"Let me out of here you bastards!" Mulder screamed into the darkness. He had been locked up without food, water, or sunlight for what he believed to be at least twenty-four hours. It didn't matter how much he kicked, screamed and cried, no one ever answered him. He knew, however, that he was not alone in that dark, forsaken room. He could hear the gentle breathing of a stranger, his captor. The reality of being trapped in the darkness with an unknown perpetrator scared him more than anything. He was not as fearless as he thought himself to be.

"I know you can hear me! Let me out!" He continued to yell, but no answer came. After hours upon hours of his pathetic pleas, he soon became tired and gave up the fight he had been enduring for almost an entire day. His head hung to his chest, tired and hungry, Mulder soon lost the will to persevere, to live. Especially if he was to never get out of the pure hell that he was experiencing. The only glimmer of hope that he had was Dana Scully coming to his rescue, and that glimmer of hope seemed to be dimming too.

~

"What have you done to him?" Dana Scully demanded an answer as tears filled her eyes, her teeth gritted.

"Do not worry, Dana. We haven't hurt a hair on your precious Mulder's head." The smoking man said as he cleared his cancer ridden throat.

"He's not my 'precious' anything." She mumbled.

"If you do not love the man, then why are you so concerned for his whereabouts? His safety?" The man questioned.

"I've only known Fox Mulder for a few days but it is human nature to be concerned for the life of another," she roared,"Why do you think we rally together during national disasters, terrorist attacks, and wars? It is only natural to love. I guess a repugnant beast such as yourself would have no clue what love is," Dana's eyes filled with tears of compassion as she spoke her heart and mind for the first time in her life. Never had she been so full of words, never had she felt so confident. The old man watched with sulking eyes and a dismal frown. He was not impressed by her speech, but more impressed by her determination. He knew that she was the right one that they had been looking for. "I will continue to fight until I get out of here. Mark my words, I will save him." Scully yelled like she had never done before. She knew that she had the spirit of a warrior, though the body of a twelve-year-old girl. She was more than she ever knew than anyone knew. In that moment she felt unstoppable for the first time in her life and she knew that she was capable of being a hero. She would save herself and Fox Mulder.

"You are quite the feisty one, now aren't you," The man coughed,"however, my dear, you are wrong about one thing: if I had no love within me, why would I offer you the cure to the disease that your family and nearly an eighth of all humans suffer from? Surely, you must see this as an action of love." He said, intimidated by the small agent.

"Your cure isn't of love, it's of power. You only want me to take it so that you can control me, the world even more than you already do." Dana hissed.

The smoking man placed another cigarette in his mouth and lit it, lighting the dim room up just a tad. He walked in circles as if he were thoughtfully analyzing Dana's rebuttal. Could she have caught on to us? He wondered. No. It could not be so. Not one person could crack the code. Two, maybe. But not one. And this was exactly why this smoking man and his army were doing all that they could to keep the two superhuman agents as far away from each other as possible.

"I'll make you a deal, Dana," he said as he walked towards the young agent only wearing a nightshirt and socks. He saw the fear in her eyes, the fire that kept her going. He admired this young woman and only thought it fair to release her on good terms, "I will let you go, under my conditions, though."

"What are they?" Dana huffed.

"I am giving you three days to make up your decision. You can either accept the cure and immediately drop out of Quantico, returning to the medical field or you can choose to not accept it." He said with a sly grin.

"What happens if I don't accept the cure?"

"Fox Mulder will be terminated."

~

Dana was released from the bondage and prison she had endured for nearly the entire night. It was daybreak on campus as she tiredly dragged her feet back to her dorm. There were agents running the track, whistling at her as she walked by in her night clothes. Cold, frightened, and alone, Dana contemplated the evil deal she had been given. If she went forward with the cure and medical schooling, she would be world renown, powerful, but also the woman that pushed the Smoking Man's plan to rule the world into full effect. The world would no longer be safe. If she didn't choose the cure, Fox Mulder would be murdered in cold blood, staining Dana's hands.

She knew that Fox was being held in the same building that she was. She knew it. She could feel it. It was like no other sensation that she had experienced before; almost psychic.
She desperately wanted to break him out. But how? When? Her small world seemed to be crumbling around her. She had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. Dana Scully was trapped between two devastating realities.

When she reached her dorm room, Chanel was pacing around nervously in circles. Even Bonnie seemed to be on edge, too.

Dana pushed the door open slowly, using every last ounce of strength that she had within her tiny being. She felt as if she could collapse right where she stood.

"Dana!" Chanel screamed, tears in her eyes as she ran to hug the tired agent. "Where have you been? We've been up all night worried sick! We were just about to call the police."

Dana was quiet. She had no clue what to tell her roommates. Not a single clue of how she could cover this up. She stood there frozen in a hug that she couldn't return.

"Dana, what's wrong?" Chanel inquired as she slowly stepped away from her.

"I-- I couldn't sleep so I went for a walk and I got lost," Dana said, staring at the wall, not blinking.

Her two roommates stared at her like she was from another planet. Their faces of relief and joy soon turned sour, concerned.

"Well, okay, Dana. Take it easy for the rest of the day." Chanel spoke in a voice that was not convinced of the redhead's story. Chanel placed a hand on Dana's shoulder, and she winced like she had never been touched by another human before. Something had changed in Dana. She didn't feel alive nor dead. She felt weak as she balanced the whole world on her back.

As the day lingered on, Dana knew that she was now the talk of the entire campus, as if she wasn't already the second strangest person at Quantico. She wandered around the halls, lost in a daze, bumping into people and not having the will to apologize. The only thing that Dana wanted to do was get in her bed. She couldn't, though. She had to save herself. The world. Fox Mulder. All while trying to be the best student she could at the training academy. It was all too much for her to comprehend. She knew that she was a force to be reckoned with, but she just couldn't figure out how to ignite the spark like within her like she had done in front of the Smoking Man.

At lunch, she picked at her food in disgust. She knew that the only right thing to do would be to break Fox Mulder out. After that, she didn't know. Where would they go? What would they do? She simply did not know. She was frightened. The only thing she knew to do was pray and her constant prayers seemed to be answered by one thought that she couldn't get out of her mind: Save Fox Mulder.

"Hey, Dana." Chanel smiled as she took a seat across from the forlorn agent.

"Oh, hello, Chanel." Dana sighed, barely making eye contact with her friend.

"Did you hear the latest news on campus?"

"Does it involve me?" Dana asked as she rolled her eyes.

"Possibly. Spooky's been missing for almost two days. No one knows where he is. There's no evidence that he ever left campus, but there's no evidence that he's on campus either."

Two days?

"Geez, Chanel, that's terrible." Dana couldn't help but think of Mulder, being locked up in the dark just as she was.

"Yeah, well, everyone thinks that his wife kidnapped him for a crazy weekend." Chanel scoffed.

Dana remembered that he was married. The image still stained her mind. She still had a hard time believing it.

"Yeah. He was kidnapped alright." Dana mumbled.

"What was that?" Chanel asked as she took a bite of her food.

"Nothing. I'll meet up with you later. I have to go work on something." Dana ran to her dorm room and immediately began her plan of how she would break Fox Mulder out.