TITLE: The Red Queen 
AUTHOR: KatyBlue 
SPOILERS: This is a Virtual Season 8 Episode, written  
for I Made This Productions. 
RATING: PG-13 
DISCLAIMER :  In their original forms, these characters 
were not created by me, but I have manipulated them for 
my own curious whims as well as your reading pleasure. 
SUMMARY: Mulder and Scully investigate a thirty year old 
cold case involving a once prominent virologist and the 
theft of materials from a Department of Defense laboratory. 
Finding that the doctor lives in their area, they attempt  
to close the case, but discover that the doctor's viral  
research might not have ended after all.  
E-MAIL: katy2blue@aol.com  Come on, you know you want to! 
or visit my web site at http://members.xoom.com/KatyBlue/ 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: To three fabulous betas; Fabulous 
Monster, Meredith and Toniann. They gave me great 
suggestions -- any errors still present are all my own.   
A huge thanks to the virtual season 8 production crew  
for all the hard work they've done to put together this  
wonderful 'cyber-season'!  You guys rock! 
AUTHOR'S NOTES: at end. 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
PROLOGUE 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
"Where do you come from?" said the Red Queen. "And where 
are you going? Look up, speak nicely, and don't twiddle 
your fingers all the time."  
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
Monday, December 10 
Falls Church, Virginia 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
Dr. Vincent White drank only to get drunk. 
 
There was no point to the act for him outside of the 
pursuit of oblivion. The bottle of wine was half full. He 
made it empty.   
 
He felt empty, reclining in the inescapable clutter of his 
neglected apartment. The slipcover half hung off the couch 
he was sprawled across. The heavy curtains were pulled so  
the room was dimmed.  The little sunlight that did manage  
to intrude spilled through a crack in the grime of the  
curtains and highlighted only dust motes swirling in its  
alluring but unreachable illumination.  
 
He barely recognized the daylight. 
 
There was a stack of mediocrity next to him. He could 
still recognize *that*, thank God. Final exams lay in an 
untidy pile at his fingertips, the corrections needed to 
fix multiple errors required an effort that Vincent no 
longer had the energy for today.  And after just barely 
starting them, no less.  
 
Given that the final grades for his motley pack of 
students were due tomorrow, he should be more concerned, 
but he wasn't. He'd get a call tomorrow from some 
administrative assistant, nastily reminding him he was late 
again. So what? It would take another three days for the 
university to start hounding him in earnest. After that, he 
had only the fallout of dealing with a multitude of annoyed 
and mediocre students when the grades were sent out and  
they started calling the biology department and demanding  
to know why they'd received an incomplete for their 
hopelessly sub-par work. 
 
He'd been through it all before. 
 
Tomorrow would be soon enough to try and make himself  
focus. 
 
He looked at the picture in his hands. He stumbled over 
these things from time to time. They gave him pause. The 
picture was of Matthew, his small body bent over a sand 
castle and his blonde hair tousled by the strong ocean 
breeze. Both hands were held out before him, as if 
uncertain he liked the sensation of the sand sticking to 
them. He'd been a very fastidious little boy. In the photo, 
his lips were pursed in fierce concentration of the object 
under construction before him.   
 
Olivia, in the background, was beaming at her little boy 
from the backlit aura of warm June sunshine. Her dark curls 
were unruly in the breeze. Her hand, frozen in that moment 
of time, tucked a curl behind her ear. 
 
The picture reminded him of all he'd lost. Dr. Vincent 
White took another swig straight from the bottle. He rarely 
bothered with a glass anymore. No point, really. He never 
had company to entertain. At the time this picture had  
been taken, he'd sipped an excellent vintage wine out of a  
crystal wineglass. He and Olivia had hosted well-attended  
and sought-after dinner parties. They'd resided in the  
opulent comfort of a three million dollar, impeccably  
decorated home on oceanfront property. Afforded this luxury  
mostly from Olivia's family money, but aided by his status  
as a well-known and respected virologist at the prestigious  
Yale University and a whopping Department of Defense grant  
for his research.  
 
He'd thought he was set for life.  
 
He'd had a beautiful family, he thought sadly. 
 
He rarely took note of his surroundings now. It was too 
depressing. 
 
He was glad the girls weren't in the picture. He couldn't 
take that right now.  Elizabeth, with those impossibly long 
lashes and light blue eyes, the riot of dark curls just 
like her mother. Little Gwennie, a smaller carbon copy of 
her older sister. Marissa, next in line, and blonde just 
like Matthew. He tipped the bottle up again and the picture 
fluttered from his fingers to settle near a stain on the 
beaten rug. He reached down to save the treasure from the  
filth it had landed in.   
 
It was too much wine all at once. His stomach protested. 
He belched and felt the acid sting of it come up his 
esophagus and out his nose. Sitting up quickly, he snatched 
the photo up, setting it where it was safe. Bending back 
over, he put a hand to his nostrils to catch the remaining 
liquid as it burned its passage out.  
 
When his hand came away stained with the red of the wine, 
he began to cry. 
 
Matthew had a nosebleed on a Sunday night, exactly thirty 
years ago.  That was the beginning of the end of his son's 
life, as well as what Dr. White had known to be his life. 
Colleagues shook their heads and avoided his eyes as they 
treated his little boy. They tried every medication they 
thought might work as Matthew's symptoms intensified. The 
pieces hadn't fit any known puzzle at the time.  
 
How could they? No one had known about that particular 
puzzle except for Vincent.  
 
His colleagues finally shrank from his impotent rage and  
guilt-filled wrath. He cursed them all. He railed at God  
and himself as the virus locked into its terrible pattern.  
He weakened at the sight of his child's helplessness.  
 
There was no hope for his son's survival. And yet he'd 
hoped anyway. 
 
In vain. 
 
Matthew labored into the early hours of Monday morning, 
December 22nd, while Vincent and his wife stood helplessly 
by their son's bedside. Three days from Christmas, 
beautiful little Matthew shuffled in little baby steps  
off this mortal coil.   
 
Looking back, he still knew this blow might have been 
endured. With his wife and three little girls, they could 
have pulled together to mourn and cherish the memory of 
Matthew. But shockingly and unexpectedly, little Matthew 
was followed within days by Olivia and all three of his 
beautiful daughters.   
 
He had no idea how his family had contracted the virus. 
But that it had somehow come from him was undeniable. 
 
And in this most perfectly designed hell on earth, Dr. 
Vincent White had survived. 
 
He called this life his penance. And he began a downhill 
slide into oblivion, self-recrimination and alcoholism  
from that day forward. 
 
He knew that he whole-heartedly deserved it. 
 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
 
ACT I 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
"I don't know what you mean by *your* way," said the Queen: 
"all the ways about here belong to me -- but why did you 
come out here at all?" she added in a kinder tone. "Curtsey 
while you're thinking what to say. It saves time." 
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
Monday, December 10  
Hoover Building 
 
Mulder had his back to Scully when she entered the room. 
He was bent over a box and she saw a cloud of dust rise in 
the spill of sunlight as he pulled a yellowed sheaf of 
papers out of it. 
 
"Good morning, Mulder." 
 
"Morning, Scully. It's your lucky day..." 
 
With some apprehension, she set her coffee cup down on the 
table in the corner and turned back to her partner. By now, 
she prided herself on being able to read even the most 
subtle hint of sarcasm in his voice, and as a result, she 
was certain this was *not* going to be a very lucky day for 
her.   
 
"What's up, Mulder?" she asked cautiously. 
 
"Skinner's got us on the X-files version of cold-case 
detail. I think our report from the last case was too much  
for him. So we've been detained from further investigation  
for the rest of this week. Instead, we have to go through  
storage room B and deliver it of any old X-files we can  
find in there." 
 
Storage room B, just down the hall from them, contained 
boxes of historical case files for every division of the 
FBI, dating back to the creation of the bureau in 1908. 
Most of the FBI's departments had already microfiched their 
older cases. But the X-files division, lacking the help of 
an administrative assistant, wasn't up to date with 
inputting older files into the database. 
 
At the moment, she wished this particular storage room had 
fallen victim to the fire that destroyed the majority of 
their original files. 
 
"You're kidding?" she groaned. He stared back impassively. 
"You mean physically go through the files?" 
 
"Yes. And no, I'm not kidding," he added. At her look, he 
said, "Don't worry. We don't have to power-lift any boxes, 
Scully. All we need to do is go through a few that, over 
the years, have been classified by other departments as 
'not fitting their criteria'. And if we're lucky enough to 
find an X-file, we make sure nothing new has come up on the 
case before we enter it into our database."  
 
He pointed to the floor where three boxes were lined up. 
"I've already got a head start and I've taken the liberty  
of denoting three categories. This first one is the 'not  
our problem either' box." Moving over, he kicked the second  
box. "This one is for the files we get to keep, even though 
they're just about as cold as ice pops -- X-files dated 
within the last fifty years, but ready to be 'put down.' 
I'm calling them the 'geriatrics.'" 
 
"Mulder..." she admonished. 
 
He nodded at the third box. "And lastly, our 'live but 
cold' X-files." The box he indicated already contained a 
file, she noted with dismay as he leaned over and held it 
up triumphantly. "Don't worry. So far, this is the only one 
even close to being active. And this particular box is 
likely to stay pretty empty, since no one's been in that 
room for the past twenty years, I think. We're talking very 
cold cases here, Scully."   
 
Mulder was attacking the task with his usual enthusiasm, 
which, while good to see, was also daunting. Perfect. Was 
she supposed to throw herself whole-heartedly into creating 
an X-file archive? What Mulder needed right now was not a 
partner, but a librarian who knew how to archive. 
 
"Can't someone else do this?" She hated the whine she 
heard creeping into her voice. He gave her a look. "I just 
mean, why do we get the pleasure of this detail? Is it 
because that storage room borders on our basement hovel? 
Why isn't anyone from the other departments helping to 
classify these cases?" 
 
She noted within seconds Mulder's uncharacteristic silence 
as he busied himself perusing another yellowed file in his 
hands. "Mulder? Did you have something to do with this 
detail?" 
 
He sighed at her lack of enthusiasm and indicated a large 
pile of boxes they needed to go through. His eyes were 
shining with the excitement reserved only for children at 
Christmas. "No one has touched these files for years, 
Scully.  And I know there are X-files in here. Do you 
really think we'd be certain to get them if someone else 
looked through these boxes?" he asked pointedly.   
 
He thought someone would keep the cases from them. And as 
much as this bordered on paranoia, she knew the statement 
also held truth. 
 
"First dibs," Mulder said, smiling sheepishly at her. "It 
isn't like I want to do this," he continued. "But I might 
remind you we were pulled off any active cases for the next 
week anyway after our latest fiasco. Besides," he shrugged,  
"it'll give us something to do." And he raised his eyebrows  
at her hopefully. It could even be interesting, Scully. I  
mean, look at the history here." He leaned over and pulled  
out a folder. The dust came off of it in a cloud and he  
waved at the air and coughed.   
 
"Slightly hazardous to your health, I'd say." At his look, 
she finally relented. With a pointed sigh, she sunk down 
into her chair and took a long sip of her coffee, 
marshalling herself to join him, but content to relax and 
watch his movements for a minute. She marveled at him, 
already well-advanced into his workday as she was just 
beginning. And she prepared herself for the unpleasant  
task ahead by allowing a good healthy dose of caffeine to  
infuse her system as she made her final protest known.  
"I'm not happy about this, Mulder." 
 
He nodded, unmoved. When she made her displeasure more 
obvious with a raised brow he went for the hard sell, 
turning that special look in her direction that was 
guaranteed to work in swaying her to his side. She waited 
with anticipation.  There it was -- the little push of his 
lower lip so it jutted out at her into a  much-too- 
endearing pout. And his eyes sparkled with such  
earnestness that she found herself giving in, though she  
knew the ploy too well and had to fight back a smile. 
 
"I'm telling you, Scully, some of it is fascinating," he 
insisted. 
 
"I'll be the judge of that," she shot back with the 
parting parry of the already defeated. 
 
He grinned. "Here, I want you to look at this one. It's 
right up your alley." He leaned over and picked out the 
sole occupant of the 'live' box. 
 
Reluctantly, she took the outstretched folder and set it 
on her desk. The manila covering was smeared with grime. It 
looked as if someone else had accidentally spilled an 
entire cup of coffee onto it at some point in time. 
 
With a put-upon sigh, she opened the folder. 
 
The date was 1970. There was a picture inside. A family. A 
middle-aged, blond man with his arm around an attractive 
dark-haired woman. There were three little girls in frilly 
dresses, arranged by height in front of the two adults. In 
the arms of the woman was a little boy. She peered more 
closely at the photo. 
 
"Dr. Vincent White..." Mulder began across the room. 
"Prominent scientist in his day..." 
 
"A virologist," Scully finished for him, recognizing the 
face. "Wow. I've heard of him. Supposedly, he was a 
brilliant researcher -- I believe he was involved in 
research that resulted in the development of a vaccine for 
one of the hemmorhagic fevers. I read about him as an 
undergrad."  
 
According to the file, there was a theft of 'sensitive 
materials' in the lab where Dr. Vincent White had worked.  
The nature of the materials stolen was not revealed to the 
bureau due to their classification as top secret Department 
of Defense Research.  
 
"The date is 1970, Mulder. Doesn't it seem odd that this  
case is stuck in there with a bunch of cases from the  
1920s through 40s?" 
 
"Exactly my question. So I looked into it a little. And it 
just so happens that Dr. White is actually very close by 
and could be easily questioned about the case. I might add 
that the Bureau never considered the case solved; in fact,  
it never even made it past the preliminary investigation." 
 
"Mulder, it says here that Dr. White was subsidized by a 
grant from the Department of Defense. Maybe the DOD or the 
Army dealt with the case." The paperwork inside the folder 
contained tell-tale permanent black magic-marker ink-outs 
of whole phrases. Classified material. Information that the 
DOD had considered unnecessary for the FBI to know.   
 
"It's still in the FBI's cache of unsolved cases, Scully." 
 
"A theft in a secured government facility sounds like an 
inside problem," she noted, frustrated at her inability to 
dampen his enthusiasm. Cold cases were just that -- cases 
that would probably never be solved. This case was no doubt 
further complicated by the involvement of the United States 
Government, under the guise of the DOD. It gave her a bad 
feeling. "Mulder, what could a thirty-year-old theft of 
classified information possibly have to do with anything 
current?"  
 
"How can you even ask that, Scully?" he demanded. 
 
She sighed, caught. "Okay...why is it an X-file?" she  
tried. 
 
Walking over to where she was reading, he pointed to the 
picture she'd been studying. "The same year of that theft, 
not long before it, in fact, Dr. Vincent White lost his 
entire family to a mysterious and unidentified virus.  
Those deaths were never investigated." 
 
"Mulder," she groaned. She stared down again at the 
picture of an apparently happy family. The children were 
smiling in the sunshine, parents beaming proudly.  
Seemingly the future stretched ahead of them all, an  
endless possibility. She viewed them now with the sense  
of poignancy that often struck her when the fate of such 
victims was known. "Okay, given that this is a case we can 
reopen, how can questioning this poor man about a thirty- 
year-old theft and the death of his entire family possibly 
have any benefit?" She looked up at Mulder, who was 
standing over her now looking entirely too ready to do  
just that. "Where did you say he was?" 
 
His eyes were glinting with that particular fervor that 
Mulder always brought to an investigation. "This once quite 
brilliant researcher," he pointed down to the picture, "is 
now teaching microbiology at a local college, Scully." 
 
Her eyebrow climbed in disbelief.  "Really?" 
 
"Really." 
 
This did seem like a far cry from Yale University and the  
development of a life-saving vaccine under a hefty government  
contract. She glanced hesitantly back down at the file. "It 
says here that there's some evidence stored on this case." 
 
"I know." Mulder leaned over her shoulder, reading off the 
list of catalogued numbers. "I believe it's in the true 
bowels of this building, Scully." He grinned. "Bet you 
didn't know there was actually a level below this." 
 
"And here I thought we could lay claim to that 
distinction," she said, looking around them. 
 
"Only psychologically. I'm going to check out whatever it  
is while you continue reading. Be right back, Scully." He 
squeezed her shoulder. "Absorb, and be ready for some  
action when I get back." 
 
"We can't investigate it until we go through the rest of 
these boxes, Mulder," she reminded him. "And Skinner said 
we're banished to the office for the rest of this week, 
remember?" 
 
"You got it, Scully. But at least we'll be ready when 
Monday rolls around." 
 
He was humming as he passed out the door. The air was 
still thick with dust from the old boxes littering the 
floor. Scully stared at the particles as they whirled in  
a shaft of sunlight coming through the basement window. 
Taking another long, slow sip of coffee, she let the folder 
drift shut on the desk. Reaching out, she flicked on her 
computer, content to let the contents of the unfortunate 
Dr. White's file remain unread until she'd finished her  
morning ritual of sipping coffee and reading her e-mail.  
 
Digging deep into the past for seemingly no good purpose 
could wait until Mulder returned from his errand. And 
hopefully even longer after that. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
The errand ended up taking Mulder much longer than she 
expected. When he came back into the office, she was long 
done with her coffee and he was sucking gingerly on his 
thumb. 
 
"Mulder? Are you regressing?" 
 
He popped the digit out of his mouth with an audible noise 
and peered at it. "Cut myself, good. It finally stopped 
bleeding," he observed.
"How did you manage to cut yourself, and what took you so 
long?" 
 
"It took a while to find the particular evidence room  
labeled 'obscure and unobtainable'. You think *these*  
boxes haven't seen the light of day, Scully?" He  
shuddered. "You don't want to go where I've just been. I  
underestimated when I said bowels. It was more like hell."   
 
Frowning, she walked casually over to where he was leaning 
up against his desk. It took a certain skill to stalk and 
corner a wounded Mulder. Reaching out, she latched onto the 
thumb in one deft snag and tugged the injured party toward 
her in order to inspect it. Mulder was the only man she 
knew who could hurt himself in any situation. Just getting 
out of bed in the morning was unsafe for him. "You know, 
that's not exactly the best way to treat a wound," she 
scolded.   
 
"What?" 
 
"Sucking on it can introduce pathogens from your oral 
cavity into the wound, as well as the other way around..."  
 
He was beginning to smirk at her, though he was patient 
with both the scolding and her ministrations, having  
learned that once she got her hands on him, it was best  
not to struggle. "What was that, Scully?" he murmured.  
"You lost me back about the point where you said the  
words 'sucking' and 'oral cavity' in the same sentence."   
 
She threw him the requisite scowl as she peered closely at 
his thumb, finally reassuring herself that it was no more 
than a superficial laceration, albeit one deep enough into 
the dermis to smart. A drop of blood welled up slowly.  
 
"Did you know that the Federal Bureau of Investigation has 
a rodent problem?" Mulder remarked. 
 
"What makes you say that?" 
 
He was about to answer when the phone rang and he pulled 
the thumb out of her grasp to answer it. She could tell it 
was A.D. Skinner on the other end from how Mulder reacted, 
a strange combination of annoyance and respect. He rolled 
his eyes and mouthed the words, "Budget meeting tomorrow," 
at her.  He peered at his thumb and stuck it back in his  
mouth. 
 
"Don't forget we're due to go over our latest expense 
report on Thursday," she reminded him. She never thought  
she'd look forward to the mundane and often unpleasant  
task of paperwork, but if it would keep them from running  
off on a wild goose chase two weeks before Christmas, she  
welcomed the distraction.   
 
Moving back to her makeshift desk, she pushed Dr. White's  
aged folder of misery to the far side as she searched for 
a band-aid and listened to Mulder assure Skinner they  
could definitely get the necessary reports ready on time.  
She knew they would need to strategize in order to slip  
their latest expenses through. The Bureau might not  
appreciate how running through a junkyard in the process  
of preventing a psychopath from killing her partner and  
hitting the dirt in the same said junkyard in order to  
avoid attracting the attention of a tiger while nursing  
her partner's thankfully superficial gunshot wound to the  
leg truly did ruin clothing, but she'd be damned if she'd  
start buying disposable suits. 
 
Mulder hung up the phone.   
 
"They're buying me a new suit, Mulder," she stated 
ominously. 
 
"You read my mind, Scully. Would you believe that Skinner 
just told me we'd better figure out a way to justify the 
names 'Anne Klein' and 'Giorgio Armani' to Accounting by 
Thursday?" 
 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
Just at this moment, somehow or other, they began to run. 
Alice never could quite make out, in thinking it over 
afterwards, how it was that they began: all she remembers 
is, that they were running hand in hand, and the Queen went 
so fast that it was all she could do to keep up with her: 
and still the Queen kept crying "Faster! Faster!", but 
Alice felt she *could not* go faster, though she had no 
breath left to say so. 
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
Friday, December 14 
George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia  
 
 
Two days, one budget meeting, an expense report and two 
new suits later, Mulder was raring to get going on the 
White case.  Scully had long since given up trying to 
convince him otherwise. And after three days of meetings, 
she had to admit that she was just as ready to get out of 
the office as Mulder.   
 
"You're sure Skinner gave us the okay on this, Mulder?" 
 
"Of course, Scully." He shot her a dirty look.  
 
"Might I also point out that it's Friday...are you also  
sure I can't convince you to take a few personal hours and  
do some Christmas shopping with me instead of starting  
this case today?" 
 
"I'm definitely sure on that one, Scully." 
 
She'd been very careful about her mention of any holiday  
plans this year in Mulder's presence. In a way, his year  
had included the loss of the only two remaining members of  
his family. And as distant as they may have been from him  
in their own respective ways, they were all the family  
he'd had left. She'd already made a promise to herself to  
stick by him this year, whether he asked her to or not.  
She also knew he'd never ask. Mulder always played it as  
if he were not big on the holidays in principle, but she  
often suspected that his indifference was more a form of  
self-preservation than actual dislike of the season. 
 
George Mason University, where Dr. Vincent White now 
taught microbiology, was in Alexandria, not very far from 
Mulder's apartment.  She'd had no idea there was even a 
university there and read the information Mulder had 
collected on it as they drove.  Small and fairly newly 
established, it was mostly a commuter school, spread over 
three campuses and attracting a wealth of non-traditional 
students.  They parked the car in a nearly deserted lot 
outside what looked to be the main building. 
 
With a few exceptions, the campus appeared empty of 
students. University attendees had completed their final 
exams for the fall semester the week before and had been 
released from the rigors of academia into the joy of their 
respective holidays.  The overall effect was a cluster of  
brick buildings, deserted of signs of life and devoid of  
any form of holiday cheer, but apparently still 
functioning in some form over the break. Signs of random 
human life were spotted moving from one building to the 
next. 
 
Mulder and Scully entered a building pointed out to them 
by an older professorial type as that holding the  
biology offices. A young dark-haired woman sat at the  
front desk, chewing gum and flirting with a rather badly  
dressed security guard. Scully idly thought that any  
company who dressed their security staff in ill-fitting  
polyester should not also be allowed to arm them. 
 
Mulder did the honors of clearing his throat to get their 
attention. They performed their routine badge display in 
tandem and the two university staffers appeared duly 
impressed by the credentials.  
 
"We're wondering if you could help us find a Dr. Vincent 
White?" Mulder inquired. "We'd like to talk to him, if 
that's possible." 
 
"If you can find him, good luck!" the woman fumed. "He's  
not answering at any of his numbers and his grades were due  
in *yesterday*." Her annoyance was evident. But her  
expression gradually changed from irritation to something  
more akin to anticipation. "Why? Is he in trouble?" 
 
"If you don't mind, we'd like to try and find him today." 
Mulder slipped easily into what Scully considered his 
'charming mode.' Mulder's attentions alone were enough  
to have an marked effect on some women. Scully had also  
decided that he wasn't quite as oblivious to it as he  
sometimes pretended to her.  
 
Proving herself one of the susceptible ones, the  
receptionist quickly fell under the spell of his eyes,  
blinked slowly, and smiled. Then she moved trance-like  
behind her desk to do his bidding. Bending over a computer  
screen, she called up telephone numbers and Dr. White's  
home address for him.  
 
The beefy security guard first scowled at Mulder for the 
intrusion and then turned his attention to Scully. Deciding 
turnabout was fair play, he looked her up and down, paying 
particular attention to her breasts. Scully sent him a 
withering look that was guaranteed to make him think twice 
about the attention he was visiting upon a federal officer. 
It seemed to work and he dropped his eyes to the floor. 
 
"Here you go." The woman scribbled the phone numbers down  
on a memo pad and tore the pink slip of paper off. She  
handed it to Mulder with a wide smile, concentrating her  
flirtations solely on him for the moment and forgetting her 
conversation with the security guard. Mulder turned his own 
attention back to Scully and mouthed the words 'let's go.' 
 
"You could try his office," the woman called as they 
turned toward the exit. "Third floor, number 364. His lab 
is right beside that. God knows, he could be hiding up 
there and just not answering when I knock. He's done *that* 
before," she added with thinly-veiled contempt. 
 
Mulder turned back and gave her a little smile. "Thanks." 
 
"Do me a favor," she said. "If you do get a hold of him,  
tell him the damned grades are due and I'm sick and tired  
of dealing with the front office. Tell him I'll do my best  
to make his life miserable next semester if he doesn't get  
them to me by today," she added heatedly. 
 
Mulder gave her a little wave as they climbed the first 
flight of stairs. "Will do." 
 
Scully shot him a look, but he was staring straight ahead, 
a little scowl of concentration rested on his face. "What 
are you thinking, Mulder?" she asked. "You know this is 
going to go nowhere.  Not that I'm complaining." 
 
"Why do you think it's going nowhere?" 
 
She sighed. "Wishful thinking," she said, resigned to her 
fate. "Christmas is only about two weeks away and I'd just 
as soon not get too involved in a new case." 
 
He turned a contemplative look in her direction. "Are you  
going to San Diego this year, Scully?" The question was  
casual, but his expression was curious. She could swear he 
was anxious about her answer. 
 
"Why do you ask?" she replied carefully. 
 
He shrugged it off. "No reason. Just asking." 
 
"I haven't made any definite plans yet," she admitted. "I 
didn't want to get my Mom's hopes up and then pull the plug 
on her. What about you?" she asked, turning the question 
around. "Want to come along?" 
 
Her question was delivered as casually as his inquiry of 
her plans. She'd wanted to ask him for a while now. She 
admitted once more to herself that she was worried about 
him being alone this year. Nevertheless, she doubted he'd 
be receptive to her offer.  
 
She was right on that account, but his expression was 
worth the effort as it turned from one of brooding to  
that of a wide smile. "Is Bill going to be there?" 
 
"Yup." 
 
He laughed aloud. "Oh, Scully, that's just asking for 
trouble, isn't it?" 
 
She returned his smile, happy to have amused him about a  
holiday that had left neither of them feeling all that  
jolly over the past few years. They climbed together to  
the third floor. 
 
"Yes, it certainly is, Mulder." 
 
She resolved to stay in D.C. for the holiday before she 
took the next step. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
Dr. Vincent White did not deign to answer their knocks on 
either the door of his lab or his office, if he were indeed 
hiding inside as the receptionist implied. However, a crack  
of light spilled out into the hallway from the next door  
down as they were making their last attempt. Scully nudged  
Mulder and they watched this door glide shut as quietly and  
quickly as it had opened. Moving down the hall to stand in  
front of it, Scully reached up and rapped firmly as Mulder  
joined her. 
 
They waited for what seemed just a tad too long for an 
answer. When the door finally opened, a very tall young man 
with wire-rimmed glasses, in his mid-twenties and wearing 
a pristine white lab coat, was revealed. He stared at the 
two of them curiously, with a tinge of nervousness in his 
stance. "Can I help you?" 
 
"Possibly," Mulder said. "We're looking for Dr. Vincent 
White." 
 
The young man's face turned into a slight scowl. "I 
haven't seen him," he answered, with a slight lisp. "I'm  
in the middle of an important experiment here, if you  
don't mind." 
 
Mulder pulled out his badge and Scully, beside him, 
followed suit. "Actually, we do mind. Could we talk to  
you for a second?" 
 
The young man's eyes grew quite wide. He opened the door 
with a scowl. "Come in -- just don't touch anything." 
 
"Do you know Dr. White?" Scully asked. As she spoke, she 
took the opportunity to glance at her surroundings and note 
the contents of the lab. It was average, certainly not 
boasting the amenities of a more prestigious location. But 
the lab space was clean and very neat and the storage 
adequate and well-organized. 
 
"Well, yes..." the young man replied, as if this were 
common knowledge and he couldn't understand why she didn't 
know. "Unfortunately," he added.  He seemed puzzled.  
Scully well remembered the insular environment that a  
university could sometimes be. One forgot that there was  
an outside world where people didn't live and breathe  
everything that was going on within the walls of a  
particular academia. "He's my thesis advisor," he  
finally explained. "This is his lab." 
 
"Have you seen him recently?" Mulder asked. 
 
The scowl came back. "No, but I'd certainly like to." 
There was irritation on the young man's face, but also a 
trace of condescension as he made his next statement. "I've  
decided that it'll take nothing short of a resurgence of  
the Bubonic plague to bring him back around," he announced  
darkly, adjusting his glasses by pushing them back up onto  
his nose with one finger. "I'm Harold Weaver, Jr. by the  
way."  
 
"Agent Fox Mulder." Mulder pointed a finger in her 
direction. "My partner, Dr. Dana Scully." 
 
Harold held out a hand to shake both of theirs. His grip 
was weak and his palms clammy, making for an unpleasant 
exchange overall. She knew Mulder's usage of her title was 
purposeful, having deduced that a fellow scientist might 
get more information from Harold than an FBI agent. "What 
are you working on, Harold?" she interjected smoothly. 
 
"My thesis research," he stammered. 
 
She nodded, feigning interest. "And that would be?" 
 
"Viral evolution," he stated, pushing the glasses up with 
one finger and staring at her again as if surprised she 
didn't know this. "I'm looking at host-parasite 
interactions." 
 
"What, specifically, about host-parasite interactions?" 
 
"Uh...well..." He pushed his glasses up again and for a 
second, seemed thrown by her question. His nervousness 
either meant he was trying to hide something or was 
painfully shy of social skills. Scully voted for the 
latter. "We, uh..." He seemed to straighten and gain some 
sort of confidence as he stated a phrase obviously learned 
by rote and practiced more than once.  No doubt, it was the 
subject of his dissertation. "In this lab, we're attempting 
to look at the parasites that affect a species of mouse in 
order to determine whether these parasites are growing more  
virulent to their host over time."  
 
"Ah." 
 
"Who's 'we'?" Mulder interrupted. 
 
He grew nervous again and Scully was almost positive by 
this point that a glaring lack of social skills was at the 
heart of his difficulty in conversing. "Barbara Cross," he 
stammered.  "She's another grad student working on the same  
project. She should be back any second. She just went to  
the biology office to get a package." 
 
"Oh. We'll wait then," Mulder said pleasantly, crossing 
his arms and leaning back against one of the lab benches.   
 
Harold scowled. "Look out. There are assays right there 
behind you." He rolled his eyes as if Mulder were possibly 
the most intellectually-challenged person ever to grace his 
presence. "I'll lose six months of work if you knock 
anything over," he muttered darkly, sprinting over to worry 
at the area and check each object while intentionally 
crowding Mulder aside. Mulder finally gave up and moved 
away, rolling his eyes. Scully shot her partner a sharp  
look and found her sympathies resting with the awkward  
young man's fear at losing months of what was probably  
painstaking research. 
 
Barbara Cross arrived moments later, walking into the lab 
and coming to a dead stop when she saw the two strangers. 
She was close to Scully's height, maybe an inch taller, but 
quite a bit wider all the way around. Her dark hair was 
straight and hung limply, in a way that almost appeared 
unwashed. She might be a mousy blonde on a good day. Large, 
heavy-framed glasses gave her an owlish sort of expression  
and her face bore the painful scars of a lifelong struggle  
with serious acne. Her eyes were hard as she studied them,  
and she impaled Harold with a glare, obviously awaiting  
his explanation for their presence. 
 
Scully stepped forward and held out her I.D. "We're from 
the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Ms. Cross. We're 
actually looking for your advisor in order to ask him a few 
questions about an old case. We just wondered if you'd seen 
him." 
 
Barbara appeared to relax somewhat as she laughed, though 
the laugh was short and without humor. Scully noticed that 
her eyes were flying past them and over to the lab area 
behind them, checking for something. She saw Mulder catch 
this too. In rare cases, this was all they needed to solve  
a case -- movement of a suspect's eyes to damning evidence. 
Barbara appeared to be glancing at Harold and then the 
alleged assays that Mulder had almost knocked over. But  
after identifying the direction of the young woman's  
attention, Scully had to remind herself that there was no  
crime here. When she turned back to Barbara, one hundred  
percent of the young woman's attention had returned to  
herself and Mulder. 
 
"We see him maybe once a week for our dressing down," she 
said contemptuously. "Other than that, he leaves us alone.  
But we're pretty self-sufficient, right Harold?" 
 
Harold was nodding vigorously when Scully chanced a glance 
at him. 
 
"I'm halfway through writing my dissertation," Barbara 
stated. "All I need from that old..." She stopped herself 
and stared at them for a moment, narrowing her eyes. 
Assessing them. "He only needs to show up for my oral 
presentation and sign the paper afterward," she declared 
finally, her voice hard and unforgiving. "And if you think 
it's not going to be stressful enough to get *that* out of 
him, you haven't suffered as his graduate student for the 
past four years. And I might add that he's been riding on 
the coattails of *my* publications for most of those years. 
Co-author. Ha!" She laughed and there was no humor in the 
sound. "I wrote every damn journal article and he couldn't 
even have the decency to concentrate long enough to edit 
them."  Her eyes narrowed.  "Why are you looking for him?" 
she demanded. "He ought to be arrested for that alone." 
 
Mulder shook his head. "The reason for our interest in 
your advisor is information we can't share with you, Ms. 
Cross. But we were wondering a bit about the nature of  
the research that you and Mr. Weaver are doing under  
his tutelage." 
 
Scully wanted very badly to call her partner on this line 
of questioning.  They had no business acting as if Dr. 
White had been involved in a crime here or asking the 
students to explain their research. The stories that would 
fly on campus after this visit could certainly be damaging 
to the poor man's reputation. 
 
"You wouldn't understand the research." Barbara said with 
disdain. 
 
"My partner here might," Mulder replied dryly, stepping 
aside to indicate Scully. "She has a bachelor's degree in 
physics, as well as being a medical doctor. Currently, 
she's a pathologist for the Federal Bureau of 
Investigation. Why don't you try her?" 
 
A faint gleam of respect came into Barbara's eyes. In her 
gaze was the respect offered a colleague -- grudging  
entrance to the inner circle of academia. Once accepted,  
however, one must play by the same cutthroat rules as  
everyone else. "You must be on the clinical side of things  
rather than the research side, hmmm?" Barbara asked,  
condescension dripping in her tone. 
 
"I've done quite a bit of research," Scully's replied 
cooly, unperturbed at the dig. There was still a dearth of 
women in the sciences, and one coping strategy for a woman 
who did go into the field was just such a hardening in her  
confrontations with other scientists. "I'm sure I'll be  
able to grasp the concepts behind your experiment." 
 
Barbara shook her head. "I don't have to tell you 
anything. For all I know, you could be spies posing as  
FBI agents, out to get to the patent before we do." 
 
"What patent would that be, Barbara?" Mulder interrupted, 
fighting back his grin at the young woman's wild 
allegation. Scully felt herself growing annoyed at her 
partner. The girl could have a point. It did happen. 
 
"Look. I have friends who are lawyers," Barbara said. "And 
I know I don't have to tell you anything. This is my 
research. I'm on the verge of a discovery that could assure 
me a very good job when I get out of this hell-hole. I'm 
not jeopardizing that by giving up my experimental 
procedure just because two bonehead strangers ask." 
 
Mulder persevered, adopting a casual tone to his voice,  
despite the insult. "We're just asking for a general idea  
here, Barbara. We don't need specifics." 
 
"Evolution," she snapped. "We're looking at host-parasite 
interactions. But you could have learned that from the 
biology office secretary, so why don't you go down there 
and bug her instead of me?" 
 
Behind them, the door to the lab opened once more to admit 
a new player into this tense little tableau. When Scully 
turned to study the newcomer, she had to blink twice to 
convince herself that Brad Pitt hadn't actually just walked 
into the room. There were a few subtle differences between 
the actor and this young man. For instance, she'd never 
seen Brad Pitt in a white lab coat. And this man's eyes 
might actually be a shade bluer.   
 
He stared at them in confusion for a minute and then smiled  
warmly, noticeably addressing his welcome greeting to Scully. 
She swore she could feel Mulder tense up beside her. "Hi,"  
the Brad Pitt doppleganger said, walking forward with a  
cowboy-like swagger to his gait. He stuck out a hand.  
"Pleased to meet you. I'm Brad. No relation to the actor,  
I swear." He laughed. "People always ask me that. I tell  
them that if we were from the same parental genes, why in  
hell would we be named the same thing?" 
 
"I've seen stranger things be true," Mulder said 
humorlessly beside her. He stuck out his badge instead of 
his hand when Brad turned his attention in his direction.  
"We're from the FBI, Mr...?" 
 
"Palmer," the young man supplied, slipping his hands into 
the pockets of his rather well-fitting jeans, retreating 
somewhat in light of Mulder's less than friendly response 
and Scully's careful reserve when faced with his over- 
enthusiastic greeting. "Brad Palmer." 
 
"Could we ask you a few questions about your research, 
Brad?" Mulder asked. 
 
"You don't have to say anything, Brad," Barbara 
interrupted.  "They're supposedly looking into some old  
case that Vince was involved in. But right now, they're  
just being nosy." 
 
Brad got a pained look on his face. He rocked back on his 
heels to catch sight of his fellow graduate student. 
"Thanks for the advice, Barb, seeing as how you know I 
can't think for myself." 
 
"You said it, not me," she shot back musically, though the 
antagonism in her voice was obvious. 
 
Brad stared her down for a second, before turning back to 
them. "What would you like to know?" he said with a wide 
smile, directed mostly at Scully. "Come on over to my 
little corner of this particular hell." 
 
They followed him to a rather untidy desk that was indeed  
shoved tightly into a corner. Like any graduate student,  
the desk contained the requisite piles of papers and  
volumes of relevant literature and various texts. There 
were a few photographs pinned to a bulletin board on the 
wall amongst interdepartmental memos about lab procedures 
and safety. Scully glanced at the collection of photos and 
noticed that each one contained Brad with a different  
female companion.   
 
Brad sat down in his chair and rolled backward, kicking 
his legs up onto the desk and putting his arms behind his 
head. He bestowed another smile on Scully and tilted his 
head, studying her with his smile lingering. "So what 
brings the FBI to our humble lab?" 
 
"I wouldn't get excited. It probably isn't your looks, 
Brad," Barbara sniped from her position in the further 
depths of the lab. 
 
Brad rolled his eyes, not appearing to be too bothered by 
the heckling of his lab mate. "Why are you interested in 
our research?" he asked curiously. 
 
Scully was growing increasingly uncomfortable with the 
line of questioning she and Mulder were following. They 
really had no business looking into whatever research Dr. 
White and his graduate students were working on. That 
wasn't part of the case. In fact, this was distinctly 
turning into a one of Mulder's fishing expeditions and  
she didn't like it one bit. 
 
"We're not interested in your research, Mr. Palmer." She 
gave Mulder a warning look. "We're just looking for your 
advisor to speak to him about an old case. Have you seen 
him lately?" 
 
He shook his head. "He's not exactly 'around,' if you know 
what I mean." 
 
"No. What exactly do you mean, Brad?" Mulder piped up.  
Scully shot him another look. He was acting as if these 
students were under suspicion. She knew, when investigating 
a crime, it often became an automatic response to suspect 
everyone, almost unconsciously. Until you suddenly found 
yourself treating everyone as guilty by default, even 
though the law was specific that the situation was assumed  
to be the exact opposite. Mulder didn't usually fall prey  
to this. 
 
Her eyes traveled over to her partner.  He was leaning on 
the second desk, arms crossed. His face looked mildly 
flushed and he moved his eyes to hers when he sensed her 
attention. She let a question pass from her eyes to his. 
'What the hell are we doing here, Mulder?'  His return  
look was unreadable, his eyes void of a return message. 
 
Brad continued with his explanation, though he watched the 
interplay between them with sharp eyes. "To tell you the 
truth, I feel bad for the guy. We think he's going insane. 
Right, Barbara?" For their ears only, he whispered, "It 
takes one to know one," and looked pointedly in Barbara's 
direction. 
 
"Shut up, Brad," she hurled back, obviously lacking 
nothing in hearing ability. "And might I add that you're 
looking at insanity every time you gaze narcissistically 
into that multitude of mirrors you no doubt have scattered 
all over your house." 
 
"At least I can look in one without breaking it, Barbara," 
he shot back without pause, staring innocently up at the 
ceiling. 
 
Barbara moved into the sphere of their conversation. 
Scully could almost feel her glowering at Brad. "If you're 
so curious about us," she said acidly, "Brad here models in 
order to put himself through school. Unfortunately, he 
hasn't figured out yet that it's actually his true calling." 
 
"Shut up, Barbara." It was Brad's turn to appear 
flustered. He tipped the chair back onto all fours and shot 
an apologetic look in their direction. "I'm getting my 
doctorate here," he explained. "Because I want to and 
because I'm qualified to." He aimed this part of the 
statement at Barbara before turning back to them. "Barbara 
hasn't yet accepted the concept that a scientist might be 
both smart and attractive."  
 
Scully sensed the young woman's frustration and anger 
building. The outward insults these two obviously exchanged 
in their everyday interactions had to be brutal on their 
respective psyches. There definitely seemed to be some sort 
of power struggle between Barbara and Brad. No doubt Dr. 
White could have been a stabilizing influence here, but his 
absence had instead created a 'Lord of the Flies' atmosphere  
in this lab. 
 
"You know, if I could make myself uglier to stop being 
harassed by you, Barb, I'd gladly do it," Brad drawled. 
"But that might give you too much satisfaction. I got into 
this school the same way you did. I applied. I was 
accepted. I'm here.  Deal with it." Scully noted that he 
was finally scowling and his face was flushed with anger 
as she studied their exchange with a critical eye. 
 
"That's what happens when a university lowers the standard 
of acceptance for graduate school to a mere 3.0 GPA," 
Barbara said loudly, her own anger barely in check. Scully 
idly contemplated that it was a wonder these students 
hadn't killed each other by now. If Mulder and she were not 
standing between them right now, she could imagine them 
coming to blows. 
 
Instead, Brad craned his neck around them, tilting himself 
dangerously back in the seat in order to make insolent and 
direct eye contact with his adversary. "Barbara, if I'd 
known I was going to have to look at something like you for 
the next two years of my life, believe me, I'd have studied 
harder," he rifled back. 
 
Scully turned to see the girl vacillating between 
attacking Brad with the nearest blunt object or bursting 
into tears. What she chose to do over either option was to 
leave the room in a huff, slamming the door on her way out, 
obviously upset. 
 
"That wasn't exactly nice, Brad." Mulder used his most 
formal I'm-not-happy G-man voice; one that Scully 
recognized as barely veiling his anger at Brad's callous 
treatment of the woman. Although to give Barbara credit 
where it was due, Scully was fairly sure the woman had 
proven herself able to fling an equal amount of insults  
in the exchange and would probably have scoffed at  
Mulder's more protective instincts. 
 
Brad looked pained. "Yeah, well you don't have to sit here 
everyday with that ogre telling you how stupid you are." 
 
Mulder shrugged. "If sitting's all you're doing, maybe you 
deserve it." 
 
Brad looked at Mulder as if he had just received the most 
grievous insult of his life. Seeing no sympathy there, he 
turned imploring eyes to Scully for protection. Two against 
one is never a good place to be if you're the one who's 
alone. Brad obviously recognized this.  
 
"Look, I'm just trying to get into med school here," he 
entreated Scully. "This was the only way to do it with my 
undergrad grades. That doesn't mean I deserve to be 
insulted at every turn for the next four years of my life." 
 
Scully took a deep breath, finding herself growing angrier  
by the minute at Mulder for dragging them into this lab and  
into what was no better than a domestic squabble. Strangely,  
she found her sympathies settling with Brad. No one can do  
much about the outward manifestation of their physiology.  
Scully had been in a similar position to Brad at one point  
in time. There seemed to be an unspoken rule in academia that  
an attractive person is highly unlikely to also be intelligent.  
She'd lived through this prejudice a number of times in her  
own career. Although it was more often a problem for women,  
she wouldn't perpetuate the inequality for either sex. 
 
Still, she had no place becoming involved in the student's 
dispute and tried to get the conversation back on track. 
"Look, Brad. We're not here to grade or judge anyone. None 
of you are in any kind of trouble here. We're just looking 
for Dr. White. Period." 
 
Brad set the chair down and his feet hit the floor. "Well, 
I can tell you about what we're working on, if you're 
interested. These two idiots act as if we're on the verge 
of the most ground-breaking discovery of the century." He 
snorted. "As if." 
 
"Brad, don't you dare think about telling them the 
experimental protocol," Harold stammered from the lab bench. 
 
"Take a chill pill, Harold. This isn't Harvard." 
 
Harold glared through his spectacles at his fellow grad 
student. He seemed to draw himself up with an enormous 
amount of willpower, but his voice shook when he finally 
spoke. "You know, Brad, you're a bane on this lab," he said 
angrily, poking a stick-like finger in his lab mate's 
direction. 
 
Brad snorted an indignant laugh. "That's ripe, Harold, 
coming from you." 
 
Scully watched the awkward young man back down from the 
insult, curiously flustered by Brad's words. Having 
apparently finished whatever experiment he was doing, he 
fumbled to remove his latex gloves and hastily exited  
the lab. 
 
"You have a way with your colleagues, don't you Brad?" 
Mulder remarked dryly. 
 
Brad shot a dirty look at Mulder. "They're no prizes to 
 
work with, believe me. You're luckier than me in that 
respect," he said, transparent in his flirtations as he 
turned to Scully and bestowed her with another dazzling 
smile. He addressed his next line of commentary to her,  
ignoring Mulder for the most part as he spoke. "The lab  
space is where we're doing our experiments. Dr. White  
has an office next door."  
 
Mulder was quiet beside her as they got a quick tour.   
Having been partners for so long now, they could sense  
when one was doing better than the other at questioning  
a given suspect. The problem was, Brad was not a suspect,  
at least not in her mind. Mulder obviously had other  
ideas. In the end, Brad was as vague about the experiment  
they were working on as his lab mates.  
 
"That dork Harold is right, unfortunately. We're trying to  
beat everyone else to a patent on our results, so I can't  
give you a lot of details," he admitted. "Did you know that  
Vince used to be quite the important virologist back in his  
day? Now, he's mainly intent on destroying the lives of his  
students. But when I started, he still had a few tricks up  
his sleeve. Lately, however, he's not too helpful." 
 
"What do you mean by 'tricks', Brad?" Mulder piped up 
finally. 
 
Scully turned to scowl at the question, but Brad wasn't 
offended. There seemed to be no loyalty lost to his mentor. 
"We're working on the evolution of viruses," he stated, 
again directing this to Scully, though Mulder had asked.  
"Have you ever heard of the Red Queen hypothesis?" 
 
"I'm familiar with it," she answered. "What's your opinion 
of the phenomenon?" 
 
"Let's just say that I've seen it in action," he bragged. 
"And that's about all I can reveal." He made a motion of 
zipping his lips that Scully hadn't seen since she was 
about ten and then gave her another grin. "Can you give us 
any specifics about the nature of your work here, Brad?" 
she asked instead. 
 
"I'm the microbiologist," he stated. "I have the magic 
fingers when it comes to growing those little viruses." He 
wiggled his fingers as if to emphasize the point and gave  
her what she was sure must be his most charming smile. 
"Propagating viral cultures can be difficult, as you know. 
On a side note, I'm also a whiz at growing their host, 
Peromyscus leucopus. The little rodent just loves me for 
some reason. I'm sure you'd find them quite cute," he 
confessed to her, "but I can't show them to you. We try  
to keep a pretty tight control over the introduction of 
contaminants to our subjects." 
 
Brad lost a majority of the points he gained with her by 
thinking she'd be swayed by the cuteness of a rodent. "What 
are Barbara and Harold working on for their dissertation?" 
she asked idly. 
 
"I call those two losers the ecology geek and the DNA 
freak." He laughed but let it die when neither she nor 
Mulder joined in. "They directly benefit from the fruits of 
my labors. That's what they do." He waved, dismissing their 
importance to him. "Why are you two looking for Dr. White 
anyway? I mean, we're all looking for him here, being in 
the middle of an important experiment while he's hiding 
somewhere with a fifth of Jack," Brad drawled. "But is he 
in some kind of trouble or something?" 
 
"No," Scully stated firmly. "Just routine questions on an 
old case. Dr. White is not under any suspicion. I want to 
make that very clear."  It was time for them to go and  
she moved toward the door. 
 
"You said a fifth of Jack," Mulder commented, moving with 
her. "Does Dr. White have a drinking problem?" 
 
Brad snorted and moved ahead, opening the door for them.  
"That guy's three sheets to the wind every time I see him  
lately. It sucks. This is most definitely a dysfunctional  
lab, and we're the fucked up children of his pathology,  
excuse my French." He gave Scully puppy-dog eyes that  
rivaled Mulder at his best. "If I hadn't been so  
distracted as an undergrad, I would have made the grades  
for med school. Right now, I can't wait to get out of  
here," he said vehemently, kicking the door in emphasis.   
 
Throughout their conversation, Scully couldn't help but 
notice him staring at her with uncomfortably apparent 
interest, giving little need to guess at what exactly had 
distracted this Brad Pitt look-alike as an undergraduate. 
At the door, he put an arm against the frame and leaned 
toward her. "If you don't mind my asking, why does the FBI 
need doctors on staff?" His voice took on a smooth timbre 
that could easily be hypnotic if a woman cared to listen  
to him long enough. "Sounds like an interesting career 
opportunity." 
 
Scully gave him a tight smile and turned to Mulder. "I 
think we've seen enough.  Thank you, Mr. Palmer." 
 
"No problem," he murmured, disappointment in his gaze at  
her obvious dismissal. He turned to Mulder, looking him  
up and down as if sizing up the competition. "Anytime, 
Dr. Scully.  And I mean any time. Do you have a card or 
something that I could take, in case I think of anything?" 
 
Reluctantly, she handed him her card. Beside her, she 
could sense Mulder smirking. "By the way," Brad said as 
they were leaving, "he might actually call me.  His 
Microbiology 101 grades are way overdue and I'm his 
teaching assistant this semester. Usually he gives it the 
ol' college try, fails, and then phones me in a drunken 
stupor and demands I earn my money by grading all of the 
exams in one hellish evening." 
 
"Call if you hear from him," Mulder said in parting. 
 
Brad looked down at the card in his hand and then back at 
Scully. "Oh, I will," he said enthusiastically, giving her 
the full benefit of his charming smile one last time. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
"I think he was checking you out, Scully." 
 
"Really?" she remarked dryly.  She barely had the energy  
to send the requisite daggers in her partner's general 
direction. "Please don't start, Mulder.  I know it may seem 
a remote possibility, but that kid might actually have a 
brain behind his GQ looks." 
 
"Really?" He smirked. 
 
"Save it, Mulder. I'm working from experience here. I know 
what it's like to be subjected to that particular prejudice 
within the walls of academia. That's all." 
 
When she glanced over, Mulder gave her one of his most 
contrite looks. However, he spoiled it within seconds by 
playfully adding, "Have I told you lately how much I admire 
your mind, Scully?" 
 
"Mulder, are you ever serious?" 
 
He gave her a rather sober look. "How can you ask me that, 
Scully?" 
 
She felt like a heel when she saw he might be genuinely 
hurt by the offhand comment. He was only injecting a little 
levity into the often dark morass of their everyday working 
lives. "Sorry." 
 
"Apology most graciously accepted." He shot her a wicked 
grin. "Amount of gray matter aside, Brad was a little 
evasive about their work, don't you think?" 
 
"You're forgetting, Mulder, there isn't any crime here. 
And scientists are notorious for being close-mouthed about 
their research. In fact, they teach you that skill in grad 
school or you learn it the hard way by having someone steal 
your ideas. As far as I can discern, all that Dr. Vincent  
White can be accused of at this point is possibly neglecting  
his students. And in my experience, that's not punishable by 
law." 
 
"What kind of virus do you suppose they're working on?" he 
pondered. "Didn't you say that Dr. White studied 
hemorrhagic fevers?" 
 
"Used to, Mulder," she emphasized. "Those graduate 
students can't possibly be working on any type of 
hemorrhagic fever. There are only six Level-Four hot labs 
in the country sanctioned to handle that class of virus. 
Your implication that they would be attempting such a 
completely illegal act for some unknown personal gain is 
not only ludicrous, but unfounded." 
 
"I don't know, Scully. I might agree the idea is 'out 
there,' but I wouldn't say it's unfounded." 
 
"Mulder, no," she answered too firmly. "You saw that set-up. 
It's simply not possible that they're doing Bio-safety  
Level-4 work there. Do you know the procedures in place  
for dealing with infectious diseases in the labs that do  
handle them?" 
 
"Not exactly, but I'm sure you're about to enlighten me," 
he answered dryly. 
 
"First of all, it requires a special containment area that 
you're well aware of from some of our previous cases." She 
shot him a dangerous look. "You remember the CDC's lovely 
disease control and prevention facility -- or maybe you  
recall the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of  
Infectious Diseases Lab in Bethesda." She paused for  
emphasis. "Since both of us have had the distinct pleasure  
of being guests at both of these facilities, you know that  
you can't just walk into or around such a place. Viruses  
needs to be contained. And from consultations I've had with  
various doctors at these facilities, due to our  
aforementioned stays," she shot him a look, "I know what  
a scientist has to go through to work there. Shall I  
describe it?" 
 
"Please do." 
 
She couldn't tell if he were seriously interested or just 
humoring her, but she went ahead with the description. 
"Upon entering a facility, they first make you take off  
everything on your body...clothing, jewelry, etc." 
 
"Ooo, Scully, keep going. I love it when you talk dirty." 
 
She gave him her best silencing glare and continued 
without pause. "Next, you don a completely androgynous, 
shapeless and unattractive disposable lab suit." 
 
He pouted at the spoiling of his fun. "Okay, so they don't 
have the facilities for handling a virus safely. Don't you 
find it curious that a small local college is doing viral 
research at all, Scully?" 
 
She scowled. "Yes, I do, Mulder. But I'm sure it's 
perfectly legitimate. You're trying to create a case out of 
nothing. Strike that. Out of some poor man's misfortune." 
 
He nodded absently. "Is it correct to say that this would 
be a federal case if he and his students were indeed 
working on some Bio-safety Level-4 virus?" 
 
"Mulder, it's unthinkable!" Her voice rose in volume from 
sheer annoyance. "Of course it would be a federal case. But 
someone would certainly have noticed by now! Never mind 
that a highly infectious virus couldn't be contained in 
that setting. The lab we just saw wasn't set up to handle 
that type of work. Besides that, academics *do* have to 
justify their particular line of research to their 
department." 
 
She knew she was on the verge of losing it by this point 
in her tirade. So she took a deep breath and lowered her 
voice to a more acceptable level for the continuation of 
this verbal dressing down of Mulder. "Dr. White must have 
some kind of grant money for himself and his students to do 
the research. Whoever provides that money is surely aware 
of the nature of the research, having agreed to fund it. 
Never mind, university oversight committees.  You heard his 
students. They said they were working on the evolution of 
viruses. That's more in the field of ecology than anything 
else. It's likely they're working with a virus that doesn't 
even infect humans, but rather some lower-order organism. 
No doubt, those 'cute' mice Brad Palmer was talking about." 
 
Mulder nodded emphatically while still managing to give 
the impression he didn't agree. And he was smiling, damn 
him. "Regardless of its implausibility, Scully, maybe we 
should look into who's funding the research and what 
specific virus Dr. White and his students *are* actually  
working on." 
 
She didn't answer. In truth, she was annoyed and dismayed 
with Mulder's bulldog tactics in this case. His suspicions 
seemed completely unfounded. And she wanted to inform him  
that even if Dr. White was working with a pathogen, it would  
be the responsibility of the FBI's Domestic Terrorism 
division, or the CDC.  But she decided to file this little 
fact away until their investigation finally exceeded her 
tolerance level.  
 
Or, she admitted reluctantly to herself, until Mulder  
proved to be correct.   
 
She would have long ago given up on Mulder's intuitive  
leaps of illogic, if they didn't so often stand up under  
her scrutiny. She had many hypotheses to explain this  
feat. Her most recent favorite centered around the  
'chaos theory.' She was beginning to suspect some similar  
occurrance of unpredictable processes within the workings  
of his beautiful mind.  How else to explain the synapses  
that allowed him to draw correct conclusions from the 
disorder of evidence presented to them?   
 
Regardless, after briefly entertaining the possibility 
that the three students were domestic terrorists, she 
couldn't help but conclude that the possibility was  
completely ludicrous. 
 
So why did she still feel uneasy? 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
At the wheel, Mulder headed the car toward the western 
suburbs of D.C. rather than back into the city. 
Specifically, the Falls Church area and Dr. White's 
residence. She stared out at lawns on which any type of 
evergreen tree or bush was statistically likely to be 
sporting a string of blinking Christmas lights.  
 
Scully sighed as she picked up the piece of paper given to 
them and glanced down at it for the correct street address. 
Mulder was like a dog with a bone when he was in 
investigation mode. Try taking it away and he'd hold on 
tighter. 
 
"I might remind you there's nothing here, Mulder."   
 
"Tell me about the Red Queen hypothesis, Scully." 
 
She rubbed at her eyes and resigned herself to finishing 
this long, exhausting day with an interview of Dr. White. 
In the meantime, she'd humor her partner. "The Red Queen 
hypothesis has to do with the host-parasite dynamic. 
Specifically, it examines the role of parasites as agents 
of evolutionary change."   
 
Mulder glanced over at her, then back at the road, waiting 
for her to give him more information before he spoke. She 
watched as he pulled a bag of sunflower seeds from his 
pocket, popped one into his mouth and started to work it 
over with his tongue.   
 
She brought herself back to the question. "Basically, it 
states that any short-lived, parasitic organism, for 
example a virus or a bacterium, can reproduce and live 
through a number of generations during the lifespan of its 
natural host. That would be you or I -- humans, mammals, 
something longer-lived. The average bacteria lives, 
reproduces and dies within a range of hours or days as 
opposed to years." 
 
He held the bag out to her and she shook her head, 
refusing the offer. To her, the salty seeds were a waste of 
time and effort for such little reward. More tease than 
treat. But she was fascinated by her partner's ability to 
separate seed from shell with no more than his lips, teeth 
and tongue. A rather intriguing show that had entertained 
her for a number of years now. Mulder opened the window a 
crack and sent the empty husk hurtling out into the wind 
with perfectly blown aim. He turned back to her, licking 
the salt from his lips and distracting her again from the 
topic.   
 
"In other words," he stated, "a virus could have any 
number of generations during which it could 'improve' 
itself through the natural course of evolution, all while 
you and I are just passing the time of day?" Mulder 
questioned. 
 
"Something like that." She had a sudden strange craving 
for a handful of the seeds. 
 
"And as humans, we're completely helpless." 
 
She shook her head. "Not completely.  Long-lived hosts 
often have immunologic defenses. For example, lymphocytes 
and other immune cells in the human body can change rapidly 
to recognize parasites and attack them." 
 
"So where does the analogy to the Red Queen fit in? Isn't 
that a character in Alice in Wonderland?" Mulder was a 
quick study. She also knew he could tell she was eyeing  
the sunflower seed bag when he placed it generously 
into her hands with a smirk. He thrived on the stranger  
quirks in any scientific theory and was waiting  
expectantly for her explanation as he swirled some  
unspecified number of seeds around in his mouth.  
 
"You're right, the Red Queen is a character in 'Through 
the Looking Glass.' The Red Queen chess piece who ran  
just to stay in place."   
 
He spat no less than seven husks into his hand and grinned 
at her. She knew he was enjoying the detail.   
 
"You know, that's a rather disgusting display, Mulder," 
she remarked. 
 
He held his hand out the window and let the wind blow away  
his efforts. "Is it?" Pulling his hand back into the car, he 
wiped it on his pants. "Back to that Red Queen, running in  
place. I'm taking it to mean that we human hosts are the ones  
running to stand still? Just barely keeping up with the  
evolution of a parasite? Always just one move behind?" 
 
"That's the idea." Shaking two seeds into her hand, she 
popped them in her mouth and let them lodge against her 
cheek while she savored the salt. "An evolutionary arms race, 
if you will, with the parasite having the advantage and the 
host always playing catch-up. However, the hypothesis isn't 
without its criticisms." 
 
"Which are?" 
 
"The argument against the Red Queen hypothesis originates 
with a long-standing idea among parasitologists. The idea 
is that if the host and parasite are co-evolving and 
adapting to each other, natural selection should favor the 
survival of a less harmful parasite and a more resistant 
host." 
 
He was doing it again. She could see him rolling a seed on 
the tip of his tongue somehow. His lips pursed and he blew 
two perfect shell halves into his hand then tossed them out 
the window. "You mean that if it wasn't in the best 
interest of the organism to kill its host, it wouldn't?  
The two would peacefully co-exist with one another instead?" 
 
"Exactly. A given parasite would choose a strategy in 
which it lives in a truce with its host, otherwise known as 
mutualism." 
 
"Virus one point. Host one point. Something like that, 
right?" He gently extracted the bag from her hand again and 
looked at her suspiciously. "Did you eat the shells, 
Scully?" he asked in mock horror.   
 
She grinned. "They're good, Mulder." 
 
"You're a doctor, Scully. Haven't you ever read the 
medical warning on the package?"  
 
"I'm not the one who consumes whole packages of those 
things, Mulder. I've kept my sodium consumption well  
within the recommended serving size."  
 
He shook his head in mock exasperation. "Spoil a guy's 
fun, why don't you," he muttered. "Back to that Red 
Queen again...what you're saying is that most scientists  
think that the best strategy for a parasite is to kill off  
only a few hosts, or deliver a low-grade infection all  
around for everyone?" 
 
She nodded. "The Red Queen camp, however, disagrees. They 
say that by default, a parasite should evolve to be as 
deadly as possible, even to the point of having no more 
hosts left." She extracted the bag out of his hands and 
shook a few more seeds into her palm. He grinned in 
triumph. Curiosity peaked, she turned the package over and 
examined the fine print, her eyebrows climbing at the 
amount of sodium in the seemingly harmless shells. 
"Remember, evolution is believed to be a process without 
direction or intent, Mulder. Therefore, it isn't going to 
stop and give pause for thought. This ideology is inherent 
in the hypothesis. The most ruthless parasite should 
therefore be the most successful, to the detriment of  
its host." 
 
"There are flaws in that theory," Mulder observed. 
 
"That's the problem, Mulder. Really, you could look at the 
arguments as two sides of the same coin. Certainly, there's 
solid evidence that viruses and bacteria can be harmful. 
But we're also still here as a species, so that says 
something too." She paused, noting that Mulder had once 
again distracted her from her problems with the case by 
piquing her interest in a subject. Their eternal give-and- 
take was, once again, rolling along. It dismayed her a bit 
and she decided it was time to finish up this discussion so  
that she could pin down his reasons for trying to make this  
a case at all. 
 
"Each argument has evidence to support it, but there's no 
definitive proof as to which side is ultimately correct. And 
it's probably likely to depend on a given situation anyway."  
 
Mulder was doing something with his tongue and another 
sunflower seed. She forged ahead. "In the final conclusion, 
parasites are, without argument, taking resources from 
their hosts in order to reproduce. And it's doubtful 
they're worrying as to whether or not they harm the host. 
Conversely, hosts are vigilantly adapting ways to avoid the 
more harmful effects of a pathogen, via their immune 
response. If both sides are even, it's the biological 
détente. No one's exactly winning but there's certainly a 
struggle going on. As a result, you can't prove or  
disprove the Red Queen hypothesis." 
 
"That's why I love science, Scully. It's so conclusive." 
She ignored the jab. Mulder frowned and rolled his window 
all the way down though the day was chilly. "Is it hot in 
here, Scully?" 
 
To her, the bite of the air felt harsh and the wind chill  
probably hovered near freezing. She watched him blow a few  
more shells into the wind, his cheeks flushed with color.  
"It's cold, Mulder. It's December, for God's sake," she  
added as the blast of frigid air hit her. "Close the damn  
window." 
 
Mulder rolled it up with an apologetic look. "Sorry." But 
she noted his discomfort and wondered if he were coming  
down with the flu everyone in the office seemed to have  
right now. He pulled at his tie, loosening it as he  
turned down a street after glancing one more time at  
the address scrawled on the slip of paper in her hand.  
"This looks like it." 
 
"Let's get this over with," Scully sighed. "Reminding a 
man he lost his entire family thirty years ago today is  
not my idea of the Christmas spirit." 
 
"Hey, look on the bright side, Scully. It could be last 
year around this time, in which case we'd be looking for 
a couple of ghosts." 
 
"Don't even remind me, Mulder." Hopefully, the small brick 
house they faced was not haunted by the spirit of malicious 
ghostly lovers. The *hallucinations* of such ghosts, she  
corrected herself.   
 
"If this is anything like last year, Mulder, I might have 
to hurt you bad." 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
 
ACT II 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
The most curious part of the thing was, that the trees and 
the other things round them never changed their places at 
all: however fast they went, they never seemed to pass 
anything. "I wonder if all the things move along with us?" 
thought poor puzzled Alice. And the Queen seemed to guess 
her thoughts, for she cried "Faster! Don't try to talk!" 
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
Friday, December 14  
Falls Church, Virginia  
 
 
Dr. Vincent White's house was a brick structure that had 
definitely seen better days. The brick was discolored and  
overgrown with ivy, and the windows were so dusty they 
obscured the interior. Dispirited curtains hung limply in 
view, and all the windows were shut tight. The front lawn 
consisted of long grass and weeds, and behind the house 
young pine saplings and bushy secondary growth were 
encroaching on what probably used to be a back yard. There 
was no sign of Christmas spirit bedecking the trees on this 
residence, though next door, two round bushes sported a 
frantic blinking display, muted by the daylight. But the  
house before them held onto its shadowy exterior, despite  
the fact that the sun was attempting to peek out from  
behind clouds. 
 
The first thing Scully noticed as they approached was a  
rat raiding the garbage bins along the side of the house.  
The sight caught her eye due to the striking white  
coloration of the rodent. She fought back an instinctive  
grimace and found its boldness in the daylight rather odd.  
Nudging Mulder, she pointed to the rat just as it leapt  
out of the bin and scurried away, disappearing into the  
backyard growth.   
 
He gave her a wry grin. "Looks like Dr. White has moved 
quite a ways down in the world." He stared up at the house. 
 
She smiled thinly. "I dare say that building you live in 
has been visited by rodents in its day, Mulder -- like  
today, maybe?" 
 
He grinned. "No doubt." 
 
She frowned. "However, although I don't think I need to  
point this out to you, Mulder, my greater concern here  
is that the species of rat we just saw was a domestic  
one, what's known as the 'wistar' strain, I believe.  
Only found in captivity -- specifically, laboratories.  
Not cavorting around in the wild." 
 
"That one seems to be doing okay in the great big 
outdoors." He gave her a pointed look.  "Don't you find  
it rather strange that there are laboratory rats running 
around outside the good professor's house?" 
 
"Well, as a matter of fact, yes I do, Mulder."  
 
His eyes were laughing at her. "Does this mean you're 
starting to believe that my persistence at this case may  
have some merit? That maybe this is actually starting to  
look like a case to you?" 
 
"I'm not willing to go that far yet." Scully reached up  
to knock firmly on the front door.   
 
Mulder's grin widened.  "How far are you willing to go, 
Scully?" he murmured. The noise of someone approaching the  
door distracted them both and Scully traveled the transition  
from personal to business with skills she was still in the 
process of adjusting to. Slightly off-centered, she poised 
with the peculiar balls-of-your-feet anticipation that is 
present in any law enforcement investigator during even the 
most innocuous of inquiries. You could never be sure if you 
were about to meet a pleasantly innocent citizen or an  
outright dangerous individual. 
 
The man who opened the door did not look dangerous. Nor 
did he look pleasant. Cautiously, he opened the door only a 
crack, but appeared to be afraid of them more than anything 
else. The door creaked on rusted hinges and dropped a few  
errant paint chips onto the stoop, permitting only a small  
sliver of access to the interior world of the house.   
 
The man, leaning rather precariously against the door, 
glared stormily at them. Though definitely recognizable as 
Dr. White, he bore little resemblance to his photo from 
younger, more prosperous years. His hair was badly mussed  
and now shock-white, lending him an Einstein-like air. His  
clothing was disheveled, as if he'd been sleeping in it.  
He didn't open the door further.  
 
"Dr. Vincent White?" Mulder inquired politely, but with a 
subtle no-nonsense edge that usually commanded respect. 
 
"Yes. What do you want?" the man demanded. "I'm not buying 
anything, and I certainly don't need conversion to whatever 
ridiculous religion you're purporting to believe in. God 
doesn't exist. How's that for a revelation?" He stared at 
them defiantly with slightly bloodshot eyes, as if waiting 
for some argument. 
 
Scully quickly extricated her badge from the pocket of her 
jacket during this diatribe. Gently, she presented it to the 
unsteady man half hiding behind his door. "We're neither, 
Dr. White. We're from the FBI and we'd just like to ask you 
a few questions." 
 
Despite the door's allowance, the light from outside 
barely penetrated the gloomy interior. "What for?" he 
snapped. "Do I have to talk to you?" 
 
"As a professional courtesy, it is strongly advised that 
you take a few minutes to speak to us, Dr. White," Mulder 
answered firmly. 
 
Muttering something unintelligible, Dr. White threw open 
the door and disappeared into his house. A blast of warm 
air hit them from the interior as they stepped forward into 
the foyer. Dr. White continued down the hallway without 
waiting for them and disappeared from view.  
 
Following him into what was obviously his living room,  
they saw him sink down onto a couch which bore evidence  
of his recent occupation. 
 
"You'll have to forgive me for the state of my house.  
But I didn't ask for company and you seem to have invited  
yourself in. So I'm deducing I have no choice but to  
display my rather lax cleaning skills to you both." 
 
'Lax' implied some proficiency at a task, albeit poor. 
Scully was fairly sure that Dr. White's cleaning skills 
were not anything so generous as half-hearted but rather, 
non-existent. The clutter of the living room was 
reprehensible. There were stacks of magazines which she 
took note of as she passed, noting that they were mostly 
medical journals. 'Virology' made up the stack to her right 
elbow when she settled in the only armchair in the room. 
Cups littered the coffee table, half empty and growing 
various mold cultures on their dark, liquid surface. The 
curtains were drawn and the room smelled musty. She doubted 
Dr. White owned a vacuum. If he did, he didn't use it. The 
room was uncomfortably hot.   
 
Dr. White stretched out on the couch as if he couldn't be 
bothered to sit up for the interview. Scully wondered if he 
was ill, his lassitude seemed so marked. Mulder glanced 
awkwardly around the room for any place to settle and 
finally had to make due with perching on the left arm of 
the chair Scully was sitting in. It made for an 
unconventional setting for the interview process but the 
doctor's defensive stance was markedly evident by that 
point. Mulder took the offer, opting for the non- 
threatening approach of sitting as opposed to towering  
over him for the questioning. 
 
"Dr. White," Scully began, finding it rather disconcerting 
that he remained in his reclining pose as she addressed him.  
"We're looking into a case that involved a theft from the  
lab you worked in on December 1 of 1970.  It's just part of  
a routine check to see if any new evidence has emerged that 
might allow us to solve the case and put it to rest." 
 
Dr. White gave up any pretense of relaxation at her words. 
But his slow return to a sitting position and his 
difficulty at speech betrayed the fact that he wasn't in 
full control of his reactive faculties, and it looked 
suspiciously as if alcohol was the likely candidate of his 
difficulties. Two empty bottles of wine sat on the end 
table beside him and there was a red stain on the rug near 
his feet.   
 
"There is *nothing* that will put that case to rest," he 
said firmly. "Besides that, it was classified top secret  
by the Department of Defense. What right does the FBI have 
looking into it at all? Do you two even know what you're 
doing? With a few phone calls, I could probably cost you 
your jobs," he remarked. "The world is full of incompetent 
idiots!" His voice was rising, and his contempt for the 
greater part of humanity obvious, but the slur to his words 
tempered the threat. That and the fact that probably not 
many people took him seriously at this point in his life, 
Scully concluded. There was something pathetic about his 
obviously drunken state. 
 
"Sir, we don't mean to open up old wounds, here," she 
soothed. "We're merely trying to close the case 
satisfactorily for our files." 
 
"Here's how you do that," he stated, leaning forward to 
fix her with an momentarily steady eye. Despite this 
attempt at an aggressive stance, his hands shook with 
tremors and his head wobbled slightly. "Shut the folder  
and put it away. It was Department of Defense research  
and no one stole that virus. For all I know, it's now  
an integral part of our biological weapons arsenal. I  
don't know.  I don't care anymore." He waved at them  
dismissively. "I'm trying to work here," he sputtered,  
pointing toward a large stack of papers beside him.  
Scully recognized them as exams, but there was very  
little red ink visible on the top paper, meaning either  
the student had correctly answered all the questions 
or Dr. White had not yet corrected it. He answered her 
curiosity indirectly with his next diatribe. 
 
"If you don't mind..." he stated pointedly.  When neither 
moved, he closed his eyes, internalizing his conflict. When 
he opened them again, his voice was defeated. "I can't help 
you," he insisted. "Why don't you go question the DOD?" He 
laughed then. It was an angry laugh, but also a weak one. 
It was followed by a deep sigh as he stared down at the 
student papers.  A wracking cough suddenly shook his body 
terribly. When he finally raised his eyes to Scully, the 
fight had gone out of them completely.  
 
He pointed to the exams. "Idiots. They're all idiots. 
'Define bacterium' is the first question," he intoned. He 
picked up the one on top. "This one wrote 'a disease'. 
Simplistic moron!" He threw the paper back down on the 
pile. "The world is full of incompetent buffoonery," he 
railed at them. "A veritable melting pot of mediocrity. I 
would have had these done if the students weren't so damn 
disheartening. Is it too much to ask that even one of them 
be worth my time?" He let out another sigh and appeared to 
be staring down at the stain at his feet. 
 
"How about your graduate students, Dr. White," Mulder 
began. "Are any of them worth your time?" 
 
Instead of growing angry, Dr. White laughed. "Barely." 
 
"Could I ask what exactly they're working on?" 
 
"They're working on their A.B.D.'s," he snapped. Scully 
had heard the infamous initials before. Innocuous letters 
that, put together, struck terror in the heart of every 
graduate student toiling away at their research. The 
initials stood for 'all but dissertation.' It was an 
unfortunate and worrisome statistic that many who started 
graduate school earned these initials rather than the 'P,' 
'h' and 'D' they sought at the start. Completing required 
coursework, qualifying exams and data collection could seem 
easy compared to the self-motivation, diligence, and sheer, 
intellectual determination required to complete the 
'dissertation' part of the process. 
 
"I'm asking about the specific project, Dr. White." 
Mulder's voice had lost any semblance of friendliness. When 
she glanced at him, he was locked in a staring contest with 
the man, his gaze hard and unforgiving.   
 
Dr. White's response was poorly-disguised outrage. "Leave 
me alone," he cried, the tone of his voice gaining a 
curious tremor. "I just want to be left alone. If you have 
any further questions, you can consult my lawyer. Get out!" 
 
Mulder didn't make a move. Reluctantly, Scully moved out 
from under his shadow and stood, casting a hard eye back at 
her partner. "We're sorry to have bothered you, Dr. White." 
 
"One more question," Mulder drawled, though she was glad 
to note he was at least rising with her. "Could you explain  
why a laboratory rat is raiding your garbage, Dr. White?" 
 
For a second, Scully saw something flicker in the man's 
eyes that looked suspiciously like fear. Just as quickly, 
it was gone. "I don't know what the hell you're talking 
about. Now get off my property." He stood unsteadily and 
despite the insistence behind his message, his step ahead 
of them to open the door wavered dangerously. Mulder almost 
reached out to steady his uncertain passage, but Scully 
stopped him with a warning hand on his arm. The last thing 
they needed to do to this poor man was charge him with 
assault on a federal officer if he decided not to 
appreciate Mulder's well-meaning gesture. 
 
When they were both out on the stoop, the doctor slammed 
the door, interrupting Mulder's thank you for his time  
and sending a blast of heat rolling out after them into  
the chilly day.   
 
In silence, they moved down the steps. Scully turned to 
study the garbage cans beside the house, but the sight of 
the white rat was only a memory now. She was struck again 
by the general disrepair of what could be an attractive 
dwelling place. As she looked back at the house one last 
time, a memory from her childhood struck her.   
 
She'd gone through a stage where she'd drawn houses to 
look alive, with the windows as eyes and the door as a 
mouth. She couldn't shake the sudden irrational feeling 
that this house was watching them leave. Strangely, it 
looked sad.   
 
She shook off the thought with a small grimace. Mulder 
would be delighted to hear this. But she would chew off her 
own arm before she'd give him the satisfaction of her more 
unscientific musings.   
 
She didn't look back again. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
Mulder dropped her off at her apartment, having picked her 
up that morning on his way in to work. On the ride from 
Falls Church to her place, he cracked his window twice, 
though the temperature was rapidly dropping. When she shot 
him a look and shivered for effect, he shut it. When they 
reached her apartment, he pulled the car up in front of her 
building and let it idle. "Well, it's the weekend, Scully. 
Any big plans?" 
 
She hated when she was asked this question. It made her 
feel as if she should have an agenda to fill her time. 
Mulder, of all people, should know better. For her, 
weekends were downtime. Their job was stressful enough that 
she didn't feel the need to be overly active. If she did 
get an urge for activity, she could usually get it out of 
her system with a quick run. "What's your point, Mulder?" 
She turned in the seat to regard him. "Should I have some 
big plan?" 
 
He shrugged. "Just asking, Scully," he replied defensively. 
 
She sighed. "What I plan to do is relax. Don't think I'm 
going to work on this case-that-isn't-a-case, Mulder, if 
that's what you're really asking. I know the novelty of 
taking the weekend off is disconcerting to you. Just think 
of it as my strategy for getting you to drop this case. 
That poor man has lost his family and a prestigious job. 
He's working at a modest college and covering up the fact 
that he has a serious drinking problem. Come Monday, you'd 
better have some hard evidence that there's something here 
besides heartache. Dr. White is looking at an early death 
and I, for one, don't have the stomach to harass him any 
further. Not only that, I feel sorry for his graduate 
students as well and therefore, don't feel a need to  
bother them any further either." 
 
"Not even the one that looks like Brad Pitt?" 
 
She scowled darkly at her partner. "Mulder, I hope you 
know me better than that. Besides, he's practically a 
child." 
 
Mulder was grinning by this point. "I'd say he's well past 
the age of consent. There's nothing illegal there, if 
that's what you're worried about." 
 
Scully took a moment to take a deep breath. She knew that 
Mulder was only joking with her, but it was annoying. She 
prided herself on her professionalism and Mulder's more 
laissez faire approach to their working relationship, 
coupled with the blurring lines of their personal 
interactions sometimes drove her to distraction. She had no 
interest in having a relationship with the young, oversexed 
and narcissistic graduate student she'd just met and Mulder 
knew it. Strangely, this made the reason for his teasing 
the real issue here. She suspected blatant male insecurity. 
 
"Thanks for the advice," she said dryly. "I'll keep it in 
mind." 
 
"Did he slip you his number, Scully, when I wasn't looking?" 
 
She successfully contained her annoyance. "Mulder, I 
resent your inference here." She gave him a look that in no 
uncertain terms let him know he was to drop the subject. 
Opening the door, she climbed out of the vehicle, but found 
herself perversely taking a moment to lean back into the 
car and qualify her statement. "Just to let you know, I 
don't always appreciate your baser attempts at humor, 
Mulder. They're often in poor taste." 
 
He nodded. "Apologies extended, Scully.  I'll try not to 
be quite so humorous." He nullified his contrition by 
tilting his head back and grinning at her. 
 
She rolled her eyes. "Watch it, Mulder.  Besides, I could 
still make you cry. For instance, I could insist you come 
over on Saturday and sit through 'Steel Magnolias' in its 
entirety." 
 
"Is that an invitation, Scully?" 
 
"It could be, if you play your cards right." 
 
"I'll bring the food?" he offered in atonement. 
 
"What kind?" 
 
"Pizza?" 
 
"Make it Chinese and it's a deal."   
 
He smiled.  "See you then."   
 
She shut the car door firmly. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
The Queen propped her up against a tree, and said kindly, 
"You may rest a little, now."  
Alice looked round her in great surprise. "Why, I do  
believe we've been under this tree the whole time!  
Everything's just as it was!"  
"Of course it is," said the Queen. "What would you have it?" 
"Well, in our country," said Alice, still panting a little, 
"you'd generally get to somewhere else -- if you ran very 
fast for a long time as we've been doing."  
"A slow sort of country!" said the Queen. "Now, *here*,  
you see, it takes all the running *you* can do, to keep in  
the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must  
run at least twice as fast as that!" 
 
~From 'Through the Looking Glass' by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
Saturday, December 15  
Georgetown, D.C. 
 
 
Her doorbell rang. She was growing hungry by this point 
and was dismayed to find it was only an upstairs neighbor, 
asking if it was her laundry that was in the washer. She  
noted the time. It was eight o'clock -- one hour after  
Mulder was supposed to show up.  With the departure of the  
neighbor, the niggling worry at his lateness finally turned  
into its full-fledged counterpart of outright fear. She  
picked up the phone and hit the speed dial. It rang exactly  
fourteen times before a groggy voice answered, "Hello...?" 
 
"Mulder?" she said hesitantly, surprised to find him still  
home. 
 
"Scully?" His voice was slurred. Sleepy. 
 
"Mulder, are you aware that it's eight o'clock and I've 
been waiting for that Chinese for a good hour now?" 
 
"Oh, God...Scully." He said it like he'd just figured out 
it was her. "What time is it?" 
 
"Eight o'clock," she repeated. 
 
"Crap. I'm sorry." She heard his sigh across the line and 
imagined him rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "To tell 
you the truth, I don't feel so well. I laid down for a bit 
and I must have fallen asleep..." 
 
"Yeah, right. Anything to get out of 'Steel Magnolias,' 
Mulder." 
 
She heard a brief chuckle. "Well, there is that, but 
seriously, I think I'm coming down with that flu everyone 
at the office is getting." 
 
"What are your symptoms?" she demanded. 
 
"Are we playing doctor here, Scully? Because I've never 
tried that over the phone." 
 
"Mulder..." she warned. 
 
He did sound awful. "I don't know. I feel like I might 
have a fever. I'm tired. You know how you ache all over 
when you have a cold? But I went for a run today so that 
might be the source of some of it. And I hate to say it but 
I'm also feeling a wee bit nauseous...it looks like  
dinner's definitely out for me," he admitted. 
 
"Sounds like the flu," she agreed. "You'd better not have 
given it to me yesterday, dragging me all over nowhere on 
that dead case." 
 
 
"You really think it's not worth our time, Scully?" 
 
She tried to be gentle with her answer. "Mulder, there is 
no way those students are working with any pathogen in that 
setting. And Dr. White just seems pathetic to me. I mean, 
how sad was that visit yesterday? That man needs rehab, not 
a federal case being reopened. Not to mention one that's 
been censored by the Department of Defense." 
 
He paused at the other end of the line, but finally 
conceded to her point, though he added one last comment. 
"The students' behavior during our visit just seemed a 
little odd to me, Scully." 
 
"They're three stressed out graduate students with one 
very remiss advisor. Would you expect their behavior to  
be otherwise?" 
 
"I guess not." 
 
"Mulder," she said gently. "Let yourself rest. Treat 
yourself to a nice bowl of chicken soup, drink plenty of 
fluids, put some pillows on that couch, pull that warm  
blanket down over you and call me tomorrow." 
 
"I don't have any chicken soup, Scully." She could almost 
hear his pout. 
 
She briefly contemplated going over to his apartment, 
bearing a steaming thermos of chicken soup, but dismissed  
the idea. Mulder had been taking care of himself for  
years on his own. Besides, she didn't have any soup on  
hand either. 
 
"S'okay, Scully. I couldn't eat anyway." 
 
"Call me tomorrow, Mulder. I want to make sure you're  
taking care of yourself." 
  
"Okay...'night, Scully," he mumbled. She could tell he was  
already falling back into a troubled sleep as he hung up. 
 
She'd check on him tomorrow. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
Monday, December 18 8:30 a.m.  
Hoover Building  
 
 
Scully was at Mulder's desk, nursing a cup of coffee and 
contemplating the mess the last week had created in their 
office when Mulder finally dragged himself in. The hallway 
was littered with old boxes and Mulder had to kick one that 
had fallen out of the way to get in the door. "Don't we 
have maintenance in this building?" he complained. 
 
"I thought you were going to stay home today?" she 
reprimanded, surprised to see him. 
 
He groaned. "What for? I'm much more likely to be able  
to entertain my misery here." 
 
 
"Are you feeling any better?" 
 
"I think I'm getting worse. But I was bored. Sorry, 
Scully." He made a face at her. 
 
"Workaholic," she accused. "Rather than spreading your 
germs to those of us still healthy, what's wrong with 
staying home and perusing all those entertaining web  
sites you say you don't look at?" 
 
 
"Scully," Mulder winced at her words. "I gave those up in 
order to win your respect a long time ago." 
 
"Riiight," she drawled, noting with concern the lethargic 
 
way her partner dragged himself over to his desk.   
 
"I have you, I don't need them anymore." This last 
statement was barely audible and she wasn't sure if it was 
an attempt at humor or a sincere sentiment. Maybe both. He 
looked tired, dark shadows having crept under his eyes over 
the two days she hadn't seen him. Conversely, his color was 
bright. Maybe a little too bright. She would have expected 
him to be just a tad pale. Standing up, she approached him 
and, before he could move or get the weak protest of her 
name out, she locked a hand onto his forehead.   
 
"Scully!" 
 
"You feel hot, Mulder." 
 
He quieted under her hand. Their eyes locked. "Are you 
done?" he asked lackadaisically. 
 
Frowning, she shook her head. "Did you take your 
temperature?" 
 
"What's the point? I have a fever. Big deal. Besides, I 
only had a rectal thermometer. Care to try?" 
 
She snorted in exasperation and continued her exam. "Any 
congestion?" 
 
He shook his head. "I do have a splitting headache," he 
admitted. 
 
"Muscle aches?" 
 
"My back is killing me. I think a massage might do the 
trick," he suggested hopefully. 
 
She ignored this ploy. "Earache? Sore throat?" He shook 
his head at both. Pulling her hand off his forehead, she 
picked up his wrist and felt for his pulse. He was scowling 
at her now. Mulder had a serious aversion to doctors, due 
to his rather checkered medical past. He only suffered her 
ministrations with a great amount of personal restraint.  
 
"Scully, why don't you go upstairs and take an inventory 
of all the people who've caught this flu over the past 
week? Maybe jot down their symptoms for a more 
comprehensive diagnosis for me..." 
 
"Quiet, Mulder." The truth was, as much as Mulder hated 
it, to an equal extent she actually enjoyed the opportunity 
to put her medical skills to use. This was not to say she 
wanted to go into practice, but she did gain a small amount 
of satisfaction at the chance to play doctor every once in 
a while.   
 
His pulse was slow and steady. Right around 60 beats per 
minute, which was actually fairly low, but Mulder was 
athletically inclined so it wasn't that unusual. She 
noticed his eyes close during this process. "Tired?" 
she asked. He nodded without opening them. They were still 
closed when she was done and stayed that way. "Mulder?" she 
said finally, finding his prolonged standing rest rather 
odd. 
 
Both eyes flew open. "What?" He was annoyed now. He pulled 
his wrist back and turned away from her to his desk. "Were 
you sitting here?" he inquired on reaching his goal. She 
noticed he was rubbing absently at his left shoulder as if 
it were sore. 
 
"It's your desk," she sighed, moving over to pick up the 
folder she'd spread there. "What's wrong with your 
shoulder, Mulder?" 
 
"What were you looking at, Scully?" He tried to glance at 
it as she reached out and pulled the folder towards herself. 
 
"Well, I was working on our report so we could shelve this 
case back where it belongs." She slapped the file shut. 
"You'll find this interesting, Mulder. I called the DOD 
today, just to check the status of this case with them, 
which is what we should have done in the first place. They 
told me in no uncertain terms that the FBI has no business 
looking into it. In their eyes, the case was actually 
officially closed ten years ago." 
 
She felt only a small surge of triumph at Mulder's downcast  
expression. But instead of coming back at her, he seemed  
resigned. "I get your point, Scully. And I don't feel well  
enough to argue with you." He sank down into his chair.  
"Let's move on then. There are plenty of cases to file."  
He scowled at the box of files to archive and his  
enthusiasm from the week before seemed to have vanished  
completely. 
 
The lack of a spirited or argumentative response took the 
wind out of Scully's self-satisfied sails. With a worried 
glance for her partner's uncharacteristic lethargy, she 
pulled the box over to her corner and wondered if she 
should have paid a little more attention to him over the 
weekend. Mulder was notorious for neglecting himself. 
Remembering at the same time that she hadn't checked her 
voice mail, she picked up the phone and punched in her  
code as she flipped idly through the aged case file.  
 
"You have two messages," the tinny robotic voice droned. 
"First message. Placed at 8:02 p.m. Saturday." 
 
Who would be calling her on a Saturday night, she 
wondered, waiting the requisite three seconds for the 
annoyingly prolonged beep before the message began playing. 
 
"Hello, Dr. Scully. It's Brad Palmer. I said I'd let you 
know if Dr. White got in touch with me. Well, he did, of 
course. In fact, I'm correcting a large pile of 
microbiology exams as I'm leaving this message." His voice 
was relaxed and sounded as if he found this humorous and 
thought she might too. "Anyway, he was obviously toasted 
when I went over to get the exams and he said some pretty 
bizarre stuff. If you wanted to talk to me about our  
conversation, here are my numbers..." After leaving these,  
Brad added that he'd be at home for the evening and more  
than happy to talk to her, then finally hung up. 
 
The next message was left approximately one half hour 
later. Brad again. "Uh...Dr. Scully? I just got a very 
weird message from Dr. White. He called me in the middle  
of correcting because he wanted me to make sure his house  
was 'taken care of' afterward, whatever that means. I  
asked him if he was going somewhere over Christmas break  
or something and he said 'nowhere.' Then he went on about  
there being no God before he hung up on me. I don't know  
if it's relevant to your investigation or anything but  
it's got me spooked. I mean, I need that old man to keep  
a tentative hold on sanity -- at least until I'm done  
with my dissertation. Anyway, I'm going over there to  
check on him. I think he sounded crazy enough to off himself  
or something. I'll call you as soon as I get back." She  
heard him clear his throat. "Maybe we could get together  
for drinks or something tomorrow night." 
 
The beep sounded rude and loud in her ear compared to the 
young man's melodious voice. Robot man returned. "You have 
no more messages," it said with finality. 
 
Scully dropped the phone into its cradle with a loud oath. 
She picked it up again just as quickly, flipping open the 
file resting on her desk to find Dr. White's home number.  
Dialing, she turned to Mulder, who was watching her with 
interest.  
 
"What's up?" 
 
"I'm not sure, but it's definitely something." 
 
"Like what?" 
 
She let the phone continue to ring. Still no answer.  She 
tried the biology department of George Mason next and was 
told Dr. White was not in. 
 
"Brad called and left messages Saturday night." She hated 
to even say the next words to Mulder. He'd had a hard year 
with a similar event featuring in it. She tried to soften 
the blow. "I'm not sure what's going on. But, according to  
Brad, Dr. White was verbalizing suicidal thoughts on  
Saturday night. No one's answering his home phone and the 
university hasn't seen him." As she gathered up the file,  
she wondered why Brad hadn't called back. The oversight  
could have many explanations, some innocent and some very  
bad. 
 
"Let's go." Mulder picked up his jacket and was handing 
hers over as they moved toward the door. 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
 
ACT III 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
How it happened, Alice never knew, but exactly as she came 
to the last peg, the Red Queen was gone. Whether she 
vanished into the air, or whether she ran quickly into the 
wood ("and she *can* run very fast!" thought Alice), there 
was no way of guessing, but she was gone, and Alice began 
to remember that she was a Pawn, and that it would soon be 
time for her to move. 
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
December 18, 9:20 a.m.  
Falls Church, Virginia  
 
 
The house again seemed to be staring at her. 
 
Scully fought back a shiver as she followed Mulder's 
longer strides up to the door. She almost ran into him  
when he suddenly stopped dead, bending over as a wracking  
cough shook his frame. "Mulder!" she said in alarm,  
pausing to place a hand on his back until his coughing  
subsided. When he came up for air, his face was red.  
"What's wrong?" she demanded. "Are you okay?" 
 
He shook his head and looked a little dazed. "I don't 
know..."  Drawing in a few deep breaths, he let them out 
carefully. "I'm fine," he said finally, pushing at the hand 
she was restraining him with as he continued toward the 
front stoop. 
 
"Mulder..." she admonished. 
 
He knocked firmly on the door, ignoring her. 
 
Brad opened it, looking distinctly embarrassed when he saw 
them. "Dr. Scully...oh God, I'm sorry. I totally forgot to 
call you back." 
 
Scully's anger rose at the young man's response and the 
realization of her own overreaction to his telephone 
messages. "You led me to believe Dr. White was suicidal, 
Brad. So how is he doing?" she demanded. 
 
Brad had opened the door only about as far as the doctor 
had on their original visit. He glanced behind him in the 
direction of the living area before turning back to them. 
"He's sleeping, I think," he whispered. 
 
"If you don't mind, we'd like to come in and talk to him," 
Mulder said quietly.  His tone didn't invite argument. 
 
"Well..." 
 
"Let us in, Brad," Scully was dangerously annoyed by this 
point. 
 
Brad stepped back and opened the door. The house was just 
as hot as it had been the last time. It appeared that Brad 
had not attempted any cleaning in the interim. In fact, he 
might have added to it. The same cups cluttered the surface 
of the coffee table, along with a few more added to the  
collection. Some of the journals had been scattered, as if  
someone had searched for an article without finding it. 
 
Dr. White was not sleeping, but reclining again on his 
couch. "Brad, get me that coffee now!" he shouted at the 
sound of their approaching footsteps. When he realized the 
cadence was wrong, his eyes flew up, startled as they  
settled on the agents. "What the hell are *you* doing back  
here? Why the hell did you let *them* in, you ungrateful,  
incompetent idiot?" he shouted at his student. 
 
 
For his part, Brad seemed unaffected by the insulting 
tirade. He just shrugged and smiled aside at Scully, as if 
they were sharing a joke. He didn't make a move to get any 
coffee. 
 
To Scully, there seemed to be no reason for them to stay at 
this point. Mulder, however, surprised her by sitting down 
in the armchair. "Dr. White. We're just concerned about 
you," he stated. "Your students are concerned about you." 
 
Dr. White laughed and glowered darkly up at Brad. "Don't  
fool yourself. This boy only cares about his grades and  
keeping me alive long enough to get them. He'd prop my  
dead body up at his oral presentation if he thought it  
would fool people." 
 
"That's right," Brad said too brightly. Having seen a 
similar dynamic in the barrage of give-and-take insults 
observed in the lab, Scully wondered if the students had 
learned their caustic interchange from the older man. 
 
"Well, Dr. White. It seems a concern of everyone right  
now is that you might try to hurt yourself." Mulder's voice  
was at its most mild and served, as it usually did, to calm 
rather than excite the man. "Do you ever have any thoughts  
of that nature?" 
 
Dr. White raised his eyes to the ceiling and sighed heavily.  
"My thoughts of that nature," he began, "are of the most  
existential variety, I assure you. I ponder life, therefore  
I also ponder death." His eyes narrowed at Scully, who stood 
beside Mulder. "I ponder the tragedies of love. Note time's 
passage," he advised darkly. "Be afraid." He shifted his 
malevolent gaze to Brad. "Be very afraid." 
 
"What do you mean by that?" Mulder asked carefully. 
 
"Stop patronizing me!" he snarled. "Everyone hates to hear 
my story," he pronounced, eyes narrowing as he addressed 
them. "So I won't bore you with it. I've held my silence 
for a very long time now. I've become a shadow of my former 
self. A slothful metaphor of what I once was." 
 
In gesturing with his hand during this speech, he knocked 
a bottle to the floor. A few drops of the last dregs of 
wine spilled over the neck and dripped onto the rug. "You 
know, Olivia used to say at our parties that I drank too 
much," he mused. "And now I'm a drunk. How appropriate, I 
say."   
 
He stared down at the bottle for a second as if he 
couldn't bear to look at the other occupants of the room. 
But when he raised his eyes, they were full of a terrible 
certainty. "The complete absence of love is a void greater 
than you can contemplate," he said darkly.   
 
His eyes passed over each of them and Scully saw a shine 
to them that hadn't been there before. "A void greater  
than I hope either of you ever know." He turned to Brad, 
hovering in the doorway. "A void that my useless Don Juan 
graduate student over there will definitely never know." 
 
He stared down again at the bottle. "Look at me," he said  
in disgust. "I've experienced the greatest fall possible.  
From the height of success to complete failure. I had a  
beautiful family," he sighed. "Now I have no one. I used  
to teach the brightest of young minds. Now, I'm surrounded  
by incompetent pseudo-intellectuals. Morons of the lowest  
order."   
 
"Takes one to know one," Brad shot back hotly. 
 
"See what I mean?" he appealed to Mulder as if he, alone, 
might have the capability to understand his terrible 
plight. "I'll say this and then I'll ask you to leave. I 
don't know why I'm here. And though I may hate where I 
wound up, I know where I'm going." He punched a finger in 
Brad's direction. "You should be so lucky." He turned his 
glare on them next. "And so should you both. But instead, 
you won't even know when your darkest moment arrives. It  
will hit you like a wall and your life as you know it will  
inexplicably be over. Wait and see how you deal with that  
before you judge me." 
 
Under the old man's dark glower, Mulder stood rather 
quickly. "My apologies for wasting your time. We won't 
bother you any further, Dr. White." 
 
Scully managed to gain her feet and follow her partner's 
rather rapid exit from the house after getting in a rushed  
"Sorry to have bothered you, Dr. White. Please take care  
of yourself." After sending one last scathing look in  
Brad's direction, she quickly followed in Mulder's  
footsteps. By the time she reached the door, he was  
already making long strides toward the car.   
 
She wasn't surprised to feel a hand suddenly fall on her 
arm and restrain her. As expected, she turned to see Brad 
directly behind her.   
 
"I'm sorry I didn't call you back, Dr. Scully," he 
apologized. "I was a little embarrassed about my offer,  
to be honest with you." 
 
"Forget it," she snapped.   
 
She was distracted from the young man's earnest confession 
by Mulder's rather odd behavior. He'd climbed into the 
passenger seat by now and was waiting for her, head bowed. 
 
"So what do you say?" Brad attempted to regain her 
attention. 
 
"Excuse me...what?" She turned back and stared at the 
young man without comprehension, having missed his words. 
 
"About drinks...say, tomorrow maybe?" he proposed. 
 
It took her a second to realize that, immediately after 
apologizing, the young man was actually trying to repeat 
his blunder and ask her out again. Talk about nerve! It 
reminded her of some of the more arrogant male student's  
overconfident attempts to ask her out during her medical  
school days.   
 
"Thanks for the compliment, but I'd advise you to stick 
with women your own age, Brad." She'd almost said "maturity 
level" but stopped herself in time. Her focus was on her 
partner right now, sitting in the car and looking 
distinctly uncomfortable. She gave the annoying young 
student a little advice in parting. "If I were you, and if 
you truly care about Dr. White staying alive, albeit for 
your own selfish reasons, I'd clean up that house a bit and 
get him into a rehab clinic, ASAP. He needs professional 
help."  
 
Walking purposely away, she climbed in behind the wheel 
and turned to Mulder.  
 
Smiling weakly, he held out the keys.  "Just drive, Scully." 
 
"Mulder..." 
 
"Please, just drive. Unless you'd like to see me lose my 
breakfast on the good professor's lawn." 
 
She stuck the keys in the ignition and got them out of 
there. He wasn't kidding about the compulsion he was 
feeling either. As soon as they were on a stretch of road 
that featured a deserted stretch of vegetation, Mulder 
asked her a little too desperately to pull over and half 
jumped, half stumbled out of the car. Bending over a pile  
of scrub brush, he lost whatever he'd managed to get into  
his system that morning. It all happened so quickly that  
he was half out of the car before she'd completely  
stopped its movement. Throwing the gearshift into neutral  
and yanking on the emergency brake, Scully sprinted over  
to where Mulder crouched miserably, holding his stomach  
with one hand and bracing himself against the ground  
with the other.   
 
He groaned when she put a hand tentatively on his back.  
"I guess I should have taken that sick day," he offered. 
 
"Oh, Mulder..." She rubbed her hand soothingly over his 
back, supporting his weight as he leaned miserably into 
her. She could feel the heat of his body radiating against 
her. "You've got a fever," she observed. "I'm taking you  
to a hospital." 
 
"No," he said vehemently, straightening up slowly in order 
to turn a fierce glare on her. "No hospital, Scully. It's  
just the damn flu, for God's sake. Don't overreact." 
 
They waited until he was sure he was through emptying the  
contents of his stomach before they got back into the car.  
Although a number of other vehicles drove by during this  
whole ordeal, not one stopped to help or see if they were 
okay, a rather sad statement about people's unwillingness 
to get involved in someone else's troubles these days. 
 
Back behind the wheel, Scully reluctantly pointed the car 
in the direction of Mulder's apartment rather than the 
nearest hospital. "My car's at the office," he protested. 
 
"I don't care, Mulder. We're closer to your place than we 
are to the Bureau. You're going home." 
 
Something was bothering Scully, but she couldn't quite put 
her finger on it. Mulder's protests against going to a 
hospital were reasonable. The flu was a virus and 
therefore, there was really no medicine to treat it. 
Antibiotics were only effective on bacterial infections.  
And vaccines were only effective in preventing one from 
getting a particular virus. But once contracted, there 
really wasn't much to do but wait a virus out.  
 
Secondary supportive therapy to keep the body hydrated and 
functioning at a level that allowed your immune system to 
fight off the invader was really all that could be 
utilized. She'd make him drink some juice once she got him 
to bed. Even the strategy of getting a fever down with 
analgesics had recently come into question, since fever 
actually acted to boost the body's immune system. But a  
few aspirin might help him feel a little better. 
 
She glanced over to see Mulder slumped miserably in the  
seat, eyes tightly closed.  And she couldn't fight a sudden 
foreboding. Despite her rationalizations that Mulder had  
certainly fought off a lot worse than the flu, the feeling  
wouldn't leave her. 
 
Reaching over, she closed her hand over his and squeezed 
it. She told herself she meant this as a comfort, rather 
than a check to make sure he was still conscious. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
Mulder walked unsteadily into the elevator of his 
building. She kept a hand on his arm even as he tried to 
shake it off. "I feel like crap," he admitted. He eyed the 
briefcase she was bringing up with her. "Plan on working 
out of my home for the rest of the day, Scully?" 
 
"I'm certainly not leaving you alone at the moment, Mulder." 
 
"I see." He gave her a look. "I didn't realize the flu 
required twenty-four hour supervision by a doctor." 
 
"Who said anything about twenty-four hours? You'll be 
lucky to get two out of me, Mulder." she shot back. 
 
"I knew I was pushing my luck," he grumbled. But his  
heart wasn't in it and his eyes were half-closed. 
 
She got him up to his apartment and settled him on the 
couch, covering him with the heavy wool blanket that lay 
across the back of it. He promptly pushed that off him, 
complaining, "It's too hot, Scully." 
 
"Drop your pants then, Mulder," she ordered on the way to 
his bathroom. 
 
"What?" his tone was indignant. 
 
"You said you only had a rectal thermometer..." 
 
"I was kidding!" he called out nervously. 
 
She smiled when she came out, holding up the oral 
thermometer she'd ultimately discovered in his medicine 
cabinet. "You're in luck, Mulder. Keep those pants on." 
 
He blew out a sigh of relief that quickly turned into an 
uncontrollable cough. Forgetting about everything else for 
the moment, she dropped down beside him in alarm. "Mulder!" 
 
She could do nothing more than put a calming hand on his  
back until the disturbing paroxysm was over. Maybe it was  
no more than a leftover effect of the beating his lungs 
had taken during his brush with the genetically-altered 
tobacco beetles, she thought uneasily. But even as she 
tried to convince herself of this, she knew she'd been 
present at his latest test of pulmonary functioning, and  
he'd been at one hundred percent. 
 
He pushed weakly at her when he finally caught his breath 
and fell back onto the couch, wincing. "I just need to 
sleep for a bit, Scully. I'll feel better, I promise." 
 
She went into the kitchen and poured him a glass of juice 
with a less than steady hand, finding thankfully that it 
was still within the suggested use date. Then she forced  
him to drink at least half the glass, until his protests  
became too much for her to override. After that, she took  
his temperature and found the mercury wavering between 100  
and 101 degrees. So she covered him with a sheet instead  
of the blanket, which seemed both less offensive to him  
and cooler. Mulder was fairly quiet through all this,  
losing some of his high color as he relaxed. She finally  
forced herself to stop fussing over him and move away from  
his side so he might sleep.   
 
Settling down at his desk with her briefcase, she kept a 
wary eye on his breathing. Something continued to bother 
her. A feeling that she was missing something. That 
Mulder's illness meant something. 
 
"Mulder, when did you start to feel sick?" she asked 
quietly. 
 
"Saturday evening I started feeling pretty bad," he mumbled 
without opening his eyes. "After my run." 
 
She opened her briefcase, flipping past copies of their 
latest expense report and the budget report until she got  
down to Dr. White's case file. She found herself lifting  
the latter out and opening it. Her notes about the case  
lay on top. Mostly information from the interviews with  
the doctor and his graduate students.  
 
What if Mulder was right about the students' possible  
activities? Curious, she flicked the on-switch of Mulder's  
computer. "You don't mind if I use your computer?" 
 
"Just don't look at any of my bookmarks," he muttered. 
 
"What will I find? Some of those web sites you don't look 
at?" she asked innocently. 
 
His response was unintelligible. 
 
She felt suddenly compelled to find out more information 
on Dr. White. The memory of his early work on one of the  
hemorrhagic fevers, coupled with Mulder's ridiculous 
suspicions of the doctor's students had her spooked.  And 
beyond the tragedy of Dr. White's family described in the 
file, his past was a mystery to her.  It suddenly seemed 
like a gross oversight that she hadn't been serious enough 
to research it more thoroughly.  She had a horrible feeling 
this oversight had been a critical mistake. 
 
Going online, she called up Dr. Vincent White in the 
Medarks database, requesting a listing of his past 
publications. She quickly found his most prominent 
publication, the creation of a successful vaccine. In 
collaboration with a number of scientists, Dr. White had 
worked on the Yellow Fever vaccine, one of the few 
hemorrhagic fevers that now had a vaccine.  It was  
apparently his greatest lifetime achievement, albeit  
shared with a number of other scientists.  She continued  
to scroll down the page and discovered that after his work  
with Yellow Fever, his publications deviated toward a  
different hemorrhagic virus, and took a turn into the  
realm of ecology rather than the clinical.   
 
Approximately thirty-three years ago, Dr. White had moved 
into investigating the evolution of another hemorrhagic 
fever known as hantavirus, along with the evolution of its 
rodent host, Peromyscus, common name; the deer mouse. 
 
She felt time stand still.  
 
Grabbing up the file in her lap, she flipped back to her 
notes. Mice...mice... her finger pointed an accusation at 
the page.  There it was.  The genus of rodent Brad had 
indicated to her that they were working with; Peromyscus. 
The 'cute' little mouse. Her hands fairly flew over the 
keyboard after that terrible moment.   
 
The doctor's first publication on the subject revealed 
that he'd had a hand in being one of the first to identify 
the various strains of hantavirus while under his DOD  
contract. In fact, the rapid advances on the treatment of  
the disease upon it's discovery in the United States, were 
due in great part to the strides made by the DOD research  
in identifying and thoroughly investigating Old World  
strains of the virus after they'd infected American  
soldiers overseas.  
 
Scully glanced over to where Mulder lay on the couch. The 
 
students could not possibly be working with hantavirus, she 
told herself. Surely, their use of the rodent vector was 
due to Dr. White's familiarity with this particular species 
and its complement of species-specific mouse parasites. But 
it seemed almost too much of a coincidence. She returned 
with dread to her reading. 
 
Hantavirus made a name for itself in a 1993 outbreak in 
New Mexico that resulted in several fatalities within a 
short period of time. The DOD's knowledge and full 
cooperation with scientists when these New World strains of 
the virus were discovered had greatly enhanced the ability 
of medical personnel to recognize and react to the danger.   
 
But Dr. White's research on the virus had stopped back in 
1970. His last paper mostly pontificated upon the virus's 
evolution. Hantavirus was not a new virus, he pointed out. 
Alleged references to the hantavirus pulmonary syndrome 
could even be found in Native American folklore. Ancient 
legend warned that if parents let mice live in their 
dwelling, they would 'take away the breath' of their 
children. The incident rate of infection, coupled with its 
rather nondescript, flu-like symptoms, had contributed to 
its going unidentified for centuries.  
 
Mulder did not have hantavirus, she told herself. The idea 
was nonsensical. Where would he have contracted it? She 
felt a chill travel down her spine as she left Dr. White's  
publications in order to log on to the CDC website, 
calling up the comprehensive fact sheet on hantavirus and 
its symptoms. Scrolling frantically through the list, she 
felt her terror mounting for each one that fit Mulder's 
profile.   
 
According to the CDC, Mulder's symptoms matched almost 
exactly that of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome -- fever, 
fatigue, aching muscles in the back, thighs and 
shoulders, followed in some portion of the cases by 
headaches and gastrointestinal upset. Distinguishing itself 
in the later stages with coughing and shortness of breath, 
known as the 'cardiopulmonary phase' -- the body reacted 
as the lungs started to fill up with fluid. From there, the 
disease progressed very rapidly. The shortness of breath 
often led to acute respiratory distress, sometimes within 
twenty-four hours, with a mortality rate of anywhere from 
forty to eighty percent. 
 
With a sinking feeling in her stomach, she turned to study 
her partner. The shortest incubation period would put the 
moment of infection back around Monday, when they were just 
starting to look at this case. How could he possibly have 
contracted it just sitting in the office reading about the 
case? With a sinking feeling, she was reminded of Mulder's 
comments after checking the evidence from the case. 
 
"Mulder, you said the Bureau had a rodent problem when you 
went to look at that evidence on Monday," she recalled, 
keeping her mounting panic in check. "Why did you say 
that?" she asked slowly. 
 
He opened his eyes with apparent difficulty. "Does it 
matter?" he muttered groggily. He rubbed at his eyes and 
she remembered the bandage she'd put on his thumb.   
 
"What was in the box you looked in for Dr. White's case, 
Mulder?" she repeated. 
 
"Believe it or not, a bunch of dried mouse feces and one 
very mummified rodent." He studied her expression quietly. 
"Don't worry, Scully. I washed my hands afterward. There 
were a couple vials at the bottom of the box. That's what I 
cut myself on. Lovely, hmmm?" he muttered. "I'll let 
Skinner know it's time for a little de-con down there." He 
pushed at the sheet now and coughed again. "Is it hot in 
here or what, Scully?" 
 
She remembered the white rat outside Dr. White's house. 
"Did you touch anything in that lab or Dr. White's house, 
Mulder?" 
 
"You were with me Scully. We both did."  He coughed again. 
A hacking, wet-sounding cough. 
 
According to the CDC web site, the primary cause of death 
from HPS was excessive fluid in the lungs. The fluid leaked 
from capillaries into the air sacs of the lungs. Autopsies 
of infected patients had found lungs so severely fluid- 
filled, they weighed twice as much as normal lungs. 
 
He had opened one eye by this point and was studying her. 
"What's wrong, Scully?" 
 
She couldn't answer him.  She was cold to the core.  
Shoving the chair back, she grabbed her address book from 
her briefcase and moved quickly over to the phone. 
 
"Who are you calling?"   
 
She heard the apprehension in his voice at her obvious 
alarm. "Just hang on, Mulder," she murmured. "And don't  
hate me. I'm calling the U.S. Army Medical Research  
Institute of Infectious diseases in Bethesda. Stay calm.  
They're the closest place to have a BSL-4 lab and a 
quarantine facility. One we've both visited before, I might 
add." She drummed her fingers impatiently on the desk as  
she waited for the dial tone. "I take back everything I  
said about the impossibility of something illegal going on  
in Dr. White's lab." She knew she was babbling in an  
attempt to control her fear, but Mulder seemed to be  
gaining a fairly good grasp of what was going on. "As  
usual, you may be right, Mulder." 
 
"Why does that not feel very satisfying right now?" he 
croaked. 
 
Her fingers punched the numbers frantically. When she'd 
finished dialing, she turned to give him a tight smile. 
"Okay. You're always right. How's that for satisfying? 
Where's the closest place you've ever seen anyone land a 
helicopter around here, Mulder?" Her eyes locked on his. 
 
The phone was ringing on the other end. 
 
He stared at her. "Tell me you're kidding." She couldn't 
keep the truth from him. His eyes turned serious at the 
expression in hers. "It's bad, isn't it?" When she didn't 
answer, she heard him say the phrase, "It must be bad,"  
for the second time that year. 
 
She fought back the tears that threatened and nodded. 
 
"You're coming with me, right, Scully?" 
 
"I wouldn't miss it for the world, Mulder," she said 
around the tightness in her throat. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
The helicopter blades created a wind tunnel-like effect. 
She had never liked flying, and helicopters were a 
particularly unpalatable option to her.  This one was huge. 
It seemed the Army could never make do with a normal-sized 
aircraft, and the one sitting on the Alexandria high school 
soccer field was mammoth.   
 
There was a crowd of long-distance spectators, held well 
back from the vehicle that had delivered them to the field. 
One of the MP's took her arm as she ran alongside Mulder's 
prone form on the stretcher. She would have shaken the man 
off, but his assistance was necessary for her to climb up  
into the flying bulk and she cursed her height-challenged 
genes instead as she accepted the help. 
 
Mulder was ash-pale under the oxygen mask before take-off, 
and all she could offer him was eye-contact and the grip of 
her hand as she perched near his side. "Just relax, Mulder. 
We should be there within half an hour. We've got plenty of 
time." 
 
Mulder's only response was to squeeze her hand, the effort 
of which seemed to send him into another paroxysm of  
coughing. To her horror, by the time it was over, blood  
had sprayed the inside of the oxygen mask with the violence  
of his cough. She noted that it was only a nosebleed without  
any sense of relief. Nosebleeds brought unpleasant memories  
for both herself and Mulder, as well as a mounting sense of 
helplessness and terror. 
 
The emergency crew and MPs around them were masked and 
gloved, as was she. They changed the oxygen mask and mopped 
up the blood, putting everything into biohazard bags and 
securing Mulder's stretcher as the helicopter lifted into 
the air. The same MP who'd helped her into the craft 
indicated a seat that she could strap herself into before 
take-off, but she shook her head vehemently and stayed 
beside Mulder, holding tightly to his hand. 
 
It was a very long, unpleasant ride. 
 
Once at USAMRIID, the bustle of uniforms was everywhere 
and at some point, despite her reluctance, she was 
separated from Mulder while they insisted on testing her 
for the virus.  
 
Just as she expected, she was asked to strip down and  
shower. Afterward, she was given scrubs and locked in a  
bio-containment room. They drew blood and checked her  
vitals, despite her insistence that she was fairly certain 
she had not contracted the virus. Finally, after numerous 
protests, she was delivered into the company of one of the 
doctors. 
 
He introduced himself as Dr. Compton.  "Just relax, Dr. 
Scully," he said. "If it is hantavirus, the presence of  
its RNA is relatively easy for us to detect using reverse- 
transcription polymerase chain reaction. As you no doubt 
know, it's a very rapid early detection method and allows 
us to get out all our guns and lick the thing before it 
does too much damage." 
 
She didn't care at the moment how it was detected. She 
didn't care about the Army's 'guns'. "How is my partner?" 
she demanded. 
 
He assessed her closely. "I'd say you made the right call. 
He's definitely got the full complement of symptoms, but 
let's not get too worried yet. It's far more likely to be 
something much more common. For example, Aspergillosis, 
Cytomegalovirus, or even the flu would be a more likely 
diagnosis at this point. We'll know within the hour. Why 
don't we wait for the results before we get too excited?" 
 
"Waiting could be dangerous. There's a high likelihood 
that Dr. Vincent White is experimenting with hantavirus if 
my partner has it. And I'd like to see Agent Mulder 
immediately to check on his condition myself, if you don't 
mind." 
 
He gave her a tight smile that was entirely too pacifying.  
"If that's the case, Agent Scully, what you *need* to do  
right now is to speak to the officials we have here waiting  
to investigate this situation.  Don't worry. We're taking  
good care of your partner." He was military all the way  
through and although Scully didn't like it, there was  
procedure to follow here before she would be allowed to  
address the more personal. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
She sat impatiently through the debriefing process while  
separated by plexiglass for the safety of the interviewers.  
A number of Department of Defense officers -- whose wrath  
was about to come down via joint cooperation between the  
DOD, the Center for Disease Control, the Army and the  
National Guard on Dr. Vincent White and his students --  
listened soberly to her tale. The DOD had files on Dr.  
White that seemed slightly more extensive than the solitary  
file she and Mulder had been using. She informed them about  
the evidence box at the FBI, which was the most obvious  
place for Mulder to have contracted the virus, given the  
incubation period of the disease.  She urged them to contact  
Assistant Director Skinner and contain the threat at that  
location as well as Dr. White's laboratory and house.   
They didn't appear to need much convincing. 
 
"If you don't mind my asking, did Dr. White have the 
technology thirty years ago to preserve a viral specimen 
for that a period of time?" she demanded boldly. 
 
"I'm afraid that, yes, he did have access to that 
technology," said a man who'd introduced himself as General 
Lowell. "But I can't discuss that matter any further with 
you." 
 
The group of men conferred in murmurs in the corner for a 
bit and finally, one came back to thank her for her time 
and wish her the best. They began to file out, obviously 
abandoning her to the doctors and her fate. 
 
She interrupted their exit. "Excuse me..."  
 
General Lowell, the man obviously in charge of the group, 
as well as being the only one to have given her his name, 
turned back to regard her. He reminded her vaguely of her 
father, but the resemblance was more due to his military 
bearing than to his physical appearance. With a crewcut of 
severely shorn white hair, he was thin in a hard sort of 
way, with the look of an older man who kept himself in 
shape for any form of mortal combat that might arise. 
Walking over, he stood tall before the sheet of plexiglass 
between them. He had at least a foot on her in height. 
 
"How can I help you, Agent Scully?" The tinny sound of his 
voice through the speakers was unnerving. It dehumanized 
him and made his voice seem almost robotic.   
 
"I'd just like to know why the case was closed by your 
department," she remarked. "Was it ever solved?  And what 
virus was it exactly that killed Dr. White's family?" 
 
He scowled briefly before giving her a curt nod. "The case 
was closed because the theft was done *by* Dr. White. And 
as for who killed Dr. White's family, he did, in my 
opinion," he stated coldly, his eyes hard as agate. "And 
yes, it was a strain of hantavirus that killed them. I'm 
afraid that's all I can tell you. I'm also going to insist 
that you forget about this case. Worry about your partner's 
condition instead.  We'll be handling it from here on 
out."   
 
Was that a threat, she wondered? At something in her 
return look, he scowled and added, "That's an order, Agent 
Scully." Turning on his heel, he walked away from her. 
 
Scully turned abruptly away from the window, forcing her 
anger at the situation down to that place where she 
contained it for her own sanity. "My partner?" she said 
impatiently to the MP at the door. 
 
"This way, Agent Scully," the young man answered. 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
The guard, who stood at least 6'4", and was heavily armed  
and in full military uniform, led her down a long hallway.   
As she padded beside him on slippered feet, she felt  
ineffectual and small. Stripped of her weapon, she was 
nearly helpless. To make matters worse, being exhausted  
from the ordeal and dressed only in scrubs reminded her  
of unpleasant, sleep-deprived nights during her short  
stint as a hospital intern. Her discomfort during that  
time had been one of the deciding factors in her  
unconventional choice of career. 
 
The MP delivered her to a fully functioning, state of  
the art ICU area, staffed by nurses who looked more like 
soldiers. It was occupied by only one patient. 
 
Mulder. 
 
As she entered the room, Mulder turned his head and, 
recognizing his visitor, attempted a smile that looked  
more like a grimace to her. Hooked up to every conceivable 
monitor, he looked surprisingly healthy. 
 
She approached the bed and took his hand. 
 
They stayed like that for a minute. He took a breath that 
sounded like it hurt. "Hantavirus, huh?" 
 
She nodded. 
 
"What have I got to look forward to?" he asked. "It's good 
to be prepared, I always say." His voice was rough and he  
coughed with the effort of his question.   
 
She put a hand on his chest and left it there, trying to 
calm him with her presence. "You're going to be fine, 
Mulder." 
 
"Why is that not very reassuring?" he mused. 
 
She sighed. "You might find it starting to get difficult 
to breathe. If it does, just let me know." She threaded her 
fingers through the hand she held onto. "We'll give you an 
oxygen mask. That might help make it a little easier. At 
the worst, we may need to put you on respiratory therapy 
for a bit," she offered. 
 
"By respiratory therapy, I'm assuming you mean I could go 
into respiratory failure?" 
 
"That's a remote possibility," she answered reluctantly. 
 
He stared at her. "Please tell me you're kidding." 
 
"I'm sorry, Mulder." She squeezed his hand. "But you've 
got very good odds against that." 
 
"Not again," he said. "I'm not going to have any lungs 
left," he moaned. 
 
"Mulder..." she said quietly.  
 
"Agent Fox Mulder, the lungless wonder..." 
 
"Mulder..." 
 
"If you pump me full of nicotine again, I swear I'll shoot 
you, Scully." 
 
She forced a smile and brushed her hand lightly over his 
forehead, running her fingers along his hairline and 
pushing errant strands back. "You're right smack in the 
middle of the Department of Defense, Mulder. They know more 
about hantavirus than anywhere else in the world. And we 
caught it early, thanks to you." 
 
He grinned at her. "Take your share of the credit, Scully. 
Believe me, I would *never* have suggested coming here. I'd 
have held out for Atlanta." 
 
She smiled and let her fingers slide down to rest along 
his jawline, leaning forward far enough to not be heard  
by the nurses. "I would have preferred the CDC myself, 
Mulder," she whispered. 
 
"The nurses are better looking there," he offered. 
 
"Speak for yourself." 
 
He closed his eyes and smiled slightly. With the closer 
proximity, she could hear the rattle and wheeze of air 
moving in and out of his already congested lungs. She 
watched him wince as he fought for the next inhalation. 
 
When the brawny military nurse came in next, Scully asked 
for a chair and was treated to folding metal at its finest. 
She and Mulder both stared at the proffered seating 
arrangement for a minute after he left. 
 
"There's plenty of room up here on the bed, Scully," 
Mulder said finally, patting the space near his hip. 
 
"Thanks." She was exhausted from the ordeal, but obviously 
she wasn't going to be catching any sleep here. She perched  
on the bed beside Mulder and settled in for an extended  
period of discomfort. When she saw him smile at her  
proximity, it was worth it. 
 
"Aren't you worried about getting it?" he asked. 
 
"Person-to-person contact is a highly unlikely mode of 
transmission." 
 
"How'd I get it?" 
 
"Well, my theory is that the virus was preserved in the 
evidence box for some unconscionable reason," Scully began. 
"Although it seems unlikely it could have been dormant this 
long and survived. The drying conditions needed to have 
been just right. Anyway, the DOD is currently investigating 
the situation without our help, thank you very much." 
 
"Skinner's going to love this," Mulder observed. 
 
"Mulder, never, never, never again stir up a pile of dried 
mouse feces and breathe at the same time...promise me." She 
gave him a stern look. "And for God's sake, try not to ever 
again introduce what was probably a vial containing 
preserved virions into your bloodstream." She held up his 
hand, which was currently sporting the apparatus to monitor 
his pulse as well as an I.V. line, and looked pointedly at 
his thumb. 
 
"Point taken," Mulder sighed. "Just don't tell me I should 
have known better." 
 
"You should have known better, Mulder." 
 
He laughed weakly. "That's what I love about you, Scully. 
You never take any crap from me." 
 
"Mulder," she said slowly. "Sometimes, I feel like that's 
all I do." 
 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
 
EPILOGUE 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
"That's right," said the Queen, patting her on the head, 
which Alice didn't like at all: "though, when you say 
'garden' - *I've* seen gardens, compared with which this 
would be a wilderness." 
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
December 22  
Falls Church, Virginia 
 
 
He'd never suspected his students of stealing his old  
research notes. Nor had he imagined them replicating his  
old experiments to compare the original strain of the  
virus with a current strain to see what course evolution  
had taken. Finally, he could not conceive of how they'd  
figured out that it had been he who'd stolen the original  
 
strain from the lab in the first place and carefully  
preserved it in his own home. 
 
Perhaps he'd told Brad in some drunken stupor. The boy had 
always been stopping by, 'just to check up on him.' 
 
This oversight was a new low for him. 
 
The house he currently resided in had seen more visitors 
in the past five days than it had since he'd moved here. 
They'd cleaned out half his belongings. His lab and 
university job were gone. His three graduate students had 
also been dismissed by the university and were now being 
'detained' by the Department of Defense.  
 
He was unable to be concerned about the fate of the 
students. No doubt the DOD would find some use for them.  
In fact, they'd probably give the three jobs. Certainly, 
they'd proven to have a certain aptitude for viral 
research. The government officials had already confiscated 
everything having to do with the students' experiment. And  
with the care the DOD took in dismantling the lab, he knew  
that the three must have been on to something and was  
certain their research would be continued in some form. 
 
All the loose ends were being taken care of. 
 
Including himself.  
 
General Lowell stood uneasily in his living room. Vincent 
wasn't sure why he was still in his home, having lost both 
his job and what was left of his reputation. He'd expected 
to be arrested along with his students, so he was grateful  
for this one last chance his old colleague was giving him  
to make things right. 
 
"I'm asking you to cooperate, Vincent," the General said 
soberly. "For the sake of national security." When Vincent 
didn't answer he made a noise of disgust. "You stole this 
virus back when you believed the world should know about 
the reality of biological weapons. He grimaced at the 
squalor around him, standing tall and aloof from it. 
Glaring down at his old colleague. "Was it worth it, 
Vincent?" he demanded gruffly. "What exactly did you 
accomplish?" 
 
"You tell me, Jack.  What did I accomplish?" 
 
His earliest research with Jack Lowell had determined  
that hantavirus had an ancient association with its host,  
co-evolving and co-speciating with the rodents. In fact, 
virus and rodent had been seemingly been living happily  
together for thousands of years. Other colleagues had  
found evidence that genetic relationships among the  
various hantaviruses paralleled the genetic relationships  
among their rodent hosts. A mutually beneficial  
partnership. Two entities, living together as one. 
 
Then came the Red Queen hypothesis. And the start of his 
terrible project. 
 
He had taken a partnership between two creatures and created 
a completely different scenario. Under the auspices of the 
DOD, he'd showed that while hantavirus had the capacity to 
co-evolve with its rodent host, it could also mutate and 
evolve against it. These more deadly strains did prove to 
have higher survival rates, as well as become more and  
more detrimental to their rodent hosts. He'd been able  
to decimate whole colonies of mice with these deadlier  
strains. 
 
"At one time, Jack, I was actually proud of what I'd  
created. At one time, I thought I could control it," he 
stated. 
 
"We were able to control it, Vincent. We are controlling  
it." The General stood staring down at his slump on the 
couch disdainfully. "You're the one out of control." 
 
"Well, there's no one left for you to control me with,  
Jack. I care about no one." 
 
"Your students?" 
 
Vincent laughed without humor. "My students were imbeciles  
to recreate this monster. Their foolishness has only  
repeated my own folly. They're welcome to pay whatever  
price it exacts from them." He picked up the wine bottle  
and took another defiant swig.  Jack Lowell grimaced in  
disgust.   
 
"As for that FBI agent you're so worked up about, I have no  
idea how he contracted the virus. Nor do I care at this  
point." It could have been a number of scenarios, he knew.  
His biologically created strain had a shorter incubation  
period than its more well-known counterpart. But his  
research had never ended up published so this fact was  
virtually unknown.  
 
"You're a fool, Vincent," the man before him said  
contemptuously. 
 
Yes, he was a fool.  He had violated nature. The strain  
he'd created hadn't emerged through any natural mutation,  
nor had it come about through the medium of ecological  
disturbance that usually served to cause an outbreak by  
bringing infected rodents into closer contact with man.  
His strain had been manufactured in the labs of the  
Department of Defense.  The mutation had occurred within  
the laboratory. It had never been a natural setting, but  
rather Man, altering nature to suit his own purposes. 
 
Ah, but this was never a good idea. 
 
He recalled how angry he'd been when he first learned how 
his research was to be used. There'd been a short period 
during which he'd talked to one too many people about his 
moral quandary. He'd even mentioned his desire to his good  
friend, Jack Lowell -- a desire to expose his unsuspecting  
role in creating one of the first terrible anomalies in  
the government's biological arsenal. 
 
Then came the sudden and stunning loss of Olivia and all 
of his beautiful children.  
 
Oh God... 
 
Thirty years later and he was still pleading with a God  
he no longer believed in to deliver him from this fate. 
 
He'd been devastated by the deaths of his family. To the  
perpetrators, it had been no more than a warning.  
 
A warning that had worked too well. Any incentive to bring  
down the project had died with his family. The government's  
culpability could not be proven. He could never determine  
how Matthew had contracted the virus. And although he'd  
suspected the DOD, they'd held him fully responsible,  
blaming him for the deaths of his family and quietly  
 
letting him go from their employ after that.   
 
 
His mistake... 
 
 
Had it been his? 
 
The last bit of incentive for revenge had been numbed by 
his guilt and an extremely rapid descent into alcoholism  
in order to escape the nightmare his life had become. The  
loss of his family had weighed him down for thirty years  
now. What would their collective weight have been, he  
wondered? Somewhere around two hundred and eighty pounds  
of flesh altogether. His beloved dead family.   
 
Oh, but his thoughts were morbid and not fit for this  
world. 
 
In the end, he'd never had the conviction to expose the 
research because he was never able to find himself fully  
blameless. He sometimes wondered now if perhaps he *had*  
unknowingly infected little Matthew. Some days, he could 
almost convince himself of this. On these days, he  
considered having the virus serve as the vehicle of his  
own death as well, a fitting tribute to his family's  
suffering, but he was never able to infect himself. He  
wasn't brave enough for that and was afraid of  
contaminating others.   
 
 
He'd always been weak. And the worst failing of this  
damnable weakness within his character was his dogged  
but hopeless persistence in life.  
 
He took a long last swig of wine, feeling drowsy. General 
Lowell shook his head in disgust. "I'll be back in an hour, 
Vincent. Pack a bag and be ready. You're going away for a 
while."  
 
The General left, the sound of the door slamming shut and  
the lock snicking into place seemed loud in the silence  
that ensued. Opportunity was knocking. Vincent took the  
syringe out of the drawer beside him. Carefully, he  
injected the lidocaine that Brad Palmer had been kind  
and unwitting enough to supply him with. It had been a  
request that Brad had readily fulfilled. What harm could  
a little local anesthetic do? No doubt that was what the  
idiotic boy told himself.  What was a little numbness? As  
long as his advisor was still able to sign a thesis it  
shouldn't be a problem.  
 
Fool. 
 
They were all fools -- including himself. 
 
No one could begin to imagine the terrible guilt he bore. 
 
He injected the drug into the skin of both wrists. Even  
now, Vincent still wasn't brave enough to die in the  
painful manner his family had. 
 
After the mistakes he'd made in his too-long life, he had 
no illusions that he would be allowed to join his long-lost 
family in a better place. He even considered Hell too good 
for himself. He'd never fought for anything his entire 
life. He had only endured. He was a weak, ineffectual man. 
Even his choice of a painless suicide showed his lack of 
spine. He had no visions of eternal pardon. 
 
He had nothing. 
 
His wrists were completely numb by the time he took the 
scalpel out of its packaging. A picture of his family was 
propped on the end table near him. Around him, the house 
seemed haunted by the ghosts of his family. Not malicious 
apparitions, but sad reminders of his lost soul floating  
in the images wavering before him. 
 
Dear Olivia, he thought. My love. My apologies... 
 
He felt as if this were the bravest thing he'd ever done. 
And quite possibly the weakest. All his life, he'd shirked 
the discomfort of taking a stand. Ironically, this final 
stand made that very same ambiguous statement about his 
life. 
 
After the cuts, there was a deluge of red. A brighter red 
than the two bottles of wine he'd overloaded his system 
with in preparation for this moment. Numb all over, he 
watched his life flow out, a surreal river of blood 
spilling onto the carpet. He deserved pain for what he'd 
done. He deserved an awful, tortured death. Not this  
numbed and quiet weakening. 
 
He turned his head toward the photograph propped on the 
coffee table.  Away from painless red spill. 
 
My family, he thought. Lost. My capacity for love. Lost. 
 
The house stood behind them in the picture, a pleasant 
sentry. The garden surrounded them, spilling colors over 
their feet. Flowers in all the hues of a rainbow. Yellows 
to pinks, fushia merging into purple, shades of blue, lush 
greens, red...oh, red everywhere... and then white... 
 
So white... 
 
Matthew was laughing, reaching out in the photo for his 
father's hand. 
 
"Dearest Matthew, my apologies..." 
 
His final words in life contained no more than this 
eternal plea for forgiveness. 
 
His life, lost. 
 
And out in Dr. Vincent White's garbage bin, a white 
laboratory rat was finishing a free lunch.  It took a 
minute to carefully wash its whiskers of the refuse with 
two tiny pink paws before it leapt out of the bin and 
scurried off into the woods behind the house. 
 
 
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
 
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
The Red Queen shook her head. "You may call it 'nonsense' 
if you like," she said, "but *I've* heard nonsense, 
compared with which that would be as sensible as a 
dictionary!" 
 
~Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll~ 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
 
December 22 
Georgetown, Washington, D.C.  
 
 
"Make yourself at home, Mulder." 
 
She turned to watch her partner shuffle over to her couch 
as she set his overnight bag just inside her room. "Are you 
hungry?" 
 
"Only if it's more of that yummy green jello." 
 
Unbelievably, the USMARIID facility had released Mulder 
earlier than they'd planned. After an unprecedented and 
fairly rapid recovery, and with Scully's sign-off on  
enforcing his convalescence, the Army washed their hands  
of them both. 
 
"Did I call them Scrooges?" Mulder asked in mock horror  
when he learned the date. "I take it back."  
 
It was two days before Christmas Eve. Scully was 
determined that they would make the most of the holiday, 
despite the events leading up to it and Mulder's currently 
weakened state of health. At the very least, her partner  
would enjoy a warm meal and not be alone this Christmas. 
 
He spotted the tree at that moment.   
 
Scully watched as he stopped and stared at it for a 
minute, all pinpoint lights and star-shaped ornaments. 
Still weak from his ordeal, he lowered himself onto the 
couch, his eyes holding the vision even after he'd settled. 
 
She crossed the room and perched beside him. They were 
quiet for a second together. "Do you like it?" she finally 
asked. 
 
He turned and smiled. "Is this my Christmas present?" 
 
She nodded. 
 
He pointed to the presents visible under the tree and 
looked crestfallen. "I didn't exactly have time to get  
you anything, Scully." 
 
"Yes you did, Mulder," she said quietly, patting his 
thigh.  "You're still here. That's enough." 
 
"No, it's not." 
 
Yes, it is." 
 
He took a deep, cleansing breath. "What I want to know  
is why I recovered so quickly." 
 
"Mulder, I wouldn't call that quick. You were unconscious 
and on the respirator for at least twenty-four hours. And 
you've been hospitalized for five days."  
 
He looked unconvinced. She didn't voice her own 
suspicions, including the existence of a few drugs the  
doctors had given him whose names she'd been unable to  
identify.  
 
"According to the doctors there," she continued, "if 
someone survives the cardiopulmonary phase of the disease, 
they usually recover quite rapidly."  
 
"I'd say 'rapid' is an understatement. I feel pretty good  
for being at death's door two days ago, Scully." 
 
How this had happened didn't matter, she decided. Mulder 
was recovering and they were together. What more could they 
ask the Fates for this year? 
 
"Well, at least I'm not the lungless wonder," he mused when 
no explanation was forthcoming from her. 
 
"Nope." She grinned. "No circus sideshows for you." 
 
He gave voice to the suspicions that mirrored her own. 
"All I've got to say is that the DOD must have some *very* 
good drugs, Scully." 
 
"Yes, they must have." 
 
"How about how I contracted it? Did we figure that out?" 
 
She sighed and dampened her frustration with the answer 
she was about to give him. "'We,'" she emphasized the word, 
"were not allowed to figure anything out. The DOD said that 
the vials found in the evidence box did, in fact, contain 
hantavirus. They don't know how the virus got placed into 
the FBI evidence archives. They claim that the FBI must 
have originally done so before the DOD took over the case, 
not realizing what they'd confiscated." 
 
"Right. Pretty stupid mistake, don't you think? What'd 
Skinner say?" 
 
"After they found hantavirus in the Hoover Building?" she 
asked incredulously. "Take a guess, Mulder." 
 
He stared at the tree again, his expression turning 
contemplative. "Okay. What happened to Dr. White, 
Scully? I know you're not telling me something." 
 
She wasn't completely sure why she'd been withholding the 
news she'd received that morning. But she knew the topic  
of suicide was a sensitive one for Mulder as well as  
herself right now. And though there seemed to be few  
parallels between the virologist's end and that of  
Mulder's mother, she also knew Mulder would end up  
blaming himself in some small way, no matter how  
unreasonable this may be. He took their cases to heart,  
sometimes a bit too much so. Suicide was very common  
around the holidays and certainly it wasn't unexpected  
in Dr. White's case. But she felt her own twinges of guilt  
for not doing more for the sad professor. And if she felt  
that way, certainly Mulder would also. She'd wanted to at  
least wait until he was feeling a little stronger before  
giving him the news, but he deserved the truth. 
 
"He committed suicide early this morning, Mulder," she 
said quietly. "He left a note, apologizing to his family. 
But no details as to what caused their deaths or anything 
about the theft his work." 
 
"Oh." That was all he said. The silence between them was 
palpable. He squinted at the tree. "You know, if you do 
this right, the lights really do look like stars." 
 
"Mulder, I'm sorry." It seemed a stupid thing to say. He 
didn't reply. Beside him, she followed his example and 
squinted at the tree. He was right, she thought with some 
wonder. The room sparkled like a sky full of stars.  She 
opened her eyes wide again. "I do think the DOD is  
covering something up about his death, Mulder. In fact,  
I'm sure of it." 
 
"Scully!" His melancholy turned into obvious pleasure at 
this statement. He faced to her with a faint grin, but 
sobered quickly at her more serious expression. Turning 
back to the tree, he tilted his head for a more thoughtful 
perusal. "I hate to disrupt your delightful, newfound  
paranoia," he finally remarked, "but in this particular  
case, I don't believe there was any foul play. Just the  
last nail in a coffin the good doctor has been building  
for himself for a while."  He paused, deep in thought.  
"You can't really blame him for what he did," he commented  
finally. "He lost everyone he cared about." 
 
The words chilled her. "I disagree. That's no excuse for 
what he did, Mulder." 
 
Mulder shrugged. "Regardless of whether or not he's 
excused for his actions," he said slowly, "he was  
obviously in a great deal of pain." 
 
Regretting her impulsive comment immediately, she reached 
over and covered his hand with her own. "I didn't mean to 
condemn him for his actions, Mulder. You know that. I just 
can't condone them. And as for whether he's excused for 
them, I don't think that's up to me." She squeezed his hand 
and let her fingers tangle with his. The action silenced  
both of them, and they stared down at where their hands lay 
entwined on his thigh. He rubbed the rough pad of his thumb 
over the back of hers. It mesmerized her. 
 
"What happened to his graduate students?" he asked, 
electing to change the topic rather than focus on one  
that was still a tender, healing wound for them both. 
 
"Supposedly arrested, but I never heard anything after 
that. 'Classified' is the explanation I was given. And 
believe me, that one word is all we're going to get, 
Mulder. The DOD made that pretty clear to me. I have no 
idea whether those students are sitting in a jail cell 
somewhere or walking away from all this scot free." 
 
"Or chained to a lab bench somewhere, finishing their  
experiments, compliments of the DOD." Mulder remarked.  
"Case closed, huh?" He looked tired suddenly. Leaning  
his head back against the couch, he closed his eyes  
and sighed. "Looks like the return of our old friend,  
lack of closure, Scully." 
 
"We tried, Mulder. And truly, I think this case was 
resolved a long time ago by the Department of Defense. 
Albeit unsatisfactorily. As for the current illegal 
activities of Dr. White's students, at least we stopped 
those before they got out of hand and caused an epidemic  
on campus. Take heart in that." 
 
"Not a very satisfying resolution," he remarked. 
 
Her heart ached for this man. But she stood, having  
determined that they'd had quite enough of viruses and  
suicides. She was ready to erase this case from her  
thoughts and attempt to enjoy the holiday. She hoped  
she could entice Mulder to do the same.   
 
"You need to eat, Mulder," she insisted. "And you need to 
rest." She moved around the couch to stand behind him. "And 
you need to keep me company for at least an attempt at 
Christmas dinner. Not to mention, watch Steel Magnolias at 
some point with me." At his groan, she leaned down and  
dropped a light kiss onto his forehead.  
 
He let his head fall back onto the couch and opening his 
eyes, stared up at her. And she contemplated with some  
wonder the amazing inner strength of this man before her.  
Placing the palm of her hand against his forehead where  
her lips had just graced, she found his skin warm under her  
hand, but not feverish. Sliding her hands around to frame  
his face, she held him in place as she studied him. He  
returned her gaze openly, showing too much of his soul,  
as he always did.   
 
"Right now, you need to eat some chicken soup. How does 
that sound?" Giving him a small smile, she started to pull 
away, still adjusting to the increasing familiarity within 
their relationship. Seemingly of its own volition, one hand 
strayed back to idly stroke his cheek until he returned her 
smile, closing his eyes under her touch. 
 
"Better than jello," he murmured. 
 
Reluctantly, she stopped the caress, letting her hand fall 
lightly away. In the doorway of the kitchen, she paused to  
cast a thoughtful look back at her partner. He was staring  
again at the tree with an unreadable expression. She wondered  
how long it had been since Mulder had a Christmas tree, 
assuming he'd ever had one with his less than nurtured 
upbringing. 
 
He must have sensed her watching him because he turned 
slightly and grinned. "Thanks, Scully."   
 
She answered with a smile of her own. "For you,  
Mulder...the world." And of course, the stars, in  
whatever earthly form she could find them. 
 
 
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
 
THE END 
 
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Most of the viral information for this 
story was obtained from textbooks, scientific journals, 
the CDC website, and my own limited experience. Any  
liberties taken with it are my own, although I've tried  
very hard to stick to facts. However, Dr. Vincent White  
had absolutely nothing to do with developing the vaccine  
for Yellow Fever or working with the DOD to identify the  
first strains of hantavirus -- those real life  
distinctions belong to other scientists. That said,  
Moose and Squirrel don't really exist either ;) Okay,  
okay...just kidding! *g* I will admit that details about  
the George Mason University were mostly fabricated. Though  
it does exist, I've never been there and apologize for any  
errors present in its portrayal. 
 
The Red Queen Hypothesis is a "real live" scientific  
hypothesis proposed in 1973 by ecologist Leigh Van Valen 
of the University of Chicago, who described host-parasite 
interactions as a kind of biological arms race. He named  
the hypothesis after the Red Queen in Lewis Carroll's  
"Through the Looking Glass" who says, "Now, here, you  
see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the  
same place."