Chapter 6
Mulder started to rise. "Stay there!" the man
snapped. "Don't come any closer! One of them got lucky and
put a bullet in me. It will take me a little while to repair the
damage. In this state I could very easily suck the life right out
of you."
Mulder sat back down. "I find it surprising you can be
hurt!" he commented.
"I'm immortal, Mulder," the man answered, "but I'm
not invulnerable. I've taken quite a few hits over the centuries,
died more than once."
"But you just said you were immortal," Mulder objected.
The man laughed. "We're all immortal, Mulder, even you, even
them." The man waved his hand toward the bodies. "This
flesh is nothing. It's just a temporary home. You've had hundreds
of bodies. I've had thousands- still we're what we
are.....hunters of truth.
We're a lot alike, Agent Mulder. We can't simply let something
go. We have to find the answers for things, the reasons. We both
live to hunt and destroy evil. I'm just a little bit better at it
than you are. And we've both still got plenty of work. What we're
fighting, Mulder is like a living fungus, sending tentacles out
into the material world corrupting and feeding on everything it
touches. I've been destroying one filament in the last few weeks.
But there's many, many more.
The Dark Ones create many servants to feed them."
"The Dark Ones?" Mulder asked.
The man smiled. "Demons," he answered, "devils,
dark angels. Whatever you want to call them Mulder, those that
live off the dying and the suffering of others."
Mulder nodded. "That light is fading," he commented.
"Are you getting better?"
The man looked down. "Why yes, I am!" he remarked.
"Enough so it's safe for me to move around and spare a
little energy for some work."
The man rose, went over to one of the bodies, knelt by it, and
put out his left hand to the back of its neck. A bright blue
light surrounded the body. After a few moments the man's chest
heaved and he began to breathe. The man went to three other
bodies and repeated the process. He then sat down again.
Mulder looked at the four men sitting up on the floor, wide eyed.
"We hate to waste good organic material," the man
across from him commented. "Repair the bodies, reenergize
them, put new Souls in them, and they now work for us instead of
against us. Drives our adversaries crazy! They never know who's
for or against them. These four were underdogs, not too well
known to their own organization. I'm afraid the others are too
well known by everyone to be of use to us.
Peter, James! Will you be so kind as to take Mr. Mulder back to
the city? His associates are getting concerned about him.
Matthew, John! You will stay and dispose of matters here. Salvage
what equipment you can, then destroy the facility."
Two of the men rose and left the room. Two others came over and
stood beside Mulder. "Can you get up?" One of them
asked.
"A moment," Mulder put in. "Sir, there's
something-"
The man across from him put out his hand and Mulder fell silent.
"Yes," the man answered, "Your sister. I can't
answer your question right now, Mr. Mulder, but I will make a
bargain. In exchange for your silence about what you have seen
here, you may tell Agent Scully, but no one else. I will do my
best to find out what has happened to your sister and give you an
answer one way or another. You must understand, Agent Mulder,
there are many aliens, not just one group. It may take me some
time."
Mulder rose. "I understand!" he acknowledged. "You
have my promise. I don't think they'd believe me, anyway."
He followed his companions outside. They drove in silence back to
the city, dropping Mulder off a block from the Headquarters.
Mulder reported in, and things slowly quieted down, the steady
routine of normal activity filled the next six months. Then, one
afternoon his supervisor called him to his office.
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