The Ties That Bind (Blood of My Blood II) by Claire kshar02@hotmail.com Disclaimer: Characters are the property of Fox, and no profit is being made from this fic. Rating: R Spoilers: Requiem. *** Mulder was right. As Sean and I walk outside, the sun fills my eyes, burning in its intensity, starbursts of light and pain in my vision. Outside: the light and color filling the world are overwhelming and I can feel tears in my eyes. My knees are trembling, from weakness or emotion or both, and I have to sit on the step as Sean runs to Mulder. There's a garden in front of my apartment building, I notice, wonderingly. What once was a flat yard has been plowed and sown with vegetables and sunflowers. Mulder stands with his back to the building, working in the garden as Sean chatters to him. The sight of my son and my friend, this garden, the daylight, my freedom...my heart fills and I can feel my soul unbound. I am alive again. I am myself again. Mulder turns to look at me, sitting on the step, watching him, and the sunlight surrounds him. I look upon his face. --------------- She looks even smaller today, if that's possible. But her back is staight and she looks into my eyes. I see the spirit of the woman I once knew, in this frail body, her unwavering eyes. I walk over to her, and she moves to make room so that I might sit beside her. "Good morning," I say eventually, after some thought. I feel the need to tread carefully around her. Her fragility distrubs me, her joints enlarged against narrow limbs, her bones defined and as narrow as a child's. "Hey, Mulder," she says, and it's as if these years have not passed. As if everything was as it once was. "You remember?" I am surprised, although her demeanor should have suggested this to me. "I had forgotten," she admits. "But I remember now." Remembering, myself, I undo the clasp on the gold cross around my neck and place it in her ruined palm. She closes her hand over it with difficulty, the hint of a smile playing on her lips. "Thank you for keeping it for me." "You should have kept it for yourself, Scully. You gave me this for protection, when you were the one who needed protection." My voice cracks, I take a breath, and try to continue. "You needed this more than me. I spent eight months in a lab and was released. You've spent four years in Hell." I pause again, my cowardice getting the better of me. But I have to say this. "It should have saved you, Scully. *I* should have saved you." "Mulder..." she leans forward and reaches her hand to me, but as she does the cross slips onto the ground and into the dust. She has to lean forward to pick it up. I take her hand, carefully, and stand up. "Come inside, Scully. You need to eat." --------------- Over breakfast (including a cup of instant coffee I once would have disdained and which I would now swear came straight from heaven), Mulder tells me about the new world in which I find myself. Rationed water and electricity, food supplies and quality erratic, the government crippled,anarchy reigning. The firearm and drug businesses, he adds with a wry grin, are making more money than ever. For whatever money's worth at the end of the world. Sean and Mulder have lived in this apartment since Mulder's return. I am surprised to note that Mulder has spent the last four years sleeping on my couch; the bedroom, he explains when pressed, waiting for me. We have the apartment and the block to ourselves, although Mulder thinks there are others living in the surroundings streets, he rarely sees anyone. Purity has killed them all, the greater part of the population of the country gone. Mulder tells me he has attempted to locate my family without success. It's possible they are hiding, but I do not hold hope of seeing them again. There's so much danger in hope. I appreciate his efforts, however, and tell him so. He ducks his head, nodding curtly, refusing to meet my eyes. And changes the subject. "I need to ask you about the vampires." Ah, Mulder, you and your smoothconversation. Yeah, this topic should be *much* easier for us to talk about. "You think they're--" I start to form the sentence, but my voice wavers and I place my head in my hands, trying to control myself. Damn you, Mulder, one sentence from you and I'm back with them, the fear in my head as real as it ever was in the flesh. I look up. He's watching me again. "You think they're really vampires?" It shouldn't be a question, I know. I know him by now. "Mulder, I was with them. They're human. They're...sick, they're disturbed, they drink blood and they torture their slaves, but they do it for their own satisfaction. Amusement. Something like that. I don't claim to understand, but I *know*." "The auctions, Scully--there have been hundreds in the last few years, I've been to hundreds of their 'bloodstock sales', looking for you. Thousands of human beings changing hands. The amount of blood that entails..." His voice trails off. He is embarrassed, fearful of hurting me with words, but I am long past the point where anyone's words could hurt me. Even his. "Mulder, they don't wear black capes, they don't sleep in coffins, they don't have pointy fangs. They are not Lestat or Dracula." Anger is taking me over. I try to lower my voice. "Their bleeding practices...they cut me open with knives, with blades, they tore at my skin with their teeth. Human teeth, Mulder. Incisors and canines. Human mouths drank my blood." As quickly as it arrived, my anger is gone, weariness in its place. I look at my hands. I had been holding them out, exposing my scars to him. I turn my palms back to my body. "Mulder, I know you want to believe in monsters. But evil is not always alien. Humans did this. Humans can drink fear as well as any vampire." -------- We're arguing. Of all the things I din't want to happen on her return, this ranks pretty highly. She is single minded and immovable as ever, and I can almost imagine that this time, this gulf between us, never passed. I can almost imagine Scully's life and body were all her own again. Almost. I interrupt her as she begins a diatribe on group behavior--I have to or we'll be here all day. "Scully. I'm asking you about them because we need information. I have an informant--a vampire named Jakob--he's forming a fifth column among his kind, those who don't believe in the torture practices. He can tell me where to find them. What I need from you is a way to destroy them." "What...wooden stakes, silver bullets? Either one of them would kill a human as easily as a master. I don't understand." I don't mention that silver bullets are for werewolves. It doesn't seem prudent. "Scully.." I'm getting tired of this discussion, and I can see it wearing on her. She looks exhausted. "If they are human as you say, they're easier to destroy. Frohike and I want to set explosives. It's the easiest way." That woke her up. "Where?" "According to Jakob, a council of vampires meets wach month--to discuss vampire issues, I guess. Now that you're safe, I can afford to move against them. You know that vampire lore often suggests that the way to kill vampires is to kill the head vampire? If we can destroy the council, human or vampire, it's going to rock their power base. We could destroy the slave trade with this one action." She's looking at the floor again. "You should have moved before now. They've been killing slaves for years." I try to explain. "Scully, you were with them. As long as there was a chance that you were alive, I couldn't take the chance." I gather my courage, raise my hand to her her jaw, tracing its line, raising her face to mine. "I think we should do it now," she says. "We? Scully, look at yourself. You're weak, you've been repeatedly bled for four years. This is no longer your fight." She raises her hand to cover mine. Her skin is almost translucent, her veins exposed, in the daylight that streams the window. When she speaks, her voice is soft. "I know you feel guilty about this, Mulder. About what has happened to me. You couldn't save me." I flinch, and take back my hand. Bullseye. "But, Mulder, this may be my chance to save myself." *** Mulder, Frohike and a vampire are sitting at my kitchen table. The scary thing is, this doesn't seem so strange to me--a reflection on my life up until this point, I think. Mulder and Frohike drink coffee and eat candy bars: part of a shipment that was bound for somewhere else, intercepted by the Lone Gunmen. Jakob does not eat or drink, but watches them and discusses strategy. Sean sits on Mulder's lap, silent, apparently satisfied to sit quietly with his father. He's a funny kid: friendly, but prone to long silences, always working on something on his own. I see a lot of Mulder in him: intensity, singlemindedness. Sean frowns, listening to the conversation. He frowns a lot for one so small...my genes showing themselves? Or wishful thinking? It's hard to see my influence in this child I have been separated from for so long. I sit at the table, next to Mulder and Sean, joining them. Mulder hands me a peanut butter cup. I hate peanut butter cups, I'm not hungry and to tell the truth, I'm getting more than a little tired of him forcing food on me all the time, and looking hurt if I refuse. He's doing this to fatten me up: concerned about the weight I have lost in my years apart from him. I understand his concerns intellectually, but emotionally it annoys the hell out of me. It's like living with my grandmother. I consider the peanut butter cup for a moment, then decide to stick to my guns and hand it to Sean, who devours it in two bites. While Frohike, Mulder and Jakob discuss strategy, I take the opportunity to study Jakob. I've never had the chance to look a master in the face before, and I'm a little surprised at what I see. He's small: only a little taller than me, thin and tense like a whip. He's younger than I thought possible: fourteen? fifteen? His skin is pale, the legacy of the night. He speaks softly, but I cannot listen to what he says. They all spoke softly, as I recall. I can hear the master's voices yet, if I let myself listen. I get up from the table and walk away. Later, Mulder explains the plan to me. Nitram, ammonium nitrate. I've heard of it: hell, everyone in law enforcement had heard of it. The Oklahoma bombing, the federal building in Dallas. The choice of terrorists everywhere. Mulder gives the credit for procurement and strategy to Frohike. "I can't take the credit myself," says Frohike. "Everything I know about explosives, I learned from my friends on the internet." Mulder grins. "It's just as well civilization as we know it has dissolved into chaos and the FBI no longer exists, Frohike, or we'd probably have to arrest you now." The plan unfolds. I continue to insist on being a part of it--if something goes wrong, I know the masters better than anyone else going along. Jakob, although willing to betray his people to us by offering knowledge, is squeamish about physical assistance. It doesn't matter. We won't need him. ------ It used to be a nightclub, Frohike explains. It looks like an old warehouse to me, but I admit that my nightlife savvy probably isn't what it should be. Frohike, Byers, Scully and I are here to carry out the explosives plant. Frohike kindly volunteered Langly to babysit Sean at the Lone Gunmens' headquarters. Byers drives the van: Scully, Frohike and I planting the explosives. Scully is still weak and and cannot carry the heavy bags, so she takes charge of the timers. I hear Frohike muttering that he hopes she doesn't blow us all sky high, but I choose to ignore it. We are doing this in broad daylight, the only time we can be certain themasters will not arrive unexpectedly. Our visibility is unnerving to usall, and we work quickly, nervously, fear dogging our steps. Scully stops to cough. I watch her out of the corner of my eye. She spent yesterday with a contact of Frohike's at what used to be St. Catherine's hospital. According to the doctor, Scully's bill of health is as clean as can be expected. I try not to think about what Frohike must have done to warrant this favor--the waiting list for non-essential medical procedures is so long as to be essentially endless, these days, and the fees beyond exorbitant. Anyway, the doctor says the infections in the wounds in Scully's arms and ankles will clear up, thanks to some antibiotics which cost more than I used to make in a month. Scully is severely underweight, however, which worries me more. I attack this problem by continually pushing food on her, which I can tell is starting to wear on her nerves. She doesn't realize it, but she needs to be reminded to eat. When you've gone hungry as long as she is, sometimes you forget what it is you need. Her mental health I try to assess myself, without much success. She keeps her feelings close to herself, but bears the scars of her past in the fearfulness which has become her constant companion, even more than the web of lines on her arms. I don't know if anyone can survive what she has and still walk out with the shreds of sanity in their damaged hands, but I know that if anyone can do it, Scully can. I have faith in her strength. ------- Mulder and Frohike finally finish the distribution of the explosive packets, and I check the timers for the fifth time. I'm terrified of making a mistake, of leaving this job uncompleted; but I'll blow us all sky high, as Frohike would say, before I'll admit it to anyone but myself. We set up video equipment: we want to be able to see the masters entering the building. We need to be sure. As darkness falls, I watch the monitors from inside the van, observing as the masters start to arrive. I stare into each of their faces, but I don't know them. Slaves are not allowed to look at their masters, and the most I ever caught was a glimpse. One of my captors could walk in front of me, and I wouldn't know. After the stream of masters entering the building dies off, Byers starts the van and drives a few blocks away; uphill, so we can watch. Frohike slides open the side door, and he and I sit side by side, watching. Mulder sits behind us, his hand on my back. Byers watches from the driver's seat. We hear it before we see it. The blast reverberates through the streets...anyone still left in town must be able to hear it. We watch the building fall. We watch the fire, spreading, before Byers starts the van and drives on. We were too far away to hear their screams, but I heard. In my heart, I can hear them scream. And it is joyous. -------- Afterward, Byers drives us to the Lone Gunmens' headquarters. We plan to see Sean and tell Langly about out exciting day at the office. It's dark inside when we arrive, which is not so unusual, what with electricity rationing like it is. So I don't start to worry until I notice the door is ajar. Once inside, I stare at the new fixture, trying to make sense of it. Scully is screaming; a wild, animal noise. I've never heard her scream before, I muse. Time seems to stand still, the seconds feeling like years. Scully never panics, and still my mind is still struggling to assimilate the shape. Of course she recognized it right away. Her Catholic upbringing maybe, or just a more accurate perception of evil. For even though my eyes can see it, my mind insists that it is not possible, it can't be. It is. A crucifixion.