Episode 8x15

TITLE: The Red Queen
AUTHOR: KatyBlue
Artwork:June Gunawan

SPOILERS: This is a Virtual Season 8 Episode, written
for I Made This Productions.
RATING: PG-13
DISCLAIMER : In their original forms, these characters
were not created by me, but I have manipulated them for
my own curious whims as well as your reading pleasure.
SUMMARY: Mulder and Scully investigate a thirty year old
cold case involving a once prominent virologist and the
theft of materials from a Department of Defense laboratory.
Finding that the doctor lives in their area, they attempt
to close the case, but discover that the doctor's viral
research might not have ended after all.
E-MAIL: katy2blue@aol.com Come on, you know you want to!
or visit my web site at http://members.xoom.com/KatyBlue/
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: To three fabulous betas; Fabulous
Monster, Meredith and Toniann. They gave me great
suggestions -- any errors still present are all my own.
A huge thanks to the virtual season 8 production crew
for all the hard work they've done to put together this
wonderful 'cyber-season'! You guys rock!
AUTHOR'S NOTES: at end.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Red Queen
by KatyBlue

PROLOGUE

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Where do you come from?" said the Red Queen. "And where
are you going? Look up, speak nicely, and don't twiddle
your fingers all the time."

~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Monday, December 10
Falls Church, Virginia
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dr. Vincent White drank only to get drunk.

There was no point to the act for him outside of the
pursuit of oblivion. The bottle of wine was half full. He
made it empty.

He felt empty, reclining in the inescapable clutter of his
neglected apartment. The slipcover half hung off the couch
he was sprawled across. The heavy curtains were pulled so
the room was dimmed. The little sunlight that did manage
to intrude spilled through a crack in the grime of the
curtains and highlighted only dust motes swirling in its
alluring but unreachable illumination.

He barely recognized the daylight.

There was a stack of mediocrity next to him. He could
still recognize *that*, thank God. Final exams lay in an
untidy pile at his fingertips, the corrections needed to
fix multiple errors required an effort that Vincent no
longer had the energy for today. And after just barely
starting them, no less.

Given that the final grades for his motley pack of
students were due tomorrow, he should be more concerned,
but he wasn't. He'd get a call tomorrow from some
administrative assistant, nastily reminding him he was late
again. So what? It would take another three days for the
university to start hounding him in earnest. After that, he
had only the fallout of dealing with a multitude of annoyed
and mediocre students when the grades were sent out and
they started calling the biology department and demanding
to know es for his motley pack of
students were due tomorrow, he should be more concerned,
but he wasn't. He'd get a call tomorrow from some
administrative assistant, nastily reminding him he was late
again. So what? It would take another three days for the
university to start hounding him in earnest. After that, he
had only the fallout of dealing with a multitude of annoyed
and mediocre students when the grades were sent out and
they started calling the biology department and demanding
to know sticking to
them. He'd been a very fastidious little boy. In the photo,
his lips were pursed in fierce concentration of the object
under construction before him.

Olivia, in the background, was beaming at her little boy
from the backlit aura of warm June sunshine. Her dark curls
were unruly in the breeze. Her hand, frozen in that moment
of time, tucked a curl behind her ear.

The picture reminded him of all he'd lost. Dr. Vincent
White took another swig straight from the bottle. He rarely
bothered with a glass anymore. No point, really. He never
had company to entertain. At the time this picture had
been taken, he'd sipped an excellent vintage wine out of a
crystal wineglass. He and Olivia had hosted well-attended
and sought-after dinner parties. They'd resided in the
opulent comfort of a three million dollar, impeccably
decorated home on oceanfront property. Afforded this luxury
mostly from Olivia's family money, but aided by his status
as a well-known and respected virologist at the prestigious
Yale University and a whopping Department of Defense grant
for his research.

He'd thought he was set for life.

He'd had a beautiful family, he thought sadly.

He rarely took note of his surroundings now. It was too
depressing.

He was glad the girls weren't in the picture. He couldn't
take that right now. Elizabeth, with those impossibly long
lashes and light blue eyes, the riot of dark curls just
like her mother. Little Gwennie, a smaller carbon copy of
her older sister. Marissa, next in line, and blonde just
like Matthew. He tipped the bottle up again and the picture
fluttered from his fingers to settle near a stain on the
beaten rug. He reached down to save the treasure from the
filth it had landed in.

It was too much wine all at once. His stomach protested.
He belched and felt the acid sting of it come up his
esophagus and out his nose. Sitting up quickly, he snatched
the photo up, setting it where it was safe. Bending back
over, he put a hand to his nostrils to catch the remaining
liquid as it burned its passage out.

When his hand came away stained with the red of the wine,
he began to cry.

Matthew had a nosebleed on a Sunday night, exactly thirty
years ago. That was the beginning of the end of his son's
life, as well as what Dr. White had known to be his life.
Colleagues shook their heads and avoided his eyes as they
treated his little boy. They tried every medication they
thought might work as Matthew's symptoms intensified. The
pieces hadn't fit any known puzzle at the time.

How could they? No one had known about that particular
puzzle except for Vincent.

His colleagues finally shrank from his impotent rage and
guilt-filled wrath. He cursed them all. He railed at God
and himself as the virus locked into its terrible pattern.
He weakened at the sight of his child's helplessness.

There was no hope for his son's survival. And yet he'd
hoped anyway.

In vain.

Matthew labored into the early hours of Monday morning,
December 22nd, while Vincent and his wife stood helplessly
by their son's bedside. Three days from Christmas,
beautiful little Matthew shuffled in little baby steps
off this mortal coil.

Looking back, he still knew this blow might have been
endured. With his wife and three little girls, they could
have pulled together to mourn and cherish the memory of
Matthew. But shockingly and unexpectedly, little Matthew
was followed within days by Olivia and all three of his
beautiful daughters.

He had no idea how his family had contracted the virus.
But that it had somehow come from him was undeniable.

And in this most perfectly designed hell on earth, Dr.
Vincent White had survived.

He called this life his penance. And he began a downhill
slide into oblivion, self-recrimination and alcoholism
from that day forward.

He knew that he whole-heartedly deserved it.


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

ACT I

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"I don't know what you mean by *your* way," said the Queen:
"all the ways about here belong to me -- but why did you
come out here at all?" she added in a kinder tone. "Curtsey
while you're thinking what to say. It saves time."

~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Monday, December 10
Hoover Building

Mulder had his back to Scully when she entered the room.
He was bent over a box and she saw a cloud of dust rise in
the spill of sunlight as he pulled a yellowed sheaf of
papers out of it.

"Good morning, Mulder."

"Morning, Scully. It's your lucky day..."

With some apprehension, she set her coffee cup down on the
table in the corner and turned back to her partner. By now,
she prided herself on being able to read even the most
subtle hint of sarcasm in his voice, and as a result, she
was certain this was *not* going to be a very lucky day for
her.

"What's up, Mulder?" she asked cautiously.

"Skinner's got us on the X-files version of cold-case
detail. I think our report from the last case was too much
for him. So we've been detained from further investigation
for the rest of this week. Instead, we have to go through
storage room B and deliver it of any old X-files we can
find in there."

Storage room B, just down the hall from them, contained
boxes of historical case files for every division of the
FBI, dating back to the creation of the bureau in 1908.
Most of the FBI's departments had already microfiched their
older cases. But the X-files division, lacking the help of
an administrative assistant, wasn't up to date with
inputting older files into the database.

At the moment, she wished this particular storage room had
fallen victim to the fire that destroyed the majority of
their original files.

"You're kidding?" she groaned. He stared back impassively.
"You mean physically go through the files?"

"Yes. And no, I'm not kidding," he added. At her look, he
said, "Don't worry. We don't have to power-lift any boxes,
Scully. All we need to do is go through a few that, over
the years, have been classified by other departments as
'not fitting their criteria'. And if we're lucky enough to
find an X-file, we make sure nothing new has come up on the
case before we enter it into our database."

He pointed to the floor where three boxes were lined up.
"I've already got a head start and I've taken the liberty
of denoting three categories. This first one is the 'not
our problem either' box." Moving over, he kicked the second
box. "This one is for the files we get to keep, even though
they're just about as cold as ice pops -- X-files dated
within the last fifty years, but ready to be 'put down.'
I'm calling them the 'geriatrics.'"

"Mulder..." she admonished.

He nodded at the third box. "And lastly, our 'live but
cold' X-files." The box he indicated already contained a
file, she noted with dismay as he leaned over and held it
up triumphantly. "Don't worry. So far, this is the only one
even close to being active. And this particular box is
likely to stay pretty empty, since no one's been in that
room for the past twenty years, I think. We're talking very
cold cases here, Scully."

Mulder was attacking the task with his usual enthusiasm,
which, while good to see, was also daunting. Perfect. Was
she supposed to throw herself whole-heartedly into creating
an X-file archive? What Mulder needed right now was not a
partner, but a librarian who knew how to archive.

"Can't someone else do this?" She hated the whine she
heard creeping into her voice. He gave her a look. "I just
mean, why do we get the pleasure of this detail? Is it
because that storage room borders on our basement hovel?
Why isn't anyone from the other departments helping to
classify these cases?"

She noted within seconds Mulder's uncharacteristic silence
as he busied himself perusing another yellowed file in his
hands. "Mulder? Did you have something to do with this
detail?"

He sighed at her lack of enthusiasm and indicated a large
pile of boxes they needed to go through. His eyes were
shining with the excitement reserved only for children at
Christmas. "No one has touched these files for years,
Scully. And I know there are X-files in here. Do you
really think we'd be certain to get them if someone else
looked through these boxes?" he asked pointedly.

He thought someone would keep the cases from them. And as
much as this bordered on paranoia, she knew the statement
also held truth.

"First dibs," Mulder said, smiling sheepishly at her. "It
isn't like I want to do this," he continued. "But I might
remind you we were pulled off any active cases for the next
week anyway after our latest fiasco. Besides," he shrugged,
"it'll give us something to do." And he raised his eyebrows
at her hopefully. It could even be interesting, Scully. I
mean, look at the history here." He leaned over and pulled
out a folder. The dust came off of it in a cloud and he
waved at the air and coughed.

"Slightly hazardous to your health, I'd say." At his look,
she finally relented. With a pointed sigh, she sunk down
into her chair and took a long sip of her coffee,
marshalling herself to join him, but content to relax and
watch his movements for a minute. She marveled at him,
already well-advanced into his workday as she was just
beginning. And she prepared herself for the unpleasant
task ahead by allowing a good healthy dose of caffeine to
infuse her system as she made her final protest known.
"I'm not happy about this, Mulder."

He nodded, unmoved. When she made her displeasure more
obvious with a raised brow he went for the hard sell,
turning that special look in her direction that was
guaranteed to work in swaying her to his side. She waited
with anticipation. There it was -- the little push of his
lower lip so it jutted out at her into a much-too-
endearing pout. And his eyes sparkled with such
earnestness that she found herself giving in, though she
knew the ploy too well and had to fight back a smile.

"I'm telling you, Scully, some of it is fascinating," he
insisted.

"I'll be the judge of that," she shot back with the
parting parry of the already defeated.

He grinned. "Here, I want you to look at this one. It's
right up your alley." He leaned over and picked out the
sole occupant of the 'live' box.

Reluctantly, she took the outstretched folder and set it
on her desk. The manila covering was smeared with grime. It
looked as if someone else had accidentally spilled an
entire cup of coffee onto it at some point in time.

With a put-upon sigh, she opened the folder.

The date was 1970. There was a picture inside. A family. A
middle-aged, blond man with his arm around an attractive
dark-haired woman. There were three little girls in frilly
dresses, arranged by height in front of the two adults. In
the arms of the woman was a little boy. She peered more
closely at the photo.

"Dr. Vincent White..." Mulder began across the room.
"Prominent scientist in his day..."

"A virologist," Scully finished for him, recognizing the
face. "Wow. I've heard of him. Supposedly, he was a
brilliant researcher -- I believe he was involved in
research that resulted in the development of a vaccine for
one of the hemmorhagic fevers. I read about him as an
undergrad."

According to the file, there was a theft of 'sensitive
materials' in the lab where Dr. Vincent White had worked.
The nature of the materials stolen was not revealed to the
bureau due to their classification as top secret Department
of Defense Research.

"The date is 1970, Mulder. Doesn't it seem odd that this
case is stuck in there with a bunch of cases from the
1920s through 40s?"

"Exactly my question. So I looked into it a little. And it
just so happens that Dr. White is actually very close by
and could be easily questioned about the case. I might add
that the Bureau never considered the case solved; in fact,
it never even made it past the preliminary investigation."

"Mulder, it says here that Dr. White was subsidized by a
grant from the Department of Defense. Maybe the DOD or the
Army dealt with the case." The paperwork inside the folder
contained tell-tale permanent black magic-marker ink-outs
of whole phrases. Classified material. Information that the
DOD had considered unnecessary for the FBI to know.

"It's still in the FBI's cache of unsolved cases, Scully."

"A theft in a secured government facility sounds like an
inside problem," she noted, frustrated at her inability to
dampen his enthusiasm. Cold cases were just that -- cases
that would probably never be solved. This case was no doubt
further complicated by the involvement of the United States
Government, under the guise of the DOD. It gave her a bad
feeling. "Mulder, what could a thirty-year-old theft of
classified information possibly have to do with anything
current?"

"How can you even ask that, Scully?" he demanded.

She sighed, caught. "Okay...why is it an X-file?" she
tried.

Walking over to where she was reading, he pointed to the
picture she'd been studying. "The same year of that theft,
not long before it, in fact, Dr. Vincent White lost his
entire family to a mysterious and unidentified virus.
Those deaths were never investigated."

"Mulder," she groaned. She stared down again at the
picture of an apparently happy family. The children were
smiling in the sunshine, parents beaming proudly.
Seemingly the future stretched ahead of them all, an
endless possibility. She viewed them now with the sense
of poignancy that often struck her when the fate of such
victims was known. "Okay, given that this is a case we can
reopen, how can questioning this poor man about a thirty-
year-old theft and the death of his entire family possibly
have any benefit?" She looked up at Mulder, who was
standing over her now looking entirely too ready to do
just that. "Where did you say he was?"

His eyes were glinting with that particular fervor that
Mulder always brought to an investigation. "This once quite
brilliant researcher," he pointed down to the picture, "is
now teaching microbiology at a local college, Scully."

Her eyebrow climbed in disbelief. "Really?"

"Really."

This did seem like a far cry from Yale University and the
development of a life-saving vaccine under a hefty government
contract. She glanced hesitantly back down at the file. "It
says here that there's some evidence stored on this case."

"I know." Mulder leaned over her shoulder, reading off the
list of catalogued numbers. "I believe it's in the true
bowels of this building, Scully." He grinned. "Bet you
didn't know there was actually a level below this."

"And here I thought we could lay claim to that
distinction," she said, looking around them.

"Only psychologically. I'm going to check out whatever it
is while you continue reading. Be right back, Scully." He
squeezed her shoulder. "Absorb, and be ready for some
action when I get back."

"We can't investigate it until we go through the rest of
these boxes, Mulder," she reminded him. "And Skinner said
we're banished to the office for the rest of this week,
remember?"

"You got it, Scully. But at least we'll be ready when
Monday rolls around."

He was humming as he passed out the door. The air was
still thick with dust from the old boxes littering the
floor. Scully stared at the particles as they whirled in
a shaft of sunlight coming through the basement window.
Taking another long, slow sip of coffee, she let the folder
drift shut on the desk. Reaching out, she flicked on her
computer, content to let the contents of the unfortunate
Dr. White's file remain unread until she'd finished her
morning ritual of sipping coffee and reading her e-mail.

Digging deep into the past for seemingly no good purpose
could wait until Mulder returned from his errand. And
hopefully even longer after that.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The errand ended up taking Mulder much longer than she
expected. When he came back into the office, she was long
done with her coffee and he was sucking gingerly on his
thumb.

"Mulder? Are you regressing?"

He popped the digit out of his mouth with an audible noise
and peered at it. "Cut myself, good. It finally stopped
bleeding," he observed.

"How did you manage to cut yourself, and what took you so
long?"

"It took a while to find the particular evidence room
labeled 'obscure and unobtainable'. You think *these*
boxes haven't seen the light of day, Scully?" He
shuddered. "You don't want to go where I've just been. I
underestimated when I said bowels. It was more like hell."

Frowning, she walked casually over to where he was leaning
up against his desk. It took a certain skill to stalk and
corner a wounded Mulder. Reaching out, she latched onto the
thumb in one deft snag and tugged the injured party toward
her in order to inspect it. Mulder was the only man she
knew who could hurt himself in any situation. Just getting
out of bed in the morning was unsafe for him. "You know,
that's not exactly the best way to treat a wound," she
scolded.

"What?"

"Sucking on it can introduce pathogens from your oral
cavity into the wound, as well as the other way around..."

He was beginning to smirk at her, though he was patient
with both the scolding and her ministrations, having
learned that once she got her hands on him, it was best
not to struggle. "What was that, Scully?" he murmured.
"You lost me back about the point where you said the
words 'sucking' and 'oral cavity' in the same sentence."

She threw him the requisite scowl as she peered closely at
his thumb, finally reassuring herself that it was no more
than a superficial laceration, albeit one deep enough into
the dermis to smart. A drop of blood welled up slowly.

"Did you know that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has
a rodent problem?" Mulder remarked.

"What makes you say that?"

He was about to answer when the phone rang and he pulled
the thumb out of her grasp to answer it. She could tell it
was A.D. Skinner on the other end from how Mulder reacted,
a strange combination of annoyance and respect. He rolled
his eyes and mouthed the words, "Budget meeting tomorrow,"
at her. He peered at his thumb and stuck it back in his
mouth.

"Don't forget we're due to go over our latest expense
report on Thursday," she reminded him. She never thought
she'd look forward to the mundane and often unpleasant
task of paperwork, but if it would keep them from running
off on a wild goose chase two weeks before Christmas, she
welcomed the distraction.

Moving back to her makeshift desk, she pushed Dr. White's
aged folder of misery to the far side as she searched for
a band-aid and listened to Mulder assure Skinner they
could definitely get the necessary reports ready on time.
She knew they would need to strategize in order to slip
their latest expenses through. The Bureau might not
appreciate how running through a junkyard in the process
of preventing a psychopath from killing her partner and
hitting the dirt in the same said junkyard in order to
avoid attracting the attention of a tiger while nursing
her partner's thankfully superficial gunshot wound to the
leg truly did ruin clothing, but she'd be damned if she'd
start buying disposable suits.

Mulder hung up the phone.

"They're buying me a new suit, Mulder," she stated
ominously.

"You read my mind, Scully. Would you believe that Skinner
just told me we'd better figure out a way to justify the
names 'Anne Klein' and 'Giorgio Armani' to Accounting by
Thursday?"


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just at this moment, somehow or other, they began to run.
Alice never could quite make out, in thinking it over
afterwards, how it was that they began: all she remembers
is, that they were running hand in hand, and the Queen went
so fast that it was all she could do to keep up with her:
and still the Queen kept crying "Faster! Faster!", but
Alice felt she *could not* go faster, though she had no
breath left to say so.

~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Friday, December 14
George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia


Two days, one budget meeting, an expense report and two
new suits later, Mulder was raring to get going on the
White case. Scully had long since given up trying to
convince him otherwise. And after three days of meetings,
she had to admit that she was just as ready to get out of
the office as Mulder.

"You're sure Skinner gave us the okay on this, Mulder?"

"Of course, Scully." He shot her a dirty look.

"Might I also point out that it's Friday...are you also
sure I can't convince you to take a few personal hours and
do some Christmas shopping with me instead of starting
this case today?"

"I'm definitely sure on that one, Scully."

She'd been very careful about her mention of any holiday
plans this year in Mulder's presence. In a way, his year
had included the loss of the only two remaining members of
his family. And as distant as they may have been from him
in their own respective ways, they were all the family
he'd had left. She'd already made a promise to herself to
stick by him this year, whether he asked her to or not.
She also knew he'd never ask. Mulder always played it as
if he were not big on the holidays in principle, but she
often suspected that his indifference was more a form of
self-preservation than actual dislike of the season.

George Mason University, where Dr. Vincent White now
taught microbiology, was in Alexandria, not very far from
Mulder's apartment. She'd had no idea there was even a
university there and read the information Mulder had
collected on it as they drove. Small and fairly newly
established, it was mostly a commuter school, spread over
three campuses and attracting a wealth of non-traditional
students. They parked the car in a nearly deserted lot
outside what looked to be the main building.

With a few exceptions, the campus appeared empty of
students. University attendees had completed their final
exams for the fall semester the week before and had been
released from the rigors of academia into the joy of their
respective holidays. The overall effect was a cluster of
brick buildings, deserted of signs of life and devoid of
any form of holiday cheer, but apparently still
functioning in some form over the break. Signs of random
human life were spotted moving from one building to the
next.

Mulder and Scully entered a building pointed out to them
by an older professorial type as that holding the
biology offices. A young dark-haired woman sat at the
front desk, chewing gum and flirting with a rather badly
dressed security guard. Scully idly thought that any
company who dressed their security staff in ill-fitting
polyester should not also be allowed to arm them.

Mulder did the honors of clearing his throat to get their
attention. They performed their routine badge display in
tandem and the two university staffers appeared duly
impressed by the credentials.

"We're wondering if you could help us find a Dr. Vincent
White?" Mulder inquired. "We'd like to talk to him, if
that's possible."

"If you can find him, good luck!" the woman fumed. "He's
not answering at any of his numbers and his grades were due
in *yesterday*." Her annoyance was evident. But her
expression gradually changed from irritation to something
more akin to anticipation. "Why? Is he in trouble?"

"If you don't mind, we'd like to try and find him today."
Mulder slipped easily into what Scully considered his
'charming mode.' Mulder's attentions alone were enough
to have an marked effect on some women. Scully had also
decided that he wasn't quite as oblivious to it as he
sometimes pretended to her.

Proving herself one of the susceptible ones, the
receptionist quickly fell under the spell of his eyes,
blinked slowly, and smiled. Then she moved trance-like
behind her desk to do his bidding. Bending over a computer
screen, she called up telephone numbers and Dr. White's
home address for him.

The beefy security guard first scowled at Mulder for the
intrusion and then turned his attention to Scully. Deciding
turnabout was fair play, he looked her up and down, paying
particular attention to her breasts. Scully sent him a
withering look that was guaranteed to make him think twice
about the attention he was visiting upon a federal officer.
It seemed to work and he dropped his eyes to the floor.

"Here you go." The woman scribbled the phone numbers down
on a memo pad and tore the pink slip of paper off. She
handed it to Mulder with a wide smile, concentrating her
flirtations solely on him for the moment and forgetting her
conversation with the security guard. Mulder turned his own
attention back to Scully and mouthed the words 'let's go.'

"You could try his office," the woman called as they
turned toward the exit. "Third floor, number 364. His lab
is right beside that. God knows, he could be hiding up
there and just not answering when I knock. He's done *that*
before," she added with thinly-veiled contempt.

Mulder turned back and gave her a little smile. "Thanks."

"Do me a favor," she said. "If you do get a hold of him,
tell him the damned grades are due and I'm sick and tired
of dealing with the front office. Tell him I'll do my best
to make his life miserable next semester if he doesn't get
them to me by today," she added heatedly.

Mulder gave her a little wave as they climbed the first
flight of stairs. "Will do."

Scully shot him a look, but he was staring straight ahead,
a little scowl of concentration rested on his face. "What
are you thinking, Mulder?" she asked. "You know this is
going to go nowhere. Not that I'm complaining."

"Why do you think it's going nowhere?"

She sighed. "Wishful thinking," she said, resigned to her
fate. "Christmas is only about two weeks away and I'd just
as soon not get too involved in a new case."

He turned a contemplative look in her direction. "Are you
going to San Diego this year, Scully?" The question was
casual, but his expression was curious. She could swear he
was anxious about her answer.

"Why do you ask?" she replied carefully.

He shrugged it off. "No reason. Just asking."

"I haven't made any definite plans yet," she admitted. "I
didn't want to get my Mom's hopes up and then pull the plug
on her. What about you?" she asked, turning the question
around. "Want to come along?"

Her question was delivered as casually as his inquiry of
her plans. She'd wanted to ask him for a while now. She
admitted once more to herself that she was worried about
him being alone this year. Nevertheless, she doubted he'd
be receptive to her offer.

She was right on that account, but his expression was
worth the effort as it turned from one of brooding to
that of a wide smile. "Is Bill going to be there?"

"Yup."

He laughed aloud. "Oh, Scully, that's just asking for
trouble, isn't it?"

She returned his smile, happy to have amused him about a
holiday that had left neither of them feeling all that
jolly over the past few years. They climbed together to
the third floor.

"Yes, it certainly is, Mulder."

She resolved to stay in D.C. for the holiday before she
took the next step.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Dr. Vincent White did not deign to answer their knocks on
either the door of his lab or his office, if he were indeed
hiding inside as the receptionist implied. However, a crack
of light spilled out into the hallway from the next door
down as they were making their last attempt. Scully nudged
Mulder and they watched this door glide shut as quietly and
quickly as it had opened. Moving down the hall to stand in
front of it, Scully reached up and rapped firmly as Mulder
joined her.

They waited for what seemed just a tad too long for an
answer. When the door finally opened, a very tall young man
with wire-rimmed glasses, in his mid-twenties and wearing
a pristine white lab coat, was revealed. He stared at the
two of them curiously, with a tinge of nervousness in his
stance. "Can I help you?"

"Possibly," Mulder said. "We're looking for Dr. Vincent
White."

The young man's face turned into a slight scowl. "I
haven't seen him," he answered, with a slight lisp. "I'm
in the middle of an important experiment here, if you
don't mind."

Mulder pulled out his badge and Scully, beside him,
followed suit. "Actually, we do mind. Could we talk to
you for a second?"

The young man's eyes grew quite wide. He opened the door
with a scowl. "Come in -- just don't touch anything."

"Do you know Dr. White?" Scully asked. As she spoke, she
took the opportunity to glance at her surroundings and note
the contents of the lab. It was average, certainly not
boasting the amenities of a more prestigious location. But
the lab space was clean and very neat and the storage
adequate and well-organized.

"Well, yes..." the young man replied, as if this were
common knowledge and he couldn't understand why she didn't
know. "Unfortunately," he added. He seemed puzzled.
Scully well remembered the insular environment that a
university could sometimes be. One forgot that there was
an outside world where people didn't live and breathe
everything that was going on within the walls of a
particular academia. "He's my thesis advisor," he
finally explained. "This is his lab."

"Have you seen him recently?" Mulder asked.

The scowl came back. "No, but I'd certainly like to."
There was irritation on the young man's face, but also a
trace of condescension as he made his next statement. "I've
decided that it'll take nothing short of a resurgence of
the Bubonic plague to bring him back around," he announced
darkly, adjusting his glasses by pushing them back up onto
his nose with one finger. "I'm Harold Weaver, Jr. by the
way."

"Agent Fox Mulder." Mulder pointed a finger in her
direction. "My partner, Dr. Dana Scully."

Harold held out a hand to shake both of theirs. His grip
was weak and his palms clammy, making for an unpleasant
exchange overall. She knew Mulder's usage of her title was
purposeful, having deduced that a fellow scientist might
get more information from Harold than an FBI agent. "What
are you working on, Harold?" she interjected smoothly.

"My thesis research," he stammered.

She nodded, feigning interest. "And that would be?"

"Viral evolution," he stated, pushing the glasses up with
one finger and staring at her again as if surprised she
didn't know this. "I'm looking at host-parasite
interactions."

"What, specifically, about host-parasite interactions?"

"Uh...well..." He pushed his glasses up again and for a
second, seemed thrown by her question. His nervousness
either meant he was trying to hide something or was
painfully shy of social skills. Scully voted for the
latter. "We, uh..." He seemed to straighten and gain some
sort of confidence as he stated a phrase obviously learned
by rote and practiced more than once. No doubt, it was the
subject of his dissertation. "In this lab, we're attempting
to look at the parasites that affect a species of mouse in
order to determine whether these parasites are growing more
virulent to their host over time."

"Ah."

"Who's 'we'?" Mulder interrupted.

He grew nervous again and Scully was almost positive by
this point that a glaring lack of social skills was at the
heart of his difficulty in conversing. "Barbara Cross," he
stammered. "She's another grad student working on the same
project. She should be back any second. She just went to
the biology office to get a package."

"Oh. We'll wait then," Mulder said pleasantly, crossing
his arms and leaning back against one of the lab benches.

Harold scowled. "Look out. There are assays right there
behind you." He rolled his eyes as if Mulder were possibly
the most intellectually-challenged person ever to grace his
presence. "I'll lose six months of work if you knock
anything over," he muttered darkly, sprinting over to worry
at the area and check each object while intentionally
crowding Mulder aside. Mulder finally gave up and moved
away, rolling his eyes. Scully shot her partner a sharp
look and found her sympathies resting with the awkward
young man's fear at losing months of what was probably
painstaking research.

Barbara Cross arrived moments later, walking into the lab
and coming to a dead stop when she saw the two strangers.
She was close to Scully's height, maybe an inch taller, but
quite a bit wider all the way around. Her dark hair was
straight and hung limply, in a way that almost appeared
unwashed. She might be a mousy blonde on a good day. Large,
heavy-framed glasses gave her an owlish sort of expression
and her face bore the painful scars of a lifelong struggle
with serious acne. Her eyes were hard as she studied them,
and she impaled Harold with a glare, obviously awaiting
his explanation for their presence.

Scully stepped forward and held out her I.D. "We're from
the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Ms. Cross. We're
actually looking for your advisor in order to ask him a few
questions about an old case. We just wondered if you'd seen
him."

Barbara appeared to relax somewhat as she laughed, though
the laugh was short and without humor. Scully noticed that
her eyes were flying past them and over to the lab area
behind them, checking for something. She saw Mulder catch
this too. In rare cases, this was all they needed to solve
a case -- movement of a suspect's eyes to damning evidence.
Barbara appeared to be glancing at Harold and then the
alleged assays that Mulder had almost knocked over. But
after identifying the direction of the young woman's
attention, Scully had to remind herself that there was no
crime here. When she turned back to Barbara, one hundred
percent of the young woman's attention had returned to
herself and Mulder.

"We see him maybe once a week for our dressing down," she
said contemptuously. "Other than that, he leaves us alone.
But we're pretty self-sufficient, right Harold?"

Harold was nodding vigorously when Scully chanced a glance
at him.

"I'm halfway through writing my dissertation," Barbara
stated. "All I need from that old..." She stopped herself
and stared at them for a moment, narrowing her eyes.
Assessing them. "He only needs to show up for my oral
presentation and sign the paper afterward," she declared
finally, her voice hard and unforgiving. "And if you think
it's not going to be stressful enough to get *that* out of
him, you haven't suffered as his graduate student for the
past four years. And I might add that he's been riding on
the coattails of *my* publications for most of those years.
Co-author. Ha!" She laughed and there was no humor in the
sound. "I wrote every damn journal article and he couldn't
even have the decency to concentrate long enough to edit
them." Her eyes narrowed. "Why are you looking for him?"
she demanded. "He ought to be arrested for that alone."

Mulder shook his head. "The reason for our interest in
your advisor is information we can't share with you, Ms.
Cross. But we were wondering a bit about the nature of
the research that you and Mr. Weaver are doing under
his tutelage."

Scully wanted very badly to call her partner on this line
of questioning. They had no business acting as if Dr.
White had been involved in a crime here or asking the
students to explain their research. The stories that would
fly on campus after this visit could certainly be damaging
to the poor man's reputation.

"You wouldn't understand the research." Barbara said with
disdain.

"My partner here might," Mulder replied dryly, stepping
aside to indicate Scully. "She has a bachelor's degree in
physics, as well as being a medical doctor. Currently,
she's a pathologist for the Federal Bureau of
Investigation. Why don't you try her?"

A faint gleam of respect came into Barbara's eyes. In her
gaze was the respect offered a colleague -- grudging
entrance to the inner circle of academia. Once accepted,
however, one must play by the same cutthroat rules as
everyone else. "You must be on the clinical side of things
rather than the research side, hmmm?" Barbara asked,
condescension dripping in her tone.

"I've done quite a bit of research," Scully's replied
cooly, unperturbed at the dig. There was still a dearth of
women in the sciences, and one coping strategy for a woman
who did go into the field was just such a hardening in her
confrontations with other scientists. "I'm sure I'll be
able to grasp the concepts behind your experiment."

Barbara shook her head. "I don't have to tell you
anything. For all I know, you could be spies posing as
FBI agents, out to get to the patent before we do."

"What patent would that be, Barbara?" Mulder interrupted,
fighting back his grin at the young woman's wild
allegation. Scully felt herself growing annoyed at her
partner. The girl could have a point. It did happen.

"Look. I have friends who are lawyers," Barbara said. "And
I know I don't have to tell you anything. This is my
research. I'm on the verge of a discovery that could assure
me a very good job when I get out of this hell-hole. I'm
not jeopardizing that by giving up my experimental
procedure just because two bonehead strangers ask."

Mulder persevered, adopting a casual tone to his voice,
despite the insult. "We're just asking for a general idea
here, Barbara. We don't need specifics."

"Evolution," she snapped. "We're looking at host-parasite
interactions. But you could have learned that from the
biology office secretary, so why don't you go down there
and bug her instead of me?"

Behind them, the door to the lab opened once more to admit
a new player into this tense little tableau. When Scully
turned to study the newcomer, she had to blink twice to
convince herself that Brad Pitt hadn't actually just walked
into the room. There were a few subtle differences between
the actor and this young man. For instance, she'd never
seen Brad Pitt in a white lab coat. And this man's eyes
might actually be a shade bluer.

He stared at them in confusion for a minute and then smiled
warmly, noticeably addressing his welcome greeting to Scully.
She swore she could feel Mulder tense up beside her. "Hi,"
the Brad Pitt doppleganger said, walking forward with a
cowboy-like swagger to his gait. He stuck out a hand.
"Pleased to meet you. I'm Brad. No relation to the actor,
I swear." He laughed. "People always ask me that. I tell
them that if we were from the same parental genes, why in
hell would we be named the same thing?"

"I've seen stranger things be true," Mulder said
humorlessly beside her. He stuck out his badge instead of
his hand when Brad turned his attention in his direction.
"We're from the FBI, Mr...?"

"Palmer," the young man supplied, slipping his hands into
the pockets of his rather well-fitting jeans, retreating
somewhat in light of Mulder's less than friendly response
and Scully's careful reserve when faced with his over-
enthusiastic greeting. "Brad Palmer."

"Could we ask you a few questions about your research,
Brad?" Mulder asked.

"You don't have to say anything, Brad," Barbara
interrupted. "They're supposedly looking into some old
case that Vince was involved in. But right now, they're
just being nosy."

Brad got a pained look on his face. He rocked back on his
heels to catch sight of his fellow graduate student.
"Thanks for the advice, Barb, seeing as how you know I
can't think for myself."

"You said it, not me," she shot back musically, though the
antagonism in her voice was obvious.

Brad stared her down for a second, before turning back to
them. "What would you like to know?" he said with a wide
smile, directed mostly at Scully. "Come on over to my
little corner of this particular hell."

They followed him to a rather untidy desk that was indeed
shoved tightly into a corner. Like any graduate student,
the desk contained the requisite piles of papers and
volumes of relevant literature and various texts. There
were a few photographs pinned to a bulletin board on the
wall amongst interdepartmental memos about lab procedures
and safety. Scully glanced at the collection of photos and
noticed that each one contained Brad with a different
female companion.

Brad sat down in his chair and rolled backward, kicking
his legs up onto the desk and putting his arms behind his
head. He bestowed another smile on Scully and tilted his
head, studying her with his smile lingering. "So what
brings the FBI to our humble lab?"

"I wouldn't get excited. It probably isn't your looks,
Brad," Barbara sniped from her position in the further
depths of the lab.

Brad rolled his eyes, not appearing to be too bothered by
the heckling of his lab mate. "Why are you interested in
our research?" he asked curiously.

Scully was growing increasingly uncomfortable with the
line of questioning she and Mulder were following. They
really had no business looking into whatever research Dr.
White and his graduate students were working on. That
wasn't part of the case. In fact, this was distinctly
turning into a one of Mulder's fishing expeditions and
she didn't like it one bit.

"We're not interested in your research, Mr. Palmer." She
gave Mulder a warning look. "We're just looking for your
advisor to speak to him about an old case. Have you seen
him lately?"

He shook his head. "He's not exactly 'around,' if you know
what I mean."

"No. What exactly do you mean, Brad?" Mulder piped up.
Scully shot him another look. He was acting as if these
students were under suspicion. She knew, when investigating
a crime, it often became an automatic response to suspect
everyone, almost unconsciously. Until you suddenly found
yourself treating everyone as guilty by default, even
though the law was specific that the situation was assumed
to be the exact opposite. Mulder didn't usually fall prey
to this.

Her eyes traveled over to her partner. He was leaning on
the second desk, arms crossed. His face looked mildly
flushed and he moved his eyes to hers when he sensed her
attention. She let a question pass from her eyes to his.
'What the hell are we doing here, Mulder?' His return
look was unreadable, his eyes void of a return message.

Brad continued with his explanation, though he watched the
interplay between them with sharp eyes. "To tell you the
truth, I feel bad for the guy. We think he's going insane.
Right, Barbara?" For their ears only, he whispered, "It
takes one to know one," and looked pointedly in Barbara's
direction.

"Shut up, Brad," she hurled back, obviously lacking
nothing in hearing ability. "And might I add that you're
looking at insanity every time you gaze narcissistically
into that multitude of mirrors you no doubt have scattered
all over your house."

"At least I can look in one without breaking it, Barbara,"
he shot back without pause, staring innocently up at the
ceiling.

Barbara moved into the sphere of their conversation.
Scully could almost feel her glowering at Brad. "If you're
so curious about us," she said acidly, "Brad here models in
order to put himself through school. Unfortunately, he
hasn't figured out yet that it's actually his true calling."

"Shut up, Barbara." It was Brad's turn to appear
flustered. He tipped the chair back onto all fours and shot
an apologetic look in their direction. "I'm getting my
doctorate here," he explained. "Because I want to and
because I'm qualified to." He aimed this part of the
statement at Barbara before turning back to them. "Barbara
hasn't yet accepted the concept that a scientist might be
both smart and attractive."

Scully sensed the young woman's frustration and anger
building. The outward insults these two obviously exchanged
in their everyday interactions had to be brutal on their
respective psyches. There definitely seemed to be some sort
of power struggle between Barbara and Brad. No doubt Dr.
White could have been a stabilizing influence here, but his
absence had instead created a 'Lord of the Flies' atmosphere
in this lab.

"You know, if I could make myself uglier to stop being
harassed by you, Barb, I'd gladly do it," Brad drawled.
"But that might give you too much satisfaction. I got into
this school the same way you did. I applied. I was
accepted. I'm here. Deal with it." Scully noted that he
was finally scowling and his face was flushed with anger
as she studied their exchange with a critical eye.

"That's what happens when a university lowers the standard
of acceptance for graduate school to a mere 3.0 GPA,"
Barbara said loudly, her own anger barely in check. Scully
idly contemplated that it was a wonder these students
hadn't killed each other by now. If Mulder and she were not
standing between them right now, she could imagine them
coming to blows.

Instead, Brad craned his neck around them, tilting himself
dangerously back in the seat in order to make insolent and
direct eye contact with his adversary. "Barbara, if I'd
known I was going to have to look at something like you for
the next two years of my life, believe me, I'd have studied
harder," he rifled back.

Scully turned to see the girl vacillating between
attacking Brad with the nearest blunt object or bursting
into tears. What she chose to do over either option was to
leave the room in a huff, slamming the door on her way out,
obviously upset.

"That wasn't exactly nice, Brad." Mulder used his most
formal I'm-not-happy G-man voice; one that Scully
recognized as barely veiling his anger at Brad's callous
treatment of the woman. Although to give Barbara credit
where it was due, Scully was fairly sure the woman had
proven herself able to fling an equal amount of insults
in the exchange and would probably have scoffed at
Mulder's more protective instincts.

Brad looked pained. "Yeah, well you don't have to sit here
everyday with that ogre telling you how stupid you are."

Mulder shrugged. "If sitting's all you're doing, maybe you
deserve it."

Brad looked at Mulder as if he had just received the most
grievous insult of his life. Seeing no sympathy there, he
turned imploring eyes to Scully for protection. Two against
one is never a good place to be if you're the one who's
alone. Brad obviously recognized this.

"Look, I'm just trying to get into med school here," he
entreated Scully. "This was the only way to do it with my
undergrad grades. That doesn't mean I deserve to be
insulted at every turn for the next four years of my life."

Scully took a deep breath, finding herself growing angrier
by the minute at Mulder for dragging them into this lab and
into what was no better than a domestic squabble. Strangely,
she found her sympathies settling with Brad. No one can do
much about the outward manifestation of their physiology.
Scully had been in a similar position to Brad at one point
in time. There seemed to be an unspoken rule in academia that
an attractive person is highly unlikely to also be intelligent.
She'd lived through this prejudice a number of times in her
own career. Although it was more often a problem for women,
she wouldn't perpetuate the inequality for either sex.

Still, she had no place becoming involved in the student's
dispute and tried to get the conversation back on track.
"Look, Brad. We're not here to grade or judge anyone. None
of you are in any kind of trouble here. We're just looking
for Dr. White. Period."

Brad set the chair down and his feet hit the floor. "Well,
I can tell you about what we're working on, if you're
interested. These two idiots act as if we're on the verge
of the most ground-breaking discovery of the century." He
snorted. "As if."

"Brad, don't you dare think about telling them the
experimental protocol," Harold stammered from the lab bench.

"Take a chill pill, Harold. This isn't Harvard."

Harold glared through his spectacles at his fellow grad
student. He seemed to draw himself up with an enormous
amount of willpower, but his voice shook when he finally
spoke. "You know, Brad, you're a bane on this lab," he said
angrily, poking a stick-like finger in his lab mate's
direction.

Brad snorted an indignant laugh. "That's ripe, Harold,
coming from you."

Scully watched the awkward young man back down from the
insult, curiously flustered by Brad's words. Having
apparently finished whatever experiment he was doing, he
fumbled to remove his latex gloves and hastily exited
the lab.

"You have a way with your colleagues, don't you Brad?"
Mulder remarked dryly.

Brad shot a dirty look at Mulder. "They're no prizes to

work with, believe me. You're luckier than me in that
respect," he said, transparent in his flirtations as he
turned to Scully and bestowed her with another dazzling
smile. He addressed his next line of commentary to her,
ignoring Mulder for the most part as he spoke. "The lab
space is where we're doing our experiments. Dr. White
has an office next door."

Mulder was quiet beside her as they got a quick tour.
Having been partners for so long now, they could sense
when one was doing better than the other at questioning
a given suspect. The problem was, Brad was not a suspect,
at least not in her mind. Mulder obviously had other
ideas. In the end, Brad was as vague about the experiment
they were working on as his lab mates.

"That dork Harold is right, unfortunately. We're trying to
beat everyone else to a patent on our results, so I can't
give you a lot of details," he admitted. "Did you know that
Vince used to be quite the important virologist back in his
day? Now, he's mainly intent on destroying the lives of his
students. But when I started, he still had a few tricks up
his sleeve. Lately, however, he's not too helpful."

"What do you mean by 'tricks', Brad?" Mulder piped up
finally.

Scully turned to scowl at the question, but Brad wasn't
offended. There seemed to be no loyalty lost to his mentor.
"We're working on the evolution of viruses," he stated,
again directing this to Scully, though Mulder had asked.
"Have you ever heard of the Red Queen hypothesis?"

"I'm familiar with it," she answered. "What's your opinion
of the phenomenon?"

"Let's just say that I've seen it in action," he bragged.
"And that's about all I can reveal." He made a motion of
zipping his lips that Scully hadn't seen since she was
about ten and then gave her another grin. "Can you give us
any specifics about the nature of your work here, Brad?"
she asked instead.

"I'm the microbiologist," he stated. "I have the magic
fingers when it comes to growing those little viruses." He
wiggled his fingers as if to emphasize the point and gave
her what she was sure must be his most charming smile.
"Propagating viral cultures can be difficult, as you know.
On a side note, I'm also a whiz at growing their host,
Peromyscus leucopus. The little rodent just loves me for
some reason. I'm sure you'd find them quite cute," he
confessed to her, "but I can't show them to you. We try
to keep a pretty tight control over the introduction of
contaminants to our subjects."

Brad lost a majority of the points he gained with her by
thinking she'd be swayed by the cuteness of a rodent. "What
are Barbara and Harold working on for their dissertation?"
she asked idly.

"I call those two losers the ecology geek and the DNA
freak." He laughed but let it die when neither she nor
Mulder joined in. "They directly benefit from the fruits of
my labors. That's what they do." He waved, dismissing their
importance to him. "Why are you two looking for Dr. White
anyway? I mean, we're all looking for him here, being in
the middle of an important experiment while he's hiding
somewhere with a fifth of Jack," Brad drawled. "But is he
in some kind of trouble or something?"

"No," Scully stated firmly. "Just routine questions on an
old case. Dr. White is not under any suspicion. I want to
make that very clear." It was time for them to go and
she moved toward the door.

"You said a fifth of Jack," Mulder commented, moving with
her. "Does Dr. White have a drinking problem?"

Brad snorted and moved ahead, opening the door for them.
"That guy's three sheets to the wind every time I see him
lately. It sucks. This is most definitely a dysfunctional
lab, and we're the fucked up children of his pathology,
excuse my French." He gave Scully puppy-dog eyes that
rivaled Mulder at his best. "If I hadn't been so
distracted as an undergrad, I would have made the grades
for med school. Right now, I can't wait to get out of
here," he said vehemently, kicking the door in emphasis.

Throughout their conversation, Scully couldn't help but
notice him staring at her with uncomfortably apparent
interest, giving little need to guess at what exactly had
distracted this Brad Pitt look-alike as an undergraduate.
At the door, he put an arm against the frame and leaned
toward her. "If you don't mind my asking, why does the FBI
need doctors on staff?" His voice took on a smooth timbre
that could easily be hypnotic if a woman cared to listen
to him long enough. "Sounds like an interesting career
opportunity."

Scully gave him a tight smile and turned to Mulder. "I
think we've seen enough. Thank you, Mr. Palmer."

"No problem," he murmured, disappointment in his gaze at
her obvious dismissal. He turned to Mulder, looking him
up and down as if sizing up the competition. "Anytime,
Dr. Scully. And I mean any time. Do you have a card or
something that I could take, in case I think of anything?"

Reluctantly, she handed him her card. Beside her, she
could sense Mulder smirking. "By the way," Brad said as
they were leaving, "he might actually call me. His
Microbiology 101 grades are way overdue and I'm his
teaching assistant this semester. Usually he gives it the
ol' college try, fails, and then phones me in a drunken
stupor and demands I earn my money by grading all of the
exams in one hellish evening."

"Call if you hear from him," Mulder said in parting.

Brad looked down at the card in his hand and then back at
Scully. "Oh, I will," he said enthusiastically, giving her
the full benefit of his charming smile one last time.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"I think he was checking you out, Scully."

"Really?" she remarked dryly. She barely had the energy
to send the requisite daggers in her partner's general
direction. "Please don't start, Mulder. I know it may seem
a remote possibility, but that kid might actually have a
brain behind his GQ looks."

"Really?" He smirked.

"Save it, Mulder. I'm working from experience here. I know
what it's like to be subjected to that particular prejudice
within the walls of academia. That's all."

When she glanced over, Mulder gave her one of his most
contrite looks. However, he spoiled it within seconds by
playfully adding, "Have I told you lately how much I admire
your mind, Scully?"

"Mulder, are you ever serious?"

He gave her a rather sober look. "How can you ask me that,
Scully?"

She felt like a heel when she saw he might be genuinely
hurt by the offhand comment. He was only injecting a little
levity into the often dark morass of their everyday working
lives. "Sorry."

"Apology most graciously accepted." He shot her a wicked
grin. "Amount of gray matter aside, Brad was a little
evasive about their work, don't you think?"

"You're forgetting, Mulder, there isn't any crime here.
And scientists are notorious for being close-mouthed about
their research. In fact, they teach you that skill in grad
school or you learn it the hard way by having someone steal
your ideas. As far as I can discern, all that Dr. Vincent
White can be accused of at this point is possibly neglecting
his students. And in my experience, that's not punishable by
law."

"What kind of virus do you suppose they're working on?" he
pondered. "Didn't you say that Dr. White studied
hemorrhagic fevers?"

"Used to, Mulder," she emphasized. "Those graduate
students can't possibly be working on any type of
hemorrhagic fever. There are only six Level-Four hot labs
in the country sanctioned to handle that class of virus.
Your implication that they would be attempting such a
completely illegal act for some unknown personal gain is
not only ludicrous, but unfounded."

"I don't know, Scully. I might agree the idea is 'out
there,' but I wouldn't say it's unfounded."

"Mulder, no," she answered too firmly. "You saw that set-up.
It's simply not possible that they're doing Bio-safety
Level-4 work there. Do you know the procedures in place
for dealing with infectious diseases in the labs that do
handle them?"

"Not exactly, but I'm sure you're about to enlighten me,"
he answered dryly.

"First of all, it requires a special containment area that
you're well aware of from some of our previous cases." She
shot him a dangerous look. "You remember the CDC's lovely
disease control and prevention facility -- or maybe you
recall the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of
Infectious Diseases Lab in Bethesda." She paused for
emphasis. "Since both of us have had the distinct pleasure
of being guests at both of these facilities, you know that
you can't just walk into or around such a place. Viruses
needs to be contained. And from consultations I've had with
various doctors at these facilities, due to our
aforementioned stays," she shot him a look, "I know what
a scientist has to go through to work there. Shall I
describe it?"

"Please do."

She couldn't tell if he were seriously interested or just
humoring her, but she went ahead with the description.
"Upon entering a facility, they first make you take off
everything on your body...clothing, jewelry, etc."

"Ooo, Scully, keep going. I love it when you talk dirty."

She gave him her best silencing glare and continued
without pause. "Next, you don a completely androgynous,
shapeless and unattractive disposable lab suit."

He pouted at the spoiling of his fun. "Okay, so they don't
have the facilities for handling a virus safely. Don't you
find it curious that a small local college is doing viral
research at all, Scully?"

She scowled. "Yes, I do, Mulder. But I'm sure it's
perfectly legitimate. You're trying to create a case out of
nothing. Strike that. Out of some poor man's misfortune."

He nodded absently. "Is it correct to say that this would
be a federal case if he and his students were indeed
working on some Bio-safety Level-4 virus?"

"Mulder, it's unthinkable!" Her voice rose in volume from
sheer annoyance. "Of course it would be a federal case. But
someone would certainly have noticed by now! Never mind
that a highly infectious virus couldn't be contained in
that setting. The lab we just saw wasn't set up to handle
that type of work. Besides that, academics *do* have to
justify their particular line of research to their
department."

She knew she was on the verge of losing it by this point
in her tirade. So she took a deep breath and lowered her
voice to a more acceptable level for the continuation of
this verbal dressing down of Mulder. "Dr. White must have
some kind of grant money for himself and his students to do
the research. Whoever provides that money is surely aware
of the nature of the research, having agreed to fund it.
Never mind, university oversight committees. You heard his
students. They said they were working on the evolution of
viruses. That's more in the field of ecology than anything
else. It's likely they're working with a virus that doesn't
even infect humans, but rather some lower-order organism.
No doubt, those 'cute' mice Brad Palmer was talking about."

Mulder nodded emphatically while still managing to give
the impression he didn't agree. And he was smiling, damn
him. "Regardless of its implausibility, Scully, maybe we
should look into who's funding the research and what
specific virus Dr. White and his students *are* actually
working on."

She didn't answer. In truth, she was annoyed and dismayed
with Mulder's bulldog tactics in this case. His suspicions
seemed completely unfounded. And she wanted to inform him
that even if Dr. White was working with a pathogen, it would
be the responsibility of the FBI's Domestic Terrorism
division, or the CDC. But she decided to file this little
fact away until their investigation finally exceeded her
tolerance level.

Or, she admitted reluctantly to herself, until Mulder
proved to be correct.

She would have long ago given up on Mulder's intuitive
leaps of illogic, if they didn't so often stand up under
her scrutiny. She had many hypotheses to explain this
feat. Her most recent favorite centered around the
'chaos theory.' She was beginning to suspect some similar
occurrance of unpredictable processes within the workings
of his beautiful mind. How else to explain the synapses
that allowed him to draw correct conclusions from the
disorder of evidence presented to them?

Regardless, after briefly entertaining the possibility
that the three students were domestic terrorists, she
couldn't help but conclude that the possibility was
completely ludicrous.

So why did she still feel uneasy?

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

At the wheel, Mulder headed the car toward the western
suburbs of D.C. rather than back into the city.
Specifically, the Falls Church area and Dr. White's
residence. She stared out at lawns on which any type of
evergreen tree or bush was statistically likely to be
sporting a string of blinking Christmas lights.

Scully sighed as she picked up the piece of paper given to
them and glanced down at it for the correct street address.
Mulder was like a dog with a bone when he was in
investigation mode. Try taking it away and he'd hold on
tighter.

"I might remind you there's nothing here, Mulder."

"Tell me about the Red Queen hypothesis, Scully."

She rubbed at her eyes and resigned herself to finishing
this long, exhausting day with an interview of Dr. White.
In the meantime, she'd humor her partner. "The Red Queen
hypothesis has to do with the host-parasite dynamic.
Specifically, it examines the role of parasites as agents
of evolutionary change."

Mulder glanced over at her, then back at the road, waiting
for her to give him more information before he spoke. She
watched as he pulled a bag of sunflower seeds from his
pocket, popped one into his mouth and started to work it
over with his tongue.

She brought herself back to the question. "Basically, it
states that any short-lived, parasitic organism, for
example a virus or a bacterium, can reproduce and live
through a number of generations during the lifespan of its
natural host. That would be you or I -- humans, mammals,
something longer-lived. The average bacteria lives,
reproduces and dies within a range of hours or days as
opposed to years."

He held the bag out to her and she shook her head,
refusing the offer. To her, the salty seeds were a waste of
time and effort for such little reward. More tease than
treat. But she was fascinated by her partner's ability to
separate seed from shell with no more than his lips, teeth
and tongue. A rather intriguing show that had entertained
her for a number of years now. Mulder opened the window a
crack and sent the empty husk hurtling out into the wind
with perfectly blown aim. He turned back to her, licking
the salt from his lips and distracting her again from the
topic.

"In other words," he stated, "a virus could have any
number of generations during which it could 'improve'
itself through the natural course of evolution, all while
you and I are just passing the time of day?" Mulder
questioned.

"Something like that." She had a sudden strange craving
for a handful of the seeds.

"And as humans, we're completely helpless."

She shook her head. "Not completely. Long-lived hosts
often have immunologic defenses. For example, lymphocytes
and other immune cells in the human body can change rapidly
to recognize parasites and attack them."

"So where does the analogy to the Red Queen fit in? Isn't
that a character in Alice in Wonderland?" Mulder was a
quick study. She also knew he could tell she was eyeing
the sunflower seed bag when he placed it generously
into her hands with a smirk. He thrived on the stranger
quirks in any scientific theory and was waiting
expectantly for her explanation as he swirled some
unspecified number of seeds around in his mouth.

"You're right, the Red Queen is a character in 'Through
the Looking Glass.' The Red Queen chess piece who ran
just to stay in place."

He spat no less than seven husks into his hand and grinned
at her. She knew he was enjoying the detail.

"You know, that's a rather disgusting display, Mulder,"
she remarked.

He held his hand out the window and let the wind blow away
his efforts. "Is it?" Pulling his hand back into the car, he
wiped it on his pants. "Back to that Red Queen, running in
place. I'm taking it to mean that we human hosts are the ones
running to stand still? Just barely keeping up with the
evolution of a parasite? Always just one move behind?"

"That's the idea." Shaking two seeds into her hand, she
popped them in her mouth and let them lodge against her
cheek while she savored the salt. "An evolutionary arms race,
if you will, with the parasite having the advantage and the
host always playing catch-up. However, the hypothesis isn't
without its criticisms."

"Which are?"

"The argument against the Red Queen hypothesis originates
with a long-standing idea among parasitologists. The idea
is that if the host and parasite are co-evolving and
adapting to each other, natural selection should favor the
survival of a less harmful parasite and a more resistant
host."

He was doing it again. She could see him rolling a seed on
the tip of his tongue somehow. His lips pursed and he blew
two perfect shell halves into his hand then tossed them out
the window. "You mean that if it wasn't in the best
interest of the organism to kill its host, it wouldn't?
The two would peacefully co-exist with one another instead?"

"Exactly. A given parasite would choose a strategy in
which it lives in a truce with its host, otherwise known as
mutualism."

"Virus one point. Host one point. Something like that,
right?" He gently extracted the bag from her hand again and
looked at her suspiciously. "Did you eat the shells,
Scully?" he asked in mock horror.

She grinned. "They're good, Mulder."

"You're a doctor, Scully. Haven't you ever read the
medical warning on the package?"

"I'm not the one who consumes whole packages of those
things, Mulder. I've kept my sodium consumption well
within the recommended serving size."

He shook his head in mock exasperation. "Spoil a guy's
fun, why don't you," he muttered. "Back to that Red
Queen again...what you're saying is that most scientists
think that the best strategy for a parasite is to kill off
only a few hosts, or deliver a low-grade infection all
around for everyone?"

She nodded. "The Red Queen camp, however, disagrees. They
say that by default, a parasite should evolve to be as
deadly as possible, even to the point of having no more
hosts left." She extracted the bag out of his hands and
shook a few more seeds into her palm. He grinned in
triumph. Curiosity peaked, she turned the package over and
examined the fine print, her eyebrows climbing at the
amount of sodium in the seemingly harmless shells.
"Remember, evolution is believed to be a process without
direction or intent, Mulder. Therefore, it isn't going to
stop and give pause for thought. This ideology is inherent
in the hypothesis. The most ruthless parasite should
therefore be the most successful, to the detriment of
its host."

"There are flaws in that theory," Mulder observed.

"That's the problem, Mulder. Really, you could look at the
arguments as two sides of the same coin. Certainly, there's
solid evidence that viruses and bacteria can be harmful.
But we're also still here as a species, so that says
something too." She paused, noting that Mulder had once
again distracted her from her problems with the case by
piquing her interest in a subject. Their eternal give-and-
take was, once again, rolling along. It dismayed her a bit
and she decided it was time to finish up this discussion so
that she could pin down his reasons for trying to make this
a case at all.

"Each argument has evidence to support it, but there's no
definitive proof as to which side is ultimately correct. And
it's probably likely to depend on a given situation anyway."

Mulder was doing something with his tongue and another
sunflower seed. She forged ahead. "In the final conclusion,
parasites are, without argument, taking resources from
their hosts in order to reproduce. And it's doubtful
they're worrying as to whether or not they harm the host.
Conversely, hosts are vigilantly adapting ways to avoid the
more harmful effects of a pathogen, via their immune
response. If both sides are even, it's the biological
dÈtente. No one's exactly winning but there's certainly a
struggle going on. As a result, you can't prove or
disprove the Red Queen hypothesis."

"That's why I love science, Scully. It's so conclusive."
She ignored the jab. Mulder frowned and rolled his window
all the way down though the day was chilly. "Is it hot in
here, Scully?"

To her, the bite of the air felt harsh and the wind chill
probably hovered near freezing. She watched him blow a few
more shells into the wind, his cheeks flushed with color.
"It's cold, Mulder. It's December, for God's sake," she
added as the blast of frigid air hit her. "Close the damn
window."

Mulder rolled it up with an apologetic look. "Sorry." But
she noted his discomfort and wondered if he were coming
down with the flu everyone in the office seemed to have
right now. He pulled at his tie, loosening it as he
turned down a street after glancing one more time at
the address scrawled on the slip of paper in her hand.
"This looks like it."

"Let's get this over with," Scully sighed. "Reminding a
man he lost his entire family thirty years ago today is
not my idea of the Christmas spirit."

"Hey, look on the bright side, Scully. It could be last
year around this time, in which case we'd be looking for
a couple of ghosts."

"Don't even remind me, Mulder." Hopefully, the small brick
house they faced was not haunted by the spirit of malicious
ghostly lovers. The *hallucinations* of such ghosts, she
corrected herself.

"If this is anything like last year, Mulder, I might have
to hurt you bad."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

ACT II

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The most curious part of the thing was, that the trees and
the other things round them never changed their places at
all: however fast they went, they never seemed to pass
anything. "I wonder if all the things move along with us?"
thought poor puzzled Alice. And the Queen seemed to guess
her thoughts, for she cried "Faster! Don't try to talk!"

~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Friday, December 14
Falls Church, Virginia


Dr. Vincent White's house was a brick structure that had
definitely seen better days. The brick was discolored and
overgrown with ivy, and the windows were so dusty they
obscured the interior. Dispirited curtains hung limply in
view, and all the windows were shut tight. The front lawn
consisted of long grass and weeds, and behind the house
young pine saplings and bushy secondary growth were
encroaching on what probably used to be a back yard. There
was no sign of Christmas spirit bedecking the trees on this
residence, though next door, two round bushes sported a
frantic blinking display, muted by the daylight. But the
house before them held onto its shadowy exterior, despite
the fact that the sun was attempting to peek out from
behind clouds.

The first thing Scully noticed as they approached was a
rat raiding the garbage bins along the side of the house.
The sight caught her eye due to the striking white
coloration of the rodent. She fought back an instinctive
grimace and found its boldness in the daylight rather odd.
Nudging Mulder, she pointed to the rat just as it leapt
out of the bin and scurried away, disappearing into the
backyard growth.

He gave her a wry grin. "Looks like Dr. White has moved
quite a ways down in the world." He stared up at the house.

She smiled thinly. "I dare say that building you live in
has been visited by rodents in its day, Mulder -- like
today, maybe?"

He grinned. "No doubt."

She frowned. "However, although I don't think I need to
point this out to you, Mulder, my greater concern here
is that the species of rat we just saw was a domestic
one, what's known as the 'wistar' strain, I believe.
Only found in captivity -- specifically, laboratories.
Not cavorting around in the wild."

"That one seems to be doing okay in the great big
outdoors." He gave her a pointed look. "Don't you find
it rather strange that there are laboratory rats running
around outside the good professor's house?"

"Well, as a matter of fact, yes I do, Mulder."

His eyes were laughing at her. "Does this mean you're
starting to believe that my persistence at this case may
have some merit? That maybe this is actually starting to
look like a case to you?"

"I'm not willing to go that far yet." Scully reached up
to knock firmly on the front door.

Mulder's grin widened. "How far are you willing to go,
Scully?" he murmured. The noise of someone approaching the
door distracted them both and Scully traveled the transition
from personal to business with skills she was still in the
process of adjusting to. Slightly off-centered, she poised
with the peculiar balls-of-your-feet anticipation that is
present in any law enforcement investigator during even the
most innocuous of inquiries. You could never be sure if you
were about to meet a pleasantly innocent citizen or an
outright dangerous individual.

The man who opened the door did not look dangerous. Nor
did he look pleasant. Cautiously, he opened the door only a
crack, but appeared to be afraid of them more than anything
else. The door creaked on rusted hinges and dropped a few
errant paint chips onto the stoop, permitting only a small
sliver of access to the interior world of the house.

The man, leaning rather precariously against the door,
glared stormily at them. Though definitely recognizable as
Dr. White, he bore little resemblance to his photo from
younger, more prosperous years. His hair was badly mussed
and now shock-white, lending him an Einstein-like air. His
clothing was disheveled, as if he'd been sleeping in it.
He didn't open the door further.

"Dr. Vincent White?" Mulder inquired politely, but with a
subtle no-nonsense edge that usually commanded respect.

"Yes. What do you want?" the man demanded. "I'm not buying
anything, and I certainly don't need conversion to whatever
ridiculous religion you're purporting to believe in. God
doesn't exist. How's that for a revelation?" He stared at
them defiantly with slightly bloodshot eyes, as if waiting
for some argument.

Scully quickly extricated her badge from the pocket of her
jacket during this diatribe. Gently, she presented it to the
unsteady man half hiding behind his door. "We're neither,
Dr. White. We're from the FBI and we'd just like to ask you
a few questions."

Despite the door's allowance, the light from outside
barely penetrated the gloomy interior. "What for?" he
snapped. "Do I have to talk to you?"

"As a professional courtesy, it is strongly advised that
you take a few minutes to speak to us, Dr. White," Mulder
answered firmly.

Muttering something unintelligible, Dr. White threw open
the door and disappeared into his house. A blast of warm
air hit them from the interior as they stepped forward into
the foyer. Dr. White continued down the hallway without
waiting for them and disappeared from view.

Following him into what was obviously his living room,
they saw him sink down onto a couch which bore evidence
of his recent occupation.

"You'll have to forgive me for the state of my house.
But I didn't ask for company and you seem to have invited
yourself in. So I'm deducing I have no choice but to
display my rather lax cleaning skills to you both."

'Lax' implied some proficiency at a task, albeit poor.
Scully was fairly sure that Dr. White's cleaning skills
were not anything so generous as half-hearted but rather,
non-existent. The clutter of the living room was
reprehensible. There were stacks of magazines which she
took note of as she passed, noting that they were mostly
medical journals. 'Virology' made up the stack to her right
elbow when she settled in the only armchair in the room.
Cups littered the coffee table, half empty and growing
various mold cultures on their dark, liquid surface. The
curtains were drawn and the room smelled musty. She doubted
Dr. White owned a vacuum. If he did, he didn't use it. The
room was uncomfortably hot.

Dr. White stretched out on the couch as if he couldn't be
bothered to sit up for the interview. Scully wondered if he
was ill, his lassitude seemed so marked. Mulder glanced
awkwardly around the room for any place to settle and
finally had to make due with perching on the left arm of
the chair Scully was sitting in. It made for an
unconventional setting for the interview process but the
doctor's defensive stance was markedly evident by that
point. Mulder took the offer, opting for the non-
threatening approach of sitting as opposed to towering
over him for the questioning.

"Dr. White," Scully began, finding it rather disconcerting
that he remained in his reclining pose as she addressed him.
"We're looking into a case that involved a theft from the
lab you worked in on December 1 of 1970. It's just part of
a routine check to see if any new evidence has emerged that
might allow us to solve the case and put it to rest."

Dr. White gave up any pretense of relaxation at her words.
But his slow return to a sitting position and his
difficulty at speech betrayed the fact that he wasn't in
full control of his reactive faculties, and it looked
suspiciously as if alcohol was the likely candidate of his
difficulties. Two empty bottles of wine sat on the end
table beside him and there was a red stain on the rug near
his feet.

"There is *nothing* that will put that case to rest," he
said firmly. "Besides that, it was classified top secret
by the Department of Defense. What right does the FBI have
looking into it at all? Do you two even know what you're
doing? With a few phone calls, I could probably cost you
your jobs," he remarked. "The world is full of incompetent
idiots!" His voice was rising, and his contempt for the
greater part of humanity obvious, but the slur to his words
tempered the threat. That and the fact that probably not
many people took him seriously at this point in his life,
Scully concluded. There was something pathetic about his
obviously drunken state.

"Sir, we don't mean to open up old wounds, here," she
soothed. "We're merely trying to close the case
satisfactorily for our files."

"Here's how you do that," he stated, leaning forward to
fix her with an momentarily steady eye. Despite this
attempt at an aggressive stance, his hands shook with
tremors and his head wobbled slightly. "Shut the folder
and put it away. It was Department of Defense research
and no one stole that virus. For all I know, it's now
an integral part of our biological weapons arsenal. I
don't know. I don't care anymore." He waved at them
dismissively. "I'm trying to work here," he sputtered,
pointing toward a large stack of papers beside him.
Scully recognized them as exams, but there was very
little red ink visible on the top paper, meaning either
the student had correctly answered all the questions
or Dr. White had not yet corrected it. He answered her
curiosity indirectly with his next diatribe.

"If you don't mind..." he stated pointedly. When neither
moved, he closed his eyes, internalizing his conflict. When
he opened them again, his voice was defeated. "I can't help
you," he insisted. "Why don't you go question the DOD?" He
laughed then. It was an angry laugh, but also a weak one.
It was followed by a deep sigh as he stared down at the
student papers. A wracking cough suddenly shook his body
terribly. When he finally raised his eyes to Scully, the
fight had gone out of them completely.

He pointed to the exams. "Idiots. They're all idiots.
'Define bacterium' is the first question," he intoned. He
picked up the one on top. "This one wrote 'a disease'.
Simplistic moron!" He threw the paper back down on the
pile. "The world is full of incompetent buffoonery," he
railed at them. "A veritable melting pot of mediocrity. I
would have had these done if the students weren't so damn
disheartening. Is it too much to ask that even one of them
be worth my time?" He let out another sigh and appeared to
be staring down at the stain at his feet.

"How about your graduate students, Dr. White," Mulder
began. "Are any of them worth your time?"

Instead of growing angry, Dr. White laughed. "Barely."

"Could I ask what exactly they're working on?"

"They're working on their A.B.D.'s," he snapped. Scully
had heard the infamous initials before. Innocuous letters
that, put together, struck terror in the heart of every
graduate student toiling away at their research. The
initials stood for 'all but dissertation.' It was an
unfortunate and worrisome statistic that many who started
graduate school earned these initials rather than the 'P,'
'h' and 'D' they sought at the start. Completing required
coursework, qualifying exams and data collection could seem
easy compared to the self-motivation, diligence, and sheer,
intellectual determination required to complete the
'dissertation' part of the process.

"I'm asking about the specific project, Dr. White."
Mulder's voice had lost any semblance of friendliness. When
she glanced at him, he was locked in a staring contest with
the man, his gaze hard and unforgiving.

Dr. White's response was poorly-disguised outrage. "Leave
me alone," he cried, the tone of his voice gaining a
curious tremor. "I just want to be left alone. If you have
any further questions, you can consult my lawyer. Get out!"

Mulder didn't make a move. Reluctantly, Scully moved out
from under his shadow and stood, casting a hard eye back at
her partner. "We're sorry to have bothered you, Dr. White."

"One more question," Mulder drawled, though she was glad
to note he was at least rising with her. "Could you explain
why a laboratory rat is raiding your garbage, Dr. White?"

For a second, Scully saw something flicker in the man's
eyes that looked suspiciously like fear. Just as quickly,
it was gone. "I don't know what the hell you're talking
about. Now get off my property." He stood unsteadily and
despite the insistence behind his message, his step ahead
of them to open the door wavered dangerously. Mulder almost
reached out to steady his uncertain passage, but Scully
stopped him with a warning hand on his arm. The last thing
they needed to do to this poor man was charge him with
assault on a federal officer if he decided not to
appreciate Mulder's well-meaning gesture.

When they were both out on the stoop, the doctor slammed
the door, interrupting Mulder's thank you for his time
and sending a blast of heat rolling out after them into
the chilly day.

In silence, they moved down the steps. Scully turned to
study the garbage cans beside the house, but the sight of
the white rat was only a memory now. She was struck again
by the general disrepair of what could be an attractive
dwelling place. As she looked back at the house one last
time, a memory from her childhood struck her.

She'd gone through a stage where she'd drawn houses to
look alive, with the windows as eyes and the door as a
mouth. She couldn't shake the sudden irrational feeling
that this house was watching them leave. Strangely, it
looked sad.

She shook off the thought with a small grimace. Mulder
would be delighted to hear this. But she would chew off her
own arm before she'd give him the satisfaction of her more
unscientific musings.

She didn't look back again.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Mulder dropped her off at her apartment, having picked her
up that morning on his way in to work. On the ride from
Falls Church to her place, he cracked his window twice,
though the temperature was rapidly dropping. When she shot
him a look and shivered for effect, he shut it. When they
reached her apartment, he pulled the car up in front of her
building and let it idle. "Well, it's the weekend, Scully.
Any big plans?"

She hated when she was asked this question. It made her
feel as if she should have an agenda to fill her time.
Mulder, of all people, should know better. For her,
weekends were downtime. Their job was stressful enough that
she didn't feel the need to be overly active. If she did
get an urge for activity, she could usually get it out of
her system with a quick run. "What's your point, Mulder?"
She turned in the seat to regard him. "Should I have some
big plan?"

He shrugged. "Just asking, Scully," he replied defensively.

She sighed. "What I plan to do is relax. Don't think I'm
going to work on this case-that-isn't-a-case, Mulder, if
that's what you're really asking. I know the novelty of
taking the weekend off is disconcerting to you. Just think
of it as my strategy for getting you to drop this case.
That poor man has lost his family and a prestigious job.
He's working at a modest college and covering up the fact
that he has a serious drinking problem. Come Monday, you'd
better have some hard evidence that there's something here
besides heartache. Dr. White is looking at an early death
and I, for one, don't have the stomach to harass him any
further. Not only that, I feel sorry for his graduate
students as well and therefore, don't feel a need to
bother them any further either."

"Not even the one that looks like Brad Pitt?"

She scowled darkly at her partner. "Mulder, I hope you
know me better than that. Besides, he's practically a
child."

Mulder was grinning by this point. "I'd say he's well past
the age of consent. There's nothing illegal there, if
that's what you're worried about."

Scully took a moment to take a deep breath. She knew that
Mulder was only joking with her, but it was annoying. She
prided herself on her professionalism and Mulder's more
laissez faire approach to their working relationship,
coupled with the blurring lines of their personal
interactions sometimes drove her to distraction. She had no
interest in having a relationship with the young, oversexed
and narcissistic graduate student she'd just met and Mulder
knew it. Strangely, this made the reason for his teasing
the real issue here. She suspected blatant male insecurity.

"Thanks for the advice," she said dryly. "I'll keep it in
mind."

"Did he slip you his number, Scully, when I wasn't looking?"

She successfully contained her annoyance. "Mulder, I
resent your inference here." She gave him a look that in no
uncertain terms let him know he was to drop the subject.
Opening the door, she climbed out of the vehicle, but found
herself perversely taking a moment to lean back into the
car and qualify her statement. "Just to let you know, I
don't always appreciate your baser attempts at humor,
Mulder. They're often in poor taste."

He nodded. "Apologies extended, Scully. I'll try not to
be quite so humorous." He nullified his contrition by
tilting his head back and grinning at her.

She rolled her eyes. "Watch it, Mulder. Besides, I could
still make you cry. For instance, I could insist you come
over on Saturday and sit through 'Steel Magnolias' in its
entirety."

"Is that an invitation, Scully?"

"It could be, if you play your cards right."

"I'll bring the food?" he offered in atonement.

"What kind?"

"Pizza?"

"Make it Chinese and it's a deal."

He smiled. "See you then."

She shut the car door firmly.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Queen propped her up against a tree, and said kindly,
"You may rest a little, now."
Alice looked round her in great surprise. "Why, I do
believe we've been under this tree the whole time!
Everything's just as it was!"
"Of course it is," said the Queen. "What would you have it?"
"Well, in our country," said Alice, still panting a little,
"you'd generally get to somewhere else -- if you ran very
fast for a long time as we've been doing."
"A slow sort of country!" said the Queen. "Now, *here*,
you see, it takes all the running *you* can do, to keep in
the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must
run at least twice as fast as that!"

~From 'Through the Looking Glass' by Lewis Carroll~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Saturday, December 15
Georgetown, D.C.


Her doorbell rang. She was growing hungry by this point
and was dismayed to find it was only an upstairs neighbor,
asking if it was her laundry that was in the washer. She
noted the time. It was eight o'clock -- one hour after
Mulder was supposed to show up. With the departure of the
neighbor, the niggling worry at his lateness finally turned
into its full-fledged counterpart of outright fear. She
picked up the phone and hit the speed dial. It rang exactly
fourteen times before a groggy voice answered, "Hello...?"

"Mulder?" she said hesitantly, surprised to find him still
home.

"Scully?" His voice was slurred. Sleepy.

"Mulder, are you aware that it's eight o'clock and I've
been waiting for that Chinese for a good hour now?"

"Oh, God...Scully." He said it like he'd just figured out
it was her. "What time is it?"

"Eight o'clock," she repeated.

"Crap. I'm sorry." She heard his sigh across the line and
imagined him rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "To tell
you the truth, I don't feel so well. I laid down for a bit
and I must have fallen asleep..."

"Yeah, right. Anything to get out of 'Steel Magnolias,'
Mulder."

She heard a brief chuckle. "Well, there is that, but
seriously, I think I'm coming down with that flu everyone
at the office is getting."

"What are your symptoms?" she demanded.

"Are we playing doctor here, Scully? Because I've never
tried that over the phone."

"Mulder..." she warned.

He did sound awful. "I don't know. I feel like I might
have a fever. I'm tired. You know how you ache all over
when you have a cold? But I went for a run today so that
might be the source of some of it. And I hate to say it but
I'm also feeling a wee bit nauseous...it looks like
dinner's definitely out for me," he admitted.

"Sounds like the flu," she agreed. "You'd better not have
given it to me yesterday, dragging me all over nowhere on
that dead case."


"You really think it's not worth our time, Scully?"

She tried to be gentle with her answer. "Mulder, there is
no way those students are working with any pathogen in that
setting. And Dr. White just seems pathetic to me. I mean,
how sad was that visit yesterday? That man needs rehab, not
a federal case being reopened. Not to mention one that's
been censored by the Department of Defense."

He paused at the other end of the line, but finally
conceded to her point, though he added one last comment.
"The students' behavior during our visit just seemed a
little odd to me, Scully."

"They're three stressed out graduate students with one
very remiss advisor. Would you expect their behavior to
be otherwise?"

"I guess not."

"Mulder," she said gently. "Let yourself rest. Treat
yourself to a nice bowl of chicken soup, drink plenty of
fluids, put some pillows on that couch, pull that warm
blanket down over you and call me tomorrow."

"I don't have any chicken soup, Scully." She could almost
hear his pout.

She briefly contemplated going over to his apartment,
bearing a steaming thermos of chicken soup, but dismissed
the idea. Mulder had been taking care of himself for
years on his own. Besides, she didn't have any soup on
hand either.

"S'okay, Scully. I couldn't eat