From: susannastarz@hotmail.com   
      
   TITLE: Predisposition (5/?) rated R   
   AUTHOR: Susanna Starz   
   ARCHIVE: Sure   
   EMAIL: SusannaStarz@hotmail.com   
      
   Other disclaimers and notes in Part 1   
      
   *   
      
   	Miller's heart was pounding as she held her hand out,   
   feeling the blood trickle down her palm and across her wrist. She   
   smiled at the dumbfounded expression on the fugitives' faces,   
   stepping towards them, wanting to speak and understand and make   
   sense of everything she'd learned in the past twenty four hours.   
   	Greene intercepted her, grabbing her arm roughly and pulling   
   her towards him, his hands already fumbling and full of paper   
   towels. He pressed them against the small wound in her hand, his   
   grip firm enough to staunch the flow of blood from a torn artery.   
   	"Greene, it's a little cut," she said, suddenly self   
   conscious. "I'm fine."   
   	"You barge in here, *stab* yourself, and suddenly you're   
   fine?"   
   	"I had to prove a point."   
   	"I don't like puns," he said, his voice flat.   
   	It took her a moment, a little longer than it should have,   
   but recent events had to account for a certain dulling of her wit.   
   Or perhaps she hadn't been expecting Greene to crack a joke. Or   
   perhaps, even worse, he hadn't made a joke, he'd been entirely   
   serious, but it was too late for her because a smile was spreading   
   across her face and she let loose a snort of laughter that seemed   
   completely inappropriate for the situation.   
   	His face paled slightly, and she realized he hadn't been   
   making a joke. Crap. Now he really thought she was insane.   
   	She glanced over at Mulder and Scully. They hadn't fled the   
   room yet. This was good. She put one steadying arm on Greene's   
   shoulder and pointed at them with her paper-toweled other   
   hand. "They understand."   
   	"You explode through the front door, yammering about green   
   blood, stab yourself in the hand, and I'm supposed to be comforted   
   because those two lunatics *understand*?" Greene looked like he was   
   on the verge of pulling his gun and shooting her.   
   	Miller decided that it would be best to ignore him for the   
   time being. She looked towards Mulder and Scully, both of whom were   
   regarding her with curiosity. She spoke directly to Mulder, locking   
   eyes with him--those familiar eyes!--hoping he'd find something to   
   believe in her story. Hell, she wasn't even sure she believed it   
   herself.   
   	But she'd read the files.   
   	She'd seen the pictures.   
   	   
   *   
      
   	Mulder had stopped halfway in his mad dash for the door to   
   stare, almost uncomprehendingly at the red blood that trickled from   
   the woman's wound. He barely registered the other police officer's   
   dismay as he lunged forward and attempted to keep the woman he was   
   risking his career for from making a complete fool of herself.   
   	"I'm real," she said.   
   	She was *real.* Not a hybrid.   
   	But what did real mean, at this point? She wasn't his   
   sister... She had a completely different set of life experiences and   
   memories, right?   
   	He groaned and put his head into his hands. This confusion,   
   this never ending mystery was supposed to have come to an end in a   
   field illuminated by starlight, in the embrace of a girl never to   
   age beyond fourteen.   
   	She was dead.   
   	He was free.   
   	Clones couldn't be dangled in front of him like carrots   
   anymore.   
   	And yet here he was again, sitting in a nameless motel   
   staring across the room at another mystery. A mystery who spoke and   
   moved and acted differently from all of the others who had pretended   
   to be his sister, and yet who looked exactly the same. A living,   
   breathing mystery with red blood.   
   	"How do you know about the blood?" He heard Scully's voice   
   pipe up behind him, suspicious and disbelieving as always. He was   
   seized by an irrational urge to reach for her, to crush her against   
   his chest and thank her for keeping her head in this situation,   
   because as far as he was concerned he was already lost.   
   	"I keep contacts in certain unofficial circles," Miller   
   said, her eyes flickering to Greene's face for a moment. "I had   
   someone pull up the case files on your sister. The pictures   
   were...convincing."   
   	"You  hacked into government files?" Greene and Scully spoke   
   at the same time. The skepticism meter in the room jumped a hundred   
   points.   
   	Miller looked uncomfortable. "I didn't hack into government   
   files. I had someone do it for me. I don't know shit about   
   computers."   
   	"Why would you do that?" Scully asked, her voice hard.   
   	Miller looked even more unhappy, her hands shoved into her   
   pockets. "I've had a rough morning." One of her hands emerged from   
   her pocket with a palm full of sunflower seeds, which she absently   
   cracked between her teeth. "I made a few unsettling discoveries   
   about my parentage."   
   	"Adopted?" Mulder couldn't stop himself from asking, feeling   
   a strange fire alight within his chest.   
   	"No," she laughed softly. "No, adopted I could have dealt   
   with. Adopted would have made sense."   
   	"Is this how you solve all your big cases?" Greene asked   
   from where he stood, arms crossed.   
   	Mulder ignored him, studying Christina Miller's face with an   
   investigative eye. She looked awkward, uncomfortable and confused,   
   but not deceptive. He detected no flicker of a lie within her   
   familiar hazel eyes. And yet...he'd never seen deception before   
   either.   
   	Maybe he'd just wanted to be deceived.   
   	"I assume this man is familiar to you?" Miller spoke up   
   finally, handing him a folded slip of paper, yellow with age.   
   	Mulder opened it with trembling hands, his fingers tracing   
   the faded newsprint. His father's obituary stared back at him.   
      
   *   
      
   	While she'd been waiting for Stephen to purloin the files   
   she wanted, Miller had passed the time by studying the faded picture   
   her own father had kept for years. It was folded and creased in all   
   the wrong places, and she was unable to get a clear image of what   
   the man in the picture really looked like.   
   	Still, she couldn't stop herself from tracing the image   
   repeatedly with her fingers, searching for herself in his face.   
   Somehow she knew that she was staring at the picture of her true   
   father, her biological father, and the thought was staggering.   
   	Now she watched Mulder as he studied the same picture. She   
   studied his face, his movements, wondering if he reflected anything   
   of her.   
   	When he looked up at her, his face was blank. "This is my   
   father."   
   	"My father had been saving that for years. Ever since he   
   learned about his murder--"   
   	Mulder winced and she could have kicked herself for her   
   insensitivity. She'd never met the damn man, so his murder was only   
   slightly more consequential than the homicides she dealt with on a   
   daily basis. But of course Mulder knew him, had been *raised* by him-   
   -   
   	"He was killed for trying to tell me the truth."   
   	"I'd like you to tell me the truth," she said, still   
   watching Greene out of the corner of her eye and hoping he didn't   
   choose an inopportune moment to play hero. He certainly looked   
   twitchy enough.   
   	Mulder laughed ironically. "You think I know?"   
   	"You must know something fort them to launch this campaign   
   of disinformation against you."   
   	She heard Greene snort something under his breath.   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)