Date sent: Tue, 28 Oct 1997 20:02:05 -0500 From: Rhondda Lake Subject: Unmasquerade 1/1 V This was written for the SPCDD Halloween contest. But I'm posting it here for the holiday. Enjoy! Disclaimer: CC, 10/13 and FOX own them. I am but borrowing them for a while. This is an answer for the SPCDD Halloween story challenge. Dedicated to my fellow SPCDDers. UNMASQUERADE by Rhondda Lake The music thrummed through him. He could feel it vibrate in his chest, stronger then the rhythm set by his own heart. It was not any tune he could recognize. It sounded classical. Fox Mulder looked around. The ballroom was gaudily decorated for Halloween. Mist hid the floor and made footing precarious. There was a smell. Old. Ancient. Dust and mold. Sickly sweet and burnt and smokey. It sent a shiver through him. He seemed to be the only man here. All around him milled women. Either tall and athletic or petite and willowy. They all wore elaborate costumes, their faces hidden by masks. Beads, feathers, paper mache... a few latex monstrosities. Their bodies draped in flowing fabrics, like something pulled from a seventeenth century French masqued ball. The women danced or moved around without making any noise. They didn't seem to speak, or hold any kind of congregation. Silent nymphs moving through the thickening mist. He couldn't remember how he had come to be here, in this ball room smelling of death and filled with women. He had the feeling he was missing something important. Mulder looked around. A glass of champaign was handed to him and he took it before noticing who was offering. The only other man here. The man released the glass and took a drag from his ever present cigarette. Mulder dropped the glass and reached for his gun, his heart at last beating louder then the music. He was unarmed, and the cigarette smoking man seemed amused. He took another drag, and the smoke he released mingled with the mist, adding another disquieting odor to the olfactory over-laden air. "You have to choose, Mr. Mulder. You only get one choice. You'd better hurry. We don't have all night." Mulder was confused for a moment, then understanding bloomed. He had to choose one of the masked women. But for what? A moment of passion in a dark room? A victim to the smoking man's plots? What sick game was this? The music faded and became the ticking of a clock. Each tick timed to his heartbeat. He felt urgency wash over him. He needed to choose. Mulder started to walk, peering at each woman as he passed, trying to see beyond the masks. Who was this? Who this? What was he choosing? Who would he choose? One woman twirled him into a dance for a few seconds. Another traced delicate fingers across his shoulders. Some closed in, asking to be chosen, trying to seduce with look or touch. He was mobbed by flowing silks and satins, gaudy masks and silent pleas. Frantically he pushed away from them. From the grasping, the wanting. They would devour him. He imagined sharp little daggerlike teeth behind those silent lips. As he pushed free he noticed her. Small and reserved she had not pushed at him. She didn't seem to care if he picked her or not. Her mask was an elaborate affair of white feathers, fashioned after an owl. Her hair hidden by a veil. Her gown was gauzy white silk, flowing around her. He knew her in an instant. Her height, her carriage, her form. "Scully?" Even as he reached forward and plucked the mask from her face he noticed the bright red stain seeping from the feathers. Horror seized him. The mask and veil slipped away to reveal his partner. She looked up at him sadly, and tried to staunch the flow of blood from her small, roman nose. He ripped her veil from the mask and tried to help, felt the blood seeping through. "Why? Why did you choose her?" They had voices now. The other women took up the chant in discordant whispers. He caught Scully as she went limp in his arms, as he tried to stop the bleeding, to stop the damned cancer from taking her from him then and there. He looked back at the other women, to ask for help, above their accusing questions, only to find they'd removed their masks. He was confronted by a room full of Samanthas, each demanding to know why he chose Scully over her. Mulder awoke with a hiss. He didn't hold Scully in his arms, just his well worn couch pillow. His own sweat had soaked through his tee shirt and slid against the leather of his couch. The static hiss of his television and the gentle bubbling of his fish tank the only sounds to disturb the room. If he didn't count his own ragged breathing. He heard a knock. Not on his door, but at one of his neighbors apartments. As he listened he could hear a chorus of children chime a merry "Trick or Treat" through the walls. Mulder sat up and held his head in his hands before running his fingers through sweat dampend hair. The nightmare was still vivid. Still enough to make him shiver as the sweat cooled on his body. Was he making a choice? Had he made it already? Was it the right one? His phone rang and he snatched it up, eager for any distraction. "Mulder." "It's me. Wanna come over and binge on leftover chocolate? I'm closing up shop for the night. Sent the last little goblin on his way." Scully's voice sounded light, almost happy in his ear. Mulder felt himself smile against the receiver. "Give me a few minutes. I'll rent Rocky Horror Picture Show and we can do the Time Warp." A snort. "I don't know if I'll dance, but if you drag your butt over here the rest of it's a deal." Mulder hung up the phone and headed for the shower. To erase the stink of his own fear. Yes. He decided. He made the right choice. -end Rhoni Lake Of course I'm in a bad mood -- someone just dropped a house on my sister!