Disclaimer: Not Mine. I'd treat them better than the actual owners do. But hey, no financial gain by me and mine, so go point your lawyers elsewhere, Mr. Carter. I even saw the damn movie, so you've gotten your pound of flesh already...

No sex, no extreme violence... just a lot of characterwork and maybe even an X File... or the explanation of one or two. Spoilers for just about everything, if only in subliminal reference. And (finally!), revenge for one episode in particular....

This is set during the cancer arc.

"The Constant Heart"
by suricata



Northwest New Jersey, 3:30pm
The drive from Newark airport hadn't been too bad -- apparently the warm spring weather had given people ideas that didn't involve driving in their cars. He hummed under his breath, tapping the steering wheel in time to his own thoughts, almost unreasonably at-peace.

In the passenger seat, his partner flipped through the case file one last time, then shut the folder and sighed quietly.

As though a switch had been flipped, his fingers clenched the wheel, almost-good mood gone. No words, no reproving sideways glances, but he felt her unhappiness, and worse, her resignation, settle over him like a heavy mantle.

Don't do this to me, he begged. Question me. Argue with me. Yell at me. Anything but this godawful I-don't-want-to-talk-about-it-Mulder silence. He wanted to shake her, scream at her, slap that sullen face until --

He pulled over that train of thought, no longer shaken by the overwhelming need to do violence. It wasn't her he was angry at, it was this thing that had come between them, this cancer that pushed at their bond the same way it pushed at her brain, pushed her towards --

No.

No no no nononono.

"A haunted house?" She broke the crystalline silence with familiar disbelief. "Voices, moving furniture, strange noises and thumpings -- Mulder this is ridiculous. There's been no crime, nothing to warrant an X-File being opened on this."

"Except one Vincent DeCandido. Age 27. Housepainter." The words came easily, once back on the familiar track of confront-and-defend.

"He fell off a ladder, Mulder. That tends to lead naturally to a concussion. Which in turn often leads to visual difficulties and, too often, when ignored, death."

Mulder opened his mouth to refute her claim, but shut it before anything could escape. Careful, Mulder, he thought. There was a line that danced between them, a line he wasn't supposed to cross, and checking for its location on a minute-by-minute basis had become yet another driving obsession with him.

"Scully. The man saw --"

"A ghost." Her voice was flat, not letting anything be read into the words.

"Well, yes." Check for the line, where are your feet, watch it, watch it...

"And you want me to see if there's any basis to his claim that this house is haunted."

He blinked. Blinked again. Then risked a look over his shoulder to his partner's face. Yes, there was a curl to her lips, a reassuring tilt to her head that he could read.

"A joke, Scully?" he asked quietly.

"A joke, Mulder," she confirmed.

And the silence was a little easier. But his fingers didn't release their deathgrip on the steering wheel. Because that was exactly what he wanted her to do.

#

Morristown, NJ
5:15 pm
The sedan pulled up in front of a large, well-maintained house. The front lawn was lushly green with the look of a pampered pet, and the white paint -- obviously fresh -- had a well-bred matte to it. A small green sign on the curb indicated the way to a state-maintained wildlife trail.

"Funny," Mulder mused. "I thought that the Pine Barrens were further south."

"What?"

"Oh, nothing. Shall we?"

There hadn't been any question of them staying in a motel; there weren't any within the Bureau's price range within close enough distance. And Mrs. Abernathy, the owner of the house, insisted that she had more than enough room.

"Besides," she had said, wringing a lace-edged handkerchief between knobby-knuckled fingers, "Almost everything happens at dusk. And dawn."

"Transfer times."

Scully smiled at the startled look Mulder shot her. "I haven't been tagging after you for four years without leaning something, Mulder."

"An honor student," he replied, and then lost himself in a study of the room where Vincent the hapless housepainter had been looking into when he saw the alleged ghost.

They had just about finished their inspection of the house -- all fifteen rooms and crawlspace attic of it -- when Mrs. Abernathy called them to join her for dinner. Two guests had arrived while they were working; a middleaged woman named Janice, and an older man Mrs. Abernathy referred to only as "the Major."

"I feel like I've stepped into an Agatha Christie mystery" Mulder said to Scully as they moved into the formal dining room.

"Mulder..." The tone clearly said 'behave.'

Dinner was pleasant, and Mulder found himself enjoying the company. Janice was Mrs. Abernathy's niece, a well-spoken woman who clearly believed her aunt's stories of ghostly disturbances. The Major was Johan, and he had known the former owners of the house, filling the conversation with stories about the wild parties that had been thrown there during the high-living 80's. Although skeptical of hauntings, Johan admitted that it was just the sort of thing the house would be prone to.

"The owners have always been on the noisy side. I wouldn't be surprised a bit if the house picked up some of their tendencies. I keep expecting Suzannah here to let loose some night."

Mrs. Abernathy wrinkled her patrician nose at him, and said that she would do no such thing. "I leave that to those with the energy for it. So long as they don't wake me in the middle of the night."

Mulder had a sudden uneasy feeling that she was talking about more than ghostly disturbances, and felt a flush rise on the back of his neck. Leaning over to make a comment about cheap motels being more fun, he stopped.

"Um, Scully..."

She lifted the napkin to her face automatically, but her eyes were unfocussed, not concentrating.

"Scully?"

She turned to him then, napkin falling away, and he sat back in his chair as though someone had gut-punched him.

"Something's here."

#

Mulder leaned against the closed door, staring at the papered wall of the hallway. He'd seen this trip as a chance to play ghostbusters, escape from their endless pushme-pullyou of arguments. A Bureau-funded way to heal the chasm that he felt yawning at their feet. Yet another Great Mulder Idea shot to hell.

The light flickered, and he frowned irritably. "Go away, already."

The lights dimmed, then a gentle chiming noise floated up the staircase from the main entranceway. The ghosts didn't like being ignored.

He grinned, a deathshead grin completely without humor. They hadn't been ignored at dinner, that was for certain. They'd done everything but a conga line through the dinning room, chimes and broken dishes and sudden bleats of what sounded like party horns. The sounds were clear, sounding first in one part of the house and then another, but always coming back to where the small group of diners sat. Mrs. Abernathy had been delighted that the 'residents" as she called them were out in such force, clapping her hands like a schoolchild given a treat.

Mulder should have been searching the house, checking the instrumentation -- on loan from that idiot Beekman -- that he had set up, searching for hidden speakers or arguing with Scully over where the sounds might be coming from. But he hadn't been able to take his eyes off his partner's face. Her pale, strained face, one slow thin trickle of blood coming unnoticed from her left nostril, her eyes tracking something that he couldn't see.

Janice had been beside Scully in an instant, checking her pulse with steady hands and a watch pinned to her blazer. "Dana? Dana, listen to me. You're here, we're with you. Can you tell me what you see?"

Mulder had recognized the trained tones of a therapist, and something else. The familiarity with which the woman manipulated his partner's attention, kept her focused but not distracted, screamed "professional ghosthunter" to him.

"Leave her alone!" He went to jerk Scully away, and was restrained by the Major's gentle hand on his shoulder. "Don't interfere, son. You'll only do damage."

Mulder got out of his chair snarling, intending to do some damage to the older man, but was stopped by the look of sadness on that dignified face. This wasn't a set-up. It was... bad luck. His-and-hers, a matched set. Why the hell had he thought this was a good idea?!

A cold tickle of air wrapped around his neck, like a caress, and Mulder shuddered, hunching his shoulders against it. Scully had kicked him out, her red-rimmed eyes a warning sign that she needed her privacy. Privacy to weep, to bewail the fate -- the damn cruel joke -- that left her an open door for the dead to walk through.

I should never have brought her here. She should never have let me bring her. Joking, she made it a joke, but she knew. Why the hell did she go along with this?

But he knew why. Because she was as anxious as he to heal the breach -- more so, because she was afraid of what he would do if left alone, under those conditions.

"And you think making up's going to make it easier, Scully?" he asked the empty hallway. "Christ, we're a matched pair."

Scully had finally blinked, just when Mulder had thought he would have to start screaming, or something equally damaging to his Joe-FBI Cool image. Turning her head, her gaze had met his, seeking reassurance. "You don't see anything?"

He'd shook his head. A loud =thump= from upstairs, followed by a crash and giggle in the kitchen, had them all flinching, and he gave her a wan grin. "Nothing wrong with my hearing, though."

"What did you see, Dana?" Mrs. Abernathy had been almost beside herself with excitment. "My dear, a genuine medium, and who would have thought it?"

Scully shook her head, and Mulder could almost sense the change, see the Scully-armor coming back on, piece by hammered steel piece. And for once, he was thankful, grateful even. For if she were armored, nothing could get at him, either.

"A figure, a child, running. People dancing. A servant, maybe, someone carrying dishes, a platter."

"What period were they? Could you make out the details of their clothing?" Janice was still using that damned voice, but it seemed to be working. Scully straightened, reached for her water glass and took a shallow sip. "No. It was all.. like a silhouette cutting, shadows and lines." She placed the glass down firmly on the table and wiped at her nose with the back of one pale hand. "If you don't mind... I think I need to lie down."

Mulder had interrupted their pleas for more information, their requests that she try once again to see more. If he'd thought she'd agree, he would have had her in the car and heading for the nearest modern hotel, expense be damned, but he knew that look on her face. She wasn't going to run again. Whatever this was, whatever was causing this, she was going to track it down, pin it to a microscope slide, and get an answer science - and she -- could respect. So, reluctantly, he helped her up the heavy wooden staircase, standing guard while she washed her face and brushed her teeth, turning his back as she changed into sweatpants and a pullover.

"Just in case," she said with a wry smile. "I've learned not to be caught in a silk nightie."

He knew that he was supposed to rise to the bait, make some leering innuendo that she could slap down, but his best effort wasn't worth voicing.

"Do you want to take a sleeping pill?" He knew that she had them in her bag, also knew that they had never been touched.

She shook her head. "I'll be fine. I just need to rest for a while."

He stood there, looking at her, then at the uncomfortable-looking chair against the wall. She followed his glance, then sighed in familiar exasperation.

"Just go, Mulder."

He nodded, turning for the door.

"But, Mulder?"

He stopped, looking back.

"Don't go too far."

#

The next morning, Scully was "fine." To Mrs. Abernathy, to the Colonel, to Janice, she responded with a small, polite smile, an incline of her head, and "I'm fine." With Mulder, she omited the politeness.

"A hallucenegen," she suggested, sipping a mug of coffee. "Aural incidents caused by someone in the house, combined with a mild hallucengen, could have triggered a visual incident."

Mulder shook his head, watching out the upstairs windows -- full floor-to-ceiling openings that let in the bright morning sunshine -- as Mrs. Abernathy and Janice worked in the semi-formal rose garden out back. "We all ate the same food," he pointed out, gamely unbuilding her objections. "And you're the only one who saw anything."

"Mulder. My... physical condition would allow even the mildest of chemicals to have more impact than a heathy immune system."

Her voice was flat, the way it always got when she was forced to acknowledge the cancer which crouched within her. A warning-off, a sign posted saying "Stay off the nerves." But he couldn't, and she knew he couldn't, and he knew that she knew he couldn't.

"Scully." He turned to look at her. "Are you going to force us through this dance again? I thought that we had agreed - no more denial. From either of us."

She didn't respond. He had been true to the promise he'd made, after the amazingly stupid incident with him trying to regain his lsot memories. And when he even thought about reverting, he had the still-visible scars in his forehead to remind him. "You need that like you need a hole in the head." Well, he had the hole now...

It was seeing those scars in the mirror that had triggered the promise -- seeing his scars so close to where Scully's cancer hid, a daily reminder that his actions rebounded so heavily on her. And where she could not reprimand him directly, the scars had no such hesitation. But she had made promises too.

"Scully?"

"But why, Mulder? Why would I be able to see them? Why not Janice, or Mrs. Abernathy? They want so hard to believe..."

"A lot of people want to play in the NBA, Scully. Doesn't mean Dennis Rodman's going to break a sweat worrying."

"Are you implying something about my hair color, Mulder?" She held up one hand. "No. Don't even start."

"Three questions," he said, sitting on the arm of the low sofa she was occupying. "One. What is causing the... alleged hauntings? Are the hoax or reality? Two. If real, why are they happening? Three. Why are you able to see them when no-one else can?"

At her look he shrugged. "I can argue a position without buying into it, Scully."

"So how do we go about answering all these questions?" She gestured at the equipment strewn about what had once been an elegant ballroom. "I'm assuming, of course, that you know what all of these toys do."

"We've got how many advanced degrees betwen us? I think we can figure it out."

Scully sighed in resignation. "We, kemosabe?"

#

Scully stood in the dining room, her back to the door, eyes scanning the walls and floorboards once again. Somewhere, something would catch her attention, would lead her to an explanation of what was happening in this house.

A ghost. Fine. She'd seen ghosts. Once is a hallucination. Twice is nerves and the power of suggestion. But when you have three separate instances, months and years apart -- it's either ghosts or psychosis. She'd choose ghosts. But only by a slim margin But why? Why here, why now? And why me, a small voice asked, but she ignored it. If she were to start asking =that= question, all the duct tape in the world wouldn't keep her from falling apart, and taking Mulder right down with her.

She wasn't fooled by his calm front, and suddenly solicitious nature. Fox Mulder -- the Fox Mulder who had willingly allowed holes to be drilled into his head, for God's sake! -- was still there, no matter how hard "Agent" Mulder tried to rein him in. And the slightest hint of weakness on her part would only make things worse.

"It's not about you, Mulder.." Of course it was. How could you separate them? Since the day she'd walked into his office... since even before that, if you believed Mulder's claim that they'd lived previous lifetimes together.

"All that time, and we still can't get it right," she said out loud, mockingly.

Dana laughed, surprising herself. "I suppose there are worse things to look forward to, than chasing after Mulder in some incarnation or another. At least I won't be bored." But still there was an aching feeling of regret. Was that all she was, all she ever could be; some kind of nursemaid-in-perpetuity?

A flash of light chased from one side of the wall across the table from her to the other, slowing as it came to the corner and then disappearing, melting into the oak paneling like water into parched earth. She took a step closer to where the light had faded, one hand reaching out to touch the wood. It was comfortably warm under her fingers, like plastic heated under the sun. Tracing the line, she walked along the wall until she came to where the light had emerged. There was nothing to distinguish it from any other spot, just satin-finished wood and moldings.

Frowning in thought, she leaned a little into the hand resting against the wall, and them yelped as she felt her hand sink into wood turned the consistency of mud. A drop of blood fell quietly onto the polished floor.

"Mulder!"

#

Every light in the dining room was turned on, despite the sunlit windows, and Mulder and Janice prowled every inch of the room as though expecting something to jump out and bite them on the nose. Scully stood in the doorway, fighting off a feeling of irritation. Mulder had taken one look at her hand, halfway into the wall, and ordered her out of the way. She'd started to argue with him, but the brittle tone in his voice stopped her.

Damn Mulder anyway, she thought, ignoring Mrs. Abernathy's anxious flutterings around her. I'm the one who found the locus, I should be --

"Locus."

"What?" Mrs. Abernathy stopped, her wrinkles reshaping themselves from concernt to puzzlement.

"Locus. The point where all points meet" She shook her head, puzzled. "I don't know --"

"Yes, that would make sense." Janice came to stand in front of her, narrow face aglow with excitement. "This house must be a locus point, a place where the Beyond can reach through to us."

Scully could hear the capital B in her voice, and shot a glance at Mulder. Her partner shrugged, his face clearly saying "your call, Scully."

"And you're the focus of the locus" Janice went on, missing the wince that passed Mulder's face at her involuntary rhyme. "How amazing. No wonder the apparitions have been more active since you arrived. Have you ever been tested for parapsychic ability, Agent Scully?"

"As opposed to the ordinary, everyday psychic ability?" Scully asked, suddenly feeling lightheaded. Damn Mulder and his "fun cases" anyway.

Her hand raised to her nose just in time to catch the new flow of blood.

"Look at the wall!"

Even as Mrs. Abernathy cried out, Scully could hear a distant rumble inside her ears, the low thunder of voices as though coming from another room. She flashed back to college, lying in bed while her next door neighbor threw yet another party she hadn't been invited to, and felt a physical twinge of loss, of always being on the outside, the odd one out. The unwanted. The rumble became a booming echo, washing past her in cold indifference. Voices cried out, familiar voices outside her ears, but she couldn't distinguish them, lost in the darkness exploding around her.

A flicker touched her, briefly, a firefly to warm the depths of space, and was gone.

"Scully? Scully, did you see them?"

That was Mulder, shouting almost in her ear. She tried to open her eyes, then realized they were open. Slowly, the darkness faded and she could see the dining room again, the people darting back and forth like bloodhound puppies learning the scent. Blood stained her hands, and her upper lip felt sticky.

"No. No, Mulder, I didn't see anything." Always the bridesmaid, never the bride, she thought in grim amusement. And then she passed out.

#

Dana knew that she wasn't awake. She wasn't dreaming, either, she knew that too. This was something else, something familiar. Something new.

She tried reaching out, to see what was beyond the white gauze she seemed to be wrapped in, and discovered that her arms wouldn't move. Or, to be more precise, that she didn't have arms. She didn't have much of anything. Moving was more a matter of looking in a direction and thinking about how she'd like to be there.

"Hello?" she tried to say. "Anyone there?"

Something moved.V She retreated, suddenly aware that she was completely helpless, completely defenseless. It wasn't a situation Dana Scully was comfortable with. V A rush of wind went past her; the fetid, sour breath of something long-dead. The smell of chemicals followed -- the familiar stench of a corpse, Scully relaxed. Corpses she knew. Corpses she could deal with. The gauze faded, as though in response to her unspoken challenge, and she found herself on a hill, surrounded by woods in bloom. Grass flattened under her feet, and she walked -- normal locomotion -- a few steps forward, then stopped. Spread out beneath her was a lake, the opposite shore shrouded in mist. A wooden dock stretched one arm into the grey water, supporting a number of poles waiting for small ships to tie up next to it. The dock was currently unoccupied. It all seemed... familiar.

She spun around, almost losing her balance as the air seemed heavier, dragging down her reflexes. "Who said that?"

"Damnit, what's going on?"

The corpsewind was back, knocking her off her feet and sending trembles across the lake's surface, leaving its stink adhering to her skin.

And the woods and the grass and the lake faded....

"Scully? Come on Scully, don't do this to me. My heart can't take it. Think of all the paperwork I'd have to fill out."

She opened her eyes to Mulder's face, inches away from her nose. His breath was sweet. She frowned, wondering what had triggered that thought.

"I'm fine, Mulder." She tried to sit up, and discovered she was in her bed, a crisp white cotton sheet drawn over her.

"I'm fine," she repeated to him, the slightest narrowing of her eyes, the tilt of her chin, all signalling him to leave the topic alone. For now.

He backed away, and let Janice come forward to take her blood pressure. Her eyes, still hazed, looked beyond the other woman, beyond Mulder standing, his face distracted and concerned, beyond the others clustered against the far wall, and into the wall itself. Wallpaper faded to reveal heavy white plaster decades old, and then solid plaster dissolved into particles, particles slipped into molecules, molecules danced into spinning atoms and in between it all whirled a neon thread of fluid energy curling like a hungry snake. It enticed her. It terrified her. It was looking right at her.

#

Mulder was ready to tear his hair out. On one hand, he had a front row seat to some of the most incredible spectral incidents he'd ever read of anywhere. Ghostchasers would kill to be in his shoes. On the other hand, trying to keep up with the damage these spooks were causing was exhausting.

And on the third hand...

He cast a glance upwards. Scully slept, courtesy of sedatives slipped into a mug of herbal tea. Suspicious, Scully had insisted on bewing it herself. Fortunately, Janice was better with slight-of-hand nursing than she was with spectral analysis.

A loud thunk behind him was all the warning Mulder got. Throwing himself to one side of the room, Mulder watched as actions from a hundred years ago played out in front of him. The couple argued bitterly, soundlessly. Then the man raised his hand, and Mulder flinched, knowing what was about to come. The woman cringed from the blow, her hand falling to the folds of her skirt, and came back with a knife that glinted silver under the flourescent lights. A stroke, a stab, and Mulder was wiping red-blue ooze from the front of his shirt as the male figure slumped to the floor. The woman stood there, shoulders heaving, then turned to look Mulder in the face. He knew she couldn't see him, that whatever had happened to her had finished generations before. It didn't matter. Her eyes were wide, terrified, and she opened her mouth to scream.

Scully sat upright, the sheet falling off her. Her eyes were wide, staring at something not in the empty room. The smell was back, a mocking slap to her sinuses, and she put up her hands in a useless gesture to ward it off.

To her astonishment, the stench disappeared. But before she could relax, there was a muffled groan from outside, the sound of a man in agony. Not Mulder, she knew, even as she was throwing off the covers and swinging her legs over, hitting the floor running, cursing under her breath for the fact that her gun was nowhere to hand even as another, caustic voice suggested that a lead bullet wouldn't be much defense against what was likely lurking outside.

The Major was lying on the floor, eyes wide and staring up at the ceiling. Scully wiped at her nose with the back of her hand, bending over the older man without hesitation. His pulse was thready, his complexion ashen. She followed his gaze upward, only to jerk back in fear. The plaster overhead was gone, replaced by a slowly pulsing, glowing ooze of muddy blue-green.

As she stared, a hand reached down out of the mass, bone-white skin flaking off in sheets as the fingers unclenched, stretched, seemingly extruded narrow fingers in her direction as though they could see her, somehow sense her disgust, her --

Outrage.

Scully didn't stop to think about the anger swelling inside her, merely welcomed the lava-hot energy it brought. Baring her teeth like a cornered badger, she covered the Major with her own body, blocking him from the hand's search.

"Go away," she snarled at it. "You're not welcome here. Go away. "

The hand paused, then continued its reach, the wrist extending, elongating. It was now halfway down from the ceiling, wavering like the tentacle of some unhealthy beast.

"No!"

She heard the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs behind her, but didn't let it distract her.

"Go. Away. Back, you. Get back. Go away. Back into the hell you came from." The words flowed out of her in a steady chant, the blood dripping from her nostril in a constant plink-plink to fall upon the Major's forehead.

The hand paused, as did the footsteps.

Her anger surged once again, the memory of her oaths - as healer, and as federal agent - merging like a tidal wave behind her, lifting and supporting her as she closed her eyes and narrowed her concentration into a sharp focus.

"No. I refuse you entrance. You will not use me, damnit!"

There was a heated blow against her forehead, and she fell backwards with a gasp. A familiar hand was suddenly there, supporting her, square in the middle of her back, pushing her forward and giving her strength.

"I said NO!"

Mulder stood on the landing, held motionless by shock. Scully and the Major were sprawled on the floor, but he was able to give them only a fraction of his attention. The pulsing mass hanging below - no, it was the ceiling - caught him like a magnet. Then he saw the hand, and his breath hitched in his throat.

"I said NO!"

The sound of his partner's voice broke his paralysis, and he moved forward, reaching down to touch her shoulder. Static jumped from her skin to his, pushing him backwards.

"Scully?"

His gaze followed hers back up towards the ceiling. The everything was normal, no sign of ectoplasm or spectral hand or anything other than flaking plaster.

"Scully?"

"I'm all right, Mulder." Her voice was tired, scratchy. The strength he had heard in it moments before was gone. Her body sagged forward, almost falling onto the Major. He felt her recover, bending forward to gather the older man up off the floor.

#

"So what do we have, Mulder?"

Mulder looked down into the delicate china cup, swirling the coffee in gentle spirals. "You don't want to hear my theory."

She smiled, tiredly. "And since when has that ever stopped you?"

He nodded, accepting the rebuke. It was as though something had been snipped in his spine, making his shoulders slump. "Before you got here, the hauntings were just that, basic thumps-and-fog. Then you walk in the door, and things escalate. Fast. Remember my theory, about why you saw the ghosts of those girls?"

"I'm not likely to forget." Pain passed over his face, and the guilt rose in her gorge, partnered as always by regret. She made an abortive gestire, as though to touch his shoulder, but caught herself halfway there. No. No denial, Dana. That was part of the agreement.

"I think I was wrong."

Well. Raising one finely-plucked eyebrow, she asked "can I have that in writing?"

He looked up, gave her a tired smile of his own. "In the specifics, anyway.Your ability to see the recently-dead isn't a new phenomina. We've been discounting your father's appearing to you when he died." Mulder hesitated, trying not to blunder this as badly as he usually did. Tact, Mulder, he reminded himself. It's not just the past tense of tack. "I don't want to push you into anything, Scully, but have you ever thought that you might be -"

"Don't go there, Mulder." She sighed, fingers finally touching his lightly in reassurance. "Yes, all right. Yes, I've thought about it. How could I not, with you dragging me into every weird experience ever documented in the continental 48, and a few places we shouldn't even have jurisdiction. Sometimes.. do you know what it was like, Mulder, growing up with Melissa? And my mother, and her feelings, and her dreams..."

"And you the practical daughter of a practical Naval captain." His shoulders straightened, a new theory catching fire within him, reinvigorating him. "You said that you felt a presence, when you were fighting off Thing's little brother. Something supporting you, giving you strength. Something - or someone?"

Scully noddeed, the memory of that voice wiping away some of the lines around her mouth and eyes, leaving a lingering sense of comfort.

"I think it's your father, Scully. Who else would be watching out for you like that? I think he's on the other side of whatever this locus is, trying to help you. Protecting you."

"I think we need to use that connection, somehow," Mulder continued. "Get him to help you to shut this gate. Before anything else gets out - before anything escapes this house."

#

The sun was barely up, but already Scully could smell the roses opening. She sank to her heels, pushing her face towards the nearest gathering of pale yellow buds. She made a mental note to herself, to suggest these to mom for her funeral. Morbid, perhaps, but the events of the past two days had given her a new perspective on death. After all she had seen, how could she not believe in... well, in something. She closed her eyes, and the lines around her eyes and mouth eased. Someone, waiting for her. Loving her. That voice had been so warm, the temptation had been to sink into it, let herself disappear into the comfort and never emerge...

But Mulder needed her. That was the lodestone of her life, these days. Trying hard not to resent him, his certainty, his overwhelming assumption of her compliance... She exhaled in a silent laugh. Always, she was there for other people. Why shouldn't he depend on her? Scully the strong. Scully the sturdy.

Scully the tired.

Forcing her eyes open, she ran gentle fingers over the silky petals. The scent was delicate, not like the overpowering longstem red roses that were so popular with florists. Garden Party, these were called. Appropriate. She could imagine them scenting a backyward filled with people in summerweight clothing eating sandwiches without crusts, drinking lemonade...

Scully stopped, lifting her head as though to catch the whisper. "Daddy?" But it was gone.

A noise from inside the house -- a crash, and howling laughter -- made her wince, forgetting the voice and the roses. This was the second day in a row that the apparitions had lasted beyond dawn. Mulder was right, it was getting worse. And if the rest of his theory was correct, it wouldn't stop just because she wasn't there.

Her mouth firming, Dana stood, turned on her heel, and marched back into the waiting house. Never let it be said a Scully ran from a fight.

"Dana?" Janice offered her a cup of tea, and Scully took it cautiously. "Just herbs," the woman reassured her. "I promise. We need you awake for this, I think."

"You think?"

Mulder and Johan were making noise in the hallway, setting up complicated wiring and cameras of obscure origin and dubious reliability. "Damn Beckman, anyway," Mulder muttered again, reappearing in the doorway. His dark blue sweatshirt was covered with the glitter of wire shavings, and his hair was standing on end with static charges. "Ready, Scully?"

She nodded, putting the tea down untasted. "Let's give it a try."

"Do or do not, there is --"

"Mulder..." she warned, and he subsided. But the manic gleam in his eye remained.

Janice had instructed her to find a place where she felt comfortable, where she felt she would be able to relax and concentrate at the same time. Scully trailed through the first floor of the old house, consciously avoiding the dining room, aware of the three trailing in her wake like anxious tugboats dogging a damaged steamer.

Always the nautical allusions, hey Starbuck?

The kitchen she discarded. Even without trying, she could see wisps of long-past lives acting out their roles. One or two servants she could have ignored, but the overlay of bodies coming and going, passing trays through each others spectral bodies was not conducive to relaxation. Likewise the bathrooms, which had been remodeled enough times to throughly confuse her sense of perspective, and Mulder had to keep her from walking into a wall that hadn't been there fifty years before.

Finally she stopped in the small library, which had originally been a sewing room. Just off the front entryway, there was a sense of tranquility here, as though nothing more active than gossip had ever occured within these walls. Moving to an overstuffed rocker upholstered in green and gray fabric, Scully sank into it, leaning against one arm and curling her legs up underneath her her body, so that the chair seemed to cradle her.

Mulder tried very hard not to pace, but the tension singling in his body was making his legs quiver, no matter how hard he tried to concentrate. Janice had refused to even consider his leading Scully through this, and his partner had backed the other woman up. Less than politely. Actually, he thought with a trace of amusement, what she said translated directly into 'give us a fucking break, Mulder.' Seems she doesn't think you can remain impartial... now why would she believe that?

The lights flickered, emphasizing the bright sunlight coming in through the one window in the room. The Major stepped past Mulder to shut the lights off, to prevent further distractions, and Mulder occupied himself in watching the dust motes rise slowly in the lucent glow. He could hear Janice's whisper, and Scully's quiet responses, but couldn't focus on them, as though it were a movie playing in another room. Better that way, not to study what was going on, not to be so intent. That way, he wouldn't interfere. Wouldn't barge in and demand to be front and center in anything Scully did...

She was going on without him. This one question, she would know the answer before he could even ask it. And even knowing that he would join her some day, that she would be waiting for him, didn't soothe that pain.

Self-centered bastard, he thought without rancor.

"What do you see now, Dana? Show me where you are." Janice's voice seemed to have a notch more tension in it than before. Mulder forced himself to take in the scene in front of him. Janice was kneeling in front of Scully, almost pitching herself forward. The Major had a hand on Mrs. Abernathy's arm, restraining her. And Scully...

He paused. He had never seen that look on Scully's face before. Peaceful, but with a tension about it, eyes closed and lips open just a hair..

She looked like a woman reaching for orgasm.

And at that thought, all hell broke loose.

Bolt lightning riccoceted through the room, smashing light fixtures and cracking the floor-to-ceiling window. Mulder threw himself to the floor, reaching automatically for his gun, forgetting that he had left it -- unloaded -- in the dresser in his bedroom upstairs. Dumb, Mulder. Very, very dumb.

v Oh yeah, he had time to think. Like it was going to do a hell of a lot of good. Lifting his head ever-so-slightly off the faded Persian carpet, Mulder saw that his companions had taken similar actions. The Major and Mrs. Abernathy were against the far wall, inelegantly curled against each other, while Janice was huddled under a wingback chair.

And Scully sat, head pulled back, hands relaxed on the armrests.. surrounded by a noxoious, shimmering, pulsing glow. It shaded to green, to orange, to a pale, veined blue that made Mulder's stomach twist and try to dry-retch. Underneath, Scully's face was calm, almost serene, and Mulder took strength from that, forcing himself not to panic.

"Scully?" His whisper was harsh, barely heard over the electric static in the room. Ghosts moved through the currents, fading in and out, stronger the closer they came to Scully. There didn't seem to be any threat -- the spectral figures were more curious than anything, from what he could tell. The glow seemed to be keeping her apart from them, but it wasn't restraining her. Mulder knew his partner would be fighting if she felt threatened.

"Scully," he tried again, this time louder.

"Mulder." Her voice was faint, as though coming from far away, from underwater. Her eyes opened.

"Ah." A clear note, a tone ringing with sudden comprehension. Standing, the glow moved with her, clinging, shimmering with her breath. The bolts crossed in front of her, then sizzled to a halt. The acrid smell of burned wallhangings and plaster filled the room, overpowering everything else.

And then a stale wind blew in from hell. Charnel house and cess pool, fetid blood and the sweat of ancient dispair. Mulder gagged, thankful that he'd passed on breakfast. The Major wasn't so fortunate.

Scully staggered under the blow of that wind. The glow around her intensified, shading to a dark orange, and she recovered, facing into the attack like the proud figurehead on the prow of a boat. Mulder pulled himself upright, stretching out one hand to his partner. She turned, slipping her hand into his own. Her skin felt cool, smooth like marble. There was no warmth, no pulse. But her fingers curled around his reassuringly.

"We okay?"

"We're okay," she said. The glow semed to pulse in agreement. He nooded, a bit shaky, and stepped back.

Scully turned, as though following a scent. The smell semed to be solidifying, condensing into a dark fog. Staring into it, Mulder could see every nightmare that had ever chased him awake, every fault or flaw ever pointed out to him, every mistake he'd ever made, every wrong word he'd ever uttered and hurt someone...

He pulled back, starting as though suddenly come awake.

"Don't look at it, Mulder."

Scully's voice, once again pulling him back from the brink. His partner, his protector. Always leading him out of the trouble he got into.

What waas he going to do without her?"

In front of them, behind the fog, a crack formed down the length of wall, from elaborate wooden cornice to polished parquet flooring. The faded, flocked wallpaper shimmered, and a pale green ooze came from the crack. Mrs. Abernathy made a noise of protest, then buried her face against the floor, unwilling to watch. Mulder couldn't look away. The ooze glowed, similar to the aura surrounding his partner. He risked a glance backwards, and matched observations. Different colors, but the same consistency.

The crack widened, enough for a human-sized shape to step into it. Framed by jagged wall on either side, the form was indistinct, hidden by the ooze and the -- Mulder squinted -- by the glow backlighting it. A pale, colorless, almost insubstantial glow that nonetheless light the entire room without shadows.

Scully stepped forward, towards the fog between her and the new figure. It pushed back, tendrils reaching towards her.

"I understand now," she said, almost conversationally. " My fear gave you entrance. But I'm closing that door. I refuse you passage into this world, and will not carry you into the next."

The fog recoiled, drawing the tendrils back into itself. Then, in a sudden jerk, shot those tendrils in multiple directions -- not towards Scully, but reaching to the others in the room. Scully sidestepped, deflecting the tendrils reaching for Mulder just as the shadowy figure moved to protect the Major and Mrs. Abernathy. Janice, her eyes wide open and lower lip caught firmly between her teeth, flicked her gaze from one figure to the other, clearly not the least bit frightened.

"I refuse you entrance," Scully repeated. "Let those who came from this plane remain, if they so choose, as they were before; shadows, pale memories clinging to what-was. But you -- you must go. You have no place here, no claim to this existence."

Moving in almost practiced synchonization, Scully and the shadowy figure herded the fog back into a corner of the room, blocking it and squeezing it down until, with a soundless cat's-cry and a violent shudder, it --

Was gone.

Mulder let out a breath he didn't even realize he was holding.

"Scully?"

She didn't seem to hear him.

Mrs. Abernathy and the Major were slowly getting to their feet, recovering the way animals do when a predator leaves the vicinity. Janice sat where she was, watching the scene with rapt fascination. Mulder folowed her gaze to Scully.

"Dana?" he tried again, desperate for reassurance.

Scully took two steps forward, towards the figure, and Mulder subsided. The least he could do was allow her time with her father. Time she had refused to take, via Boggs, in the first wave of her grief.

Scully stopped in front of the figure, her head turned up with a look of such love, such complete joy, that Mulder had to avert his gaze, looking instead at the ghostly figure. Then Mulder frowned. He had never met the Captain, but he thought the man should have been.. shorter. And bald. And not quite so...

So much like Jack Willis.

One ghostly hand raised, as though to stroke Scully's cheek, but stopped just shy of touching her. She bent forward, placing her skin against the open palm, and the glows surrounding each ran and merged, creating an electric humming just above the human hearing level. Layered above that, Mulder thought he heard a rough voice, a man's voice, whisper Scully's name -- her first name -- with a painful, sweet longing.

Then he stepped backwards, pulling away and back into the crack. The ooze retreated, the glow faded, and there was nothing left to indicate any of it had ever happened.

Except Dana Scully, her nose bleeding, her eyes fixed somewhere, on something none of them could see.

"Wait," she whispered. And collapsed.

# # #

Mulder threw the last of their bags into the car, and turned to look at his partner. "Ready to go, Scully?"

She nodded, tearing her gaze away from the house. Opening the door, she slipped into the passanger seat, buckling the seatbelt and rolling down the window. Mulder stared at the building a long moment more, then got into the car and started the engine.