ABSALOM V: The Price of a Man
by - Joyce
February 1998
DISCLAIMER: Mulder, Skinner, Scully and CSM belong to CC and Fox Broadcasting and I am only borrowing them for a moment and will return them. No infringement is intended. Jason belongs to me.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: A very big thanks to Meredith whose editing skills keep me focused and whose very polite prodding produced this first part.
FEEDBACK: mab49@earthlink.net
SUMMARY: Jason sets into motion the end game for Mulder's soul.
"Shall I ransom them from the power of Sheol? Shall I redeem them from Death?" (Hosea 13:14)
13 days after the attack
George Washington Hospital
Mulder slowly floated to the top of the ocean of drugs cascading through his veins and tried to remember why he was flirting with permanent narcotic addiction, again. His mind felt like half-melted Jell-O, not enough form or substance to hold even a passing thought. Random flashes of memory appeared and vanished with the chaotic intensity of a disco light.
Terror.
A desperate fight to breathe.
A man's fist closing off his airway, smiling coldly then furious when Mulder did not slide easily into death.
Air, blessed air and the touch of Scully's hand on his face.
Floating on top of the waves, he tried to remember if he died and heaven was an eternity of feeling Scully's touch or if he had survived and had a future where nothing had been said or settled between them.
"Hey, partner."
Despite the drugs which made even the smallest muscle movement a challenge, Mulder smiled. He suspected it appeared more like a lopsided loopy grimace, but he hoped Scully would know what he meant - she usually did.
"Come on, partner. Time to wake up," Scully said soothingly, her tone easing him gently back into consciousness, her hand resting on his, wrapping her fingers around his while her thumb rubbed the back of his hand in slow circles.
Mulder made an abortive attempt to answer her and felt the sting of pain as his throat fought the muscle relaxants briefly then gave up the effort.
Oh, yeah. His throat. Memory came surging back and he remembered with stark clarity the knife that had slashed through his throat on a lonely street.
"Shush, Mulder. Just take it slow and easy. The doctor won't be happy if you rip out all of his nice stitches," Scully cautioned.
Mulder felt the restraints around his wrists and felt the odd weight of a cast on his left arm. Vague memories of struggling against his restraints as he was being murdered came to the fore and the distinctive sound of bones snapping replayed. Damn. He felt his lungs expand and contract independent of his will and stopped a sigh before it had half formed.
Shit. He hated respirators. More memories surged back on the ebbing tide of drugs. The urge to breathe against the cycle of the respirator was very tempting, but hard-learned experience kept him still.
Mulder nodded slightly, being very careful not to jar the air tube at the base of his throat. Very cautiously he opened his eyes, blinking a bit at the light. To his delight, the first thing he saw was Scully haloed by the light, looking for all the world like his guardian angel.
He squeezed her hand to let her know he was awake and aware and was rewarded by a smile that rivaled the dazzle of the overhead lights. For some reason beyond his fathoming, Scully glowed. Even her eyes, usually clouded with worry whenever he woke up in a hospital, seemed to shine with some emotion he couldn't quite place.
How long, he mouthed. It was dark outside, but whether that meant he had been asleep for hours or days he couldn't tell.
"Thirty-six hours. You were in some pain and the doctor decided it would be best if you simply slept through the worst of it," Scully assured him. Mulder sensed that she had not agreed with the doctor's course of action, but hadn't interfered.
Mulder felt the head of the bed being raised slowly to give him time to adjust to the new angle. When he was finally upright he saw the doctor come in followed by a nurse. He gave Scully a sad look as if to ask if she could protect him from another exam, but she merely shook her head and retreated to the foot of the bed. At least there he could watch her instead of worrying about what the doctor was doing.
Dr. Ozwin didn't say a word throughout the examination except for a few random 'hmmms' and a 'tsch' or three which meant nothing to Mulder but seemed to say something to Scully. He read her face for his fate, knowing her eyes could not lie. He knew the possibility that the latest attempt on his life could have resulted in permanent damage, damage that would effectively exile him from the X-Files. The doctor couldn't know how desperately Mulder needed reassurance, but Scully did and the slight relaxing of her eyes along with the merest hint of a smile was enough to tell Mulder that he still had a future, at least one that he cared about.
"Excellent, Mr. Mulder, the stitches look in fine shape. If nothing further interrupts your recovery, I should be able to remove them in three more days," Dr. Ozwin said heartily. His cheery manner deflated at the impatient glare directed at him by his patient. "Just try not to have any more adventures and maybe we can get you into rehab and out of here, OK?" he added with a tone of exasperation marring his professional cheery tone.
Mulder gave his doctor another glare and nodded, very, very carefully. Dr. Ozwin's rules of recovery were etched into his brain - no sighing, no exaggerated movements and, above all, no talking.
It wasn't as if he'd arranged that little attempt on his life that sent him back into a drugged sleep for thirty-six hours. Mulder wanted out - out of this bed, out of the tyranny of the respirator, and out of the depressing need to have his meals fed to him through a gastrointestinal tube. Right now, he might consider cold-blooded murder for a western omelet and whole-sale slaughter of innocents for a cup of coffee.
Mulder gave Scully a look that mixed inquiry, mild pleading and worry hoping she would be able to interpret a plea for some kind of assurance from the doctor that he was going to speak again. Scully gave him an amused, but slightly exasperated look and nodded.
"Dr. Ozwin, what are his chances for a full recovery? You said at the very beginning that there would be a 50-50 chance of him regaining his voice. Has there been any change in your prognosis?" Scully was all professional, crisp, no-nonsense.
Mulder figuratively held his breath as he waited for the doctor's reply. The damn respirator kept on pumping air into his lungs, but his soul paused as he waited for his sentence to be pronounced.
"Mr. Mulder has remarkable powers of recuperation. Unless something else happens to interfere with his recovery, I expect he will regain full use of his voice. There will be residual huskiness and I doubt if he should consider a career in singing, but with proper rehabilitation, he should been speaking again in one month, possibly two," Dr. Ozwin replied in a genial fashion that involved a lot of teeth and a smile that actually produced a dimple. Concentrating on showering Scully with his charm, he ignored Mulder's part in the equation very thoroughly.
Mulder silently growled at the doctor. For the first time he noticed that Ozwin resembled a graying Adrian Paul. He actually seemed to be trying to score with Scully over his prone body. Suddenly Mulder made up his mind to be rid of the stitches in two days and out of the hospital in under a week. This much charm had to be bad for Scully's health - something along the lines of too much sugar for a diabetic. He owed it to Scully to make as fast a recovery as possible.
**************
Engrossed in his silent grumbling, Mulder did not notice Scully's tender smile as she watched him glower, but Ozwin did. With a sigh, he hustled out of the room.
"Thank you, doctor, for all you've done," she said graciously, but with a note of finality in her voice that told Ozwin his advances had been noted and rejected. Ozwin turned and gave her a shrug and a smile to indicate that he understood, then moved on to his next patient.
Scully chuckled to herself, careful not to make a sound. Mulder's pouting was the best sign she'd had in nearly two weeks that his determination to fight back against all odds had made a full recovery. She had been more worried about his spirit than his voice. Physical complications never stood in Mulder's way; he either overcame them or ignored them in his headlong rush after his truth. As long as he had the spirit to keep fighting, she knew he'd manage to get back in the game.
Looking at him drifting into a half-aware world, dazed by the drugs that were slowly ebbing from his system, she wondered how she ever thought she could push him away to save him the pain of losing her. They were linked too close for that rational plan of hers to work. Even now, she had only to touch him, to lightly caress his skin and he would burst through the haze of the drugs to be with her.
Time had nearly slipped through her fingers. No more hesitation, no more waiting until the right moment, she was not going to take the chance that he would be ripped from her before sharing in her joy. Whoever was trying so desperately to kill Mulder might not wait until her 'right moment.'
Moving back up to stand beside him, she allowed herself the luxury of watching him doze, drugged and relaxed, with all the tension and fire that made him banked down to smoldering coals. His face was slack and relaxed with half-lidded eyes that made her wonder if this was how he would look after sex. For once, Scully did not banish that thought back to the closet of her fantasies. Just for now, she would allow herself to see her partner as a man and understand her own feelings for him, as a woman.
As if sensing her gaze, Mulder opened his eyes and lay there absorbing her scrutiny. His eyes darkened with recognition of the meaning of her gaze and a small flush spread from his neck up the lines of his face. With a smile at her own daring, Scully took her finger and traced a long lazy spiral along the lines of the flush. Mulder licked his dry lips and threw himself into her eyes, pulling her into a pool of longing, uncertainty, fear, and passion intense enough to burn both of them to ash if ever unleashed.
Startled by meeting passion to match her own, Scully dropped her hand and stepped back. In an instant, Mulder lowered his eyes and when he raised them again, they were the eyes of a friend and partner, nothing more. Perhaps, she thought, there was a hint of regret lingering, but no sign of despair or shame. Scully realized that whatever the ultimate destination on their journey, Mulder had every intention of exploring this particular extreme possibility.
Mulder smiled as he tapped his finger on the bed to indicate he wanted free of the restraints and wanted the chalkboard. Scully quickly unfettered him and helped him balance the board in against the cast on his left wrist.
What happened? You came back early? You OK?
Puzzled, Scully tried to figure out what he was talking about then realized he was referring to the latest attack.
"Someone tried to kill you and make it look like an accident. Rather clumsily, I might add." Scully had to chuckle at the raised eyebrows and outraged look Mulder gave her. OK, so making comments about the assassin's competency and professionalism were a bit excessive under the circumstances, she admitted to herself. The look on Mulder's face however, almost made the slip worthwhile.
"You were a lot more stubborn about living than he had counted on, but I wouldn't have made it in time." Scully laid her open hand against Mulder's face in silent apology. His eyes absolved her.
You came. That's all that matters.
"Well, if the assassin hadn't been killed by someone else, I would have been too late. I don't pretend to understand what's going on here, but I suspect there's a division in the enemy ranks. Skinner is furious. You now have your very own private guard right outside the door." Scully smiled as she recalled Skinner's anger at the attack. The first agent assigned to guard duty had told her that the Assistant Director made it very clear that if anything happened to Agent Mulder that Death Valley would be a step up from his next assignment.
Mulder looked quizzically at her but accepted the slight shake of her head. She wasn't ready to fill him in on the details, yet. She'd save them for the times during rehab when he was ready to climb the walls and needed a diversion. She'd save them for a time when her guilt wasn't quite so raw. The idea that she could have been tamely sitting in the waiting room while Mulder was ruthlessly murdered still haunted her.
Not answered my question. You OK?
Scully saw the stubborn lines appear around Mulder's eyes and the look of concern that he tried to hide behind a smile.
"More than OK, partner," Scully gave Mulder a full-fledged smile and watched his expression dissolve into a look that a man might give if offered a glass of water in the desert. She noted the snap of the chalk as his fingers clenched in a spasm of hope and fear.
"Seems I qualify as an extreme possibility. My cancer has receded. The doctor doesn't know why, but x-rays don't lie."
Scully was stunned to see a tear roll down Mulder's cheek. More tears blurred his eyes as they turned the color of the sea in autumn. The chalk fell from his fingers as he raised his hand to touch her cheek. His hand cupped her face as his thumb moved along her chin and swept briefly over her lips. A look of utter awe and gratitude shone in Mulder's eyes that drew her into the eye of the storm, into a silent, private place where he kept his heart.
Leaning forward slightly, Scully turned her lips against the palm of his hand and kissed it. Still saying nothing, making no other move, she acknowledged his heart and opened her own to him. Finally he smiled back at her, breaking the spell with a look that combined lively curiosity, relief and the promise of passion yet to come.
Fumbling for the chalk, he finally located a sliver of it and retrieved the chalkboard from his lap.
You'll make me believe in God.
"He's just one more extreme possibility, Mulder. When you get your voice back, we'll argue which is easier to believe in, God or aliens," Scully said with a laugh. She hadn't laughed or smiled so much in ages. She felt like a prisoner released from a dark, dreary dungeon coming up into the sun. Mulder was alive and they had a future to believe in.
It's a date. Welcome back, partner.
"I never really left you, Mulder. I just took the scenic route for a bit. Now, go back to sleep. I'll be right here." Scully firmly removed the chalkboard and chalk and set them on the table. Mulder's initial protest was deterred by the return of her hands on his arm and cheek. Leaning into the sanctuary of her touch, Mulder allowed the drugs to float him away and fell asleep with a smile, sailing on the hope in a future he had not dared to believe in before.
Scully watched him sleep and prayed that they would be allowed the future she saw reflected in his heart and his eyes. So many enemies remained obscured in shadow. She watched and tried to believe in the extreme possibility that they could have a future. At least she was now assured that she would not leave him alone to fight on without her at his side.
**************
Washington Mall, 21 days after the attack
"A most satisfactory development, my friend," Jason commented dryly. The smoke from his friend's cigarette blended with his breath in the cold air to form a great billowing cloud that obscured faces already hidden in shadow.
"Yes, the A.D. is proving to be a most efficient tool," the smoker replied with quiet satisfaction.
Jason's smile was lost in the darkness. His friend's tastes in revenge were simple, but very direct. It was refreshing. So few in the Consortium these days understood the exquisite pleasure of a well-planned and executed revenge.
A gentle drifting snow began to fall, further hiding the two men from curious eyes. Jason wondered anew if the devil looked after his own or was merely amusing himself by sending an entire city into the throes of panic with the expenditure of a few snowflakes.
"I thought the last clean-up job was handled with more efficiency and dispatch than usual. He will make an excellent addition to our team, once he has resigned himself to the inevitable," Jason noted with cold appraisal of the walls closing in around Assistant Director Walter Skinner. Mr. Skinner was now deeply inveigled in their affairs. Jonathan's foresight in cultivating this particular game piece was reaping unexpected benefits. Whatever plans the Elders may have had in mind for Skinner would now be diverted in the smoker's favor. Jason allowed himself a moment of smug satisfaction. Their plans, nearly forty years in the making, were moving towards completion.
The smoker exhaled a perfect smoke ring that hung motionless in the cold night air. A second attempt fragmented in a sudden gust of wind. He shrugged deeper into his coat.
"I know, old friend, we are both too old to hold these clandestine meetings in the cold. However, until I can be completely certain that all the listening devices have been removed from my office, it would be wise to meet in unexpected places," Jason said, keeping his anger under tight control. The Elders were consumed with paranoia after last week's revolt within their ranks. The entire power structure of the Consortium was still reeling from the effects of the mutiny.
"Now, old friend, what is so important to drag both of us out into this cold," Jason asked gruffly, shaking a half-inch of snow off his shoulders.
"Your time is running out." Cold words. Clipped, urgent words.
Jason went very still. He could feel his skin twitch in anticipation of the bullet's sting. Did he want the end to come at the hands of a friend, or would he rather die cursing a faceless drone? His breathing remained calm and even, but he knew his friend had heard the infinitesimal catch in the rhythm before he exerted control.
"Mulder's time is running out. With his goes yours."
Jason fought the urge to sigh in relief. This night would not end with him sprawled in the snow, staining the crystalline whiteness with his blood. His friend, balked of his dreams of writing spine-chilling dramas, sought amusement in manipulating emotions and fears. He refused to give his friend any more satisfaction than he had already gleaned from the situation and merely cocked a quizzical eyebrow. A brief growling cough rewarded his control. Tit for tat, my friend, Jason thought.
"The Elders are in the process of deciding that any threat to their security must be eliminated," the smoker continued, this time allowing his anger to seep into the words.
Jason understood that anger. He too felt the frustrated fury at having to answer to a bunch of old fools who were fluttering about like panicked turkeys on Thanksgiving morning. Now they were turning away from ravaging their own ranks to contemplating a truly disastrous course of action.
"Why now? The Project is beyond Mulder's ability to derail," Jason asked without expecting an answer. Events were accelerating, hurtling them all to the culmination of decades of plots and conspiracies. The Elders felt the loss of control as events twisted in their hands to control them and were lashing out in desperation.
"They are afraid of what they do not control or understand," the smoker snapped contemptuously. "Mulder, by necessity, has been kept ignorant of his purpose in the Project. What he has learned, the scraps he has scavenged, cannot be reassembled into the truth - they are only shards of a mirror that reflect darkly what he seeks to know."
"I would have thought that the Elders would at least have respected the Compact," Jason muttered softly, knowing he was a fool to believe the Elders respected anything other than the intoxication of power. They must believe that the Compact would never be enforced. Decades of wielding unlimited power had rendered them senseless to the possibility of retribution for any act. Then again, they had been chipping away at the terms of the Compact before the ink had dried on their signatures.
"When souls are sold so cheap and the devil has not come to collect, the damned may believe themselves free of the bargain," the smoker replied. "Fools. The devil comes at his own time. Do they think that he has forgotten about them?" The smoker puffed irritably at his dying cigarette, pulling the last fragments of fire and smoke deep into his lungs.
"Or us," Jason added so quietly that only the snowflakes heard him.
"With Bill Mulder dead and Fox's parentage in question, no doubt they feel safe in moving against him," Jason commented, letting the unspoken question hover in the air between them. He wondered just how close to the mark the rumors were that placed Fox Mulder in his friend's lineage.
The smoker turned to face his friend, giving him an enigmatic smile before languidly lighting up a fresh cigarette. The exhaled smoke seared the falling snow and melted into the night. He stared at the snow-shrouded statues of the Korean War Memorial with a distant pensive expression that Jason refrained from interrupting. Jason stared into the night, content to wait for his friend to speak. They were used to these long silences between them. Words were merely the necessary clutter of their daily lives. Their souls, such as were left to them, lived in the silences.
"She was a beautiful woman. All beauty and intelligence, enough to tempt a saint, but no fire." The smoker gave a self-mocking chuckle, echoed by Jason's smile. His friend had worn many names and could claim many titles, but saint was never even a remote possibility, even before the Compact.
"All the fire has been leached out of them. It is as if they poured all their fire into one vessel until nothing was left of themselves but pale shadows, half-dead wraiths moving among the living, mocking us. And him - all fire, ready to ignite in a conflagration that would destroy us all," the smoker mused in a distant tone that suggested to Jason he was veering dangerously close to the brink of prophecy. As his voice died out, lost in the rising wind, the smoker sighed and gave his shoulders a vigorous shake to dislodge the snow that threatened to transform him into a puffing snowman.
"The Elders are blind fools. I should let them destroy themselves by destroying Mulder, but I have no intention of throwing away four decades of work. I gave Bill Mulder my word. His son will follow him into the Project as was ordained." The smoker flicked his half-smoked cigarette away into the snow-bank forming at their feet.
"You will bring Mulder to me by week's end, Jason. We will make Mulder ours. We will reap the rewards of faithfulness and obedience," the smoker commanded briskly.
There was no need for threats. Failure had only one reward and Jason knew it. Their position was already shaky. Jason suspected that more than one Elder might be tendering the proposition that he and the smoker might also be considered threats. The tightrope of ambition and power they had walked for these many years had grown slippery with Jonathan's blood. They had seen his connection with Fox as betrayal. Few of the Elders were capable of comprehending Jonathan's deep understanding of the labyrinthine consequences of the Compact. If those fools of Elders did not realize the value of Fox Mulder, then they deserved no less than the fate they dealt to Jonathan.
"I will see to it personally," Jason assured his friend. He shivered slightly, from the cold wind that cut through his thick wool coat, he told himself.
"Well, then, Fox, time to bring you home where you belong. You've had your fun, now it is time to put away childish things," Jason murmured as he walked away, leaving his friend standing in the blowing snow, staring at the statues of men who had fought in the first war of the Project and felt the stone-cold emptiness of its purpose immortalized forever on their weary bronze faces.
**************
Tic-Toc Cafe, Next evening
"You have the tape." Jason's tone made a comment out of the question. He had been kept waiting by this over-confident whelp. The familiar surge of his anger at minor league players who thought they were too valuable to discard brushed the edges of his self-control. Little men with big ambitions were so pathetic, so blind to the reality that no man was irreplaceable.
"Yes. It's gonna cost you, however," the grungy young man with a buzz haircut grinned in what he obviously hoped was a sinister manner. Jason tried not to sigh. He cautiously took another sip of coffee and made a mental note to hire someone to torch this place. Any cafe that abused coffee this badly should not be allowed to exist.
"Lenny, we agreed on the price yesterday," Jason said smoothly. Even the boy's efforts to gouge more money out of a contracted deal were predictable.
"Yeah, well, this little piece of art is a masterpiece. You can run it through any test you want and it will come up clean. I'd say that's worth another thousand, wouldn't you? I don't know what scam you're pulling, but from the looks of this tape, I'd say you're gonna be raking it in. So, I want my share, up front," Lenny demanded, holding the tape box behind his back. The metal rings on his nose and eyebrows glinted as he leaned forward to emphasize that he thought he held all the cards.
"Very well. You seem to have me over the barrel, so to speak." Jason gave in with a show of resigned impatience. Lenny's startled 'oh' quickly turned into a gloating grin. With a kick of his foot, Jason moved a satchel from under his seat to the boy's feet. "I think you'll find everything to your satisfaction."
Lenny's tongue flicked over a tiny ring attached to his lip as he barely restrained a grab for the satchel. With a passable attempt at a sneer he passed the tape to Jason under the table. Pausing only long enough to give the box a tiny shake to confirm that a tape did indeed lie inside, Jason slipped the box into his coat pocket. The boy was an arrogant fool who had developed unseemly ambitions, but he had been trustworthy in the past.
"Then our business is complete. Enjoy the rewards of your labor," Jason said as he rose to leave. Lenny barely nodded in reply, squirming impatiently as his feet cradled the satchel. His hands were actually twitching on top of the table. Jason smiled pleasantly at his erstwhile minion and departed into the night unmarked by the bored waitress slumped in a corner reading an introduction to business textbook.
Behind him he heard the sound of the satchel being hauled up to the bench and the small snap of the hasp as it sprung open with a swift, vicious bite. A string of adolescent profanities followed him out of the doorway. As the door shut, he heard Lenny give an exultant 'yes'.
Rejoice while you can, little man. The artist should never outlive his masterwork, Jason thought with a grim smile as he climbed into a nondescript car that hid a V8 engine and a state-of-the-art electronic system beneath its battered exterior.
"One down, one to go. Welcome to 'This Is Your Life,' Mr. Skinner," Jason whispered under the strains of a Scott Joplin piano rag CD.
Lenny, unaware he was dying, gathered up his booty and scurried out into the night. The poison spread out from the tiny puncture mark on his hand carrying the deadly toxin through his bloodstream.
**************
Later that night
"Doctor, I don't remember asking for your opinion. In fact, I don't recall that our little agreement requires anything more than absolute cooperation from you. Now, do as I suggest and I will forget this little faux pas of yours," Jason let the dagger behind his words be seen in the icy clipped tones he used to cut short the doctor's protest. The man was becoming tiresome. Necessary still, but fast losing whatever advantage the trust he had constructed with his patient gave him.
"Yes, I know it will be difficult to explain, but it isn't as if we are asking you to justify a full-blown resurgence of the cancer -- just a mild setback. If all goes well, that is all it will be. Another set of tests, more scans and something as simple as a technical malfunction can be blamed." Jason tried to avoid using complicated concepts. For a doctor, this man was surprisingly dense where abstract motivations were concerned.
"I thought you would see it my way." Jason said with cool arrogance. Considering the consequences, doctor, you're a blind fool to even attempt to argue with me, Jason thought as he gave the doctor his instructions. As soon as Mulder was safely under control, he would have to see about arranging a skiing accident for this idiot doctor. Such convenient things, skis.
Strangely, he actually felt a twinge of regret over this particular move in the game. Agent Scully had been glowing like a young sun this past week, shedding hope like rays of light into the tired soul of her partner. Jason watched as Mulder soaked up life and hope in equal measure and made a recovery his doctors frankly labeled astonishing. A full week before the earliest target date for his release saw him heading home. It was almost a pity to quench that sun, even for a moment, but Mulder had to face the consequences of a refusal to join them.
"Your king is in check, Mr. Mulder. Will you sacrifice your queen and bishop? I wonder. Are you a player as Jonathan foresaw or something more? The end game is at hand. Your move," Jason said softly as he leaned over to move the red king's knight into position to threaten the white queen. Unless Mulder was willing to sacrifice Scully and Skinner, the only move left open to him was to accept checkmate. Common sense and experience told him that Mulder would capitulate, but Jason knew that in a crisis, Fox Mulder never did anything he was expected to do. He was the ultimate maverick in a game where every move, every stratagem had been predicted and planned for. The Elders were right to fear him, but fools to try to remove him from the game.
THE END
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