Colorblind
By Humbuggie
© 2003 

Disclaimers and all that in part 1


Part six
 
‘Mulder? Mulder! Come on, buddy.’  I feel strong hands shaking me and I
look up. 

‘Yeah, what?’ 

The second I open my eyes, I regret having done that. Sharp light rushes
into view and blinds me. Automatically, I raise my hand before my eyes
to protect them from the intruder. But where does the light come from? 

‘God damnit, Mulder.’ 

Hey, I know that voice. I look to the side and find Skinner hovering
over me. 
Hovering? I must be on the ground if he’s lingering over me, staring at
me with that strange look of discomfort that he only has when I’m in
trouble. 
I look at him and at Terence next to him, then at Daniel on the other
side, and there are people staring from behind the windows. They’re all
staring at me. What is going on? I am on the ground. But how can that
be? A few moments ago I was sitting on a chair in Terence’s office. Now
I’m on the tiles and they’re cold. 

‘What -?’ 

‘You passed out,’ Terence says and his voice sounds distressed. 

‘You’re going back to hospital, Mulder. This has gone far enough. We can
do this without you.’ 

‘No.’ I push him away and roll on my side, slowing moving up. Everything
is sore; bile comes up in my throat. I move away from all helping hands,
and shake my head stubbornly as I reach up alone. ‘No, I’m fine.’

‘Yeah, right,’ Skinner groans. ‘Have you looked into a mirror lately?’ I
look wearily at him. 

‘Stop it.’ 
‘
You stop it,’ Skinner snapped. ‘Stop being such a stubborn fool. You are
going to kill yourself for nothing.’ 

‘There’s always a reason,’ I say, finally getting up with the help of
Skinner and Daniel, who help me on my two feet. I can barely stand. I
hate this loss of self-control.   

‘Scully will kick your ass when she finds out about this,’ Skinner warns
me. 

‘She won’t,’ I say calmly, ‘unless you tell her.’

‘You can bet your ass, I’ll tell her. I want to see her damage you.’ 

‘Are you threatening me, sir?’ 

‘Of course I am,’ he says, softening up a bit. 

‘Thanks,’ I smile wryly. He looks at me as if I have lost my mind. I
smile, despite everything and soften up too. ‘As long as you’re
threatening me, you care enough to help.’ 

‘Did you ever doubt that?’ he asks estranged. 

‘No,’ I say calmly. ‘Not really.’ 

‘Good.’ 


Part seven

While I chew on a sandwich and devour a cup of soup, we make a list of
Tommy’s possible whereabouts. Skinner had gotten my file from the
basement office earlier and spreads it out on Davis’s desk. I explain
the case to them as briefly and thoroughly as I can, taking deep breaths
in between as nausea creeps up from hidden corners in my mind. 

‘Thomas – Tommy – Delaney’s sister Tina died about a month ago.
Apparently, she committed suicide. A gun was found at the scene and all
evidence pointed towards the girl having inflicted this upon herself.
But her father, Donald Delaney, did not believe that she would kill
herself, and asked the FBI to take a look at the case.’ 

‘According to Mr. Delaney, his stepson Thomas, had special abilities
that he used to enforce his will upon people. He believed that his
stepson had forced his daughter to commit suicide by using mental powers
of control,’ Skinner continues. 

‘We had a case like this before,’ I take over again, ‘a long time ago we
had to deal with a man whose psychic abilities allowed him to force
people to kill themselves. His sister was also able to do this.’

‘Robert Modell,’ Davis says. ‘I know about that case. He put the whammy
on you.’
I grin painfully at the memory of holding a gun to Scully’s face. 

‘You can imagine then our concern when we first spoke with Mr. Delaney,’
I continue. ‘I believe strongly in mind-control and wanted to make sure
that this teenager did not have them.’

‘But you found no evidence?’, Davis says. 

‘That’s right,’ I confirm. ‘We first talked to Tommy about four days
ago. He seemed like a normal, vulnerable kid suffering under his
stepsister’s suicide. He showed nothing out of the ordinary. Even now, I
don’t believe that he has any abilities, and that his father simply
needed a scapegoat for his daughter’s death. Mr. Delaney knew quite a
bit about the Modell-case. As you know, the story was spread out in the
press because Modell had taken hostages in a hospital. I think that’s
where Mr. Delaney got the mustard. I believe that he just wanted to make
himself feel better about his daughter’s death.’ 
 
‘My agents came to me with their conclusions,’ Skinner continues. ‘I
agreed with Mulder’s vision that it was a bogus case. He did however,
believe that the kid was hiding something and wanted to check it out. He
often disappeared at night and my agents wanted to know where he went.
So I agreed on a surveillance to close the case. But to us, the girl’s
death was labeled a suicide.’

‘We followed the boy to the abandoned warehouse on Elk Street,’ Mulder
explains. ‘I believe he was there every night, hiding from something –
his life maybe. As soon as we walked in to find him, the boy started
running. We wanted to talk to him, but he just kept on running. And then
he took the shot. It came out of nowhere.’ 

‘Mulder, you were thinking earlier about what you saw in that warehouse
before you were attacked,’ Daniel asks me. ‘You said you weren’t so sure
that Thomas shot you. Can you explain that?’ 

‘Did I say that?’ I ask surprised, wondering about that. Yes, I do
remember saying something in that line. ‘Strange. I didn’t mean to say
that. Why would I have said that?’ 

‘Mulder, what exactly did you see?’ Terence’s asked, in friendly tone.
‘Did Thomas Delaney shoot Scully, or was there someone else in that
warehouse?’ 

‘I don’t know,’ I say truthfully. ‘One minute we were running, the next
I was on the ground.’

‘You hit your head when you fell. Could it have confused you?’

‘No. The shot came at the exact same time. If there was a gun, I would
have seen it.’

‘But Scully saw it. She pushed you away.’ 

‘There was something,’ I say quietly. ‘Something with the shadows.’ They
look at me and wait. 

‘I can’t explain it exactly. They felt out of place. They were moving,
as if they hid something in them. It’s like they had a mind of their
own.’ 
‘You’re not making any sense,’ Skinner speaks. 

‘I know.’ I laugh, estranged, trying to go back to that place, but the
memory doesn’t return. 

‘There must have been someone else,’ I say, looking at my three
colleagues. 

‘The boy wasn’t alone, that’s why the shadows moved. He lurked in them,
waiting for us.’ I get up, swaying instantly as dizziness strikes hard. 

‘Mulder, easy.’ Skinner grabs me before I fall forward. I grasp onto his
arms and wait until the nausea passes. 

‘Thanks,’ I groan and let go after a while. 

‘Sure?’

‘Yeah.’ 

He lets go of me and watches me as my brain starts to work. There was
someone else, I’m fairly certain about that now. Something felt out of
place. I’d had that feeling before, with Robert Modell. When he put the
whammy on us, I had the same sense of losing my grip on reality. Perhaps
there was some truth about Tommy’s abilities after all. Perhaps he
wanted to avoid us seeing what was there.  

‘Who can lead us to Thomas?’ Daniel asks calmly as they watch me
struggle with my memories. ‘The father?’

‘He’s our only lead,’ Skinner agrees. 

‘What about the mother?’ Terence asks. ‘Do you think she would be able
to talk by now? She has been in that institution for a month now.’ 

‘Forget about her,’ I say. ‘Not a sane word came out of her, when we
visited her.’ 

‘The father it is then,’ Skinner says and watches me. ‘Mulder, we need
you to talk to him. You have seen him before. You’ll know better than
anyone if he’s hiding something now. Are you game? And feeling okay?’ 

‘Always,’ I say. 


Part 8

I take another nap in the car, which does me the world of good. The
moment I close my eyes and the back of my head hits the soft passenger
seat cushions, I’m out of there. It’s like the lights of the world all
shut down and allow me to rest. I’ve rarely felt like that. And I know,
yes, that I should be in a hospital somewhere resting. I know that I’m
weak and too vulnerable.

I dream of Scully: of blood red skies and her blood coloring them. She
stands before me, pale as a sheet and deathly ill. ‘You’re abandoning
me,’ she says accusingly. ‘Why aren’t you by my side?’

‘You have to understand,’ I beg of her. ‘I want the one who did this!’

‘You want him more than you want to help me,’ she accuses. I wake up
with a cry, just as Skinner pulled up to the Delaney’s driveway. 

‘Are you okay?’ he asks, worried. 

‘Yeah. Just a dream.’ 

By the time we arrive at the Delaney residence, I feel a bit better and
less nauseated. But the light of day still hurts my eyes, and every
wrong move sends flashes of extreme pain through my head. 

Skinner turns off the engine and looks at me. 

‘Mulder, you don’t have to go with me.’

‘No.’ I shake my head and touch my cheek. I’m flushed with fever. 

‘If he knows anything, I’ll know too.’

‘Okay.’  

Skinner follows me up the small staircase and rings the bell. A few
moments later, a very annoyed Donald Delaney stands before us. 

‘What do you want now?’ he asks, upset. ‘I told you that I don’t know
anything. 
When are you folks going to find Tommy, and get this over with?’ 

‘We’re doing our best, sir,’ Skinner says calmly. 

‘Weren’t you in hospital or something?’ he asks me with raised eyebrows,
as he gives me the once over. 

‘Not anymore.’

‘You look like you belong there.’

‘I’m okay. Sir, where do you think your stepson might be?’

‘Everywhere and nowhere. I haven’t seen him since he left the house that
night. I didn’t know about it, until the Feds came to tell me he shot
your partner. If I’d known, I would have called you. I don’t want him in
my house ever again.’ 

‘Do you still care where he is, sir?’ I ask quietly. 

‘I never cared. He destroyed this family. As far as I am concerned, he
might as well be dead.’

‘When your son – excuse me, stepson – supposedly killed your daughter,
you allowed him back into your house, sir. Wasn’t that a dangerous thing
to do?’ I ask quietly. 

‘You’ve asked me this before,’ Delaney speaks harshly, ‘but what other
choice did I have? My wife became sick and Thomas is only sixteen years
old. I couldn’t throw him out, could I? Back then, I still believed that
I was mistaken. But I wasn’t, was I? That boy killed my daughter, and
then he killed your partner.’

‘She is not dead, sir.’ 

Delaney does not respond to that and shrugs angrily. 

‘You never feared for your life?’ Skinner asks. ‘You must have felt that
he might harm you too?’ 

‘Never. I am stranger more than my daughter. He wouldn’t be able to
influence me.’ 

‘So you still believe that he has psychic abilities, sir?’ 

‘How else do you explain my daughter’s death?’ 

‘Suicide, sir.’ 

‘There must have been a reason then. She was very happy. Look, I’ve told
all of this to you before. All I can add now, is that I no longer
support him. I don’t care what happens to him now. He can go to hell. Is
that all?’ 

I nod. ‘Just one last question, sir. If you know where he is, tell us.’ 

‘He’s probably back in that warehouse. He always had the hots for that
place. I don’t know why. Go look for him there.’ 

‘We have, sir,’ Skinner says. 

‘Then I don’t know where he is. I don’t care. Goodbye.’ Delaney smacks
the door in our faces. Skinner and I share a glance. 

‘Nice guy,’ my boss remarks. 

‘Too nice, I would say.’ 

‘Do you think he had anything to do with all of this?’ 
‘Perhaps it’s time to look for an alternative motive.’ 

‘I’ll have Terry take a closer look at him.’  I nod and stumble towards
the car. 

Skinner unlocks the door and walks over to me, as I struggle with
dizziness and returning nausea. I close my eyes for just one second and
have difficulty remembering where I am, or even who I am, as the sun
shines brightly on to me. Evening is falling too slow for my liking. I
ache for darkness that doesn’t hurt my eyes so badly. One moment I have
the car door in my hand, the next I’m holding on, fighting to stay on my
feet. 

‘Get in, Mulder.’ Skinner opens the door for me, and helps me gently
inside. I don’t object when he closes the door and walks to the other
side of the car. He gets in and buckles my seatbelt. I look at him,
seeing him through a fog. His image appears and vanishes before my eyes.


‘I’ll take you back,’ he says. I nod quietly. 

It’s nearly six as we return to the Bureau. Skinner wakes me up. I see
that same fear in his eyes again. I think he’s afraid that he might not
be able to wake me at some point. But I always return to the land of the
living, and the place where I am still colorblind. 

Skinner’s phone rings as we enter the building. He speaks quietly, hangs
up and turns towards me. 

‘What is it?’ I ask. 

‘We have to go to hospital.’

‘She’s dying.’ 

‘Mulder –‘

‘Is she dying, sir?’ 

‘She’s not well.’  

‘Let’s go.’ I almost trip over my own feet as we rush back to the car. I
feel my heart sink. I should have been with her, holding her hand and
urging her to wake up. What if she dies before we get there? What if she
is not responding to treatment because I wasn’t there to help her? She
cannot do this to us, I beg. She can’t! 

Skinner takes me to the ICU. I’m barely aware of the fact his arm is
supporting me at all times. He’s like a beacon of light, that man, but I
can’t thank him for it yet. I need to be with Scully now, and with the
adrenaline rush within me ordering me to get even with Tommy Delaney. 
As the doors open, I see instantly that Scully’s cubicle has even more
machines in it. And her body is in a worse state than it was before. She
really is in bad, bad shape. 

‘What happened?’ Skinner asks. ‘You said before that she was doing
well.’ 
The doctor starts a whole complex explanation on how Scully is not
responding well. I don’t understand any of it. I just get the picture:
she is really, really bad.

‘It will be touch and go in the next few hours,’ the doctor says. ‘You’d
better stay with her. She needs your moral support.’

‘No,’ I say stubbornly. ‘First we need to find the kid.’ 

‘Mulder, please.’ Skinner says, grasping my arm. ‘There are other things
to think about now.’

‘No.’ I shake my head, sending flashes of pain through my own body. ‘I
can’t stay here.’ 

‘Why not?’

I hardly dare to look at Scully’s unconscious form. I’m the reason she
is lying there. If someone put the whammy on me, once again, I am to
blame. I should be the one dying. The one suffering. Not her. She had
nothing to do with it. She was there, as my partner. 

Tears spring in my eyes as I rush out of the room, followed by Skinner.
He stops me in the hallway. 

‘My God Mulder, you think you’re to blame, don’t you? You think that kid
put the whammy on you, like Modell did.’ I look into his eyes.

 ‘It’s the only explanation I have, sir. We ran straight into a trap. We
should have seen that gun. It wasn’t that dark in that building. I’m a
sucker for whammies, remember? An easy target.’ 

‘You are not to blame, Mulder. You were never to blame with Modell
either.’ 

‘I put a gun to her face, sir. Not once, but twice. And you say I’m not
to blame? I am a liability. When I’m near her, she gets hurt.’


‘Stop this nonsense. You’re very sick and not thinking straight.’ 

‘We need to find the boy. He’s the only one who can tell us the truth.’ 

‘When you talked to him, did he tell you about special places, he had?
Places he might have gone to?’

‘No.’ 

‘Did you find out why he went to that warehouse?’

‘No. You said they combed the place.’ 

‘Inside and out, they found nothing.’

‘Can you take me there, sir?’

‘What are you hoping to find?’

‘Something. The reason he went there. If his father is right and he has
returned there, we will find him.’ 

‘Mulder, I am not happy with this. But I will do this for your peace of
mind. It is obvious that you won’t listen to anybody reasoning with you.
I just want you to swear to me that you will allow people to help you
when this is over.’ 

‘Yes, sir.’ 

We drive to the warehouse on Elk Street where Thomas Delaney had taken
us that fateful night. It’s nearly seven and the image of Scully is
embedded in my mind. I feel shivers run down my spine the moment we
enter the compound. Skinner parks the car in front of the large wooden
doors that reminds the place of a better time. The lights no longer
work. We have flashlights that we use to get a better view of the
building.

But the moment I enter the building, I can feel that something is wrong.
It’s the same feeling I had that night; the one I ignored the moment we
stepped inside. I feel as if someone is watching us. Toying with us. The
shadows are not right. 
And I just know that Thomas is here.

‘Sir,’ I say quietly, and reach for my gun. Skinner watches me and then
automatically does the same thing, even though he can’t feel that same
sensation I have. He goes with my lead. 

I blink my eyelids, struggling with the disorientation that creeps up
from within me. I have difficulty keeping the flashlight straight ahead,
pointing it at dark corners and places that I don’t care for. Skinner is
ahead of me, protective of me, and caring for me. I know that he will
interfere the moment something goes wrong, but are we being played here?
Is someone going to put the whammy on me, or on him, and force us up
against each other? Are we going to kill each other? 

I’m afraid. My god, I have to admit it: I’m horrified. I want to run
away as fast as my legs can carry me. Instead, we walk forward. 
A sudden noise startles us. 
‘There,’ Skinner cries out in triumph, pointing at a darker corner
leading to the back. We can see running feet clad in Nike’s, that lead
up to a boy dressed in jeans. He tries to get away from us. It’s déjà-vu
all over again. 

‘Tommy, stop!’ Skinner cries out and I want to say that he has to get
out of there. Instead, I follow him as fast as I can, and with every
step I take, a hammer pounds into my head. I have not felt this bad
since the Antarctic. 

In that instant, I lose Skinner out of my sight. I hear a muffled sound
and then a cry, then another sound. 

‘Skinner!’ I call out his name and try to catch him in my flashlight but
he’s gone. He has rushed around the corner, into the shadows. I follow
to that place, keep my gun in the air and point at the corner.

Behind a couple of boxes lies Skinner, face down, flat forward and with
blood on the back of his head. 

‘Jesus,’ I say, holding my gun onto Tommy who is standing there,
shivering. He stares at Skinner. ‘Hands in the air!’ I cry out, and hold
my weapon up level with his heart. The teenager looks at me as if I’ve
gone mad. ‘Hands up!’ I repeat. 
He slowly does what I say. 

I look around for anything that he might have to harm me with and find
nothing.  I see his eyes staring straight into mine, they have a strange
sort of innocence in them that I absolutely hate. I want to throttle
him, kill him and get it over with. I want to punish him for killing
Scully, and then perhaps – Skinner. 
I look at my boss. If he’s dead, I’ll kill the boy and then myself. 

‘Stay where you are,’ I groan, and with one hand holding up the gun, I
kneel. I place down the flashlight so that it shines onto Skinner’s
body, and feel his throat. He’s still alive. Thank god. I let out a sigh
of relief and turn towards the boy. And he stands there with those
strange eyes, just looking at me. 


“What did you do to us?’ I ask coldly. ‘How?’

‘How did I do what?’ he replies and I just lose it. I move forward and
grasp him by the collar as I force him onto the ground, on his back. I
point my gun into his face and he stares into the barrel of it. He’s
absolutely horrified. 

‘Why?’ I hear myself shout. ‘In God’s name: why did you shoot her?’  
The teenager lies underneath me, staring at me with the fear of a slain
puppy in his eyes. 

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ he shouts. ‘I don’t know.
Please, let me go! I didn’t do anything wrong! I didn’t -’
‘- Shoot her? I saw you! You had a gun in your hands. How dare you lie
to me now?’ 

‘I don’t know – I swear to you that I didn’t shoot her. I saw it happen,
but I didn’t do it! I didn’t have a gun.’ 

‘Then who did?’ I ask coldly. ‘Who did it?’  He doesn’t reply. I look at
him, and those eyes that remind me so much of Modell’s, soften. He
doesn’t put the whammy on me. He doesn’t have it in him. 

Tommy’s insistence makes me loosen my grip. I stare at him, surprised,
and as our eyes find each other, I suddenly remember what I saw in the
shadows: the figure of a man lurking. The only man who could have known
his stepson came there every night to find peace and solitude, was also
the father who had killed his own daughter.  


Part 9

The world sways before my eyes. I struggle with my intent to stay awake
and my hunger for release. I let go of the kid and move off of him. 

‘Your father,’ I whisper. ‘It was your father.’  Tommy starts to cry,
moving his hands before his eyes. 

‘Yes,’ he whispers. ‘It was my father.’ 

I move off of him and sit on the ground, holding my hands before my eyes
as the memories return. Thomas was running away from us. He’d been
surprised to find us there. He would have seen his father too, in the
shadows. His father had the gun. And he somehow made us believe that
Tommy had it and used it shoot at us.  

‘Why?’ I ask. ‘Why did he do it?’

‘The money,’ Thomas whispers. ‘He gets all the money. The insurance
policies.’ 

‘Insurance policies?’

‘He has them on all of his family. On Tina, on me and my stepmother. He
gets everything.’ 

‘But to shoot his own daughter?’

‘She wasn’t his daughter, just like I wasn’t his son.’  I stare at him,
amazed. 

‘Didn’t you know?’ he asks. ‘She was adopted the day she was born. He
didn’t kill his own flesh and blood. He wouldn’t know how to love
anyone, anyhow. He used us since we were kids. He never cared much for
us anyhow. We were good for the money. The older we died, the more he
would get.’ 

‘So, if you die too, he will collect more insurance money?’

‘And what better way to have your son die, than to be killed by the FBI
after being labeled a murderer,’ Thomas speaks bitterly. ‘I know what
bullshit story he’s told you.’  But it wasn’t a bullshit story. Donald
Delaney had the ability to play with our minds. He must have. 

‘Have you ever seen anything extraordinary about him?’ I ask, tiredly,
lowering my gun as I try to get Skinner to wake up. He won’t respond.
I’m worried about him. 

‘No.’ I feel anger surge in me. We had Donald Delaney and then we let
him go. 

‘Get up,’ I whisper, crawling onto my side, then slowly upwards as
dizziness overwhelms me. ‘We have to get out of here. You need to get
protective custody.’ 
‘So you believe me, then?’ he asks. ‘I’ve been hiding in the darkness,
in the hidden rooms in the back of this building for a day now. Nobody
knows about them. I’m afraid.’

‘I’ll protect you.’ He seems relieved that I believe him, and I do. I
see things clearer now – less foggy. 

‘You’re hurt,’ he says. 

‘Yeah.’ I look at him and take out my cell phone to call Davis. I stay
knelt down by Skinner’s side: he’s beginning to move. I’m so relieved. 

‘Stay with me Tommy,’ I say, with my back partially directed towards the
boy, 
but he doesn’t respond. 

The second Davis is on the phone, I see something go down on the ground
beside me. I stare at Tommy who collapses without so much as a cry. He
ends up on the floor next to Skinner. 

I turn my back hastily and stare into the madness of Donald Delaney,
standing inside the darkness. He holds a bat in his hands. I look at the
back of the boy’s head. He received quite a blow, just like Skinner did.
Jesus, I think he’s dead. 
Donald raises the bat and comes towards me.
 
‘No,’ I say, holding up my hands to protect my head as I crawl
backwards. I reach for the gun, but before my fingers find it, the bat
goes up and swings into my direction. I stumble backwards to protect
myself until I hit the wall. As he hefts the bat, I fall aside. I can
feel the wood impact my head, but it doesn’t hit me hard. It’s like a
rough graze. Yet it feels like a blast so hard, that it forces me to see
stars. Its more than enough to send me straight back into oblivion.  
And before I reach that place, I realize that I am in quite a big mess, 
A horrible, deadly mess. 


Part 10

I hear something dripping beside me, like the constant tickling of water
onto the ground, released from a broken pipe. I know that sound. I’ve
heard it before. 
I have difficulty forcing my body to respond to my senses. In fact,
nothing seems to work for me. I’m lying useless on the concrete. 

I hear sounds but they’re distant. They don’t seem to intrude into my
brain. I listen to them, and wonder what they are. I taste blood. I open
my eyes to find myself suddenly staring into the beady eyes of a rat. My
God! Immediately, I slump backwards, only to find myself hit a wall with
my back. I’m lying against a concrete pole holding up parts of this
building. I must be dead. This must be hell. My head bursts with
extreme, hot pain. 

“Skinner! Tommy!” 
I strain myself to see them, but all I can do is stare into nothingness.
I’m in bad shape. I know it. And I don’t know where they are. I don’t
know why I’m still alive. 

Footsteps come out of the shadows and approach me. I look up to find
Delaney looking at me. He smiles strangely. 

“Nobody will find you here,’ he says. ‘It will soon be over. The rats
will take care of business. They like the scent of blood, you know.
They’ll devour you. Or, if you get lucky, you might die of your injuries
after all. You really do look like shit, you know.’  Frantically, I try
to push myself up as the rats leave their hideouts, and watch me. He
stays calm. 

‘Where are they?’  He sighs. 

‘Seems like I’m going to collect my insurance money after all. I’m
pretty sure my wife will die soon. Thanks for helping me out, by the
way. I knew you would help me convince the world, my stepson was a
liability.’ 

I stare at him wearily and say nothing. He leaves calmly and shuts the
door behind him. I look around. We must be in one of those hidden rooms,
I think. If what Tommy says is true, no one will ever finds us here. 

I hear the rats crawl over the floor. They find something. They’re
snapping at it, tearing at flesh. Oh god, please let that be Tommy’s
body and not Skinner. Skinner must still be alive. 

Suddenly I hear a very loud groan behind me, one that can only come from
him. Thank god, he’s still alive. I open my mouth, but not a single
sound comes out. I have to struggle find my tongue again. 

‘S – Sir? Skinner. Are you there?’  Another groan follows and then his
heavy voice comes back to me.

 ‘Yeah. What the hell happened?’

‘Delaney,’ I just say. ‘It was Delaney.’  Nothing comes as a reply, and
I realize I’m probably not the only one with a concussion now. I sigh
deeply, and rest my ahead against the pole, trying to find a good
position to sit. 

But the rats are gathering around me. They sense the blood that comes
from the side of my head, where Delaney’s bat hit me, damaging me even
further. 
If they crawl on me, they will eat me. 
Oh God. 


Part 11 

Silence follows noises, and follows silence. I don’t know how long has
passed since we ended up in here. I’ve lost all track of time. Skinner
hasn’t responded anymore and his silence worries me. I think of Scully
all the time. Why in God’s name did I have to find out the truth? We
will die in here and nobody would ever find out. 

Suddenly hard, strange noises coming from outside these walls, shake me
up. I open my eyes and look at the door, willing it to open. But nothing
happens. I heard sounds like people running and rushing through the
compound. I hear a cell phone. They’re here! 

‘H – Hey,’ I say, trying to get my voice to sound harder. ‘We’re here
…!’ 
Nothing works.

Another cell phone. I hear familiar voices right outside these walls.
They must be close. It’s Davis. If only we could get him to hear us. The
cuffs! I strain my arms and feel the cuffs graze against the iron pole
that holds me. I start rattling the cuffs as hard as I can, scratching
my wrists and hands in the process. 

‘Hey!’ I suddenly hear Skinner moan behind me. ‘We’re here!’ 
He calls out for them as loudly as he can, and I just want to kiss him
there and then. He’s awake, he’s alert and he’s loud. 

More noises that seem to go on forever and then – as if the man upstairs
himself were involved, – and the door opens. Flashlights enter the dark
room and find us. 
In the light, I see that rats have been lingering about at my feet.
They’re now scattering all over the place. I sigh with relief. 

Terry is the first one to reach me. ‘My god, Mulder,’ he says, checking
me out. Someone else un-cuffs me. I want to get up but can’t. Skinner is
moving behind me. 

‘I need help!’ Davis says. I look at him in gratitude and want to ask
him how he got here, but nothing much happens. 

I’m lifted up and placed on a stretcher; from then on everything just
becomes one big blur. Oxygen helps me to breath and I hear their worried
voices. ‘Second-impact,’ I hear Skinner say. ‘It’s bad.’ 

After that, there’s nothing else. 


Part 12 

A hospital, an ER, doctors, nurses and a whole lot of tests. I just let
them happen and don’t respond to anything else. It aches too much to say
anything. 
Blurry images and Skinner keeps on entering the picture. He has a big
bandage around his head. 

More darkness, then finally, a beeping that enters that complete, serene
silence. 
I look up and think that I’m dreaming. I’m staring into Scully’s eyes,
and she smiles. 

Okay, so this must be a dream. But she won’t go away. I can feel her
fingers in my hand. She’s so close to me, I can actually smell the soap
she uses. 
I stare at her for a long time. She laughs.

 ‘No, Mulder, it’s not a dream.’ 

She moves away a bit and I get used to the relative darkness inside the
room, I’m in. I can see now she’s wearing a hospital gown and peignoir.
She’s walking around in slippers. 

‘How?’ 

‘You’ve been unconscious for nearly three days,’ a voice says and I find
Skinner. 

‘You missed Scully’s wakeup call.’ 

I keep on staring at my partner who takes a seat by my bed. She does
look very pale and tired, but at least she’s already up and about. 

‘What happened?’ I ask. 

‘When you were asleep, while we drove to the compound, I called Terry
and asked for backup. He found the blood and figured out there must have
been a hideout in the building. The noise we made led him to us.
Unfortunately you were in very bad shape. When Delaney hit you, he
nearly killed you.’ 

‘And you, sir.’

‘Seems my skull is harder than yours,’ Skinner groans. 

‘The boy?’

‘He’s dead.’  I remember the sound of the rats and shiver. 

‘It’s over, Mulder,’ Skinner says. ‘That’s the most important thing. All
you have to do now is rest. Delaney is in custody.’

‘Scully?’  She comes closer. Skinner moves her chair so that she can sit
by my side comfortably. 

‘Yeah.’ 

‘You’re okay,’ I say, and touch her face. 

‘Yeah. Did you ever doubt that?’ She groans painfully as her hand
touches her chest. 

‘But don’t you ever do that again, Mulder. You’re so stubborn. Skinner
told me that I should kick your ass. He said it’s a promise he made.’

‘Yeah,’ I smile at the memory and grasp her hand. She feels so great. 

“I can’t wait.’  She leans forward and kisses me, not caring that
Skinner is in the room. And she comforts me, as she always does. Her
blood was on my hands, but it did not kill her. That’s the only thing
that matters. 


Epilogue

Skinner picks us both up and drives us home. I’ve been silent for a few
days, having to relish the fact that Scully is truly all right, and that
everything is as it was. But the fear that I have within me, that some
day she might get hurt because of me, is still there. Scully knows that
and is trying to deal with it too, convincing me that I have done
nothing wrong. But haven’t I? 

Skinner drops us off at her apartment where I am going to stay for a few
days while we both continue to recuperate. I feel comfortable in this
apartment, perhaps even more, than in mine. It’s warm, beautiful and
inviting. 
And as Scully sits next to me and holds my hand while we watch a DVD, I
am engulfed by happiness. This is true happiness to me. 

‘Are you okay?’ she asks me, worried. And I look at her, take her face
in my hands and remember every line, every freckle and every form of it.


‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘I’m just fine.’ 

She smiles. ‘Of course you are. 

End 


Sandra Vets 
Freelance Copywriter and author

www.tales4rent.com 




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