UMBRA 2:ELLIPSIS Chapter 12 By Dawson E. Rambo Edited by Scott Carr Disclaimer: Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Walter Skinner and any other tangentially mentioned characters created by Chris Carter remain his copyrighted property, the property of 1013 Productions, and the property of Fox Television, a unit of 20th Century Fox, Inc. The author believes that the use of copyrighted characters in the forum known as "Fan Fiction" is protected under the "Fair Use" statutes of US Copyright law. No infringement of any copyright is intended. Characters created by the author remain his property. Archive Title : ELLIPSIS 12/? Posting Date : 4 November 1998 Classification : SRA/MSR[m] Overall STORY Rating : NC-17 (explicit sexuality, violence) CHAPTER Rating : R Keywords : UMBRA, Mulder/Scully, Thriller Summary : Withheld at author's request. Spoilers : Umbra "O can't you see, brother- Death's a congested road for fighters now, and hero a cheap label." C. D. Andrews (1913-92), British poet, scholar. "To a Pilot Lost in Aragon, in London Town, no. 459" (March 1938). "Death not merely ends life, it also bestows upon it a silent completeness, snatched from the hazardous flux to which all things human are subject." Hannah Arendt (1906-75), German-born U.S. political philosopher. The Life of the Mind, "Thinking," (1978). "Men are never really willing to die except for the sake of freedom: therefore they do not believe in dying completely." Albert Camus (1913-60), French-Algerian philosopher, author. "The Rebel," pt. 5, "Historic Murder" (1951; tr. 1953). "I have known a vast quantity of nonsense talked about bad men not looking you in the face. Don't trust that conventional idea. Dishonesty will stare honesty out of countenance any day in the week, if there is anything to be got by it." Charles Dickens (1812-70), English novelist. Mr. Sampson, "Hunted Down," New York Ledger, 1859. "Wolves which batten upon lambs, lambs consumed by wolves, the strong who immolate the weak, the weak victims of the strong: there you have Nature, there you have her intentions, there you have her scheme: a perpetual action and reaction, a host of vices, a host of virtues, in one word, a perfect equilibrium resulting from the equality of good and evil on earth." Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), French author. Clement, in Justine, ou les Malheurs de la Vertu (1791). +=+=+=+= Cook County Hospital Chicago The ambulance-bay door burst open as the paramedics pushed the gurney carrying Tim Clark through the entranceway and turned left, heading towards the trauma room. Oz Vance and Ramon Cruz, still dressed in their assault gear and still armed, followed. The paramedic began his recitation to the trauma team. "White male, twenty nine, GSW to the upper right leg, through and through. Lost at least four to five liters of blood. He's shocky, tacacardiac, diaphoretic, resps 30 and shallow, BP 70 palp and dropping. We gave him two thousand ringers, wide open, and plasminate. MAST pants applied." The ER doctor, gowned and gloved, nodded, accepting the information as the team made the left turn into the trauma room. A nurse stepped in front of Cruz, holding up her hands. "You'll have to wait out here," she said firmly. Cruz opened his mouth to argue, and then saw the look on her face. "He's a Special Agent with the FBI," he said softly. "He just saved a bunch of hostages at the Pine Bluff Nursing Home." She held his gaze for a long moment and then nodded. "We'll do everything we can," she said softly. Cruz thanked her and turned away, finding Vance with his eyes. "We have to call this in," he said. Gunnery Sergeant Osborne Vance would rather have done anything in the world than make the telephone call he was now faced with. Sighing, he reached for his satellite phone. After dialing, he waited for the voice to answer. "Patch me through to Mulder," he finally said. +=+=+= New York Fox Mulder sat in his rental car outside the TPD's Sixth Precinct, slowly and methodically popping sunflower seeds into his mouth. After almost ten years together, six of them married, Scully had still not managed to break him of the habit. He took pains not to do it when he was around her, but she was in Virginia, a good six hundred miles away. She'll never know, he thought, smiling. The cellphone in his pocket trilled, startling him. He held it up, staring at it. No way, he thought. There's no that's Scully. He pushed SND and lifted it to his ear. "Mulder." "Boss, it's Oz." "What's up?" "Uh...Clark has been hit, sir." Mulder frowned. "Hit? Hit where?" "In the leg, sir." "I didn't authorize a life fire exercise, Vance." There was a very long pause. "Sir, I think you need an update." Mulder listened as Oz brought him up to speed, first on Chicago, and then on the Hawaii job. By the time he was finished, Mulder was fuming. "I want to know why I was not informed about these two missions," he said sharply. "I want to know the status of the Hawaii mission ASAP. I want you and Cruz to get on the next available aircraft, civilian or military, heading to Los Angeles. When you get there, you will call me and let me know of any situational changes. You will inform the doctors there to contact HQ if there is any change, no matter how minor, in Clark's condition. Furthermore, at your discretion, you may inform the doctor of Clark's special military standing, if and only if you think that is required for some reason. As soon as I can spring Nelson from the cops here, we'll be on the next military flight to Hawaii." He paused. "Is that clear, Sergeant?" "Aye, aye, sir," Vance said and hung up. Mulder snapped the phone closed and stared out the window. They're upping the stakes, he thought. Three hits in one day. They've either changed their schedule, or my friend isn't telling me everything. And if he's not telling me everything, that's the same as lying. And if he's lying, that means I can't trust him anymore. And if I can't trust him anymore, that means I am on my own. Fuck. Mulder opened the phone and dialed again. "Let me speak to Director Skinner," he said. "It's Mulder." After a minute, he was connected to the Director's office. "Agent Mulder," the Director said. "What can I do for you?" "Sir, the New York mission is in its terminal phase. The objective was...met, but our operative is currently being detained. The nature of the...alignment of forces has changed, sir, and I need to get to Hawaii as soon as possible, with my operative." "Understood, Agent Mulder. I'll do what I can." And as it turned out, the Director of the FBI could do a hell of a lot when it came to the Transit Police Department. Pete Nelson was released within ten minutes. An hour later, Fox Mulder and Pete Nelson were aboard a USAF Special Missions Wing VC-20 heading for Paxtuent River Naval Air Station. +=+=+= Oahu, Hawaii The three US Navy F-14Ds landed at Pearl Harbor just after four in the afternoon local time. Scully had arranged for a car from the local FBI Field Office to meet them, and within moments they were whisked away. Scully, sitting in the front seat, turned to the driver and snapped, "Status update. Now." "Nothing for six hours. They've made only one demand, but it's something we don't understand. All attempts at communication have failed. If the local commander hadn't heard from the Director, I'm sure he would have tried an assault by now." "What's your read on the situation?" "If I had to put a word to it, Ma'am, it'd be "weird." These are kids...from all descriptions, six clean-cut teenagers. The leader, or who we think is the leader, shot a hotel employee in the face for no apparent reason. They took about forty hostages in the main ballroom. They've closed and barricaded the doors, and our automated sniffers have detected that there's some kind of nitrate-based explosive near the doors, so we think the place is wired to blow if we make a frontal assault." Scully nodded, absorbing all this. "Get us there," she said. "Fast." The Special Agent driving the BuCar nodded and pressed the gas. He had no idea who this woman was, but he'd seen the equipment she and her two comrades had stowed in the trunk. These people, he thought, mean business. +=+=+= Hawaii The lead entity paced back and forth in the ballroom, glancing at the doors leading to the hallway. His thoughts were focused on the upcoming battle. He knew that the forces arrayed against him would do everything in their power to kill him. He had come to Hawaii expecting to die a glorious death for his cause. There was no greater gift he could give than that of his life, and he was prepared to do so without question and without hesitation. But what was taking so damn long? He went over the options in his mind again. Hawaii State Police SWAT Team. The FBI's Hostage Rescue Team. A military SWAT team (not the Umbra team, but just as dangerous.) And then, of course, the Umbra team itself. And finally, if the Gods were with him, if his cause was just, the MindWalker. The entity, who in another life had gone by the name Raymond, stopped in his tracks. Something didn't make sense. He began walking again, trying to think through the haze that his mind had become. Dimly, he remembered what his life had been like Before. He remembered being able to think clearly, to have thoughts that he considered his own. He remembered having ideas and opinions. But that seemed foreign to him now, alien. He grinned at his own wry humor. Alien. But something about the MindWalker tugged at his mind. After a moment of intense concentration, he realized what it was. They had told him they didn't know who the MindWalker was; They were unaware of his identity. He'd accepted that at face value. It made sense, because if They did know who the MindWalker was, there would be no need for these elaborate hostage situations. They could just arrange for a convenient accident. A heart attack, poisoned food, a long shot from a sniper's rifle. Something. Anything. As he concentrated, Raymond began to see the holes in the logic. They'd given him that list of possibilities when the mission had been assigned, and in that order: Hawaii State Police, FBI HRT, MP SWAT Team, then the UMBRA team, and the MindWalker. If he was lucky, they said, the MindWalker would come. Raymond knew that another team was operating today in Chicago, and that there was something going on somewhere on the East Coast. He'd heard the mumblings of his human handlers, and knew that there were three operations today. Which meant that the MindWalker, if he wasn't here, was at one of the other mission sites. Which meant that he was connected somehow with the...FBI. Or... Raymond stopped dead in his tracks again. The MindWalker was on the Umbra team. Quickly, he reviewed the operations to date. Phoenix. They'd watched the videotapes from that operation, as useless as they were. They'd been told that the MindWalker had been there, but he'd outsmarted the team somehow. Gotten onto the plane. They'd accepted at face value, too. It had been impressed on them again and again how important it was not to underestimate the MindWalker. He was wily, they were told. Incredibly smart. Genius-level IQ. Could think in sixteen dimensions and directions at once. Like a game of chess, they'd said. Always one step ahead. It will take a brave soul indeed to take the risks required to outsmart the MindWalker. But the Umbra team had taken the plane. That's what they had been told, and again, Raymond had accepted it at face value. But in order for the MindWalker not to have been killed by the military commandos, for him not to have been mistaken by them as one of the team members, they would have to have known his identity beforehand. Which meant he was one of them. Raymond closed his eyes, trying to concentrate. He remembered the lecture about the Umbra team. Six members, an executive officer and a commanding officer. The eight most deadly people on the planet, he'd been told. One of them...one of them was the MindWalker. So why not kill them all? Indeed...why not? From that line of reasoning, Raymond arrived at a decision. The best way to get them to commit to an action early was to force their hand. To make them respond to him. Demands were...nonsense. It was a game, a ballet, a kabuki that everyone was familiar with. The hostage- takers would take the hostages and make demands. The authorities would appear to appease the hostage-takers, giving into the demands in tiny, agonizing increments until a plan could be formed and carried out. And then the hostage takers would either be arrested or dead. Raymond opened his eyes and sighed, realizing for the first time that he and his team were being sacrificed. Lambs to the slaughter. Not this time, he thought. And then another thought crashed into his consciousness. It was as though his brain were reacting to the traitorous thought he'd just had. He saw the compound, the training rooms, remembered the instructors repeating his orders over and over again, beating him when they deemed it necessary. He shook the memory off. He turned to the hostages. Pathetic, they'd said. High emotional impact. His thoughts broke up and then realigned; he remembered the conversation on the airplane. They'd told him to do this: To find a pathetic hostage and kill him. Force the Umbra team's hand. Make them move before they were ready. So it wasn't idea, Raymond thought. I've been programmed. Brainwashed. He pointed at a hostage. "You," he said. "Come here." +=+=+= Scully was being briefed by the Hawaii State Police commander when the telephone next to him rang. He stared at it, wide-eyed. "That's them," he said softly. Scully indicated that he should answer it. "Captain Tanaka," he said. After a minute, he held the phone out to Scully. "They want to speak to you," he said. She took the phone. "Scully." "Are you...no, you are a mere woman. You are not the One." "Who am I speaking to?" Scully asked. "We are the One," the voice said. "We are the many that are the One." Scully had a wild memory of a Star Trek episode that Mulder had made her watch one rainy Sunday afternoon. They sound like those aliens, she thought. What were they called? The Borg. "We demand the MindWalker," the voice continued. "Bring him to us or we will kill these hostages." "I don't know what you mean," Scully said, stalling for time. "What's a "MindWalker?"" There was a very long pause. "Can you see the doors?" the voice asked. Scully took two steps to the left and peered down the hallway. "Yes," she said. "I can see the doors." She heard the sound of the phone clunking down, and then silence. For two incredibly long seconds there was no noise, and then came the sound of a gunshot. Scully winced, holding the phone away from her ear. A second later, a second gunshot rang out. There was movement down the hallway, as one of the doors leading to the ballroom opened. Scully drew her sidearm, knowing she had no shot but doing it anyway. A body was tossed into the hallway, and then the door slammed again. Scully heard footsteps approaching the phone. "The MindWalker will be delivered unto us by midnight, or we will kill a hostage every hour." The phone clicked in Scully's ear. "Oh, Jesus," the HPD captain said. He raised his radio. "Conners, Walker-" Scully moved the radio away from his mouth, shaking her head. "We need to get her out of there!" the cop said. "She could be-" "She's dead," Scully said, finality seeping into her voice. "They shot her through the head." The Captain peered down the hallway and saw that Scully was right. The woman wasn't moving, wasn't breathing. And after a minute, they saw something they'd missed. She had been pregnant. "What about the baby?" the cop asked, tears of anger and frustration rimming his eyes. Scully just shook her head. She could see the bullet hole in the woman's abdomen. They'd shot the baby, too. At that moment, her satellite phone rang. +=+=+= Paxtuent River Naval Air Station, Maryland "Scully...what the HELL is going on?" There was a pause. "Mulder?" "Yes, dammit, Mulder. What the hell is going on? Why wasn't I informed that you had not one, but TWO missions ongoing?" "Mulder...you were on a mission of your own!" "No, Scully, I wasn't. Pete was on the mission. I was providing backup." He paused. "I should have been informed." His wife didn't answer. "Whatever," Mulder finally said. "We can talk about that later. Cruz and Vance are on their way to Hawaii from Chicago." "What about Clark?" Mulder wondered if he should tell her what he'd just learned five minutes ago himself. He realized she had a right to know. "Tim is dead," Mulder said softly. "He took a round through his leg, nicked the femoral artery." "Oh, shit," Scully said just as softly. "What...what about the nurses, Mulder? That was a nursing home for God's sake. There should have been nurses and doctors all over the place." Mulder shook his head, walking back and forth on the tarmac next to the two F14Ds that would ferry him and Nelson to Hawaii. "Budget cuts, Scully. There was only one doctor on site, and he had no trauma experience to speak of. No RNs, only LPNs, and they were experienced with geriatric patients, not trauma. Vance and Cruz applied a tourniquet and called for an ambulance. He bled out..." "Clark was in incredible shape, Mulder. He should have been able to survive a simple bullet wound to the leg!" "I can't argue with you, Scully, because I wasn't there! Neither of us were. We can debrief Cruz and Vance after this Hawaii thing is over." He paused. "I know it's asking a lot, Scully, but I don't think you should tell the guys. They need to concentrate on the gig." He paused again. "What's your status there?" Scully turned and looked back down the hallway. "They just killed a hostage." She hesitated. "A pregnant woman. They shot her through the head and abdomen, killing her and the child." "Scully, they're trying to force your hand," Mulder said. "I know that, Mulder. I have no intention of making any kind of decision until after I've calmed down." "What are their terms?" "Midnight," Scully said, checking her watch. "Just over six hours." Mulder did the calculations in his head. Even on max cruise, there was no way he could make it from Pax River to Oahu in six hours. Sure, if he had a SR-71 on call... Even didn't have that much juice. "I'm on my way, Scully." There was another short pause, and then: "Do you have any orders, sir?" Mulder felt his teeth grinding together. "No, Scully. You're there and I'm here. You're in command. You do what you think is right." Another short pause, and then quietly: "Thanks, Mulder. I know how hard that was for you to say." "No, it wasn't," Mulder said, calculating. "You've been trained just as hard as me and the rest of the guys. You know what you're doing. You're a natural leader, Scully. You don't need me telling you what to do. Just do it." "Aye, aye, Colonel, sir." She paused one last time. "I'll see you when you get here." And then she was gone. Mulder folded the phone up, zipped his borrowed flight suit closed and ran the ten steps to the F14. Settling into the back, he waited for the ground crewman to strap him in. Toggling the intercom, he said, "Let's get going." +=+=+= Hawaii Scully was studying the hotel's blueprints when she felt movement behind her. The HPD captain was standing there, wringing his hands. "My men are requesting that they be allowed to remove the pregnant woman's body," he said hesitantly. Scully shook her head without replying. "It's really bothering them," the cop insisted. "I don't care," Scully said. "It's too dangerous. The chance is too great that they would take some kind of action. I'm sorry, but the answer is no." The HPD captain strode angrily away. Scully returned to staring at the blueprints. There was really only one way into the room, and that was from above. The problem was that the crawlspace above the ceiling was barely a foot high. Barely enough room for her, let alone Brooks or Douglas. She wished Pete Nelson were here. He knew more about explosives than any man she'd ever met. The charges on the doors were the only thing standing in the way of an assault from the front and from above. "Douglas," she called. A moment later Toshiro Douglas was at her side. "Boss?" "Do we have any intel on the charges from the Phoenix job?" she asked. Douglas thought a minute. "Radio controlled detonator, as well as a collapsing dead-man's circuit. Pretty basic stuff." "Do we have any attack against that?" Douglas considered, and then shook his head. "Too risky to chance trying to jam the signal. Any jammer could inadvertently send out the detonate signal...and...boom." Scully nodded, thinking. "We need a way to get rid of those charges. We can't make it in from above." "Ma'am?" Douglas said, shifting on his feet. "What?" Tosh took her arm and led her away from the rest of the assault team, down a short hallway that led to the restrooms. "Ma'am, permission to speak freely?" Scully nodded, crossing her arms. "Ma'am, our objective on this mission is the same as the Chicago and New York teams, is that right?" Scully nodded. "Well, why don't we just...let it happen?" "Excuse me?" "If we feint a frontal attack, they'll blow the charges, right? If that happens, everyone in that room will die...including the entities. They'll end up doing our work for us." Scully's mouth dropped open in surprise. After a minute, she closed it. "Tosh! There are possibly forty hostages in that room!" "Forty against seven billion, boss. I know it's cold, but it seems like a fair trade to me." "No," Scully said, shaking her head. "That is a last ditch option. Tosh, the explosives could quite possibly level this hotel! There are guests, staff, police officers...there's just no way we can..." "Get away with it?" Tosh asked. After a minute, Scully nodded. "I suppose that's as apt a term as any. The investigation into the incident would end up thrusting the Umbra team into the limelight, Tosh. Matheson is good, but he can't stifle Congress. Not on something like this." Toshiro Douglas nodded his assent and moved to leave. Scully stopped him with a hand on his arm. "But you've given me an idea," she said. "I'm all ears." +=+=+= Scully walked back to the command post. "Can we call in?" she asked the HPD captain. He nodded towards the phone. "Just pick it up. It'll ring inside." Scully lifted the phone to her ear. After a moment, the same voice she'd heard before answered. "Yes?" "The MindWalker is here," Scully said. +=+=+= Raymond's world began to spin. He'd done it! The MindWalker was here! "Send him in," Raymond ordered. "That's not going to happen," Scully said stiffly. "I will detonate the charges," Raymond said quickly. "I will kill everyone in this room, and quite possibly everyone in this hotel." "And you'll die as well, your mission incomplete." "You just the MindWalker is here!" Raymond objected. "The MindWalker," Scully said carefully, "is in Hawaii. Not at the hotel. Not yet." "BRING HIM TO ME!" Raymond screamed. "Listen to me," Scully said. "I'm in contact with the MindWalker. You will release the hostages before the MindWalker will agree to meet with you. This is non-negotiable. You know what the MindWalker means to your cause. You've already killed two people-" "One." "She was pregnant," Scully pointed out. "WHATever," Raymond said. "I must think about this, discuss this with my comrades. I will contact you soon." +=+=+= Raymond hung up the phone and began pacing. "He is here," he announced to the room. The hostages, huddled in one corner, began to whisper excitedly. "SILENCE!" one of the other entities ordered, waving his rifle at the crowd. They fell silent instantly. "Are they going to send him in?" another entity asked. "No," Raymond replied. "The woman, our contact, has told us that the MindWalker wants us to release the hostages before he will appear." "We cannot allow that," a third entity announced. "They warned us of that tactic at the compound. It is a trick. If we give up the hostages, we have no bargaining power. No way to force their hand." Raymond stopped pacing. "Let's think about this," he said. "Thinking is for the weak," a fourth said. "Listen to me," Raymond insisted. "Listen closely. We need to explore our options so that we do what is right, what our cause demands. First, they have told me that the MindWalker is in Hawaii. We have accomplished that much. But we are alone here, comrades. We have no backup, no one to make an attempt against the MindWalker if we fail. Therefore, it is up to us. We cannot kill him if we cannot get to him. And we cannot get to him if we don't release the hostages." "But if we release the hostages, nothing is stopping them from coming in here and killing us all!" a fifth entity objected. "Yes, there is," Raymond said. "Several things. First, we still have the explosives. We can level this hotel, killing everyone in it... including the MindWalker." "If he's here," the second pointed out. "You just said that he was in Hawaii, not necessarily here." "This is true," Raymond conceded. "The decision must be made. We are prepared to die for our cause. We are prepared to kill all of these hostages, as well as any innocent bystanders. Are we agreed on that?" Five heads nodded as forty people broke into a cold sweat. "So, the point is -- we must force the hand of the MindWalker. And the only way to do that is to give him no choice but to comply with our demands." "We must kill hostages until he complies," the second said smugly. Raymond thought about it for thirty seconds. "There is no other way," he agreed. "We must kill the MindWalker. There are only six teams of our comrades left." "Five," the third entity pointed out. "The sixth team is preparing for the offworld mission." Raymond nodded, accepting that. "Fine. We will call back and announce that unless the MindWalker is delivered to us, we will kill one hostage per minute, and when we are out of hostages, we will detonate the charges." +=+=+= "SHIT!" Scully said, slamming the phone down. Her gambit had backfired. "Boss?" Douglas asked. "Get into position," Scully ordered, unslinging her weapon. "They're going to kill a hostage a minute until we give them what they want, starting in five minutes. We have to do a frontal assault." "The charges..." "They'll have to open the door to dump the bodies in the hall, otherwise we wouldn't know that they're serious. And they have to deactivate the charges in order to open the door. The first time that door opens, we go in, flashbangs, weapons on full-auto. Rock and roll, boys. We're going to have to spray and pray." Turning to the HPD captain, Scully began issuing instructions. "Pull everyone back. You have two minutes. Get everyone as far away as you can." "We just finished evacuating the guests," the cop said. "It'll just be you and your team." "Go," Scully ordered. The cop turned to go, stopped, and then looked back. "Good luck," he said, holding out his hand. Scully shook it. She waited for the HPD SWAT Team to clear out before stepping down the short hallway leading to the restrooms. Closing her eyes, Scully opened her mind and concentrated. [Mulder?] +=+=+= Aboard US Navy Tomcat F-14D Call Sign Stalker Two Six [Mulder?] Mulder's head snapped up. [Scully?] [Hey, lover. I need some help.] [I'm listening.] [I fucked up. I lied and told them that you were here, hoping to trade you for hostages. They called back and told me that they'd start killing a hostage every minute until you appeared, and then blow the building.] Mulder winced. [What are you going to do?] he asked. [We're going to wait for another hostage to be shot, and when they open the door to dump the body, we're going in. Full-frontal.] Mulder closed his eyes. [Hold on,] he thought. Toggling the intercom, he asked, "How far?" "Time or distance, sir?" the pilot answered. "Time." "About ninety minutes, sir." "Can you get there any faster?" "I can go faster, sir, but we'd end up swimming towards the tail end of the flight." "Do the best you can, Commander." "Aye, sir." [Scully? I'm about an hour and a half away. I'm not going to be there in time.] [I know. I...I just wanted to hear your voice. This... this feels like it's going to turn to shit.] Mulder made a command decision. [Scully, I want you in the door last. Not first, but last. I know you've trained to lead from the front, but--] [Mulder,] Scully interrupted. [It's too late to make a change--] [Scully, listen to me. I have a feeling, OK? I have a feeling that something is going to happen. I don't know what, but something different than what we've already seen, and I want my best pair of eyes to see it. Please, Scully.] In Hawaii, Scully took a breath. It went against every single instinct she had. The team had trained this evolution over and over again, and every time, she'd been the first in the door. She was short, she was quick. It was suicide to change the order at this late date. But Mulder was her CO. And her best friend. [Fine,] she thought. [I hope you know what you're doing, Mulder.] [Scully?] [What?] ["I love you,"] Mulder thought and said at the same moment. "Sir?" the pilot asked. +=+=+= Hawaii Walking back to the CP, Scully regarded Brooks and Douglas. "I've been in contact with the CO," she said. "He wants to change the entry order. Brooks, you first, then Douglas, then me." Brooks and Douglas exchanged a glance. The same thought occurred to them at the same moment. The XO's scared. They both knew that Mulder was airborne in a Tomcat, and wasn't due for at least an hour, probably two. And F14s didn't have SkyFones. "Yes, Ma'am," they said stiffly. "Any other orders?" Mental note, Scully thought. Remind Mulder to explain his decision to Douglas and Brooks. Otherwise, they'll never follow you into combat again. "No. Same as always, just a different order." She checked her watch. "Two minutes. Get in position." +=+=+= When it happened, as always, it went quick. There was a muffled shot, and then twenty seconds later, the door to the ballroom opened. Brooks was waiting, a flashbang in his hand. He tossed it in, counted to two and crouched. The explosion was loud, and Brooks was moving before the echo died, Tosh on his ass. They exploded into the room, Tosh moving left, Douglas moving right, their backs against the wall. One of the entities was already turning towards the hostages, his rifle coming up. Douglas took him with two shots to the head and moved on, looking for other targets. He spotted the entity with the detonator and brought his weapon around, depressing the trigger at the same time Brooks found him. Six shots from two weapons shredded the entity into a bloody heap. The room was a madhouse. The hostages were screaming and crying, crawling away from the wall they'd been huddled against. The shots from the Umbra team's suppressed MP5s were muffled in the noise. Scully came in last, her specially-modified Glock held in two hands, the narrow red beam from her laser sight tracking around the room like an electronic Cyclops. She found a target and fired, taking the entity in the throat and the forehead, dropping him like a sack of flour. They cleared the room in less than nine seconds. "CLEAR!" Douglas called. "CLEAR!" Tosh echoed. Scully remained silent, her sense on alert. She'd never tried it in a combat situation before, but she knew she had no choice. She concentrated, opening her mind, probing the minds of the hostages, looking for something out of place, something that shouldn't be there-- Scully heard their thoughts and winced. No please I don't want to die please don't shoot me oh God I don't want to die Mommy Daddy God I'm sorry if you'll just let me live I swear I'll stop cheating on my taxes oh God please no please no must kill them kill them all the cause must be- *Him.* Scully's pistol moved on autopilot, tracking one of the "hostages." Without blinking, without hesitation, she shot him in the forehead, killing him instantly. Tosh turned to Scully, his eyes wide. "Boss?" Scully moved to the target and reached down, lifting his shirt. The bright discoloration on the chest was there, but fading. "He was one of them," she said, her voice tight. Rolling him over, she found the SIG P229 holstered at the small of his back. "See?" she asked. Tosh gaped. "How did you...?" "That's why Mulder wanted me to go in last," she said. "He knew...somehow, that I'd find this guy." And once again, the respect, awe and...fear that the UMBRA team members felt for their CO and XO went up another notch. +=+=+= Aboard US Navy Tomcat F-14D Call Sign Stalker Two Six "About sixteen minutes out, sir." "Roger that," Mulder transmitted back. He desperately wanted to contact Scully, but he knew she might be smack in the middle of a pitched battle, and distractions were the one thing she didn't-- [Mulder?] [Scully!] [It's all over. All six entities are...dead.] [Casualties?] [Two hostages. We're fine. We're mopping up now. We're gonna need some help here. The local cops are making a big stink about the way this went down. They're making "talk to the press" noises.] [I'm about forty minutes away. Do me a favor and have a chopper at Pearl ready for me?] [Done.] +=+=+= Aboard VC-20 Tail Number N4901954 Six Hours Later Mulder and Scully sat together in the two forward-most seats. The rest of the team sat two rows back, talking quietly. "Mulder..." Scully whispered, leaning over. "This...this almost blew up in our faces." "Literally," Mulder said. Scully didn't answer. Her expression said volumes. "I know, I know," Mulder said. "Sorry." "We have to reevaluate our tactics, Mulder." "How so?" "We need to get each member of the team able to operate independently. We have no idea how many other teams of entities there are. We showed them today that we are able to operate on three fronts simultaneously. If they're watching, they're learning. They'll know next time to start executing hostages almost immediately. The demands they'll give...we'll be unable to meet them in any realistic time frame." Scully paused. "It's gaining momentum, Mulder. They're getting smarter." "I need to talk to our friend," Mulder said. "I need answers, and I need them now." "WE need answers, Mulder," Scully said. +=+=+=+= END CHAPTER 12