From: mrkeller829@gmail.com   
      
   =====o============================o=====   
   "Chermera" by Mary Ruth Keller Part 12  of 45   
   E-mail: mrkeller@eclipse.net, mrkeller829@gmail.com   
   PG-13   X-File: Myth-arc   Disclaimed in Part I   
   Already sent to Gossamer   
   =====o============================o=====   
      
   Fourth Floor, Mayer Hall   
   University of California at San Diego   
   Monday, June 8, 1998   
   7:23 am   
      
   Andrea Rosen knocked on the closed office door of Sandra Miller, the repeated   
   taps ringing through the solid oak. She was just coming off a shift at the   
   observatory. But, before she went back to Cary and a long late morning nap,   
   followed by other    
   relaxing activities time and distance had too often denied to her life partner   
   and herself, she needed to check in with the Assistant Professor. She had   
   further questions about Evans and his pension, but she was no longer an   
   official agent of the Bureau,    
   so could not use that as a cover to approach Jerry Donato and his Sergeant.   
   She was hoping the chestnut-haired sister of her former boss would offer to   
   shepherd her into the precinct to smooth the way to a successful conclusion of   
   her investigation. She    
   turned at the clop, clop, clop of Sandra's cycling shoes, a sound familiar to   
   the short-haired triathlete.   
      
   "Hello, Doctor Rosen." The lean professor was eyeing her from the hallway.   
      
   Andrea turned. "Professor Miller." She took two steps toward the older woman.   
   "I need your help, please." Her graduate school deference was beginning to   
   kick back in.   
      
   A slight twitch was all Sandra would allow to register to her face. "About?"   
      
   "I'm looking into -"   
      
   The Professor had held up a hand. "I'm not with the Bureau, Doctor. I don't   
   answer to someone's beck and call."   
      
   A chuckle emerged from the brunette triathlete. "When I was in the Bureau,   
   neither did we. Your brother saw to that. We were free to -"   
      
   The chestnut-haired woman curled her lip in disgust. "Chase vampires?   
   Poltergeists? Yeti, perhaps? But, criminals, hardly."   
      
   Andrea drew herself up to her full height. "Is that what you think we did,   
   Professor? Waste the taxpayer's money on impossibilities?"   
      
   Sandra stomped to the door, flipped the lock, then yanked it open. "Let's talk   
   about this inside, shall we?" She nodded to the heads poked out into the   
   hallway. "Away from prying ears."   
      
   --o-0-o--   
      
   Mayer Hall 4132   
   University of California at San Diego   
   Monday, 7:39 am   
      
   Andrea Rosen took in the interior of Sandra's office. There were a few framed   
   prints of her younger days, surrounded by colleagues and friends, including   
   the now-deceased Tom Wilton. But, mostly, the space was that of any college   
   professor: book-lined    
   shelves, reprints in stacks on the lowest, a cabinet with glass doors, through   
   which she could see data tapes, boxes of floppy disks, spare keyboards, and   
   monitors. The Dell on the desk looked several years out of date, an   
   observation confirmed by a    
   quick check of the model number. Andrea noticed how comfortable, how familiar   
   the space seemed. Like her own, she realized with a chuckle. When she heard   
   the office door closing, she faced the chestnut-haired professor.   
      
   "What's so funny, Doctor Rosen?"   
      
   The brunette triathlete shook her head. "Oh, just change the JFM's for JAS's   
   and this would be my office."   
      
   Sandra clipped the chin strap of her bike helmet over the top bar of her   
   carbon-fiber Specialized, now mounted on its stand. "If it won't bother you,   
   I'm going to get changed. I have an exam to administer in two hours. It's just   
   us girls, after all." Her    
   long hair, now free of the helmet, fell over her face as she stripped the   
   cycling shorts into a roll on the floor.   
      
   Andrea, determined not to stare, turned to study the texts on the nearest   
   bookshelf. Her one glimpse had told her Sandra was as lean as her brother, if   
   not thinner, all lanky legs and arms. "If you're pressed for time, I can come   
   back."   
      
   The sound of fabric slipping over skin stopped for a moment. "No, it's not a   
   problem. The exam's all ready to go. I just have to go to class to distribute   
   it, and be around to answer any questions, although, this is a good group of   
   kids. I don't think    
   there will be any difficulties."   
      
   Rosen heard two shoes drop to the floor, so she felt free to turn around.   
   "Okay, what's bothering me is this, Professor -"   
      
   The chestnut-haired woman held up a hand. "Please, it's just Sandra. We're   
   colleagues, after all."   
      
   The brunette triathlete nodded. "Okay. I'm Andrea." The two women began to   
   relax in each other's company, before the younger one began explaining the   
   reason for her visit. "I know there's a connection between Evans's retirement   
   funds and the firm of    
   Houlihan, Jackson, Shepherd, and Whittington, but I just can't see it."   
      
   Sandra pushed a wheeled chair toward Andrea with her hip before she stepped   
   back toward her desk. "Whittington, did you say? Not Jerry's pseudo attorney?"   
      
   The astronomer nodded, as both remembered the angry man in a Brooks Brothers   
   suit stalking out of Nichols's office. "The connection is James Andrews, the   
   art dealer, but I can't see the chain that links them together."   
      
   Sandra settled in her padded chair. "Okay. Start at the beginning." She waved   
   at the whiteboard "Use that if it helps you work through your thoughts. Maybe   
   between the pair of us, we can figure something out." She tugged a folder with   
   a thick stack of    
   papers out of a top drawer. "I'll have to stop to distribute the exam, and   
   tell the students to come find me if there are questions, but then we can keep   
   going, if we need to."   
      
   Andrea smiled, genuinely. "I appreciate that." She opened her backpack to pull   
   out her own documents. "Also. please keep this under your hat. Right now, it's   
   just a whisper of a case, not even anything concrete enough that your brother   
   would take it    
   seriously."   
      
   The hazel darkened. "I'll deal with him another time." A long hand waved. "Go   
   on."   
      
   The triathlete uncapped a black marker, then capped it again. "Sandra, please,   
   don't take this the wrong way, but, he's not what you're thinking he is." She   
   began pacing, as she had so often seen him do. "He's not a flake or a kook. We   
   collected so much    
   evidence, between his pushing and Scully's cataloging, we actually got a real   
   case, a significant case, one we could take to court and that we won."   
      
   The Professor snorted. "Yeah." She rapped on the desk with the knuckles of her   
   right hand. "So, Andrews. Lay it on me." She swung both feet up on the papers   
   on her desk, crossed them at the ankles, then interlaced her fingers behind   
   her long curls.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)