Get your own Free Home Page"What?" He got to his feet, scattering photos around him. "Scully? What's wrong?"
"Salt Lake City, Utah," she said softly. "Transfer effective immediately."
He shook his head, refusing to hear her.
"I already gave Skinner my letter of resignation," she added brokenly.
Mulder stared at her. "You can't quit, Scully."
"I can, Mulder. I debated whether or not to even tell you in person, because I knew--"
He took a step toward her and then stopped, gesturing at the photos at his feet. "We're close to something here," he said, his voice rising desperately. "We're on the verge--"
"You're on the verge, Mulder." She blinked and looked away. "Please--please don't do this to me."
He continued to gaze at her. Not believing she was here, not believing this could be it. "After what you saw last night," he said at last, "after all you've seen, Scully-- You can't just walk away."
"I have. I did. It's done."
He shook his head, stunned. "Just like that..."
"I'm contacting the state board Monday to file my medical reinstatement papers--"
"But I need you on this, Scully!" he said urgently.
"You don't, Mulder. You've never needed me. I've only held you back." She forced herself to look away from him, biting her lip to keep herself from crying. She turned and started for the door. "I've got to go."
He caught her before she reached the elevator, running to keep up with her. "You're wrong," he cried.
Scully turned on him. "Why was I assigned to you?" she asked fiercely. "To debunk your work . To rein you in, To shut you down."
He shook his head. "No. You've saved me, Scully." He put his hands lightly on her shoulders and gazed down into her open blue eyes. "As difficult and frustrating as it's been sometimes, your goddamn strict rationalism and science have saved me--a hundred times, a thousand times. You've--you've kept me honest and made me whole. I owe you so much, Scully, and you owe me nothing."
He dipped his head, a knot in his throat as he went on in a voice barely above a whisper. "I don't want to do this without you. I don't know if I can. And if I quit now, they win..."
He gazed down at her and she stared back at him, silent, her blue eyes dark in the half light. She moved very slightly away from him, not breaking his gaze; her own registering respect and sorrow. His hands remained barely touching her arms as she lifted herself on tiptoe and kissed his forehead.
He did not move away, did not for a moment respond. Their eyes met and linked. A sudden, inexplicable tension flared. And then his hands tightened on her, his head dipped as he drew her toward him, his fingers moving upward to trace the long line of her neck, her skin warm beneath the thick mane of auburn hair, her cheek. For only an instance she hesitated, then reached for him. She could feel his mouth grazing hers, when--
"Ouch!" Scully pulled away from Mulder, rubbing her neck where his hand had been.
"I'm sorry." Mulder stared at her, worried he had done something wrong.
Scully's voice was thick. "I think...something...stung me."
She withdrew her hand as Mulder moved around her, running his fingers quickly across her neck. He shook his head. "It must've gotten in your shirt."
He gasped as Scully slumped forward, as he hastily caught her in his arms. Her head lolled drunkenly as Mulder whispered, frightened, "Scully..."
She stared up at him through slit eyes and opened her hand. In the palm lay a bumblebee, legs feebly twitching. "Something's wrong," she murmured, barely coherent. "I'm having ... lancinating pain ... my chest. My ... motor functions are being affected. I'm--"
Frantically, but as gently as he could, Mulder lowered her until she lay upon the floor. She felt limp and helpless as a sleeping child, her head rolling to one side. She continued to speak, her voice growing fainter and fainter, eyes no longer focusing.
"...my pulse feels thready and I--I've got a funny taste in the back of my throat."
Mulder knelt above her, straining to hear. "I think you're in anaphylactic shock--"
"No--it's--"
"Scully..." Mulder's voice cracked.
"I've got no allergy," she whispered. "Something ... this ... Mulder ... I think ... I think you should call an ambulance..."
He stumbled to his feet and raced for the phone, punching in 911. "This is Special Agent Fox Mulder. I have an agent down--"
The Well-Manicured Man nodded grimly. "Imagine our surprise when they began to gestate. My group has been working cooperatively with the alien colonists, facilitating programs like the one you saw. To gain access to the virus, in hope that we might secretly develop a cure."
"To save yourselves," broke in Mulder.
The WMM shrugged. "When war is futile, victory consists of merely staying alive. Survival is the ultimate idealogy." He hesitated, then gave Mulder a cool smile. "Your father wisely refused to believe this."
"My father sacrificed my sister!" cried Mulder angrily. "He let them take Samantha--"
"No." For a moment the WMM looked almost sorrowful. "Without a vaccination, the only true survivors of the virul holocaust would be those immune to it: human/alien clones. He allowed your sister to be abducted, to be taken to a cloning program. For one reason."
"So she'd survive," Mulder breathed in sudden understanding. "As a genetic hybrid..."
The WMM nodded. "Your father chose hope over selfishness. Hope in the only future he had: his childrem. His hope for you, Agent Mulder, was that you would uncover the truth about the Project. That you would do everything you could to stop it--
"That you would fight the future."
He fell silent. On the other side of the backseat, Mulder sat stunned, feeling as though all at once his destiny has been validated, or maybe simply justified. "Why are you telling me this?" he said at last.
The WMM stared at his hands for a long time before replying. "For the sake of my own children. Nothing more, nothing less. Once they learn what I've told you, my life will be over."
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