stop them. Hadn't
been
able to muster any support for any effort on the part
of
others to stop them. Just another one of "Spooky"
Mulder's
fantasies, oh-so-plausibly-deniable. But the
moment
the swarm had gone free, he had known it was over.
The
conspiracy had won. He didn't have any clear notion
*what*
they had won, but it was obvious things had gone
well
beyond the point where any normal solutions could
apply.
He thought of a message on his cell-phone's readout,
from
years ago: "ALL DONE BYE BYE."
Yeah.
That pretty much summed it up.
Mulder
had never felt so helpless, so hopeless. He had
spent
his whole life in an effort that clearly had been so
futile
it now seemed absurd. His work, his search for
Samantha,
his life--it was all going up in the smoky flames
of
Armageddon, and it didn't seem to him that there was a
damned
thing he could do about it.
Worst
of all, he couldn't seem to feel anything much about
it.
Nothing but a dim, numb fatigue that had seeped into
his
bones. He was still going through the motions of trying
to do
his work, trying to save what and who he could, but
deep
down inside, he did not believe his efforts meant
anything
or had any chance of success.
There
was nothing left now but the salvage operation, which
might
or might not work, and which, in any case, was more
Scully's
line than it was his.
****
As
Scully drew her bath, she found she couldn't help it,
couldn't
stop thinking about him, worrying about him. And
the
longer she worried, the angrier she became, furious
with
him and even more so with herself. It was so foolish
of her
to dwell on his comings and goings this way. He was
an
adult, and a highly trained, well-armed adult at that.
Mulder
was good at squeezing his own way out of tight
situations.
He always had been. He could take care of
himself.
She knew that.
So why
was she obsessing over this now? Why couldn't she
just
let it be? Why couldn't she worry about him in the
sort of
cool, detached way she'd worry about any of her
other
colleagues?
She had
always known there was something more between them
than
friendship, more than service camaraderie, more even
than
being partners. She would not have called that
something
love or even lust, but maybe that was just
because
those words felt so forbidden. Putting their
relationship
in those terms was dangerous. And what she and
Mulder
shared was already dangerous enough, for both of
them.
Nevertheless,
whatever that "something" was, it certainly
felt as
powerful as either love or lust. He had become part
of her,
and she part of him, almost as if they had
physically
grown together, like Siamese twins. Nevermind
that
there'd been no actual, physical joining. Over the
years
Scully had begun to feel as if she had a missing limb
when he
wasn't there, and over the same period of time,
slowly,
the absence of that joining had begun to
feel...well,
unnatural.
She
hadn't wanted to take that step, and apparently,
neither
had he, because he had never made even a subtle
effort
to veer that direction. And in any case, the bureau
bigwigs
would've had a fit--some of them devoted a fair bit
of time
to looking for excuses to hammer Mulder. Give the
OPC
evidence that Mulder had pranged his partner, and some
of them
would have been turning cartwheels in the streets
with
joy. At the very least, she and Mulder would have been
separated
professionally, and that would have been agony.
They
both had too much invested in the work to have it
disrupted
in that way.
But now
the bureau was coming apart. The nation--maybe the
world--was
in the process of coming apart. Things were way
beyond
any concern about her career or his, and it seemed
to
Scully now that nothing stood in the way of taking that
last
step toward fusion except the thin air between their
bodies.
And God knew whether they'd have the chance if they
waited.
She
sighed in resignation and turned off the water in the
bath.
She picked up the phone, dialed. Still "no service."
She
paced her living room, her plans for the evening
abandoned.
Damn
him.
Damn,
damn, damn.
The
doorbell rang, and she jumped, startled out of her
anxious
reverie. One hand on her gun, she went to the door
and
peered out the peephole.
It was
Mulder.
Scully
let go of a long breath--half anger, half relief.
She
unlocked the door, just barely able to resist the
temptation
to drag him inside by the collar and beat the
ever-loving
shit out of him.
"Hey,"
he said. His eyes had a manic glaze they got when he
had
been running continuously for far too long. She doubted
he had
eaten or slept in days. But his suit looked fresh,
and he
smelled of soap and shampoo--she'd never noticed any
dandruff
on him, but he used Selsun Blue like some kind of
preventive
talisman--he had come over right out of the
shower.
He flopped bonelessly down on the couch in a motion
that
telegraphed exhaustion and defeat.
She was
in no mood to let up on him just for a little
fatigue.
She stood over him like the school-teacher nun
from
hell.
"Where
the hell have you been?" she demanded. "I don't
appreciate
the way you dumped all the packing-up on me,
Mulder--most
of that shit is yours, and--"
He
waved her off. "Oh, forget all that."
"Forget
it? There's material there that relates directly to
a
number of active cases--"
"None
of that matters now, Scully."
"Doesn't
matter?"
"By
the time any of those cases could be brought to trial
the
perps'll all be dead. It's irrelevant unless we do
something
about the bees."
The
galling part was, this actually made sense. She ground
her
teeth. "You have a suggestion?" she asked dryly.
"Not
yet. But I've got something that might help us find an
answer."
He pulled a small glass vial out of a pocket and
handed
it to her.
"What's
that?" Before he could answer, she knew what it
was--one
of the bees.
"It's
dead," he said. "Sorry. I couldn't figure out how to
get it
back alive."
Despite
herself, she was impressed. "Where did you get it?"
"Ohio."
"Ohio?"
God. The damnfool had gone right into the
100-percent
fatality zone.
"Just
outside Columbus, to be exact."
"How
the hell did you manage to get in and out of Columbus,
Ohio,
without getting stung?"
"I
doused myself with gasoline, just like I did in Canada
that
time last year. Don't worry--I've had three showers
since
then."
"That
keeps the bees from stinging?"
"At
least temporarily. I didn't hang around long enough to
test
whether it would wear off." He retrieved a roll of
35-mm
film from another pocket and handed that over, too.
"You'll
need to get started as soon as you get set up in
South
Carolina--maybe Pendrell can help, too. Speed things
up that
way, with two of you working on it."
It
occurred to her suddenly that he was turning this
material
over to her in a way that suggested *he* wouldn't
be
around to help. "Wait a minute," she objected. "What are
you
going to do?"
"I'm
going to Connecticut to get my mom."
Absurd.
He was nuts. On the other hand, it was also quite
human
and perfectly understandable. Scully had already
shipped
her own mother off to the Caribbean, where--she
hoped--she'd
be safe.
"I
don't think that's such a terrific idea," Scully said
carefully.
"The bees are getting closer every day, and--"
"They're
not heading for New England, not yet, anyway. And
she
can't get here by herself--she doesn't get around that
well
anymore."
Scully
sighed. His mother had made a miraculous recovery
from
her stroke; she was nearly as functional as she'd ever
been.
But Mulder had a difficult time seeing her that way.
He kept
picturing her in a coma. Scully understood, but all
the
same, she knew he was wrong.
"All
she has to do is take a bus to Massachusetts and get
the
ferry out to Martha's Vineyard," Scully said. "I don't
think
the bees can fly that far across the ocean, do you?"
He
blinked, considered this. "I don't know," he said. "What
makes
you think they can't?"
"They
went around Lake Michigan, not across it."
He
shook his head. "Lake Michigan is farther across than
the
distance between Cape Cod and the Vineyard."
"Then
wire her the money to fly down here. It's too
dangerous,
Mulder. What if the bees get here before you can
get
back? Then you'll both be cut off, and neither of you
will
get out."
"Well,
then, we'll both have to try for the Vineyard, or
Nantucket."
He was on his feet again, already heading for
the
door.
She
moved between it and him. "It's too dangerous," she
repeated.
"Mulder, she's a grown-up, and I doubt very much
she'd
want to see you endanger yourself on her account."
He let
his head drop forward in resignation, then lifted it
again
to look at her. "If it was your mom, what would you
do?"
He had
her, there. She'd go--even if it meant the hounds of
hell
snapping at her feet.
She
sighed. "Will you at least stay the night and get some
sleep
first? Eat something? You're in no shape for this,
and you
know it."
"I'm
all right."
"Bullshit."
She stepped forward and took the lapels of his
jacket
in her hands. "I'm not letting you go until you get
some
rest."
She had
him cold, now--something about the touch had
stopped
him dead in his tracks, and there was a deep
sadness,
a loneliness in his eyes that caught her, too.
"I
can't stay here, Scully," he whispered. "If I do, I'm
not
sure I'll be able to leave. I'm afraid something
might...
Swear you won't wait for me. If it gets bad,
you'll
just go."
She
could see how tightly he was caught between his wish to
stay
and protect her, and his fear that he couldn't protect
her if
he tried. He hadn't been able to protect Samantha,
or his
father. That was the Mulder she knew so well she
could
almost read his thoughts--he spent his life wedged in
a
narrow chasm that was guilt on one side and terror on the
other.
Still
holding onto his jacket, she lifted herself on tiptoe
and
kissed him. His mouth was warm, his lips soft, and
suddenly
he was kissing her with a passion that caught her
breath.
She hadn't planned this, hadn't thought it through,
and she
had a moment of panic. But then his long arms
curled
around her waist and she found herself unwilling to
protest,
transported by the sensation of his mouth on hers
and her
breasts crushed against his chest.
*No
more thoughts. No plans.* Just her fervent wish to know
nothing,
feel nothing but his flesh and her own. With one
hand
she let go of his jacket and reached up to twine her
fingers
tightly through his hair, to ensure that he could
not
pull away from her. Then she let her knees go limp so
that
her own deadweight dragged him toward the floor.
There
was no romance in it, no gentleness, just the two of
them
tearing at each other's clothes, and only the
essentials
at that - his trousers and shorts, her nylons
and
panties. Then fusion as he found her and penetrated. He
was
bigger than she had realized, and so hard...just having
him
inside was enough. She arched her back and came, came
with
her whole body, grinding against him, her own hoarse
groans
reverberating in the still room and inflaming her
even
more. Dimly she realized that he had held perfectly
still
for her, to keep from disrupting her orgasm, and she
felt
him trembling with the effort required. Then, just as
she
began to relax, he moved.
His
figure was so slim, she rarely thought of him as
strong,
but she felt his strength now as he thrust with a
startling
power, withholding nothing, all the force and
intensity
of him focused inside her. Scully gasped and met
him
with force of her own, eyes closed, aware of nothing
but the
fiercely sweet sensation of him moving inside her,
driving
into the hottest part of her center. He shuddered,
and she
came again. Through a haze of passion, she heard
his
animal howl of release.
After a
long, silent moment, she felt his lips graze hers,
then
his breath warm against her neck. She twined her
fingers
into his hair again, gently this time, and held
him.
Later,
Scully would remember that afterward, his tie
remained
immaculately knotted, as if nothing unusual had
happened.
Continued
in Part 6.
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (6/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (6/14) By Loch Ness
September
8, 1997
Washington,
D.C.
She had
gotten him into bed, after that, where he'd gone
dead
out like a light the minute he hit the sheets. Scully
molded
herself against his back and lay awake, not really
thinking
of anything, just soaking in his warmth, watching
over
him, worrying she might not have another chance to lie
beside
him and shelter him, take shelter from him.
She
knew he feared he couldn't take care of her. And he
couldn't,
of course, but then, she didn't want him to. All
she
really wanted from him was what she already had--the
certain
knowledge that he would fight like hell for her,
never
willingly let go of her, no matter what. Mulder's
affection
was hard to obtain, but once won, it was as
unconditional
as a puppy's. She had rejected him, insulted
him,
rebelled against him--hell, she'd even shot him--but
none of
that mattered a damn, because he had given her his
heart
and just didn't know how to withdraw that gift. He
had
never given up on Samantha, and he had never, would
never,
give up on her.
She
felt him go tense in his sleep, and her attention
sharpened.
He moaned softly. Dreaming, gripped by some
nightmare.
She stroked his hair. "Shh," she breathed. He
stretched
his spine like a cat, sighed, and settled back
into
slumber, the tension drifting away.
Scully
knew he was blaming himself for the bees' attack. He
was
thinking he ought to have been able to do something
more to
stop it. He hadn't said so, wasn't planning to say
so, at
least in part because he feared she'd take his
self-recrimination
to mean he was blaming her. For slowing
him
down, for arguing him to a standstill, for not
believing
him, for not having the same willingness to throw
her
life away in search of the truth. She thought now that
he
might've been right to blame her for those things. In
retrospect,
she wished she *had* done more to support him,
had
been more open to his views. So many times, he'd turned
out to
be dead right.
He'd
been dead right about the bees, that was for damn
sure.
But nobody had listened. She hadn't listened.
Instead,
she had read him chapter and verse on the
Africanized
honeybees that had moved up from South America
into
parts of Texas, pointing out that they hadn't meant
the end
of civilization. She'd accused him of having spent
too
much time watching *Them* in reruns on cable. And he'd
been
right, and she'd been dead wrong.
All she
could do for him now was give him her love and a
warm,
dry place to sleep and hope it was enough for him to
cling
to, despite everything else he was losing.
Around
dawn she finally dozed, lulled into sleep by the
quiet,
even rhythm of his breath.
****
She
woke to find him sitting on the bed, gazing down at
her,
dressed and ready to leave. He leaned in to kiss her,
and she
held him briefly, her arms tight around his neck.
She let
go after a moment; she could almost hear his
muscles
straining to hold the position.
"Okay,"
he said. "Now you can call me Fox."
She
smiled and shook her head. "I don't want to anymore."
"No?"
"It
would sound funny now. It's too late, Mulder--you're
stuck
with your surname."
"Oh.
Okay, good." He glanced away, his eyes darkly
thoughtful.
"You didn't swear," he said softly.
"To
what?"
"That
you won't wait for me."
She put
one hand over his heart. "I'm not going to have to
wait
for you, Mulder," she said. "You're going to get your
mom and
be back here in record time, and the three of us
are
going to get to safety together."
"Swear,"
he said.
"On
one condition--"
"No
conditions, just swear."
"--you
e-mail me, the minute you get there, so I know you
made it
all right, and let me know when you're coming
back."
He
sighed. "Okay, I can do that."
She sat
up, holding the sheet to her bare chest, and laid
one
hand gently along his cheek. "You do know that I love
you,"
she said.
His
eyes were haunted, his mouth tight with anxiety. "I
want to
believe," he whispered.
"What
will it take to persuade you?"
"If
you don't wait for me. Then I'll believe."
She
kissed him. "Then you hurry back."
He
closed his eyes, and smiled. "I will."
And then
he was gone.
****
By the
time he passed Baltimore, the traffic was godawful
in both
directions, and it seemed to Mulder that every
jerkwater
town between D.C. and Boston must have put up a
roadblock
to stop drivers and check for bees.
As if
anybody who had bees in his car could drive.
Mulder
found that his badge eased his way, but still, every
five or
ten miles, the traffic would stop, would line up.
Wait
for a state trooper to check things out.
It was
aggravating as hell, and he had begun to worry that
he
wouldn't make it back in time. Maybe Scully had been
right--maybe
this whole idea had been a fool's errand. By
the
time he reached New York, he had begun to wish he
hadn't
come, to consider turning around. But hell, he was
halfway
there, now. The traffic heading south surely would
lessen
by the time he started on the return trip--by then,
people
who were going south would be heading *toward* the
bees,
not away from them. Few would want to do that.
As he
drove he reflected that twenty-four hours ago, he
wouldn't
have cared much whether he made it there and back
or not.
He wanted to get his mother out because it was the
right
thing to do, but his own survival had not been an
issue.
Twenty-four hours ago, he hadn't had Scully to get
back
to. To live for. In the moment when she had reached
for
him, the ice that had hardened around his heart at the
bees'
arrival had begun to crack and melt away.
Somehow,
they would survive whatever happened. If they had
to find
their way to some hot, dank, primitive corner of
the
world--hell, Borneo would do, if only they could be
together.
Or Antarctica, for all he cared. He could live in
an
igloo, he figured, eat dried fish. He could give up
everything
else--ESPN, Chinese food, Samuel Adams
beer--only,
please God, let him have Dana Scully's arms
around
him, and he would regard himself the luckiest son of
a bitch
on Earth.
He
didn't know whether to believe that she really loved him
or not.
It seemed improbable--could it really be true? The
idea
terrified him. He knew all too well how painful it was
to love
and have love snatched away, to have it go sour.
Samantha
had been snatched away. Phoebe, his father--those
loves
had gone sour. Scully's affection, in whatever form
it
took, had become so important to him he was sure he
couldn't
survive losing it. He would've forgone having her
love
him, if only it would mean she just wouldn't learn to
hate
him. All she had to do was tolerate him, and he would
be
content just to be near her.
Still,
if for once in his life the fates that controlled
such
things had finally seen fit to give him a break--God,
could
it *really* be true?--he was for-fucking-sure not
going
to argue about it. He would just love her, and thank
every
God man had ever conceived that she let him.
****
Greenwich,
Conn.
Mulder
found his mother locked up tight in her house,
sitting
in front of the television, chewing her nails and
staring
at CNN. "Get some things together," he said
breathlessly.
"I'm getting you out of here." He thumped his
laptop
down on the kitchen counter, near the phone jack,
and
began setting up to send Scully the e-mail she had
asked
for.
"Fox,"
his mother started.
"Move,
Mom," he said. "Go. I don't have time to discuss
it."
"Fox,
there's nowhere to go."
He
turned, too tired and frazzled and anxious to get back
on the
road to care what arguments she might put up.
"Mother,"
he said sternly, "if I have to handcuff you and
carry
you out of here, I will."
Her
look was sad, helpless. "All right," she said meekly,
and
went upstairs to her room to pack.
Mulder
typed furiously, hit "send," then logged off and
packed
the computer up again. Only then did he turn to see
what
CNN was saying about the bees.
The
swarm was eighteen hours out of D.C. And part of the
swarm
had turned north, toward New York State.
If they
didn't hurry, they'd get cut off.
****
Under
normal conditions, he could've made it. But
conditions
weren't normal. Twelve hours later the
roadblocks
were still up. This time the state troopers were
warning
people not to go south, and the last time he got
stopped,
just south of Trenton, N.Y., his badge didn't do
him any
good.
"My
orders are to not let anyone pass," the trooper said
from
behind his mirrored sunglasses. "I'm sorry, sir, but
it's
for your own safety."
Mulder
noticed National Guard trucks a thousand yards away.
Soldiers
with M-16's on their shoulders. He decided not to
argue.
He'd pretend to play along. He'd find another road.
If he
could get on I-76 heading west, he could hook back up
with
the 95 into Maryland just west of Philadelphia. Beyond
this
point, surely, there'd be no more traffic, no more
blockades
because there'd be no one to man them.
He
nodded at the trooper. "Thank you," he said. He turned
around,
and started looking for a way to get on another
highway.
When he finally wound around and got to the
interstate,
it was blocked only by a "Road Closed" barrier.
He got
out of the car to move the obstacle out of the way.
But
then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw something
dark
moving along the horizon.
"Shit,"
he murmured, suddenly afraid. He had seen that gray
shadow
before--it had chased him out of Ohio.
The
bees. He was too late.
****
They
turned again. Went north, this time. According to the
car
radio, the swarm was right behind them all the way.
Remembering
what Scully had said about the bees not being
able to
cross large bodies of water, he headed into Rhode
Island,
then to Massachusetts. Three times he stopped to
try to
call or e-mail Scully, but he couldn't get through.
Phone
lines jammed or dead; cell phone no help.
Finally,
he did get an e-mail through to the new North
Carolina
office, with all the files he had on what he knew
about
the bees attached, the subject line asking somebody
to
please deliver the material to Scully or Pendrell.
Just in
case he didn't make it, he wanted somebody to have
that
stuff.
When
they finally reached New Bedford, Mulder knew they'd
never
make it around the peninsula to Woods Hole, where the
ferry
to Martha's Vineyard sailed. They'd have to go
straight
to Nantucket. Another state trooper told him he'd
have to
leave his car--they were saving the space to try to
get as
many people aboard the ferry as possible.
Mulder
had been driving for thirty-six hours. He was
exhausted,
and he would've agreed to anything that would
get
them away. He shouldered his mother's bag and led her
onto
the crowded deck.
He
stood at the railing, desperately fighting nausea, as
the
ferry lurched out into Buzzards Bay. He looked
longingly
at the Elizabeth Islands as they passed, about
thirty
minutes later, and then at Martha's Vineyard,
beyond.
But he reminded himself that Scully had figured the
bees
couldn't go as far as the Vineyard. Surely they
wouldn't
make it to Nantucket.
The
freighter had pulled clear of Martha's Vineyard and
pushed
on for about ten minutes when the bees struck.
Mulder
heard them before he saw them, and at the sound, he
grasped
his mother's hand and headed below decks. But it
was
already too late. Before he'd gone more than two or
three
steps, the sky went dark with them, and everything
seemed
to turn to noise--the insects buzzing, voices
shrieking
in agony, the sickening thud of bodies striking
the
wooden deck.
Mulder
tried to ignore it, tried not to hear or see
anything.
He kept pushing forward, toward the hatchway. If
they
moved slowly but steadily, if *they* made no noise, if
they
could just get inside, then maybe...
The
first sting hit him right in the face, just above his
left
eyebrow. For a moment, it was just a bee sting,
maddeningly
painful but with no other obvious effects, and
he kept
going, intent on forcing his way to the hatch. Then
he was
stung again, and it hit him--every muscle in his
body
went into a vicious cramp, and he just managed to draw
one
shuddering breath before he doubled over in agony and
fell.
His
mother called his name, her voice sharp and fearful.
She
screamed. He tried to reach out to her, but his body
would
not cooperate. His muscles all had knotted, his spine
curled
until he was sure his bones would break with the
strain.
He felt
his mother fall beside him, but if she cried out or
groaned,
he couldn't hear it over his own hoarse, tortured
grunts.
****
Sometimes
it was dark, and sometimes light, but Mulder had
no idea
whether the time that passed was measured in days
or
hours. He didn't know anything but misery. He writhed on
the
rough deck, jerked about by muscle spasms like a broken
puppet,
his head exploding. Violent bouts of nausea,
retching
so hard he thought his guts would burst out
through
his throat. Miserable thirst, alternately afire
with
fever and racked by chills.
He was
incapable of voluntary motion. He could only lie in
whatever
position his twisted muscles would allow. He could
heave
and sweat and shiver. His eyes were swollen shut, and
even if
they hadn't been, he didn't want to see, didn't
want to
know. He could smell the death around him, a smell
that
had become all too familiar to him in course of his
work.
Mulder
was not comforted by the fact that the symptoms he
was
suffering had proved him right, yet again--he had
thought
there was a connection between the toxin in the bee
stings
and the black cancer he had encountered in Siberia.
What
good did knowing that do him now?
Each
time sleep claimed him, he went willingly, hoping it
would
be for the last time. The only thing he had the
strength
left to want was to be dead so that it would
finally
be over.
God,
why couldn't he just die?
****
He woke
to a sound like endless, roaring thunder, and for
the
first time, he did force his eyes open. He was looking
straight
up at a painfully bright, blue sky. He saw the
ship's
superstructure looming above him, and it seemed to
split
and waver in shimmering, fragmented shards of
splintered
vision. A huge shadow crossed him, and then he
saw
what looked like a gigantic red and black insect
hovering,
its wings whirling above it. A blast of hot wind
hit him
hard.
*Get
away.*
Without
thinking, ignoring how much it hurt, he crawled
away
from the huge, roaring bug. Then suddenly he was
falling,
and he hit the water below.
It
hurt. Oh, God, it hurt. The surface of the water had
felt as
hard as concrete. And it was cold, and the cold set
off
another paroxysm of cramps. He couldn't swim, and he
gasped
in pain, sucked in a mouthful of water. He was going
to
drown. In his head, he was laughing--it was so
ludicrous.
After all this, he'd just up and fucking drown.
Something
grabbed him. For a moment he got his head above
the
water, and he saw the huge red insect still poised
above
him. A figure with dark eyes shadowed behind a face
plate
had hold of his arm. He tried to struggle, but he
couldn't.
The pounding in his head was worse. He coughed
and
gagged, and then it was worse yet.
Then
there was nothing but blackness and a roaring, and
then
there was nothing at all.
****
When he
woke again, he was in a hospital. His head still
hurt;
he hurt all over, but not as much, and though his
mouth
was dry, he no longer felt thirsty. He wondered how
much
water he had swallowed when he went overboard.
Something
stung his arm, and with a terrible effort, he
turned
to look. The motion made his head hurt and his
vision
go fuzzy. The man standing beside him had punctured
the
inside of his elbow with a needle, drawing blood.
Vaguely
familiar, this man. Mulder fought to focus his
eyes,
clear his gray, dusky vision.
He knew
this man, but he couldn't make his brain work. Red,
slightly
curly hair. Freckles. Mulder tried to speak.
In his
head, he was saying "who are you?" but the sound
that
came out of his mouth was more like "huhhh..."
The
red-haired man looked up, eyes wide in surprise. "Agent
Mulder,"
he said. "You're awake."
*In a
manner of speaking.*
"Uhhh..."
Mulder got out.
The
red-haired man withdrew the needle, then came closer.
"You're
in a hospital in North Carolina," he said. "You're
going
to be all right."
The
combination of proximity and the voice did the trick.
Pendrell.
It was Agent Pendrell.
"Haaw..."
Mulder focused, cleared his throat, tried again.
Half-croak,
half-whisper, he managed, "How...how is
that...possible?"
"I
don't know. We're running some tests to try to find
out."
"Uh...okay."
He frowned suddenly. "Ssss..." It was so hard;
why was
it so hard? "Sss-scully," he said.
Pendrell
glanced away, his fair skin coloring slightly.
"Have
you been exposed before, to the toxin in the bees'
sting?"
He had.
The "black cancer" in Tunguska had produced almost
identical
symptoms, and it killed people, too, though not
as
many, not as instantly, as the bees.
"Buh...black
cancer. The files I sent. Where...where's
Scully?"
Pendrell
looked at the floor. "Are you sure it was the same
substance?"
He knew
it would hurt, but he didn't care. He forced his
arm up,
forced himself to grab Pendrell's wrist and grip it
with
whatever strength he had. "Sss-scully...god...dammit."
"I'm
sorry," Pendrell murmured, not looking at him. "I
don't
know what happened. I just don't know. I heard she
didn't
make it out of D.C., that's all I know."
Mulder
let his hand drop nervelessly onto the blanket, let
his
head fall back, his eyes close. He'd known, from the
way
Pendrell wasn't looking at him, but still it was a
shock.
Like a gunshot to the chest.
She had
waited for him. And died.
Gone,
all of them. Scully, too. Everyone he'd ever really
loved
dead or gone.
Samantha,
his father, his mother.
Scully.
His
throat constricted painfully, and his eyes burned, and
he
realized, as if from a great distance, that he was
weeping.
That did not matter, of course--nothing did now.
God,
why hadn't he just died?
Continued
in Part 7.
lochness@texas.net
Letters
of Transit (7/14) By Loch Ness
DO NOT
ARCHIVE. ***Not to be entered in or nominated
for any
competition or award.***
Classification:
T, RA Crossover references to the film
*Casablanca*
International readers: US4 spoilers. Rating:
NC-17,
for VIOLENCE, PROFANITY and (M/S) SEX. If you are
under-age,
please do not read this. See Part 0 for
disclaimer,
summary and introductory notes.
***********************************************************
Letters
of Transit (7/14) By Loch Ness
TWO
YEARS LATER
July
21, 1999
Galveston,
Texas - The Casablanca Club
Mulder
led Skinner, Cancer Man and the Pendrells to a
four-top
table near a window. *Nice view. Only the best for
the
happy couple and the evil government minions,* he
thought
bitterly.
"Have
you a moment to join us?" Bloodworth asked, very
correctly
remaining on his feet while Pendrell just as
correctly
pulled Scully's chair out for her.
Mulder
hadn't seen manners like this since his last visit
to the
Boston Yacht Club. It left him feeling as if he'd
been
transported into a real-life Sartre short story. *Next
thing
you know, we'll all be singing *Auld Lang Syne*.* He
ground
his teeth again. He didn't want to join them--he
wanted
to get the hell away from the lot of them and never
look
back. But it would make Pendrell uncomfortable if he
did sit
down, and he figured the little shit deserved at
least a
moment of discomfort. What the hell.
Mulder
smiled. "If I wouldn't be intruding on federal
business,
I'd love to."
"Ah,
yes, I'd heard you were...pursuing other interests.
Well,
this is purely social."
*Bullshit,*
Mulder thought. *You have even less social life
than I
ever did.* He appropriated an empty chair from an
adjacent
table and sat between Skinner and Pendrell. Where
he
could get an unobstructed view of Mrs. Dana Pendrell.
She was
keeping her cool, on the outside at least, but
there
was a tension in the way she held her mouth that he
recognized
as meaning she was feeling awkward as hell. She
was
wearing a beige suit with a mustard-colored shell under
the
jacket, the familiar tiny gold cross at her throat.
Reddish-brown
lipstick immaculate on her perfect mouth, as
always.
Suddenly
she looked straight at him, her azure eyes pinning
him
like a laser beam. "How have you been?" she asked.
The
warm, low sound of her voice stopped his heart for a
moment.
He breathed carefully, trying to release the sudden
constriction
in his chest.
"I'm
still on my feet," he said lightly. "You?"
"I'm
fine." What she always said when she wasn't.
A waitress
appeared, and Bloodworth ordered champagne. Then
he
turned to Scully. "I heard you had some trouble getting
out of
New Orleans," Bloodworth said.
"There
was a misunderstanding about our clearances," Scully
said.
Mulder heard a note of stress in her even tone--it
had
been more than a misunderstanding.
"Nothing
Mr. Skinner can't clear up for you, I'm sure."
Mulder
saw a muscle flex along Skinner's jaw.
"I'm
sure we can work something out," the A.D. said
tightly,
"if you two wouldn't mind stopping by my office in
the
morning."
*Jesus,*
Mulder thought. *Sit, Walter. Roll over, Walter.
Good
Walter. Lick his fucking face, why don't you?*
"Sure,"
Pendrell said. "No problem."
The
waitress came back with five glasses of champagne, set
them
down one by one. "How long are you planning to stay in
Galveston?"
Bloodworth asked pleasantly.
"We
haven't really made any decisions about that," Scully
said.
Bloodworth
nodded and sipped his champagne. Nobody else was
drinking.
"It can be difficult to get away," he said
knowingly.
"What with the blockade. Don't you agree, Mr.
Mulder?"
Bloodworth
knew about Georgia, and he wanted Mulder to know
he
knew. Mulder shrugged. "It's not impossible to get by
the
blockade."
"But
of course you need a boat." Bloodworth gave Scully a
slantwise
look. "I'm afraid on inspecting yours, we
discovered
it had been damaged. Badly holed. It was already
sinking
when we went aboard to examine it."
Scully's
look was venomous--it told Mulder there'd been
nothing
wrong with the boat when she'd left it. "How lucky
for us
that you discovered that when you did," she said.
"I
haven't tried it myself," Mulder said, "but I'm told if
you
have the right equipment you can go across the causeway
and over
the mainland to Colorado." He turned the stem of
his
glass on the crisp table cloth. "There are still
flights
out of Denver to L.A.--even to Honolulu--if you can
just
get as far as Denver."
"Well,
of course, those flights are reserved for movement
of
essential personnel," Bloodworth said.
"Which
leads us to the question of how the SEB defines
'essential,'"
Mulder said, allowing himself the sarcasm.
"Just
what is that definition these days? Mute alien-hybrid
clones
only?"
Bloodworth
laughed. "I'd forgotten about that vivid
imagination
of yours," he said, smiling. "What a sense of
humor
you have!"
Mulder
grinned back at him. "Well, we are revisiting old
times,
aren't we? Don't worry--despite the fact that it's
all
quite true, I'm not delusional enough to expect that
anyone
will believe it."
"Actually,"
Bloodworth said, then he stopped long enough to
light
another Morley and exhale a plume of smoke in
Skinner's
general direction. "I think it could be argued
that
Mr. and Mrs. Pendrell are essential personnel. How is
that
antivenin coming along, anyway?"
Scully
started. She hadn't expected Bloodworth would know
what
she and Pendrell were working on. Despite himself,
Mulder
felt his left eyebrow rise a notch.
"We
haven't perfected anything yet," Pendrell said,
frowning
down into his glass. "But we're making progress."
"Well,
now. That's certainly encouraging news."
Skinner
got to his feet suddenly. "Excuse me," he said
softly.
Mulder
knew he must have spotted Krycek, but he also knew
better
than to turn and look. He left it to Scully to
notice
what Skinner was doing.
She
didn't disappoint him. "My God," she said. "Is that
Alex
Krycek?"
Now he
turned. Krycek strolled through the front door and
took a
left turn on the deck that extended out a few feet
from
the building, and disappeared from sight. A moment
later
he was back in view, now running, with two of
Skinner's
men hot on his heels. He lunged toward the
railing,
trying to leap into the water, but the two cops
caught
him before he went over. He shouted, and struggled,
but
they had him.
"Huh,"
Mulder said. "What do you know? I think it *is*
Krycek.
Looks like he's got himself in trouble again."
"He
has a talent for it," Bloodworth said, his tone cold.
"What
do you suppose he's done now?" Scully asked.
Mulder
shrugged. "It's Krycek--could be anything from
murder
to panhandling."
"Does
he come here often?" Bloodworth asked, his look
suddenly
penetrating.
The
feds had Krycek handcuffed and were leading him off the
dock.
"I don't recall him ever having been here before,"
Mulder
said. He saw Skinner heading back toward the table.
"But
then," he went on, "I generally don't have time to
socialize
with the guests. Speaking of which, I'm afraid
I'm
going to have to excuse myself, too." He got up. "Much
as I've
enjoyed this, I have a business to run. Oh, and
nevermind
about the check--it's on the house. My pleasure."
"I
think we should be going, too," Pendrell said, rising to
his
feet.
"So
soon?" Bloodworth said.
"We've
had a long trip," Scully said. "We're tired. But
thank
you both--it's been a very pleasant evening."
"I'm
glad you enjoyed it," Mulder said. He stood back out
of the
way while they went past. "Please come again."
To
Skinner, Scully said, "Is there a particular time you'd
like us
to come by at the office?"
"Mid-morning's
good," the A.D. said, his face unreadable.
"We'll
be there," Pendrell said, and then he took Scully's
arm and
led her off.
"Mr.
Mulder," Bloodworth said. His tone was soft, underlain
by a
hint of steel. "I hope you're not thinking of doing
anything
rash to help them leave the island."
"What
makes you think I'd do that?"
"It's
said you have helped some in the past--paid their
passage,
arranged their transportation. Naturally I assume
you may
have an understandable affinity for your former
colleagues."
Mulder
gave him a cold smile. "Mr., uh...*Bloodworth,*" he
said,
"if I knew how to get off this island, do you think
for a
moment I'd still be here myself?"
"Wouldn't
you?"
He let
the smile die. "The bees flew from Cape Cod to
Martha's
Vineyard. They'll be here, too, before long. You
know
it, and I know it. The only thing I haven't figured
out is
just what you and your army of speechless drones
intend
to do with the wreckage after it's over. I confess
it's
beyond me what you could gain by reducing North
America
to roughly the cultural and technological
sophistication
of the Bronze Age."
Bloodworth
smiled.
****
Scully
and Pendrell walked down Seawall Boulevard toward
their
hotel in silence. The concrete seawall itself,
erected
to guard against the storm surge from a hurricane,
dropped
off steeply toward the smooth, sandy beach. The
nightly
curfew was two hours off, and there were still a
fair
number of people walking or lounging along the street
and on
the beach. A half-moon threw a glow on the surf as
it
rolled steadily, quietly up onto the sand. Some small
part of
Scully's mind registered that it was
picturesque--she
might even have called it beautiful, if
she had
been capable of caring about anything that far off
in the
distance.
"Are
you all right?" Pendrell asked, his voice low.
"I'm
fine," Scully lied. Her emotions stewed, simmered. She
dared
not lift the lid, for fear they would boil over.
Mulder
was alive. How could he have been alive and not come
back to
her? Come looking for her? Why would he do that?
Had she
meant so little to him? No, that was impossible.
She'd
had his heart, his soul, in her hands. He had *given*
them to
her. And yet, he had not come for her. Had she
completely
misread what he had meant when he had asked her
not to
wait for him? Was that possible?
*Don't
wait for me. Then I'll believe.*
No. She
had known exactly what he meant. She had not
misread
it. Although he had not explicitly said so, he had
been
just as much in love with her as she had been with
him.
What in God's name could've happened in Connecticut
that
would have so transformed him?
It had
been clear from looking at him that he was much
changed,
and not just two years older, not just the three
or four
strands of silver hair she'd noticed at his
temples.
The Mulder she had known had worn his heart on his
sleeve.
He'd been an open book to her, so easily readable
she
could almost hear his thoughts in her mind. He'd been
mercurial,
moods spanning the whole range from manic energy
to
quiet grief to vitriolic moral outrage. Cool of nerve,
but
never cold of heart. He might not have been a hero in
the
usual sense, but he had been possessed of a heroic
passion.
The Fox
Mulder who owned the Casablanca Club seemed devoid
of any
passions at all. The look on his face when he had
seen
her had been profound astonishment--but there'd been
nothing
else she could read in it. No embarrassment or
horror
or affection or pain. Just surprise. Only once
during
the evening had Scully noticed the smallest glimmer
of the
old fire in his eyes, when he had come back at
Bloodworth:
*Just what is that definition these days? Mute
alien-hybrid
clones only?* And then, as if the tiny flame
were a
candle, he had simply blown it out, and it was gone.
She
couldn't understand it. It was completely unlike him.
He
might be physically alive, but it was clear something
inside
him had died. She did not want to see him like that.
They
reached the hotel room and went in. Scully sat numbly
on the
end of the bed.
Pendrell
said, "The man in the lobby downstairs said the
freighter
to Mexico City leaves on Saturday."
She
nodded. "The sooner the bettter," she said.
****
Mulder
took his run every night after the bar closed, while
the
Gunmen cleaned up the club. He went out in plain
defiance
of the island curfew; it was too damned hot to run
during
the day. He did his five miles down and back on the
beach,
dodging the milky-white, gelatinous blobs of
Portuguese
men-o-war washed up on the sand. The little
jellyfish
had a nasty sting even when dead and were best
given a
wide berth. The thunderstorms off in the distance
had
dissipated after sundown, leaving a clear, cool, humid
sky.
In the
last two years he had spent a lot of his time
learning
to block out thoughts of the past--if there was
any
coherent lesson in his life, Mulder figured it was the
futility
of trying to change his own history. He had
spent--wasted,
as he now calculated it--most of his life in
an
effort to undo or correct his own past. To get Samantha
back so
that things would be right. It hadn't worked then,
and it
wasn't going to work now. As he ran along the beach,
he
tried valiantly to focus on nothing but the mechanical,
enervating
rhythm of his feet on the sand. Just running.
Breathing.
Futility
again. The more he concentrated on other things,
the
more *she* intruded on his thoughts. Every time he
thought
he had pushed her aside, his eidetic memory yielded
up
another mental image. The play of light like dancing
flame
on her hair. The crisp, competent grace of her
movement
as she had sat down at the table. Seeing her had,
yet
again, melted the ice he'd been using to numb himself.
He
wanted to shove the mind-pictures away, as a child might
reject
playing with a cat who had once scratched its hand.
The
past couldn't be repaired. He had gone to New England.
He
hadn't been able to get back. Pendrell had said what he
had
said. Mulder had not checked it out on his own. And now
it was
too late. It was done, and wishing would not undo
it.
He
sensed that the near future held something nasty, though
he
couldn't predict what it might be. A bad patch in his
life
loomed ahead, and the last thing he needed was
something
that would make him vulnerable. He was vulnerable
to
Scully, sure as hell. No solution to that problem loomed
immediately
on the horizon, so he went back to trying
desperately
to concentrate on running. To watching out for
the
men-o'-war on the beach.
He
wasn't surprised to see Skinner waiting for him outside
the
club when he came back. "A little past your bedtime,
isn't
it?" he asked the older man.
"We
didn't find the couriers' documents on Krycek," Skinner
said.
"Tough
break. You want a cup of coffee? Sounds like you've
got a
long night ahead of you." He went inside, Skinner
following.
Mulder shivered a little at the contrast as the
air
conditioning hit the bare skin on his face and arms.
The
A.D. slung his jacket across the bar and loosened his
tie.
Mulder went behind the bar and scooped coffee beans
into
the grinder.
"Did
he give them to you?" Skinner asked.
"Krycek
hasn't given me the time of day in years." He ran
the
grinder, its harsh whine loud in the empty club.
"That's
not what I asked you," Skinner said, when the
machine
went quiet.
"I
don't know what 'them' you're talking about."
"You've
become a very adept liar. And don't tell me you
didn't
lie to Bloodworth about not knowing how to get off
the
island."
"I've
always been an adept liar," Mulder said. "I just used
to have
better reasons to tell you the truth. As for
Bloodworth,
I don't like the fucker. Never have. And what
my
plans are is none of his business."
"Are
you thinking of giving Pendrell and Scully the letters
of
transit so they can get off the island?"
"What
letters of transit?"
Skinner
smiled. "The ones Krycek gave you."
Mulder
sighed heavily. "You want to search me, Walter? You
want to
search the club? You don't even need a warrant
these
days--I couldn't stop you if I wanted to. Go ahead.
But
they're not here, because I don't have them, because
Krycek
didn't give them to me."
"Bloodworth
doesn't want Pendrell and Scully to leave the
island."
"He
made that pretty clear. You want to tell me why?" Into
Skinner's
sudden silence the coffee maker gurgled and
exuded
steam. Mulder shrugged. "They made it this far
without
my help. Why should I stick my neck out?" He poured
coffee
for both of them and slid a mug across the bar
toward
the A.D.
"I
always thought you were in love with her," Skinner said,
stirring
his coffee.
"You
were mistaken," Mulder said coldly. But he heard the
harsh
note in his own voice--too harsh, and he knew Skinner
had
heard it, too.
"Prove
it," the A.D. said.
He
laughed. "I haven't seen her since '97, and she married
somebody
else."
"That
doesn't mean you're not in love with her."
Skinner
wasn't buying it, and Mulder yielded to the
inevitable.
"Okay, so I wouldn't kick her out of my bed
just
for eating crackers. So what? I can't give her
paperwork
I don't have. And if Krycek had any emigration
papers
with him, he didn't offer them to me."
"Uh,
huh," Skinner said, unconvinced.
"Look,
I didn't kill those guys on the causeway. And Alex
Krycek
and I are not friends. I didn't know Pendrell and
Scully
were coming to the island, and I have no plans
either
to assist or interfere with them."
There
was a silence, Skinner avoiding Mulder's eyes.
Finally,
Skinner said softly, "Pendrell's very close to
developing
an antivenin for the bee stings."
"Good
for him. What's that got to do with me?"
"You're
the guy who ran the blockade with a cigarette boat
full of
Malathion six times--you tell me what it has to do
with
you."
"Nothing,
that's what. Public service is your line of
work."
Skinner's
turn to sigh. "I'm sorry to hear that," he said.
He
sounded tired, suddenly. "I was hoping you had those
letters
and might be willing to devote them to a good
cause."
He looked up, and there was a heavy sadness in his
eyes.
"You used to be the kind who'd fight for the chance
to do
the right thing."
Mulder
nodded. A cold anger gathered in his chest. Who the
fuck
did Skinner think he was, coming across with this
self-righteous
crap? "Yeah," Mulder said. "I was. And all
it got
me was a reserved seat down in the same sewer with
you and
Krycek."
Skinner's
jaw went hard. "Sorry to bother you." He picked
up his
jacket.
"Don't
give me that," Mulder said, his anger boiling over.
"There's
damned little evidence you'd know the right thing
to do
if it bit you in the ass--you're still doing that
smoking
bastard's bidding." Mulder leaned toward him and
let his
voice go low. "You've got one fucking nerve asking
me to
trust you. Your idea of doing the right thing has
always
been to get me to smash myself up on the rocks doing
it for
you. Not this time, *sir.* If you want to help
Pendrell
and Scully get off the island, go ahead."
There
was a hard silence, both of them glaring at each
other.
Mulder broke it, backing off his belligerent stance.
"*If*
I had the letters and *if* I wanted to give them to
Scully--neither
of which is true--you'd be the last
motherfucker
I'd tell." He picked up his coffee. "And
that's
all I have to say."
"Okay,"
Skinner said. "I deserve that. But the time's
coming
when it's not going to be so easy to turn your
head."
"Bullshit.
There's nothing easier than turning your head."
Mulder
took his coffee and went toward the kitchen. "I
learned
that from you, Walter." He stopped and turned just
before
he stepped through the double doors. "Hit that light
switch
before you leave, will you?"
Continued
in Part 8.
lochness@texas.net