Copyright 1997 by Rebecca Johnson

I did not think up "The X-Files", Mulder, Scully, Skinner, Pendrell, Krycek, 
etc. They do not belong to me, and I'm not trying to steal them. 
Please don't sue, all you'll get is a Barbie doll. However, the plot is 
mine, as are any characters not previously mentioned in "The X-Files". 
Don't steal them, please. And always remember what Mom said, if you can't 
say anything nice, don't say anything at all. :)

To my good buddy Gem who shared the moment of lunacy in which this story 
was conceived. :) And I'm gonna say it's a PG-13, for an autopsy scene I 
got carried away with and some innuendo.

Sniff, Sniff... I'm Yours!

Chapter One

     Amid the amazingly dull clutter of Fox William Mulder's
apartment, an even duller celebration was taking place. 
     Perhaps 'celebration' was too strong a word. All that was
really going on was two people were sitting and eating cake.
Chocolate cake, prepared by Dana Katherine Scully's own hand.
With triple fudge frosting, and one large pink candle in the
middle. The candle was only slightly melted. The initiator of the
party had barely gotten it lit before Mr. Mulder had snuffed it
out, blowing like the Big Bad Wolf.
     "I think you spit on me." Scully fretted without energy. She
began scratching through the drawers in his tiny kitchen, looking
for a knife that wasn't a plastic hold-over from a fast food
restaurant. Chaos ensued.
     Mulder smiled his characteristically grim smile. Chaos
followed Scully around as faithfully as Quequeg, her pomeranian
foundling. 
     Upon locating the one real knife Mulder owned, Scully began
divvying up the cake with small, precise cuts. No one would guess
she was a doctor.
     "Happy birthday, Mulder." she said as she poured two glasses
of cola.
     He mumbled something unintelligible, and took one bite. Then
another, and another, until the plate was clean. Even if he was a
another year older and lamenting every second of it, Scully's
superb cooking took the edge off. 
     "I'll take that as a compliment." Dana said dryly, pointing
at his empty plate.
     "Thanks. It was great." Mulder replied, properly chastened.
     Scully smiled. "It's not over."
     She pushed the remains of the cake out of the way and slid a
small package across the table. The blue foil wrapping was
positively garish amidst the pervasive brown of Mulder's
apartment.
     He paid no attention to the gift. Instead he thoughtfully
drained the soda from his glass, sat back.
     "Are you going to open it?" Scully asked. Her statement was
punctuated by a sneeze.
     "Are you going to take anything for that?"
     Dana blew her nose. Her left jeans pocket seemed to have an
endless supply of pink tissues. "It's just a cold. It'll be gone
by morning."
     Mulder's look told his partner he was more than skeptical.
     "Stop staring at me and open your gift."
     As much as he would have liked to have ignored his birthday,
Mulder knew he couldn't. He'd tried it once, years before. The
only thing that happened was the he became twice as depressed.
And though he would never say it aloud, the winking of the paper
had tweaked his curiosity. 
     With a shrug, Mulder ripped into the wrapping. A white box
emerged, with the words; "Temptation for Men" emblazoned in gold
upon it's face. He raised one brow.
     "Cologne? Are you trying to tell me something?"
     "Not just any cologne, Mulder. It's the kind with
pheremones."
     Both eyebrows rose. "The chemical substance produced by most
animals to attract a mate?" He tossed the unopened box towards
his partner. "You *are* trying to tell me something."
     Scully dropped her tissue to grab the box. Gag gift or not,
the stuff had been expensive. "I'm not saying anything, Mulder.
I'm just trying to make you laugh."
     "Ha. Ha."
     Scully rolled her eyes. He was such a crab about birthdays.
She opened the box and withdrew the plain spray bottle. The hand
with the box slipped back to her side. Unseen, a small piece of
paper fell out and skittered under Mulder's couch cum bed.
     "At least smell it. When the woman in the store gave me a
sample, I thought you'd like it. Whether it's claims are true or
not."
     Fox accepted the cologne as though it were a live hand
grenade. Did Scully actually expect him to wear something called
"Temptation"? That was embarrassing enough. And if anyone were to
find out-!
     Ignoring her partner's obvious discomfort, Scully turned the
box over in her hands and read off the cologne's supposed powers.
     "'Unconditionally guaranteed to make the wearer more
attractive to the opposite sex. Using the science of modern
fragrance formulation, and the magic of human pheremones-'"
     "There isn't any proof humans secrete pheremones. Scientists
are just speculating."
     //Phtooey! Scientific logic! Phtooey! Phtooey!// Mulder's
thoughts, much at odds with the intense exterior he usually
presented to the world, wrenched his lips into a smile that made
Scully leery.
     "You didn't let me finish. This is the part that really sold
it for me. 'This scent is a modern day love potion. One spritz
before you approach that someone special, and not only will she
say yes, she won't be able to keep her hands off you.'"
     Mulder held in a nasty snicker. "Sometimes I just don't
understand you, Scully. You are the last person I would have
expected to buy this kind of thing."
     He pulled off the gold cap and sniffed. It smelled
suspiciously like Obsession. He set the bottle off to the side,
taming the smile into a nasty smirk. "Did you get yourself the
kind for women?"
     "Please."
     Mulder stared, maneuvering his features to barely hint at
smugness.
     "They were all out." she finally admitted under her breath.
     

##############

     The early morning sunlight streamed through the windows in
Fox Mulder's apartment, turning tiny bits of lint in the air to
glitter. It's occupant kicked up even more lint as he rushed
around trying to get ready for work.
     "Tie, tie, tie." he chanted, throwing armfuls of clutter out
of the way. "I need a tie."
     He found one hiding under three days worth of newspapers
piled beside the coffee table. It would have to do. He slipped it
over his head on the way to the kitchen. Mulder's breakfast was a
leftover piece of birthday cake from the previous day and some
milk.
     He held the glass in one hand, tucking an errant shirt
corner into his grey slacks with the other. When that hand was
finished, it groped out blindly for the cake. It landed instead
on the bottle of "Temptation" Mulder hadn't bothered to put away
yesterday.
     The feel of the cold crystal was irritating at first.
Another wasted moment of time he desperately needed. But gazing
on it for one moment more had a different effect. Mulder stepped
back, looking out over his cluttered apartment and his life.
     "I need a wife, too." was the assessment.
     Mulder hurried to get his jacket, coming back to the table
before he slipped it on. He stared at the little bottle. Finally,
with a what-the-hey shrug, he picked it up and applied a generous
amount. Even if it didn't get him a wife, it did make him smell
good. The tie was slightly reminiscent of chow mein.
     He crammed the entire piece of cake in his mouth, wiped his
fingers on a leftover napkin, and rushed out the door.

##############

     As Mulder swept by her at warp speed, the security guard
inhaled deeply. She liked whatever cologne he was wearing.
*Really* liked it.
     "Agent Mulder!"
     Holding in a groan, Mulder turned around without missing a
step. He was fairly sure that no one would care if he was a
little late, but Mulder hated to give "them" any reason, no
matter how small, to frown on him.
     "What's the matter? Did the plate in my head set off the
metal detector again?" 
     The guard, Connie, giggled hysterically at Mulder's joke.
The sound was jarring. Mulder had never heard anything more than
a low chuckle out of her before.
     "Oh, Mulder you're so funny!" she chirped, moving in closer.
She'd never met anyone who was "magnetic" before.
     "Thanks." His smile did not reach his eyes as he took a step
backwards. It wasn't that he didn't like Connie. She was a
friendly sort whom he'd talked with at the ubiquitous office
party. But Mulder simply wasn't comfortable having her stand so
near. 
     "Look, I'm kind of late, so-"
     "I'm sorry!" Connie said, again closing the gap between
them. Her hand landed on his sleeve. "I don't mean to keep you,
really. There's nothing wrong. I was just wondering, are you free
Saturday night?"
     The only indication of Mulder's shock was the widening of
his green eyes. She'd been wed only six months prior; Mulder had
attended the ceremony himself. And now she was hitting on him?
Connie? Sweet little just-married, brown-haired, doe-eyed,
Beaver's Mom Connie? 
     And that wasn't all she was about to do. Caught by the
burning hands of what she'd later term "lust", Connie simply
couldn't help herself. The forward progress of her body had
slowed, that of her head hadn't. Just before their lips met,
Mulder dodged neatly out of her grasp.
     "You know, I'm not sure." he said, barely keeping the
shocked stutter out of his voice. "I'll get back to you." 
     With that, he turned and darted down the hall.
     "What a man." Connie sighed to herself.
     It took Mulder twenty minutes to get from the first floor to
his basement office. He was positive, because checked his watch
as often as a condemned man. Everywhere he turned, dozens of
female voices called after him. Married, single, old, young. All
shapes and sizes. They flocked to him like hummingbirds to
trumpet vine. He'd never seen anything like it. Even the coldest
of rebuttals left their hearts fluttering, their cheeks flushed.
By the time he had slipped into his office and locked the door,
he'd been asked to dinner by twelve different women.
     Mulder was three steps away from crazed. He'd joked about
wanting this kind of thing to happen, but they were only jokes.
He'd never been a ladies' man. He knew now he never wanted to be.
It was too hard on the blood-pressure!
     Scully looked up at him curiously. "You're late."
     "I know." he sighed, sinking gratefully into his chair.
     "Get stuck in traffic?"
     Remembering his dance with Connie, Mulder said; "Something
like that."
     Scully decided to overlooked his frazzled demeanor. It was
probably nothing more but his usual reaction to Monday morning.
She handed him a memo sent down by upstairs. "Since you weren't
here, I took the liberty of RSVPing to this. Skinner wants us in
his office 'at our earliest convenience', meaning 'right now'.
And he didn't say why."
     Mulder paled noticeably.
     "What's wrong?"
     "I'm just having a weird day." he said. "You sound
congested."
     "I am." Scully touched her reddened nose gingerly. "This
nose no longer functions."
     "Did you take-"
     "No."
     Mulder smiled and shook his head. "Scully, Scully, Scully." 
     "Shut-up, Mulder."

##############


     "Mulder! Wait!"
     His response to the excessively feminine voice was to grab
Scully's arm and begin bodily dragging her along.
     "Walk faster!" he said under his breath.
     In normal tones, she demanded to know why.
     "Just because-"
     "Mulder!"
      He cast a longing look at the door to Skinner's office only
three yards away. With some effort, he turned to deal with the
secretary calling his name. He always thought of interaction with
Kelli as "dealing"
     Miss Easton was in his face, quite literally. She was mere
inches away, enveloping his senses with her lime green suit,
heavy perfume, and the candy scent of discount cosmetics. It was
rumored she never stepped beyond her own bedroom door in less
than full makeup. Now Mulder believed it.
     She wasn't tall, but she was built, bearing more than a
passing resemblance to Dolly Parton. Her brown eyes and brows
gave away the fact her blonde hair wasn't natural, but Mulder
doubted she still recalled it's original hue. It was worn high
and big, in a curly style admired by Texas pageant queens. Her
eyeshadow was the same vivid green as her suit, her full lips
slicked with high-gloss red. False-eyelashes sticky with mascara
fluttered up at Mulder.
     "Darling! I haven't seen you in so long!" she brayed. Her
voice was as brassy as her haircolor. "Where have you been hiding
out?"
     "Oh, nowhere." Mulder said, mock-pleasantly. Every time she
moved, the scent of overripe fruit shot right up nostrils.
     The sound of a hyena reverberated off the walls. "Mulder,
you're so funny!"
     "So I've been told." A sneeze dug at the back of his nose.
     "Why don't we have lunch today. We can use the time to catch
up." Kelli moved in on him like a piranha. //Just let me borrow
that lower lip for thirty seconds.//
     This time, Mulder didn't bother with any pretenses. He
simply leaped away, behind Scully. As she'd been doing the whole
time, Dana watched the scene placidly and without comment.
     "We have to go." he said. "AD Skinner wants us in his
office. *Yesterday.*"
     Kelli took the rebuff well, giggling and promising "some
other time". Mulder hustled his partner into Skinner's front
office, glancing around nervously for *that* secretary. She was
gone, praise be.
     "Mulder.." Scully drawled. 
     He turned a face towards her that begged for no inquires.
     "Are you doing your hair differently?"
     He gave her a crooked smile of thanks. The relief she saw in
that face only served to enflame her curiosity further. After the
meeting with Skinner, she promised herself she'd find out what
was going on.
     "Shall we?" she said now, inclining her head towards the
door with the Assistant Director's name on it. Mulder nodded and
knocked briskly.
     Walter Skinner opened it himself, looking about as happy as
he usually did. His eyes flicked over the two agents from behind
small wire-rimmed glasses.
     "Well, I'm glad to see you two." he greeted them. He stood
to the side and bid them enter with one arm. "Come in."
     Mulder proceeded Scully into the room. His entrance caused
the two people seated in front of Skinner's desk to rise.
     And rise, and rise. //When did Elle Macpherson and Naomi
Campbell join the FBI?// Dana's head tipped nearly all the way
back just so she could look the pair in their eyes. Between those
two, Mulder and Skinner, her own lack of height became painfully
apparent. Scully didn't *feel* short; it was always jarring to be
reminded that she was.
     The assistant director moved closer to the two as yet
unnamed agents, presumably to be in a better position to
introduce them. Scully was aghast to see that both of them were
every bit as tall as the six foot, two inch Skinner.
     "Agents Mulder and Scully." he said, indicating each in
turn. "I'd like meet agents Walsh and Hayes. They'll be assisting
you on your new investigation."
     The women's eager handshakes and nervous smiles instantly
marked them as greenhorns. Their faces had the fresh, unspoiled
look of new linen, so Scully dutifully concluded they were just
out of Quantico and this was to be their first case.
     "Have a seat." Skinner told the veterans, as the rookies
sank back into theirs. Mulder flopped instantly down into the
chair on the end, leaving Scully as a buffer between him and the
new agents. With the way women were acting towards him today, he
was taking no chances.
     Sighing to herself, Dana took the remaining spot at the
center of the crescent of chairs. All parties had easy views of
each other; a discreet "checking out" took place while Skinner
readied himself for the meeting.
     The one Skinner had said was named Hayes sat right next to
Scully. She had armloads of dark curly hair pinned back in a
demure looking bun, and a face devoid of make-up. Disgustingly,
it didn't hurt her looks a bit. She was dressed in a taupe jacket
and skirt, well-cut and expensive looking. So were her shoes,
that Scully noticed when Agent Hayes crossed her long legs.
     //Four inch chunk heel pumps. No wonder she towers.//
     The other one, in her purple jacket and slim cut matching
pants, looked like a vivid tropical bird alighted by mistake on a
strange shore. Between the long red hair curling around her
shoulders, and even redder lipstick, that was the word Scully
kept coming back to describe Agent Walsh; *vivid.*
     As an afterthought, Dana leaned slightly forward to check
Walsh's shoes. Black granny boots, to match her black turtleneck.
With four inch heels.
     She sat back, satisfied the world hadn't become giants while
she slept.
     Skinner cleared his throat. Agents Hayes and Walsh stopped
staring at Mulder, who had studiously pretended not to notice,
fixing their full attention on the assistant director.
     "Ladies and gentleman, meet your new case. Ingo Crenshaw."
He pushed a copy of the police report across his desk towards
Mulder. A manila folder followed it, the edges of crime-scene
photos peeking out. Dana reached for it. After years of seeing
corpses of people slaughtered in unique and disgusting ways, the
unmarred body of a young, blonde man lying on his back was almost
dull.
     "He was found in the department store where he worked this
morning by a fellow salesman. No cause of death apparent, no
evidence of break-in."
     "This is a case for local law enforcement." Mulder said, his
eyes skimming rapidly over the paper in his hand.
     "You need something to do." Skinner deadpanned.
     The women smiled politely, recognizing the joke. Mulder slid
the paper back across the desk with a flat expression.
     "We suspect a serial killer is responsible. Two bodies were
discovered this month with the same MO; No injury, no forced
entry. Cause of death was contact with poison-arrow frogs, which
were found at both scenes. Mr. Crenshaw may very well be victim
number three.
     Skinner turned to Scully. "Crenshaw's body is in custody
here. I'd like you to perform the autopsy. Agent Walsh will
assist you."
     Scully cast her an all-too familiar look.
     "I'm trained as a pathologist's assistant." Walsh said. "I'm
very qualified to help."
     Dana face-faulted. If that was so, it was Dana that should
have been assisting. A pathologist's assistant was typically a
graduate of a baccalaureate program which provided training in
several areas, such as autopsy dissections, dissections of
specimens removed at surgery, specimen photography, and video
applications. What on earth was she doing in the Bureau? The
demand for qualified pathologist's assistants exceeded supply,
garnering them excellent pay and benefits in their little-known
area. Forty thousand to start, if Dana's memory served. She felt
a momentary twinge of guilt. She liked to think she saw past
stereotype.
     "The crime scene is waiting for you." the assistant director
went on. "Take agents Hayes and Walsh with you. They need the
field work."
     If it was possible, Hayes looked both happy and indignant at
the same time. Happy to be going with the handsome Mr. Mulder,
indignant at the small remark about her inexperience. For reasons
pertaining to the former, Walsh glanced enviously at her
counterpart.
     "That's all. You know the routine from here. Dismissed."
Skinner said.
     Walsh and Hayes popped out of their seats like jack-in-the-
boxes. Scully and Mulder were slower to rise. They turned and
left Skinner's office with the two rookies trailing faithfully
behind.
     But not for long. Before Scully even knew what was
happening, Walsh and Hayes had sandwiches her partner between
them, leaving her walking a step behind. 
     "So how long have you been with the Bureau?" Agent Walsh
asked.
     "What made you decide to join?" Added Hayes.
     Mulder was forced to glance *up* at her rather than down, as
he was accustomed to doing. He didn't know who to answer first.
Seeing him look between the two with that helpless expression on
his face was heartbreaking.
     Scully sighed sharply. She was already in a bad mood from
her cold; the antics of the two girls - And indeed she thought of
them as girls. - only served to exacerbate the condition.
     "We should get to the crime scene before it gets too cold."
Scully said, loudly. Mulder stopped and turned to face her, the
other two following suit. From the expressions on the girls'
faces, you'd think they'd never laid eyes Scully before.
     //Bless you.// "You're right. But why don't you and I check
out the scene, while you two," Mulder pointed to the two new
agents. "...perform the autopsy. You said you were qualified."
     "I am." Agent Walsh said. "But she isn't."
     "No, I'm not!" Agent Hayes agreed, looking panicky. "I'm not
even qualified to bone a chicken! Not that I'd want to do that.
I'm a vegetarian."
     Walsh cast her partner a disapproving look. "Besides,
considering our lack of field experience, I think Assistant
Director Skinner would like us to remain in a group. That way a
senior agent can supervise each segment of the investigation."
     Mulder groaned inwardly at her impeccable logic. "Okay.
Let's go." he said to Agent Hayes.
     The brunette perked up instantly and noticeably. Mulder
gazed at Scully, communicating silent fear. She gazed back
helplessly. Then he turned and walked away.
     Scully followed at such an energetic pace that Walsh
couldn't stop herself from commenting.
     "Do we get to come, or are you going to pawn us off on
somebody?" she called, smiling innocently.
     Mulder and Scully looked properly guilty. 
     "You can come if you promise to be good." Mulder replied. 
     "We promise." Hayes and Walsh chimed in unison.
     "Mulder," Scully whispered in his ear. "Whatever you're
doing, you'd better stop it. I'm going to gag." 
     He gave her a roguish grin. "I'm just curious why it isn't
working on you."
     "Can we go?" Dyna cried. She made no secret of the fact she
was trying to break them up. Agent Walsh blushed furiously as a
staring match ensued between her partner and the two senior
agents. She had to break them up.
     "I get shot gun!" 
     Tension vanished as though it had never been. Dyna took a
step towards Victoria, fists balled. "I get shot gun!" 
     "No, I do!"
     "*I* get shot gun." Scully announced. "I always get shot
gun."
     "Except when you drive." Mulder added unhelpfully.
     All three women gave him a look. He held up his hands in a
silent; "I surrender".
     "I suppose we could all run for the car, and whoever gets
there first gets the front seat." Agent Walsh suggested.
     Scully shook her head and pointed. "Not with those shoes."  
     Walsh smiled sheepishly. "I guess running's out of the
question."
     "So we'll leave it up to the driver to decide who gets shot
gun." Dyna said, blinking at Fox.
     In that moment, Mulder knew what a gazelle felt like when it
was about to be attack by a lioness. Except that was usually a
one-on-one confrontation. Here, it was three to one.
     To save his own skin, he awarded the gunner's seat to
Scully. She'd known him longer, and was immune to whatever it was
that was still attracting women to him like ants to a picnic.
     "Crud." Agent Walsh said without rancor when the decision
was made. "I hope the car has a good back seat."
     "It does." Mulder assured her. "Lots of leg room."
     Victoria grinned stupidly, taking the remark as an indirect
compliment. Scully sighed deeply again and massaged her temples.
Mulder led the way to the garage, setting a quick pace for his
own sake. 
     Dyna stewed the entire way. Her disappointment at losing the
choice position beside Mulder rapidly turned to a burning thirst
for revenge. Stick her in the backseat, would they? And behind
Scully? Depriving her of even the small pleasure of sitting
behind Mulder? No way was she going to take that quietly!
     Fox had just joined the traffic stream when a dark, curly
head darted in between his and Scully's seats.
     "I like music." Dyna said flatly, stabbing once at the
radio.
     "No problem." replied Mulder.
     Dyna had, deliberately, not looked at the station she'd
picked. So it was something of a surprise when a man began
wailing;
     "Feeeeeeeeee- lings! Nothing more than fEEEEEE-lings!"
     "Yuck!" Dyna's head came and went in an instant.
     "ma-CHO, ma-CHO, macho man!"
     "Alright!" Victoria clapped her hands. "Disco!"
     She and Dyna both planted one hand on their hips, pointing
the opposite hand's index finger first at the floor, then at the
roof, and so on.
     "'I've got to be, a ma-chooooo man!'" they sang along at the
top of their lungs. 
     Scully punched the seek button.
     "Hey!"
     Dyna's head came and went, a turtle in it's shell, and
"Macho Man" blared again. "We're listening to that."
     "No, you're singing." Scully said, changing the station.
     "You can listen and sing at the same time." Dyna returned to
the disco.
     "We'd prefer it if you didn't."
     "Didn't what?" asked Agent Walsh.
     "Sing." said Scully.
     "Sing what?" Walsh was being dense on purpose.
     "Sing that song."
     "What song?"
     Dana's impression of an irate Marge Simpson growl was
impeccable. Walsh grinned at her through the rearview mirror. 
Mulder continued to drive, pretending he was all alone in the
car, on his way to the hamburger stand for a Coke.
     "'Macho Man' is over anyway." Dyna reached over and jacked
up the volume. "'Burn, baby, burn!'"
     "That's it!" Scully turned the radio completely off, her wan
cheeks flaring red. "We just won't listen to the radio at all
since you two can't stop acting like a couple of two year olds!"
     She crossed her arms across her front, hunkering down in her
seat. Walsh and Hayes were silent, staring in shock. 
     "We were just acting the way we thought you wanted us too."
Victoria muttered.
     "Yes. You're treating us like babies; why shouldn't we live
up to the part?" Dyna concurred.
     The sudden silence behind them filled Dana and Fox with
dread. Both turned in unison, expecting the worst.
     Walsh and Hayes were neatly buckled in, on opposite ends of
the seat. Their feet were on the floor, hands folded in their
laps. 
     Mulder sighed deeply, turning back to the road. Peace, at
last. Those two had enough energy to light up DC for a week. It
was draining simply being around them. 
     Scully gnawed her bottom lip, less at ease. She didn't trust
the girls. They struck her as the revenge type, especially Hayes,
and she felt it would be just a matter of time before they
started in again.
     But when ten minutes passed without a single word from the
backseat, Scully actually relaxed long enough to turn the radio
onto a "soft hits" station.
     "I have to go."
     Both Mulder and Scully were seized by horrible memories of
Eve, the Killer Clone Girl and her sister, Eve. Mulder stole a
quick glance in the rearview to see if two small, dark-haired
children in matching red coats had appeared.
     They hadn't, but he inquired of Victoria the same thing
which he had inquired of Eve when confronted with that same
question. "Can you hold it?"
     "Only for a little while." she pouted, retreating into
silence and crossing her legs.
     A minute later, it was Dyna's turn. "Are we there yet?"
     "Does it look like it?" was Mulder's response.
     "No."
     "Then we aren't."
     "So when will we be?"
     "I don't know."
     "You should. You're the driver."
     "I hate this song." Vicky announced, swiftly popping between
the seats to punch the seek button.
     "Work! Turn to the left!"
     "Ru-Paul!" Vicky crowed, shouting out the lyrics to
"Supermodel". She was just doing it to be annoying. In reality,
she found the cross-dresser revolting. She had only picked up the
lyrics after a dreadful foray into a techno-accessories shop to
pick up some green hair additions for a play her college had been
putting on.
     "Eeeeeeew!" Dyna was in and out in an instant, the seek
button once again her victim.
     "I'm too sexy for Milan. Too sexy for Milan, New York and
Jaa-pan!"
     Mulder's patience expired with a silent scream. He hit a
button, any button.
     Vicky leaned forward and slapped his shoulder. "I love that
song! '...you know what I mean, and I do my little turn on the
cat-'"
     "Stop!" Scully shouted. She finished the fiasco with the
radio by wrenching the power button off and stuffing it down her
blouse.
     Vicky looked very put-out. "I thought I was the only one who
did that."
     "I have to go." Dyna mumbled miserably.
     Mulder's knuckles turned white upon the steering wheel.
"Hold it."
     "I can't!" 
     "You're going to have to. We're on the interstate."
     "I can't! I have to go, right now!" Dyna wailed. "If you
don't let me go, my bladder will burst!"
     "Don't be melodramatic." Victoria sniffed. Then; "I have to
potty too."
     "Hold it."
     "With what?"
     "*Anything!*"
     "That's sick." Victoria sniffed.

##########

     "I hate them. I really, really hate them." Scully was
sitting spread-eagled in the front seat of the light blue Taurus,
arms dangling at her sides, simian-fashion. Her expression was as
blank as a sleepwalker's.
     Mulder nodded. His stance was identical to his partner's.
Such a reaction to having all the energy sucked out of one's body
was only natural. 
     The thirty-six unbearable miles to the destination had ended
worse than either Mulder or Scully could possibly have imagined.
Scully's refusal to put the button back on the radio prompted a
ten-minute argument between herself and the two girls over abuse
of authority. There was so much air being whipped around in the
cab of the vehicle, Mulder kept checking to make sure his hair
remained fastened to his scalp.
     Then the unthinkable happened. Scully won.
     In his rearview mirror, Mulder saw them both. Eyes and
mouths forming little round Os. They collapsed back against the
seat, unable to comprehend what had just occurred. Mulder braced
himself while they pondered.
     Once it began, it didn't stop until they'd parked.
     "Are we there yet?" 
     "I'm tired!"
     "I'm hungry!"
     "How far?"
     "She's touching me!" 
     "I gotta use the potty!"
     "She's still touching me!"
     "I need to blow my nose!"
     "Better stop the car!"
     "Stay on your side!"
     "I am on my side!"
     "No you're not! You're on my side!"
     "Am not!"
     "Are too!"
     "Am not!"
     "Are too!"
     "MULDEEEEEEEEER!"
     The twin storms had since exited the car, and now Mulder and
Scully were trying to recuperate from the devastation they left
in there wake.
     But speak of the Devil and his imps appear. Agent Hayes's
dark head poked out of the front door of the Dillard's where the
victim had been killed. She waved them inside vehemently.
     "Oooooh, boy. Here we go." Scully croaked, oozing out of the
vehicle.
     Mulder couldn't follow. His muscles refused to budge.
     "Don't you dare leave me alone with them." his partner
ordered. She slammed the car door to make her point.
     Mulder made a sound like a dying moose.
     Scully crossed to his side. "You are coming, Mulder. Accept
that, because I will carry you if I have to."
     He looked up into the feminine face and was reminded of just
how cruel women could be.
     "Don't our years of friendship and loyalty count for
anything?"
     "No."
     Defeated, Mulder dragged his recalcitrant limbs into a
standing position.
     Heading as they were into a professional situation quickly
brought back their vigor. Mulder straightened his tie as he
walked; Scully her jacket. It was time to be tough, to show no
fear. They had to find out what happened to Ingo, and nothing was
going to stop them from doing exactly that.
     There was still a sprinkling of law enforcement personnel
wandering around both inside and outside the store. A uniform was
writing something in a notebook. He gave the agents a look; they
flashed their badges. He shrugged and lifted the yellow crime
scene ribbon so they could duck under.  A sign on one of the
glass doors proclaimed the store closed. Scully and Mulder
ignored it. Inside, the store was dim and cool. Occasionally,
they saw a warm body moving about among the racks.
     "So where do we go?" Scully asked.
     "He worked in Men's Clothing. That's where we are." Mulder
replied, gesturing to a display of fancy polo shirts nearby.
"Let's find a register."
     They followed the tiled path as it forked to the left. From
far away, Scully heard a feminine squeal of delight. It almost
sounded like- She shook her head. There was no living with them.
     They came upon an island register fairly quickly. The
register, as a matter of fact. The taped outline of Ingo
Crenshaw's body was still on the brown carpet in front of it.
     "So where are all the witnesses?" Scully asked, looking
around. 
     Walsh's head popped up from behind a rack. "There you are."
she said cheerily. "We were afraid you'd gotten lost."
     "Nope. Sorry." Mulder replied. "Find anything?"
     "A half-off sale on neckties." Victoria held up one with a
daring tropical print.
     Mulder smiled, just a bit. "That might help your boyfriend,
but what does it do for the investigation?"
     "Not a darn thing. And who said anything about a boyfriend?"
Walsh came forward, a selection of ties slung over one forearm.
"I meant these for you." She held a green one with electric blue
squares to his throat for a moment. "Honestly, Mulder, after all
those wild tales I heard about you at the Academy, I was really
expecting something more innovative." She flicked his plain grey
tie disdainfully.
     She was about to test a purple one against his shirt when
someone cleared their throat. All turned. A grouchy middle-aged
man with his sleeves rolled up stood on the tile glaring at them.
     "If you aren't cops, they're are plenty here to arrest you."
     Scully flashed her badge and identified herself and her
partner.  "And that-" she said, inclining her head towards Walsh,
who scurried off to put the ties back where she'd gotten them
from. "is Agent Walsh."
     "Is the brunette with you too?" the man asked, nonplussed.
     Mulder nodded.
     "Well, when she comes back, tell her to stop fingering the
merchandise. Don't I have enough problems around here already?"
He pushed past Scully and began collecting papers from the
register.
     "You wouldn't happen to be Ken Marshall would you?" Mulder
asked.
     "The one and only." the manager grunted. 
     "You found Ingo's body?"
     "Yup."
     "Aren't you lucky." Walsh said drily. She had out a small
yellow pad and was busily scribbling away. One green eye glanced
at the outline on the carpet. "He toppled like a tree, didn't
he?"
     Marshall growled.
     "You'll have to excuse her, she's new." Scully said. "What
can you tell us about that day?"
     Marshal had finished with the papers. He bunched them up. "I
already told the cops everything there is to tell."
     "Humor us." Mulder said.
     "I came in at seven and found him dead right here."
     Mulder and Scully shared a look while Walsh kept writing.
     "And there were no signs of struggle or of forced entry?"
     Marshall tossed the ball of paper in the wastebasket. "No."
     "Was there anyone here Mr. Crenshaw didn't get along with?"
     "No."
     "Was he having any personal problems?"
     "No."
     "A regular Boy Scout." Walsh muttered.
     Her comment did not go unnoticed. Mr. Marshall snorted
through his nose and placed his hands on his hips. "Ingo was a
real good kid. He was popular with just about everyone, and he
never gave me any trouble."
     "I'm sure he was a great guy." Walsh protested, faithfully
scribbling. "But *something* odd must have happened to him
recently. Did he break up with his girlfriend? Was there an irate
customer in here?"
     The manager paused. "There was that one woman." he said
slowly.
     The federal agents moved in closer.
     "She came in the afternoon before Ingo died, trying to
return this shirt. She didn't have a receipt, and it was obvious
the thing had already been worn, so Ingo couldn't give her a
refund. She went ballistic, demanding to speak to someone in
charge. So I came out and tried to explain things to her, but she
wouldn't listen. I told her she couldn't get her money back, and
she throws the shirt down and points at Ingo. She screams
something in, like, Romanian, spits on the floor, and tells me
she cursed him. Then she just stomped out."
     Mulder's eyes started to glow. This was his area. "What did
the woman look like?"
     "Little; maybe five feet. Kinda chunky, with brown eyes and
long blonde hair. She was in her late twenties, I'd say." replied
Marshall.
     Meanwhile, unnoticed by anyone, Agent Hayes had been
steadily approaching. She had her arms folded behind her back,
and the expression on her face was quite serious. She stopped
beside Walsh and listened for a moment.
     "Look," Marshall laughed nervously. "You don't really think
Ingo died of a curse, do you?"
     "I have a *very* important question for you, sir." Dyna said
suddenly. Her professional tone of voice caught Mulder and
Scully's attention. Walsh looked skeptical.
     "Yes?"
   Dyna whipped out a cream colored slip dress. "Do you have this
in a size six?" 
     Mulder turned away in disgust; Scully threw up her hands.
Agent Walsh whacked her partner hard on the arm with her
notebook.
     "This is an interview, not a shopping trip!" she howled.
     "I know! That's why I'm asking this question. Do you have 
this in a six? I need to know."
     Needless to say, the interview collapsed soon after. The
agents thanked Marshall for his time, and wrangled him into an
appointment with a sketch artist to develop a picture of the
woman. Then they set off to search the store one last time. It
was a long shot, but there was the chance of an eleventh-hour
discovery of some key piece of evidence the police had missed.
     Scully, for one, was looking for a small, brightly-colored
frog.
     Mulder took off his black trench coat and lay it across the
register beside Scully's while he searched. Walsh set off on her
own, but Mulder abandoned his hope that she might be helpful when
he saw her examining a rack of shirts. Dyna had long since
vanished.
     "A curse, huh? That's one we haven't done before."
     Scully rose from her kneeling position, readying her flaming
Sword of Logic to cut his infant theory to ribbons. "Mulder,"
     "I know, Scully, I know." He swept aside some dress pants to
check beneath the rack. "There's no such thing as a curse."
     "Precisely." Scully sniffed congestion out of her nose.
"It's much more likely this woman is our serial killer."
     "The files on the other victims didn't say anything about an
irate blonde woman."
     Scully stooped to check under some shelves. "But they're all
in customer-service positions. A convenience store clerk, a
doctor's receptionist, and now a clothing salesman. She's
choosing her victims at random, Mulder. Whoever happens to annoy
her. The curse was probably just a moment of melodrama."
     Mulder hmmmmed, unconvinced. He had fully expected Scully to
dismiss the curse. That woman was so loyal to her scientific
explanations it almost made him jealous. But he also felt it a
foolish thing. They both had seen plenty of evidence that
witchcraft and sorcery were more than just herbs and belief. 
     They continued to search, occasionally trading comments
about the nature of the case. The odd police officer would pop up
from time to time to add his own idea. And while this went on,
someone else was performing a search of her own.
     When she noticed that Mulder had left his coat unattended,
Dyna was tempted. When her meandering eyes spotted the shiny
black wallet peeking enticingly out of the pocket she just
couldn't help herself.
     She crossed the floor in two quick strides and snatched up
the wallet. Dyna was pleased to discover his driver's license had
been inserted in the front pocket with the clear plastic window.
No rifling required. 
     Behind the register in an instant, Agent Hayes availed
herself of a pen and paper, upon which she copied Fox Mulder's
address and phone number. On a whim she took down the rest of the
information on the card. The paper was tucked inside her jacket,
the wallet replaced in his coat.
     "Back to shopping!" she giggled to herself.
     The search of the store turned up nothing new. Not a single
frog. Mulder pointed it out to Scully, saying it was one more
reason why she should take the curse more seriously. Scully said
it had probably gotten away, and ordered a search of the
ventilation system. The officer in charge said that such a search
would take all day, so Mulder and Scully would just have to wait
for a call, should anything turn up.
     Something else the agents were unable to locate was the
fourth member of their party.
     "Fan out." Walsh sighed. "She's probably in the shoes."
     As it turned out, she was in Misses', thumbing through the
racks with a bag hanging from her arm. Mulder suppressed a groan
when he saw her. 
     "We're leaving now." he said, grabbing her arm and pulling
her away.
     She reached out for the dress he had made her leave behind.
"No! Wait!"
     "Just because it's Dillard's doesn't mean you can shop. Come
on."
     Dyna was about to complain when she got another whiff of
that marvelous cologne. Her will melted, and she trailed after
him, patting the spot in her jacket where his phone number lay.

--


Chapter Two

     "So what's on the agenda for today, Mulder?" Scully asked
the next morning, when all were gathered in his office. Agents
Hayes and Walsh made quite a pair. They were sporting pantsuits
nearly identical to each other; Walsh's in black, Hayes's in navy
blue. Scully wondered if they'd called each other last night and
coordinated their outfits. 
     Mulder didn't look up from his book about curses as he
answered Dana. "The autopsy."
     "Naturally." Walsh said, sitting on a file cabinet and
swinging her feet in utter boredom. "But what will you do in the
meantime?"
     Mulder looked up at her, wondering if she seriously wanted
an answer. The question was so banal. He decided that she did;
she struck Mulder as a pretty straight-forward person. It would
have been refreshing had she not been such a pest.
     "We should go interview Crenshaw's family and friends."
     "Who's 'we'?"
     "Agent Scully and myself."
     "Uh-uh. Can't." Walsh said, shaking her head. "Scully has to
supervise the autopsy."
     Mulder glowered, irritated that Walsh had noticed the flaw
in his plan to get away from them. So far that morning, only one
woman had come up to him, and her advance was half-hearted at
best. But the two greenhorns were still clinging like kudzu vine.
     He sighed. Scully had to slice and dice; Walsh was supposed
to assist. That left Hayes to help him with the interviews. He
looked at her, standing out of the way in a corner, and saw the
jaws of her mind seize upon this idea. her eyes glittered, and
Mulder wished he were dead.
     But there was no way out of it. He sighed again. "We being
Agent Hayes and I." he said unenthusiastically. 
     Dyna grinned. Walsh threw her a jealous look before she
hopped off the cabinet. She turned to Agent Scully.
     "I'll race you to the autopsy room."
     Scully shook her head, blew her nose. "Not if you're wearing
shoes like you were yesterday."    
     Without being asked, Agent Walsh swung one foot up until it
almost touched the tip of Dana's nose. Scully went cross-eyed,
looking at the tread bottom of the black lace-up ankle boot.
     "Okay, so you can run. Don't ever stick your foot in my face
again." she said, pushing said foot down. Maddeningly, Walsh did
not lose her balance.
     "Sorry. But I'm afraid I'd have an advantage over you, shoe-
wise." Agent Walsh said, indicating the pumps that just matched
Scully's burgundy suit. "So I guess running's out of the
question."
     Scully shrugged. The girl was on her nerves already. "Mr.
Crenshaw is in no hurry."
     Scully rose from her seat. Mulder was about to throw himself
at her feet and beg her not to leave him alone with Dyna, but he
doubted it would do any good. Dyna was already at his side.
     "Are you ready to go?" she asked cheerily. "I've never been
on a witness interview before."
     "You don't say?" Mulder gathered up his papers and trudged
out of his office.
     Agent Hayes peppered Mulder with questions during the
elevator ride to the main floor. He got out, turning back to give
Scully a despairing look.
     She could only give him the open-handed gesture of
helplessness in return. "I'll call you if we find anything."
     His shoulder drooped visibly as he walked away, Dyna
bouncing along beside him like a puppy.
     When the elevator doors didn't close in the normal fashion,
Scully turned to Walsh. She was leaning her thumb on the "Doors
Open" button, staring after Mulder. Her face was a peculiar
mixture of longing and jealousy. 
     "The morgue's on the third floor." Scully said.
     "Huh? Oh, morgue!" Walsh hurriedly punched the number three
button. The doors closed and the car began to move upward.
     //Dyna has all the luck.// she thought sourly.

############## 

     "So how long have you been partners with Agent Scully?"
     Mulder glanced from the road to the most expectant face he'd
ever seen. All she needed was ears and a tail to wag.
     "Almost five years."
     "Five years? Isn't that unusually long for two agents to be
partnered?"
     "Yep. But no one else will have me."
     The slight grin he flashed was so stunning she momentarily
forgot to laugh.
     "That's not true." she said a beat too late, giggling
nervously.
     "You're new yet."
     The tiny conversation died a quick death, and silence
settled comfortably inside the rented car. Agent Hayes watched as
highway slipped by the windows. She kept pushing the two tendrils
she had deliberately pulled down from her bun behind her ears. It
was a nervous habit she'd had since she was very young.
     "Can I turn on the radio?" Dyna didn't wait for reply before
she stabbed at the "On" button.
     Mulder winced.
     The station was playing oldies. She had come in right in the
middle of a man's dreamy voice crooning; "Pardon the way that I
stare/ There's no one else to compare / The sight of you leaves
me weak / There are no words left to speak-"
     Dyna fumbled for the seek button, her finger attacking the
black plastic face of the radio. Mulder was staring by the time
she'd gotten the station to one that played rock.
     She grinned at him, feeling her face light up, a neon sign
of emotion. Dyna told herself she was very interested in the
scene outside her window, and glued her nose to it accordingly.
     Mulder said nothing. He hunkered down over the steering
wheel, casting nervous glances at his seat mate. He'd heard those
lyrics, alright. The tiger was waiting in the bushes, and had
stepped on a twig. He would be ready when she pounced.
     Dyna spent an interminable length of time thinking up a way
to chase away the tension in the air. None of the lines she could
conjure were right. Too brash, too shy, too rude, too formal. One
by one they presented themselves and were dismissed. She
despaired of ever getting him to talk to her again.
     Then her eye landed on a gaudy neon banner displayed in
front of a pet shop. "Tarantulas Are Here!", it cried in pink
letters three feet tall. The neck that had been scrunched into
Dyna's collar extended, her lips turned upward in a smile.
     Coco-colored eyes flicked to the driver. Emerald-colored
eyes looked back.
     //Dear me, he's a canary at a cat convention.//
     But that wouldn't stop her. The idea was too perfect to
allow it to die unimplemented.
     "Agent Mulder, have you ever been there?" she asked,
pointing out the driver's-side window.
     He turned to see she was pointing at a bowling alley that
had closed up over eight months ago. His brow furrowed deeply.
She didn't look like the bowling type.
     While his head was turned, Dyna's nimble fingers quietly
undid the buckle on her safety belt. Mulder never saw a thing.
     He turned back to ask her if she bowled-
     "EEEK! SPIDER!" she shrieked, leaping from the passenger's
seat, over the drink holder, nearly into Mulder's lap. She
wrapped her arms around his neck as the car swerved into the next
lane.
     "What the-" he cried, the expletive lost in her scream and
the blaring of horns.
     Wonderfully dexterous steering saved them from a collision.
Unscathed, the blue Ford Taurus came to a lurching stop in a
nearby grocery store parking lot.
     "What is it?" Mulder yelled.  Dyna hadn't stopped wailing.
     "We almost died! I saw my whole life flashing before my
eyes, it was horrible!" she cried. "Oh, right. There was a spider
on the dashboard! A *spider*! I hate spiders beyond all else!"
     "A spider?" Mulder yanked her grasping fingers from his neck
before she broke the skin. "You almost got us killed over a
spider?"
     "I fear spiders more than death!" Dyna pouted, her lower
quivering dangerously.
     Mulder gaped, leaning heavily back against the door where
Dyna's landing had pushed him. She fears spiders more than death,
and she's an FBI agent in the Violent Crimes division. What was
wrong with that picture?
     Even though her arms had been plucked off like grapes, Dyna
still huddled close to Mulder, ignoring the hard plastic drink
holder digging into her leg. She liked being so close to him. He
smelled good.
     "I hate spiders!" she repeated, her voice and body
trembling.
     Taking her repetition of her dislike for arachnids to be a
hint, he worked his hand behind his back towards the latch. He
pulled on it without thinking. The combined weight of himself and
Agent Hayes caused said door to fly open, and they toppled
partially out. Reflexively, Mulder grabbed her about the waist.
His seat belt, which was still fastened, saved them from going
any further than halfway down. Agents Hayes and Mulder wound up
on their sides, suspended in mid-air, nose to nose.
     Dyna took one look at the pair of eyes not inches from her
own and awkwardly scrambled out onto the pavement, on all fours.
She jumped up, trying to pretend nothing had happened. Mulder
straightened and disengaged his seat belt. His face was rather
red. 
     "I'm sorry!" Agent Hayes squeaked, tears welling up in her
eyes.
     "No... uh... problem." Mulder nervously stood and brushed
off his jacket, feeling terribly, terribly embarrassed. "I'll
find the spider." he mumbled, thankful to be able to hide behind
the car.
     Dyna stood on the pavement sniffling while Mulder kneeled on
the passenger's side and hunted for the non-existent arachnid. 
He was about to give up when he saw a twitch under the dashboard.
Hardly believing it, he withdrew a handkerchief from his breast
pocket and moved in close. 
     "Got'cha!"
     Agent Hayes started at the exclamation coming from the car.
Mulder stood up, handkerchief held out in front of him. He walked
over to her, a stupid grin on his face as if he'd accomplished
something important.
     "Look, there really was a spider." Without thinking he,
shoved the hanky under her nose. Dyna saw spindly, jerking legs
sticking out from the folds of white fabric.
     With a blood-curdling shriek, she backed up against the nose
of the vehicle. A quick boost, and she was curled up in a ball on
the hood.
     "Get away! Don't touch me! Leave me alone!" she screamed.
     All this noise attracted the attention of a young man in a
red apron, collecting stray shopping carts from the parking lot.
He strode over to Mulder and Hayes, a dark scowl on his face.
     "What's going on here?" he demanded of Mulder. "What are you
doing to that woman?"
     "Nothing!" Mulder glanced at the fellow's name tag. "Biff.
Nothing at all."
     "Nothing?" Biff repeated skeptically. "Then why is she on
the hood of your car, screaming to be left alone?"
     "Because she is." Mulder replied flatly. The spider still
jerked between his fingers.
     "Why you sick-" Biff started to rage.
     "Nothing! It's nothing!" Dyna cried, scrambling back onto
Terra Firma. "I'm on the hood of his car, screaming my lungs out
because of a speed!"
     "Speed" was her own self-coined term for a spider. She'd
invented it while still quite young, because of spiders'
disturbing ability to accelerate rapidly.
     But as Biff and Mulder knew nothing of the term's origins,
they stared at her blankly and she realized her mistake.
     "I mean, a spider!" 
     Biff's hands were still clenched into fists. He glared at
Mulder, and Dyna decided it was up to her to save his life. And
in one long breath, Dyna began to tell the bag boy the story
about the spider under the dashboard that had been hungrily
licking it's chops for a taste of her tender, maiden flesh. 
     "Then this heroic young man," Dyna slipped up under Mulder's
left arm and patted his sternum. "Saved me from the horrible
creature! He should be commended! The end, let's go!" She began
hauling Mulder back towards the vehicles.
     Biff was unconvinced, but there was little he could do. 
     "If you say so." He wandered away, tugging a cart behind
him.
     Mulder let out a deep sigh.
     "You could say thank you." Agent Hayes mumbled.
     Mulder turned to her, his brows knitted tightly together.
"Why should I? You almost got me beaten up! Maybe arrested."
     "It wasn't my fault!" Dyna protested. "It was the spider's!
If you hadn't shoved him in my eye, this wouldn't have happened!
You should have thrown him away, or stepped on him, or backed
over him! Anything!"
     Mulder rolled his eyes contemptuously. "Just get back in the
car." he barked. While Agent Hayes obeyed, he made his way to
some landscaping and shook out the handkerchief. The spider
staggered away onto a dandelion.
     "I am in hell." Mulder said to himself on the way back to
the car.

##############


     Leading Agent Walsh to the morgue was a little like walking
a Great Dane. The girl was all legs and arms, galloping along one
step behind. Getting run-over seemed to Scully a very real
possibility, even though it was obvious to her that the taller
woman was shortening her strides to allow Scully to lead the way.
Walsh's footfalls echoed loudly in the silent, sterile halls. The
occasional head popped up in a door to look, then sank back down
again when the intruder was identified.
     "So you've been partners with Agent Mulder for four years?"
the beanpole asked, trying for the fifth time to start a
conversation.
     "Yes." Scully replied. 
     Walsh frowned. "But isn't that the time when the higher-ups
to start looking at reassignment?"
     Scully paused in the doorway of the linen room. She couldn't
imagine working with anyone else. The very idea made the lowest
part of her throat ache. She and Mulder were perfectly suited; no
one else would ever share that kind of rapport with her again.
      But separation was inevitable.
     A sudden sneeze drove away the lump in her throat. Scully
blinked. The sentimentality could wait. She began looking through
the neat stacks of fabric, arranged first by garment, then by
size.
     She paused over a pair of pants. "What size are you?"
     Agent Walsh had been leaning against the wall outside. The
abrupt subject change stood her upright and widened her eyes
behind her glasses. "Pardon?"
     "Size. As in clothing."
     "Why?"
     Unseen by Agent Walsh, Scully rolled her eyes. "For your
surgical scrubs."
     "Oh! Size eight, or a small."
     After some shuffling, Dana exited with an armload of perky
blue cloth. She handed half the pile to the Agent Walsh before 
leading the way to the locker room so they could change. They
sealed their clothing the small metal lockers provided expressly
for that purpose. Scully once again led the way; Agent Walsh
continued to pester her with questions, mostly about Mulder.
     //This day can't get any worse,// Scully thought, tempting
Fate.
     It called her on the carpet. No sooner had the words floated
silently through her mind, who should round the corner ahead but
a short, red-haired man in a white lab coat.
     "Hi!" Agent Pendrell called, buzzing right over to them.
     The hallway was completely bare. There was nothing to duck
behind, not a trash can, not an extra room. Scully mentally
cursed the government's spartan decorating style before affixing
a fairly pleasant expression on her face.
     "Hello, Agent Pendrell." she said, hoping she sounded
happier than she felt.
     "What are you up to?" he asked.
     Standing just behind Scully, Agent Walsh went completely
unnoticed. Rather unusual, considering that even without her
shoes was still a full head taller than Scully. But the mystery
soon resolved itself. One look at the carrot-topped fellow made a
tiny grin break out upon her painted lips. 
     //It is the east, and Scully is the sun.//  Walsh thought.
//How darling. That is, it would be darling if she was more
friendly.//
     "We're just on our way to an autopsy." Scully said, taking a
step in that direction.
     "We?" Pendrell at last took his eyes off Scully, noticing
the giant behind her. He jumped, then stuck out his hand
nervously. "Oh! I'm sorry! Agent Chris Pendrell." 
     "Agent Victoria Walsh." she said, leaning down to take his
hand. She felt like a mother meeting her daughter's boyfriend for
the first time, and had the facial expression of exactly that.
     Pendrell picked up on it. He drew back, fidgeting
uncomfortably. As much as he liked Scully, he didn't want people
to know. Mulder finding out was an accident he regretted to this
day. It could get back to her, and that would ruin *everything.*
     "Well, I'll let you go now. I didn't mean to keep you from
important business. Nice to see you again, Scully."
     Walsh found that she could hear his heart going pitter-
patter as he said Scully's name. It only made her smile more
broadly.
     "No problem. See you later, Pendrell." Scully said, setting
off down the hall at a brisk clip.
     Walsh watched her new partner's admirer skip off in the
opposite direction. "I Could Have Danced All Night" would have
been the perfect background music.
     She resisted the urge to coo. She had a soft spot in her
heart for guys whose faces went all cuddly at the mere mention of
a girl's name. There simply wasn't enough of that type in the
world, in her opinion. When one came along and set his sights on
you, one simply didn't let him get away.
     However, Scully apparently didn't know this. So Walsh
strapped on her Cupid wings and took it upon herself to tell
Scully what it was she was missing.
     "He was cute." Walsh said once she had caught up with
Scully.
     "Who? *Pendrell*?"
     "Sure. Why not?"
     Scully found herself lacking a suitable response. There was
nothing wrong with Chris, per se. He was a really great guy, or
seemed to be. But ever since a certain loose-lipped partner had
let it slip that Pendrell had a crush on her, Scully had been
going out of her way to avoid him.
     It wasn't because she *dis*liked Pendrell. It was because
she didn't like him enough, and was afraid of leading him on. At
least that's what she told herself.
     Agent Walsh smirked at Scully's aghast expression. "Good
answer."
     Dana glared mildly. "I was thinking."
     "If you have to think about someone like that, there's
something wrong." 
     "Here's the autopsy room." Scully said too loudly, pushing
open the door. She now liked Walsh even less. Not only was she
ditzy, rude, and loud, she was one of those insufferable people
who discussed the personal lives of those they hardly knew.
     Everything in the autopsy room was spotlessly neat. The
supplies in the glass fronted cabinets were straight as soldiers.
There was already a table set up under the napping spotlights, an
instrument tray waiting.
     "Hmm. Very clean." Walsh commented, flipping on the lights.
"So where's the stiff?"
     Dana winced at Walsh's use of slang. "The body is still in
storage. I have to go get it."
     "Aren't you going to let the diener do that?"
     Scully pretended she hadn't heard her. "Please set-up for
the procedure." she said, gathering her red hair back into a
ponytail. Once her hair was secured, she extracted a paper bonnet
wrapped in cellophane from a drawer and donned it. A pair of
latex gloves from one the cabinets followed.
     "I'll be back." 
     The peace of the hall was a welcome change. As she walked,
Dana tried to remember if she had been anything like Walsh when
she had been a rookie. Or if she'd known anyone like Walsh. She
couldn't say that she had. Dana had kept to herself, she hadn't
mentioned anything personal until she felt comfortable with the
other person.
     Yesterday's fiasco in the car notwithstanding, that was the
rub. Walsh and her partner were too forward, too eye-poppingly
bright. FBI agents were supposed to be subdued, both in manner
and in dress. Walsh flouted this convention; Scully never did.
Walsh was her opposite.
     Dana felt better after she identified this. Now she knew how
to deal with Walsh.
     //I just wish I didn't have to.//
     Oh, well. It was only for a short time. Then the Towering
Twosome would be assigned to someone else, and she and Mulder
could resume their quiet pursuit of the truth.
     Scully paused. When had she come to think of it as it her
pursuit?
     She brushed it aside. There wasn't time to think about it
now.
     The diener on shift at the freezer was reading a fishing
magazine when Scully came in. He put it down with a sigh and
rose.
     "Who do you need?"
     Scully told him, and he shuffled off to the freezer room.
Dana didn't follow. She knew she wouldn't be needed. This man was
over six feet tall and sturdy. He'd also been employed by the FBI
HQ for many years, so she knew him to be experienced. Experienced
dieners, even those of slight build, could transfer even obese
bodies from the gurney to the table without help. Since the
comfort of the patient was no longer a consideration, the
transfer was accomplished with what appeared to the uninitiated a
rather brutal combination of pulls and shoves, not unlike the way
a thug might manhandle a mugging victim.
     Dieners were pretty much left alone by management and
enjoyed a much greater degree of autonomy than most workers at
their grade. The theory behind this that circulated among other
divisions was that management didn't know what went on in the
morgue, and didn't care to mess around with it's staffing come
belt-tightening time. Dana's own impression of the "diener
personality" was that they were somewhat secretive, and she
suspected that they had a lot more going on in their lives than
they tended to let on. It was not uncommon for them to receive a
variety of strange visitors in the morgue, some of whom had a
less-than-savory appearance. 
     He wheeled out the veiled cadaver. "Which room?" he asked
     Scully signed the necessary paperwork. "Number four. Just
down the hall."
     Scully and the diener returned only to discover Agent Walsh
making shadow puppets on the wall, using a pen light clenched
between her teeth for illumination. Scully stabbed the overhead
lights on. Walsh swung sharply around, and the beam from the
penlight hit Dana squarely in the eyes. 
     Walsh spit the light out when Scully groaned. It clattered
nosily across the tile. "Sorry. Got bored."
     "You must have been loads of fun at Quantico." Scully
groused, and motioned for the diener to push the gurney parallel
to the autopsy table. It was a waist-high aluminum fixture,
plumbed for running water with several faucets and spigots.
Basically a slanted tray with raised edges to facilitate neatness
and clean-up.
     Walsh completely glossed over Scully's irritated tone,
chattering on as she slipped her own hair beneath a paper bonnet.
"Oh, I was. Of course, Agent Marcase did get a little mad at me
when I'd yell; 'Whee!' after hitting the target."
     A look of amazement crossed Scully's face. Agent Marcase had
been her firing range instructor, and more than lived up to his
reputation for breaking new recruits. Dana had loathed every
moment under his tutelage.
     "You yelled 'whee'? In Marcase's class?" 
     Walsh nodded, the picture of innocence.
     "How did you keep from getting kicked out?"
     Victoria thought about it for a moment. "I always made sure
to hit the target."
     Scully's mouth fell open.
     "He's done." Walsh pointed to the autopsy table. The diener
had transferred the body onto the table, tucking in the flopping
limbs. He then placed a rubber, brick-like appliance, a "body
block", under the patient's back to cause the chest to protrude
outward and the arms and neck to fall back, thus allowing maximum
exposure of the trunk for the incisions.
He tersely saluted Scully on his way to the exit.
     "Thank you." Walsh called after him. She set out the tools
on the tray while Scully put on her mask and goggles, and once
was herself properly gloved, read the toe tag to verify they were
working on the right body.
     "Crenshaw, Ingo Q." she said. "I wonder what the Q. stands
for."
     Dana was impressed by how precise the rows of tools were
They looked like teeth glittering in the light.
     "Is the tape recorder on?" Scully asked.
     Walsh depressed the "record" button. "It is now."
     Scully nodded and pulled the swing-arm lamp hanging over the
table closer to the body. The "On" light of the video camera
attached to it blinked red. 
     "Examination and autopsy of Crenshaw, Ingo Q. Case number 
EL-352602. Special Agents Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Dyna Hayes and
Victoria Walsh field investigators." she said, and pulled the
white sheet off the body.
     Walsh colored all the way to her hairline. She turned away,
putting a hand up to shield her eyes.
     "Oh, my. What a strapping young man he was."
     Scully glared at the woman. She began to speak, then thought
better of it and reached over to stop the recorder.
     "What's the problem? You act like you've never done this
before."
     Walsh didn't lower her hand. "Sorry. I have this thing about
naked people."
     "You'll have to get over it. And please don't say anything
non-medical while we're taping." Scully said, reactivating the
recorder.
     Walsh continued to blush, and devoted an extraordinary
amount of time to examining Ingo's fingernails.
     "Body is that of a white male, thirty-one years old.
Weighing 175 pounds, seventy five inches in length." Scully
reported.
     The outside of the body showed no marks indicative of
struggle or injury. It was very odd. As though this healthy,
young man had simply stopped in his tracks and died. Scully noted
the lack of external evidence.
     "Moving on to internal examination. Agent Walsh will make
the preliminary torso cut."
     With that, Walsh took a scalpel and made the standard Y-
shaped incision in the trunk. The arms of the Y extended from the
front of each shoulder to the bottom end of the breast bone,
called the xiphoid process of the sternum. The tail of the Y made
it's way from the xiphoid process to the pubic bone, taking a
slight detour to avoid the navel. It was very deep, extending to
the rib cage on the chest, and completely through the abdominal
wall below that.
     With the Y incision made, the next task was to peel the
skin, muscle, and soft tissues off the chest wall. This was done
with a scalpel. When complete, the chest flap was pulled upward
over the patient's face, and the front of the rib cage and the
strap muscles of the front of the neck lay exposed. 
     Walsh sniffed. In her opinion, human muscle smelled not
unlike raw lamb meat. But at this point of the autopsy, the odor
was otherwise very faint.
     Agent Scully then wielded what looked like a heavy pair of 
curved pruning shears to open the rib cage. She made one cut
up each side of the front of the rib cage, so that the chest
plate, consisting of the sternum and the ribs which connect to
it, was no longer attached to the rest of the skeleton. The
recorder picked up the sickly wet crack of bone splitting,
     "Entering chest cavity." Scully said, for the benefit of the
recording device. She pulled back and peeled off the chest plate 
with a little help from the scalpel, which she used to dissect
the adherent soft tissues stuck to the back of the chest
plate.
     After the chest plate was removed, the organs of Ingo
Crenshaw's torso lay exposed.
     "Well, now we know what killed him." Agent Walsh's voice is
calm on the tape.
     Scully's voice is disbelieving, and a little irritated. The
latter most likely because of Walsh's chatter. "The victim's
heart seems to have been completely desiccated." 
     Among the soft, wet tissues of his other organs, lay a dried
up little thing encased in a milky white membrane. The heart, and
what was left of the pericardial sac that normally surrounded it.
     "It looks like a big prune." Walsh said for clarification.
     Scully glared at her. "I'm going to try to remove it.
Scalpel." 
     And after that, the recorder also picked up the sound of
twin gasps. When the cold metal tip of the scalpel brushed the
dried-up heart, it crumbled into fine, maroon dust.

--


Chapter Three

     "It crumbled? In his chest?"
     "Uh-huh." Agent Walsh cut off Scully. "The second she
touched it, the muscle disintegrated."
     Mulder noticed the floor around the autopsy table was rather
generously spotted with blood, which Walsh was now busily mopping
up as per Scully's orders. She'd already taken care of that
dripping from the hanging meat scales used to weigh the organs,
as well as the smeared chalkboard and chalk on which they had
written organ weights.
     Dyna was huddled in the far corner of the room, fanning
herself vigorously. Her face was ashen, her lips compressed into
a thin line. The sights, the *smells*! Oh, it was ghastly! Why
did they have to talk in here, of all places? She was going to be
sick any moment.
     "And even after that, Agent Scully insisted on a full
dissection." Walsh continued tartly. She was stinging from being
made to do the mopping. She was a pathologist's assistant! Not
some maid! She was supposed to finish up the dictation and notes,
not mop the floor. She was also betting Scully would make her do
the report. No, that was where the glory lay. Scully would that
herself.
     "And she made me run the gut!" Walsh snapped.
     Dyna groaned miserably and leaned more heavily against the
wall, her hand over her mouth.
     "Run the gut?" Mulder looked puzzled.
     "The opening of the intestines for examination." Scully said
in her usual scientific vocabulary. She was smirking. It had been
the perfect revenge.
     Mulder grimaced. As he could well imagine, it was an
extremely malodorous task. What he didn't know was that it was
usually the task of the more experienced party. But Scully  had
intimidated Walsh into doing this ever-hated chore.
     "And let me tell you, she has a steely glare of disdain like
no other!" Walsh cried, shoving the bucket of red water over to
an errant spot of blood. She swished away with two swipes of the
mop.
     "We sent extra samples of the heart to the lab for analysis,
along with the usual microscopic slides." said Scully.
     "Which I also had to do." Walsh grumbled, pouring the water
from her mop bucket down a nearby sink. "I'm qualified to be a
prosector. I'm not supposed to mop up like some diener."
     The sound of man clearing his throat brought a flush to her
cheeks. She didn't have to turn around to know a diener was
standing in the doorway.
     "You wouldn't have had to, if you'd waited."
     The same diener who had brought in the body crossed over to
the autopsy table. He lifted the bloody sheet.
     "Well, at least you didn't rinse off the body before I got
here." he said.
     "Sorry." Walsh mumbled, unsure what she was apologizing for.
She scuffed her feet nervously. This action tore open one of the
paper booties she had on over her shoes to protect the latter
from any mess on the floor.
     The man grunted as he removed the sheet from Ingo's body.
Off in her corner, Dyna's knees started to give. She'd never seen
an autopsied body before, outside of the television. And in
there, nothing that didn't need to be seen remained shrouded.
Here, it was all out in the open. The Y incision that had been
cut in the chest was stitched closed, baseball-like, with a thick
twine. It was quite obvious the organs had not been put back
inside, and that the chest plate was not firmly reattached to the
ribs. The whole trunk appeared collapsed, like a rotten spot in
an apple. The diener began to matter of factly rinse the body off
with a hose and sponge. The water ran off it tinted pink.
     Dyna fled, her eyes tearing copiously.
     Mulder jumped out of her way. He got a sudden whiff of...
something, and he felt the same urge as Hayes. "Maybe we should
talk in the hall."
     Scully followed him right then, Walsh took time to strip out
of her paper and latex garb. She walked right into the middle of
a quiet argument.
     "... no idea, but it's no curse!" Scully was saying. She
stopped abruptly. Walsh did not let that stop her.
     "Of course it's a curse. What in nature could cause a heart
to dry up that way?"
     "Obviously the coroner was sloppy putting the body into
storage." Scully snapped.
     "And only the heart suffered for it?" Mulder looked
skeptical.
     "There is a sensible explanation for it." Scully insisted
stubbornly. "And I'm sure microscopic examination of the
desiccated tissue will reveal some clues as to what that
explanation is. I have to go change."
     Walsh leaned close to Mulder as his partner stalked off
towards the locker room. "I believe you, Mulder." Funny. he
didn't smell as good as he had the day before.
     "Are you hungry?" she asked. "I'm starving."
     
##########

     "Do we all have plans for tonight?" Agent Walsh asked,
sliding into her topcoat.
     "Television." Scully answered. She sneezed hard, adding;
"And chicken soup."
     "Nothing." Dyna put in. She was still feeling bad from that
horrible sight in the autopsy room. Just the mention of food made
her stomach roll over. 
     Three sets of eyes turned to Mulder, the real addressee of
the question.
     He looked up from his file slowly. "Pardon?" His tone was
anything but enthusiastic.
     "They want to know what you're up to tonight." Scully pulled
the file from under his fingers, placing it in the cabinet.
     "Knicks."
     Dyna was taken aback. "What?"
     "He means basketball. The New York Knicks. Am I right?"
     Mulder nodded at Walsh, readying himself to refuse any
possible request the girls' might come up with.
     "Have fun." Walsh said, heading for the door of Mulder's
office.
     "Yes, do. Both of you." Dyna added as she followed.
     Mulder was convinced his heart would stop.
     Scully blew her nose for the umpteenth time that day. "Why
so surprised, Mulder? Did you think they were going to surgically
attach themselves to you?"
     Fox narrowed his eyes at her. "You don't want to know."
     Down the hall, safely inside the elevator, Walsh pouted
miserably. "Shame it's too late to get tickets to the Knicks."
     "I don't want to see a silly old basketball game anyway."
     Her tone was too smug, too breezy. Walsh's head swung
towards her, brows raised. "What do you know?"
     Dyna pulled the piece of paper from her jacket with a
flourish.

##############

     "Which one is it?"
     "Forty-two."
     "Are you sure?"
     "Of course I'm sure! I only stole it off his driver's
license!"
     "Why did you do that, anyway?"
     "He wouldn't have given it to me willingly. We haven't
exactly ingratiated ourselves."
     "They deserved it. They were mean."
     "True." agreed Dyna. "But I do think the 'my side your side'
thing was a little over the top."
     "Here we are." Victoria said. In the dark hall outside the
apartment, two girls looked at each other for a moment, digesting
what Dyna had done, and what they were seemingly about to do. It
would mean their badges, and possibly their freedom. It was
immoral to boot.
     From her purse, Victoria's surgical-gloved fingers withdrew
a credit card and went to work on the lock. The door to apartment
forty-two swung open.
     "This is breaking and entering. This is illegal. We're gonna
get arrested." she sang as she ducked inside.
     Dyna shut the door with her own gloved hands - They were
stupid, but not that stupid. - and leaned against it for good
measure. "What are we looking for?"
     "Nothing." Victoria chirped, moving out into the clutter.
"Just seeing what makes him tick."
     Dyna paused. They had just committed a class one
misdemeanor, proceeded by a felony, to see what made a guy they
had just met "tick". 
     She looked at the coat stand with pool balls attached to the
ends of the arms and knew instantly she had made a horrible
mistake.
     "I think we should leave."
     Victoria tossed her jacket over the back of the couch. "It's
a little late for that now. Oh, look! Fishies! He's not a total
loss."
     Dyna made a fretting noise. "If we go right now, no one will
know we were here."
     Agent Walsh wasn't listening. Having cooed over the fish for
a moment, she was busy surveying the cramped space Agent Mulder
apparently called home. It was obvious he had it confused with a
storage area.
     "This must be the place where clothes come to die." Vicky
said, nudging an old t-shirt with the toe of her boot. The floor
was littered with clothing. He slept on the futon, judging by the
awful late-seventies pattern on the afghan.
     Typical man. 
     Victoria mumbled something about the medicine cabinet and
went off to find the bathroom.
     Dyna's overwhelming curiosity soon squashed any qualms she
had about going through the place. Looking at all the clutter was
unbearable. Dirty clothes, dust, old, frayed magazines all over
the place. The kitchen was the worst. Dishes, crusted with old
food, piled knee-deep on the sink. Crumpled napkins poking up
here and there like ugly white flowers. He'd even left his
cologne on the table, for Heaven's sake! Why men were such slobs
was beyond her comprehension.
     But, as long as she was there, she might as well do the man
a favor. Feeling just like a Popple, Agent Hayes rolled up her
sleeves and indulged in one of her favorite past-times: cleaning.
     "'Temptation for Men'" Dyna read. Her face twisted into a
sour looking knot. "Why would he want *this*?"
     She unceremoniously dumped it and it's box on top of the
overflowing trash can, then went to work in earnest. To her mind
it was a win-win situation. He got an apartment that was clean,
germ-free, and in perfect order, and she got to see, up-close,
every item he owned.
     "EEEACK!"
     Dyna, moving dishes from the sink to the dishwasher, jumped
sky-high. Victoria came stampeding into the kitchen, her chest
heaving.
     "There is something in the shower!" she gasped. "And it just
*waved* at me!"
     Dyna's eyes bulged. "What do you want me to do about it?"
     "Find me a flyswatter for one thing!" Victoria said
irritably. She paused, stabbing a finger at the open dishwasher.
"What is that?"
     "A dishwasher."
     If it was possible, Victoria became even more irritated.
"Naw, I though it was a boat. I mean, what are you doing with
it?"
     "Putting the dirty dishes inside to wash."
     "Why?"
     "Because they're *dirty*."
     "Dyna!" Victoria exclaimed. "No one's supposed to know we've
been here! Don't you think clean dishes will be something of a
giveaway?"
     Dyna hated to admit that her friend had a point. She liked
to think of herself as always right. But she hated squalor even
more. "I'm doing him a favor. Besides, he'll never know it was
me."
     Victoria snatched a frosting-encrusted plate out of Dyna's
hands and replaced it on the counter top from whence it came. "Of
course he'll know. He's an FBI agent. When he comes home to find
his place rearranged, he'll call his buddies to come search the
place and BOOM, we're in jail!"
     Dyna's lower lip jutted out. "But it's so nasty in here!"
     "When you marry him, you can disinfect to your heart's
content. Now put the dishes down, and help me get that whatever-
it-is in the shower."

##############

     Dyna's "help" was to simply watch while Victoria duked it
out with the odd-looking critter. Victoria won. Afterwards, they
fanned out into the apartment again, Dyna opting to stay in the
living room.
     "There's no bedroom." Victoria boomed. "Where does he keep
his clothes?"
     "Maybe he has a box."
     "A box? You can't put suits in a box."
     "Are you sure you've tried all the doors? There could be a
closet somewhere."
     Victoria looked dubiously around the small efficiency
apartment. She didn't think she had missed any doors.
     "Try that." Dyna suggested. She was pointing at a small
chest of drawers they had first assumed to be clerical in nature.
Victoria shrugged and opened the bottom drawer. The layer of
rubber shielding her fingers from any nasty encounters made her a
little bolder about looking for evidence of aberration. 
     Dyna was right; it was indeed full of clothing. But what
about his suits? He couldn't fold them up in there. It only had
four drawers.
     //Just T-shirts in this one,// she thought, rifling through
them as though they were a stack of paper. The man was fond of
sports.
     //Oh well, no one's perfect.//
     Jeans here. Socks up there; some ties. And.. //Oh, my!//
Victoria snatched her hand away and slammed the underwear drawer
shut. That much about him she didn't want to know.
     But the lack of a closet was eating her up.
     She moved back into the bathroom and headed outward, looking
for any doors she may have missed. There was one in the kitchen,
but that was a broom closet, she was certain. She opened it
anyway.
     The tiny alcove was full of dress shirts, suits, and a
couple of trench coats. A stack of boxes went from the floor to
her waist. Another box had been mashed into the small upper
shelf. Vicky opted to start at eye level, rifling through the
hanging clothes. The fine fabric pushed her label-checking
button.
     "Hugo Boss?" She held the jacket away from herself,
examining it. "How can he afford such nice clothes on an agent's
salary?"
     That question would have to become the newest X-File. She
couldn't begin to think how - Unless the man didn't eat, which
was entirely possible. - and she didn't yet know him well enough
to ask.
     Mulder's shoes, both casual and dress, were piled up on top
of the boxes. Most of the shoes were strictly bargain-basement,
save for one pair of Hush Puppies. The cardboard box directly
under them held his winter clothes, the one on the top shelf some
long-forgotten sports equipment.
     "So far, so good." she said. "Nice, boring fellah."
     At least, that's what she thought until she got to the final
layers. The dust bunnies were of no concern. She had larger ones
at her house. No, it was the three, flat Rubbermaid containers
piled one on top of the other which cast a very bad light upon
Mr. Fox.
     Victoria hauled the uppermost one out and popped the lid. It
was full of magazines. The cover of the one right on top bore a
picture of George Burns with a very young Vanessa Williams at his
side. 
     Right beneath the title; "Penthouse"
     "Oh, no!" Victoria cried, feeling her heart sink to her
knees. It had to be a mistake, it simply *had* to be!
     She looked at the title of the second magazine. "Penthouse".
Then six issues of "Playboy", five "Hustlers", about seven with a
name that was just too lewd for description, and she was back to
"Penthouse" again.
     "This is terrible!" Her eyes felt hot and scratchy. "He
seemed so nice!"
     Unable to stop herself, Victoria went through the other two
containers as well. Full to the brims, they were, of every
girlie-magazine ever put to press. It was revolting.
     "Oh, this one's been dog-eared!" she exclaimed, dropping the
magazine like a hot pan of lasagna.
     Meanwhile, back by the "bed", Dyna had been acquainting
herself with Mulder's musical tastes. In her opinion, the poor
man needed therapy.
     She put the Meatloaf CD back on it's pile and moved to the
TV cabinet. It was as full as everything else in that place. //We
have to do something about this pack-rat complex of his.// The
tapes were arranged on end, two high and three deep. The front
row consisted of home-recorded tapes, mostly of wrestling
matches, and a couple of Stallone movies. Dyna took them all out,
piling them in neat stacks beside her.
     The second layer was all purchased movies, none of which
Dyna found to her liking. Popular media called them "Testosterone
Fests". Victoria had her own moniker, that wasn't very nice.
The nickname for "Richard", used in the slang sense, and "Flick".
Each one Mulder owned starred Lorenzo Lamas, Stallone, or Ahh-
nold.
     "Ick." Dyna dismissed them with a word, constructing another
neat pile.
     She reached in for the third layer without looking. Her
fingers closed firmly around a tape. She guessed this too was a
store-bought one, by the slick feel of the box.
     Dyna dropped the tape with a shriek the moment she saw the
title. She sat there staring at it for several moments, her brain
knocked all out of gear. She remembered where she'd seen that
movie before. At one of her friend's houses when she was in
junior high; part of a huge, ignominious collection. The girl
hadn't been her friend for very long after that day.
     "'Amazon Girls A Go-Go'?" Dyna had to say the title out loud
to make herself believe that was really what was written on the
box. Her hand fluttered over her heart. "Oh, no!"
     Maybe it was just a fluke. Maybe that wasn't what was really
in the box. It happened. Victoria's Mom had once bought "Sleeping
Beauty", only to get home and discover the tape within was really
"Mad Max". Dyna pulled this tape out, praying this tape was the
victim of such switching. No such luck.
     "Okay, so he's got *one*. I suppose there are a lot of
people who have *one* of these movies lying around... Oh, whom I
kidding?" Dyna ducked her head to peer into the video cabinet
beneath the TV.
     "Princess Cotton Candy". "Debbie Does Dallas". "Tarzan and
Jane: Unleashed". "Pirates of the Caribbean" - obviously *not* a
Disney production. "Desert Fire". "Clan of the Cave Harlot". "The
Fairy Queen".
     Dyna could read no more. The entire third layer, more than
two dozen cassettes, was nothing but girlie-movies! Over-watched
girlie-movies, judging by the tattered condition of the boxes.
     "Vicky!" Dyna shrieked, leaping to her feet. "Come look!"
     "Oh, no! What did *you* find?" Victoria asked as she hurried
in.
     "What did I find? What did you find?"
     "I asked you first."
     Bursting with the need to tell someone, Dyna stabbed her
index finger at the open video cabinet. "In there!" she cried.
"It's horrible!"
     "What is- 'Little Red Riding *Hooker*'?! Oh my God!"
Victoria jumped back from the TV so fast that she kicked over
most of Dyna's stacks. For once, Dyna didn't care. 
     "See! He's *weird*!" Dyna exclaimed.
     Victoria chewed on her lower lip. "Maybe he's... keeping
them for someone else?"
     Agent Hayes set her hands on her hips. "Even if that were
true, he still shouldn't be! That's sick!"
     "Oh, no!" Victoria grabbed Dyna's arm to haul her to the
closet. "You haven't seen sick until you've seen this."
     Dyna gasped and covered her eyes at the sight of the
magazines. "My corneas are bleeding!"
     "Mine should be." Victoria grumbled. "I'm aghast that he
could keep this smut in his house. It's not normal!"
     "It's debauched!"
     "We've got to do something."
     Dyna's hands dropped from her face. "Do something? Like
what? Throw them all out?"
     Victoria smirked.
     "Weren't you the one who was just telling me not to touch
anything, so he wouldn't know we were here?"
     Victoria shrugged. "That was different. We're protecting his
moral character."
     "Like he's got any left." Dyna mumbled.
     "That may be, but we still have to try. Now help me."
Victoria stopped and began gathering the magazines into a single
container. Then they went to collect the videos. One stop at the
garbage chute down the hall, and it was all over.
     Back in the apartment, Victoria was going through her
wallet. "Just so I don't feel bad, I'm going to leave some money.
After all, that was his property we just destroyed."
     Dyna shook her head in disgust. "So what if it was? Anyone
with that kind of 'property' has a serious problem."
     "Just humor me, would you?" Victoria placed a wad of bills
on the kitchen table. "We should get out of here." she said. "Did
we get all the normal videos put back the right way?"
     Dyna inspected the living room. "I think so. No, wait, we
missed one."
     The tape had slid partially under the futon when Victoria
kicked over it's stack. Dyna pulled it free, noticing a small
piece of paper that came skittering out along with it. She
replaced the video in it's rightful place, and picked up the
paper.
     Her gasp was herd through the entire apartment.
     "Now what did you find?" Victoria threw on her jacket and
joined her friend.
     "This." Dyna waved the paper in the air. "Read it."
     Victoria did so, while Dyna hurried into the kitchen. She
was after that bottle she had pitched.
     "'Congratulations, you have just purchased the most special
cologne on the market today. "Temptation for Men" is a unique
blend of smoky plant extracts, sensual musk, plus the finest,
most potent human pheremones available-'"
     Victoria looked up as Dyna returned, clutching something in
her hand. "Pheremones? You must be kidding."
     "That isn't all." Dyna said. "*Smell* this."
     Looking dubiously at the bottle shoved under her nose,
Victoria complied. Behind her glasses, her eyes expanded to the
size of teacups in a single second.
     "That smells just like Mulder!" she exclaimed. "He actually
wears the stuff? He's even sicker than we thought!"
     Dyna shook her head, dark curls bouncing. "No, no, no! Think
about it! He's wearing pheromone cologne, and we're falling all
over him. So is every...other...woman...he...meets. You weren't
with us when we left. Getting to the garage today was murder!"
     Vicky's eyes grew wider still. "You mean it actually works?"
     Dyna nodded, slowly.
     "Where do you think he got it?"
     Agent Hayes went back to the kitchen, rooting through the
trash for the white box she had also taken the liberty of
trashing. The price sticker on the bottom was intact, the dollar
amount lined through in black ink. It was easy to see the cologne
had been a gift, raising their opinion of Fox Mulder a short way
out of the hole it had fallen into.
     "Barney's." Dyna said out loud. She glanced first at her
partner, knowing instinctively what she was thinking. Then she
checked the clock on the VCR. Ten-thirty. "They're open until
midnight."
     The pair grabbed their things and stampeded out of the
apartment, barely remembering to close the door behind them.

--

Chapter Four

     "Did the Knicks - achoo! - lose?" Scully asked Mulder the
next morning.
     From the chair behind his desk, Mulder gave his partner a
surly look. "Bless you. No."
     "Then why do look so - *snuck* - depressed?"
     "Oh!" Dyna Hayes' wordless exclamation short-circuited the
conversation. She dug inside the tiny purse hanging from the door
knob, and brought out a yellow and white box. She rose and placed
it firmly in Scully's hand.
     "Here. Take this. *Please*." Hayes said.
     Scully looked at the cold medicine and snucked again. Walsh
handed Dana her cup of coffee.
     "I guess this means I'm overruled." said Scully. She knocked
back two pills with a thank you.
     "So why are you depressed?" Scully asked, returning to her
previous line of questioning.
     "My apartment was broken into." said Mulder.
     "Really?" Agent Hayes asked, shocked. "What did they take?"
     Mulder sighed, but was unable to fully hide the coloring of
his cheeks. He shouldn't have mentioned the incident, especially
in light of what had been removed. "Nothing, actually. They left
me money."
     "Someone broke into your apartment and left you money?"
Scully repeated. She blew her nose and shook her head. "This city
is getting weirder all the time."
     "In'it?" Agent Walsh commented. She and Dyna shared a
knowing look.
     Mulder stared at them suspiciously. They were certainly
busybodies. He would not have been surprised in the least to
discover they were responsible. But he had no proof.
     //Since when does that make a difference to you?// a voice
in his head asked sardonically.
     "Are we going to finish up our interviews today?" Dyna
asked. She could see the mental wheels turning.
     The very thought of ever getting into a car with Dyna again
made him physically ill. "Maybe. I got a message on my machine
from the cops yesterday. They say they found a frog in the
ventilation system at the store where Ingo died."
     "Eew." said Hayes.
     "It's waiting in the lab to be examined. Speaking of which,
have you got anything back on the autopsy?"
     Scully shook her head. "Not a thing."
     "No loss." Walsh was staring at some of Mulder's alien
spacecraft pictures. Her fuchsia jacket and lime green pants were
giving everyone headaches. "It'll give us some time to run a
toxicology on the frog."
     "You mean you're going to kill it?" Hayes cried.
     "No, it's already dead." Mulder replied.
     "Poor little thing."
     "So what's the battle plan, oh fearless leader?" Walsh asked
Mulder.
     He pulled out one of his innumerable files. From it he
withdrew an artist's rendering of a woman's face. She might have
been considered pretty, had it not been for the hard, cold look
the artist had somehow managed to impart.
     Scully sighed deeply. "The woman who supposedly cursed Ingo,
I assume."
     "Correct." said Mulder. "We even have an ID on her."
     "So who is she?"
     "Svetlana Rademacher. Recent immigrant from Russia, who was
once arrested for petty theft." Mulder looked pleased with
himself for finding out all that so quickly.
     "So when do we go interview her?" Hayes gave Mulder an
expectant look.
     "Scully and myself are going right away." Mulder told her.
Dyna looked crestfallen, but he didn't let that bother him. 
     "And what are we supposed to do?" Walsh asked dubiously.
     "You could start the preliminary report. And maybe the
autopsy notes too." 
     "Desk duty." Walsh spat. And Scully sounded so smug about
it, too.
     The senior agents were already on their way out. Scully
hurried down the hall, hoping to avoid any complaints. Mulder
lingered in the doorway long enough to say; "Someone has to do
it." with false sympathy before he too was gone.
     "Yeah, that cologne works really well." Walsh dropped down
in Mulder's vacated chair. Her face was sour-looking. "Make us
ga-ga over *him*."
     "I don't think it was the cologne." Hayes sighed. She
flopped down in Scully's chair. The two young women sat immersed
in bitterly disappointed silence for a few moments.
     Hayes fished in her jacket pocket. She brought out a bottle
of "Temptation for Women" and turned it over in her fingers. "All
that money, gone to waste. Now what do we do with the stuff? We
can't very well use it on him if he isn't here."
     "I know." sighed Walsh, regarding her own bottle. She
dropped it on Mulder's desk and stood up. "You know what he
problem is?"
     "Scully." they said in unison.
     "She's the whole reason this entire case is going badly for
us." continued Walsh, stalking around the office. "If she hadn't
been in on it, we wouldn't have made fools of ourselves in front
of Mulder that first day. He'd like us by now." Under her breath,
she added; "And I wouldn't have had to run the gut."
     "The case might even be solved, too!" Hayes put in. She was
a wizard at placing blame. "I think a curse is a perfectly good
explanation for why that fellow died. But, no, Scully has to go
and look for a 'logical' reason."
     "What we have to do is get Miss Lollipop Guild out of the
picture for a while." 
     "But how?"
     Walsh paused, twisting a lock of dark auburn hair around her
fingers. That was the question, wasn't it? Scully and Mulder
seemed permanently attached to each other. She twisted the hair
in the other direction. Getting Scully's attention wouldn't be
hard. It was keeping it. Walsh accidently yanked on the lock,
grimacing at the explosion of pain in her scalp. She began to
untangle her fingers. There was a knot in her hair now.
     A knot in her red hair.
     Hayes did not miss the light bulb over her partner's head.
"You've got something?" 
     "I sure do. Come with me."
     "Where are we going?"
     "Barney's, and then the drugstore."

##########

     The phone in Mulder's office jumped to life. Dyna Hayes
scrambled to answer it.
     "They're back." Victoria's voice said. "Get up here."
     Hayes wasted no time. She caused quite a ruckus, rushing
through the halls in her hunter green suit. But she couldn't risk
Mulder or Scully seeing her.
     "It's about time you got here!" Vicky hissed as Dyna rounded
the corner by Pendrell's lab. "I'm starting to get funny looks."
     "That's what you get... for coming up here so soon." Dyna
panted.
     "The window has a good view of the parking lot." Victoria
sniffed. She just wished that the blinds around the lab hadn't
been close; she couldn't see who was inside. 
     Walsh tugged on her partner's sleeve. "Now let's go get this
over with."
     Dyna nodded. She couldn't catch her breath after such a run.
     "Just remember; when the squirting starts, hold your
breath." Victoria pulled out her bottle of "Temptation", removed
the cap, and slid it back into her pocket.
     Walsh was just about to open the door to the lab when she
fell victim to one of her sporadic bouts of indecision. She
stepped back into the hall. "Maybe we shouldn't do this. I don't
want to be mean to Pendrell; I like him."
     Dyna rolled her eyes. "You would."
     "You have room to talk, Miss 'Kissing is a clearing house
for germs'."
     "Well, it is! Do you know how many different kinds of
bacteria are present in human saliva?"
     "Yes, because you tell me every chance you get!"
     An agent neither of them knew gave the girls an alarmed look
as he passed by. They smiled, quelling the argument until he was
out of ear-shot.
     Walsh swung on Hayes in a reptilian manner. "You and your
Lysol obsession really suck the romance out of life."
     "At least I'm not crawling with *viruses* I picked up by
sticking my-"
     "Shut-up!"
     Hayes obeyed, giving the other woman a acrid look. 
     Walsh took a deep breath, and mentally put on her oft-donned
invisible Cupid wings. This wasn't simply a way to get Scully out
of the picture; she was doing someone a favor. Pendrell liked
Scully, and by golly, Walsh was going to give her to him!
     "Pendrell, hon, this is for you." she mumbled just before
diving through the door.
     "Agent Pendrell! Hi!" Vicky exclaimed, shattering the
stillness of his lab. 
     Pendrell jumped, nearly knocking over his microscope. "Uh,
hi." he replied. Who *was* this?
     "You don't remember me, do you?" Victoria smiled coyly. She
was delighted to find that he was alone in the lab. "The hallway
yesterday? With Agent Scully?"
     That jogged his memory. The light of recognition came to his
eyes. He stood up from his microscope and reached out a hand.
     "Oh, sure! Agent Walsh, right?"
     "Uh-huh." She shook his hand enthusiastically. Too
enthusiastically. Pendrell was afraid his arm was going to come
out of the socket.
     "And this is Agent Dyna Hayes." Dyna stepped forward and
gave Pendrell one of her famous limp-wrested handshakes. It
wasn't him. She just wasn't keen on any kind of physical contact,
period.
     "Hello." Chris' smile was twitchy. "Dyna's a unique name. Is
it short for something?"
     Hayes' face puckered like she'd just gotten a mouthful of
vinegar. Her brown eyes flicked over to her partner, asking if
she was required to answer. Walsh's own eyes shifted towards the
fabric seat of the chair Pendrell had just been sitting in, her
hand touched the pocket in which the cologne bottle hid. Then the
green orbs hardened into steel.
     Dyna could barely contain her sigh. She reminded herself she
was doing it for Mulder, and flashed Pendrell her Endearing Smile
# 16. Vicky wormed her way over to the vacated chair.
     "Why, yes it is." Hayes said pleasantly. "It's short for
Dynasty. But I'm not fond of that name, so I prefer not to use
it."
     "Call her Dynasty, and you die." Walsh chirped, discreetly
spraying cologne on Pendrell's chair. She fanned the smell away
from Chris vigorously.
     Pendrell's blue eyes widened. "Oh, really? I'll be sure to
call you Dyna, then."
     "You're so sweet." Hayes smiled.
     "Yes, he is. Just a darling." Walsh came behind him, giving
both shoulders a little squeeze.
     Chris gave both of them a puzzled look. They certainly were
odd. Much too perky to be special agents. Even Pendrell, who
himself had an unfortunate reputation of being over-eager, was
nothing like these two.
     "Is there something I can help you with, Walsh?" Pendrell
shrugged out of her grasp, turned to face her.
     "Have you found anything unusual in those autopsy slides we
sent you?" 
     Pendrell shook his head. "No. They're not even close to
being done."
     She had to think for a second. "What about the frog?"
     "Frog?"
     With her mind drawing a blank on small talk, Victoria
decided to cut to the chase. She reached into her jacket pocket,
withdrawing a bottle with a gold cap. Those closed blinds were
going to come in handy.
     "I was just at the department store, and I found this
cologne that made me think of you." she said and pulled off the
cap. "It's called 'Temptation'."
     Poor Pendrell blushed scarlet. "And it made you think of
*me*?" She was joking with him, he was sure. He hated when women
did this. He never knew how to answer.
     "Uh-huh. Won't you try it?"
     She gabbed his tie, managing to get two squirts onto it
before Pendrell could jerk it from her hand and step out of
range. "Hey! Don't do that." He coughed and waved his hand in
front of his face. "Are you sure that's not 'Obsession'? It sure
is strong."
     Walsh did her best imitation of a confused look, and lobbed
the bottle over Pendrell's head to her partner. "I don't think
so."
     "What-" Pendrell started to say, while his eyes tracked the
bottle's progress through the air.
     Dyna moved in quickly. The back of Pendrell's lab coat fell
victim to three sprays, and he whirled around. 
     "Cut it out! What is this?" he demanded. These two-! They
were acting out some nightmare scenario, as if they were demented
salespeople in the men's toiletries section at Barney's! He tore
off his coat. The smell was overpowering. Pendrell threw it down
beside the microscope and reached for the bottle in Hayes' hand.
"Give me that."
     "Whoops! Butterfingers!" Dyna chucked it towards Victoria,
who caught it and applied a generous amount to Pendrell's
discarded lab coat.
     He whirled again, completely lost as to what to do. He had
never seen anything like it. "What is wrong with you two?"
     "I'm sorry, Chris, really I am." Vicky tossed the cologne to
Dyna once more and picked up the phone, as well as a pair of
scissors lying nearby. "But you'll be glad we did it in about two
minutes."
     Pendrell heard "pish pish pish", and a new wave of odor
flooded his senses. He looked over his shoulder, and there was
Dyna spraying him from head to toe. He darted away, pushing past
Victoria and heading around the end of the lab table. With the
barrier between himself and the nuts, he felt better.
     "Get out of my lab!" Pendrell demanded, just before a
mammoth sneeze almost knocked him flat. 
     "In a minute, we promise." Dyna said, pocketing the cologne.
     "Mulder, hi. I need to talk to Scully." Victoria said into
the phone. "Scully, get your fuzzy butt up to Agent Pendrell's
lab. He found something incredible in that heart sample. It's
amazing, you have to see it!"
     "I didn't-" Dyna threw a notebook at Pendrell's head to keep
him from blowing it.
     "Yes, it's under the scope right now. Just get up here!"
Victoria slammed down the phone, cut the cord with the scissors.
"Thanks, Pendrell, you owe us one."
     Together the girls bolted out the door of the lab, a cloud
of scent following after them.
     "I'm going to report you! You're nuts!" he yelled at their
retreating backs. He would have followed, but another sneeze
prevented it. His head was beginning to ache to boot. Oh the
smell-! It was everywhere, seemingly stitched inside his
nostrils.
     Two more sneezes propelled him out into the hall, where he
gulped untainted air. It took a moment for Pendrell to get
himself composed. He felt as if a tornado had suddenly blown into
his lab and wrecked everything. He hoped to hell no evidence
containers had been open. The stench was sure to contaminate
them, and then his rear would really be in a sling.
     When the sneezing and watery eyes had subsided, and his head
no longer throbbed, Chris decided that the worst was over. He
smoothed his shirt, sniffed once. He was horrified to find that
the smell clung.
     Meanwhile, Walsh and Hayes were hiding just around the
corner, ready to implement phase two of their cockeyed plan.
     "Get out your bottle." Vicky ordered her partner. 
     "Cologne or perfume?"
     "Perfume."
     "Why?" Dyna began patting pockets, searching for the correct
container.
     "Because a little something never hurts." Victoria was
watching the elevator intently, her own bottle already in firing
position. She sprung into action as soon as the first cuff of
Scully's camel-colored pantsuit was visible.
     Scully was a little startled to be met at the elevator by
the two rookies. "What is it?" 
     Victoria got on one side, Dyna on the other. Each grabbed
one of Scully's elbows and hustled her along.
     "It's amazing." Victoria chattered. "It'll blow your mind.
You've never seen anything like it."
     "Really wild." agreed Dyna. "Have you tried this perfume?"
     "Huh?" 
     That was all Scully had time to say before she was assaulted
on two sides by a shower of fragrance. She covered her face in
both hands, shocked by the intensity of the smell. What was that
stuff? And why were they drowning her in it?
     "What are you- Whoa!"
     The two taller women physically heaved Scully into the lab,
not much caring much what happened after that. Dana stumbled
forward, carried by momentum. Her arms flailed out, searching for
anything that would break her fall. 
     Her body connected with something warm, slightly soft, and
redolent of cologne. Both went down on the floor.
     "Holy cow!" Agent Pendrell exclaimed.
     Scully lifted her head from his chest. She was totally
disoriented. It took her a moment to get her bearings, but when
she did, and found herself lying sprawled atop a startled Chris
Pendrell, she was to her feet in an instant.
     "Oh, my gosh, I'm so sorry!" she cried.
     As soon as they had relieved themselves of their burden of
Scully, Walsh and Hayes initiated phase three. The former locked
the door from the inside and slammed it shut. Dyna whipped out a
tube of super glue. She jammed the thin metal tip into the
keyhole in the knob and squeezed hard. Clear liquid shot into the
lock mechanism. In a few seconds it had hardened into concrete.
     "That's it! Let's go!" Dyna cried, taking off down the hall.
     "I'm really sorry!" Victoria yelled to the people she had
just trapped, and sprinted away.
     Scully froze when she heard that. Those two screw-ups
*planned* this? It didn't seem possible. They didn't have enough
spark between them to light up a five watt bulb! And what purpose
did it serve? Anger overtook surprise; Scully flung herself
against the door, intent on chasing them down and making them
answer.
     The knob didn't budge.
     Scully kicked the door and swore.
     "What is it?" Pendrell asked, picking himself up. Oh, what
else was going to happen to him today?
     "They did something to the door. It won't open." Scully
futilely jiggled the knob.
     "Let me try." Pendrell had no better luck than Dana did.
"It's jammed. We'll have to call maintenance."
     Dana fell back into the lab. Her face was flushed, her chest
heaving up and down. She could feel the pulse beating in her
neck. 
     "I'm going to get those two." she said, pointing past the
closed door. 
     Pendrell snorted. "Count me in. They were just in here,
tearing everything up."
     "That's exactly what they do." Dana growled.
     The two stood in silence for a moment. To look at them, one
would think they'd been running a marathon. Both were breathing
hard, with flushed faces. Scully rubbed her eyes gingerly. The
light in the room had gotten brighter, to the point of
irritation.
     "You said something about calling maintenance?" Scully
asked.
    Pendrell had to snap himself out of it too. He had
forgotten who the woman standing next to him was. 
     "Uh, yeah. I'll do that." he said, heading off towards the
phone ruefully. Stuck in a room, alone, with Dana, and he wasn't
even going to get to enjoy it.
     Scully remained where she was. The light was so bothersome
that she reached for the switch, shutting off half of the
overhead lights. Midday turned to dusk, and she sighed in relief.
     "Oh, thank you." Pendrell said. "It was really bad there for
a minute."
     "No problem." Scully replied in a pant. On top of all it's
other faults, the lab was unusually warm. She was sweating after
only a minute. Scully turned her back on Pendrell and gripped the
front of her blouse with two fingers. She pulled it out from her
chest rapidly, welcoming the cool rush of air that resulted.
     "Uh-oh."
     "What?"
     Chris held up the severed phone cord, one end in each hand.
Dana gaped.
     "They cut it?" 
     Pendrell nodded, tossing the ends to the floor in his best
imitation of disgust. The anger he so recently developed against
Walsh and Hayes began to ebb. He couldn't have asked for a more
enjoyable predicament. 
     Well, the ambient air temperature could be a trifle more
pleasant. Having one's shirt sticking to one's back was not
precisely sexy, especially considering that Pendrell didn't have
the kind of chiseled physique that could make things like
perspiration attractive.
     //Who says you don't have any self-confidence? Whoever says
that is a total doof.// Pendrell thought.
     "We'll just have to knock on the door until someone comes."
Dana said resolutely.
     "That might take awhile." Pendrell caught her arm before she
could dart away. "It is lunchtime."
     Dana let out a sigh. It figured. Oh, well. Things could have
been worse. She could have been stuck with Eugene Tooms. "Then I
guess we're stuck here for a while."
     "For a while."
     They looked at one another. Scully had never noticed that
Pendrell's eyes were blue. A really pretty shade of blue. Then
she noticed that his pupils were dilated almost completely. Odd,
she hadn't turned the lights down that much.
     A sudden wave of heat washed over her, but it had absolutely
nothing to do with Pendrell. "Why is it so hot in here?" Dana
asked, removing her jacket. She sniffed. "And what's that smell?"
     "Cologne." Pendrell sighed, loosening his tie and collar.
"They were spraying it all over just before you came in."
     Dana's fingers, in the process of loosening the top two
buttons of her own blouse, froze right in the middle. She sniffed
again. 
     "Do you know what kind?" she asked, her lips suddenly dry.
     Pendrell rolled up his shirtsleeves before he replied;
"Agent Walsh said it was called 'Temptation'."
     Scully gasped, reached out to grasp the lab table for
support. Oh, no! Please, say they hadn't! Please say the smell
was plain, old "Obsession". Her blue eyes danced upon Pendrell
for a split second, and her face flushed an even deeper crimson.
Oh, please, not like this!
     "Dana?" Pendrell was instantly alarmed. She looked like she
was going to pass out. He leapt, grabbing her elbow to lend
support.
     "I'm fine." Breathless from heat and shock and worry, she
tried to wave him away. He wouldn't go. "But we have got to get
out."
     "Why? Because of the smell? It's not that bad, and it'll go
away in a few minutes, anyway." Chris felt the first digits of
panic tickling the bottom of his stomach. Just a little bit
longer, and he'd have his courage up.
     "No, it's not that it's bad. It's that it-" A wisp drifted
under her nose, and a curious lightness effected her knees.
"We've got to get out of here."
     Still, Pendrell did not turn her elbow loose. She moved
towards the door, and bounced back towards his chest like a yo-
yo. Dana put out a hand to stop her forward progress. It landed
over his heart, and she could feel it beating fast beneath her
palm.
     "Scully, wait." 
     She looked up into his eyes. Thoughts of leaving slowly
began to slither away from the forefront of her mind. His eyes
were much more enjoyable...
     "Are my pupils as dilated as yours?" she asked.
     "Yeah."
     "Is my face as flushed?"
     His fingers brushed across her rosy cheeks. His voice was
soft. "Yeah."
     Dana hadn't even noticed how the gap between their bodies
had closed. His hands were moving softly up her arms, over her
back. His touch was barely there. Her hands rested gently around
his waist. What had she been going to do?
     "Dana, I-"
     "Did anyone ever tell you that you're a very handsome man?"
She ran her fingertips lightly down the line of his jaw, across
his bottom lip. She could almost feel the blood flowing under his
warm skin.
     Pendrell smiled, shyly. With her eyes half closed that way,
and the romantic blush to her cheeks, he'd just been thinking
about beautiful she was.
     "Not until now." His own lids began a downward slide, along
with the rest of his head.
     Scully smiled, a dreamy expression Chris didn't really see. 
"You are."
     "Thanks." he murmured, his eyes closed as he made himself
remember this, every moment of it. It didn't matter that he was
head over heels, and she wasn't even close to tripping. Right
now, it was enough.
     She slid her lips along his cheek. Keeping her mouth only
just brushing against his skin, she gently teased his chin.
     He deeply inhaled the scent of her hair. "I think I love
you."
     Her reply was to press her lips to his. Her hands lingered
on his shoulder blades. The blood coursing through her was on
fire, his lips burned against hers.
     When it was over, he stood trembling, and held her clasped
against his chest. They were quiet, experiencing one another in
the dimness.
     "Chris," she whispered against the corner of his mouth.
     His lips twitched. She knew his first name. "Huh?"
     "How long is lunch?"

--


     Chapter Five

     "I really feel bad about that." Walsh was saying to her
partner, in regards to the sneak attack upon Scully and Pendrell,
as they rode the elevator down to the basement. 
     "Because of Pendrell?" Dyna put a sarcastic emphasis on his
name.
     Vicky scowled. "Only you could resist a boy who's got a
crush on a girl."
     Dyna shrugged.
     Outside the basement office, the girls whipped out those
overworked bottles once again, ready for the real test of
"Temptation for Women". Even though they gave credit for their
overenthusiastic attraction to Mulder to the perfume's companion
scent, they refused to extended it to the women's version. At
least not consciously. Neither one had applied a drop all day.
     "Let's just hobe it works fast." Walsh said, pinching her
nose shut and dousing herself.
     In a similar position, Dyna replied; "It seebs to."    
     When every conceivable pulse point had been thoroughly
saturated, the girls capped their bottles and headed into the
tiny office.
     At his desk, Mulder's nose twitched spasmodically. The pair
smelled. Even over his burgeoning cold he could smell them.
"What's the perfume you rolled in?"
     "We didn't roll in it." Dyna drawled, chafing at his terms.
     "I just put a drop behind each ear." lied Victoria.
     Mulder shook his head, sneezed. Both women turned ashy.
     "Was that because of us, oh we're terribly sorry!" Dyna
exclaimed.
     Mulder held up a restraining hand as he sneezed thrice more.
     "I don't think it's you." he groaned. Mulder did not bother
continuing until he had crossed to Scully's desk and swiped one
of the tissues she had placed in the top drawer. He blew his nose
loudly.
     "Ship coming through." Victoria muttered.
     Fox rubbed his nose vigorously. "I think I caught Scully's -
*Achoo!* - cold."
     "Awwwww." The pair's sadness was real. With his nose stuffed
up, their magic potion was useless. Vicky turned to Dyna,
distressed.
     "Do you have any more cold medicine?"
     Hayes shook her head. "Scully never gave it back to me."
     "Well, maybe it's in her desk. " Walsh sprung towards it,
leaning over the wrong way. She ripped open the nearest drawer,
rifling through it viciously. The medicine had to be in there. It
just had to be! She hadn't spent ninety dollars on that perfume
to have it foiled by a germ!
     "It's not in there, I already checked." said Mulder after
another blow.
     "Oh, rats!" Walsh collapsed across the top of the desk.
     "It's not end of the world." Mulder said. He sounded just
like she had a few minutes earlier, with two fingers squeezing
her nostrils shut.
     "Yes it is!" Dyna cried, backed up into a corner. Her germ-
alarm was going nuts. "You're sick! You shouldn't be out in
public where you can infect people!"
     Walsh's head snapped up. That gave her an idea.
     "No." she said, scrambling up from the desktop and smoothing
her jacket. "No, you shouldn't be out in public. You'll just make
yourself sicker. It could escalate into something serious."
     "Like pneumonia." Dyna was onto her plan in an instant.
     Mulder snorted, a strangled sound. "It's just a cold."
     "Just a cold." Victoria scoffed. She plucked his trench coat
off his desk where it had been thrown. "How many people have said
exactly that, and then woken up in the hospital?"
     "Yes! How many, indeed! You should be home in bed."
     Mulder looked at the two girls with alarm. Victoria
especially, she was standing right next to his chair. "You're
overreacting."
     "Pish! We're just concerned with your well-being." Vicky
replied, grinning toothily. She shoved both hands under his arms,
and somehow managed to lift him to his feet.
     That left Mulder stunned. Her limbs were so skinny it was
almost comical. How could she be so strong? He allowed Vicky to
button him into his coat without protesting. The bright pink wool
of her jacket concealed any muscles beneath.
     She had him out in the middle of the room with just a push.
"Home, yes, that's where you need to be."
     "But we have a case to finish!" Mulder at last found his
tongue. "We have to get an arrest warrant for that woman."
     "Svetlana whoever can wait. That nose of yours can't." Dyna
said, moving in on the opposite side from her friend.
     "It's running like it's in the Boston Marathon, here." Vicky
pressed a fresh tissue to his nose.
     Mulder tried to object, but he couldn't get the words around
her hand.
     "Don't you worry about a thing. We're gonna take you home,
put you to bed with some nice soup, and make sure none of those
evil supervisors call and bother you." Victoria continued.
     Mulder whimpered as he was dragged from his office.

##########

     They were like his grandmother. Each one, the spitting
image. He hated ever having to go see that woman while he was
sick. She was a dear, Mulder was the first to admit it, but much
too doting. One sneeze, one sniff, and here the tornado would
come. Bundling him up like a mummy, sweeping him into bed, and
force feeding any one a hundred nutritious broths down his young
throat.
     Maybe he was exaggerating. Thus far, all Dyna had done was
too force him onto the futon, and then go around tidying up his
apartment.
     "No wonder you're sick! Look at this mess. Perfect breeding
ground for germs." she clucked.
     "Really, you don't have to-"
     "Yes, I do! Otherwise this place will be the origin of a new
strain of ebola or something." 
     Mulder sighed and lay back. It was useless to complain. But
he supposed he shouldn't worry. Since the break-in, there was
nothing odious for her to find. And he'd get a clean apartment
out of the deal. 
     Victoria was a little more personal. While Dyna busied
herself cleaning, Vicky came in and started to strip him. First
the jacket came off, then the tie, then the belt, then his shoes
and socks.
     "And I'll stop right here." she said, pulling his shirt from
his pants. "You look perfectly comfortable. Now, stay here, and
I'll go make you some chicken soup."
     Mulder sighed. Telling her there was nothing in the
refrigerator was pointless; she'd find out soon enough.
     "Oh, dear." Victoria gazed with despair at the naked
shelves. Two half-empty bottles of Yoo-Hoo and a box of baking
soda stared back at her.
     "I have to go shopping now." she said, straightening up.
     Dyna poked her head into the fridge. "Gracious."
     "Typical man." mouthed Victoria, grabbing her coat.
     She came back in half an hour with four bags of stuff. Dyna
had finished the living room and was now attacking the kitchen.
     "I'm impressed. It's finally staring to look like people
live here."
     "I'm going nuts." Mulder grumbled, pushing past her. He
reached into the nearest bag. "A scented toilet paper roll
holder?"
     Victoria snatched it out of his hand. "That nook you call a
bathroom is atrocious."
     Mulder shrugged, flashing a tiny grin. "Maybe. But the
shower stall has been a source of free mushrooms all year."
     Victoria giggled; Dyna groaned. The man was beyond anything
she had ever imagined. A more miserly horde of cleaning supplies
she had never seen. All Mulder had was a broom, a mop and a puny
little vacuum cleaner.
     "Did you buy some disinfectant?" Dyna whispered to Vicky.
     The red-head handed her partner the economy-sized bottle of
Lysol. Dyna took it gleefully, rushing off to parts unknown.
     Victoria turned back to Mulder. "Shouldn't you be in bed?"
     He shook his head.
     "Yes, you should." Victoria guided him to the futon, where
she covered him up. "I'll have you some tea and some cold
medicine in no time."
     Indeed she did. Before Mulder knew what was happening, he
had a mug, a box of tissues and one of Comtrex all to himself.
Victoria whistled as she chopped up ingredients for the soup, and
stocked his shelves.
     "She's going to make a bang-up mother." he said, turning on
the television.
     As the medicine kicked in, and the smell of chicken soup
began to fill the apartment, Mulder warmed considerably to the
idea of having two moms around. By the end of the early news, his
apartment was cleaner than it had ever been, and he was polishing
off his second bowl of soup. He decided he'd beg them to stay.   

     "Does this building have a laundry room?" Victoria called,
peering into the dirty clothes hamper in the bathroom. Dyna was
at her side.
     "Yes. In the basement."
     "Good. He's way overdue." said Vicky, hefting the container.
She paused in the kitchen to gather up her purse, and demanded
that Hayes accompany her. The brunette went along grudgingly.
     The laundry room was small. Smack in the middle was a double
row of six washing machines standing back to back. Along the far
wall was a bank of dryers. A few chairs were scattered here and
there along the walls, and a soap and softener machine rested
against the wall opposite the dryers. Mercifully, it was
deserted.
     "Tell me again why you wanted me with you?" Dyna asked.
     "So we can talk without cutie-pie hearing us." Victoria
replied. She dropped the hamper next to a corner washer, then
pulled a pink wallet out of her purse.
     "What's there to talk about? We squirt on some of that
stuff, and he forgets how much he hates us."
     Victoria sighed. Dyna just didn't understand how complicated
these things could be. The men's cologne seemed to incite quite
an enthusiastic reaction, from what Dyna had been telling her.
There was a danger the women's version had the same problem. Of
course, with Mulder involved, it might not be such a problem.
     Vicky gathered a handful of change from her wallet, holding
it out to her friend. "Take this and get some detergent and
softener."
     Dyna shrugged. She crossed to the machine on the wall,
picking out the stronger of the two brands of soap and settling
for the lone brand of fabric softener the machine offered.
     She looked over her shoulder. Vicky had pushed up the
sleeves of her lime green mock-turtle neck - An uncanny match for
those loud pants.- and was leaning over the hamper.
     "You aren't going to sort through that with your bare hands,
are you?" she asked, horrified.
     Vicky looked up. "Do you have some gloves I could wear?"
     Dyna remained silent. 
     "That's what I thought." said Victoria, and she plunged into
the hamper up to her elbows. Hayes shuddered, busying herself
with the machine.
     The detergent came in a lilliputian green box. Dyna almost
said it was cute. The tiny bottle of softener was a perfect
match. She brought them over to where Victoria was rummaging
through Fox Mulder's unmentionables.
     "Now what?"
     Victoria brought out a dull-colored tie, spotted with some
unknown substance. She sniffed it. Chow mein. Yuck. "Put a scoop
in each washer, and fill the softener dispensers."
     Dyna sighed like someone terribly put upon, but did as she
was asked. Victoria narrowed her eyes.
     "Do you not do laundry at your place?" she asked, fairly
certain of the answer.
     Dyna did not disappoint. "I send my laundry out."
     Victoria snorted contemptuously. Dyna was such a prissy-la-
la. Vicky made a mental note to concoct some horror story about
unsanitary laundry conditions and what it left on the clothes so
Dyna would start doing her own. It would bring her down a peg.
     The hamper seemed to be mostly tee and dress shirts, with
some socks. Victoria guessed even Fox knew you had to dry-clean
suits. But how the tie wound up in the melee was another subject.
Then she saw the first pair of boxers.
     Victoria swallowed hard. Oh, she'd figured she'd find some,
but it still didn't keep her from feeling like a snoop. She
sighed. At least they were boxers, and not tightie-whities. That
would have been too much. And they were kind of cute boxers. Nice
blue-plaid flannel.
     Shaking it off, she began to sort in earnest. The light-
colored tee shirts, socks and other sturdy garments went in one
machine; their dark-colored counterparts in another. Light and
dark dress shirts took up two more washers which she set on
delicate. She hesitated a moment, and then figuring he would
notice or care, and that she'd had never had a problem washing
her own silk garments, Victoria tossed all the boxers in washer
number five. The last one got the jeans.
     Dyna was leaning against one of the washers, looking bored
now that her job was done. Her ears pricked up when Victoria
began to sputter helplessly.
     "What is it?" she asked, as if someone had mentioned
diamonds.
     Victoria was bent at the waist over the hamper, one hand
braced on the edge, the other dangling inside the plastic
container. 
     "Come *look* at this." she said, gurgling like a mountain
stream. Abruptly, she clasped her free hand over her mouth to
hold in her snickers.
      Dyna hurried over, burning from nose to toes with
curiosity. Eagerly she looked into the hamper. Her brow furrowed.
What was so funny about a red headband?
     "I don't get it." she said flatly.
     "You will." Victoria spluttered, face red from the effort of
restraining her laughter. She grasped the thing in both hands,
stretching the fabric slightly. Dyna's eyes bulged, and then her
shoulders began to shake.
     The girls continued to clutch at the ragged edges of their
composure for a moment, but it was a losing battle. Dyna was all
but doubled over, looking to be a bit green around the gills.
Victoria was trying, to no avail, to silence her by tightly
squeezing her arm.
     Dyna sucked in a lungful of air. "They look so *tight*!"
     The remark sent the girls over the edge, and they collapsed
in hysterics. Dyna's knees were buckling underneath her, sending
her toppling towards a washer. She let herself go, expecting a
soft thud and then a slide to the ground.
     No such luck. She missed the washer by half. Dyna screamed
as she fell on her backside, legs flailing.
     Vicky howled with mirth at the ludicrous picture Dyna made.
Pandemonium reined supreme. Dyna was face-down, beating the
floor. Victoria had both arms wrapped around her middle, tears
pouring down her face as she gasped for air.
     "They're so *little*!" she wheezed, her entire body
quivering like a disturbed Jell-O mold.
     Dyna nodded her head, unable to speak. She slapped the floor
repeatedly. Victoria sat down heavily, then rolled onto her back
with her knees doubled up to her chest. "I can't breathe!"
     The duo snickered wildly for several more minutes. Then as
they ran out of air, it wound down like a clock. Only the
occasional snort was heard as they lay there letting their sides
recover.
     "Imagine it." Victoria said into the silence, her voice a
wicked grin. "If he bent over wearing these, he'd cut himself in
two!"
     The room erupted again, Dyna managing to kick the hamper
over on top of Vicky. That just made them laugh harder and
louder, until all the squawking got the better of someone on the
floor above them. The girls fell deadly silent when the ceiling
shook under three mighty pounds.
     Victoria collected herself and tossed the Speedos in with
the delicate, then set all six washers to work. They passed the
forty minutes talking and alternately running upstairs to assure
Mulder they hadn't deserted him. He was absorbed in a ball game
and didn't really care. He'd also gotten into a pair of sneakers
somewhere along the way.
     When the washing was finished, Vicky tossed each bundle of
wet clothing into a separate dryer. Those worked in tandem as
well, so Victoria managed to get six loads of laundry done in a
little more than an hour. 
     Dyna actually lowered herself to help with the folding, and
the pair traipsed upstairs with a full hamper. Victoria had a
stupid grin on her face, thinking of the red Speedos tucked into
her pocket. She couldn't help herself.
     Victoria left the clothes in front of Mulder's dresser. He
could put them away. She was done rooting through his things.
After slipping into her jacket, she herded Dyna into the
bathroom.
     "Okay, the place is clean and he's fed. Are we ready?"
     Dyna nodded.
     "Okay. Hang on. Here we go." Victoria pulled out the perfume
and began to squirt.
     They sauntered into the living room surrounded by a cloud of
fragrance. Mulder's nose twitched; he inhaled and looked up.
     "Hello." Dyna cooed. Without being invited, she plunked down
on the futon beside him.
     "You rolled in the perfume again." Mulder said, sneezing.
     "How rude!"
     Victoria stood over Mulder, allowing the fumes to waft. "I
know it's a bit strong. But it was either that or eau de raw
chicken. How are you feeling?"
     Already his nose was becoming accustomed to the scent. His
awareness of it faded away until he stopped smelling anything in
particular. Instead, he became aware of feeling rather warm, with
a nice thrumming feeling low down in his abdomen.
     Mulder grinned. "Much better, actually."
     The lascivious undertone to the words had Dyna on her feet
post haste. She wanted him to like her, but *not* in that
fashion. 
     What neither of the women had taken into account when they
came up with this little scheme was their conservative view of
romance. Case in point, Dyna maintained that if she ever got
married, and that was a very large "if", she and her husband
would have separate bedrooms. Period. Dyna needed her space, and
romance simply did not allow for it. And though she never
articulated it to anyone, she planned to go to her grave a
virgin.
     "Would you like some more soup?" she asked him, tugging on
her partner's sleeve. Distance was needed between herself and
Mulder.
     The thrumming and the warm feeling increased, unfolding and
spreading. He looked at Dyna, his expression halfway between
goofy and sleepy. Victoria, who knew a little something about
human body language, took note of his dilated pupils and began to
think they had done something rash.
     "No. I don't want more soup." said Mulder.
     Dyna responded without thinking, an unfortunate habit of
hers. "What do you want, then?"
     Mulder reached out, grabbing Dyna's hand. His thumb moved in
a slow, circular motion in her palm. 
     "Do you really have to ask?"
     //Oh, yeah. We made a mistake.//
     Dyna leapt back, agreeing with her partner's silent
sentiment. No, this was not what she'd had in mind at all.
     "Excuse you!" she exclaimed.
     Victoria's mind was not on Mulder. It was on the perfume, in
scientific gear. This was certainly a rapid and acute response,
as was the response of the women to Mulder's cologne. The thing
was, Mulder had only put on a couple of squirts and had gotten a
reaction equal to what the girls were witnessing now. The stuff
packed a wallop. 
     And Dyna and Victoria had bathed themselves in it.
     Mental alarms went off, and Victoria came back to Earth just
as Mulder was taking a step towards Dyna.
     "Don't deny it, Dyna. You feel it too." he was saying,
reaching for her.
     Dyna scurried behind Victoria, peering at Mulder over the
red-head's shoulder. 
     "I feel a squirming in the pit of my stomach!"
     "See! You do feel it."
     He advanced; Vicky squawked as Dyna hauled her backwards.
Mulder took another step, they retreated an equal distance. This
odd dance moved them in a backwards-J shape and ultimately into
the corner by the fish tank.
     "Vicky! Do something!" Dyna cried, grasping handfuls of
Victoria's jacket. She was using her friend as a human shield.
Vicky sighed. Dyna claimed to be brave, but in truth she was the
biggest of cowards.
     For lack of more suitable options, Victoria did as Dyna
suggested. Her hands flew out, slicing through the air like the
blades of a windmill. They came to a stop in a classic Jackie
Chan pose.
     "She can kill you in a second. She's well versed in karate!"
Dyna hissed at Mulder.
     Victoria didn't bother to point out that she was only a
yellow belt, and not a very good one. She couldn't even throw
people smaller than she was. Mulder was an inch taller and a good
fifty pounds heavier.
     "Good, I thrive on danger." Fox purred.
     His body moved forward an inch in the manner of a striking
snake, then fell back. Victoria slashed her hands around a little
more to keep him at bay. She threw in a "Hwwwaaaaaa!" for good
measure.
     "You don't understand!" Dyna said. She gave Vicky a shove
towards Mulder, but did not release her death-grip on the jacket.
Victoria turned partially and glared at her, only to be yanked
backwards once more. "She's my bodyguard! She's trained to
protect me!"
     Mulder smiled lecherously and wagged his brows. "I'll bet
she is."
     Victoria gaped at him in disgust. She couldn't believe
something like that would come out of his mouth. He seemed so
quiet and intelligent. 
     Then she remembered the magazines. She was pushed forward.
     "She'll destroy you!" yelped Dyna.
     Mulder reached for Vicky. She slapped his hands away in a
very un-karate-like manner. 
     Mulder was not dissuaded. "Oh, it'll be worth it."
     Dyna moaned pitifully, pulling Victoria back. She had to
think fast. She had to frighten this man, otherwise she would be
lost! Violated! Ruined beyond all hope of recovery. Poor Victoria
went stumbling forward yet again, nearly losing her footing.
     "Don't you see the vengeance in her eyes?" asked Gem, her
voice a thrilling whisper.
     Mulder looked into wide green eyes, smelled her lovely
perfume. "Yes." he sighed.
     "She has the hands of a trained killer!"
     "Oooooooo."
     "Dyna! You're not helping!" Victoria growled, ignoring
Mulder to try and disengage Dyna's hands from her jacket. She was
tired of being a human yo-yo.
     Mulder made a guttural sound and reached. Dyna shrieked.
Vicky punched him in the chest with one fist; it pushed him one
step away and produced a grimace. That was all.
     It was enough for Dyna. She gave Victoria a robust shove
from behind.
     "Go forth, my mighty battler!" A moment later she recanted.
"No! Stay here and protect me!" 
     Vicky was yanked backwards. Her left leg flew up in the air
as she struggled for balance, her arms went out and braced
against the wall and the fish tank. Mulder looked momentarily
puzzled. Then he grinned and took advantage of the weak moment.
His hand closed on Vicky's right arm.
     Victoria's left leg, accordioned towards her body by
Mulder's torso unfolded, pushing him away. Dyna was compressed
between the wall and her partner; she moaned pitifully.
     Vicky lashed out with her foot again. It hit empty air. The
smile on Mulder's face sent chills down her spine.
     Resuming her Jackie Chan pose, she said; "Boy, I wish I had
my gun!"
     Neither Dyna nor Victoria carried their FBI-issued firearms
when off-duty. As soon as the clock hit going-home time, the
cursed things were unloaded and safely locked away far from their
owners. 
     "Oh, I hate guns!" Dyna cried. "I'm terrified of getting
shot in the foot. Ouch!"
     "But then I could nurse you back to health." said Mulder. He
was busy searching for a way around Victoria.
     "And they do have safeties." growled Victoria, all the while
watching Mulder, looking for the moment when she could bolt.
     The moment the last word was out of her mouth, Fox brought
himself up short. He slapped his forehead with the heel of his
hand. 
     "Safety! I almost forgot! Thanks!"
     The females' eyes grew huge. Without another word, he moved
forward again. Victoria raised her hands to deliver a blow, but
he wasn't lunging for them. Mulder fell against the desk only
inches away from their position, and began madly combing through
the drawers.
     "I know there in here, just wait a minute, I'll find them."
Mulder assured them. Pieces of trash flew through the air like so
many birds.
     Exactly what "they" were dropped into the slot. 
     "Oh, God!" Dyna shrieked, giving Victoria another push.
     She needed no further prompting. Victoria was worlds more
liberal about romance than Dyna, but at that moment her oft-
repeated, self-coined phrase came to mind.
     "There are three people in this world who are going to see
me naked: My mother, the doctor who delivered me, and my
husband."
     Mulder being none of the above, Victoria took off at warp
speed with Dyna on her trail like white on rice. Mulder, however
was punch-drunk but not oblivious. He abandoned his search to
pounce on his darlings before they could escape. The girls
shrieked and dodged to the side. This served to over-extended
Mulder, who toppled to the carpet on his stomach.
     But they did not get away. Mulder had thrown them just
enough off course so that a bee-line to the door was impossible.
Her brain running strictly on automatic, Victoria bolted for the
bathroom instead. Once inside, she slammed the door resoundingly.
Dyna went for the farthest wall and wound up standing on the
toilet.
     Victoria backed away from the locked door. "Not good. Not
good. This is not good."
     "No spit, Sherlock! What are we going to do?"
     Vicky's acrid response was cut off by the door knob
rattling. Both girls looked on in terror.
     "Knock, knock!" Mulder's voice was muffled, but
unmistakable. "I know you're in there!"
     "Oh, no!"
     Dyna began to hyperventilate, looking around for any other
way out of the bathroom. 
     "Open the door." Mulder called sweetly.
     "Not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin!" cried Victoria.
She leaned against the door, wondering if it would do any good.
     Dyna's hysteria paused. "You have hair on your chin? Yuck!"
     "*Dyna!*"
     "If you won't let me in, I'll have force my way in." sang
Mulder.
     "You wouldn't dare!" Victoria hissed over her shoulder.
"You'd forfeit your security deposit!"
     "I accept your challenge, fair maiden." came the reply. Then
silence. Dyna began to whimper, and Vicky braced herself more
firmly against the door.
     "He wouldn't." she mumbled.
     Pounding feet. The force of the object - Fox's shoulder,
most likely.- slamming into the door sent Victoria sprawling on
the floor. Dyna screamed, and began clawing at the wallpaper.
     Victoria rolled onto her side, dumbly watching as the door
shuddered under Mulder's repeated attack. When a crack appeared
in the frame near the lock, she snapped.
     "Out! Out! I want out!" She sprung to her feet, ripping the
shower curtain back as though she expected to find a portal there
that would take her home.
     *Crack!* One of the hinges gave way.
     "There isn't any other way out!" Dyna wailed.
     "What about the window?"
     "Do you see a window?"
     Victoria gave into a tearless sob. Her fingers closed more
tightly on the dull beige curtain, almost tearing the plastic.
She looked at her hand.
     Dyna demanded to know what she was doing when Vicky tore the
curtain from it's rod. Vicky didn't answer, at first, just shoved
one end into Dyna's trembling hands.
     "Get down off the pot!" she said, her eyes gleaming with
inspiration. "That door's about to give, and when it does we'll-"
     *Thud!*... *Thud!*... *Thud!* 
     "Okay!" Dyna said. She began to chant, under her breath,
scared stiff. "Okay, okay, okay, okay."
     *Thud!*...*Crack!*...*Crunch!*
     "Now!" Victoria yelled as the door fell in.
     With a cry of primal rage, the two girls charged Mulder as
if they were playing football and he was on the opposing team.
The shower curtain was stretched between them. He had only just
righted himself after almost falling with the door when he was
enveloped by yards of beige vinyl. Dyna and Victoria rushed out
past him, leaving the world's first human burrito to struggle out
of his "tortilla".
     Meanwhile, his intended victims were setting new speed
records as they charged down the hall. Due to the lateness of the
hour, it was dark and deserted. But light still shone from under
the many doors they passed, making Victoria wonder briefly if
anyone who had heard the commotion, and how could they not?, was
going to lend assistance or call the police.
     Probably not. If they had called, the cops would have been
there by now. Vicky suddenly detested the "don't get involved"
mentality of the world.
     They slid around the corner, intent on one destination. The
elevator. If they could just get to it, they would be safe.
     But Mulder was an athletic young man, who jogged more in a
week than either of them did in a year. As they rounded the
corner, Mulder was at his front door, in time to see a flash of
bright green pants. Their lead began to evaporate at that moment.
     "Wait!" he bellowed, his voice only spurring them on. "I
found them! I've got red, purple, and green! I'm out of blue, but
I do have one Fourth of July left!"
     Dyna cried out in disgust and terror. They came to a
screeching halt in front of the elevator. Dyna smashed her finger
against the "down" button without a second thought. Victoria
heard the hammering of Mulder's size-twelve feet and looked up.
He was bearing down on them like a freight train.
     The elevator door slid open.
     Dyna and Victoria threw themselves into it's waiting
carriage. Dyna snugged herself into the corner by the button
panel, and punched number one over and over.
     The closing of the doors was an agonizingly slow process.
Time slowed to a crawl. The doors inched closed. Dimly, they
heard Mulder calling out to them, telling them to wait and to
come back. The doors moved another inch closer.
     The girls finally began to relax when there was only a
hand's width of space left to cross before the two doors would
become one. At last, safe.
     Mulder's muscled arm shot through the space like a snake.
     Dyna shrieked, crushing her finger upon the "close" button.
The arm failed, doubled over and found a handhold. It began to
push the doors apart.
     Victoria flung herself forward, shoving with all her might
at the arm. It moved an inch; she pushed harder.
     "I'm sure I can find a glow-in-the-dark if you'll give me a
minute!" said Mulder conversationally.
     "We don't like that stuff!" Dyna shrilled. She was still
stabbing faithfully at the "close" button.
      All that was caught was his hand, and when the doors closed
on that he would have no choice but to pull it out.
     "Yeah," concurred Victoria, her voice seething with sarcasm
as she glared at Mulder through the space between the doors. "We
like the chocolate flavored kind!"
     "You're in luck!"
     The words had the same effect on Dyna as a blow to the gut
would have. She doubled over, clutching her middle, feeling sick.
She stabbed helplessly at the button.
     Victoria gave a strangled cry. The doors were sliding open.
     "Dyna!"
     The brunette looked at the doors, then at the panel. Her
finger was depressing the "open" button. She fell away from it,
into the far corner.
     But it was too late. The doors parted like the Red Sea, and
Mulder wormed between them. He stooped, wrapping his arms around
Victoria's middle. He flipped her over his shoulder and dashed
through the gaping maw of the elevator. One was better than none,
his pheromone-addled brain reasoned.
     Victoria was too shocked to cry out, or struggle. She was
immersed in the feelings the condemned must have when they set
eyes upon the instrument of their demise.
     The dismayed look on her friend's face was just the catalyst
Dyna needed. Suddenly, the invertebrate grew a spine.
     "Stop!" she cried, rushing out into the hall. She knew just
the way to save Victoria. "Don't take her!"
     Mulder paused, sensing an offer.
     "Take..." Dyna's voice trailed off. She had a very well-
developed sense of self-preservation, verging on cowardice. She
just couldn't risk her own neck. "Don't take her!"
     Victoria's head bobbed on a neck of gelatin. Mulder resumed
his march down the hall.
     "I'm deeply touched by your selfless sacrifice on my
behalf!" Vicky rasped. 
     "I'm trying!" Gem fussed. Time for Plan B. She bounded up to
Mulder, staggering under the shifting weight of his burden. She
brought her shoe down firmly on Mulder's toe.
     "There! How do you like that?" she crowed.
     Mulder winced. "It's not really my thing, but for you,
okay."
     Gem hauled off and slapped him.
     Victoria realized she would have to save herself. Rocking
back and forth to make Mulder fall wasn't working. Thinking of
her own afflictions, and praying Mulder had them as well, she
fastened her hands to both sides of his waist.
     "Coochie, coochie-coo!"
     Her gambit worked. Mulder was extremely ticklish. Insanely
ticklish. Nothing could have been more effective in bringing him
down. Instantly his knees buckled under. His un-burdened shoulder
fell against the wall, and his entire body began to drool to the
floor.
     "Yes! Yes! Oh, golly Vic, *yes*!"
     Dyna flashed back to how she felt in the autopsy room. Her
mouth clamped shut to hold back the bile. Someone have mercy on
her!
     Victoria was quite disturbed also, but being of stronger
stomach, she gritted her teeth and kept tickling. It didn't take
long before Mulder was on the floor, curled up in a ball with his
arms around his tortured sides. And as soon as he was, Victoria
bounded to her feet.
     This time, both girls made it into the elevator. The rested
against the cool walls, panting from exertion. Slowly they began
to calm as the carriage transported them to the safety.
     Twin sighs of relief exploded as the doors parted to reveal
an empty lobby. Wearily, they staggered out.
     "I hope you appreciate my selfless act back there." Dyna
sniffed.
     Victoria glowered at her, two brows made one. "Joan of Arc
would have been proud."
     "Yes. She would." chirped Dyna, totally ignoring Vicky's
contempt.
     The pair was one step from the door when something heavy and
metal clanged behind them. They whirled.
     A disheveled Mulder stood in the doorway of the stairwell.
His chest heaved, and his eyes glowed. A toothy grin split his
face.
     "At last, in a world full of shipwrecks, I find the
dreamboats. Darlings, come to papa!"
     They screamed and ran.

--


     Chapter Six
     

     The basement office was pitch black, the lights off and no
windows to provide illumination. The air conditioning hummed
softly. It was the only sign of life.
     A soft click in the door interrupted the air conditioner's
monologue. Then a shaft of light from the outside hall cleaved
the blackness.
     A hand groped out for the light switch. Overheard, the bulbs
snapped on with a buzz. The two women looked blearily over the
office.
     The pair were a sorry sight as they staggered in, flopping
down in the closest chairs. One rested her head on Mulder's desk,
savoring the first real snatch of comfort she'd had in some time.
Her red hair was a mess, with small twigs poking out here and
there. She was still wearing the achingly loud fuchsia and green
ensemble she'd been in the previous day, rumpled and dirt-
stained.
     Draped over Scully's chair, the brunette looked no better.
The dirt stains stood out more strikingly on her cream colored
pantsuit. Her French twist trailed haphazard strands. She felt
she looked like Medusa. The leaves she hadn't yet noticed were a
fitting touch.
     Dyna groaned, gripped in the throes of exhaustion yet unable
to fall asleep.
     "I agree. I agree." mumbled Victoria, eyes shut.
     They had spent the night hiding from Mulder. While galloping
down the sidewalk with "papa" only a few steps behind them, they
decided that the risk of getting mugged or murdered was not too
great. They ran and ran for blocks. Crossing against the light at
intersections was an interesting experience for all of them.
     Dyna and Victoria had jumped for joy when they went dashing
past a park. At last, a hiding place that didn't involve the
interior of dumpsters! They vaulted over the fence like a couple
of Mary Lou Rettons and dove into the underbrush. Hence the twigs
in their hair.
     But somehow, someway, Mulder found them. He *always* found
them. The first time they weren't surprised. Crawling on one's
belly through a field of pyracantha bushes is not the world's
most quiet activity. Add to that Dyna's shrieking each time a
twig raked across her skin, and their only hope would have been a
deaf pursuer.
     So they moved to the trees. Up in the boughs was a
defendable position. And if they just held on tight and didn't
say anything, he'd run right underneath them and never be the
wiser.
     Boy, were they ever wrong.
     Dyna and Victoria clung to the branches of an oak tree,
biting lips and listening to Mulder search for them.
     "Little Bunny Foo-Foo, hoppin' through the forest!" they
heard him sing. "Scoopin' up the field mice and boppin' 'em on
the head!"
     "I am not a mouse. I am a human being." Dyna whimpered.
     "Shut-up, you idiot, he'll hear you!" Victoria said with as
much ferocity as she could manage in a whisper.
     The singing stopped. The girls fell silent. Faintly the
sounds of the city filtered in. Then the rustling of foliage in
the summer breeze just above that. No footsteps. No Mulder. 
     Still, they waited. He was a sneaky one. And all that
pheromone perfume was only making it worse. Both resented the
bottles bumping in their pockets, but just tossing it out for
some unsuspecting goober to find was too cruel to be feasible.
     Behind them, the leaves stirred violently. Mulder's head
popped through, grinning.
     "I just won the grand prize, and it's you!" he crowed. In a
moment, he was clambering towards Victoria's branch.
     She promptly fell off.
     And so off they dashed to the small man-made lake. Dyna
cowered behind the rushes at the far back. Victoria tossed two
medium sized rocks into a less congested section of the lake,
then lay down beside Dyna and hoped Mulder would fall for it.
     He did, at first. He arrived in time to see ripples, so he
stood, waiting for the women to surface. When an unreasonable
amount of time passed, he recognized he had been duped. The
combing of the vegetation along the banks began a moment later,
and the girls bolted. The moon, waxing gibbous, lent enough light
for him to see as they tore off among the trees.
     And so it went, hiding, being discovered, hiding some more
in that accursed park for the better part of the evening. Dyna
and Victoria hadn't slept a wink.
     So here they were. They'd finally escaped the park early
that morning, and taken the bus with what change they'd had in
their pockets. Both their purses were gone, abandoned at Mulder's
apartment. They chose to go to work, because squirrled away in
Mulder's office were their spare house and car keys. And in only
three days time!
     Victoria's head stirred from the desk. She couldn't sleep.
She was too tired to sleep. She wanted to go home. 
     "If we were made out of foam rubber, we'd be Muppets." she
observed.
     Dyna's head tried to come up. "Which one would you be?"
     Her green pants came to mind. "Kermit."
     "And who would I be?"
     "Miss Piggy." Victoria drawled.
     From some deep reserve within her, Dyna found enough energy
to toss Scully's tissue box at Victoria.
     The latter groaned again. "The truth hurts, baby. Now which
filing cabinet did I hide my keys in?"
     "Mine are on the inside roof of the one over there." She
pointed.
     "So?"
     Dyna made indignant noise. Did Victoria actually expect her
to get up and get them? After all Dyna had been through?
     "S'pose he's got anything to eat in this desk?" Vicky wasn't
expecting an answer. She opened the deep bottom drawer.
     And gave a cry of joy.
     "Our purses!" She tossed Dyna's tiny black one in the dark-
haired woman's general direction. She brought out her own
average-sized purple one and kissed it.
     "Now I can call a cab to take me home!" 
     Dyna stared contemplatively at her own purse. It had landed
in her lap. "You know what this means?"
     "Huh?" Vicky was rifling through her wallet, greeting each
bill by name.
     "He's here."
     Victoria's eyes, nose and mouth twisted up until the lot of
them would have fit beneath a bottle cap. She gave a sobbing cry.
     "Oh, he can't be!" she wailed.
     Dyna was not perturbed. "Do you think these purses simply
walked here from Mulder's apartment? Do you think someone else
went and got them?"
     "I know, I know." Vicky grumbled. "I was just saying."
     Dyna rose slowly to her feet. "I think we should be going.
We will be extremely lucky if he doesn't have us hunted down and
arrested as degenerates."
     "Us? Degenerates?" Victoria snorted, adjusting the purse
strap now lying across her chest. "He's the one who had glow-in-
the-dark-"
     "Stop!"
     Victoria stuck out her tongue, both at Dyna and as a non-
verbal comment on the glow-in-the-dark... things. She rose,
checking to see if her knees would still hold her up. She found
that they would.
     Vicky had taken one step away from Mulder's desk when the
black phone jumped to life. She stared at it as though it were a
live hand grenade.
     "Answer it." said Dyna. She never could resist sticking her
nose into things.
     "What if it's him?" Victoria hissed.
     "Hang up."
     There was no arguing with that kind of logic. But still,
Victoria didn't want to risk it. So she split the difference, let
the phone ring once more, then picked it up.
     "We're sorry. Fox Mulder is busy chasing aliens right now,
but if you leave the location of a safe contact point at the
beep, he'll get right back to you. Beep!" she said in her best
answering-machine voice.
     "Uh-huh. Hello, Walsh." replied Skinner's secretary. "Please
come up to AD Skinner's office right away."
     "Why us?" Walsh's voice was shrill.
     "Because it's something to do with the Crenshaw case, and
Mulder didn't come into work today, and we haven't seen Scully
since yesterday. So you're it. Don't keep him waiting."
     The dial tone mocked Victoria.
     Dyna was understandably cross over this turn of events.
     "I can't see the boss!" she cried. "I'm dirty, I'm unkempt!
I probably smell bad! That's not what gets promotions!"
     "Shall we not show up and get fired?" asked Victoria.
     "You can't fire government employees."
     "Right." Vicky snapped her fingers. "They can just demote us
to janitors."
     Dyna glowered, but went.
     The pair didn't say anything as they walked to the elevator.
Nor did they speak when they got in. But as the doors began to
close, Walsh sang;
     "It's time to something something. It's time to light the
lights. It's time to something something on the Muppet Show
tonight."

##########

     Skinner's secretary gave the disheveled pair an odd look as
they passed by her desk. She didn't try to stop them. After four
years, she knew that anything that came out of the basement was
bound to be weird, and weird was normal.
     Dyna scratched on the door.
     "You'll have to scratch harder than that if you want him to
answer." said Victoria.
     "I don't." Dyna scratched again.
     Victoria rapped briskly on the door, while her partner
willed her body to shrivel into a ball. Just as her toes were
beginning to think about curling under, Skinner's voice called;
"Come in."
     Victoria sighed, and pushed open the door.
     Skinner was at his desk reading over some kind of form. His
eyes grew wide behind his glasses when he saw what stood in his
doorway.
     "You wanted to see us, sir?" Victoria asked meekly.
     Skinner took off the glasses. No, he didn't need a new
prescription. They really were covered in dirt and leaves. He
gave them the once-over three times. It was almost tempting to
ask what they'd been doing; he decided not to. Every time he
asked Mulder that question, he got an answer a lot farther out
than left field. And these two didn't strike him as any more
normal than "Spooky" was.
     "Yes. Come in." His voice plainly announced he was less than
pleased.
     Victoria squared her shoulder and went inside. She
positioned herself in front of his desk in the at-ease stance.
She looked a wreck, but so what? Attitude was everything,
according to every Fortune 500 lecturer she'd ever listened to.
     Dyna was less self-assured. She scurried along with her head
down, looking as though she were about to be hung. Halfway to her
destination, Dyna's exhausted feet became entangled with each
other, and down she went. There was a thud coupled with a crunch
as she landed hard on her stomach. She lay there, whimpering.
     "Agent Hayes?" Skinner cried with alarm, rising to his feet.
     "Ow-how!" she wailed. The tears were already plowing muddy
tracks down her cheeks. "I hurt myself!"
     Victoria bent down. As soon as she had helped lift Dyna into
a kneeling position, the smell hit her like a mack truck. A
golden stain was spreading unabated over the left front pocket of
Dyna's jacket.
     It hit Skinner, coming around the desk to lend his own
assistance, a moment later. He stopped as if he had run into a
wall.
     "Whoa!" he cried, unable to stop himself. He was waving a 
hand in front of his face. "Whoa! What is that?"
     Dyna couldn't answer. She had buried her face in her hands,
bawling as though her heart would break. Last night was bad
enough, but now *this*? it couldn't be happening!
     Victoria felt the prick of tears beneath her own eyelids.   
"It's perfume."
     "Strong!" coughed Walter. The odor was a pungent cloud,
wreathing the room. "Broke the bottle?"
     Victoria nodded. Dyna shot a single glance at the assistant
director, and gave in to a bad case of the snivels.
     "Oh, Vicky, what have you done!"
     The auburn-haired woman chose to ignore that little
misplacement of blame. She leaned over to her friend's ear.
     "How much was left in the bottle?"
     "Almost half!" 
     Half? Victoria's head swam. The full bottle was a little
over four ounces. This was the biggest dose yet! She looked up at
Skinner. Already his cheeks were beginning to pink.
     "Dyna! Let's move, gotta go!" Vicky exclaimed. She hauled
her partner to her feet as easily as she had Mulder. The wave of
fragrance rolled over Skinner, filled every crevice of the
office.
     He sniffed deeply, his face wrinkled disagreeably. "God,
what an awf- "
     Victoria's throat closed up.
     He sniffed again. "Lovely fragrance."
     Dyna's hand snaked out, clamped about Victoria's forearm.
     "Sir, we have to leave now." said Victoria, wasting no time
in backing towards the door.
     Skinner fixed his eyes upon them. The scent tickled his
nostrils delightfully. Dyna thought he looked just like a koala
bear, getting ready to munch an unsuspecting eucalyptus leaf.
     "No, don't go away." he said, his voice much softer than the
usual baritone.
     "Yes, sir, we have to!" Victoria turned and flung the door
open.
     The secretary sniffed.
     "Wait! You haven't seen my eraser holder yet!" Skinner
cried.
     "Yes, we have." Victoria squeaked, hurrying out of the
office. Though she wanted to, she didn't run. They were
conspicuous enough as it was. Instead, she fantasized she was
power walking up a deserted forest trail. Dyna matched her step
for step.
     Once they were in the hall, crowded with the usual mid-
morning melee of FBI headquarters, the power walking turned to
speed walking. They had to get away from all other human beings.
Especially males.
     Victoria heard sniffing and turned to look. Skinner was
standing in the middle of the hall, watching them with a dumb
grin on his face. A couple of male agents were smelling the air.
     "Oh, no. Oh, help. Oh, no." Victoria said, kicking into a
gear that was just under a run.
     Dyna raced along beside her. However, her mind was on a
different motivation for terror, reflected in the huge eyes fixed
straight ahead. She thought Victoria had come to the same
conclusion when Vicky squeaked out those words.
     "What if it works on women too." Dyna hissed, articulating
her thoughts for the first time.
     "Oh, no!" Victoria yelped.
     She turned again. No women were sniffing, thank heavens, but
they had picked up four more tails of the masculine gender. The
girls swept past the water cooler. Two men chatting there
stopped, put their cups down.
     "I'm sorry we ever bought that stuff. I'm sorry I ever let
you talk me into this." Dyna was saying.
     "Don't talk." Victoria snapped. The water cooler men were
heading towards them. She broke into a full-fledged run. "Just
*move*!"
     Dyna, for once, didn't argue. The two shot off into space,
knocking people out of the way with abandon. They had to get
downstairs and out of the building. She was going to go home and
bathe with the strongest soap she could find. No, not soap. It
wouldn't do the job. Maybe Lysol Deodorizing Cleaner. And then
she was going to burn this suit. She would buy another, later.
When she'd recovered.
     All their thoughts about escape would lead one to think that
the elevator was the promised land. Not so. They blew past it
like it wasn't even there. After the fiasco with Mulder, they
were going to use good old-fashioned self-propulsion.
     "Feet don't fail me now!" cried Vicky as she flung herself
around the corner, running for all she was worth. The main
stairwell was a short way ahead. She dove through the door,
pounding down the stairs so fast she risked tripping and bashing
her skull in on the edge of one. It didn't matter. She was
desperate to get out. Not just out of the stairwell, but from
headquarters. Out and away from *them*.
     Down the stairs they flew like birds, hanging tight with one
hand to the railing as they whirled from one flight to the next.
Down and down they went, hearing the pound of their own
frightened hearts, the burn of breath within their chests. They
hoped the clatter of footsteps was made only by their own four
feet.
     On a landing near the end of their flight, Victoria's feet
lost traction. She slid along the smooth tiles a short distance
and rammed into a wall. She caught the railing of the stairs she
had just come off of, saving herself from tumbling down the next
flight. 
     Dyna grabbed the railing as well, jerking to a stop on the
last step. Both sagged where they were, throats burning, lungs
searing, hearts needing just a small push in order to jump out of
their chests.
     "I... wonder... if... we're... being... followed." panted
Dyna.
     Victoria threw back her head, staring up the flight they had
just bolted down. She held her breath for a moment, listening.
     Several flights up, she heard the sound of many, many
tasseled feet.
     Without a word she pivoted fast and took off. She was at the
main lobby in seconds. Victoria used the weight of her body to
depress the bar latch on the door, it's momentum to open the
door. She kept on running, not caring if Dyna was keeping up or
not. Under the circumstances, she felt she was entitled to be a
little selfish.
     Dyna was thinking the same thing, so she kept up nicely.
They attracted plenty of attention as they charged headlong
through the lobby. Stares and orders from the security guards to
stop were consummately ignored. 
     It was a flat-out run all the way from lobby to parking
garage. Both girls felt that had someone only been clocking them,
they easily would have qualified to compete in at least a couple
of Olympic track events.
     In the dim, cool concrete womb of the parking garage, the
two split ranks and began weaving among the huge support pillars
that kept the levels separated. Here and there they darted, like
rabbits, hoping to confuse anyone who might be following his
nose.
     At last, Victoria ran up behind her partner. She grabbed
Dyna's arm and stopped them both.
     "Where...did...you...park?" she asked, heaving air into her
lungs as fast as humanly possible.
     Dyna banged her foot on the ground a couple of times, then
pointed to the east.
     "Let's go." said Victoria, setting out in the direction Dyna
had indicated. Her pace was a brisk jog now.
     Somewhere, back behind them, a metal door banged against the
concrete wall. 
     "They're like bloodhounds!" Dyna shrieked, taking off.
"Following the scent!"
     Whether or not the door was actually admitting a herd of
ill-gotten men, Victoria neither knew or cared. She raced after
her friend at top speed.
     Dyna started moving among cars for some unknown reason.
Vicky followed because she had no idea where Dyna's car was, and
her own car was an entire level up.
     Victoria was looking behind them, trying to see if they were
alone in the garage or not. Dyna came to an abrupt halt, and
Vicky plowed right into the back of her. The pair squawked and
listed forward, but managed to remain upright.
     "What now?" Vicky demanded.
     "That!" Dyna squeaked.
     Victoria looked down. Crushed beneath the heel of Dyna's
shoe was a hand. A plastic hand. A couple of fingers had been
snapped off, the wrist beneath the leather jacket was bent into
an odd angle. But the bigger question was what was it doing
poking out from under a car?
     Dyna shrieked as it began to move. Both of them reversed
course, backing up a couple of steps. Out came and elbow, a
shoulder, then a head. There was a whole man hiding under that
car!
     He had been on his back. Now, he scooted out and stood up.
He was wearing black jeans and a white tee shirt in addition to
the jacket, and his dark hair was slicked back. He might have
been considered handsome, had it not been for the murderous gleam
in his brown eyes. The mangled prosthetic arm hung oddly at his
side.
     "Oh, no, he's physically challenged! If he sues he'll win!"
moaned Victoria. In the next breath she said; "Sir, we are
extremely sorry! We had no idea you were under there!"
     "No idea!" echoed Dyna.
     The man didn't reply. The girls continued to back up, their
eyes on an alternate route to Dyna's car. He didn't know them, if
they got away there wasn't a chance he could sue them, or even
press charges.
     He was using his real hand to reach across his body, for
something in the waistband of his jeans. His fingers closed
around the cool, pebbly surface of it's handle. A fist of scent
punched him right in the nose. Stupid, and they wore too much
perfume. He'd probably be thanked.
     But something about the scent got to him, slowed his fingers
as they tugged upon the device. It infected him, making feelings
run through him the way a drink of strong whiskey did. He could
track the course of the smell, from his nose, down his throat,
into his lungs, and right on down to his-
     "Who are you?" he asked, his voice neutral.
     "No one important." replied Victoria. She saw the blush
creeping across his face and stabbed Dyna hard in the back with
her finger.
     "Just passing through." said Dyna. They began to scurry
away, putting a car between themselves and this strange man.
     "Wait!" The prosthetic arm reached up, trying and failing to
make the stop gesture of a traffic cop. He shoved the gun back
into the waistband of his jeans, and forgot all about the bomb he
had been planting under that nicotine-sodden SOB's car.
     "Can't! Appointment!" Victoria called, scrambling across the
hood of a car just so one more would be between them.
     "What's your name? Mine's Alex." the man said, starting to
come after them.
     For the third time that day, the girls were running. Mr.
Alex appeared to have some dignity about him. He just jogged
after them, keeping a nice pace even though he was expending a
third of the energy they were. His little black-and-white self
was just bouncing along without a care in the world.
     "Pant! Wheeze! Gasp!" said Dyna unhelpfully.
     "Gripe later." panted Victoria. "Run now."
     It took a while, but they managed to lose Alex somewhere
along the way. Dyna pointed and whooped at the first sight of her
dark green Altima.
     The pair stopped by running into the little automobile.
Victoria slid down to the concrete floor, gasping, while her
partner rooted in the tiny black should bag she had somehow
managed to keep a hold of through all of this.
     And she rooted. And she rooted, And she rooted some more.
     Vicky glared at her. The thing wasn't a purse! It was a
glorified cough-drop box! How could she possibly lose anything in
it?
     "I can't find my keys!" Dyna wailed, tears springing
unbidden to her eyes.
     "You have to!" Vicky snapped. She rose, tearing the bag from
Dyna and dumping it's contents onto the ground. She dropped to
her knees and scrabbled through the resulting mess.
     Dyna kneeled down across from her, putting things back into
the purse, item by item.
     "Maybe it isn't so bad." she said. "We could have a harem."
     Victoria paused. "Skinner is after us. Do you want him?"
     Dyna had to think about it for precisely two seconds.
"Change of heart!"
     They found the keys mysteriously attached to Dyna's
sunglasses case. Victoria ripped them off and tossed them to
Dyna, who swept the last stray items back into the bag.
     "Hurry and open the door!" Vicky cried.
     "I'm trying!" Dyna said, fumbling to get the key into the
lock. It trembled as her hand trembled, missing time and time
again.
     It was torment for Victoria. Little fish swam along her
spine. Her heart that had been thudding all this time began to
beat even faster, building tempo without a pause.
     The air had somehow grown thicker, colder. The back of her
neck prickled all the way to her shoulder blades, the same way it
did when- When someone was watching her!
     She swung around frantically, peering between the pillars.
There was nothing there. It was no comfort. She was panting like
an over-tired race horse. And the feeling that she was being
watched would not go away.
     "Hey there!"
     Victoria shrieked, the sound ricocheting off the thick walls
all around them. Next to a nearby concrete pillar stood Alex the
One-Armed Man, grinning drunkenly.
     "Tag, you're it." he said, taking a step forward.
     Victoria fled, screaming. Dyna and Alex were right behind
her. She dashed through the garage, never stopping, never slowing
down, until she had found one of the exits. Though it was not
normally used by people on foot, Vicky didn't care. She jumped
over the yellow-and-black striped barrier, ran up the ramp into
the light of day.
     A short section of driveway made a T-intersection with the
man car path that circled the FBI complex. Two oceans of lush
green grass sprawled luxuriously on either side of her, enjoying
their morning drink.
     "I can't take this anymore!" she screamed.
     She turned to face one of the islands of grass. She took off
running, a gymnast about to make the vault of her life. With a
little jump, Victoria belly-flopped onto the wet blades and began
to roll around, trying to scrub the stench of "temptation for
Women" off of herself.
     Dyna exploded from the garage, took one look at her friend,
and decided she had gone completely crazy. But the idea was
sound, if the application wasn't. Dyna tore off her creamy
jacket. Alas, the perfume had soaked onto the leg of her pant,
and through to the skin. She was still tainted.
     "No! Oh, no, oh *no*!" she screamed, dropping to the grass
just like her friend.
     Together, they scooted and scuffed, rubbed and scrubbed. The
water from the sprinklers soaked them to the bone. The grass bled
green upon their clothes, their skin. It was awful, a horrible
sight.
     "Get it off! Get it off!" Dyna shrieked.
     And Alex? While Dyna had barely escaped getting caught by
the guard, Alex Krycek did not. While the girls pretended they
were horses in the pasture, the two men pair wrestled just inside
the garage. Alex tried to pull his gun, it was knocked from his
hand. He was summarily arrested.
     And still in the throes of their perfume agony, Dyna Hayes
and Victoria Walsh ran across the parking lot, loudly cursing
their rotten luck and swearing never to anything even remotely
like this ever again.

--


Epilogue

     The pain was already unbearable. When Scully began to
whistle, it was like two knitting needles shoved deep into his
ears.
     "Scully, please." Mulder muttered quietly. If he didn't move
and there was no sound, he could manage.
     Scully glanced up from her magazine, grinning. "What,
Mulder?"
     Oh, the pain! Mulder lay his head on his desk, pillowed on
one arm with his hand over the exposed ear. When was his aspirin
going to begin working? He'd taken four just prior to coming to
work.
     "Whisper, Scully, please." Mulder begged, his voice a mere
shadow in the air. "My head is killing me."
     "Oh, sorry." she said, dropping her voice to a stage
whisper. "You know, if you put a cold cloth on your head and your
feet in a bowl of hot water, it'll really help. Worked wonders
for me."
     "Really?" Mulder's bloodshot eyes closed, seeking sleep. He
should have stayed home. Why hadn't he stayed home?
     "Uh-huh." Dana sounded as fresh and chirpy as a cheerleader.
Mulder was still trying to figure out why. He was also trying to
get a look at the cover of the magazine she was reading. Every so
often, she'd exhale in delight and mark the page. Shopping,
perhaps? But Mulder had never known her to get that excited about
clothes.
     The click as the doorknob turned echoed around within his
skull like a gunshot. Mulder buried his head deep into his arms
and groaned.
     Dyna and Victoria shuffled into the room like a pair of old
ladies. They looked like dirt. Their hands and faces were
sporting scrapes and bruises, their eyes bloodshot just like
Mulder's. The two of them moved as if every step was painful.
     "Hello!" Scully sang, almost percolating in her seat. The
smile on her face would not go away.
     "SHHH!"
     All three hissed at her in unison. She returned to her
magazine without a word. She was going to thank the two women for
what they'd done for her, but now- So grumpy! How could anyone be
in a bad mood on such a glorious day?
     It didn't occur to her that the massive hangover she'd come
into possession of yesterday, and the three obvious hangovers
sitting around her were connected in any way. She figured Mulder
had hit the bottle too hard because he was upset about the
Rademacher woman disappearing before they could arrest her. What
Hayes and Walsh had been up to she couldn't fathom.
     But what did it matter? What did any of it matter? She was
so happy she felt like floating right out of her seat. The smile
temporarily dimmed by their admonishment bloomed brightly again.
     "Okay, we made the effort to come in." croaked Walsh. Her
voice was barely audible. "Can we go home now? I want to soak my
feet."
     Dyna nodded miserably. She cradled her throbbing head in her
hands. The both of them had figured out pretty quickly that
"Temptation for Women" was very much like alcohol. It got you
hooked, then pounded you into the ground. And they were sure the
perfume was responsible, because neither of them drank. At all.
Not a drop.
     "I second that emotion." Mulder's voice was muffled by the
tangle of limbs over his face.
     Victoria blushed deeply. She had dreaded this confrontation,
inevitable or not. Vanishing off the face of the earth seemed
like such a neater, easier way to deal with it. Apologizing was
so painful.
     But it needed to be done, and Dyna would never do it. Not
that Victoria blamed her. But there was no third party they could
foist the distasteful duty onto. Victoria gathered in some
oxygen, and tucked her courage up around her ears like a security
blanket.
     "Mulder, we're sorry." she breathed, both out of
embarrassment and consideration for their aching skulls.
     "Why?" came the nearly-unintelligible reply.
     "Because of the day before yesterday."  
     His arm shifted position. One red, rheumy eye peered out at
her from beneath a heavy lid. "What happened the day before
yesterday?"
      Victoria's mouth fell down; her lids went up. Could he-?
No, he wanted to hear her say what she had done. He was going to
rub her nose in it, and then yell at her.
     She wouldn't make it easy for him. "You know what."
     The one eye blinked. "No, I don't."
     "Yes, you do."
     "Nope. Sorry. You'll have to tell me."
     Vicky gave him a suspicious look. She didn't believe a word
of it. "You really don't..." She almost said "remember", but
opted for "know" instead, in case he wasn't lying.
     "No." His sighed carried with it the flavor of irritability.
"Outside of waking up yesterday morning in my apartment, the last
thing I remember is eating your chicken soup."
     Vicky pressed a hand to her heart. His eye looked at her
steadily, he didn't try to touch his mouth. He wasn't lying! He
really didn't recall the events of the bathroom, the hallway,
nothing. She was spared.
     "Why? Do you know something?" He slowly drew his head into
the upright position. "I was covered with scratches, and someone
ripped my shower curtain down."     
     Vicky thought fast. Dyna had her back to them, not paying
attention.
     "Dyna was rinsing it off, and she tripped. Tore like a piece
of paper. And you were sleeping so peacefully, we didn't want to
wake you." said Vicky.
     "The scratches?"
     Victoria shrugged. "Don't know. We left after the shower
curtain incident." Hey, it wasn't a lie.
     Mulder shut his eyes and sighed. His fingers gently massaged
his temples. "Damn, I took too much cold medicine." he growled.
"I've felt like hell since yesterday."
     //Sleeping dogs.// Vicky reminded herself.
     "You could put a cold cloth on your head and your feet in
hot water. That's what I'm going to do." she told him.
     They both though their craniums were going explode when Dyna
cried in a loud voice; "'Brides' magazine?"
     They turned. Scully was indeed clutching a copy of that
publication to her chest, looking terribly embarrassed. Dyna was
hovering over her like an angry bumblebee.
     "I'm sorry." Dana told the injured parties. "I had no idea
she was going to yell."
     "No problem." Mulder looked more than alarmed. He looked
ready to toss his cookies. "Why do you have that?"
     Scully blushed, giggled. Mulder's stomach rolled.
     "Well...." she drawled, looking shyly at the floor. Victoria
moved in closer. This she had to hear for herself.
     Scully raised her eyes to Mulder's and beamed. "Chris
Pendrell and I are getting married."
     Mulder gaped at her, his jaw on the floor. *Married*?
Scully, his Scully? And *Pendrell*? He sat back heavily in his
chair, grasping his head. He let out an odd sound, halfway
between a laugh and a moan.
     Victoria and Dyna were smiling from ear to ear. It was like,
look what we did. They felt justified in taking the credit. After
all, if it hadn't been from them and their perfume, Pendrell
would still be pining away.
     "That's great!" Victoria cried, pain in her head be darned.
She moved to hug Scully. Their heads bumped and Victoria drew
back, her eyes sprouting tears.
     "Sorry. Thanks." said Dana.
     "Congratulations." Dyna went for a less intimate handshake.
     Scully's smile positively glowed. "I wanted to thank the
both of you. If you hadn't -" She winked at the two taller women.
"We never would have - I wouldn't be so happy right now. Thank
you, and I want you to come to the wedding."
     Vicky grinned, nodded. She wouldn't miss it. Dyna inclined
her head politely. The way she felt, all she wanted was to go
home and go to sleep.
     "You're invited too, Mulder." said Scully.
     He made that same odd noise.
     Scully softened her voice as she looked at him. "And I'd
like you to give me away. With my father gone... Mulder, there's
no one else I want to do it."
     Victoria cooed, clapping her hands lightly. Mulder felt a
sudden pain in his gut. Give her away? She might as well have
asked him to cut off his own leg with a butter knife. 
     //But look at her eyes,// he thought. Two aquamarine jewels
shined out at him, so hopeful it made his heart hurt just to
look. //I can't say no to her. She loves him.//
     He nodded his head, slowly. "Sure."
     "Awwwwww." Vicky wiped two straggling tears from the apples
of her cheeks.
     She voice was like cold water to Mulder. He cleared his
throat and stood up. It was all he could do to keep his face in
it's regular non-expression.
     "I feel like-"
     Dyna made a sharp noise, holding up one finger.
     "Dirt." said Mulder dryly. "I'm going home. This case and go
jump, for all I care. It will never be solved anyway."
     "Like ninety percent of the stuff we investigate, what's
your point?" asked Scully.
     Mulder grumbled wordlessly and reached for his trench coat.
     "I'm leaving too." said Vicky. "I shouldn't have come in the
first place."
     "I agree." said Dyna. She gave the office one last cursory
glance. She hoped never to see it again. She wanted her own.
     But even in her hungover state, Dyna's eyes were sharp as an
eagle's. They latched onto the small Barney's bag nestled between
Scully's feet.
     "What's that?" 
     Dana grinned mischievously and stooped. Dyna looked on with
interest. She wasn't nosy, she simply liked to know everything
that went on around her.
     "Well, since it worked so well on Chris the other day..."
she began. Her grin was feline, as if she were still licking the
remains of Pendrell off her lips. The three other occupants of
the basement office used their mobile faces to express in varying
degrees their discomfort. Dana barely took notice.
     "I just couldn't stop myself from getting a supply for the
honeymoon."
     Her delicate fingers reached into the bag, bringing out a
white and gold box. She turned it so the lettered side faced out.
     "Temptation for-"
     Hayes and Walsh shrieked bloody murder and stampeded out of
the office like so many buffalo.
     Mulder was not far behind.

     THE END