From drjudd@rainbow.net.au Fri Aug 30 08:54:13 1996
OFFSPRING
DESLEA R. JUDD
drjudd@rainbow.net.au
Copyright 1996
DISCLAIMER
This book is based on The X Files, a creation of Chris Carter owned by
him, Twentieth Century Fox, and Ten-Thirteen Productions. Fox Mulder,
Dana Scully, Walter Skinner, and a number of lesser characters including
Bill Mulder, Mrs Mulder, Samantha Mulder and her clones, Maggie Scully,
Melissa Scully, Captain Scully, Sharon Skinner, Kimberly Cooke, the
Cigarette Smoking (Cancer) Man, the Well Manicured Man and his offsider,
Frohike, Quiqueg, Gautier, Jean Gautier, Ellen, and Alex Krycek remain the
intellectual property of those parties. A number of other characters are
the author's creation and are copyright, and may not be used without her
written permission. These include but are not limited to Dr Karen
Koettig, Agent Grbevski, Melissa Samantha Scully, Grace Skinner, Clone 1
(Cynthia), Clone 3 (Carolyn), Clone 4 (Catherine), Dr Sam Fieldman, Dr
Paul Sturrock, Dr Marion Pieterse, Wendy Tomiris, Serena Ingleburn,
Amarette, Dr Jillian Maitz, Hallie, and Emily Trent. Any queries
concerning ownership of minor characters not mentioned here should be
directed to the author.
(See Pt 1 for complete spoiler, content, and comments info).
A few spoilers from Pilot, Duane Barry, Ascension, One Breath, Colony,
Endgame, Anasazi, Blessing Way, Paper Clip, Nisei, 7.31, Piper Maru,
Apocrypha, and Avatar.
I've rated this book R just to be on the safe side, but I think it's more
PG-13, in truth. There's some low-level sex (three scenes, more
emotional than anatomical), low-level bad language, low-level violence,
and that's about all.
Comments, good and bad, are welcome; but make sure they're constructive,
please! My e-mail is drjudd@rainbow.net.au, but don't worry if you see
something else in your "reply" header like magna.com, because Rainbow.Net
shares a server with another ISP called MagnaData. And if you think my
work's worth stealing, I'm flattered; but don't even think about it.
Archivists, feel free to add this to your collections; but be sure to let
me know.
OFFSPRING BY DESLEA R. JUDD (14/18)
SEVEN
Neonatal Intensive Care Unit
St John of God Hospital
Baltimore, Maryland
March 12, 1997
Skinner and Karen Koettig arrived at St John's Hospital, Baltimore,
at four in the afternoon.
No sooner had baby Melissa been settled into the neonatal intensive
care unit and Skinner ensconsed at her side, when a nurse came rushing
in. "Dr Koettig," she said in quiet but urgent tones. "You're needed in
surgery. It's Emily Trent."
"Surgery? What the hell happened?"
"Emergency caesar. They think they've lost the baby."
Karen motioned to another nurse. "I'll fill out the paperwork on
this admission when I get back. She's premmie - thirty weeks - but seems
fine. She shouldn't need anything special." Without waiting for an
answer, she bustled out.
It was some time later that Skinner, who had been trying to read
rather than lose himself in his child (and was losing the battle utterly),
looked up at the sound of footsteps. Karen had returned.
"I might have a solution to your problem."
There was no joy or triumph in her voice, however. Karen Koettig
sounded (and looked) defeated. She pulled a chair up alongside Skinner's
and slumped into it, dejectedly.
He waited until she was ready to go on. Finally, she said in a
gravelly voice, "You never really get used to it." She shivered a
little. "Losing patients, I mean. I had a seventeen year old girl in
there. A runaway. Homeless. She was seven months pregnant when an
oncologist friend of mine contacted me. She'd been found collapsed and
brought to his hospital, where she was diagnosed as suffering from uterine
cancer. It must have been hereditary for her to get it at that age. It
was exacerbated by the pregnancy, which wasn't picked up because she
didn't seek antenatal care. Wasn't in a position to, of course. I
brought her here when his hospital threw her out for not being able to
pay. I'm not supposed to, because she's got no earthly way of paying. I
don't care what she can and can't pay, Walter; I'm not throwing a
homeless, terminally ill child out on the street."
He bowed his head. "She's dead?"
Karen shook her head. "Not yet. There was foetal distress and we
did a caesar and hysterectomy. The child's gone. She's doomed, but she
insisted on carrying to term to give the child a chance." Skinner
shuddered. This was too like Grace. It cut too close to the bone. "I
would never say this to her, but it's just as well. The child was
half-caste. There's no family to take it when she dies, and half-castes
don't fare very well on the adoption market."
Skinner suddenly saw where she was headed. "You haven't filled out
the paperwork on the infant, have you?"
"Not yet. I suggest you go and talk to her. She's awake, though
pretty cut up. I'll stay with Melissa." Skinner rose.
"Walter?" He turned.
"Be gentle with her."
Route 47
South-East Mercer, North Dakota
March 12, 1997
"Scully-"
She pre-empted him. "If this is going to be a protective speech of
concern, Mulder, you can save it. I know what I'm doing, and I know I'm
going to pay for it later. But it has to be done."
"You look like you're paying for it now."
Scully looked pale and drawn. Her face was deadly white and her
normally brilliant emerald eyes were a dull, washed out sea-green. She
stopped him to go to the bathroom every half-hour (which she laughed off
as normal after birth, and he supposed she'd know; but it still worried
him), and spent most of the drive drowsing. He thought being separated
from her daughter so soon must be excruciating. Her face whenever he
mentioned the baby confirmed it.
She had wanted to fly all the way, but that Mulder had vetoed.
Frohike knew that they had been delayed and would wait as long as he had
to. Purchasing the plane tickets would have been difficult as they had no
way of explaining the expenditure - not that Skinner would have questioned
the purchase, of course. These were the arguments which he had offered,
but what it really came down to was that he didn't want her leaping into
whatever was waiting for them in Mercer without so much as a sleep after a
gruelling induced labour. It wasn't so much out of concern for her
delicate system (although she did look frail) as common sense: if they
got into a dangerous situation with her in her current condition, they
might not get out again. Scully had perhaps acknowledged the wisdom of
this; for although she looked at him, frankly disbelieving, as he raised
his admittedly weak objections, she had not argued.
So they had flown as far as Minneapolis, where a
not-particularly-interesting X-File which he had been shelving for weeks
awaited them. After reporting with the local authorities in a manner
which was completely token, they had taken a room and a car, and driven
north-west to Mercer. They arrived shortly after nightfall.
Frohike met them in a greasy diner on the outskirts of the town. He
bustled towards them, all excitement. He looked at Scully and his face
fell. "You look - as lovely as always, but you look like you've been
through the wringer!"
Scully bit back a smile. She looked anything but lovely, but she
supposed that that was Frohike's awkward attempt at tact. "It's been a
rough day." She paused. "I'm fine, Frohike. What have you got?"
"I don't know if this means anything to either of you, but I've got a
woman who claims she's your sister, Mulder." Mulder's eyes widened. "I
didn't even know you had a sister, you secretive bastard. Pretty, too."
Trying for levity, Mulder said, "Yeah, and that's exactly why I
didn't tell you about her." It didn't work. His voice tight with
anxiety, he said quietly, "Tell me."
Frohike shrugged. "There's not much to tell. I got a tipoff and
came here to follow up on a branch line. I found a train shed at the
terminus with an adjacent old warehouse - that's what it looks like
outside. Inside there are labs, and a bunch of - well, you'd have to call
them cells. They're nice enough apartments, but there's no doorknobs on
the inside. There was only one train in the shed, and it was equipped
with a full surgical setup - theatre, rudimentary intensive care and
recovery, and nitrogen storage. I thought they were into organs at first,
but I looked in, and all I could see were petri dishes." Mulder and
Scully exchanged glances. "I don't know what was in them. There was a
computer which probably had a database of the contents - they were
catalogued by number - but I heard voices and I had to get off. Just as
well, because it pulled out a few minutes later." Frohike paused. "I
went back into the warehouse. Security was fairly lax. There are a lot
of guards, mind you; but they're complacent. It's too isolated for them
to have much in the way of trouble, I suppose. I went into one office and
found a woman rifling through a filing cabinet, and she was as terrified
as I was - she wasn't supposed to be there either. I asked her name, and
she said she was Samantha Mulder. That's when I told her I was working
with you."
Mulder nodded slowly, not trusting himself to speak. Scully asked,
"What else did she say?"
Frohike shifted uneasily. "She said she'd been in that facility, and
others like it, for most of her life. She knew how to get out of her
cell, move around the warehouse and use the computers to find things out,
but she didn't know enough about the area outside the warehouse to risk an
escape attempt. Apparently she tried once elsewhere and paid pretty
dearly for it. She said she did once manage to make some sort of
arrangement with some women who needed to contact you themselves, but
something went wrong and the women were killed." Mulder bowed his head,
remembering the woman who had claimed to be his sister. She had been some
sort of genetically engineered clone. Once he had hated her for lying to
him, but that had faded over time. She had redeemed herself by willingly
exchanging herself for Scully in a hostage situation, ultimately being
killed herself. And she had led him to the other clones, who would have
helped him find her had they, too, not been killed.
Frohike continued. "I tried to convince her to come with me to you,
but she wouldn't. She said there were others she wanted to get out and
she wanted you to come to her - and maybe help her if it was safe to do
so. She's waiting now."
Mulder nodded. "All right. Let's go."
Scully took his arm. "Mulder, what if it's a trap?"
He looked at her. "Frohike got in and lived to tell the tale," he
protested.
"And maybe Frohike isn't who they want," she countered. "What if
it's me? Or you?"
Frohike cleared his throat. "Miss Mulder said this might come up.
She said to tell you the two of you were playing Stratego the night she
left."
"Anyone could have known that," Scully said. "It's in your second
lot of hypnotherapy notes, Mulder; and it was also posted as an addendum
to her file."
"She said she was winning."
Mulder's eyes widened. "Only she and I knew that," he said softly.
"No-one else - not even the hypnotherapist." He turned to Scully. "I
have to do this, Scully, you know that."
She nodded, suddenly resigned. "I know. And I'm with you. But for
God's sake, promise me you won't do anything rash."
"I promise," he said readily.
"Liar," she accused. "Come on, let's go."
A Warehouse
Unmapped U.S. Government Territory
North Dakota
March 13, 1997
They found her in a disused office in the bowels of the building.
Mulder drew in his breath when he saw her. Scully took his hand for
a moment, squeezed it gently.
She looked identical to the woman who had claimed to be his sister so
long ago. With a mane of wavy blonde hair and laughing blue eyes, she
reminded Mulder of photographs of his mother when she was young, before
his father had taken the light away.
He stepped towards her involuntarily, but Scully grabbed his arm,
preventing him from going to her. "How do we know you're not another
clone?" she asked evenly, ignoring Frohike's confused glance. Her tone
was not so much confrontational as conversational.
The woman smiled indulgently. "Thank God you've got someone looking
after you, Fox," she laughed. She picked up a letter opener from the desk
and stabbed the back of her hand viciously. She held it up.
The blood dripping down it was red.
Mulder broke away then, and went to her, throwing his arms around
her, laughing. Scully held her breath, waiting for a shot to ring out or
for him to drop to the floor from some evil injection, but it didn't
happen. Unbelievably, it didn't happen. The woman was laughing and
crying and saying his name.
It was really her.
It was impossible to believe. After all this time, all these trials,
it was as simple as walking into a building and seeing her and calling her
name. Scully didn't know if she'd expected fireworks or a UFO launch, but
somehow, the moment was too important, too special, to be so mundane. It
was the same feeling she'd had after she'd given birth to Melissa.
Scully watched them in amazement for long, long moments. It was only
when Frohike turned to her in concern that she realised she was crying,
too. A little shaken at her own response, she wiped her eyes with the
back of her hand and went to them. She barely noticed when Frohike said
something about wanting to check out the area, and discreetly slipped
away.
Automatically, she pulled off her scarf and bound Samantha's wounded
hand. Samantha gave her hand just as automatically, still staring at
Mulder. Mulder was cradling his sister's face in his hands, tears
streaming unashamedly down his cheeks. Scully was entranced at the whole
dynamic of it, the love between the two of them. The bond between her and
Mulder was such that she felt his joy as acutely as he did, if that were
possible.
Trying not to give way again (was this a postnatal hormonal thing?
she wondered idly), she finished with Samantha's hand and started to move
away.
Mulder seemed to come to himself then. "Scully, come back.
Samantha, this is-"
She finished for him. "Special Agent Dana Scully. I know." She
turned to Scully. "In case you hadn't guessed, I'm SAM." The way she
said it seemed to imply uppercase letters.
"I guessed," Scully replied, conveying her understanding.
Samantha broke away from Mulder then. "Come," she said urgently.
"We have a lot to discuss."
Coming In Part 15: Answers/The Project Ends/Firestorm
--
_______________________________________
| |
|Deslea R. Judd (drjudd@rainbow.net.au) |
|"The Owls Are Not What They Seem" |
| - The Log Lady, Twin Peaks) |
|_______________________________________|
(
geocities.com/hollywood)