Title: Divine Creatures
Category: Classic X-Files
Author: DKScully94@aol.com
Usual - satanic cults in small towns.


The sun had just begun to peek over the green hills as Farmer
Jones and his son, Frank, walked outside, yawning and stretching
the sleepiness out of them.  Frank could hear the cows lowing to be
milked, and he smiled at his father before walking towards the
barn.  Jones headed towards the tool shed; he had to fix up his
tractor so that he and Frank could get the plowing done before
dusk.

Frank entered the barn, yawning as he grabbed the milk bucket off
the wall. Suddenly he saw it, a bloody trail leading from one of the
stalls out the back door, which he realized was swinging open.  He
ran to the stall and saw that the brown cow that lived there, Alice,
was gone.  Frank was scared, and angry.  If Alice was hurt, she
might have broken out of the stall to find a place to die.  Lately,
many of the cows had been breaking out and disappearing,
presumably dead somewhere.  Frank didn't want to lose another
animal; maybe they could catch Alice before she disappeared.

"Pa!  Pa!  Come quick, Alice has gone and took off!"  Frank cried,
running out of the barn, waving his hat at his father, who was
under the tractor.  Jones squirmed out from under the machine,
throwing down his tools and cursing.

"Damnit, damnit, damnit!  That's the third this week!"  Jones cried,
grabbing his coat off the tractor and running towards his son.

"Bobby up on Lavender Hill says his pa lost five cows in a month,
all of 'em are gone.  Bob's pa lost it all!"

The father and son began to run, past the barn and through the
green, dewy-wet fields towards the forested hills behind their small
farm.  As he ran, Frank could see a trail of blood in the grass, and
hoof prints.

"She was bleeding bad!  What the hell did she do to herself?!"
Jones cried.

"Look, Pa!  Up in the trees!" Frank stopped; stunned with wonder
as he looked up to the hilltop where a stand of tall trees stood
around a small Stonehenge-like altar.  The stone was bathed in
dark blood.

"What the hell is that?  Why the hell is it on my property?"  Jones
mumbled, but even his anger could not overcome his sense of fear
and innate suspicion.  The two started up the hill, taking care not
to go near enough the strange altar to feel the effects of its evil.  It
fairly radiated the stuff, in invisible black waved.

In the center of the stone altar was a fire pit that looked freshly put
out.  Nearby was a stone table that looked as if it was dragged of
and on the fire; it was also bathed in black blood.  The air smelt of
smoke and burned flesh.

"What kind of freak show is this?"  Jones cried, now consumed by
anger.  He'd be damned if he let some kind of satanic cult burn his
cattle on his own property.

Suddenly a group of dark figures emerged from the trees, like
shadows that had detached themselves from the darkness.  They
wore cattle-skin cloaks, and stood with their heads bent and their
hands clasped as they began to chant in deep, rolling voices.  As
they chanted, a pair of glowing green eyes began to blink in the
darkness.  Jones heard the scraping of claws, saw a white-toothed
grin.  Paralyzed with fear, he could do only one thing as he looked
upon his death.

"Run, Frank!  Run home and call the cops!"  Jones cried, unable to
move as the creature began to move forward.

"Pa!" Frank cried.

"Go!  Go now and don't look back, Frank!"

Frank suppressed his tears and let his deep fear pull him away,
running back the way he had come.  He didn't look back, even
when he could hear his father's screams, with underscored by the
deep chanting of the dark figures.

~*~

"That them?"  The cop drawled, chewing on a piece of grass as he
leaned against his old, run-down patrol car.  The cop next to him
nodded, uttering a slow: 'Yup' as he watched the blue Lexus pull up
the driveway.  Both cops were fat and nearly bald, wearing thick
coats in the dense mist that had begun to hang perpetually over the
area.  Drops fell off their twin broad brown hats.

The cops watched with hostile expressions as Special Agents
Mulder and Scully stepped out of their rented blue car, looking
around, assessing the place.  Scully noticed the two cops before
her partner did, and began to walk over.  The cops glanced at each
other, both taking in her petite form, fine short red hair,
glimmering azure eyes and determined stance.

"Good morning."  She called; pulling out her frequently flashed
FBI badge.  "We were told to meet you here."

The cops glanced at each other again, exchanging a brief look that
said 'stupid city people'.  Scully glanced back at her partner; she
could clearly feel the hostility that the two men emanated.

"Yes, ma'am, this is the place."  One of them drawled, pulling out a
lighter and a cigarette.

"What have you found?  Anything new?"  Scully asked.

"Not much more than what we told ya before, ma'am."  The other
cop said, in a voice equally as slow and bored as his partner's.

"Mind if we go take a look at the...altar, you said?"  Mulder finally
spoke, appearing suddenly, it seemed, behind the other agent.  The
cops looked up, noticing him for the first time.  As they had done
with Scully, they assessed Mulder quickly.  They exchanged
another of their slow glances, noticing his tall, thin build, his
fashionably cut hair and prominent nose set into a very defined
face.

"That's what you're here for, ain't it?"

The four of them began to walk up towards the small forested hills,
but they didn't walk together.  Scully would usually have attempted
small talk, or at least talk about the case, but the hostility from the
two small-town policemen kept her quiet.  Consequently, the
group walked in silence through the heavy fog.  Mulder wondered
about the thick mist as they walked, it obscured vision in all
directions, he could barely see his own hand when he held it in
front of his face.

"Is this kind of fog normal around here?"  He asked.

"Weeell, now that ya mention it, Mr....what was yer name?"

"Mulder."  He smiled.  "Yours?"

"Mulder?  What fool kind of name is that?"  The man sneered.  His
partner laughed.

"It ain't, that's what.  Hey-are you really agents?"  The man asked
suspiciously, stopping suddenly to glare at them.

"Are you kidding me?  Didn't you just see her badge?"  Mulder
cried, an edge of laughter to his voice.  Scully groaned, praying
silently that her rash partner wouldn't ruin relations with the locals
so soon.

"Ya, we saw her badge, not yours."  They stared at him
suspiciously.

"Oh, for the love of..." Mulder mumbled, angrily pulling out his
badge and triumphantly thrust it at the speculative policemen.
"There, see?  Completely official!  Can we get on with it?"

The two looked at Mulder's badge critically, looking at the picture
and then up to the livid agent.  Finally they handed it back.

"My name's Harrison. Albert Harrison.  Hey, I didn't catch your
first name."

"I don't have one. It's Mulder.  Just call me Mulder."

They each shrugged and began the walk again.  Mulder rolled his
eyes, exchanging a look with Scully, who was laughing silently as
she looked at his angry face.

"Calm down, Mulder."  She smiled.

Finally, after negotiating the fields and making their way through
the fog, the four emerged on top of a hill.  Mulder immediately
noticed the altar. The mist gave the area a very eerie feel as it
twirled and wisped about the stones.  He crept closer, taking care
not to touch anything.  There seemed to be dried blood all over the
center stone, as well as on the ring around it.

"Uck."  Scully made a face of distaste, snapping on a pair of latex
medical gloves.

Mulder smiled back at her and carefully walked to the center
stone.  He bent down and studied it, noticing something strange.

"Scully, take a look at this."  He called to his partner.  She looked
up and came over.

"What is it?"

"Claw marks on the stone."  He pointed.  There were deep ruts cut
into the stone.

"My god.  What kind of animal attacks a rock?" She wondered,
then pulled out a pair of small tweezers to extract a whitish
fragment half stuck into the rock.  She held it up to her face, but
couldn't tell what it was without a microscope.  She put it carefully
into a plastic bag.

"The answer to that is what kind of animal made these marks.  We
find that, and I think we'll find what we need to know."  He stood
up and turned to look at the two policemen.

They were gone.

"Scully?  Where did those cops go?"

"Huh?"  She looked up, her brow furrowed.  "I don't know, Mulder.
Maybe they went back to the cars.  I don't think they liked us very
much."

"No kidding. Well, whatever.  We should take this to the crime
lab."  He pointed to the fragment in her hand.  "What about the
blood?  Did anyone do a check on that?"

"I don't think so, but the evidence would logically say that it's cow
blood."  Scully stepped out of the ring.

They began the walk back down the hill.  Neither of them looked
back to see the glowing green eyes in the forest, watching them.

~*~

Scully peered into the microscope, adjusting the magnitude of the
lens as she focused on the shaving they had cut from the fragment
she had found.  Peering into the lens, she gasped.

There were moving cells!

"What is it Scully?"  Mulder turned from where he had been
munching on sunflower seeds.

"Mulder, there are living cells in this fragment.  It looks like
bone..."

"Bone?  You mean, like a claw kind of bone?"  Mulder asked,
coming up beside her.

"Possibly."  She backed away, rubbing her eyes.  "We should run a
DNA check, find out what creature left this behind."

"I'm not so sure that that creature's DNA is on any file we have
access to."

"What are you saying, Mulder?"

"You heard me.  I'm not so sure that we're dealing with your
conventional bear attacks, Scully.  Why would any creature only
eat at the altar of a satanic cult?"

"You saw that altar, Mulder.  The animal probably comes after
they've left to eat...the leftovers."

"I don't know, Scully.  I think we have to find out what this cult is
all about."

"What are you suggesting, Mulder?"  Scully asked, standing.

"How would you like to spend the evening sitting in the woods?"
He smiled.

Scully rolled her eyes.

"Great."

~*~

It was a cold, wet night as the two FBI lay, huddled under a
raincoat, in the dirt and grass of the forest on the hill.  With his
binoculars, Mulder had a clear view of the altar.  Scully had long
ago abandoned her pair and was nodding off, her head pillowed on
her crossed arms.  As yet, nothing much had happened on the hill.
For the past two hours, Mulder had been watching the rain wash
the bloodstains off the stone altar.

"Mulder..." Scully said sleepily, her voice muffled since her mouth
was pressed against her arm.  "Can we go back to the motel now?
There is obviously nothing happening here."

Mulder groaned.  He knew that he should take her advice, it was
sheer stupidity to lay here any longer...all that they had succeeded
in was giving themselves colds.  But he also knew that if he waited
just a few minutes longer, maybe they'd see something...anything...

Then, he saw it.  What he had been waiting for all evening...

A large group of people descended on the hill from all directions;
all was wearing cattle-skin cloaks.  Their hoods shadowed their
faces, and their hands were clasped just below in front of their
chests.

"Scully!  Pick up your binoculars!  Look!"  Mulder whispered,
hitting her shoulder to wake her up.  Groggily, but ready to jump to
her duty, Scully grabbed her binoculars and held them up to her
face.

Silently, the partners watched as the cult members entered the ring
and began to walk slowly in a shuffling circle, chanting in deep
voices.  Mulder couldn't make out the words, but he guessed that
they were speaking some kind of prayer.

Suddenly, Scully heard the bleating of a cow in distress.  Gasping
with horror, she watched as four likely cloaked cult members
dragged a cut-open, bleeding cow up the hill.  They placed the
distressed cow on the stone altar, and then all of the members
stepped back, out of the ring.  The members stood silently
watching the cow lowing and struggling to stand, but her legs were
cut to shreds.  Then, one of the members, a woman, began to chant
alone, gesturing with her arms, as if imploring to the heavens.
Soon, all the other members began to hum along with her until the
very air seemed alive with electricity.

Mulder heard the brush breaking and snapping as a large creature
ran towards the altar, not ten feet from where he and Scully lay.
He strained his eyes and caught a glimpse of a dark, huge dog-like
creature running, he could hear its slobbering growl, could see its
hackles rising as it burst into the clearing.  The humming grew in
intensity as the strange creature stepped into the moonlight of a
sudden clearing in the clouds.

It was huge and disgusting.  It looked like some kind of mutated
dog, with scales and bulging, moving muscles.  It's eyes were wide
with...hunger, fear, madness, Mulder couldn't tell.  He glanced
over and met Scully's eyes, and he could see the surprise and fear
in them that echoed his own.

"Mulder...what is that thing?"  She whispered.

"I...don't know, Scully, but I think we've found the creature that left
the bone fragment you found."

"We have to stop them, Mulder."  She stood, taking a step forward.

"Scully, no!"  Mulder hissed, futilely grabbing for her, but it was
too late.  The creature turned with a growl, staring straight at them.
It's glowing green eyes focused on Scully's standing form.

"Scully, run!"  He cried, pulling out his handgun as he jumped to
his feet.  Tearing herself from the creature's hypnotic eyes, Scully
turned and ran down the hill, back towards their car.  The creature
howled and tore after her; it's claws tearing deep furrows in the
ground.  Mulder took one glance at the chanting cult members,
who seemed to have not noticed the change in their ritual, and then
turned to fire at the howling creature.

He was suddenly hit from behind and flung to the ground.  He
looked up to see one of the cult members, a slim woman, prepared
to tear at him with her claw-like nails.  He dropped his gun and
brought his hands up around her wrists, struggling with her.  He
couldn't believe the strength the slim woman possessed.  Mulder
looked up with shock and saw her eyes were glazed over, as if she
were in a trance, and her teeth had grown to canine length.  Mulder
suddenly felt very scared.

Scully charged down the hill, her coat flying behind her, and she
prayed that she wouldn't trip.  She could hear the creature's mad
growling as it ran behind her; it was catching up to her!  Scully
could feel her strength waning; her reserves were being taxed.
"God, no, don't let me die like this..."she thought, but she knew
that she had no time to pull out her gun and fire before the creature
caught up to her.

Mulder knew that he couldn't overcome his assailant, she seemed
to have superhuman power.  Suddenly, he heard shots being fired
at close range, and the woman slumped over him, dead.  He
pushed her off of his body, and didn't waste time looking for his
savior.  Mulder turned and took off down the hill, following the
trail left by Scully and the creature.

Scully heard the familiar sound of Mulder's gun firing, and she
turned as the creature howled in pain.  It fell to the ground,
whimpering.  Mulder stood behind it, his gun still up in a firing
position.  The two partners stared at each other, both panting from
the adrenaline and exertion.  Scully rushed over to her partner and
hugged him.  His arms came down around her and his face rested
on top of her head as they regained their breath.

"You two sure know how to get yerselves inta hot water, now."
Harrison smiled as he came down the hill slowly, chewing on a
plug of tobacco, his gun in his hand.

"Officer Harrison!"  Scully cried, pulling away from her partner.
"Where...how..."

"We heard about yer 'stakeout' last night, and we knew we couldn't
let you city fo'k sit out here alone.  'liable to get yerselves hurt,
don't ya know."  He smiled.  Scully looked beyond him to the line
of patrol cars that had pulled up.  She could see the local
policemen pulling the cult members into their cars.

Mulder turned around, a goofy smile on his face.

"Thanks, Harrison."

"Anytime, Mr. Mulder."

~*~

The woman who had led the chanting the night before had been
named as the cult's leader.  She sat behind the simple wood table
under the wide lamp hanging from the ceiling, her face
complacent, her hands folded on the table.  Her eyes were focused
on a point above her interrogator's head, her lips pressed together
in an unnerving silence.

Scully stood against the wall behind her partner who was sitting
across the table from the woman.  Her arms were crossed and she
was staring with a bored expression out the sole window in the
cold concrete room.  They had been in this room with the woman
for hours to no avail.  Two detectives had tried to get her to speak,
then Scully herself had tried, and now Mulder hoped to force her
to talk.  She could tell that his anger was threatening to boil over,
if he wasn't careful he would probably lash out with physical
violence - against the table, a chair or the wall, but Scully knew he
would not strike an innocent human being...

"I'm going to ask you one more time.  What were you and the
others doing out there last night?"  Mulder growled.

"Mulder, give it up.  She's obviously not going to speak. Try one of
the others."  Scully sighed.

He stood up, running his fingers through his hair.  He took one last
glance at the woman...and noticed something strange.  He grabbed
Scully's elbow and pulled her into a corner.

"Scully, she's in a trance.  That's why she won't talk."

"What?"  She gasped, in her patented 'surprise' voice.

"Look at her eyes.  She looks like she's in some kind of hypnosis or
mental trance."

Scully looked at him questioningly, and then went over to the table
and peered at the woman's face.

"You're right, Mulder."  She gasped.  "This woman is
completely...comatose."

"I'll go check the others."

Mulder ran out the door.

~*~


Scully stepped into the lab, wearing blue scrubs and latex gloves.
She fitted a white surgical mask over her shapely mouth and
walked over to the plastic-covered lump on the central table.  She
tried to repress her urge to gag as she pulled away the plastic,
telling herself to be clinical, professional...

The dog-creature was a dark green-brown and was scaled instead
of furred.  Its ears were tufted like horns, and its teeth were
amazingly long...Scully pulled out a small ruler and took a quick
measurement...five inches!  The creature itself...Scully produced a
larger, collapsible ruler...six feet long! God, the thing was almost
as long as a man!

She pulled out a small recorder and set it nearby on a metal
counter.  It would begin to record as soon as she began to speak.
Scully looked up to the ceiling where a camera in the corner
recorded the entire process.  She swallowed and began.

First, she cut down the creature's abdomen, opening the ribcage to
view its organs.

Scully gasped and peered closer.

"I have opened the chest cavity and found that there are no organs
of any kind inside...no heart, lungs, stomach or intestines...there
isn't anything here..."

She opened the skull and stuck her hand inside.

"The skull is empty as well..."  She was confused and frustrated
now.  What was wrong with this creature?  How could it possibly
live without organs or a brain? It couldn't, that's what.  So what
was the creature using to survive?

She peered closer inside its chest cavity, wiping her finger along
the inside wall.  Withdrawing her fingers, she saw that they were
covered in red blood, like that which coated its teeth and muzzle.
She wiped the blood on a swab.

"Note: have the DNA in this blood checked."

She sliced the epidermal layer of the arm, peering at its veins.
They contained blood as well.  Was it the same kind?  She had
begun to form a hypothesis that was definitely not normal for her.

"Note: have the DNA of the blood found in the veins checked
against that of the blood in its chest cavity.  Look for a match."

Suddenly, the creature began to glow red.  Scully pulled away with
surprise and watched as its body dissolved into nothingness.

"Uhhh..."  She didn't know what to tell the recorder.  What could
she say?  "the creature's body has dissapeared...I'm not sure how to
explain this...it just dissolved..."

~*~

Mulder smiled at her as she came out of the lab.  He immediately
frowned as he noticed her glum face.

"Scully?"

"Did you find anything, Mulder?"  she asked, pulling off her latex
gloves.  Mulder took them from her with a look of disgust and
threw them in a corner.  She frowned at his unsanitary habit.

"Ya.  All of the cult members are in some kind of coma-like
trance. We can't get a word or an action out of any of them."

"That's strange.  Have they taken any kind of drugs?"

"I don't think so, Scully.  They've been in police cars since we
busted them."

"Maybe they took something before their ceremony?  We should
have them all take blood tests...and speaking of blood tests...I
found something in that creature's body that was really strange."

"Since when is blood strange?"  Mulder smiled his 300-watt
patented crooked smile at her, that smile that made her melt.  She
shook it off, forcing herself to be professional.

"It isn't usually.  But this creature had no organs...just blood in his
veins."  Scully shook her head and ran her fingers through her hair.
"I'm so tired.  Spending the night in a wet forest and being chased
by demons is not my idea of a relaxing night."

"What are you talking about?  You spent half the time sleeping!"

"Mulder..."   She sighed, giving him her 'I-don't-care-
right-now-leave-me-alone-don't-fuck-with-me-Mulder' look.  He
smiled and put an arm around her.

"All right, all right.  Why don't you go back to the motel and get
some rest?  I'll finish up here - hell, I'll even write the case report."
He smiled down to her.

"Mulder!  You hate writing the case reports."  She smiled back to
him.  Mulder always knew how to lift her mood.

"Don't worry about it.  You go on."  He spun her towards the door
and gave her a gentle push.  "Don't worry about little ol' me. I'll be
fine.  Oh...but if any thing needs to be dissected..I'll call you."

"Thanks, Mulder."  She smiled, taking one last glance at his
handsome face before leaving the building.

Mulder stood in the hall, watching her leave.  She was framed
against the sunlight, she was just a silhouette.  He watched her
until he couldn't see her anymore.

~*~

Anna Tatalina stared at the wall.  Where was she?

She shook her head and noticed the bars on the door, the single
lamp swinging above her head.  Was she in jail?

Ahhh...it came to her suddenly, in a flash. The ceremony...the
angering of his Divine Creature...the police and the FBI agents.
Now she was in jail.  How come she couldn't remember anything
after the disruption of the ceremony?

"Oh, my divine lord!  Why have you taken my memory?!"  She
whispered.

She heard no answer.  Her lord had abandoned her.  She had failed
him.  She was supposed to have protected the Divine
Creature...until his Coming to take it...and them...to his kingdom.

Anna began to weep, and in the cells near hear, she could hear her
fellows crying as well.

~*~

"Mr. Mulder?" A small blonde woman poked her head into the
temporary office he had taken in the police crime lab.

"Um...hi?"  He rubbed his eyes.  He had been staring at his laptop
for hours.

"We've got the blood work you requested."  She smiled, handing it
to him with a penatrating look.  She wiggled her eyebrows at him
and flashed her teeth.

"That was fast."  He smiled awkwardly.  He was constantly being
accosted by young girls when they were on the case.  At least, he
thought so.  Scully never seemed to notice.

"Well, I knew you wanted it quickly, Mr. Mulder."  She let her
hand linger on his.

"Thanks."  He pulled away quickly and waved at her as she
sauntered out the door.

He shook his head and opened the file, but he couldn't make head
nor tails of the strange charts.  He glanced at his watch.  Almost
eleven o'clock.  He had to get back to the motel anyway, maybe
Scully would still be up.

~*~

Scully looked up from the t.v. when the knock came.

"Come in, Mulder.  I'm still up."

"I thought you might be."  He smiled again and came into the door,
closing it behind him. "I got the blood work you wanted from the
secretary."

"Really?"  She sat up with an interested expression, shutting it off
the television.  Mulder handed her the folder, sitting beside her on
the bed, looking over her shoulder as she opened the folder.

Scully took a deep breath, trying to ignore his breath on her ear, his
arm against hers.

"Um...it looks like the blood inside the creature's chest was...cow
blood." She looked up to him, and almost ran straight into his face
- he was so close to her...close enough to...

"What about the blood in its veins?  I'll bet it's cow blood too."  He
seemed completely oblivious of their closeness! Why couldn't she
be?

"Um...actually, yes.  This was cow blood, too." She sighed and
stood up suddenly.  She couldn't stand it anymore.  He stared up at
her, a questioning look on his face.

"Wh..."  He half-stood, looking at her.  Why did she look
so...stricken?  "Are you okay, Scully?"

"Ya...I'm fine, Mulder.  Just tired.  I think I'll go to bed now."  She
didn't look at him.  She knew that if she did, he'd see it in her
face...he'd see how she felt.  Scully couldn't let him see that.  Not
now, maybe never.

"Sure.  I'll...look, Scully, are you sure that you're okay?"  He
approached her, a look of concern on his face.  He moved to touch
her arm, but she suddenly moved away from him.

"Goodnight Mulder."  Her voice was tight, as if she were choking
on tears.  He wanted desparately to pull her into his arms and
comfort her.  He didn't want her to ever feel pain again. But he
knew that now was not the time.  She wasn't ready, and he didn't
know if he was, if he ever would be.

"Goodnight, Scully."

~*~

When they entered the jail the next morning, Officer Harrison was
the first to accost them, his face a mix of fear and anger.

"They're all dead."  He said bluntly.  Mulder glanced at his partner
and looked questioningly back at the officer.

"Who's dead?"  He asked.  Scully was a little quicker than he was,
however.

"The cult?"  She responded, walking past the two men to go down
the hall where the cult had been held.  They were all slumped over,
unbreathing, on the floor.  She looked back at Harrison.

"When did this happen, Officer Harrison?"

"Last night, a little after yer partner left.  The man on duty, 'at was
Jeb, he called me in here all frantic-like, saying they just dropped
dead like that.  We didn't want to move them, just let you look
first."

"Get these people into cold storage."  She commanded, turning to
Mulder with a sigh.  "Mulder.  We might be here for a little longer
than we expected .  I have to run a blood test on these people. I
think they may have been taking drugs."

"You think they O.D.ed?"  Mulder questioned.

"It seems the only logical explanation, Mulder."  She sighed again.
God, she was so tired. Tired of this case, tired of the constant
tension between her and her partner, the non - stop quests for
phantoms of the lost.

~*~

"The blood tests revealed nothing.  All members of the mysterious
cult died without an apparent cause.  The creature found in the
woods that night also dissapeared without a trace.  A scan of the
forests revealed little - there were signs of a large, carnivorous
creature, but no other creatures were found.  Again, I am forced to
leave this case open, pending further developments."  Mulder read
the last paragraph of the case report, then slid it with a sigh into
the file cabinet behind his desk.  One more time, one more case,
filed away without absolution.

He turned and smiled at Scully.  She looked exhausted.  He
glanced at the next case folder on his desk, then decided not to hit
her with it just yet.  She needed to rest.

"How about I take you home, Scully, maybe we can watch a movie
or something."  He offered. He couldn't think of a better way to
spend his evening than watching a video with his best friend.

"I'd like that Mulder."  She smiled, thankful for the release from
another case, thankful that they could spend the evenings as best
friends for once, not partners.

She picked up her coat and left the room.  Mulder stopped for a
minute, glancing back at his desk, his office that had been like
home to him for years.  He smiled affectionately, switching the
lights off, glad that he finally had someone trustworthy to share the
room with.

The End