Charles Grant - The X-Files - Goblins

He didn’t jump, didn’t turn his head. “The day you figure out how to turn off my brain, Scully, let me know.” He shook his head, but carefully. “Amazing, isn’t it.”

“Your brain?” She leaned her forearms on the railing. “It’s okay, but I wouldn’t call it amazing.”

“Chameleons,” he said. He nodded toward the woods. “Somewhere out there somebody has figured out a way, maybe, to create natural protective coloration in a human being. I don’t know what you’d call it. Fluid pigmentation?”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure that’s—”

“It was your idea.”

“Yeah, but I still don’t know. Do you have any idea what kind of genetic manipulation that would require? What kind of control on the cellular level that would mean?”

“Nope.” He glanced at her sideways. “But if you tell me, maybe I’ll be able to get some sleep after all.”

She rolled her eyes as she straightened. “Go to bed, Mulder. Just go to bed.”

He smiled at her back, suddenly yawned, and did as he was ordered.

Sleep, however, was still hard to come by.

Aside from the aches in his head and side, he couldn’t help thinking about the possibility that there could be someone in the room right now, standing against the wall there.

Invisible, and watching him.

Waiting.

And he wouldn’t know it until a knife tore out his throat.

There was no dawn.

There was only a gradual shift from dark to shades of grey, and a falling mist just heavy enough to keep windshield wipers working, to raise the sharp smell of oil and tar from the blacktop.

Mulder was not in a good mood. Following Scully’s orders, Webber had let him oversleep, and it was close to ten before he finally opened his eyes to a note on the pillow that told him the others would be waiting in the Queen’s Inn.

He was also not miraculously cured. Although his head seemed fine except for a small lump beneath his hair, his side felt as if it had been set in cement. Every time he moved, he thought his skin would rip open.

He supposed he ought to be grateful for the extra healing time, and for the concern Scully showed him, but knowing that didn’t make it happen. He showered and dressed as quickly as he was able, thinking that he would eat quickly, check with Chief Hawks on the slim to none chance there had been any new developments overnight, and then… he smiled mirthlessly as his brush fought with his hair … then he would have a few words with Major Joseph Tonero.

His stomach growled as he knotted his tie, and he snarled at it to hold its horses. Then he grabbed his coat, stepped outside, and was pleased to see that the weather perfectly complemented the way he felt.

I live for days like this, he thought gloomily as he descended the center staircase.

Scully recognized his mood immediately, and after a quick check to be sure he was all right, she hustled them through breakfast and outside, with a reminder that while they were heading for the post, there was also someone else out there, the shooter, they had best not forget.

Andrews still thought the so-called goblins and the shooting were related; when no one rose to the bait, she slumped into her corner and glared at the passing scenery.

There was no sound then but the rhythmic thump of the wipers and the hiss of the tires.

It wasn’t until they had passed through town that Mulder remembered wanting to have a word with Hawks. He punched his leg lightly and scowled, and ordered himself to get with it, or he’d blow it all because he wasn’t thinking straight.

Once this is done, he promised; I’ll talk to him when we’re done here.

Fifteen minutes later they passed between two simple brick pillars that marked the post entrance. No guards, no guardhouse; a stretch of woods that quickly fell away to the post’s main complex — barracks, administration buildings, and on-post housing. A transport plane from McGuire lumbered and thundered overhead. A squad of troopers double-timed across an intersection, their dark green ponchos slick with water. They passed a construction site for a new federal prison twice before Scully finally gave up and made Hank ask directions. An MP gave them, and within minutes they were on New Jersey Avenue; it didn’t take them long to find what they were after.

“Brother,” Webber muttered as he pulled up in front of Walson Air Force Hospital.

It was a seven-story light tan brick structure, but it somehow seemed a lot smaller.

Because, Mulder realized, it was mostly empty. A lot of empty rooms and offices, a lot of space for things to happen without anyone being any the wiser.

He sat up and watched the entrance, something quickening inside when he noted that hardly anyone went in, and no one came out.

“What makes you think he’ll be here?” Andrews asked, rousing herself from her sulking.

“If he’s working on a project,” Scully answered, “he will. Something like this doesn’t often hold over weekends.”

Something like this, Mulder thought.

“But do we have any authority?”

Mulder opened the door, slid out, and poked his head back in. “We’ve been asked in by a U.S. senator, Licia. The senator the major himself called. So if he wants to argue, he can write his congressman.”

A civilian receptionist sat just inside the entrance, a multiline telephone and a logbook the only items on her small desk. Mulder wished her a good morning, showed her his ID and asked directions to Major Tonero’s office. She wasn’t sure the major was in, and because of her standing orders was reluctant to give him the instructions until he insisted; then she pointed to a bank of elevators to their left.

As they moved away, he heard a noise and looked back.

Webber had his finger on the telephone’s cutoff button. “I don’t think so,” he said politely, with a wink. “Government business, okay?”

Mulder couldn’t believe it when the woman suddenly grinned. “Sure. Why not?”

Pancakes and women, he thought; the guy’s got it made.

The major was in.

But it didn’t look to Mulder as if he’d be there very long.

The office was a two-room suite on the second floor. When Mulder ushered the others in ahead of him, he saw a handful of packed cartons against one wall, and an empty bookcase behind what he assumed was Tonero’s secretary’s desk. The door to the inner office was open, and he gestured the others silent as he approached it. He could see the major standing in the middle of the room, back to the door, speaking quietly but angrily to someone seated at his desk.

“Damnit, Rosie, I don’t give a damn who—” He turned and saw Mulder, and forced a smile. “My goodness, Agent Mulder, what is this, a raid?” He laughed as he shook Mulder’s hand and nodded to the others.

The person behind the desk was Dr. Elkhart.

Mindful of protocol and egos, Mulder allowed Tonero to direct the conversation, politely answering questions about his health while he noticed that Dr. Elkhart, in a lab coat, was not as composed as she wanted him to think. Although she sat back in the major’s chair, her legs crossed, her hands on the armrests, her cheeks were lightly flushed, and her attempt at a bland expression was nearly a total failure.

She was, he thought, royally pissed off.

What, he wondered next, is wrong with this picture?

“It’s a real tragedy about Carl,” Tonero said, stepping back to perch on the edge of his desk, ignoring Elkhart completely. “I want you to know that I am not going to rest until this matter is solved.”

“I appreciate that, Major,” Mulder said, sensing rather that seeing Scully take a chair just behind and to his left, while Webber and Andrews flanked the door. It was a large room, but their positions and attitude now made it seem much smaller. “I can assure you that we’re not going to let it rest either.”