Title: Tunnel Vision Author: spookycc Rating: Possibly PG, nothing more than the ep. Classification: Fill-in-the-blanks for "Medusa", Doggett POV. DF -- *Doggett Friendly* Summary: Doggett's take on "Medusa". Spoilers: Um, yes. :) For "Medusa". To be safe, for S8 so far. Disclaimer: No characters, human or canine, are mine. And no dogs were harmed in the making of this fanfic. :) Feedback welcomed at spookycc@earthlink.net Dedication: As ever, to Doggett's Bitch (f/k/a "Vixen" :). My soulmate, always. And for girlassassin, you know why. :) No beta-reader was used. All typos are my own. **** Tunnel Vision **** Boston Transit Subway System Sparks fly from more than the welder's torch as we meet with Deputy Chief Karras of the Boston Transit Police. He is instantly hostile, and I'm sure I'm not hiding my disbelief that he'd wanna run the trains again before we find out what killed the transit cop last night. We meet the people who will be going down in the tunnels with us. Dr. Lyle, from the CDC, Bianco, the transit cop, and Melnick, the engineer who oversaw the tunnel's construction some four years ago. They understand the need for Scully's expertise here - Karras explains she has experience with what he terms "equivocal death". Melnick pipes up. "Equivocal? I mean, either you're dead or you're not, right?" I hope no one notices my discomfort at *that* topic of discussion. I can't even explain what happened to me on my last case, and here we are on another X-File. They're puzzled at *my* presence. Like I'd let her go down there alone. I tell them I'm just "a good shot" and leave it at that. The heat and humidity hit me first. It's February, but the tunnels are stifling, and the humid air works its way up to the platform where we change. I'm more than happy to shed the suit, even if it means putting on Kevlar. I notice that Scully hasn't changed yet. Karras made it clear that the time pressure is on us. "You need some help with that?" God, that sounded bad. Scully doesn't catch it. She looks very serious. "No. You're going in without me." "What?" This is not like Agent Scully, not at all. She lowers her voice. "I don't know what kind of games are being played, but I'm gonna be much more effective analyzing the situation from up here." "Yeah, but I'm just a tag-a-long here." That pretty much describes my X-Files experiences thus far. "This is *your* thing. You've got all the experience." "You've got capable people with you, Agent Doggett," she returns. "What I need down there are eyes and ears." There's something more. I feel it. But I don't push the issue. If she wants to stay up top, then she has her reasons. That's good enough for me. I nod slowly in acceptance. "OK." I take the Eyes & Ears=81 unit from her. "I'll be your eyes and ears. I wish someone would tell me what the hell it is I'm supposed to be lookin' for." As we enter the tunnels, I tell her that I hope I'm sending her a good picture. "We've got you every step of the way," is her response. As we make our way further down, everyone is commenting on the climate. Hard to believe it's mid-winter up above, and hotter than hell down here. Dr. Lyle dryly comments that it's great we're enduring all this so that the good people of Boston can get home in time to watch Survivor 2. I smile to myself just a bit at that. Scully's voice comes through the earpiece, asking if I'm still reading her. "Like a songbird, Agent Scully." There's something very - personal - in this type of communication. It's like she's right here, *with* me, even though she's many feet above. She's never been more able to see things through my eyes. My thoughts are interrupted by shouts from Melnick. I rush back to where the rest are gathered around him. Shining the flashlight on the back of his neck, I describe his injury to Scully, in case the wound isn't clear on her screen. It looks like a burn. About silver dollar size. Wonder what she'll make of it? It looks to me like we're looking for a toxic leak, not a man, down here. Though the CDC robotic units didn't register anything. We saw a puddle back aways. Dr. Lyle pulls a sample and sends the analysis to Scully above. It turns out to be seawater. Well there's a breakthrough. I hear Karras' voice through Scully's mike. "Four hours, Agent Scully." I wish he'd stop riding her ass on this. Like we're gonna take any longer down here than we *have* to. Bianco sees a shadow ahead, and we follow its path to a fork in the line. This other tunnel is old, decommissioned. Should we spend time here or go on? It's a mile yet to where the train lost power. I opt to go in, just for a minute. Not surprisingly, I hear Scully voice my name. Twice. "Just takin' a look," I assure her. I'd hate like hell to walk right past the damn thing on our way to the location of the power loss. I ask Melnick whether we should investigate this tunnel or not. He should know whether it's worth the time. "Lotsa places to hide in here," he nods. I ask Dr. Lyle for her opinion. Instead she shouts at me to look out. I whirl around, hearing a yell in front of me. At the same time, something - something *big* - hits me square in the chest. It knocks the wind out of me , and I fall backward, hitting the dirt floor soundly. I hear Scully's voice in my earpiece, but I can't tell what she's saying right away. My mind is kinda fuzzy. Then it clears a little. "Can you hear me?" I struggle to get a full breath of air. I'm sure my answer is not encouraging, since I can only croak out a hoarse little "Yeah." Melnick offers me a hand up, but I'm still dizzy, so I ask him to give me a minute. Scully knows I'm "ok" now - I can afford a moment to get rid of the cobwebs in my head. No one knows what hit me when I ask - Dr. Lyle said it came at me like a "phantom". I roll over slowly, and come face to half-eaten face with what was probably once the assailant we're looking for. I hear my name in the earpiece again. "You call that equivocal?" Melnick muses. "Agent Scully?" I've gotta hear her take on this. She tells me she needs some data. Dr. Lyle is already transmitting the pictures. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Melnick walking further into the tunnel a few steps, until Lt. Bianco steps in front of him, firearm raised. Time to intervene here. "What's the problem?" I break their eye contact with each other. Bianco insists that since we found what we're looking for, we should get out of here. But Melnick has spotted something on the floor. I look where he points. Three bodies, in plastic. Scully asks me to get closer, but the smell prevents any *real* close-up view. She asks that they be uncovered, to see if the skin looks the same as the others. I don't wanna touch them, and I'm sure she didn't intend for me to, but I'm not sure I can uncover them without risking more contamination. She sees enough through the plastic to make an educated guess that the same contagion killed them. Dr. Lyle sees a shadow outside the cloth at the end of the tunnel. Lt. Bianco follows us back into the main tunnel, but then he decides for himsel f that it's time to get out. Thing is, *he's* not in charge down here. Scully tells me what I already know. If there's someone here, he could be infected as well. So could *we*. She is right in wanting us to remain here and find the unknown person. I can hear Karras through her mike again, telling her she's being "irrational". Now *there's* a word I don't use to describe Scully very damned often. While she and Karras argue, we're stranded where we stand, waiting to be told what to do, as if I don't already know. I ask her anyway. She tells us to leave the bodies and go after whomever else is in the tunnel. "All right, we just got our order." I bring the group together to move out. "We're gonna continue on." "Says who?" That's Bianco again. He's consistent, if nothing else. "Says the *boss*." That should shut him up. Instead, he walks from the back of the group and keeps pace beside me. He seems genuinely curious at first. "Agent Doggett, this agent you work with deals with weird stuff, right?" I nod. "She works on something called the X-Files. FBI cases dealing with unexplained phenomena." "You know her at all?" I lock my gaze with his, wondering where he's headed with this. "Yeah, I know her." (Although not as well as I feel I should by now.) "We've worked together for a short time." "I wonder why she sent you down here instead of coming herself." So that's where he's at. Trying to pit us against each other. If the situation weren'= t so serious, I'd laugh in his face. "It was the right call," I tell him simply. He gives me a look. "You gotta problem with that?" We both stop, and he answers. "Yeah. I got a problem with somebody I don't know that keeps me down here in the dark looking for jack squat, when we've already found our man." I hope I was never this one-dimensional when I was a cop. Well, he is a *transit* cop, after all. "It's a question of contagion." I wonder why he can't see that. Maybe he doesn't *wanna* see it. Or maybe he already *knows * about it. He pushes the issue. "It's a question of who's in charge." This alpha male chest-beating stuff is getting tiresome really fast. He's trying my patience, what little patience I haven't already sweated out. I hear Scully in my earpiece again, calm, cool. So she's been hearing all this, then. "Agent Doggett? You all right down there?" "Fine," I answer tonelessly. I can handle this crap, it's just annoying. "What'dya got for us?" We're close to where the train stopped now. I ask Scully what we're looking for. She doesn't really know, either. Melnick's shouts bring us back to him again. Shit - it looks like there's electrical current running through his arm. Scully's voice again, barely coming in over the man's shouts. She wants to know what it is. I wish to hell I knew. "Agent Scully, *talk* to me!" I need her advice. My instinct would be to pu t water on it, but with electricity, that could be dangerous, too. Scully advises to do just that, stressing fresh water. I pull the plastic canteen off my belt and empty it onto Melnick's arm. It seems to ease his pain, but he's in bad shape. "What *was* that?" Dr Lyle asks. Great. The CDC doc doesn't know what it is . "I don't know. And I don't like it that *you* don't know." I try to get answers from Scully, but she's as helpless as we are on this. Then she voices her real fear. A biochemical weapon. "Great!" That's just frikkin' great. Bianco asks what Scully said. "She sai d a lotta people might be takin' cabs home tonight." Bianco is still ranting about Scully's "guessing" what's going on, but my partner's voice mercifully pulls me away from that, and his voice fades to background noise. As usual, hers is the voice of reason. Cool. Rational. Sh e lets me know that the only place anyone could be hiding is just ahead, abou t a hundred yards. Melnick can't be moved, so I leave Dr. Lyle with him. We'll have a hazmat team pick them up. Bianco follows me, but only reluctantly. We come upon an abandoned station, and I try to raise Scully on the headset. There is no response. "Here we are pissin' away our time, and she's asleep at the wheel," Bianco grouses. Screw him. I keep tryin' to get Scully. "C'mon, Agent Doggett," he chides. "Make a decision. Let's get outta here." "We gotta find whoever it is that's still down here, Lieutenant." "And what if we don't find him?" he argues. "Maybe it'll be *us* they find laying face-down on the floor, dead." While we "debate" on whether or not my partner knows what she's doing, something catches my eye. On Bianco. He's got green glowing areas on his hands and face. He's *infected*. I bring his attention to it. I think he already knew. "The stuff's *on* me. You see that? It's spreading! I *told* you, Agent Doggett, we shoulda gotten out." "That's exactly why we gotta stay." He's blind to the implications here. If this gets out, it could threaten the whole city. I try to calm him down, bu t he's panicked. He starts walking away, so I pull my gun on him. I ask him to put his weapon down, and he does so, very slowly. I lean over just a bit, to pick it up... Bianco kicks dirt from the floor into my face - while I can't see, he nails me on the left side of my head, and I fall into a darkness much deeper than the tunnel's.... I hear a voice. My eyes still closed, I take deep breaths and try to remember where the hell I am. The voice is insistent. Concerned. It's my partner. "Agent Doggett?!" I wonder how many times she's said *that* while I was out . I wonder how long I've *been* out. I mutter something that she takes to be the affirmative. "I'm here. I hear ya." I'll bet she's been getting a dandy picture of the ceiling while I'm lyin' down here. Damn, my head hurts. I hear a relieved sigh on the headset. "God, you had me- I started fearing the worst." Her voice is much softer now, but no less concerned. I know she thinks I was infected, but I tell her it was just Bianco blind- siding me. Then I sit up and look around. Bianco is gone. I tell Scully this, and explain that he was infected. There's an uncomfortable pause, and then she asks, "And what's your condition, Agent Doggett?" I look down at my hands. A green, glowing residue is all over them. Damn. "= I assume it's not good." I hear concern in her voice again. She wants to send a hazmat team down to quarantine me. But if I wait for them, Bianco could get out of the tunnels and into the city. I can't let that happen. I walk for a few moments, hearing Scully's end of conversations above. Then her voice is directed my way again. "Agent Doggett, we've got a new wrinkle." "Don't tell me." I bet it's not a *good* wrinkle. "We're running out of time. It's twenty to four." "I'm movin' as fast as I can." Granted, that ain't too fast, but there you are. "Agent Doggett, you shouldn't be moving at *all*," her voice softens again, with just a touch of "Doctor Scully" in it. I don't need to explain to my partner the need to find Bianco, to keep him isolated. She understands that all too well. She's worried about *me*, and although I appreciate that in more ways than I can express right now, I hafta find him. She warns me that the toxin could react to an increase in body temperature, or heart rate, and I counter by telling her that maybe just *moving* is keeping it from causing a reaction. We just don't know, and she agrees with that. "Just make sure Karras holds those trains 'til I find Bianco." I hear a heavy sigh on the headset before Scully lets me know there are already passengers at the next station. "You tell that son-of-a-bitch he's gotta clear the system! He's-" Something catches my attention. It's Bianco, on the floor, hurt. I hear my partner giving directions to someone on-line with the CDC. "Agent Scully, what do you want me to do?" "Get out of there, Agent Doggett," she responds. "What about this man?" Her voice is tinged with more worry. "I'm gonna send a hazmat team down for him, but from what I've seen, the reaction's progressive." She wants me to get away from him, to avoid further contamination. Bianco asks me not to leave him here. There's only one option, really. I help him to his feet and we work our way through the tunnels, very slowly . I see something ahead, and lay Bianco down to pursue whatever it is. It's a boy - he looks like he might be a homeless kid, I dunno. He won't respond t o my questions. He only points off down the tunnel. Scully is worried about contagion again, but the boy is not infected. This is apparently the piece of the puzzle Scully needed. She figures out what causes the contagion to react on the skin. It's sweat. "Just my luck." If I sweat much more, we'll hafta *pour* my clothes off whe n I get outta here. *If* I get outta here. Scully explains the electrical current is carried by the sweat, and I wonder... Electricity... The boy wants me to follow him, so I do. He enters a room aglow with green residue - on the ceiling, walls, pooling on the floor. It reminds me briefl y of the green slime in the hospital room where I found Scully that day... Tracing our course on her monitor, Scully locates a tunnel link where she could get a hazmat team in to quarantine us and get us the hell out. Sounds like a plan. I go back and help Bianco through the room, onto the main track, close to an access point. But the puddle is leaking into the main tunnel. "We got big, big problems here," I inform Scully. "Yes we do," she agrees. "You see this flood?" "No, it's worse than that." The tension in her voice is raised a notch. Great. This impossibly hopeless situation just keeps getting worse and worse. "I think this moron Karras has started the trains rolling." Dammit! I glance at the "go" switch above our heads, and sure enough it flashes red to green. There's a train in the tunnel. In *this* tunnel. I lean Bianco against the wall, and leave the boy to help him. I've only taken a few steps onto the track, avoiding the live third rail, when I don'= t need my flashlight anymore. The train's headlights illuminate the whole damned tunnel. Scully is yelling at me to get off the tracks, to get out of here, but I need to keep the contagion from spreading to the people on the train. I'm n o hero, but I can't let this infection get out of the tunnel. It's just that simple. Worried for me, she's not seeing the bigger picture right now. I pull the gun from Bianco's hands, with difficulty. The lieutenant has a death-grip on the gun, and it takes a few moments to pry it away. Does he really think he can shoot his way out of whatever the hell we've stumbled into? I let Scully know I have an idea, but I don't bother telling her how far-fetched it is. She's already worried enough. I ram the gun into the green water by the third rail, and wait for the trai n to make the circuit complete. Just before it hits the spot, I jump off the track - right into the wall. I hear the train shriek as it hits the circuit, and the tunnel is lit by what looks like lightning, everywhere. I lean heavily against the wall wher e I landed, trying to catch my breath. Sounds of static electricity fill the tunnel, and I can't hear for a few moments. When I *can* hear again, her voice is there. "-Can you hear me?!" is all I catch of whatever she has said. "Yeah," I answer as best I can. My chest is heaving - it feels like electricity still buzzes through the tunnel. "Yeah, I'm here." "Thank God," I hear her much-relieved voice, and I feel a ripple of warmth course through me, despite the fact that I'm sweating bullets already. "Uh- I lost you on the visual." I fiddle with the controls on my headset, and hear her again. "OK. OK, I've got you. You're back." I somehow manage to get to my feet, and gaze down the track at the tail lights of the subway train. I see electricity still buzzing around the puddle below me, and then the green glow of the water is gone. I look at my hands, knowing Scully can see them as well. It looks like the infection is gone, too. I stand motionless for a few moments, looking at Bianco and the boy. The lieutenant's expression is not unreadable, but he doesn't speak. "Are you ok?" Scully again, softly this time, reminding me she's still up there, she's still concerned. Like I'd *forget* that. "I can only hope, Agent Scully." The four hundred yards to the access tunnel might as well be four hundred thousand. Bianco and I make it about halfway there, before the injuries of the day finally take their toll. I send the boy on ahead to meet the hazmat team, as my legs give way underneath me... I slip into half-awareness as I feel the jostling that tells me I'm being loaded onto a stretcher. I've been *here* before, that's fersure. But never in quite this state of - whatever state I'm currently in. The ride up the stairs is no picnic, and by the time we reach the platform, I'm a little more alert. They slide the stretcher onto a gurney for the ride to the EMS unit. If I tilt my head back a bit, I can see the red reflection of the ambulance lights. I wish I could see outside, somehow. I was down in that tunnel for so long. I'd like to see daylight. Rolling along, watching the rows of platform lights race across the ceiling , I'm almost dizzy enough to pass out again. I close my eyes to shut out the distorted view above. I feel a little jolt as we bump lightly into what I'm guessing is the back bumper of the ambulance. It doesn't help my pounding headache a damn bit, and I squeeze my eyes tighter, to try to ease the pain a little. "Whoa, hang on a second!" I hear a voice that *still* sounds like it comes from above, even though she's right beside me now. My partner has caught up to the gurney, and I *feel* her right here, even though my eyes are still shut. I exhale a huge breath. I can't even begin to explain my relief that she's here now. "Agent Doggett?" she's noticed my unsuccessful attempt to beat down the headache by clenching my eyes shut even tighter. "Are you ok?" "Yeah, just swell," I respond. I open my eyes and look into hers. They are distorted a bit by the hazmat suit she wears. And they look darker than usual. Troubled. It's probably just my eyes adjusting after being down in the tunnels for so long. Or not. Using her best "Doctor Scully" technique, she talks them into letting her ride along to Boston General. They slide the gurney in, and she settles in on one side while the EMT hooks me up to a few more monitors on the other. He gives us as much privacy as you can get in the business end of an EMS unit, as he radios ahead to the hospital. I feel a hand - her hand - on my arm. Even though she wears protective gloves, her touch warms me, and I feel safe, for the first time in about five hours. "You're gonna be fine. It looks like you're pretty much clear o f the contagion. We're just gonna take you in, clean you up and run some tests, to make sure." She nods like she's convincing herself as well as me. I turn my head a little, and glance at her gloved hand. "Not takin' any chances, though, huh?" Shit! I didn't mean that the way it came out! She pulls her hand away like she's touched a hotplate. She thinks I'm backhandedly referring to her not going down there with me. I know she does. "Scully - I didn't mean-" "No, it's ok. You've got every right to feel that way." "*What* way? You made the right call. We needed you up there with that idio t Karras. You figured out what caused the contagion to react. *You* got my as s outta there." She nods, unconvinced, and her eyes turn a shade darker. It's not my own eyes playing tricks this time. I know a troubled look when I see one. I've seen a lot of them. I reach over with the hand that's not trapped by an IV line, and lay it ato p hers. She raises her head and looks down at me again. And she takes the gesture as an invitation to speak. Good. "When you were 'down', Agent Doggett," she begins. "Which time?" I try to lighten the mood a little. She *almost* smiles. Almost. "*Both* times. There was a part of me that wanted to pitch my headset in the trash and come down after you. I think yo u deserve an explanation why I didn't do that." I shake my head. "You don't owe me any explanation, Agent Scully. You did what you felt you needed to do, and I did what I needed to do. There was no point in exposing yourself to the organism when we already had a team in th e tunnel." Why the hell did I say that? I really need to *know* why she didn't come along. It's her ball game, but I felt a deeper reason - I *still* feel it. And I feel isolated, by more than her hazmat suit, when she won't open up t o me. Scully looks at the floor of the vehicle, then back at me. "There are... *medical* reasons why it's more unsafe than it would normally be for me to expose myself to anything hazardous." I knew something was going on, with the personal time and the hospital admittance. Please, God, don't let her tell me that her cancer has returned . How could I tell her what it would do to me to lose her now? I couldn't. She'd never understand. Her heart is somewhere else, with Agent Mulder. "What is it, Agent Scully?" I push as gently as I can. Despite my urgent need to hear what she is saying, I feel my eyes drifting shut. Damn. The pain meds kicking in. If she answers my question, I'm no longer awake to hear it... **** Boston General Hospital I run a finger over my left cheekbone as I lay waiting for the nurse to return. It's still a little tender, nothing major. Bet I'll have a nice shiner, though. I don't know why I have to stay here any longer. I feel *fine*... Damnit, the nurse said she'd be right back. Where the hell is she? I push the call button for the third time, call "Nurse!" a couple times, and finally I just get out of bed, intent on finding her. I see a glimpse of red just outside the door, and then I'm stopped in my tracks by my partner, looking very much "Doctor" Scully. I feel like a little boy caught trying to sneak out of school. "Where do you think you're going?" she asks. Damn, that schoolboy image hit s me again, and I smile sheepishly. "To find the nurse. She said she was gonna talk to the doctor about me goin ' home. I could be dyin' in here, for all she knows." "Well you're not, Agent Doggett," Scully replies. She explains that she met the nurse and has the information from the doctor. I'm clear of the infection. Let's cut to the chase. "Well, can I get outta here?" "Yes." She looks pleased to be able to tell me that. I start to walk around to the curtained divider, to change into my clothes, when I suddenly remember about the back of hospital gowns. With just a hint of a smile, I turn to face my partner, and walk sideways into the changing area. Scully has the good sense to avert her eyes a bit, in case I hadn't turned fast enough. I trust this woman with my life, and she does the same with me. But when it comes down to familiarity, we really don't know each other all that well. I n the ways that count in the field, yes. I usually know exactly what she's gonna do, how she's gonna react, and that's saved my ass a coupla times. Bu t after hours? She is still very much closed-off to me. I realize that I really wish that were different. Pulling my mind back to the case as I pull on my pants, I ask about the res t of the people who were in the tunnel with me. Scully tells me that the boy is with social services, and that plastic surgeons are working on Bianco an d Melnick. Dr. Lyle has been discharged. I slip my t-shirt on over my head. Glad they were able to bring our suit- cases up here, 'cuz I don't *ever* wanna see that shirt I was wearing in th e tunnel again. "You know, I'd like to think that this is over," I tell my partner. "But there's gonna be hell to pay for these guys." "No... it's *over*, Agent Doggett," I hear from outside the curtain. I step out, not caring that I'm still zipping up my pants. "Excuse me? This guy Karras put a *train* back on the tracks. He recklessly endangered peoples' lives." Scully holds up the envelope she carries. "But there is no proof of that." "What do you mean, there's no proof?" With a sigh, Scully explains that the organism is dead. There is no trace o f it anymore. It was destroyed, probably by the electrical charge I set off. I don't try to hide a look of disgust, as I slip a dress shirt on. "We've got victims. Dead bodies." Since they were infected with a pathogen that still hasn't been identified, Scully tells me that not one criminal charge will stick. "These guys were just doing their job," she goes on. "Keeping the trains running." She pauses, and lowers her eyes. "But they've got you to thank. And not just for saving their butts." "No, you figured it out," I insist, "I was just your eyes and ears." By now she *has* to know I'd do almost anything for her, without question. Is it too much to ask for a little openness in return? She smiles. I think her smile affects me like it does because I see it so rarely. She hasn't had much to smile *about* since Mulder disappeared last year. And then there's whatever health issues she's still keeping from me. "Agent Scully-" I start. she raises her head, and meets my eyes, just for a moment. I feel like maybe it's time. Maybe *now* she'll tell me what the hell is *really* going on. Maybe she'll pick up the thread of conversation I zoned out of in the ambulance. Damned pain meds. Just that quickly, the moment passes. A sad look crosses her face, and her voice almost sounds teary. "Let's go home." And she is gone. I watch her thoughtfully as she leaves the room. Then I grab the rest of my clothes, still stuffed in my suitcase, and follow her down the hall and out of the hospital. I feel like I was *so* close, and no w I'm right back where I started, with nothing. I wonder if she'll ever *really* open up to me. ~fini~ Author's Notes: Doggett's thoughts as they leave the hospital should "feel" familiar. That'= s intentional. They're almost Mulder's exact words to Scully in one of the last scenes of FTF. Much appreciation as always to Doggett's Bitch, who did a bit of beta-ing o n this piece, as well as the always-welcome Doggett insights. :)