Chapter 1 x-x-x-x-x Psychos do not explode when sunlight hits them, I don't give a fuck how crazy they are. - Seth Gecko x-x-x-x-x Susan Morgan's Rehoboth beach house Rehoboth Beach, Delaware 10:30am Scully struggled to wake up. She hadn't been that tired since...since...since a bad day a few years ago that started with "identifying" Mulder's body and ended in the hospital. Mulder. Scully dragged herself up from the recliner and panicked. Mulder was gone. Jumping up, nearly tripping over the footrest, she quickly discovered him standing on the balcony staring at the ocean. Walking to the balcony door, she noticed he was showered, shaved and in his jeans, black tee-shirt and Nikes. He was scratching his side and studying the horizon. Self-consciously, she combed her fingers through her hair. Scully was relieved. It was not the man on the video screen. "What did you think of Susan?" he asked without turning to her. "Seemed nice enough." she yawned, "Fit the profile." she let slip. "The profile?" Mulder turned his attention to her, "What profile?" Scully blushed a little, making Mulder’s day, "The Mulder "ex" profile. Bright, brunette, beautiful." "Any other "b" words?" he teased. "Probably. She's the reason you're out of the hospital. She found a judge that signed a court order releasing you." "Diana probably didn't like that." Mulder scratched his side and turned to the ocean again. "I got us an order of protection against Diana. Skinner too." "Makes you a "b" word -- busy." "I have a lot to tell you, but I need to know what happened to you." "You know what happened." "No, I don't. I went to see Albert and got a call from Skinner saying you were in the hospital. I get back and you're in the psych ward, Dr. Harriman is worried about a stroke...." "And a lawsuit." Mulder interrupted. "And Diana Fowley was making things difficult again." Mulder turned and smiled at Scully again. She noticed the smile was a peaceful one, not the sad smile she thought was uniquely his. "Come inside, I want to show you something." Scully followed Mulder back into the bedroom. She returned to the recliner while he sat at the end of the bed. "Pick a number one to ten but don't make it two or three since that's your birthday." "Mulder, we don't have time for party tricks." Scully complained. "One to ten. Think about it when you pick it." "This is stupid" Scully told him, but picked a number anyway. "Seven," Mulder told her, "two, two, three equals seven." Scully was surprised but told him "Lucky guess." "One to one hundred. No reason to pick the number either, just pick one." She waved her hand dismissively, "It was a lucky guess Mulder, you won't get this one." "Seventy-one Scully. You can't keep picking numbers that mean anything to you." "What does seventy-one mean to me, Kreskin?" she challenged him. "It was your family's first home in Japan, not the one you lived in the longest, but Housing Unit Seventy-one was your family's first stop." Scully was shocked. She didn't even remember Housing Unit Seventy-one, it was just the one her mother spoke about the most. "Mulder, I don't understand...." "Yes you do," Mulder cut her off, "you just need to believe it. It is why you got the Gunmen to give you their copy of Gibson Praise's CAT scans. You want to compare them, see if mine look like his." "Do they?" "Don't know Scully, you tell me." Mulder scratched his side again, "Whoever Diana is working with thinks so." "What do you mean?" "She has a copy of the etching. She's carrying it with her." "So?" "So? You have a copy of it too, somewhere near here because I can do the Kreskin thing when it's around." "I still don't understand." "Diana's working with the people who experimented on Gibson. People who would be very happy to start working on someone with similar brain scans." Scully was horrified, "My God Mulder." "That's why I fought the doctors at the hospital, why I wouldn't sleep. Not until you saw me, Skinner saw me. If I just disappeared, both of you would have known Diana was involved." "Skinner's dirty." "Skinner's got another keeper. Alex Krycek is back in the picture." "He told you that." Tapping his head, Mulder said "Indirectly." "Jesus, who isn’t involved with this?" "Where are Gibson's CAT scans?" Scully got Mulder's X-Rays and compared them to the ones the Gunmen had for Gibson. They were similar, but not identical. Scully showed the differences to Mulder. Gibson's scans had more activity spread throughout his brain. Mulder's brain activity was more centralized. "That might explain the headaches." Mulder told her. "Are they bad?" "When there is just one person -- like now -- it's a dull throb. It's like I read too much, didn't get enough sleep, was in a stuffy room -- basically a day in my office. And you're not saying one thing and thinking another. That's confusing." Mulder scratched his side again. "When I was in the elevator at work or at AU, it was bad. The elevator emptied out in Hoover before it got too painful but at AU I couldn't get out." Mulder scratched his side again before pulling up his shirt. "You got anything for this?" Mulder showed Scully his side. She gasped at the evenly spaced burn marks below his ribs and looked at him. "Diana. When I figured out what she was up to she was, well, less than thrilled with accusations." "That's how she got you committed." She opened the bag from the Gunmen and took out the first aid kit she requested. "That's how she got me under control. A few phone calls while I was drooling from a fetal position on the floor and Diana had me as a guest of Georgetown Memorial." "Bitch." Scully muttered, working on his wounds. "You keep going to those "b" words Scully." Mulder changed the subject, "You want to tell me what you saw in Africa?" "How do you know I went to ...." Scully stopped herself, she knew how he knew. "I don't know what I saw. Chuck Burks is investigating." Surprised, Mulder asked, "Not the FBI?" "Not after I saw what they did to you." Scully finished on the small burns, "Now what?" "What did Albert tell you?" Scully sighed, "Nothing, he’s dying. They took him to do that ceremony they did to you." "When did they start the ceremony for Albert?" "A couple of days ago. Mulder, Albert is riddled with cancer -- lungs, liver, brain." "The ceremony worked for me." "A man in his thirties who was a little dehydrated, a lot exhausted and coming off an LSD style drug and a minor gunshot wound." "Not that minor." he teased, rubbing his shoulder. "If Albert can't translate it, someone on the reservation can or they'll know someone. We need to get to New Mexico, more importantly we need to get out of the area. Sooner or later Diana is going to get the legal means to get near us." "And I don't want to go back to my padded room." Mulder added. Scully dug through the Gunmen's Knicks bag, "We have ID's, passports, driver's licenses and credit cards." She handed him a plastic bag that read "Mulder". She tore open an envelope with dollar signs on it -- "They only were able to put together about a thousand dollars. That will barely..." "There's money in my apartment. A lot." Scully looked around the well appointed bedroom, "Is the former Mrs. Mulder paying alimony?" "No, " he told her, "after last summer I decided I needed some ready cash for quick hops to the North Pole. When we got the X Files back, I rented the houses on the Vineyard and Quonochontaug for the summer. Money isn't a problem." "Getting back there might be if they're looking for you." "Park a couple blocks away, back door, in and out two minutes. We need to get flight info to Gallup." "Have the boys take care of that" Scully handed Mulder the cellphone the Gunmen left in the duffle bag. "Anything else?" "I'm gonna need ear plugs or headphones or something for the plane. I won't be able to sit on a crowded flight with the etching." "We'll pick something up on the way to your place." She took her overnight bag to the bathroom to clean up, "What else do we need?" "Vegetarian meals on the plane. The food back from Arcadia Falls a few months ago really made me sick. I can't afford another scene." Scully closed the door of the bathroom and readied for her fifth long plane ride in six days. # # #