Disclaimers in part 1
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"something is happening.
something obscene."

~~Lucille Clifton -- The Gift of Tongues~~
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SUNDAY, APRIL 4, 2000
LONE GUNMEN HQ
MORNING

BYERS:

Now that Sari and Devi have arrived, the troops are all assembled. Mulder has safely returned from his close encounter of the security guard kind, and he and Agent Scully are most definitely not dressed alike today. Deborah and Langly are both awake and with us, as is our guest, Nicole Jackson. Sari looks exhausted, but this doesn't surprise me. I doubt she slept very well last night. Devi simply sports the 'kill me now' look of the hung over.

"Good morning, darlings," she says. "I'm sorry I'm so dismally attired today." I can't imagine what she means by that, unless jeans with rhinestones along the pockets and a scarlet sweater are 'dismal.' Of questionable taste, yes; Dismal? I doubt it. I think Sari's right -- her sister is a magpie.

Sari puts down her cat carrier, and releases the Cardinal into our midst.

"Oooh!" Frohike coos in a nauseating falsetto, "my kitty-boo is here to see me! Does the Cawdinal want his bwekkies? I'll make some scwambled eggs and bakies for oo..." Mel scoops up the purring ginger mountain, "... doesn't mommy ever feed oo?" Mulder and Scully stare at him in disbelief as our resident dirty old man heads for the kitchen.

"I fed him twenty minutes ago, Mel," Sari says. "You keep this up and the furry-assed beast won't have any ground clearance left."

Deborah follows Frohike and the cat with her eyes. "Oh, that is such a gorgeous cat!"

"Hey, you ain't feeding that cat my breakfast," Langly shouts, following him into the kitchen. Nicole is simply looking around in confusion. "Like, Richelieu's obviously never missed a meal in his life," Ringo whines, but it really is time the chef did his job and provided us with some breakfast.

"Oh, Nicole, thank all the Gods you're here!" Sari runs to her and throws her arm around Ms. Jackson. The two women embrace, passionate in their mutual relief to see one another alive and safe. Nicole bursts into tears, and Sari mumbles words of comfort in her ear. I'm not sure they'll let go anytime this year. I'm happy to see Sari so relieved. The contrast to last night's intense, disturbing silence is extreme. We all know it isn't over yet, but I can be fairly certain that neither Sari nor Nicole are likely to disintegrate in front of us now.

Nicole is alarmed when she realizes Sari's right arm is in a cast. "Sari, girlfriend, what the hell happened to your arm?"

"Barry," Sari replies. "Almost a month ago now. I'll be fine -- and it won't happen again, because these wonderful people," she indicates all of us, "finally found a way to put the bastard behind bars for good."

"That is good news, honey." Nicole holds Sari out at arm's length, examining her. "Not your arm, I mean, but taking that asshole down. Is it healing okay?"

"Yeah, it's fine. I'm right on schedule. I assume you've met everyone here already, but this is my sister Devi. Devi, this is Nicole Jackson, the friend I was telling you about, and Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, who helped nail Barry."

"Just Mulder," Mulder says in his typical monotone.

"Hi Nicole," Devi says, rising to embrace Nicole warmly. "I'm so glad you're safe. Digging into Pinck's business like that is incredibly dangerous, as I'm sure you know all too well. We were so worried about you. Sari was nearly out of her mind over it."

Devi turns to our fibbies, offering them her hand, and they each take it in turn. "Thank you, both of you, for helping to save my sister's life. I could never express the true depth of my gratitude for what you've done. If you ever need anything that I can provide, you have but to ask. And that goes for you boys, too," she says to us. "But to return to the Pinck issue," she says, as Langly and Frohike return with table settings, and a couple of large platters of food, "I do have some news for you, gentlemen. I'm not sure what use it may be at this point, though."

"Wait until we get back with the coffee and tea," Frohike says, grabbing Langly by the arm and dragging him back into the kitchen.

"I wanna sit down with Deb and eat," Langly protests.

"As soon as we're done. You have to carry the mugs, Hairboy." Langly gets a pissy look on his face, but complies. Devi and I lay out the plates and flatware.

"I'll come help," Deborah offers, and follows them into the kitchen. Sari takes the moment of calm to come and give me, Mulder and Agent Scully all a hug. I'm somewhat surprised when both of them accept her gesture without comment or any hint of discomfort. Then again, Sari did stay with Scully for a few days, from what I've been told.

"Thank you for bringing Nicole here, Dana," she says quietly. "It means so much to me that she's safe now."

"We don't really know how safe she is here," Mulder cautions, "and we don't have any way of knowing how safe you are, either, if Pinck has managed to connect the two of you."

Something's bothering me, and I can't put my finger on it. "Black Widow... oh, hell -- he may already know about the connection," I tell them, considering the possibility for the first time. I feel my stomach tighten. I have a very bad feeling about this.

"Who may already know what?" Langly asks, hauling in a tray full of mugs. He sets them out in front of everyone as Deborah and Mel come out with the hot beverages and their various possible adulterants. As the three set everything down, Sari goes around and hugs Mel and Langly, then offers one to Deborah. She looks at Sari for a brief moment, then nods, and Sari embraces her as she has everyone else in the room.

"She's willing to hug Frohike?" Mulder mutters to Scully as Sari moves around the room. "She really is braver than I thought." I hear a muffled thump as Scully kicks Mulder's ankle. He yips.

"Black Widow may already know about the connection between Sari and Dr. Jackson," I tell him. Langly's eyes narrow, and he and Mel exchange glances. "That's the hacker who was in Sari's system, and crashed the Sierra Club system Thursday," I explain to the agents.

"Hadn't thought of that," Langly says.

Frohike shakes his head; he hadn't either. "If he knows, Pinck probably knows." The tension level in the room rises, but we all sit around a cleared-off work bench to tuck into our breakfast.

"You know, folks, you can call me Nicole. I save the titles for work." She piles her plate with scrambled eggs, bacon, and a poppy seed muffin. I take some of each, sprinkling chopped serranos and shaking tabasco onto my eggs.

"Ooh, Sari, he likes it hot," Devi teases, poking her sister in the ribs.

Sari sighs. "When did you say your thirteenth birthday was going to be?" she asks archly. They both giggle. Sari takes two muffins and a big mug of tea, then becomes serious again. "John, how likely is it that Black Widow actually knows about my connection with Nicole?"

"There's a damn good chance of it by now," Frohike replies. "I'm sure Pinck would have had him check out Nicole's system as soon as they found out who their leak was. Nicole, did you keep any records at all of Sari's contact address?"

"I had the contact in my e-addresses, but not with Sari's name on it."

"Was it the only address you had with no name on it?" Langly inquires.

He has a point. If I found one address out of dozens with no identification, I'd look into it.

Nicole looks perplexed. "Ah... yeah. Would that cause a problem?"

"It would flag that address as special," I explain. "And if they suspected Sari was getting inside information from somewhere, knowing that you were leaking it, they'd probably make the connection fairly quickly. This could be a very dangerous situation for both of you." I look around to our assembled think tank. "Any suggestions about how to help minimize the danger?"

Deborah, quiet until now, says, "Ummm... guys, I know that you're into some really weird shit here. I saw more of it last night than I expected. Are you saying that people really are in danger?"

Langly takes her hands. He looks into her eyes.

"Yeah, Deb. That's what we're saying. I didn't want to drag you into this. I was kinda wanting to keep you out of it by not telling you too much. I thought maybe you could be safe that way. But I don't think that was ever possible, being around us. Byers was right. You have to know everything if you're gonna be with me... if you even want to still be with me now." There's a catch in his voice, fear, and a deep sadness. If I didn't know he wouldn't show it in public, I'd think he was close to tears.

I reach out and take Sari's hand under the table, and she squeezes mine tightly in return, our fingers twining together. Langly's fears echo my own. Sari is my friend, and anything that puts her at risk is cause for concern.

Deborah looks down into her plate, avoiding his gaze. "Ringo, this is all getting kinda confusing for me. Can we talk about it later, in private?" She looks up briefly, and he nods.

"We do need to get down to business, though," Devi says. "Where do you want to start?"

"I will," Nicole says. "The packet I gave to Agent Scully last night is the core information for one of Pinck's current research projects, code-named Wildfire, just outside Andover, Kansas. When you read through it, you'll find a description of their plan to develop and attempt to deliver a toxin to the civilian population. I don't know what its ultimate purpose is. The project is funded through the National Institute of Health, but ultimately derives from an upper-echelon military mandate within the Department of Defense."

She pulls a small specimen cassette from her pocket. It looks extremely well-sealed. "This," she says, "is what was inside Bootsie. And Deborah, thanks for putting my pup back together. My late husband won him for me, a few months before he died."

Nicole hands the cassette to Agent Scully. "This is a sample of the toxin they've been working on. I was a minor research fellow on this project. The project head tried very hard to keep its true nature from us, but I could see that there was much more to this than met the eye, and started looking into it."

Mulder and Scully examine the cassette.

"Please don't open that outside a Level 3 Hazmat Containment area," Nicole says calmly. Mulder snaps his hand back away from it quickly. "It's quite safe in its sealed cassette, but if for some reason the tube inside has cracked, or the seal has broken, it will be very dangerous to open the case."

Scully nods. "Yes, we have some resources we can use to analyze the sample." She puts it in her pocket. "Thank you, Doctor Jackson. I know you must have put yourself at extreme risk to obtain this material."

"Scully," Mulder says quietly, "do you think that Smoking Bastard is behind this?"

"It's certainly possible, Mulder, but we both know that most of his cohorts died at Fort Marlene. I still want to know how he's maintaining his power base. We haven't seen much of him recently."

"I'm less concerned about who's behind it right now, than what it is," Sari says, "and what Pinck and the DoD plan to do with it. Why are they working with some toxin that results in massive birth defects in both humans and wildlife, not to mention who knows how many other things it might be causing?"

"They've been working for years on secret projects like this," Mulder says.

"Yeah," Frohike adds, "it's all about that alien hybridization project..."

"Oh, please guys, can we can the alien bullshit and discuss reality here?" Sari snaps, muffin halfway to her lips. "Nicole's life is in danger. Let's not talk little green men."

"Grey." Mulder says. "They're grey. And they're quite real. I've seen them."

Sari stares at him in disbelief, then looks at Agent Scully for a voice of sanity. "I've seen a lot of very strange things in my time with the X Files, Sari," Scully says. "I don't know if they're alien, but they are essentially inexplicable under the currently known laws of science. There is, without doubt, a massive conspiracy within our government involving the cloning of human beings, attempts to create and disseminate toxins through very unusual means, and a collaboration with forces unknown that are working extragovernmentally with what seem to be very sinister motives."

Deborah, Devi, Nicole and Sari are all rather confused at this. Nicole looks at Sari. "You sent *these* people to rescue me? Girl, where the hell is Rod Serling?" She's become very uneasy. We've got to do something to reassure her, and fast.

"I don't suppose you've found any proof of this... conspiracy?" Sari asks cautiously.

"A great deal, but it tends to conveniently disappear into the bureaucracy," Scully says bitterly.

"So how can I trust you with that sample, if your evidence keeps disappearing?" Nicole asks. Not an unreasonable question, under the circumstances. They even lost that damn bee we found in Mulder's hallway.

"We have to try to keep it out of official channels for as long as possible," Mulder says. "Sari's currently involved in a Congressional investigation of Pinck. While most of them are in someone's pocket, there are a few here and there who are actually attempting to expose the truth. If we can find out what Wildfire is, and keep it out of the hands of the government and the bureaucracy at the Bureau until the time comes to present the evidence at the hearing, she can present it before the press and expose this project for what it is. Whatever it is."

Mulder looks over at Frohike and Langly, across the table from him. "Are you guys willing to keep this stuff here until that time?"

We look at each other.

"Are you kidding?" I ask. "A Level 3 Biohazard? Here in the office? You're insane, Mulder!" Mel and Ringo echo my sentiments vigorously. It's like asking us to store a pocketful of plutonium for a few weeks. We're rather attached to our lives, and we'd like to keep them.

"Well, where..." Mulder starts.

"Just because we won't keep it here, doesn't mean we don't know a number of more appropriate places," I tell him. He smiles. "We know people who work in Hazmat labs. They'll know precisely how to keep it safe and undocumented for as long as we need it stored."

"Look, lets ignore all this alien shit. What I want to know is, what the hell is this toxin we're talking about?" Deborah looks pointedly at Nicole. "You wanna fill us in, Nicole?"

Ms. Jackson takes a deep breath. "Okay, here it is in a nutshell. Wildfire is a spliced up, bioengineered strain of e. coli, designed to attack mammalian central nervous systems. It's been inserted into the wheat crops, but vectors through the groundwater under the fields. It's actually harmless in the wheat itself, but once it gets into the groundwater, it travels. You can get it drinking from a well, a city reservoir, a stream, any unboiled or insufficiently filtered water source. For all I know, it may be blood vectored as well. As Sari's report states, the general results are late-term miscarriages and massive neurological birth defects in both humans and animals. It's ugly, and I don't believe that's all it does, but I don't know what was going on at the Andover Medical Center. I have no idea what it does to adults or older children, but I imagine it does something. It may well do other kinds of neurological damage, but for all I know, it could take months, or even years to show up. I don't know why anyone would want to create something like this."

We're all sitting silent, trying to absorb this. After a moment, I think I may have an idea about what's going on. "You said project Wildfire was ultimately derived from a DoD mandate?" I ask her.

Nicole nods. "Yes."

"Does anyone know if there's anything in the databases or the paperwork that can link this conclusively?" I motion to the manila packet near Scully's plate.

"I haven't had time to examine the evidence yet," Scully says.

"I don't know if that was one of the papers I was able to get before I had to run," Nicole says. "I believe I got a copy out of the Pinck files. I think it's in here."

"You don't know?" Frohike asks.

"Like I said, I had to run. I didn't exactly have time to make an inventory list."

"Hang on guys," I interrupt, before things start to get out of hand, "if we can prove the DoD link, I suspect I know why they might be doing this, and it I don't think it has to have anything to do with Mulder's favorite conspiracy."

"Okay, Byers, so what's your answer?" Mulder asks.

"Biological warfare."

"But why against our own people?" Deborah asks. I remember asking that question myself once.

"They'd say that they require a secure testing ground before they take it overseas for use on so-called 'enemy' populations. We mean nothing to them. American citizens are nothing but lab animals to these people. And if this is what we're dealing with, we can expect the whole thing to be buried by Congress the instant we bring in evidence of military involvement."

The guys are nodding in agreement, as is Mulder. Nicole looks thoughtful; Deborah, horrified. Sari and her sister look at each other and seem to come to some silent agreement.

Devi speaks. "Actually, John, your analysis makes perfect sense. And I think at this point, I should tell you I've learned that Pinck is planning on expanding its overseas operations within the next three months in Sri Lanka, South Africa, and Indonesia. I overheard a discussion between a Pinck representative and an Indonesian trade representative, and the Pinck rep was talking about how things are 'heating up' here because of a Congressional investigation. The Indonesian was discussing the 'better business opportunities' in his country for all kinds of research activities. They were discussing the use of one small island, inhabited almost entirely by a 'troublesome' indigenous population, not unlike the East Timorans. With the knowledge just provided by Nicole, and your analysis of the situation, I believe that we may be facing corporate genocide against an Indonesian minority within the next three months, as a field test for an American military operation."

Everyone starts talking at once, and I doubt that anyone is actually listening. I think we need to break for a while to let the implications of the situation sink in. The situation has suddenly changed drastically. The danger is no longer theoretical. If this information leaks before Nicole and Sari are able to testify, they stand a very high risk of assassination. I feel my heart skip several beats, and look at Sari. She looks back at me, fear in her face. I lean over to her so she can hear me, and take her hand. "Let's talk." She nods and we enter the hallway in search of a little quiet.

"You have to step away from this, Sari. It's just gotten far too dangerous. Let Mulder and Scully take this to Congress."

"What, the same government that conveniently loses all their evidence?" She snorts. "Right. That'll help."

"The military isn't beyond sending assassins after people if they think one of their pet projects is endangered. We could deal with Barry, but he's only one man. We're talking about the entire United States military here. Who knows how high this goes?"

"If the information is given to enough people, John, who will they assassinate? Eliminating me or Nicole won't kill the information. We're talking about thousands, maybe ultimately millions of lives here. We're talking *genocide,* John. How can you ask me to sit silent in the midst of all this? Would you ask for my silence if we lived in Germany in the 1930s? To remain silent while millions perished, when I could expose that horror and perhaps prevent it? I suppose you're going to ask me next if I'm scared, and the answer is, I'm fucking terrified, but that doesn't mean I'm going to let this go." She glares at me.

"Sari, this isn't about letting it go. It's not about allowing genocide. The guys and I can publish the information, but you know how we're received by the general public. I'm just asking you to let Mulder and Scully take it from here. Please. If you won't do it for your own sake, then..." I can barely say the words, "then do it for me. I don't care if you think I'm being selfish. Maybe I am. I don't have that many friends, and I don't want to lose you. You mean too much to me."

Her anger vanishes, replaced by astonishment. Tears start to well in her eyes. "John, I..." she wraps her good arm around me, and I hold her close. Her lips brush my cheek, and she says, "Thank you John. I... I didn't know... it's just..." She steps back and looks me in the eyes. "I can take this to the mainstream media, John. With Nicole's documentation, with the sample she brought, and the records Mel and Ringo found last night, we can bring enough evidence to the table to crack this open long before Congress gets around to hearing the information. We can bring it before the people, where it can't be silenced. You and your friends may not have the credibility to do that, but I do. I have to, John. Nicole and I have to do this."

"Sari, we don't have proof yet, particularly not of the information that Devi overheard. We can't risk exposing your sister by going public with that information. But we can use it behind the scenes to find the documentation and prove it without bringing her name into it."

She nods. "I can agree to that, but we need to discuss it with Devi first."

"Fine, then let's discuss it with Devi. But please, Sari, don't expose yourself any more than you absolutely must."

She nods, and we return to the office.

End part 16