From: livengoo@bcvms.bc.edu
X-From: rkwong@engin.umich.edu (Roberta Chi-Woon Kwong)
Newsgroups: alt.tv.quantum-leap.creative,alt.ql.creative
Subject: "Leap of Faith" part 4/?
Date: 18 Apr 1995 18:34:05 GMT
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor
Message-Id: <3n10mt$f07@srvr1.engin.umich.edu>


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This story is also currently appearing in alt.tv.x-files.creative.

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Subject: Leap of Faith 4/? 

OoooKay!  Here's Leap 4 of ?  Thanks to those of you who took the
hint and sent encouraging mail.  Boy, do I love to be goaded into
writing! It gives me an excuse to perpetrate the kind of thing I
could never get away with in conver- sation!  Everyone thank the
real-life victims of this story, I've named them once and if you
didn't catch 'em first time around I won't point them out. Please
assume trademarks where common sense indicates. All the small print
and The ownership stuff still applies, X-Files, Scully, Mulder
Ten-Thirteen, Chris Carter, etc. QL stuff, Bellisarius.  If you
don't know it already you're watching the wrong shows.

The story itself is Livengoo's, please don't toss it around for
profit or without asking first.  And don't tell Sheryl Martin who I
really am! Narf!

 Sam was leaning against the wall, waiting, when Mulder stepped out
at 1:15.  

"Very nice outfit.  Hard to see and stylish all at once, how can
you beat that." Sam gestured to his black jeans, gray pullover and
light-weight, black windbreaker.  "If I didn't know better I'd
think you were trying to sneak past my door."

"In space, no one can see you blush."  His voicel.  Sam was willing
to take that as an apology.  Of course, you look pretty shifty
yourself. I like the black-on-black look."

"I take it you want to visit the overlook?  Take in the
constellations?  See what all the beautiful people are doing?"  He
could hear Mulder starting to chuckle.  

"And here, I was thinking you might have had enough climbing after
today."

"If I could survive tie-shopping with you I can survive another
hike tonight."

***************************

Mulder had been a little too embarrassed to talk on the drive out.
He let the radio talk shows full of angry farmers and college
professors cover for the silence.  The road tunneled into a summer
mist ahead of them, with the pine that seemed to grow everywhere
here eating whatever light escaped the road and the mist.  They
passed one or two pick up trucks full of shouting, men going home
from bars, but the roads were mostly empty.  When they pulled into
a rutted, dirt road it felt like driving on construction rubble.
Sam's teeth rattled in his head, and he was very glad when Mulder
pulled over in the deep shadows of a stand of pine and sweet gum.
They stepped out, boots crunching in dried, spikey gumballs, and
breathed in the still-sticky, wet night air.  A scent of earth, and
trees and a faint note of mildew made the air heavy in their lungs.

It took Sam a few minutes to find the path he'd followed that
afternoon, but Mulder was waiting patiently now.  There was almost
no talk.  Neither one felt like breaking the quiet and they had no
way to know who might be listening.  Once Sam had found the path
and the two of them tackled the upward trail they no longer had
breath to talk, even if they had wanted to.  The trail that was
clear and open in the daylight seemed overgrown and pitted on a
moonless, foggy night. Mulder managed well enough, but Sam really
missed the long legs and strength he was sure he should have.
Scully had to work that much harder to climb over logs and jump
streams, that Sam was out of breath by the time they reached the
peak. He was very, very glad when Mulder stopped.  Maybe Scully
herself knew ways e easily, but Sam was climbing as though he was,
well, Sam!  

The overlook was deserted, bare stone dark with moisture from dew.
Faint lights were scattered in valleys they could see at a
distance, but none close at hand. Mulder was turning, now.  Looking
or listening for something.  Sam's blood was still pounding too
loud in his ears to hear anything until he got his breath back.  By
then Mulder had chosen a direction and was just waiting for Scully
before he was ready to start off again.  Sam looked up at him (a
long way up, too far, said something in Sam's memory.  He wondered
for a moment if Scully was as disconcerted by being as tall as Sam
thought he had been, as he was by being her height).  

"Do you hear it," Mulder's voice was almost a whisper.  "That hum,
and a clank every so often."  Now that he knew what he was
listening for, Sam heard it too, a sound that clashed with crickets
and tree frogs by its harsh, manmade character.  He wondered how he
could have missed it that afternoon.  Must have been something on
his mind.  

They traveled more slowly now, shadow to shadow, listening for the
trouble they doubted they'd be able to see.  A guard with a night
scope would see them before they'd ever track him, but they might
hear a tired man wearing a heavy piece of equipment  The air felt
congealed, loaded with the scents of forest, and an odd smell like
hot metal.  Mosquitoes buzzed and dove at their heads.  Mulder was
counting on just those mosquitoes to irritate any guards, make them
twitch and slap, sounds that would give them away.  Or wear some
kind of repellent he and Scully just might smell before trouble
could see them.  

They were lucky.  They'd reached a crest with no interference.  By
that time the humming was loud enough to cover their own movements,
and lights from below shown bright enough that they could see
clearly.  Sam felt his skin crawl.  If he'd had balls they'd be
riding high from stress and fear.  Mulder dropped and crawled to
the crest, Sam right behind him. 

"Helloooo, nurse!" breathed Mulder softly.  

Blinding lights blasted a crumpled mass into visibility.  Men in
camouflage swarmed in its vicinity, but no one touched it.
Mulder's face in the reflected light was pale.  Sam might be a
skeptic, but he didn't think anything like that had ever been built
on Earth.

**********************************

Agent Scully was tired of sterile, white walls, tired of people who
watched her as though she were a ghost, and most of all, tired of
not knowing what was happening.  Waiting for Al Calavicci to walk
out of the Imaging Chamber and brief her was wearing on her nerves.
Now the computer was chattering about aliens and space craft and
she had no intention of standing here spectating anymore. 

"Let me in there, Gooshie."  She was using her best "Doctor's
Orders" voice, the one that made people jump, and Gooshie was
dithering as he tried to reconcile conflicting authorities.

"B-b-b-b-but the Admiral said . . .and, well, Ziggy won't  . . .but
I can't,"  Agent Scully was glowering at him, it was like Sam was
glowering at him.  All Gooshie's instincts wanted to obey and let
her in there, and all the guidelines ordered him to keep the door
locked.  The problem was, thankfully, solved when the door opened
and Al peered out, squinting in the light. 

"Scully, I think I need you to see this."  He wasn't happy about
taScully stepped in, the door shut, another blank, white room.  Al
reached for her hand and suddenly she was in the North Carolina
woods at night.  She'd known he had contact somehow, known that the
time-travel story he told her could well be true, but looking at
Mulder and herself lying on the ground in front of her froze her.
Her first thought was, "am I really that short?!"  She never saw
herself as short, or at least not until she wasn't short anymore.
Then she tracked past them, to the lights and the crumpled, dark
artifact below and her mouth dropped open.  It was clearly not of a
natural origin, and she knew of no terrestrial craft that looked
that way, even taking the effects of crash into account.  She
suddenly looked away from it, looking for Mulder's reaction.

Her partner was watching it, almost hypnotized.  He started to get
up, bracing his arms to pull into a crouch.  Before he could get
past the push up she, Al's friend, put a hand in the middle of his
back, used leverage and slammed him back down.  His glare almost
made Scully grin, it was so familiar.  But Sam was hissing now,

"You are NOT going down there, just forget it!"  Scully had thought
her voice was lower than that.  "All else aside, the guards won't
let you get close."

Mulder glanced from her to the craft, and back.  "I want a closer
look.  These could be . . ." he let it trail off.  Scully knew what
he was thinking.  

"Al, tell Sam.  He's got to get some sense into this discussion.
Tell Mulder, I don't know, Yes, tell him that even if that ship is
the right kind, it's clearly crashed.  His sister can't be on it,
or they'd have already found her, that getting caught by these
people won't help, and they won't let him see the thing."

Sam could hear her clearly, and it made good sense.  Leaving aside
the strange sense of hearing your own voice as a stranger's, he
turned to Mulder and lifted her comments almost word for word.
Mulder looked back, listening, wanting desperately not to see the
good sense of what she said.

"Scully, I may never get this close again.  Maybe there's something
there, of I can figure out how to get close . . ."

"You want to just disappear one day?  Even if you got past those
guards and everyone in there isn't dead, what do you think they'd
do?"

"I want to learn about them, not take a tour coach class!  If they
took my sister . . ."

"Even if there's only one species visiting, even if this is it and
they took your sister, this shn't the time or place."  Sam badly
wished he had the strength of his own body.  Arguing against
Mulder's compulsion was a pitched battle.  He'd have laughed to
know how similar Scully's thoughts were at the same moment.
"Mulder, if you go down there I will follow you and I do not want
to get killed down there."  He was watching Sam now, looking at him
more than the ship.  Scully was still holding Al's hand, leaning
down in frustration trying to talk him into backing away as though
Mulder could hear her.  Sam and Scully both held their breath,
waiting.  When Sam felt the tension go out of Mulder's muscles he
drew in a sob of air, and slowly backed down the dark side of the
slope, Mulder close behind him.  

Al had watched, and entered data.  This had been Scully's show,
back seat driver or no.  She watched them crawl, military low and
careful, back through shadows until they were far enough clear to
stand and leave.  Then she relaxed, giving a faint smile to the
Admiral.  "I feel almost as tired as they must. Don't you get
exhausted, having to watch and knowing you can't touch a thing?"

Al took his cigar out and watched her.  "Yes.  Yeah, I get
exhausted.  But nobody else can do this, reach him in here.  Sam'd
be alone if I gave up.  We don't leave our people behind.  And I
don't leave my friends behind.  You wouldn't either, that's why
you're in here."

*************************

Sam sat on the motel bed entering notes into Scully's laptop.  He
felt like he might be trespassing, but she'd need this information
if all went well.  He was careful to mimic her style.  They'd come
back almost silently.  Mulder had retreated to his room, with a
quiet "Goodnight, Scully."  He hadn't heard a sound from him since
he'd stopped moving around an hour or m 

Al stepped through his door and wandered over, looking over Sam's
shoulder but not down Scully's top for once.  He seemed shaken by
what he'd seen.  Sam knew how he felt.  

"Do me a favor, Al.  Go check on Mulder.  I don't want him sneaking
out on me."

Al went through the wall like Casper the Friendly Ghost (tm!).
When he came back his jaw was a little tight, but he nodded.  "In
bed and sleeping."

"What, no nightmares?"  Sam almost hoped that exhaustion might have
helped.  Mulder had been so quiet.

Al glanced back.  "I don't know, Sam."  He sighed.  "I think maybe
the nightmares are just quiet ones, tonight."  Sam shivered.
Silent nightmares?  What a lonely, terrifying thought.  It would be
like being alone with them if you couldn't even scream at them.  He
turned his thoughts away from that.

"You never told me what happens to Scully, Al.  Only Mulder."

"It's changed once already.  It changed this afternoon."

"What was it before?"

"She tried to stick it out, but resigned the FBI after Mulder
vanishes the second time.  Moves midwest with a nice neurologist,
gets married, two kids, teaches pathology, divorce.  She winds up
eccentric, a single mother, teaching medicine and writing articles
for some magazine called The Lone Gunmen."

"And now?"

Al looked very uncomfortable.  "Well, since that guard went over
the cliff today," delicately avoiding mentioning how the guard went
over the cliff.  Sam did not take such things lightly.  "After
Mulder vanishes she takes over the X-Files, she keeps looking for
him.  11 months after he vanishes her body washes up on the Eastern
Shore of Maryland, murdered.  The case is never solved."  Al looked
up at Sam.  "And Mulder still vanishes day after tomorrow."

"Any idea when?"  Sam felt nauseous, afraid of what the future was
starting to look like.  He couldn't let this happen, couldn't let
this future come to pass.

"No idea.  Near as I can tell you were together until early
afternoon, so sometime after that.  The information we need is in
those sealed records. We've been trying to bribe and borrow, but
these things are guarded tighter than Fort Knox."

"Keep trying, Al.  Just keep trying." Al vanished.  Sam sat with
his chin on Scully's knees, hugging his legs and shivering.  "I
feel like I'm in one of your nightmares, Mulder.  Like the horror's
happening right in front of me and I can't move or scream to make
it stop."  It was a long, long time before Sam could crawl under
the sheet and let go of the future he kept seeing.  Even then, he
left the lights on.

**************************

Day 3.

Al was not happy with Dana Scully, and the feeling was
reciprocated.

"I don't think it's a good idea for you to go back into the Imaging
Chamber, Agent Scully.  I'd rather keep the contacts down t "You
are not keeping me out here while you brainstorm on insufficient
data."  Scully's voice was low, controlled, and furious.  "You are
taking risks with my life and my partner's life.  I have a right to
be there, and I know him better than anyone else."

"I'll be frank," Al was glaring back at her, no longer even
noticing Sam's feature.  He was seeing Dana Scully's expressions
and not much else.  "If you could have done this job you would be
there now, not Sam.  You blew it, Agent Scully.  We need your
information but we can handle this situation without you." Years in
command put steel in his voice.  It didn't phase her.

"You've already changed the situation.  I don't think your man
knows this kind of matter well enough to deal with it . . ."

"And you're the expert on UFOs?"

"I'm the expert on Mulder.  That's your problem, isn't it?  You
never did tell me what happens that Sam Beckett has to stop.  I
don't like dealing blind any more than you peoelped because I'm
convinced you're for real, but it's time to ante up.  Exactly what
are you trying to prevent?"

Al sighed and fidgeted with his cigar.  He'd been able to keep her
in the dark so far.  They had no evidence that Leapers ever
remembered what had happened to them, no rumors or National
Inquirer stories, but he didn't want to take the risk either.
Particularly not with someone like Scully, who would know this
might not be just an hallucination.

"This project is a top-flight, ultra-classified secret, Agent
Scully.  Telling you anything could put both you and us at risk."
The expression on her face said she was not impressed.  "Look,
you've seen the UFO, help us out here. What kind of risk does this
represent?  We can figure a lot of it out, but your information is
very important."

"What - are - you - trying - to - prevent."  

Al watched her.  He hated these showdowns.  He always lost against
women.  "Look, isn't it enough that I have to go through this every
divorce?  I don't need it from you, too."  It didn't defuse the
situation any.  "Agent Scully, would you believe me if I said
things are changing?  That the situation's not stable?"

A muscle twitched on Sam's long jaw, and Scully stood up and leaned
over him, appreciating for once how well Mulder had used this
psychological trick.  "Admiral, I can help you.  I want to help
you.  But obviously your situation has to do with my partner and
you have got to tell me what you believe is going on." Pound fact,
she thought, and when you can't pound fact pound table.  

"Agent Mulder disappears sometime tomorrow.  He vanishes for 18
months, is in a coma when he reappears, and never completely
recovers even after he wakes up."  Al's voice was soft and
expressionless.  "From the nature of the investigation and reports
of unusual phenomenon we inferred that he was abducted by aliens.
The records are sealed and we have not been able to access any firm
data."  Scully was listening intently, face pale.  Please, please,
don't let her ask about herself.  Al's hands were sweating, he felt
nauseous telling her this.  

"Where was I?  Why didn't I stop him?"

"That's in the sealed files.  We just don't know.  Ziggy thinks you
weren't there because you were arrested by the guard who shot at
Sam.  If you'd been in military custody he would be alone tomorrow.
Sam . . . dealt with the guard.  We don't know why you, Sam,
doesn't interfere at this point.  So far the record still shows him
vanishing."

Scully was quiet a long time.  Her hands, Sam's long, surgeon's
hands, were locked together as she ran through every path she could
think of.  "Will you let me talk with Sam now?  I think we need to
put our heads together."  Her voice matched his, soft,
expressionless.  Al had to grin.  If she'd been wearing her own
skin he'd have proposed to her.  Always looking for the next ex, he
thought to himself.

***************************

The buffet offered the usual breakfast range, plus grits, fried
okra, fried tomatoes, fried bread, and any number of other lethal
dietary weapons. Mulder's plate was loaded with a deadly looking
assortment of bacon, eggs, toast, fried tomatoes and a few other
items Sam's medical knowledge identified as coronary inducing.  Sam
wondered if he'd already been abducted and had his metabolism
modified to cope with the ruinous things he ate.  How he stayed
thin and alive on this stuff was a mystery.

Sam had begun to nibble a weird hybrid of grits and fresh
strawberries when the door appeared next to their table.  Al and .
. .  hard to know how to identify him, as Scully or as himself,
stood looking oddly pale, lit as they were by the Imaging Chamber
rather than the violent spill of southern-summer-morning sunlight.
Scully looked distinctly relieved to see everything apparently
normal.

"I think we'll come back later, Sam.  We need to conference."  Al
looked grim, as though he'd just been through a battle.
Considering Scully's presence and the stubborn look turned on Al a
battle was a good bet.

Mulder had been quiet since returning from his early morning run.
They'd sat in his room - it was already inundated with notes He'd
finally looked up at Sam, watching for a minute.  Sam felt oddly
vulnerable, as though Mulder could read his mind.  "You're the
skeptic, but even you have to believe what we saw last night."

Sam had been braced to give a fight, not an opinion.  "I'm not sure
what to make of what we saw.  I know what it looks like, but I can
think of other explanations."

"What, experimental weapons testing went wrong?  A new stealth
bomber?  Scully, that thing had no aerodynamic structure I could
recognize, could you?"  A shake of the head.  "Kateras and Benning,
the young couple, doesn't it seem likely to you that what we saw
could have been responsible for their mysterious vanishing act?"
The ironic inflection told Sam that Mulder had already made up his
own mind.

"I don't know, Mulder.  I was shot at yesterday.  Kateras and
Benning might have been arrested."

"Their tape featured no sound of humans approaching, no gunfire,
there's no blood.  All there is on that tape is flying lights.
More than one set of flying lights."

Sam sighed.  "So you think there are more aliens?  Why didn't they
just do their shopping and leave."

"They haven't finished, they want their lost man back, I don't
know!  I just know that the army aren't the only people up there,
and humans aren't the only people up there."  He ran his fingers
through his hair, frustrated to be so close.  "Hell.  I can hear
your stomach growling from here."  He looked up with an apologetic
smile warm enough to smooth over the tension in the air.  "Horn
Cafeteria again, or do we gamble on my pick?"

So they wound up eating at a surprisingly good little restaurant,
with Mulder telling stories from Oxford, beginning with an illicit
box of condoms.

"So to hide, them we blew them up and lodged them in the chimney.
Of course, when we lit the fireplace the air in the condoms
expanded and they jostled loose and floated out the chimney like
giant soap bubbles, until they cooled and drifted down over the
campus . . ."

Sam was laughing so hard he could barely finish his grits.
Mulder's recounting of a ghost that turned out to be a humidifier
carried them through coffee.  Sam summoned up a medical school
myth, gambling that Mulder didn't know all Scully's stories, and
enjoyed the effect when the punchline left Mulder wiping tears of
laughter away.  Sam was grinning when they left, wishing all his
leaps could be like this, just this moment.  He wondered if Scully
knew the stories they'd told this morning.  

The ride back to the motel was a lot less tense than the morning
review session. As they pulled around the red pool Sam even grinned
and suggested a swim.  Mulder shuddered.

"I'd feel like I was swimming in blood!"

"You have a disgusting imagination."

"Little do you know.  Look, we still have a few interviews to
finish.  You want the rest of the hikers and I'll take the
witnesses to the UFOs?"  

"Sounds reasonable, since we don't have an autopsy to let me earn
my keep." The door opened behind him, Al and Scully stepped through
and watched them, waiting.  "Just one thing Mulder, promise me you
won't go hiking on your own up there, and keep in touch."  The
fleeting, guilty expression on his face showed reflected a direct
hit.  Mulder nodded to show he knew he'd been caught out.

Sam had met better liars than Fox Mulder.  

Still keeping up my rep?  Lemme hear from you guys -
livengoo@bcvms.bc.edu