#my brain is in 6 billion places this morning good luck everybody

[miidnighters]

lamenting the fact that billie was turned before she could get piercings bc her w a cute lil belly bar? a tongue piercing? even her earrings are clip ons

as an extension of this thought, she probably does glue little gems to get belly like a piercing w like, eyelash glue or something. girl's got workarounds

[mldrgrl]

Not Again: Part 2

by: mldrgrl Rating: PG13 Summary: See Part 1

Part 2: Returned Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3

Chapter 4, Day 4:

Scully can’t sleep.  For one thing, she’s uncomfortable, but for another, she can’t turn her mind off.  She doesn’t want to admit it, but she’s worried about Mulder.  She doesn’t like the thought of him in the middle of the ocean on an oil rig with a partner she’s not sure she can trust to watch his back.

Two o’clock rolls around and she hasn’t been able to keep her eyes closed more than a minute or two, so she gets up and logs into her work email to get a head start on things that might be waiting for her.  There’s an email from Mulder in there, time-stamped at 6:43 p.m.

Scully -

If you get bored tomorrow and need something less mindless to do, I thought you might want to take a look at the photos of the body that washed up in Texas.  Does it look like death from explosion to you?  This has black oil written all over it, Scully, I can feel it.

They’re sending the body to Quantico sometime tonight.  Maybe you can make a call and get the autopsy report.

Good luck either way.  I wish I could be with you.

-Mulder

She opens up a series of attached photos and scrolls through them.  She can’t tell from the photos alone what may have caused the angry, red lesions covering the body.  Her ID still works for the Quantico database, so she checks the log to see when the body arrived and when the autopsy will be performed, and by who.  Her suspicions are raised when the file indicates that the body is not to be autopsied, but transported to Mexico first thing in the morning.  The serial number for the cold storage locker is at the top of the intake sheet and she memorizes it before she shuts down her computer.

Without stopping to talk herself out of it, she gets dressed and heads to Quantico.  It’s not even three in the morning when she flashes her ID to the night guard and makes her way down to the morgue and scrubs in.

*****

It’s seven a.m. when she calls Skinner, only after trying to reach Mulder for an hour.  She doesn’t think she can speak freely over the phone, so she asks him to meet her at Quantico as soon as possible.  Twenty minutes later, and clearly annoyed, he comes through the door.

“Close the door,” she says to him.  “Lock it.”

“What’s going on?” he asks, doing as she says.  “What are you even doing here, Scully?  You’re due to report to SA-”

“I realize that, Sir, but Mulder emailed me photos of the body of the man killed on the oil rig last night, and I couldn’t let it go.”

“Let what go?”

“His belief that the black oil had something to do with this.”  She gestures to the body on the table next to her and Skinner grimaces.  “Now, I can’t reach Mulder, and I don’t know who to talk to about this.”

“About what?”

“What I found in the autopsy.”

“How did you even get access to the body, it’s my understanding the situation has become political and this man was supposed to be sent back to Mexico untouched.”

She ignores Skinner, takes up a pair of long tweezers and walks around to the top of the table.  “I found it by accident in the third ventricle of his brain,” she says, inserting the tweezers into the area in question.  

As soon as Scully puts slight pressure into the area, black liquid oozes out of the brain and pools at the back of the head.  Skinner looks alarmed and tries to pull her away from the body, but she lifts her elbow out of his grip.

“No,” she says.  “It’s okay.  It’s alright.”

“What do you mean?  I was under the impression that this stuff could literally jump into a man's body.”

“It can, and I've seen that happen, but that’s the thing.  This man was clearly infected by the alien virus.  It entered his system and it was massing in the pineal gland, but now it's dead.”

“I don’t understand.  What killed it?”

“Well intuitively, you would say the same thing that killed him, which would be exposure to high levels of radiation.  Yet it makes no sense because the virus itself has radioactive properties.”

“Then we need to get in touch with Mulder and Doggett.  They need to know what they’re dealing with.”

“Actually I was hoping you could convince Kersh to order a controlled evacuation of that rig as soon as possible.”

“I can’t go to Kersh with this.  It’s not evidence you can even explain or that he’ll understand.”

“If the virus gets loose, Mulder’s life is in danger.  Everyone on that rig is in danger.”

“We don't know that for sure.  There are nearly two dozen men on that rig and not one other case.  Why?”

Scully shakes her head and has to swallow the lump in her throat that comes on quickly.  Damn these pregnancy hormones.  “I don’t know,” she whispers.  If she can’t convince Skinner that Mulder is in danger, there’s no way she’ll convince Kersh.

*****

Against Skinner’s orders, Scully does not report to SAC Connors.  Instead, she heads to the basement and into the back room to hook up Mulder’s radio transmitter.  She tries to reach the oil rig all morning.  A blister blooms on the side of her finger from depressing the button on the microphone continuously, but she doesn’t give up.  Finally, something like a voice cuts through the static.

“This is Orpheus,” a faint voice replies to her signal.  “Go ahead.”

“Orpheus, I’ve been trying to reach you for hours,” she says.  “This is Special Agent Dana Scully.  I need to speak with one of the agents you have on board, either Mulder or Doggett.”

“I can take your message, Agent Scully.”

“No, I need to speak with Mulder or Doggett directly.”

“Agent Doggett’s fishing, Agent Scully,” a different, instantly recognizable voice answers.  “You’ll have to settle for me.”

“This isn’t a joke, Mulder.”

“You found something, didn’t you?  Is it the virus?”

“Yes, I did.  And it’s dead.”

“Dead?  What killed it?”

“Possibly radiation.”

“That’s not possible.”

“I know,” she says, holding a hand to her head in frustration.  “I know, and this could be an isolated event, but that he's infected at all means that everybody out there could be at risk.  And that includes you and Agent Doggett.”

“We’ve got to quarantine the rig.”

“No,” she says, emphatically.  “Mulder, you have got to get off the rig.  Agent Doggett can give the order.  We can quarantine you and the crew when you get back.”

“Scully, if these men are infected the last place we want to be is onshore where they can infect other people.  You're sitting on the answer right there, Scully.   It’s in the body.  You need to find out for sure what killed it.”

“What if I can’t?”

There’s a beat of silence and Scully thinks the transmission may have gone dead.  “Tell the kid I went down swinging,” Mulder finally says.

“Mulder?”

There’s no answer.  Scully throws the microphone down and puts her head in her hands.

*****

Biting the bullet, Scully goes to Kersh herself, bringing him her autopsy report and photos of the body.  She breezes past his secretary and knocks on the door before she lets herself in.  Kersh looks surprised to see her.  It’s the most emotion she’s ever seen him display.

“Sir, I’m sorry to come unannounced,” she says.  “I wouldn’t be here unless it was an emergency.”

“What kind of an emergency crops up in wiretapping?” he asks, disdain in his voice.

“This is my autopsy report on Simon de la Cruz.”  She places a file on his desk and then steps back.

The disdain in Kersh’s voice turns to full on anger.  “Who authorized you to conduct an autopsy on this man?”

“No one, Sir.”

“Agent Scully, this is an insubordinate stunt the likes of which I would expect from Agent Mulder.”

“I don’t have time for reprimands, I need you to look at this report and I need you to order an immediate evacuation of the oil rig that Agents Mulder and Doggett are on.”

Kersh flips open the file with thinly veiled disgust.  “What am I looking at?”

“This man was exposed to a virus.”

“And?”

“And the entire crew of that ship may be infected as we speak.”

“You want me to order a multi-billion dollar company to shut down their operations because you suspect their crew might have a virus.”

“This isn’t a suspicion.  This is-”

She’s cut off by the ringing of Kersh’s phone, which he promptly answers.  He stares at her with contempt as he listens to the caller.  She turns to give him the semblance of privacy as he mmhms and I sees his way through the call.  Eventually, he hangs up, and Scully faces him again.

“I see I’m not the first one you went to to plead your case.”

“Sir?”

“That was the president of Galpex-Orpheus expressing his dismay that AD Skinner ordered an evacuation of his rig when I expressly assured him his business would not be affected by the investigation.”

“How could you even promise such a thing?  Especially when the company could have very well been negligent.  Who exactly do you work for?”

“As of now, Agent Scully, you are suspended until further notice.”

“Sir, if you just-”

“Effective immediately, Agent Scully.  Turn your badge over to AD Skinner on your way out of the building.”

Trembling with rage, Scully turns and exits Kersh’s office.  She has to fight the urge to slam the door on her way out.  On the elevator down to Skinner’s office, she curses the man for being such a hard-headed bastard.

She feels rather defeated as Skinner ushers her through his door and she places her badge on his desk.  He looks perplexed.

“I’ve been ordered to turn in my badge,” she says, holding her head high, but feeling like she’s on the verge of tears.

“You went to Kersh?”

“I felt I had no choice.”

“I want you to explain something to me.”  Skinner hands her an open folder.  “I had Agent Navarro copy me on the blood tests you ordered on de la Cruz.”

Scully browses the report Skinner hands her and then stops to read more carefully.  She knits her brow and studies the first page, and then the next.

“This indicates that his T-cell count is impossibly high,” she says.  “To put it in layman’s terms, it would mean he’s a virus-fighting machine.”

“What would explain that?”

She thinks for a moment.  “Well,” she says.  There are isolated cultures, in northern Italy for one, where people are immune to certain diseases.  Heart disease in that case, through a genetic mutation.”

“So this man had what?  A kind of genetic immunity to the alien virus?”

“His employment records listed him as mixed Mexican ancestry, when in fact he is Waicha Indian. The Waicha are an indigenous Mexican culture that has a rare undiluted gene pool.  Maybe these genes may have an innate immunity to infection.”

“Alright, he’s immune.  But, he died from being burned.”

She shakes her head, forming an explanation.  “No, not burned,” she murmurs, shaking her head and thinking out loud.  “Irradiated.  Because the virus had no effect on him.  The crew members who were affected by the virus couldn't control him, so they killed him, by irradiating him.”

“So why not kill Mulder?  Or Agent Doggett?  Why kill only this man?”

“All I can think is that he must have been a threat.  Possibly because of something he knew.”

“Even if we did know, and were able to give word to them, would it be something that would put Mulder and Agent Doggett in danger as well?”

“I don’t know.”

Under the pretense of escorting Scully to retrieve her things, Skinner walks her down to the basement and she turns the transmitter back on.  Both of them attempt to contact the oil rig in separate shifts.  She paces while he sends out the signal.  Agent Doggett is the one to respond this time.

“AD Skinner?”

“Agent Doggett?”

“What is that noise?” Scully asks, moving around Skinner to listen more closely to the speaker.  “It sounded like banging.”

“Agent Doggett?” Skinner asks again.

“Yeah, right here,” he shouts.

“Can you hear me?”

“Yeah.”

“What is that noise?”

“Banging.”

Scully takes the microphone from Skinner.  “Agent Doggett, I think I know what killed de la Cruz.”

“Right now we got bigger problems.  We’re gonna need a chopper.”

“Tell him there’s a chopper on the way,” Skinner says.

“There’s a chopper on the way,” she tells Agent Doggett.

“Agent Scully, listen.  There are three men on board here that are not infected.  Me, Mulder and a man named Diego Garza who may be mentally unstable.  Could be why he tried to wreck this radio room, just like his friend Simon de la Cruz.  He may resist rescue attempt because he believes there are men in flying saucers who are coming to get him.  Agent Scully, do you-”

The transmission begins to break up on their end and Scully tries to answer Doggett back, but the feed goes completely silent.  Skinner flips off the radio and she slumps against the table for a few moments.

“I guess I better walk out now before Kersh has me thrown out,” she says.

“I’ll deal with Kersh.  Go home and try not to think about it.  I’ll have Mulder call you when they land.”

“Do you think they’ll make it?”

“Of course.”

She nods, but she can tell Skinner isn’t too sure.  She picks up the attache she dropped off in the office when she came in and heads out, with her boss behind her.

“You wouldn’t have enjoyed wiretapping anyway,” Skinner says.

“Probably not,” she returns.  “But, I needed something to take my mind off the fact that I have no idea where I’ve been for six months, no idea how this baby came to be, and no idea what I’m going to do.”

Skinner looks mildly shocked and puts a hand on her back.  “Would you like to speak with Karen Kosseff about this?”

“I don’t think therapy’s going to help this time.”

They ride the elevator together in awkward silence until the doors open to the parking garage.  She can tell Skinner wants to say more to her, but she walks out and doesn’t look back.

*****

Her cell phone rings just a few minutes after she walks through her door.  She can barely hear him, but it’s Mulder.

“Are you alright?” she asks, holding a hand over her ear to try to hear him better.

“Doggett and I are the only survivors,” he answers.

“I’m sorry, are you saying everyone on that rig is dead?”

“Blown to smithereens.”

Scully sucks in a breath.  She has no idea what that means in terms of containing the virus.  It isn’t good news.

“Where are they quarantining you?” she asks.

“They’re not.”

“Mulder…”

“Doggett and I are fine.  You can check me out yourself when I get back.”

“I will.”

“Look, I’ve got to go.”

“Stay vigilant, Mulder.  Be aware of any signs of-“

“I know the drill, Scully.  Lo-uh...I’ll see you later.”

There’s a click on Mulder’s end and then silence.  Scully hangs up the phone with an odd feeling in the pit of her stomach.  The baby kicks and she rubs her hand over her belly.  She’s no less worried now, having spoken to Mulder, than she was before.  She needs to see him and look into his eyes herself to make sure he’s okay.

Suddenly, she feels a small jab of pain in her side and she sucks in a breath and presses her hand to her ribs.  Some flash of a memory comes to her in the moment, but it lacks specificity.  She only remembers being annoyed with Mulder for wanting her to explore crop circles with him on a Saturday.

The baby shifts within her.  The pain lasted only a second and doesn’t come back.

*****

Scully is abruptly pulled from sleep by a noise she registers as knocking only after jerking awake and flailing an arm out for the phone on her nightstand and realizing she’s on her couch and her phone didn’t ring.  She struggles to get up and pushes the hair out of her face as she makes her way to the door.  Before she even checks the peephole, she suspects Mulder is on the other side.  He looks relieved when she opens it for him.

“You didn’t answer your phone,” he says in lieu of a greeting.  “I just wanted to check to make sure everything was okay.”

“Yeah, I...I guess I fell asleep.  What time is it?”

“Not even ten.”

“Come in.  You’re back already?”

“Landed about an hour ago.”

She can tell she startles him when she grabs his face and holds his head steady as she looks in his eyes.  He looks nothing but concerned.  No black clouds in the whites of his eyes, just a little bloodshot which tells her he’s tired.  She releases him and finally feels the relief she’d wanted when she spoke with him earlier.

“Am I clear?” he asks.

“All clear.”

“Skinner told me what happened.  I’m sorry, Scully.  I didn’t mean for you to-”

“I know you didn’t.  It’s okay.”  Even as the words leave her mouth, she feels her shoulders begin to shake and she drops her head.  Once again, she’s unable to keep her motions in check and she knows it must be an aspect of the pregnancy because she can usually keep her frustration under control a lot better.

“Oh, Scully.”  

Mulder puts his arms around her and she lets her head fall against his chest.  There have only been a handful of times she’s allowed him to hold her like this, times of distress and heartache.  It’s always been comforting, but never more so than now.  She feels the urge to cling to him and release her pent up fear into his chest.  It’s like she’s realizing for the first time how strong he is and how weak she is.

“It’s not okay,” she whispers.  “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do right now.”

“You need time to adjust.”

“I can’t sit at home all day alone, I’ll go insane.”

Mulder moves one hand in a broad circle over her back and then he reaches up to push her hair over her ear.  She closes her eyes and sighs.  If she could stay like this for awhile, maybe she could absorb some of his strength.

“There’s something else you should know,” he says.

“What?”

“Kersh has been sanctioned and his office is under investigation.”

Scully gasps a little and pulls back to look at Mulder’s face.  “What?”

“Your suspension has been removed from your record, but Skinner doesn’t think it’s a very good idea for you to come back just yet.”

“Did Skinner file a complaint against him?”

“Yes, but he’s not the only one.  Kersh was suspected of accepting bribes in other matters and has been under surveillance for some time.  You might have to testify to what you heard in his office today.”

“When can I come back?”

Mulder pulls her back into a hug.  “Give it a week at least.”  

“What am I going to do with a week?”

“What if we went away?”

“Away?”

“Yeah, like a vacation.  What if I took you somewhere?”

“Where?”

“How about some place tropical?”

“Are you just saying that because you have a hot tip on the whereabouts of the Fiji mermaid?”

Mulder pulls back and chuckles.  He puts his hands on her face and swipes at her tears with his thumbs.  “You see,” he says.  “You’re still the skeptical Scully I know and love.”

Her heart jumps in her chest a little.  It hits her that part of the reason she hasn’t felt much like herself is that she definitely feels different around Mulder.  Not a bad kind of different, just different.  Like she needs something from him, but she doesn’t know what that is.

“Running away never solved anything,” she says.

“It’s not running, it’s just a vacation.”

“I’ll think about it.”  She pauses and studies his face for a moment.  “Mulder, in the months I can’t remember, did you ever ask me to go look at crop circles with you?”

“You turned me down cold.”  He cocks his head and purses his lips.  “Are you...did you remember something?”

“Being annoyed with you.”

“That certainly narrows it down.”  He smiles at her and she closes her eyes for a moment.

“Did you go without me?”

“To find the crop circles?”  He sighs when she nods her head.  “Yeah, but I came up empty handed.  You on the other hand, had an epiphany.”

“What?”

“Apparently you and God had a little tet-e-tet in a buddhist temple.”

“Clearly I was pulling your leg.”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“That doesn’t sound like me.”

“I was just as surprised as you are.  Listen, I’ve got tomorrow off.  Think about where you want to go and call me.  Skinner will be thrilled he doesn’t have to force time off on me this year.”

“What about Agent Doggett?”

“He’s a big boy.  I’ll promise to send him a postcard.”  

Mulder brushes his thumbs over her cheeks again and smiles.  His eyes move over her face and there’s a fleeting look of sadness there when he lets go of her.  She walks him to the door.

“Night, Scully.”

*****