Bound- by Isabella. Washington D.C. FBI Building, office. 1:00 pm "It was a dark and stormy night," "It was?" she asked while sitting on his desk, her arms folded across her chest and her legs crossed. "Come on be serious." "I am....., wasn't it dark and stormy?" "No it wasn't," she answered. "Oh" She sighed and slid off the desk. She made a quick glance around the room, scanning the area for a clue. "Hey wait a minute, why am I doing this?" he asked. "We're going alphabetically tonight." "So?" "So your name come before mine, or did you skip first grade?" He sat back, "whoa someone's a bit nasty today." He put his arms behind his head as he leaned back agaist his cumfy office chair. Placing his feet up on the desk he slowly began to relax. "Sorry it's been a bad day," she said. "Yeah" "Bad week is more like it," she corrected. "Yeah" "And quiet frankly I'm sick of you." "You're what?" he said in a shocked-you-just-killed-my-puppy-way pushing forcefully away from his desk, perhaps a little too forcefully because the chair fell over as he stood up. They stood there for a while watching the little wheels spin on the toppled chair. Listening to the quiet murmur of the plastic rubbing agaist the metal wheel. "Scully," he said. She slowly looked up at him. Her eyes filled bewilderment, her mouth slightly open. "Yeah?" "Let's get out of here." "We can't Mulder, we have the........" "Yeah, yeah I know." He leaned his body up agaist the wall. Mulder quietly picked up the newspaper placed idly on his desk. His fingers grazed the edge of the pages as he perpared to flip through the morning news. Gently scaning the print for key words in his mind. "Mulder, it was your idea to do this," she said walking to the back of office then turning to face him. Mulder raised an eyebrow as he focused on the paper. "Yeah it was," it was clear he was no longer listening. "In fact YOU signed me up for this." "Scully?" he said while examining the paper closer. "Yeah?" "Is this yours?" he handed her the paper. "No I thought you bought it," she glanced at the paper. "What is it Mulder?" "Turn to page 14." She flipped the pages rapidly to the section he had specified. He watched her eyes move up and down the page and stop suddenly. She looked up, "Where did this come from?" He gestured to the desk. She smiled bitterly and glanced back down at the paper. "Food poisening plague rages through community," she read it out loud and looked up at him. "FDA called into inspect possible cause." Mulder nodded as she looked up at him skeptically. "So?" "So?" he repeated, shock by the fact that she didn't grasp the importance of this devolpment. "Scully have you gone color blind? It's circled in red." "Yeah, and?" "And what about the word...," he used his finger to pinpoint the location of the item. "Alpha-pac written next to it?" "Mulder I can't even begin to list all the possible...." "Plausible explainations, blah blah blah." She frowned, "possible ways this could be significant." A tiny smirk appeared on her face. He turned away for a moment, then turned sharply around and pointed at her. "You did that on purpose," he said. "Of course I did, but would you rather be interviewed for some book about the thrilling life of an FBI agent?" Mulder thought for a moment, considering the possibility of sitting in a room telling his most thrilling, patriotic, anti-X file story to an overworked, underpayed, struggling author who was just out to make a quick buck on yet another 'FBI tell-all' book. Even when he couldn't seem to remember whether or not is was raining. "Let's go." He grabbed his jacket off the coat rack and quickly headed for the door. "Hey remember," she called out to him. He turned around, his eyes connecting with hers. "Yeah?" "It was your stupid idea." Tibsignroh, Ohio Highway 82 9:00 pm. Scully yawned and tried to adjust her sit so it was more confortable. "I hate Ohio," she said yawning again, "barren waste land." "Oh you're just cranky," Mulder squinted through the fierce rain. "Hey Scully does this count as dark and stormy?" "Ha ha ha," she sat up to get a better look at him. "Mulder, whatever made you want to do something like that?" "Like what?" "Inside the FBI- shocking stories from real agents." "I don't strive to be weird, Scully. I do indulge in the normal activities of life." "I know," she nestled herself back into the reclined chair. He nervously shifted in his seat. "You know?" "I always have the room next to yours remember?" "Oh," he swallowed sharply. "Can't trust those motel rooms, the walls are paper thin." "Yeah, you know what Scully I'm getting a pretty good picture right now no need to go on." A small truck approached them from the left side. It was plain grey, and when they passed it the head light illuminate some wording. In big bold red letters on the side it read 'Alpha-pac'. Mulder and Scully exchanged indentical glances. Mulder grabbed the wheel of the car and did a complete U-turn as the car truck passed them. The tires screeked as the car balanced its weight and resisted flipping over. It gently rocked back into a centered position as the truck started to accelerate. Mulder turned to Scully, "you ready for a wild ride?" She sat up, pulling the lever that forced the reclined seat into the upright position. Mulder pressed the gas petal to keep up with the truck. The rain poured down harder, banging agaist the windsheild. The tires sprayed water droplets into the moist air. The black Oldsmoblie melted with the ground, running so close to the road you could feel the texture of the asphalt rattle the windows. Scully wiped some condensation off the windshield. She almost pressed her face up agaist the glass. "Mulder....., there's something, yes there is something leaking from that truck." "What is it?" "I can't tell, there's too much moisture everywhere. Mulder, did you ever take machanics in high school?" "No, why?" "Because I'm not sure but I think that's oil leaking." Mulder looked through the windsheild, "Shit Scully talk about your bad luck." "What?" He motioned to the driver side of the truck. The nervous driver puffed away at a cheap cigarette. The mix of ass and live amber was consuming the rest and growing into an unstable mass. "Mulder I think it would be a good time to pull over." "I think you're right." He tighten his hold on the wheel, and for a while seconds seemed to go by like hours. Mulder turned the wheel, and the car began to shift to the left. With all the motion Scully could still see the driver accelerate and flick his cigarette. The ambers floated quickly down to the road that was slick with oil. Their car began to lose traction, and shifted erractically back and forth. Mulder turned the wheel harder just as the discarded ash hit the oil laced road. Whosh, flames sweeped around the car. They barely grazed the surface before Mulder swerved to the left and slammed on the brakes. The fire spread down the road and moved up towards its origin. Quickly the flames jumped to the truck. In one massive split second the truck was globbled up by oblivion. Tibsignroh, Ohio Jefferson motel 11:20 pm Scully rested on her back, enjoying the soft bed. She stared up at the ceiling listening to the sound of the massager bed bumping agaist the wall in Mulder's room. At least she hoped it was the massager. The rain streamed down the window of her room. Thunder crashed in the distance. Scully was alone in the darkness, consumed by her thoughts, poundering the general existence of this moment. The moment where everything is just so quiet that mind, body, and soul stir together and conspire for variety. Such moments where one is forced to ponder the mysteries, stillness, frailness, and general random nature of life. Headlights passed the window, flickering a distraction into her nitch. Again headlights spread their light through out her space. It was annoying and it made it increditably hard to drift slowly off, but It's nothing that couldn't be solved by closing the blinds. Her body felt weak, tried from a long week or stressed over the developments in life that she did not ask for, did not strive for, did not want blessed upon her. A third car disturbed her thoughts, but this time the invasion did not pass. Instead it lingered, the light flowing through the window and peircing everything in the room with the sharp pure white light. Scully rose from her bed and approached the window. She shielded her eyes from the light, and searched vainly for the darkness that had conforted her only a few minutes ago. The car's engine stopped suddenly, the light snapped off. Suddenly Scully didn't know which was more blinding the light or the darkness that followed it. The car door swung open slowly, a tall light haired man emerged >from the car. Slamming the door shut he turned to Scully. The man looked at her for a moment a quickly made his way to the room next to hers, Mulder's. Scully let out a heavy sighed and crashed down on her bed. "Agent Mulder Aveon lady calling. Jesus." She rolled her eyes, sometimes Scully respected Mulder's connections, but it must be around 11:30 now. Really where did he find these people? Tibsignroh, Ohio Jefferson Motel 9:00 am "Mulder?" Scully knocked on Mulder's door. "Mulder?....Come on we need to get out?" "You want have time for breakfast we have to go now," Scully put her ear agaist the door. "Mulder? are you there?" There was no answer. Scully's hand reached out and touched the smooth doorknob. She slid her hand around and it and turned. The door swung open easily, it was unlocked. Scully placed her hand on her gun and slowly entered the room. "Mulder?" she called out. Still no answer, everything was motionless. She scanned area, checked all the rooms,and checked the windows and door. No forced entree, nothing stolen, Mulder was gone. Everything in the room was just as Mulder would have left it, except one thing was missing, Mulder. Did he leave early to brief the police on a new development? No, he hadn't even unpacked yet, his suitecase sat untouched in the closet. In fact his gun and badge were still sitting on the table next to the TV. Panic raged through her, where was Mulder? If he ran off last night after seeing that man and got him killed or worse she would have no way to help him. She wouldn't know where to start. Calmly she looked again around the room hoping for a sign, Nothing. Scully slowly began to reason with herself. "You know how Mulder is, he'll be fine. He's probably already at the crime scene." She took a deep breath and left the room. But the problem was she did know Mulder, and she didn't like this. Tibsignroh, Ohio Wheat feild 10:45 am Scully examined the body, the fresh was an unaturally blue and burned. She readjusted her uncomfortable rubber gloves. Scully looked carefully at the burns, they appeared to be chemical burns, but she could not determin what caused the skin to turn blue. It wasn't the normal shade adapted by corpses, it was much brighter. She looked around the feild, still no Mulder. To be perfectly honest she was starting to miss his endless string of impossible conclusions. "Come on what would Mulder think this was? Flesh eating virus? Alien disease? Government testing? Mutant freak preying on farmers?" She shook her head, no she was missing something. "Damn it," she swore as she threw down her forceps and probe, which she had been using to aid her first look at the body. She couldn't do the thinking for both her and Mulder. She revisted her memory of Mulder's room that morning, making a survey of the objects in the room. She was able to place everything she thought he would bring, except his phone. Was it possible that she could simply call him? It was worth I a shot, hell it was the only shot she had. She hit the speed dail on her cell phone. Silence hung on the line for a few seconds, then in it started ringing. Scully held her breath. It rang six times, then someone picked up. "Mulder?" Scully heard silence then a click. Something was wrong now she was sure of it. She looked back down at the dead body, how to start tracking Mulder? Should she even try? The detective approached her from the side. "Agent Scully? You have any idea what killed this man?" What would Mulder say here? "Yeah, I'm not completely certain yet." "OK, you want to give my men and me something to go on? I mean are we looking for a man or should I call the CDC?" "I doubt there's one man behind this," she removed her paper air flitter mask as she stood a safe distance from the body now. "But I wouldn't call the CDC just yet. Take exterme precautions, but let us look into it for a couple of days before you have the area swarming with a thousand different people distroying evidence." "Yes, ma'am" the officer replied. Scully had to admit, that felt good. But now it was time to focus and finding her partner so things could get back to normal, she could conduct the autopsy and he could ignore the local police while he searched for the truth. It didn't work very well any other way. The officer stopped her before she left, "Agent Scully?" She turned around, annoyed by another interruption. "Yeah?" she asked as she rubbed her forehead with her thumb and index fingers. "Well I thought you might want to see the caves tonight." "That's nice officer but I'm really not up for sight-seeing tonight.." "No you don't understand, this hasn't been the first time we've seen this sort of death." "What? Why didn't somebody tell us?" "Well, come to think of it, no one can remember calling you guys in the first place. But about the caves, that's were we found the first victim, what would you guys call it? patient zero?" "Ok let's go." She didn't really want to go, but what choice did she have, Mulder or no Mulder she had an investigation to finish. Tibsignroh, Ohio Greenrock caves 11:10 am Scully moved through the moist rocks, wearing a paper air flittered mask and a double set of rubber gloves. The officer had just left her at the mouth of the cave with a story about a horrible blue, burned corpse crawling toward the mouth, perhaps to escape what ever was inside these caves. The rock was brownish bronze, and moss dangled from the stone like garland on chirstmas trees. The floor was sandy, year of erosion, and the lighting was dim. Nobody had been here since they found the first body, about one and a half years ago, and what had once been a very well light tourist area was now left to rot and its light burned out bulb by bulb. She held her flashlight beam close to the ground, trying to avoid tripping. Scully walked carefully down the path way, taking samples of every life thing and every area she could think of. Anything could have caused the disease, anything could be infecting her right now. The thought made her shudder and wish she was wearing a full biohazard level 4 suite. The light got thinner til the point where even with her flashlight she had to strain to see. While she walked and took samples she thought about the name Alpha- pac. She had heard that somewhere before, but where. Scully walked slowly paying more attention to her memory than to where she was going. She didn't see that the pathway suddenly made a steep drop. Slowly she walked towards the cliff-like edge. Her foot swung over the edge and just as she realized there was no ground below her, the weight of her body pulled her into the rocky slide. She slid down the rest of the pathway, blocking rocks and dust that were flying up. The band of her air flitter snapped and the mask flew off as she decended. She tried very hard not to breath, not to inhale anything from the cave that possibly could infect her. Scully looked down and could tell that the level pathway was unstable. She was quickly approaching the end of the ride, and wasn;t looking foward to dropping through the floor. Scully crawled around for something to hang onto. In totally darkness she finally grabbed a root. It was pure chance that she would even find something like that. A few feet from the weak ground and hanging on for dearlife. Carefully she climbed down, manuevering around the flate land onto more solid ground. She had lost her flashlight, she couldn't scale the steep incline, and she couldn't hold her breath forever. If there was something in this cave that had caused the infections than Scully was screwed. She slowly exhaled and leaned her body up agaist the wall of the cave. She was so tired, and she let her body slide slowly to the floor. Scully was resting in total darkness, completely alone having some unknown agent infect her body. She could fill with each breath the cause finding life in her nutrient filled blood stream. It would wait, fester a bit, incubate in her body heat, it would use her as a host then when it had sucked everything useful up so that nothing was left but damage she would die. No, no she wouldn't. She didn't even know if the pathogen was airborne, and there was no way to confirm she had even been infected. Scully didn't even have any evidence to prove that this isn't a food poisening outbreak. She didn't know if it was a virus or bacteria and now she was wishing she had autopsied the body/ies before she had come here. She held up a small sample of moss. Reaching into her pocket, Scully pulled out a match. As she ran the match up agaist a rock it sparked and burned. Scully examined the moss. Did it have a blueish glow? No it was probably just her eyes,.... but it looked so real. Scully's hand losened and the glass tube slid out of her hand. It bounced off her body and rolled across the cave floor. Scully reached for it, falling just short of grabbing it. The match went out. Scully carefully crawled out, feeling around for the tube. She creeped her way, inching on to the unstable rock floor. Her hand probe the smooth ground. Suddenly she was not afraid of what lay in this cave, her main concern was finding what might lead to the answer as to what caused it. She heard a crack, Scully stopped in her tracks. Was the floor stable? The ground creeked again, and Scully frantically reached out. Her fingers touched the cold glass, she rapped her hand around the tube just as the floor broke. Scully fell down into the deeper darkness, landing on her hands and knees. She groaned in pain and rolled over onto her back. "Scully?" a voice called out in the darkness. Everything stopped, she stopped breathing, stopped thinking, and stopped feeling any pain. "Mulder?" she asked. "I'd know that groan of pain anywhere," he said. "So Scully how are you?" It was Mulder. "Where the hell have you been?" she asked. "Right here. Scully?" "Yeah?" "Where is here?" "You're in the lower section of the caves in Tibsignroh Ohio," she answered. Scully suddenly felt very much alone, she reached out for Mulder. "Where are you?" she called. Her hands searching for him. "Right here, keep talking" She could hear him moving towards her. She could almost feel the dust on the floor shift with his moments. Finally she touched something, "That you?" she asked. "Yeah, Scully we got to stop meeting like this." She hugged him tightly, just make sure he was really there. She couldn't she again thing, it seemed to be darker here. The darkness invaded in eyes as the pupils search for some dim illumination. "Mulder how long have you been down here?" "I don't know, I woke up here. Scully?" "Yeah?" "What's that smell?" "What smell? She suddenly realized that Mulder had probably been in a seal enivornment all this time. But he was right, the smell was stronger. She lifted her hand off the ground, something sticky was on it. Scully froze. "Scully? What's wrong?" "Nothing everything's fine," she quickly replied. Scully got a match out of her pocket. "Mulder do you have a candle?" "Yeah right next a my pocket refrigerator, hold on." His voice was playful, he was trying to make her laugh. Perhaps he could sence the amount of fear radiating from her mind. Scully struck the match, a blaze of color enlightened their whole position. Scully looked at her right hand, the moss. She must have fallen on her test tube, crashing it and infecting her. She quickly wiped the moss off and hoped that it had not been on there that long, but she knew she was wrong. As the match burned, and they run out of time, Scully got an idea. She collected the moss and slowly lowered the match. The moss blazed up, apparently the moss' chemical properties also made it very inflammable. She grabed whatever twigs or material she could find in the dust. Mulder helped her suppling everything he could find. She grabed the air filter mask, no need for this anymore, and threw it in the flames. The fire would not last for long, but for a while it was all the light they had. Scully looked up at him, it was Mulder. But how had he gotten down here? She looked around, right behind him was a small crawl space. It was steep, and judging from the bruises on his hands he might of been pushed down it. "Mulder? who brought you here?" "The last thing I remember was opening the door to a man I'd never seen before." "You never saw him before?" "Not once in my life." This changed everything, it brought raise to the conclusion that Mulder could possibily of been abducted. He seemed to read her thoughts, "this sort of thing always happens to you, must feel good to be the knight in shinning armor for once." She looked at his face, he looked almost ashamed. "Mulder," she said softly. He shook his head signaling that he didn't want to talk about it. Scully leaned back agaist the wall of the cave. Could they crawl up to the surface? If they tried to crawl up that steep slope they would lose there light, and could possible get stuck or lost. "Mulder?" "Hmmm?" he quietly hummed in responce. "I've been thinking, I certin there never was any FDA investigation. I've heard of Alpha-pac before." He lifted his head, "where?" "In a scientific journal, there was a small article about this new bacterial treatment for crops that is suppose to be harmless to humans but repulsive towards bugs and vermon. It was approved by the FDA two months ago I think." "You think this is chemical poisening Scully?" "No, I don't." She said while looking down at her hand. "Well, what then?" "They spray the crops with the chemical, some of that chemical must land in the air and isn't it possible that the wind could carry it here?" "Yeah so?" "They found one of the first victims in this cave, and look." She held out a piece of moss. "This moss looks blue doesn't it? The same color of the victim's skin. Mulder reached out placing his hand under her. He examined it, but she wouldn't let him touch the infected area. He looked up at her, "you said their skin was blue?" Scully nodded. He was quiet, letting go of her hand and just watching her for a while. She glanced nervously around the cave, trying not to look him in the eye for fear that if she did she would have to confirm what they both knew. "Oh I don't believe this," she said. "What?" "There, it's a kerosene lamp." She pointed to the mouth of the crawl space. He looked back at it, then back at her. "It can't have any oil in it, look how old it must be," he said. She wasn't really listening. She was too busy reaching if it. Her fingers stretched til they touched the smooth metal. She climbed up onto the wall, grabbing the lamp. "It has almost a full thing of oil." "You're kidding." She lit the lamp, "nope let's get out of here." Slowly she crawled through the small tunnel. She turned her head around and saw Mulder right behind her. Tibsignroh, Ohio Police station bathroom 2:30 pm Scully rubbed her skin off using the anti-bacterial soap and water. She had washed her hands so many times her skin was white. She didn't know how much of the agent had been absorbed through her skin, but she wasn't up to risk it. Scully had to be honest, when she did not die after the first twenty minutes of exposure she relaxed abit, conviced that if it didn't kill her immediately she would be ok. It was a foolish assumption that contradicted all of her medical training, but she couldn't spend that time in the cave worring about it or she might never have seen the lamp. Tibsignroh had a very small morgue that was very rarely used. It was hardly the ideal location for an inquiry into a possible outbreak, but it was what they had now. Scully walked out of the bathroom to face Mulder and the rest of her life, however long that would be. Mulder was standing in the lobby of the small police station looking down at the shinny tile floor. He look very worried, more than she thought she had ever seen him. She grabbed some sterile non-poweder gloves, pulling her hands through them, then letting the rubber go to make a loud snap. She moved towards Mulder, who was now looking up at her. "Are you sure?" he asked. "Yes," she said. "Can't someone else do it?" "What would the point be Mulder? To risk infecting others? We don't know anything about this disease and as long as we don't know anything we can't do anything." He shifted his weight, standing balanced on both legs now. Mulder looked at her for a minute, "Scully," She looked down for a moment. Mulder bent his knees slightly, arcing his back so that his glanze repositioned it self to met her. He tilted his head slightly to the right, as if by viewing her from the side was a way to sneek passed her emotions. "Scully, I thought this would be a little too hard for you." "It will be but it has to be." "No it doesn't" She looked up at him for a moment. "Mulder I need to know what's going to happen to me." There was silence, he stared at her for a while. He respected her for that but could tell she was going through a great amount of pain. She looked down briefly again. "I don't trust someone else telling me their interpretation of what might happen to me. I have to see it for myself so that I can come to believe it and handle it." He nodded, Mulder had to respect that. Scully slowly walked towards the morgue. She reached out her hand and touched the swinging metal door, pushing it ever so slightly and slipping through it. She entered the morgue, the body layed on the table, motionless and blue. She reached out and touched the cold skin, it jumped. The arm spasmed off the table when she touched it with her right hand. Tibsignroh, Ohio police station 4:00 pm Mulder looked at what looked like bacteria under the microscope. He blinked, scewing the his vision. Mulder had been staring at the microbe of 15 minutes and his eyes were going. Mulder pulled away from the microscope, rubbing his eyes. It was the bacteria that made the moss blue. The bacteria feed off the moss, thriving on it's energy. Did this bacteria feed off of the victims, was it feeding off Scully right now? Scully brust through the metal door connecting the morgue to the police station. She walked quickly up to Mulder. "Electricution," she sighed. "What?" Mulder asked. "Those men didn't die of an infection they died of internal electricution." "INTERNAL electricution? You think someone trying to cover their tracks?" "No Mulder," she said. "No." "Why not?" he said a little hurt and a little interested in her opinion. He tilted his head to one side slightly, watching for her reaction. She begin to walk back towards the wall, Mulder followed behind her. "Because Mulder the burned tissue stretched throughout the GI track, including the small intestine and large intestine. It....Mulder it almost looks like this man just had a powersurge. "Ouch." "That had to be the understatment of the year." "Could all this have been caused by this?" He asked while handing her the slide. She walked over to the microscope, focusing it first and staring at the samples. Her head slowly came up and her face was filled with terror. "Mulder I think I have a theory." He leaned up agaist a metal table then realized that it contained a body and quickly jumped back. Mulder stared at the body for a minute then turned his attention back to her, "you were saying?" "Alpha-pac spreads 'safe' bacteria treatment of crops." "So?" "So, bacteria has been known to swap genes." He approached her carefully, "are you saying that this," he motioned to the slide, "Is the product of the Alpha-pac bacteria mutating into a new strain?" "And I think that Alpha-pac is trying to cover it up before the bad press gets out of hand." "What makes you think that?" She held up a copy of the local paper, a small headline read 'New crop treatment put on hold'. She smiled slightly, he held onto the smile hoping it would last. She took a sample from the stomach lining, placing it on a slide and a drop of slide gel. Slowly placing the cover slip and placing it on the stage of the microscope. Mulder just watched her doing her working, wanting to touch her popping the bubble of fear. Scully always drew into herself and Mulder wanted to be her support just once. "Mulder, look at this." He moved over to her side, Mulder looked into the microscope. He could see the tissue sample, but then there was something that was bonded to it. It was blue, and Mulder didn't need Scully's scientific background to know what it was. "It looks like it bonds to the cell." Scully ran to the closet. "Come on, Come on," she said. She quickly grabbed a battery, a volt meter, and some wire. Scully took a sample of the bacteria sticking the volt meter in it. She looked up at Mulder, her eyes were as wide as dinner plates. "Mulder this stuff produces over 200 volts of electricity." "Wow he must of had one hell off static cling." "I think I'm starting to understand what happended here, these people ingested the bacteria which bonded to their tissue and was absorbed through the blood stream. From there the bacteria multiplied and spread to the other organs." "Scully, you should see the doctor." "Mulder I think we shuld talk to these Alphac-pac people." "Dana please," "Mulder there is no evidence to conclude that this bacteria is absorbed through the skin, and if I go to a doctor now I'll be taken off the case and probably isolated as a precaution." "So it's better to risk everyone's safety so you can confront your immotality?" She frowned and looked hurt and angry. "Mulder," anger raising in her voice. "You'd do the same in a second, in fact you have several times, I'm going to find out what this is and I don't need this bullshit from you." He watched her storm out of the building. Mulder couldn't move, he wanted to run after her, but his body wouldn't relent to his will. After a few moments of just staring at the door she had just left, he finally got the strength to lift his leg. He ran into the parking lot. And there she was, standing next to their rental car her head in her hands, in such distress that she didn't even notice his presence. Mulder walked up slowly behind her, just watching her perhaps trying to read her mind, to understand what she was going through. He couldn't really, but if they were going to work together he would have to try. He wrapped his arms around her, "I'm sorry." he whispered in her ear. "You're right, It's just who's going to tell me I'm wrong when you're," he stopped not wanting to say it. "Scully who will keep the balance if I lose you?" She was quiet, staring down at the ground. "The balance," she said softly. "Without the contrast of your skeptism i think I'd become completely consumed by my mission and lose touch with what I'm trying to do. Scully without you I'm not a member of the sane community. You keep me human." She let a laugh escape from her fear as she broke anyway from him. "I think that it's time to solve this case, Mulder." "Me too." She opened the car door, agaisted the driver seat, and got in. Scully looked at him again this time she smiled a little. Mulder tried to smile back, but he was too nervous. Unknown location in Ohio Alpha-pac headquaters 6:00 pm Mulder turned the knob to the entrance of the warehouse. He glanced at Scully who nodded. He swung the door open, entering with his gun drawn. He took two steps into the warehouse than lowered his weapon. "Damn," he said. Scully entered behind him, looking around the room she to put away her weapon. The whole warehouse was empty, not a single box, crate, or scap was left behind. She looked around the room again. "Mulder look," "What is it?" he said turning to her. "The freezers are still here." She gestured in the direction of the large silver doors. They had been cleaned recently and sparkled and shined. "I don't know Scully looks like they clean them out too." "Maybe that's just what they want us to think." She walked swiftly towards the doors. Pulling open the first one, empty. She moved to the second, empty as well. Scully looked back at Mulder, who shrugged then walked up next to her pulling the third door open. She looked at him gratefully, they were a team again. Mulder moved to the fourth freezer, he tried to pull it open, but it wouldn't budge. He looked back at Scully who gave him the seem suspicious gaze. "Looks like someone's hiding something," he said to her. "Mulder this freezer is set for below -20C it's normal for it to seal shut when slammed." He looked back at her like he had been abandoned all of a sudden. She stared right back smiled and said, "for contrast remember?" He smiled, "help me get this open." She grabbed the handle with him. Mulder prepared his body to pull the freezer out of the wall if need be. "On three ok?" he said. "One, two, THREE." They tugged at the door with all their combined strenght. They pulled harder, and harder until the door popped open. Both Mulder and Scully fell to the ground as the freezer door swung open. "Well, that was fun," Mulder said looking at Scully for a reaction. But Scully was memorized by what was contained in the freezer. She stood up and walked slowly into the fringed environment. "My God," she whispered to herself. "Mulder come here." He got up off the floor and moved slowly into the freezer, checking that the door wouldn't close behind them. He looked into the room for the first time and saw what she was referring to. The selves were filled with body parts in jars. The parts in question had all been exposed to the bacteria. Wires emerged from each bottle. "What do the wires do?" "I...I think they are powering this building with the electricity produced by the bacteria." "Wow what's next telephone lines using seaslugs?" Scully ignored his comment, she looked down at her own hand. She was too absorbed in her own destiny to notice the movement behind them. Mulder wasn't though, "Hey you, FBI freeze." The man ran and Mulder started to pursue him down the empty warehouse. Scully grabbed her weapon and exited the building, moving around the other side. She could feel her query approaching, Scully swung out the side of the building taking her target totally by surprise. He just kept running, he tried to knock her over, but Scully placed her hands up to deflect his moving body. Her chest make contact with her right hand, as her hand scraped the area of exposed skin in his V-neck a flash of blue lighting illuminated the sky. The man flew to the ground, had she done that?" unknow location in Ohio The backseat of a police car. 6:30 pm Scully sat quietly in the squad car, waiting for Mulder to finish up talking to the police so they could decide her fate. She focused on the ground wondering if her life had ever really been in any danger at all. "They're not going the press charges," Mulder said to her. She looked up, a bit startled by his sudden presence. He was leaning agaist the car door, smiling. "Why not they have ever right to?" "Well Alpha-pac gave the family an official settlement. I guess they didn't want to make public what happend to all those people." Mulder picked up her left hand, "to be honest Scully I didn't know you had it in you." "Well I'm not to proud of this." "You did the right thing, hell you had no clue what you were doing anyhow. Scully?" "Yeah?" "I'm so glad you're not dieing," She looked up at him again, trying to stare through his sunglasses. "Me too Mulder." He swatted down on the ground, so that when she looked down she would still see him. "Scully, you and I are bound by the fact that neither of us understands their own believes." "Maybe" Alexandria, Virgina Mulder's apartment. 11:00 am "Agent Scully went under laser surgery to remove the layer of mutant cells from her right hand. It is to my understanding that she was never in danager to begin with, and death is only caused by ingesting the bacteria infected food. Though it is still unclear how the bacteria got into the cave or how many people died because of this bacteria. Alpha-pac has official given up on bacteria and virus treatments, but interestingly all their documentation and samples were seized by the government for national sercurity. Agent Scully appears to be doing fine and will be able to return to work in about a week....." end.