From fox42@ix.netcom.com Fri Mar 28 19:16:10 1997 Subject: "Kicking the Habit" (1/4) by Gerry Hill From: fox42@ix.netcom.com -------- Disclaimer: This story is based on the characters and situations created by Chris Carter, the Fox Network and Ten Thirteen Productions. As such, the characters named are the property of those entities and are used without permission, although no copyright infringements are intended. The following work is for the distribution and entertainment of fanfic members only. Any further distribution of this work without the author's consent is in violation of federal law. Rated R for language, sex and violence. Classification: T, A and MSR (always). Summary: Mulder becomes addicted to heroin and Scully must try to save his life and his career. Author's Note: I realize that this plot is far from original. Everyone from "Starsky and Hutch" to a book written by Ed McBain has addressed this story line in various forms. But I thought it would be good for some Mulderangst and Muldertorture, which we all love, right? My thanks once again to Danielle Culverson who kicks my butt when I need it, provides inspiration, and puts her finger on problems I miss; to Beth Ward who encourages my XF fanfic writing (and mania); and Macspooky who provides support, info, intertainment, and expert assistance. KICKING THE HABIT (1/4) by Gerry Hill (fox42@ix.netcom.com) Sunday evening Greenbelt Park, Maryland MULDER: It had been ridiculously easy for them to snatch me. Like picking a fucking daisy by the side of a footpath. They had been waiting for me in the dusk near the car. After the ballgame I was looking for my windbreaker where I had remembered tossing it at the edge of the playing field earlier, but I was having no luck finding it. As I strode down the dimming pathway through the deepening shadows of the trees, I was too busy kicking myself for losing it and was not paying attention to my surroundings. By the time I reached the side street where I had parked my car, everyone else had packed up the baseball gear and left for home. Even the neighborhood kids had disappeared, and the park had been full of them earlier. One boy on a bicycle half a block away was the only sign of life. This peaceful, cool, early spring evening gave me no forewarning of danger and my thoughts, as they often did, had turned to Scully. We were going to have a meal at her place before she had to pack for her week's vacation in Cozumel, Mexico, with her brother's family. At least they found that they had their hands full when they jumped me; I didn't go quietly. Before they got tired of the game and rammed my head against the side of the car, I managed to cause a little damage. As I blacked out, I remembered thinking that one of the thugs was Jimmy Jakes' right-hand man. Regaining consciousness was a gradual process. First I was aware of an immense pain which slowly concentrated into one location: My head. Light shone on the opposite side of my eyelids, and I was reluctant to open them up to the glare. I was lying on my right side on what I thought to be a bed, and I felt restraints on my wrists behind my back, and on my ankles. By moving my limbs slightly, I could tell that the restraints were handcuffs. Finally venturing to open my eyes, I gave a yelp to see a pair of eyes staring back into mine from two inches away. A was able to move my head back despite the lightning bolts of pain this caused so I could at least focus. I saw an attractive woman, maybe 30 years old, curly black hair, big brown scared-looking eyes, and a tremulous smile. "You're finally awake," she whispered. "I was hoping you would come around soon just to keep me from dying of fright all alone." "Hi," I croaked, clearing my throat. "I'm Fox Mulder." Known as Mr. Cool in some circles, but somehow I didn't think that I was hitting very high on the "suave meter" at the moment. "I'm Ginni Adams. Do you know what's going on?" "I was hoping you would know." I tried to ignore the galaxy of pain otherwise known as my head and rolled slightly backward to look around. I saw that I was, in fact, lying on a bed. The surrounding area looked pretty ordinary, like a standard hotel or motel room. Then from somewhere behind me, I heard, "Get Jakes. Tell him that the sleeping beauties are awake, and get the junk while you're at it." Great. Jakes was a sadistic son of a bitch, and I didn't relish lying here helpless while he had the upper hand. I tried not to think of what he had in mind for the woman. Her eyes were wide and frightened. They stared into mine as if surprised I hadn't already magically saved her. Sure. I had planned to just shake off these cuffs and then ask the thug behind me to return my gun, please. My eyes were trying to reassure her, but who was I kidding? I could hear a door open and close somewhere, and the muffled footsteps of large feet on the carpet approached the bed. Jakes and "the junk" had arrived, apparently. And suddenly there he was, in our field of vision, standing at the foot of the bed, smirking. All five feet, eight inches, of a man who had the personality of a snake. Jimmy Jakes ran all the drug and prostitution connections in greater Washington, D. C. It was rumored that he came from old money, but from the wrong side of the blanket. He was smart enough to have built his empire without serving too much jail time, but the feds had recently hit him below the belt. Actually *I* was the one to have recently stumbled across one of his operations and had been responsible for closing down said operation, taking a huge bite out of his profits in the process. Apparently he wasn't too thrilled about that. "Fuckin' fed," he sneered. Did I say that he was a brilliant conversationalist? He turned to someone nearby and demanded, "Give 'em both the first dose, Doc. And you, Hicks, hold 'em down." I felt someone unlock the cuff on my left wrist, then I was shoved over onto my back with my freed arm held immobile, extended in front of me. The goon's other hand shoved my shoulder into the bed so I couldn't move my upper body. (In my defense, he was twice my body weight and muscle). Jake lent a hand by holding my feet down. The "doctor" approached after preparing something on a tray. He tied a length of rubber around my upper arm, then picked up a hypodermic. I was terrified more of getting AIDS at that point than of what might be in the syringe. He tapped and felt for the vein, then plunged the needle into my arm. He wasn't gentle, and I felt as if the needle was going to come out the other side, through my elbow. I didn't scream, but drew blood with my teeth when they bit into my lower lip. "Scully!" my mind was wailing. They removed the rubber thing and left me alone. I already was feeling this indescribably delicious warmth stealing through my veins, which sent little spasms of pleasure throughout my body. What *was* this shit?! I was vaguely aware that they were going through the same process with the woman, but I found it difficult to concentrate on anything but the mounting bliss which ran rampant in every atom of my being. Someone lifted my left eyelid and remarked with amusement, "He's out there." I giggled to myself as the phrase brought visions of me drifting along in outer space, happy, no cares or worries, just pleasure permeating my universe. I don't know how long I was in la-la land, but I guess I finally crashed at some point. Someone was trying to make me eat a bowl of soup, but I gagged and they got out of my way. I must have slept then. SCULLY: "I. Cannot. Believe. This." On second thought, I was talking about Mulder, here. But it was the last damned time he was ever going to pull a stunt like this. I had absolutely had it with him. The thought occurred to me that he may be in trouble. Actually, where he was concerned, that would have been the most likely scenario. I kicked the table leg that held our uneaten, congealed dinner, and grabbed the telephone receiver. A few minutes later I was able to ascertain that he had, indeed, played baseball with his buddies, then had left for my place. That was over two hours ago. I arranged to meet Charlie Griffin, Mulder's team's pitcher, at the park to see if we could figure out what had happened. He had apparently been one of the last to leave the game after it ended. After exiting the Baltimore/Washington Parkway, I had to slow way down as I entered a 25-mile an hour speed limit. I didn't need to be stopped by the small town's local police right now. Fortunately, I didn't have far to go. Taking the first right turn off Southway, McDonald Field was to my right behind rows of small townhomes. At this time of night, I was able to find a parking spot easily enough on the street. I walked along a pathway until I reached the open field where I saw Charlie standing in the middle, waving at me. His linebacker physique was unmistakable. Charlie and I had both brought our flashlights, since the park's lighting was too dim and spaced too far apart to give much visibility at night. It took half an hour, but we finally discovered Mulder's windbreaker (it had "NY Knicks" on the back in huge letters) under one of the rhododendron bushes at the west end of the park. There was no sign of his car in the area. I thanked a worried-looking Charlie, reassured him that Mulder was probably all right and had gotten sidetracked, which was nothing new. I would call him when I heard anything. The windbreaker bothered me. He had bought it last weekend, and Mulder was so attached to it that he hardly could bear to take it off to sleep, much less discard it in some bushes. It was time to get the Bureau involved. I hoped to God that Mulder hadn't just gotten a wild hair up his butt. All hell would break loose if he called me later with an improbable story about some four-breasted alien babe who kidnapped him for a night of depravity. But I had a bad feeling that he was in real trouble. It looked as though I would be blowing off Cozumel, my first real vacation in two years. MULDER: After I woke up and was thinking clearly, I knew that the injections we had been given were heroin. That's what Jakes dealt in. The needles still bothered me, knowing that Jakes couldn't care less if I developed AIDS, especially if he were planning to kill me eventually. I could feel the dull emptiness where my body craved a return of the drug for the release it could give. I wasn't hooked yet, but I could see how easy it would be. So was he trying to get us addicted? Then what? God, where was Scully? She has always been my lifeline, my salvation, but I was so afraid she wasn't going to make it this time. Ginni was still asleep by my side, but that ended abruptly when the Three Stooges burst into the room again. The whole injection process was repeated, except I fought harder this time, earning a slap to my already-sore head. They took our cuffs off after the injections, and left us alone. The rush was so sweet in the second that the drug took over. I couldn't describe the initial feeling - it would sound trite if I said that it was like returning to the womb, secure and protected; it was much more than that. Oh, yeah. Much, much more. There was an absence for the first time of the driving guilt I had carried throughout my life for so many things, primarily the loss of my sister. Gone was the twisting knife of self-blame for losing her. It simply didn't matter anymore. That last statement should have horrified me, but that's what was so great about this drug. You didn't *have* to feel sad, or horrified, or guilty. It took you to a wonderful place inside your mind where thirty women were making love to you at once. Your body was in constant orgasm, constant peace, constant oblivion. I never wanted to return to ugly, painful reality. But return I did, and it had proven more harsh each time. They had been giving us increasingly larger doses, so the times in between got harder and harder to take. I had been telling myself for five or six days (a week?) now that I didn't need the drug; I could take it or leave it. (If I had a choice, which I didn't up to this point). I tried an experiment today to see if I was kidding myself. When they approached me with the needle, I resisted. The doc only grinned and said "Fine," and left me alone. I was OK for a while, just got fidgety. Since they had been leaving the cuffs off lately, I got up and investigated breaking out of the room somehow. I found it hard to concentrate, but I didn't see any way out. My nerves began jangling at this point, and even the feel of the cloth of my jeans and tee shirt against my sensitive skin were driving me insane. I took them off, sweat pouring from me all the time. My eyes kept tearing, I was yawning uncontrollably, tremors started in my hands, and the walls seemed to be closing in on me. Then my muscles started cramping, and something like paranoia set in with a vengeance. It felt like someone was right behind me, but no one was there when I turned. The cramping got worse, and by the time they finally shot me up, I was crying with relief. I stupidly tried withdrawal again the next day and got all the way to the point where the pain in the bones and muscles of my arms, legs and back was overwhelming. My muscles began spasming and I could feel my heart beat speeding up. I was terrified out of my mind, but I didn't know of what. If I had my gun, I would have blown the back of my head off. I was begging and pleading for a fix by then, and the fuckers took their own sweet time about giving me that release. The worst thing was that I proved to be so susceptible to this addiction. It was almost as if I had been waiting for this escape all my life. My weakness scared me, but not enough to deter my descent into this black pit. I think they are giving me very large doses now, but that's no excuse. This must have been going on for weeks, and then one day they said they would withhold the drug unless Ginni and I had sex with each other. There was hasty copulating between us, hazily aware of the video camera, but not caring if we were being watched or not. Ginni's eyes looked out at me the whole time from her place in hell, but we still had to perform for our reward. There was another time they demanded a sex show, but I was too far gone in the clutches of the drug to manage anything. There were crude remarks about my "manhood" and some ridicule, but they finally let us be. But not until the linebacker climbed onto Ginni for his own pleasure. She didn't seem to care much one way or the other, at this point. The days went by, and all I knew was the needle, followed by that bliss which had become all that I am and all that I desire. They tried to feed me now and then, but I wasn't interested in food. Only one thing held my interest any more. I had lost myself, probably forever -- but even that didn't mean anything now. My lucid times gradually became intolerable to me. As I lay there and waited for my next fix, I was all too aware of how easily I gave up everything and everyone of importance in my life just to feel that sweet release. I used to think that I was strong. That my convictions and passions were an unchangeable part of me. Only to find out how wrong I had been after a few days of tasting an absence of guilt and of pain, of forgetting about the sister I had lost, of dismissing my partner from my thoughts who was practically my soul-mate, of forsaking my mother, my career, my self... I had to have sought this total obliteration of all that I was. I couldn't blame everything on the drug, although it facilitated my fall. If I had this capacity to accept the violation of my deepest values, then there was nothing to halt my eventual slide into an everlasting hell. SCULLY: I went to Mulder's apartment after leaving McDonald Field, but didn't expect to find him there. The place looked like it always did; gloomy and cluttered. No sign of anything unusual. I checked his messages, but just my own were on the tape, still waiting for him. I called Skinner then, at his home, apologized for waking him up (how had it gotten to be 11:30 already?) and gave him the news about Mulder. He was surprisingly supportive, and said he would get the word out to local law enforcement. Hopefully, they could check on all incidents occurring in the past eight hours, especially those which took place in the vicinity of McDonald Field. Skinner even asked me how I was doing. I stammered out, "Fine, sir," before he continued throwing three orders a minute at me. The last thing he said was, "We'll find him, Agent Scully." Yeah, maybe that was the trouble. Oh, I didn't mean that. I admitted to myself not long ago that I was in love with the bastard, but hadn't shared that with "himself" yet. I didn't know whether I ever would be able to, without losing him. I was pretty sure that he felt the same love for me, but his twisted psyche would never allow him to accept unconditional love. He kept too much of the pain he had accumulated over the years in some central, secret place. It had become a part of him now and heaven help the person who tried to take some of it away from him. I think he would go for the sex. Just sex was no problem for him. But the love would bounce off his insulated heart, refusing to let anyone all the way in. At least that's what I believed, but I have been known to be wrong. Once or twice. I called in every source Mulder and I had and put them on what little trail there was. I searched in all the places I could think to go. I did find one of his bimbos who worked at a greasy spoon a few blocks from the office who said he was supposed to have called her the evening he disappeared. She was pretty hostile toward me, though, and I don't know how reliable that information might be. With her IQ level, she may have thought I would be jealous if she told me that. She was right, dammit. Has he got some kind of mold he measured these bimbos against? Long, shapely legs; size 38C chest, wasp waist, dark hair, IQ optional. -------- Three weeks had gone by now and we had come no closer to finding him than when he disappeared. Most nights I've only had a few hours of sleep, and came close to losing it several times. I hadn't been able to accept that he might be lying dead somewhere. Oh, God, this was too difficult. I cried in the car outside my apartment this evening, despairing of ever seeing him again, of hearing his dear voice, of touching him... -------- I had a horrible shock today. I had stopped by Mulder's office on this twenty-third day of his disappearance to go through everything he had been working on for a second time, in the hope I would come across something I may have missed before. I found a package with my name on it in the pile of mail on his desk. It had today's postmark, so it hadn't been there long. It was a videotape. The note inside was hand-lettered on common ruled spiral notebook paper. It read: "Fox told me to be sure you got a copy of this. He said that it would be the closest you'll ever be to getting some." Mulder had a VCR in the office, so I popped it into the machine. A few seconds of watching the images it spit out, and I fell to my knees, a harsh sound escaping my lips. It was Mulder and some woman on a bed. He was mounting her, penetrating her, *screwing* her...oh, God. I somehow slapped the "off" button as I frantically ran for the bathroom and lost what little I had eaten lately. I was sobbing and heaving at the same time, and finally tired myself out. Sitting on the cold tile of the bathroom floor, I tried to pull myself together and think coherently. No matter what was on that tape, my partner needed me, and he needed me thinking clearly. After rubbing my face with cold water and rinsing my mouth, I felt marginally better. Carefully keeping my mind a blank, I made myself return to his office and re-wind the tape. Behaving as clinically detached as any doctor worth their golf clubs, I "observed" the tape from beginning to end. I tried to ignore the people this time and concentrated on the rest of the picture. There were items lying on the lower part of the bed, and they looked like drug paraphanalia. Another shock. What little I could see of the room was unremarkable. OK. I needed experts to pull everything meaningful out of this tape we could possibly get. The FBI lab would be the logical way to go, but it would ruin Mulder's already-dubious reputation, and would probably result in his leaving the FBI. There was no way the subject matter of the tape, with the evidence of the drugs, would be kept secret. I had to get an ID on the woman; that was a key to finding Mulder. I'm sure there were other clues in the film, if I knew what to look for. I made a decision, and hoped to God it didn't get Mulder killed. MULDER: I heard them talking earlier when they thought I was out of it. They said they were going to give us an overdose tomorrow. Jakes told the "doctor" to make an anonymous phone call to the Bureau after it was done. He wanted them to find me here, dead, with the needle still in my vein, next to the dead hooker. I was sorry about Ginni, but my first reaction was relief to finally know when it will all end. I had escaped the agony of my life temporarily through the drug, and soon all the pain would be gone forever. I felt a tear rolling down my cheek, but it couldn't be regret... Unbidden, Scully's sweet face leaped to mind. I had shoved her memory so far down that I had managed to not think of her for a long time now. She was sad in this vision, and told me that I couldn't leave her yet. I whispered, "Oh, Scully, don't do this to me. Let me go. Your life can be so much better if I'm not in it, with all the sadness and pain I've made you suffer." But those eyes just kept gazing at me accusingly, clearly telling me that I had abandoned her. They were laughing when they came into the room later, about how they had screwed with the FBI bitch's head - something about the videotape. A sob escaped my aching throat as I pleadingly reached out for the drug. (Continued in Part II) From fox42@ix.netcom.com Fri Mar 28 19:18:37 1997 Subject: "Kicking the Habit" (2/4) by Gerry Hill From: fox42@ix.netcom.com -------- (Same disclaimers as Part I) Rated R Summary: Mulder becomes addicted to heroin, and Scully must try to save his life and his career. KICKING THE HABIT (2/4) by Gerry Hill (fox42@ix.netcom.com) SCULLY: I think I scared the Lone Gunmen when I suddenly showed up and demanded to be let in. Their paranoia must have kicked into overdrive when I kept banging on the door and ringing the bell. Once I had explained things, however, they quickly became focused on the tape. They completely surprised me with how professionally they acted in light of what they were watching unfold on the screen. I told them that the first thing I needed were some decent copies of the woman's face. I needed to get it out on the street as soon as possible, hoping someone would recognize her. They got to work on it, after they made a duplicate tape. While Byers and Langly started analyzing the duplicate, Frohike and I were getting the copies from the original. I sensed Frohike's repeated glances, and finally turned to him and said, "What!" He actually blushed. Frohike, blushing? He managed to say, "It must not be easy for you, dealing with what's on this tape." I gave him a blank stare, replying, "When was it ever easy where Mulder was concerned, Frohike?" He slowly nodded, but I could see the concern in his eyes for me. I wondered, too, what all this was doing to me, deep down, but there wasn't time for introspection right now. As soon as the last copy fed out of the machine, I was off and running, telling the guys to keep working on it, and I would be in touch. Skinner had those copies in the hands of every law enforcement agency in the area within the hour, telling them to make more copies as needed. He put a dozen agents on the street in the Greenbelt area and another six in Mulder's own neighborhood, trying to turn up someone who recognized her. I absolutely refused Skinner's direct order to tell me where I had gotten this photo, and why this woman was important. I might have been able to trust him, but couldn't take the chance. I would have to deal with the repercussions later. At least he was trusting me enough to run with the photo. That afternoon Langly called to tell me that he was following a lead on the picture that hung on the wall above the bed in the tape. I vaguely remembered seeing it; there was a forest and a deer in it, I thought. He said that these prints were bought in quantity by hotels and motels, and he might be able to find out which chain had picked up this particular scene. There had been no fingerprints of interest on the cassette. The tape itself was not unique. It was not a new tape, however, and they were attempting to see if they could pull up any of the old, taped-over, images. They didn't have that kind of equipment, but knew someone who did, and wanted to know if they could take it to him. I hesitated to include another person, but didn't have much choice. I felt the urgency to find Mulder building up in me, somehow knowing that I had to hurry. I told Langly to go ahead. -------- I was going to murder - literally kill - a policeman named Hendricks. I would reach down his bleeping throat, grab his testicles, and pull them out his mouth. He had taken a report from a kid near McDonald Field the night Mulder disappeared, and forgot...*forgot*...to file it when his own dog got hit by a car, and he went home early to console his family. He found it in his car under other paperwork just an hour ago. Instead of using it to catch the sugar sprinkles from his donut, which would probably have been more in character for him, he finally turned it in at the police station. The faxed report reached me at the Bureau and I raced over to question the young boy who had seen something suspicious going on that night near the park. He had just gotten home from school, according to his mother, and they would be waiting for me. Doug Reeder lived with his widowed mother in a nice old brick and frame two-story home not far from McDonald Field. He was eleven and had sandy-blonde hair that stuck up at the crown, nice friendly blue eyes, and a killer smile. It was obvious that his looks came from his mother. "Why has it taken so long for you to question Doug about this?" she quite logically wanted to know. "It has been almost a month." I gave her some story about how no one had realized the possible importance of it until now. She raised her eyebrow at that, but let it go. Doug went through his story for me. As he rode his bike home from a basketball game at school, he was in a hurry to have supper, which would be waiting for him. Some flurry of activity down the block had caught his eye, so he stopped for a moment to try and make out what was going on. Then he realized that it was a fight with three or four men involved. It was getting too dark to see any details, but everyone seemed to be going after one guy. Doug remembered hearing the faint sound of a "thud" and then car doors slammed and two cars pulled away from the curb, headed toward the Baltimore-Washington Parkway. That would have only taken a few minute's drive, and then they could have gone anywhere. "I know it was getting dark and there are a lot of trees along that street, but could you give me any kind of a description of the men or of the cars? Even an impression might help." I hoped my desperation wasn't showing. What Doug had seen may not have involved Mulder at all, but I knew deep down that it had. Doug closed his eyes and thought about it. Still with his eyes closed, he envisioned the scene and said, "Couldn't see the men well enough. They were behind the cars, in the dark under the trees. Both cars were American. One was just standard-size, blue or green, nothing special. The other was a little larger, and was a light color, like white or really pale blue." He opened his eyes and shrugged. "That's about all I can remember." Scully thanked them both for their help, and walked back to her car. What Doug had told her didn't help much, but it did indicate that Mulder hadn't gone off on his own this time. She called the Lone Gunmen to see if they had any new leads. She hoped her voice didn't betray her when Langly said that the picture on the wall had been purchased in quantity by the "JJ Corporation." Oh, my God. Mulder had just been embroiled in a nasty drug bust and I had helped him with the research into holding corporations of the principal suspect, Jimmy Jakes. "JJ Corporation" was one of Jakes' fronts; a motel chain, with about a dozen run-of-the-mill motels scattered around Prince Georges County, Maryland. They had been involved as the scene of numerous prostitution and drug pushing arrests. Could it be this easy? The picture was bought by his corporation for the motels, and it showed up in the videotape. Could they be that stupid? Not wasting time to worry about it, I grabbed a telephone book and ripped out the page that showed the location of the motels. With a map, I marked their locations, and found three within a few miles of McDonald Field. One was off the B/W Parkway, one off the John Hanson Highway, and one in between. The remainder were scattered all over the county. My cel phone rang at that point, and it was Skinner. The photo had been identified as that of Virginia Lee Adams, a hooker under - surprise - Jimmie Jakes' "protection." I told him that I, too, had uncovered a link to Jakes and asked how many agents I could have to cover the motel chain. Skinner stressed caution. "If Jakes is holding Mulder for revenge, he won't hesitate to kill him if he sees even the slightest indication that a law enforcement official is sniffing around. Does he know what you look like, Agent Scully?" Unfortunately, Jakes had seen me in court with Mulder several times during the trial. And then there was the videotape that had been addressed to me. Oh, he knew who I was, all right. Since evening was approaching, Skinner thought that some of his more ordinary-looking agents could go to the motels and check in, then look around as discreetly as possible. They would be told to take no action that could endanger Agent Mulder, but to get in touch with me if they saw or heard anything of interest. I didn't like that idea; I had a feeling that we needed to hurry. I wanted to hit all the motels at once and see what ran besides the cockroaches. In the end I had to agree, since I had no realistic alternative. What I didn't tell him was that I planned to stake out the Welcome Inn just because it was the nearest to the scene of the kidnapping. I would stay out of the way unless something happened. But first, I went home, ate a few bites, and changed into jeans and an old denim shirt, a light jacket, and tennis shoes. It was a very long night. I had a vantage point of the front and side entrance to the motel, and had brought a sandwich and a thermos of hot tea. I missed the comforting bulk of Mulder in the other seat, with his maddening dry wit and equally maddening illogical theories. At least it kept us occupied during the interminable hours of a stakeout. Frohike called me about 11:30 to tell me that, after further analysis, Mulder's...performance on the videotape just overlaid some football game; nothing useful. As far as I could see, absolutely nothing had happened at the motel other than the drunk I watched checking in around midnight, accompanied by one of Jakes' hookers. By the time dawn was coloring the horizon, I was losing the battle to stay awake. I decided to pull a cap down over my red hair and take a stroll around the motel, just to wake up. Not a thing had moved out here all night, so I thought it should be safe enough. MULDER: Although the nailed-in-place window had some sort of covering over it, I could tell that morning had finally arrived. I had been lying here, gradually coming down from the latest high, and I thought about it being my last day on earth. Visions of early mornings on the vineyard ran through my head, when I would go down to the beach, Sam trailing along behind, fussing about keeping up with me and would I please slow down. The water was so blue and clear. Scully's eyes came to mind, and I quickly shut that memory out. No more pain, please, God. The thought of dying was becoming seductive. The doc came in with a tray of goodies. I licked my dry lips, knowing what was coming, but afraid of it, too. He moved over to Ginni first, giving her the deadly overdose with a steady hand. Ginni had been asleep or spaced out, but her eyes flew open when the drug hit her system. Her back arched in a convulsion and saliva ran from the corner of her mouth. She couldn't breathe. Her eyes locked onto mine as she continued to convulse, but then I think her heart finally stopped. Her eyes remained open, staring through me at something only she could see. The whole thing didn't take very long. My turn. He came around to my side of the bed, tied the rubber thing around my arm, and grabbed another hypodermic. Holding my wrist with his other hand, he brought the needle toward my skin, while I watched with fascination. He pushed the needle in and shoved the plunger down. "Shit," he exclaimed. There's not enough of it." He looked at me as he tried to decide what to do. "Keep your girlfriend company for a few minutes. I'm going to get some more and finish the job." He threw the needle aside, grabbed the tray, and left the room. I remembered hearing a sob and realized it was coming from my throat. The way I was beginning to feel after a minute or two, I wasn't so sure the doc *hadn't* given me an overdose. Instead of the sensual rush of the drug, I was beginning to hyperventilate, my skin was tingling, my extremities felt numb, it felt like fire flowing through my veins, and my stomach muscles had begun to spasm. What the hell had he given me? Now my throat was straining to keep air moving into my lungs. I could almost feel switches being turned to "off" in my brain, one by one. I strained one last time to draw a breath, then everything went black. SCULLY: I reached the back end of the parking lot where there were several large dumpsters side by side near a six-foot wood fence. As I passed the dumpsters, I noticed a car pulled snugly into the space behind them, next to the fence. I gasped when I realized that I was looking at Mulder's car. It had a good-sized dent in the side now, but it was undoubtedly his car. Elated, I spun around and ran back to the side entrance I had passed earlier. On the way, I called Skinner on my cel phone. After telling him I had found the motel we wanted, he said he would notify Karen Farris, the agent who had checked into this motel last night. He would have her meet me at the exit door, then call more agents in as backup. The cel phone went back into my pocket. I unholstered my weapon and held it pointed upward with both hands as I stayed close to the wall to one side of the door, waiting for Agent Farris. When I heard a noise inside the hotel, just the other side of the wall from where I stood, I peered carefully around the door jamb through the glass. There, not five feet away, was a tall, thin man who was opening the door to the room at this end of the hallway. What galvanized me to action was the sight of the hypodermic that he held in one hand. My eye caught movement at the far end of the hall and I hoped Agent Farris had arrived. I pulled the door open and planted my foot at its base to keep it open. As the man looked up, startled, I screamed "Federal agent! Drop it! Put your hands in the air!" and stuck my gun in his face. His expression showed shock and I thought he was moving his hand downward to drop the syringe, but it kept coming at me in his fist. Before he could plunge it into me, I shot him. Not waiting to see what kind of damage I had inflicted, I grabbed the key card from the floor where it had fallen and used it to open the motel room door. I had a feeling of urgency - of time running out for Mulder. The first thing that hit me upon entering the room was the stench. Unwashed bodies, vomit, urine, and some medicinal smell. I fought to keep from heaving as I moved deeper into the room. When I saw the bodies on the bed, my throat felt as though a fist had grabbed and squeezed. The woman was clearly dead. I dropped my weapon and fell to my knees next to a frail-looking Mulder where he lay - oh, God - not breathing! And I couldn't detect a heartbeat. I screamed "NO!", got to my feet, made a double fist with my hands, and slammed them as hard as I could into his chest. Afraid to hope, I checked quickly and found a thready heartbeat! I made sure his airway was clear and began breathing for him, mentally chanting, "Please, please, please. Come back to me, Mulder. Please, please..." I felt a hand on my shoulder, and I gratefully made room so that Agent Farris could give me a hand. She said, "I've called for an ambulance. The guy in the hall will probably live, but he's losing blood from a wound in his shoulder." Together we kept Mulder's heart going and breathed for him until the paramedics arrived with their gear. I finally spared a glance at the woman who lay dead next to Mulder, and felt pity for her. She appeared to have been caught up in the same horror as had Mulder, but didn't get the chance to survive it. Before the paramedics moved Mulder, Skinner showed up at the door, taking in the scene. He motioned with his head for me to come out to him. I didn't want to leave Mulder, but there was nothing I could do at the moment for him. Skinner pulled me aside from the commotion in the hall and spoke in a low tone, "The man you shot is afraid Jakes will kill him because he screwed this up. He said that Mulder has been fed heavy doses of heroin regularly since they snatched him, and is thoroughly addicted by now. They were about to overdose the two of them," he nodded back toward the room, "then call the authorities so they would be found this way." I wearily slumped against the wall, closing my eyes. I suddenly was aware that Skinner was leaning close to me; I could feel his breath against my ear. "I've told the paramedics that Mulder is a suspect, a John Doe, and will have a Bureau guard accompanying him in case he can make a statement. We don't want it to get out that an FBI agent is a heroin addict. He would be booted out of the Bureau in a second. Why don't you take Agent Farris with you and stay with Mulder?" Giving him a grateful glance, I said, "Thank you." He had done so much for us recently that I had begun to view him more as a friend than as a supervisor. I saw that the paramedics were wheeling Mulder out of the room on a gurney. He was still on a respirator, heart monitor, and IVs, but he was alive, thank God. Skinner told Agent Farris to take her car and meet us at the hospital. Before they could wheel the gurney out through the exit door I realized that the media had arrived in force. There were cameras and reporters everywhere beyond the glass in the parking lot. Telling the paramedics to hold up for a second, I took my jacket off and held it over Mulder's face as we moved through the crowd to the ambulance. Once inside the ambulance, the driver wasted no time in getting us to nearby Prince Georges County Hospital. At the hospital, I quickly gave the doctor all the information I had on Mulder's condition. I stuck to the story Skinner had concocted, leaving Dr. Weismann with the impression that Mulder was an unnamed suspect who was on heroin and may have overdosed. When he left me in the waiting room to continue to work on Mulder, I collapsed onto a sofa next to Agent Farris. "OK, Agent Scully, I'm ready to hear what the hell has been going on. You and I both know that's Agent Mulder in there, and not some suspect. Why the fake "John Doe?" Wearily, I explained that we were trying to protect his identity from the press and the Bureau for now, given the stigma "heroin addict" had with those institutions. "Even if it wasn't his fault?" She sounded unbelieving. And naive. "It won't matter. The fact of the addiction will be enough to ruin his career and reputation. I can't force you to keep quiet about this, but I'm asking you to please give him a chance to recover and get back to normal." She stared at me, apparently thinking it over, and finally nodded. I let out the breath I hadn't realized I had been holding, and gave her a smile. We waited for another hour, and finally the doctor walked in, looking more tired than I felt. "Although he still has a fair amount of narcotic in his blood, he has not received an overdose. Instead, there has been a severe systemic reaction to an additive in the heroin; the quinidine. Heroin is cut with various additives, and he finally got a dose with the product to which he is allergic. He has had respiratory failure, followed by pulmonary failure. The CPR someone gave him kept him alive until we could get the toxicity flushed from his system as best we could. His body is fighting off the remainder of the irritant and, other than the withdrawal syndrome which should hit shortly, he should recover." "What should be done about withdrawal?" was my first question, although I had a fairly good idea. "We can't keep him here throughout a withdrawal phase; however, we can start him on oral methadone and send a supply home with him for his own course of treatment. That is, assuming the police won't want to lock him up as a felon." He raised his eyebrows in question. I shook my head. "We don't have anything to hold him on, Doctor Weismann. I'll take charge of him as soon as he can leave the hospital, so I would appreciate it if you would order the methadone to be delivered to me before he leaves." He looked inquiringly at me for a moment, then shrugged and said, "All right. He should be ready for release in the morning if the treatment and his recovery rate continue on track." He told us where we could find Mulder, and I left Agent Farris to get the paperwork completed for the methadone. When I reached Mulder's room, I found that he was still unconscious, hooked up to IVs, a catheter, and monitors, with a respirator down his throat. If what Doctor Weismann had told me were true, then at least the respirator should have been pulled. I knew that, were Mulder conscious, he would be gagging and fighting the tube, in a panic. I had to get it removed before he woke up. The nurse I cornered down the hall was not too happy to drop what she was doing to perform a function not ordered by a doctor on staff. I told her what Doctor Weismann had said, and she insisted on verifying the removal of the respirator with him personally. I left her with a phone receiver to her ear to check on my partner. Just as I feared, he was waking up. His eyelids fluttered and his hands were moving restlessly in the restraints. Shit. Here we go. (Continued in Part III) From fox42@ix.netcom.com Fri Mar 28 19:20:00 1997 Subject: "Kicking the Habit" (3/4) by Gerry Hill From: fox42@ix.netcom.com -------- (Same disclaimer as Part I) Summary: Mulder becomes addicted to heroin and Scully must try to save his life and his career. KICKING THE HABIT (3/4) by Gerry Hill (fox42@ix.netcom.com) Mulder's eyes flew open at the same time I heard the nurse entering the room behind me. He went into complete panic mode as he realized the tube was down his throat and he began to silently struggle. He wasn't aware of me or of anything else but the need to get rid of the respirator. He gagged and fought his restraints, getting more and more out of control by the second. I had a hand on his forehead and on one of his arms, but I might as well have been a hundred miles away for all the calming affect it had. The nurse had brought another nurse along with her, and they shooed me out of the room. I left them to do their jobs, pacing in the corridor, unable to relax. When they finally left and I was able to re-enter his room, I found Mulder looking exhausted, with his eyes closed. He had dark smudges under his eyes and his face seemed gaunt. The IV needle was taped to his right hand, the restraints were removed, but my eyes were drawn to the terrible needle marks and bruises that covered his left arm. It was a wonder none of it had gotten infected. I gently touched my fingertips to his poor abused skin. Suddenly I was aware of Mulder's gaze. I looked into his expressive eyes, now wide open and aware. His look spoke of incredible pain and guilt, with some deeper feeling moving in those hazel depths. "Scully." My throat ached in sympathy when I heard his raspy whisper, caused by irritation from the respirator. I gave him a smile, and said, "I'm here, Mulder." His next question was odd. "Am I dead?" He looked as though he really wanted an answer. "You were," I answered, "but we brought you back just in time." His gaze drifted off as he sighed. "Oh." He seemed to be disappointed in a way. His next words were spoken with great sadness. "Ginni's dead, though. I saw them kill her." I managed to say, "Yes, she died, Mulder." It was his turn for tears, and I thought they were for Ginni, but I was wrong. "Why did you bring me back? I wanted to die. I was ready." I took a breath to calm myself and said, "Mulder, that's the drug talking now. You don't want to die. You're strong, and you have a lot to live for. You'll feel better soon, about everything. Why don't you get some rest, and you will probably be able to go home in the morning." He nodded slightly and obediently closed his eyes again. But I saw a few tears escape from under his eyelashes while I waited for him to drift off. I sat in a chair by his bed, worried about this defeated attitude. Even at the worst of times, he had never expressed wanting to die. I was deeply afraid for him at that moment. Jakes' men must have reached something in him, touched or hurt a secret place inside, but, please God, not so that it was beyond healing. About half an hour later, I heard someone at the door and looked up to see Agent Farris standing there, holding some papers and a large plastic bag in her hand. I stepped outside the door so that we wouldn't bother Mulder, and she handed me the bag and papers. "This is the methadone with the instructions on administering it." She peeked in at Mulder and asked, "How's he doing?" "Pretty depressed, but the real withdrawal symptoms haven't kicked in yet. I'm hoping to get through this day and have him home in the morning before we need to start on the methadone." "Do you want me to sit with him while you go get some rest?" I thought about it, but there was no way I could leave Mulder, especially in his state of mind. "Thanks, but you go on home. I would appreciate it if you could see if someone would bring my car here from the motel so we'll have transportation in the morning. Here are the keys. They can leave them under the floor mat." She said that she would be happy to do that herself; she could have her brother who lived close by to take her back to the motel. She left, telling me to call her if I needed any more help. I wondered if she would keep quiet about this situation, and I decided that she probably would. Using the telephone at the nurse's station outside Mulder's room, I called the Lone Gunmen and told them we had found Mulder, thanks to their help. They were excited, all trying to talk on the phone at once, and wanted to come see him immediately. I talked them out of it, convincing them to wait until he got settled in at home. All I told them was that he was dehydrated and malnourished, which was true, and needed time to get some strength back. I think they suspected that drugs were involved, given what had been glimpsed on the videotape, but they didn't bring it up for some reason. Since "incurious" and "diplomatic" were not words with which they were familiar, I was surprised by their reticence to broach the subject. Skinner stopped by to peek in on a slumbering Mulder and to tell me that the "doctor" was in a safe house while they tried to locate Jakes. The asshole was in hiding, apparently, and no one would turn him over, knowing the kind of retaliation they could expect. Skinner told me to take whatever amount of time I needed to get Mulder back to normal. He didn't say the words, "drug-free," but it's what he meant. I told him that the withdrawal timeframe could be anywhere from one to three weeks, depending upon the strength, frequency, and amount of narcotic he had been given. After Skinner left, I settled into the chair to get some rest and found myself unable to sleep. The chair wasn't too uncomfortable; I just felt that Mulder and I had come to an important point in our lives where some decisions were going to have to be made. By both of us. We had been on the verge of slipping into a physical intimacy, but hadn't quite taken the final step yet. Now...who knew what was going on in that brilliant mind of his? My fear had not eased, but had settled around me like a cold, clammy fog. I don't know how I managed, but I must have drifted off and slept for a while. I shot up out of my chair as the echoes of a scream rang in my head, nearly falling on my face as my non-responsive legs tried to bear my weight. They had been tucked in one position for too long and had gone to "sleep." Mulder was awake and looking embarrassed when I bent over him. I waved away the nurse, who seemed grateful that I was taking over. I brushed the lock of hair from Mulder's damp forehead and asked softly, "Bad dream?" His eyes were very dark and not communicating with me beyond the subdued, "Yes" response I got. Then I noticed the tremors in his hands. Looking closer, I realized that he was perspiring, his eyes were moist, and he kept sniffing like he had a cold. "You're showing signs of withdrawal, Mulder," I told him. "The doctor prescribed a methadone treatment that will help make it more bearable for you." I turned to get the bag and the instructions, but heard a snarled, "No!" and his hand clamped over my wrist. For someone in his current condition, the grip was strong, on the verge of painful. Moving closer to him, he saw that I was not forcing the issue, and he let go of my wrist. He muttered, "Sorry, but I can handle this without taking something that will just prolong the process." "But withdrawal can be unbearably painful, and methadone isn't addictive like heroin, Mulder. You don't have to suffer." His haunted eyes cut to my soul when he rasped, "Yes, I do." My silence spoke the question for me. "Scully, I let them shoot that filth into me. I begged them for it. I...did some things just to get a fix." He paused and drew a shuddering breath. "I even gave up on Samantha - I didn't care anymore." The last words came out in a wail, and I moved to comfort him, but he shoved me back. "I've lost part of myself, Scully, and...and I don't think I can ever get it back." Helpless to reassure him, I watched as he turned his back to me and let his grief out in deep, wracking sobs. My heart was aching for him, but I knew he didn't want me in the lonely place he had gone. I brushed my own tears away and returned to my vigil in the chair. He was in the early stages yet; there would be time later, when the symptoms became more painful, to try again. There was no real change in his condition throughout the afternoon. He flatly refused dinner, and then I noticed he was alternately flushed and perspiring, then suddenly shaking with chills. The nurse told me that his heart rate and blood pressure were elevated. Finally, I decided that he could do this at home. Every hour we remained in the hospital, it grew more likely that he would be found out and exposed to the world as an addict. Checking him out was no problem, and I put everything on my credit card, planning to straighten it out with Skinner and the health coverage later. Since we had no clothes for him at the hospital, he just wore the institutional pajamas they had provided, with my long coat from the car thrown over his shoulders. It was nearly midnight when we arrived at my apartment. When he saw where we were, he refused to get out, saying, "I'm not going to let you go through this hell with me, Scully. I need to go to my own place." He suddenly gave me a sickly smile. "The neighbors are used to all sorts of weird noises at all hours of the night from my apartment." I thought about it for a moment, then told him to sit there while I ran inside for a second. I quickly packed up everything I might need for a week or so at Mulder's. He could object all he wanted, but he was not going to go through this alone, however much he may insist and throw tantrums. When he caught sight of the bag, he did go ballistic, but I rode it out, ignoring him all the way back to his apartment. He stubbornly sat in the car while I went up to his place and began cleaning off his bed which served as a storage area, since he never used it to sleep in. Eventually I heard the door slam, and then his angry footsteps came toward the bedroom. Once he got into the doorway, he kept coming until he had me backed up against the wall. "You know what they made me do with Ginni, don't you?" he demanded, his voice harsh and bitter. I could only nod my head. "Don't you see, she could easily have been you, Scully; it wouldn't have mattered. It was just a...a *thing* I had to do before I could be rewarded. And I did it. I saw then that my soul was capable of such cruelty. I can't see how to get back to what I was, Scully." He stood there, within inches of touching me, panting in terror, his eyes begging me to understand, to leave him, to run. So I did the only thing my heart wanted, and that was to put my arms around his waist and hug him to me as closely as I could. I felt his rigid muscles flinch away from me, so I reluctantly released him. Then I saw that he hadn't been rejecting me so much as reacting to the severe stomach cramps which were ripping through his mid-section. He moaned as he wrapped his arms around his body and bent over in agony. I managed to shove him toward the bed, and when the backs of his knees hit the edge, he fell back onto it, still clutching his stomach. He was perspiring heavily again, and I could see tremors running through his body. "Please let me get the methadone - it will relieve the pain, Mulder." At my words, his eyes moved to mine. He spat out, "No!" Then he growled, "Get out, Scully, I don't want you to see me like this. It will just get worse." "You're not getting rid of me Mulder. You need help." I understood his attitude in a way, but I was also fed up with it. I noted that he had paled and was now shaking from chills, so I pulled the covers up over him. Suddenly he shoved the covers away and staggered to his feet. "Bathroom" was the only word he managed, as he tried to hold his nausea in check long enough to reach the toilet. He just did make it, but having nothing in his stomach only made the retching that much more painful. When he finally came out, I led him to the bed and he didn't protest. He just crawled under the covers and lay there, shivering, with eyes watering, nose running, yawning alternating with sneezing. If I hadn't know better, I would have thought he had caught a really bad cold. I only wished. He turned on his side away from me then, and I knew he wanted me to leave him alone. Over the next few days, the tremors got worse, and finally developed into convulsions. I screamed at him once, telling him to take the damned methadone, but he managed to shake his head in refusal even in the midst of a painful muscle spasm in his lower back. It was possible that he would survive this, but I really doubted *my* ability to cope. His agony was my agony, and he didn't realize that fact since his world has narrowed around him to a small space filled with constant torture. The ordeal had been going on for five days when something so horrible occurred that I still shook from it over 24 hours later. I had been in the kitchen fixing a small bowl of soup, hoping I could get it down him while he was in a lull, when there was a sound from somewhere in the apartment. Since it had been so quiet, any little noise was noticeable. Then came the sound of a gunshot, terribly loud in the confines of the apartment. It had come from the bedroom, I was sure. Oh, no, no, no. My heart stopped, I couldn't breathe. In an instant I stood in the doorway to his room and saw him sprawled out, face hidden by a pillow, a gun loosely held in the hand that lay limp beside him. I heard myself crying out, then I sagged to the bed next to him and put my shaking hand on his arm. I hesitantly pulled the pillow away from his face. The sight of all the blood froze me in place for what seemed an eternity. At first the blood prevented me from seeing that the wound was a shallow furrow in his scalp near his temple. When that fact registered on me, I was overjoyed. He wasn't dead. He had somehow missed a point-blank shot. A muscle spasm or convulsion must have spoiled his aim, but I wasn't trying to figure it out right then; I was too thankful that he was alive. The first thing I did was go out into the hall and reassure some of the neighbors that the shot they had heard was an accident, no one was hurt, and I showed them my FBI identification for further reassurance. I just hoped that no one had called the police yet. I returned to the apartment and cleaned Mulder's wound, put a bandage on it, and waited for him to regain consciousness. From the angle of the wound, I didn't think he had done any serious damage to his skull or brain, but needed him to be awake to make sure. His eyes reacted normally to light, so I didn't believe that he had a concussion. Several hours passed, and he still remained out of it. I supposed that was good in a way, since he could escape the withdrawal pains through this oblivion. As I said, though, I couldn't stop shaking. Almost losing him twice in just a few days was not helping me to age gracefully. How he knew that I kept a spare gun in my overnight bag is beyond me. I may have mentioned it to him once and that damned wonder- memory of his allowed him to recall it years later. I had left the bag on the floor in the corner of his bedroom, dammit. I prepared a dose of the methadone and placed it on the table beside the bed for when he awakened. I knew it was going to be an uphill battle to get him to take it, but I was ready to be as nasty and hard-headed as I possibly could, if simple persuasion and appeal to his common sense didn't work. My concern was growing as the day drifted into late afternoon and Mulder still hadn't awakened. I was considering calling an ambulance after all, when I saw him move his legs under the cover in the bed. I was by his side in an instant, not knowing what reaction to expect from him when he realized that he was still alive and hurting. His eyes were open and unreadable, refusing to look at me. Mortally afraid that he would completely withdraw from me and close me out, I ventured, "You're a selfish bastard, Mulder, but I love you anyway." He closed his eyes as if in pain, drew a deep, shuddering breath, and whispered, "I'm sorry." "For what? That I love you?" I replied, trying to get him to look at me. I think that "selfish bastard" had registered with him, but the "I love you" had not, until I had spoken it the second time. As I sat on the edge of the bed next to him, desperately trying not to cry, he turned his head to stare at me, as if seeing me for the first time. Finally, I had to let everything out - the pressure was too much to bear. "How could you think of taking yourself out of my life like that, Mulder!?" I cried out through my gut-wrenching sobs. "Didn't you know what that would do to me? How could you not know how much I've always loved you?" The bed was shaking with my weeping, and even through the tears I could see how pale he was getting. But the dam had burst and there was no turning back any more. He put a hand up to my wet cheek and his eyes were deep dark pools. He silently pulled my head down to his chest, under his chin, and held me there while I cried until I thought my heart would break. "Shhh. Don't cry, Scully," he murmured. "Everything will be all right." It seemed as though I cried forever, but I gradually calmed down to a hiccup now and then, and lay in his warmth, feeling his heartbeat against my face. Then I was aware of a severe rigidity to his muscles and realized that he was having another convulsion. I quickly moved to the side of the bed again to give him room in his agony. After he rode the pain out and the convulsion subsided, I brought the methadone dose to him, offered it in silence, and held my breath. It was his turn to weep now, and the tears ran freely as his trembling hand reached out to take the dose from me. After it went down his throat, he turned away from me again, pulling himself into the fetal position, and lay there shivering under the covers. I retreated to the living room and settled down on his couch to wait and hope. My nerves had begun to calm down from the absolute hysteria level to a more moderate jangling. The apartment had grown dark with the approach of evening, when I heard a knock on the door. I had just checked on Mulder, who was sleeping, and my first impulse was to ignore whoever was out there. Then I could hear Agent Farris' voice calling, "Agent Scully? It's Karen Farris. I just wanted to see whether you needed anything. And to give you some information from the Assistant Director. Agent Joe Baxter is with me." I called out, "Just a second." I turned on a lamp and retrieved my gun from where it had been lying on the coffee table, tucking it in the waistband of my jeans, under the shirt-tail. Trust no one. The two FBI agents walked into the living room and stood there looking around nonchalantly, probably curious about "Spooky" Mulder's home. Joe Baxter was new to me. I had heard that he had just transferred to Headquarters from Violent Crimes in Dallas, Texas. He was about Mulder's height, was black, and was slender, but a bit heavier than my partner. Now that we weren't frantically trying to keep Mulder alive in that hotel room and hospital, I was able to really "see" Agent Farris for the first time. She was maybe an inch taller than me, with blonde hair cut in a short, attractive fluff around her pretty face. Her blue eyes didn't seem to miss much, and she caught me looking her over, to my embarrassment. She just gave me a nod and asked, "How is he?" "Getting a little better." "And you?" "Coping." I'm afraid that those eyes were seeing a lot more of my anguish than I would normally show, but I was truly tired, both mentally and physically. She said, "Let's sit down." She and Baxter sat down on Mulder's couch/my bed, while I took the overstuffed chair opposite. I didn't dare to close my eyes, or I would have been out of it immediately. Then Agent Farris said something that got my attention. "AD Skinner asked me to tell you to be extra cautious. There's some indication that Jakes is still in the area and that he's interested in finishing off Agent Mulder. He didn't go into detail, but he has ordered Agent Baxter to stand guard outside the building, and to have me up here to make sure that you'll have help if someone tries to reach him. He'll have two more agents relieve us in the morning." Agent Baxter spoke up. "I thought that I would set up shop just inside the front entrance, where I wouldn't stand out like a sore thumb. I could keep an eye on the elevator, the front door, and the stairway from there." Skinner must have some reliable information or he wouldn't have committed these agents to an all-nighter. I filled Baxter's thermos with coffee we brewed up, and he headed downstairs. Farris insisted that she keep watch in the hallway, since she couldn't keep an eye on approaching danger from inside the apartment. She took a chair with her to the opposite end of the hall from the elevator and settled down to wait and watch. (Continued in Part IV) From fox42@ix.netcom.com Fri Mar 28 19:21:34 1997 Subject: "Kicking the Habit" (4/4) by Gerry Hill From: fox42@ix.netcom.com -------- (Disclaimer same as Part I) Summary: Mulder becomes addicted to heroin and Scully must try to save his life and his career. Rating: R for language, sex and violence Classification: T, A, MSR KICKING THE HABIT (4/4) by Gerry Hill (fox42@ix.netcom.com) SCULLY: At 12:30am, it began. I learned later what happened, since I was only present for the last part. A hooker named Angel sauntered up the sidewalk to Mulder's apartment entrance. Jakes had sent her ahead to see if Mulder had any protection in place. Once inside the foyer, she stood with a hand on her hip looking over the tenant's names and apartment numbers which were posted behind a glass case on the wall. She hadn't seen Baxter, who had kept out of sight behind a pillar near the door, and he startled her when he emerged from its shadows. He had noticed the tiny top she wore; her breasts peeked out from underneath its scanty bottom. Her skirt barely covered the essentials, and her red spiked high heels made her taller than Baxter's 5'11. "Could I help you find someone?" Baxter asked. "You scared the hell out of me. Where did you come from, anyway? I'm trying to find Chuck Bishop's place on the fourth floor. We had a "date." She gave a little twitch of her hips. "Anyway, I saw his name up there; he's in 44." She swayed over to the elevator, pushed the "up" button, and tapped her foot impatiently. Baxter sighed and went back to his post. When Angel got off the elevator, she took her time walking down the corridor, looking at apartment numbers and eyeing the woman down at the end of the hallway. When she reached #44, she started banging on the door. No one answered for several minutes, so she swore loudly and pounded on the door a little harder. Finally giving up, she spun around and angrily walked back to the elevator, muttering to herself. As she left the building, Baxter got an eyeful when she stopped, bent over, and adjusted her shoe strap. Five minutes later, two men entered the building, one of them shooting Baxter with a silenced pistol as the agent was trying to pull his own gun from the holster. He fell with a fatal gunshot wound to his head; they had known enough to realize that he would have been wearing a bullet-proof vest. He was dead before his body was pulled out of sight behind the pillar. The men traveled up to the fourth floor via the elevator. As soon as the door opened they quickly strode down the corridor toward Farris. She had gotten as far as unholstering her weapon, when both men shot her with their silenced pistols. Not bothering to hide her body, they discarded the pistols on the floor and drew automatic weapons. They turned to the entrance to apartment #42, unceremoniously kicked the door in, and entered with weapons trained on the interior. ----------------- Earlier that evening, once Agents Farris and Baxter were in place, I had returned to the bedroom to see if Mulder were still asleep. I approached the bed and saw that his eyes were open, staring up at the ceiling. They moved to my face as I drew close, seeming to devour me with their intensity. "Scully," he huskily said. "I know that you don't understand what's going on in my mind. I need to explain it; I want you to understand." "Mulder, you can tell me all this later. You need to rest right now." He closed his eyes for a moment, appearing to be gathering strength to say what he felt he had to tell me. "You have to know how I've changed so you can make the choice to stay with me or not." My knees felt wobbly at that statement, but I forced myself to gain control over my emotions, and waited to see what was to come. "The profiles that I do; I could put myself into the heads of the worst kind of murderers and rapists, but I always knew in the back of my mind that *I* was OK...*I* could return to my sane, normal world. Everything would be all right again." He had to stop talking for a moment, as he struggled to calm his emotions. I put a hand on his arm, but he pulled away abruptly. "I'm not trying to be melodramatic or garner sympathy. I'm just trying to explain how *everything* has changed. I don't think of myself as one of the 'good guys' anymore. And I don't think I can ever find my way back." I decided to keep quiet and let him get it all out, then I would try to knock holes in this notion he had gotten entrenched in his brain that he was capable of the worst of crimes. At least, I hoped to God I could dispute it, or it would destroy him. It almost had already. He pulled himself up to lean against the headboard with a pillow at his back. The sheet slid unnoticed to his waist and I saw that the sweat on his face covered his chest, too. "I've found that I have an addictive personality. Not everyone becomes addicted to heroin in the time I was exposed to it, Scully." His eyes bored into mine, demanding understanding. "The narcotics I've had to take when hospitalized in the past were seductive, so I've tried to avoid medication of any kind over the years." He paused, taking a shaky breath. "I tried to kick the habit twice while they were holding me captive. I was begging for it before very long. I think I would have done anything they asked, in order to get a fix. Anything. And you know that Ginni and I had sex as ordered. What you didn't know was that Ginni tried to resist at first, but I ignored her..." His voice cracked. "Then she finally went along with it when she knew I wasn't going to listen to her objections." He closed his eyes. "I want a fix right now. I want it so much," he whispered. "If you weren't here to keep me straight, I would have gotten my hands on more somehow." He opened his eyes again and commented, "Not a very pretty picture of your partner, is it, Scully? A pitiful addict, suicidal, and morally corrupt." Finally, I couldn't stand it any more and burst out with, "That's the most ridiculous load of crap you've ever tried to hand me, Mulder." His mouth opened to say something, but I went forward, full speed ahead. "Those men knew what they were doing. They gave you enough of that junk to make sure of addiction, then amused themselves with tormenting you. You had no control over what happened with Ginni, and you must know that. There is no one who could have come out of that whole, and you are no exception. And you *can* get back to where you were. You can! The drug is still causing depression and half a dozen other debilitating symptoms, but you'll get through it eventually." My pep talk obviously wasn't working. I didn't like the defeated look I saw in those eyes now, and he had stopped listening to me. The sound of the brass whale sculpture smashing against the wall jerked him back to attention. I had grabbed the first thing at hand, hurling it with all my strength and anger and fear. His eyes were riveted on mine. "It doesn't *matter* what you thought or felt under the influence of the drug, Mulder. It wasn't you. In your right mind and normal condition, you would never hurt anyone, and your sister is still the focus of your search for the truth." He was breathing faster, and I noticed now that the sweat had dried and he was shivering. The methadone hadn't lasted as long as I thought it would; I should have given him a larger dose. He turned his head away from me then and I could see his fists clutching the sheet until the knuckles whitened. As I turned and walked through the bedroom door to get more of the drug for him, I heard a tremendous noise from the entry. It sounded as though someone had kicked the door open. I pulled my gun out and flattened myself against the wall in the hallway next to the living area and peered around the doorway. Two large men in suits carrying automatic weapons barged in, sweeping the room with their guns, looking for someone. I didn't have to wonder who that someone was. I ran back into the bedroom, pulling Mulder's gun from its hiding place behind the bureau. I threw it onto the bed next to his hand. He fumbled with it for a second, and his eyes were huge. "We've got trouble," I whispered. "Two bad guys with guns." "We don't want a gun battle in here," he said in a low voice. "The bullets will go right through these walls into other apartments." I nodded, but from the looks of things, didn't know how we were going to stop these guys without gunfire. I heard one of them approaching in the hallway. As he came through the door, he saw Mulder sitting on the bed. While his attention was directed that way, I stepped out from the wall behind him and swung my gun as hard as I could against his head. It hit him a solid blow, but didn't put him out. He was turning toward me, gun coming around to bear, when Mulder's body crashed into him like a freight train. They hit the floor so hard that the furniture shook. The other guy was coming toward us fast from the sounds of his footsteps. He caught a glimpse of me and my gun when I looked around the door frame, and he dropped back out of sight. Mulder had his hands full, meanwhile. The guy was half-loopy from the blow to his head, but was bigger and meaner than my partner. Mulder was hanging on for dear life to the guy's gun hand, trying to keep him from using the weapon. Only wearing his boxers, he had the look of a Greek warrior, with sweat-defined muscles straining as he did battle. But I knew that his strength was a momentary surge of adrenalin, and he was far too weak to continue this for much longer. I stepped up to the combatants and once again whacked the guy with all my strength on his head. This time he went limp and Mulder gratefully got to his feet and dove over the bed to the other side, taking his gun with him. He was motioning for me to follow, when the gunman in the front room decided to begin firing. The first shot came through the wall so close to me that I felt the tug on my shirt sleeve as it passed. His next round hit me in the side and spun me so that my back was to the wall and I faced Mulder across the expanse of the bed. I could see the fine spray of my blood misting the air in front of me and falling onto the bed covers, making a pattern of red spatters. It all seemed to happen in slow motion. Seeing Mulder's face then, it seemed as though *he* had been the one who had been shot; there was so much agony in his expression. I watched as his gaze shifted to the doorway and his expression hardened. He took aim, and then carefully and deliberately pulled the trigger as my attacker entered the room in a crouch. Mulder shot him four times, making sure he was thoroughly dead. When my partner walked around the bed toward the two fallen men, it looked as though he were going to put a few bullets into the head of the unconscious man, too. Still using the wall for support, I managed to choke out, "Help me." His attention snapped back to me and he put his strong arms around my body, lifting me to the bed. The pain in my side suddenly kicked in with a vengeance and he could read the agony in my expression and the way my muscles tensed, I realized. His face was anguished with worry for me. He grabbed a clean tee shirt from a drawer and pressed it into my wound. A fresh stab of pain rippled through me, but I knew we had to slow the blood loss. He was reaching for the telephone by the bedside when he suddenly froze. I saw her at the same time Mulder felt the muzzle of the gun against his neck. I didn't know who she was at the time, but Angel, the hooker who had reconnoitered the building for Jakes earlier, held a 9mm Baretta on Mulder. My weapon was on the floor, about ten feet away, and Mulder had put his onto the nightstand, since he was still only in his boxers, with nowhere to tuck the gun. Angel smiled and said, "It's a shame to mar this nice body, but..." she snarled and brutally shoved the gun hard against the muscles in his neck, "you seem to have killed my boyfriend here." I could see that she was a second away from killing Mulder, and he fastened his eyes on mine. His lips formed the words, "I love you," as a deafening blast filled the room. And I fainted for the first time in my life. -------------------- Not a hospital again. I recognized these white walls only too well, along with the electronic monitors, the IV line, the medicinal odor......Suddenly I was fully awake and horrified when I remembered what had happened before I blacked out. Mulder! That woman had shot him! Had...killed him? But before the fear and grief that built up in my chest could fully become formed, the touch of a hand on mine drew me sharply back to the world. I focused on Mulder's dear face hovering just above mine. Somehow, he wasn't dead. And it all became too much for me. I had lost him when I had discovered his body in the motel, but Farris and I managed to bring him back. Then his abortive suicide attempt nearly took him away from me in a particularly horrific manner. Then, finally, the gunshot I heard when that woman held a gun on him in his apartment. I had come so close to losing him too many times in just a few days. It all hit me at once, and it was too much for me to stand. I began to shake uncontrollably, and I knew that some kind of sound was coming from my throat, but I had no control over any of it. I could dimly hear Mulder's voice saying, "Scully? My God, what's wrong?!" He was shouting for the nurse, and then I mercifully sank into unconsciousness once more. ----------------- MULDER: Everything in existence has come down to Scully's being safe and getting well again. All that crap about me and my damned problems was so pointless and trite - I didn't believe that I had burdened her with all that sniveling and whining. As I sat there at her bedside, my eyes roamed over her delicate features as she slept. It was so clear to me what is important: Her life; her sanity; her safety; her feelings. She has said that I blamed myself for everything; even for when it had rained during our investigation of an outdoor crime scene. OK, maybe she was right, but, dammit, I *have* been at fault for so much that has hurt her and her family. The doctor was just in to see her, and he told me that he was pretty sure she would be physically all right, thank God. The bullet had passed through her side, hitting nothing too major, although she had lost quite a bit of blood. But that terrifyingly unexplainable seizure-thing...the doctor still hadn't figured out what that had been about. He hadn't said as much, but I know that he was considering mental as well as physical causes. A brain scan had not shown anything unusual. I tried to be patient and hoped that she would be back to normal when she woke up. Mrs. Scully had been here all morning, worried sick about her daughter. I finally convinced her to get some rest so she can relieve me for a few hours later this evening. It was strange, but my withdrawal symptoms had taken second place to the recent events. Oh, they still made themselves known, like when it felt as though something was clawing my guts out, but I had been able to ride the pain through until it eased enough for me to be able to ignore it. My personal favorite symptom was the itching skin and the weepy eyes and nose. But I'm close enough to kicking the drug out of my system that I feel that I might make it back to a semblance of the old Mulder. With a few more demons on my back, of course. And not that the old Mulder persona was all that great and enviable, but it was certainly a damn sight better than what I had become recently. But I didn't want to think about that right now. I took a few minutes away from Scully to go down the hall and visit Agent Farris. After Farris had staggered into my bedroom, covered in blood, barely able to remain upright, she had shot Angel a fraction of a second before Angel had been able to pull the trigger on me. Farris' bullet had hit Angel right between the eyes, finally ending the immediate threat to our little group. The first thing I had done once I could control my shaking was to summon the paramedics. Then I had tried to make Agent Farris comfortable on the bed next to Scully, but both seemed to be in bad shape. Agent Farris had been hit in her left upper arm and another bullet had gone through her right thigh. She also had a head wound, which was bleeding profusely. I had tried to stem the flow of blood from all the various wounds, with partial success. As I neared Agent Farris' hospital room, I could hear voices coming from that direction. Peering around the doorframe, I saw a tall young man who resembled Agent Farris; he was standing next to her bed. I rapped gently on the door to warn them of my approach, and then walked in. Her brother was a mess, with uncombed hair and wrinkled clothes. And it was evident that he was still in shock to find his sister in this condition. When he looked at me accusingly, it was obvious that he knew who I was. >From under the bandages, Agent Farris gently asked him to leave us alone for a minute. After the reluctant brother left the room, she stared at me and then said, "How are the both of you doing?" After thanking her for saving both Scully's and my lives, I told her with a smile that we would be fine. I asked her to tell me what the doctor had said about her own situation. She responded that she would be all right, but Baxter... I knew, of course, that Baxter hadn't made it, and I held her hand reassuringly in mine, trying to pass my sorrow and understanding through this physical connection. It seemed to help a little, as her distress gradually faded into a doze, probably from the painkillers in her system. I left her to rest, and returned to Scully. --------------------- SCULLY: When I opened my eyes, I was in a mental haze, not registering any external stimuli. I floated there on the remnants of my dreams for what seemed like hours. I suddenly noticed that something was missing. Mulder. Then I remembered that he had been there when I had awakened earlier - or had that been a dream? I closed my eyes, drifting in and out of consciousness. The next thing I remember was Mulder's voice, and it seemed to be very close to my ear. I kept my eyes shut, concentrating on the low tones, trying to understand what he was saying. "...Sitting here, I've been focusing on what's important. Your possible death shocked me out of my self-pity. When I remembered the endless depth of the despair that brought me so awfully close to ending my life, I was so ashamed. That despair came from the drug, and now I can't believe how close I came to killing myself while you were in the other room." He paused, and I felt the soft caress of his hand on my cheek. I sighed, but I don't think he noticed. Then his husky voice continued. "I'm sitting here, pouring out my soul to you, Scully, and even though you can't hear me, I need to say this. Because I have a feeling that, were you awake, you would be running as fast as you could to get away from me, the person who has become the albatross around your neck. You've spent the past four years sailing through stormy seas, always weighted down with my enemies, my nightmares, my impossible goals, and even my paranoia. But I love you. And that love can't be returned by you, or there would never be any hope of your escaping the endless frustration and torture caused by my presence." A shaky intake of breath, and the impossible words, "You have to leave the X Files and...my life." My eyelids opened in shock to see him seated by my side, his head lowered into the palms of his hands. He must have sensed my gaze, because his head came up and I saw his cheeks wet with tears and the defeat and tiredness written on his face. "Scully," he whispered. I reached toward him with my arm outstretched, and he willingly stood and bent over me, bringing his head closer. My arm reached around his neck and pulled him gently to me so that my mouth met his in a kiss. It was tender and soft and loving; all that I had hoped it would be. If he hadn't finally pulled back, I would have kept on kissing him until we dropped from exhaustion. His eyes were shining with love, just as I thought that mine probably were, too. I whispered, "I'm not going anywhere, Mulder. We do this together." He sat back in the chair, a sadness mingling with the love in his expression. "You heard all of that?" "Yes. And while I understand what you're feeling, I'm not going to leave you. As a matter of fact, I want...a closer...partnership." I blushed, not knowing quite how to say this. Mulder came to my rescue. "OK; this time I *know* you're coming on to me." His grin was the first sign of any kind of happiness I had seen from him in way too long. "Ahem," came from the doorway. We looked up to see AD Skinner standing just outside the room, looking slightly uncomfortable. Oh, Lord, how long had he been there? "I'm glad to see that you two are doing better than you were in the wee hours of the morning. And I see that Agent Farris will pull through, although Baxter didn't make it." His jaw clenched, and I knew he had a hard time with losing agents; he took it personally. Mulder nodded and spoke up. "Sir, what about Jakes?" Skinner found another chair, dragged it closer, and sat down with a sigh. "We just had a gun battle over on the east side with him and some of his gang. We lost another agent - DiCosta - and took down four of them. We have three in custody, but no Jakes. The word is, he successfully got out of town." He eyed us both. "Now, he'll probably leave you two alone for awhile; he'll be too busy running and trying to save his own neck. But that won't last forever, so you need to keep an eye out for him or his henchmen. I'm keeping a guard on you and Farris here at the hospital, just to be safe, and we'll re-evaluate that once you leave here." Mulder suddenly gasped and doubled over clutching his stomach. The withdrawal symptoms hadn't finished with him yet. When he was able to straighten up again, he saw two pairs of concerned eyes gazing at him. "I'll be OK. This hardly happens any more." The sweat stood out on his brow and he was paler than before. Skinner stood and placed his hand on Mulder's shoulder. "Take care of yourself, Mulder. I'll be looking forward to getting you back on the job and back to your old contentious self." He gave a small smile and the two of us nearly had a heart attack. Skinner, smiling, and telling us he looked forward to the grief Mulder caused him on the job? "And take care of each other," he added, as he walked out the door. Mulder and I could only stare at each other, realizing that Skinner was probably giving us his blessing. And we both broke out into grins. EPILOGUE It has been four months since we left the hospital. So far, Mulder's HIV tests are coming up negative, thank God, but he has to return in a couple of months for more testing. As far as the addiction, he's being overly cautious and taking nothing more than the occasional aspirin. Agent Farris has fully recovered and works occasionally with Mulder and myself on cases when the work gets too overwhelming. She's a smart woman, and I find that I like her more every day. Mulder bitches and moans about how she does things, but secretly, I know he likes her, too. As for Mulder and myself, the night we reached my apartment after leaving the hospital, we both headed for the bed and let our love express itself at last. We didn't come up for air (or food, mail, ringing phones, etc.) for days. We took it very slowly, given our conditions, but it's amazing what two determined people can manage to accomplish. We're both going to be all right, I know it now. THE END