This one was finished on the first of 95 (1/1/95).  Because of when
I wrote it you can't yell at me about Mr. X not having talked to
Scully yet.  It isn't the greatest, but I like it, though that may
be because I wrote it and I have to like it.  :)  The characters
belong to GA, DD, CC, Fox, and 1013.  It's kind of a Lochness
Monster story.  So, I hope you enjoy.
**********
Crystal
by Mystic
**********
	Ex-Navy Seal Fabian Aneiros sat alone on the deck of his
ship on Lake Crystal in Crystal Lake, Connecticut.  He had been
retired for four years now and felt as if he had been gone a
lifetime.  He lived on the Ship, which was actually just a boat he
called Ship.  He spent most of his time wondering whether or not
retiring three years before planned was the right thing to do.
Kiley Grovers came on deck.  He was an old friend of his that
retired at the same time as him.  They decided since they were both
single they would live out the ends of their lives together.  Kiley
was two years older than Fabian, but at sixty-three he could still
out wit anyone half his age.
	"Anythin' exitin' up here Fabe?"  Kiley asked.  He had a
slight slur in his words because of a bullet that had grazed his
mouth when he was only thirty.
	"Nope, same old crap.  Fish seem to be jumpy today though."
	"So why ya' ain't got your fishin' pole out?"
	"Fishing is boring.  All you do is throw out and pull in."
	"Wish I had a lady to fish."  Kiley's sick sense of humor
didn't work today.  Fabian could feel it in his gut that there was
something wrong.  He had felt it for days but never as strong as
today.  "Hey buddy, wha's wrong?"
	"Nothing.  I just don't feel like laughing."
	"Somethin's buggin' ya', I can tell."
	"There's something wrong."
	"Wha'?"  Without response a huge grey mass emerged from the
lake.  From the front of the mass a large snake-like object came
slowly out of the water.  Then a head.  The thing looked at their
shocked faces, threw it's head back and howled.  Fabian and Kiley
covered their ears in disgust.  The thing jumped out of the water
and then dove back in.
	Everything stayed silent.  Kiley looked at Fabian who had
thrown up.
	"Wha' the hell was tha'?"  Kiley asked him.  Fabian looked
up into his eyes.
	"I felt sick."  Kiley slapped him on the back.
	"No' tha',"  Kiley pointed out into the lake, "tha'?"
	"I don't know"
**********
	Scully sat at the desk in the X-Files basement
'headquarters' and looked at a file she had been interested in.
Mulder was late today and she found a file on phychokinetics on the
desk and decided to read it while she waited for him. She could
just see the look on his face when he came in and caught her
engrossed in an X-file.  The phone rang and she reached over to
pick it up.
	"Scully."
	"Crystal Lake, Connecticut, Fabian Aneiros, his boat's name:
Ship.  Ask about the Crystal Lake monster."  The dark voice said.
She jotted it down as Mulder walked into the room.  He was about to
talk when she waved him silent.
	"Who is this?"  Scully asked.
	"Your friend in the FBI.  Look into it, you won't be
disappointed."  He hung up on her.  She put the phone down on the
hook and looked at the words she had written on the paper.  Mulder
picked the psychokinetic file up and put it back in the drawer it
came from.
	"Who was that?"  He asked.
	"Our friend in the FBI."
	"He talked to you?"  Mulder asked a bit shocked.  Up to now
he had only contacted her once and that was only by dropping a
newspaper on her doorstep at Quantico.  "What did he say?"
	"Look."  She gave him the paper and he looked at it.  She
saw that look in his eye.  They were going to investigate.  "When
do we leave?"
	He smiled and looked at her.  "Would you object if I said in
an hour."
	"No.  But why would we want to?"
	"The Crystal Lake monster is not a newly seen thing.  There
have been sightings for almost ten years, but everyone just figures
that the sightings are bogus.  No one has ever gotten a good
picture of it."
	"Sounds a lot like the Loch Ness monster.  You think this
Fabian has seen it?"
	"I am surprised that you are even acknowledging its
existence."  Mulder smiled at her.  "I think that Mr. X would not
just call to send us on a vacation."
	"Ok, so we leave?"  He nodded.
**********
	Four and a half hours later they arrived at the dock and
found 'Ship.'  They walked up to the boat and knocked on the door.
An elderly man answered.  He looked to be late fifty's.  His hair,
black and in perfect military cut.  He had dark sleepy eyes and his
body was in great shape, considering his age.
	"Agents Scully and Mulder, FBI."  Mulder said to the man.
They both took out their badges.
	"Fabian Aneiros.  May I help you?"
	"We are here to investigate the Crystal Lake monster."
	"You heard about the thing?"
	"Yes."
	"Well, come in, come in."  They walked into the boat and sat
down on a bed which seemed the only thing to sit on.  "What have
you heard about the monster?"
	Scully scratched her head and looked at Mulder.  Mulder
looked at her and then back at Fabian and answered, "Just that it's
in this lake and you have seen it."
	"How do you know that?"  Fabian asked a bit shocked.
	"Well we are the FBI, we know everything."  Mulder joked.
Scully held back a laugh.  "We were told by a friend that you had
recently spotted the animal."  Just then another man walked into
the room carrying a bag of groceries.
	"Fabe?"  He questioned.  Fabian led his friend into the
room.
	"This is agent Scully and agent Mulder, of the FBI.  Mulder,
Scully this is my pal Kiley.  They want to know about the Crystal
Lake monster."  Kiley shook their hands and eyed Scully.
	"I really wanna fish wid' her."  He said.  Fabian smacked
Kiley on the back.  Mulder narrowed his eyes at Kiley, giving him a
look that said, 'Stay away from her.'  "Fabe, we should all go on
deck, there's more room to talk there."  Scully and Mulder got up
and they all went up to the deck.
	"So whadda ya two know 'bout Crystal?"  Kiley asked.
	"They don't know much, but they want to know about the
sighting we had the other day."  Fabian told Kiley.
	"The other day?"  Mulder asked.
	"We were sittin' on deck jokin' 'bout fishin' an' this thin'
come ou' the water.  'Bout big as a house, bigger than a house I'd
say.  It looked at us and it howled, but this ain't no normal
howlin' see, this thin' sounded like a wounded animal.  I been in
battles, seen people gettin' shot and they ain't ever howled like
this thin' did."  Kiley told them.
	"Where do people usually see this thing, Kiley?"  Mulder
asked.
	"Out there, un the water.  Usually far out."
	"Do you have any pictures?"  Scully asked.
	"Sure do miss."  Fabian said rushing down into the boat.  He
ran back up and put five pictures in her hands.  She looked through
them and handed them to Mulder.
	"These are pretty blurry.  I don't think I can say that it
is even remotely plausible that those objects in the photos are
Crystal, as you call it."
	"You doubt my credibility Scully."  Fabian asked.
	"No sir, I doubt the credibility of the photos."  She turned
to Mulder whom was amused.  "I'll wait for you in the car."
	She turned and walked down the dock.  Mulder couldn't tell
whether she was pissed he asked her to come or she was going to
laugh at the men for saying the creature existed.
	"Your girlfriend doesn't believe me does she?"  Fabian
asked.
	"No."  Mulder said, his eyes following Scully down the dock,
then realizing what he said, he shook his head and added,  "And
she's not my girlfriend."
	"Well the thing does exist.  You want to make a believer out
of her, you just rent a boat for a day or two and go out.  She'll
see it for herself."  Mulder looked at him knowing that was exactly
what he wanted to do.
**********
	Mulder opened the door to the car and Scully looked at him
wondering why he had such a sly grin on his face.
	"Mulder?"  She questioned.
	"Scully you don't get sea sick do you?"  He said, the grin
growing wider.
	"No, Mulder.  What did you do?"  She demanded.
	"Tomorrow we meet out on the dock with Fabian and Kiley.
They are going to stay at our motel for three days and we are going
to go out and see if we can't find the Crystal Lake monster for
ourselves."  Mulder turned on the car and drove out of the parking
lot and to a motel.
	After they had secured their rooms they went out to find a
diner they could eat at.  Because this place was so near the lake
there were a lot of sea food places around.  They stopped at
'Crystal Diner'.  They ordered a lot of shrimp.  Scully was so
hungry she was finished with her meal before Mulder had even
started.
	"Pig."  He murmered.
	"Fox, shut up!"  She smiled wiping her mouth.
	"I told you not to call me that."  He started grinned but
stopped when he saw she did it on purpose to piss him off.
	"So tell me again, why are we going out on this boat?"
	"Because Skinner wouldn't spring for two round trip tickets
to Honolulu."  She laughed and kicked him under the table.  He
lurched forward and laughed.  "Scully you always want tangibility.
I want to give it to you.  If we see this thing then we would have
seen it.  If we don't, then you can make fun of me."
	"It wouldn't matter because you would say that Crystal
didn't come up because she knew we were there."  Mulder cocked his
head and whispered,
	"She?  Who's to say it isn't a he?"
	"My God, drop it. As long as it doesn't try and make a pass
at us I don't care what sex it is."  Mulder smiled.  He paid the
bill and they left the diner to get their bags from the motel.
**********
	The next morning they met with Fabian and Kiley on the dock.
Fabian told Mulder the basics about operating the boat and then
they left.  Mulder maneuvered the boat towards the center of the
lake.  Twenty minutes after leaving he cut the engine and threw
down the anchor.  He rubbed his eyes and felt a hand on his
shoulder.
	"Dramamine?"  Scully asked him.  She handed him the pill and
a cup of water.  He quickly downed it.
	He suddenly felt like an idiot.  He went and made all the
arrangements to stay on a boat for three days and two nights and he
forgot that he himself got sea-sick once in a while.  Scully sat
down in a chair on deck and took a camera out of her bag.  She took
two pictures of the lake.
	"Why did you do that?"  Mulder asked her.
	"Because my mother will never believe that you dragged me
out to Lake Crystal to see the Crystal lake monster."
	"Why not?  I've dragged you out to the woods and to the
Arctic."
	"Yeah but those weren't worth a picture, and I had physical
proof of those."  She shuddered at the memories.  "Mulder, now that
we're out here, what do we do?"
	He looked out at the water then he looked at her.  "We
wait."
**********
	They spent the morning sitting on the deck of the boat.
Mulder scanning the water with binoculars, Scully reading local
newspapers they had brought along.  There was a stove inside the
boat where Scully made some canned soup for lunch.  At four in the
afternoon Mulder got a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach.  He
started to tell Scully but when he turned to her she was sleeping.
She looked so peaceful he decided not to wake her.  Then he decided
not to tell her anyway because she would probably tell him that it
was the sea sickness acting up on him.
	The waters suddenly became very still.  Mulder picked the
binoculars up again and looked out over the water.  He could see
nothing out of the ordinary, although he did think it was strange
that the fish were jumping right out of the water.  Scully moaned
and sat up.
	"What happened?"  She asked running a hand through her hair.
	"Nothing.  You can go back to sleep."  He put a hand on her
shoulder and gently pushed her back down into the chair.  She lay
back but didn't close her eyes.  The boat began to rock back and
forth again with the waves that had picked up.  Scully took a
magazine and flipped through it.  A picture caught her eye and she
grabbed Mulder's arm.  He turned and she handed him the magazine.
	There was a large photo of Crystal.  Mulder looked at the
magazine article.  A local fisherman had taken the photo of Crystal
only fifteen meters away.  He looked up at Scully.
	"What about it?"  He asked her.
	"Just thought you'd be interested in it."
	"Why?"
	"Because this is really boring."  He laughed and read the
article.  It wasn't very large or descriptive.  Mostly told the
history of the monster, but Mulder already knew.  He knew of the
four hundred and seventy three sighting in the last ten years, the
seven boats that disappeared, the two bodies found mutilated on the
west bank of the lake and the thirteen missing men.
	Scully took the binoculars from Mulder's lap and looked out
on the lake.  "Mulder this is crazy."  She sighed.
	"Why?"
	"The infamous Loch Ness Monster photo was said to be a hoax.
This is too."
	"Why would you say it is a hoax?  Scully we've been on the
water no more than eight hours and you're already giving up."
	"Ugh."  She sighed.  She went down into the boat.  Scully
didn't feel like arguing with Mulder right now.  She laid down on
the bottom bunk and fell asleep.
	Mulder took out his cellular and called the motel room that
Fabian was staying in.  Fabian answered on the third ring,
	"Hello?"
	"Fabian, this is Mulder."
	"Oh, hi.  So how you doing out there, see anything unusual?"
	"No."
	"Well you'll know."
	"Know what?"
	"When it's near.  You get this feeling of dread inside your
stomach.  Makes your stomach do flip flops."
	"And if I should get this feeling while I'm out on the
water?"
	"Well if you were a fisherman you'd get off the water, but
you want to see the thing so I'd say stay out there and keep an eye
out because it's close."
	"Ok."
	"Mr. Mulder, I didn't tell you this before because I didn't
want to scare Miss. Scully but there's a harpoon under the floor
boards."
	"Where?"
	"In the back, where you sit. You'll see a gold handle, just
pull it up."
	Mulder walked over to the handle and pulled it up.  He
pulled the harpoon out of the hole.  It was five feet tall and had
a large steel hook on one end.
	"Fabian, this won't scare Scully, she'll want to play with
it."  Mulder said laughing.  "So you and Kiley are Ok at the
motel?"
	"Yeah fine.  These are supposed to be you and Scully's
rooms?"
	"Yeah."
	"A pretty lady like that and you want to sleep in a separate
room."
	"Honestly, I'd rather stay in the same room but we each need
privacy."
	"Privacy my ass, I'd..."
	"Drop it."  Mulder said sternly.  He didn't like where this
conversation was going.  Scully would not like it either and he
respected her.  "Look I'll call you back tomorrow if I see
anything."
	"Ok. Bye."
	Mulder hung up the phone and sat on deck for three more
hours before going inside to eat.  When he went inside he found
Scully sleeping on the bottom bunk.  He already knew that she would
want to sleep there.  Mulder made some chile on the stove, it was
the only thing he knew how to make.  He woke her up and, as he had
thought, she said she was sleeping on the bottom bunk.  Mulder
didn't mind, he just wanted to get some rest.
	In the morning she woke up first because she had gotten so
much more sleep than he.  She felt like a lazy jerk.  She left
Mulder by himself on deck yesterday.  Scully sat on the deck and
drank some hot chocolate.  She had left some on the stove for
Mulder when he woke up.  She looked out on the water and suddenly
got a chill.  Why were all the fish jumping out of the water like
that?
	"The Crystal lake monster is there."  Scully whispered
imitating Mulders dead-pan expression.
	She took out the camera and focused in on the jumping fish.
When she was going to take the picture Mulder came on deck and hit
his leg on a deck chair.  He groaned and she snapped the picture of
the jumping fish looking at Mulder.  They both heard a large splash
and turned to look at the water.  There were large waves.
	"I hope your picture comes out good because you probably
caught whatever made that splash."  Mulder said sitting down.
	"It was a large fish, Mulder."  Scully said smiling.
	They spent the rest of the day in silence.  Nothing.  Mulder
decided that he would try to fish, but he ended up hooking himself
in the back.  Scully took the rod from him and showed him the
correct way to fish.  She could not believe that his father had
never taken him fishing.  Her father had always taken her and her
two brothers down to the lake in the summer.  Her sister, Melissa,
always thought it was a waste of time, she would rather be on the
phone with some dumb boy.
	Scully and Mulder actually caught two fish, which they ate
for lunch.  That was another problem.  Mulder didn't know how to
clean them, Mulder didn't know how to cook them.  Scully had to
push him away from the stove before he burned them.  They ate their
lunch and then went back up to the deck for a little 'R&R' as
Mulder called it.
	Scully fell asleep, again, on the deck around seven.  At
nine Mulder tried to wake her to tell her it was time to eat dinner
but she would not budge.  He picked her up and took her down into
the boat and laid her down in the bottom bunk.  Half an hour later
she woke up and jumped out of the bed.
	"Mulder."  She said.
	"Scully, you're awake."  Mulder said coming down into the
from the deck.
	"How did I get down here?"
	"Sleep walking."  Mulder said faking disappointment.
	"Mulder?"
	"I carried you down.  You fell asleep on the deck, I brought
you down so you wouldn't catch your death of a cold."
	"You sound like my mother."
	Mulder laughed.  "There's some soup on the stove.  I'm going
to sleep.  Wake me in the morning."
**********
	In the morning they both sat upon deck.  Scully was putting
her stuff in a corner so that when they got to the dock she could
leave as soon as possible.
	"What time are we supposed to be back at the dock to meet
Fabian and Kiley?"  Scully asked
	"At three in the afternoon."
	"Why did you make it so late?"
	"That's not late, Scully."  She shrugged and sat down.  The
sky darkened.  Scully had not noticed the sun was actually out for
the past two days.  Mulder looked at Scully who was staring at the
sky.
	"You know your cheeks are pink?"  She looked at him.
	"What?"
	"From falling asleep in the sun your cheeks are pink."  He
sat on the edge of the boat.
	"Well it's going to rain."
	"How would you know that?"
	"This is the calm before the storm."  A fish jumping on deck
caught both of their attentions.  "What would it say if it could
talk?"
	"Help?"  Mulder joked.  He picked the fish up and threw it
in the water.  When he did a large thump on the left side of the
boat sent him flying out into the water.
	"Mulder!"  Scully screamed falling to the deck.  She got up
and went over to the side of the boat.  "Mulder?"  She yelled.  She
knew he could swim, he was a swimmer in high school or something.
Right?  "Oh God!"  She saw his head pop up out of the water.
	"Scully!"  He screamed before going back under.
	She saw a large grey hump appear in the water.  Scully
sucked in a breath and dove into the water.  She opened her eyes
and looked around.  Something hit her hard in the back.  She went
up to the surface to take in another breath.  She saw Mulder's leg
in the water and dove for him.  She saw him under the water and
grabbed him.
	Pulling him into the boat she heard a howl.  Scully looked
out and saw Crystal.  She looked around her and saw the harpoon
leaned against the right side of the boat.  She grabbed it and
looked at the monster.  Crystal howled again and Scully threw the
harpoon at it.  The harpoon hit Crystal in the back and she
thrashed around in the water until she went under.  Scully did not
want to check to see if Crystal came back.  She dropped to the
floor of the boat next to Mulder and pressed her ear to his chest.
He was not breathing.  She put her hands on his chest and pushed at
it.  She put her lips to his mouth and breathed.
	"Come on Mulder."
	She pushed at his chest again and breathed into him.
	"Mulder don't give up on me."
	Again she breathed into him.
	"Mulder, please."  She cried.
	Again she breathed.
	"Mulder, don't leave me now, I need you."
	Again.
	She started to cry.  The warm tears running down her face
and onto Mulder's as she breathed into him again.  He suddenly
caughed and sputtered water.  She put him on his side and he spit
out more water.
	"You ok?"  She asked crying.
	He nodded.  She ran up to the front of the boat and pulled
the anchor up and then went to the controls of the boat and started
it up. She quickly got the hang of it and moved it to the dock.  It
was two thirty in the afternoon when they got to the dock and then
at three Fabian and Kiley arrived with their bags.  They saw Mulder
leaning on Scully's shoulder for support and their happy faces
became worried.
	"What happened?"  Fabian asked.
	"Crystal decided to give us an up close and personal
interview."  Scully told him.   She was not in a good mood right
now.  One she had almost lost Mulder and two, she had been wrong.
	"You're both ok though, right?"
	Fabian and Kiley took their bags and went to the car.
Mulder was still a bit groggy but he managed, with Scully's help,
to get to the car.  When they were both in the car Scully thanked
Fabian for using his boat.
	"Will we ever see you two again?"  Scully started the car
and then looked up at him.
	"Not while that thing is in the water."  She answered.
Fabian and Kiley then waved good-bye and Scully drove off.
**********
	When they got back Scully and Mulder had each taken one week
vacations upon Skinners request.  Mulder sat in the X-Files
basement and looked at the psychokinetics file Scully had been
looking at before they left.  Why was she reading it in the first
place, it's not like she believed it?  Scully walked into the room
and sat down.  He raised the folder and she looked down at her feet
smiling.
	"I was bored and that was interesting to read."
	"An X-File, interesting to read, for you Scully?"
	"I don't have to believe in it to read it and think that
it's interesting, lay off it."  She took a deep breath.  "How you
feeling?"
	"Great.  Although I'm a bit depressed I can't remember
anything after you grabbed me and anything before I spit up water."
Scully felt her face grow hot.  She remembered why she had come.
	"Mulder remember that picture I took when I wasn't looking?"
	"Yeah, when I hit my leg."
	"Well what came out on the photo shocked me and I thought it
might have somehow been a fake so I went down to have it examined."
She pulled a photo out of a large manila envelope and handed it to
him.  "They said it was genuine."
	He looked at the photo of Crystal in mid-air.  She seemed to
be diving into the water.
	"It explains the splash we heard."  Mulder said handing the
photo back to her.
	"Mulder I know what your thinking, you want to go back and
look for it.  I don't want you putting your life in danger, again,
for a stupid monster, leave it as is.  Stay with the satisfaction
that I can't tell you that it was a fake, I believe it actually
exists."  She said that last sentence a bit nervous.
	Mulder took the photo and went over to a drawer containing
X-Files.  He pulled up X-File number 7760968 and put the photo in
with all the other.  Then he put the folder back in the drawer and
closed it.
**********
Ok, did you like it?  I really want to know.  All comments to
Mystic:  Nalvarez@delphi.com