DISCLAIMER JAZZ: "The X-Files" and its characters are the 
creations and property of the fabled Chris Carter, Ten 
Thirteen Productions and Fox Broadcasting. I am, of course, 
using them without permission. No copyright infringement is 
intended. All other concepts or ideas herein are mine.
RATING: NC-17
SPOILERS: Through US season 7
ARCHIVE: ONLY ON THE AUTHOR'S OWN WEBSITE 
(http://rowan_d.tripod.com/elizabethr.html) UNTIL STORY IS 
COMPLETED. This way I can mess with the early parts as later 
parts develop...

WATER'S EDGE
by
Elizabeth Rowandale (aka Elizabeth Boyd-Tran) <elizabeth@tranfamily.net>
Copyright (c) 2002


CHAPTER 9B



Scully pulled the comforter closer around her shoulders and 
tucked her legs tight beneath her.  The longer she read, the 
colder her apartment felt.  Her metabolism was slowing down in 
the quiet of the early hours.  She had long since ceased to glean 
any real knowledge from the medical journals spread before her.  
Their presence was merely a distraction.  Something to keep her 
thoughts away from the case, if only for a few hours.

It wasn't working anymore.

Scully pulled off her glasses and tossed them on the nightstand.  
She rubbed at her eyes, free from daytime concerns of smudged 
make-up.

She was avoiding the vulnerability of sleep.

It was an old game for her.  Don't close your eyes and keep the 
monsters outside.  Sometimes, in the early hours of the mornings 
spent in second rate motel rooms in half forgotten towns, she 
could still hear her counterpart on the far side of the wall--
pacing the hard floor and abusing the remote control; hiding from 
the demons behind his eyes.  But then, she would come fully 
awake, and aware of the real and unforgiving silence.

Scully gathered the medical journals from her comforter into a 
neat pile and dropped them to the floor.  She reached out a hand 
to extinguish the beside lamp, but instead her hand fell to the 
telephone.  She pulled the handset into her lap.  A gentle ripple 
of thunder carried through the outer wall, and she caught a 
flicker of lightning in her peripheral view.  Spring storm season 
had come.  Rain reminded her of Oregon, and the smell of 
graveyards at night.

Scully picked up the phone and dialed the lighted numbers in the 
dimness.

A groggy voice responded on the third ring.  "Hello?"

"Hi."

"Dana."

"Did I wake you?"

"It doesn't matter."

"I'm sorry.  You can go back to sleep."

"Don't be ridiculous.  Are you okay?"

"I'm fi--" She stopped.  Swallowed the taste of damp trees.  
"I'm...I'm a little shaken, I think."

"By what?"

She gave a slight laugh at Daniel's equanimity.  "You.  Work.  
This.  Everything all at once.  It's..."

"...hard for you to open up."

There was significance in her silence.  "Yeah."

"It's okay.  I understand.  You know that."

"Yeah."

"Do you want to come over?"

"Yes."  She was surprised how easy that was to say.  "But I need 
to sleep.  I have an early meeting."

"Do you want me to come over?"

She smiled.  "No.  I mean...you know what I mean."

"Occasionally."  His voice was warm, welcoming.

"Just talk to me for a few more minutes before I fall asleep."

"As long as you like."

She didn't respond, but she thought he heard her quiet sigh.

"Actually, I'm glad you called," he began, letting his voice tell 
her he heard her deeper need, yet keeping his words as light as 
she wanted.  "I forgot to ask you--I have this annual charity 
ball thing night after next...all about financing for the 
hospital, etc., etc.  I don't claim it will be the highlight of 
the social season, but I would love it if you would join me.  
It's extremely short notice, I know, so if you can't--"

"I'd love to."  Her quick response caught her off guard.  The 
whole concept was so utterly foreign to her present existence.  
But there was another Dana...a former self back there somewhere, 
who had always answered invitations this way, who had wished 
night after night over her med school books that she could appear 
in public just one time with Dr. Daniel Waterston.  She closed 
her eyes, working to pull the two lives together into her 
present.  "I need an excuse to get out.  Buy a dress," she added 
with a half-genuine smile and a derogatory glance at her closet.

"Is the storm heavy there?"

"Not yet...but I think it's moving in."

"The weather said it might go around you."

"You never really know, do you?"

"No...you never do."  He paused, and she didn't speak.  "You 
haven't gotten afraid of thunder after all these years, have 
you?"

Scully swallowed against an uncannily timed crack overhead.  "No.  
I'm not afraid of thunder."

Daniel kept talking.  And the sound of his voice kept her 
listening, as it always had.  The sound of the rain was lulling 
her from without.  She was forgetting for a moment why she didn't 
want to close her eyes.

Ten minutes later they said good night.

Scully turned off the light and let her lids fall before her 
thoughts could wander.  She drifted into slumber, handset sliding 
onto the empty pillow beside her.

The tail of Mulder's Knicks T-shirt dangled from beneath the 
pillow and brushed against her wrist as she slept.


*****


She felt the shadow cross her eyelids before she awoke.  The 
first conscious image she registered was a vaguely human 
silhouette outside her bedroom window.  In that moment, the 
figure was close to the glass, pressed tight against it as though 
straining to peer inside.  Seconds later the figure was a quick 
blur to the left and then there was nothing.

Scully was on her feet in an instant, and the cold metal in her 
hand told her she had snatched up her weapon from the nightstand.  
She was dizzy from the quick return to consciousness, but she had 
learned how to activate her adrenaline and smooth things over.  
It took only a single breath to level the room.

The rain had slowed to a drizzle while she slept.  Visibility was 
good, if shadowed.

With a quick glance around the room, Scully crept toward the side 
of her window.  Pressing her back to the wall, she sidled up 
against the window frame.  With a deep breath, she whirled toward 
the window, weapon raised, like the window was a doorway of a 
suspect's room--falling back on Academy procedure as though she 
had known it as long as which hand to use for her fork.  The 
landscape was clear.  An innocuous car swished past on the damp 
pavement.  But there were ample places to hide--bushes, trees, 
parked cars.  The thought crossed her mind with a sickening ache 
in her stomach, that the figure might have been *inside* the 
window, if she had been too hazy with sleep to distinguish.  But 
that was fear playing her.  She knew her senses well enough to 
trust them.

Scully turned from the window and made her way through the 
apartment, following the path of windows between her bedroom and 
the front door.  She scanned the lawn and street beyond for any 
movement.  But the neighborhood was quiet in these early hours.  
Slipping into a pair of pumps by the front door, Scully flipped 
the still intact deadbolts and ventured into the hallway, weapon 
still ready.  The hall was clear, well lit, making her squint 
against the sudden brightness.  She moved quickly and quietly, 
jogging down the hall and through the double doors into the damp 
night air.  Her breath was coming fast, heart racing, but she was 
on top of her game, instincts alert.

The thick dampness made her silk pajamas cling to her skin, and 
she was glad there was no one nearby to watch.  Scully walked the 
outer path to mirror the inner path in her apartment, feeling the 
chill wind more and more in the dampness.  The soaked grass 
squished beneath her feet and sucked at the heels of her pumps, 
making her feel less secure of easy escape.  But there was 
nothing to escape from.  Nothing she could see.  Everything was 
quiet.  The sky above was clearing, starlight breaking through 
the clouds.  Her breath fogged around her.  But she was alone.  
Whatever she had seen was gone.  Or lying in silent wait.

Back inside, Scully turned on all her lights and made a thorough 
search of her apartment, aware that she had left the door 
unlocked as she made her outside search.  She had memorized every 
nook and cranny in her home that could possibly be made large 
enough to harbor a person.  The process was automatic now, but 
the knot in her stomach remained as she worked.  There was an 
increased sense of intrusion as she moved near the bedroom 
window.  Just as there had been near the closet after Pfaster, 
near the vents after Tooms.  She would have to do something to 
reclaim that area for her own in the days to come.  New drapes, 
perhaps.  Or one of the crystals Melissa had left her, hung in 
the window to catch the morning light.

Scully at last came to a standstill in the center of her living 
room, listening to the soft patter of the lingering drizzle, the 
more constant trickle of the storm drain.  And her own forced 
breath.  She stood there for a long moment, weapon arm slack at 
her side.  Her breath at last had begun to slow, when her 
telephone rang and sent her pulse rate flying.  She took a moment 
to place her weapon safely on the dining room table, then picked 
up the phone.

"Hello."  Her voice was more ragged than she expected.

"Dana--Michaels.  Sorry to wake you.  I--you okay?"

"What?  Yeah, I'm fine.  I was just--"

"Just?"

"Nothing, I just...thought I heard something.  It's nothing.  
Michaels, what's going on?"

"Ennnhhh...You don't want to know."

"Dammit.  There's another one isn't there?"

"The guy's not wasting any time anymore.  Gettin' downright 
cocky."

*No, wrong attitude.  This guy wasn't flaunting it.  Not like 
that.  That wasn't what he was about.  Or was she that off base?*  
"Where?"

"Alexandria.  Two blocks from the goddamned station house."  

"I'm on my way."

The rain was getting stronger again.


*****


Four hours at the crime scene, icy rain drizzling from her hair 
down the back of her neck, making her stomach muscles quiver and 
proving harsh winter was yet present alongside the random 
glimpses of spring.

Three hours in the equally chill autopsy bay, exhaustively 
enumerating the violations inflicted upon Donna Flaners' body and 
cross referencing the similarities to each of the previous 
crimes.

Ten minutes in the bathroom off the locker bay, head turned down 
beneath the blow dryer, desperate to break the penetrating cold 
at the back of her neck.  Breathing.  Whiting out the images 
behind her eyes.

Four hours of bulletin boards and evidence bags and blown-up 
photos and wandering theories.  And now, watching the last 
glimmer of the day's sunlight vanish from the thin windows at the 
top of the basement walls, Scully sat in the quiet, hugged her 
coffee mug for warmth, and let the images on the walls envelope 
her.  Waiting for the click.  If she didn't hear the click, if 
she didn't stay here, buried in unconscionable information, until 
she heard the click, another woman would die.

She sensed Michaels' presence in the doorway before he spoke.  
"That coffee worth drinking or should I just go with hot water?"

She almost smiled, but didn't speak.

Michaels moved forward.  "Forensics is still combing every inch 
for prints, but it looks like the guy was still wearing gloves.  
They're working on DNA, hair and fibers."

Scully nodded, her eyes still scanning the images around her.

"I'm going to take an hour, go get a real meal.  I haven't had 
anything since about 5am, and I'm betting you haven't either.  
Care to join me?"

Scully gave a cursory smile she knew meant nothing to Michaels, 
but she had nothing else to offer.  "No, thanks, you go on.  I 
have some more to do here."

"We all have more to do here.  It doesn't end until it ends, but 
you gotta be smart about it, you know that."

Scully pushed up from her chair, unable to sit still any longer.  
"I know that.  Thank you, but I need to stay until more of the 
lab reports come back, and I want to start compiling the 
interview lists, we should be out in the field by tomorrow 
morning."  She set down her coffee and picked up the Flaners 
report.  Donna Flaners.  27 years old.  Done with life.

"Dana, we don't..."

"We caught this one sooner than the others, but the trail is 
getting colder by the minute, and--"

Michaels moved closer.  "That's very true, and I am no less 
dedicated to this task than you are, but--"

"I'm not saying that, I'm just saying I'm not ready to leave 
yet."

"Dana--"

Michaels' hand on her cheek caught her unarmed.  "Dana."  His 
voice was softer now and she was frozen.  "It's okay.  YOU'RE not 
Mulder."

Scully cringed and stepped away.  "I am not--"

But Michaels stepped with her, didn't give any ground.  "Dana, 
you are here.  Everyday.  You are doing your job, and you're good 
at it.  But it is okay to keep mourning at the same time."  With 
his last words, Michaels' fingers gently smoothed back her hair.  
He had never been so brave with her.

Scully drew a controlled breath, eyes constant on the surface of 
the desk.  "I know that," she whispered, but it was no longer a 
reproach.

A moment passed in silence, then Scully took a step back and 
Michaels dropped his hand.

"I'll, uh..." Scully swallowed, straightened her cross.  "I'll 
stop by the Deli in about half an hour."

Michaels nodded, then a moment later he left, closing the door 
behind him.

Scully stood in the quiet office, eyes closed, dizzy with the 
weight of ghostly echoes.


*****

End Chapter 9b.  Continued in Chapter 10a...
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