A Little Knowledge  (3a/7)
                  ****************************
                               by
                          Patti Murphy
           
     It was after five when Scully glanced at her watch.  She was
on hold, again.  She'd been on the phone all day with various
branches of the FDA, four different pharmaceutical companies, a
handful of slaughterhouses and more mid-level, faceless
bureaucrats than she cared to count.  She realized that she was
hungry, and tried unsuccessfully to remember what she'd had for
lunch.
     Mulder's phone was still glued to his ear, too, and she
noticed that the wastebasket by his desk had overflowed in a
cascade of crumpled paper balls.
     They were getting nowhere.  Fast.
     The annoying muzak in her ear stopped and a weary voice told
her that Mr. Greeley had left for the day, but that he would get
her message first thing Monday morning.  Scully thanked the woman
and hung up.  Even if Mr. Greeley did return her call, she
doubted that he held the key to the puzzle that Mr. X had dropped
on them.  Scully was starting to wish that she could meet with
Mr. X one more time -- just long enough to inform him that he was
welcome to take his top-secret, highly-classified, pain-in-the-
ass business somewhere else.
     She got up and wandered around the office, massaging her
neck with one hand, while she waited for Mulder to get off the
phone.  She was in the lab, staring at some X-rays and thinking
about a hot bath, when she heard Mulder hang up.  "Anything?" she
called to him.
     He walked into the lab, rubbing his face.  "Not a thing.  I
wasn't able to trace a single bovine organ back to its home. 
You?"
     "I spoke to three people at each drug company who told me
that the FDA must keep those records, and five people at the FDA
who told me that it was the responsibility of the drug
companies."  She sighed and leaned against the counter.  "I can't
help but think that this is turning into a huge waste of tax
payer's dollars, Mulder."
     "No bigger waste than say, Newt Gingrich," Mulder said.
     She smiled a bit.  "Seriously, this trail isn't leading us
anywhere.  I think it's time to regroup."
     Mulder leaned against the opposite counter.  "We know it's
the insulin.  We just have to find out what and how."
     "Hang on," Scully said, raising a hand.  "We think it's the
insulin.  It's just a theory.  That might not be it at all."
     Mulder stared off into space for a moment.  "We need more to
go on.  I'm going to try to contact my contact."
     Scully pursed her lips.  "I don't know, Mulder."
     "What else can we do?" he asked.   "If there's something
here, we're sure not finding it."
     She shook her head.  "I just have a bad feeling about him."
     A grin spread across Mulder's lips.  "A bad feeling? 
Careful, Scully.  You're starting to sound a little spooky."
     His teasing didn't elicit a smile from her.  "Call it an
educated guess then," she said.  "I don't trust him." She walked
back to her desk and started packing her briefcase.  "Besides,
why should he help us, anyway?"
     Mulder went back to his chair, sat down and propped his feet
on his desk.  "He said once that he does it because he feels a
certain loyalty to Deep Throat." 
     Scully stopped sifting through her papers long enough to
nail him with a look.  "The night that I met him, he sure wasn't
feeling much loyalty to you, Mulder."
     "I have that effect on people," he said.  "Frankly, I'm
surprised that you've stuck around this long."
     "Keep it up and I may jump ship, yet," she said.  She slid
on her pumps and snapped off her desk light.  "Look, let's sleep
on it for the weekend and start again on Monday.  Maybe we'll be
able to see some angle that isn't obvious to us, now."
     Mulder nodded.  "I'll see what I can find out.  For all I
know, he may not even work weekends."
     She raised an eyebrow in disapproval and stopped herself
from telling him to be careful.  Instead, she picked up her
briefcase and headed for the door.  "Have a good weekend,
Mulder," she said.
     "Yeah, you too, Scully," he replied.  "Have you got another
date with the deli guy?"
     She stopped at the door and turned, bracing herself before
she answered.  "As a matter of fact, I do," she said.
     "Well, have a good time."
     She studied him for any signs of sarcasm, but found none. 
"Thanks," she said.  "I will."
     "See you Monday."
     "Yeah.  Bye."
     She left, looking a little confused, and Mulder listened to
the click of her heels recede down the hall.  He crumpled up some
more paper, threw it at the wastebasket and missed.  He leaned
back in his chair and sighed.  He wished he had told her to be
careful.


     The living room was bathed in flickering blue light from the
television set and the Knicks were behind by six points.  Mulder
got up and wandered into the kitchen in search of another cold
beer.  He popped it open while he stood at the fridge, took a
long drink, and then returned to the living room and his losing
team.  He glanced at the masking tape X on the window pane as he
passed by.
     The bastard had better contact him this time.
     He took another slice of pizza from the open box on the
coffee table and folded it in half with one hand.  He was in the
process of jamming most of it into his mouth when the phone rang. 
It took three rings for him to swallow and answer.
     "Mulder," he said.
     "Tomorrow night, nine p.m., in the parking garage of the
Watergate Hotel.  I'll find you.  And don't be late, Mr. Mulder,
because I have better things to do with my time."
     The line went dead.
     Mulder put the receiver back in its cradle.
     The crowd on t.v. roared and Mulder looked towards the
noise.  The tide had turned.  His team was winning.


     Scully spent most of Saturday doing laundry, cleaning her
apartment and trying to convince herself that an attractive,
intelligent and sensitive man really was going to take her to
dinner that night.  She had a date, the first one in a long time. 
Lunch had been nice, but somehow having lunch with someone, even
someone as charming as Peter, didn't count as a date.  It was
more like an interview.  A chance to get together on neutral
ground and check each other out, with the comfortable knowledge
that if this midday meeting turned out to be a disaster, you
could always plead a hectic day and escape back to work.  Except
she hadn't wanted to escape back to work.  In fact, she could
have sat in that sunny restaurant all afternoon and into the
evening, talking and listening, getting to know each other. 
     It wasn't until she was folding the last load of laundry,
still warm from the dryer, that she realized she was nervous.    
Nothing like dating to make you feel like a gawky fifteen year
old again, she thought.  Fortunately there were a few important
differences between her teenage dating experiences and her
current situation.  For one thing, she wouldn't need her mother
to rescue her poor suitor from her father's inevitable
interrogation at the front door when he called for her.  She
smiled recalling how her mom would literally push her and her
date out the door, ending her husband's "Stern Sea Captain
Routine", with a cheerful "Really, Bill!"  And of course, there
would be no one to flick the porch light off and on when a
midnight goodbye on the front steps threatened to stretch past
what her father considered an acceptable time limit.
     Not that there had been teenage boys lining up to ask her
out.  Her sister, yes, but not the youngest of the Scully women. 
She remembered lamenting this fact once to her mother, while they
did the dishes.  
     "Boys don't ask me out because I'm not pretty," she had
said, not daring to look away from the plate she was drying.  She
had been afraid to say the words out loud before now, afraid that
somehow speaking them would make them true.
     Her mother had been startled.  "Sweetheart, you don't really
believe that, do you?"
     She shrugged.  "It's all right, I guess.  I don't mind that
much."
     Margaret Scully shook the dishwater off her hands then
quickly dried them on her apron.  She took her daughter's face in
her hands and looked into her eyes.  "You listen to me, Dana. 
You have a very special kind of beauty."
     She had fidgeted and rolled her eyes.  "I know, I know, I
have inner beauty.  But nobody asks you on a date because your
insides are beautiful, Mom."
     "It's not just your insides that are beautiful, darling."  A
fierce love shone in her mother's face.  "If I could have one
wish for you, it's that you could see yourself the way I see you. 
Beautiful and intelligent, strong and compassionate."  She saw
tears welling in her mother's blazing eyes and suddenly felt
embarrassed.  Her mother smiled through her tears, then quickly
kissed her on the forehead. "Come on," she said, turning back to
the sink.  "We have dishes to finish."  
     Scully smiled at the memory, recognizing how long ago that
had been but how little things had changed.  She still felt gawky
and uncertain at times, only now she was better at masking it
with a practised clinical detachment and a cool exterior.  And
usually, it worked.
     So why was she so nervous?  She wasn't a fifteen year old
girl anymore, shocked to suddenly find herself inhabiting the
body of a woman and not at all sure how to act.  She was an
intelligent, accomplished professional, respected by her
colleagues, if not for her assignment, then at least for her
talent and her abilities. She had proven that she could hold her
own in the boys' club on any case.
     But this wasn't a case, this was a date.  A date with a man
she found very attractive.  A man who made her feel beautiful
when he looked at her.  Not for the first time this week, she
started to imagine the feel of his hands on her body, then caught
herself and felt a sharp rush of embarrassment.  This had to
stop.  Next, she was going to be listening to her old Air Supply
albums.
     She had finished folding the towels and was putting them
away in the bathroom when it came to her.  She was nervous
because it had been a long time since she'd slept with a man. 
She sat down on the edge of the big, claw-footed bathtub and
tried to remember precisely how long.  At least a year and a
half, she decided.   Not since Mulder and her assignment to the
X-files.
     Mulder, again.  How had he managed to invade her life so
effectively that he popped into her head even as she was
contemplating sleeping with another man?  She got up brusquely
and strode back to the living room to finish folding the laundry. 
By the time she was dressing for her date, she had managed to
convince herself that she was worrying for nothing.  It was just
dinner and a movie -- nothing to be apprehensive about there.  As
for what might come afterwards, she would play it by ear.  Surely
she was too pragmatic to let herself be swept off her feet by her
hormones.
     At two minutes to five, the door bell rang.  She opened the
door to find Peter standing there with a dozen white roses.
     "Hi," he said.  Then, with a shy smile, "These are for you." 
He held out the flowers.  The intoxicating scent of roses washed
over her.  They locked eyes and Scully felt every ounce of her
pragmatic resolve draining away. 
     She couldn't help but smile.
     Peter waited in the living room while she put the flowers in
water, then went to locate her jacket and purse.  She slipped her
cell phone and her gun into her bag and for just a moment, she
let herself wonder what Mulder was doing tonight.  


  
     The car radio muttered softly.  Mulder had searched for
something to listen to while he waited, but had only been able to
find an AM phone-in talk show.  The current caller was drawing a
parallel between replacement players in major league baseball and
welfare recipients, the precise logic of which escaped Mulder. 
He was reaching to turn it off when the passenger door flew open. 
He jumped involuntarily and grabbed for his weapon.  The man was
in the car before Mulder could lay  his hand on his gun.
     "Feeling a little nervous this evening, Mr. Mulder?" the
black man asked.
     Mulder let out his held breath and sank back into the seat. 
"You shouldn't sneak up on people like that," he said.
     The man's face showed no emotion.  "And you should try not
to be such an easy target.  This is a dangerous business we're
in, you know."
     Mulder returned his steely gaze and realized again how much
he disliked this man.   The man drew a manila envelope from
inside his overcoat and tossed it into Mulder's lap.
     "Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas, Mr. Mulder.  This is
the biggest gift you'll get all year.  I'm sorry I didn't have
time to have it wrapped."
     Mulder picked up the envelope.  "What is it?"
     "All the scientific data of a top-secret government project,
the point of which seems to be evading you and your partner, as
well as the obituaries of three scientists, all of whom have
coincidentally died within the last six weeks."  He scanned the
parking garage as he talked, and Mulder realized he was
experiencing a growing urge to do the same.  "One of the
scientists who worked on this project is still alive.  I suggest
you find her, as quickly as possible, before she decides to take
up bungee jumping or some equally dangerous hobby."
     "Do you have any idea where she is?" Mulder asked.
     The man stopped sweeping the area with his eyes long enough
to glare at Mulder.  "Shall I write the report for you as well?"
     The feeling of knuckles hitting bone with a satisfying thud
flashed through Mulder's mind.  Except he knew that this man
would shoot him through the heart before he could land the punch.
     The man's hand was already on the door handle.  "One last
thing, Mr. Mulder.  I would advise you and your partner to move
very quickly on this one.  There is a clean up operation of the
highest efficiency in motion and in a few days, there won't be
anything left to investigate."  He started to get out of the car.
     "Wait a minute!" Mulder said, and grabbed the man's arm.
He stopped and looked at Mulder's hand, then turned his
blistering gaze on Mulder.  Mulder waited the length of two
heartbeats before he let go of his arm.  "What's your interest in
this?  Why are you helping us on this one?"
     The slightest trace of a smile crossed the man's lips, but
never made it to his eyes.  "Sometimes, when you want things done
right, you have to do them yourself."  He slipped out of the car
and strode quickly towards the shadows.


     The evening air was cool with the memory of winter but
Scully was still warm from the glow of the wine they'd shared at
dinner.  The meal had been long and candlelit and they had
decided to skip the movie, in the end, in favour of a walk around
the Tidal Basin.  The cherry trees were in blossom and the air
was thick and syrupy with their fragrance.  They held hands and
walked the slow walk of two people who were enjoying the night
and each other.
     She couldn't remember the last time she had felt so relaxed. 
And she knew it wasn't just the wine, even though she had
surpassed her usual one glass limit.  It was everything:  the
breeze that caressed her face and stirred the petals in the
trees, the lights reflecting and dancing on the water, and this
man, whose fingers were gently intertwined with her own.  She
searched for the familiar hollow spot, listened for the echo of
her own shouts, but heard only contented silence.
     Peter squeezed her hand and peered down at her in the half
light.  "You're awfully quiet," he said.  "Are you O.K.?"
     She smiled, her self-consciousness dissipating like mist. 
"I'm fine," she replied.
     He turned to face her, then stood there, looking at her. 
"Let's go back to your place," he ventured.
     Scully studied his eyes, saw the promise of comfort and
healing there.  She nodded.


cont.