Please see first section for disclaimer/warnings.

Anamorphosis
by Megan Reilly
eponine@prodigy.net

-----
PART II

-8-

	She'd been quiet since the ceremony.  This worried Mulder a lot. 
He kept looking over at her, trying to catch her eye, but she didn't really
look back.  Every once in a while she'd squint or move her head slightly,
the way people did when they were lost in thought.
	He wanted to know what she was thinking about.
	There was laughter and  talking all around him - who'd have ever
guessed Skinner and the Lone Gunmen would get along so well? Maybe
they could have an effect on each other, he thought, but he knew the
Gunmen would never be able to trust someone so high up in government. 
They preferred anarchy to order and rules.
	He didn't want this.   Neither did Scully from the way she'd
completely zoned out.  "It's time for us to go, I think," he said, getting up.
He had to grab Scully's arm to get her attention and her eyes were blank. 
The Gunmen yukked it up but Mulder couldn't take his eyes off his wife.
	His *wife.*
	He'd seen that glassy stare before.
	Not in her eyes, though.  On patients.  In the ward where he'd
interned in college.  His stomach was churning. Maybe he was imagining
things.  Nerves?
	"Scully?"
	She blinked and her eyes focused for a second.  "I'm okay," she
said in a quiet voice and managed a tight smile.
	He was too scared to ask.  It was him, he knew, she was having
doubts and regrets about marrying him.  She could do better.  She
deserved better.  Why hadn't she realized this before the wedding?  He was
almost resolved to this. He'd barely been able to believe it that she'd
agreed.  It had felt like humoring him when they looked at houses, but he'd
wanted to hard to believe.
	Wanting to believe things that were ridiculous or impossible had
long been one of his strengths.
	He could feel the tension building in the silence as the ride home
stretched long in front of them.  He opened his mouth to relieve the pain
in his clenched jaw and it popped painfully.  In the passenger seat, Scully
seemed oblivious.  Even that made him feel worse.
	"Did I do something wrong?"  His knuckles were white on the
steering wheel, but his words didn't break through her fog.  Expressions
still crossed her face, but  none of them took hold.  She was ignoring him,
he thought.  What had he done, or was marrying her enough? He stole
another glance at her noble profile, her eyes fixed out the window.
	Once in her apartment, she sat down on the couch. Maybe it was
always this awkward after weddings.  He didn't know. Maybe that was the
purpose of receptions and parties and expensive trips.  To avoid this
moment, where things settled quietly at home, when he felt he should do
anything other than what he desperately wanted to do.
	He sat down on the couch and her eyes darted up to his face.  "Did
I do something wrong?" he asked quietly.
	Her eyes turned away and she put her head down.  This time she
heard him at least, even if it made her go inward more than she had been. 
Her mumble was so low and almost unintelligible.  He had to strain to
understand.  "He hurt me."
	"Scully?"  Her words struck his body like lightning.
	"Why're you calling me that?"  Her face drew up, in a childish
frown.
	"What should I call you?" he asked carefully, adding to her tone
and expression her slumped posture and legs that drew together at the
knees and then splayed out, toes pointing in.
	"Starbuck."
	Oh, shit.
	"Who hurt you?" he asked, finding it difficult to draw air into his
lungs.  Something was very wrong.  This didn't happen after weddings, he
knew.  This was not normal.  Why the fuck couldn't things ever be
normal? he asked himself, just once?
	"Billy," she said in a teeny, tiny voice.
	Mulder could only stare at her in horror.  "How?" he asked.
	She shook her head again, more turning her face away from him
than actually shaking it to indicate "no."  "Didn't happen yet."
	"When did it happen?" he asked.  She didn't respond. "Scully?" 
What the hell was going on here?  He was scared, as scared as he had ever
been.  His stomach was pure acid in the middle of his body.  He could face
aliens or killers, but this...he had an inkling what this was, and that
frightened him all the more.  "Starbuck?" he prompted gently.
	The look on her face made him jerk away involuntarily.  "It didn't
happen yet," she mumbled. Scully, who never mumbled.
	Horror was beginning to blossom into realization.  This was not
Scully.  This wasn't Scully! "How old are you?"
	She looked at him as though he was silly.  "Four."
	He bolted up from the couch and paced around the room in a loopy
circle. This could not be.  Her eyes followed him with interest as he
returned to her side.  This could not be happening!  He wouldn't let it.  He
couldn't let it.  She was stronger than this.  She flinched at the gentle hand
he placed on her shoulder. "You're not playing a game with me?"  He
searched her eyes with his, flicking from one eye to the other. He didn't
find any merriment in her irises, which seemed to have turned a darker
blue than he'd ever seen them.  She didn't even look like Scully any more. 
There was no hiding the desperation in his tone.  He already knew Scully
wouldn't joke around, not like this.  Scully didn't joke.  She didn't scare
him on purpose. This was not funny, not in the least.
	"What kinda game do you wanna play?" she asked, eyes bright.
	Oh, shit.
	"Do you know who I am?" he asked slowly.
	She nodded after a second of thinking.  "You're married to Dana."
	He couldn't deal with this.   He wanted to shout at her, knock some
sense into her.  Most of all, he wanted to wake up from this, go back to the
morning and start again.  She couldn't be referring to herself as a child and
talking about herself in the third person.  Talking about them in the third
person when they were both right there.  Either she didn't know what was
real or he didn't.  He didn't care which.  "Where is Dana?"
	"Dana doesn't know.  But she's scared anyway."
	He knelt in front of her. "Could I speak to Dana?"  Please, please,
oh god, please.
	She shook her head vigorously.
	"Is there anybody else..."  It sounded so incredibly crazy.  Anyone
else he could talk to?  What was this, the phone company?  A customer
service line? Phone sex?  This was a woman, this was his wife and
something terrible had happened between their wedding vows and their
arrival in the apartment.  Something to make her flinch and turn away
from everything she knew.
	She shook her head and put her thumb in her mouth and he died a
little, trying not to show it to her.  A second later she removed it, making
excuses to him.  "Mama says not to. She says it'll ruin my teeth."
	"I don't think it matters now," he told her, walking away again.  He
couldn't deal with this.  "Scully?" he asked again, and she seemed to
ignore him.  She didn't put her thumb back in her mouth. He could feel 
her eyes on him as he tried to figure out what to do. What was going on.
	He knew what it looked like.
	But it was too impossible.
	It was pretty damned ridiculous, in fact.  He'd rather hear about her
meticulously made up under hypnosis past life with him and Melissa
Ephesian where she'd been in *love* with him and he'd never noticed. 
How much more telling could that scenario had been?  Her unconscious
mind knew he was listening.  Even though they were engaged and about to
get married, how many insecurities about their relationship had that
revealed? How many of her worries about being his soul mate, his lover,
his friend and lifetime partner?
	He was not worthy of her.
	But this was too ridiculous.  And yet, what if the reference to that
damaged, troubled woman had been some kind of a warning from her
inner mind.
	Inner mind, what a load of crap.
	But he was standing in front of a different facet of his partner - his
wife - than he had ever seen before.  A different personality.  One he
certainly would have noticed before this.
	Maybe she there was no before this. Maybe the stress of marrying
_him_ made her crack.
	His fault.  His fault.
	He didn't know what to do. Unfortunately he knew more about this
from watching "Sybil" than from school.  Dissociative identity disorder
was virtually unheard of in Europe.  None of his teachers had believed in
it, except as another hysterical phenomena born of American soap opera
plots. He knew this was what Scully herself would say if she were there to
have this conversation.
	But he only had to remember Melissa Ephesian to know how this
could ruin a life.
	He shuddered.
	Not to mention that he only had coursework in psychology.  Okay,
he'd been a good student, but being a good student was easy.  He could
have mastered anything he'd been interested in.  He had a degree in
psychology, and even though he had a knack for uncanny jumps of logic
and a track record as a profiler, that didn't make him right.
	Multiple personalities?  There had to be a logical explanation.
	"Mister?"
	He jerked around.  She looked at him.  "It's past my bedtime."
	He nodded, expecting her to go to bed.  Maybe this would be over
in the morning. Maybe it was temporary, maybe he would wake up.
	"My daddy would read to me and my mommy would tuck me in,"
she told him. He couldn't say anything.  "Why are you here instead of my
mommy?"
	Maybe he should give her mommy a call.
	"Your mom's on a trip."
	She looked doubtful.  "You'll take care of me?"
	He nodded.   A promise he'd already made.  Sickness or health. It
was funny because he'd always been sure he was the  one who would lose
his mind.
	Not lost, he thought furiously. Not lost. He would get her back. 
Somehow.
	This could not be happening.
	She slipped off to bed and he put his head in his hands, allowing
himself a moment of fatigue.  Two moments and he would have burst into
tears.  
	This couldn't be happening.
	He needed information.
	He thought about what had happened in the few weeks that
predicated this strange turn of events..  The case overwhelming her.  The
attack and the hypnosis.
	Which had been his idea.
	It went beyond that, though.  She'd seemed exhausted and
headachy since her visit to San Diego.
	Not cancer, he prayed.  What if she had another brain tumor
because of what they'd done to her?  What if it was pressing on some vital
area of her brain, relieving her of blood pressure and memory?  What if
four years old was all there was left?
	Oh, god.
	It didn't explain what she'd said about her brother hurting her.  He
assumed it was her brother; while her father had the same name, she'd
called him Ahab.  Especially if she was thinking of herself as Starbuck. 
She wouldn't have called her father Bill.  She didn't call her mother
Margaret.  Her parents wouldn't have stood for it, just as his wouldn't
have.
	He still didn't know what to do.  His empty hands sought
something to munch on, drawing him into the kitchen.  A bag of fresh
popcorn would do.  Scully didn't have any sunflower seeds, his favorite
food for thinking difficult thoughts.  He picked up the bag of pre-popped
corn and noticed something odd in the trash.
	A mangled, ruined bouquet.
	Why would she...?
	He found the card under the couch in the living room.  "Don't ruin
your life."  Signed by Bill.  Her brother.
	Why did Bill hate him so much?
	"He hurt me," the four year old aspect of his wife had whispered.
	Virtually all cases of multiple personality disorder hinged on brutal
childhood sexual abuse.
	Rage blurred his vision. He was going to kill the fucking bastard if
it was true.  And while he had no proof, he had no reason to doubt her. 
She was his wife and she had never lied to him.
	He wanted to be wrong, but he knew that he wasn't.  He could feel
it.  He didn't know who to call or who to trust.  He knew he could trust
her.  Cautiously, he slipped into her darkened bedroom.  "Are you still
awake?" he asked softly, not wanting to use that name so foreign to him.
	"Uh-huh."  The utterance trembled.  When he turned on the light,
she sighed.  
	He remained in the doorway.  "Are you afraid of the dark?"
	"Maybe a little."
	He nodded.  "I used to be scared of the dark," he admitted, crossing
the distance to the bed.  She was looking up at him with eyes wide and
round.  She looked like a little girl, tucked up tight in the bed, the buttons
on her pajama top fastened wrong.  Her arms lay limp over the covers. 
This was not the wedding night he'd dreamt of.  Not by a long shot.  "Why
do you think the dark is scary?"
	She didn't answer for a long time, staring past him at the wall like
she'd turned herself off, like some kind of a robot or something.  "Cause
it's dark," she answered, as though that summed it all up for him.
	Maybe it did.
	"You said Bill hurt you."
	She glared at him instantly.
	"Bill your brother Bill?"
	"What other Bill?" she asked, her lips drawing tight, almost a pout,
but not quite. Angry, but scared too.  She was a tough little kid.  Or, um,
whatever.  Sitting here, talking to her, *seeing* her, was too convincing. 
It scared him.  He accepted this because it was real.  This wasn't like
talking to Scully.  This wasn't like talking to someone who was
pretending.  This was like talking to a very smart, scared little girl.
	Who happened to inhabit the body of a beautiful thirty five year
old woman, that was the confusing part.
	"How did he hurt you?" Mulder asked, dredging up every aspect he
could remember of those torturous visits to clinics and patient wards. 
He'd detested them.  The goal might not have been to convince him
against becoming a psychiatrist, but that had been the desired effect.  He'd
chosen to be the one who locked up the insane, the disturbed, not the one
who tried to heal them.  Sometimes without any encouragement or
success.
	She wasn't talking.
	"Did he hit you?"
	A limp shouldered shrug.
	"Did he say mean things to you?"
	No response.
	"Did he pretend to be a big purple dinosaur?"
	She didn't laugh.  There was no response.  He was learning.  No
response meant it hadn't happened.  So he'd hit her? Maybe. Mulder
pressed on.  "Did he touch you somewhere you didn't want to be touched?"
	That was too much for her.  "Go away, I want to sleep," she
demanded, flopping over in the bed.  But she didn't close her eyes and she
didn't turn her back on him.  She didn't trust him.
	"What did he do?" Mulder asked.
	"Nothing yet."
	"When did he do it?"
	"Leave me alone!"
	He was getting at something here, but he didn't want to push her. 
She was going to cry and he didn't want to see her in pain.  Whatever this
was, it was a reaction to pain, to try to drive it away.  He had no idea what
he could do to her psyche if he forced this.  Obviously she remembered. 
But she wasn't ready to tell it.
	"I'm here, Scully," he said, and she lay rigid in the bed, breathing
shallowly.  He felt rage coming off of her body, controlled ultimately. 
That was Scully, he thought, but he walked out of the room, leaving the
light on.
	How could that have not been real?
	He still didn't want to believe it.
	But something had happened.  And that wasn't Scully in there.  He
wanted to ask her more questions, but he was too afraid.  He knew that
Dissociative Identity Disorder didn't have a cure. Years of intensive
therapy could still leave a person splintered.
	Pretty bleak.
	Mulder slammed his fist against the wall.  He didn't want to
believe it.  They'd lived through so much. This was ridiculous.
	He felt angry and betrayed. He didn't want to feel that way about 
Scully.  He loved her.  But he couldn't help feeling she'd abandoned him to
this.
	He fell asleep in the chair, his fists angry and his jaw tight.
	Only a few hours later, the sun was up and so was his wife.  He
opened his eyes to find her staring at him eerily and he just stared back,
praying she *was* his wife and that whole weird experience was over  He
hadn't even considered the scarier possibilities - what if she was possessed
by the devil?  He didn't believe in the devil, but he did believe in the purity
of evil because he'd seen it too many times. What if that had invaded her
soul?
	There was a darkness in her soul, but he had a feeling the evil
beings responsible were mere mortals.
	"Scully?" he tried hopefully.
	"I want my mother."
	Starbuck again. He sighed. "How -" he faltered.  What could he ask
her?  "Do you remember Skinner?" he tried. 
	"I want my mother," she repeated stubbornly.
	"Scully -"
	"I want my mother!" she screamed at him.  Her face started to turn
red. "Where's my mother, I want my mother!"
	"Ssh," he suggested.  What did he know about little kids? Adults
who thought they were little kids?
	"Mommy," she cried, sinking into tears.  He could only stare at her. 
It was bizarre that he was feeling happy to have averted a temper tantrum. 
She could have thrown herself on the floor and thrashed and screamed like
he saw a little boy do once in the Safeway when his mom wouldn't buy
him a squirt gun.  At the time Mulder had felt a certain envy for the ease
with which the child relieved frustration.  Maybe he'd been wrong to stop
Scully. Maybe she needed that childish release, maybe that was what this
was about.
	"I'll - ah - call your mom," he said, inching away form her toward
the phone.  It was morning and this wasn't better.  It was a game he'd
played with himself often as a boy - was he too sick to go to school the
next day?  Most of his symptoms were psychological, but he hadn't wanted
to see a doctor.  So he waited until the next morning.  If he still felt bad in
the morning, he could tell his mother.  This was still bad and it was
morning.  She wanted her mother and he'd be damned if he wouldn't give
that to her.  She deserved anything in this world he could give, and he
wanted her better.  Maybe her mother could provide some comfort that he
couldn't. Maybe her mother could get Scully back. Scully had run to her
mom before when she'd felt threatened.  Did he threaten her?  The smile at 
seeing he was #1 on her speed dial faded quickly. He didn't want to think
about her crying.  He pressed the keys to get #3.
	"Yeah."
	It was Bill.  Mulder's knuckles cracked with the force of his anger. 
She said Bill had hurt her. Even though she hadn't been able to give
details, Mulder believed her.  He knew the power of repressed memories,
having been haunted by them most of his life.  Not remembering didn't
make it not real. "Margaret Scully, please."
	"She's asleep, who's calling?" Bill's anger was thinly veiled.  A
glance at the clock told Mulder it was 5:30 in California.
	"Fox Mulder.  Wake her up," he ordered.
	"Fuck you," Bill told him.
	"If I ever get my hands on you, I'll break your fucking neck. Let me
to talk to your mother."
	"You think I'm going to let you talk to her that way, you
goddamned psychopath?"
	"I'm going to tell her what you did to your sister, you fucker." 
Mulder's voice was quiet with sinister fury, playing his hunch that Scully
was telling him the truth, even through whatever dementia she was
suffering.
	There was a frightening silence from the other end of the line. "I
didn't do anything."  Bill's voice had changed to ice.  A coldness Mulder
had heard in the tones of murderers denying conclusive evidence.  For
Mulder, it was only more proof.  Mulder waited for the dial tone, but he
heard the phone gently click against the surface of a table. Mulder waited.
He'd scared himself with his outburst.
	"Fox, what is it?  What's the matter with Dana?" Mrs. Scully's
voice was frantic and sleepy.
	"She needs you." He couldn't keep the desolation out of his tone
and he watched the crying child of a woman he loved while listening to
her mother cry 2,000 miles away. He had no words for either of them.

	The woman who couldn't get a flight for her daughter's wedding
arrived almost immediately.  Mulder was exhausted when he got her at the
airport and his mother-in-law seemed to have aged twenty years. He'd
never seen the gray in her hair or the lines in her face before.  "Did you
marry her?"
	He picked up her suitcase and saw her eyes track down to his ring.
"Yes," he answered.
	"When?"  Mrs. Scully's eyes were filled with fire.
	"Yesterday."  He led her through the holiday crowds to the meter
where he'd left the car parked.
	"When all this began."  She didn't accuse him.  She didn't  have to.
"Bill was right."
	Bill was never right. Mulder wanted to scream it at her.  He was
angry with Bill and angry that Mrs. Scully would chose Bill over him. 
True, Bill was her son so Mrs. Scully probably couldn't see the truth, but
Mulder knew he was good for Scully.  He loved her with his entire being. 
So he spoke with ill-considered words, unable to stop once he'd begun.  "I
have some bad news about your son, Mrs. Scully," Mulder said, trying to
contain his anger for her sake, but at the same time wanting to hurt her
because she hadn't been there for Scully.  "I think he abused your
daughter."
	Mrs. Scully didn't say another word the rest of the drive.  He saw
her face turn white and wondered if he'd done the right thing in telling her
that. Maybe not, he thought, pulling out onto the expressway, hurrying
back to Scully.

	When he opened the door to Scully's apartment, it was like
entering the monkey house at the zoo. The TV blared a live action
cartoon.  Scully's face was smeared with makeup and her hair was tied
into two ponytails.  Langly was almost a mirror of her and the two of them
scrambled across the hard wood floor with die cast metal cars.  Byers was
uncomfortable as he maneuvered a plastic police helicopter above them.
Frohike was at the kitchen table considering the measurements of an
unclothed Barbie doll.
	Mulder closed the door and waited for Mrs. Scully to fall apart. 
He'd underestimated her strength because she walked over to Scully. 
Byers and Langly backed off, leaving Scully looking confused.  "Dana,
honey?" said Mrs. Scully.
	Scully bit her lip and started at her mother for a long time.  Then
she seemed to close off, clutching the shiny purple car in her hand.  "Dana
says you're my mommy."  Mrs. Scully managed a forced, faltering smile. 
"You're too old to be my mommy."  She pouted and turned her full
attention to vrooming the car.
	Mrs. Scully looked crushed.  She shot at look at Mulder.  "She
talked to these 'others'?"
	"Just Dana," Frohike spoke up.  He didn't raise his eyes from
Barbie's rack.
	No one said anything and Mulder sat down in a chair, exhausted. 
He didn't want this. It couldn't be real. He would wake up. He had to. 
Something jolted his foot and he opened his eyes.  Scully, on the floor
with her toy car.  "Sorry mister."  His look must have been harsh because
she crawled away from him quickly.
	Mrs. Scully looked as lost as he felt.
	Frohike got to his feet.  "Mulder, come on."  Mulder looked at him,
not moving.  "Come on."
	"I can't leave -" Mulder's voice cracked.
	"She's in good hands," Frohike informed him, pushing him out the
door.  The drive to  Mulder's apartment in  Frohike's ancient VW was
silent but for the put-put of the motor.
	"So talk," Frohike ordered once they were at Mulder's. He took the
couch and Mulder paced the floor, needing to get back to Scully.
	"This can't be real," Mulder stated, raking his hands back through
his hair. It was dirty. He needed to shave, shower.  "It can't be happening.
It's a dream, a nightmare -"
	Frohike's face as he absorbed was what broke Mulder.  He sat
down on the coffee table and put his head in his hands, crying
unashamedly.  "I can't do this. I can't help her. She's always been the
strong one.  For this to happen to her - after everything - why do I have to
lose everyone?  Why can't someone just love me?  Shit, this isn't about
me," he stopped himself.  "It's about her. How can this be real?"
	Frohike patted him on the back.  "What can you do to help her?"
	Mulder shook his head. Nothing, there was nothing...
	"You can take care of yourself," Frohike said. "You can find her
the best doctors, you can read the literature and you can support her."
	Eventually Mulder nodded. He had to stand by her.  He owed her
his life. He loved her, he was nothing without her.  He raised his head and
looked at Frohike. The man was amazing.  "So who are the best doctors?"
he asked.
	They went back to Scully's.  "Where is she?" Mulder demanded
when he walked in to find Mrs. Scully reading a magazine while Byers
and Langly played Old Maid.
	"She's asleep," Mrs. Scully said without looking up.
	"She didn't...change?"  He wanted Scully back.  Now. He wanted
Scully back now. Mulder wasn't patient, especially where she was
concerned.  He'd thought her mother could magically cure her.
	All three sadly shook their heads in unison. Mulder felt his
shoulders slump.  "How did this happen, Fox?" Mrs. Scully sounded like
his own mother as she folded away her Better Homes and Gardens and
waited for an answer.
	Mulder took a deep breath, gathering his thoughts.  "It's possible
this is a spontaneous regression and she'll naturally get over it.  But the
way she talks about Dana as someone separate from herself...I think she's
dissociated.  She meets the criteria for multiple personality."  Clinical was
the only way he could get through this.  It was too laughable and painful
otherwise.
	"Have you called a doctor?" she asked, doubtful.  Like her
daughter.
	"I called you first."
	"Call if you need us." Langly offered, seizing the first opportunity
to escape.  Mulder nodded and waved his thanks to the guys.
	"Odd friends of yours," Scully's mother commented.
	"Scully's friends too," he insisted.  "They gave me a list of local
doctors."
	"I want to take her back with me to San Diego," Mrs. Scully said as
he went to get the cordless phone from its base.  The remainder of her
words were unspoken. Away from this, way from you.  She thought he
was causing this.
	"No," he said, staring at her.  She had the same stubborn look he'd
seen Scully get. "No," he said again.
	"She needs to be with family."
	"I am her family!"
	"It was marrying you that did this to her!" Mrs. Scully shouted
back.
	Mulder had no response to that. It was very likely true, he thought,
just as he'd caused her cancer and her sister's death.  He blamed himself. 
He picked up the phone and dialed the first doctor on the list, aware of
Scully's mother watching him, waiting for him to fail.
	"I don't deal with that."
	"I don't have time."
	"We would love to have her come to our facility, but we don't deal
with multiples. Entirely too disruptive.  You do understand..."
	"We can't..."
	"No, sorry..."  The doctors had a million excuses.
	There was only one name left on the list. Mrs. Scully was looking
over his shoulder.  Waiting to take Scully away from him, for good, back
to Bill where she would never get better.
	"Dr. Callaway, you're my only hope."
	The light female voice on the other end of the line laughed
pleasantly.  "I am?"
	"I didn't mean to say that," Mulder blurted.
	"What did you mean to say?"
	He liked her.  "I think my wife has dissociative identity disorder. 
She's taken on the characteristics of a small child.  I mean, I don't want to
believe that, but something's wrong.  Something's terribly wrong."  He
stopped. He was letting his fear show. He couldn't give in to that.
	"May I ask a few questions?"  He heard her rattling for paper and
pencil.
	"Of course," he said, feeling relieved.  She hadn't turned him down.
Yet.
	"Good," she said, "Can you be here by five?"
	"Tonight?"
	"Yes," said Dr. Callaway. "I need to meet her if she is to be my
patient."
	"We'll be there," Mulder promised, ignoring the look Mrs. Scully
gave him. He went to the bedroom, struck by sudden caution at the door. 
What would he find when he awakened her? After a second, he walked
into the room.
	She was lying in bed with her eyes open as though she'd been
waiting for him.  "Scully?" he asked, almost daring to hope.  
	"Starbuck," she reminded him.  She sat up and he saw the fear in
her eyes. "Were you and Mommy fighting?"
	He couldn't lie to her, although he wanted to.  "Yes."
	"It was about me.  You hate me.  You want me to go away.  So
does Mommy."  Her mouth pursed, upset, but she didn't cry.
	"That's not true," he said, calmly lying. He did want Starbuck to go
away if it meant it would return Scully to him.  "We want you to come
with us to see someone. A doctor."
	"I'm not sick," she told him.
	"I know.  We just want to make sure.  Come on," Mulder said and
waited for her to get up. She did, finally, struggling to put on Scully's
sneakers.   She looked at the soles several times before putting them on
the wrong feet.
	"Are your shoes on right?"  Mulder asked her.
	"They're fine," she drawled, sounding like a miniature version of
Scully. Except it already was Scully.
	He decided not to think about that.  "I'm going with you," Mrs.
Scully informed him. There was nothing he could say about that.

-9-

	At five o'clock they sat in Dr. Callaway's office.  Starbuck swung
her feet and looked uncomfortable.  She knew she was the focus here. 
Mrs. Scully looked drawn and tired.  Dr. Leslie Callaway was lovely - tall
and slim with her hair gathered into a clip at the top of her head.  She
smiled at Mulder and at Mrs. Scully, but most importantly, at Starbuck,
introducing herself.
	Scully said nothing.
	Dr. Callaway turned to Mulder with her questions.
	"Has she complained of frequent headaches?"  She looked at
Scully, who wasn't acknowledging her.
	Mulder nodded.  "She's had a lot of stress recently."
	The doctor nodded and made a note on a purple legal pad.  "Has
she ever experienced what's known as 'missing time' - a period of time that
she blacked out, that she could not later recall?"
	Mulder didn't need that explained to him.  He felt Mrs. Scully's
eyes hard on his face.  Like he'd been lying to her.  "Yes," he said, "But it's
always been associated with alien abduction missing time."
	Dr. Callaway's eyebrows went up and Mulder wished he could
disappear.  "She believes she's been abducted by aliens?  From space?"
	No, little brown men from beyond the border, Mulder thought
sarcastically.  Or worse yet, Canadians.  He knew sarcasm was a defense
mechanism and he was only trying to live through this very abnormal
situation.
	"Mulder believes she's been abducted by aliens.  Dana doesn't
believe in them," Mrs. Scully spoke up harshly.
	"You don't believe this then?"  the doctor turned to her.  
	At least she's getting a good idea of the family conflict pulling at
Scully, Mulder thought.
	"Something happened to my daughter," Margaret stated.  "I don't
know what.  Neither does she, as far as I know."
	"How long to these alien episodes last?"
	"The longest was three months," Mulder replied.
	"That's unusually long for an alien abduction, isn't it?"  Dr.
Callaway asked evenly, sounding as though she'd been informed on the
subject.  Maybe she too read the Weekly World News, Mulder thought.
	"Yes," he had to admit, feeling like he'd been nailed by his own
lawyer while on the stand.
	"Was she abused as a child?"  Just as smoothly as the alien
question.
	"Never!" Margaret cried.
	"She may have been," Mulder said.
	"No she was not," Margaret insisted strongly.
	"She said, to me, last night, that her brother hurt her." Mulder
knew he should drop this.  Mrs. Scully looked furious.
	"Okay," Dr. Callaway interrupted.  "Does she behave in strange,
bizarre or unpredictable ways?"
	Neither of them said anything.
	"Maybe a little," replied Mulder.  "Since Thanksgiving."
	"Does she have any sexually related disorders?"
	"She may," Mulder mumbled.
	Dr. Callaway gave him a direct look.  "You said you're her
husband.  Don't you know?"
	"We didn't...get a chance..."  How red was his face?
	"The marriage is unconsummated."
	"Uh, yeah."
	"I know this is difficult," Dr. Callaway said.  "We can stop here. 
There's a couple more questions, but we can stop."  She put the notepad
aside.  "I'd like to talk to Dana."
	"Starbuck."  Terribly, they'd forgotten she was listening.  Mulder
had hated that as a kid, and as an adult, when people talked around him as
though he couldn't hear or understand what they were saying.
	"Starbuck."  Dr. Callaway smiled at Scully, then included Mulder
and Margaret in the expression.  "There's a coffee place downstairs if
you'd like to come back in half an hour."
	Mulder shook his head.  He wasn't leave her there.  Dr. Callaway
escorted them to the office door.  He spent the next thirty minutes staring
at the paintings in the lobby.  So did Mrs. Scully.  They didn't speak to
each other.
	It was the longest thirty two minutes and five seconds of Mulder's
entire life.

	The door creaked open a moment before it opened - the handle
needed grease, and so Mulder and Mrs. Scully were both on their feet by
the time Dr. Callaway appeared in the doorway.   Her face was
wonderfully neutral.  Mulder hadn't really considered utilizing his psych
degree in a practicing capacity, but he hoped that if he had, he would have
been a doctor like this one. Calm.  Cool.
	"Well?" Mrs. Scully was anxious.
	"This is very delicate ethical ground," Dr. Callaway said.  "Even
though my patient believes she is four years old and depends on the care
of others, she has the right to privacy."
	Mulder's gaze didn't relent and neither did Mrs. Scully's.  But Dr.
Callaway didn't speak. It was their turn to talk.
	"What's the next step?" Mrs. Scully asked finally.
	"I'd like to use hypnosis.  If this is a regression to a time when she
felt safe, we may be able to bring her back to her current age."
	"If not?"
	"Dissociated personalities usually emerge under hypnosis," Dr.
Callaway answered gravely.
	Mulder's stomach became a hard, sick knot.  "She was recently
hypnotized - could that have brought this on?"  He could barely get the
words out.  She hadn't wanted to go under.  He'd pushed her, so she would
remember. What if she'd remembered other things, too?  What if this was
all his fault?  Of course it was.
	"Hypnosis can't cause anything," Dr. Callaway answered.  "This
probably would have emerged anyway."
	"Can you do it now?"  Mulder couldn't keep still, rubbing his hands
together, moving from foot to foot.  He wanted this over.
	"She's been through a lot," replied Dr. Callaway.  Mulder's eyes
slid to the figure huddled on the floor in the corner, drawn into herself. 
She seemed to be physically shrinking until she would finally be as large
as a four year old child.  "Tomorrow morning is soon enough."
	Mulder nodded and they prepared to go. He didn't want Starbuck
for another day. He wanted Scully.  He wanted his wife.  Dr. Callaway's
hand caught his arm.  "It's going to be a long road back," she cautioned.
	He couldn't take a breath.  "I know," he said quietly, wishing it
wasn't true. He was working to accept it as best he could.  He had hoped
the doctor would cure her, or prove that he was wrong.  Her serious
manner only confirmed his worst fears.
	Mrs. Scully insisted on sitting next to her daughter on the drive
home.  This meant Mulder spent most of the drive glancing in the
rearview mirror to look at them.
	Scully - or what seemed to remain of her - had her feet up on the
seat.  Knees drawn up under her chin.   Her cheek rested on her crossed
arms and her eyes sought comfort from the passing scenery.  Her
expression never changed from its fixed look of dreamy and sad.
	Mrs. Scully kept trying.  She toyed at fixing Scully's hair.  He'd
never seen her as a fussy mother before this. Maybe she hadn't been.
Maybe she felt some compulsion to make up for it now.  Scully made little
jerks with her head, away, wanting to be left alone.
	"There's not a lot of space..."  Mulder said to Mrs. Scully back at
his wife's apartment.  Scully went off automatically to prepare for bed. 
Neither of them coaxed a word about the session from her.  What she had
discussed with Dr. Callaway was a complete mystery.
	"I'll take the couch," Mrs. Scully replied.
	"That's where I'm sleeping." He was willing to be territorial when it
came to Scully.  He knew what was best for her. He was not going to leave
her.
	Mrs. Scully gave him an authoritative look.  "You have your own
apartment, Fox."
	"I'm her husband."
	"I'm her mother!"
	"And I'm not sure that's what she needs right now," Mulder stated
as calmly as possible.
	"I'm not sure _you're_ what she needs right now."
	He glared and his tongue ached from his teeth biting in to keep
back the angry words.  He wanted to vent, to rage at her.  She glared right
back.  Margaret Scully was a force to be reckoned with, as was her
daughter.  Finally he managed to say, "You have your house in Baltimore."
	He went into Scully's room.  She was kneeling by the side of her
bed, her hands pressed together and her face turned up to god.  He paused
a moment at the sight of her.  She was beautiful.  An innocent.  He loved
her so much.
	She sensed him and lumbered clumsily to her feet, then got into
bed.  He pulled her covered up to her chin.  "Did you like meeting Dr.
Callaway?" he asked.
	"She's not like a regular doctor." It was almost a question.  Mulder
nodded.  "We drew pictures and played with dolls."
	Mulder nodded again. Play therapy was an effective tool in
learning from children as they acted out their problems.  "Did you
remember anything?"
	"How can I remember what didn't happen yet?" she asked.  "I just
want to play."  Her eyes closed for a second.  It seemed a profound and
important statement.
	"What do you like best about being four, Starbuck?" he asked her.
	"No one hurts little girls when they're just four," she said quietly. 
More insight from the future, he thought.  He had to wonder if that was
normal, or if she was trying not to remember.
	He almost made himself laugh. Was any of this "normal"?
	Mrs. Scully had gone while he was in with Scully.  He felt guilty
relief.  He knew she would be back.  He lay down on the couch, fully
clothed, dreading what the morning might bring. No longer did he believe
a night's sleep would bring his Scully back to him.
	He couldn't sleep for remembering her words.  All little girls
should always be safe.

	The next morning, Dr. Callaway prepared to hypnotize Starbuck to
see what would come out.  "Is she easily hypnotized?" she asked Mulder,
turning away from her patient, who sat in her chair with her eyes closed,
feet swinging back and forth in casual circles.
	"Yes, very," he replied, thinking of the times before.  But she
doesn't believe in hypnosis, he thought.
	Dr. Callaway nodded.  "They usually are," she said and he
wondered what she meant by that.  "You should go," she suggested.
	"I'm staying here," Mulder insisted. He wasn't leaving her alone.
Not with anyone.  Not while vulnerable under hypnosis, especially.  She
was too fragile, too open to being hurt.
	Besides, he needed to know.
	"I'm staying too," Mrs. Scully declared.  Mulder glanced at her. 
Did she need to know as badly as he did?  Or did she need to know more,
to be told of what had gone on in her own house?  Why hadn't she
noticed?  But he couldn't blame her, he knew.  That was unfair.
	He didn't know how he felt.  But he knew he shouldn't blame her.
	"I want you to breathe deeply," Dr. Callaway said to Scully,
turning her back on the observers to focus fully on her patient.  "And then
think of a time and a place -"
	"I don't need this crap," Scully informed her coldly, opening her
eyes.
	Mulder's shoulders tensed painfully, ready to snap.  Starbuck was
gone instantly, replaced by someone he didn't know at all, someone who
seemed not at home in her own skin. And angry.
	"And neither does she.  The kid doesn't know anything, it didn't
happen to her."  Her eyes narrowed, focusing on Mrs. Scully.  "Don't you
understand anything?"
	Mrs. Scully's face was frozen with horror and shock.  Scully-but-
not slumped down in her chair, her feet hitting the floor.  One hand
casually strayed up to wind a strand of her hair between her fingers.
	"What should we call you?"  Dr. Callaway asked carefully, but
there was an aura of excitement radiating from her that Mulder reacted
badly to her.  This would be exciting to a therapist, he thought, but not to
the people who were living it.  This was hell and he was not pleased about
it at all.  He just wanted Scully back.
	"DK," Margaret breathed while Scully sulked in the chair.  "I'd
forgotten."
	"Yeah. DK."  She confirmed, sounding for all the world like a
sarcastic teenager.  Her eyes found Mulder and he tried to gaze back while
his stomach snarled into knots that felt irreparable.  "So you're here," she
said to him as though she didn't care at all.  "Scully's been worried about
you."
	Scully?  Did she know what was going on in her own body and
mind?  If she was so worried about him, why was she doing this?
	Mulder was instantly ashamed of himself and it didn't do anything
for his stomach.  Scully was the victim in this, and no matter how
abandoned he felt by her...this was not her fault.  He was so tired of trying
to be strong; he'd spent his entire life dealing with blow after blow.
	This wasn't about him.
	He was terrified now that Scully was just another personality, one
that had been out when she was with him.  What would he do if he learned
he loved a woman that only partially existed?  A fragment of a whole
person?  And if that was true, what would happen if she became
integrated, as he'd read was the goal of therapy in cases like this one. 
Would she still love him when she came through this?
	"Does Scully want to talk to us?" Dr. Callaway asked.  It annoyed
Mulder that she sounded like a medium calling on spirits from somewhere
beyond.  Everything was annoying Mulder.  He got this way when he
hadn't slept.
	DK jerked her head back and forth.  "She's scared.  That's why she
let Starbuck out. Selfish brat. I didn't think I'd ever break through."
	Dr. Callaway waited for more.
	DK went on.  "She's had her chance.  Like that Scully.  Man, what
a number.  Never has any fun.  You know this." DK's eyes found Mulder,
to his surprise.
	"Is that what you want to do, DK?  Have fun?"  Dr. Callaway's
guidance was firm.
	"Well yeah," DK shrugged.  "I never really got my chance, y'know. 
By high school, she was starting to forget.  Deal with it.  Cope."
	"Who would you say is the strongest of you?" the doctor inquired. 
"The best able to cope?"
	Another careless shrug peeled off DK's shoulders.  "It's kind of
open to discussion now," she reported.  "Dana's been gone for a while. 
Scared.  Scully can't deal with this right now. She's too shocked.  They
want to come out, but they don't know it yet.  Scully was in charge for the
longest time..."  She shrugged again.
	He couldn't accept them as separate entities.  There had never been
anything wrong with Scully. Not the Scully that he knew.  She had been
whole, he thought.  A little damaged, maybe a lot damaged, but she was
what was real.  He was clinging to that, praying to get her back.  And if
the reality turned out to be different...he didn't know what he would do.
	"Do you remember everything that happened?"
	DK shrugged again.
	"Okay," Dr. Callaway said.  "I guess that's enough for today,
Dana."
	She grinned.  But it was a sneaky grin.  "It's still DK," she informed
them, springing up from the chair, ready to leave instantly.  
	"Please wait for us in the lobby," Dr. Callaway suggested and DK
slouched out.  Mulder watched her go, amazed at the physical
transformation between this woman and Starbuck and Scully.  
	"Well?"  He turned anxiously to the doctor, searching her face for
answers.  He found few and only felt his frustration grow.
	"The personalities don't seem to be completely dissociated," Dr.
Callaway responded.  "Most multiples have different names and different
histories and don't know about each other.  The way she speaks..."
	"She's faking," Maggie said and sounded almost hopeful.
	"No," said Dr. Callaway.  Mulder didn't know which answer he had
been hoping for.  Either would have been bad news.  If she wasn't faking,
she was really sick.  If she was, she was really sick to pretend such a thing. 
But Mulder knew with dread that what he'd seen was real.  "It may be a
good sign.  The final break may be recent and incomplete.  So we may
have a better chance to cure her."
	Mulder wondered if he dared to hope for that.  For a cure.  What if
he was lost in the reassembly?
	He could not think of her in that way. She was not broken.  
	"It's fascinating," the doctor said, putting a sour look on Maggie's
face.
	Mulder knew she was trying.

	DK and Maggie fought all the way home.  "I want a nose ring," DK
said, flipping through the magazine she'd stolen from the lobby of the
doctor's office.  She'd found a terrible picture of a heroin-waif model with
too much eyeshadow and a ring in her nose.
	"No," snapped Maggie, who'd chosen to sit in the front seat next to
Mulder, leaving DK in the back like a child.  He jumped at the force of
her word.
	"Why not? It's sexy," DK said, tilting her head to consider the
photo from another angle.  She aimed this appeal at him and he knew it.
	"Ick," he contributed, hoping there weren't any eyebrow, tongue or
nipple rings in the magazine.
	"It's not your body," Maggie argued.
	"It's mine as much as hers," DK snarled.  "She doesn't even know
what to use it for.  You think she hasn't done -"
	"Shut up!" Maggie screamed, her face a scary shade of white.
Mulder could see she couldn't take this any more.
	DK pouted in the back seat. Mulder watched her in the rearview
mirror because Mrs. Scully had begun to cry and he couldn't look at her.
He didn't know what to do with either of them.  He felt responsible. He
felt he should be doing something.  There was nothing he could do and he
felt helpless.  " I just want my daughter back," Mrs. Scully sniffled.
	"You got her," DK muttered with a cold gleam in her eye.  The
look of the unloved. Mulder recognized it from his own teenage self. 
Maggie jumped out of the car as soon as they reached Scully's apartment,
hurrying for her own car, not even offering to come inside.  DK was not
someone she wanted to spend time with.
	Mulder knew it was hard for her.
	It was hard for him.
	DK flopped down on the couch when they went inside. She
propped her feet up on the back of the couch, splaying her jean-covered
legs wide.  Mulder tried not to notice her pose, which thrust her breasts
purposely out and angled her hips provocatively at him.  
	"Wanna fuck?" DK asked, moistening her lips with her tongue.
	Mulder was reviled.  "How old are you, DK?" he asked, reminding
himself that this was *not* Scully.
	"Fourteen."
	She acted it, with her less than subtle or effective attempts at
seduction.  "Let's watch TV," he suggested, intrigued by the easy sexuality
of this not-Scully.  He wondered if she had ever openly behaved this way
when she was fourteen.  He couldn't imagine it.  He figured DK was some
hidden away fantasy she'd had.
	"You have a tattoo," he said to impress her when he caught DK
looking covetously at a navel ring on MTV.
	"Where?" she jumped, sounding genuinely excited.  She looked
down at herself, unfamiliar with her own body, her arms and legs moving
in different directions at once in a very young-seeming way.
	"Here." He got up and curiously she followed as he led her into the
bathroom. She looked into the mirror with impossibly earnest eyes.  He
lifted her shirt with a finger and touched the ink painted flesh he found
there. Pointing it out to her.
	When she turned to peer over her shoulder in the mirror, she was
practically in his arms. He tried hard to think of other things  The coldness
in her eyes as she judged the painting on her skin.
	A girl in a woman's body. This is sick, Mulder, he told himself.
	But she looked just like the woman he loved.  Was, in some oddly
connected way, the woman that he loved.
	She realized their positions and lost interest in the tattoo instantly,
moving to press up against him, rubbing her body against his like a cat.
	He couldn't do this.  His heart was pounding, scared, and he took a
step away.
	"You liked it when I sucked you off the other night," DK said
coyly, her finger reaching threateningly for the buttons on his jeans.
	He took another step back, blood fighting its way through his ears
with a loud sound. "That wasn't -"
	She grinned.  "Dana thought I should."  It occurred to him she
could be lying. "You liked it. More even than the boys at school.  You're
my first real man."  She lowered her eyes in an imitation of flirting.
	She was lying.  "Stop it!" Mulder ordered. "I don't like it when you
do this."
	"It scares you," she murmured and he realized that was what she
wanted.  To scare him. How much must she hurt inside to behave this
way?  If only he could touch that.
	"No. It scares you.  So badly you have to lie," he told her firmly.
	Her face changed and something ugly came into her expression.  "I
hate you!" she screamed, ran to her room and slammed the door.
	He sighed and leaned against the wall.
	She did scare the hell out of him.  He sat down in the living room,
staring blindly at the TV, knowing he had caused this.  It was all entirely
his fault.  He would give anything to get Scully back.
	He had to do something.
	Finally, reluctantly, he gave in and knocked softly on the door to
Scully's room.  When there was no answer, he swallowed back panic -
what if she'd done something to herself? - and pushed the door open. 
Scully was sprawled on the bed, her eyes open, red but dry.  She'd been
crying and stopped.  Because of him.
	"Hey," he said gently.
	"I'm not her. Go away."
	"You don't have to be her."
	"It's her you want," DK said roughly, wiping her nose on her hand. 
"Nobody ever wanted me."  She said the words to herself.  Reminding
herself of past injustices, perhaps.
	He sighed. This was so hard.  Talking to a fourteen year old when
he only knew the wonderful, bright adult she had become.  "I know it feels
that way at your age," he said carefully.
	She looked down at her bitten fingernails, feigning indifference.
	"Maybe if you talk about it..."  he tried.  Wanting her to open up.
	She looked at him.  "I know you're a shrink, too. Dana told me."
	"Dana talks to you?"
	DK shrugged.
	"Does Scully?"
	It was the wrong thing to ask. She rolled her eyes and made an
angry noise in the back of her throat.  "What is it with you and _Scully_? 
She's a cold, angry, unemotional, unfeeling bitch."
	"That's not true," Mulder said.
	DK looked him in the eye.  "We all are.  Remember that."
	"Thanks for the warning."  He descended into sarcasm himself. 
Protection.  There was no point in trying to talk to her, he thought, but
questioned his own motives as he returned to the living room.  Did he
really want to talk to DK, to understand her - or was she right, was he
merely looking for Scully?
	He missed her. He missed her so much.  Talking to her.  Her
skepticism.  Her manner, her way.  He loved her so much it hurt.  And he
was terrified that by helping her, he might be losing her permanently.
	Which was the only thing scarier than the notion he'd already lost
her.

-10-

	Morning brought another session with Dr. Callaway.  Mrs. Scully
attended, too, looking as though she hadn't slept.  Mulder could
understand that, but wondered if she had resumed her life.  What did she
do all day?  As far as he knew, she didn't work. Or had she sat home all
night, watching and wondering the way he did?
	"Is there any one of you who remembers everything?" Dr.
Callaway asked.
	"No," DK said, even as she was transforming.  Mulder had seen a
man shape-shift - a man who had assumed his own form - and this was
almost more disconcerting.  The process was similar, a series of subtle,
almost unnoticeable changes that left an entirely different person behind.
	Dr. Callaway knew it, too.  She leaned forward.  "What's your
name?"
	Scully didn't speak.  Her body seemed heavier, more deeply tied to
the earth.  Her eyes didn't quite focus.  But she heard.
	"Is there a name I can call you?" the doctor pressed, her eyes
darting across Scully's face in an almost nervous way that made Mulder's
stomach ache.  This woman had to know what she was doing.  She had to. 
The alternative was too frightening to contemplate.
	Scully shook her head.  "I don't like being out here," she said
slowly.  Her voice sounded huskier.
	"You'd rather be inside?  Where it's safe?"  Dr. Callaway zoomed
in, but Scully didn't respond, sinking into that deep, troubling silence
again.  "What have you seen?"
	An even, weighted shrug.
	"You need to face this."  The doctor sounded so convincing.  "So
you can help.  The others accept it.  Do the others know?"
	What the hell is she talking about?  Mulder asked himself, but he
knew he was angry because he  felt like he should be doing something, or
protecting her from these questions, and there was nothing that he could
do.  If he spoke up, the doctor would make him sit outside and he wanted
to stay.  He wanted to know.  He wanted to believe his mere presence
could be a comfort to Scully.
	"Scully.  Dana.  It scares them," Scully-but-not admitted.  "So
they're hiding.  Don't want to face it."
	"Yet you're able to accept it."
	She didn't say anything.  Mulder wondered if this was another
personality.  If maybe these personalities went deeper than they seemed to. 
They seemed almost superficial, aspect-oriented.  Starbuck was the child;
DK the teenager; Scully the adult.  He'd studied Freud in college.  Now he
had to think of the id, the ego, and the superego.  He looked at Scully
again, wondering if this -person- speaking now was some embodiment of
her inner mind.
	It gave him chills and made him sick.  His mind felt it had to bend
to get around the concept.  He was uncomfortable with it.
	She sat back silent for many minutes, completely blank, almost
catatonic.  She didn't move, didn't blink.  She didn't even seem to be
breathing.
	Mulder could hear the clock ticking, beating like thunder in time
with his heart.  What if no one came out?  What if she slipped away from
them for good this way?  What if no one could reach her?  He wanted to
shake her, to force her eyes to focus. He wanted her to look at him and
yell at him for doing so. But he could only sit back and wait, like a game
show contestant who didn't know the answer as he waited for the time to
run down.
	"Is there anyone else who knows what happened to Dana, who can
help her to understand?"  the doctor asked.
	"Mom?"  Scully's change was instant.  Her body convulsed and she
was in tears, her voice coated with their moisture.
	The change in Mrs. Scully was almost as strong.  She'd been doing
her best to remain calm, clenching the arms of the chair she was sitting in. 
But no mother could keep from reacting to a daughter who cried out for
her.
	"Mom, I'm sick."
	"We're here to help you, Dana," Mrs. Scully's tone was even,
strong.  More so than Mulder would have been able to manage if she had
called for him.  But she never called for him, did she?
	"Are you going to put me away...like you did Charlie?"  Scully
looked small and afraid.  Her voice was reedy, high, almost painful to
Mulder's ears.  He looked at Mrs. Scully.  This was the first he'd heard of
anything like this concerning Scully's younger brother.
	Mrs. Scully drew back as though she'd been struck.  "No," she
whispered fiercely.
	Mulder stared at the older woman, trying to come up with any kind
of an answer until he heard Scully say his name.  Had it really been so
long since she had?  She sounded surprised, like someone in a dream. 
"Mulder.  You're here too."  Was she happy to see him? He couldn't tell.
	"Yes," he said and his throat was impossibly tight.
	"It's been a while."  Her smile was embarrassed.  Sweet.  She was
happy to see him.  His heart lightened a little.
	"How long has it been?" he asked.
	"Since they took me...since Duane Barry."  She whispered his
name and shook her head slightly, fighting against something in her head
associated with that man.  "I...couldn't..."  She shook her head, pressing
her lips together in a vain attempt to hold back the tears.
	"What happened to you, Dana?" Dr. Callaway's voice was low. 
Unobtrusive.
	"I don't know." Her face crumpled with pain and distress.  "It's all
so weird...I called but no one came.  And it was so dark...so very dark." 
Her brows pulled together and her voice rose.  "I woke up in the hospital. 
But I didn't want to...I wasn't strong enough...no one knew I was there at
first. It's all mixed up."
	She looked at Mulder, her gaze bold enough to make him shift
positions in his chair.  "You wanted me to be Scully," she said.
	He didn't know what to say to that.  He didn't know if it was true,
or even, really, what it meant.  Maybe it was something he should
apologize for.  "Scully, I -"
	"Mulder?"  It was her panicked voice, her wide-eyed panicked
face.  "What's going on?  _Mom_?  How did I -?"  She looked around
frantically, moving tensely to the edge of her chair.  "I don't know how I
got here."  She saw the psychiatrist and seemed to recognize her as a
mental health professional.  "Oh," she said, sounding ashamed.
	"Do you know what's  been happening?" Dr. Callaway asked.
	"I was...was I -?"  The words were too hard for her to say.  A hand
went to the back of her neck, touching the microchip she knew was
implanted under the skin there. "Did I -?"
	"Scully, what's the earliest memory you have?" Dr. Callaway
asked, before Scully could get her bearings or put up any defensive walls.
	She frowned, working hard. Scully tried to please people.  "I don't
remember a lot of my childhood.  Sorry."  She said the words as though
they were ordinary.  Did other people remember?
	The doctor didn't let her off so easily. Mulder cringed, knowing
where this would lead.  He wanted to stop this, to let Scully gather herself
together into the poised woman he knew.  "Why do you think that is?" Dr.
Callaway continued.
	Rather than answer the more difficult question, Scully replied to
the first.  "My father.  Reading to me before bedtime.  Leaving the night
light on."  She frowned again, then looked at Mulder.  "I forgot I was
afraid of the dark."
	"Why were you afraid?"
	"Aren't all kids?"  she asked, but didn't look like she believed it. 
And Mulder knew that to Scully, belief was everything.  If she didn't have
faith in her own words...it scared him.  "I think I got locked in the
basement when I was five."
	"Scully," Dr. Callaway began gently, "You've given a specific age
for something you only think happened.  Why is that?"
	"I did get locked in the basement when I was five," she said more
firmly, but she was staring down at her hand.  The wedding ring.  She
touched it like she couldn't believe what she was seeing was real.  She
raised her head and looked at Mulder.  "Why don't I remember?"
	"You've been having blackouts and missing time." Mulder hated
that Dr. Callaway answered for him.  He was having his heart ripped out. 
He wanted to pull Scully away and keep her safe, but he couldn't.  That
wouldn't help her.  "Do you know why?"
	"There are some things you just don't ask yourself."  Her voice was
iron and it gave Mulder chills.
	"Have you ever heard of dissociative identity disorder?" Dr.
Callaway pressed onward.
	Scully looked at Mulder.   "Like Melissa Ephesian."  He didn't
know what he heard in her tone.  Sadness?  Pity for that woman?  For
herself?  Acceptance, so easily?  Not Scully.
	He could only sadly nod.  Just like Melissa Ephesian, a woman
he'd once believed to be his soulmate.  His regression to a former life had
been a load of crap, he knew, because Scully had proved it to him.  But
now his real soul mate, his other half, the woman who made him whole
again, had that same disorder.
	For once Dr. Callaway looked confused.  She didn't understand the
shorthand between them.  "When did the split occur?" she asked.
	"Only a couple of days ago."  DK announced her presence by
beginning her incessant hair twirling again.  "When Scully started to
remember.  Before that, we were different but all the same."
	"Why don't you tell Scully what you've remembered?" Dr.
Callaway suggested.
	"Here?"  DK shook her head and retreated inside.  Again, it seemed
there was no soul inside Scully's body for several agonizing seconds and
Mulder felt himself growing tense.  DK finally returned to report, "She
won't listen. She's scared."
	"Scully, what happened in the basement?" Dr. Callaway asked.
	The frown lines cut deep into her face.  She was straining - but to
remember or to forget?  Mulder pressed his hands together to keep from
reaching for her.  "The rabbit died.  Like Grandma did.  I thought I could
keep her safe.  He said he'd kill me if  I told," she babbled.
	"Who would."
	"Bill."  Starbuck bit her lip and looked pleadingly at Mulder.  "I
don't want to..."
	Dr. Callaway once again responded for him, controlling the
session.  "Keep trying," she said, but sat back in her chair.  "You must
keep trying." It was a suggestion, to end the session with. The look she
shot toward Mulder and Maggie dismissed them.
	Mulder's knees were weak as he got to his feet.  He felt oddly
exhausted by the session.  How must Scully feel?   She was the one who
had been through a realm of experiences and emotions in the last hour. He
rushed to her side, wishing he had more to comfort her with that his hand
on her arm.
	He felt her flinch and saw her force her smile.  She was making
herself endure his touch.  That hurt him deep in a place that he didn't want
exposed to pain. He liked touching her and he liked to be touched.  Touch
was a vital sense in bonding and loving and living.  Now she was denying
that. He didn't want to lose her.  He released her arm.  "How are you
feeling?" Such a formal question.  He hated it.  It was something you
could ask a stranger.
	"I'm fine."
	At least there was no doubt to her identity, he thought.  Scully was
back. But for how long?
	"Mom, why are you here?"  She turned to the older woman. "I
thought - you didn't make the wedding."  Mulder looked at his wife.  Did
she or didn't she remember the ceremony? Did she consider herself bound
to him? He hated himself for wondering.
	"I'll never forgive myself for that," Mrs. Scully told her daughter. 
"I should have been here.  For you."
	"No, it's fine," Scully said, but Mulder could read her eyes.  She
was scared and desperately trying to hide it.  What was wrong with her
was serious enough to make her mother come to her side.
	Scully was oddly quiet for most of the afternoon, but Mulder was
relieved that she remained Scully without any maddeningly sudden leaps
into DK or Starbuck.  She even went into the bedroom to lie down for a
nap, exhausted.  Mulder could have used one himself.  The tension
between Scully and her mother was unbearable and filled the air.  It barely
decreased when Scully left the living room to lie down in her bedroom.
	"Do you need to talk?" Mulder asked Margaret.
	"It's all so hard to accept," Maggie told him. "She's always been the
strong one.  For her to act like this now..."
	"She's not crazy.  She's not acting.  She's hurting," Mulder told her.
	"I know that, Fox," she snapped.
	"It's Mulder," he retorted.
	Mrs. Scully gave him a long, hard look that reminded him of his
own mother.  Then she rose from the couch.  "Tell her to call me,
Mulder."  Her tone said it all.  He'd now severed whatever tenuous crisis-
built friendship they'd once had.  The door closed and he turned on the
television, waiting for Scully to wake up.
	He'd been the one to call her mother from Allentown, Pennsylvania
when Scully's cancer had been diagnosed.  She'd asked him to call and
he'd done so without question.  He'd had his feet knocked out from under
him, but he knew he had to do whatever he could to help her.  Scully'd
been so complacent, so calmly accepting, as though she had already
known of the cancer attacking her body.
	Margaret Scully had been furious.  Not only because her daughter
was ill and she was terrified, but because it was Mulder who told her.  He
supposed that perhaps it was because he'd scared her more.  She'd
probably waited years for this call to come, the one from Mulder to tell
her she'd lost her other daughter.
	He knew she'd been angry with Scully when she arrived.  He didn't
know what passed between them then, didn't want to know. But he knew it
had been angry and blameful.  Just as they had remained at odds
throughout Scully's cancer.  When Scully didn't want treatment, Mrs.
Scully tried to thrust religion on her as some sort of a miracle cure.
	Mulder knew Mrs. Scully blamed him.  She'd never said it, but he
felt it radiating from her.  He'd seen it in her eyes before.  Once, he'd
retrieved Scully from her home, delusional and wild.  He'd thought she
was dead, raped by the side of the road, and all the while Mrs. Scully had
been hiding her daughter from him. Thinking he was to blame.  Which he
probably was.
	Water under the bridge, he thought, wiping his hands down his
face to try to clear it from his mind.  He wasn't going to think about the
sad family reunion when Scully had been cured.  He'd sat in a hard plastic
chair in the hallway, unwelcome. Unwanted.  Not a part of any family
Scully would ever have.
	Shut out.
	To blame.
	One sorry son of a bitch.
	This *was* all his fault.  
	Thank god Scully wandered back into the living room at that
moment, sheepishly smiling at him, her hair flattened on one side.  "I
couldn't sleep," she admitted.
	He smiled back at her as she plopped down on the other end of the
couch. Scully.  He'd never been so happy to see her.  She glanced at the
television and changed the channel casually, at ease in her own home. 
She found a channel she liked and looked at it for a few seconds, ignoring
the way he was staring at her.  He loved that she could ignore him when
he couldn't take his eyes off of her.
	"Pizza?" she asked, rising to phone in the order.  They didn't speak
while they waited, just companionably watched a repeat of an ancient Tic-
Tac-Dough episode until the pizza arrived.  Scully paid the delivery boy
and doled out portions on milk white china, handing one to him.  " What's
really happened to me?" she asked as casually as she would have asked
him what program was on next.
	"Only you know that for sure," he answered.  He knew it was lame.
He wanted to tell her, to help her, to give her the answers she sought, but
he was tired of talking about it.  But mostly he knew that this was her
journey and if she didn't make it herself she would not be able to recover. 
Now that she was back, he wanted their life to return to normal.
	He wanted to believe she wouldn't go away again.
	It would be so easy to forget.
	"I don't have to go back," she told him.  Obviously having the same
thought he was having.  He stared at her, knowing he should tell her she
had to continue to see Dr. Callaway.  "I'm fine now, aren't I?" she asked.
	Her eyes searched his, looking for answered and keeping him from
looking away.  There was still an edge of panic to her, held carefully at
bay but making her wiry muscles taut.
	"Yeah," he whispered, damnably agreeing with her.  He wanted so
badly to forget.
	"Where are we going on our honeymoon?" she asked him.
	His heart started going again, fast, in a crazy fit. Uneven beats. 
Could he be so lucky?  She was his wife and she was safe again. He
pushed away doubts he rationally knew he should hold on to.  She was his.
Finally.  "Where do you want to go?" he asked.
	"Up the coast," she said decisively.  She'd thought about it.  "A
little bed and breakfast.  I don't care where. Just be with you."
	"You don't care?" he teased lightly, feeling joyous.  Pure, amazing,
light as air joy.  He wasn't sure he'd ever felt it before.  This was Scully
and she was better.  His mind told him he was having a stress reaction, but
it didn't prevent him from kissing her lightly on the lips - wishing to linger
but not allowing himself to because it was a testing kiss.  She passed - or
was it he who passed?  He ordered her to go and pack.
	He dialed the Lone Gunmen from her phone.  They weren't travel
agents, but they were the next best thing.  His best resource.  Sometimes
he would swear they were magicians.  Having Scully safe and in love with
him made him believe there was magic in the world.
	"How is she?" Frohike sounded desperate for news.
	"You promised to keep us updated," Langly reminded him, his
voice tinny through the speakerphone.
	"I'm hoping you don't need a babysitter." Byers' remark was telling.
	"She's better," Mulder said.  Did he dare to believe it? He had no
choice.  He had to believe it. "We're going on our honeymoon.  That's
where you guys come in."
	Frohike's "We do?" drown out Langly's "Uh, Mulder?"
	"Know of any bed and breakfasts snowy and perfect -"
	"I don't think you should do this," Frohike said seriously.
	"What?" Mulder asked in a low voice.
	At that moment, Scully walked into the room, carrying just a tiny
purse.  "Packed," she said with a smug smile, sitting down to wait for him.
	"I've been doing some reading," Frohike said.  "This could push her
past the brink, Mulder.  She has a lot to deal with and this can't -"
	Mulder was silent.
	"Are you still there?" Frohike asked.
	"Yes," Mulder said, looking at Scully.
	Frohike sighed.  "Just don't push her," he advised and hung up.
	"Looks like we're on our own," Mulder said, feeling unsettled.  He
wanted to think that she was better. That she wanted this.  Wanted him. 
He had to think everything would be all right.
	He also knew, in his heart, that Frohike was right.

-11-

	In the end, they didn't go far.  They traveled up the highway a ways
to a little inn Mulder remembered from his wilder, younger days.  Not that
he'd had all that many of them.  The inn was suitably quiet and romantic,
with soft decor and equally soft upholstery.
	Scully sat down on the bed, looking nervous but trying not to.  She
didn't want to let it show. "Nice," she said, the word almost meaningless. 
She took in the bounce of the mattress and the silkiness of good cotton
sheets.  A floral picture hung on the wall over the dresser.  There was no
television.
	There was only one reason why anyone would be in this rented
room.  And it wasn't to sleep, though it involved the bed.
	Mulder sat down next to her.  "This is awkward," he said, ruffling
her hair.  He thought it best to get their feelings out into the open.  The
same weird feeling he'd had on their wedding day, of not knowing what to
do or how to proceed.  Now that their goal was fixed, it seemed so strange
to be focused wholly upon it.
	Their relationship had never, really, been a sexual one before.
	Maybe they should have dated before marrying, he thought.
	She nodded, unable to say anything.  Her stomach unfolded as his
fingers threaded through her hair.  This felt safe.  Mulder was a gentle
man with her. He always had been.  He would never do anything to hurt
her.  "I trust you, Mulder," she said.  The words surprised her. She'd meant
to say love.  She loved him.
	He nodded seriously.  Her trust was a large responsibility.  "If you
don't want -" he offered.
	"I do," she said quickly.
	They sat on the bed and waited.  For what?  She realized the first
move was hers.   She turned her head and met his eyes.  Their color and
expression changed under her gaze.  Communicating.  At that moment,
she felt she could feel his thoughts inside her body.  She gave in, threw the
last vestige of caution away, and pressed her lips against his.
	He let her explore slowly before he returned the kiss.  He didn't
touch her with his hands, just teased her with his tongue and his lips and
his teeth.  She could feel the inner core of steel that she relied on for
strength melting deep inside.  She didn't need it any more.  She didn't need
to be strong to be in love with him.
	She let it go and allowed him to lay her gently against the bed
beneath his body.  He touched her face as he kissed her, a touch that
meant something to her. He'd stroked her face before with the same look
in his eyes.  He released her lips and drew back, memorizing her face.
	His eyes were dark with desire and his breath was fast.  So fast. 
She could feel it resonating through her body.  Her breath was just as fast,
rushing through her ears.  He slipped his hand under the shirt she was
wearing, watching her.
	His fingers were cold against her stomach.  Or was her skin that
hot?  She could feel her face reddening and his hand slipped around her
breast inside the soft cup of her bra.
	She felt the shock all the way through her when he began to
unbutton her blouse.
	The lower button was okay.  The next higher was fine.  Her shirt
was still closed.  He was looking at her body now and she lay there. 
Waiting for what he would do.  Not participating.  Another button and
there wasn't enough air reaching her brain.  In, out, she had to remind
herself but all she could manage was the in-in-in of panic.  Didn't he see?
She didn't know why she was so terrified suddenly, why her blood was
pounding through her head.  Something about having her clothes removed
for her.  When she closed her eyes, the memory almost came to her.  This
had happened to her before.  The last button opened and he pushed her
blouse apart.
	There was nothing pushy in his hands or his movements, but she
was unable to control her reaction.  A dark, animal place in her mind
remembered *before* when someone hadn't been so gentle as Mulder. 
She couldn't see the face, didn't want to.  Something terrible had followed. 
Something that wasn't love at all.  Ripping her shirt off, exposing her...it
had been a violation.  Only a small fraction of a violation yet to come.
	She couldn't handle this.  The terror was too much.  It threatened to
suck her under and she knew there were others, much more capable,
begging to take over.  To take her control from her.  She couldn't lose this
experience and she couldn't lose her control.  To have either lost into the
darkness, the missed time, would be terrible.
	She flailed up, scurrying away from him like a startled spider.  Her
knee coming up whacked him in the jaw, but she didn't notice as she
curled into the corner.  Where it was safe.
	Where it was safe?
	This was Mulder and she trusted him so why on earth was she
acting so crazy?  She wanted to stop, wanted to kiss him.  She desperately
wanted to make love with him.  But she *couldn't*.  Like when she'd been
younger, a small child, dealing with the frustrations of the adult world, the
things she couldn't reach, the skills she didn't yet have.  The same kind of
couldn't.
	There was pain in Mulder's eyes, and tears, she saw after she
pulled her blouse closed and looked at him, aware that she was acting
crazy, aware that there was no reason for her to behave this way.  She was
shaking again.  "Mulder?" What was happening to her, why couldn't she
control herself?  Why was so she terrified?  Even scarier was the
realization that it wasn't rational and it didn't make any sense.
	"I'm sorry," he said.  A few flecks of blood appeared on his lips.
	"You're bleeding."  She didn't understand.  Where had the blood
come from?  She hadn't hit him...she realized she had, accidentally, in her
need to separate her body from what her brain told her was danger.
	"I bit my tongue."
	Blood in her mouth. She could taste blood, feel its coppery
bitterness on her tongue. Not now, but sometime in the past.  When? She
didn't know.  It scared her not to know.
	"I -"  She didn't know what to say.  It didn't make sense to her, and
there were no words.  "I don't know why -"
	"It's okay," Mulder said.  He seemed sad but resigned.  "I'll take
you home."
	"No," she said.  "I want to -"
	He shook his head.  Why was he shaking his head?  Why did he
know more than she did?  Her stomach was weak and trembly, still
recovering from desire as well as fear.  "It's okay," he said, trying to
convince her.  His hand reached out to her, and stopped.
	He didn't want to touch her.
	She looked down, ashamed, absorbing herself in buttoning her
blouse. Once before she had done so.  Mulder hadn't unbuttoned it then. 
A suspect, a creep.  Another man who exerted power over her sexually.
He'd used her for his own needs.
	Mulder had rescued her then because she hadn't been able to fight
for herself.
	She loved him so much.
	"Come on," he said, waiting for her at the door of the wasted,
rented room.
	She wanted to cry in the car on the way back, but she couldn't.  It
would have been a release and she was too afraid.  Too afraid of losing
her hard-won control.  She'd wrapped its iron fingers more tightly around
herself and was determined not to let it go.

	"Your mother's here," Mulder said, recognizing the car as he
parked on the street in front of Scully's red brick building.  He had planned
to drop her off and go home. He couldn't take this.  Not right now.  But
seeing her mother's car, something told him to go inside with her.
	Bill and her mother were sitting in the living room, grim and silent. 
Mulder felt his blood boil that they would be lying in wait for her this
way.  Before Bill could even rise from the chair, Mulder attacked him,
throwing the first hard, satisfying punch.
	Bill Jr. was bigger and stronger than Mulder and fought back, but
Mulder had blind fury on his side.    He threw more punches, but Bill's
solid blow to his jaw made his ears ring.  Bill glared and Mulder's rage
faded.  Violence felt good but it wasn't the way.  Mrs. Scully was yelling. 
But what penetrated his red fog was Scully's quiet voice saying one word:
"Stop."
	"What did you do to her, you sick bastard!" Mulder shouted. Bill
had punched him where Scully's knee had struck him earlier.  He could
feel his jaw begin to swell.
	"Mulder, stop," Scully's voice was calm and strong.  Mulder took
two steps back away and watched as Scully walked over to her brother and
extended a hand to him to pull him up.  He couldn't believe she was doing
that.  Unwary, Bill accepted her offer of assistance.  "I know what you
did," she said to him in an icy voice.
	Bill looked stunned.  Scared.  He looked at his mother to see her
reaction and recovered.  "I didn't do anything," he said.  "This is false
memory syndrome.  Don't you see that, sis?"
	Scully was watching him, alert, as he moved in closer to her.  "He's
been filling your head with crap and lies," Bill continued.  "First little
green men and now this?"
	Scully didn't look at Mulder.  She continued to stare at her brother. 
If she watched him, he wouldn't be able to surprise her.   Her look was ice. 
There was fire in rage, but this was much more powerful.
	"There are doctors who can help you recover from this," her
mother said.  "You can help you to see the truth again."
	Her mother believed Bill over her.  The realization was a blow and
for a second, she lost her breath.  If her father was alive, he would hate her
for this.  For breaking apart the family.  Because it hurt, she held it deeper
inside, unwilling to respond to the pain.
	"I think you'd better go now," she said in an ugly strong voice. 
After a second, Bill nodded and looked to her mother to leave.  Mulder
made a movement toward the door.  "Mulder," Scully said. Her mouth
trembled with the effort it took not to cry.  She held out her hand to him. 
"Please stay."  He couldn't leave her now.   She needed him.  Mulder took
her hand and she clung to him until the door closed behind her family.
	"I can't believe -"  Mulder began.  Scully sank into the chair and
covered her eyes. His words stopped.  She didn't need to hear this right
now. "I'm sorry."  It couldn't convey how sorry he was.
	She had to do something to stop the voices in her head.  The ones
that told her she was stupid and weak and most of all, wrong.  She was
already beginning to pick apart every detail, every action of the evening. 
The one she kept coming back to was the one where she jerked away from
Mulder's touch when she had wanted him to touch her.  She needed to
know that someone loved her right now.  She needed to cancel the
negative experiences with positive ones.  She had, in her life, turned her
back on too many things due to fear.  If she walked away from this now,
she would not be able to return.  Her sexuality was something she needed
to reclaim for herself.  She wanted it for herself.  To prove it hadn't been
taken from her along with her innocence and her trust and her faith. She
wanted to be Mulder's wife.
	She needed to be.
	"Mulder," she said, raising her head.  "I'm ready now."  He didn't
know what she meant until she led him into the bedroom.
	She didn't turn on the light, but a streetlamp leaking in around the
blinds and provided all the mood lighting they needed.  She began to
remove her clothing, purpose in her every movement.  _She_ undressed
herself, _she_ chose what she would do with her body.
	When she faced him, she was naked and unafraid.  He had stripped
down to his shorts and gave her a questioning look.  He didn't understand
the difference between this time and what had happened in the motel.  She
couldn't explain it to him in words.  There had been too many words.  She
helped him to take off his shorts, measuring him with her hand and
helping him spring to arousal.  She was not afraid.  She knew what she
was doing.  She knew that he loved her.
	She looked into his eyes, eyes that had seen and experienced so
much.  He would never hurt her or humiliate her or make her do anything
she didn't want to do.  Her love for him filled her chest so much it hurt to
try to breathe.
	"Are you sure about this?" he asked, pulling away from her
slightly.  His chest heaved with rapid respiration and she could see him
trying to calm himself.  In case she wasn't sure.
	"I'm sure."  There was no doubt in her voice or in her mind.
	"What's changed?" he asked, gruff.
	"Nothing," she answered.  "There's nothing to be afraid of."  And
she touched him so he would know she meant her words.
	She was ready for him.  The satin sheets were still on the bed, as
they had been since their wedding day. Waiting for them.  The fabric was
cool and slippery against their skin.  Her hips slid a little when he entered
her.  She bit her lip at first, feeling the pain of time and residual fear.  But
he was impossible not to open up to.
	He wasn't a particularly great lover, but he was tenacious and
tender.  His love for her made his hands gentle and his touch sweet.  He
knew what to do to drive her to a place she'd rarely been, a red hot place
deep inside that turned to an icy white heat.
	She didn't make a sound as he moaned sensually above her.  His
voice was rough, involuntary.  She could feel it resonating in her skin. 
Her mouth was open as she strained for air and sensation and release.
	Release.
	She turned her head away from Mulder's cries as the convulsions
came, shaking her unexpectedly from the safety of her world into
uncontrollable sobs.
	Breathless, shattering sobs she could not control.  She shouldn't be
crying like this.  Another thing she couldn't explain, couldn't stop, could
only submit to. Sometimes even her own body betrayed her.  Mulder was
staring at her and she felt him limp within her before he withdrew. 
"Scully -?"  She could hear it in his tone that he was afraid, again, to touch
her.
	"I'm okay," she said, covering her teary eyes with her hands.
	"Did I hurt you?"  his voice was so careful.
	"No."  She only cried harder.  Now he thought she hated him.  "I
don't know why... I don't know why..."  She hiccuped.  "I love you."
	He looked at her, unsure, for a long second, before wrapping her in
his arms and petting her hair, murmuring soothingly to her.  Her skin was
still fever hot and sensitive.
	"I love you," she said quietly, again, so that he would know it.  She
loved him.  He was asleep before she wiped the final tears away.  A line
between his eyebrows spoiled the perfect bliss on his face.  She tucked
back the hair from his forehead and kissed him. He was too good for her,
she thought as she went into the bathroom to clean up.

	Something had changed.
	She was different.
	Men, she thought, walking nude from the bathroom and looking
casually at the one who was sleeping in the bed.  She didn't recognize him
immediately, but she judged his bedroom as too feminine. She picked up
his T-shirt from the floor.  It was stretched out and smelled like him, but
she slipped it over her head anyway.  If she'd opened any of the drawers
she would have found it was not his bedroom but hers.  But she didn't
open any of the drawers.  There was still a tingle of excitement in her
body as she drew up her panties and trousers across her thighs.  There was
a jacket on the chair.
	She had to get out of there.  It was the only driving thought in her
brain. She had to get away.  She didn't know what had happened.  Couldn't
remember.  Damn.  This had happened before.  She frowned, but tried not
to let it trouble her.  The past was all darkness.
	The jacket was big and smelled deliciously of old leather.  She
looked into the mirror, barely recognizing herself.  She looked into her
own dark eyes.  No answers came to her.
	She had to get out of there and fast.  There was something acid
burning in her stomach; a terror, a warning of danger. She knew she'd
fucked him and didn't know why.  She knew it had been consensual, could
feel with her body that she'd enjoyed it, but didn't remember the act. Didn't
remember anything. Damn.
	She slipped out the door, not hearing the latch catch behind her.
	Outside, it was night and cold and she didn't know where she was. 
That had happened to her before.  The last time she opened her eyes to
darkness and silence, not only in the present but in the past.  She turned
her head and saw a bus lumbering in the distance bore the destination of
Georgia St.  She knew an address on Georgia Street.  The memory jumped
into her mind.  Not her address.  She didn't know where she was, but
Georgia St. was address that would do. She could get help there.  An old
friend.  One who'd helped her before.  When the past was darkness.  He'd
been kind to her. Taken care of her.  An old, grandfatherly figure.  They
had taken care of each other for a time.  Before the darkness intervened. 
Thankful to find money in her pockets, she flagged down the bus and paid
the driver, sinking into one of the seats.
	Her thoughts couldn't help lingering on the man she'd just left.  She
knew his name, but couldn't recall ever having met him before.  Mulder. 
She was surprised she had been in his bed.  But she knew it had to relate
to the reasons why she couldn't remember.
	Watching the scenery carefully, she pulled on the bell cord.  A
light at the front of the bus flashed, indicating it would stop at the next
exit.  It smelled musty, humid and gassy.  She felt dirty just sitting on the
seat.  She rose and walked to the front of the bus, pausing before she
started down the steps, indicating her wrist and getting the driver to show
her his watch.  Midnight.  She smiled her thanks and gave a jaunty wave. 
She thought she heard him say something, a deep mottled sound oozing
through the silence of the world that surrounded her.  She didn't know
what it was.	
	Only midnight, she thought, walking along the deserted street until
she reached a familiar rundown brownstone.  She didn't know why he
didn't clean it up.  The key was still on the ledge above the door but she
knocked and stood back, jamming her hands into her pockets as she
waited for him.
	He was dressed, but he'd been sleeping.  He looked grumpy and
then he looked at her.  He opened his mouth and she could see his lips
moving and shook her head vigorously, holding up both of her hands in a
motion to indicate he should stop.  Frustration filled her.  If she had ever
known sign language, it had disappeared into the void of her past.  She
gave him an eager look and a smile, raising her eyebrows.  "Remember
me?" her expression intended to say.  There was no notepad in the jacket
pockets. Maybe it wasn't hers after all.
	Realization dawned slowly over his face. Had it been so long? 
Had he been able to forget about her so quickly and completely?  He
seemed to be straining to remember the fingerspelling of her name.  But
he managed it with fingers grown clumsy and she grinned, nodding.
	He motioned her inside and they went together.
	It hadn't changed at all.  She took in the beaten doctors waiting
room style couch and the desk with the now-antique typewriter on it.  No
manuscript by its side and she tweaked an eyebrow at him.
	He tapped his watch and shook his head.  No time to write.  She
made her hand look like she was holding an invisible pen and wrote on an
invisible sheet of paper.  He jumped into motion from where he had stood,
watching her, finding her several sheets of typing paper - the top sheet
coated with dust - and a ballpoint pen. She looked at it.  He'd stolen it
from the United Nations.  Wow.	
	Then he took the pen from her and scribbled on the paper:  "It is
good to see you again, Diana. It is Diana, isn't it?"  He looked anxious,
almost scared, as he examined her face.
	Why wouldn't it be Diana? she wondered, sitting down on the
couch and stretching out her legs.
	"AMNESIA," she scribbled.  She always wrote in capital letters. 
Once she'd read a book about graphology and it told her that indicated she
wanted to be heard.  She'd found it to be ironic.  
	Will nodded, lighting a cigarette.  He offered her one and she took
it, but didn't light it, just rolled it between her fingers.  There weren't any
nicotine stains.  She hadn't smoked in a while.  How long had she been
gone?
	She nodded seriously.  "YOU DON'T KNOW WHERE I'VE
BEEN?" she asked him.
	He shook his head.
	"THERE WAS A MAN IN MY BED.  BEFORE I CAME
AWARE.  BUT IT'S OK THIS TIME."  Not like last time.  Last time she'd
been put into the trunk of a car and awakened later, raw and hurting.  Will
had been there.  He'd recognized something in her.  She didn't know what. 
She couldn't even hear.  Being smart was her only real value to the world. 
She had the notion Will was the first person who had ever recognized that
in her.  She looked up at him through strands of tumbled red hair.
	He was puffing on his cigarette almost nervously.
	"HOW LONG?" she asked, a little afraid to know.  It had been a
long time.  She could feel that.
	He held up four fingers.
	She nodded, feeling cold.  "YEARS?"  She already knew.  He
nodded and she looked down at the tattered couch.  He patted the couch
and mimed sleep, walking to the cabinet and withdrawing a flattened
pillow and a worn gray blanket.  Looked army issue.  She wasn't
concerned with comfort.
	She had to look up to see him nod his head in approval.  He
walked into the bedroom, shutting the door firmly.
	That was what she got for showing up unannounced.   She lay
down on the couch, feeling much too lost to sleep.
	She wasn't sure how she'd come to know Will in the time before,
either.  Something had just...clicked.  She thought she reminded him of
someone.  Maybe she looked like a girl he'd known before his face had
become lined and his expression sour. She didn't know, and had no real
way to ask.  It was too personal a question to write on a piece of paper and
expect an answer to be written for all the world to see.  When people
made noise with their mouths, it faded, but papers could be folded and put
into pockets and saved forever.  There were so many things she could not
ask.
	She remembered the amnesia.  The terror of the black hole opened
in her memory, extending all the way back as though someone had turned
a spotlight on her.  She knew how to read but didn't know her name.
	Will told her the amnesia had been brought on by the rape, which
she did remember.  A man at the window in the rain.  She remembered the
feeling of the screams scraping against her throat, but maybe no one had
been able to hear them. No one had helped her.  Sometimes she thought
she heard the screams in her nightmares, but knew it was impossible.  The
bad man smelled - schizophrenic, she learned later, though she knew he
was crazy at the time. Crazy and savage.  A handful of her hair had been
ripped out of her head.  And the blood on her thighs...
	He'd hurt her again in the woods after he'd thrown her in the trunk
of his car.
	Will told her the man had been killed. She'd been glad to hear it,
but at the same time, sorry she hadn't killed him herself.  Will helped her
pick the name Diana for herself - it was the name of a strong woman in
mythology, a huntress.  Will knew about mythology.  It was in a book,
with stories and beautiful pictures.  One of the few things Will treasured;
one of the few nice things in his apartment.  Hidden behind a dingy
stained cloth cover were such magnificent tales and drawings.  Will was
like that.
	All Diana knew about was science.
	Will let her stay with him and work on his top secret government
project.  She'd taken to the work as though she'd been born for it.  After
all, she couldn't tell anyone about it.
	She wondered about the project's progress and decided it was time
to sleep.

	Mulder woke and she was gone.  Her clothes were gone and his T
shirt and jacket.  her purse was still there.  "Oh, god," he said, immediately
alert and remembering Frohike's cautionary words.
	It had been too soon.
	Her sobs rang in his ears.
	He had hurt her.
	He was such a despicable bastard.
	He had to find her.

	She made Will breakfast in the morning.  Of course, it didn't take
that much effort to pour our a bowl of Cap'n Crunch, which was all Will
had.  She held off on the milk since she didn't know when he'd be up.
	Not much had changed in his apartment.  The walls were more
yellow, tinged with more smoke.  She went through his drawers.  A couple
more obituaries in the scrapbook.  Edward, gone in a car bomb over the
summer.  Damn.  He would have hated that.  He'd always been so prissy
and well manicured.  Being blown into a thousand bits would have pissed
him off.
	She felt sadness though.
	A new picture of Mulder in the drawer.  The frame was cracked
and the glass gone.  Mulder was related to Will in some way. Diana didn't 
know how.  Will pretended not to be obsessed with Mulder.  In the photo,
he looked maybe 15 with a girl who looked twelve.  Probably his sister -
Susanna, Cynthia - whatever her name was.
	A touch on her shoulder.  A smile.  Will was up.  He appreciated
the breakfast.  She put the photo back in the drawer and sat down at the
table with him.
	She motioned to her belly and he stared at her. When she realized
there was no way to make him understand, she wrote the words down. 
"CAN I STILL NOT GET PREGNANT?"	
	He looked surprised.  It was hard to surprise him.
	"LIKE BEFORE."
	"I don't remember saying that."
	He was lying.  She thought back. It didn't seem like four years ago
to her.  "Wouldn't," she recalled.  She could see the writing in her mind's
eye.  He'd told her, after the devastating rape, that she would not get
pregnant.
	"Why?" he scrawled on the paper, frowning at her.
	"THE MAN LAST NIGHT.  NOT CAREFUL." She thought she
could still feel his semen burning inside her like acid.  It was
disconcerting not to remember the act.  "YOUR FRIEND MULDER."
	Now he was very surprised.
	She nodded vigorously.
	He didn't say anything more.  She suspected he knew more than he
was saying.

	"Call Skinner," said Byers.
	"You were right, Frohike," Mulder said.  His head ached and he
was scared.  "This is my fault."
	"What was she wearing?" Langly asked, hacking.
	"Call Skinner," Byers said again.
	"Black pants.  White T shirt. My leather jacket."
	"Shoes?"
	"I assume so. I've got to find her."  Mulder couldn't sit still.  This
wasn't helping.
	"Call Skinner."
	"She could be anywhere," Frohike said.
	"Damn straight she could be anywhere," Byers said irritably.  "A
couple of days ago, she thought she was five years old and now she's
missing? You have got to call Skinner."
	"If I call Skinner, her career is over," Mulder shouted.  "As a
mental health risk she'd be kicked out of the Bureau and she doesn't
deserve that! This is not her fault!"
	"He'll find out anyway," Byers said.
	"No," Mulder insisted.  "She's getting better.  She's fine.  She's
going to be fine!  I just have to find her!"
	Byers and Frohike exchanged a look. Mulder was almost
hysterical.
	"No trace."  Langly pushed back from the computer.
	Mulder walked out.
	The other two looked at Langly like they blamed him.

-12-

	She followed as Will led the way to the labs.  She wondered what
she would be working on.  More with hybrids and cloning?  She hoped
not.  The experimentation had grown too much for her to bear, before. 
She wondered if they had to do with her amnesia.
	He opened  the door to a sterile white lab marked BioHazard Level
5.  He walked to a scientific freezer and withdrew a tube half filled with
frozen black liquid.  It began to thaw instantly and when he set it on the
table, it oozed toward her almost curiously.
	She took a step away, alarmed by the strange substance, looking
around wildly for a blue hazard protection suit.  There were none.
	"You're immune," Will took her notepad to tell her and she
shivered, wondering how she had become so.  "Like Krycek," he
elaborated.
	She looked at him, not certain what he was talking about. 
"WHERE IS KRYCEK?" she asked.  She liked Krycek. He had a nice
mouth.  She hoped she would get to see him.
	He shook his head, looking at her for a second.  She wondered
what he was thinking.  Sometimes she wished that she could hear; then
people might tell her things, things they were hesitant to write down. 
After a moment, he walked away, leaving her alone in he lab with the
black oil. She looked at it, hoping this wasn't going to turn out like the
cloning and hybridization experiments had.
	
	Mulder had a recent photo of Scully in his hand.  And he walked,
knocking on the doors in her neighborhood.  He heard more than one
peephole slide shut and footsteps recede from the door without its
opening.  He must have looked like a madman, but he was determined. 
He was going to find her.  And if he had to be mad to do that, he didn't
honestly care.
	Out came his FBI badge, even though this wasn't official business
and he was on suspension.  She couldn't be gone again, she couldn't just
disappear in the night.  Not like this. He would not let this happen.
	"Have you seen this woman?"
	Invariably, the answer was no.
	It was cold and a freezing rain was beginning to fall, lightly, like
icy needles penetrating his skin.  What if she was out in this, alone and
frightened and unable to care for herself?
	"Have you seen her?"
	"No."
	She was gone.  He slumped onto a wet bus stop bench, thrusting
his head into his hands. His hair, damp from the rain, was crisp in the
freezing temperature.  His eyes burned, but he didn't feel the cold blowing
through his clothes.  This chill came from inside.
	Aliens hadn't even crossed his mind, or government conspiracies. 
All he could hear were her broken sobs in the night as he held her.  She'd
said she was okay and he'd wanted to believe her and now he knew he'd
damaged her in some new and terrible way.
	This was his fault.
	She was running from him now.
	A jogger in triple layer Goretex sped by, her red ponytail swinging
with every step.  His head shot up even though he knew it wasn't her.
	"Have you seen her?"  He offered the photo like a very old man.
	"Yeah," said the runner.  Mulder just stared at her.  Unable to
believe.  Not knowing what to do next.  The woman continued, "This
morning."
	"Where?" he demanded.  She took a step back and returned the
photo.  "Did she look all right?"
	"Fine," said the runner.  "Didn't look mad, either.  You have a
fight?"
	He did not answer.	
	"I think she got  on a bus."  The woman shrugged.  "Hope you find
her," she offered, and jogged away.
	So she was probably okay.  At least sort of okay.  If she was able to
take care of herself.  But on a bus, she could have gone anywhere.  Damn
it!  And he didn't know what was in her mind, or where to begin to look.
	He didn't know which was worse - believing DK or Starbuck were
out there, alone, or believing that she, Scully, hated him.

	The black oil was fascinating, but yielded few answers.  It seemed
to be plain old diesel fuel, yet was sentient and alien.  It had no inherent
radioactivity, yet left isotopes on everything it touched.
	Really weird, she thought, alone in the lab.  She looked around,
feeling the loneliness all around her.  A glance at the clock told her night
had fallen.  She wasn't tired - she felt like she'd been asleep for four years -
but the memories were beginning to come.  She couldn't block them,
couldn't make them leave her alone.
	She went to Will's and the memories followed her.   He wasn't
there.  She made dinner, but he never showed up to eat it.  She knew he
could be anywhere and she ate it herself.  Alone.
	She sat there for a long time in the TV-less room, trying to recover
her distant past and forget the portions she remembered.  Nothing.  She
could have been in a coma for four years for all she knew, except her body
was strong.  She'd had some awareness, but now she couldn't remember.
	Finally she gave up and let the memories come to her.  She closed
her eyes and she was back there.  Memories were like that for her - almost
more real than real life.  The few memories she had.  So many of them
were terrible.  She wondered, sometimes, what would happen if she had a
full set, thirty years or more of such strong memories.  And if they had
sound.  Like an outdated computer, would her brain overload and shut
down under their weight?
	Maybe that was why she couldn't remember.
	But she remembered that day.  The last day.
	The last day she remembered before arriving at Will's that
morning, she'd been in the lab, working on procedures.  She was trying to
find a way to make the harvesting easier, to create more hybrids from
fewer materials, or none at all.
	She was troubled over what she was doing to these women and she
hated herself for it.  They were experimenting on live women.  In so many
terrible ways, they were doing to them the same thing that crazed man in
her apartment had done to her.  They were stealing these women's lives
and medically raping them.  She was taking part in that.  She was hurting
them the way she had been hurt.
	A woman went into arrest, the monitor flashing until it caught her
attention.  Diana went to her, but it was too late.  The woman had begun
to hemorrhage and as Diana watched, horrified, her life just slipped away.
	Diana hadn't cried.  She had walked into the hallway, but there was
no one about.  She looked at the telephone, but it would not do her any
good.  So she sat there, with the dead woman, thinking about what she had
done.
	That was when she realized she was not serving the good of
mankind.  They were not using noble methods.  They were inflicting pain
and suffering.  Will assured her these women would not remember what
they had gone through, but Diana knew they would on some level, or else
the amnesia they would suffer to cover the time they were missing would
drive them slowly mad.
	As it was driving her slowly mad.
	The scalpel had been wonderfully silent as it slipped through the
thin skin on her wrists.  It hadn't hurt.  She had not watched her blood drip
vividly on the white tile floor for very long before everything went dark
and she fell into the void.
	She shook her head in Will's apartment, clearing the memories
away.  It didn't matter where the time had gone.  She'd wanted to die in
that moment but she wasn't dead now.  She had the feeling she'd been
subjected to an experiment after her attempt and that had produced her
amnesia.  That the same thing that she had done to those women had, in
some terrible irony, been in turn performed on her.  She was back now. 
And while she was curious as to why she'd been with Mulder, it didn't
matter to her.
	The research did matter, which was why she headed back to the
lab at midnight.  It was the only thing she knew and she felt less alone
when she was working. It took her mind off things.  So far as she knew,
testing the black oil was not hurting it or anyone else.  That was the sort of
work she was striving for.

	Mulder lay awake in her bed in her apartment.  It was all so quiet,
so foreign.  It didn't even smell the same as his apartment.  It was so
wrong.
	Mrs. O. should be screaming at her husband in the apartment next
door.  The streetlight should be blazing through his living room window
and casting a glare on the TV. 
	He should be doing something to find Scully.
	But he could only lie there and wait for her to find her own way
back to him. And hope against hope that she was safe.

	The door to the lab opened abruptly.  Diana looked up, instantly
aware of the draft, uncertain of how many hours she had been working. 
The man inserting himself into her workspace had interrupted what might
have passed as a trance, a period of intense concentration. Now she was
realizing her feet hurt and her lips were dry.
	She watched him as he moved, not knowing she was there.  Lean
and graceful limbs, moving in conjunction as easily as a cat's.  His fingers
stroked down one panel of a glass cabinet with a mixture of curiosity and
awe.
	Even though she remained completely still, something changed
and he sensed her.  Not her specifically, but a person, a danger to him.  He
turned, ready to defend his life.
	He jumped when he saw her.  She smiled, happy to see him.
	He stared at her like she was a ghost, his eyes roving wildly and
rapidly over her face.  She nodded toward him.
	His mouth was moving.  Quickly.  She did not know how to lip-
read and she watched him, completely blank, feeling a strange queasiness
in her stomach at his anger and at not understanding.  She frowned and
waited. Didn't he remember she couldn't hear him?  She just shook her
head, vigorously, then reached for the notepad.
	When he saw her hand move for the paper, his eyes changed.  She
saw surprise there, as though he was seeing someone he had long believed
dead.  He said her name in sign language, frowning, his eyes searching
hers, as though it was a test, as though he could not believe it.
	She wondered why he was so incredulous.
	His hand came up to touch her, to confirm that she was real.
	She grabbed that hand, feeling torn open inside.  Her eyes met his
and he tried to pull away, but her grasp on the latex remained firm. 
"WHAT HAPPENED?" she wrote quickly, holding it in front of his eyes,
impossible to deny.  She hurt for him.  Hurt that she hadn't been there for
him.
	His eyes turned away.  He didn't want to answer.  She pulled on the
prosthetic, insistent, getting his attention.  "Long story," he signed to her. 
Krycek knew American Sign Language.  He had begun to patiently teach
her, before.  Before, how much she hated that word, that thought.  The
notion of the time lost.
	She waited.
	"In Russia. Stupid people," he signed quickly, irritatedly, as though
it didn't matter any more, like it hadn't happened to him, like it wasn't a
part of his body they were talking about.  It was awkward for him, signing
with one hand and it distracted her often, looking at the hand and arm that
hung dead from his shoulder.  She was only missing her past; she was
better off without it.  She couldn't imagine what it would feel like to be
dissected alive.
	"WHEN?"
	"Two years."
	A long time.  She nodded.  He'd adjusted.  It was an impossibly
long amount of time.  There was an angry light in his eyes that never
really faded.  A product of history, another reason she knew she didn't
need her own past.  "I'm sorry," she signed passionately, putting her entire
body into it.  His expression didn't change and she could feel the tension
radiating from him.  She moved, relaxing one knee so she could lean in
closer to him.
	She saw his little sigh at her nearness.  She could feel the change
in his body.  He'd missed her.  But he was not giving in to his feelings. 
"We have to go," he signed urgently.
	"Why?"
	"Danger."
	She didn't have the capability to say what she wanted to with her
hands, not in sign language or gesturing or her odd combination of the
two.  It made her feel like a child with no language to try to communicate
that way.  "DANGER FROM WHAT?" she scribbled.  "JUST WORKING
IN THE LAB."
	"Like before?"  God, not that word again, she thought at his signs. 
Her brain had to race to translate.  She felt out of practice, not only in her
mind but in her hands.  With his good hand, he grabbed her arm to force
her from the building.  
	Self-defense training kicked in automatically and she shoved him
away, stopping short of knocking him to the floor.  "No!" she signed
emphatically, shaking her head.  Very rarely did she wish that she could
scream, or yell or shout. This time she wished she could.  
	His grin was ironic and playful.  "You used to like that," he
suggested, his hands then moving to touch her hand.  Something happened
in her stomach.  She had loved his touch.  Before.  When he used to mold
her fingers, teaching her with infinite patience. Krycek could speak and he
could hear, so she didn't know why or where he had learned to sign.
Maybe he wasn't as proficient as he seemed to be, to her inexperienced
eyes.  She thought there had been someone in his life, someone he had
cared about.  She suspected that was why he displayed some softer
feelings toward her.  Because she reminded him of the person he had
cared about before.
	She shook her head, even though she could feel the blood rushing
low in her body.  On some level, she had had feelings for this man. 
"Where?"  It wasn't a real sign.  A jerk of her thumb and a shrug.  A
question.
	He didn't acknowledge her and they walked out of the lab, down
the twisting white corridors, pausing to pass through frequent security
checkpoints.  At one of them she twisted, spelling Will's name and
beginning to write on her notepad, an explanation to him for her
disappearance.  Will pretended not to care, but he would worry...
	Krycek yelled at her.  She could feel his breath hot on her face. 
She frowned at him and he softened his expression, wrestling the notepad
from her hand.  He wrote in bold, economical strokes.  "Will is _not_ your
friend.  He's responsible for everything that happened to you."
	She shook her head.  She didn't believe that.
	He spoke to her again.
	Her frown deepened and she shook her head angrily, grabbing back
the paper.  "I CANT HEAR YOU!!!!!!! STOP TALKING TO ME!!!!!! 
WHY ARE YOU DOING THAT????"
	His eyes flicked over to a security guard who wasn't paying
attention to them.  He made the sign for outside.
	She followed him to a big, black Volvo.  She couldn't help her
grin, catching his eyes and raising her eyebrows.  This was his?
	He rolled his eyes, getting in and unlocking her door for her.  She
looked at him. He'd shelled out his own money for a top of the line car
with heavy duty bulletproofing.  He'd been fearless when she knew him. 
Things did change.
	"WHATS GOING ON?" she wrote, and passed the paper over to
him.	
	"I know who you are."
	She looked at him like he was stupid.  Of course he knew who she
was.
	"I know who you usually are," he wrote and then sighed.  She was
watching him closely, absorbing every letter as he crafted it.  She frowned,
urging him not to hesitate, to write more.  Finally, he did.  "Your name
isn't Diana.  You, right now, are only a small part of someone else.  A full,
warm and rich part of her, but a part nonetheless that has no reason to see
the light of day.  You run away when she's been badly hurt."	
	She sucked in a breath. It was absolutely unbelievable, but the pain
and panic in her gut suggested it was true.  
	"And she can hear," Alex added.
	The final blow.  How was that possible?  How could she hear when
she was someone else?  Her ears didn't work!  Was he stupid?
	Then why did she think she knew he was telling the truth?  Why
did she feel like she'd heard his voice?  Heard other voices?  Why did she
think sometimes that she heard voices in her dreams?  In her mind?
	"HURT BY WHO?" she asked.  "WILL?"  She couldn't believe
that. 
	"He used you."  Alex's tone was hard.
	"Why?"  She didn't need to grab back the pencil, using her hands
and her face to express her meaning.
	His hand touched the side of her face, his fingers snaking into her
hair and catching hold, digging in like ht was attempting to claw through
to her skull.  It hurt but she endured it.  Liked it.  His eyes burned.  "You're
brilliant. He wanted to harness what's inside here."  He had to hold the
paper up in front of her eyes because she couldn't move her head when he
touched her that way.  His fingers clenched and she let out the tiniest gasp.  
Instantly his grip slackened and trailed away.
	He took a deep breath and looked out through the window.  She
was shaking her head.  Finally he noticed.
	"He wanted you to die," Alex told her, writing the words.  They
were so ugly. So horrible.  Such things shouldn't be expressed on paper. 
They shouldn't exist at all, she thought.  "Duane Barry was supposed to
murder you, not rape you."
	She nodded, biting her lip. She'd wished at the time that he had
killed her, but he hadn't been able to.  The pain was still vivid in her mind,
every moment of his attack wretchedly clear.
	"But you didn't die, you changed. Into someone he could use.  For
a while." Alex looked at her seriously.  "They did to you what they did to
the others."  She nodded, not entirely surprised and uncertain of how to
feel about this confirmation.  "Then they poisoned you.  You were
supposed to die."
	She was only shaking her head.  She couldn't believe it. 
	"Mulder saved you," he wrote.
	"Mulder?" she spelled with her fingers.
	Gently he picked up her hand from where it was lying in her lap
and brought it up in front of her eyes.  She hadn't seen the ring before. 
	She jerked her hand away, staring at it like it was a foreign thing. 
It was a wedding ring.  He wanted her to believe it bound her to Mulder, a
man she did not know.  This was too much. She shook her head, so hard it
hurt her neck.  She wasn't going to cry.  She looked at him, wanting help,
wanting this to stop.  She looked at him, wondering where he fit into this.
	He wrote the words slowly.  With shame creeping up into his eyes. 
"I helped them to hurt you.  I was part of that."
	She only stared at him.  Sad.  Not wanting to believe it.
	He nodded again.  " In your real life -"
	She grabbed the paper away before he could finish writing about
her "real" life.  Wasn't this her real life?  Wasn't she alive now?  The past
was not real to her.  She tossed the paper away and reached for the pen to
throw it away too.
	He started the car.  Determined.  She was going back.  She reached
for the door handle, to jump out, but there wasn't one.
	She only stared at him.
	He touched her hand.  He was taking her to Mulder.  A man she
did not know.  Whose bed she had been in, in a time she could not
remember.	
	_He_ should protect her.  
	He picked up the paper and used the pen he had kept possession of. 
"You belong with him," Alex said.  "He would never hurt you."
	"YOU'D NEVER HURT ME."  She was crying now, damn it, and
she didn't ever cry.  How could he give her to a man she didn't know?  She
wanted to stay with him.  The man she did know.
	"There's so much you don't know."  The soft whisper of a touch
against her skin and then he pulled away.  Putting on his armor.  Preparing
to leave her behind.  Driving her back to Mulder.	
	He couldn't talk to her as he drove, with one hand on the steering
wheel and the other, horrible limb tucked against his thigh.  When the
arrived in front of the brick building, she wouldn't look at him and he
finally he stopped looking at her, got out of the car, and opened the door
for her.  "I'm sorry," he signed, crouching in front of her.  If she didn't get
out of the car, none of it would be real.  She recognized the building.  He
was taking her back to Mulder.  Dumping her like used goods no one
wanted any more.
	She frowned, stomped her feet, and tried to plant herself. Grabbing
onto the car door.
	He looked at her, waiting.  She felt like a child throwing a tantrum. 
For the same reasons children threw tantrums.	
	"Don't make me."  The words were signaled with force.  She meant
them.  She saw in his eyes how he felt about her, he couldn't shove her
into another man's arms, another man she didn't know or even like...
	He shook his head again and she went with him into the building.
	They went into the building, walked into the apartment where
she'd awakened the day before from her four year sleep.  She didn't ask
why or how Krycek had the key.  He had lots of keys.  They were silent as
they strode through the dark apartment.  She didn't have her paper.
	He turned on the light in the bedroom. Mulder, asleep in his
clothes as though he'd fallen, unconscious, onto the bed, didn't react. 
"You'd better get up, Mulder," Krycek ordered.
	Mulder's eyes shot open and he jumped up, his hand reaching for
his gun.  He saw Krycek first.  "What are you -"  he fell into silence when
he saw her.  When he spoke again, his voice had changed. "Where did you
find her?"
	She wished they wouldn't talk because she didn't know what they
were saying.
	"I don't know what you did to her, but you'd better take damn good
care of her in the future,"  Krycek threatened.  He didn't have his gun like
Mulder did.  He didn't need one to make his threat real.
	"Mulder, what's going on?"  Scully asked, and jumped at the sound
of her own voice.  She felt as though she were waking from sleep, but her
eyes were already open and she was standing up and Mulder had his gun
out.  Terror started coursing through her again. She was wearing Mulder's
jacket. Time had passed without her.
	"It's okay," Mulder said, odd when he was holding his gun on an
assassin.
	"I meant what I said," Krycek said.  Why did he look at her like
that?  Like he _knew_ her?  Goosebumps rose as he turned his back on
Mulder's gun and walked out of her apartment.
	"Mulder, what just happened?" she asked, sliding into the desk
chair as her knees buckled.
	"What do you remember?" he asked.
	"Making love with you."
	"Nothing between that and now?" he demanded.
	She shook her head, feeling fearful.  She hated to cry.  "Did I
get...taken...again? Is that where the time went?  Is that why Krycek was
here?"
	"I don't think so," he answered.  "You know you've had some
problems."
	She nodded.
	"And you know why."
	"I'm remembering things I'd tried to put away, and while I'm
remembering those things, I'm forgetting other things."  Her voice sounded
so weak.  She wondered if a person could shake apart from fear.  She felt
as though pieces of herself were going to drop away onto the floor. 
Everything sounded too loud, like her ears had just popped.  She put her
arms around herself to stop that, to hold herself together. "Where have I
been, Mulder?"
	"I don't know." His voice was rough.  He was scared, too.  She saw
now the signs of worry on his face.  The lines, the stubble, the circles like
bruises under his eyes.
	"Krycek found me," she reasoned out.  "He brought me back. He's
not bad, Mulder."  Why was she so cold?
	He nodded.  He knew.
	"Why did Bill come here and say you'd brainwashed me?" she
asked, her voice thin.  Fighting tears.  She didn't want to feel this way, but
it was night and it was dark and she was so tired and scared and she knew
she had to feel it before it would go away.  She didn't know where the
time had gone.  She didn't want to lose anything else.  Mulder was safe. 
He'd tried to keep her safe.  Even after all the times she hadn't believed
him, fought with him over faith versus truth, he believed her.  "Why did he
lie?  He knows what he did."
	"What did he do?" Mulder asked, knowing this was what she
needed.  She hadn't transformed or reverted.  Scully was facing it.
	"Don't make me say it," she whispered. Mulder looked at her. 
Almost imperceptibly moved his hand on the bed.  An invitation.  She ran
to his side and he put his arm around her.  Waiting for her answer.  She
had to say something.  "He hurt me."
	"How?"
	"He made me feel small and scared and worthless."
	"Do you feel that way now?"  He was being so careful.  But she
wasn't fragile.  She had never been.  She was getting stronger.
	"Sometimes," she admitted.  "And I don't want to feel that way, but
I don't want to disappear either.  I like who I am, I like being me."
	"Good," he said. Such a weak word.  So useless.
	"What do I do now?" she asked him.
	"I don't know," he replied honestly.
	"Does Skinner know I was missing?"
	He shook his head.  "I didn't tell him."
	"Am I going to be able to go back to work?" she asked.
	"How do you feel?"	
	"I feel fine. But I felt good before..."  she trailed off.  Before. 
Before she'd started deconstructing.  Before the time dissolved.  How
could she live like this? Never knowing when or where she would just
disappear.  How many days had she lost this time?  How many more?  Not
having the answers made it hard for her to breathe.  When was this going
to end?
	"Why did you cry?" he asked in a soft voice.  She realized when
she saw his hand move that he was afraid to touch her.
	She shook her head, sealing her lips.  "I think that's something you
shouldn't have to hear."
	He nodded, but she knew he didn't understand.
	"Mulder," she said.  "It's not something anyone needs to hear.  I
don't want to pull you down into the details."
	"What if I want the details?" he asked, his voice breaking in the
middle.  Caring.
	"You don't," she told him. She was keeping her mind closed to the
memories as she spoke to him.  They were too strong.  Even that scared
her, as she wondered if holding them separate would make her go away
instead of making the pain go away.
	"What if I need them?" he asked quietly, caressing her with his
eyes.
	"No one needs that," she whispered, wiping her eyes on the back of
her hand.  "No one."  She indulged in a sniffle and pushed her hair back. 
"What time is it?"  She turned her head and saw the clock.  It was almost
five a.m.  "Oh god," she laughed, "And I'm so tired."
	"Come to bed."
	"I'll feel worse if I sleep."  She stood.  "You sleep. I can take
myself to Dr. Callaway's."
	"You don't have to," he said and then after a second added, "Unless
you want to."
	"No," she said, finally.  She would need the support.

-13-

	"I feel like I'm getting better," she told the doctor later that
morning.  "Because I've remembered myself and dealt with it.  Or thought
I had, until...what exactly happened to me?"
	"You had a dissociative fugue," Dr. Callaway said, as though it
was perfectly normal and happened every day.
	"Someone else came out."  Again.  She was so frustrated.  She just
wanted to  be better.
	The other woman nodded.  "I suspect this may be what happened
during what you call 'your abduction' as well.  Often this sort of thing
happens to normal people who feel for some reason that they need to
escape."
	"But I didn't feel that way," she murmured, struggling to
understand.
	The doctor waited, as though challenging her: maybe you did need
to escape.  Scully didn't say anything, feeling manipulated.  "You
mentioned that you have remembered things."
	"It's embarrassing to talk about," Scully demurred.
	"I'm not going to judge you.  What happened to you was not your
fault," Dr. Callaway said.  "But it may help you to talk about it."
	Scully thought for a moment.  Then she began, "I remembered..." 
Her heart was racing because the memory was vivid, maybe because it had
been locked inside for so long it had not had the opportunity to wear away
with time.  In the basement. Again.  With him.  Mommy was with Missy. 
She didn't know where.  She just knew no one would help her.  She also
knew he'd kill her if she made a noise.  Like he said he'd kill the bunny.
	She was wearing her day of the week underpants.  But it was
Sunday and she was wearing Thursday.  She hadn't thought anyone would
see.  He'd hurt her more if she made any noise.  More if she cried.
	But she didn't want to cry.  What he was doing down there with his
finger felt good. It also felt dirty and squirmy and sick.  And hurt.  A lot. 
But good.  Like riding the merry go round at the fair.  Funny and warm. 
Even though she was scared and it was wrong and shouldn't be.
	Scully choked, forcing herself back to the present. Leather chair.
Her feet were on the floor.  Torn panties were not around her ankles.  Dr.
Callaway's office.  "I couldn't have," she said, horrified at herself and what
she'd just confessed.  "I couldn't have wanted him to do that."  She felt
sick.  She could taste the acid from her stomach burning up in the back of
her throat.
	Dr. Callaway patted her hand and it only made her feel sicker. 
"You didn't.  You weren't enjoying his abuse.  Your body reacted in a
normal way to stimulation.  Even little girls..."
	"I know," she said through the tears that always damnably seemed
to come.
	Dr. Callaway waited patiently for her to stop crying.  They were
mild tears and stopped relatively quickly, to  Scully's relief.  "Have you
ever had a normal sexual experience?" she asked.
	"If I hadn't burst into tears with my husband..."  It felt so weird to
refer to him as her husband.
	"That happens to people who've gone through what you went
through."
	She nodded.  She knew.  She wasn't sure it made her feel better.
	"Do you please yourself?"
	Scully looked at her in horror, feeling her face flushing.
	"You feel guilt about doing so," Dr. Callaway said.
	Scully looked down.  She could feel her gold cross weighing
heavily against her skin. Burning her.
	"Why do you feel guilty?"
	She shrugged, but silence awaited her, pressing for an answer.  "It
should be with a man," she said.
	"Even married women -" the doctor began gently.
	"I know."
	"You're uncomfortable."
	Extremely,  Scully thought.  She nodded and raised her eyes.  "If it
will help me," she conceded.
	But the doctor backed off.  "Think about it on your own," she
suggested.
	"I don't think that's why I ran away," she said.  "Before, he came to
my apartment.  With my mother.  My mother brought him to my house to
say she believed him and not me."
	"How did that make you feel?"
	"Scared."
	"Why scared?"
	"No one will believe me.  They all think I'm crazy.  That I made
this up, that I made this happen.  Why would I lie?"  Her eyes were wet
again.  "Why doesn't she believe me?"
	"How does that make you feel?"
	"Mad.  Angry.  But I can't be."
	"Why not?"
	"There's no proof," Scully said.  "I wouldn't believe it myself."
	"Isn't the way you feel proof?  Aren't your memories proof?" the
doctor asked.
	She shrugged.  She couldn't put her hands on a memory.  And she'd
always required tangible proof in the past.
	"What you feel is valid.  What happened to you is real.  You need
to cope with that," Dr. Callaway said.  "I think that's enough for now."
	She opened her mouth to protest, but she knew the doctor was
right. It couldn't all happen in one day.  She had a lot to think about as she
got up and walked out of the office.  Mulder jumped up, happy to see her
when she opened the door.  The man was as good as a puppy when it came
to unconditional love.  She pulled his arms around her and squeezed him
tight, safe and warm for all of a second before she broke away.
	"I hate crying," she said, slipping out of his arms again.
	"It's okay to cry when you're injured," he told her. "Good session?"
	"Things to think about," she said, staring out the car window and
not seeing the scenery as he drove back to her apartment.
	She couldn't be angry with her mom for not believing something
she wanted to not have to believe herself.  But her mother had always,
always been there for her - or had she?  Why hadn't she noticed this was
happening during her childhood?  Where had she been then?
	Scully was terrified that her mother had known she was being
abused and had looked the other way.  And now she was lying just like
Bill.  She didn't want to believe it.
	Everyone lied to her.
	She drew in a sigh and thought about the doctor's other advice. 
About touching herself.  Did she have issues there, too?  She didn't know
what normal was - was she normal?  She didn't do it very often.  She didn't
use a vibrator or anything.  She used her fingers and they always felt dirty
afterward.  And she was always guilty after.  It was for release, nothing
more.  Fast and only when she needed it.
	"Can we stop for a second?" she asked, suddenly panicky, feeling
trapped in the car with her thoughts.  Her bad thoughts.  Mulder looked a
bit worried but pulled into a gas station as she'd requested.
	She jumped out of the car a second before it came to a complete
stop.  She sucked in as much freezing air as she could, but it wasn't
enough as her feelings overwhelmed her and she was desperately sick into
a nearby trash can.  She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to keep her
stomach down.
	A hand lay against her back.
	She flinched away. "Don't," she said, even though she knew it was
Mulder.  She hated the look she saw on his face when she turned around,
hurt but trying to understand.
	This could not be allowed to become an excuse for her to hurt the
people she loved.  The people who loved her.  Even if the things they did
made her uncomfortable. "I'll get used to it," she told him.  She'd been fine
with his touching her before.
	He nodded.
	"Temporary sensitivity," she said.
	He nodded.
	She nodded.  Who was she trying to convince, anyway?  She
needed something to get the taste out of her mouth.  She couldn't get the
scent of vomit out of her nose, but she could get the bile off her tongue.
	She'd fully intended to buy a Snapple or diet soda, but she walked
directly to the counter.  The clerk had been watching them through the
window, wondering about the crazy people.  She was crazy now, wasn't
she, she thought.  "Morley Lights. Hard pack," she mumbled, letting her
hair fall across her face as she searched through her bag for money.
	"Matches?" the clerk inquired.
	She shook her head and scooped her choice from the counter.  The
box felt odd in her hand, covered in its crinkly plastic wrapping.  Mulder
was waiting for her in the car.  Alarm lit his eyes when he saw the box in
her hand.  "DK?" he asked.
	She shook her head.  DK was the smoker, though.  She placed the
box between her palms.
	"Scully."
	"Uh-huh."
	"Don't smoke those in here," he requested.
	"I wasn't going to."  It was about control.  How long could she hold
the box without opening it.  How long could she wait after she opened it
before pulling one out.
	They tasted worse than puke.
	She had to prove she was strong.  She had to prove it to herself.
	"Was it DK...in Comity?" Mulder asked delicately, as though he
worried the question would upset her.
	She almost laughed.  She hadn't thought of that case in ages.  Why
would he think of it now? she wondered.
	"I could smell them. In your hair," he answered the question
without her speaking it.
	Of course.  The cigarettes.
	"DK is who I was when I was thirteen or fourteen.  She's not a
different person.  She is me, in high school. When I felt hurt and lost."
	"I felt the same way," he offered.  They'd reached her apartment
and got out of the car.  She thought of Mulder as a boy.  In high school,
such a short time after his sister's disappearance, an event that had
shattered his entire life.  An event he had only recently begun to heal
from.
	Maybe it takes twenty years, she thought, or thirty, or thirty five. 
Maybe it takes a lifetime.
	They sat down in her living room on opposite sides of the couch. 
"Would you -" she began.  He looked at her curiously and she had to stop. 
How could she ever ask him such a terrible thing?  But she wanted to
know.
	"How was it between you and Samantha?" she asked.
	He picked up on her meaning immediately.  "Are you asking what
it is to be normal or are you asking if I abused her?"  His eyes were
demanding.
	She didn't know.
	"I was four when she was born. I loved her.  Like she was a puppy. 
Like she was mine.  I was in awe of her existence.  We all were.  She was
all the things in the rhyme - sugar and spice.  A spoiled little princess, but
wonderfully kind.  I resented her for being their favorite but I knew why. 
Everything fell apart without her.  Like she was the glue."  Mulder fell into
silence, thinking.
	Who had been the glue in her family?  No one.  all of them
together.   Or did they never know because the glue had never been gone? 
Just dried and disjoined, like pages out of an old paperback.  Missy to the
northwest, Bill to the navy, her to the FBI, Charlie always separated.
	"What do you want to do?" he asked her. "I get so bored not
working."
	She nodded. It was a compulsion they shared.  If they could lose
themselves into work, they wouldn't have to consider the rest.
	"I want to see my brother," she said.
	"Scully."  His tone was halting.  Wanting to tell her no, but with no
idea how to say so.
	"I want you to meet Charlie," she said, smiling.  Mulder was silent.
Once again, she'd surprised him.  A good surprise, she hoped.  Mulder got
up from the couch.  Willing to make a start.  Suddenly fear flooded her
stomach.  "Uh, Mulder?"  He turned and looked at her.  What if he didn't
understand?  What if he didn't want to go?  "Charlie's...special."
	Mulder nodded.
	Scully only gaped at him.  
	His gaze was clear.  "You mentioned, before, about being put away
like Charlie. I assumed there was something different about him..."  He
waited, leaving the door open for her to explain.
	"Mom had him when I was thirteen.  She was over thirty five," she
said. Mulder waited.  "He's got Down's syndrome.  His mental capacity
will never be greater than that of a very small child."
	"I'm sorry," Mulder offered, reaching for her hand.  She let him
take it.  It felt good.  Acceptance.

	"He's been here his whole life?" Mulder asked as they sat in the
car, waiting before they went into the nursing home.
	She shook her head.  "Since Mom and Daddy moved to Virginia.  I
guess he was five."  And now he was twenty.  It was easy to forget the
passage of time in someone who in many ways remained ageless.
	"How did he feel?" Mulder asked.
	"He was sad," she recalled.  "He wouldn't talk.  Sometimes he had
tantrums."  They sat a moment longer.  Mulder was waiting for her to be
ready to go in.  "I wonder what it feels like," she admitted.   "Being here,
isolated.  No one visits as much as they should."
	"But you love him."
	"He's family."  She nodded, and pushed on the door handle.
	The home resembled a home for the aged in some ways:
comfortable furnishings and colors designed to soothe, activity rooms and
nurses.  But there was a vitality. It wasn't a scary or horrible place.  The
Scullys had chosen well.
	"Hey Charlie."  Scully waited at the doorway to his room for him
to come to her.  He looked like any boy in khakis and a flannel shirt until
he raised his head.  His hair was an orangey red and he bore the telltale
features.
	"Dana!"  Charlie's eyes brightened.  He ran to her and clung in an
everlasting hug.  She patted his shoulder, smiling.  Hugging felt good. 
Unconditional love felt good.
	She noticed Charlie sneaking looks at Mulder.  He was shy to the
extreme.  "Charlie, this is my husband. His name is Mulder."
	"Mulder?"  Charlie threw his head back and laughed.
	Mulder looked embarrassed, but he grinned painfully.  "Fox."
	"In socks," Charlie said, dropping to the floor to examine Mulder's
ankles.  Mulder stood still.  
	"I'm sorry," Scully said, trying to distract her brother. "Charlie - I
don't know why - Charlie -"
	"Seuss," Mulder explained.  At her blank look, he said, "Fox in
Socks, Dr. Seuss.  The great philosopher of our time."
	She looked at him doubtfully.
	"You'll see," he said.  After Charlie had satisfied his curiosity over
Fox's socks, the three of them sat down together to explore the adventures
of the mischievous Sam I Am and the Cat in the Hat, who came back
several times that afternoon.
	"At least it wasn't Babe the pig," Scully commented as they walked
out that night.  She had no right to complain, as light with laughter as she
had become. But leaving always made her feel sad, since she never knew
when she would make it back for another visit.  "I wonder how much he
understands," she said, knowing her brother's intelligence was about the
level of a three year old child.
	"He's amazing," Mulder said quite honestly as they joined in the
rainy rush hour.
	"Mom was thirty five when she had him," Scully said after a little
while.  She herself was thirty five.  The age her mother had been when
she'd had three mostly grown children.  "If I could have kids, they
probably wouldn't be normal," she said. Not considering normal as good
or bad, but as a scientifically determined range.
	"Testing," said Mulder.
	She nodded, wishing she could think about something else.
	"If you were carrying a genetically damaged child, would you abort
it?" Mulder asked her.
	As much as she craved a baby in her womb and in her arms and at
her breast, she had to answer, "Yes."  It saddened her incredibly.  "What
kind of life could I make for a special child?" she asked him.
	He didn't say anything.
	"Would you?" she asked, wondering if it was an absurd question. 
Did men think about babies at all the same way that women did?
	"It's possible high or genius level intelligence is a birth defect the
same as retardation is," Mulder said.
	He wouldn't, she interpreted.
	Someday he would leave her for a young, beautiful woman who
would bear him children.  And she was scared.
	They ate a quiet dinner together in her kitchen, spaghetti and
bottled sauce, cooked by  Mulder.  Scully was exhausted and prepared for
bed after eating.
	"Do you want me to leave?" Mulder asked her.
	She shook her head.
	"What do you want me to do?" he asked.
	She shrugged.
	"What do you want to do?" she asked him.
	He didn't say anything.  So much for communication.  She slipped
into bed and found she wanted him there with her.  But he'd gone back to
his apartment.  She mourned that, and couldn't sleep for a long time,
certain she would lose him.

	She knew she was dreaming but she couldn't make herself wake
up, which only added to the terror of the nightmare. What, is it real?  What
if she wasn't going to wake up?
	She was looking for her doll.  She didn't like dolls much but Ahab
brung her this one from Russia.  It was missing.  She wanted it.
	Bill said he threw it in the basement.  Bill was mean to her.  She
didn't know why.  She wished he'd stop being so mean.  She was in
kindergarten so she got to stay at home in the morning with Mommy. 
This was after school, though.  She already knew her letters so that part
was kind of boring, but she liked playing with the other kids.
	It was dark in the basement and she didn't like the dark.  She
wasn't scared, just didn't like it.  But she wanted her doll back.  It was
magic.  Ahab told her not to believe in magic, but she knew it was true.
	The light came on.  "Bill, where's my doll?"
	He picked her up and set her on the work table.  "Bill?"  She didn't
like it when they treated her like a baby.
	"Shut up," he said.  Why was he mad?  But he was mad so she was
quiet, trying to sit still and looking around for her doll.  It was on one of
the shelves.  Staring at her with eyes that looked weird.  Magic.
	She could almost reach.
	He reached under her dress, warning her with his angry eyes. 
"Bill?" she said as he pulled down her underwear and he raised a hand and
pushed it over her face, holding her down against the rough surface of the
table.  
	She squealed and kicked him and he punched her in the face. 
Hard.  Tears filled up her eyes but she wasn't gonna cry.  She didn't move. 
She saw people get punched on TV sometimes.  It hurt.  She didn't know
why he punched her.
	Her feet dangled and she looked down.  They seemed so far from
the floor.  She wasn't sure she could get down because she was just little.
	Her tongue found blood on her lip.  "Ow, Bill."
	"You want your stupid doll?"  He grabbed the heavy wooden figure
and it sort of slipped out of his hand and it hit her.
	It hurt too much to cry.
	Blood poured from her lip. It got on her tongue and went down her
throat.  Her lip felt ripped.  She felt sick.  She saw her tooth that had been
a little wiggly on the floor.  Her head hurt.
	He'd stepped back to keep her blood off him.  She put her hand up
and blood went on her fingers.  Why wasn't he helping her?
	Why couldn't she wake up?  She had bad nightmares before, but
she always woke up before it hurt.
	"MOM!"  Bill yelled, backing away as she slid down from the
table, winding up on the floor.  "Dana hurt herself!"
	Mom came when Bill yelled but not when she yelled.  She didn't
realize she hadn't yelled.  "I think she ran into the table down here."
	Stupid bad magic doll.  She left it there.  Mommy yelled at her for
climbing on the table and Mommy made her get needles in her mouth
from a doctor to make the bleeding stop.  But it was Bill who was mean
because the magic doll made him lie.

-14-

	Her lips felt swollen when she woke up. Nightmare.  But she knew
she'd had stitches and she remembered the doll.  She'd always thought she
hit the table, though.  Memory, she thought, rolling over in the bed.
	She had to still be dreaming because Bill was sitting in her
bedroom chair.  She scrambled up in the bed.  "What the hell are you
doing here?" she demanded.
	"Mom wanted me to speak to you."
	"You broke into my house!" she cried.
	"Dana, it's ten a.m.  I knocked. I was worried," he said calmly. 
Rationally.
	"I can take care of myself."  The gun was on her nightstand.  By
the clock that read 10:15.  He was lucky she hadn't shot him.
	Part of her wanted to.  It would be so easy to pick the weapon up
and claim he'd surprised her.  But that wasn't what her service weapon was
for.  It would be wrong.  As wrong as what he'd done to her.
	"Dana," he said, taking a step closer.
	"Don't take another step," she ordered.
	"You're completely irrational," he said in that jovial good guy way
he had. "I have never done anything to you."
	"That's not how I remember it," she said, fighting the urge to finger
the invisible scar on her lip.  She remembered the stitches.  She knew it
had happened.
	"Can't you see these memories are not memories?  You've been
brainwashed. By him.  Because he knows what he's done to you. He is the
only one you shouldn't trust, Dana."
	She could feel the walls breaking down inside.  She didn't want to
cry but she couldn't fight or scream either.  Only she could help herself
this time.  Scully didn't know how to cope with this.  Her body shook with
the effort of trying to retain control.
	"You hurt me, Bill, and I don't want to see you right now."
	"We have to talk about this," he urged, moving closer.  He sat
down on the edge of the bed.  Scully, who didn't know what she was
supposed to do and only saw her childhood abuser coming closer.  She
blacked out.
	But Starbuck smiled at her brother.  "It's okay, Bill," she said.
	He looked surprised.
	"You want to play?" she asked brightly, putting her thumb in her
mouth.
	Bill backed away, horrified at her.  What did she do? she thought,
watching him.  He just turned and walked away, leaving her alone.  She'd
never been home by herself.  But if she pretended Mommy was upstairs
where she couldn't see her, it would be okay.
	She slid out of bed.  The weird house again. She couldn't make the
TV turn on.  It didn't have a big turny knob like the TV at home did.  The
phone started to ring.  She wasn't allowed to answer the phone by herself. 
When it kept ringing, and when Mommy didn't answer it, she remembered
that Mommy wasn't there and she was by herself.
	Maybe when Ahab went away this time, Mommy went too.  Maybe
that was why Bill was scared.  She was scared too.  She felt little and
helpless and most of all lonely.  She was hungry too.
	So she sat there and waited for someone to come. Mommy always
told her if she got lost, to stay where she was and not move till Mommy
found her. 
	Mommy was taking a long time.

	When the pounding on the door started, she raised her head and
looked at it.  Very slowly she began to scoot away from it.  She wasn't
allowed to open the door for anyone, ever.  And this person was angry, she
could tell by the way they were pounding on the door.  It made her scared.
	"Yeah, all right already,"  DK called, getting up, but the door was
swinging open. Mulder stood there.
	"Why didn't you open the door?" he demanded.
	"Obviously, you have the key," she said.  His shoulders slumped as
he recognized her.  DK.  Fine, she thought, walking into the kitchen.  She
was starving and didn't really care that nobody liked her.
	"What brings you out?" Mulder asked, taking off his coat and
tossing it on the couch.
	"You," she snapped, pouring nonfat milk [ick] over the Special K
[double ick] she'd found in the cabinet.  Taking a bite, she wished she
could pour about a pound of sugar on the cereal.  She winced but kept
eating.
	"Who was here before?"
	He never wanted to talk about her, she thought.  Always that
boring, straightlaced Scully.  "Starbuck," she said.  "When you knocked,
she was scared he'd come back, so I came out."	
	"Scared who'd come back?"  Mulder frowned.  He frowned all the
time, DK thought.
	"Oh, Bill was here," DK felt the tears burn in her eyes.  She didn't
want them.
	"He was?" Mulder cried angrily.
	"Who was what?" Dana asked, calmly wiping tears away.
	Mulder just stared at her.  She stared back. Neither of them knew
what the question was. "Scully?" he asked.
	She nodded mildly, wondering if she'd ever get used to him calling
her by her last name.  It was so much nicer to be called by her actual
name.  But he only did that during times of crisis, like when he held her in
Donnie Pfaster's house.   "What're you doing here?" she asked.
	"It's Christmas," he said.  He looked older.  And tired.
	"It is?  Happy Christmas."  She didn't see a tree.  He sighed
heavily. It made her sad, but Mulder was so often depressed.  She
understood that because she'd struggled with dark thoughts after her
abduction. But she had to stay positive.  If she let the darkness take her...
	"Mulder, what happened?" Scully asked, he only shook his head
like he'd been defeated.  There was a blank space in her memory.
	"Damn it," she whispered to herself, realizing it had happened
again.  Mulder raised his head to look at her. Recognizing her.  Not
realizing it hadn't been her.  "I can't do this," she said.  "I thought I was
better!"  The coffee cup she'd brought down from the cabinet in the
kitchen rattled in her hand so she decided against caffeine.  Mr. Coffee
was unplugged anyway.  And why the hell was it Mr. Coffee, anyway? 
Why not Ms. Coffee?
	"You've been flipping channels since I got here," Mulder said
dryly.
	"When was that?"
	"Fifteen, twenty minutes."
	"I feel like they're taking memories away from me," she confided. 
"I had a bad dream and something happened and now I don't remember
any of it.  Including the dream.  Just that it was bad."
	"She said someone had been here," Mulder passed along.
	"Bill?" Scully asked.
	"Why would you guess that?"  Mulder questioned, searching her
eyes.
	"He was in the dream.  I think.  God, I hate not knowing."  She
turned and saw the clock on the microwave.  "It's so late."  The morning
was practically gone.
	"Merry Christmas, Scully," Mulder told her.
	She tensed.  "It's Christmas?"  she cried, astounded at having lost
track completely of what day it was.
	"Yeah."
	"I only have a week," she lamented.  They were due back to work
the day after New Year's.  How could the days have slipped by so quickly? 
They'd been married an entire week.  Seven days.  A lifetime slipping
through her fingers like grains of sand.  She didn't feel married.  She didn't
feel crazy.  She didn't feel anything.
	"Are you going back to work?" he asked her.
	"I want to," she replied.  "Do you want me to?"
	"I don't think you'd pass a psych screening in a hundred years," he
replied honestly after just a second's hesitation.
	"Would you?"  She was serious.
	He laughed. It wasn't a happy sound.  Like rust on a gate.  Like he'd
rather be crying, but it hurt too much.
	"Who's going to test me?" she asked, but already felt defeated. 
"You don't want me back."
	"Not if you're going to flip out on me when I need you," he said
almost inaudibly.  Like he knew he shouldn't say it, so tried to say it like a
joke, but it didn't sound that way at all.
	He didn't trust her any more.
	She didn't trust herself.
	She'd thought she was strong enough.  But this was the first time in
her life she had no idea what to do.
	"Maybe you should go," she said.  Without trust between them,
what was there?  She'd never been what he wanted and now maybe she
never could be.  All she wanted was to feel better and she didn't know how
to do that.
	"Are you punishing me for being honest?" he looked like a green-
eyed, suspicious little boy.
	"No," she said softly.  "I don't know what to do with you here."
	"What would you do without me here?" he asked.
	"I don't know."
	"Let's do that together," he suggested, settling comfortably into the
couch.  He let her ease into him until they were lying together.  She pulled
his arm cross her stomach.
	"Do you want to remember?" he asked finally.
	"I feel like there was nothing good in my childhood.  Every
incident now seems tied to the abuse. It permeates everything...and yet no
one ever noticed," she told him.  "I want to remember the good parts.  I
want to be able to move on."
	"I think remembering brings them on," he said of her other selves. 
"Like you said, they steal your memories."
	She nodded, concentrating on his breath against her skin.  The heat
of his body.  The texture of his jeans through her thin pajamas.
	"We should make new memories," he said.
	"What do normal people do at Christmas?" she asked.  Last year
she'd tried to do normal, to see her family and she'd discovered a dead
child that belonged to her.  That was as normal as it got for her.  And for
him.
	"Go to the movies," he said sarcastically.
	"We could do that."  She strained to be agreeable, but she knew
that wasn't what he wanted, either.
	"We could go to my mother's and you could experience my hell for
a while," he said.  She shifted to look at his face, sensing that was what he
really wanted to do.
	"Should I pack?" she asked.
	He gave her a long, measuring look before he agreed.  "Don't bring
the cigarettes," he said as an afterthought.  "She can't stand smoke."  He
flashed her a grin like it was a joke.
	As she tossed jeans and a sweater into an overnight bag, she
thought of Mulder.  He'd taken ketamine and shocks to try to remember
fragments of his lost past.  Did he still harbor that much desperation inside
him? Would she come to understand such extreme behavior?  Accept
them?  Try them herself?
	"Would you still do anything to remember?" she asked in the car as
he drove.
	He shook his head.  "There are so many versions of that night in
my head... I know that I will never know the truth."
	"What about her?" she asked.  He was tense at the wheel, but she
had to know.
	"I guess it's the same," he said.  "In a world where cloning is
commonplace, how do you really ever know?"
	"Does it matter?" she asked.
	He shook his head.  "But sometimes I want to talk to that girl I
grew up with.  To ask her if she ever played Stratego again."
	"Did you?"
	"Constantly."  The look on his face betrayed the figurative nature
of his statement.  They had been playing a game of strategy for the past six
years.  One that was  unwinnable.
	"What's next?" she asked.  The alien war, the oil, the planned
invasion...it was all so very far away at that moment.
	"Mom," he said.  "Mom's next."
	Scully tried not to let that intimidate her.

	"Fox?"  She came out of the house, drying her hands on a dish
towel, surprised.  Scully hung back as son embraced mother.  She'd seen
those two have differences, but never once had Mulder forgotten his love
for his mom.
	She wanted to be a mother forty years in the future and have raised
a son as terrific and loving as Mulder.
	"Mom, you remember Scully," Mulder said, turning to include her.
Mrs. Mulder's sharp blue eyes found her. Scully couldn't read the other
woman's expression.  "My wife."  Mulder's words fell like bullets into the
silence.
	His mother was surprised and Scully watched her struggle not to
show it.
	She's disappointed, Scully thought.
	Then Mrs. Mulder closed the space between them and shook her
hand warmly.  "Do you have a first name?" she asked.
	She nodded, but didn't want to add to her own confusion.  "Call me
Scully, though," she suggested, finding it incredibly odd.  Asking her
mother in law to call her by her maiden last name.  That her mother in law
didn't know her name, though they had met before, although not under the
best of circumstances.
	"Do you like oatmeal cookies?" Mrs. Mulder asked.
	Scully could feel Mulder's eyes on her.  He was wondering if
cookies could turn her into a child.  She didn't want that to ever be a
question in his mind.  She was under control.  She could do this.  She
could accept an offer made by a woman almost as ill at ease as she felt.  "I
love them," she smiled warmly.
	"Chocolate chip for you, too, Fox," his mother added and they
went into the house together.
	"She knew we were coming," Scully whispered to him, taking his
hand behind his mother's back.  There was so much comfort and
reassurance in his hand.
	"Are you saying there's something spooky here to investigate?" he
smirked.  She hedged and he grinned. "I called her."
	She squeezed his hand and they reached the kitchen at the back of
the house.  It was warm and smelled of vanilla, a scent she remembered
from the winter days of her own childhood.  They had had happy
Christmases when she was young, hadn't they?  "Oatmeal was my
daughter's favorite," Mrs. Mulder said, catching Scully shoving an entire
cookie into her mouth.  It had looked smaller on the plate.  She started to
wonder if she was bringing up memories the other woman wanted to
forget.  She didn't know what to say.  But she noticed that Mrs. Mulder
didn't use Samantha's name, the way Mulder didn't.  As though it hurt too
much.
	Mrs. Mulder had never struck her as the cookie baking type, so
when she swept a telltale blue Pillsbury wrapper out of the way and
smoothly into the trash bin, Scully caught Mulder's eye and they both
laughed.
	"How did this come about?" his mother asked, pinning Mulder
down with those blue eyes.
	"I love her, Mom," Mulder said.  It made warmth spread through
Scully's chest.  Love.
	Mrs. Mulder nodded as though she'd known that already.  "And she
loves you."
	Scully nodded, and didn't miss the I-told-you-so look mother gave
her son.  Scully wondered what that was about - had they discussed her at
one point?  What had they said?  She didn't speak to her mother about
Mulder.
	"I'm sorry we didn't let you know before," Scully said.
	"Fox knows I don't travel since my stroke.  And you're here now."
	"I'm surprised it doesn't bother you," Mulder stated hesitantly. 
Scully could see him cower slightly, as though afraid he was going to start
and argument.
	"I don't let things bother me any more," she replied.  "The past is
very long gone and not worth talking about. I know this now."  His mother
contemplated a perfectly round cookie.  "I hope some day you'll learn the
same thing."
	"Maybe I have," Scully heard Mulder breathe.
	"Did you have a honeymoon?" his mother asked.
	Scully looked away.  They'd only shared one night together.   How
could it be so few?  She was guilty.  Ashamed.
	"We will," he swore.  "Any suggestions?"
	"Your father and I went to Montreal," she said.  "The two of you
should go somewhere tropical."
	"Tropical," Scully repeated.  She'd never been the beachgoing type,
even as a child growing up in San Diego.  She burned too easily, even
though she enjoyed the feeling of the sun against her skin.
	"The Bermuda Triangle," Mulder said.
	"Easter Island," Scully counted.
	He nodded like she was on to something.  "Or maybe somewhere
normal," he volunteered.
	"Ah, love," his mother said, sending all three of them into
chuckles.  "Have you seen the photos?"  she asked Scully.
	So much for forgetting the past,  she thought.  But Scully followed
her in silence to the stairwell wall, decorated with photographs.  Mrs.
Mulder began to identify the people in the captured moments, but Scully
barely listened to the narrative, seeking out pictures of Mulder.  There
weren't many from his adolescence.  After Sam.  He stood with an
awkward grin and a basketball trophy in one.  The other appeared to be his
graduation.
	So much about him she didn't know.  She knew his life of the past
six years and his family history intimately. In between...did she really
know him at all, this man she had married?
	She missed her mother with a physical ache.  She didn't want to
have to cut the ties between them. But she didn't know how she would
handle the fact that her mother did not believe her.
	She wasn't going to think about that.
	Mulder ambled out of the kitchen finally to join them.  "Look how
gorgeous you were," Scully said, clasping his hand as she indicated the
basketball picture.
	He shook his head.
	"I bet all the girls loved you," Scully said to him and he shook his
head more.  "I would have."
	"I was shy," he informed her brusquely.  "You'd have scared the
hell out of me, honestly."
	She wanted to tell him she wasn't always like D.K, who she knew
he had met.  But she knew he wouldn't believe her.  By her senior year,
she'd been more like herself.  She'd finished her acting out phase.  Back
then, senior year, she'd been more free than she felt now, but essentially
the same person.
	His hand crept up on her back, between her shoulder blades. 
Incredibly light, more a presence than a touch.  "Do you want to head
home?" he whispered softly into her ear.
	She hesitated.
	"Stay," Mrs. Mulder encouraged, but her tone seemed sharp
somehow.  Scully glanced at her, knowing that was how she was going to
become.  Sharp, even when she didn't mean it.
	"I am tired," Scully admitted, not feeling up to a long ride back in
the car.  She wasn't certain Mulder was up to driving back.
	"You could sleep in the car," he said as she'd known he would.
	"You're tired."  She could see it in his eyes.  She didn't want to say
that she wanted to stay.  There was something wrong, to Mulder's eyes, in
wanting to stay in this Connecticut home, wanting to be near his family,
who he'd fought so hard to walk away from.
	"The guest room is set up," Mrs. Mulder told them and Scully
looked at her with sudden insight.  It was made up not because she'd
known they were coming, but in case Samantha found her way home.  It
made Scully feel sad.
	"Thank you,"  Scully said graciously.  Was it uncomfortable for
her, letting someone stay in her daughter's room?  Just in case, hope
against hope...?  Mrs. Mulder closed the door behind them, leaving
Mulder and Scully alone in the bare room.  The sheets were cold and
smooth like glass.
	Mulder was oddly staring.  "Scully -"
	Was he too scared to sleep in the same room with her?  Too scared
of what she might do?  "I think it's too cold to lie in this bed alone," said
Scully who was never coy.
	He got in next to her.  She'd brought a nightgown so her undressing
for him would not be an issue between them.  It had been more than a
handful of years since she'd put any effort at all into seducing someone.
	All it took was kissing, to her delight.  Mulder really liked kissing. 
The thought made her stomach flipflop. It was a good thing, since she felt
she'd been severely deprived of kissing him up to that point.
	She didn't dream that night.  She wasn't sure she even slept.  Lying
under Mulder's arm in the body-warmed bed, she could see the stars in the
crystal, smog free sky.  The shade on the window was up.
	Stars.
	It made her implant itch.  The back of her neck.  Burning with
stimulation just under the skin.
	If they could receive information through the chip, couldn't they
send it too?  Couldn't they make her feel this way? Believe anything they
wanted her to believe?
	They knew more about her than she did.
	The itching became almost unbearable.  She closed her eyes but
couldn't sleep.  It stung and she concentrated on blocking out the sensation
before she tore the alien object from her flesh with her own fingernails.
	She slid out of the bed as soon as the sun rose.  The itching feeling
was subsiding as the rays of light grew stronger, leaving the darkness and
the stars behind, but she still felt tortured, haunted, by it.
	Mrs. Mulder was in the kitchen, even though it was early.  She
smiled mildly at Scully and poured her a cup of coffee.  "I used eggnog for
cream," she said.
	"Good thinking."  Warmth flooded through her insides.  "Thank
you for your hospitality.  I realize this is sudden."
	"I meant what I said.  Any woman who can make my son live in
the here and now rather than the past..."  She sounded almost bitter.  "It's
harder at the holidays."
	Her mouth was dry and she wasn't sure if she should say anything
because the loss of Emily was so different from the loss of Samantha, but
she thought this woman might understand as no one else could.  "I lost a
daughter last year," she confided softly.  "At Christmas. I'd only just found
her."
	"We lost Sam at Thanksgiving.  So many years ago."
	Scully nodded, not certain the other woman had really heard her. 
It hurt but this time it was a good hurt.  Until Mulder got up, rumpled and
in love with her. It was all over his face and she blushed at the sight of
him.
	"We're going now, Mom," he said.
	"Don't be strange," she said, then stopped, momentarily confused. 
"Strangers."  She forced the words out.
	Mulder paused, struck by the urge to care for his mother.  Then he
nodded and they went out to the car.  "I'm glad this went well."
	Scully nodded, wondering if she should mention the restless
feelings she was having.  Then he turned on the car and the radio came up.
	"...Hundreds of sightings of an unidentified flying object over the
nation's capital last night, much too late for Santa Claus..."
	Mulder's hand moved to change the station.  She put her hand on
his wrist, harder than she'd intended.  She met his eyes with all seriousness
and fear.  "It's starting again."
	He paled and changed the radio station. Celine Dion's nasal heart
would go on. Scully changed the station, not wanting to think about the
chills in her body.  Despite the radio, it was a quiet drive home.