"The Eighth Side of the Triangle"(11/?) by Susan Jameson (DrBarnBarn@aol.com) See part 1 for headers, archive info, etc.
~~~~~ Trinity Hospital As Scully Saw It ~~~~~ It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood ... a beautiful day for a neighbor ... That's a joke. You're supposed to laugh. But it really is a beautiful day. I don't understand how it can be so beautiful, but it is. I want to enjoy it, every minute of it. I don't know how many more beautiful days I'll see. I don't think it will be many. I'm not going to get better. I'm really not going to get better. The chip isn't helping and the immunotherapy isn't working and nothing is working... I just keep getting sicker and sicker and sicker. I'm going to die. Not someday, either. I'm going to die in a few days. I keep telling myself that and I only believe it for short flashes of time. It's funny ... I am so tired and so weak and I almost feel that death will be a relief, and yet everything in me refuses to believe that death is even a possibility, that there is even the slightest possibility that I could cease to exist. My mother says that's the strongest proof possible of the existence of the soul. Mulder once told me that it's simply proof that the human mind is incapable of comprehending its own extinction. In other words, he said, it proves nothing. Mulder ... What are they going to do to him in that hearing tomorrow? Almost as impossible as believing that I'm going to die is realizing that I may never see him again. They may arrest him at the hearing tomorrow and charge him with murder; they may hold him without bail, or set the bond so high that it will take too long to free him, and I'll be gone before he's out of jail. I'll be dead before he's out of jail. Did you hear what I just said? I'll be dead. I cannot imagine it. I cannot. And imagine never seeing Mulder again. I knew I wouldn't see Daniel again, but Mulder? Daniel ... I can hardly remember the sound of his voice now. I can't remember how he looks except in his pictures. I'm too tired ... my mind won't work. There's only one thing I can remember clearly now ... how it felt to be in his arms. So wonderful ... so warm and so safe, so loved ... I think I'll remember that until I die. Which I suppose is now, isn't it? Why can't I see Mulder? There has to be a last time eventually, for everyone, but I thought he'd be here with me at the end. He should be. I want him here. If I have to die, then I have to die, but I can't do it without him. I can't. I just need to know that he still loves me. I need to know that he still trusts me. I need to know that when I'm gone, he will remember me the way we used to be together, before Ed Jerse and all the terrible things I did and said then. I want it to be that way. But I'm so tired ... Maybe it's time to rest ... Will he really be in jail? Not with me? No ... please, God, no. Just one more time, please. Just one ... Please ... ~~~~~ American Red Cross of Central Maryland 4700 Mount Hope Drive Baltimore, MD 21215-3231 Captain Carl W. Meisenheimer USS George Washington (CVN 73) FPO AP 09550-2873 Via facsimile Dear sir, We have received a request for emergency leave for Commander Daniel Anthony Reilly, MC, USN, whose fiancee, Dana Scully, is terminally ill in a hospital in Washington, D.C. We have verified through her employer, Assistant Director Walter S. Skinner of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, that Ms. Scully is the commander's fiancee, that she is in the final stages of nasopharyngeal carcinoma and is not expected to survive; indeed, her death is expected at any time. Given the travel time required and the sad duties of funeral arrangements and so forth that are, unfortunately, expected to occur in the next week or so, we would ask that the commander be granted immediate leave, the anticipated length of which is from one to two weeks. If the Red Cross can be of any further assistance in this matter, please do not hesitate to contact us. Yours truly, Debra Doswell Armed Forces Emergency Services Casework Aide ~~~~~ TO: reillyda@washington.navy.mil FROM: skinnerws@fbi.gov SUBJECT: Dinah Washington She's a great singer, commander. Listen to her, and I'll see you and we'll talk about her work and what it means when you're back stateside. In the meantime, there's not much reason to talk to anyone else about it. WSS ~~~~~ As The Smoking Man Saw It ~~~~~ "As I said," I told him, "I'm offering you a chance to know the truth." He seemed ... more tired than anything. Perhaps more wary than I'd known him to be in the past. Still, I judged that the time was ripe, that he would at least be willing to explore this ... extreme possibility. "In exchange for what?" he asked. Once again, my instincts were entirely correct. It was a beautiful moment in our relationship; one I wished I had more time to savor and enjoy. Unfortunately, time was precious. I had to press on. "Quit the FBI," I said. "Come work for me. I can make your problems go away." He hesitated only briefly. "No deal," he said, in a tone that left no room for discussion. You may suppose that his answer disappointed me. Perhaps it did. And yet I must confess to a certain pride in this young man who had grown to be so strong, so unwavering in his loyalties, so willing to persevere in his quest despite the enormous cost to himself and all those around him. Not that I could accept this answer from him. There was far, far too much at stake. "After all I've given you?" I said, as though I were amazed by his response. That seemed to anger him. "What? What have you given me?" he said. "A claim of a cure for Scully? Is she cured? You show me my sister only to take her right back. You've given me nothing." A skilled negotiator knows when to offer more bait; he also knows when to withhold it. This was one of those times. "I intend to keep my promises," I said. "I just need something from you." Or perhaps not. "You murdered my father," he said, in a voice so cold I barely recognized it. "You killed Scully's sister, and if Scully dies, I will kill you. I don't care whose father you are, I will put you down." My dear boy, you have no idea whose father I am. None at all ... but I mean that you shall know, when the time comes. "Well, you're certainly capable, so I've been told," I said, calmly. "I understand you have a hearing tomorrow where you'll have to testify to these murderous impulses of yours." That seemed to shock him. That was rather interesting, if entirely naive. Did he honestly think I wouldn't know that he'd committed murder, or that he was to be called to account for it? Quite the contrary: I knew exactly who was to question him, what questions were to be asked and how he was to be saved from his inquisitors -- and at what price. It was an overdue accounting at that -- the blame for quite a few deaths must be laid at his feet, and the list grows longer every year. And yet Fox Mulder is such an innocent in so many ways; even then, he thought he could be rid of me simply by walking away. "When you reconsider, the offer still stands!" I called after him. He didn't answer me. Perhaps he hadn't the strength to engage me again. He is fragile without his partner, after all, as my colleague pointed out, and I didn't bother to ascertain whether he meant Dana Scully or Daniel Reilly. In the end, it makes no difference -- they're equally vital to him. Having both of them placed out of his reach at the same time was a difficult and delicate task, but it was necessary if I am ever to win his loyalty -- and ultimately, so much more effective than Alex Krycek's clumsy attempt at murder. The equation was simple: With the commander dead, Mulder might become even more dangerous to our plans. He would know, or he would find out, who was responsible for the commander's death, and his desire for revenge -- and his well-known capability for murder -- might drive him to achieve what he might otherwise never have come near. With the commander at sea, on the other hand, Mulder remains in a particularly torturous limbo -- he is unable to gain any help or strength at all from his very handsome lover, but equally unable to move on to any other man. And Daniel Reilly is quite handsome, as I'm sure you realize. When I was a younger man, I might very well have been tempted to become involved with him myself; which is what leads me to suspect that young Alex might perhaps have had... shall we say, rather petty motivations for choosing murder as a means of controlling Mulder? We didn't send Alex to the FBI in order to seduce Mulder. That was entirely his own idea. I had no particular objection to it, you understand, as long as it didn't jeopardize the mission, but under the circumstances, Alex should have realized that there would be no return engagement. Jealousy can be a very ugly thing. It can also cause unnecessary disruptions in our carefully constructed plans, and that is something I cannot allow. There will be no more attempts on Commander Reilly's life. I believe that point has been made to all concerned, particularly Alex, whom I have counseled on the need to acquire some finesse. There are better ways of maintaining Mulder's fragility. Dana Scully will live, of course. That was determined long ago, over objections from some less-imaginative members of our group. But she will not succumb to her cancer ... not this time. It's a very simple matter, really ... it has nothing to do with the chip. The need for that will become apparent much later. No, Agent Scully's recovery requires only that the orderly who pushes her wheelchair be someone capable of healing by the laying-on of hands, and capable of understanding the necessity for doing so ... he will be someone who performed this service for us before, when my beloved Teena lay near death from a stroke. This service will be done so that someday, like my darling before her, Dana Scully may become the mother of a new race. It is her destiny -- unless, by some misfortune, it becomes necessary before that time to remove her permanently from Mulder's life. I hope not. For now, I find it far more useful to manage her in the same way we are managing Commander Reilly: We take her away, awaken Mulder to the possibility that she will be lost to him forever, and then graciously give her back. In this way, he lives under the shadow of her death, knowing all the while that it is he who casts the shadow. He craves her endlessly, and always will; yet that very craving threatens her life, and always will. Her life is in our debt. And he knows it. This creates in him a particularly useful type of fragility. But no one should ever mistake his fragility for a fatal weakness. It will never be that. With or without Agent Scully or Commander Reilly, he will survive, and he will continue to fight. He will leave this field of battle with his shield or on it. Fox Mulder is my son. He has my strength. He may bend, but he will never, ever break. Never. ~~~~~ LT James S. Reilly USS ANNAPOLIS (SSN 760) FPO AE 09564-2416 Ms. Dana Scully Trinity Hospital PO Box 2959 Washington, D.C. 20008 Dear Dana, I guess there's no tactful way to say this -- I mean, there probably is, but I'm not Daniel so I can't think of it. Daniel told me that you're sick. I guess I could try to tell you how bad it makes me feel, except who gives a damn how it makes me feel, right? You feel a whole hell of a lot worse, I know. I am so sorry, Dana. For a whole lot of reasons, and the biggest one is that I don't want to lose you. Dumb, right? You were never mine. You'll never belong to anybody but yourself. Ever since Daniel told me I've been ... well, not praying so much as asking God what the hell He's thinking, taking away a brilliant, beautiful, loving woman like Dana Scully when she's so young, when so many people love her and need her. I told you when we met that it was okay with me if you didn't want anything more than friendship. I meant it, too -- when I said it. Not anymore, Dana. I love you. I know you don't want that, and I'm sorry as hell, too, because I can't do a damn thing about it. I've turned this thought every way I can in my head and it comes out the same way. I wish you could feel the same way, but if you can't, I understand. But I hate that the time got away from us. I wanted the day to come that you'd have some room for me in your life, and now I guess it never will. Maybe it's just pure stubbornness -- I've got that in spades -- or maybe it's something more, but I have a feeling you and I will meet again, and I want us to meet with our eyes open. You decide what you want to do with me, but do it knowing the truth. In the meantime, I'm praying for you every night -- for your recovery and, yes, for my own nefarious wishes to be granted. Love, Jim
END "The Eighth Side of the Triangle"(11/?) by Susan Jameson (DrBarnBarn@aol.com)