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S PG
Spoilers: Folie a Deux; The End; Unusual Suspects
Archive: I'll send to Gossamer. All others request the url from me.
Summary: I want you guys to tell me who Diana Fowley is.
IN OTHER CONTEXT: EPHEMERA, TYING The ENDs
EPISODE DIALOGUES by Vince Gilligan and Cris Carter
ISMS ARRANGED by Mary Greten.
ORIGINAL MATERIAL by Mary Greten. <mgreten@xtalwind.net>

~Prelude~

Tall, thin, dark-haired, and tired FBI Agent Diana Fowley dozed in
the uncomfortable motel room chair. Awakening, she immediately
looked for her young charge, Gibson Praise, who had the remarkable ability
to read minds. He had been in front of her watching TV cartoons.

Diana recalled his parting words to Agent Scully:

"They want to kill me, you know."

"Gibson?". Panicking, she glanced around the motel room "safe
house".

Gibson stared out the window behind her.

Diana leapt at him. "What are you doing?"

"There's a man with a gun." the boy said calmly.

Diana dragged and shooed him toward the bed, but she stayed by the
window to verify Gibson's observation. She commanded, "Gibson, get
down. Get back. Get back."

"He didn't come here to kill me. He's aiming at you."

"Wha.!" Shocked beyond control, Diana stood up in front of the
window. A gunshot perforated her lung.

"Is that how it happened?" An unknown voice asked her.
"Yes.", said Diana, bewildered, scrutinized her new surroundings.
"I don't know where I am. It is empty. Peaceful, serene,
pleasant even, but still... a void."
"True", agreed the voice, "you are in the 'deciding place'. The
dimension between your world and eternity."
"I am dead?" Diana queried.
"No, you are attached to time by a silver cord.", replied the
disembodied voice.

~The beginning~

Petite, slim, red-haired, and exhausted FBI Agent Scully had
toughed her way through a long almost uncompromising day.

So long, that even she, who, as an medical doctor, held the highest
respect for necessary psychiatric hospital protocols, wearied of the
floor Nurse's intransigence.

"I'm very sorry, but it is after hours and Mr. Mulder is resting. I'll have
to ask you to come back in the morning.", The automaton insisted again.

Agent Scully sighed audibly and raised her credentials to the nurse.
"I've come a long way, and I know he wants to see me, so what do
you say?"

"I'm sorry. Really. It's hospital policy." The putridly polite person
in white recited by rote.

Scully fed-up, glaring at the nurse, did a mind boggling double take
when she suddenly saw the nurse as a dead woman talking. She would
have done a third take had Mulder's screams not penetrated her
predisposed-to-hear-him-anywhere-anytime cerebellum.

On the run down the hall, Scully unholstered her gun from behind her and
took the safety off. Kicking Mulder's door open, Scully's trigger
finger reacted.She shot at the murky figure attacking Mulder until it
scampered through the window making a pane shattering albeit
instantaneously clean getaway.

Scully looked back at Mulder. Her eyes showed alarm not only for the
evil that passed, but for the more subtle turpitudes her innate sense
of peril, honed by five years in the X-files, warned her would come
as a result.

~In the Deciding Place~

"If I am not dead. Who, then, are you?"
"I am an... Ephemera. Smithereens of a consciousness yet forming.
Your presence in our realm is convening more of us pertinent to your
life and your significance to the lives of those who have been here
before you."
Diana sensed she, too, was mind-only, but that did not stop her from
attempting to raise an eyebrow. "Under whose direction?" The
Ephemera answered, "I do not know, Perhaps when I coalesce, you
can query me again, if it still matters to you".

~The middle of the beginning~

If Assistant Director Skinner was not any two things, he was not a
statue and he was not blind. Two women could crack his stock stern
exterior - Sharon, his estranged wife, and the petite woman sitting
alone in front of his desk.

The woman, wearing a luscious lavender suit and designer heels,
recovered well in the past months from the cancer that closely claimed
her. She toned her body and deliberately decided to add more color
and style to her wardrobe. Heads turned in admiration or envy as she
walked briskly through the hallways of the Hoover building. If she
noticed, she gave no notice.

But Skinner's concern, now, was her partner's immediate mental
state and secondarily her own. He formulated his words carefully.

"Agent Scully, I have to say I'm at a bit of a loss here. Do I infer
correctly from this that you believe there's some merit to Agent
Mulder's claims?"

Scully shifted slightly in her seat. "I believe that Agent Mulder is
mentally sound and fit for duty. Aside from that belief, I can only
present to you the few hard facts that I've been able to gather. That,
as per Agent Mulder's assertions a toxin has been found to have been
injected into the spine of the shooting victim, Mark Backus. As of yet,
we've been unable to identify it. Furthermore, Gregory Pincus has
apparently disappeared without a trace along with half a dozen other
key witnesses integral to this investigation - among them, Agent
Mulder's nurse at the hospital and several VinylRight employees."

But Skinner was not satisfied. "Men and women described by Mulder
as zombies."

Scully visibly sagged, "I can personally vouch for the fact that there
was an intruder in Agent Mulder's hospital room."

"Describe this intruder, Agent Scully"

Scully hesitated. "It was dark, sir."

Skinner's voice hardened a tad. "You must have gotten a glimpse.
What did you see?"

Scully pursed her lips and folded her hands seeking vainly for the
words to mitigate the effect of:

"The moving shadow of what appeared to be big giant bug, sir".

Skinner caught the nuance. "So essentially you saw what
Mulder saw." Worriedly, wrinkling his extended forehead, he
continued. "I don't like how this is sounding, Agent Scully. I trust you
have an explanation I can bring with utmost seriousness to my
superiors that does not preclude your own inability to continue as
Agent Mulder's partner."

Not at all surprised by Skinner's request, Scully replied, "Yes, sir. I
believe I do". Summoning the credence of her convictions, she handed
her superior officer another sheet of paper.

"Sir, I have researched a condition known as "Folie a Deux" and culled
two commentaries on it that, while not only lucid to the lay person,
apply one not all and the other most wholly to our case. If I may, sir,
I'd like to lead you though them as they apply to Agent Mulder and me.

Skinner nodded for her to continue. Scully tackled the longer first.

{"Folie a deux" is characterized by the communication of delusional
ideas from one subject to other ones who have been living closely with
him for a long time, usually his relatives.}

"I do not live closely with Agent Mulder. We live across town from
each other. I am not a relative."

{Before illness shows, there is a leader-follower relationship between
partners}

"Sir, if I seem to 'follow' Agent Mulder, it is because I was assigned
to the X-files in 1992, for the purpose of annotating his discoveries
and theories with those more scientifically palatable to upper
echelons."

{who are lacking of external sources of pleasure and are socially or
culturally isolated.}

"Agent Mulder and I see enough of each other during our cases, that
the normal 9 to 5 routine when not traveling seems like a vacation. He
goes his way. I go mine. And rarely, except for phone conversations,
does this twain meet."

{The dominating partner usually is a paranoic subject who strongly
needs his ideas to be accepted by other people,}

"This might, to some, characterize Agent Mulder, but it does not define
him."

{while the dominated partner is a dependent subject who shares the
other one's ideas in order to get pleasure from him and who is not able
to criticize these ideas because of the lack for external influences.}

"Sir, this is blatantly untrue of me. My external influences continue to
be, by the very fact I am here explaining a well known if,
controversial, co-dependence theory with as much impartiality as
incurred by my medical education, training and natural proclivities, still
very much in effect".

Skinner marveled silently at her ability to comma-speak.

{The two partners project hostility into the external world because, if
the dominated partner does not share the other one's ideas, hostility
will be projected into him and he will become very anxious.}

"As for any interpretations of this beyond the envelope of longtime and
anguished partners protecting each other while investigating cases vile
at the minimum treasonous at the maximum, even a cursory review of
our cases will reveal the true basis for this strong cohesiveness
between Agent Mulder and myself."

{Interpersonal mechanisms in "folie a deux" are similar to those which
take place in brainwashing, hypnosis and psychotherapy.}

"This would only follow if all of the above were true."

Scully fretted, "Sir? You have been silent. Shall I go on to the
second commentary or do you have questions for me now?".

Skinner waved for her to go on to the next one.

{If a couple attempt to merge with each other for all time, rather than
achieving wholeness they will find they become two halves of one
whole - their completeness will be illusory - they will suffer from "folie
a deux".}

"Sir, I should stress that the words 'couple and meldings' in this
commentary is being used in their most generic terms".

{But if each is able to stand fully within him-or herself, respecting the
distance between them, then when meetings and meldings do occur,
they will be truly creative.}

"This is what Agent Mulder and I strive for. Without exception our
cases are X-files precisely because of their defiance of purely
conventional ratiocinations. We do keep a part of ourselves to
ourselves; we need that distance. We cannot afford to think alike; we
must be, each in our own way, inventive."

Skinner said nothing as if waiting for her to finish.

Scully tilted her head. "Sir?"

The Assistant Director rose from his seat and came to lean against the
front of his desk diagonally facing her. His hands at his sides gripped
his desk.

"Agent Scully, you are going to have to help me here. But first I want
you to understand that given the current climate storming around the X-
Files, the worst answer I can give to my superiors is 'I don't know'.
I also need you to further comprehend that I will do my best to avoid
having these questions be asked even if I must seek legal counsel to
do so, but doing that might, in this real world we reside, imply evasion
of evaluation at the very least. Do you 'hear' me, Agent Scully."

Scully, daughter of a Navy captain, heard him just fine.

"Good." Skinner breathed easier. "I am going to ask these questions
the manner they might be posed to you by someone other than
myself."

"I understand, sir."

"Why do you allow Agent Mulder to invade your personal space?
When you are together you both emanate a physical closeness that can
easily be misconstrued. He can practically enfold you within his coat;
you argue in each others' face. If one of you is not running errands,
you lunch together either on a park bench or in your office. Neither of
you cultivate friendships outside it. Why is that, Agent Scully?"

Scully's stomach churned as it did after the chemo treatments for her
cancer. She could taste her bile and moistened her lips with her tongue
to be rid of it.

"My personal space is mine to do with as I wish. I sensed Agent
Mulder's innate need to protect someone. Having failed his sister, I
surmised he was subconsciously projecting that need onto me. Then I
realized, sir, it could be that we are adjusting for our height
differences, as well, while speaking not to be overheard. Don't other
partners argue in the other's face? I had two brothers in my face all the
time. I worked emergency rooms. I always had someone in my face. I
hold my own. Cultivating friendships outside the X-files office? Is this
obligatory? I needn't remind you of Agent Pendrell, Sir. Truthfully,
who would chance our friendship?"

Skinner didn't answer. He, too, had been a target to discredit or
dismantle the X-files. "All right, Agent Scully, that leads me ask you
about comfort..."

"Comfort, Sir?" Scully interrupted. "I still don't have a desk." Her eyes
twinkled a smile.

Skinner blinked in surprise at this unusual display of Scully's humor.

"I didn't mean to open old wounds here...I should have said 'solace'.
How do you both cope with the repercussions from the loss of loved
ones; abductions; cancer; the horrors of Home, Pennsylvania, Chaco
Chicken, the Modells, big giant bugs; possible alien invasions and the
task of taking on a global conspiracy to cover them up? What do you
do in your motel rooms to help each other through the night?"

Scully bristled at the implication of improprieties, but kept her voice
steady.

"We find a place to run or otherwise workout; we order take out and
rent videos and crash mindlessly into both; we read or write reports.
Rarely, when we've successfully completed a case, we celebrate at a
decent restaurant and/or attend a movie, play or sporting event. On
the more unconscionable cases, we leave each other alone unless one of
us hears the other hurting then we hold on to each other until we are
both spent and occasionally falling asleep together, but that is given
no more thought than falling asleep on a shared beach blanket except
perhaps we are wearing more clothes. And, anticipating your next question,
the adjoining rooms are to watch each other's backs not wash them."

"Thank you, Agent Scully, that will be all." Skinner moved to behind
his desk allowing Scully room to maneuver out of her chair and walk to
the door. As she twisted the doorknob, Skinner, not looking up, re-
iterated,

"I will honor my promises. I can't promise more than that."

"I understand, Sir." Without looking back, Scully shut the door
behind her .

~The end of the beginning~

Scully met Mulder who had been pacing at the elevator. "What did
you tell him?" Mulder asked nervously as they entered the elevator.
"The truth...as well as I under stand it." She dodged.
"Which is?"
"Folie A Deux. A madness shared by two." Elevator doors closed.
Mulder pressed the down button. "So, Skinner accepted your explanation?"
"He did, but..." Scully fidgeted.
"Just say it, Scully"
"I think we can expect visitors of the earthly kind very soon, Mulder"

~In the Deciding Place~

"Does any of this make sense to you, Diana?" a new voice asked.
Diana was jolted aback. "Who are you?"
"We are the same Ephemera. There are more of us here now"
"How can I see events that happened before I transferred back to
D.C."
"It helps that each of these beings have each been, each in their own
way, here before you. Part of their essence remains with us."

~The Beginning of the Middle~

Having seen Mulder's apartment, Skinner was not surprised that the X-
files office seemed to be Mulder's true home. Newspaper clippings
tacked to a bulletin board and files strewn about. An "I Want to Believe"
poster with a post-it note on the UFO declaring "You are here". A rare,
if more than one of two, picture of Mulder and Scully standing in a
doorway reading a paper. Skinner stared sadly at the picture wondering
if he could get one for himself. He absent minded picked up few files and
in perusing them missed seeing Mulder's entry.

Mulder was clearly surprised to see him.

"Wow, you know you're going places in the Bureau when the
Assistant Director tidies up your office for you. What's up?"

Skinner was slightly abashed to be seen in such a sentimental
moment. "I was just, uh, looking."

Since Scully's cancer and their separate battles to ferret the cure from
their common enemy, the men shared a muted informality.

"For anything special?"

"I came down to ask you something. I, uh, I guess I was nosing around
-wondering about you- your, uh, long-term plans."

"MY long term plans? You got them right there in your hands." He
took the files with paternal care from Skinner and inserted them into
one of the cabinets that lined the far wall.

Skinner rephrased himself. "What do you hope to find? I mean, in
the end."

If Skinner was trying to lead him anywhere else, Mulder missed the
leash. "Whatever I hope to find is in here. And maybe I'll know it
when I find it."

~In the Deciding Place:~

"What is it, Diana. I feel pity from you."
"Skinner was trying to gauge the purpose of my return's effect on
Mulder and Mulder doesn't have a clue."
"These 'X-files' obviously means much to these beings."
"Do you really know what they are?" Diana wondered.
"Eventually."

~The Middle of the Middle~

Scully inserted the head scans of Gibsons head into the backlighted
frame. "Analyze the data with an eye to the parapsychological." She
told the three men that she had caught preparing themselves for bed.

"Ooh!. A walk on the wild side." The shortest and oldest man
exclaimed.

Scully, looking away, switched off the viewer. "First, I want you guys
to tell me who Diana Fowley is."

"Diana Fowley? Geez, we haven't heard that name in a while." Byers.
the slim, trim bearded one said.

"Then you know her."

"Well. Yeeaaah." Bryers droned out a delay.

Frohike broke the silence, "She was Mulder's chickadee when he just
got out of the Academy. Good-looking."

"Well, she claims to have worked closely with him for a while." Scully
prodded.

"She was there when he discovered the X-Files." Blond tresses Langly
answered. "She has a background...para-science."

"She got a legate appointment a while back in Berlin." Byers blurted.
"I always wondered why they split up."

Scully, uncomfortable, looked away and grimaced tightly. Still not
looking at the men, she turned the viewer light on. " Well. Why don't
you boys see what you can find?"

Later, on her way to show their findings to her partner, Scully nearly
burst in on Mulder and Diana holding hands and smiling. Benumbed,
she continued to walk down the hallway, paused in thought then reversed
her steps without glancing through the window. Mulder and Diana were
still holding hands.

Scully returned to her car. With some difficulty, she found the key
hole, opened the door, tossed Gibson's scans on the passenger seat.
She used the quiet in her car to ponder the recent sequence of events
for a bit. Then, she inhaled deeply and reached for her cell phone.
Exhaling slowly, she dialed.

Mulder let go of Diana's hand and stepped aside to answer his phone.

"Mulder, it's me"

There was a slight reticence. "Where are you? Scully"

"I'm, uh, I'm on my way to work." She decided. "I was hoping I could
show you something. Something about the boy."

"I'm at the psych facility with him. Why don't you come by and show
me?

"Uh, no, I'd ... I'd prefer to show you at work if that's okay."

"Okay, what is it?"

"I think you'll be surprised, Mulder. Very surprised."

~In the Deciding Place~

Diana found herself smiling at her three old acquaintances and vaguely
sensed there was more herself here now.
"Why are you chuckling, Diana?" A female voice inquired.
"I am taken back to see how open minded she is. That is not how she
projects."
"It is a professional persona she has perfected through out her career.",
the voice replied knowingly. "More of us are coalescing too."

~The End of the Middle~

As Scully pulled out of the parking space, she just missed being
careened into by Agent Jeffery Spender, the inexperienced Agent in
charge of the Gibson investigation. Getting out of his car, Spender
was accosted by a murky figure who had been smoking a cigarette in
the shadows.

"Agent Spender. I need to speak with you." The man demanded.

"Who are you?"

"Somebody who's taken an interest in you ... in this case of yours.
This case I gave you."

"Who are you? NSA? CIA?

"You're a bright boy".

"You said you had information." Spender deflected.

"Control the board. Know which men to sacrifice and when."

It was the aroma of the cigarette smoke that first alerted Agent
Mulder to the Cigarette Smoking Man's presence. Intuition did the rest.

"Agent Spender!." Mulder yelled on the run. "Agent Spender?
Who were you talking to?"

"I don't know". Said Spender genuinely confused.

Mulder fumed. "You don't know who you were talking to?
You're lying."

"What's your deal?"

"I was told he was dead."

"Well, obviously whoever it is, he's not.". Spender shot back.

~In the Deciding Place~

Diana, if she could see herself, had paled. "I know that Shadow man's
voice." She said.
"So do we." replied the Ephemera.
Curious, Diana queried, "You said that I am in the dimension between
time and eternity. Do you come from eternity?"
"When the spirit moves us." the Ephemera's voice smiled. "We exist
here as long as we are needed."

~The Beginning of the End~

Assistant Director Skinner convened a meeting in his office to discuss
the ramifications of Scully's findings.

At Mulder's soft nudging, Scully began. "All of the boy's brain
processes are showing extraordinary activity in exactly this part of the
brain. Which is not just abnormal or anomalous, but from what I know
absolutely unheard of."

"There are corollaries," Mulder interrupted, "The individuals who have
been responsible for great leaps forward in understanding in science.
Newton, Galileo, Einstein, Stephen Hawking. All these men exhibited
modes of thinking that are suggestive of access to special brain
centers."

The A.D. was not convinced. "All right. So this kid is a human oddity.
Tell me why anyone would go to such lengths as to kill him?"

"This kid may be the key not just to all human potential, but to all
spiritual unexplained paranormal phenomena. The key to everything
in the X-Files.", emphasized Agent Mulder.

"We're supposed to believe that this boy was going to be killed
because of the X-Files?" Agent Spender sneered.

Scully, a quiet sufferer of the stings of verbal darts, mildly chastised
him. "You mischaracterize what I've said. This would be quantifiable
scientific proof of everything Agent Mulder and I have investigated
over the past five years."

Agent Fowley objected, "How do you quantify the spiritual? It can't
be done. You ask for immunity for a killer on that basis, the Attorney
General's gonna go off. You're allowed to investigate the X-Files as an
indulgence. But draw the wrong kind of attention and they'll close you
down. Put an end to all your work. Something I happen to have an
interest in myself."

Mulder nodded. At which of Fowley's statements, Scully could only
conjecture.

Skinner heard enough. "Let's everyone step out into the hall. Agent
Mulder, you stay put."

~the Middle of the End~

As coincidence would ordain it, the only two women in a crowded
room, previously essentially unknown to each other, who find their
fates are inextricably bound by a common interest if not goal, faced
each other at the intersection on paths out of the room. The men held
their places in expectation. Since Scully was already directly in line
with the door, she took point, but not before a universal female signal
was shared and agreed upon between the two.

Scully stood away from the men who milled arround directly in front of
the office. She leaned against the wall near the corner positioned so
she could see should they be called back. Agent Fowley followed;
she, too, braced herself against the wall.

"Will Skinner agree to this, Agent Scully? I don't know the man".

"I do. But, I am not aware what other parameters he must factor
into his decision."

"Including me?", countered Agent Fowley.

After a few moments deliberation, Scully decided to accept her
overture, "I don't know much about you. But I do have some
'It wouldn't surprise me' hypotheses."

"And, what would they be, Agent Scully?"

"I think at some date during your time with Agent Mulder, you were
recruited by a well dressed man, American, deep voiced, who spoke
as if the words were coming from the back of his throat. He convinced
you that Agent Mulder had lost his way in Violent Crimes and he
needed your help to steer and entrench him in the right direction
toward the X-files. In return for your joining the FBI and subsequent
co-operation, he would see to it that you were well rewarded by a
position more challenging and suitable to your abilities. I think your
motives were honorable, but your work with Agent Mulder was too
good; you enjoyed the X-files as they were then. With you there, they
couldn't manipulate Agent Mulder to fit their agenda; you, in your own
way, were I. You lucked out. You got a promotion. They gave me cancer.

"As for your requested reassignment and things at home you decided
you wanted to get back to, I, having watched your first patron die,
believe you were contacted by phone by a man who had been
presumed dead. He probably sounded as if he were speaking with a
cigarette in his mouth or puffing on one constantly. His method of
eliciting your assistance would have been less genteel than your
previous patron but nonetheless effective: Agent Mulder was in
trouble, recently released from a mental institution by his partner who
may not be too stable herself, and persuing the X-files inappropriate to
the its 'original intent'. Like you, before me, I must be removed. They
couldn't do it with cancer, botched my murder killing my sister, and
took my daughter. So, they bring back my partner's ex-lover with
credentials to evaluate our work and partnership and re-direct the X-
files to more suit their needs."

Scully paused.

"I may have said too much, but I seek no confirmation nor to I expect a
denial. "Again, I have no quarrel with your intentions. But I deem I
must tell you that you are being used, and because of an affinity of
purpose between us, I sense they will soon abuse you too. Normally, I
keep my own counsel, but Agent Mulder has been through too much
to lose you to them also."

Agent Fowley said nothing for a second or three then asked. "When
did Fox take that damn ring off?"

Scully, jerked out of the seriousness of the moment, had to laugh. "He
wasn't wearing it when I first met him. I found it later in his desk
while looking for a data tape. He made no effort to hide it. I assumed
it to be his father's wedding ring given to him after the divorce. The
Lone Gun Men said he wore it in 1989 when they first met him. They
said at one point it was the only thing he was wearing. But his records
showed him always to be single. I've never had the need to questioned
him about it. Was it from you?"

"God, No." Fowley exclaimed. "He got it at a Christmas Party his
second year in Violent Crimes. Each year they would pick a name
from a hat, all but Reggie Perdue and the previous year's selectee were
eligible. Mulder's name was picked. They gave him the ring as
the man most wedded to his work and by extrapolation least likely to
get married. Mulder wore it faithfully in pique of perverse irony."

~In the Deciding Place~

Diana noticed that the void had developed a horizon of inviting
bright, glowing light.
"Your tether to time has dissapated." said the Ephemera.
"I am near death?"
"Very."

~The End of the End~

The two agents stood in stunned silence in their fire gutted office.
Scully held tightly to the arms of a disbelieving Mulder. Time, for
them, became a swirling vortex of cases, actions, reactions, losses
and few gains. And now, Skinner had to tell them that Agent Fowley's
condition had worsened. Mulder, named in her living will as he was in
Scully's, was needed at the hospital. Scully heard Skinner at the door.

"Come on, Mulder." She pleaded. "Agent Fowley needs you. We'll take a cab."

If Skinner were still a Marine would have saluted this woman as she
passed him on the way out. "No, I'll drive. Agent Fowley is technically
still under my jurisdiction." He volunteered.

At the hospital, it was the swing shift with its minimal staff and
ICU was having a bad night. Two code blues were already in progress.
Scully read Agent Fowley's charts and monitored the pumpers and
other life support devices. Agent Fowley was now in accute cardiac
distress. Scully could not find an resident or intern not already
involved in a life saving situation. Like it or not, she would have
to ask Mulder's permission to tend Agent Fowley herself.

"Mulder, listen to me. Her heart is failing. They have the drugs and
defibrillator in here; but does she want to be resuscitated?"

For the first time since the phone call about the fire, Mulder spoke.
"Try, Scully, please try, we've lost too much today not to try".

Scully commandeered an overworked floor nurse, announced she was a
visiting M.D. and that there was no time for more formal introductions.
She then transported her mind back to her emergency room tenure and
went to work.

~In the Deciding Place~

"Agent Scully was correct, you know. That is why I was so shocked
when the boy claimed I was the target."
"You have to chose to return, now, Diana" The Ephemera urged her.
"Will I remember any of this? I should know... this... I have a degree
in Para-Science..."
"Most of our returns remember in everything in part or whole, sooner
or later, depending on their disposition. But, before you leave, one of
us has been granted unique permission to ask you a favor. Will you
try? Good. Now, Go back. Click your heels if it will help, Hurry".
It was foolish, she knew, but Diana could swear she saw the Ephemera
waving and then dispersing like a thousand fireflies from a single egg.

~Epilogue~

A long week later, Agents Mulder and Scully were interrupted while
scavaging and salvaging their office. Each had been making alternate
visits Agent Fowley in ICU at the appointed hours. Scully knew
that the comatose are sometimes able to hear, so why not visit for a
chat. In the words of a fictional MASH doctor, "It couldn't hoit".
The hospital called again. Skinner brought them the news. Agent Fowley
was conscious and asking for Scully.

All three arrived promptly at the next visiting period allowing Agent
Fowley to become more stabilized in the interim. However, only Scully
was permitted to see Agent Fowley.

Scully held Agent Fowley's hand and put her ear close to Agent
Fowley's mouth to avoid taxing the ailing agent's energy and
inevitable sore throat.

But Diana's voice was as soft and lilting as a child's...

"Mommy, don't cry anymore. I am with Aunt Missy."

~The Beginning~

.................................................

References:

1. Lozzi B, Michetti F, Alliani D, Preziosa P, Loriedo C, Vella G:
RELATIONSHIP PATTERNS IN "FOLIE A DEUX". [REVIEW].

2."The Druid Way" Phillip Carr-Gom, directed to me by
DM3567@aol.com

3.Near Death Experiences www.spiritweb.org/Spirit/nde-faq.html

4.Out of Body experiences www.spiritweb.org/Spirit/obe-faq.html