by Tim Lebbon
Sighing, Skinner opened a desk drawer and put the ashtray inside. Then he slid the drawer shut and stared out the window. His fists curled at his sides. He didn’t realize he was crying again until he felt the wetness roll down his cheeks. He thought back to what Ramirez had said the night before—his dying words. Of how he’d been caught between two masters, and unable to make a choice for himself.
Then, with the smoke still lingering in the air, Skinner stood up and decided to go check on Mulder.
The End
Back in El Paso My Life Will Be Worthless
by Keith R.A. DeCandido
J. EDGAR HOOVER BUILDING
WASHINGTON, D.C.
3rd APRIL, 1994, 9:17 a.m.
Special Agent Jack Colt arrived at the Assistant Director’s office feeling very much like a schoolkid who was sent to the principal’s office. Usually the Assistant Special Agent in Charge doled out his assignments, but it was the ASAC who told him to report to AD Skinner.
The AD’s assistant smiled at him. “One moment, please.” She pushed a button on her phone and said, “Agent Colt is here.”
Skinner’s tinny voice sounded over her phone’s speaker. “Send him in.”
Colt nodded to the assistant and opened the wooden door to Skinner’s expansive office. The AD was standing at his desk, back to the window, while a familiar man in a plaid shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots sat in one of the guest chairs. The latter rose to his feet, running one hand over his balding head.
“Thanks for coming, Agent Colt,” Skinner said. He always sounded like he was speaking through a clenched jaw. “I believe you know Detective Johnson.”
“Of course.” He reached out to shake the man’s hand, and Martin Johnson of the El Paso Police Department returned it firmly. “What brings you up from El Paso, Martin?” His face fell. “Oh, Christ, don’t tell me Nobilis is putting together another appeal?”
Johnson sat back down. “No, but I reckon he’ll be puttin’ one together soon. I’m afraid we’ve found two more bodies. Brunette women, both strangled, sliced across the stomach—”
“So it’s a copycat.”
“—and with the skin cream on the women’s nether regions.”
Colt winced. “Somebody must’ve let that out to the public.”
“No sir, they did not,” Johnson said tightly. “As God is my witness, the only folks who know that particular detail in El Paso are Doc Gardner, me, and Detective Martinez. That’s why I flew up here instead’a calling. Loose lips sinkin’ ships and all that.”
Colt shook his head. “And Nobilis is still in prison?”
“Hell, he’s in solitary. He ain’t had no visitors, and he ain’t sent no mail out, and we ain’t let him see any’a the mail he gets.”
“Who’s he get mail from?”
Johnson shrugged. “The usual—groupies, lawyers, fetishists. He don’t see none of it, so it ain’t that. I’m thinkin’ we got the wrong guy. Again.”
“That’s not possible,” Colt snapped.
Skinner snapped right back. “That’s enough, Agent Colt. Obviously, this new set of murders needs to be investigated.”
“Look,” Johnson said, “most’a the murders we gotta deal with back home are morons killin’ other morons. Kids fightin’ over sneakers, drug dealers fightin’ over street corners, men fightin’ over women. This freako stuff is outta our league, which is why we called y’all in the first place two years ago.”
Colt noticed the file on Skinner’s desk. “May I?”
Skinner nodded.
Picking it up, Colt said, “You called us in, Martin, because more murders kept happening after you put people in jail. You arrested Arlo Montrose, then two more murders. You arrested Buck Halverson, then four more murders. You arrested Jebediah Zipkis, and then five more murders and I’m on a plane to El Paso.”
“An’ you arrested Frank Nobilis, and now we got two more.”
“I arrested Nobilis because he’s who the evidence pointed to. Evidence doesn’t lie.”
Skinner’s phone buzzed, followed by his assistant’s voice over the speaker. “Agents Scully and Mulder are here.”
Colt’s head snapped up toward the AD.
Skinner pushed a button on the phone. “Send them in.”
The door opened to a tall, skinny dark-haired man in a gray suit very much like the one Colt was wearing, and a petite redhead in a green pantsuit.
Pointing at the two new arrivals, Colt asked, “What’re the two nutjobs doing here?”
Smirking, Fox Mulder said, “Actually we prefer the term ‘sanity challenged.’ And technically, I’m the nutjob. Scully here’s the skeptic.”
“Agents Scully and Mulder have a lot of experience with cases that are out of the ordinary,” Skinner said.
Rolling his eyes, Colt said, “Oh, please. This isn’t one of Mulder’s whackadoodle alien things—it’s a serial killer. And yes,” he said quickly as Mulder was opening his mouth, “I know you worked in Behavioral Sciences and Violent Crimes.”
“Actually,” Mulder said, “I was just going to ask if we could sit down.”
Johnson had risen to his feet, prompting Skinner to say, “Detective Johnson, this is Special Agent Fox Mulder and his partner, Special Agent Dana Scully. They’ll be assisting Special Agent Colt.”
Mulder shook the man’s hand, as did Scully. “Pleasure to be meetin’ you both,” Johnson said. “I gotta hit the road—I’m flyin’ back tonight. I’ll pick y’all up at the airport tomorrow.”
“Thank you, Detective,” Scully said with a small smile.
Colt turned his gaze upon Skinner. “I work alone, sir.”
“No, Agent Colt, you work for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Whether or not you are permitted to flout FBI procedure regarding partnership is entirely up to the people who supervise you. While your ASAC is willing to indulge you on the majority of your cases, I am not willing to do so on this case. All three of you are on a plane to El Paso tomorrow morning to investigate these latest murders, see if they match the ones that Frank Nobilis is in prison for. My assistant will send you your tickets through interoffice.”
Colt blew out a long breath. “Happy happy, joy joy. Fine, we’ll fly to El Paso.”
*****
VISTA ATLANTIC FLIGHT 1013
IN TRANSIT BETWEEN WASHINGTON, D.C., AND DALLAS, TEXAS
APRIL 4
“You know, I get why you two were assigned to me now.”
Colt was staring at Mulder and Scully, sitting across the aisle from him. The Bureau had sprung for first-class seats, which Colt had made a mental note to thank Skinner for, and Colt had been fortunate enough not to have a seatmate. The X-Files goons were in the two seats across from him. Mulder had a Walkman in his lap, headphones in his ears, eyes closed. He was in the window seat, leaving Scully to read over files in the aisle seat.
Scully removed her reading glasses, set the file down on the tray table, and stared at him, green eyes flashing. “And why is that, Agent Colt?”
“Same reason why the Bureau keeps your little goon squad running. Keeps the clearance rate up.”
“Excuse me?” Scully asked with a frown.
“C’mon, for what other reason would you guys be allowed to continue? You get all the crazy cases that can’t actually be closed, but since you’re a special unit, you don’t get counted with the regular stats. So the public thinks that we have a better clearance rate than we actually have and they feel safer.”
“You really believe that?”
“You don’t? C’mon, Agent Scully, I spent last night looking over your recent case history.” Colt started enumerating on his fingers the files he’d read last night while staying late at the office. If he was going to be stuck with these garbanzos, he wanted an idea of their casework. “In the last few months alone, we’ve got Mount Avalon: four deaths, two people missing and presumed dead, no arrests. Worcester, Massachusetts: a woman raped and assaulted, two orderlies murdered, Agent Mulder assaulted, no arr
ests. Milford Haven, Massachusetts: six people killed, a woman missing and presumed dead, no arrests. The USS Ardent: almost the entire crew missing and presumed dead, no arrests. Gibsonton, Florida: three people murdered, the suspect still missing, no arrests. Murray, Virginia: three members of a family, including a three-year-old, murdered, and you guessed it, no arrests.”
“We’ve also closed a few cases. The chicken plant in Dudley, Arkansas, the murders in Fairfield, Idaho, and the INS station in North Carolina, the death fetishist in Minneapolis...”
Colt held up a hand. “Yeah, sure, you’ve run into a couple—and I gotta give you credit for that loony Pfaster in Minneapolis, that was a good bust—but let’s face it, the only reason the Bureau puts up with your crap clearance rate is that it makes the rest of us look good.”
Scully shook her head. “That’s one theory.”
“Look, whatever, but I prefer to work alone, all right? You two can come along and cover the Bureau’s ass in case it winds up going into the toilet, but stay out of my way when we get down there. I’ve had enough of partners.” Then he recalled something else he’d read the previous night. “And I think you’re in a good position to understand why.”
“How’s that?”
“The last regular partner I had got shot in the head. And he was already pretty crazy before that, and the bullet rattling around in his cranium just made him worse. Name of Duane Barry.”
Scully went rigid. Most people wouldn’t notice any difference, but he could see her entire body freeze up, even though there was almost no discernible change to her facial expression.
“He was always wound too tight even before he caught a bullet. Always talking about himself in the third person, it was like being partnered with Bob Dole.” He gave her an apologetic look. “I’m sorry you had to go through that with him.”
“I’m fine.” Scully said those two words with the same lack of conviction that relatives of murder victims did when people idiotically asked them how they were doing.
“Either way, after two years of being partnered with that jackass, you can see why I’m not exactly eager to embrace the notion of teamwork.”
Scully had been staring at an indeterminate point on the plane’s floor, but now she looked up and stared intently right at Colt once again. Despite everything, Colt actually flinched, and then decided that Agent Scully must’ve been damn good at interrogations...
She said, “You mentioned our clearance rate. Maybe it’s not what it could be, but at the very least, we’ve been able to put a stop to more than one tragedy before it could happen, or failing that, before it could get worse. And the successes we have had are due to Agent Mulder and me working together.”
Colt shrugged. “If you say so. But I got a lot more closed cases under my name than you do, or that I did when I was partnered with your erstwhile kidnapper.”
*****
EL PASO COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINER’S OFFICE
EL PASO, TEXAS
APRIL 4
“Damn.”
Colt regarded the two bodies on slabs with a depressing sense of déjà vu.
“Something wrong, Agent Colt?” Mulder asked.
“Hm?” Colt looked up, having momentarily forgotten that he had two tagalongs. The three of them had been led by an assistant to this exam room, containing the two latest victims of what local news had been calling “the El Paso Ripper” for the past several years. “No, just—well, up until now, I was kind of half-entertaining the notion that EPPD screwed up, that this was just an unrelated double murder. But looking at these two now...”
A voice came from the doorway. “Nice to see you’re still a judgmental bastard, Jack.”
Looking over, Colt smiled at the entrance of the stooped-over form of Louise Gardner, the chief medical examiner for El Paso County. “Always, Louise, you know that.”
“You brought company this time?”
Indicating the other agents with his left hand, Colt said, “Dr. Louise Gardner, these are Agents Dana Scully and Fox Mulder. They’ll be helping me out.”
“Seriously? Your parents named you Fox? You got brothers named ABC, NBC, and CBS, too?”
Without missing a beat, Mulder said, “My oldest brother is named Dupont, but he’s kind of the black sheep of the family.”
Scully interjected before the banter could continue: “I’m also a medical doctor. I’d like to assist on the autopsy.”
Gardner grinned, showing off her dentures. “Agent Scully, you just made my assistant’s day. He’s been dreading this, and he’ll be more than happy to defer to you.”
Colt nodded. “I need to reinterview the witnesses.”
“I’ll come with you,” Mulder said.
With a wince, Colt started, “Look, Agent Mulder why don’t you—?”
“Do what Skinner asked and back you up? Sure.” Mulder shot a sardonic grin at Colt.
“Fine.” Colt let out a very long, very annoyed sigh.
“I’m gonna get started on Mrs. Underwood here,” Gardner said, pointing at the body of Eleanor Underwood, the first victim. “Agent Scully, whyn’t you scrub in and tackle Miss Alvarez?”
Scully nodded, and went over to the closet to get a set of scrubs.
Colt sighed, grateful that he’d managed to ditch one of them. With luck, he’d be able to dump Mulder, too.
The first person Colt and Mulder talked to was the husband of the first victim, Todd Underwood.
“Can you tell us where you were on the night of the 2nd, Mr. Underwood?”
“I told the cops all this already. Why you askin’ me this stuff?”
“We’re not the cops, Mr. Underwood,” Colt said patiently, “we’re the FBI, and we believe there may be a connection between Eleanor’s death and other deaths in the city over the past few years.”
Underwood blinked. “Say what? You talkin’ about the El Paso Ripper? Man, they got that sonofabitch in jail. Anyhow, I was at work.”
Mulder then asked, “Did Eleanor meet anyone new recently? Or did someone come back into her life that she hadn’t seen in a while?”
“Nah. I mean, she worked at one’a them call centers, and they got people comin’ and goin’ all’a time, so there was always new people there, but that’s it.”
Frowning, Mulder checked the file. “This says she’s unemployed.”
“Yeah, she got fired last week.”
Colt sighed. That wasn’t in the file, and he made a mental note to yell at Martin Johnson later.
Their next stop was Dona Alvarez’s roommate, Katarina Rossov. They both worked as nurses in the Bliss Private Hospital just outside of town.
“I’m glad you’re here, actually,” Rossov said with a slight Russian accent. “That detective asked me to telephone him if I recalled something, but I am afraid that I misplaced the business card he handed me. There was a man at the hospital who was very rude to Dona. He was visiting another client—this was about a week before she was attacked. It was either the 30th or the 31st. I know it was before the 1st, because it was before the doctors decided to play April Fool’s jokes on the nurses.” Rossov’s tone indicated how little she thought of that particular tradition.
“Why didn’t you mention this to the police?” Colt asked.
Rossov looked sheepish. “I had forgotten about it as soon as it happened, honestly—we get rude people in the hospital all the time—but I remembered this man after thinking because he was so rude.”
“Can you provide a description of him?”
“I am afraid not, but our hospital uses videotape surveillance. They keep all the tapes once they have been fully recorded on, for security purposes.”
Colt asked a few more questions, confirming as it said in the report that Alvarez didn’t have a boyfriend, then he and Mulder took their leave.
“Well,” Colt said, “I don’t want to get too optimistic, but we’re already in better shape than when we started, between this cranky hospital visitor and the job that Underwood got fired from.
I don’t want to count out the husband—though it’s too bad that Alvarez wasn’t seeing anyone.”
Mulder frowned. “What difference does that make? Serial killers like the El Paso Ripper almost never know their victims intimately. Sometimes they suffer delusions that they do, but they’re most often strangers. For that matter, all the people that the EPPD and you imprisoned have been strangers to the victims.”
“Yeah, and they’ve all been the wrong guy. Maybe it’s time to take a different approach.”
“Intimate contact doesn’t make sense,” Mulder said, “unless you think there’s a huge field of commonality between an unemployed telemarketer and a nurse at a private hospital.” He smiled. “Besides, people don’t usually need a reason to want to kill a telemarketer. And anyhow, your theory still holds—we already talked to Alvarez’s significant other.”
Colt frowned. “What?”
Indicating the small house with a shake of his head, Mulder said, “Didn’t you take a good look at the place? Only one bedroom, and the living room sofa doesn’t fold out. They slept in the same room, likely the same bed. They probably kept it quiet since they work together, and private hospitals in Texas tend to be funded by old-money Southern types who wouldn’t look kindly on a homosexual relationship.”
For several seconds, Colt just looked at Mulder. He wanted to argue the point, but looking back over his memory of the house, all the clues were there, not to mention how grief-stricken Johnson said that Alvarez was over her roommate dying.
“Sonofabitch.”
Mulder smirked. “Not bad for a sanity-challenged special agent.”
Colt sighed. He hoped Mulder wasn’t going to be this self-righteous for the entire case. “Fine, I think at this point we need to split up. I’ll go check out the place where Underwood worked, you go to Bliss Hospital and go through the tapes.” If he was going to get saddled with partners, he was damn well going to let one of them do the drudgework.
*****
DEW DROP INN, ROOM 120
EL PASO, TEXAS