A Visit from the IS 

                        by jordan

     "Scully!" Fox Mulder called into the woods where his partner
had disappeared moments ago. "Hey, Scully! What are you doing
out there?" 

     A hundred yards away, standing patiently among the oaks and
firs, Dana Scully turned her head in the direction of his shout. Then
she turned back without answering to watch the brown and white
terrier sniffing along the base of a long dead tree trunk that made a
low bridge between two rocks. The dog was determined to get under
the tree and snag his leash on something, and Scully was equally
determined to jerk him back each time he tried. He had already done
his business and was just investigating, but Scully was in a
sulky mood and was content to let Mulder shout until his throat was
raw. 

     As soon as she realized her childish stubbornness, she chided
herself and pulled the dog back to her. Turning, she made her way
back up the slope where Mulder was sitting on the hood of the car
with his arms crossed. His face was all clouds and recriminations. 

     "Back so soon?" 

     Scully said nothing, ignoring him. He jumped lightly to the
ground, and the terrier gave a little yip and rushed him, straining to
the end of the leash and jerking Scully forward as it went for the cuff
of Mulder's dress slacks. Seizing the material in its teeth, it began to
shake and twist its head furiously, growling and snarling in mock
ferocity. 

     Scully couldn't restrain a laugh as Mulder hopped on one leg
and shook the other, trying to rid himself of the animal.  
     
     "Damnit, Scully, we have a job to do. Get this thing off me." 

     Obligingly, Scully knelt down and the terrier danced back to
her happily, tail wagging a jaunty victory. She looked up at her
partner with amusement and said, "He likes you, Mulder." 

     "Well, I don't like him." 

     "Yes." She rose and went to the car, opening the back door so
the dog could hop in.  "You've made that abundantly clear." 

     The two FBI agents got into opposite sides of the car, each
closing their doors with a little more force than was necessary.
Mulder started the engine, racing it, and then took off with a little
squeal of tires on asphalt. 

     The long lonely stretch of woods flashed by on either side of
the car. Twilight had crowded most of the light from the forest, but
there was still a good hour of daylight left in this mountain valley. 

     After a few minutes of driving, Mulder glanced in his rear
view mirror and saw the dog panting and grinning at him. He looked
briefly at Scully and said, "It's not that I don't like dogs." 

     "You just don't like MY dogs." 

     "I said I was sorry when your last dog got killed." 

     "And with such sincerity." 

     "Look, Scully, this is a business trip. I just don't think it's
appropriate to bring a pet to work with you." 

     "What did you expect me to do with him? I only got him from
the pound a month ago, and I couldn't very well put him in a
boarding kennel, after all the impoundment he's had in his life. And
my mother has the flu and isn't up to puppy sitting." 

     The last bit of information was all Mulder seemed to hear.
"Really? Is she all right?" 

     "She's feeling pretty bad. If I thought we were going to be
gone more than a day or two, I wouldn't have come. And I wouldn't
have brought Jack." 

     At the sound of his name, the terrier jumped up, putting his
front feet on the back of the seat, and licked Mulder's ear with
doggish enthusiasm. Mulder twisted his face away, rubbing the side
of his head in disgust. "Ack! If that thing gives me one more wet
willy, I'm going to--" 

     "Mulder!" Scully pointed ahead, the alarm in her voice
bringing all his senses to full alert. 

     On the road ahead of them lay a huge fallen tree, at least fifty
feet long. The base had clearly been uprooted, and long tendrils of
naked white roots stuck out in all directions, the taproot itself
narrowing into the distance like a giant anaconda. Mulder hit the
brakes, not hard enough to bring the car to a skid even on the wet 
road, but enough so that the seatbelts locked as they lurched
forward. 

     "Holy shit," he said, under his breath. "Where the hell did
that thing come from?" 

     He got out of the car. A light rain had begun to fall, and at
first Scully just rolled down her window to watch. But then curiosity
got the better of her, and she got out too. 

     Mulder walked the length of the tree and back. It was a huge
old pine, and the top was new growth. When he got to Scully, who
was standing by the roots looking into the forest, she said, "Mulder,
where did this thing come from? It looks like it's just been pulled out
of the ground like a carrot, but there's no cavity anywhere between
here and the forest wall."

     "Are you sure?" 

     They both looked along the sides of the road, walking across
the gravel shoulder all the way to where the trees began. The ground
was soft, but not muddy enough for a sinkhole, and weeds and grass
grew in a long flat plane as far as they could see, uninterrupted by 
so much as a drainage ditch. 

     Mulder came to stand beside Scully. He touched her arm.
"Looks like it was put here deliberately to stop us." 

     "Do you know how big the crane would have to be to lift a
thing this size even after it was somehow extracted from the ground?
It would have made more sense to just park the crane across the
road." 

     Mulder was on the point of answering, but he looked down
into her pale face, her big anxious eyes, and lost his train of thought.
He put his hand on her arm again, feeling the fine tremor in her
muscles under the tan trenchcoat, and squeezed reassuringly. 

     "Let's get out of here." 

     She nodded, and they both turned back towards the car.
Beyond it, half a mile down the road but closing fast, a pickup truck
was approaching them at high speed. Without speaking or even
looking at each other, both agents reached for their guns, Scully
taking a step behind Mulder and to his left, assuming a defensive
position, arms locked with the gun extended and pointed at the
ground. 

     A black Ford truck came sliding to a stop behind their rented
Taurus. The doors flew open and two people came tumbling out, a
man who had been driving and a teenaged girl. They ran around to
the front of the truck, their faces white with fear. 

     "Are you the FBI man?" the man asked. "Agent Mulder?" 

     Mulder holstered his gun, nodding. "Are you Robert Farley?" 

     "Yes, sir. This is my daughter, Susan." 

     The girl twitched her head in a nod, staring at the tree across
the road with a look of horror. 
 
     Farley, a tall balding man with long arms and legs that made
his flannel shirt and jeans look sizes too small, said in a shaking
voice, "They landed! Two days and a night now they been buzzin'
round the pasture like they were tryin' to make up their minds, but
now they're here!" 

     Scully, tucking her gun into the holster at the small of her
back, stepped forward, hands raised placatingly. "Take it easy," she
said. "You reported to the Air Force several UFO sightings over the
past forty eight hours, correct?" 

     'Yes, mam'n. I know they were laughin' at me, but--" 

     "And subsequent cattle mutilations?" 

     "Yes, mam'n. Lost two of my best heifers just last night." 

     Scully's face seemed to relax in the comfort of her skepticism.
Mulder had intercepted the call from the Air Force, knowing they
would ignore it, and had initiated the X-File himself.   Now the
excitement in his voice was unmistakable: "You say a UFO crashed
at your farm? It's there right now?" 

     "Didn't crash, Agent. It landed." Farley sounded on the verge
of tears. "You musta missed the cutoff to our place, two miles back.
We took off towards town, saw one of them godawful big trees on the
road, and thought we could come back this way. But now--" he
gestured towards the tree, "--Now they got us blocked in." 

     Scully went to the girl and put her arms around her shoulders.
At the gesture of sympathy, Susan began to cry. "It's just sittin'
there. Like nothin' you ever seen. Like nothin' at all. Just sittin'
there by the barn." 

     Mulder and Scully exchanged a world of meanings in a single
look. His eyes said eager, boyishly thrilled things, and hers said,
Settle down, use your head before we go charging into an unknown
situation. But they both knew that she would ultimately surrender
to his passion. 

     He said to Farley, "Think you can drive around this tree?" 

     Farley shook his head. "Dang fields are like oatmeal mush
after these past couple weeks of rain." 

     "Do you have tools at your farm, like axes, or a chainsaw?
Maybe a winch?" 

     "Mister, I ain't goin' back there, not for nothin' on God's
earth!" 

     Susan pulled away from Scully and went to her father, who
embraced her awkwardly.  Mulder regarded them for a moment,
rubbing his lower lip with his thumb. Then he said, "Look, you two
can stay here, and we'll go to the farm and have a look, okay? Then
we can bring back some tools and see about getting us all out of
here." 

     The girl wiped at her eyes and looked at him solemnly.
"Mister, you go out to our place, and you won't be comin' back." 

     The agents got back into the Taurus, where the small terrier
was overjoyed to see them. It jumped into the front seat and Scully
held it in her lap as Mulder backed the car around and then drove
slowly in the direction from which they had come. 

            It was easy to see how they had missed the cutoff; it looked
like an extension of the shoulder of the road, a wide fan of gravel
that might have been a rest stop unless someone looked more closely,
and saw that the fan narrowed again into a road that disappeared
into the trees. 

     "What are you thinking?" Mulder asked in a low voice, as the
Taurus crunched slowly over the gravel. 

     Scully tried to peer through the windshield, but the path
twisted through a corridor of trees that blocked her view. "I don't
doubt they saw something," she said, "But the question is, what? If
it is a downed aircraft of some sort, we know from experience that
we could be in more danger from the men trying to find it than from
anything else." 

     "Yeah, but what if it is what they say it is? And no one is
coming down that highway for some time, not from either
direction," he pointed out. "It's going to take awhile to get those
trees moved, and from the look of these woods, a helicopter would
have trouble getting in here." 

     "Not really," she said. "I'm sure it isn't solid forest. What
bothers me is that we were on that road no more than half an hour
ago. How could anyone move a tree that size in that time. We should
have seen something, passed some heavy equipment trucks." 

     Mulder made no reply. The car was still moving, but he wasn't
driving it anymore. He was staring through the windshield, mouth
agape.

     "Oh, my God," Scully said. 

     It wasn't so much what was there as what WASN'T there:
between the house and the barn something hovered, an emptiness,
a space where the edges of light bent and blurred and color faded
into nothingness. It was like paint smeared over a picture, where
things made visual sense only up to a certain point, and then
dissolved into an unsettling chaos.  

     "What is it?" Mulder demanded. He braked the car abruptly
and flung the door open, jumping out. Scully got out on the other
side, staring, speechless. 

     As they watched, the strange shadowlike space shifted, moving
away from the barn and melting over the farmhouse. 

     Towards them. 

     "Mulder..." 


     Gliding with terrible speed and silence, like some kind of
invisible snake, the presence hovered nearly over the car. It seemed
to touch the earth; at least, all the grass shimmered and faded away,
leaving the awful nothingness in its place. 

     Mulder said, "Scully, listen to me. When I run, I'm going for
the trees directly to my left.  You go back in the opposite direction.
If we--" He broke off sharply when three yellow figures materialized
out of the spinning dark. All three moved awkwardly, as if unused
to gravity. They were wearing crome yellow suits that were identical,
but the creatures within were all different from each other. Two
seemed vaguely similar to one another, though only a thin strip of
brown face and glittering eyes showed through the visors of their
helmets. The third creature had a much smaller head, and Mulder
glimpsed what looked like a rat or a squirrel's head. It was so
nightmarish he was glad that from her angle Scully couldn't see it. 

     But see it or not, Scully turned and began to run. She bolted
like a rabbit for the woods, a flash of tan trenchcoat and red hair.
The ratlike creature turned in her direction and began to go after
her. Mulder leaped in front of it, holding his gun up.The creature
came to a stop in front of him, looking at him with tiny beady eyes
that made Mulder's knees go weak with fear. A hand of some kind
shot out, slapping the gun from his grip, and the creature advanced
on him. 

     There was a flash of motion to Mulder's right, and a sound
like ripping cloth as the terrier came snarling out of the car. It hit
the ground with a grunt and rushed headlong at the creature
advancing on Mulder. It went straight for where the cuff of the leg
of the creature would have been,  had it been wearing pants, and
sank its teeth in with a roar of rage. 

     What seemed to be a silly futile act had a sudden dramatic
payoff: the yellow suit tore in the dog's grasp, and there was a loud
hissing sound like decompression. One of the other creatures ran
past Mulder, and the third struck at the dog. 

     After that, things were a blur. Mulder heard two screams, one
from Scully, heartbreakingly calling his name, and the other was
from the dog, a terrible howling death cry. The last thing he
remembered was seeing a long skidmark of blood across the grass
as he was dragged into the yawning mouth of oblivion. 

***************** 

     Dreams of struggling. Pain. 

     "Mulder?" 

     He groaned at the pain in his head when he tried to open his
eyes. The light was very dim, but he could see Scully, leaning over
him. He could see a lot of her. She was naked. 

     "I've had this dream before," he muttered, trying to sit up. 

     Scully helped him, and the feel of her bare arm sliding across
the skin of his back alerted him to the fact that he was also
completely naked. 

     "Thank God you're alive," she said. 

     Mulder blinked, looking around. These seemed to be in some
kind of all-vinyl room, everything padded. The ceiling was no more
than five feet high. He could see no doors, no source for the light. 

     "What happened?" he asked. 

     "I know you've been waiting all your life to hear this," she told
him. "I think we've been abducted." 

     Mulder leaned back on his elbows for a moment, trying to
absorb information in a way that wouldn't make him go insane. No
use. It was insane information, and it only made his head ache worse. 

     "If it helps, one of them is dead," she said. "Jack killed it." 

     "All right Jack," he said, feeling an unexpected pang. It had
been a silly little dog, but it had thrown its life away for him, and
now he was ashamed of the way he had acted towards it. 

     "At first I thought it was the different pressures of our
atmosphere," Scully went on.  "Jack ripped its suit, and it died. But
when we got on this ship, or wherever we are, I could see that Jack
had actually gotten hold of its..I guess it was a leg." She shuddered
at the memory. "I saw it squirming around in that suit, making
squealing sounds, and then it died.  

     "But then the others took off their suits, and they were<
breathing the same air we were. I think maybe the suits  are like the
ones we wear when we're around hazardous or toxic areas. Maybe
Jack introduced something foreign into its system. But he killed it.
There must be a way to fight them." 

     Mulder couldn't tell if she was babbling from anxiety or if he
was just having a hard time following anything. He said, "How long
was I out?" 

     "Hours and hours," she said. "Maybe all night. It's hard to
estimate time under these conditions. I didn't fight like you did, so
they just hauled me in here. But you fought like a tiger, even after
they gave you a jolt with some kind of instrument. They had to do it
twice.  I thought they'd killed you." 

     Her voice broke on the last word, but she regained control
quickly. Mulder rubbed his hands through his hair and sat all the
way up. "Did they examine us? Did they do any experiments?" 

     "No. I don't think they're going to do that." 

     Mulder had trouble looking at her without staring at her
nakedness. "Hey," he said softly.  "How are you holding up?" 

     She seemed to have trouble looking at him, too. "I'm fine," she
said, in the small brave voice he knew so well, the one that meant a
lion could have her head in its mouth, but as long as it wasn't biting
down, she wasn't going to complain. Mulder took her wrist and
rubbed his thumb gently against the smooth skin over her pulse in
small circular motions. She allowed the caress for a moment, then
drew away, crossing her arms over her breasts protectively. "I have
a theory, if you're interested." 

     "Sure. Go ahead." 

     She took a deep breath and tightened her lips as if to focus.
"When that...thing...died, it changed, Mulder. It's hard to explain
how. It sort of dissolved into another form. It's hard to describe it.
I could hardly bear to look at it. But I did.< And I saw it transform." 

     "Into what?" 

     "Something so strange I can't even define it. Not biped, no
face. Just...beyond words. But the other two. I saw them clearly. And
they looked like--well, sort of like--" 

     "What?" Mulder prompted. 

     "They looked like COWS, damnit. Big brown eyes, brown and
white pigmentation, vestigial horns. I know it sounds crazy. But
that's what they reminded me of." 

     Mulder rubbed his hand over his mouth. "Cows, Scully?" 

     "I said it sounded crazy. But listen. While I was in that other
room with them, they didn't show any hostility towards me. Just sort
of a mild interest. Then, after they finished with you, getting your
clothes off, they seemed...I can't explain it.  Like they were fading.
Their eyes started to change shape, but also the look in them got
meaner. They started to look like more bovine than anything else I
coud identify."

     "Cows from outer space," Mulder said dreamily. "Sure. It all
makes sense now." 

     "But I'm telling you, they don't look so much like cows now.
They look different. There's just enough of the bovine features left
to see what they were before, but not completely."

     "And your cow theory is--?" 

     "Okay, think about this for a moment. Something comes to
earth from another planet, from somewhere in the IS." 

     "The what?" 

     She said the letters carefully. "I. S. Infinite Space." 

     He laughed. "I haven't heard that term used for years." 

     Her mouth twitched with impatience. "I'm sorry I'm not as
well versed in alien terminology as you are. But wherever they're
from, they aren't from around here, okay? So why are they here? To
make contact and exchange information? I don't think so. To
conquer the human race? Maybe, but we're still alive. So what can
it be? Ask yourself this: why does any ship put into port?" 

     Mulder rubbed his lower lip thoughtfully. Her cool logic was
always soothing to him, even when he teased her about it. But this
time he could vaguely follow the thread of her reasoning. "Why does
any ship put into port?" he repeated. "Repairs? Supplies?" 

     "Exactly! And what sort of supplies do they need most?" 

     "Fuel? Food. Oh." He suddenly realized where she was going
with the whole cow thing.  "Oh," he said again. "Food. Prime rib." 

     "Farley didn't say cattle mutilations on his report, did he?
Didn't you just assume that? He told us he'd lost two of his best
heifers last night. Now we see creatures that look like those heifers,
except the third one, which looks suspiciously like another animal
common to every farm: a rat." 

     "Well, it didn't look that much like a rat..." 

     "Think, Mulder. Think about the implications." 

     They looked at each other, full eye contact for the first time
since he'd awakened. He saw something in her eyes that unnerved
him, some kind of steel, a resolve.  

     "You are what you eat?" he offered. 

     "It makes sense. Suppose they came here looking for food.
They eat a couple of cows; one of them tries a rat. Somehow, they
assimilate those animals into their very genetic structure. And they
begin to exhibit signs of these animals in their physical appearance,
maybe even in their mental structure. Maybe that's what happens
whenever they eat, but I'm guessing it came as much of a surprise to
them as it does to us." 

     "So you think they're going to eat us?" He frowned. "Then
why are we still alive?" 

     "That's what I've been asking myself. Why didn't they just kill
us and eat us right away? My guess it's for one of two reasons.
Either they're just too full at the moment, and waiting for the cow
characteristics to fade before trying another dish, or maybe they
didn't kill us right away because cows don't eat people, and for a
little while, the cows had predominance over their normal mental 
processes." 

     Mulder shrugged. "Actually, I have an X-File on record of a
herd of cows in a remote village in Ireland that did eat--"

      He saw her warning look and shut himself up. "Well, okay, so
they're digesting their most recent kill, and they demonstrate the
characteristics of that animal. Is that it?" 

     "That's it." Scully leaned back, waiting for his counterattack. 

     But Mulder couldn't think of a better explanation for their
situation. He said, "So when they're finished being cows, what will
they be?" 


     "Whatever they were before they arrived here. And then
they'll come for us." 

     "Any theories about what we can do to fight them?" 

     "I'm more concerned about the repercussions of what would
happen if they did eat us." 

     He tried a smile. "To us or to them?" 

     "To the world, Mulder. Think about it. What would happen
if for even a few hours our genetic code got mixed up with theirs? If
our human nature, greedy and rapacious and warlike, became
welded with some clearly technologically advanced nature?" 

     "Hang on a minute, Scully. You're going way overboard with
this thing. First of all, you saw one of the cowlike characteristics of
these things was horns? And brown and white pigmentation? Well,
all cows don't have horns. And sometimes they're black, or tan, or
brindle. So if your theory is concrete, these IS guys didn't assimilate
ALL characteristics of cattle, so much as they assimilated THESE
cow's characteristics. Are you with me so far? Maybe they assimilate
the individual, and not the whole species." 

     "But how could that be? We are all individuals of our species.
We all have the same basic genetic code in  common." 

     "Yes," he agreed, "But if they ate me, for instance, would they
become aggressive and warlike, or would they just develop a taste
for sunflower seeds and Knicks games? If they ate you, would they
suddenly understand human  anatomy and physiology, and start
arguing with each other about the improbability of their own
existence?" 

     Scully looked down at her hands, smiling. Mulder reached
over and nudged her arm.  "What are you thinking,  partner?" 

     "I was just wondering how long this dream is going to go on
before I wake up." 

     He heard the tremble in her voice and saw a bright tear glisten
as it fell to the back of her hand. Then he moved to put his arms
around her, drawing her head into the hollow of his neck. "Hey," he
said softly. "We're still standing, aren't we?" He smiled. "In a
manner of speaking, that is..." 

     She kept her face averted; she hated to cry in front of him.
After one silent convulsive breath that could have been a sob, she
seemed to regain control, but let him hold her a few more minutes.
He ran a hand up and down the smooth skin of her back,
memorizing the curves and dips and swells of her body. She sniffed
and wiped at her nose. "Listen, Mulder. I want you to do something
for me." 

     "Anything," he whispered. He rubbed his chin over the top of
her auburn head, breathing in her scent. "Just tell me what you
want, Scully." 

     She drew back far enough to look up into his eyes. "If it comes
down to it, and they get us, let me go first." 

     "Like hell," he grunted. 

     "Please." She gripped his arm urgently. "If we're right, if they
do assimilate individual characteristics, then if they take me first,
they'll never take you. You can move in while they're weakened, and
kill them." 

     "You think you're weaker because you're a woman?" Mulder
tried to look down at her, but she turned her face against his chest.
He said, "Women are just as tough as men, just as aggressive. Hell,
you survived medical school. And if you're thinking that
assimilating female characteristics will make them gentler in general,
think again." 

     "No, it isn't that." 

     "Because you're religious, then? Well, let me tell you, Scully,
those religious values have been the cause of more wars than
anything else in the history of the world." 

     She shook her head again, her hair tickling his nose. 

     Exasperated, he said, "Then what?" 

     "Sometimes you can be such a jerk, Mulder," she whispered. 

           She lifted her face at the same moment he lowered his to look
down at her, but this time she didn't stop until her mouth was
against his. It took him a few seconds to realize what she was doing,
and to respond in kind. He put his hands on her face and held
her head while they kissed gently, then fiercely, with a sudden
passion that excluded fear and everything else but its own burning 
intensity. 

     Mulder groaned in his throat and pushed her to the  floor,
afraid to touch her but unable to stop himself from running his hand
up from her waist to her breasts. She gave a sharp little intake of
breath and  he raised his head to look down into her eyes. 

     "Are you saying what I think you're saying?" he asked. 

     "What do you think I'm saying?" 

     His voice cracked like a teenager's. "I love you." 

     "Yeah," she said. "That's it." 

     He lowered his head again, but a hiss of hydraulics  startled
them both, and they flew apart. Scully gained her  feet first, hunched
a little, but Mulder forgot and banged his head into the low ceiling,
cursing. 

     The door to the chamber was sliding open very slowly. 

     "This is it," Scully said. "Remember. Ladies first." She
swayed from side to side, preparing to rush the door. 

     Mulder moved in front of her. "Screw that." 

     The door stood fully open, and the two creatures, out of their
uniforms, stood blinking at them with large brown eyes. They still
had the brown and white pigmentation, but no horns at all. Instead,
they were both shorter, stockier, with ears vaguely like cow ears, but
rows of pointed teeth that seemed to smile at them in fiendish
anticipation. 

     Mulder clenched his fists when they approached, but held
back, disturbed by something familiar about them. One creature
passed him and went to Scully, bumping into her and rubbing its
face against her throat. "Oh my God," Mulder," she cried, "It's
tasting me." 

     Mulder drew back his arm to strike, but the other creature
seized his wrist in its mouth.  Instead of biting, it held on firmly, the
pointed teeth clenched just hard enough to hold without breaking
the skin. It tugged at him and he stumbled towards the door. 

     Then Mulder and Scully were led outside, into the cool wet
morning with just the beginnings of blue coming into the sky. The
first thing they heard was the loud din of helicopter blades whirring
overhead. The sky seemed to be full of them. 

     The creatures touched them repeatedly, then glanced skyward
with quick darting looks and ran-hopped back into the shadowy
realm of the ship. 

     But not before Mulder turned like Lot's wife, for one last look.
 
     "Did you see that?" he shouted at Scully. "Did you see that?" 

     Scully hand his hand in hers and was half dragging him back
up the incline. They ran for the Taurus, still parked where they'd
left it. Beyond that, they saw heavy duty military vehicles, and
dozens of uniformed soldiers. When Mulder realized what was about
to happen, he took the lead, running for the cover of the trucks. A
ground missile was fired with a shrieking sound, and the shock wave
hit them at the same time they heard a tremendous explosion. An
enormous column of flame shot up from the direct hit, effectively
taking out two Air Force helicopters hovering too close to the blurry
area. 

     Someone put blankets around them, someone guided them
behind the trucks, but it was every man for himself when the debris
of branches and metal and clods of earth began to rain down on
them. A second explosion followed the first, to add to the general
confusion. 

     "Come on," Mulder urged. He had spotted the Farleys' truck,
and dragged her to it. The Farleys themselves were nowhere to be
seen. But the keys were in the truck. 

     There were more shots fired; the soldiers were advancing on
the farmhouse. Mulder started the truck and drove it unnoticed up
to the main road. 

     "Think we can make it back to the motel before they figure out
we're gone?" he asked. 

     "I think they're going to have their hands full for awhile,"
Scully said, "But what about that tree on the road?" 

     "Let's hope they cleared it during the night." 

     "Pedal to the metal," Scully urged. 

     To their deep relief, the soldiers at the roadblock where the
tree had been removed had only been instructed to keep anyone
from entering, not from leaving. But only when they were a mile out
of sight of the soldiers did Scully finally take a long sigh of relief and
lean back on her seat, pulling the blanket around her tightly. 

     "What did you see back there?" she asked. "I was running
away, and I didn't even look."


     Mulder grinned at her, the open happy grin of a boy who has
gotten away with something foolish and dangerous. 

     He said, "What's brown and white and has pointy teeth and
just loves the hell out of you--and me?" 

     She looked at him with wide eyes. "Oh my God, Mulder! Are
you serious?" 

     "They must have eaten him first, which is why they didn't go
after us right away." 

     "So at least part of my theory was correct. Are you sure?" 

     He couldn't wipe the grin off his face. ""Pretty sure," he said.
"I can't think of any other reason two creatures from the IS would
suddenly have such a change of heart." He laughed out loud. "Or
why they'd have six inch tails wagging like hell behind them." 

     


the end, wag wag wag



Feedback, please, and none of them snausages, 

okay?