Caduceus

Scully flipped through a file on their latest case. From what little she read as she scanned it the case was on a rash of human mutilations. “Did we get this case through your reputation, Mulder? Why haven’t the local authorities even touched it?”

“Actually they asked for you. Specifically.”

“Me?”

“I was just as surprised.”

“Wait a minute,” Scully flipped back to the beginning of the file “these bodies were found in Maryland.”

“That’s right, why?”

“It’s nothing, I’m sure.”

“What?”

“It’s just that I went to Medical School in Maryland. Just a coincidence.”

“Do you know a Dr. Jefferson?”

“Jefferson? He was my senior instructor, he talked me into forensics. Why?”

“He’s the one who requested you.”

“So much for coincidence. When do we leave?”

“Tonight.”

**********

Walking into the Maryland School of Medicine was like taking a step back in time. Scully smiled as she passed doors that held familiar professor's names. Nothing much had changed in the eight years that she had been gone. They even had the same hideous salmon pink paint on the walls of the long hallways.

“Hey, Scully, look at this.” Mulder pointed at a picture on the wall. “She’s cute, a friend of yours?”

“Very funny, Mulder.” Scully looked at the younger version of herself that stared out from behind the glass. It was a picture of her graduating class.

A young man who was making his way down the hall with one too many papers in his hands finally lost his grip and the paperwork fell to the floor at the Agents’ feet. Scully crouched down to help him retrieve the papers. When their eyes met the man smiled wide in surprise.

“Dana?” He asked. “Dana Scully? My God, you haven’t changed.” Ignoring the papers he rose and helped her up. “Just as lovely as ever.”

“I’m sorry,” Scully hesitated “you are...?”

“Of course, it’s been so long. Jeremy Waterson.”

“Jeremy, you were in my class, right?”

“That’s right, forensics even.”

“What brings you back here?”

“Just cleaning up some odds and ends.” Waterson replied vaguely. “Word on the street is that you went and got yourself a government job.”

Scully held out her badge for his inspection.

“Hmm, Special Agent. Very impressive.” He looked over at Mulder. “And that would make you...?”

“This is my partner, Special Agent Mulder.” Scully answered for him.

“Charmed.” Waterson cooed.

“Likewise.” Mulder replied uninterested.

“I bet Dana here keeps you on your toes, she always was wild and crazy.”

“Really?”

“Never mind, Jeremy.” Scully interrupted quickly. “We really must be going, it was nice seeing you again.”

“The pleasure was all mine, I’m sure.” He said giving Scully’s hand a quick kiss. “I hope you get your spook.”

The Agents continued down the hall. Before they turned the corner Mulder looked back over his shoulder at the gangly Waterson who was busily picking up his fallen papers. Mulder didn’t like him already. He was too open, it made Mulder think that his personalty was more of a screen than a display of his true self.

“How’d your friend there know we were here on business?” Mulder asked suspiciously.

“What else would we be doing here?” Scully answered matter-of-factly.

They came to Dr. Jefferson’s door and knocked. An older man with thick spectacles opened the door a crack.

“Yes?” He said from within the room. “Can I help you?”

“Agents Scully and Mulder.” Scully announced. “You are expecting us.”

“Scully?” Dr. Jefferson repeated. “Oh, yes, yes, of course, Dana.” He opened the door wide. “Please, come in, come in both of you.”

Dr. Jefferson ushered them into a small office cramped with medical text books, models of various organs, and charts. Dust infused every surface. Mulder smiled as the doctor offered them chairs opposite his desk. It felt like they were back in college.

“Now then, Agents, what can I do for you?”

“We are investigating a rash of murders in the area.” Mulder stated bluntly. “We understand that you’ve reported some incidents here at the school. Apparently the victims were students of yours, the report isn’t quite clear on that. In fact it isn’t clear on anything really.”

“Ah, yes, well, sorry about that the local police are not used to this.” Dr. Jefferson pushed his glasses higher onto his beaked nose. “In fact there has only been one murder.”

“The report said five bodies have been recovered.” Scully interjected.

“Oh yes, there were five bodies, but only one of them was murdered. The others were bodies from the school.”

“I don’t understand.” Mulder admitted.

“They were cadavers, Agent Mulder. Bodies for the students to dissect that had been stolen from the school. Very strange. The murdered man was a student here, well an ex-student at any rate. It wasn’t until the murder that we felt we had a problem on our hands, students often pull the classic body snatching trick. When we realized that one of the bodies was fresh we told the police, and they felt it would be best to call the FBI. We don’t get very many murders here, and certainly none like this. I had recently stumbled across a newspaper article with Dan, I’m sorry, Agent Scully here in it. So I recommended her. So there you have it, five bodies one murder.”

“I see.” Mulder looked at Scully, but she didn’t seem to understand it any more than he did. “I understand that all of the bodies are being held here.”

“Yes, we act as the city morgue. It gives our forensics students some hands on experience. Of course we haven’t let the student’s touch these ones.”

“I think we’d better see them.” Scully added standing up.

“Yes, yes, of course, I’ll show you the way.”

**************

It wasn’t really necessary for Dr. Jefferson to escort them to the morgue, Scully had spent hundreds of hours there during her graduate work. However, it made him feel like he was helping. When they got to the door it had been taped off by the police and a new code had placed on the automatic lock.

Inside the five bodies had been laid out on five of the twenty exam tables and covered with stained sheets. Dr. Jefferson walked over to nearest body and pulled the sheet back.

“Whoa!” Mulder had not been prepared for the condition of the body.

The body was completely denude of skin, even the facial covering had been removed. All of the muscles had been delicately separated as if by an artist hand. The lace work of the hand ended in a set of untouched nails that had been painted pink. The manicure stood out in stark contrast to the bare muscle structure of the cadaver.

“Was this the murder victim?” Scully asked undisturbed.

“What? Oh, no, no, this was one of ours.”

“Did the, uh, body” Mulder didn’t know quite the words to use “have skin when it was stolen.”

“Yes, yes, as a matter of fact it did. This is a muscle dissection, all students have to perform one and name all the muscles. If you don’t mind me saying so, this is grade A work.”

“Have the others been similarly dissected?” Scully asked.

“Yes, including the murder victim.”

“Well that explains why the file said these were mutilations.” Scully turned to Mulder. “I’d like to spend a few hours with the bodies and see if I can find anything, why don’t you go talk to the local police and see if you can get anything more out of them.”

“Any excuse to get out of here is fine by me.” Mulder replied.

“Will you need my help, Dana?”

“No, Dr. Jefferson. I’ll be fine, I know how busy you are. It’s almost graduation time again isn’t it?”

“Yes, in seven days actually. So things are in a bit of tizzy even without the murder and body snatching which so far we have managed to keep quiet, thank God.”

When the others had left Scully flipped on the over head recorder and started her report. First she went around and gave the cadavers that had been stolen from the school a quick once over.

“Case X-223-561, location: Maryland Medical School Morgue. Preliminary autopsy report by Dr. Dana Scully.” Scully paused for a second while she looked for the skinless cadaver’s number she found it on a metal tag attached to the ear.

“Cadaver number 57A4903, the body has been striped of skin and the muscular system has been dissected and exposed. Possible motive, unknown.”

“Cadaver number 98V3761, this cadaver has been used apparently to show the nervous system, with the brain and spinal cord exposed and neatly pulled apart into its different substructures. A bone saw must have been used to open the skull and cleave the spinal vertebrae. The morgue and any equipment storage areas should be checked for a missing bone saw and other medical supplies that might also have been stolen to perform this dissection. Failing that any medical suppliers in the area should be checked for small orders sent to nonmedical businesses or residences.”

“Cadaver number 07L1179, latex has been injected into the veins and arteries to show their structure and blood flow. The system has been filled with different colors, blue for the deoxygenated veins and red for the oxygenated arteries. The cadaver record does not say anything about it being treated with latex. This means the thief must have painstakingly filled the circulation system him or her self. All of the major components of the circulatory system have been meticulously exposed. Even the lungs had been removed after the latex treatment, with acid most likely, to show the delicate lace work of the pulmonary arteries and veins. Again, special medical equipment would have been used in this process and it may be traceable.”

“Cadaver number 24R8253, subject was female and apparently used to demonstrate the female reproductive system. The abdomen has been cut to expose the uterus, oviducts, and ovaries. One oviduct and half the uterus has been cut open to expose the inner layers. The rest of the body has remained untouched.”

Scully placed the sheet over the long since dead woman. It was easy to look at these bodies with a clinical eye because she knew they had all died of natural causes and had generously left their bodies to science. However, the next body was that of the murder victim. She had saved that one for last because she felt it would require a proper autopsy and not just and inspection.

Pulling back the blood stained sheet it looked like an autopsy had already been performed. All the visceral organs were separated and dissected.

“Victim, Steve Dogwood, MD. Cause of death unknown, however from the condition of the body I suspect poison of some kind. The body has not been embalmed showing that the murderer was smart enough not to try and gain access to formaldehyde, the purchase of which could easily be traced. The viscera has been exposed, I’m assuming this was to investigating the digestive system. Why he or she turned to murder instead of simply continuing to steal bodies is not yet known. However, now that they have tasted a fresh body they will most likely be in search of more. A general alert to the community should be issued.”

“These dissections have been performed through a great amount of labor and skill. It is my opinion that the murderer is well versed in science and may even be a doctor, or wishes to be one.”

Scully flipped off the recorder and sighed. There really wasn’t anything she could do other than send a blood sample to the lab for analysis. She was about to pull the sheet back over the body when something caught her eye. Taking out a magnifying glass Scully took a closer look at the snakelike coils of the dead man’s intestines. The were tiny perforations everywhere. Flipping over a portion of the small intestine it all came clear. Well maybe not all of it, but at least the holes and the general state of the corpses.

***********

“What’s this?” Mulder looked at the bagged object Scully had handed him.

“Evidence. It is a label on the end of a pin that was stuck in the upper section of the small intestine of the murder victim.”

“Duodenum?” Mulder read from the slightly damaged tag.

“That’s the medical term for the upper portion of the small intestine, where the pin was.”

“What does this mean? Our murder/slash body snatcher, I’m assuming they are one in the same, is doing some kind of homework assignment?”

“Sort of. Each of the cadavers had a different major system exposed.”

“Why switch to a live body, so to speak.”

“I’m not sure, maybe the security around the cadavers was tightened too much or maybe just to get attention.”

“Right, Dr. Jefferson said they really hadn’t paid much attention to the stolen cadavers. The thief and murderer is an artist, of sorts, and he wants acknowledgment of his work. A murdered man would bring an inspection and perhaps an admiring eye to his work.”

“Mulder, I don’t think were dealing with just some avant garde artist with a copy of Gray’s Anatomy.”

“So what are we dealing with?”

“A doctor.”

“Doctor?”

“Or at least someone with a strong medical background. I’m almost sure of it. Look at this.” Scully handed Mulder another evidence bag this one contained a small piece of paper with some slightly damp writing on it.

“Steak, broccoli, potato.... A grocery list?”

“Stomach contents. The murder dissected and labeled the victim with incredible skill and attention to detail. Did the local police have anything useful to add?”

“No, not really. The only thing the captain had to say, and I quote: “Gross”.”

“Great. The problem with this case is every student here and every doctor in the area could be considered a suspect.”

“Then we better get started.” Mulder sighed. “Why do I get the feeling that this is going to be a long case?”

“Because there are over 500 students and eleven pages of doctors in the Maryland yellow pages.”

“Well, let’s let our fingers do the walking.”

**************

Three days later they were no better off then when they’d started. They had been given access to all of the students records and were looking for anything that might warrant closer attention. Since the bodies had been stolen from the school it seemed logical place to start.

So far a few students had turned up with what might be called a criminal record. However most of the charges were for public intoxication. One student that stood out against the others was Gary Bradshaw. He had been caught body snatching his freshman year. Bradshaw was brought in for questioning. It had turned into a dead end. When they asked Bradshaw about his previous record he actually laughed at the memory. He’d placed the body in the bed of his dorm supervisor. It had been the practical joke of the decade he said. Then he turned a bit more serious, he had the sudden thought that his past was going to keep him from graduating in the next week. They assured him it wasn’t and he was dismissed.

“What do you think, Mulder?”

“Just a kid with a sense of humor.”

“My thoughts exactly, besides he has a stable background and a bright future in front of him.”

“That doesn’t lend itself to raging psycho.”

“I’m sure he’s been too busy passing the final exams.” Scully sighed and went back to the files. “Square one.”

The next morning when they came back to the file room Dr. Jefferson and a police officer were waiting for them. Dr. Jefferson was visibly sweating and the cop didn’t look any happier.

“Ah! Agents, I was hoping you’d come soon.” Dr. Jefferson greeted nervously.

“Good morning, Doctor.” Scully replied.

“No, no, not so good. There’s, well, there has been another murder.”

“Where?” Mulder asked.

“That’s the thing,” Dr. Jefferson looked around and then lowered his voice despite the fact that there was no one else around “it would appear that it happened, well, uh, here.”

“Here?”

“Yes, this morning there was another body, not one of ours of course, anyway, there was another body in the morgue.”

“It was found in the morgue?” Mulder asked astonished.

“Yes, yes, terrible.”

Scully was already moving towards the morgue when Dr. Jefferson squeaked a protest. She didn’t pay him any heed. She couldn’t believe what was happening, she and Mulder had been here almost all night. Right here, five doors away from the morgue.

Punching the code into the automatic lock Scully quickly gained access to the morgue. That made her realize that whoever the murderer was they knew the access code. Inside the original five bodies were off to the side, the sixth was on the center exam table with a sheet over it. Ripping back the sheet caused a piece of paper to fall to the floor. Ignoring the body, the face of which was almost completely missing, Scully bend down and picked up the paper. She stared at the words inked in blood. When Mulder finally caught up with her she read the crimson page aloud.

“All that hard work last night didn’t save this life, nor break this case, did it Dr. Dana? Perhaps you should seek an alternate career. Failing that,” Scully faltered for a second “failing that I have a more permanent solution for you.”

***********

“Put that away, Mulder. He isn’t going to attack right now.”

Mulder looked down at the gun in his hand, he hadn’t even been conscious of drawing it. “We have to get you out of here, Scully.”

“No, the killer is trying to get my attention, he knows me. You need me to catch him.” Scully turned the paper over. On the back was a perfect thumbprint in blood. “He’s mocking us, look.”

Mulder took the paper and took a close look at the thumb print. “This didn’t get here by accident, he even rolled his thumb so we’d get a complete print.”

“That means we can rule out any of the students. They wouldn’t be that stupid, it would just take a simply fingerprinting to catch him if he were enrolled here. He must be confident that we don’t know him.”

“I’ll have a messenger send this over to Danny, maybe they’ll have something in the database.”

“I doubt he would make it that easy for us.” Scully looked back at the corpse. “Do it anyway. I’m going to see what I can find on this body.”

“Scully...”

“I’m fine, Mulder.” Scully assured as she found a pair of gloves. “I can handle it.”

“I just think that you’d be safer back in Washington.”

“He all ready knows who I am, I’ll be just as easy to find in Washington.” Scully turned a set of stone eyes on her partner. “If you want to protect me help me catch this guy.”

“All right, if that’s your decision.”

“It is. When you send the messenger give him instructions to get the files from the Quanitco Medical School on enrolled students between 93’-94’.”

“What are you hoping to find?”

“I taught the forensics class there for two years before I was assigned to the X-files. I failed a lot of students, our killer might be one of them. I’m hoping to go through them and see if one jumps out at me.”

“Figuratively speaking.”

“We’re wasting time, Mulder. Go.”

Mulder hesitated.

“Leave, please.”

**********

A few hours later Mulder found Scully still in the morgue. The fresh body was covered again by a sheet. Scully was over by one of the sinks washing something. Mulder cleared his throat so he wouldn’t startle her.

“Danny found a match to the fingerprint.” Mulder announced.

“The 'Caduceus Killer’, I know.”

“How?”

Scully turned around and held up what she was washing. It was a tiny gold charm. Mulder came up and took it from her. In his palm lay a caduceus, the universally recognized symbol of medicine. The delicate gold trinket bore two snakes wrapped around a winged staff in intricate detail.

“I found it in the heart of the latest victim.” Scully turned and picked up another one off the counter. “I went back and found this one in mouth the previous victim. I forget how many doctors he has killed in the past seven years, but I do know this is his calling card. I would have found it sooner if I had done a complete autopsy on the first victim.”

Mulder knew the number: 11. At least that was the number that had been officially reported. Mulder was almost positive the number was higher. Local police and coroners could easily over look reporting something as small as a piece of jewelry. Even the FBI couldn’t collect all the information on every murder in America. No one knew who the killer really was. He’d left fingerprints, but those prints had never been traced. It takes a previous criminal record or army service to have prints on file. Other than a murder spree this guy was clean.

“Did you get the files I asked for.”

“Yeah, they’re in the records room down the hall.”

“I want to catch this guy, Mulder.” Scully took the charm back and placed it in an evidence bag. “I need to catch him.”

***********

Two days of sifting through enrollment records hadn’t yielded any answers. Scully took off her reading glasses and rubbed her sore eyes. Looking down at her gold watch she found that it was already midnight, she’d been there since four that morning. Mulder couldn’t help her with the files because he didn’t know any of these students. He was going through local dental records trying to identify the second victim who had been rendered unrecognizable by the Caduceus Killer’s dissection of the senses. In doing so he had removed and diced up both eyes, tongue, and half the face while getting at the sinuses.

Mulder put down the X-ray he was looking at and noticed the time himself. Scully had been here when he’d arrived in the morning so he didn’t know how long she’d been working. However, he guess it had been since far before sunrise. She had her back to him so he could see the V of sweat that marred the back of her white blouse. He suddenly got the feeling that the stain was caused more by fever than exertion. It was time to give in for the night.

“You need some sleep, Scully.”

“Just one more hour.”

“No, it’s time to call it a night.”

Mulder was right, and Scully knew. However, she wasn’t about to stop searching, the answer was here. This case was like a choke chain collar around her throat and she couldn’t breath until she broke it. She wanted it solved before the campus went into graduation and that left her less than twenty four hours. She also need to solve it before he claimed his next victim, which very well might be herself.

Mulder came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. Scully paid him no heed and continued to flipped through the files. He slipped his hands down her forearms and caught a hold of her feverantly working hands.

“Stop this.” Mulder hissed softly in her ear.

“Get off me, Mulder.” She tried to shake him off but she could only offer token resistance.

Mulder pulled her closer to take her away from the files. Crossing both their arms around Scully’s waist Mulder attempted to talk some sense into her. “Have you ever heard the story of Archimedes ?”

“Mulder...”

“Hear me out, Scully. This might help. A wise King once came to Archimedes with a problem, he had been given a gift, a golden statue, and he wanted to know whether or not it was solid gold without destroying it. Archimedes struggled with the puzzle for weeks, he tossed and turned at night, he wouldn’t eat. Finally his wife (who was also at her wits end having to deal with him) suggested that he go take a hot bath. He took her advise and while he was getting in the tub he noticed the water level rise: displacement. Suddenly he had a way to discover volume and therefor with weight he could get density which would tell him the diffrence between gold and any other metal -he had his answer. He cried ‘Eureka!’ and was so excited that he leap out of the tub and ran naked through the streets to the palace to tell the King.”

“What’s your point, Mulder?”

“My point is that you need a hot bath.”

*************

Mulder had finally won out. The students were all starting to blur into one anyway. They walked back to the hotel where they were staying, which was only a few blocks from the school. Mulder had brought a few dental records with him in case he suffered from his usual insomnia tonight.

“I’m right next door if anything happens.”

“I know, Mulder. I’ll be fine. Go get some sleep.”

“Only if you’ll do the same.”

Scully didn’t bother replying. She locked the door and turned the hot water on in the tub. A bath did seem like a wonderful idea. She poured some of the hotel shampoo into the running water for bubbles. Slipping out of her cloths and into the tub Scully let the near scalding water attempt to soothe her. The water felt good. Water. Water. Suddenly Scully made a connection. She practically exploded out of the bath tub. Unlike Archimedes however, she remembered to cover herself.

She rushed to the School. All the lights were dimmed and the doors were locked. However, they had been given the codes to the doors. Coming to the picture that Mulder had pointed out to her before of her classmates she searched through the pictures. Looking at the last few names her blood froze when she couldn’t find the name she had come here to find, the name the bath water had reminder her of:

Jeremy Waterson.

“Waterson.” She whispered in horror. He had the training it would take. He knew her, he had 'accidentally' bumped into here after all this time, and he’d known what she had gone into the FBI. In itself none of that was real cause for alarm. However, he had been in forensics as well, he’d told her so. Why hadn’t Dr. Jefferson asked him to help her? Unless Dr. Jefferson didn’t know he was here, or knew that Waterson wasn’t qualified because he had never graduated!

“Brava!”

The ironically chilling accolade spun Scully around. “Waterson!” She snarled.

“I must admit that I was getting disappointed in you.” Waterson walked down the hall in a casual manor. “I was only going to give you till graduation to figure it out. After that I was going to declare myself the winner and claim my prize.”

“What do you want? Why have you been doing this?”

“Revenge, my dear Dr. Dana, revenge.”

“Revenge?” Scully couldn’t even imagine what she could have done to Waterson, she hardly knew him. “Over me? It’s been eight years.”

“You didn’t exactly leave a forwarding address. And don’t think this is all about you. I have been keeping busy, there were 158 of you. 132 now.”

“158 of us?” Scully still didn’t have all the pieces together. Then it dawned on her. Turning slowly Scully stared in horror at the 158 pictures of recently graduated students behind the glass panel. “When Dr. Jefferson told me the murder victim was an ex-student he didn’t mean ‘ex’ as in dead, he meant that he had all ready graduated.” Scully said to herself. Her eyes went wide with growing realization “He graduated with me, all the victims did!”

“You never did take the time to get to know your fellow classmates, did you Dana? Or else you might have recognized the victims or at least made the connection a little sooner. I figured it was a safe bet, you’ve always been cold.”

“You’ve been hunting us all this time? Why, because we became doctors and you didn’t?”

“That’s a bit simply put, but in a way, yes. And when I found you, I found a special case. You not only had to prove you could be a doctor, you went and made Agent. So I thought it would be sweeter to use them both against you. It was easy to get Jefferson to ask for you, I just left the newspaper article that I had used to find you, and he took care of the rest. I thought I would offer you a case you couldn’t solve and a life you couldn’t save. Unfortunately I waited too long and it would seem that you’ve solved the case. But there is still the issue of the life.”

“What life?”

“Why your own, of course.”

***********

Scully went to draw her gun, but found that like the naked Archimedes running to the King she had dashed out of the room too fast and forgotten it.

“Tsk, tsk.” Waterson clucked as he walked calmly closer.

“Stay Back, Waterson!” Scully threatened emptily. She took a moment to size up her opponent. He was wiry, but he still had the advantage of height and weight on her.

“Now, now, Dana, I’m reasonable. I’ll make it quick.”

Standing her ground Scully waited for Waterson to come in range. When he did she spun and kicked him hard in the throat. Waterson dropped to the floor coughing with a mixture of pain and surprise. Scully fled down the hall trying to get to an exit. When she heard Waterson’s outraged cry she took the nearest right to avoid detection. Unfortunately this took her deeper into the building.

Coming to a locked set of glass doors Scully desperately punched in the only door codes she knew. None of them worked on this inner door. When a large caliber bullet shattered one of the glass doors in front of her Scully abandoned the autolock. She had underestimated her enemy, weapons were not part of his profile he’d always used Sodium Penthol, she hadn’t thought that he’d be armed. Scully turned to face Waterson and stepped toward him to get out of the broken glass. If she was going to die she didn’t want to be shot in the back.

“You’re brave.” Waterson croaked, blood stained the corners of his mouth. He held a .45 unsteadily in his left hand.

“I have to be.”

“You’re also fool hearted!” Waterson came up and sharply back handed her across the face. Scully hit the floor, she scrambled back to avoid being kicked. The remaining glass door kept her from going too far.

“Please,” Scully was not below asking for her life “I haven’t done anything! I don’t understand!”

Waterson’s face was flushed, sweat dripped down his hollow face, and his frame trembled. He did not seem like the same calculating killer he’d been a moment ago.

“I just wanted to help people!” Waterson screamed.

“You still can, you can help me! Put the gun down Waterson.” Scully tried to get control of her runaway heartbeat. “You can help me.” She repeated in a whisper.

Waterson wavered for a second. He looked down at his victim who didn’t even seem to notice glass she had backed into. Looking around the empty hall his eyes fell on another set of pictures from a previous graduating class. “No.” He murmured. “No!” He repeated with conviction. “It’s too late for that!”

Scully watched the shaken Waterson try to steady the gun’s aim at her heart. The lack of sleep and the past ten minutes had taken the fight out of her. Scully closed her eyes causing the gathering tears to spill, and waited for the searing lead to take her life.

The shot that rang through the long hallway was almost enough to stop Scully’s heart in itself. However, when the pain didn’t come she slowly opened her tear reddened eyes. Waterson was on his knees at her feet with a look of shock on his pale face. Blood poured out of his cavernous mouth. When he finally fell to the cold floor Scully could see Mulder still standing in his firing stance at the end of the hall. At that moment she realized she’d been holding her breath. When she drew a ragged breath the rush of oxygen to her over exerted system caused her to slip gratefully into unconsciousness.

************

“How did you know to come?” Scully asked Mulder. She had just woken from a two day sleep in a hospital bed, but other than a few cuts and bruises she was no worse for the wear.

“I didn’t really.” Mulder admitted. “I had just identified the second body when I got a notion. I came to the school to check out the picture of your classmates. Not only were the name of both the victims on it, but the names of the other 11 Caduceus Killer victims were also there. I was going to turn back to the hotel when I noticed some blood on the floor. When I stopped to look closer I heard Waterson cry out. You know the rest.”

“Thank you, Mulder.” Scully sat up, she’d been in bed far too long. “There is just one more thing I have to check on.”

“What’s that?”

“He said he had killed 26 of us, I have to know if that’s true.”

“It is, I already checked.” Mulder reached out to and smoothed down her crimson hair. “I’m sorry, Scully.”

“The real tragedy is when you kill a doctor you're not just killing one person. You’re sentencing some of those they would have saved to die as well.”

************