I say, 'what living man would wear your suit?

You sew for monsters, or sew for no one.'

He glances up, blue eyes still squinting:

....'I sew an endless suit

to clothe the mist and keep it warm

and give it any shape I can.

My son, my son, here, please put it on.'"

                    --Irving Feldman. "Family History."

Thursday, May 19, 1988. 2:22 PM. J. Edgar Hoover Building. Freight Elevator to the Basement Level.

"Aw, come on. She's gotta be kidding..."

Sauceda peered from the open elevator into the gloom of the corridor stretching beyond. The overhead fluorescents were the economical low-watt variety, great for the national economy, no doubt, but not good for much else. And only half of the lights scattered down the hall were even on at all. The air conditioning didn't seem to be operating on this floor, either; the basement was sweltering. Humidity weighted the heated air, and Sauceda's lungs labored to draw it in. He patted his pocket for the key Dorothy had handed him, trying to reassure himself that she had made no mistake.

Dorothy Bahnsen had been with the Bureau even longer than Sauceda. By a few years, anyway. She'd worked records when every file in the Bureau could be housed in cabinets along the walls of the bullpen. And she'd developed the records system to keep track of those files when they'd grown too cumbersome for simple alphabets. Through the years, Dorothy had supervised the transition of records from handwritten index cards, to computer punch cards, to microfilm, and now into massive databases. Her current project was the installation of a computerized scanning system, guaranteed to render every file in the Bureau instantly accessible-- from anywhere in the world-- with the touch of a button. And the proper password, of course. The Bureau's case files were Dorothy's life, her children, and she boasted that she had touched-- at least once-- every record ever filed in the Bureau Headquarters. Few people disputed the claim.

Sauceda had contacted her the morning before, slipping off to Mulder's bedroom and keeping his voice low. He needed anything, he'd explained, that might shed some light on the disappearance of Samantha Mulder and the subsequent investigation. But he didn't want a trail of file requests that could be traced back to him. Dorothy assured him that she would fulfill the request herself, and set to work immediately, discreetly sending data searches into every file system and database at her disposal.

Most turned up zilch. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children coughed up a file on the case but it was far from the usual NCMEC standards. The Center hadn't been founded until 1984, but they'd done a fair job of developing files on earlier cases, in an attempt to centralize records. Still, the Mulder report was unusual in its brevity. You'd think when a man worked for the State Department there'd be a little more interest shown when his daughter vanished from the face of the earth, leaving her brother on his knees in the middle of the living room, completely catatonic. Maybe Purdue had been onto something. Maybe Skinner's cigarette-smoking friend *did* have something up his sleeve--

Sauceda's only other reference had brought him here to the basement. It wasn't anything Dorothy had discovered, though. Yesterday afternoon, still locked up tight in apartment 42, Mulder's unrelenting stare devouring the television, Sauceda had pulled out his much-thumbed copy of Baez' report. He had the paper all but memorized by now, but he was desperate for some kind of help, some glimpse, however brief, into the working of Mulder's mind. Or at least someone's intelligent attempts at interpreting it. The psychological analysis had to hold some kind of key. Something they had all missed.

Sauceda was proud of his version of the report-- but secretly. He kept it hidden in a pocket of his suitcase, squirreled away like miser's gold, fingering it occasionally to reassure himself of its reality. His copy, after all, was not the pristine, sanitized, officially-sanctioned summary submitted to Blevins and Skinner and filed so methodically into Mulder's personnel records. No, Sauceda had obtained his copy directly from the source-- "borrowing" Baez's draft from the man's motel room in Shreveport and availing himself of a copier at the pharmacy up the street. His partner's life duplicated in blinding pulses of light at five cents per page.

There were discrepancies between the draft and the final report. Concerns carefully edited, a few minor points added, but for what reasons, Sauceda had no clue. Baez had pages of notes from his sessions with Mulder, a kind of fact-finding question-and-answer procedure that had surely done little to help the young man come to terms with the escalating body count in Shreveport. From what Sauceda could tell, most of the questions attempted to document childhood memory lapses-- Mulder could remember birthday parties, but not those who came. He recalled men visiting with his father at all hours, but never seemed to have seen their faces. He could remember sports scores, games played before he was even born, but his entire senior year of high school was a blank-- The subject seemed to fascinate Baez. For that matter, it fascinated Sauceda and he'd been furious when Baez failed to comment on the subject in his official report. Had the man simply decided that the subject was irrelevant? That the young profiler's carefully veiled anxieties were moot? Perhaps Baez had attempting to curb his own personal curiosity in favor of a more balanced assessment. Maybe he decided that detailed documentation of dream states, Mulder's astounding leaps of logic and the mental shorthand that generated them, were beyond the scope of law enforcement and bureaucrats.

Sauceda couldn't ask, of course, not without revealing his own duplicity, his theft. But the report had burned into his brain over the past several months, intruding at odd times during cases, and even during his sleep. He'd found himself reciting whole paragraphs whenever he'd glanced over to find Mulder staring out the window of a plane or a car, dark eyes bright but distant, that formidable brain arranging and rearranging the world fleeing past his vision. The unedited report was cramped, handwritten notes lining all margins, mostly indecipherable. But even the legible ones were couched in language that shed little light on the man entrusted to watch Sauceda's back, who shared his meals and slept in the next motel room.

This time, however, in Mulder's apartment, one notation had suddenly become quite clear. So clear that Sauceda marveled that he hadn't noticed it before. But there it was on the left margin of the third page: a letter and a dash followed by a short string of numbers. The standard format of a Bureau file number. Sauceda'd called it in to Dorothy that afternoon, just on the dubious hope that it might mean something to her.

She'd laughed at him. "And just what kind of hocus pocus do they have you investigating, Dr. Sauceda?"

She always called him by his title-- on duty at least. Always so proper. Always so carefully professional when other eyes were around to notice, other ears. It was the *way* she said the words that was seductive as hell, like the way she had of glancing at him over her glasses. She could still make his southern hemisphere burn, even after all these years and he'd been grateful she couldn't see his blush through the phone.

"I dunno, Dot. I was hoping you could tell me."

"Well, sir"-- again that warm purr-- "when they send a man of science to pull an X File, I think maybe it's time you retired."

And then she'd explained it to him. X Files. Paranormal psychobabble and UFO baloney. For years she'd filed them under "U" for "Unsolved/Unexplained" until she'd simply run out of room in the file cabinet and moved on to the mostly unused letter "X." Her own personal contribution, she'd confessed, and Sauceda could hear her pride through the line. But in recent years, the files had been banished to the basement despite her objections, a reflection of the high regard the Bureau brass held for this nonsense.

Now, standing in the poorly filtered basement, Sauceda wondered why the brass even bothered. Why keep track of cases that didn't even warrant a decent share of the electric bill?

He sighed, eyes aching in the flickering fluorescents, his head pounding from lack of sleep. This was a wild goose chase and he had only himself to blame. His partner was locked down in a hotel room like some caged animal, and here Lenny stood: fiddling around in the basement looking for crap so ridiculous no one even wanted to admit it existed. Still, it was the best lead he had at the moment.

Talk about a sorry state of affairs--

"Third door," Dorothy had told him solemnly. "Third door on the left from the elevator."

Actually locating a third door, however, was quite another matter. File boxes and office discards littered the corridor on both sides, some of the debris stacked to the ceiling. Sauceda found the first door blocked by cases of copier paper, no doubt hoarded away by some over-achiever department head. He almost missed the second door, noticing it in passing only as a knob sticking out beside some oversize file cabinets.

The third door, however, was just past a short corner, unblocked. Sauceda grinned at his good fortune. Apparently, not many people bothered to come this far down the hall, not that he could blame them. An old oak desk had been pushed against the wall across from the door. It was littered with boxes of unused folders and envelopes, an ancient stapler. There was a rather foul looking coffee cup on the desk's one free corner, someone's ash tray still filled with cigarette butts. Either the rats were getting bigger or some hardy soul had made himself a quiet break area.

Dorothy's key slipped into the lock easily enough. The odor of dust and old paper, sulfuric in the heat, burned down his throat as he pushed the door open. Sauceda laid his hand over his mouth and nose but it didn't help much. Within seconds, he was sneezing convulsively; he left the key in the lock to dig for his handkerchief. Dorothy had warned him: the basement was the deep dark hell of filedom, where bad files go to die. Sauceda hadn't thought it wise to laugh at that bit of information. Dorothy had an odd way of being serious when he least expected it.

The lighting, when he found the switch, wasn't much better here than it had been in the hall. An old drafting table dominated one corner of the room, along with an even more ancient typewriter. Another ashtray, used, sat beside it, along with a neat stack of typing paper. The room rambled on disjointedly to his right, a few dusty tables shoved together piecemeal in another corner, shelves disappearing into the darkness beyond the scope of the light.

Two file cabinets sat alone against the wall facing him. Sauceda's brows drew into a single concentrated line and he peered into the darker recesses of the room. Nothing. He regarded the cabinets again, thoroughly disappointed. Hell. Two lousy cabinets and they went to the trouble to shove them way off down here? These were just files, for crying out loud, not harbingers of a plague. Sauceda had dealt with bureaucracy for the better part of his life-- it just never seemed to get any clearer to him.

He fumbled in his pocket for the scrap of paper with his file number: "X-40253" and began his search with the left-hand cabinet, the top drawer. The cabinet was full, the folders packed in so tightly he could scarcely get his fingers in to search the file tabs. He jerked his hand back several times as the folders bit in defense-- damned paper cuts-- but persistence paid off soon enough. He found the file in the third drawer and cursed the dim light, squinting to verify the number.

"X-40253: Subject: Samantha T. Mulder. I.D. 378671." Hey. All right, then--

Then Sauceda frowned in earnest. He'd come down here expecting to simply find another slim folder, a duplication of the information filed with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. But this file was a thick one, several inches deeper than the NCMEC's.

So what the hell was it doing squirreled away down here with all the crap files?

Sauceda blinked, trying to adjust his eyes as he fanned through the papers in the folder-- and then he grinned. Well, of course this file was thicker-- there was another folder tucked inside it, creating the bulk of the paperwork. No doubt just someone's careless filing. Yep. A wild goose chase.

His headache was getting worse. Hell, it was time to get back to Marty. He didn't like the idea of being away too long, he didn't care what Purdue said about keeping an eye on the kid himself. No one knew Marty like he did and--

Sauceda yanked the file free, but lost his grip just as it came loose from the drawer. The folder thumped to the floor, the shock of its impact echoing in the tombed silence, papers and contact sheets and glossy x-ray film skittering free across the concrete.

*Clumsy old man...*

Sauceda knelt, gathering papers guiltily. Dorothy was going to have his hide. Of course, he could always tease her about her sloppy file clerks. He glanced at the misfiled folder, trying to determine which papers went where. "X-71009." My. Someone really *had* been doing some shabby filing.

Sauceda's eyes traveled further down, however, just a scant inch, to the name below the number. The faded letters knocked the air from his lungs. His knuckles slammed down hard against the concrete as he struggled to remain upright.

"Subject: Fox William Mulder. 10-13-61. I.D. 292544."

And such a nice thick file, too--

Sauceda's hands trembled as he scrambled for forms and photos, trying to view them in the miserable lighting, unable to wait until he could see adequately, unable to trust his legs to stand. He flipped the folder open, scattering its contents into a collage around his knees.

It was the oddest case file Sauceda had ever come across. There were no police reports, no crime scene photos, no witness statements or search warrants. Instead, the papers seemed to document a series of rather oddly divergent tests. Sauceda settled on his haunches, flipping through pages hesitantly, recognizing the significance of scarcely half of what he perused: EEG's, Rorschach psychological evaluations, REM patterns, something labeled "Kirlian and ESP-er Data." He held a sheet of X-ray film to catch the light across the room and recognized the disjointed dashes of DNA imaging.

Pages of them.

And there were pages of other things, too, each with unfathomable labels: Ganzfeld, DMILS.... One page provocatively declared itself Precognition/Clairvoyance DAT. Sauceda noted a frequently recurring reference to something called MKULTRA and Project Ultra stamped along the upper right hand corners. The DNA film was labeled "PROJ. MRKURY," an unassuming stamp along the lower corner. Sauceda, lost in the overload of incomprehensible initials and terms, began looking for what he could understand and his eye focused on the dates of each report. His heart began to pound, banging in his ears as he scattered papers across the floor, scanning the forms, incredulous.

The DNA testing was recent, covering a scant 3 years, but other dates went so far back, Marty must have been a toddler-- Sauceda wiped sweat from his brow and looked again. No. Younger, even. Some of them. Christ. The files chronicled a lifetime of tests conducted since birth. He noted a very recent date: Marty's trip to Georgetown for that gunshot wound last year.

God Almighty, but Marty hadn't said jack-- Sauceda pulled that set of papers loose: "REM Analysis" and "P/C DAT Followup." The subject, the report informed him dispassionately, had been dosed with Halcion following the testing. Sauceda shook his head, blinking to verify the dosage as the paper trembled in his hand: Halcion at that level was notorious for causing black-outs, short-term memory loss. There would have been no legitimate reason to subject a gunshot victim to that kind of drug, especially at that level--

Sauceda searched the papers again. There was a definite pattern: Mulder, younger and younger, tested, and dosed with various drugs that could erase the memory of that testing. These weren't physician's reports, he realized. They weren't even the credible records of researchers. The men who'd signed these forms were psychological rapists, vultures awaiting any opportunity to get Mulder in a medically fragile situation so they could perform a few more tests--

That was it, then. That was the reasoning behind the latest push to verify Mulder's stability. They weren't worried for him. The bastards needed some more blood. A few more EEG's--

A single name leapt at him from the page in his hand. It made his blood freeze.

"Rorschach Evaluation. Subject Age 12. Martha's Vineyard Hospital, Linton Lane, Oak Bluffs." Test results signed by a Dr. Heitz Werber, project psychologist. Followed by a letter requesting the assistance of a Dr. Emil Baez, psychiatrist.

He remembered the first meeting with Baez in Shreveport. The man introducing himself to Mulder, smiling, Mulder scanning him cautiously. With no hint of recognition. And Baez had said nothing. Like he hadn't *expected* Mulder to remember--

*Christ. God. Sacred Heart of Jesus--*

"Drop something, Dr. Sauceda?"

Sauceda jerked at the silken voice from the door. He spun around painfully on his haunches and the hair stood up on the back of his neck at the sight of the man framed in the gloom.

Sauceda had never known his name but he recognized the craggy face well enough. That glacial gaze had been silent witness to Sauceda's assignment to Marty nine months ago, a solemn sentinel in the corner of Skinner's office as Patterson had detailed Sauceda's duties and rationalized Mulder's peculiar quirks. The stranger's silence, his snake-sure eyes, the way he flicked his cigarette ashes-- an overly finicky cat pronouncing judgment on some less-than-delectable morsel-- unnerved Sauceda even then. But neither Skinner nor Patterson had acknowledged his presence. It was as if he'd been invisible to all eyes save Sauceda's.

And the smoking bastard hadn't changed a bit. Sauceda wondered how long the man had been lingering in the shadows of *this* office.

The man in the door smiled languidly. The action never reached his eyes, not even to crinkle the wrinkles that much deeper. "Find some interesting reading material, Dr. Sauceda?" The man sucked at his drug of choice like it was some kind of oxygen delivery system. He took a leisurely step into the room and Sauceda jerked to his feet, wiping his hands on his jacket, seeking to be rid of whatever had attracted the attention of this carrion-eater.

The smoking man continued to advance, however. Sauceda retreated steadily, uncertain why, but determinedly following his instincts, his training serving him well. His back hit the open drawer of the cabinet, slamming it shut. The noise was an explosion, echoing in the vaulted room and the other man stopped, one foot on a page of Mulder's file, an action calculated for casual accident. Sauceda didn't fool himself that anything this man did was accidental.

*He knew.* He knew about the file. Its contents. Its significance to Mulder-- Sauceda felt his blood rush to his feet as he accepted the realization, saw his comprehension register in the indifferent eyes behind the veil of smoke.

"Marty doesn't know." Sauceda's voice was small, he surprised himself that he had found his tongue at all. "He has no idea--"

The man smiled again; it looked like a gash in a death mask.

Sauceda's heart pounded ominously, his shirt sticking under his arms. He shook his head to clear it. It wasn't like he was being held at gunpoint, dammit-- "He thinks he's going crazy. And he's not. It's-- the spook--" he waved frantically at the scattered reports on the floor "--it's something that's been done to him. On purpose--"

Smokey clicked his tongue. It sounded vaguely obscene.

"See here, Dr. Sauceda. You give us entirely too much credit." The cigarette waved the air, a lazy sweep, disregarding whole lives, executing nations. "Just what is it you propose we've done? Created some kind of mutant? A serial killer detector? A modern vampire slayer, perhaps?" Again, the self-indulgent smile. "I assure you that is all far from the facts. Still. We've had the occasional interesting side-effect, don't you think?"

Sauceda was breathing much too hard. "Just what the hell have you done to--"

"What we have or have not done is insignificant to this discussion, Dr. Sauceda. What *you* intend to do, however-- that would be the determining factor, now. Wouldn't you say?"

Another patient drag off the cigarette. The movement reminded Sauceda of a man delicately pulling the wings off a fly. Right now, he had entirely too much sympathy for the fly. The dark-suited man shrugged at Sauceda's silence, flicked ashes over the DNA data.

"How's your wife, Dr. Sauceda? Imelda, isn't it? And that grandson of yours? Doing very well in school, I hear. Kindergarten, isn't it?" A tilt of that skullish head. "Such a bright young boy. So much promise."

Sauceda's knees buckled slightly but he refused to kneel. He heard the words well enough, though. Their meaning. And the words the man didn't bother to speak.

"A shame," the stranger purred, "if something should happen to them... Tragic. And completely avoidable, of course."

Sauceda closed his eyes, opened them. Opened more than just physical eyes, saw more than just the day to day of his mundane life. Saw things too clearly for an old man just waiting on the bliss of a well-deserved retirement...

The man regarding him noted that change as well and smiled contentedly.

"You needn't worry about your partner, Dr. Sauceda. Young Mulder will be just fine. I'll see to that." A slow solemn flexing of the mouth. The repetition of a vow. "I've seen to that for years."

Sauceda didn't remember the long trip back to his car, didn't remember even leaving the room, or what had become of Dorothy's key. And he didn't care. He was too numb to reason, too shaken to allow himself the luxury of concern. He stood shivering in the heat of the parking garage, laid a steadying hand on the hood of his car and vomited his fear beside the wheel.

Mulder woke to the sound of seed husks cracking in another room. He lay quite still, eyes closed under the crook of his arm, heartbeat lulled by the comforting noises of his dad in his study, calmly munching sunflower seeds. His own breathing echoed in the stillness-- silence so deep that the earth seemed uninhabited, only he and his father remained. Mulder smiled, reveling in the assurance that everything, finally, was okay. Everything would be better now.

Until he made the mistake of opening his eyes. And there it was waiting for him, as it did each time he woke: that gut-wrenching assurance that Samantha was not there, and that nothing was better and nothingwouldeverbebetteragain.

Sitting up was a struggle. Mulder was groggier than he would have expected following legitimate, undrugged sleep-- had just been too long without it, he conceded. The last vestiges of sunlight filtered through the drapes, heavily muted, the room one great shadow in the gathering evening. There was a blanket laying across him that he didn't recall having before. The discarded Mickey D's bag was gone from the dresser. His journal was untouched though, still on the little table, the pen exactly as it had been when he'd lain down, the photo beside it. Mulder shrugged himself free of the blanket and wobbled to the bathroom to rid himself of excess soda.

Finished with that necessity, Mulder spent a few extra minutes washing his hands. The water was cool and oddly comforting as it flowed across the scabs on his knuckles: old injuries from his impact with the mirror, new ones left by his struggle with Purdue. The memories of the encounters stung and he flexed his hands, concentrating on the sharp pangs of protest as the skin stretched, popped open. Rivulets of water tinted just the barest shade of pink.

The persistent if irregular rustle-crack-silence in the next room was distracting and entirely too intriguing. He could hear the television again, too, muted voices, the occasional swell of mood music. Mulder splashed water on his face, moaned softly as the liquid flowed across his eyelids, cooling their incessant burning. More water-- he'd kill for a shower right now-- and his fingers found the barest hint of stubble along his jaw. Mulder glanced up to the mirror, to check the circles under his eyes, the pallor of his face.

He glanced up into blank wall.

"Well. Fuck me."

Mulder pulled his hands from his face, combing his finger through his hair, then reaching back to massage his neck. He glanced up into Purdue's eyes and the ASAC nodded and looked away quickly. Cats, Purdue had learned, don't like being stared at. It was a sign of aggression, inciting antagonism, and Mulder was as bad as any cat he'd ever met. The ASAC cracked another peanut and popped it into his mouth, content to resume his television viewing. He sat comfortably, big feet propped on the coffee table, big bag of roasted peanuts in his lap. A big plastic bowl was at the far end of the sofa and he tossed empty shells at it as he munched. He missed, though. A lot. Not that he cared much.

Mulder stood a moment, wavering slightly on the balls of his feet. Purdue took him in peripherally, Mulder's hazel gaze boring holes through his thin veneer of indifference. The profiler was probably considering giving Purdue a piece of his mind. It'd serve the ASAC right, no doubt. Taking mirrors off walls--

Mulder plopped into the nearest chair, however, without so much as a grunt. Purdue covered his surprise by readjusting the remote balanced on his knee, cracking another peanut. Mulder was to his right, slightly ahead, well into the ASAC's field of peripheral vision. The back of Mulder's chair curved just slightly though, and when Mulder leaned back, Purdue would be visible only as a pair of shoes propped on the coffee table. Mulder might even convince himself that he was just as invisible to Purdue-- if Purdue was careful. The ASAC wasn't out to be deliberately deceitful but every man needed at least the *illusion* of privacy. And right now, unfortunately, illusions were about all that Mulder could afford.

Purdue's chosen channel had dredged up an old Humphrey Bogart movie, one where he had Lauren Bacall and a boat. Purdue couldn't quite place the film, but it seemed to have some semblance of a plot, a poor man's "Casablanca" as best he could tell, right down to the French Resistance and some of the cast. Mulder stared at the screen for a while. He even managed to focus on it occasionally. Purdue kept to his casual tranquility, and the profiler slowly relaxed into the confines of his chair, the muscles in his shoulders loosening, eyes half-closed, breathing slow and restful. Purdue realized that the silence between them was surprisingly comfortable. He blinked slowly, trying to determine when this state of affairs had developed.

Mulder's eyes focused again. Bacall was trying to sing. She looked all of eighteen-- but in that provocatively mature way Hollywood seemed to paint all females back in the 'forties. She was sultry and leggy and built like a ton of bricks, but her singing voice was remarkably masculine, deep, and slightly off-key, with a husky, nearly monochromatic delivery that managed to be sexy as hell. Bogie was awfully impressed with it, too. Him and about half a bar full of sailors. Mulder leaned his head back as she droned, lost, apparently in the warmth of that impossible voice. His hands, lax upon the arms of his chair, trembled sporadically but he didn't seem to notice. Purdue didn't allow himself to stare. He'd hoped Mulder's nap had done the young man more good than this, though--

Bacall's lullaby was short-lived. Now she was lighting Bogie's cigarette-- and getting the same look from him that Mulder had given Fowley when she'd lit his this morning. Purdue tossed another peanut shell at his bowl. It hit the lamp on the end table and he didn't bother to retrieve it.

"Sauceda's on his way back," the ASAC mumbled around his peanuts, sociable as if they'd been chatting all evening. "He's stopping off to get some dinner. Thought you might like some Chinese. Tso's chicken okay?"

Mulder nodded, not really focusing as he scanned the litter of Pepsi cans and candy wrappers on the coffee table. He didn't ask where Sauceda might be coming back from, Purdue noted. And why should he? They were in town, after all. Mulder probably figured Sauceda had gone home for a while.

"Where's Diana?"

Purdue glanced up, eyeing Mulder a little more sharply than necessary and mentally kicking himself for the reflex. Hell, it was just a question. Mulder ignored the look, and the ASAC concentrated on actually hitting his bowl with the next shell.

"Diana's taking a nap. I asked her to take shift with you tonight. Hot Sauce sounded pretty well beat when he called in--"

"I meant what I said this morning," Mulder's growl was soft, still sleepy. "I don't *want* her here."

Purdue shrugged, refusing the challenge. "Fine. Then you got me."

"No!"

Purdue paused, peanut midway to his mouth. Mulder had jerked to the edge of his seat with the word. Now he clawed the arms of his chair, pushing himself back behind his upholstered shield.

"Sorry, Mulder. It's one or the other--"

"This place is lousy with agents," Mulder's voice was calculatedly calm. "And Sisyphus doesn't climb walls. I don't need anybody camped out in here with me."

"That's not the game plan--"

"The hell it isn't." Mulder was sitting forward again, fists clenched, but his focus resolutely on the television. "I'm a grown man, I don't need a freaking babysitter."

It wasn't babysitting, of course. It was policy. But Mulder had policy overrun his life too often lately to appreciate it much and they both knew it. Purdue wasn't playing the game of averted eyes and lackluster interest anymore, though.

"You don't get left on your own, Agent. And you know damned well why."

Mulder blushed deeply, retreating into the confines of his chair. "Goddam--" he hissed.

"No, goddam you." Purdue slung his shell at the lamp without bothering to remove the nut. "You want me to treat you like a child? Lock your butt up someplace and stick someone else out here as bait to catch her with? I'm doing you the courtesy of letting you take an active part in your own defense, dammit. You want out of the loop altogether? Just open your mouth one more time. I'll slap you clear to Canada and we'll take this bitch without you."

Mulder's jaw worked a minute, grinding over the words and Purdue suddenly reconsidered. The situation was clarifying itself to Mulder rapidly, that much was obvious. Purdue could see the gears turning from across the room. How could Mulder have been so clueless, though? Purdue had explained the plan to the profiler himself--

But that had been yesterday. And yesterday, Mulder hadn't even known his own name, let alone been able to appreciate the intricacies of their little trap. Or even remember there was a trap.

"Shit," Mulder glanced away, licking his lips. "You mighta told me we weren't just running," he whispered. It was a poor defense but apparently the only one he had at the moment. It was an admission, too, if Purdue needed one.

Purdue didn't, although he appreciated the gesture. The ASAC held his tongue, offering no defense for himself, no reprisals for Mulder. He rolled his current peanut across the inside of his cheek, sucking the salt from it, allowing the man in the chair time to recover. On the screen, Bogie was chatting with some fat man and not enjoying it much. He seemed to like it even less when Fatty's pal took a slap at Bacall.

"Hell," Purdue shrugged finally, face solemn. "Who knows? Maybe we *are* just running. Sisyphus doesn't seem to want you directly, anyway. Just whoever happens to be around."

"And that's why I don't want Fowley here." The belligerence was back, but wary now.

"And you'd say the same thing about anyone else I'd pair you up with." He spit a bit of stray shell off his tongue, wiped his hand across his mouth. "Problem is, Mulder, you just don't want anyone in the line of fire. Sauceda told me you're trying to get *him* off the case, too." He shook his head, watching the profiler grit his teeth. "You know, personally, I think we need Patterson on this case. Sisyphus'd be doing the Bureau a favor taking out that one." Mulder blinked at him owlishly and Purdue glanced away. The ASAC couldn't bring himself to apologize for the words, though. And he didn't particularly like what that said about him.

Mulder swore, still finding himself at square one. He combed at his hair again with frustrated fingers. "Okay. Fine. I can't be trusted. I deserve that. But I want Lenny here. No one else." Purdue shifted uncomfortably and Mulder's brows furrowed. "I want my *partner,*" he repeated obstinately.

The ASAC scrounged in his bag for another peanut, his tone carefully neutral. "You know, you might as well get used to the idea of a new partner--"

"He doesn't retire for another four months, dammit. You send him with Imelda or you leave him with me."

The ASAC chewed his peanut solemnly. It was a bitter little bastard but he swallowed it anyway. "Sauceda's tired, Mulder. You scare him. You know that?"

Mulder looked away. He was breathing hard, suddenly, eyes wide like he was fighting some kind of impending hysteria. Purdue bit his lip. Great. Now the kid was on to panic attacks. Well, hell--

Mulder laid a fist against his chest, every pore in his body breaking out with sweat. Purdue hadn't expected the reaction and watched him numbly. Mulder hadn't expected it either, apparently, and was working hard to control it. Scooted tight against the back cushion, he leaned his elbow on the arm of the chair and rested his head on his hand, effectively shielding his face from Purdue. His hand shook violently. He swore under his breath, desperately focusing on the television: Bacall slamming doors and Bogie grinning like a Cheshire cat. Purdue chomped his peanuts furiously, allowing Mulder the illusion that his reaction had gone unnoticed.

The attack passed within minutes. Mulder relaxed by degrees, cautiously releasing muscles held too tightly controlled, and Purdue's heart subsided back into its usual position in his chest. Purdue reached for another peanut, winced as the salt rubbed into cuts in his palm. He contemplated his hand dully: he'd been squeezing his fists so tight, his fingernails had bitten into the skin. He wiped the salt onto his pants leg.

"You okay, now?"

Mulder nodded, still not removing the shield of his hand.

Bogie's rummy pal was asking Bacall if she'd ever been bit by a dead bee. Jeezus, who did they get to write this crap? Purdue forced himself to crack another nut. There was soft *ping* across the room as the nut shot free and ricocheted against the television screen. Mulder glanced over at the sound, quickly away, then back again as he realized Purdue was watching the screen rather than staring at him.

"You know," the ASAC informed the television, "I used to have the damnedest nightmares as a kid." Mulder had no overt reaction to the statement other than to hold his breath. Purdue continued his confession without glancing at him. "I'd wake up shaking, vomiting sometimes. Just like you." That got a blink from the profiler. Purdue lick salt off his lips. "Used to... used to terrify me. I thought something was wrong. That I was losing my mind." He stared down into his peanut bag a minute, trying to re-orient himself. "I never told anyone, 'cept one night I screamed so loud it woke my dad." He grinned sheepishly up at the screen again. "My old man slept like a log most nights, but--" Purdue caught himself, sobered. "Anyway, he told me that dreams were just the answers to questions we didn't know to ask yet, you know? Just the mind turning things over. I think it's why I went into law enforcement. Because of the terrible things I would see in my dreams. I didn't want anyone to have to live through them. Maybe--" He glanced at Mulder, that calm, impenetrable face, too pale, one cheek, one eye lit blue by the glow of the television, the other in shadow-- Purdue jerked his head away, flushing furiously. "Shit. Look. I just-- Oh, hell, just forget it."

Mulder hadn't laughed though, had made no smart-ass remarks. It took Purdue a moment to register that fact. He glanced up to find the profiler watching him solemnly.

"What do you want?" Mulder asked.

Purdue shook his head. "I don't want anything from you, Mulder. I just need to know you're okay."

"I'm okay."

The ASAC nodded. "Yeah. I noticed that."

It was Mulder's turn to look away. God, but Purdue hated this tactile-less dance, this overly-polite psychological slaughter. Mulder's confrontation in the parking lot had been honest, at least: aggression, understandable under the circumstances, played out to a logical conclusion-- the impact of fist against bone. Reassuringly simple. So how had they wound up here? Purdue grunted. They were here because, despite all Purdue's assurances, the ASAC had simply become another Patterson in Mulder's life. The realization burned like the salt in his palm. The move to Violent Crimes had changed nothing-- not for Mulder. Purdue had no right to sit here like this, desperate to get into the young man's head, the one place on earth Mulder held sacred. It'd serve him right if Mulder pulled another gun on him.

Still, reading human nature was the brick and mortar of Mulder's profession. If he didn't want to talk, then dammit, he wouldn't-- and he wouldn't let Purdue make him feel guilty about it, either. Purdue could respect that.

"Look, son. I told Diana about your dreams. It'll be no surprise--"

"She thinks I've got some kind of ESP-er ability or some such crap. Is that what you think of me? That I've got some kind of microchip tuned into Mars, and little green men are feeding me clues from Serial Central? What did you do, Reg? Pull my records just to figure out how I passed the psych test to get into the Academy?"

"I don't think you're insane, Mulder--"

"No. You just think I'm subject to hallucinations and emotional breakdowns--" Mulder face altered as he spoke the words, as he recognized the proof in the trembling of his own hands. Purdue didn't answer and watched him fall back against his chair without actually bothering to scoot back in it. The profiler sprawled there, panting silently, eyes wide, furiously reordering his perceptions.

"You're not insane, Mulder." Purdue was using his Special-Agent-In-Charge voice, calm, certain, every word authorized by God. Mulder didn't even blink. "Mulder." Finally, the hazel eyes focused on him. "I've got no problems with your abilities as an investigator, son. Or as a profiler. Personally, I think you're better than *you* think you are. Diana isn't here to second-guess your judgment-- or your method of getting there. And just between you and me, I seriously doubt she knows *what* she thinks. Baez, on the other hand, seems to believe you have a, ah--"

"Gift?" Mulder almost spat the word.

"Yeah. A gift." Purdue's voice was extraordinarily careful. "Do you?"

"Sure, I do." Mulder's face was impassive. "My dad sends me aftershave for my birthday every year."

On the screen, Bogie tough-talked a line and everybody jumped. Purdue wondered vaguely why it never seemed to work for him. "Look, you're under enough stress as it is. You've got a problem with Diana being here, I can understand that--"

"No, you don't. You have no idea."

"Fine. So explain it to me."

Purdue had Mulder biting his lip now. They were silent by mutual consent, watching Bacall walk across the black and white room and slam a door. Woman could be arrested for walking like that. Having legs like that--

"Diana's a good agent," Purdue insisted. "She's done some fine work. Sure, she comes at things from an odd angle sometimes, but so do you. Most times." He raised a hand as Mulder scathed him with a glance. "Okay, so maybe not from the same *kind* of angle, but she's had some good result. She's trained to handle herself--"

"She trained to handle me, too?"

Purdue frowned. "I know you better than to expect that kind of machismo crap from you, Mulder. You're doing it on purpose. It's not working."

"She tell you about that?"

"Tell me about what?"

Mulder shook his head and closed his eyes, passing a hand across his brow like he was trying to wipe away some pressure there. "Nothing," he said.

Purdue's frown deepened. So, Mulder had Fowley holding out on him, now, too. Nice trick, that. And it hadn't taken the little punk a day-- Purdue felt his blood pressure rising but he didn't bother to work out why the situation should bother him so much. "You listen up, Agent. Diana Fowley walks into this case with my permission to knock you on your ass if she so much as wants to--"

"Oh. So she needed your permission to do that?"

"No, she doesn't. And that's exactly why I chose her."

Mulder chewed the inside of his cheek, refusing to answer.

"Look Mulder, let's just cut the crap for once. I brought Diana in on this because I thought she might be some help to you in getting a handle on this thing."

"*What* thing?"

Purdue fisted up his bag of nuts. "Okay, fine. You wanna play twenty questions? Let's do it." Purdue was on the edge of the couch now. "You told me in Wheeling that you couldn't just dream this stuff on demand. That you couldn't just *make* it happen. So tell me this: can you make it stop?"

Mulder's face flushed hot again. He jerked forward, but his hands clawed into the chair, refusing to let go.

"Yeah." Purdue nodded slowly. "I didn't think so."

Mulder swore but said nothing further, surrendering his struggle abruptly. He sank back in the chair, like he could become small and invisible at will.

"So where was the spook last night, Agent?" Purdue demanded. "No dreams? No psychosomatic hemorrhaging?"

Mulder shrugged against the flint in the ASAC's voice, impervious, suddenly, to Purdue's attack. "How much did you have Lenny give me?" Anger kept his gaze unblinking as he regarded the ASAC. "How much Thorazine to make sure I stayed down while she waltzed in and butchered two men?"

Purdue tossed the bag on the coffee table. Watched it lie there. Why did he feel so responsible for this man? Hell, it wasn't his job to hold him together. To pick up the pieces as Mulder threw them down.

Deep within his chair, the profiler shook his head. "If I dreamed, I don't remember," his voice was mournful, and he refused to glance at Purdue, instead watching Bogie tell Bacall to take her bottle and go to bed. She did it too. "Maybe it was too close this time. Like Kay--" He strangled on the word and looked away, back to the bedroom. "Nothing like a good night's drug-induced coma," he managed.

"So what was all day yesterday about?" Purdue held very still. "Who was walking up behind you then, Mulder?"

Mulder shook his head, this time almost imperceptibly, his eyes closed against the room. Purdue watched the anguish constricting Mulder's forehead, waiting for it to ease before he whispered, "Yesterday was just you, wasn't it? Shutting down from too much..." He didn't finish the sentence and Mulder didn't deny the words, too busy pressing his fist into his left thigh.

"Goddammit-- stop that!" Purdue cleared the distance between them, one hand jerking Mulder's wrist up to relieve the pressure on his leg, the other hand capturing the profiler's fist before he could take his swing. "You son of a bitch!--"

Mulder endured a long string of profanity, apparently too surprised to resist. Purdue paused finally, vaguely aware that he was repeating himself and that he was gasping. Mulder's eyes on his were wide, dark, and frightfully transparent. Flecks of gold gleamed in the irises, mingled with browns and blues and violets. The colors moved, swirling, mingled, and paled as Purdue watched, blurred as Purdue's gaze penetrated deeper, drawn to the unfathomable depths below--

Purdue inhaled suddenly, the gut reaction of a man just as he hits the water that will surely drown him. Mulder blinked then, slowly, terminating the vision, releasing him. The irises, when Mulder opened his lids, were an unassuming gray. The ASAC dropped the young man's wrists and paced across the room, seeking some place safer.

On the screen, Bacall was trying to teach Bogie how to whistle. And doing a pretty good job. God, but he needed a drink. The wet bar was across the room, however. He'd have to pass Mulder--

And Mulder was watching him. Those impossible eyes, body perfectly motionless. Mulder didn't even look like he was breathing.

Purdue shook his head. Damn Fowley. *He* should have taken the nap. He leaned against the wall, crossed his arms, crossed his legs at the ankles, physically boarded up nice and tight while psychologically trying to look so nice and casual. Yeah. Like Mulder was buying it.

Purdue bit his lip. "Okay. Gift or not, I realize that this stuff doesn't come cheap. Profiling is easy for you, a talent, but only at a cost." He waved a hand, indicating the room, Mulder's carpeted prison. "So now you're paying for it. *I* expected it at some point. I think you did, too. And this is where it happens, where you get it worked out. I'm just trying to make it easier on you. That's all."

Mulder took a slow breath. He seemed to be pondering the statement, shrewdly seeking the ambush he was certain awaited.

Purdue nodded under the regard, ignored the shirt sticking to the sweat on his chest. "I told you before, son: I've been where you are. Still drop in for the occasional visit." He pushed himself free of the wall but kept to the far side of the room, safely out of Mulder's sphere. "All I'm saying is if you need to talk I'm here. If you'd rather talk to someone else, that's fine, too. But you can't keep pretending it doesn't hurt--"

Mulder set his jaw and shoved his body to the far side of the chair, a wounded cat seeking a burrow-- or a wall from which to launch himself. "Okay," his response was low and slow, tightly controlled, "I admit it. It hurts. Gee, Dad, I feel tons better. Can I go home now?" His brows descended abruptly. "Or is this where you tell me I should spill my guts because it's what *Kay* would want me to do?"

Purdue resisted the urge to slam his fist through the wall. "I'm not going to lie to you and tell you I'm sorry for what I said on the parking lot. But, yeah, I didn't know the woman and I won't presume to tell you what she would and wouldn't want for you. I just know what *I* would want for you. For whatever the hell that's worth."

On the television, Bogie had Bacall walking around him, checking for strings. No one was paying attention though, not even Mulder who was watching without seeing.

"She deserved better than me," Mulder confessed, apparently not realizing he'd spoken aloud. "She deserved better than a lot of things she got, I think." He spoke from a weary bewilderment, the blunted sensibility that overtakes the soul worn out by tragedy and grief, when the first glimmerings of objectivity begin to color memory and experience. It hurt just listening to him, to hear the certainty in his voice.

"You didn't kill her, Mulder," Purdue's voice was cautious, treading carefully on the space that Mulder had allowed him. "I know Patterson sent you on so many guilt trips you had frequent flyer points, but it's not your fault she's dead. You've got to know that." "Yeah." Purdue didn't quite know how to interpret that weary monosyllable: whether it was evidence of Mulder's failure to be fully convinced, or simply an expression of exhaustion. There probably wasn't that much difference. Guilt was not about intellect; it's about emotion. And emotions, unfortunately, have a logic all their own.

Purdue tried again, still steadily wary. "You will heal, Mulder. I know it's hard for you to believe, but you will. Eventually. It'll feel like betrayal and you'll hate yourself for it, but you'll do it."

"In spite of myself?" Mulder glanced up finally, his voice bitter. Purdue took in the image: Mulder white as a ghost, bones too-prominent beneath his skin, circles under his eyes-- eyes as penetrating as a cobra's. Mortally wounded, Mulder would go down fighting. Even wanting death, it wasn't in him to give up.

"Yeah," Purdue nodded, certain now. "In spite of yourself."

Mulder sat forward, sick of the conversation. "The condition you're describing is popularly known as survivor's guilt. And I really don't need the refresher course on psychological theory--"

"Funny, isn't it?"

"Pardon?"

"How knowing the name of something doesn't mean jack when you're trying to live through it."

"Shit."

Purdue resumed his place on the couch. Mulder watched him, sliding back just a bit more to the far side of the chair. Shadows crept across his face as Bogie pistol-whipped Fatty with gusto. The action on the screen was cartoonish and had no place in their reality. Purdue scarcely registered it. He'd been with Violent Crimes too many years to take the Hollywood ideal seriously. Hollywood had no idea how bad it got. The horror show that was every day life for the men and women who worked the scenes, who dealt with the carnage left behind when the perpetrators had fled. The fallen bodies, locked in unnatural positions. The insects, just hatching or fully grown, that gave the coroner an approximate time of death. The smell. The families, wives, husbands, children who answered the doors and stared up at you, innocent, unaware that you had arrived to shatter their lives with a few sympathetic words.

The work was hard. Hard on the nerves, on the heart. If you wanted to survive, you learned to shove your emotional involvement into a hole in your soul and simply ignore it until you had time to deal with it. And even time was taken on the run: sitting in the back of a car, riding in a plane, long sleepless nights in unfamiliar motel rooms. Just like Mulder now.

The truth was that the work was often so bizarre that you needed some external source of emotional stability. Something, someone else, that could provide a sense of normalcy. You didn't just need it. You craved it, the reassurance that someone close held the sense of true north even when you didn't trust yourself to know. Maybe Kay had been that for Mulder, just like Olivia had been for him for so many years.

And now here they both sat without a compass. The blind leading the blind-- and there were dragons in the ditch. It was kind of pathetic when you thought about it. Purdue refused to think about it, though. He didn't like being pathetic. He *wouldn't* be pathetic. And he'd be damned before he saw Mulder in that condition, ever.

"Sometimes," Purdue chanced, one foot on the coffee table, "I wonder if God even knows what the hell he's doing. He always seems to be taking the wrong ones. Killing the strong, the ones who enjoy life and leaving the rest of us to deal with it." He pulled his peanut bag back onto his lap, stared into it. "Lousy way to run the world, if you ask me. Hell. Not that anyone *is* asking."

"Is that why you didn't have me arrested?" Mulder demanded from his corner of the chair. "'Cause you feel *sorry* for me?" Purdue's brows raised. Mulder was watching him, both hands on the near arm of the chair, clenched tight. "This morning, you son of a bitch," Mulder growled. "The parking lot? Or am I hallucinating on top of everything else?"

Purdue shrugged. It was becoming a chronic gesture. "As far as I'm concerned that stunt you pulled was just so much psychological hyperventilation." His eyes narrowed, a warning. "And I *don't* feel the least bit sorry for you, sir. You try it again and I'll kick your ass. We clear on that?"

"Psychological hyperventilation?" Mulder repeated the words, rolling them across his tongue. "I was mad enough to kill you--"

"No, you weren't."

The profiler's brows climbed up into his hairline. "I pulled a *gun* on you, dammit--"

"I noticed. Nice try at suicide, Mulder. Not terribly subtle, but it could have been pretty effective." He slung the bag of peanuts back at the coffee table. "I mean, if it works, you get to die and don't even have to waste energy pulling the trigger, right? Just wave your pistol around and wait for me to pull my gun and do your dirty work for you." Mulder's mouth opened, closed as he turned away abruptly. Purdue slammed a fist into the couch cushion. "Look me in the eye, damn you!" Mulder obeyed, reluctant, but holding the ASAC's gaze determinedly. "That's what you wanted, wasn't it?" Purdue demanded. "For me to put you down like a goddam dog in the street? Wasn't that your plan? Well, here's a little advice for next time, Mr. Mulder: number one: try for a place not quite so public. And number two: find yourself another goddam executioner."

Mulder dropped his gaze and seemed grateful for the television to focus on, the Vichy shooting at bystanders, the clandestine meetings, the imagined tragedies that bore no resemblance to his own. His eyes were too bright in the dim light, profile reflecting the garish red light of a sudden commercial. His right hand rubbed a small comforting circle against his chest.

Purdue was registering every emotion fleeing across the young man's face, and finally understanding. Mulder hadn't consciously intended a suicide at his hands. Hadn't planned it. The very thought seemed to amaze him, maybe even frighten him, eyes widening hollowly. But what the unconscious mind desired-- that was often a very different story. One that Mulder, for the moment at least, didn't seem able to discern as he sat there, struggling with the economics of doubt.

Purdue shook his head, tried to make his voice light. "Just between you and me and the door post, I tried it myself once. Lucky not to be in Leavenworth, right now." Mulder's eyes sought out Purdue's general direction but his face remained in profile, listening but not trusting himself to look over. Purdue shrugged his brows. "A word of warning if you ever feel the need to take Skinner down a few notches: watch your aim. The man's got a jaw like concrete."

Mulder seemed to have registered the words, the easy smile in Purdue's voice, the reassurance. He was unable to reconcile the information with the conversation running through his own head, however. Elbow on the chair arm, he propped his temple against his fingertips, his palm once more an ineffective shield. Purdue waited for the onslaught of yet another panic attack. It didn't come, though and Mulder simply sat, eyes down, unfocused, jaw lax as he breathed through his mouth. He looked like he seriously needed to lie down. Purdue wondered how he might suggest it, sans affront to Mulder's self-esteem. The young agent surprised him, however, and spoke, his voice distant.

"She doesn't kill at random any more," Mulder noted the fact, as if this had been their topic of conversation all evening. "She kills by a common thread. Me."

"Mulder. You're not responsible--"

"It's like the observer in Einstein's theory: the observer changes what he observes by the fact that he is there observing it. I *am* responsible at some level. Her choice of victims proves that."

Purdue opened his mouth, closed it. It was becoming an old argument, one he'd run out of ammunition for. He pulled a baggied paper from his pocket, unfolding it. "Is that the explanation for this, then?" He handed the slip over and Mulder removed his hand from his forehead, accepting the item gingerly: standard printer paper, like he used on his Epson at home, the edges rough where the tractor-feed strip had been torn away.

"Sauceda found it tucked inside a picture on your desk," Purdue explained. "I asked him not to mention it until you'd had some time to rest up." He watched as Mulder read, face completely without expression, voice flat.

"*It must be an old photograph of you, out in the yard, looking almost afraid in the crisp, raking light that afternoons in the city held in those days, unappeased, not accepting anything from anybody. So what else is new? I'll tell you what is: you are accepting this now from the invisible, unknown sender, and the light that was intended, you thought, only to rake or glance is now directed full in your face, as it in fact always was, but you were squinting so hard, fearful of accepting it, that you didn't know this. Whether it warms or burns is another matter, which we will not go into here. The point is that you are accepting it and holding on to it, like love from someone you always thought you couldn't stand, and whom you now recognize as a brother, an equal. Someone whose face is the same as yours in the photograph but who is someone else...*"

Mulder glanced up, offering nothing in response. No flicker of emotion.

Purdue licked his lips. "So she really has moved onto prose. Like you thought she would. She--"

Mulder shook his head. "Same book," he said quietly. "Page sixty-four."

The stillness of Mulder's face was unnerving. Purdue mouthed an "Oh" but couldn't seem to locate his own voice. Mulder surrendered the sheet of paper, apparently unconcerned.

"What she did to Seilman," Purdue struggled with the words, "is that what she intends to do with you?"

Mulder shrugged, very distant and just four feet away. "She's like the moon's child," he lisped. "Trying her wings."

"That's crap, Mulder. Answer the question."

Mulder looked away to the television, an act of defiance or confusion. Purdue couldn't determine which.

"It's an invitation, isn't it?" the ASAC tried again. "She's inviting you to join her, to become what she is."

"She wants what she's never had: someone thinking about her, anticipating her, not taking her for granted."

"Killing eleven people. That's a hell of a cry for attention." Purdue chewed his cheek, wondered when that had become a habit. "When did the sex bit come in?"

Mulder shrugged. "It's always been there at some level. It's the intimacy she's after. The need to share who and what she has become."

"So it's not just the physical act."

"It rarely is for women," he grimaced. "Not any *I've* been with, anyway."

Purdue shook his head, trying to follow the logic. "And she thinks what? That you're just going to sit up and perform for her when she gets around to you?"

Mulder smiled languidly, hollowly. "We don't have that kind of relationship, she and I. We're engaged in intellectual intercourse."

Purdue watched the eyes bleeding green almost to clear. "Yeah," he said. "You hope."

"She'll make her move tonight, you know."

Across the room, Purdue sighed deeply. "Yeah. I figured."

"Probably just as well," Mulder picked at a loose scab on his knuckle. "I need to get back to my apartment before the neighbors start complaining about the smell."

Purdue shivered, suddenly. *Someone trompin' on your grave,* his Granny would have said. He was left with the oddest sensation when it had passed, the instant awareness of heightened senses: the give of the upholstery against his back, the solidity of the table against the sole of his shoe, the coolness of the air on the skin below his rolled up sleeves. The air was tinged with the faint odor of Diane's cigarette and barbecued chicken wings. Purdue had experienced the sensation many times: rushing a suspect, thundering into the lair of a wanted fugitive, shotgun in hand, a flack jacket the only barrier between him and mortality. It was the type of thing that happens when a man is certain of death, aware that each second could be his last. Purdue wondered why it would be happening to him now specifically.

"I got someone cleaning up your place." He shrugged at Mulder's surprise. "Thought it might help. Not trying to get into your personal business or anything."

Mulder shrugged back. The motion said, *Yeah, like I have any personal business anymore. Like I even have a *life* anymore.* There was no animosity in the gesture however, just a quiet resignation. Purdue couldn't say that he liked the implication.

"Don't suppose you want to keep the table..." Purdue waited patiently.

"Table, mattress. Hell, tell them to haul off the whole damned bed." Despite the profanity, the words were spoken lightly, a quiet abandonment. Mulder stared at his knuckles, studying his handiwork. "Christ." He sank back further into the chair like living itself had become oppressive. "I'm sorry," he said without glancing up. Purdue was silent and he clarified: "About the parking lot."

Purdue nodded, his face a mask. Not that Mulder ever looked over. Purdue himself concentrated on the television, unwilling to intrude further on the man crumpled in the chair. He spent a minute watching Bogie convince some guy that he wasn't much into kissing Frenchmen. Strange film.

"So," Mulder licked his lips, watching the screen himself, "when you slugged Skinner, this was *before* he was an AD, right?"

Purdue waved a hand vaguely. "Skinner was born an AD. Slapped his mother when he popped out and reassigned her to an obscure regional office to avoid embarrassment." Mulder grunted softly, a concession of good humor that didn't reach those lifeless eyes. Purdue's voice was softer. "Just give yourself some time, Mulder. That's all I'm asking. Hell, between the stress and the spook--" Purdue choked momentarily. "Just let me help you. Stop fighting me."

"I don't know how to stop." The words were scarcely a whisper and Mulder's brows drew to a frown, not entirely certain he'd spoken aloud. He looked away from the ASAC, apparently not wanting confirmation one way or the other. His eyes grazed the coffee table again, focused on the Whitman's Sampler box, its lid open, the candy untouched.

Purdue sat in silence, struggling with words that didn't seem to want to form. He'd already said everything he'd known how to say; it would be just as pointless to repeat it. He noted the direction of Mulder's gaze and nodded at the Whitman's. "Go ahead," he offered, "Help yourself."

Mulder looked up from the box of chocolates like Purdue'd just offered him the key to Fort Dix. Purdue glanced away, embarrassed suddenly, confused, staring at Bogart.

"It was my wife's favorite," he explained finally, "I'd-- I'd buy her one for our anniversary every year. I didn't think and did it again yesterday. Habit, I guess."

Mulder was silent too long. Purdue struggled to follow the action on the screen through the haze over his eyes. *The blind leading the blind--*

"It was Sam's favorite, too." Mulder finally found words. He frowned, apparently wondering why they should have been those words exactly.

"Sam?" Purdue blinked, vision clearing rapidly.

"Samantha. My sister."

Purdue took a good long look at his agent. *Finally. The sister. The one that disappeared--*

The brother's eyes refocused on the box and he leaned forward slowly to receive a chocolate. He held it carefully, as a man would regard a gem brought up from the belly of the earth, a rough jewel, encrusted with magma and graphite and the blood of those who died to bring it forth to daylight. "My mom buys me a Whitman's every year," he said the words with some amazement. "In memory of Sam." His voice was old and tired, flat. Purdue almost didn't recognize it.

Purdue whispered, "Like putting flowers on a grave."

Mulder nodded. "Only we don't have a grave. We just have Whitman's Samplers." He placed the chocolate in his mouth and chewed solemnly. Purdue's tongue had dried up completely, swollen with salt suddenly, too wearied with pointless words.

"I loved her," Mulder whispered, an escaping thought, "as much as I could."

Purdue bit his lip, but the words would not remain unspoken. "Samantha? Or Kay?"

The rattle of the door and Mulder glanced up. Glanced up to find Sauceda there, Chinese wafting from the bag in his hand, Diana over his shoulder.

Diana, Purdue realized, withhereyesthatlookedlikeKay's.

Mulder didn't answer the question.