Manassas-Part 6/7 Summary and disclaimers in Part 1 ***** "Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead, Drayton!" David Glascow Farragut to his flag captain, Percival Drayton-August 1864 ***** August 30, 1862 Groveton, Virginia Near Manassas Junction The Confederate army was in trouble. It was mid-afternoon on the 30th of August. Jackson and his men had held their position behind the embankment of the unfinished railroad for almost two days. But they were tiring and the Union army just wouldn't quit their assault. Ammunition ran out, and the soldiers began throwing rocks at the men in blue. Jackson finally called on Longstreet, who had been waiting patiently on Jackson's right. Longstreet responded immediately. The Yankees were completely unprepared for the attack on their left. Longstreet bombarded the Union troops with artillery, breaking their lines three times, then sent his men in for a full attack. Pope, who had never realized Longstreet was even in the area, had been concentrating all his men on the north side of the battlefield. Longstreet's attack from the south caught him off guard, and he tried desperately to send men to meet Longstreet's forces. They were able to put up a bit of a fight, but it was no use. The 5th New York Zouaves fought back the strongest, and they suffered for it. One surviving Zouave described the battle as 'the very vortex of Hell'. The Union was driven from the field. Scully found herself elbow deep in blood, and never had time to wash it off. Wounded Union prisoners were brought it, and Sean did his best to see that they received adequate care, but another of the doctors wasn't so generous. He often purposely overlooked a seriously wounded man in blue to help a less seriously wounded man in gray. Scully could only shake her head in disdain and do her best to help whoever she could, no matter what the color of their uniform. She had already determined that their was no good or bad side in this war, only good and bad people on both sides. By late afternoon, it was determined that the south had won. Injured men coming into the camp were singing joyously, despite the pain of their wounds. ***When Johnny comes marching home again, Hurrah! Hurrah!*** ***We'll give him a hearty welcome, then, Hurrah! Hurrah!*** ***The men will cheer, the boys will shout!*** ***The ladies they will all turn out!*** ***And we'll all be gay when Johnny comes marching home!*** Scully was finally able to take a break and curiosity drove her to a rise that overlooked the battlefield. What she saw astounded her. Thousands of men waged war in the field below her. She saw Jackson's men behind the 'safety' of the railroad embankment to her left. Almost directly below her and a little to the right were Longstreet's men, the artillery still pounding away at the slowly retreating Federals, who were beginning to scatter far across the field. The houses that made up the tiny village of Groveton became shelter for the retreating Union army. Men and horses lay dead and dying around the field. Several orderlies risked their own life to retrieve injured men who couldn't move off the field themselves. During every charge, the Rebel Yell, that frightening, high-pitched keening that had so terrified the union troops at the fist Bull Run, could be heard from Longstreet's troops. Jackson's men were quiet; they were too exhausted to make much noise. They could do little but defend themselves. Scully knew the fighting would continue tomorrow, but the battle itself was nearly over. The army would leave soon, and head into Maryland. It would be Lee's first of two invasions of the north. Both would fail. This one would lead to Sharpsburg, where a huge battle would be fought on Antietam Creek next month. Next year, Lee would get as far as Pennsylvania, to a little town called Gettysburg. It would be the beginning of the end for the south. Just before sunset, the wounded were loaded up into wagons, as were the supplies and everything in the medical tent. The camp was being broken down, and the army was preparing to move. Because Jackson's troops had been so tired, pursuit of Pope and his men hadn't been accomplished. The Federals had a strong, hard-fighting rear guard that enabled them to escape. The Confederates were determined to follow. Scully was helping to pack things up, anticipating more fighting and more wounded in a different location, when she suddenly realized she couldn't go. Something inside her told her that in order to get home, she had to stay in the area. The grove of trees not far from the Anderson farm was the key. She just had to figure out how to use it. She found Melanie helping make a seriously wounded man get as comfortable as possible on one of the ambulances. Despite her own exhaustion, the woman turned and smiled at Scully. Scully felt a lump form in her throat. Could she really leave? Melissa was here, in a way. And Pendrell. They were no longer alive in her world. But they may not survive this one either, she told herself. Could I really watch them die again? "Melanie," Scully started. "I have to go back to your mother's." Melanie's smile disappeared. "Why?" Scully shrugged. "Personal reasons." She sighed. "I want to go home." Melanie gave he a sad smile. "I understand that feeling. And I know that, despite the wonderful help you've been here, that you want to help the side you believe in. I wish I could, too. But I won't leave Sean." She came forward and hugged Scully. "I'll miss you." Scully brought her own arms up to wrap them tightly around her. "I'll miss you, too." Slowly, they disengaged. Melanie smiled again. "You know, I had a little sister. She died when she was only five of Scarlet Fever. She would have been about your age had she lived. I'd like to think that she would have been as brave and caring as you." Scully felt the tears in her eyes. She had wondered if she had a counterpart in this world. "I'll tell Sean your plans, and he can find you an escort to my mother's. But please, let me write a quick letter that you can take to her." Scully nodded and Melanie ran off to find her husband. She was sick of the dead. Sick of the blood. Sick of this war. Despite this, she would willingly stay and help these people through the coming years. But she knew she couldn't. She knew that it was time to go home. ************************************************************ "I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah, with one hundred and fifty heavy guns and plenty of ammunition; also about twenty-five thousand bales of cotton." Telegram sent to Lincoln from Sherman-December 1864 ***** August 30, 1862 The Anderson Farm Near Manassas Junction, Virginia The sun was low in the western sky when Scully dismounted from her mare in front of Maddie's house. Maddie ran out to meet her, her arms open, a huge smile on her face. Scully welcomed her embrace. She pulled away and turned to look at the young man who had ridden to the farm with her. He was too young to be fighting a war, not even old enough to shave yet. But Scully had seen so many boys like him die over the past couple of days. As she thanked him, she wondered if he would survive. Chances were good that, even if he did, he would be missing an arm or a leg by the end of the war. He took the reins of her horse, then turned and rode back towards the battlefield. All was quiet on the farm; it was very obvious the battle had come nowhere near. Scully was thankful for that at least. Maddie began her usual chatter as she lead Scully into the house. She learned that 'the boys', meaning Alfred and Jonah, had gone to the neighbors to procure some smoked ham they had hidden away from the troops of both armies. Scully smiled. A home cooked meal certainly sounded wonderful. But she felt too anxious, too nervous. Something was about to happen, and she wasn't sure if it was good or bad. She shook her head. Wouldn't Mulder be amazed by her 'second sight' of late? Feelings, premonitions. When had she developed a sixth sense? Or maybe she should be asking herself when she had learned how to read that sixth sense. Scully went upstairs to change clothing, thanking Maddie with another hug and a kiss on the cheek when the older woman brought up a pitcher of hot water. Scully gave herself a sponge bath, desperately trying to rid herself of the stench of blood, sweat and death. Finally satisfied that she was as clean as she was going to get, she changed into another of Melanie's old dresses and made her way downstairs. Alfred, Jonah and Caleb were there, sitting at the table and talking quietly among themselves when she came down. They quieted when she entered the room, and Maddie turned worried eyes on her. Caleb stood, his old body hunched, his face wrinkled, but his eyes bright. Scully figured he must be near 100. That was a great age in her time. In the 1800's, it was unbelievable. "Mizz Hale," he said. "We've been talking. We think it's time you went home." "That's why I came back here instead of going with Melanie. This is closer to Washington." "Yes'm. It is," Caleb nodded. "But that ain't what I'm talking about. I'm talking about your real home." Scully stood, speechless. She looked at Maddie, who wouldn't meet her eyes. "What...what are you talking about?" "You don't belong here, Mizz Hale," Alfred said. "Caleb. He's seen people like you before. Now, we wouldn't normally believe in something so...silly. But we got to thinkin', and we think that maybe he's right." "About what?" Scully was getting very nervous. "When were you born, Mizz Hale?" Jonah asked. Scully did the math quickly in her head. "1827." Jonah shook his head. "No, Ma'am. When were you really born?" Scully breathed in deeply. "How did you know?" she asked without giving an answer to the question asked. Caleb, still standing, his dark eyes flashing, smiled. "I've seen people like you before. People from the future. I even tried to help one get back home, but he died before he could." "How?!" Scully was surprised at how desperate her voice sounded. "How do I get home?" Caleb sat down again. "You need to find the place you arrived. Then you need to think about home, about the people waiting for you there." He smiled brightly again. "And a few kind words to God wouldn't hurt." Scully shook her head. "That's it? No magic spells? No conjuring of smoke? No lightning flashes?" "Lightning is how you arrive, but you need an even greater power to get home." "God?" "Our good Lord may be that power, yes. But it will be your desire to get home that will convince Him to send you back." "There's no place like home?" Scully mumbled, not quite sure about Caleb's answer. It wasn't that she didn't believe in God. It simply sounded too easy. "What's the catch?" "Catch?" Caleb looked at the others in the room. They all shrugged, not knowing what she meant either. "Nevermind." Scully brought a hand out to brace herself against the wall, suddenly feeling faint. "What if I wanted to stay? What if, knowing the future as I do, I want to stay and try to change things?" Caleb's eyes became serious. "Others in your situation have tried," he said softly. "They never return." He paused. "I always believed that they were brought here for a purpose, and once that purpose is fulfilled, they want to go home. If they don't listen to that 'call', they get themselves in trouble. They most likely died." He looked at her intently. "You have a strong desire to go back now, don't you? You musta already done what you were meant to." "What?" Scully asked. She got another shrug as an answer. Scully's head was beginning to ache. "When do I do this?" Caleb stood again. "I think now would be as good a time as any." He walked up to her. "Hey! You never answered our question. When were you born?" Scully swallowed. "1964." "Wow. You gotta 'nother 100 years before you even get born?" Caleb laughed. "I bet you know a lot about what's gonna happen in the years to come, don'cha?" Scully nodded, but said nothing. "Too bad we'll never know," Caleb finished, and Scully sighed in relief. He wasn't going to ask her anything she would be afraid to answer. ************************************************************ "With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." A. Lincoln-March 1865 ***** August 30, 1862 Near Manassas Junction, Virginia The sun was sitting low on the horizon when Scully and Jonah walked out to the tree grove. She had quickly said her good-byes to Maddie, who had had tears in her eyes, Alfred and Caleb. Then she had let Jonah, who carried a musket, accompany her not far from where Alfred had found her more than a week earlier. It was still very hot, and the sound of cannon-fire could still be heard far in the distance. Scully knew they would go silent after dusk. And they would probably continue elsewhere tomorrow. When they reached the grove, Scully's eyes automatically searched the ground under the trees. In the faint light, she spotted the glimmer of metal and rushed toward it. Pushing away some leaves, she picked the object up. And started to laugh. It was her cell-phone. The 'low battery' light was faintly blinking, and nothing happened when she pressed the 'on' button. Her laughter grew louder, almost hysterical, and tears formed in her eyes. She looked off to the side and saw her gun right at the foot of the tree. She had scoured this area for days after her arrival and found nothing. Now suddenly, in near dark, she found these. She looked at Jonah, who was watching her with an unreadable expression. She lifted the phone up. "Home," she said simply. A branch snapped off to her left, and Jonah immediately raised his weapon to his shoulder. Scully quickly reached down and scooped up her own gun. A dark shape appeared, the low sun giving his face a red cast. "Jason!" "What are you doing, Jonah?" Stanton asked. Jonah, who had lowered the musket upon recognizing Stanton, said, "Mizz Hale wants to go home. I'm making sure she gets there safely." "Here? In the middle of a grove of trees?" Stanton's voice was incredulous. "It's a long story, Jason," Scully said softly. She looked at Jonah, who gave her a nod and turned away to go back to the farm. She turned to Stanton. "What are you doing here?" "Melanie told me you had gone back to her mother's." He stepped closer. "Do you want to tell me why you are standing in the middle of the countryside at sunset with Jonah?" he glanced down at the gun in her hand. "And armed?" "Didn't anyone tell you there's a war going on?" Scully smiled. When he didn't smile back, she sighed. "I can't tell you much more than this: I'm not from this time. I'm from the future." The silence after this statement was deafening. "Jason? No smart remark or joke? No...anything?" "What do you want me to say?" His voice was strained. "That I believe you?" She smiled sadly. "Yeah. I guess I did expect you to believe me. As crazy as it sounds, Mulder would have believed me." "Mulder?" She hesitated. "The man I know you as in my time. The reason I can't stay here in yours." "Me? In your time?" "Yes." "Is he who you were talking about earlier, when you said..." He didn't go on. "'You're not him?'" she finished. "Yes." She shook her head. "You are him, but you aren't. It's so confusing! All I know is that he needs me. And I have to go back." "You love him?" Scully nodded, trying desperately to swallow the frog that had suddenly appeared in her throat. She did. She loved Mulder! "Well, well, well," a low voice said off to Scully's left. She turned her head, startled. Stanton, too, was caught off guard. "Jason, my love. Please put down the rifle." Darlene Montgomery stood there, a pistol in her hand. It was aimed at Scully. "Darlene!" Stanton's voice was harsh. "Obviously, you never caught her," Scully said. She couldn't help but smile at the very Mulder-like, exasperated look Stanton gave her. "Do shut your mouth, Mrs. Hale," Darlene purred. Scully had no intention of obliging her. "Actually it's Scully. Dana Scully. And I'm not, nor have I ever been, married." She looked at an astonished Stanton. She shrugged. "Where I come from, unmarried women are quite common. They have careers, own land, vote. They've even served in combat in the armed forces. In fact," she continued, as she carefully grasped her skirt in her left hand and rearranged her grip on the weapon she held hidden behind her skirts in her right. "My job is in defense of the great and wonderful United States of America. All fifty of them!" With a well trained, but slightly rusty move, she spun to her left and brought her right foot up in a roundhouse kick that connected with Darlene's pistol and sent it flying through the air. Smoothly, she brought her weapon up and pointed it directly at Darlene's shocked face. Stanton was obviously just as shocked, but not so much that he didn't remember to retrieve Darlene's gun from the ground. Then he looked at Scully, a slight smile on his face. "Fifty?" "Ooops," Scully said, but she really wasn't sorry to let that slip. Scully kept her gun on Darlene as Stanton tied the spy's hands behind her back with a leather strap. "Do you know what they do to spies, Darlene?" he whispered menacingly to the dark haired woman. "I certainly won't argue when they decide to stand you up against a wall and shoot you." Darlene looked dazed and didn't respond. Scully looked to the west and saw that the sun had nearly disappeared behind the horizon. It was time to go. "Jason," she said. "Why don't you take Mrs. Montgomery back to your men; I'm sure they must be around somewhere close." "And leave you here?" Stanton asked, his voice hard. "I don't think so, Dana." "This is where I need to be, Jason. Please. Leave." Leaving Darlene tied and still in a daze, he walked up to Scully, grabbed her by the shoulders, and kissed her. Hard. "Does this Mulder kiss you like that?" he demanded, when he pulled away. Scully found it hard to catch her breath. "No," she whispered. "No?" "He's never kissed me at all." "Never?!" Stanton was astounded. "Not really," Scully told him, a smile playing on her lips. 'But I intend to change that if I ever get home,' she thought to herself. Stanton shook his head. "Then stay," he whispered. Scully felt the tears come. She swallowed hard. "I can't," she moaned. "I don't belong here." She blinked rapidly and looked down. "Please, Jason. Let me go." A chorus of shouts and gunfire distracted them. Stanton's men, who had indeed been keeping watch a short distance away had run into a small unit of Federal cavalry. A small skirmish began on the edge of the treeline. Stanton instinctively turned toward them, but was stopped by a familiar voice. "Don't move, Stanton." He had come from behind them, using the sounds of the battle to hide his approach. "Rollins." Stanton's voice was flat, empty of any emotion. "All we want is Mrs. Montgomery, then we'll leave you be. Mrs. Hale can come with us as well, if she so chooses." He looked weary. Dirt streaked his face and his uniform was no longer spotless. He showed no signs of the injury that Stanton had inflicted days earlier. "Mrs. Montgomery is under arrest for espionage, General. You can't take her anywhere." Stanton lifted his arms and casually gestured around him. "How will you get back to your men? You are in enemy territory now." Darlene, who had not moved a muscle, or so Scully thought, since Stanton had tied her up, suddenly lunged forward, her hands free and a knife in her grip. She grabbed the closest person to her, Scully, and held the knife to her throat. Stanton drew his pistol, despite Rollins' warnings to hold still. "Don't do it, Jason," Darlene said, her voice high pitched and desperate. "Drop the gun, or I swear I'll slit her throat from ear to ear." Scully, who had admittedly been caught off guard, could not find any leverage, and her struggles were useless. But Stanton hadn't dropped his gun. Instead, he met her eyes with his own. She stilled her movements. With no words spoken between them, Scully knew exactly what he was telling her. At his slight nod, Scully lunged back, away from the knife, and then sideways. Just as her upper body cleared Darlene's, Stanton fired his gun. His aim was perfect. The shot echoed in the coming night, then all was silent. Even the skirmish had ended in the distance. Scully stood with both Stanton and Rollins, looking at the body that had once been Darlene Montgomery. "Well," Stanton drawled. "I guess you can have her now." Rollins glared at him, but there was no hatred in the look. "I was only planning on arresting her anyway." "For what?" Scully asked. Rollins sighed. "Spying. She was playing both sides." Horses could be heard now, crashing through the underbrush towards them. "Colonel?" It was Byers/Bowers. "Get out of here, Rollins," Stanton hissed. "You were never here!" Rollins wasn't about to argue. With one last glance at Scully, he turned and ran off through the trees. Stanton turned to Scully. His eyes held a question. One Scully couldn't answer. "Go," she said softly. He nodded, then leaned down, taking her lips once more with his. Then he backed away. "Don't forget me." "As if I could." "Sir!" Stanton's men had ridden up to them. "We have to get back, sir," Bowers said. He was leading the roan. Stanton took the reins from him and mounted. Then he looked down at her. "Fifty?" Scully nodded. "Is one of them Virginia?" She hesitated, then nodded again. With a smile, Stanton turned his horse and rode away, his now confused men following. Scully watched them until they disappeared in the growing darkness. Then, she silently fell to her knees. She looked up at the dark blue sky, watching the first stars of the evening appear. Then, quietly, she began to pray. ***** End 6/7