ALL HALLOW'S EVE IV: MIRACLES (10/18) By Sue Esty (AKA Windsinger) For Disclaimer see chapter 1 Chapter 10a: Dana The distance Ellie has wrapped me in is not all of a piece. Sometimes I exist as in a cloud. Sometimes as if I were walking in a fog or in a dream. Sometimes the distance is so great it is as though I exist in a world of one. At the beginning I seethed with insulted indignation but that kind of anger won't last, besides Ellie assured me patiently that this is temporary. She needs a few hours so she can concentrate and do her work and on most levels I believe her - as if I had any choice. Nothing to do then but peer through this frosted glass and attempt to make out what the shadowy forms I can see represent. One image which I wish had not been so clear is that of a dark figure alternately pushing and pulling itself along the floor at my feet. Ellie stood nearby so still that she was as invisible to him as a ghost. Upon waking from Ellie's conjured dream, or perhaps still in it, Joseph left the big bed, dressed in the big cavern with aching and awkward slowness, and was on his way outside even though it is barely dawn. What business he has, I have no idea. By the time Ellie has gathered some items from the kitchen and follows, he is by the platform in the clearing. He's searching for something in one of the big storage containers. Even in the gray dawn light I can recognize the components as he pulls them out. They are all part of the scanner Skinner had brought. Ellie moves softly towards the opening to the path I came in on yesterday so we are well out of sight before Joseph manages to clumsily don the power pack and head gear. Even from this distance I can hear the sharp intake of breath and his low twisting moan as the electrodes start shooting images into his brain. Ellie is out for a long walk and to my profound irritation she doesn't hurry. Her wanderings take her first one way and then the other. As she goes, she reaches for the occasional leaf. Sometimes she bends and digs for a root. She doesn't travel in a straight line but still has some destination in mind. At its end I realize that she is heading towards her car. Skinner had ridden with her the day before. Since Joseph was still being sought with some fervor by the Consortia, Center staff tried to keep their trips to the cave random and changed vehicles whenever possible. It made sense then that he had taken advantage of having Ellie's car available. When he realized that Ellie would be staying the night, he had radioed Helen and asked her to pick him up from a side road some miles away. Arriving at the car, Ellie went to the trunk and took out a tripod, a black iron pot and some other mysterious items and proceeded to make a small fire. Only dimly can I feel its warmth and sense its wavering light. As she chants in that tongue I don't understand, she cooks, throwing in at odd times and with more chanting the withered fruits of the long winter and the fresh ones of the new spring which she had gathered on her way. She concentrates on her work with a single-minded devotion. As if she has forgotten me entirely, there are no hourly updates, no little reassurances. All I know is that whatever she is brewing is a mixture of strong, sharp odors. As distanced as I am, I can still feel how its fumes sting her skin and make her eyes water. After what seems hours it boils down into what can fit into a large jar about the size of a sack of flour. She pours it in and, while it cools, extinguishes the fire and puts away her implements. I ask. <> I demand to know. <> is all the answer I get. In response to my anxiety she dampers me way down. All I know is that she must be capable of ignoring me entirely, for while I'm still complaining she curls across the back seat of her car and goes to sleep. * * * * * * * Chapter 10b: Mulder The ground is soft and almost muddy. These last dozen yards or so I've felt the dampness sucking into my clothes as I twist and pull with my nearly useless arms and twist and push with my equally useless legs. Tired does not begin to describe how this body feels but I cannot stop now even if I wanted to. The seductive quality of the dream has faded, but not the pattern it has written inside me. This is how a salmon must feel, compelled, helpless before unreasoning instinct. I know that this will not be over until I've fulfilled all that is written in the plan. I just hope that, like the salmon, the main purpose of all this is not just to mate and die. If so, my assigned mate is in for a disappointment because this body has been sterile for years even if anyone would want these hybrid genes. Because of the Lone Gunman's newest invention, my head aches even worse than this reject of a body even though my 'eyes' are switched on only about a tenth of the time. I have been crawling for nearly four hours. There is mud under my fingernails and on my face and, despite the physical effort required, I'm shivering as the cool air tries to dry my sweat and mud-dampened clothes. The pale morning sun doesn't help much except to tell me that it's well past dawn. The path under my hands has narrowed but under its scattering of last year's leaves it is hard-packed from the time it was frequently used. When the land begins to slope consistently downhill I grit my teeth and turn on the scanner's power pack. Mentally squinting through the blinding headache, I eventually make sense of all the ghostly forms. There's the rock with its almost unnatural stairway and to the left - that must be the bank below which flows the stream. I push the glasses up onto the top of my head after that. They've served their purpose. I've found the place from my dream. I need only manage a few more yards. Calculating that I've covered that stretch of ground, I reach out and down with my hand and all too quickly feel the wet chill of the water and a surprising current. The stream is here, but from the force of its flow and the nearness of the water level to the bank it's no stream today. It must be a small river and even colder than I remember. Of course, there had been rain two days before. Skinner had complained about some washed out roads. Such a storm at this time of year would have gone a long ways towards melting the remaining snow in the higher elevations and the more shadowed ravines. I had been stuck inside for days as the cold front slowly passed, which was why I had been working so contentedly outside in the sun when Skinner and Ellie came visiting. From the exertion of the past hours and the emotional high of having made it this far, my heart is pounding. Now what? I turn towards the rock, not that I can see it, but because it must be there looming over me to my right. Follow the events of the dream. Once I've reached its base, I remove Frohike's contraption entirely and pile its parts in a dry spot. I've sweated under the leather cap so the spring air is refreshingly sharp as it stirs my wet hair. Now I begin to climb, which is not such a different process than my lizard navigation, only more vertical. It proves more difficult than I thought, steeper and more smooth, but finally I haul myself over the lip and onto the nearly flat surface at the top. It's nothing like making it onto the big bed in Joseph and Sara's room. The granite is rough under my scraped and bruised hands but gratefully has warmed under the sun more than the rain-sodden ground. Somehow I rise to my knees. The breeze is stronger here, fresh and invigorating. In my mind I see two streams spread out before me. I see the stream as it was in my dream, quietly flowing by. Inviting. But I also see it as it must be from having touched it with my hand only moments before, higher than I had ever seen it, rolling and plunging in a spring flood. Despite the fact that through my knees I can feel the vibration of the rock as it resists the pressure of the water, it's the first image that persists. How can I say what happens next? Actually, describing is easy, explaining why would be impossible. More salmon logic? The lingering seduction of the dream? No, in the end I'd like to believe that it is my spooky sense which tells me that this is what was meant to be. I've learned to listen to that sixth sense over the years - to keep me safe, to know where the bad guys are, where there is danger. Doesn't mean I always heed it, but I'm warned. Over the past few months it has become in large part my eyes and ears. I trust it, and, trusting, I quite simply scoot to the rock's edge and push myself off. For a heartbeat I hung suspended in the air. Won't I be surprised if I've rolled off this nice safe rock only to plummet a hundred or more feet to my death. I calm the panic with the memory of that vibration under my knees. There must be water here. It occurs to me a microsecond too late that there may be a bit too much water. It would take tons of water rushing against a rock this size to make it vibrate. Water has power. Didn't it cut the Grand Canyon, literally shaping the earth? My flight of faith comes to an end as I hit the water which, I must admit, happens rather sooner than I expected. I know that I didn't have time to take a good breath. When the COLDNESS of it hits me like the slap of a huge hand, I realize that any breath I would have taken would have been knocked out anyway. Certainly the cold has temporarily stilled my heart. Why the hell have I done this anyway? I mean my life was bad but not completely without hope. Whatever the reason, it couldn't possibly have been strong enough. What if I died here? I have never felt any serious desire to commit suicide and I wouldn't want either Scully or Skinner to think that I had. I go under, no surprise there. The icy water locks onto my skin, goes into my mouth, into my ears, freezes my eyes. Fuckinshit but it's cold. Where's the surface? I'm in complete darkness, of course, and the current is so strong that I don't know which way is up. The starving ache builds up and up in my chest. It's like knives are stabbing me in my ears. I should open my mouth and swallow to equalize the pressure but I'm terrified that if I tried the force of the river and my body's uncontrollable need to breathe will drown me. The only good thing I notice as I fight to find the surface is that my headache is gone. To add to this tricky problem of searching for air, I'm burdened by the fact that I now swim about as well as a four branched stick does but without the buoyancy. This means not very well at all. There's also the current which is far, far stronger than I expected even from dipping my hand in the flow earlier. I am tumbling faster and faster in the churning water. A rock catches me in the ribs, another on the hip. This is not just a flood, this is a torrent, a rapid. I am swept helplessly away from the area of pool in my dream. Dozens of yards every second. I'll be miles down stream before I get out at this rate. On the other hand I won't need to worry about that if I can't get to the surface for a breath soon. My lungs are past aching for want or air. They are burning. Panic seizes me. I must MOVE. I Reach UP with those rigid, nearly useless arms, push OFF with those equally useless legs. It's my spine that cracks first as I rear my head up for just a moment when I sense the surface near. I feel the fused bones snap. Only the knowledge that opening my mouth will certainly drown me keeps me from screaming. I'll save the screaming for later. I find the surface. My mouth stretches open like a starving baby bird. When my ears pop it's like an explosion but at least I get a gulp of half air, half water before I am spun around by a mini-whirlpool and pulled down again. Before I can rise, I am caught underwater at the waist by a thick post which is fixed somehow to other debris. Rapidly blackening terror overcomes pain and I heave away at the post, pushing my body back against the current in order to free myself. The strain on my right elbow nearly fixed at a ninety degree angle is horrible. It snaps. I can practically hear that brittle sound which is astounding considering that I'm not only distracted by a pain, which is indescribable, but because the river is roaring so loudly in my ears. The right knee goes next and then the hip. I am on fire from the pain which I realize the numbing cold actually helps. More importantly, I'm finally free of the post. I use it now as an anchor to push against. I find the rolling, washing machine action of the surface. Sweet stuff which is actually more air than water this time is sucked down into my starved lungs. I cling to the post for, as they say, my dear life, certainly for my skin, but the current is relentless. The other hip joint and knee, which I thought were fused nearly solid, are ripped free at a time when I really needed their rigidity. I am below the surface again and tumbling now like a broken toy further and further from where anyone will ever look for me. Not in time anyway. I am battered by a series of rocks in this stretch of the rapids and slashed once across the chest by something sharp. My old enemy barbed wire, perhaps? I get a gulp of air here and there. I am fading in and out of consciousness. By now all the minor joints have broken lose, all the little bones in my hands and feet, wrists and ankles now float free though my extremities are so numb that I don't remember feeling each individual bit of agony at the time. They do respond to my will, however, as I push away at the debris that batters me but, they are like tools which have no feeling. Thank fickle Fate, I am in the free flowing part of the stream now, going a little slower and with no obstructions, though by now I wonder if I have enough strength to raise my head. Always too dense to be much of a floater, with all the water in my belly and probably my lungs, I know what the Titanic must have felt like towards the end. I feel a different darkness descending, my world closing in until only the tiniest pinprick of awareness remains. No! I won't die. I can't, not like this. If I did, Scully's going to be really pissed that she came all this way for nothing. With that encouraging thought I know I must break free of this downward spiral, this deadly passivity. In order to release the adrenaline surge which I need to hold on for just a little while longer, I crack the fusion in my last major joint, my left elbow, all by myself. While red lightning going off all along my left side, I somehow get my head up. Air again for my aching lungs. The river is quieter than before and over its more distant thunder someone is crying, sobbing. I am. I am so tired and so cold, I want this to be over. Within seconds I feel a pressure of something large on my right. The surface is prickly, somewhat sharp - but most important of all - it's solid and not showing any inclination to go anywhere. I am caught on a mass of flotsam and jetsam, mostly roots and dirt. Always loved that chapter in the Rings trilogy. Such wonderful words. They are wonderful here. The mass stop my helpless flight. Somehow I find the strength to heave myself up so that my head and one arm are above the surface. I am overcome with the simple relief of not moving. After a few minutes to cough a lot of flood water out of my lungs and breath in some dry air, I take stock. My limbs are limp and floating free, though so numb from the icy water that I can barely feel them. Still, it is so odd a sensation after being locked in my tree shape for so long that I don't know what parts are supposed to move like that and which are broken. Of course, I am still in darkness so I am without direction except for up and down, and upstream and downstream. Which is the shortest way to solid ground? And even if I manage to make it to land, will there be any people nearby? The cave was selected for its solitude. I'll be a sight staggering into someone's kitchen. I've lost nearly all my clothes so there's this mixture of greenish and Scots-Jewish skin to explain, though with all the bruises and contusions I've received in the last few minutes I probably won't need to. If I'm bleeding, though, that's a problem for my would-be rescuers. But I'm thinking far ahead of myself. Land first, and I don't have the time to wait for the level of the stream to fall. Long before that I will die here of hypothermia. Just now, however, I am incapable of finding the strength to move. I'm still having trouble controlling my limbs, too. After months of being carved into that single curled and rigid shape my hands and feet seem miles away. After a while I give up trying. I am so tired. If it weren't for the support from the roots of this mammoth tree there would be no way to keep my head up. Love that good solid feel of natural wood. The pile of debris must be much more extensive then just my root ball protector. There seems to be a kind of harbor here for the current is slight. As the minutes pass and my heart slows, I begin to think that I was wrong about how cold the water is. I am almost comfortable and having gone way past exhausted it is pleasant just to lie here. I think I will sleep a little. I do that and the darkness becomes entire. It is a voice that wakes me. It is calling sweetly, "Mulder, wake up, damn you!" It is far way and a little fuzzy because there is still water in my ears. My impression is that the voice has been calling for some time, but I'm still having trouble finding the strength or will to move. The voice seems suddenly nearer but then I may have faded out for a while. Certainly the tone is familiar. Scully's voice? Could it...? A little energy spurts though me making my legs and arms tingle. All at once I want to go to that voice but first there's this little problem of extracting myself from my jealous tree stump lover. A few seconds later and I wish I had stayed with my faithful friend. I literally flounder in the tide. Only a few feet from the tree the river becomes interesting again, full of current and eddies and undertow. It's not anywhere near as bad as it had been upstream but too much for me. My arms and legs are useless, as weak as water, and I go under. It is almost pleasant to give up if for no other reason than to die knowing someone has come for me. Then arms catch me, warm, urgent arms which hold my face above the flood and pull me crosswise to the current. I wonder if it is the Nexie of the Mill Pond come to capture for herself a human lover. Big surprise she's going to get. * * * * * * * * Chapter 10c: Dana Ellie overslept. I know she has because when she did wake she sprang up like a deer, grabbed her jar of potion and the armload of blankets she had pulled from the trunk and took off back towards the cave at a dead run. In her haste, she forgot to phase me out so I stay quiet because I am as eager as she to get to wherever she is going. To Joseph, I'm certain. We don't pause at the cave but take another path. I know this path. I know where it leads. To the stream. The grass is new and long and not much used but something has dragged itself along it not so very long ago. The stream is a quarter of a mile from the cave. The trip must have taken him hours but still we arrive too late, in other words, we slide into view just in time to see a dark form disappear from the rock which overlooks the stream. There's a solid splash. Even over the rush of the water, which is thunderous because the stream is running nearly at flood stage, I hear that splash. We run past the foot of the rock and the neatly piled components of the scanner Skinner had brought the day before. So that's why he was putting it on back there in the clearing; he needed it to find his way here. I break my silence but not intentionally. I shout to her. Ellie is concerned but light years calmer than me. <> and I feel the fog settle over me again though it's more like white noise this time, like the sound of the overgrown stream as it roars past sounding like a locomotive. With the jar still locked tight under her arm, Ellie begins to run again. Her calm quickly evaporates. I'm certain that she's miscalculated the speed and ferocity of the flood. Frantically, she begins to tear at the brush along the shore trying to keep pace as he is borne helplessly along by the rush of the water. She is chanting again and more passionately with every step. It's a pleading cry, a prayer, but to whom I have no idea. I only know that where she is going is where I would go if this were my choice. It is the chanting she is isolating me from. We can't run along the bank all the time. The lay of the land won't allow it and, besides, it is shorter to cut across bends. >From time to time, though, I still see the racing grayish-brown of the once quiet stream which has turned to raging white water. I search frantically for some glimpse of a man's dark head but there is too much debris bobbing and rolling about. Usually what I see is a log or submerged rock but at other times I see something that looks like an struggling animal. I feel Ellie's tears drying cold on her face. We are caught in a thicket. No way through without a machete or a bulldozer. Nothing to do but retrace our path and go back. It takes so long and it seems like an hour since we last saw the water. Finally we do but though Ellie stands on the bank and looks up and down there is no sign of him. At least the river is quieter here and the land more level so we can stay near the edge. We begin running again. Ellie is crying his name. I won't remind her how useless that is, how she is using up energy she may need later, but she has lost her calm just as I have found mine. I have always been good at keeping my head in an emergency, of keeping my cool while others are losing theirs. That time Mulder was dying from lack of water on that death ship, I rooted through the galley looking for fluids to save his life. That day I was the coolest mad woman you could ever hope to find. That frantic search yielded me sardine water and lemon juice and snow glob water. A disgusting concoction and never used as it turns out because Mulder insisted on maintaining his own brand of stubborn nobility. But I still remember that search. The booming of those empty kettles and pans in the deathlike quiet of that floating tomb. We are still madly searching. Only when Ellie lets me loose a little am I finally allowed to get in a few good curses of my own, but mostly I stay centered. I know that there will be time to cry and wail later. Ellie seems to feel my calm and draws on it gratefully. In growing despair, we attempt to check out every clump of debris in that broad expanse of dull water but there is so much of it. It must take us fifteen minutes to find him. A third of the way out in the center of the widening flood, his head is floating above the surface resting entangled in the roots of a tree whose foundation must have given way in the saturated ground. He is lying so quiet out there in his own little universe that I am suddenly filled with despair that we are too late. When Ellie splashes down into the water I'm certain of it. Far too long. Ellie lets me call to him though it's still her voice and 'Mulder' is what I call because I'm not thinking straight any longer and it's the name that comes most naturally to me. It never enters my head that 'Fred' would probably have as much affect. While we are still only half way to him, up to our chest in muddy water and leaning forward against the force of the flood, he stirs. He even raises his head and turns our way. How can he know? When he pushes off from the debris where he's been protected from the current, I call out for him to stop and wait for us but he keeps coming. He is not swimming strongly or well and after only a few seconds goes under. We see him disappear but almost immediately we're there. Taking a deep breathe, I duck, flailing out for him with Ellie's arms. Nothing. I kick with the current since this is the way he would be sweep along and this time when I reach out I catch hold of a long foot which is attached to a naked leg. I wrap Ellie's arms around his chill body and heave him up. As always, there's so much of him. I'll always remember the trip back. He is so waterlogged that it takes all of my strength to keep his head above water and still make progress across the current. We are both so cold that my only plan for the future is making it back to where Ellie dropped the blankets. There's little time for being grateful that we have found him alive. Not only is he alive, but he's even of some use when it comes time to get him up the bank, though he is far more helpful in the water than on land. He's so limp. He crawls a few feet and then collapses onto his face. Ellie rushes for the blankets which are a hundred yards or so upstream. It's as Ellie shakes out the first blanket that my medical eye kicks in in full. He is scratched, battered, and bruised and there's that acid scent in the air that stings my eyes from his blood but this is not too bad. All the water dampens it down. I'm rubbing one dripping arm dry with a corner of one of the blankets when I notice how long he is. He's rather like a boneless and much battered fish but at least he's stretched out and not curled into the rigid, carved toy he had been. Whether this is good or bad I don't dare guess. He collapsed onto his stomach and that's good because I don't know how much water he's swallowed, lots probably. I'll risk him throwing up on the blanket in order to take the time to roll him on his side and get a blanket between him and the damp ground. This will also give me a chance to check for injuries. He moans in response to some pretty minimal prodding. We get him on his side and after Ellie has smoothed the good sturdy wool under him, I take my hand and wipe the mud and grass from his face asking automatically, "Do you hurt anywhere?" Sightless eyes closed, he wheezes, "Everywhere." He proceeds to throw up about half a gallon of disgusting water before abruptly passing out. I lean back on Ellie's heels and let Ellie's mouth drop open. He HEARD my question! He'd heard me call to him in the river, too. I'd forgotten there at the end that he was deaf. And so he had been, but not anymore. End of Chapter 10