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DISCLAIMERS ETC IN CHAPTER ONE.

Preponderance 
By Alanna Rabun 

Chapter Four. 

+++++ 

A cold war was waged in a small cabin near Las Cruces, New Mexico. 

The man felt every muscle in his body tense as fury flashed across the woman's
face.  She took a step forward, he took a step back.  Immediately cursing
himself at the reaction, he planted his feet firmly on the wooden floor, and
held his ground.  Anger and tension became infused with the air they breathed. 

Then, just as the woman made a move to lunge forward in anger and
confrontation, she suddenly dropped to the ground.  A pool of blood spread from
her face onto the wood floor. 

And the man rushed to her side, one word emerging in a strangled voice. 

"Scully!" 

+++++ 

The cell phone in my coat pocket rings shrilly, distracting me from the forms
in my hand.  Like so many times before, I pull it out and hit the send button,
then raise it to my ear. 

"Mulder." 

The voice on the other end hesitates just a moment.  It can't be Scully, I can
already tell that.  As I hear breathing on the other end, I begin to wonder if
perhaps those phone-sex operators have gotten hold of my cell number. 

"Fox?  It's..."  I recognize the voice.  "Maggie Scully." 

I can already tell something's wrong.  Mrs. Scully wouldn't be calling me
unless.... 

"Something's wrong.  Um, Dana wanted me to call you." 

Panic seizes hold of my motor functions.  "What?  What is it?"  I don't bother
to disguise the fear in my voice. 

Mrs. Scully is having a tough time keeping calm, I can tell.  "She.... there's
been a shooting." 

I can hear chaos in the background, along with the faint sound of a police
siren.  "Is she okay?" 

"Yes, she wasn't shot.  Fox, um, you need to get to the Safeway on Randolph
Road as soon as you can.  It's near the Parklawn Cemetary." 

"Randolph Road?  Which city?" 

"Rockville."  I quickly commit the location to memory.  "Fox, I'm sorry, but I
have to go." 

The line disconnects.  I drop the file in my hand and rush out of the building,
on my way to Rockville. 

+++++ 

Mulder rushed to her side, easily scooping Scully up in his arms.  He carried
her over to the bed and set her on the mattress.  Rushing back over to the
sink, he grabbed some dingy white handtowels and doused them with water, then
brought them back over to her. 

Scully remained still, so still, on the bed.  Mulder had come here full of
anger, desperate to confront her with what she had done,  and fully expecting
both of them to break with the fury of their argument. 

He had never expected this. 

As darkness bathed the room, he wiped the blood from her face and placed a cool
washcloth over her brow. 

And over and over again, he whispered, "Scully," while his heart slowly broke. 

+++++ 

I can see the flashing lights from a block away. 

The parking lot is still open, though yellow police tape blocks off the
entrance to the store.  I pull my car into an empty space and tear out of it,
pulling my badge out of my coat pocket as I run.  Scanning the officers
standing around the perimeter, I look for one who might be clueless enough to
let me in, and when I spot him, I run up. 

"Agent Mulder, FBI," I yell. 

The young officer pulls himself up straighter.  "I'm sorry, agent, but you
can't go in there." 

Goddammit, I really want to slap this greenhorn.  Making my voice menacing, I
bark, "I have reason to believe that my partner is in there." 

"Who's your partner?" 

"Special Agent Dana Scully." 

His face becomes very serious, and a look passes across it so quickly I can't
place what it is.  "Oh.  I think you should go see the Captain over there."  He
gestures over to a cluster of officers around a squad car. 

Not giving him a second glance, I hurry over there.  When I'm a few steps away,
I see the flash of red hair in the backseat of the squad car.  Oh, God.  Why
the hell is Scully -- SCULLY! -- in the back? 

A man, his uniform showing the markings of a police captain, spots me and
approaches.  He sees my badge held in front of me and immediately calls out,
"Agent Mulder?" 

"Yes, where is she?"  I try to keep my voice calm, but it's so damn hard.
Scully hears my voice and turns around to face me, a look of uncontrolled panic
on her face. 

Just as I get close enough to the car to grab the handle, the captain grabs my
arm and leads me away from the car.  "I think you'd better come with me,
Agent." 

"I think you'd better let me talk to my partner!"  I try to pull out of his
grasp, but despite being several inches shorter, the man is fucking strong.  He
pulls me about fifteen feet away from the car.  I want to scream.  I want to
pull out my gun and shoot my way back to her. 

"Agent, there's been a situation." 

"NO SHIT!  What the hell is going on here?"  My voice is more scream than
anything else. 

"Your partner is under arrest." Before I can interrupt him again, he continues.
 "Thirty witnesses say she shot another woman point blank.  The other woman is
dead." 

I am stunned.  It was self-defense.  The other person was a suspect. Anything,
ANYTHING but murder.  The other woman was -- "Agent Scully tells us that the
victim's name is Samantha Mulder." 

+++++ 

He must have dozed off, because the stirring of her body next to him startled
him out of a dream.  In it, he was wading through knee-deep blood on the cabin
floor, trying desperately to get to her.  But she always remained an arm's
reach away, moving further from him with each step he took.  Sitting up
straight in the hard-backed chair, he shook the cobwebs from his brain and
looked down at her.  Mulder could barely see Scully in the darkness, so he
walked over to the wall and flipped on the overhead light, wishing that he
could use a lamp instead of the harshness of the cabin light. 

He wanted to feel anger -- God knew he'd spent most of his trip out there in a
state of fury so intense he could barely see straight -- but instead he just
felt hollow. 

And terrified.  He was terrified. 

The nosebleeds were supposed to have been a thing of the past.  They were
supposed to have been gone with the insertion of that small computer chip in
the back of her neck.  The two of them were never supposed to relive the horror
of that time.  But then she stirred again in the bed and her neck was bared to
him from under her short black hair. 

A bandage was where the chip had been. 

Goddammit, Scully!  Why the hell did you get rid of it?  Do you have a
deathwish? 

Thinking back on the past couple of weeks, he realized that she most likely
did. 

Angry tears stung his eyes.  How could this have happened?  How could they ever
survive? 

Did she even want to? 

+++++ 

The drive to the police station takes forever. 

Mrs. Scully is in the car with me.  She tells me that the two of them had been
out running Saturday errands, when suddenly Dana had steered the car toward
Rockville, telling her mom that she "had" to go there.  Mrs. Scully had been
confused, but followed along.  Next thing she'd known, her daughter was in the
Safeway, pointing a gun at another customer.  And then all hell had broken
loose. 

I can feel hell swirling around me. 

Samantha.  What the fuck was she doing there? 

What the fuck was Scully doing killing her? 

Before we left, the officer came up to me, after I'd told him that I needed
more information about "Samantha Mulder".  Before they'd taken away her...
body... they had checked her ID, which listed her as "Samantha Moriarity", of
Gaithersburg. 

The name of the woman who had met me in that diner so long ago, while Scully
had been dying. 

Mrs. Scully fell silent beside me, and I can't find my voice to ask her any
questions.  I'm too busy trying to make sense of this ghastly situation. I'm
too busy trying to hold myself together, until I can find out what the hell the
truth is. 

We pull into the parking lot and I nearly forget the older woman as I rush into
the station.  They won't let me see Scully while she's being booked, no matter
how much I scream and demand that they let me talk to her. 

I feel so damned helpless. 

Finally, after standing around the headquarters for over an hour, about ready
to jump out of my skin, a detective approaches me. 

"Agent Mulder?" 

"Where is she?"  I bark at him. 

He motions for me to follow him into an office.  "I'm Det. Stanhope, and I've
been assigned to your partner's case." 

I don't take the chair he offers me.  "Could you please tell me what the fuck
is going on here?" 

His voice hardens in the manner of someone not wanting to put up with my shit. 
I'm very familiar with that look.  "Agent, if you're going to be difficult, you
can wait outside." 

I bite my lip and clench my fist to keep from hitting the bastard. 

Det. Stanhope holds up a videotape, and I notice a television and VCR in the
office.  "I can't tell you much about the case while it's under investigation,
but I can tell you that it doesn't look good for your partner." 

"Define 'good'."  Somehow I keep my voice under control. 

"All I can tell you right now is that we have witnesses who say that Agent
Scully shot the woman in what appears to be a premeditated manner.  We also
have security camera videotape, and though I've not watched it yet, I have
reason to believe it will show exactly what is being described." 

I sway slightly on my feet.  "Show it to me,"  I demand. 

His voice becomes condescending and I want to shoot the bastard myself. "Agent
Mulder, you know I can't do that.  Now, if you can get yourself assigned to the
case, you can see it.  Until then, you're just going to have to sit back and
wait while we take care of this." 

My voice strains in my throat.  "Tell me, Det. Stanhope.  If your partner was
in this situation, how would you react to being told to 'sit back' and let
someone else take care of it?" 

For the first time, I see him relent slightly, then the proverbial rod is
shoved up his ass.  "Look, there's nothing more I can tell you right now. I
probably shouldn't have even told you this much, but I thought you'd want to
know."  He pauses, and leans back in his chair.  "Now, if you'd please, step
back and let us handle the situation, and I'll make sure my captain keeps you
informed of what's going on." 

I wish I had something to break, to lash out at.  Instead, I grip my fists
tighter, feeling my fingernails dig into my palms.  Trying to make my voice
sound as threatening as possible, I growl,  "You do that, *detective*." 

I don't give the bastard the satisfaction of seeing me out of the office. 

And so I go out into the precinct and wait, as my soul threatens to collapse. 

+++++ 

Mulder stood in the kitchenette, making instant coffee.  The ritual of the
motion comforted him, mocked him.  This could have been any time in their past
-- discussion and debate over coffee, though it was usually some wonderful
gourmet blend she'd concoct, rather than Folger's Instant Crystals.  He poured
the black liquid into two chipped mugs, and turned back to her. 

He found her sitting up in the bed, a look of confusion on her face.  It was
quickly replaced by anger. 

"What the HELL are you doing here?"  She spat out the words. 

The man nearly dropped the mugs, hot coffee sluicing over his hands.  He
somehow managed to set them on the counter, as she continued her tirade. 

"Do you want to kill me?  Do you want to ruin my life some more?" 

Before he could reason out his response, his heart took over and his words
ricocheted off the walls of the cabin. 

"No, Scully, I think you're doing a good enough job of that on your own." 

She winced, and her voice became ice-cold. 

"Fuck you, Mulder." 

With that, she rose to her feet, so unsteady that she had to grab onto the edge
of the bed for balance.  He remained planted in place, watching her stagger
over to him.  Mulder could hardly move, hardly speak, as she closed the
distance between them, each step seeming to increase the reddened lividity of
her skin. 

And as his hands still smarted from the coffee burns, she reached out and he
felt the sting of her palm against his cheek. 

+++++ 

I'm finally allowed to see the videotape. 

Scully walks up to Samantha, a look of fury on her face.  Samantha reacts with
surprise, and before she can even move her lips to say anything, Scully pulls
out her gun and shoots the other woman twice times in the chest.  Samantha
collapses on the floor, a pool of dark gray blood spreading out from her body. 
And then she moves to stand over the woman on the floor, and aims for the
woman's brain.   My partner steps forward and just stares at her. 

That's all I'm allowed to watch. 

Fury targets me from all sides, from the Moriarity family lashing out at Scully
for taking their beloved wife and mother, to my own mother, asking me what the
hell my partner had done.  And I want to collapse from my own confusion and
pain. 

The night of Scully's arrest, I'm finally ordered out of the building by Det.
Stanhope, but rather than go back to my apartment, I decide to barricade myself
within my car and stay until I'm allowed back into the headquarters the next
morning.  Just as I reach my car, the Smoking Man appears out of nowhere. 

He says nothing, and I try in vain to smother my urge to shoot him myself.
"Agent Mulder, I have some information for you." 

I don't reply. 

His face changes slightly -- becomes something resembling sad, as if the
bastard could actually experience emotion.  "The woman that Agent Scully
killed....  She was your sister." 

My hand tightens on my gun in the waist holster.  I could shoot him now, I
could kill him.  But then, not only is doing so outside a police station
definitely not a good idea, I just can't do it.  God only knows why, but I
couldn't kill him. 

"Why the hell should I believe you?" 

"Why the hell would I lie to you?" 

I laugh, the sound scraping along my throat.  "You tell me." 

"It was her, Agent Mulder."  With that, he turns and walks away. 

I don't go after him.  Instead, I collapse back against my car.  My world
dissolves around me. 

My partner has murdered my sister. 

I'm not sure how I managed to make it inside my car, but the next morning I
come to, sitting inside of it, my muscles stiff from the cramped area.  I
immediately peel out of it and stalk toward the front door of the station. 

I find my mother waiting for me at the door. 

I can't speak to her, not now.  I can't deal with the hatred on her face. I
walk past her, ignoring her demands for me to stop. 

Inside the headquarters, I find Det. Stanhope's desk.  He's busy polishing off
a pastry and coffee, and I want to shove them down his goddamned throat for
daring to be relaxed while all this is happening. 

He looks up at me and I order, "I want to see her." 

"What?" 

"I want to see her.  Now!  Get me an interrogation room." 

I think I've intimidated the hell out of the asshole.  He stumbles off to the
captain's office and I walk over to a secretary, asking where the interrogation
rooms are.  She gestures down a hallway and I go over there, choosing one
without Stanhope's directions. 

And I go inside to wait for Scully. 

+++++ 

"What the fuck is going on here, dammit?" 

He grasped her wrists in his hands and stared her down, his height relative to
hers giving him an advantage.  Mulder felt like Goliath, able to crush David
with one blow.  He had never even entertained the thought of striking her, but
it was all he could do not to lash out with his body, as she had just done. 

"You tell me, Mulder.  How the hell did you find me?"  She paused, her face
cherry-red with wrath.  After a short pause to catch her breath, she spat, "Why
the hell did you desert me?" 

"Desert YOU?  I'm not the one who jumped bail and got the hell out of town!" 

Scully struggled against him, trying in vain to wrestle her wrists out of his
grasp, but each motion only increased his grip on her.  He wanted to bruise
her, to make her feel all the pain he'd endured since all this had happened. 
And yet, he knew that her words were only the tip of the iceberg. 

Finally, he let her go, shoving her backward, and he watched her struggle on
her feet before finally regaining balance. 

"Couldn't take the heat, huh Scully?  Little Miss Logic couldn't stay and clear
her name, so she ran away."  Mulder hadn't realized how bitter his words could
become.  "But then, isn't that just like you?  You can't handle something so
you just avoid it altogether." 

Her voice was a whisper. 

"Fuck you." 

+++++ 

My life has become a blur. 

Everything happens in a progression of macabre events.  Clinical and concrete,
unlike the horrors I deal with at the Bureau.  But what makes this my ultimate
nightmare is that it's all about me, in a way the past never has been. 

All about me. 

God, what a self-centered statement.  But then, Scully and I are at the center
of this hurricane. 

And she is gone. 

I got the call from Maggie Scully earlier this afternoon.  She was frantic, of
course, as she told me that she had come back from getting some thing at her
house to find her daughter gone, along with the car and a suitcase.  I wanted
to reach over the phone lines and shake her, to ask her how she could be so
foolish as to leave Scully alone.  But I didn't. 

The parade of horrors continued.  Just as I disconnected the telephone, it
rang.  I answered and found myself talking to Mom's lawyer.  He told me that my
mother was already making plans to file a wrongful death civil suit against
Scully, and would I be available to come in sometime in the next few days to
discuss it with him?  I hung up on the bastard, and fought the urge to call my
mother and tell her exactly what I thought of her.  But the same insecurities
and fears which have plagued me all my life kept me from doing it.  I need to
wait and get my thoughts together -- to figure out just what the hell is going
on -- before I can confront her. 

What the hell IS going on? 

My partner -- the person I trust more than anyone else in the world, the person
I once loved with every ounce of my being -- killed my sister.  My SISTER.  The
object of my search for my entire life.  Why couldn't this have been different?
 Why couldn't Samantha Moriarity have come to me on her own, and we could have
had a reunion full of joy and promises of a future, instead of our reunion
being over her bloody corpse. 

Her death caused by my partner. 

Fuck. 

I had the presence of mind to call personnel and let them know I needed an
indefinite leave of absence, and fortunately they didn't argue with me. They
gave up a long time ago.  Then I hit the road. 

My powers of intuition and profiling are failing me now.  I have no idea where
the hell Scully could have gone.  I only know that I have to get to her. 

I only know I have to hear from her just what the hell happened. 

I only know that we have to work through this together. 

Or lose ourselves in the process. 

+++++ 

Flecks of blood clung to her upper lip, drying around the edges of her nose. 

He felt the fury of her gaze as she tried to stare him down.  It pierced his
body as strongly as any gun she could have fired.  Mulder stood his ground,
refusing to let her get to him. 

"Tell me what happened." 

Her lips parted and she stared at him, gaping slightly as if she couldn't
believe the absurdity of his words. 

"Come on, Scully, you're far from stupid, so quit acting that way."  He took a
step forward and she flinched. 

"Why the hell should I tell you anything?"  It was less a question than a
dagger. 

Mulder placed his hand on his pocket.  "I have my telephone with me.  I could
call the police station right now and turn you in."  A look of fear briefly
flashed over her face.  "Which option is more attractive?  Talking to me, or
spending the rest of your natural life in prison?  Maryland has the death
penalty, so if you're tried for Murder One, you could easily be sentenced to
lethal injection." 

Her gaze shifted to a spot past his shoulder, as he could feel her wrestling
with her obstinancy. 

"Of course, lethal injection is just your style, right, Scully?  Nice and
clean.  The scientific way to die." 

Mulder could see an epithet forming on her lips, but she remained silent. 

"I want to know why you killed my sister, Scully."  His voice broke on the
words.  "God damnit, my *sister*?  What the hell possessed you to do that?" 

Her hand involuntarily raised as if to touch the back of her neck, and then he
realized what she thought. 

The chip. 

That was why she'd removed it. 

Good Lord. 

Despite the few threads of common sense to which he still clung, he wanted to
take her in his arms and tell her that he understood, that he'd be with her. 
But the memory of being told that the dead body on the Safeway floor was
Samantha kept the current of anger alive. 

"I can't,"  she whispered. 

"You 'can't' what?"  he whispered back. 

Like mercury, her mood shifted and her voice became bitter.  "I can't tell
you." 

Suddenly, the urge to destroy something engulfed him.  His hands blindly
reached out for the cooling mug of coffee, and he dashed it to the floor,
barely noticing the cacophany as it shattered in a hundred clay pieces at his
feet. 

"Fine,"  Mulder growled.  "If you're not going to talk to me, maybe you'd like
to talk to the Sherriff."  His hand moved to his pocket and he pulled out his
cell phone. 

Just as his finger pressed down on the 9 key, she catapulted forward and
tackled him.  Her small body overpowered his own, knocking them both to the
ground.  Shards of clay pressed through his shirt, knifing into his back as
Scully lashed out at him, her primal fury making her actions brutal and without
finesse. 

He easily overpowered her. 

Pushing his body up, he grabbed her forearms in his hands and rolled them over,
until his long, bigger body pressed hers into the cheap linoleum of the floor. 

And he stared her down, cursing her and willing her to break. 

+++++ 

END (4/9)