GriefAMOR CARITAS Part 1: Grief *** St. Joseph's hospital, Sunday One of the shoes squeaked. They were the only two people in the hospital waiting room at this ungodly hour of the morning. The sound of footfall was clearly audible against the newly-washed floor, especially since every other step was accompanied by a leathery creak. Scully watched Mulder pace up and down in his mud-caked running shoes, noticed that it was the left shoe that made the noise, and checked her watch once more. "Someone should be here soon with news. You really ought to sit down." He looked over at her. "I'm not tired," he said, the words belied by the gray cast to his skin and the shadows beneath his eyes. "Mulder." Scully got up and planted herself firmly in front of her partner, making sure she had his attention before speaking again. "We drove for hours to get here. You're upset, and you're anxious. I think you should sit down before you fall down." "That's your medical opinion," he stated in a flat, dry tone. "It's my opinion as a human being looking at another human being who's trying to maintain inhuman strength. Come on." She took her seat and patted the place next to her. Mulder's smile was a small arc at the corner of his downturned mouth. He let his shoulder bump against Scully's in a tiny gesture of appreciation as he took the offered chair. In return, Scully smiled and gave his arm a minute squeeze before organizing her thoughts about the evening's events. It had been a long drive from D.C. to Connecticut, seeming longer because they had traveled by night in a strained, apprehensive silence. Mulder had gone straight to Scully's apartment after he received the call and she had gone with him at once, heading straight to her car because it was the one that had been checked the most recently. There was no sense in putting more people in the hospital, Scully reasoned, guiding the shaken Mulder to the passenger's seat. Now they were waiting for word on her condition. Scully suspected a stroke, especially given Teena Mulder's history, but there was no word waiting for her son when he arrived. An orderly told them to wait, and wait they did. Just as Mulder was about to begin another lap around the room, a white-coated woman entered. "Fox Mulder?" "Yes, that's me. Are you...?" "Leigh Burns. I was on duty when she was brought in. Mr. Mulder, it appears as if your mother has suffered a small stroke." He glanced at Scully in silent acknowledgment of his partner's diagnosis. "How's she doing?" "Pretty well, although she's rather disoriented at the moment. We'll want to keep a close eye on her for a few days. I'm reasonably certain that she should be almost unaffected. The drooping on the left side of her mouth and the weakness of her left arm and leg are already improving. The aphasia was fairly mild; she was even able to talk for a few moments before she went to sleep." "So...she's going to be all right?" Mulder relaxed visibly, his body going limp with relief and fatigue. Scully put herself beside him, letting him rest his weight against her. "I'd say so, yes. She's sleeping right now, but you can come and see her first thing in the morning. Do you have somewhere to stay?" "I booked us some rooms at the Hampton Inn," Scully informed her. "I'll see that he gets a few hours of sleep, and we'll be by in the morning. If there are any developments, you can reach my cell phone. I'm familiar with her case history." Scully handed a card to Dr. Burns, who studied it carefully. "Special Agent Dana Scully, M.D. I'm impressed." She smiled warmly at the two exhausted visitors. "I'll keep you informed about her condition. If you don't hear from me, just come in at nine tomorrow morning when visiting hours start." "Thank you very much." Mulder shook hands with the doctor, then followed Scully out into the night air. The cool breeze made him shiver. Scully saw the tremor and wrapped her arms around his waist. "It's going to be okay, Mulder," she told him. His weary smile showed that he believed her with all his heart. ***** Journal entry, Wednesday afternoon. We are going to bury Teena Mulder tomorrow. Of all the strange and puzzling things I've encountered, this has to be among the most inexplicable. Mulder and I saw her the day she died, and she was sitting up in bed feeding herself. She recognized us both and even commented on the change in my hairstyle. When I saw her last, she was holding Mulder's hand and mother and son were talking softly about how sorry they were not to see one another unless there was an emergency. It seemed as if everything would be all right for them. Finally. That night, she passed away. Dr. Burns was agitated and saddened. There was no reason for Mrs. Mulder's death. Her blood pressure was excellent, her EKG almost normal, and she had no sign of reaction to any of her medications. Yet her heart simply stopped in the middle of the night. My ears still ring with Mulder's outraged cries as they echoed through the corridors, demanding everything from post-mortem tests to Dr. Burns' head on a platter. The only way I could stop him from breaking every piece of furniture in the hospital was to agree to do the autopsy myself. To do so is a violation of so many codes of ethics that I hardly know where to begin. But I know that Mulder is standing by his door, waiting for my knock, and I will have to use all of my skills to find out what really happened to his last living relative. May God help me. ***** St. Joseph's Hospital morgue, Wednesday Scully reached overhead and rewound the tape recorder, the movement slow and painful to her overworked shoulders. With a heavy sigh, she began to stitch the Y-shaped incision in the cadaver's chest. Her needle left small, precise tucks in the white flesh; she chose to perform that task herself rather than leave it for an assistant. But this had been Teena Mulder, whose son was waiting outside the door for her verdict. This woman had given life to the man who was probably the only friend Dana Scully had in the world. Scarcely an hour ago she had held Teena Mulder's heart in her hands, examining it for visible signs of damage. What was undetectable was the damage wrought by a tragic history: a distant, uncommunicative husband, an affair with a man she did not love, a daughter whose fate could never be known, a son whose descent into obsessive near-madness was reminiscent of a hawk spiraling downward in the evening sky. That heart was forever stilled, and Scully had no idea why. She ran a gloved finger over the vials and slides that were to be sent to Pathology. Scully's external examination had revealed nothing out of the ordinary, nothing that would account for such a sudden death. Evidence of two minor strokes, some lung damage from smoking many years ago, and the general deterioration of a body in its sixties were all she could find, and that evidence gave her no insight at all. Moving on to the abdominal cavity, Scully continued her reconstruction. A frisson of sorrow went through her at the memory of Teena's womb, a womb as dead as her own and for reasons just as unfathomable. She had to stop, leaning forward on the metal table until the pounding of blood in her ears subsided. "Snap out of it," she muttered to herself, hearing overtones of her father's voice. She straightened her spine and went back to work. With great respect she shrouded the thin, violated body. She turned to leave, then changed her mind and turned back to lift the white linen gently from Teena Mulder's face. Taking a pair of scissors from her tray, she snipped off a lock of white hair from above the forehead, placed it in one of the little plastic envelopes, and tucked the memento in her pocket. Finally she disposed of the lab coat, gloves, and cap, turned out the light, and opened the door. In the hallway, Mulder leapt to his feet. "Well?" he demanded. "Mulder." She placed her hand over his forearm, forestalling the barrage of questions. "My preliminary findings are inconclusive. For a woman her age, with her medical history, I'd have to say that her death was from natural causes." "But Scully..." "Hear me out, please." She looked up at him, at his eyes suffused with pain, and she reached up to place her palms on his face. "I've ordered tests and we may find something there. You'll have to be patient. I'm so sorry, Mulder." He nodded, scratching her palms with the stubble on his unshaven cheeks. For just a moment he rested his forehead against hers, then he brushed his lips across her temple and pulled away. "I'm sorry, too. For making you do this." "It's okay," she whispered. "It's okay." He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles and looked at the door. "I want to see her." "I wouldn't suggest it, Mulder." The lump in his throat was audible as he swallowed. He sagged against the wall, his chin dropping to his chest. Scully could see wetness at the corner of his eyes. Grief. "She's not there," Scully whispered. "She's with God. And with you." Her finger rested for a moment above Mulder's heart. "No, Scully. She's just...gone..." His voice broke and he turned away from her, facing the wall. Scully pressed his hand, then continued her solitary journey to the pathology lab. ***** Journal entry, Thursday evening It was a paltry affair. Mulder's mother had requested cremation and the scattering of her ashes. My family did the same for Daddy, but we did it with love and reverence. I cannot find words to describe what I saw today. Teena Mulder's death announcement was in the newspaper, yet her funeral was so sparsely attended as to be almost a deliberate mockery of her life. A nameless minister intoned the words, and a handful of people watched as Mulder opened the container with a steady hand and let his mother go free. He said nothing to me on the way there, nothing during the service, and nothing when we returned a while ago. He never let me stray more than a few feet from him, yet he never let me touch him. I listened all last night and this afternoon for any sounds from his room, but there have been none. Mulder has taken his grief and swallowed it whole, putting it so far away from me that I cannot help him. The pathology results came back negative, frustratingly so, considering that we were pinning all of our hopes for resolution on some microbe, something we could blame for this loss. Mulder came to my room after the funeral and I went over the paperwork with him. "This isn't right, Scully," he said in a rough-edged voice. "You must have missed something." That hurt. Somehow I managed to keep my tone even. "We did everything we could." "But you must have missed something!" Agitation raised the pitch and volume of the words, making them caustic against the exhaustion and frustration I was feeling. "I haven't missed anything, Mulder, because there was nothing there to find!" He backed away a little, but I strode right up to him and stared him down. "People die, Mulder, and sometimes it's not a conspiracy or murder or...or anything but the end of a life!" "NO! She was fine, she was FINE!" He picked up a glass, testing its heft by passing it from hand to hand. For a moment I thought he was actually going to throw it at me, but instead he threw it at the wall. The shattering of the glass was drowned out by his accusations. "You talked to her. You saw her CHARTS! There's no way she could have just died like that. There has to be something else." He turned completely away from me and began picking up the shards of broken glass. One pierced the web between his thumb and index finger and he hissed in pain. "Son of a BITCH!" He put the injured flesh in his mouth, wincing, and my anger faded away at the sight of his blood. "Let me see." I tugged at his arm but he didn't move. "Mulder. Let me see." Reluctantly, he gave me his hand but kept his face averted. He glared at me when I touched the center of the gash. "There's a piece of glass in there. Hang on." I went into the bathroom for my bag, then returned to find him staring absently at the rivulets of blood that were meandering down his wrist. I took tweezers and pulled out the tiny shard of glass, applied antiseptic to the wound and bandaged his hand lightly. Mulder said nothing the entire time, but looked at me with such unabashed helplessness that I wanted to weep for him. Instead I took his injured hand and gave it the barest hint of a kiss. In that moment of contact, I felt his agony as surely as if it had been my own. There was an insistent knock on the door. I resented every step that took me away from Mulder as I walked across the room to answer it. I took the manila envelope that the bellhop handed me, thanked him tersely, and ran a fingernail under the flap, shutting the door with my hip as I did so. Inside I found a photograph and a hand-written note from Dr. Burns: "One of the nurses said that Mrs. Mulder was visited by a nun the evening she died. I took the liberty of acquiring a security camera shot. I doubt that this is significant, but I wanted to keep you informed." Frowning, I put on my glasses and looked at the picture. It was of a youngish woman, light hair showing beneath her scarf-like headdress. The feeling of recognition was sudden and overwhelming. "Mulder, do you know this woman?" He leaned over my shoulder and looked at the photograph, his breath warm in my ear. "I've seen her before." "Me, too. I just can't place her." Something else suddenly occurred to me. "You know what's weird?" Finally, Mulder looked into my eyes as he listened. O"St. Joseph's is actually a public hospital, bought by the city. One of my friends from med school did his residency here. There aren't usually members of religious orders in these hospitals unless the patient specifically requests them." "My mother was Presbyterian," Mulder added, a spark of interest reviving his eyes. "I don't remember her mentioning any friends who were nuns. And, come to think of it, there wasn't a nun at the funeral, either." I stuck my finger over the headdress, obscuring it. "Her face..." Mulder's breath caught in his throat. "Oh, my God. Scully, she's ours - she's FBI. Her name is Broadway...Broadhurst..." he snapped his fingers, trying to get a last name to come to him. "Broadman! She works in VCS, she got there just as I left." "Get on the phone to Skinner, NOW," I insisted. "I'll pack and meet you in the lobby in fifteen minutes and we'll go straight back to D.C. If there really is something going on, Mulder, we're going to find it." He headed for the door, then paused to look at me. "Scully, I'm..." "It's okay," I said too quickly, needing to head him off. "I'll see you in the lobby." I threw my things into the suitcase, making sure to bring this journal with me. Out of habit I checked all the drawers to make certain I was leaving no personal objects behind. I opened the nightstand and took out the hotel Bible. It gave me strength; I caressed its cover before replacing it for the next visitor. The smell of its new leather lingered on my fingertips as I carried my suitcase downstairs. Mulder wasn't in the lobby, but was already standing outside by the car, his head bowed. "Mulder?" I went to his side and looked up into his eyes. "Amanda Broadman has no record of FBI employment. She has no social security number, no home, no address. She no longer exists, Scully." He looked at me with lifeless eyes. "She's been 'erased.'" ***** FBI Building, X-Files Office, Friday morning There was no remark. Mulder usually made some comment when he found Scully sitting at his desk, but this morning there was none. Scully saw in his demeanor the signs of a wounded animal, in such pain that there was no thought of territory or domain. Mulder's languid wave stopped her in the midst of rising. "I'm not staying," he said as he drew nearer. "Skinner found me wandering the halls and told me to get the hell out of here." "It's probably a good idea, Mulder. You need to take a little time..." The shared recollection of a similar conversation made them both smile ruefully. Scully thought she felt a phantom caress on her cheek, a recollection of the touch that had surprised her all those years ago, but the hand was real; Mulder was pressing his palm against her face. "Hello, Pot," Mulder said softly. "I think my friend Kettle would like to meet you." Scully, grateful for the contact after so much separation, sat still as she spoke. "Are you going to be all right?" "I have to be. I'm all that's left." "Mulder..." She watched in consternation as Mulder left her side to collect his coat and some folders. When he got to the doorway, he turned and tried to smile. "I'm fine, Scully." A cold chill traveled down her spine. Seeing the slump of his defeated posture was more than she could bear. With a sigh she took the photograph of Amanda Broadman and put it into a file folder containing the recollections of the few co-workers willing to discuss her. Her sorrowful reverie was interrupted by the trilling of the phone. She dropped the folder, the contents spilling like dead leaves over her feet. "Scully," she said breathlessly into the receiver. There was a long silence. "This is Special Agent Dana Scully. May I help you?" The voice on the other end was young and tremulous. "Agent Scully, my...my name is Sharon and I'm at the convent - The Little Sisters of Charity." Scully jotted down the names and made a note in the margin: "teenager...frightened?" "Sharon, how did you get this number?" "She gave it to me." Sharon was speaking in a whisper. "She told me to call you. She says you're the only one who can help." "Who?" There was a pause during which Scully sat up very straight in Mulder's chair. Finally, the girl spoke again. "Amanda Broadman. She's with us. And she needs your help." "Wait. You're saying that Amanda Broadman is actually a nun?" "No. She came to us in a borrowed habit and said she needed our help. She's hiding from the man who made her...I can't tell you over the phone." "How did she know to call me?" "It was your partner's mother that she...that she..." Scully could hear whispering in the background. "He said he'd kill HER if she didn't do it. She needs your help." "She killed Teena Mulder? How?" The sound of her own heartbeat nearly deafened her. Oh, God, she thought, Mulder was right. "But I performed the autopsy...Let me talk to her, Sharon." "She can't. But please, please come. I have to go." The line went dead. Scully replaced the receiver without looking at it; her eyes were fixed on something that only she could see. She'd prayed for guidance. For an answer. But not for murder. ****** Journal entry, late Friday night The girlish voice haunted me all day long. "Please, please come," she begged, and I felt the pull to follow. I called Mulder and asked if he needed anything. Of course he said he didn't; if he were on fire he'd refuse to ask me for a glass of water to put it out. So I said good night and told him I'd call in the morning. It didn't take me long to acquire some information on the Little Sisters of Charity. It's a working convent with an orphanage and school attached, with about a hundred sisters living there. Not too many miles from here; I could reach it easily by car. The problem is going to be getting in, but I imagine that Father McCue could do that for me. I've done stranger things at his request, after all. As I was perusing the information, I felt Mulder's presence at the door. I can't describe how I knew he was there, but he never surprises me any more; something, some unearthly connection is always alerted just before he knocks on my door. By the time my exhausted legs dragged my feet across the room and I turned the knob, he had finally worked up enough courage to knock. "Scully," was all he said, but I heard all of the weary tones on earth in the sound of my name. I led him in, my heart sinking. He looked awful. The toll of the last few days was visible on his pale, drawn face, and his legs seemed too weak to support his weight. "When was the last time you ate?" I inquired while I pushed him into a chair. He shrugged. "Or slept?" He shrugged again. I ached with him on a primal level, yet I was also incredibly angry that he would choose to do this to himself. He watched me with listless eyes while I went to the kitchen and poured a glass of orange juice. I avoided that distant gaze until I returned and handed him the glass. "Don't throw it," I warned. "I won't," he promised, in a childlike voice of contrition. He took a few sips and set the glass aside. I noticed that his fingers trembled. To tell him or to let him grieve in silence... I crouched down beside him, hoping that he would allow me to touch his hand. My fingers grazed his feverish skin and he did not pull away. But his face, the face I see in daydreams and nightmares alike, was that of a defeated man. Once I had seen righteous anger in his eyes, in the flare of his nostrils as he spoke of finding the truth. Once there had been fire in his voice, and hope and a form of compassion that was given only to me. Now he was an empty vessel, and I had nothing with which to fill him up again. ...please, please come... My imagination overlaid Mulder's silent appeal with the frightened words of a young girl, and a sudden thought of Samantha made me shudder. Mulder's fingers closed around mine and his head drooped. "Scully," was all he could say in his harsh, broken voice. Help me, he was saying. Deliver me. Save me. Not for all the world would I have let him see my tears. Instead, I held him for as long as he would let me, not moving except to smooth the rumpled hair that lay in whispers against my cheek. "Stay here." I was offering my home. My body. If only I could bring him back. He pulled away, grief embossed on the pale paper of his face. "I can't." He ran his fingers along my jawline as we looked at one another for an endless moment. He rose, kissed my fingers, and disappeared into the night. Before I knew what was happening, my head was down on my arms and I was weeping, shedding tears for Mulder's rage and my own helplessness. Scully, his friend, was not able to reach him, nor could Dana, the woman, calm the restlessness in his soul. Only Dana Scully, the sum of the parts, could give him what he must have to survive: not friendship nor love, but evidence. The irony of it tastes like gall. ***** Holy Cross Hospital Cafeteria, Saturday morning "I'm relieved to find that you want to see me in your professional capacity, Dana," Father McCue told her as he waited for his tea to cool. "When a parishioner says she'll meet me in the hospital, I often fear the worst." Scully smiled with genuine affection. "I'm sorry if I startled you, Father. Your housekeeper said you were doing rounds here today, so I thought I'd catch up with you." She took a deep breath and forced herself to look into the face of her priest. "I'm unofficially investigating a case, and it turns out that I may need to spend some time at the Little Sisters of Charity." He looked at her with a grin. "You want to go undercover as a nun?" "No." She smiled back, then shook her head. "No sister acts for me, Father. But I'd like to arrange for a religious retreat." "It's a working convent...they don't usually..." "Father, please." He looked into her eyes, at the straightforward gaze of a woman who had beaten death and despair, and he nodded. "I'll make some calls. The Mother Superior will need to know who you really are. Who do you WANT to be?" "Let's keep it simple. I'm Dana Scully, a doctor in need of spiritual guidance." "Ah." He took a sip of his tea. "Then you want me to tell them the truth." Scully bowed her head, caught, but she was smiling. ***** Journal entry, Saturday night When in doubt, run. Run as fast as you can. Those have been Mulder's unspoken words for as long as I've known him. He runs morning, noon, or night, whenever he needs to clear his head. He does it not for his physical health, but for his psychological balance. I spent much of today searching his favorite hangouts. By early afternoon I was footsore and annoyed, but almost at the stroke of three I found him in Rock Creek Park's cemetery, by a tomb shrouded by shrubberies. My first view was of the hexagonal slab and the stone benches, shaded and serene. Then I saw Mulder, sitting silently with his hands outstretched. Then I saw it. The statue. Grief. I must have said it out loud. "It's not really called 'Grief,'" Mulder said by way of acknowledging my presence. "It's a memorial to a woman who committed suicide." "It's beautiful," I whispered as if afraid to disturb the bronze image. The downcast eyes and the hand pressed softly to her cheek reminded me of images of the Virgin. But somehow, this woman was infinitely sadder. Mulder did not look at me when I came to sit beside him. "Mulder, I'm going away for a while." He continued to stare sightlessly at his clasped fingers. "It has to do with your mother. There's a lead, a pretty sketchy one, but I'm going to follow it." "You don't want me with you?" I almost smirked at the thought of Mulder in a convent, dressed as a nun. "You can't go. I'm going to be at the Little Sisters of Charity. I think I've found her, Mulder. Amanda Broadman." "Did she kill my mother?" Ah, a Mulder-leap of logic. Grateful that I did not have to look at him, I said softly, "I believe that she was coerced into it. And I still have no idea how it was done." "She could just as easily kill you." "No. Mulder, she asked for my help. I don't think she'd hurt me. If she were really out for revenge she'd come after you, not me." He nodded. "When do you leave?" "In a little while. I just wanted to tell you." "Thanks for not ditching me." At last he looked up at me, his eyes matching the silvery green of the foliage around him. "Will you call, let me know how you're doing?" "Every night." He tried to smile. As I turned around to make my way back to the car, I heard him once more. "Scully?" I stopped. "Will you pray for me?" I couldn't face him, knowing what that request must have cost. "Every night." As I have done for so, so long. As I do now, and always. ***** Journal entry, Sunday morning I arrived at the Little Sisters of Charity after a nerve-jangling drive through heavy traffic on the way out of the city. Stepping into their quiet courtyard was like turning off a dentist's drill. Mother Matthew received me in her study. She looked like the Mother Superior in "The Sound of Music," motherly but with an internal resolve that let me know that an iron fist resided in that velvet glove. I liked her immediately. "So," she said in her melodious voice, "it is very unusual for us to receive visitors. I've been a friend of Frank McCue for many years, however, and if he says that you need to find solace among us, I believe that it is for the best." I nodded, realizing that I was studying my shoes. "You went to Catholic school," Mother Matthew said as if she could read my thoughts. "I can always tell the way the girls look when they think they're in trouble." The smile on my face felt unfamiliar after the pain of the last few days. "I did go to Catholic schools, yes. It was the one constant in our family's life; we moved fairly often." "Yes, you're from a Navy family. Frank told me about that. Now, what is it about us that makes you think you belong here?" Father McCue warned me about the probability of that question, so I was ready. "I'm not really a contemplative person, Mother. I have to be active to think, yet I need to get away from the...insanity of my life. You work here; you do wonderful things for people who need your help. I want to help, too." "I understand that you are a doctor." She peered over her rimless glasses at me. "What's your specialty?" I paused for a fraction of a second. "Path...pediatrics." Whatever inspired me to tell that lie, I'll never know. And I know that she knew I was lying; I could see it in her eyes. "Well, then, I'd like to put you to work tomorrow at the school. We have a number of children who have little coughs and sneezes that should be attended to, but we just can't get them all to a doctor. Why don't we discuss it after Mass?" "That would be fine." I rose and picked up my suitcase. "I appreciate that you were willing to bend the rules for me, Reverend Mother." "Frank said that you were in need of spiritual guidance. We're in need of a pediatrician. The match was made in Heaven, don't you think?" I could feel the heat of blood rushing to my cheeks but didn't want to betray myself so early, before I'd even had a chance to find Sharon and ask her what was happening to Amanda Broadman. Instead I nodded my thanks and went to my room. The cell I was directed to by Mother's assistant was small and tidy, with a narrow bed and one little chest of drawers. The crucifix over the bed was the only ornament. I unpacked quickly and made certain that my medical bag was ready to go - the one I carry on cases with Mulder, since I often end up acting as his personal physician. Maybe saying I was a pediatrician wasn't so far off the mark. ***** Sunday afternoon Scully sat on the edge of her bed, hands folded, trying to retain the peaceful feeling that had washed over her during Mass. She had been introduced as Dr. Dana Scully and welcomed by the members of the order, although they were surprised and curious as to her choice of locations for a religious retreat. Scully greeted all of the sisters and novices, noticing that one girl seemed particularly intent on meeting her. When they shook hands the girl whispered: "I'm glad you're here - I'll talk to you as soon as I can." Recognizing the voice as Sharon's, Scully went to find her at the conclusion of the service. The girl was nowhere to be seen, so Scully decided to return to her room for quiet reflection. So intent was she on her meditations that she jumped when she heard the knock. Quickly and quietly she let her visitor inside. Sharon was as young as she had sounded on the telephone, a teenager with the last vestiges of baby fat clinging to her cheeks and hands but with the haunted, pained countenance of someone who had endured many tragedies. She managed a weak smile and and looked at Scully through bloodshot eyes. "I'm so glad you came. Amanda is really scared, and I don't know what to do." "Start at the beginning, Sharon. How do you know Amanda?" Sharon saw Scully's offer of a seat and perched tentatively on the edge of the bed. "She lived down the street from me when I was a kid. She used to babysit. She was with me when it happened." Scully frowned and crossed her arms. "When what happened?" "My parents sent me to Catholic school because they thought I was a runaway. But I didn't run away." Her voice became tremulous. "I was taken. So was Amanda, one night when she baby-sat me. But my parents didn't believe..." "Taken? You were kidnapped?" Horrified, Scully sat down next to Sharon and held the girl's hand. "How old were you?" "I was seven, and Amanda was nineteen, home from her first year in college. They came and took us, but I was too scared to tell my parents anything about it..." Scully's heart was beating fast as Sharon continued. "My parents thought Amanda took me joy-riding or something, but that wasn't it, that wasn't it...and they came back and took me over and over again..." Tears flowed down Sharon's face and her breath came in hitching sobs. "There were tests...and bright lights...and it hurt, it hurt SO much..." Without a second's hesitation Scully took the sobbing girl in her arms and rocked her back and forth, lost in the maelstrom of her own thoughts. ...what did they do to you? Oh, God, no... She smoothed the hair back from the nape of Sharon's neck and felt the scar, letting her fingertips trace the tiny outline of a computer chip. ...she's been catalogued...just like me... She whispered, "What about your parents, Sharon?" "They're dead. Daddy worked for the Federal Emergency...Emergency..." "Federal Emergency Management Association? FEMA?" ...I have to tell Mulder... "Sharon, sweetie, listen to me. I have to call my partner at the FBI. Then I need you to take me to Amanda. Can you do that?" Sharon shook her head. "I can't. She's hiding in one of the attic storerooms." "But she asked you to call me, didn't you?" "She...she...I'm so scared!" Trembling and crying, Sharon fell face-down on the pristine bedspread and buried her head in her arms. "She needed someplace to hide. I told her how to get up to the old attic...I'm in so much trouble, I don't know what to do..." "It's going to be okay, Sharon. Nothing's going to happen to you. Ssh, ssh..." Scully stepped as far away as she could in the tiny room, then took out her cell phone and dialed the familiar number. "Mulder, it's me." ***** Sunday night Even under Scully's slight weight, the old wooden stairs groaned in protest. Scully had half-expected to find some sort of Gothic turret where Amanda Broadman was hiding inside of an ancient armoire. Instead, she found a well-lit stairway and a large oak door. Scully tapped against the dark wood. "Amanda? It's Dana Scully." There was no response. "Amanda? I'm here to help you." The silence was broken only by the sound of pigeons cooing under the eaves. Scully tried the knob. It turned by itself just as she was pulling her hand away.The hinges creaked and the door opened just far enough for her to get into the room. Darkness wrapped itself around her. "Amanda?" Faint moonlight streamed through the leaded glass windows, casting circular patterns of light on both the ghostly, sheet-covered furniture and the spectral figure of Amanda Broadman standing in a corner. "I'm glad you found me," she whispered. "I wish this could all be over." Scully took several steps toward her, her shoes making soft sounds in the layers of dust that coated the floor. "It can be, Amanda. But you need to tell me two things - why you did this, and how." Amanda's rueful smile was cut short by a violent fit of coughing. She held a tattered tissue up to her mouth; even in the dim light Scully could see the red stains that coated it. "I think you can tell why I did it. 'How' is not as easy to explain." "Is it cancer?" Scully asked, keeping her voice neutral. "Yes. Naso-pharyngeal, just like yours. And for the same reason." "You had an implant." Amanda wiped her mouth and jammed the tissue back into her pocket. "Did Sharon tell you what happened to us? We were taken, just the way you were. Neither of us can remember what happened, but we did know one thing - we had those chips put in the backs of our necks. Our parents thought we were crazy or lying...but that doesn't matter now. Remember the mugger in the garage at the Hoover building a couple of months ago?" "I saw the memo. My partner insisted on walking with me to my car every night...you were attacked?" "I was the only victim. I was the target. They didn't take my wallet or my keys. All they took was this." She pointed a bony finger at the back of her neck. "Think about it. The 'mugger' struck once. What kind of criminal takes something out from under your skin and leaves money and a car behind?" "The kind who is using the crime to cover up a larger one." Scully's eyes were adjusting to the low light and she could make out more details of Amanda's face; the sunken eyes, the pallor, the cracked and bleeding lips. It was a face she had seen in the mirror. "Not two weeks later, I was diagnosed with cancer. They're giving me another month or so to live, unless I can get what you have." "Another implant." She came closer and touched Amanda's wrist. "Was that the deal? You kill Teena Mulder, and someone gives you a chance for remission?" "Something like that." Amanda faced the window, the light giving her already pale skin an unearthly glow. "I hated doing it. I met Mulder a few times when I first joined the Bureau; I liked him. I know that it was hard for him to lose his mother like that." She took in a shallow breath. "But I don't want to die." "I did the autopsy myself. I didn't detect anything unusual. How did you do it?" "They gave me a syringe and told me to inject it around a hair follicle, somewhere that wouldn't show. It was a small needle. The smallest I've ever seen." "What was in the vial?" "I honestly don't know. But I do know one thing...it wasn't of this earth. He told me that himself." "Who?" Amanda's expression gave Scully her answer. She decided to ask another question. "Do you really think that I'll just walk out of here and tell Mulder that you had a good reason to murder his mother? Do you think you can get away with it?" Amanda turned to her, the filtered light making a ghostly halo around her thin figure. "I already have." Suddenly the light began to intensify, an aching brightness that was too much to bear after so much time spent in the dim moonlight. Blinded, Scully gasped and threw her hands in front of her face, squeezing her eyes shut against the impossible brilliance. She lost all sense of time or place until she heard the chapel bells ringing. When she opened her eyes again, the room was dark and Amanda Broadman was gone. ***** Journal entry, Monday afternoon I looked everywhere for Amanda last night, but there were no hiding places in the room. No wall panels moved, no floorboards could be pried up. The windows were locked, and the door was locked from the inside. Why did she have Sharon call me if she was trying to escape? How the hell did she get out of that room? My head pounded as I stood next to the window where Amanda had been standing. I knew damned well how she got out of that room, but I couldn't make myself admit it. I lowered my aching head. That's when I saw her notebook. It was a small spiral pad with nothing on the cover. But when I opened it I found a note was addressed to me, with instructions to put it into Mulder's hands. I tucked it in my pocket and was looking for an exit that I might have missed, when the door opened and a surprised Sister Rosario shooed me down for prayers. When I went back, the room was locked once more and I had no way of getting inside to investigate further. I desperately needed to talk to Mulder. I counted the hours until our meeting time this morning. He caught up with me while I was doing "rounds" at the school, peering into the ears, noses, and throats of second-graders. A voice behind me startled me with its baritone plea: "Can I have a lollipop, Doctor?" "Will you be a good boy and brush your teeth if I give this to you?" I teased, holding the purple candy just out of his reach. His smile made him look healthy for the first time since he told me about his mother's stroke. I gave a matching treat to the little boy who was squirming on the table, then patted him on the back and watched as he loped off to play with his friends. "I'm glad you got here, Mulder. There've been more developments." "Really?" He closed the clinic door and leaned against it, hands in his pockets. "What have you found out?" "That Amanda Broadman did kill your mother." I looked up at him and noticed the that he was setting his jaw, bracing himself. "She was an abductee, and she had an implant just like mine. Only hers was taken away, and now she has cancer." "What does that have to do with my mother?" Mulder asked. "She was offered a replacement. I don't think I have to tell you who made that offer." Mulder didn't react. He only said, "I want to talk to her." "You can't. She's gone." "She's dead?" "No." I bit my lip for a moment. "I mean she's gone. Disappeared. But she left this for us." "By way of explanation?" He looked at me in disbelief. "She hands over a notebook and that makes it okay?" "No, Mulder, of course not. But it tells how and why, and it give us some idea of what kind of the big picture could be." I flipped through a couple of pages. "He offered her not only a chance to live but also a chance to start over, erasing her past and giving her a future, a chance to beat the cancer that was killing her." "And the price was right. One woman's life. My mother's." "But you don't know why she was marked. Read this." I turned a few more pages and pointed to an entry near the bottom. Mulder produced his glasses from his jacket and put them on before starting to read aloud. " 'The remains of the Consortium, the self-appointed saviors of certain members of the human race, have reason to believe that anyone with any trace of alien life in them must be terminated, in order to stop any chance of an alien-human hybrid being formed.' " Mulder looked up over the rims of his glasses. "My mother wasn't an abductee, though." "Keep reading." " 'Teena Mulder suffered a stroke several years ago, one from which she was not expected to recover. A healing man was brought to her...an alien...' " He stopped and stared at the paper, a sign that his mind was working in a dozen directions at once. "That's why you couldn't find anything in the autopsy, Scully...someone like Jeremiah Smith, if just his touch was enough to mark her... those men are trying to eradicate the evidence, and they gave Amanda Broadman a substance to do just that." "I know." He must have heard the fear in my voice, because he immediately turned back to me. "Can they counteract the effects of the chip?" I spoke carefully, trying to reassure us both. "I don't believe that they could. Why bother removing Amanda's chip if they could just give her this substance?" "Then you're safe," Mulder said quietly. I felt his concern wrap me up in its soft folds. "For now," I answered. We sat in silence for several moments. "I just wish she hadn't asked to be cremated..." "It wouldn't have made any difference, Mulder; no one would even begin to know what to look for." He grimaced, his face turning pale at the idea. "What do you think we need to do first when we get back to D.C.?" I had been dreading this moment. "I'm not going to leave just yet. I still don't know how Amanda disappeared, and I want to check on the girl who called me. She has an implant, too. And Mulder..." I trailed off. He looked at me, expectant. "There are children here at the orphanage who have implants. That boy I was examining when you came in, and several others. And Sharon's father was with FEMA. It could be a coincidence, but I want to find out why there are so many orphans with these things stuck in their bodies and if there's any connection to government agencies. So...I need to stay here." "You may be right," he said slowly, but he turned away from me as if to hide his disappointment. "I'll get the boys to start looking for our missing Non-Nun and do a background check on anyone else in civil service who may have been an abductee. Who knows how many government-subsidized assassins are running around out there?" He was becoming interested in spite of himself. As he got up to leave he reached out and took my arm. "You're okay with this? With the children?" He was so gentle and so sincere that I forgave the last dozen insensitive things he'd said or done to me. "I'm okay with the children, Mulder." Satisfied with my answer, he released me and headed for the door. "You may be in a convent, but you should still be careful. Watch your back." "It's a habit." He groaned and ducked his head; I heard faint echoes of his laughter as he walked down the corridor and went back into the world without me. ***** Monday night The children's softball game ended when sunset made it impossible to find the bases. Scully helped to usher the sweating, chattering children to their dormitory and walked briskly toward the convent, hoping for enough time to make herself presentable enough for Vespers. She removed her cap as she stepped into her room and was trying to make order out of her wind-swept hair when she heard a scream. She reached for the weapon at her waist. "Damn!" she said under her breath when she realized that she'd stored the gun in a drawer, then grimaced at the sight of the crucifix hanging over the bed. "Sorry," she apologized. It took her only seconds to find her gun and she raced out of her room in the direction of the commotion. The group of terrified nuns who had responded to the scream parted when they saw "Doctor" Scully run up to them with a gun in her hand. "It's Sharon," said one of the women. "There's a man in there...he has a knife..." "Federal agent! I'm armed!" Scully said loudly outside of the open door. "Is that you, Agent Scully?" The familiar voice made Scully shudder. She went into the room and found Sharon facing away from her, sitting on the edge of the bed, clearly in pain and shock. A thin trickle of blood flowed from a wound at the base of her neck. The smoking man sat beside her. A small scalpel was in one hand, while his other held something small between his thumb and forefinger. Scully motioned for the nuns to retreat, but they stayed in a flock, watching in horror as their guest pointed her gun at the intruder. The man was calm. "Put that down, Agent Scully. You wouldn't want me to drop the chip." "You're going to destroy it anyway." "Not necessarily." He set the scalpel aside and took out a cigarette and lighter. Never taking his gaze away from Scully, he lit the cigarette one-handed and took a long drag from it. "I could be persuaded to let you have this, to let HER have this, in exchange for some information." "Make it fast," Scully hissed. "The whereabouts of Amanda Broadman." "Why? So you can kill her the way she killed Teena Mulder?" For the first time, Scully saw a look of sorrow pass over the lined visage of her enemy. "I thought I was saving her when I brought Jeremiah Smith to her. I didn't know that it would seal her fate." He took another pull on his cigarette. "But that doesn't matter now. We have to get rid of anyone who has any connection to their technology or abilities. It's the only way to stop the colonization." The nuns were silent except for the sound of stifled tears. "Give me the chip and I'll let you walk out of here on your own two feet," Scully said evenly. "Where is Amanda Broadman?" "I don't know." "But *I* do," Sharon said weakly from her vantage point. "They took her. She was waiting for them. They're going to save her..." Her eyes rolled up in her head and she collapsed, boneless, on the bed. Scully felt boundless anger wash over her, the rage at having her own life be made the pawn in a game played by madmen. She remembered the long hours of suffering, her family's agony, Mulder's guilt ridden-caresses, as the cancer ravaged her body. She looked at Sharon's crumpled form. She looked at the man on the bed. She raised her weapon and fired. ***** The smoking man grabbed his upper arm and slid from the bed to the floor. Blood oozed between his fingers, eventually covering his hand and extinguishing the cigarette he still held. Scully stood over him, her weapon pointed directly at his head. "Put down the chip," she demanded. "Carefully." With his good hand he placed the tiny device on the floor. His mouth was slightly open in fear. His breathing was labored but his gray eyes were cold. His gaze was focused just beyond Scully's head. She refused to fall into the trap and turn around. "Dana." She felt the Mother Superior's touch on her arm. "You've protected Sharon. I'll call the police and paramedics." "NO!" Her cry bounced off of the stone wall, reverberating for endless seconds. "He's going to tell me WHY he did this, the son-of-a-bitch. You're going to give me answers for ONCE! TELL ME!" "You wouldn't understand, Agent Scully." "TELL ME!" Every atom of her being was focused on her trigger finger. His survival instinct remained intact, making him speak softly and calmly. "Teena was not part of the hybridization program, not like Cassandra. However, she was touched by a 'healer' and that will mark someone as surely as any other encounter." "Why did you have to kill her?" "Because we cannot allow any form of hybridized human to survive. Not even the simplest adjustment to the body. Or else it all starts." He looked at his arm, noting that the bleeding had stopped, then back up at her with a smile streaking across his thin lips. "And you've already had a sample of what will happen, haven't you?" The phantom taste of the alien umbilical cord came back to her and made her retch. The gun wavered in her grasp. "What about the children - the ones you've marked?" "The chip?" His tone was offhanded. "The chip isn't theirs. It's ours. They're safe...as long as no one does anything rash." He took in a shallow breath, the pain overriding the shock. "You may not believe this, Agent Scully, but I did love Teena Mulder once." "DID you," she spat, straddling his legs, the gun pointed directly at his head. "I love her SON." He seemed less surprised by her words than she did. "I saw what he went through when she died," Scully continued, enraged. "I LIVED it with him! I suffered everything he suffered because it's what *I* felt when you fucked up and murdered my sister instead of me!" Scully felt her whole body become a wick dipped in oil, set aflame by rage and vengeance. "I'd put a bullet through your heart if you had one, you BASTARD! But this will have to do instead." Her aim was true, her hands steady even though her arms were aching from the weight of the gun. The weight of the world. That thought took over her body, making her arm muscles tremble at last and her aim falter. She heard the voice of the Mother Superior: "My child." With a low moan Scully let the gun clatter to the floor, the sound against the hard wood almost as loud as a report. She looked at her prey through acrid tears. "Get the hell out of here," she mumbled. He used the wall to help him stand. Beside the bed lay the bullet that had grazed his arm and bounced off the crucifix; he kicked it away disdainfully. With studied nonchalance he took out a cigarette and lit it as he passed Scully. When he was gone she fell to her knees and wept. ***** Journal entry, late Monday night I'm almost too tired to think clearly. I let him go. I had him right there, staring down the barrel of my gun, and I just let him walk away. Even after all the years in the FBI, I still hate to fire my weapon. I hate even worse the taking of a human life, no matter what the crime. I believe in the justice system - even though it has failed me more than once. I believe in God, and He would not allow me to pull the trigger. I heard his footsteps grow fainter in the hallway as he walked past a long line of shocked women. Sister Rosario, the round-faced Hispanic nun who surprised me in the attic, was the first to come to my side. "You have to get up now, Dana," she said gently. "You need to help Sharon." Sharon. As if sleepwalking I gave the instructions to get her to the infirmary and have someone get bandages and antiseptic ready. The Reverend Mother delicately picked up the chip as Sister Rosario helped me to my feet, bearing my weight as she guided me down the hall. I felt so cold as I passed the nuns who were standing in the hallway, stock-still and white with shock. "I'm sorry," I whispered to them as I passed, afraid to look into their faces. "I'm sorry." My self-recrimination took a brief hiatus while I carefully cleaned the chip and put it back into Sharon's neck. As I put the butterfly bandage there, I offered up a silent prayer. Please let this keep working. She doesn't deserve to die. I dragged myself back to my cell and sat down on the bed. Someone had cleaned Sharon's room and found the spent bullet, which now sat harmlessly on top of my suitcase. I held it in the palm of my hand, wondering how in the world I was going to tell Mulder what happened here. "Dana." The sound of the Mother Superior's voice was a welcome respite from the accusing voices in my own head. I stood up and walked slowly toward her, genuinely penitent. "I'm so sorry for everything. For lying to you, for putting all of you in danger. I thought...I thought..." "I made a phone call to Father McCue and he explained everything to me. But Dana?" I looked up at her, contrite. "Dana, I knew from the beginning that you were lying. You don't do it very well." She took my hand between both of hers, warming its coldness with her love and compassion. "This man you shot, is he going to be all right?" "It was just superficial. He has places to go, people who will take care of him in silence. He'll be better than he deserves." I sighed. "I'm sorry. You don't know what he's done, what he's still capable of doing." "But God knows, my child." She touched my cheek. "I think He may have sent you to us for our safety. Perhaps He might have done so in a less...dramatic fashion." We both smiled. "But He does what He knows is best, and now we know how careful we must be to protect ourselves and the children. We're grateful for that knowledge, Dana." "Thank you," I whispered, managing a weak smile for her benefit. "Mother? What will happen to Sharon?" "I've called her aunt in Pennsylvania. Sharon will stay with them for a while, until she decides what to do with her life." She went to the doorway, then turned and looked at me with sad eyes. "Much as you must do, Dana." I watched her as she departed, leaving an air of serenity in her wake. I was sick at heart, sick to the very recesses of my soul, and dreading my return to the world. Even so, I packed my suitcase and called Mulder, asking him to come for me in the morning. ***** Tuesday morning Mulder walked slowly through the herb garden, looking for a flash of red hair, his beacon. "Scully?" He said in a loud whisper, wanting to find her but reluctant to disturb the peace of the unseasonably cool morning. "Over here." He had not seen Scully's bright hair because she was wearing a hat and scarf with her coat, her hands encased in gloves. Her breath came in little white clouds as she placed sheets over some of the more delicate plants. "It's so cold," she said conversationally. "Yes. Uh, Scully, I don't think I'm really supposed to be back here..." "It's okay. There are men who do yard work here, you know." He leaned against the fence that separated them. "We couldn't find where he went. He's disappeared into the woodwork. Again." "I'm sorry, Mulder," Scully said in a low, hurt tone. "He was unarmed and you couldn't shoot. I understand that. But, Scully..." "Mulder, it's done. Drop it." She looked away from him, at the gray morning sky. "Have you found out anything about a possible connection?" "It's not easy. No one in civil service is exactly thrilled about putting an alien abduction on their resumé. And the children...birth records don't exist, adoption records are closed or missing altogether. Someone's been very thorough with this. So get your stuff and we'll go. I'll fill you in on the way." "I'm not leaving, Mulder." He sighed in exasperation. "Scully, I know you want to stay here and look around, but this is not a good time for it..." "I'm staying." "I need you back in D.C. There's so much more to this than..." His voice trailed off, like the clouds of steam that formed from his breath. Scully turned around to face him then, her eyes the only color in the bleak landscape. "I'm staying," she said gently. Numbly he whispered, "You...you can't..." "I am. I went to the Mother Superior a few hours ago. She said that I'm moving too fast," she continued, a tinge of sorrow in her voice, "but that I am welcome to stay here while I consider it more carefully." He stared at her, his pulse drowning out the chapel bells. "I don't expect you to understand this, Mulder." Words finally returned to him, sad and lonely ones. "What about your family?" "I talked to my mother this morning. She just wants me to be at peace. Mulder, I can't go on with the kind of life I was leading. I can have peace, I can have it here, loving God and serving Him." She saw the anguish on his face and it tore through her. "Mulder, please. Please don't make this harder than it has to be." She could almost see the words rushing through his mind, written across the endless depths of his eyes...you're leaving me you're leaving me you're leaving me... "Scully," was all he said, the one word a hopeless, pleading cry. "I have to go, Mulder." She turned around only to find his hand on her arm, holding fast. "Mulder, please." "Don't do this," he entreated. "Mulder, let me go." She wriggled out of his grasp and he frantically clutched at what he could reach - the end of her scarf. It snapped away from her head, tossing her hat into the wind. Her hair was shorn away. Scully let out a tiny cry, covering the rough edges of clipped hair with her hands and staring into Mulder's horrified eyes. He had seen her frightened, injured, dying. Naked. But not like this. Tears stung her eyes as she raced past him toward her sanctuary. Those same tears mercifully blurred her vision, saving her the agony of seeing Mulder's face as he watched her slam the iron gate. The metallic clang resounded like the fall a guillotine, severing her from Mulder. From her heart. ***** To be continued in "Amor Caritas: Silence" About the title: "Amor" is, of course, "love." "Caritas" has the obvious translation of "charity," but it can also mean "affection" or "dearness." About how small the world is: Imagine my surprise when Auburn posted "Go With God" while I was writing this story. She was gracious enough to realize that two people can have the same idea simultaneously, and for that I thank her. The same goes for Dasha, in whose "Increments" Mrs. Mulder also passes on, for her understanding. Author's Notes: Many years ago, when I was young and foolish instead of just foolish, I wanted to pursue a degree in art history in hopes of becoming a museum curator. Then I decided that I wanted a place to live. Some food would be nice, too. I got a teaching certificate and went to work, but I never lost my love of art. Several months ago I re-read some books about Augustus Saint-Gaudens and was struck once more by the beauty and nobility of his work, especially one piece - Amor Caritas. More than a portrait of his lover in the guise of an angel, it has an uplifting quality that cannot be described, only felt. It was then that I got the idea for this series. "The Adams Memorial" (which really is in Rock Creek Park in D.C.) served as the inspiration for "Grief." "Silence," a marble statue in the Masonic hospital in Utica, New York, inspired the like-titled second story in the series. Book covers for them may be found on my site, if you want to see where the ideas came from. (Caveat: I flipped the image of the Adams for compositional reasons, and I put Scully's face on the Amor Caritas angel. I'm a very bad girl indeed. Blame Nascent.) However, none of this would have seen the light of day had it not been for the saintly patience of my beta readers, Jordan and Barbara D. You wouldn't believe what my stories look like when they get them. Well, if you'd ever seen my kitchen, you would. Trust me, my words only work because of the work THEY do. Ladies, this one's for y'all, with love, respect, and chocolate. ***** To the next part, Silence. Feedback is adored at marguerite@swbell.net.