Shadowstalker Disclaimer: Fox Mulder,Dana Scully,Walter Skinner,X,the Cigarette Smoking Man,Margaret Scully,the Lone Gunmen and the Blue Beret UFO Retrieval team are the property of Chris Carter,Fox Broadcasting and 1013 Productions.They have been borrowed,respectfully,but without permission.I'll return them in A-1 condition,I promise.(But if Scully wants to hang around she's more than welcome to.hehehe)No copywrite infringement is intended.Please don't sue me,I'm broke anyway. Summary:While on vacation in Montana,Scully and Mulder are tipped off about the site of a crashed UFO. Rating:PG-13 I guess.Most of the violence/relationship stuff is implied,but not specifically described. MSR Warning:In this story,FM and DS have an established sexual relationship. Non-relationshippers are so warned.I don't go into detail,and if you don't like them together that way,you might be able to ignore that aspect of the story as it is mostly in the background. Spoilers:None for the TV show that I am aware of,but this story has a brief reference to a previous story of mine entitled "The Walls Between Worlds".It is not necessary for you to have read that one as this is not really a sequel,more of a story that takes place at a later date on that time line,much like a later episode of the show that is its own self-contained story.If you haven't read it and are interested,I believe it is on the Gossamer Archive,or I could email it to you.And wouldn't that just tickle my ego to have someone ask me for it. :-) Archivists are welcome to add this story to their collections as long as my name and email remain attached to it. Comments,suggestions and constructive criticisms will be welcomed at tthwaite@banff.net. Flames will be used to heat my hot chocolate.Though especially humourous or literary ones may be kept for the occasional ego-deflating reality check. Not to sound patronizing,but I thought I'd include a short glossary of some terms,I'm not sure if everyone will immediately recognize some of the jargon I've included.Just because I keep a dictionary next to my computer doesn't mean everyone does. :-) Glossary: Comunit-Communications device. Cryogenics-The physics involving extreme low temperatures.Used herein as a suspended animation device. Ecliptic-the plane of a planet's orbit. Fallen Angel-Code name for a downed UFO.(I believe that the military DOES have a code name for it,but I don't know if this is it,so humour me.) Gravity Well-The area around a planet or other space body where its gravitational forces have an effect on another object. Light Month-The distance light would travel in one month-12,951,014,400 kilometers or 8,094,384,000 miles Photovoltaic-providing a source of electric current under the influence of light or similar radiation. Stratosphere-The second lowest layer of the atmosphere(10 to 25 miles) Thermosphere-The topmost layer of the atmosphere(above 50 miles) Prologue Mulder's office-Aug 3 1997 "We're going *where*?" Mulder shouted. "We're going to Uncle Pete's campgrounds on Flathead Lake in Montana for a week.And we're not going to do *any* talking about work.It's going to be just the two of us,alone.Do some hiking,fishing,...maybe some water skiing if you're up to it.But absolutely *no* aliens, mutants, or other weirdness." "Camping? Like in a tent? And who's 'Uncle Pete'?" "Yes,in a tent.Don't worry,the air mattress is probably more comfortable than your couch, anyway.Uncle Pete isn't really an uncle,he's an old Navy buddy of my Dad's.When he retired,he bought into a small campground and recreation center.They have rental boats for fishing, sailing, water skiing.The scenery is picturesque.And I'm going to make sure you turn off your phone.As I said,it's going to be just the two of us.And no X-Files." Mulder knew when he was beaten.When Scully used *that* tone,she wasn't going to accept any arguments from him.So he bowed to the inevitable. After Scully had left that evening,Mulder suddenly thought of something he hadn't before in his shock at hearing her plans. he thought, As he walked to his own car,he wondered what the rumor mill would make of he and Scully taking time off together.He knew that it was sort of an open secret among their colleagues, here in D.C. at least, that they were a couple.Something, generally suspected in most cases,just never talked about. Skinner knew, but he looked the other way officially since the Bureau frowned on romantic involvement between partners.Mulder had caught him with a knowing grin on his face a few times. However,it was unlikely that anyone really knew that they were going to spend the week together.For once,it was Scully who had prevailed upon the Lone Gunmen to help hide their tracks. She had Byers book their plane tickets and rental car under assumed names. Mulder thought, He chuckled quietly at the thought as he got into his car to head to his apartment to finish packing. ****************************************************************** The tiny ship floated in the vast darkness.It drifted,as it had for millennia,through space.The being frozen in its cockpit blissfully unaware of the passage of the ages.The cryogenic suspension unit had never been intended to operate for such a span of years,but,to the credit of its designers,it was still functioning.The pilot,alive but suspended,accompanied the tiny ship through the cosmos.Three times in its long journey it had encountered a star system.The gravity wells of those stars and their associated planets had altered its course minutely.But it had not been hindered in its endless voyage.That was about to change.The unremarkable yellow star ahead had nine planets orbiting it.The third planet was a blue-green,life-bearing world.The tiny ship and its occupant were headed directly for it. As the ship drew closer to the star system,the long-dormant systems began to revive.The increased energy falling on the photovoltaic armour was transmitted throughout the ship.Most of the systems failed,their components decimated by time and disuse.But the ship's central computer survived.It processed the information relayed to it by the few remaining systems. Confirming that the ship's trajectory would indeed lead to a crash onto the third planet,it tried to revive the maneuvering systems.When this failed,its programming called on it to begin the reanimation sequence of the cryogenic unit.A living,thinking,*creative* brain would be required. The pilot sluggishly returned to consciousness.His disorientation upon waking was quickly submerged as his training took hold.Surveying the instruments,he muttered every curse he could think of.Less than 5% of the ship's systems were operational.It seemed as if the computer had woken him up just in time to realize he was going to die,crashing on some strange planet. Still,he was a Shadowstalker,the best of the best of the pilot/commandos in the Rowerren Star Force.He would find *some* way to land his crippled ship without killing himself. ****************************************************************** NORAD headquarters-Cheyenne mountain-Aug 7 1997 The blip on the orbital radar appeared at first to be a meteor.But when it unexpectedly altered its trajectory slightly just prior to entering the atmosphere,greater attention was turned to the object.It maintained a ballistic flight path down through the thermosphere.But it did not burn up on entry despite its small size. Once the object reached the lower reaches of the stratosphere,it began to slacken its headlong plunge.But it was still traveling at high speed when it fell off the radar tracking screens in northern Montana,disappearing into the mountains. General Hickum,in his office overlooking the command center,lifted the receiver on the blue phone on his desk.This phone was connected directly to the headquarters of a Special Operations Group that did not officially exist. "We have a Fallen Angel," he said, "Radar contact lost 47o 40' north, 114o 1' west.Object on a north-easterly trajectory.Trajectory indicates object most probably crashed." He hung up the phone,then called his second in command into his office.The official story would be that a meteor had been tracked and observed to have impacted in the remote area of the Lewis and Clark National Forest. ****************************************************************** Finlay Point campground-Aug 8 1997 Dana Scully emerged from the tent,stretching.She turned briefly to smile fondly at the person still snoring inside,then crossed to the fire pit to start the fire for breakfast.She thought the smell of coffee was the only thing that would get Mulder out of the tent before noon.She chuckled quietly as she remembered the look on his face last week when she'd finally told him of the arrangements she had made for their vacation. But the next time they had vacation time,*Mulder* got to make all the arrangements.That was the deal they'd made.Scully figured they'd probably end up trying to sneak into some Top Secret facility Mulder thought was hiding a UFO or something.She snorted wryly to herself.Picturing all the trouble Mulder could get them into wasn't getting breakfast done. Mulder sat just inside the tent flap,watching Scully grill the fish she'd caught the night before. He'd barely gotten the tent up before she'd grabbed the pole from the back of their rented Jeep and headed to the lakeshore.He'd watched her,absolutely astounded,as she caught several good-sized trout in less than half an hour.She showed him the best way to clean them,and then made him clean all of them,saying that since he hadn't helped her catch them,he could clean them. The cool,professional demeanor she maintained in the office had been shed like a snake's skin. This robust,outdoorsy woman amazed him.Watching her,crouched over the fire in jeans and flannel shirt,he thanked whatever benevolent Fates that had brought them together.And he had to admit,she was better at this kind of thing than he was.He'd never done much camping as a child.He'd never really appreciated what Maggie Scully had meant when she'd told him her daughter had been a real tomboy as a child.And he supposed some of it could also be credited to Scully's Navy brat upbringing as well. Scully turned as Mulder stepped out of tent. "You're awake?" she grinned, "I thought I'd have to get a bucket of cold water to throw on you after you stayed up so late last night.Did you see any more meteors?" "Nope," he replied, "Just the one.But I still think that the one we saw probably impacted not too far away."He waved his arm in the general direction of the mountain range to the northeast. "Mulder, we are not,repeat *not*, going meteorite hunting.This is supposed to be a relaxing vacation." She glared at him,menacingly. Mulder held up his hands in mock surrender and stepped closer to the fire. He sat down next to her,grinning. "So,what's for breakfast?" "I'm having the fish I caught,I don't know what you're having," she replied,scooping the fish from the frying pan onto her plate.After handing the pan and spatula to Mulder,she started to eat,holding the plate in her left hand and her fork in her right.She'd gotten nearly halfway through her breakfast before the increasingly woebegone look on Mulder's face caused her to relent.She reached over to where she'd hidden the other plate and handed it to him. "God,Mulder.If you ever had to live off the land,you'd starve," she chuckled. "I don't think so," he replied between bites, "I don't plan on ever being forced to live off the land without having you with me.You wouldn't let me starve,would you?" "You try to force me into doing all the cooking and I just might." When Mulder looked at her,that just-kicked puppy dog look on his face,she couldn't keep from grinning. "Don't worry,I'll teach you how to cook over a fire without burning yourself.It's not *that* hard." Mulder chuckled.Scully was a *good* cook,no matter what the circumstances. ****************************************************************** Deep in Lewis and Clark National Forest-Aug 8 1997 The twelve men of the Blue Beret UFO Retrieval team made their way through the underbrush, just over a mile and a half from the old logging road where they'd left their truck.They were nearing the site where the 'Angel' had fallen.The corporal assigned to bring up the rear grumbled silently to himself.He hoped that this wasn't just another damned exercise.He'd been having a good time in that pool hall when his beeper went off.Those marks hadn't quite tumbled to the hustle,but they were bound to figure it out if they had much time to think about it. The point man's raised arm brought the squad to a halt.They closed ranks and cautiously probed forward,now that they encountered evidence that something had indeed crashed in these woods. The trail of broken branches and singed brush stretched for nearly a mile. Slowly making their way through the splintered branches on the ground,they came upon the ship, half buried in the soft earth at the edge of a small clearing.It seemed remarkably intact.The opening in one end indicated that whatever had piloted the craft had survived.And escaped. The sound of a breaking twig was loud in the silence.All twelve men turned in unison toward the noise and opened fire,the chatter of their M16s shattering the woods' natural quiet.But they were aiming at nothing.The pilot watched them from high in the branches of a nearby tree. he thought, He stayed in the tree,watching silently as the men searched the brush. He knew he'd be hard to spot even if they did look up,his tawny-gray pelt very effective camouflage,but he was irritated that they didn't.He waited for them to leave so he could return to his ship and retrieve the rest of his survival gear.Unless a miracle happened and he managed to get a reply to a distress call,it seemed as if he was destined to spent the rest of his life on this miserable planet. His eyes narrowed as the men returned to his ship and started to rifle through it.He couldn't allow that,he needed some of the equipment still in it.And since they didn't appear disposed to be friendly,they would have to be eliminated. The men had no warning. ****************************************************************** Finlay Point campground-late afternoon-Aug 8 1997 Mulder sat on a rock at the edge of the lake,drying himself.He watched Scully still swimming leisurely 20 yards from shore.He had to admit her form was much more graceful than his.He watched,frankly admiring,as she climbed out of the water.The emerald green one piece bathing suit clung to her figure like a second skin.She grinned impishly as she walked up to him.She stood over him,gazing down for a second,then shook her head vigorously to spray droplets of water on him. Mulder lunged up from his sitting position and wrapped the towel around her like a straight jacket,pinning her arms.Using one arm to hold her struggling body,he started to tickle her unmercifully with the other hand.Scully managed to trip him and they fell bruisingly to the hard ground.Freeing her arms,she tickled him back.They rolled around on the ground for a few minutes,neither managing to hold an advantage.Mulder may be bigger and stronger,but Scully had grown up with two brothers and had some unsportsmanlike tricks of her own. Tiring of the game,Scully playfully bit Mulder on the nose. "Come on,Mulder.Let's get back to the campsite and I'll give you the first lesson in Scully's Outdoor Gourmet Cooking." When he started to protest,she cut him off with a kiss. Mulder followed the directions Scully was giving him from her seat on a log a few feet away. She'd been right,cooking over an open fire wasn't too hard.Especially since the meal he was preparing was a prepackaged,dehydrated stew.All he'd had to do was add the correct amount of water(after sterilizing it) and keep stirring it at regular intervals.And it even smelled appetizing,despite the picture on the package. Scully watched him,amused.She'd made sure that the first meal Mulder would be cooking was virtually unruinable.And she'd hoped that he didn't find some way of ruining it anyway.She was a little surprised Mulder was such a city boy.After all,he'd grown up in a somewhat rural setting,but all the time in the city had blunted his skills. She smiled as she remembered the look on his face last night when she'd packed the food they'd brought back in their rented Jeep.He'd never thought of bear-proofing the campsite. "I think it's ready,now," Mulder said to her,tasting the stew, "And it even tastes like stew,not cardboard!" Scully grinned as she handed him the plates. "Do you want to do some more stargazing tonight,Scully?" Mulder asked as they watched the last traces of the sunset disappear from the sky. "Scully?" he prodded when she remained silent. "Hmmm?" she replied,coming out of her own thoughts. "Quarter for your thoughts." "Tomorrow's the ninth,isn't it?" "Yeah...so?" "It's that other me's birthday tomorrow,Mulder." he thought, Mulder still had trouble believing what had happened to them in May.Dr. Starcastle's experiments with Time and Space had opened a doorway on another Earth somewhere and accidentally switched Scully with a person from that Earth.That person,a Gillian Anderson,was an actress who worked on a television series that was a fictional account of his and Scully's real work on the X-Files. Even *he* had trouble with the idea that,in some other universe,they were *fictional characters*.Bizarre.Fortunately,Dr. Starcastle had found a way to switch them back to their proper worlds.And had then proceeded to use his invention to disappear into some other world himself. Scully hadn't spoken of the experience since the night,immediately following their return to Washington from that case,when she'd told him everything that had happened to her.Meeting people that had looked exactly like people she knew,yet were total strangers.Meeting Gillian's daughter. Seeing what the show's fans were doing on the Net.And discovering that the show's episodes were eerily accurate in their depiction of their work.Except for a few details.He smiled wryly to himself when he remembered Scully telling him that the fans of the show wanted to see a personal relationship between the main characters (namely,he and Scully) but that the show's creator was adamant in refusing to do that. "You okay,Scully?" he asked quietly,putting his arms around her. "I'm all right,it's just strange.I was just reminded that,in some other reality,I'm a figment of somebody's imagination.Albeit a popular one," she replied,a tiny smile on her lips. "That's *there*.You're *here*,and very real to me!" Mulder retorted. They sat together in silence for several minutes before Mulder asked quietly: "So what do you want to do tonight?" "I'd thought we'd go to bed early tonight,Mulder," she replied quietly. "Go to bed? It's barely nine o'clock,you're not tired?!?" "No,I'm not tired.I just thought we'd go to bed," Scully turned to face him,a small smile playing at the corners of her mouth as she gestured toward their tent. Mulder grinned.He stood and offered her his hand.Scully took it and soon they were inside the tent,in each others' arms. ****************************************************************** Finlay Point campground-Aug 9 1997-before sunrise The middle-aged,bearded black man glanced back at the large manila envelope he'd just left sitting in the big pot next to the fire pit.When the information he'd left in the envelope had first come to his attention yesterday,he'd thought it would interest Mulder.It had taken him several hours to find out where Mulder was.He had finally come across a credit card receipt from a camping supply store in Polson,Montana,where Mulder had purchased food and water purification tablets.He thought it serendipitous that Mulder was vacationing less than 100 miles from the site he wanted Mulder to see.(As the crow flies,that is) When he'd arrived at the campsite,he'd originally intended to wake Mulder up to give him the envelope.But when he'd stuck his head into the tent and seen the other head next to Mulder's,he'd switched tracks.He'd assumed Mulder was vacationing alone,and the presence of Scully sleeping curled up in Mulder's arms in the tent had caught him by surprise.He didn't think any of his associates knew that they were together. Walking back to where he'd left his car several sites away,he silently had to applaud the two of them.The arrangement of gear he'd seen in his brief look inside the tent spoke of an established routine,indicating that they'd been a couple for a while now.And they'd been hiding it well. Driving away,he wondered if the envelope and its contents would convince Scully to investigate; he already knew Mulder would want to jump right in.He pushed the speculation out of his mind and sped up:he needed to get back to Washington before anyone noticed his absence. ****************************************************************** Lewis and Clark National Forest-Aug 9 1997 2 miles from the crash site Merawl,the pilot of the crashed ship,stood in the entrance of the cave he'd chosen and stretched leisurely.He glanced down at the remains of his breakfast,two small animals he still found fascinating.His homeworld had nothing like them. They had brown fur and long ears.Their hind feet seemed unusually large also,but they'd been remarkably quick and agile and he'd taken longer than he'd expected to catch them. He was glad none of his Clanmates had been around to see him stumble when one of them had evaded his first attempt by making a right-angled turn and darting away.But he had caught them. He'd eaten them raw since he didn't want to advertise his presence by lighting a fire.They'd tasted a little odd to him,but their meat was very tender.And he admitted to himself that he actually preferred his meat raw.His people were less removed from their savage ancestors than they liked to think. He returned deeper into the cave to the meager store of equipment he'd salvaged from his ship. Things didn't look promising.The comunit he'd managed to salvage had a strictly short range,no more than a light month.And the starscape he'd examined minutely last night was totally unfamiliar.It was highly doubtful he was anywhere near any of the planets or outposts his people had colonized. He sat down and took stock of his prospects.Food and water weren't a problem.The weather was a little warm for comfort,but the angle of the sunset last night and sunrise this morning indicated that the axis of this planet must be tilted at least 20 degrees from perpendicular to the ecliptic.And he was in this hemisphere's summer.And if the air was a little thicker than he was used to,the planet must be less massive than his birthworld;he felt wonderfully light on his feet. Okay:food and water plentiful,atmosphere thick but breathable,temperature tolerable,gravity a little more than three quarters what he considered normal.He could survive.He picked up the small square of photocells and the heavy case of his ship's computer and walked to the mouth of the cave.Laying the photocells in a patch of sunlight,he plugged them into the computer and waited for it to power up. Once it was fully online,Merawl input a query he hadn't thought to last night before the small battery pack ran low.When the answer came up,he was stunned.He'd been drifting for over three thousand years?Despair washed through him.It looked like he was stuck here for the rest of his life.Not wanting to accept that verdict,he had the computer run a thorough analysis of all the information it had on his journey,hoping to pinpoint his whereabouts in relation to his people's territory.Hoping against all odds that he was on a planet either somewhere near their borders, or along the path of their expansion. Several minutes later,the computer finished its analysis.Merawl felt a tiny measure of hope when it reported that this planet was,indeed,along the path of the Rowerren expansion.But it was still doubtful his people would reach here in his lifetime.And even if they did,they would probably bypass this system since it was inhabited.And it was entirely possible that the natives of this planet might have reached the point where they were beginning to send colonies out to the neighbouring star systems themselves by then. He returned to his cache of equipment to retrieve his comunit.He hoped that his people would come.If he could get a distress call out,they just might investigate. After examining the few tools present in the emergency kit,he began to wonder if he should try to find a population center.He might need more sophisticated tools;and this planet's inhabitants did have the technology to provide him with some.If he could risk trying to steal them.He certainly didn't want to risk physically encountering any more of the natives after his first experience with them. Postponing that decision for the time being,he began to tinker with the comunit,trying to increase its range. ****************************************************************** Finlay Point Campground-Aug 9 1997 "What the...?" Scully had just found the envelope in the pot by the fire pit. She glanced back toward the tent as she picked it up.Mulder was still asleep.He seemed to be getting more sleep on this trip than he usually got each night.She thought it might be the result of her insisting that they put work totally out of their minds and just concentrate on each other for a short time. But when she saw what was inside the envelope,she had the sudden feeling that their vacation was over.She knew Mulder.And the contents of the envelope would certainly get him back into his "Hot on the scent" mode.*Her* curiosity had been piqued. Wondering who could have left this and how he or she had found them,Scully sat on a log by the fire and studied the contents of the envelope.There was a map of the Lewis and Clark National Forest with a small area circled and a handwritten notation: "Probable crash site",a transcript of a radar tracking station's report of the "meteor" and its anomalous behavior,and a handwritten memo stating that a team had been sent into the area to investigate and recover the object.Contact with the team had been lost after they'd reported finding the object.The team had been out of contact for twelve hours when the memo had been written. Scully looked at her watch.Whoever had left this was fast.The last time mentioned in the memo was barely four hours ago.But the note at the bottom of the memo caused her face to pale.The cryptic statement that the area would be "sanitized" if contact with the team was not reestablished within 24 hours of last contact made her shudder.She was so wrapped up in the envelope's contents that she didn't hear Mulder getting up and leaving the tent. Mulder stood just outside the tent,looking at Scully's back.She hadn't answered him when he called her name.He could see her holding a piece of paper in a trembling hand.He stepped up behind her.When he gently placed a hand on her shoulder,she dropped what she was holding and jumped up with a startled cry.Mulder was surprised by the look of fear in her eyes before she realized who he was. "Scully?" he asked. "It seems like my preparations to get you to myself for a week were in vain," she replied after taking a deep breath, "You'd better have a look at this,Mulder.*Somebody* found us." She gathered up the documents she'd scattered in her surprise and handed them wordlessly to him,then busied herself with preparations for coffee to give him time to go over them. Mulder stood for a second,surprised.Last night she said that *he* would be making breakfast today.But when he finally looked at the papers in his hands,he forgot about breakfast.At first,his paranoia insisted that this was a wild goose chase with the sole purpose of getting the two of them in hot water.The final memo changed his mind. Scully was looking at him when he raised his eyes after finishing the memo. "We can have everything packed up in less than an hour,Mulder.And I did say something about hiking last week,didn't I," she grinned. Mulder was a little startled.Yes,he wanted to check this out,but he hadn't expected her to be so willing.His replying smile was broad.They made sandwiches while the coffee brewed and packed quickly.They were on the road within a half an hour. ****************************************************************** Washington D.C.-Aug 9 1997 Cigarette smoke wreathed the man's head as he listened to the voice on the phone.When his caller finished talking,he thought for a few minutes before replying. "If contact is not reestablished by the deadline,sterilize the site." He hung up the phone.He would have preferred to send in another team,but information about this incident had been accessed last night.He knew someone in the organization was leaking things to Mulder,but they hadn't found the leak yet. he thought. The loose surveillance they kept on Mulder hadn't found out where he was,but his name hadn't turned up on any plane or train passenger manifests. ****************************************************************** Lewis and Clark National Forest-Merawl's cave-Aug 9 1997 Merawl finished tinkering with his comunit.He hadn't been able to extend its range any,but he had come across something else.The natives of this planet used primitive(in his opinion) radio. His comunit wasn't built to receive the frequencies they were using,but he thought that the native soldiers who'd found his ship must have been in contact with their superiors.They'd have had radios.As he prepared to return to the crash site to search for one,it suddenly occurred to him that it would be wise to get far away from this area soon.Others would eventually be coming to look for the missing soldiers. ****************************************************************** Lewis and Clark National Forest-Aug 9 1997 Scully held on tightly as Mulder tried to avoid some of the worst potholes in the overgrown logging road she had found on the map.But they could see broken branches all along the side of the road,indicating that somebody had driven something a lot bigger than their Jeep through here recently.Rounding a blind curve through the trees,Mulder suddenly slammed on the brakes, narrowly avoiding crashing into the rear of the truck parked in the road. They got out of the Jeep and inspected the truck.It seemed to be a standard Army transport. Scully rechecked the map from the envelope.They were right in the middle of the circled area. They spread out along the brush along the side of the road,hoping to find some sign of the direction the truck's occupants had taken.They were in luck,Mulder found a bootprint.A recent one,no more than a day old. Wordlessly,they headed in that direction. ****************************************************************** The Crash Site-Aug 9 1997 Merawl studied the pile of equipment he'd removed from the bodies of the soldiers.Most of it appeared to be weaponry or ammunition of various kinds,but several devices were obviously intended for communication.Now if he could only figure out how to work them.His efforts were complicated by the fact that the natives of this planet had smaller fingers and he was forced to try to manipulate the various knobs and switches with his claws. As he probed at the device in his hands,Merawl kept glancing at the weapons.Some of them seemed to be explosives of some sort.He wondered if he should try to use them to destroy the remains of his ship.Given the hostility of the natives yesterday,he thought it would be better to destroy the technology his ship represented rather than let the natives discover how to use it. Once they developed their own form of space travel,their hostility could possibly become a threat to his people. He was finally rewarded with a burst of static from one of the devices.He couldn't read any of the symbols written on the devices,but he thought he was managing to discover which symbols were on which controls.He suddenly paused in his investigations as his sharp hearing detected sounds which didn't belong.Someone was approaching.He gathered up all the devices which seemed to be for communication and put them in the pouch slung over his shoulder. He briefly considered just returning to his cave,gathering his equipment and walking away,but he was curious about these natives.He needed all the information on them he could gather if he was going to avoid them and survive.So he climbed up the same tree he'd hidden in the first time they had come here.He watched closely as the two natives came out of the trees and stared at the scene in the clearing. One was dark haired and a little taller than many of the soldiers he'd encountered the day before.The other was much shorter and had red hair very close to the colour of one of his people's ruling Clans.The short one's body shape was very different,too.More curves.And the scent coming from that one was very different. he speculated. He didn't find anything unusual in the presence of a female,his people's females were warriors alongside the males.But there were only two of them.And they weren't openly carrying any weapons that he could see.Strange. Mulder and Scully stared at the carnage in the clearing.Scully was the first to recover, approaching the nearest body and kneeling to examine it.Mulder scanned the clearing and the surrounding trees. "Mulder,this man looks like he was mauled by a lion or something," Scully said,her face a little pale. All the bodies looked the same,ragged claw marks at the edge of ripped open throats and eviscerated torsos.Numerous empty shell casings lay on the ground among the dead.But all the weapons were together in a pile separate from the bodies. "Somebody,or *something*, has been here since these men died," Mulder said as he approached the wreckage at the edge of the clearing.A brief inspection showed places where equipment had obviously been removed. Merawl had watched the actions of the two natives with growing interest.The careful way they'd examined the bodies and then studied his ship seemed to indicate that they were more restrained than the soldiers yesterday.Perhaps all the natives on this planet weren't that hostile.He decided to test that hypothesis and tossed a small stone. The two natives whirled toward the sound,drawing small hand weapons from their clothing.But they didn't immediately begin shooting.He watched as they searched the area the sound had come from.They seemed more observant than the soldiers.They even looked up into the trees.When they didn't find anything,they returned to the clearing,putting their weapons back into their clothing. "What do you think we should do now,Mulder," Scully asked, "There's no way we can salvage much of that ship.The deadline in that memo before they 'sanitize' this place is less than a hour away." "I don't know,Scully," he replied, "I think we should keep looking for the pilot of that thing. It obviously escaped." "It's probably also responsible for this," she added,waving at the dead bodies, " Are you sure you want to meet it?I mean,these were trained soldiers.And they were obviously shooting at something.But there's no dead alien.And if twelve well-armed soldiers got themselves killed by it,what do you think it could do to us?" Mulder thought about it.Scully was right about the danger,but he still wanted to find the pilot of the UFO.The proof of extraterrestrial life.Because she was also right about them not being able to salvage the ship itself.When *they* did get here to 'sanitize' the area,all the evidence would disappear. Scully could almost see the wheels turning behind Mulder's eyes.She sighed and walked over to the pile of weapons.She picked up an M16 and several clips of ammunition. "All right,if we're going looking for it,we'd better be prepared," she suggested,stuffing the clips in her pockets. Mulder joined her at the pile and selected a weapon for himself. Merawl hadn't understood what the natives had said,but when they picked up weapons from the pile,he guessed that they were going to continue looking for him.He was uneasy when they started heading toward his hiding place.He would have to wait until they had passed by and were well out of sight before coming down out of the tree and returning to his cave.He would have to move quickly after that. The two natives didn't pass him by,unfortunately.The tall one stopped at his tree and pointed at the claw marks Merawl had left climbing it.Merawl dropped out of the tree,knocking the small native to the ground.He rolled behind the tall native and stood up,grabbing him by the throat. The sound of the native weapon was loud in his ears and Merawl suddenly paused.He kept his hand on the tall native's throat,but didn't kill him,as he looked at the smaller one.She hadn't been shooting at him.She'd fired straight up in the air.And given the steady way she was pointing the weapon at his head now,Merawl thought that it had been deliberate.Possibly an effort to show him that they wouldn't kill him out of hand. He didn't particularly like killing when it wasn't necessary.And if these natives were willing to let him go without too much fuss,he was perfectly willing to return the favour. Merawl reached his other hand around the native he was holding and pulled the weapon from its grasp.He held it up for a second,then threw it aside.He searched his captive's clothing and removed the other weapon,tossing it aside as well.He pointed at the weapon in her hand,then the ground.When she hesitated,he extended the claws on the hand he held to the tall native's throat and repeated the gesture.Small beads of the native's blood appeared on his throat as the tips of Merawl's claws just barely penetrated the skin. Scully couldn't believe what was happening.The alien was at least a foot taller than her partner and bore a striking resemblance to an Earth bobcat.The tufted ears twitched twice as it stared at her with vertical slit-pupilled amber eyes.It repeated pointing to the gun in her hands and then the ground.She tore her eyes from its compelling gaze and looked into Mulder's eyes.She could see fear in his eyes. "Run,Scully," he whispered hoarsely, "Get out of here.Save yourself." "Not a chance,Mulder," she replied, "I'm not leaving without you." Scully tossed away the M16 and raised her hands. Merawl debated demanding that the female native surrender the other weapon he knew she had in her clothing,but decided not to.He retracted his claws and shoved his captive toward the female.Both natives stared at him.He pointed at himself,then behind him.He then pointed at the natives,then past them. Mulder looked down at Scully. "I think he wants us to go our separate ways." "But,Mulder,can we just let him go?He's already killed twelve people.I realize he probably acted in self-defence,but..." Mulder opened his mouth to reply,but stopped when the low drone of an approaching aircraft caught his attention. Merawl had been wondering about the noise.When the natives reacted strongly to it and he caught the sudden smell of fear on them,he was surprised.Their fear of the approaching sound seemed greater than their fear of *him*.Strange.The two natives looked back toward the site of his crash,then at each other.Then the tall native moved suddenly and grabbed his small weapon. Merawl braced himself to attack,but the native put his weapon away and the two started to run. The tall one paused and waved at Merawl to follow them,then turned and ran after the short one. Confused,Merawl ran after them.They were headed in the general direction of his cave,anyway. He caught up to them quickly.Passing them he began to head directly toward his cave. Mulder helped Scully climb the jumble of boulders leading to the cave the alien had disappeared into.When they reached the mouth of the cave he turned and looked back toward the crash site. The drone of the approaching plane was much louder now.He finally spotted it,low on the horizon.It was flying pretty low to the ground.He could make out the four large propellers on the engines. he thought, He turned as Scully returned to the mouth of the cave with the alien close on her heels.They were both carrying strange equipment.The three watched the approaching plane in silence. Scully turned to Mulder,horror plain on her face,when the plane,reaching the site of the alien's crashed ship,suddenly nosed over and dove into the ground.The massive explosion igniting the forest for hundreds of yards in every direction. "We're going to have to move fast if we want to get to the Jeep ahead of that fire,Scully," Mulder remarked, "And what are we going to do with our new friend?" "Take him with us," Scully answered. When Mulder looked at her in astonishment,she pointed at the map in her hand. "We're less than a hundred miles from the Canadian border,Mulder.If we can get him close,let him out and find some way to tell him to head north northwest,he can lose himself in the wilderness of the Canadian Rockies.There's more uninhabited space up there and it'll be easier for him to avoid contact with humans.And I don't think *they* will try a cross-border hunt for him unless *they* know EXACTLY where he is.The political costs would be too high." Merawl had been ignoring the natives' conversation.He was trying to understand what was happening.That aircraft had not crashed accidentally.Was it possible that the natives of this planet would be willing to burn square miles of forest just to eliminate the evidence of an alien landing on their planet?It seemed absurd. He looked down at the small female native pulling on his arm.He followed in a daze as they climbed down to the forest floor and headed toward the road he'd found during his original reconnoiter of the area yesterday. ****************************************************************** Lewis And Clark National Forest-Aug 9 1997 Merawl followed the two natives down the dirt road,still bewildered by the events of the past two days.He'd crashed on this planet,narrowly avoiding getting himself killed. Soldiers of this planet's dominant species had come to his crash site with the intent to kill him and he'd had to kill them.Then these two natives had shown up,but they hadn't tried to kill him. It seemed like they were willing to help him actually.And then someone had deliberately crashed an aircraft on the spot where he himself had come down,obliterating the remains of his ship and setting a forest on fire in the process. Now he was running along behind the two natives.The road had curved back toward the forest fire and he was beginning to wonder what the natives were trying to do when they rounded a corner and came upon a pair of wheeled vehicles.The natives put the equipment of his that they'd been carrying in the back of the smaller vehicle.The short female gestured for him to climb in the back with the equipment while the male climbed in the front and started the engine. Merawl climbed into the vehicle,unable to think of doing anything else.Once the female had climbed into the vehicle as well,the male reversed it quickly and turned jarringly around. Merawl bounced around as the vehicle sped along the road,racing to get ahead of the fire.The female kept turning in her seat to look back at him,occasionally shouting something to the male. "Slow down,Mulder!" Scully shouted over the wind, "We're far enough ahead of the fire now!" Mulder slowed down to a speed a little more conducive to retaining life and limb now that they appeared to be away from the danger of being barbecued. "Do you really think we can make him understand," Mulder asked,jerking his thumb over his shoulder at the felinoid alien huddled listlessly in the back of the Jeep, "that we want to help him? And that he's going to have to head north northwest to get to safety?" "I don't know," she replied, "But we have to try.It's not as if we could smuggle him across the border ourselves.We're going to have to find some way to communicate with him." Mulder stopped the Jeep a few hundred yards from the highway. "We've got to hide him," he said to Scully, "We have to pass through two towns to get close to the border.Although,by the time we get to the second one,it'll probably be dark enough that we won't have to worry too much." Scully and Mulder looked back at their passenger.The alien was curled up in the back, unresponsive.He didn't move as Scully opened out a blanket and covered him with it. Mulder and Scully exchanged a worried glance and then Mulder put the Jeep in gear and headed out onto Highway 2,turning northeast.The town of East Glacier Park was about 20 miles away. Merawl lay huddled in the back of the native's vehicle,hidden from view under the blanket. But at this point,he cared little if he was seen or not.He'd sunk deep into despair as he'd finally realized just how alien the natives of this planet were.And his three thousand year slumber, frozen in cryogenic suspension as his ship had drifted through space before coming to rest on this wretched planet,was finally penetrating,too. Three thousand years.He wondered what his people were doing.The thought had suddenly occurred to him.His ship had drifted here at a fraction of the speed of light,but his people had developed faster than light space travel long before the accident which had sent him drifting through space.Their expansion should have brought them this far long ago.And if they had come this far and discovered this planet,they just might have decided to quarantine this system given the irrational (by his standards) behavior of its natives.And that meant that they would avoid all contact with it.They might even ignore any distress call he might manage to send out. Merawl sighed deeply.Death would be preferable to spending the rest of his life trapped on this world. ****************************************************************** Waterton-Glacier International Park-2 miles south of the Canadian border-Aug 9 1997 Mulder stopped the Jeep in the small clearing where the deserted side road dead ended.It wasn't much of a road,more like two parallel tracks barely discernible in the underbrush.He was amazed that Scully had even spotted it in the dark.But at least they were probably safe from the prospect of anyone finding them.He and Scully climbed out of the Jeep and went around to the back. Their passenger didn't move when Scully removed the blanket.They gazed worriedly at the alien.Unable to communicate with it,they were at a loss as to how to proceed.Mulder decided to see to his and Scully's needs.It was after sunset and the temperature was dropping.He pulled out the tent and began to set it up beside the Jeep. Scully's attention was still focused on the alien.Its eyes were open,but it was totally unresponsive;almost catatonic.Sighing deeply,she decided to help Mulder.Rummaging through the back of the Jeep for the coffeepot,she stopped when her hand touched one of the items the alien had brought.It was vibrating slightly.Lifting it up,she saw a small light blinking on one end.The small mesh grills at opposite ends of one face suggested that it was some kind of communications device. Suddenly hopeful that it meant that others of his kind were trying to contact the alien,she held the device in front of his face so the blinking light was plainly visible.For several seconds,the alien remained quiescent.Then it blinked.It reached out suddenly and grabbed the device from her hand.It manipulated one of the knobs and brought the device to its head. Scully stepped back,trying to contain a highly inappropriate giggle.The alien looked remarkably like a person in a Halloween costume trying to talk on a cell phone.But the rapid,guttural speech of the alien triggered alarms in the back of her mind.The alien sounded angry. Mulder left the tent half set up and joined Scully.They waited patiently for several minutes while the alien alternately listened and spoke into the device.When the conversation ended,the alien closed its eyes and took a deep breath.Then it looked at the two agents...and smiled.Mulder thought it was like looking at a grinning tiger. Merawl hopped out the the vehicle,much happier than he'd been a few minutes ago.His people had sent out a colony to this area of space.He'd been right when he'd presumed his people would have quarantined this system after they'd discovered it,but they were monitoring the natives. One of that colony's long range scouts had picked up his distress call.They were sending someone to pick him up in three days.Now all he had to do was find some method of informing the two natives who had brought him here. Mulder and Scully sat at the fire an hour later.The alien had chosen to spend the night in a tree. Scully had again surprised Mulder by being the first to understand what the alien had been trying to tell them,and make the alien understand that *she* understood *him*.Once she had pointed out her thoughts to Mulder,he was annoyed that he hadn't understood sooner. After they had the fire going, the alien had crouched to draw a crude picture of the Earth.Then he'd waved the stick around the picture,held up three fingers with one massive hand and pointed first to himself,then the sky.It was so obvious in hindsight.The alien would be picked up in three days.All they had to do now was wait. Merawl rested in the notch between two branches,occasionally glancing at the two natives sitting by the fire.His joy at learning he would be rescued after all overcame his anger at being reprimanded for landing on a proscribed planet.He hadn't been able to keep that anger out of his voice as he'd told his rescuers that he hadn't landed here by choice,he'd CRASHED here.And his ship had since been destroyed. He'd managed to calm down toward the end of the conversation,explaining what had happened to him and emphasizing that he'd drifted,frozen in his cockpit,for over three thousand years. The Rowerren on the other end of the com had been understandably skeptical.But once he was back among his own people,Merawl felt he would be able to adjust.He had a lot of catching up to do. Three thousand years of his people's history to learn,new technology to master.And most important,being reunited with his Clan. He was already becoming very impatient for the next three days to pass. ****************************************************************** Waterton-Glacier International Park-Aug 12 1997-almost midnight Scully watched Merawl pace around the small clearing.The past three days had been very interesting.She and Mulder had managed to establish very basic communication with the alien; consisting mainly of hand signals,with only a few spoken words.Names had been the first words established.Scully was fascinated by Merawl's rumbling,guttural speech. "Shouldn't be too long,now," Mulder whispered in Scully's ear. She nodded,trying to suppress a giggle which suddenly fluttered at the back of her throat. Mulder was as excited as a kid on Christmas morning. "Contain yourself,Mulder.They won't be staying." "I know,Scully.But it looks like we'll have a secret that *they* know nothing about for once." ****************************************************************** NORAD headquarters-Cheyenne mountain-Aug 12 1997-11:54 pm General Hickum was on duty when the orbital radar picked up another anomalous contact. Tonight's blip was definately *not* a meteor.Its entry trajectory was virtually a copy of a Space Shuttle reentry.But it was headed toward northern Montana,possibly even across the border into Canadian airspace where Hickum had virtually no authority.He decided to scramble a couple of fighters from the small Air Force Reserve base near Billings to investigate the bogey. ****************************************************************** Waterton-Glacier International Park-Aug 12 1997-midnight Mulder thought as the small alien ship settled onto its landing legs.He could feel the heat acquired during entry into the Earth's atmosphere still radiating from ship.When an opening appeared in the side of the ship,he was a little disappointed to see subdued red interior lights instead of a blinding white light like UFO abductees usually report. Scully was startled by the appearance of the alien that appeared in the craft's opening.Not by the being's felinoid appearance,but by the colour of its fur.It glowed under the red lights, virtually the same shade as *her* auburn tresses. Merawl stood slightly to the side of the two...humans...that was what they called themselves,his impatience to be away from this planet barely under control.He was surprised by the appearance of the being exiting the ship as well. he thought, Fleet First Claw Ramerk descended the ramp to greet the enigma which had sent her to this proscribed world.They had no records of any lost ships in this sector for as far back as the colony expedition a thousand years ago.So where had it come from?Her eyes narrowed when she saw Merawl.In the firelight,it was difficult to make out the true colour of his fur. she wondered, She suppressed her questions,they would be answered in due time. Mulder and Scully stood silently while to two aliens had a brief,but spirited discussion.When it was finished,Merawl walked up to them.With the claws of his left hand,he scratched the first finger of his right hand,causing a small amount of blood to well up.Extending his right hand,he left a trail of his blood first along the line of Mulder's jaw,then Scully's.He bowed his head at them,then turned around and walked up the craft's ramp without looking back.They watched the other alien stare at them for a second,then turn and disappear into the craft as the ramp started to rise. Ramerk didn't know what to make of Merawl's actions.She doubted that the aliens understood what he'd done.But she wondered why Merawl would use the ritual formal acknowledgement of a blood-debt.Granted,they may have saved his life,but he would never be returning to this planet. she decided as she stepped into the bridge of the small scoutcraft and gave to order to lift off. The craft's liftoff was much more violent than its descent,and Mulder wondered briefly why until the approaching roar of jet engines penetrated the noise of the craft's engines.Looking up into the sky,he could barely make out the running lights of two small aircraft as they turned to pursue the rapidly climbing spaceship. he surmised,watching them disappear in the distance. "Let's get some sleep,Mulder," Scully said, "I want to get out of here first thing in the morning.Go back to Uncle Pete's.We have only two days' vacation left." "Sure,Scully," Mulder replied, "But the campground is only about two and half hours from here.Why not go now?" "Now?" "Now.I think I'd rather be somewhere else if they decide to send a ground team to check this area out.Those fighters must have seen the ship leave." "Good point." Scully immediately walked over to the tent and began to take it down.Mulder joined her in packing up their equipment and within a half hour,they were on highway 89 headed south, back toward Flathead Lake. ****************************************************************** Mulder's office-Aug 15 1997 Mulder sat at his desk,plowing through seemingly endless paperwork.But his thoughts often turned to the past week.Fire fighting crews were finally beginning to contain the fire in the Lewis and Clark National forest,a fire reportedly started when an Air Force Reserves plane had crashed while on a 'routine training flight'.The cause of the crash was 'under investigation'. Scully sat at her computer,listening to Mulder grumble to himself over the paperwork he'd left unfinished before their vacation.Skinner had already given Mulder a short lecture on the necessity of completing paperwork in a timely fashion;and they'd been back at work for less than two hours.Things were definitely 'Business as usual'.She silently thanked God that they didn't have to fill out any reports about the incidents of the past week as she read over an autopsy report VCS had sent to her for her opinion.This one appeared to be a straight forward homicide,but she was sure it wouldn't be too long before she and Mulder were back doing what they did best,solving X-Files. THE END Well,that's it. As always-comments,criticisms and suggestions will be welcomed at tthwaite@banff.net. Hope you enjoyed it. :-)