Title: Angel in the Mist
Author:  Ali Harrett
Reply To:  XXandie@aol.com
Rated:  PG
Category:  X
Sub-categories:  R, A, H
Keyword: Mulder/Scully romance
Spoilers: `Post-Modern Prometheus' and `Detour.'
Summary:  Mulder is kidnapped mysteriously.  
Archive:  Yes!  Anywhere!
DISCLAIMER:  Mulder and Scully belong to Chris Carter, 1013 Productions and
FOX, Inc.  Please don't sue me!  Like many other writers out there, I go to
school and I am poor, and not making any extra income off of my obsession.  If
anything, I'm failing my classes and losing money by spending time writing
this!  Maybe I should become an English major so I can do this for grades, too.
`Walking in Memphis' is done by Marc Cohen, and `Joy to the World' is by Three
Dog Night and the lyrics to both are not at the end.
Ted Grifford is mine and my not be used without permission.


Angel In The Mist



    Deep in the forest, the little rabbit lay hidden amongst the underlying
shrubs.  He shook in terror, feeling the presence of the invading humans.  A
deer ran past his sanctuary as shots from hunting rifles were discharged.  Pain
entered his being, a bright, searing pain that took his breath away, as a stray
bullet logged into his flank.  
    How dumb could he be?  Anger, fear, and extreme pain mixed in his small,
furry body, triggering him body to transform.
    The hunters chasing the deer ran screaming into the dense trees, as they
saw the creature that arose from the underbrush.
    Grinning at nothing but himself, he tore the bullet from his side, and
chased after the men at a great speed.  He felt revived in his natural form.
    Summoning his powers, he called forth a great mountain lion.  The beast,
hungry for flesh and revenge, readily obeyed the strange man-animal.
    In a great roar of triumph, the lion and the creature feasted on the stingy
meat of the hunters, and left nothing but bloody bones behind.

XXXXXXXXX

    The music was just too much.  He got up from the old wooden chair and stood
in front of Scully.  He slid toward her in Elvis style and held his hand out to
her, tilting his face away, afraid to see the acceptance that would be in her
eyes.  
    He felt her small, soft hand enter his, and he pulled her body to his.  His
right arm went around her body and his left hand captured hers.  She looked up
at him.     He leaned in to kiss her, ready to give her all of his pint-up
feelings, but instead stared into her eyes.  <I love you,> he told her with his
eyes.  Hers seemed to mirror what he was thinking, and both seemed happy to
leave it at that.  
    They watched the Cher-impersonator as she sang a rendition of Marc Cohen's
song, and continued to dance, holding eachother tightly, their hearts beating
wildly to the beat of the music.  And then the music stopped, and so did the
wild merry-go-round of the past week.
XXXXXXXXX

    A shot rang out, and the sound of glass shattering followed.
    "Mulder, don't do that!  You can't see me, and I can't see you.  The
bullets might ricochet off of the glass and hit me.  Or you!"  Scully's voice
bounced loudly through the labyrinth of glass.  They were trapped in a fun
house, chasing a suspect, who had mysteriously disappeared through the maze.  
    "Scully?" Mulder spoke loudly. 
    "Yeah?"
    "I would never hurt you,"  he promised.   And she knew it to be true.
    They continued to work through the maze, each in separate corridors. 
Scully watched her images in the smooth planes of glass.  Every angle of her
body was exposed.  She had filled out nicely since her recovery.  The once
hollow skin beneath her eyes was now taunt and as pale as the rest of her face.
 Her lips had returned to their full, soft texture and form.  Her clothes no
longer sagged at her hips.  Not only that, she had more energy.  She was alive.
 
    The movement of her body created a sort of turn on for her, and she struck
a sexy pose, glad that Mulder couldn't watch her take pleasure in the motions
of limbs, yet wanting to show him everything she could do.
    Then she heard a deep feline growl as it echoed in the huge room.  It
sounded hungry.  Scully ran, bumping into a pane of glass, and scaring herself
more.  Then rationale kicked in, and she slowed down, and paced her steps.  The
more the creature could hear her, the more likely it was that it could track
her.  She waited for a few moments, and tried to catch her breath. 
    A heavy raged breathing permeated the stillness of the air, and Scully
shook.        She couldn't see the creature anywhere, only the images of
herself on the multiple panes of glass.   
    She heard Mulder's muffled scream of agony, and then shots rang out again,
and the glass beside her broke into a million pieces.  A massive golden cat lay
amongst the ruins, panting heavily, blood oozing form it's side where the
bullet had entered it's chest.  
    Mulder lay about 5 feet from it, gasping in pain.  His smart Armani outfit
was torn to shreds over his chest, and long, deep, bloody claw marks were
clearly visible.  He was sprawled out, unwilling to move.
    Momentarily feeling sorry for the animal, she walked over to it.  It
growled softly at her.  The blood loss from the lion was great.  A puddle of
blood surrounded it, and was growing rapidly.  She looked into it's eyes, dazed
by the silent message it told her.  She pointed the gun at it, and pulled the
trigger.  She shook her head, not sure if it was the sound of the gun that had
phased her or something else.
    She turned her attention to Mulder.  His breath was deep and raged.  She
ripped of the shreds of cloth from his shirt and pressed them against his
wound.  It was an ugly mark.  The skin was pulled up in parts, frayed in
others, and she winced when she saw glimpses of white through the torn and
bloodied skin.  She pressed the cloth against the gash harder, needing to stop
the blood flow.  
    He stared up at her, away from her.  He was going into shock fast.
    "Don't go to sleep,"  she whispered to him.
    "Sing to.  Mmm..me," he demanded, stuttering in time with the pain
pulsating through every cell in his chest.  "Not.   Jera.  Miah." She grinned. 
    She thought really hard for a moment.  She didn't know the words to many
songs, so she hummed the tune to "Walking in Memphis," hoping he'd remember
that night, and remember what it meant to them.  She trailed a finger down the
side of his cheek as she hummed.  He smiled.  His eyes closed.
    "Fight it Mulder.  Don't go to sleep."
    He opened his eyes again, the hazel color becoming cloudy.    She let her
gaze roam over his face, eventually  resting on his lips.  They screamed to her
to be kissed, especially the bottom one, but she fought the urge.  Her partner
was down for the count, and now was not the time to think such unprofessional
thoughts.      She continued to hum.
    His hand moved to touch her arm.  She stroked the fine, dark hairs on his
wrist, relishing their softness.  "Go.  Get help.  Be OK,"  he persuaded her.
    She got up from where she had sat beside him, and brushed to dirt off of
her pants.  <I love you,> she promised him with her eyes.  Wordlessly she left,
carefully back-tracking her steps.
    
     Reality was slipping from him fast.  He pressed his hand against the
blood-soaked cloth, and cursed himself.  Everything was moving slowly, and he
was cold all over.  Before he fell into the mist that was starting to
surrounded him, he felt for his gun, and was relieved to find that Scully had
placed it back into it's holster that was at his hip.  Her face flashed in his
mind, and then she was gone.

    "I'm Agent Scully with the Federal Bureau of Investigation.  My partner's
been hurt by one of your animals.  He's in dire need of medical attention!" 
She flashed her badge to the woman at the Information center.  The secretary
didn't look impressed. 
    Stifling a yawn, the woman replied.  "OK, *Agent* Scully.  I will get the
medical staff to follow you.  Now, where did this take place?" 
    "In the Hall of Mirrors.  Just hurry!"  Scully was becoming infuriated by
the woman.
    "And what was the animal and where did it go?"  The woman continued,
writing down some information on a clipboard.
    "Look, lady.  A federal agent is dying from a wound that one of your
carnival beasts gave him!  If you don't dispatch someone soon, I will
personally have you arrested for failing to comply with the law!"  Scully
asserted.  The woman looked up at her, startled, fear creeping into her face. 
The demure agent was now a big as a giant.  The woman got on the phone.
    Inwardly, Scully smiled.  Sometimes being a government official was great. 
You could get anything you wanted, within reason.  "And call 911 and have an
ambulance waiting."  The woman smiled tentatively, her hand trembling as she
dialed the numbers.


    "He's this way.  I know it," Scully told the small convoy of the
fairground's employees that were following her.  She lead them through the maze
of mirrors.       She  turned around, puzzled, when she reached the end and
hadn't found him.
    "Look, lady.  We don't have time to play games,"  one of the men told her.
    "But he was here!  I must have took a different turn, or something!" 
Scully looked worried.  "Let's split up and search again."
     Again, they went through the mazes, combing the shadows for a dead lion
and a dying man.  And again, nothing was found.   The sound of the ambulance
sirens resounded in the building.  
    "Well, now look at what you have done!  You've called us all out to search
for something that isn't there.  Get your brain checked, lady!"  The employees
left, leaving her to deal with the emergency medical team.
    She told them there had been a mistake, and they left.  She pressed her
back up against one of the walls outside of the building.  The cool night air
flowed through her light weight attire, and she shivered hard, almost in a
convulsive manner.  Where was Mulder?  Where was the lion?  Sighing in
almost-resignation, she re-entered the building to search for clues.  <Oh, God,
Mulder.  What have we gotten ourselves into now?>

    She walked through the maze of mirrors once again.  This time, though, she
traced her steps carefully.  She figured if she went through the entrance she
had taken instead of the one he had, then she'd have a better chance of
recognizing where the incident had taken place.  She came about to the area
that she was sure the glass had been broken.  She studied the mirrors, looking
for scratches and dents, or the lack thereof.  
    One pane she looked at was almost flawless.  When she looked at it more
carefully, she found that it did not stand the same as the other mirrors
surrounding it.  It was shorter and stood straighter than the other mirrors. 
Something else caught her eye.  Underneath the pane, a small piece of
red-and-white cloth stuck out, and was almost totally hidden away.  She pried
it out of the tiny space, taking care as to not tear the evidence.  The cloth
was still damp, the fresh blood still soaking through the cotton and polyester
mix. 

    Her search ended in vain, with only the scrap of bloodied cloth tucked into
a sterile plastic bag.  As she exited the building, she noticed drops of blood
along the concrete floor, and a smear on the side of the metal door.  Some of
the drops were still partially wet.  She took out her handkerchief and let the
blood soak into one corner of it.  She placed the new piece of evidence into
another baggy, and marking it with an ID number. 
    She walked to her car, which was parked close to the edge of the pine
forest, to put the evidence into safekeeping.  Out of the corner of her eye,
she saw a movement from the trees.  Flashlight in hand, she walked toward where
she saw the trees move.  The bushes under the trees shifted again, and she
could hear dry leaves cracking.  In one swift move, she dropped her flashlight
to the ground and whipped out her gun from her side.
    "Freeze!  FBI! Put your hands in the air and come out from the trees
slowly!"  she yelled forcefully.  Nothing moved.  There wasn't even a sound. 
"FBI!  Come out with your hands up!"  she yelled again.  
    A growl emanated form the underbrush, and a male figure jumped out of its
protective cover.  It was their suspect that they had followed into the fair. 
But something was different.  Something was wrong.
    His eyes glowed red in the darkness of the night, and they locked with
hers.  He peered deep into her soul, and paralyzed her by shear will.  What she
saw frightened her, and chilled her instantly to the bone.
    His life story, such a sad one,  flashed across her eyes.  Animals were his
friends, and revenge was what he lived for.  The gruesome pictures of gore and
raw carnage played in her mind.  Then the death of the two hunters for which he
was being sought for was etched clearly into her memory.  
    Unable to move, unable to break away from his probe, she whimpered.  As he
approached her, he started to morph into something unbelievable.  His back
became hunched and more hairy, his teeth grew into fangs, and his fingernails
shone as bright, white claws in the moonlight. His features remained almost
human, but did not quite make him man, nor made him animal.  
    Terror screamed through her body, and oozed out of every pore and every
inch of her being.  He grabbed her gun viscously from her outreached hands,
breaking her trigger finger in multiple places as he did so, the sound of bone
snapping cracked in the air.  Pain traveled up her arm.  A tear of fright and
pain slipped from her eye.  He pointed the gun at her head, and pressed the
muzzle against her temple.  He stared into her eyes the whole time.
    <Goodbye, Mulder,>  she thought.
    Then, for a split moment, he looked away, as they heard approaching
footfall.      She felt the spell break, and ducked just in time to escape the
wrath of her own bullet.  She slammed her left hand into his grip, and the gun
fell from his hands.  A growl rumbled in his throat as he tried to stare her
down again.  
     He lunged for her gun, but instead was caught in the groin by a flying
Scully-foot.  He wailed in anguish.  She reached her gun before he did.
     A complete silence fell upon her ears as he stood in front of her, still
in obvious pain.  She was till avoiding his gaze, but was surprised to find
that he was no longer looking at her, but into the forest.  She followed his
line of sight, and saw dozens of pairs of eyes staring back at her.
    She fought the torrent of random, indeterminable thoughts that passed in
and out of her mind, and pointed her gun at the man-animal.  Her ears hummed
with the sounds of snarls and hisses.
    Using her unbroken hand, she pulled the trigger, aiming to miss.  Her
timing had to be right.  She had already guessed that the wild animals would
not be happy, and she was right.  They leapt from the undercover in the second
it took her to refocus and fire again.  
    The bullet made a sickening sound as it entered his body at high velocity,
and entered his chest cavity.  He stumbled backwards from the momentum as she
took aim and fired again.  The next bullet hit his scull, and he moaned in
defeat as his body fell to the ground in a heap.
    Scully looked around her.  All of the eyes were gone.  She ran to her car,
locked all the doors.  She carefully snapped the bones in her finger back in
place and made makeshift splints from the car's first-aid kit. After this task
was done, took her cell phone from it's charger and called for backup.
    The carnival continued in the backround, and not a soul stepped out from
the shadows as she waited, shaking and at the brink of tears, but now wasn't
time to cry.  Mulder was still out there, she hoped.  <Mulder, I will find
you.>

 XXXXXXXXXX

    "Agent Scully, are you sure you're up to this?"  Agent Grifford asked.  
Scully sighed and glared at the other Agent.  "I'm fine.  We need to find Agent
Mulder.  He's hurt pretty badly.
    "How do you know he's out here?"
    "Because," she whispered softly, "I'd feel it if he were dead."    
    She continued down the path that was carved amongst the trees.  Agent
Grifford's flashlight played along the trucks and the underbrush as they
walked, bringing inanimate objects to life.  She jumped numerous times, afraid
that a wild animal would leap out at her and eat her alive.
    But the forest was quiet, eerily so, and it reminded her of her and
Mulder's escapade with the Mothmen a few weeks back.  Except now it was night. 
And there were no Mothmen. 

XXXXXXXXXXX

    "Ssccuullllly..,"  Mulder moaned.  He didn't know where he was.  A thick
fog covered his vision, and his body hurt and ached all over.  
    In his delusional state of mind, he saw only Scully.  She walked to and
fro, back and forth, and around in circles.  He couldn't make out her features
clearly, but he knew them by heart, so it didn't matter.  
    He was mesmerized by her movements.  She was so beautiful, he thought, in
her pure, white silk gown.  It was very low cut, and contoured her breasts and
hourglass shaped body.  The silk flowed around her, and moved in tandem with
her elegant gait. 
    "You're so beautiful, Scully.  You're an angel."
    But the angel turned into a great panther that lunged at him and grabbed
his arm in it's mouth.  It dragged him through the forest, gnawing on his flesh
as it did so.
    He screamed.

XXXXXXXX

    "Mulder.  Mulder, it's OK," a musical voice spoke by his ear.  It had been
humming `Walking in Memphis.'
    "Scully," he murmured.  
    "Are you feeling alright?"  
    He had been slowly coming out of his 2-day coma, and Scully was reason why.
    He had been whispering and moaning her name all morning, and now it seemed
he was awakening.  
    His eyes fluttered open.  It took a moment for them to focus, but when they
did, they met a pair of sparkly sky blue Scully eyes. She was smiling.  She was
so beautiful when she smiled.  He smiled too.
    "Where am I?"  He asked her.
    "St. Mary's Mercy Hospital.  Do you remember what happened?"  She whispered
in his ear as she lay cuddled up closely beside him on his hospital bed.
    "All I remember is a panther coming out at me and chewing my arm off while
dragging me through the forest."
    "No, Mulder.  Where did you get that idea?" She asked, bewildered.  "You
were hit by a drunk driver two days ago.  You were lucky.  The other guy was
not."  She failed to mention that the dead man had been driving a Panther, and
the fact that he had mentioned it irked her.
    "But..  I remember us being together in a fun house.  I remember you going
to look for help for me."  He said in a rush as things started to come back to
him.      "You were watching over me, too, in a mist."  Confusion became etched
on his face.
    "We *were* in a fun house.  We were chasing Ted Grifford.  We caught him. 
Then you got into the accident on our way back to DC."
    "Ted Grifford?  But I thought that he was in the FBI."  Scully's cell phone
rang just then.  She pulled herself away from Mulder for a moment to answer it.
    "Scully."
    "Agent Scully?  I'm glad I've reached you.  Ted Grifford has escaped. 
There are two dead men outside of the block.  It looks like a wild animal got..
.. .." and then the line went dead.
    "Who was that?" Mulder asked, as he reached for her hand that he swore had
been broken.
    Scully stared at her cell phone before she pressed the `End' button.  "Ted
Grifford escaped.  Wild animals are on the loose. And then the line went dead. 
I must get down there!"  
    She started to roll off of the bed, but Mulder caught her around the waist
before she could leave. "Scully!  Grifford is a morph!  He isn't human.  He
isn't animal.      He is both.  If he could morph into a mouse, he could
escape, and then he could change back into a human or another animal!"
    Scully brought her nose down to his as he spoke.  Then she kissed him on
the lips.  At first, it was a teaser, but then it became passionate.  She had
been waiting a long time to kiss Fox Mulder.  
    When they were done, she pulled back. "Mulder, I love you, but how do you
come up with those weird ideas?"  She ruffled his already mussed-up hair.
    "I love you too, my sweet angel."

XXXXXXXXX

    Ted Grifford shook himself out.  He had just transformed from a rat to a
tiger to his normal being in fifteen minutes, and he was tired.  And full.  He
loped to the edge of the forest and disappeared into the thicket.

The End


Feedback please!  This is my first attempt at a real X-file (jnot really--a
work in progress is, but this is the first time i have posted an x-file)and I
want to know what you all thought.    

"The complete lack of evidence is the surest sign the conspiracy is
working."-unknown