"Call out if you need anything else." Chris said softly as he paused at the door. Mulder nodded, scrubbing a hand wearily across his forehead.

"Just let me know when you guys get back into camp...if you see any sign of elk where this guy said they'd be. I still don't trust him and Lloyd says it's pretty goddamned unlikely for elk to be up this high this time of year."

"I will." The older man shot a glance back over towards the bed again, and Mulder could almost see another question brewing. But Chris had always been the epitome of sense, and instead, the older man simply turned and pulled the door shut behind him.

Mulder dropped the bar on it without thinking and then leaned back on the rough wood and simply watched Scully sleep.

She had come to in his arms as he'd picked his way down the slope back to the clearing, and had insisted that he put her down. Reluctantly, he'd done so, but had not commented when she'd used his arm as a support the rest of the way. She would not talk about the gun she still clasped in her icy little hand, the fact that she was flushed and sweating, nor why she'd fainted.

When they'd reached the cabin, she'd barely made it to the bed before falling on it and slipping into sleep.

Almost as if she were coming down from a huge adrenaline rush.

Frowning, he slowly moved back across the room and tossed another of the logs that Chris had been nice enough to bring in, onto the fire. She was going to tell him what happened in her when she woke, he knew she would. He'd just never been the most patient of people. Especially when it came to her.

He leaned up against the wall and stretched his legs out in front of the fire. And he watched her.

Always his favorite activity. He had plenty of practice. Watching her had been the closest thing to intimacy that he'd allowed himself for so many years. It had taken the literal end of the world to allow them to drop the necessary and all-too-personal walls that had kept them apart in that one, final, most important way. They had finally expressed it out loud, acted on it. And if the world hadn't already ended, it wouldn't have ended for them.

A tap on the door interrupted his gentle exploration of the curves of her face. He got up quickly to answer it before Scully woke up. Pushing it open, the snow howled and beat into the crack he'd created and he found himself looking at the red-cheeked face of Pike.

The boy grinned at him and slipped through the breach easily, yanking the door shut behind him. Mulder held a finger up to his lips to indicate quiet and Pike nodded.

"Dad's just left with the others. Denny doesn't want to do anything and Shan is doing some stupid sewing thing with her mom." The boy grimaced to show his opinion of 'stupid sewing things' and went to plop down in front of the fire. He glanced across the room to where Scully slept and he bit his lip. "What happened to Dr. Scully? Dad didn't say."

"Don't know. She'll tell me when she wakes up." He said, wishing that he could be as confident of that as he sounded. He was still trying to decide if he wanted to boot Peter out or not.

"Can we play cards?" Pike asked eagerly. "I'll be quiet."

Mulder hesitated for a moment and then nodded. It wasn't like he had anything to do except wait for her to wake up so he could shake some sense into her. He reached up onto the crude mantle and pulled a worn pack of cards down. It was missing the King of Spades and the Seven of Diamonds, so they had to settle for games where it didn't matter as much.

"Five Card Draw." Pike said, grinning. Mulder had to smile in reply. He wasn't sure how the boy's dad felt about him teaching the kid to gamble, but Pike wasn't going to say anything and neither was he.

"We'll bet sunflower seeds." Mulder said, lounging back onto one of the two pillows and shuffling the cards as quietly as he could. The child thought for a long moment, his brow crinkling under his fair bangs as he folded his legs under him with the unthinking flexibility of the young.

"Ok. I guess if you don't have anything better." It was an obvious attempt to get Mulder to give up the goods. He knew that Pike had been itching to find out what he had brought back with him.

"I might. But I don't think you'll want to gamble with it."

"What?" The boy's voice was breathless with anticipation. Ah, the real reason he'd come over here then, Mulder grinned. If only adults could be this transparent.

He leaned over onto his side, stretching for his discarded frame pack and dragging it towards him. From one of the side pockets he pulled forth a small Nintendo Game Boy.

"All three of you are going to have to share this." Mulder said, handing it over. "And once this battery is gone, that's the end of it. I won't have you guys burning up our batteries on games...so be frugal with it."

Pike's eyes were wide as saucers, and he took the toy from Mulder's hand like it was spun glass.

"You still want to play cards?" He asked the boy with a knowing smile.

Without a trace of guilt, Pike shook his head.

"I want to go show Shan!" he exclaimed. "Wait till Denny sees this!"

That took care of the decision whether or not to kick him out, Mulder thought as Peter exited the cabin at the speed of light. He was gathering up the mussed cards when Scully made a little snorting noise. He looked up to see her staring at him with one eyebrow raised.

"Why on earth did you bring back only one game? You realize they're going to be fighting non-stop over it, don't you?"

Mulder didn't reply, instead he moved to sit on the side of the bed, looking down at her.

"I only found one." He ran a hand over his itchy beard. "What happened out there Scully? Why did you have your gun out?"

She didn't hesitate.

"I saw someone. I sort of took a little walk out into the woods a ways, just checking it out.. and I could feel someone watching me. I'm sure someone was there. A red coat. I saw a red coat. I don't know who, but I started to work myself up...and that's when I nearly put a bullet..." she faltered to a stop, her fingers lifting up to gently touch the spot between his eyes.

Eyes that were hard with fear now.

"There was someone out there with you? You couldn't tell who?"

She shook her head.

"It might not have been Strick, you know, Mulder." She said, reading his mind. "It might not have been anyone. I think this pregnancy is making me more paranoid than you."

"Strick has a red coat." Mulder muttered. "You've never had a very active imagination Scully. If you think you saw someone, I have no doubt you did." He growled. "We'll get to the bottom of this when everyone gets back."

"Back?"

"Almost everyone went out with Strick to find this theoretical Elk herd he claims he saw."

She smiled faintly at him, trying to head his paranoia off at the pass by distracting him.

"Everyone's gone, so why don't you lie down here and try to sleep. Don't even try to tell me that the meager 4 or 5 hours you got last night was enough."

He *was* tired. It was something that he was used to, exhaustion riding on his skin like a jacket he never took off... and the bed looked very inviting with her in it.

Her hand raised up and he let her take his and pull him down next to her.

Maybe the dreams would leave him be...just this once.

We buried her in a plot near the south pasture.

Mom was crying into Granddad's shirt and dad looked like someone had shot his best hunting dog. I was just numb all over. There was little regret, Lila had been a nuisance at the best of times. She wouldn't be following me around anymore.

I watched dad fill dirt in over the little coffin, shovelfull by shovelfull...black earth swallowing the rough pine box. I could imagine the worms down there getting ready to feast, getting ready to devour that blank, stupid, pretty face. I kept seeing her frightened eyes through the water, her blond hair streaming and floating around her face like yellow snakes.

I felt my mom staring at me and I wondered briefly, dully, if she guessed. What would she think? What would she say? Her precious Lila was gone and I had killed her. I tried not to let a smile curl my lips. Not while she was watching. After a long moment, she looked back down at the coffin and resumed weeping.

The funeral, if that was what you wanted to call it, didn't last very long. We all had chores to do and my dad wasn't about to let us off the hook just because our sister had died.

I remember what happened next so clearly. Like it had been yesterday.

I was walking towards the woodshed to gather up logs to stock the house with when I heard my parents arguing. It was not an argument like I'd ever heard between them before. Normally when they fought, my dad did a lot of yelling and my mom used to end it when she ran crying from the room.

They were in the kitchen and no one else was around, but they'd left the screen door open to fight the summer heat. Flies buzzed incessantly in the air and the pungent odor from the cattle pens was thick in my nostrils. One of my dad's hunting dogs was asleep under the kitchen steps.

I would have paid no mind to their argument, their fights had long since ceased to bother me, but it was the hissing that caught me. They were hissing at each other in these low, angry voices. I sidled towards the house until I was just around the corner from the door. Their words carried in the heat of the summer air.

"..If I every find out that you did, Carl, I'll make sure you pay for it!" My mother was furious, spitting like a cat. My father answered in his low, bear-growl.

"I don't know where the fuck you got these crazy ideas Margie, but if you're threatening me, you'd better be prepared to put your money where your mouth is. How you could even think that I'd kill my own daughter..."

"I saw the way you looked at her. Just like the boys, only I made sure you never touched her. That musta drove you crazy. You're a sick man, Carl, sick. You need to get some help..." Her words were cut off by the sound of a slap. A slap I wish I'd given her. My hand was pressed over my mouth like I was trying to keep a scream in.

I staggered away from the house to the barn, managing to slip inside one of the stalls where I retched up my breakfast into the filthy hay.

She had known. She knew. She did nothing.

Somehow I had always imagined that my mom didn't know about what my dad was doing to us. I would indulge myself in these fantasies where she would find out one day and in a fit of outrage she would take us all away from him in the middle of the night like in the movies. We would go and live with her sister Halley in the city. And we would be free of him.

But she'd known all along.

The hatred I still feel even now always surprised me. So strong it seems to burn through my veins.

And I think that was when I decided what I would do. Mr. Ears had shown me the door... and Lila had helped me walk through it.

His brain would not leave it behind.

Again he saw the snowfield, smelled the faint odor of smoke and death.

Again he saw the charred farmhouse, his eyes replaying the sight of the people clustered against what had been the door. Why didn't they escape through the windows? Had they been blocked somehow? Was there no back way out of the house? Something was odd about the scenario. Something was odd about the way the skeletons lay. It tickled his mind, wouldn't let him rest...and then he was moving again, over to the eviscerated woman. Seeing the body, the gaping belly.

Scully's face.

There was something there. Something he wasn't seeing.

"Mulder?"

There were hands on his cheek, cool against the heat of his skin. He opened his eyes to see his partner's blue eyes inches from his, concern written in them.

"You were having a nightmare again."

He struggled to sit up, letting her help him untwist himself from the blankets. The room was cast in shadows from the fire in the corner, the windows dark.

"Jeez Scully, why did you let me sleep so long?" he asked, blinking blearily around. He *did* feel better, but he wouldn't admit that.

"You were tired." She said matter-of-factly. She was on her knees next to the bed and she pushed herself up onto her feet with some effort. He let his hand stroke across her distended abdomen as she stood.

"I thought you would nap with me." He said, aware that he sounded whiny. She smirked at him, moving slowly back to the table where her book sat upended.

"I only let you think that so you would sleep."

"Manipulator." He grumbled. "Is the impromptu hunting party back?"

"UmmHmm." She nodded, picking her book back up and lifting a mug of tea to her lips. "They didn't find anything, but Lloyd said that there were tracks. So maybe Hobb wasn't lying."

Mulder shrugged, bending down to pull on his discarded boots.

"Maybe. But I still want to talk to him." He muttered.

She had nothing to say to that, she just returned to her book, a tattered thing on herbal medicine.

"I'll be back." He said, yanking his gloves on. As he shoved his gun into his pants, she raised her eyebrows at him in a way that told him not to fall off a cliff or fight a bear or anything else abysmally stupid while he was out of her sight.

He nodded and slipped out into the night.

It was a new world now. The storm had stepped up from quiet suffocation to howling banshee. The wind whipped and bit at him as he made his way towards the lights of Howie's cabin. Treetops bent and groaned under the weight of both wind and snow. He tucked his head deep into his collar, suddenly realizing why Scully hadn't volunteered to come with him.

It was hard, cold work getting over to Howie's cabin. At least another foot of snow had accumulated since he'd fallen asleep that morning. Snow always looked so white, fluffy and innocent in small quantities. In large amounts it was a huge pain in the ass. He was nearly exhausted from pushing through it by the time he got to the stoop of Howie's cabin.

A knock, a muffled shout from inside, and he was shoving his way gratefully into the warmth of the interior. A table had been set up near the fire and Howie, Melchor, Jenn and Hobb were sitting at it, playing cards.

"Hey Mulder. Feel rested?" Howie asked, gesturing him to an empty seat.

Cozy little scene. His eyes found a dirty reddish jacket hanging on one of the hooks by the door.

Fuck pleasantries.

"Strick, what were you doing this morning?"

Every eye in the room fastened itself on the stranger.

Hobb stared almost balefully at him.

"I went for a walk. I'd wanted to see if I could catch sight of those elk again. To repay you folks for letting me stay through the storm." His face was an innocent blank, giving nothing away, but the investigator in Mulder was screaming that he was hiding something.

Mulder frowned, his eyes narrowing.

"Did you see Scully ..Dana, out in the woods when you were taking your 'walk'?" he asked.

"No. Why do you ask?" Hobb asked, tugging a blanket closer around his shoulders.

"She said she saw you." Mulder improvised. She had not said any such thing, but the red jacket was implicating. The only other person in the camp who had a red jacket was Pike.

The room was silent. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Strick pursed his lips and fidgeted, his hands beginning their dry-washing again.

"I just wanted to talk to her. In private. She looks so much like... But she started running.." he murmured almost in sing-song. Mulder felt his teeth grit together.

Jenn and Howie gasped in stereo.

"Is she all right?" Howie asked, half-rising. "She seemed fine when I talked to her this afternoon.."

"She's fine." Mulder didn't mention that Scully was already starting to doubt that she had seen anyone at all.

He returned his gaze to the stranger and then his eyes widened slightly. A flash of a freestanding, lodgepole pine entryway shot through his mind's eye. C Lazy 7. There, on the corner of Hobb's blanket, was an embroidered C Lazy 7 brand.

He clenched his teeth, forcing the memories of the dead woman to recede.

"Where did you get that blanket?" he asked in a very quiet voice.

Hobb actually blanched, and Mulder had to force himself not to jump to conclusions based on extremely circumstantial evidence.

"I...I came across it. Found it somewhere along my travels." The man drawled, trying to be nonchalant.

"You found it." Mulder repeated coolly.

"What is it? What about the blanket?" Melchor asked, frowning. He'd set his cards down carefully, looking between Hobb and Mulder slowly.

"I came across a farm in the foothills outside Helena. A family had been murdered. That blanket bears the same brand as that farm."

Strick's mouth began working soundlessly, looking at everyone in turn.

"You think that.. you think I.." he was shaking his head. "No. No I wouldn't, I would never.." He began to swing his head back and forth almost violently.

"Mulder, just because he has the blanket, doesn't mean he's a murderer for god's sake." Jenn spoke up. Strick was shrinking away from the table, his head still going, his hands still twisting. He'd started a low hum, a tune that Mulder couldn't place.

He watched the man for a long moment and then nodded slowly, standing up.

"True. But I'm warning you right now Strick. Stay the hell away from Scully." His brain had put the image of the eviscerated mother on hold in his head. Stick had finally stilled, sitting and looking like a frightened rabbit. "You go near her and I won't bother with threats, I'll just kill you." He turned towards Howie. "You going back out to look for the ghost herd again tomorrow?"

Howie nodded, a little nervous in the face of the rather blatant threat Mulder'd just made to a shivering, hollow man.

"Yeah. I'd ..uh...planned on it. We need the meat."

"We do. I'll be going this time." His eyes drilled into the stranger. Hobb was staring almost impassively back at him now, his face eerily calm and collected. "Make sure to wake me in the morning."

He put one hand on the door before looking back at Hobb. The old man looked thoughtful, staring back at Mulder with his head slightly canted. Almost like a dog's. For a moment he saw a glimmer of sharp wit, compassion and intelligence there before it vanished under the glassy shroud of Hobb's demeanor.

He filed the look away and stepped back out into the storm.