Classification: TRHA

Rating: PG

Summary: A visitor and a lot of strange conversations.

Spoilers: None.

Disclaimer: One more time...yes, you can have them back when I'm done! I'm not going to mortally wound them, so don't worry about it. Property of 1013 Productions and Fox Television.

"Truth conceals itself in error
History reveals its face:
Days of ecstasy and terror
Invent the future that invents the race."

Donald Lehmkuhl, Copyright 1974

'Avath
 

July 24, 1999
Allison's townhouse

I woke up and found the day had become twilight, which was a freaky sensation, but not half as strange as finding the house to be totally silent. I could hear NY Times purring at the foot of the bed in the quiet.

There was a post-it stuck on the computer screen.

"Ally, took the girls to the Vagabond to see a double feature of Freddy Krueger. It's time they expanded their cultural boundaries. Back around 10. We're getting dinner at Burger King, so don't cook. P.S. We fed the critters, but I won't say what we fed them to." I chuckled.

I was so damned lucky. He had to be as tired as I was, but he was kind enough to be dragged by two teenage girls to watch slash 'em and gash 'ems for four hours, and then provide dinner as well.

It wasn't quite 8, which gave me some time. I needed to get my Greek into shape. The Latin was coming back, but I hadn't tackled the Greek yet. What to read?

I went for one of my favorites, the tragedies of Euripides. It was between the Medea and Alcestis. I decided on Alcestis. Say what you will about the politics of the play, but it's not one that ever fails to affect me on an emotional level. The central question in Alcestis is, what sort of wife offers to die for her husband, and what sort of husband lets him?

Reading the play was more disconcerting than usual. For reasons unknown, Langly's theory that Eric's death had not been an accident kept needling me, and every time I would translate one of Alcestis's lines, I kept thinking-oh Jesus, this was making no sense whatsoever.

I really needed to focus on the structure and not the content. Either that, or it was time to switch to Sophocles.
 

My reverie was broken by the sound of shouting and laughing and arguing as Langly and the girls came through the door, and from the sound of it, they'd brought Tiny and at least a couple of cats along just to make certain I knew that quiet time was now over. I ran down the stairs and grabbed grabbed Langly from behind, wrapping my arms around his small waist. God, I
thought, for as much as that guy can eat, he stays amazingly thin.

"I see you survived your expedition with the girls," I laughed.

"They lied about the movie!" chided Miranda.

"Yeah, I thought we were gonna see "Nightmare on Elm Street," and they did the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre I and II instead!" squawked Shelby.

"It was SO gross!" Miranda made a gagging gesture.

"Hey, admit it, it was great!" Langly jabbed back. "'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' is a classic!"

"Euripides is a classic," I corrected him. "'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' is not."

"Oh Jesus, she's been hitting the books again. Y'know, I'll bet some of those plays you read were like "Star Wars" in their day."

"Oh, they were. Actually, more like an Anthrax concert. The performers wore loud clothes and makeup and the audience knew all the words to the chorus."

"Probably threw things, too."

"The Greeks were not subtle in certain areas. Art appreciation was one of them."

"Hey Langly," Miranda asked as she grabbed two iced teas from the fridge, "you promised us a trip to 'Rocky Horror.' So when are you gonna make good on it?"

"Next Friday."

"Langly, we play cards on Friday night," I reminded him.

"It's a midnight show. So you can lose some money, and then we can go to the flick."

"I haven't done 'Rocky Horror' since college."

"That's gonna be SO cool!" It was Shelby, who was getting to be like a second child to me.

"Shelby," I asked, not wanting to be rude, but not wanting any unpleasant phone calls, "does your mother know you're still here?"

"Yeah, I left her a voice mail. She went tango dancing. My dad's working. It's okay if I stay, isn't it?" She now looked somewhat worried.

"Of course it's okay, and you know you're always welcome. As long as your parents know. I'd hate to have the parent police running after me."

"Mom, the parent police have been after you for years," Miranda laughed.

"Yeah, you actually let these kids have fun. Gotta be a criminal offense," Langly reached in and grabbed a Corona. "Where're the limes?"

"In the crisper, and grab one for me, okay?"

"What, a lime or a beer?"

"Both, you idiot!"

We retreated to the bedroom. It was a ritual now-the kids took over the living room, we went upstairs.

"You're looking better," he observed as he popped the tops of the Coronas.

"Yeah, I'm okay. I think I'm ready to have a beer now," I concurred. "Did you talk to Dana or Mulder before you took off?"

"Nah, but I talked to Frohike. Old mother hen is back there, hanging around and clucking all over the place. Dana's okay. Her blood pressure sort of dropped for a while, but she's doing better, and the kid's still functional." He popped a lime wedge into the Corona and took a long sip. "Ally, you think it's a good idea to be hanging around there, what with Scully in the shape she's in? I mean, I saw what it did to you today."

I sipped my Corona slowly. "I don't know. I mean, she's my friend. I owe it to her to be there for her. But I really don't want to talk about my experiences with it, I think it'd just get her all freaked out. And I don't want Mulder knowing any of this. He'll go cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, and right now, that's not what Dana needs." I fired up a cigarette. Langly reached for the pack, then thought better of it. "Watching Mulder is a lot like watching Eric, only in extremis. It just brings back the worst sensations. It's as if the body and the mind both remember everything, and all they need
is a trigger."

"Hell of a big trigger." We both chuckled over the lame comment. He was perusing the photos on the wall. "Y'know, Eric sort of looks like Mulder. Only he dresses better."

"That's because he never wore ties."

"I mean, it's not like he really looks like Mulder all that much, he's got the dark hair and the same eyes and stuff."

"He was a lot smaller than Mulder. Mulder's a pretty big guy. Eric was only 5'8"."

"At least he didn't have a stupid haircut."

"No, he had it pretty long most of the time. Said it was actually easier to keep it in a ponytail. It didn't get in his face when he was working or doing sports."

"He was a good guy. I would've actually liked him."

"Yeah, you would have."

"But I'm not sorry he's not here."

I wasn't quite sure how to respond to that one, so I opted for the diplomatic approach, which on rare occasions I am quite capable of.

"Langly, I'm just glad you're here."

"Me too." We were sitting cross-legged on the bed now, enjoying our Coronas and finally having the opportunity to relax. "There is one thing I wanna do, though."

"What's that?"

"Miranda tells me he had a hell of a music collection."

"Yeah, he did. Most of it's at Public Storage. I just grabbed a few things I really liked when we came here."

"Well, music is meant to be listened to, not shoved into a storage space. I'm gonna go check it out tomorrow. Unless, of course, you really think he'd have minded that much."

"No, I think he'd actually appreciate that."

"Good, because I haven't bought any new CD's in a while, and from what the kid described, his collection could make a dead man come."

"I'm not sure I'd put it in those terms, babe. He had some really great stuff, but there are albums by Foghat and Mott the Hoople tucked away in there."

"Nice to know the guy wasn't a total paragon of virtue."

"I don't fall in love with paragons. I do men, thank you very much."

"Yeah, and whaddya say you do me right now?"

"Langly, you are so crude sometimes!"

"This offer is still good."

"Langly," I said, stubbing my cigarette and setting down my Corona, "if that's the way you're going to be-"

"Yeah?"

"Then get the fuck over here and get your clothes off!"
 

It was the silliest lovemaking we had done. We were laughing so hard that Miranda actually pounded on the door at one point and told us to shut up, we were embarrassing her. That just made us laugh harder. We did finally settle down to snickers and giggles, though. And I was still giggling on and off when we were done.

I marveled at the sleeping blonde curled up next to me. I was in the crook of his arm, and he had his head buried in my hair. This man was sweet, silly, sensuous, serious, snappish, shrewd, schizoid...I kept turning the alliteration over in my head, coming up with as many terms as I could that applied and began with 's.'" The insanity that always set in when I embraced the classics was back with a vengeance. And that gave me a major fit of the giggles.

That woke him up a bit. "Do I really look that funny?"

"No," I reassured him. "Just doing goofy stuff in my head."

"Like what?"

"Well, I was trying to think of all the words that apply to you that begin with the letter 's'."

"Ally, you need a new hobby. Reading dead languages makes you weird."

"Hey, dead languages are fun. And there're no ancient Greeks or Romans around to hassle me about my pronunciation. Besides, I have classes starting in just over four weeks, and I've been away from this stuff for awhile." I gave him an evil grin. "And unlike some of your hobbies, its legality is not questionable."

"I don't know. It oughta be." We both laughed.

"Speaking of illegal hobbies, what's the plan for Vegas?"

"Oh yeah, Vegas. We let Byers take care of that. He's key on this stuff. Among his many talents, he's a damn good travel agent."

"Why am I not surprised?"

"Hey, underneath those ugly suits beats the heart of real resourceful guy. He always finds the cheapest airfare, but we never have to make 500 stops along the way. And what he does, he gets us the low end hotel rooms. And then he plays a few games of blackjack and we end up getting a suite comped for us."

"Byers plays blackjack?"

"And he's good."

"I just didn't take him for the gambling type."

"You probably don't think he's into funky poaching, either, but anytime there's a little...side job that Mulder needs, he's always the first to say yes."

"The joys of not having a criminal record."

"Yeah, one of the great things about Byers is that he can get around and nobody ever suspects anything about him, because he's so damn straight looking. Y'know he's a presenter at the Black Hat Briefings this year."

"No, I didn't."

"Well, it's not like he said anything, but all you have to do is check out the program, and you can find out. The suits love him. He looks like one of them. And he's a college professor to boot, so he's got amazing credibility. We'd be seriously without resources if we didn't have him. And he's a good guy. He's a good friend. Sometimes he's so anal he drives me insane-"

"That shouldn't be hard," I interrupted.

"-but he's really the guy that saves our butts. Me and Frohike, we know a lot, but Byers make it all seem to come together. He's got a good head. And a good heart."

"He's always been very good to me."

"Byers is decent to everybody. I'm not trying to make it sound like he doesn't think you're cool, because he does. But Byers would say please and thank you to a thief. And the thief would say, you're welcome. The guy just exudes class. And not because he was a rich kid."

"I thought he might be, if he grew up in Scarsdale."

"His old man owns a paper company. Capitaliste extraordinaire."

"Let me guess, Daddy's a Republican."

"Big time Republican. The guy scares the hell out of me, and I've never even met him."

"Does Byers have any sort of relationship with him?"

"Not to speak of. The guy sounds like he's a total robber baron bastard, and I mean Byers, that's just not him. Supposedly, the old guy's cut him off, but Byers has plenty of bucks from both grandpas. His dad's father was already rich, and his mother was even more rich."

"Sounds like the Rausches are small time. I'm not sure what my mother's net worth is, but probably nowhere near what theirs is."

"Your mom is currently worth about 32 million bucks."

"Trying to figure out if I'm worth sticking around for?" I teased.

"Ally, I don't give a fuck about your mom's money. I really don't. Money's great, particularly when you don't have any, but who the hell needs 32 million dollars?"

"If she died tomorrow, I'd get 8 million or thereabouts then. The will's split evenly between the kids. My oldest brother will argue that he should get more because he's got more kids and he's the oldest son and blah blah blah, and if he contests, I'm not going to fight him. Do be aware of that."

"Dan's the richest kid in the bunch."

"Yeah, but you have to figure out where he comes from. Or more specifically, where his gold-digger wife comes from. And I'm not going to get into their trip. Cheryl thinks she's all that because she's married to my brother the wealthy surgeon and she's connected to the Rausch family fortune. Funny thing is, Cheryl's from nothing."

"Probably why all this shit is so important to her."

"Could be. Anyway, I don't feel like talking about Cheryl, because she's basically a waste of time. I'd rather hang with Emma and Lydia anytime. They're Eric's sisters."

"I knew that."

"That's right, you did the family background. By the way, you'll meet Lydia soon. She's going to come down for a visit before the start of fall semester. Girl's trying to finish her dissertation."

"Isn't she a pharmaceutical chemist?"

"Yeah, but Lydia's cool. She's an old headbanger. Lydia's the only 38-year-old in the world that still goes to Metallica concerts. And her guy is seven years younger than she is. So she won't even blink at us. She may, however, try to get your classic Megadeath T-shirt. She's been looking for that one for years, so I'd get it out of the laundry room before she gets here."

"Y'know, I'd get my stuff out of the laundry room if I had a drawer to put it in."

"Fine. You get the lower one."

"Just one?"

"Listen, there are differences between the sexes. And one of the primary differences is that women get more bureau drawers."

"God, I've been naïve all these years."

"What? You thought the primary differences were physical?"

"No, I thought the main difference between men and women was that men think the Three Stooges are funny, and women don't."

"Well, that is an important distinction, but the bureau drawers are pretty close to the top of the list, followed by cleaning gutters and taking out the trash."

"Ally, you always take out the trash."

"Don't tell anyone."

August 1, 1999

Lydia called to say she couldn't make it until the 3rd. That meant that I would only get to spend a couple days with her, but she did offer to stay until the 12th when I got back from Vegas and Los Angeles. I was immensely appreciative of the offer; Shelby's parents agreed-somewhat half-heartedly-to Miranda's staying with them, but Miranda wasn't crazy about the idea. Staying with her very cool aunt, however, was another story.

"Shelby's mom is such a jerk," Miranda informed us. I had met Shelby's mother and wasn't all that impressed. "And her dad's never there. He's always working."

"Were I married to Shelby's mother, I'd stay at work, too." I was in the middle of translating a passage from "The Odyssey" and was sort of half-listening.

"The woman is a total drunk," she went on. "I wouldn't know if I've ever seen her sober."

"I wouldn't know, sweetheart."

"At least you've cooled it on the booze some, Mom." That made me drop my book.

"Miranda, I'm not a drunk."

"No, Mommy, but you were on the way to it. I talked to Langly about it. He was worried, too."

"God, what else do you and Langly talk about?"

"Mom, he's really cool. He'll talk about anything mostly. And he always listens. I mean, he's not like a dad or anything. But he's like this really cool adult I can talk to. And he's funny. And he's got great taste in movies."

"Oh, yeah. Anything with a big-breasted bimbo who gets sliced and diced in the opening scene of the film."

"Hey, one time when you were teaching sign language, we rented 'Schindler's List.'"

"Seriously."

"Yeah, we did. He watched it with us." She looked sober. "I'm glad he did, because Mommy, that was the scariest movie I ever saw. But he'd stop the tape and then we'd talk about it, him and Shelby and me. And then we'd watch some more. Took us three nights to watch it while you were with Agents Ellen and Mark."

"Wow. Didn't think Langly watched that sort of stuff."

"Well, he does. And he knows a lot about it. Says he reads stuff on it, and took some classes in college."

"I think he's a far better historian than I ever could be."

"Definitely. So Mom? When are you gonna marry him?"

"Miranda, do you know something I don't?"

"Mommy, I always know things you don't. Like I knew you guys would get it together."

"When?"

"About half an hour after you met."

"Uh-huh. Sure."

"Mom, I did! And remember I said you'd start sleeping with him?"

"I seem to recall that, yes. But I think that was more of a logical deduction by that time."

"Mom, you are so clueless."

"I hear this a lot."

"Mom, he's gonna ask you. Soon. Just watch."

"He told you this?"

"Are you kidding? He doesn't know it yet!"

"So how do you know?"

"Daddy told me."

Okay, did this kid need therapy or what? "Miranda, you're a level-headed kid. What's going on here?"

"Seriously Mom. He and I...talk sometimes. He says he came to see you one time. How come you never told me?"

"Miranda, it was just a dream."

"That's not what you told Mulder."

"No, that's exactly what I told Mulder. He thinks otherwise. And how do you know this?"

"From Daddy. He doesn't come that often. But I can talk to him even when he's not there, and he remembers what I've said. He's in some place far away. He's not able to come back for more than a little while at a time. And he says it's different...it feels different. It's like you remember some feelings but you don't feel them anymore. He misses us, but he says he's glad you're happy."

"Miranda, this is pretty crazy. You have to admit that."

"No, I don't. Hey Mommy, I'm not the one who needs a drink anytime life goes crazy."

"Miranda, that's hardly fair. And I am trying, you know."

"Look at me, Mom. Do I look demented? Are my grades in the gutter? Do people think I'm a total weirdo? I don't think so."

"They might find it a bit...odd if you related this to them."

"Oh, Shelby knows all about it. She thinks it's really cool."

"Miranda, we used to think Ouija Boards were really cool, too."

"Mom, this is not bullshit. It's nothing like what you do at parties or anything. I don't do any of that stuff, in fact. I don't because I think spirits should be taken seriously. I don't think we should screw around with them just for fun."

"Anybody else you tell about these...experiences you have?"

"Oh, I told Langly. He says he's not really into that stuff, that I should talk to Mulder."

"Please don't. Mulder'll find it irresistable to make you his little lab rat."

"He will not! He'll believe me. He'd probably really want to know."

"I'd go along with that. Just be prepared that if you discuss this with Mulder, he's like a terrier with a rat. He's not going to let it go."

"Mom, remember you told me I was born under the veil?"

"Yes, you were. They had to break my water at the end, because you came out in the cawl."

"Langly says that some people believe that means you're very psychic."

"Well, sweetheart, I don't know if you're psychic, and I'm in no position to judge. You are very clued in to things. You've always been an observant child. And very sensitive and intelligent. If you want to talk to Mulder, go ahead. I'm sure he'd be interested." Mulder might also be able to tip me off if he thought she was psychologically in trouble. "You could also
talk to Agent Ellen. She's not as well-versed as Mulder, but she does know a fair bit about it. And she's really nice."

"Oh, yeah, you told me about her. Aren't we supposed to go to her house sometime for dinner?"

"Yeah, we said after Langly and I got back from Vegas, we'd do it."

Ellen Sternberg was a delight to work with. She had a raucous sense of humor and an appreciation of all things absurd. She was going to work well with Mulder and Scully. She and I hit it off immediately, and we planned to get together in the near future. This, of course, was before Dana was forced to go on maternity leave much earlier than anticipated. She'd had her hands full then; now she was really going to be swamped. Our communication was largely restricted at this point to tasteless postings on e-mail. For a rabbi's wife, who once studied for the rabbinate herself, Ellen knew an inordinate amount of truly gross jokes and stories. Of course, she'd been a police officer as well, which may have provided her with her wealth of material. At 5'10", she was tall enough to be intimidating, and she balanced that with her friendly, open face and wildly
curly black hair.

"Would it be okay to e-mail her?"

"You can, but she's buried right now with Dana on leave. I'm sure she'd respond to you as soon as she was able, though." Ellen had two sons of her own and totally adored kids.

"Okay, cool. She's in your address book, isn't she?"

"Yep."

"You going out to Dana's today?"

"No, today I'm going to pass. I was just there yesterday." I had visited Dana three more times in the hospital, keeping it short and sweet, and I had gone to her mother's house twice, where she was recovering. She was definitely doing better, which was encouraging. She and Mulder planned to return to their home next week sometime.

I liked visiting Mrs. Scully-Maggie, as she insisted I call her-but sometimes she made me uneasy. The first time I visited Dana at her house after she had been released from the hospital, Dana had been sleeping. So Maggie and I started talking, and of course she wormed it out of me that I had been through a miscarriage. I didn't have to tell her not to tell Dana-Maggie is not stupid-but I was rather upset at having to do the whole song and dance again. It bothered me that this woman could always get you to reveal things you really didn't want to talk about.

Maggie Scully should have been an investigator. Her daughter and son-in-law had nothing on her.
 

August 3, 1998

"Mom, Aunt Lydia's here!"

"Yay!" I raced down the stairs to find my sister-in-law hugging Miranda fiercely and then tickling her like she did when Miranda was little. Lydia was rewarded by having her hearing severely diminished in one ear from Miranda's shrieking.

I really wasn't planning on taking any of your classes anytime soon, but I may have to if she keeps shrieking like that."

"It's only started. Wait until the horror flicks come out tonight."

"Yeah, we've got H20 for later."

"Cool!" Lydia could appreciate a good slash 'em and gash 'em. "So how are you, Ally? You're looking good."

"Not bad yourself, girl," I assured her.

Lydia reminded me so much of Eric. She had the same dark hair and dark eyes, the same fine facial bone structure. At least she didn't have the beard. She'd tinted her hair with a raspberry-colored rinse. I noticed that she'd replaced her nose ring with a very conservative little silver stud."

She must have noticed that I noticed. "I've got a new boss. Can you believe he complained about my nose ring and my earrings?" Lydia had earrings running halfway up the lobe of one ear and all the way up on the other one. "Good thing he'll never see my tattoos!" Lydia had several of them, all tastefully done, but not in places generally regarded as being for public consumption. "Like I'm a better chemist if I don't wear so many earrings? I don't think so!" She threw back her head and laughed hard. "And you should have seen his reaction to the blue streaks in my hair! When he started, I'd just chunked my hair, and you could see his blood pressure rise when he met me! His face turned so red, I thought he was going to have
a stroke on the spot! And now that I've worked for him for a few weeks, I'm sort of hoping he would!"

"He sounds like a major dickrag."

"Wonder how he'd feel if I wore my red vinyl bustier to work."

"You still have that thing?"

"Sure. Why get rid of such a great piece of clothing?"

"Well, he'd do one of two things. One, he'd probably try and get you fired for something as soon as he was able. Or two, he'd try and fuck you."

That brought about an incredible peal of laughter from her. She had the same musical laugh as her brother, and the same twisted sense of humor.

"Hey, Lyddie, you want a beer?"

"Oh God yes. I'm saved! There is-" she whipped open the fridge door-"Carta Blancas and Sols! Girl, you always did have good taste!" She pulled out two Sols. We popped the tops and Lydia took a hard pull on hers. "Ah, yes. The perfect antidote for driving the New Jersey Turnpike." She took down another third of the beer. "Do you know why New Jersey has toxic waste and New York has all the lawyers?"

"Because New Jersey got first pick."

"And that's the nicest thing I can say about New Jersey, it's got such lovely toxic waste. L'chaim!" We clinked bottles.
 

We'd been sitting on the patio drinking beers and laughing like kids for a long time. But after her fifth beer, Lydia started to come down hard. She looked very depressed.

"What's doing, Lyddie? Too much beer?"

"No. Not that."

"Doesn't sound like it's Seth." Seth was her significant other, and it sounded like things were good between them. They'd been together a long time, were perfectly happy with the way things were, and I didn't see any subtexts floating around in there.

"No, definitely not Seth."

"Your new boss sounds like a total dickrag, from what you've said. And bad bosses can make things hell."

"Yeah, he's a dickrag. But it's not just him specifically."

"So what's going on?"

She drew patterns with her fingers on her thighs and looked down. "You know I'm almost done with my dissertation."

"Yeah, it must feel good to see the end in sight."

"Ally, I'm thinking about quitting chemistry."

That took a moment to wrap my mind around. "Wow."

"Yeah. I'm not sure I can do this anymore."

"I'm sure you can do it, Lyddie. You're brilliant."

"Not the issue here."

"So what is the issue?"

She stayed silent for a long time. "It's hard to explain."

"Have you talked to Seth about this?"

She shook her head in the negative. "He's been real supportive while I've done this. I'm not ready to drop this bomb on him yet. I have to be absolutely certain when I do."

"I can understand that."

"Ally, it's not that I don't like doing chemistry. I do. But I can't do science like it's being done in my lab. Or any lab these days."

"What's changed? It was always a snake pit."

She barked harshly, a sharp, short laugh. "The snake pit I don't have a problem with. I knew what that was like when I went in. I can even deal with constantly kicking and screaming for R&D money."

"So what is it?" I asked gently.

She looked downright desperate now. And scared.

"Ally, you'd never believe it if I told you."

"Try me. I've seen some pretty incredible stuff since I've been here."

"Not like this, girlfriend."

"Lyddie, I try really hard not to rush to judgment on things. I think you know that."

"That's why I'm talking to you and I haven't talked to anyone else about it."

"Yeah, but Lyddie, I can't help you if I don't know what's up."

She twisted her hands in her lap. I'd never seen Lydia like this. She had her bad days like everyone, but I'd never seen her in this state. And I was getting very worried.

"Ally, you're probably going to think I've lost my mind. I'm not sure I haven't, come to think of it."

"You look pretty stressed out, but I don't think you've lost it."

She peered around the top of the fence that surrounded the patio. "Are your neighbors gone during the day?"

"Lydia, what's going on?" I was really becoming frightened. She was definitely not behaving like herself. If Dana had been in better shape, I would have called her to get her butt over here posthaste.

We were interrupted by the sound of my car door slamming, keys jangling, feet loping up the walkway. "Hey! Ally! Is that you outside?"

I walked to the gate and unlatched it. "C'mon in, Langly."

"Oh, shit!" Lydia was almost in tears now. Her face was a study in abject
terror.

"Lydia, this is Langly. Langly, Lydia."

END OF PART 18