CLASSIFICATION: V, A, A flicker of MSR
RATING: R for mild sexual scenes and language
SPOILER WARNING: A few, up to S5.
SUMMARY: An ending, of sorts
AUTHOR: marasmus@my-deja-com/marasmus_k@yahoo.com

DISCLAIMER: Not mine. You know the drill, suing is like a broken pencil*
(*pointless <g>)
_______________________________________

Just four hours to go. Already the coming dawn was painting the night
sky a mistier blue. There was the rumble of the odd passing car, its
tires hissing through puddles, the tick of the clock on the mantle, the
gentle drum roll of rain on the windows.

"Well?" she asked, sounding too shrill for her own comfort.

His eyes flared wide and he sat up with a peculiar half-laugh,
scrutinising every inch of her until she couldn't decide whether to snap
at him or flee back into the bathroom. "You... uh, you don't look like
you," he said awkwardly.

She was rattled by his reaction and moved across to the mirror. Some
other woman stared back at her; a woman with puffy brown eyes and a
lined forehead, wavy dark  hair making her skin seem a sickly milk
white. She closed her eyes, not wanting to acknowledge it.

She sensed rather than heard him moving from the sofa and when she
looked up again, his face was hovering over her shoulder, looking
intently at both their reflections. Unexpectedly he gave her a smile and
said: "In fact, we don't look like us."

"At least I don't look as if I've been taking fashion tips from Byers."
His laugh was about as small as the joke had been as he touched the
short bristles of the beard he had been cultivating. She bowed her head
and he picked up a strand of hair that had fallen across her face and
twisted it behind her ear.

Then he stopped and stared into the mirror again, one hand moving to her
shoulder, tracing the line of her neck. "I can't get over this. You
don't look like you." He looked distracted, as if it were a thought he
scarcely knew he had spoken aloud.

She smashed the companionable silence, stalking toward the kitchen.
"It's only hair dye, I suggest you *do* get over it," she threw over her
shoulder.

Who would have guessed she would be upset about losing the Scully mark
of Cain? As a child she had asked God every night if she could wake up
with dark hair like her mom instead of the pale carroty mop that made
her an easy target in games of 'torment the new kid'. But as she'd got
older, she had become used to and finally grown to like standing out in
a crowd.

Now she was back to dullness; a bird in drab winter plumage.

She squeezed the brown contact lenses from her eyes with angry
imprecision, blinked away a few tears of pain, snapped the case shut,
and thrust it into the pocket of her grey sweatpants. Then she banged
the cupboard doors and flung teaspoons into the sink until her temper
cooled as suddenly as it had flared.

Mulder looked contrite as she emerged with two mugs of coffee. "I'm
sorry, Scully, I didn't mean to offend..."

"It's okay," she interrupted. "I'm just a little tense." She noted his
almost imperceptible nod, took a deep breath and added: "and a little
scared, I guess."

He stood up and in one fluid motion, plucked the mugs from her hand, set
them on the table and pulled her close in a hug that didn't quite
disguise the tremors in his own arms.

He gave a lopsided smile and muttered into her ear: "Now I know it's not
you. Whatever happened to 'I'm fine'?"

She pulled away first, as always, and smiled back. "I'm trying out a new
catchphrase, didn't I tell you?"

"It's too late now, Scully. Your timing sucks," he teased as they sat
shoulder to shoulder on the sofa, staring at the heavily marked maps.

-------------------------------------------

She had come up with the basics of the plan. She had always been a
better strategy player, she was more careful, more patient, it was why
she beat him at chess so often. But the wrinkles, the devious little
details, the cunningly planted "fuck yous" to the people who were
driving them to this... they were all his own.

Everything was memorised because paper was risky. He knew she had
drilled herself until she too could recite every name, remember every
email address and password and recall every account number.

She had wanted them to travel together at first -- he suspected she
didn't want to let him out of her sight -- but he quickly persuaded her
that they were too conspicuous as a couple.

Instead they had worked out a complex set of bluffs and double bluffs.
It was like the old days; they had worked so well together it had almost
been... no, it *had* been fun.

He remembered their arguments over routes and tactics over the past
three weeks, and smiled as he watched the first fingers of light creep
across the sky through the crack in the drapes.

As if to break the silence, she asked: "Do we still have company?"

He nodded, nudging the heavy cloth aside to look out on the road. "Still
only two of them though, I'm guessing front and back exits, one man per
car, 12 hour shifts. They haven't broken the pattern in three days."

"You don't think they'll make an early move?"

"Skinner says not."

He deliberately did not think about what bargains Skinner must have made
to get access to the information. His former boss had told him they had
been targeted, along with a couple of hundred other "trouble makers" and
"significant subjects" who would be spirited away to the box cars. All
would be snatched within 24 hours to prevent one set of disappearances
alerting other targets.

This time no one would be returned: All part of the project's
acceleration under its new masters.

What had saved them from a black ops bullet on a dark night was that
they were needed: More tests. He would never forget the look on Scully's
face when he told her what he had found out.

He had expected cold anger, that was pretty much her preferred emotion
these days. He had even suspected that she might try to convince him
this was a Skinner double-cross. Instead,  just for a second, he had
seen such fear in her that it had almost unmanned him. She had been in
those train cars before and if it terrified even someone like her beyond
enduring...

They had only one advantage -- they knew *when*.

"So tomorrow's the day. They're working to a timetable. Jesus." She put
one hand over her eyes wearily.

"Well that's the good thing about fascists, Scully," he said. "The train
cars have to run on time."

She smiled, something he had seen more in these last few days inside
these four walls than in all of the last six months.

-------------------------------------------

Three hours to go. An unlovely wintry dawn broke. The sky faded through
shades of drizzly grey, each one more bleached out than the last. It
wasn't the finest way to remember Washington.

She had managed to get him to understand she needed to be on her own for
a while to sort out her thoughts or she would start stalking him with
kitchen implements.

He had insisted they should stay in one apartment for the last few days
before they ran, just in case someone did try to make the snatch early.
For once, the tediously persistent rumours they were sleeping together
actually worked in their favour. It clearly had not struck anyone as odd
that he was staying there. She wasn't sure what to make of that.

She had preferred staying in the apartment with him anyway. Any time she
went out or talked to someone else she had to follow the script and that
was so hard.

She stood in her bedroom, methodically packing and unpacking the small
rucksack, always trying to fit in one more thing without making it look
too bulky, but not paying much attention to what she was doing. Her eyes
flicked towards the line-up of photographs she kept on the top shelf of
the bookcase.

Her mom had looked oddly pleased at the closeness of the hug in the
middle of that crowded restaurant on Tuesday. Perhaps she had thought
her daughter was finally loosening up a little.

Alarm bells had only started ringing when she asked her mom to give her
love to Bill and Charlie.

"They're looking forward to seeing you next week, Dana," her mom had
said, dark suspicion blooming in her face. "You will be there for
dinner? A case hasn't come up, has it? It's a long time since we've all
been together."

She felt a surge of irritation at her mom for playing the guilt card so
quickly but she stamped on it; no time for that. "No, nothing coming up
at all  Mom. I'll be there."

She had wanted to be honest but two tables down, someone was listening.

Someone always was.

-------------------------------------

Just two hours left. The apartment was oppressively warm with the drapes
closed and was only going to get warmer.

"This is going to wreck the paint work," she said, climbing down from
the chair, half of the smoke detector trailing wires from her hand.

"The next owner can make it a feature. We'll get the real estate lady to
point it out specially." His voice swooped up into a falsetto. "'And
these scorch marks are where the two fugitive FBI agents burned all the
paperwork relating to their daring escape'."

She snorted with laughter and he was surprised to see her pour the
lighter fluid into the small metal trash can from shoulder height, as if
it were some kind of religious ritual. Something was going on behind
those steely blue eyes.

They watched the lighter fluid drip and ooze across the sturdy road
maps. "They are never going to fall for this, Mulder," she muttered.

"Come on, Scully, these people have no imagination," he said a little
too brightly. "They are going to bring in all kinds of experts to
reconstruct the words and lines on that paper. They'll be so impressed
with how smart they are, they'll never think it's a trick, and in the
meantime, we've sent them every direction but the right one.

"Plus I marked a few clinics and installations they think we don't know
about. They're gonna shit bricks when they see that, wondering who else
we've told."

They grinned at each other; he could see that she enjoyed that picture.

He stepped back and she struck the match, dropped it in and folded her
arms in satisfaction as it blazed brightly and grey-black smoke curled
up to the ceiling.

"Perhaps we should toast marshmallows, Scully," he said, staring into
the flames.

"And how would their scientists explain the residue? That the fugitive
feds paused in their daring escape to take a snack break?"

The fierce heat and the height of the blaze began to alarm him. Turning
to her he began: "Scully shouldn't we dampen this down a..." She wasn't
there.

Seconds later she emerged from the bedroom, a crumpled piece of card in
her hand. She dropped it onto the pyre and as it unfolded in the heat,
he saw it clearly for the first time. Pale gingery hair. A wide smile. A
three-year-old's party picture, distorting as the plastic coating the
paper began to melt.

"What are you doing?" he asked carefully, trying to make his voice as
even as possible.

Her chin jutted out and her eyes hardened. "It's the only picture I
have. I can't take it with me and they can't have it."

He nodded and put a hand on her arm, longing to comfort her but
uncertain whether his touch was even welcome. Her ramrod-straight
shoulders hitched slightly under his grasp and he supposed that meant
she wanted him to let go. He let his hand drop to his side feeling
useless and angry.  He was glad it had burned -- he detested that
fucking picture and everything it symbolised.

Flecks of blackened paper swirled slowly downwards on the air like
snowflakes in negative.

-------------------------------------

The seconds were ticking by too quickly; she wanted to reach out a hand
and still the clock on her mantle and believe that by her action, she
could make time stop too.

His eyes followed her around the room as she trailed a finger along the
bookshelves and the mantlepiece.

It's not like I spent much time here, she thought wistfully. He had
abandoned his apartment without regret. There was nothing there that he
couldn't stand to lose, she knew. He had pared his life down to the
essentials: himself and his files. She knew the files were as much
locked in that peculiar memory of his as they were in the cabinets and
computers of the Hoover Building.

She had always prided herself that her itinerant life as a child had
left her able to pack everything she would ever need into a couple of
suitcases -- that she wasn't attached to mere places. The burning of
their basement office should have taught her that that wasn't quite true
any more.

This had been the first place that was truly hers, not base housing or a
dorm or rented room. She prowled the apartment, not sure whether she was
trying to commit it to memory, say goodbye or convince herself that she
didn't care after all.

She could see she was making him tense; he was sitting on the sofa,
twisting a cushion between his hands, wishing away this little amount of
time they had left.

The third time she stalked into the kitchen, he rasped: "Scully. Please,
just sit down. You're wearing tracks into the carpet."

It's my damned carpet, she thought sourly but sat next to him. She
wanted to break the silence and yet she couldn't think of a thing to
say.

"What will you do? When you get there?" he asked suddenly. She was
nonplussed when she realised she had been so focused on the journey that
the destination had almost slipped her mind.

"I... assumed we would consider our options, Mulder."

He threw his head back on the cushions and smiled. "'Consider our
options'. That's a very Scully answer."

"Which means?" she snapped.

"Precisely nothing. What if we don't get there, Scully?"

You're supposed to be the insane optimist in this relationship, Mulder,
she thought, recalling a barked line from one of her Quantico
instructors a decade ago (Jesus! A decade): Failure is not an option.
You cling onto that dismal cliche, she told herself.

"Then Mulder, I shall have to come back and save your sorry ass yet
again, which will piss me off," she said, trying to make a joke of it.

"No Scully. You keep on going," he replied. "Anyway, you're assuming
that it would be me that screwed up."

She found herself growing angry. "If it *was* the other way round and I
didn't show up, would you keep going?" she snapped. She thought it was a
rhetorical question.

But he looked into her eyes and very deliberately, very evenly, his
voice almost cold, he said: "I would. We both know what goes on in those
train cars. No fucking heroics, Scully, not this time."

His eyes were dark and they glittered in the half light of dawn,
unreadable and remote. She was sure she'd remember how to breathe any
minute now. "Okay," she said in a flat tone. "No heroics."

-------------------------------------
An hour left and every tick of the clock couldn't come soon enough now.
He was trying to peek past the drapes again, just to make sure they
hadn't decided to change their plans and come for them this day of all
days.

Scully was sitting on the sofa, her arms curled around her stomach,
shivery and trying to force down the feeling of nausea. She didn't have
time for her usual attempts to scry what Mulder had meant by that last
remark. Perhaps, for once, she was supposed to take him literally.

He had put an arm on her shoulder again after his little outburst of
honesty -- whether to comfort her or himself she wasn't certain -- but
she had shaken him off because it was easier to stay mad than start to
think about it.

Would she go back for him if this went wrong?

An hour ago, she would have said yes without question. But he had forced
her to consider what going back would mean: no access, no inside
information, no protection. The sharks would be waiting to snatch her
when she surfaced and there would be no Mulder to help her ward off the
dim and fragmentary memories of the abduction that sometimes made her
mind stutter until she was incapable of action.

Now he turned and stared at her, his hands jammed in the pocket of his
sweatpants and his jaw working to and fro.

She knew she appeared all the things she most wished she was not: old
and tired and small and scared.

"Scully, I have to tell you something," he said hesitantly, his voice
like honey and razorblades. His tone was the one he had always used to
bring her running.

She knew he understood exactly what he was doing to her. Maybe he always
had, but now they didn't have time for their usual insane games of
push-me-pull-you.

She might as well be honest for once.

No heroics.
 
 

"I'm sorry I shut you out, Mulder. You do it to me too, but that's no
excuse. I'm sorry I clung on to the status quo for so long when you were
willing to let it go." Damn, she was babbling. "I've been afraid and
angry..."

He breathed out loudly and looked at the ceiling. "I haven't made it
easy for you."

She winced a little at the unspoken confirmation that he thought she had
been a coward. "You never did. I liked the challenge. But you do
know..."

"No I *don't*. I hoped. But it's tough being pushed away all the time."

She opened her mouth to object but his voice was hard. "Oh I know I did
it too. But you could have trusted me. I wouldn't have let us screw it
up."

She ran a hand through her hair and looked away. "No. I believe you
wouldn't." She let out a mirthless laugh. "I am a different matter,
however."

"You'd've been okay. I have faith in you."

"We're not exactly made for each other are we?"

He looked at her, his eyes seeking her explanation.

"We disagree about everything at the most basic level," she said. "I
spend a third of my life running after you trying to stop you from
killing yourself, a third second-guessing everything you say and a third
locked away in here, trying to tell myself how sensible I'm being by
keeping our relationship just professional... when just professional is
the last thing we are."

"Could've been worse." It was her turn to request an explanation. He
smiled at her serious expression. "Could've been boring."

She raised an eyebrow. "Well, it's never been that."

"Not even on stakeouts?" he said teasingly.

"No. Except for those sports shows you listen to. I may have passed out
on your shoulder a couple of times through the sheer tedium of it."

"Well, I wore the drool with pride."

She picked up a cushion and lazily threw it at him. "Asshole."

He flopped down on the couch next to her with a grin. She had never met
anyone as impossibly mercurial as him, never met someone who could so
easily lift or sour the atmosphere in a room. Or perhaps he only had
that effect on her.

She looked across at him at the instant he turned his face to her and
both of them reached out a hand automatically. The tips of her fingers
jabbed painfully against his for a moment and they both pulled back
before, finally, their hands wandered into a firm, comforting clasp.

-------------------------------------

He moved towards her, so slowly that it felt as if the interval could be
measured in geological time. Then finally he pressed that perfect bowed
mouth of his to hers. Neither would concede ground by closing their eyes
so, as the kiss deepened and their lips slowly parted, each disappeared
into the widening well of blackness in the other's pupils.

An eon or two passed before they surfaced for air.

"Now whose timing sucks?" she whispered.

"Mine always did," he replied softly, letting his hands wander now she
had tacitly given him the right to roam. His fingertips traced the curve
of her body from breast to thigh, his hands stroked her hair...

.... and she pulled away slightly, just enough for him to be perturbed by
it. "What?" he asked softly.

"Nothing."

No, he thought. There could be no 'nothing' any more. She would not
catch his eye, which was always a giveaway. "Well?"

Then, slowly, and as if she was planning to make him pay for forcing her
to admit something so petty, she said:  "Well, I was thinking that
dark-haired women are more your type." She stared at the sofa cushions
and the ceiling and anywhere but at him. "Phoebe. Diana..."

For a second his eyebrows headed for his hairline. Then he laughed.
"Once maybe. But now I have this thing for skeptical redheads that I
just can't shake off."

"I'm not a redhead any more."

He tapped the side of his skull. "You are up here, Scully. Anyway, I'm
sure normal service will be resumed as soon as possible."

"Better believe it," she grumbled happily before he stopped her mouth
with another kiss and ran his hands up from her hips in an arc to cup
her breasts, each thumb tracing a lazy circle around her nipples. He was
rewarded with a small bite on his swollen lower lip and released a brief
jet of laughter.

Her hands burrowed under his T-shirt to the hot skin of his back and her
short nails pressed the flesh before moving upwards to consider the
ridges of the scar on his shoulder. Then she slid her hands slowly
toward herself to follow the lines of his rib cage and rake down through
the fine hair on his chest.

At last, he could freely touch her and have her caress him. He squeezed
his eyes shut as the thought sent a fresh pulse of desire through him,
and he brought his mouth down on hers. His hands swept down her body
again, the left stroking the serpent he knew was curled across her
spine, the right slipping under the thin cotton layers at her navel.

In turn, her right hand whispered up from its short stay on his thigh
and trailed over the soft cotton covering his erection and followed its
length upwards. His entire body involuntarily jumped towards hers, and
he felt her lips smile into the kiss.

His fingers slid down past the silky skin of her stomach, through soft
hair, and eased into her hot, slick centre, delighting in the way that
every small touch made her press closer to him. He wanted to continue
cataloguing every part of her, saving every sensory impression he could
to study and relive later, but he wasn't sure he could safely open his
eyes yet.

He sniffed that warm mixture of lemon soap and faint perfume traces on
her neck, tasted the soft, salt warmth of her skin, then moved to the
hollow of her throat that was guarded by the cross she wore. He had
fantasised about worshipping in that spot. He slid the cloth of her
T-shirt out of the way and kissed her there, almost reverently.

He had hoped to lose himself in her so far that he didn't have to think,
but his mind was refusing to abandon the real world. Perhaps if he
didn't open his eyes and look at the clock, no time would pass.

He felt his throat tightening and had to suck in several juddery breaths
as a mixture of want and longing and paralysing fear swept over him.

 "Scully, what will I do without you..." he whispered.

Then his train of thought was derailed by her authoritative voice. "No,"
she said.

"We have time..." he murmured in a desire-slurred voice and moved both
his hands back to her waist to pull her closer.

She pushed him back and away. "No. Stop. I can't... I won't do this."

His eyes snapped open and he exhaled sharply; a billow of anger and
frustration. "Damn it why can't you just let go of..."

"No, I mean I'm not doing *this*."

"Scully," he said, his voice a little ragged. "Please."

"No. I won't join in with this... this whole farewell fuck scenario."

"Is that what you think this is?" He had shifted his hands to the
neutral territory of her forearms and looked, in turn, puzzled, offended
and furious.

"No. Not entirely," she admitted awkwardly, shuffling out of his grasp
to the opposite end of the sofa. "But I won't give you permission to..."

"Permission?" he interrupted, his voice rising as he leaned towards her.

"Permission to say goodbye," she said firmly, looking him straight in
the eye. "This is not goodbye. I will see you in two weeks as agreed,
and we will take care of unfinished business then. Is that clear?"

"Unfinished business? Jesus, Scully, very military. Are you taking
lessons off Bill?"

"I mean it," she snapped back, sounding more brittle than she had
before.  "Because I want this very much. But I don't want it to be
because I'm afraid or because you want to scratch one more experience
off your list..."

"Is that really what you think... " he began in a low dangerous tone,
but she rushed on, heedless, her words tumbling out in broken sentences.

"It's because I sense you're giving up somehow. I hate that because it
scares me. Because I want to give both of us a motive to be careful.
Because I love you."

He sat back and stared at her mutinously, not wanting to hear her words.
He watched her expression change, like the slowly mutating colours of
oil on water, moving from anger, to fear, finally to uncertainty...

He was so mad at her that he drank it in for a long moment. See how it
feels, Scully? See how it feels to be pushed away by silence?

Then what she had actually said sank in, and he felt childish and
ashamed. This wasn't a mind game he was playing with some date. This was
his best friend.  The one person he trusted. One of the finest,
strongest people he knew. And by God, she knew him, knew exactly what he
was thinking, and had called him on it.

"C'mere," he said, his voice cracking slightly as he pulled her into a
kiss which was returned with a ferocious intensity.

Then abruptly, the heat between them dissipated. He closed his eyes and
was surprised to find that the action displaced two fat tears which slid
down his cheek. He felt her take his face in her hands, brush them aside
with her thumbs.

"I do love you, very much," she said. It was the same tone she had used
the first time they met. ('Actually I'm looking forward to working with
you')

A challenge. A dare. A declaration of intent.

He looked up at her again. "And you knew that didn't you, you bastard?"
she added with a faint smile, shaking her head as if despairing over a
naughty but amusing toddler.

"Always been a believer." He pulled her close and kissed the top of her
head, then rested his chin there. "So... until we next meet, Scully," he
said softly.

"I will hold you to that promise," she replied, her cheek to his chest,
one hand sliding along his bristly jaw line.

The next time he glanced at the clock showed their countdown was over.
He looked into her eyes and they nodded at each other. Then she pulled
the hood up over her hair, picked up the rucksack, and they left her
apartment to go jogging together, as they had every day for the past
three weeks.

-------------------------------------

Mrs. Horvath always shopped for milk and bread this early on Saturdays;
she had grown up in a small village and crowds drove her crazy. Besides,
she had bought fresh bread for George's breakfast every Saturday for 37
years, and even now he had passed on it was a hard habit to break.

She would usually be finished by 8:30am and on her way home with some
small treat for herself   perhaps a couple of candy bars or a muffin or
two   and a tin of something tasty for her cat Mookie.

She was trying to decide on Mookie's present when she saw the couple out
front.

She shook her head at their foolishness. It was lucky they were wearing
hooded shirts or their hair would be soaked. Even though she had been a
US citizen for the past 40 years she still caught herself shaking her
head and muttering "Americans!" every time she saw some young person do
something silly.

Like these two for example. What sort of idiots went out jogging in this
weather? They'd catch their deaths.

"Honey, we need milk," the man said. Why was he talking so loud?

They pushed open the door and as they walked in, his hand moved to the
small of her back. The gesture made them exchange tender looks.

Mrs. Horvath smiled and turned her attention back to the crucial
question of the day: can of tuna or gourmet rabbit-flavoured kitty
chunks?

She saw them nod at the nice young clerk who looked so much like George
had back when he was in his first year at the university in Szeged. His
Adam's apple bobbed like a yo-yo as he acknowledged them with a little
bow of his head. Now Mrs. Horvath's curiosity was piqued; she knew the
clerk was a friendly sort and that was most definitely not his usual
greeting.

Instead of going to the dairy section, the man guided her towards the
back, where the packets of pasta and bags of rice jostled for shelf
space. The woman looked surprised and a little annoyed as he led her to
the out of the way corner that was the one blind spot in the in-store
security system.

It was also very close to the pet food section, Mrs. Horvath noted with
satisfaction.

The couple were bedraggled and the woman in particular was very pale and
tired-looking. "What, Mulder?" she said, sounding worried.

"You keep going. Promise?" he said urgently.

"Mulder..." she began, as though this were a long-running argument. Mrs.
Horvath peered between the cans of dog food and wished she could see
more of their faces.

"You promise," he insisted. "No heroics." The tall man was gripping her
wrists so tightly that whiteness was welling in the skin around each of
his fingertips.

"Okay I promise. I promise," she whispered quickly. "Now let go or we'll
mess this up."

The man looked into her eyes for so long that Mrs. Horvath thought he
had not heard the woman's words. "Okay then, Scully, " he said finally,
bowing his head as though acceding to a higher power.

With a final look around her to check that no one was watching, the pale
woman took his face in both hands and kissed him fiercely. "Two weeks,"
she hissed. "I'll see you in two weeks.Don't stand me up."

She hugged him tightly and then moved to leave but neither seemed to
want to loose their hold on the other. Finally he let his hands drop.

"Don't wait for me to follow right after you," he said. "You get going.
I'll hang around for a couple of minutes. Less suspicious."

She nodded and, without a second glance, slipped through the door the
clerk held open that led to the storeroom and the alley out back.

The man's face remained impassive but Mrs Horvath saw that his hands had
curled tightly into fists.

A moment later a second woman, wearing identical clothing to the pale
woman, entered the shop through the back door. She was followed by a
bearded fellow, who was wearing the same jogging outfit as the tall man.
At first glance, the two could have been brothers, though on closer
inspection they were only a similar height and build.

"Change of plan," the tall man said and pointed at the woman who had
just stepped in. "I only need you."

She shrugged. She was almost the same height as the woman who had
vanished through the door moments before, though she was younger and
less pretty. Once she pulled up the hood though, the resemblance was
close.

Then he turned to the bearded man accompanying her. "Go. Tell the guys
thank you, and not to worry." The lookalike appeared surprised but
smiled and disappeared through the back door again.

"Ready?" he asked the woman. She nodded. "Then let's go."

The moment they were out of the door, they were running at a blistering
pace.

The storeroom door flapped open and for a second Mrs Horvath caught a
glimpse of the pale woman, wearing a black jacket now, out in the alley
behind the shop. She was climbing into a battered grey car. Then it
swung shut again and she was left staring into the face of the clerk. He
looked terrified, his eyes flickering to her face, then down to the
counter and then to the door.

Mrs Horvath had lived under the fascists and the communists. She and
George had fled from Vojvodina after the wartime massacres and found a
home in Budapest where, for a few precious years, they had thought they
were safe. When it all fell apart in 1956, and the Russian tanks were
reducing to rubble any building from which a shot had been fired, she
and George had given up on home and set their sights on the border.

No one would think it to look at her now, but she had once known what it
was like to sneak over fields and run through ditches, the hem of her
coat hanging heavy with sewn-in gold, just one suitcase and a carpetbag
carrying their entire life.

She had lived in terror of the flicker of a car headlight or the rasp of
a rifle bolt being drawn back. Of never knowing whether the next person
you saw would run to call the authorities or let you pass safely. You
never forgot the expressions on the faces of your fellow fugitives.

She knew she had worn the same look of fear for George that she had seen
in the pale woman's face for her lover.

Mrs Horvath was well-acquainted with the idea that some things were not
meant to be seen. She gave a crooked grin to the clerk and patted his
hand as she paid for her groceries.

Just a helpless old lady, buying treats for her cat.

-------------------------------------

The woman left by the front door, her long, dark brown hair trailing
over her shoulders, wearing one of Scully's most expensive suits,
another tucked in her bag. Scully would have been mad but he figured
waste not, want not.

He had thanked the woman before she left and she looked at him,
appraising him until he felt uncomfortable. "No problem," she drawled,
shooting a suggestive glance in his direction. "Any time. It was fun."

He never asked her name. Safest not to, really.

Now he was alone with the ticking of the clock; the humming of the
refrigerator and the drumming of the rain on the windows.

Less than 24 hours to go.

He wanted to go shave but his hands wouldn't stop shaking.

-------------------------------------

At 7am on Sunday morning, right on schedule, the bell rang. He heard
footsteps clanging on the fire escape outside the window. After a
minute, a five-strong tactical team bust open the door locks to find
Mulder lying on the sofa in a crumpled suit. "It's open," he called
sarcastically.

His heart pounded like a techno beat as two men dragged him to his feet.
True to the cliche, all five intruders wore black suits. They strode
arrogantly through the apartment, kicking open the doors.

The face of the tall, balding man who appeared to be in command hardened
as each member of his team returned to the living room and shook his
head.

"Where is she?"

"Sorry, she popped out for breakfast. Didn't she let you know?" The slap
blindsided him.

The commander appeared to consider and pulled a portable radio from his
pocket. There were a few brief expletive-laden exchanges; Mulder assumed
they were with the men outside the front and basement entrances.

"You came to *us*, Mr Mulder,"  he said finally, trying to load his
voice with menace. "You were told what the deal was and what the
penalties would be for both of you if you tried to go back on it. Now I
think it's time for you to tell us where she is."

"You think I'd trust you to let her go afterwards?" Mulder sneered,
putting a hand to his aching jaw. "You only get me. She's gone, you
fucker."

"Gone where?"

"Ask Tweedledum and Tweedledee out there." Mulder jerked his head
towards the street. "They were supposed to be making sure we didn't
run."

Another smack, so hard it knocked him back onto a chair, which then
toppled backwards. As the back of his skull hit the floor, Mulder's
vision fizzed the grey-white of a static-filled TV screen.

"Careful, Raker, we need his head intact," the balding man said, then
left a dramatic pause. "The rest is fair game."

Mulder snorted at this piece of machismo and blinked as the ceiling swam
into focus. "No need to get violent," he muttered.

The tactical team fanned out in the small apartment, sweeping her vases
and lamps onto the floor and tipping out the contents of her drawers and
cupboards. One man was going through all the papers in the drawers of
Scully's desk, shovelling them into brown boxes. There was the cymbal
crash of smashing glass from the kitchen. It was supposed to intimidate,
he supposed, but it actually cheered him up to think that they were
frustrated enough to indulge this sort of pointless display.

Then, there was a murmur of excitement from the kitchen. "We found this,
sir," said one of the tactical team, a younger man who sounded keen and
green. The commander looked and nodded his approval as the scorched
metal trash can was pulled from its hiding place and carted downstairs.

Two men pulled him upright again, one of them, Raker, sneaking in a
punch to the kidneys. Then they cuffed his hands behind his back and
began to pull him out of the door of his second home.

He stole once last glance at the clock on Scully's mantlepiece and
finally, he permitted the picture to appear in his brain.

Scully in her airline seat now, looking porridge-pasty and sweat-sheened
as she always did when they faced a long flight, her knuckles white
against the armrests as the 747 lumbered into the air in a chemical
haze. Acting cranky with perky stewardesses. Grumbling about the food.
Wishing he was there so they could swap sarcastic little comments.

Gone. Safe.

It might only be a temporary reprieve, until They came, but he loved the
thought that Scully was still out there...

Somewhere, a part of him gave way and he realised he didn't give too
much of a fuck about any of it any more. There was just one thing left
that he had to do.

He had always promised it to himself, and it would piss them off
beautifully.

He gave the balding man an almost delirious smile.

"Take me to your leader," he said.

---------------------------------------------------
ends
---------------------------------------------------
Obligatory bit at the bottom:

I know Scully has a fireplace in WotC but I just like freestyle arson
better.  Thanks to those without whom... Tuatha for being so kind and
perceptive, Meggo for her incisive comments and for catching my "that"
addiction.

I'm still new at this so all comments, including (especially?)
criticisms, welcomed at marasmus@my-deja-com or marasmus_k@yahoo.com
Should you wish to archive, just contact me.
(Appropriate soundtrack list available on request <g>)