X-Files : Virtual Murder

Please note two things: One the Red Dwarf story has been deleted to make room for the following X-Files tale.
The second thing I have to say is that I am advising people that this story contains moderate bad language and violence and some gore.  Please reader discretion may be advisable.

PART ONE

Prologue:

“Yeah Ralf, I own you man, I like totally own you!”
Tom centered the cross hairs again with a deft touch of his control pad.
They switched from white to red and in that instant, Tom’s thumb hit the fire button.
Ralf’s character spun round as the slug took him square in the side of his head.
A cloud of red mist indicated where Ralf’s character’s head had been, and the body collapsed in on itself.

Mentally Ralf, counted down from five to zero. The screen briefly went black and he smiled as he realised that he had re spawned on a rooftop. The sniper rifle spun slowly in a green circle.
He moved his player forward and smiled again as he heard the beep that indicated he had the gun, and a full clip of ammo.
Ralfquickly moved as his target radar indicated enemy units too his right.
Get under cover, he told himself. No worries he thought.
He crouched behind a partially demolished wall and waited.

There! Sharky was in sight. Pity it wasn’t Tom but hey, Sharky was one of Tom’s team and he was almost as big a pain in the ass.
Team Alpha were a cocky bunch that needed bringing down a few pegs. True they had talent, but the cockiness, bordering on arrogance, pissed off a lot of the other teams in the league.
Ralf clicked the right trigger and the image zoomed in on Sharky, who was moving forward using the terrain as cover. He focused, shutting out the taunts from Team Alpha and his own inter team chatter.
He gripped the control pad a little tighter and held his breath.

Come on, he thought, move forward you son of a bitch, move forward!

Yes! Sharky obliged Tom’s wishes.
Sharky’s character fell, minus it’s right arm. He heard ‘Sharky’ cuss and advise his squad to find the sniper, but Ralf was already on the move.
He jumped from one roof top to another and headed for a chimney stack. He checked the target radar again.
Figures below according too the scope. Two green blips, those were his own team mates, but they were going to be flanked!
He could yell over the headset but that would tip off the enemy that he knew what they were up too. So the best thing to do was to keep quiet and get the drop on the bastards.

He moved too the left hand side of the chimney.
Any second now, they’ll come past that burnt out school bus and be exposed.
Shoot one, and move and hopefully his mates would be able to see the second man and deal with him.
Wait, he told himself, wait. There you go!
Zoom in, raise it too ten percent and zero in on the lead guy’s head.
He squeezed the trigger and splat! Another one fragged!
And the back up man had been spotted and the guys he saved took him out with a quick burst of an Uzi.

“Thanks Tom!” he heard Del say.
“No worries Del, could have yelled but that would have tipped them off”
“Understood” said Del.
Mitch also thanked him and it was then that Tom got wasted.
The message came up, “You were filled with lead by Ralf’s Colt .45”
“Bastard!” he hissed and imagined Ralf’s face split by a cocky grin.
Del spoke up, “Careful, it’s getting personal between you two. Keep a level head Ralf, this is a friendly, the tournament isn’t until Saturday!”

Ralf nodded as again he counted down and focused every ounce of his concentration.
Three…two…one. Right, whose next?
Tom respawned. He pictured himself now on the battlefield. He was now in the zone.
His surround system took him away from the console room, took him out of the cyber club.
He was there, in his head he was on the battlefield.

Tom no longer felt his hands on a control pad, to Tom he was holding the knife in his hand and there, there was Ralf, sighting along the barrel of his rifle.

He drew back his arm and the knife flew straight and true.

Ralf’s character took the blade square in the ribs, just beneath his arm.
As he turned to see who had thrown the knife, Tom opened up with his 9.mm pistol.
Ralf swore as he watched his character fly backwards, as three bullets struck him in the chest.

“Yeah laugh that off you moron!” taunted Tom over the headset.
“Yeah whatever! Look kid, you ain’t that hot you know. So you nailed me, big deal.
Your single kill against me, doesn’t alter the fact that I wasted your ass twelve times.
Twelve times! Count them, you snot nosed punk! And just wait until Saturday, I’ll make it
my personal assignment to kick your punk ass!”

The club moderator warned them to watch their language and behaviour. But both kids
scowled at each other from across the club room.
“Man it’s only a game!” he muttered, “You’d think it was a matter of life and death!”

After the kids had gone, the club staff had a brief go at the game the kids had been practicing
with.Weapons of War 2 the logo read. What the hell was the fuss all about? It’s just a game for
God’s sake…..

In the privacy of his own bedroom, with his headphones on, was where Tom was happiest.
Here immersed in his own private world, he could just tell his problems, his anxieties to just go too hell.
So okay mum and dad were still around to give him grief about homework and study but not tonight, in fact, not this weekend. Mum's sister was ill and so she and Dad had both gone over to visit her, leaving him free for the next three days to do whatever the hell he wanted.

He was only a little bit behind with his homework but as it was mostly reading some novel by some dead guy, it wasn't as if he still didn't have time. The test wasn't until Tuesday anyway, and the book was only 120 pages long, if that. No big deal.
Tom switched on his console and logged onto his account.
He opened the forums and checked to see what games were currently active.
Oh look, he mused, Ralfs clan were on line, and yeah there was Ralf himself.

He saw that they were playing an older game than Weapons of War 2, but that didn't matter.
Tom crossed his bed room and found the game disc he needed.
He smiled as Moving Targets title sequence blasted through his speakers. Right, he thought, headset on and log on.
Time to make Ralfs life a misery; this time he would own him. Yeah, this time it would be a different story.

EPISODE 1

Dana Scully rubbed tired eyes with the palm of her hand. They felt as if they were full of grit, and her head was beginning to throb.
The text on the screen of her laptop was starting to blur in front of her eyes. Maybe it was time to take a break, she thought. But this report should be on Deputy Head Skinner's desk tomorrow morning, so she stretched and decided it was time for some fresh air.

She just couldn't understand how the other guys could spend hours squinting at their monitor screens like they did. Dana wondered if some of them had real lives to live outside of the office.
She became aware of a shadow falling over her, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw a figure standing in the doorway.
“Mulder” she muttered, “What can I do for you?”
“Wrong” came the reply, “It's me Doggett your new partner, remember?”
“Sorry” she said. “It's just that I still expect him to walk through that door at any moment.

He's done this before you know, gone AWOL and just turned up out of the blue”
Doggett smiled, “I've heard the stories Dana. I understand that he's an enigma, and a maverick, but Dana it's been three months now. He's never been away that long before has he?”
Dana shook her head, “No, not for this long. Anyway is there something I can do for you?”
“Actually I was about to ask you the same thing. Can I get you a drink, maybe some food?”
Dana smiled, “Let's hit the café down the street, my treat”

He smiled and passed her her coat.
They left her office in darkness, except for the light coming from Dana's laptop monitor screen.

“Tom is that you? Jesus man, didn't you have enough this afternoon?”
“Yeah Ralf, it's me and I'm gonna show you all that you shouldn't ignore me or for that matter disrespect the clan”
He heard Ralf snigger, “Look you and that clan are a bunch of pussies! You guys ain't fit enough to shine our damned boots! Get over it man, your team sucks and you suck the most!”
Then some other punk chipped in; “You tell him Ralf!”
Tom scowled and then snapped back, “This is none of your freaking business, stay out of it!”
The other kid came back with; “Yeah? This is our clan's server jackass, we are the hosts so this is my business!”
“Okay”, replied Tom, “Let's just play then shall we?”

Once again Tom got in the zone. The control pad wasn't a pad, it was his gun.
The derelict buildings were no longer on the screen, they were all around him. The distant hum of his heat sink was the breeze blowing through the trees.
He approached the plaza, hitting the button that put him in stealth mode without thinking about it.
Tom slipped past the defunct fountain, past the overturned news-stand. He crouched to avoid being seen through the windows of the building he was now moving along.
There, he thought, there's one of them now.

Tom saw the name tag on the man's uniform, not over his head.
The guy's name was Kent, and he was looking for a target to hose down with his Uzi machine gun.
He sited down the barrel of his Walther and squeezed off one shot straight too the head.
Despite his anger, despite the days frustrations and the countless taunts and insults, his hand was steady, his aim true.
Even as Kent fell, Tom saw another slipping into view too his left.
The Rock says, what kind of dumb name was that? Another jerk!

And then Ralf started typing private messages too him on screen, to distract him.
He did his best to ignore it, but dammit, Ralf was such a god-damned ass clown!
He felt the anger rising and as his finger pressed the button on the control pad, he felt all the anger flow through him and even though The Rock says had dropped, he kept pumping rounds into the guy's body....

The Rock says aka, Billy Watts, heard the sound of the footsteps through his headset and scowled.
Where the hell was the guy? He checked the screen but couldn't see him at all.
Then Bill could have sworn he heard footsteps in his room, even through the headphones.
What the heck? Was that someone in his room?
No way dude, he was alone and the house was locked up tighter than a drum. So who was that?
Maybe I'm imagining this, he thought. He closed his eyes and opened them up again quick.

The shadow was gone. Yeah trick of the light...and then there came the flash and Billy Watt's game was over.

Dade County Coroner's Office: June 21^st 2001, 7:30am

Dana looked down at the body on the slab and conceded too her professional colleague from the police department, that this was an odd one indeed.
Again she examined the wound on the kid's forehead and well, it looked like a bullet hole, and the exit wound in the back of the skull seemed to confirm it.
But after a more than thorough search of the boy's bedroom, they hadn't found the bullet despite it being a through and through. What was even stranger was the size of both wounds. Neither of them added up to being inflicted by any known calibre of bullet on the data base.

And there were no fragments of lead in the kid's skull or brain. No trace of a bullet at all.
If the gun had gone off at point blank range there would be powder burns from the muzzle flash, but there wasn't any. But there was no doubt, something had blown the back of the kid's head off.
Billy Watts, aged 20, she read and then sighed, what a waste she thought. She felt a headache coming on.
She disposed of her rubber gloves in the waste bin and joined Agent Doggett outside the room.

“Like they said, a complete puzzler even by our standards. The kid suffered severe trauma too the head, but they haven't found a bullet, and gun shot residue, nothing. And the kid was in a securely locked house and there was no sign of a break in. No foreign fingerprints, no sign of an intruder.
All we have is a dead kid and a couple of distraught parents and a grieving girl friend.”
Doggett shook his head, and gently laid a hand on her shoulder.
“Something will come up, it always does” he said, and mentally he crossed his fingers.

It had been a good night and the day had gotten off to a pretty good start as well.
Last night, Tom had scored the highest kill rate. In fact one kid had logged off right after he had gotten a stealth kill and yeah, he'd even been able to do his study work over breakfast.
Yeah, life was good! Now maybe, just maybe, Ralf would keep his freaking mouth shut!
If he didn't, well no problem, Tom would show them all again why they shouldn't write him off.
Yeah tonight he'd kick ass all over again and enjoy every freakin' minute of it!

END OF PART 1

                                                                                                   X-FILES: VIRTUAL MURDER
                                                                                                                   LEVEL 2

Ralf's apartment June 22nd  10:15 a.m

Ralf's eyes scanned the monitor screen as the list of servers and game types scrolled down the screen.  Who shall I totally own next? he wondered.
Yeah that will do nicely, there were some guys on that clan list that needed reminding that Ralf Sawyer was no damned push over!
Smiling he logged in....

Doggett walked away from the graveyard.  He had attended the funeral on Dana's behalf.
An assumedly, unrelated hit and run incident had kept her away from the service.  He didn't know Billy Watts or his family, protocol demanded
that the Beaureau at least show some respect too the innocent victim.
True the kid wasn't totally innocent, he had been busted for posession of marijuanna on two occaisions, had two unpaid traffic tickets and had also been
reprimanded for under age drinking, but on the whole he wasn't a bad kid.  He had good grades, hadn't bunked off of school and had managed to get
himself an attractive girlfriend, three years his senior.
He removed his shades and offered his condolences too the kid's mom and briefly shook hands with the father.  It was over, another life ended before it's time.
Dogget just wished he and Dana could get the bastard responsible sooner rather than later.  Nobody outside of the service would ever understand just how
shitty it felt to sit there and tell grieving relatives that sorry, as of yet you have no clue as to motive for the crime, never mind the identity of the killer.

Ralf moved through the sand covered streets of some anonymous middle eastern town.  He and the rest of his squad moved as one.
He very rarely played team death match, too many jerks that forgot what being in a team meant.  But this team were all newbies and were, to be blunt,
getting their butts handed too them on a plate.
It didn't help that the opposing team were verbally putting them down and destroying their morale.  Everyone deserved a chance to prove themselves dammit!
"Hey Warwick", he said into his head set, "Watch your right flank!  Oh man, I said watch it!"
"Yeah Warwick, watch me blow your friggin' brains out, you moron!"  taunted the opposing player even as he pumped Warwick's avatar with lead.
"Hey Joey whilst you are boasting and taunting, guess whos'e behind you!"
Ralf grinned as Joey's avatar turned to face Ralf and got the butt of his AK 47 rammed into his digitised face.  Laughing he pumped two shots into the downed
soldiers chest. 
"Hey he's down, melee attack killl man!  No need to shoot him as well, that's like just rubbing his face in the crap man!" some guy complained.
"Oh yeah?  Look Bart Simpson, it was okay for you to flambe Mick with a flamethrower and then pump him full of 0.guage shot gun pellets was it?
Blow it out of your ear man!"
Simpson didn't have an answer too that.  He also had no answer for Ralf's accurately pitched grenade that blew him too smithereens.
"Assholes" he muttered....right next target! 
"Hey Mitch watch your back!"
Mitch turned and despatched his attacker; "thanks dude"
"Your welcome" replied Ralf....


F.B.I Offices Dade County  12:30 p.m.

"How was the funeral?" asked Scully softly as she went over the final notes from the hit and run.
"Same as normal, everyone crying, praising the kid too the heavens, the usual" he said
"That sounds cynical to say the least" said Dana with some reproach in her voice.
"Maybe it does. I hate funerals" he said, "I don't mean any disrespect, but heck, a funeral's bad enough but to get the cold shoulder from some
of the relatives because you have not caught the killer, now that really blows.  It isn't the right time or place to tell them that there's not even the
remotest hint or clue as to how the crime was actually commited.
I just wanted to tell 'em something that would help but couldn't.  It's always the same."
"I know, been there, done that, bought more than one tee shirt" she said now with sympathy, "Sounds like you need a vacation"
"I need a vacation?  That's good coming from Miss Burn the candles at both ends!" he said it with a smile and she smiled back.
True, she mused, I have put a lot of hours in since Mulder went missing, without a break.   Who am I to judge?
"God", she said, stretching tired limbs and a stiff back, "I need a coffee"
"Good" said Doggett, "I'm buying"

Ralf's apartment 12:40 p.m.

"Whoa great shot!  You took that dip shit Ralfie out nooo problem dude!"
"Yeah the dumb mother never saw it coming!  That Ralfie, is how you use a sniper rifle, ya hear me butt munch?"
I'll show you thought Ralf.  Keep taunting jackass just a few seconds longer, 'cause the longer you and your boyfriend stand together, the easier and the sweeter
this will be!
He took aim and let them have it from medium range, his M-16 turning them spinning them around before they literally bit the dust.
"Whos'e laughing now girls?" he said, his voice dripping with malice. 
Those two had really been pissing him off, just like Billy Watts had and look what happened too him!  But hey, like he topped himself, not my fault he couldn't
live with the fact that he was a complete and utter loser!
He took great delight in waiting for 'Bart Simpson' to respawn before letting him have it again.
"Hey spawn killin' ain't allowed!" 'Bart' said.
"Dude I lost count how many times you and whats his face, did the same to my newbie squad so go swivel on a stick!  One rule for some and another for
others yeah?  Just 'cause this is your sucky clan's server don't give you the right to break your own rules and then piss and moan about it when some guy
gives you back the same grief.  Live with it, or log off loser!"
"The clan does NOT suck!" complained Barts partner.  What the hell was his name again?
Oh right, Deuce.
"Deuce is that so?  Well where was the rest of the Clan when I took you out last time?  Shouldn't you guys be watching out for each other?  You have as
much of an idea as to what team work is then my pet chinchilla and he's smarter than the lot of you!  Oh Deuce, by the way......"
"Yeah what?"
"SURRRPRISE!" and ralf sent the rocket launcher on it's way....

Twelve blocks away, Lenny Harker was one second watching his monitor as his character moved across a roof top and the next, he was trying desperately
to dodge the incoming missile that was beginning to fill his screen. 
He knew there was nowhere to run too, nowhere to hide now but heck he had to try!  In despair he ran towards the roof edge, even as the fireball in all of it's
pixilated glory filled the screen behind his character.  In true Die Hard fashion, his character dived off the roof and he turned away from the monitor.
He didn't wanna see the impact with the ground, or watch his character get blown to pieces.  He wanted to kill his speakers, so he couldn't hear the explosion in surround sound. 
But it was so real....he thought he could feel the heat from the incoming rocket....no that was just plain stupid.  But he turned as his monitor exploded and shards of glass
punctured his face and a large sliver sliced through his right eye.  He was dead before he hit the carpeted floor of his bedroom. 
He was dead before the exploding shell took out his PC, blew out his bed room window and the flames consumed the room and tore apart his body.....

Dade County: 2:30 P.M Outside of Lenny Harker's apartment building.

"Never seen anything like it" Fire Chief Anderson grunted,  "I mean there was an explosion, took the damned window out, burnt the room and the kid too a crisp,
but left the rest of the upstairs room intact.  Sheeit, it never even went past the bedroom door, in fact the door although burnt is still standing in the frame.
The building next door should be damaged but it ain't.  It's like theres been a case of spontaneous combustion up there, over in seconds.  And if I didn't know better,
I'd say his PC is the culprit.  BOOOM.  But I ain't seen nothing like it before and I pray to God I never see it again."
Dana Scully could only hope he was right.  She pulled on her rubber gloves and signalled to Doggett that it was time for them to see the evidence for themselves.....


                                                                                                       END OF LEVEL 2

                                                                                                       LEVEL THREE

The computer was indeed a molten mess.  The screen had shattered with the force of the blast, and had reduced it too fragments that filled the space of the room with shrapnel that had cut clothing and shredded flesh like a thousand mini razor blades.  Doggett picked his way through the debris as Dana studied the window frame.
"The glass is inside the room as if something took out the window from outside.  That doesn't add up."
Doggett grunted his agreement, "Yeah and the back casing of the PC looks like it's been impacted by a projectile.  But the wall around the window is undamaged.  Just what in the name of hell is going on here?"
"Two deaths, both right out of that Final Destination movie.  Nothing to connect the two guys, except that they played on line war games." she murmured.
Doggett shrugged, "Perhaps that is the connection?  They both played these games but that doesn't explain what happened does it?  Have the technician's salvaged anything from the last vic's hard drive?"
Scully shook her head 'no'.   "It's badly damaged, but they think they can salvage something but it's going to take some time.  They'll check for malicious emails, see what he downloaded, that sort of thing"
Doggett studied the shelves of the kid's room.
"This one liked graphic novels, something the other kid didn't.  Batman, Spider Man and all sorts of Japanese stuff, wasn't fussy by the look of it.  Liked table top gaming too"
Scully saw that Doggett was looking at a well thumbed copy of Warhammer fantasy role playing.  She arched an eyebrow.
"Didn't see you as the RPG type" she said with a slight trace of amusement.
He smiled, "Yeah at University I dabbled.  It was kind of fun, in a geeky, nerdy kind of way.  Good way of escaping the stress of exams and studying.  You never tried it?"
Dana again nodded her head, "Only the role play offered by training procedures, hostage crisis negotiations, that kind of thing."
Doggett said, "Same thing only with dice and the chance to slay the odd Dragon or two."
Scully gave his back an odd look and then proceeded to study the room herself.  "The fire hasn't damaged his books, graphic novels or his CD's and DVD collection.  Into all kinds of films, or he was.  Comedy, westerns and Japanese animation.  Heck even a modern musical or two.  Liked wrestling too"
Doggett frowned, "Both normal teenagers for the most part.  And they both had a social life"
Dana looked up, "Oh? I thought gamers were a solitary lot.  What have you got?"
Doggett smiled, "They both went too the same cyber cafe.  Let's have a chat with the owner shall we?  Maybe he can tell us something about the victims"

The owner of the Cyber cafe felt a little intimidated.  The woman was mature but good looking and kind of hot.  The guy, well he was a little cold he thought, but seemed to know his stuff when it came to computers. 
"Yeah Lenny and Billy both played in the league games, though they belonged to rival clans.  Pretty good, but there are guys and may I add, some girls that were better players than them."
Dana asked, "And just how competitive were they?"
"Sorry" he replied, "I'm not sure what you mean"
Doggett responded, "What Agent Scully meant was just how personal could the games get?"
"Well things got a little heated the other day but nothing out of the normal.  Well no, maybe I had to tell them to watch their language.  I mean you get the usual trash talking, and a fair share of compliments.  A team mate may get hazed if he screws up, so yes things can get a little heated.  I mean these guys can now earn big bucks for gaming.
It's a sport now.  Some teams get sponsorship deals that involve free flights too the bigger tournaments.  They can win new system upgrades, new computers, and even cash prizes.  There's a competition in a few weeks time, right here in Miami that's worth a few hundred dollars to each member of the winning team.  Yeah, it can be quite lucrative.  The winning league will get 300 bucks each, that's not bad at all if you ask me."
Doggett listened too all of that with a small smile.  "So who was insulting who?"
The cafe owner shrugged, "They were all guilty of that to some extent I suppose.  But yeah, I guess it got real heated between Ralf and Tom but they left on good terms."
"Must have, because nothing has happened to Tom or Ralf yet." said Doggett quietly. 
"Well once they are in their homes, I can't regulate what might happen"
Dana nodded, "Thank you for your help, Mister err?"
"Clive.  Robin Clive a.k.a. Ice Pick.  But you can call me-"
"If you think of anything else?" interrupted Doggett. 
Dana breathed a sigh of relief.  The guy was hitting on her for God's sake!  Even as he was being questioned about two freakish homicides!  Some guys just took the damned biscuit!  She turned as a group of kids walked into the cafe.
"Any of these the guys that were here last time?" she said abruptly.
Robin studied them closely, "Yeah, that's Tom right there.  Seems to be with a new bunch of kids though.  He changes clans a lot.  He bugs people sometimes."
"Does he now?" said Doggett with an odd look on his face. 
"Look I gotta go, things to do.  Feel free to watch or play.  First hour on the house" said Robin moving away.
"Think we'll take a rain check" said Dana as she left the cyber cafe.  Doggett studied the kids some more before following his partner outside.
"You think Tom's a suspect?" said Dana.
"Heck I don't know.  It could be any of them.  Any damned one of them.  It's not just a question of who, but how the hell they did it as well.  Skinner will want answers soon, and we are nowhere near the truth or a decent idea as of yet.  Come on, I need a coffee"

The game was different but the action was as intense as usual.  This time the guys were flying world war two aircraft in a simulated dog fight. 
Up until recently, not many people played Angels of Freedom, but then someone had bought the licence and had revamped the programme to run on modern
machines.  Now it was enjoying a re emergence. 
Tom banked his Spitfire too the right, the rest of his squadron following the lead of their leader.  Tom wasn't as happy with flight simulations as he was with
other types of games, but if you wanted to be a pro, then it paid to be versatile.  Later tonight, Tom would probably fire up Turbo Dreams and go tearing
around virtual race tracks for the first time in ages.  There was a competition coming that paid well for both the team and the individuals that could win in Grand
Prix mode and that was one of the toughest modes in the game. 
But back too the present.  His Spitfire was now flying wing tip too wing tip with one of his mates.
"Back off a little Joe, if we need to turn sharpish, one of us will wipe out the other.  Thanks"
Joe complied with his request.  Tom relaxed and then he heard his squadron leader speak up;
"Okay guys, we have bogies at two o'clock and closing fast!  FW 190's!  Oh heck, those things are like armoured tanks!"
Tom spoke up, "But the Spitfire is faster and more agile man, don't sweat it!"
"Roger that Tom.  But the second wave will be right behind them!  Okay peel off, and engage.  Watch your mate's backs guys at all times!"

Despite team work, Tom's squadron had been decimated three games too one.  It wasn't any one person's fault, they had just been unlucky.
He slammed his homework book shut with a scowl and scanned his games library.  He had to be careful though, because if Mum suspected that
he was gaming and not studying...
But damn it!  He had been working for three hours solid, time to relax! 
Yeah Space Marines, let's see if anyone is up for a frag fest on an alien world or a space station.  Keep your Halo's thought Tom.  This was, in
his opinion one of the best sci-fi shooters ever made, period.  Soon he was immersed in the intense action, as twenty two players exchanged
gun fire and insults on a digitised alien planet.
And Tom once again, was disrespected and got more than a fair share of flack and cruel jibes.  He again felt the walls of his room melt away and the
ceiling vanished and became the Ochre sky of the world that they fought on.  His carpeted floor was now the dusty and blood soaked surface of the planet
Diablo.  Pulse beams flashed over his head, even as he heard the warning shout of "Sniper!"
But Tom was on it.  He flicked to alternative fire and fired at the hidden gun man's position.  The guy had gotten under his skin and had insulted all and sundry.
Not just Tom, but his team and his family!  Well the sucker was going to pay!

Miles away, David Cole found his seat being thrown backwards across his living room with sudden and unexpected fury, as the Hell Storm Grenade detonated
on screen.  His PC blew as well as well with a huge explosion. 
The coroner would rule that the cause of death was the exploding PC but he left out the details concerning the shrapnel that he had dug out of the body.
Shrapnel that was tested as a metal that wasn't involved in the manufacture of the PC.  Shrapnel that could not be identified as any known metal....

                                                                                                          END OF LEVEL 3

                                          VIRTUAL MURDER: END GAME


Doggett grimaced as he cracked a stiff neck.  Dana winced, "Sounds like you need a massage" she said.
"You offering?" he joked, and she arched an eyebrow and studied the reports they had. 
"So does any of this weird crap make any kind of sense?  I mean we have nothing but pressure from up high and a growing collection of dead kids.  The latest wasn't even in this city so the cops thought it unrelated.  How the heck they came to that conclusion is beyond me."
"Agreed.  But face it, they are not used to the out of this world stuff we face.  Hey and I thought you were the sceptical one"
"Like you used to be right?  Never mind that, we have to come up with something soon.  Skinner's phone call to me was far from a social chat."
"I can imagine", replied Dana, "He's under pressure too, from the powers that be.  Even he has to answer to someone.  So what do you think is going on and who is your chief suspect?" she asked.
Doggett scowled, "I have no idea.  Forensics say that the computers had suffered no major interior faults that they could detect. If it's a virus then it's a killer, quite literally too.  But it can't be as only these gamers are being hit by it.  So that suggests that a gamer is responsible somehow for these deaths.  We've ruled out normal viruses, power surges and God knows what else.  So who is it?  And how the hell is he or she, doing it?"
"Don't know" sighed Dana, "It beats the crap out of me and gives me a headache I could well do without"
"One thing I know is it's late and I need some sleep.  See you in the morning" said Doggett.
Dana sat back in her chair and surveyed the hotel room.  A killer that could reach out and snuff out a life, from anywhere, any time and any place, without leaving a trace.
She had to admit, it scared her.  With a shudder, she closed down her laptop.

Tom rifled through his large game collection.  He could sell some, but he'd miss them.  They were like old friends, hell knows, he had few real life friends outside of the gaming community.  He'd given up his multi player role playing some time ago.  The intense action of team death match and multiplayer was now his caffeine.
He popped open a can of Coke and sat in front of his monitor, checking the clan forums.
At last his clan was getting into the top 10 in this region.  It took time, sweat and a damned lot of patience.  They could not, would not have done it without him!
He was their M.V.P. for God's sake!  They knew it now, and now the other clans were beginning to see how good he was.  Yeah they were learning, and if they weren't learning they would soon damned well learn.
For some games were just a brief diversion, but for him the battlefields became real.  He could feel the heat of the deserts, the chill of the mountain ranges.  He could feel the recoil of the weapons as they bucked in his hand and pushed back into his shoulder.
When he flew an aircraft or space ship, he was there in the cockpit, too the point where his apartment vanished and became that ship or aircraft, or tank whatever.
His monitor was an extension of his senses, his control pad, or keyboard were his instrument panels and weapon systems and God help his rivals when he got into 'the zone'.
He looked through his catalogue of games and smiled as he loaded Space War: Galactic Empires 2....

Dana couldn't sleep.
She tossed and turned in her bed until she thought, "Screw this" and made herself a drink and on impulse fired up her laptop.  She smiled.  Her messenger service kicked in and there was Doggett.  He too couldn't sleep she mused, but occasionally he would go to sleep and forget to switch his laptop off.
Dana smiled as she typed 'Morning Agent Doggett.'
'Morning'
'Can't sleep?'
'No. You?'
'No.  Any ideas?'
"Ha ha ha, no only odd dreams about being chased by space invaders!'
Dana laughed out loud at that, but then she stopped as an odd idea formed in her head.  That couldn't be right could it?  God if that was correct, then how could they stop it?  And damn it, were they safe?  What happens when and if they realise that they were onto him or her?

Tom threw the Air Vixen into a steep climb, his targeting system locking onto the rival pirate craft.  He felt the G-Force pushing him back into his seat.  His finger hovered over the trigger of weapon system. 
The cross hair went from green to red, and then the triple beep told him that the lock was confirmed.  His thumb stabbed down on the trigger and his ship bucked as two Star Buster missiles flew and struck home.  One minute there was a ship, the next a small fireball, fringed with sparks.  He whooped as he flew through it, performing a barrel roll in celebration.
Then he heard it.  That idiot that had been taunting and insulting him.  He had had the good grace to shut up for five minutes, but now he was back on the air, giving him and his squadron grief.
"Hey loser!  Think you are some hot shot that can shoot anybody, out fly us all?  You celebrate fragging him?  That was a bot jackass!  A freaking bot!"
"Yeah?  It puts us in the driving seat with that kill.  We outnumber your piss poor fly boys three too one now.  So who is the dumb ass now?  Come on, whatever your name is, take me on one on one.  I dare you.  Your ass is grass, and I'll freaking smoke it!  Come on ace, try me!"
Ace laughed, "You are on.  Come on guys, give us some free space!"
A bot, yeah so?  All it proved was that they couldn't rustle up a full squadron when push came to shove.  Punks. 

It would take several hours for the report to come in.  A kid in Memphis had died at his computer.  It seemed that the guy had died from being exposed to a vacuum.
Henry Davis had died through oxygen deprivation, in a bed room with an open window.  Doggett and Scully now knew that potentially any computer user was at risk.
And not only in this country.  Heck this guy could kill anyone, anywhere around the world.

"So now what?" said Dana over a cup of coffee and a bagel.
Doggett took a deep breath and replied, "Beats the crap out of me.  But something tells me that you now have a theory?  Go on, shoot"
"Well this is way out there, but here we go.  What do we have?  A half dozen apparent homicides committed by a perpetrator that leaves not a single scrap of DNA or any kind of forensic evidence.  How does he or she do it?
Through the victims computer by some means.  This means we have no material evidence besides broken bodies and wrecked computers.  That's what we have, and despite all that we have, as I have had to explain to Skinner, we have a murderer that we cannot arrest, because we can't pin anything on him or indeed her.
So how are they doing it?  My guess is, and this is where it gets really really freaking weird, is that somehow our killer can reach out through his victim's computer and do the deed. 
We know these guys can get into the games they play, but I think the killer really  gets into the game.  He becomes part of the programme.  He integrates himself into the game itself.  It's not just virtual reality for our criminal, it is reality.  He is not just the player, he is the game.  And we can't prove a damned thing."
Doggett took a few seconds to absorb the idea.  He then braced himself, for he knew what he was about to say was not going to be popular at all.
"No but we may be able to force his hand."
"How?" said Dana.
"Someone confronts him on his own turf.  Provokes him and makes him react."  he says calmly.
"What?  You mean play a game and wait for your PC to explode in your face?  No way!" she said, causing customers in the cafe to look at her sharply.
"I play, you watch.  But not me.  I'll play from the hotel and challenge a club gamer to a duel or whatever they call it.  You watch the players at the cyber cafe and pounce when the time is right.  Listen into the game chat and well, grab the angriest one there.  I have no other plan, do you?"
She chewed her bottom lip before replying, "No dammit.  But if it goes wrong, what then?"
He didn't have an answer.

Dana didn't like this one bit but with the cooperation of the owner of the gaming club, she was now able to sit in his office watching the events unfold.
In his hotel room, Doggett was logged on.  Armed with a high specification FBI issued lap top and copies of some of the club's most popular games.
As soon as Dana knew what they were playing, she would contact Doggett, and then she would watch them here as Doggett tried to goad the one they were after
into action.  She didn't like this one bit.
Her head turned towards the doorway as the gang walked in.  She recognised some of the players, there were some she didn't.  Those that she couldn't identify walked towards another area of the club, one not reserved for clan members.  She watched them sit down, and leant over to the manager.
"Everyone here?" she asked.
"No" he said softly, "Afraid not.  Two of them aren't here.  Tom and young Michael.  Mind you Mike's one of the youngest members and can't always come over at this
time of the day.  He helps with the chores around the house."
"So who are the hotheads here?" she asked.  She hadn't given an explanation as to why they had set this up.  It's not as if he would have believed her anyway.  Even though she had come up with the theory, she wasn't sure she believed it herself.  In some ways though it made some of Mulder's theories seem normal.  And yeah, she thought bitterly, he had been right most of the time, she wished now she had paid more attention.
Her attention snapped back to the situation at hand.
"Hot heads?  Well Kevin can get fairly riled up, and so can Nathan, but Tom's the worst."
"Which one's which?" asked Dana
"Nathan is the black kid in the Fifty Cent tee shirt.  Kevin, where's Kevin? There he is.  The guy with the shaved head and the red shirt.  As for Tom, well I can't see him.
No, he ain't here"
Suddenly Dana got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Doggett logged in and sat back until his mobile rang, "Doggett"
"It's Dana,  OK first off I'm going to say that I think this is terribly foolhardy and I hope you get out of this all right.  Anyway they are playing War Front: East VS. West, highly politically correct I don't think.  Secondly we have a couple of no shows at the cafe so be aware.  One will be at home doing chores and homework, the other well he may show up still.  His name's Tom, so be careful. Please"
"Don't worry, I will" he replied and snapped the phone shut.  He inserted the relevant disk and waited patiently while his laptop installed the game and it's drivers.  He agreed too the licence agreement without reading it and sighed with relief as the loading screen came up and he found the servers up and running.  Right then, which one? 
He used the blue tooth to connect too the local area network. Got them.  There they were, Dade County Gamers server.  Right then, let's get ready to rumble!

Virtual tanks and aircraft shot at each other.  Targets exploded in balls of fire and shrapnel.  Digitised troops were shot and 'killed'.
Doggett logged in and waited for his avatar to spawn.  Right, I'm in.  Taunts came over the air, through text chat and headsets.
Doggett ducked to avoid an incoming shell, and for a while he deliberately didn't fire a shot but allowed himself to get fragged as they call it.
"Hey whose the newbie then?  Man you gotta start fighting dude, I mean that gun in your hand isn't a stick."
Doggett grinned and spoke into his microphone; "I'm waiting, biding my time"
"Excuse me? Why man?"
Doggett answered the anonymous speaker; "Because I'm waiting to take on the very best man there is here.  Heard he likes to shoot his mouth off and brag.  I hear he's pissed off a lot of people, even members of his own clan.  How dumb is that then?"
Someone else answered with a laugh, "That'll be Tom.  He's not here, not signed in yet.  Give him time man, should be on real soon"
Doggett said, "Oh he's special then?"
"Maybe my clan mate but the guy can be a jerk.  No correction, he is  good, damned good but he isn't afraid to remind the world how good he is if you get what I mean."
Doggett sighed, "Yeah know the type.  Thinks his God's gift and all that crap.  Well I aim to show him that he isn't all that.  What do you guys think about the accidents then?
Did Tom know them at all?"
"Suppose he did, well on line anyway.  And yeah the idiot probably wound them up real bad.  But hey he ain't a killer.  I mean they were accidents, right?"
Doggett sighed and then said, "Yeah of course they were.  Let me know when-"
"I'm here.  Whose that flaming me?"
"Me. Screen name Dogged Determination."
"You figure you are better than me then?  Well watch and learn sucker, watch and learn"
And Doggett did so.  Sure enough, the kid was good.  His kill ratio soared within seconds of him logging in.  And then his bragging began.
Within seconds Doggett wanted nothing more than to show him up himself.  Well in his time, Doggett could play real good. 
He had beaten his friends on the Genesis and the Nintendo but on line gaming was a different beast, but the one time he had tried an associates X-Box 360 his training had given him the reflexes to respond to on screen threats.  Despite being a rookie, he had won several games of Counter Strike and Insurgence. 
Now all he had to do was goad this jackass.  The insults flowed thick and fast and he could tell that this Tom was winding up most of the players.
"Tom, Tom, man you call that a clean kill?  I could do better with my eyes shut."
"That's bull man and you know it.  That was a sniper shot to blow all other snipers out of the water lame ass!  Shut up and play, show me what you got!"

Dana could hear all this.  She leant towards the manager, "This guy, Tom.  He's here, right?"
"No" came the answer. 
Dana felt icy fingers run down her back.....

Doggett's fingers flew over the keyboard, inputting commands for his character to obey. 
Side step, strafe left, take out the enemy soldier heading towards cover.  Call for the medic to take care of Dagger One.
Then, wait, there he was.  Tom, or at least his avatar. 
Doggett studied the figure.  It seemed partially insubstantial too him and he had the horrible impression, that he was looking through the monitor, right at him.
"There you are" he whispered.
"You want to challenge me?  Who are you anyway?" Tom said.
"I'm the guy that's going to beat you.  Show you up as the loser you are."
"Don't make me laugh!  You?  A rookie?  Man you got a good score last round but that was just beginners luck.  Well luck runs out bucko"
"True, it does.  So you want to go or not?" Doggett knew he was close to riling this kid.  Just a bit more pressure, just a bit more.
"Why should I satisfy your desire to show the world what a loser you are?"
"Because kid, every time you log on, I'll be here waiting for you.  And I'll be hounding you, making your sad life a real damned misery until I've taken you down"
Then Doggett made his character dodge as Tom opened up with a German made MP3 Machine gun.

The manager of the club rifled through his papers hurriedly.
"Tom Tom Tom" he kept repeating over and over, "I know I have his details somewhere.  Here he is, Tom Wilkinson, a.k.a. Wild Boy.  Home address, 3322 Gable Drive, Apartment 41B." He turned to say something too Dana but she had already fled the office.
As she ran she fished her mobile out of her jacket pocket and speed dialled Doggett's number.
"Doggett, he's not at the club!  He's at his home!  I'm on my way there now!  Be careful please John."  She closed the connection without awaiting a reply and called for back up.

Doggett ducked behind some masonry and fired back at Tom with his Walther pistol.  Hits registered but the kid's body armour absorbed the damage.  He cursed and then got hit as he risked breaking cover to lob a grenade.
But the threat of explosion got him the break he needed and he made the cover of a parked up camper van.  Hurriedly he swapped from pistol to AK47.
There he was, trying to track him down. He sighted down the barrel and squeezed off a burst of fire.  Tom jerked and flew sideways and Doggett was awarded a kill, his fourth in a row against Tom. The guy must be pissed right now.
Then he frowned; what was happening?  The screen was going fuzzy, the image was blurring, becoming indistinct.  And the walls of his apartment were beginning to flicker.
Now he knew how it worked, he became part of the game and then dragged his opponent into the virtual battlefield!  That was how you got in, but how the hell would he get out of it again?  Doggett began to wonder if this was such a great plan after all.
Tom advanced, and his avatar, no not his avatar;this somehow was Tom smiled.  He raised his gun.
"Yeah go ahead, kill me, take me out of the real world and the game"
Tom paused. "What?  Sorry, what did you say?"
Doggett grimaced, "I said go on shoot, remove me from the game, permanently.  You mean you didn't know you were killing people for real?  Sorry, Tom I don't buy it"
Tom stopped and lowered his gun.
"What the hell are you talking about?  I don't kill people, I just frag their avatars.  None of this is real!  Man you are one twisted mother, you know that?"
"I'm twisted?" replied Doggett, "No Tom, I don't play these games for real.  I'm not the one that when he loses a game, or let's the taunts wind him up, loses it and sucks them into the game and then uses it to actually kill for real.  Don't look so freaking dumb!  I cannot believe that you don't know the reason why some of the guys you beat never ever log on again."
Tom looked puzzled for a moment, and then taking a breath, took aim again.
"Quit the b.s. mister!  It's a game, and for you it's game over!"
Tom began to squeeze the trigger....

Dana's car screeched too a halt outside the apartment block, accompanied by two squad cars.
She slammed the door shut and rushed inside, ignoring the calls of the police with her to wait for backup. 
A cleaner looked up as she yelled, "Tom Goodwin!  Which is his apartment?  Quickly!"
"I don't know!" the cleaner replied, "I only work here lady!"
She cursed under her breath but the deep voice of a black man called out; "Goodwin you say?  The kid that always plays his rock music too freaking loud and spends too
much time playing games?"  She nodded impatiently.
"4th floor, apartment 45B"
She accelerated as fast as she could.  She was on the third step of the fourth flight of stairs when she heard the shot...

Doggett sat back in his seat.
The room was in semi darkness, sunlight filtered by the drapes.
His laptop screen showed a solid wall of static. 
He dragged a sweaty hand over his weary face and was only vaguely aware of the outside world.
Shaking, he reached out for his cell phone....

The door gave way under officer Freeman's foot with a shower of splinters.
He stopped in the threshold as Dana pushed past him.
Tom Goodwin was slumped back in his seat.
His head lolled back loosely, his hair obscured his face.
A control pad lay discarded on the floor beside him and the smell of burning electric components filled the air.
A cloud of blue-grey smoke hovered near the ceiling, and the white rug was stained by a slowly spreading pool of crimson.
Tom had been shot once, right between the eyes.  But there was no way that anyone could have been in here to do it.
"Doggett" she whispered, and she cursed as downstairs she heard the voices of concerned parents wondering what the Police were doing here....

   EPILOGUE 1

 The coroner closed the drawer and sat down heavily in his chair.
A kid, shot with a weapon that bore no resemblance to any handgun he knew.  A completely new calibre or so it seemed. 
But there was no bullet.  Nothing, but a body and a tag on his toe.

EPILOGUE 2

Dana sighed.  She had read Doggett's report and that would have to do. He wouldn't or couldn't talk about the final moments of this case.
Could it have ended any other way?, she sighed; no it couldn't.
They couldn't arrest him, because what evidence did they have that they could have pinned on him.
No fingerprints, no DNA, nothing.  Not even a bullet.
And if they had locked him up, that wouldn't have stopped him.  Most juvenile halls had computers and the same kind of games.
He would have carried on even behind bars.
She looked at the lap top and with a shudder, closed it, and left the office in darkness as she closed the door behind her.

               THE END.








                                                           


                                               Conversation Peace 2 :  Platform 9B
                                                By A.J. Preece

"Funny, I would never have seen you as the kind of man who'd be into this kind of thing" said the portly figure too his companion.
"What?  Oh you mean steam trains.  Yes I find them most relaxing.  Makes a change from all the usual hustle and bustle of my life"
Brigadier Alistair  Lethbridge Stewart (retired) studied the man next too him with an arched eyebrow.
"You're breaking the laws again aren't you?  I mean you shouldn't be here with me now.  At least not the version I'm seeing now"
The Doctor gave an impish grin and his eyes sparkled behind the spectacles that he wore."Well you now how it goes, you travel from one end of the cosmos too the other, battle devils, monsters and assorted nutters throughout time and space, and suddenly, it strikes you.  You haven't seen your old friend for ages and ages and ages, so what the heck, go see him, make sure he's OK."
"But how did you find me?" the former soldier said.
"Ahh well once you've been around me for a while, something rubs off.  Oh in a nice way I assure you!  What I mean is that the TARDIS can track old friends.
It's all complicated timey wimey stuff that would take ages to explain. "In fact"; he added with a mischievous grin, "I don't fully understand it myself!"
"Timey wimey? Good grief man, that's not like the you I know so well! You have changed indeed.  So what version am I looking at now?"
"The tenth version" he said softly.  "Yes I've been rattling through regenerations at an alarming rate.  Time to slow it down or I'll run out". There was an awkward silence, broken by the mournful wail of the approaching train.

Now they sat in the restaurant carriage, a tea pot gently steaming between them.  Next to the pot was a plate with the remains of a scone and raspberry jam.The Doctor licked crumbs off his fingers and sighing sat back in his seat, smacking his lips with satisfaction.
"Tea and scones, can't beat it.  Unless you are on the pavilion at Lords or the Oval, watching a decent game of cricket." said the Doctor.
"Oh yes indeed but it's all changed now.  Hooligans chanting and beating drums, getting blitzed on beer and cider, it's all ruined now. And it's not the same on
the television. Besides Doris would rather watch her soaps and hospital dramas." grumbled the Brigadier.
"I forgot to ask, how is Doris?" said the Doctor.
The Brigadier sighed, "It's not good Doctor. Her eyesight's going, poor thing. She now has to walk with the aid of sticks and she's on a huge waiting list for
a hip replacement. The U.N.I.T pension isn't what it was. I can't afford to go private, it would be cheaper to fly her off to Canada or the United States believe it or
not. But the old girl doesn't like flying I'm afraid. So what am I to do?"
The Doctor regarded his friend sadly, "I don't know. All that service for the country, no, the world. You've faced all sorts that if it wasn't for you, would either have
the human race enslaved or worse, the planet could be a blackened crisp floating in space. Like mine" he added softly and he thought that the Brigadier hadn't heard it.
"Good grief! You mean your home world has gone? I'm so sorry Doctor" he said gently.
"That's the problem you see Brigadier, you fight and fight but in the end it's inevitable. Everything has it's time and it's place and then poof!, it's gone. Like friends and
loved ones they come and go. I've never allowed myself to get close too anyone, or at least tried to. You see my life doesn't allow the cosy domestic scene.
But even I get lonely. I-I lost someone recently. Oh they aren't dead" he added swiftly, seeing the look on the Brigadier's face,"But they are somewhere where I cannot get too them now. Another world, another time. I miss her." He then looked embarrassed and cleared his throat loudly, "So I thought why not look up some old friends. But Jo wasn't in, Sarah wasn't answering her phone and Tegan, could be anywhere by now."
The Brigadier fell silent, this wasn't like the man he had known at all. Everything changes, even the Doctor, and in more ways than one.
"I envy you Alistair.You have constants in your life, a stable home and someone to come back too. I don't even have a home, well there's the TARDIS but it seems so
empty." Then the Doctor flushed and looked like he regretted saying any of this.

The journey was over, and once again, the Doctor and the Brigadier stood on platform 9B. 
"Time to go, Doris will want her tea soon" he said softly.
The Doctor nodded and smiled briefly, "Give her my love Brigadier. Give her a big big big hug from me and hold onto her tight, because you never know when it can all
just vanish like a soap bubble. I envy you" he said again, and the Doctor shook his friend's hand and walked away into the gathering twilight. The Brigadier blinked away a stray tear. 
"Sentimental old fool" he chided himself, but he understood what the Doctor had meant. And for the first time ever, he understood exactly the burden the Doctor was carrying. It was the first time that he had ever really felt sorry for the Time Lord. Shaking his head sadly, he got behind the wheel of his Jaguar and sped off, the sound of his car engine barely drowning out the sound of the Doctor's time machine fading away into infinity. The Brigadier thought it was the loneliest sound he had ever heard.

             The End

                                                   

                 X-Files: More Questions than Answers

                                                      By

                                                A.J. Preece

 

The office was still empty.  Everything had been left exactly the same, and that was at the insistence of their superior.

Even now sometimes she found herself on the threshold of the tiny, cluttered room, thinking that she had seen a shadow fall across the frosted glass panel, or had heard a footstep.

Once she thought she had heard his voice murmuring quietly, the way he did when chewing over a problem.  But as always, her prayers had gone unanswered.

Dana Scully felt nervous about entering the empty room.  Why?  She couldn’t honestly say, but part of her felt like she was intruding on sacred ground.

Get a grip!  She chided herself.  The document you want is in this room somewhere, so get your act together, get in there and pick it up!

Scully stepped into the room and closed the door softly behind her.

 

Deputy assistant Skinner sighed.  This was going to be one of those days.

He had a back log of cases growing on his desk and now the Cigarette Smoking man was once more, an unwelcome visitor.

“You don’t like me much do you?” he said.

Skinner smiled ruefully before replying, “My you are a perceptive fellow”

The Cigarette Smoking man laughed without humour.

“And just where is Agent Scully right now?”

“Doing some research on my behalf” replied Skinner, putting emphasis on the word my.

The Cigarette Smoking man cleared his throat, and ignoring the ‘no smoking’ sign on Skinner’s desk, lit up another one.

“I honestly think that Agent Scully isn’t fit for active duty” he said.

Skinner recoiled slightly in his chair.

“I beg your pardon?  That is not for you to decide.  Besides I wasn’t aware that you were qualified to pass judgment on an agent’s physical or mental health”

The Cigarette Smoking man chuckled again.

“Since Agent Mulder’s disappearance, she has struck me as being unfocused.  She has also shown some signs of insubordination.”

Skinner cut him off before he could get into gear.

“It’s true she was opposed to being teamed up with Agent Doggett.  But you can hardly blame her.

She and Fox Mulder had a rapport.  They didn’t always agree with each other but they did work well as a team.  Indeed each of them saved the others life on more than one occasion.

Now before we can accurately ascertain the exact whereabouts of Agent Mulder, or indeed, determine whether or not he is still alive, someone above me, decides to deny her compassionate leave and pair her up with a total stranger”

“Bull!” snapped the Smoking Man, “She refused leave as well you know!  Just as she did when we discovered she was pregnant! 

And your tone of voice implies that I had something to do with Doggett’s assignment.

You may or may not choose to believe me, but I did not have anything to do with that.

In fact I opposed it.”

Skinner frowned, “Why?”

The Smoking Man grimaced, “None of your business”

Skinner tried hard to keep his temper in check.

“Anything that involves the welfare of my field agents is my business, you sanctimonious bastard!”

The Smoking Man flinched as if struck by a physical blow.

“Oh please spare me!  Honestly Skinner, you never fail to surprise me.  You act as if you are so righteous, but tell me, how your agents would feel if they knew that you ordered a cover up yourself on more than one occasion?”

“That’s a lie!” said Skinner.

“Hmm well Mister Skinner, I’ve seen your signature on files that have been listed for deep burial in our archives.  Of course whether or not you did actually sign those orders is a moot point”

Skinner felt the colour drain out of his face.

“You son of a bitch!” he breathed.

The Smoking Man grimaced again.  Heartburn was becoming more of a problem these days.  Knowing my luck its angina, he thought.

“Use your head Skinner.  If I was trying to set you up, would I sit here and warn you about it?”

Skinner frowned.  “Whose side are you on?”

“My own, but it suits my purposes to see that you don’t take a fall.  We trust you”

“And”, said Skinner cautiously, “who is we?”

“Need to know, Mister Skinner.  If we ever feel you need to know, we’ll tell you”

He rose and then mashed his cigarette into the ashtray on Skinner’s desk.

“Time I wasn’t here” he said, “I have an appointment with my physician.  I fear it may not be good news”

He opened the door and almost bumped into Agent Doggett.

Doggett watched him leave.

“And what did Mister Happy want this time?” he asked.

“The usual Agent Doggett.  He just wanted to get under my skin and up my nose, and as usual the bastard succeeded.  Is that the report on the Mulligan case?”

“Yes.  Agent Scully told me to tell you that hers will be ready later on”

Skinner smiled.

“I hope so.  I have to wade through quite a back log.  She never used to be like this”

Doggett stood hovering nervously.

“That’s all for now Agent Doggett.  Thank you”

 

Scully sat behind Mulder’s desk.  She gazed around the office one more time and then frowned. 

Mulder’s answering machine message received light was flashing. 

That didn’t make sense!  The line to Mulder’s office had been cut.

She reached over and switched it on.  Her eyes welled with tears as she heard a voice that was unmistakably Agent Mulder’s.

“Don’t worry.  I’m still around.  I always will be partner.  Hang on in there, once I have some answers I’ll come back.

Oh I’ve done some checking.  Doggett’s fine, just fine.  Trust him okay? 

Take care”

Scully started to weep.

 

Five minutes later Scully walked into Skinner’s office.  She composed herself before handing over her report.

They both turned to leave when Skinner called them back.

“Not so fast!  Get yourselves booked on a plane to Idaho a.s.a.p.  There have been some crop circles reported”

“Crop circles?” queried Doggett.  “Why does that get our attention?”

Skinner frowned, “Because in the middle of each of the circles, there’s a dead body.  One of which has been identified as a man who went missing eighteen years ago.  Do I have to say anymore than that?”

Both agents shook their head and left the office.

Skinner sat back and went through all that he had learnt.

As usual there were more questions than answers….

 

                                                  THE END

                                                                                                BABYLON 5

                                                                                              HUNTER, HUNTED
                                                                                          
                                                                                              EPISODE  ONE


Prologue:

The grave yard shift, can't live with it, cannot live without it.  It's a nessecary evil.
Susan Ivanova kept telling herself that.  Maybe one night she'd actually believe it.    And maybe one night she'd actually get some decent sleep.  Yeah right, she thought.
She smiled as a subordinate passed her some fresh, black coffee.  "Thanks" she murmured.  Didn't things ever calm down out here? 
The Raiders had been dealt with and just when they all thought some peace was at last going to descend on the station, the Shadows had started their campaign against the Allied Worlds.  And had it united all the races together in an effort to deal with the threat?  Like hell it had.
The Narns accused the Centarri of collusion, and Ivanova didn't want to believe that Londo would do that. but something told her that she was fooling herself.  Certainly Garibaldi didn't think it was beyond the realms of possibility, and you didn't have to ask G'karr what he thought about the situation.  He had been the most vocal with his accusations.
She didn't envy Captain Sheridan at all.  But being that close too the Captain, only meant that the crap would more often than not, fly in her direction too.  She had tried to duck it but some of it would stick, no matter what she did.  Her reverie was broken as the jump gate flared into life.
"What the-?  Are we due any visitors?" she asked.
A ginger haired man that she didn't know the name of, spoke from his console.
"That's a negative Commander"
She studied the approaching ship and hit the comm link.
"Ivanova too Captain Sheridan, we have an unidentified vessel hovering outside, just sat there, not talking too us.  In fact it's not doing much of anything."

Sheridan groaned.  What time was it?  Three thirty in the damned morning.  Oh crap, he thought and cricked his stiff neck, and winced as something 'popped'.  "Okay I will be right there"
Why does this have to happen now?  He yawned, stretched and winced as this time his left elbow cracked. 
"I'm getting too old for this" he muttered.   He walked towards the shower and looked at the hanger where his suit hung.

The vessel hung there, not answering any attempts at communication.  They had tried all frequencies, all known languages and there had been no response whatsoever. 
The vessel looked like a giant, christmas tree decoration.  It was like a multi pointed star, made of some black, non reflective material.
The ship was a beautiful if not intimidating piece of engineering.  And it was also big...very big.
Scans had measured the craft as being one and a half times bigger than a Minbari Warship and they weren't small. 
Sheridan regarded it with narrowed eyes and his mouth compressed into a thin line.
"It won't talk too us at all." This was not a question, it was a statement as he ran through the facts in his head and then vocalised his thoughts.  "It does not appear to have raised it's shields, that is, if it has shields but sensors indicate that it is armed and very well armed at that.  This reminds me of the first contact we had with the Minbari, and we know what happened there"
Ivanova's raised eyebrow told him exactly what she was thinking. 
"We have first contact with a new species, and not for the first time, we have no clue as to how to deal with it.  Any ideas people?"
The deafening silence was all the answer he needed...

                                                                                                        
                                                                                                        EPISODE 1

9:07 a.m, and that damned ship was still there.   It was a possible menace to shipping as one major lane was now blocked by this giant.
And now the latest theory that came from some bright spark, was perhaps, fantastically, the most logical.   There had been no response from anybody on board that ship, because there was nobody on board.
In the end, Sheridan had requested the prescence of Talia Winters, the Psi Corp officer and she had attempted contact but had shaken her head with a puzzled expression.  She hadn't made contact with any sentient life forms at all.  She couldn't even pick up on rudimentary empathic signals.
"No Captain, I am picking up nothing"
Garibaldi rocked on his heels, "Well failing all else we could buzz it with some Star Furies and see what happens?" he mused.
Sheridan gave him an odd look, "Michael, I hope you are kidding"
Garibaldi frowned, "Well it can't just sit there much longer, we have traffic stacked waiting to come in.   And in case anybody has forgotten, we are expecting G'Karr through that gate at any moment.  He's coming back from visiting that Narn Colony remember?"
Sheridan scowled, "I could hardly forget.  I had to stall Londo like crazy.  I swear he suspects I was bending the truth when I said I didn't know where G'karr had gone" 
Garibaldi chuckled, "Bending the truth?  Twisting it into a pretzel shape more like!"
"No more than he has" said Ivanova pointedly.
"Going back to your suggestion Michael, any misunderstanding of the situation could light a powder keg and..."
Suddenly the bridge was flooded with a blinding blue, white light and then when it faded, the ship, if that was what it actually was, had vanished.
"What the hell?  Did it explode?" Ivanova asked.
Garibaldi shrugged, "No boom, no shockwave, so I guess the answer is a resounding no" 
A voice spoke from a far corner, "Captain, before the light faded, I got the feeling that it scanned us.  Very briefly, but we were scanned"
Sheridan didn't like the sound of that. 
"I know it's gone, but consider this station on yellow alert.   Call me paranoid, but I don't like this one little bit"

At the precise moment that the craft vanished, a small scarab like craft detached itself from the star shaped object.  It was now clinging like a limpet too the side of Babylon 5, and a neat hole was being cut into the hull, just large enough to let a man, or maybe two, into the craft.


10:00 a.m. and sensors detected a small tremor that rocked the vessel for a brief moment and a tiny drop in atmospheric pressure.  It was almost as if there had been a breach in the hull, but it had been sealed within seconds.
Engineering dismissed it as a sensor malfunction and delayed the reporting of it.
In the meantime, a scrab shape vehicle detached itself from the craft, now empty, it's passengers long gone.  Before anything could register it's prescence, it appeared to crumple in on itself, like paper in a bonfire.  There was no wreckage, no traces of spilt fuel, nothing.
But the tremor had been felt and Sheridan hauled the engineering section over the coals for the delay in reporting the situation.   An investigation was launched but nothing was found.

In brown sector of Down Below, a Drahzi walked along a poorly lit corridor.  He blew his nose into a hanky.
Why had he had to pick up a cold?  Humans!  All this science and the common cold still had not been cured!  And now he had one and....
what was that?  A soft footfall from behind him?
He turned swiftly. 
"Hello?" he called out and then sneezed.  He raised his head just as something rushed towards him.  He opened his mouth to scream, but the large, heavy metal weapon crushed his skull and decorated a bulkhead with his brains before he could utter a sound.  The creature reached into his belt and took out a knife and bent over the corpse, intent on it's grizzly work.....

Blue Sector, near the hydroponic garden, a Centari youth left his female companion in a huff.  He wasn't used to being refused! 
Wasn't his money good enough?  He knew what she was!   Off duty my Centari eye! he thought.
He walked between two rows of plants and the paused as something rustled the branches of a bush to the left, some way ahead.  He tried to peer through the foliage, to see what had made the sound.  They had imported bees and birds for atmosphere but this was something bigger.
Another rustle and despite a voice in his head saying, 'no don't!' he edged towards the sound. 
Then another sound, but this time from above his head?  He looked up even as he felt something grab him.  His head was being squeezed even as he was being lifted up off the floor with ease!  His eyes widened in horror at the thing  above him, and he tried to scream, but his skull cracked with a sound like an eggshell being stepped on.  His eyes rolled back into his head, as his blood started to flow and drip onto the path below him.....


                                                                                                                       END OF PART ONE


                                                                                                                  HUNTER,  HUNTED PART 2

"Look Vir, what is it?  Stop hovering and tell me what the heck is wrong!"  growled Garibaldi.
"He's missing sir!" replied a nervous Vir.
Garibaldi summoned the last ounce of his patience.  "Who is missing Vir?"
"Clendo Marn, he's one of Londo's distant cousins.  Normally Londo wouldn't be too worried but he has managed to get himself elected onto the Centauri council.  He came here to ask Londo for some advice, and records show he arrived over twelve hours ago.  But he's always been free spirited shall we say and when he didn't report too Londo as he was supposed to, then Londo got concerned."
"So concerned he left it twelve hours and then sends you to talk too me.  Oh that's very concerned.  Alright I'll look for him okay?
Anything about him I should know?"
Vir looked embarassed.  "Well he has a fondness for a certain type of woman.  The kind that -"
Garibaldi sighed and spared Vir any further discomfort, "I get the picture Vir, don't worry.  And I think I know where to start looking.
I'll be in touch"
"Oh thank you Mister Garibaldi, thank you.  I'll give Londo the news right away"
Garibaldi watched Vir shuffle off.  Okay, like Londo, this guy likes the women.  So if I was Clendo, Michael thought, where would I go to look for that kind of company?  He smiled and headed towards the bar area.

Doctor Steven Franklin had a mystery on his hands.  The corpse on his slab was that of a Drazhi, no doubt of that.  But well....
The med lab door hissed open and a tired looking Captain Sheridan, came over to where the body lay.
"So", Sheridan said softly, "Run this by me again please"
Franklin shrugged, "A Drazhi was found in Down Below.  He's been stabbed, a single wound through the heart.  But the odd thing is, that whoever it was that killed him, took his teeth as a trophy."
Sheridan took a step backwards.  "I'm sorry?" he said incredulously.
Franklin repeated himself as Ivanova entered, "This poor Drazhi, had his teeth removed after death, every single one of them"
"A trophy collector" Ivanova said softly, and then said, "The question is why?  What's the point?  Religious ceremony?  Someone sending a message?"
Sheridan replied, "If it's a message, then we need to send one of our own.  And that message is, we shall not allow this to escalate any further.
Nobody else gets killed like this, not on my watch!"  He then turned on his heel and left the medlab.  And as Sheridan left, Ivanova and Garibaldi watched horrified, as another gurney was rolled in.  On it was a fresh corpse, that of a Centauri.  His head had been mangled, what was worse he'd also been scalped.  "I can imagine the explosion when the news of this reaches Londo" said Garibaldi through gritted teeth.

"When will the bait we've lain draw out the prey?"  asked the one Hunter too the other through their own private comm units.   "It will happen, we have to be patient.  We were assured that this was prime hunting ground.  We'll simply just have to...wait, look!"  Their eyes narrowed as they spied a reptilian humanoid walking down a passageway.  The two creatures set off in pursuit....

"Cledo was a relative of a friend of a friend of a friend, Captain" said Londo.  Sheridan winced at the tone of Londo's voice and at the smell of alcohol on his breath.  "I assured his family that he would be in safe hands.  I assured them that Babylon 5 was the best place for him to learn something about life in a friendly environment".  Sheridan almost snorted in disbelief.  Of all people to talk of a friendly environment! he thought, that was rich, rich indeed.  Their war with the Narn was at least responsible for fifty percent of their current problems. 

"I demand a full enqui-" Sheridan cut him off.  "Londo, you will get a full enquiry, as it's already under way.  Furthermore, I shall also insist that you guys stay out of it." Londo went too speak, "Of course, if you are attacked then you can defend yourself, with reasonable force.  But I'll make it clear to you now, I will not condone any vigilantism. Now excuse me, I need to attend to my duties."  Londo smiled without warmth, and left Sheridan alone with his thoughts.

The young Narn rounded a corner and stopped in mid stride.  Was that a noise behind him?  He whirled, knife in hand.  And then whirled back the way he'd been facing as something rushed him.  He parried a blow from a strange, serrated blade, his wrist armour absorbing the strike.  He pirouetted and kicked the creature in it's midriff and then struck it with a palm strike to it's jawbone.  As it staggered back, T'Karr studied the creature in front of him.  It seemed to be wearing some kind of padded armour, adorned with tiny skulls and teeth (some of them looked fresh).  Bladed weapons protruded from twin scabbards on it's back. 

It flexed gauntleted fists and studied him through the narrow eye slits of some kind of helmet.  Braided hair swung as it shook it's head clear of any cobwebs caused by the punch.  It staggered again as the Narn unleashed a flurry of forearm strikes, punches and kicks and then he hissed as the blade wielded by T'Karr slashed it's chest.  Bright green, almost luminous blood flowed.  T'Karr stepped forward and kicked it hard on the jaw.  The beast sank too one knee and then T'Karr spun round on one foot, and connected with his extended left leg.  The blow caught him high on the right temple and threw it sideways into the wall of the corridor.  T'Karr hissed and then he was struck from behind.  Something hard and sharp struck him in the middle of his back and he gazed in shocked horror at the two feet or so of steel that protruded from the middle of his chest.  He breathed a heavy sigh and fell dead too the floor....

It was Delenn who found T'Karr's body.  It was Delenn's eyes that widened in horror as she saw that the Narn's spine had been removed...as had his skull....

 

                                                                                   HUNTER HUNTED PART 3

The council chamber was in an uproar.  Ivanova rolled her eyes, Garibaldi had a look on his face that said he was in the mood to hit someone, very very hard indeed, and Sheridan wished he could be somewhere else right now.

"Please! One at a time!" yelled Ivanova, but nobody seemed to be listening so there was only one thing she could do, she surmised.  Susan pulled her PPG and discharged it at the ceiling.
The single shot was followed by a shower of fragments from the ceiling and then a deathly silence. 
Sheridan looked angry and relieved at the same time and Garibaldi shrugged as if to say, I wish I'd thought of that!
The Captain took a deep breath and squared his shoulders.

"Now N'Toth I understand the latest victim was a Narn but may I remind you that a Drahzi, two humans, one Minbari and a Centari have all been killed so far by someone or something that does not seem to mind who crosses it's path.  Does it kill for food?  We don't think so.
We think it's hunting for sport.  The skulls and spine, and teeth removed all suggest trophy collecting.  We also think they smuggled themselves aboard after the unidentified ship earlier.
There is evidence that a device, or a small ship, locked onto the hull of Babylon 5 and breached the hull."
Before he could continue, G'Karr's aid interrupted;
"That's all fine and well Captain, but theories won't get the problem sorted.  We need to be the ones that start hunting it or them and we need to do it sooner rather than later"
Again the council chamber was full of noise as the other races raised their voices in agreement and punched the air with their fists.
"I will not condone vigilante actions aboard this vessel!" Sheridan roared, "Is that crystal clear?  If there is any such signs, then regardless of race, creed or species, then so help me God, I will lock such perpetrators up!  I don't care if you are an ambassador, a security agent or a damned toilet attendant, the law will be applied too it's full reach and extent.
Mister Garibaldi's men are working triple shifts right now to find these murderers and yes, we hope to capture them alive and bring them to trial. 
So people, relax, calm down and I suggest you travel the station in at least groups of three, or better yet, unless the business is urgent then stay in the confines of your quarters.
We will get too the bottom of this."
"Oh? When?" asked Molari, not looking at all happy.
"As soon as is humanly possible" replied Garibaldi.

In Blue seven, two men worked threading cables through a conduit.  They talked loudly, taking drags on their cigarettes.
"Yeah that new dancer is hot, hot, hot!  I haven't seen such nice curves since that Vorlon Racer visited the station, if you know what I mean!?"
His companion gave a hearty chuckle; "Yeah I know what you mean Harry.  Anyway pass me a number seven wrench will you?  This plate's being a bitch!"
As Harry passed the wrench they heard the scream.
Vince, Harry's companion, raised his com unit. 
"Security, this is Vince Carter, me and Harry down on blue seven have heard screams, we are now investigating."
The two men removed their coveralls, exposing the security uniform underneath.  Both men drew their PPG's and charged them up.
They heard another scream.
"Where the hell is that coming from?" asked Vince.
Harry stopped as something started to drip onto his left shoulder.  He raised a finger and studied the deposit on the end of it.
"Blood" said Harry and started looking up...

Three other security men, lead by Zack McGowan entered the area. 
Two of the men carried a PPG rifle.  Better not to take any chances, Garibaldi had said.
Zack opened his com link; "Harry, Vince, report"
Vince's voice came back over the com unit; "It's on one of the upper gantries.  We saw movement but couldn't get a positive ID on the life form.  We found Dave Lazell dead."
Zack scowled, one of the Night Watch had been killed now.  This wasn't good at all.
"Wait!" Harry shouted, "What in the name of hell was that?"
"What?" said Vince.
Harry frowned, "It was like a shadow only, well you couldn't see what was casting it.  It crossed that pool of light over there.  There was a shadow, but no physical form.
It was like a ripple in the air dammit"
Vince looked at his friend as if he was crazy.  But then...
Vince went pale, "Crap, I think I just saw a ghost"
But Harry didn't speak, he fired at something too their right.  "There's two of them, repeat two!   One headed west towards Blue Two and the other heading towards the service elevator shaft"

The report came back to Sheridan.  Ghosts?  Invisible?
He sat on a bench in the garden area, trying to clear his head and get his thoughts straight.  He wished that G'Karr was here.
True he was a warrior, but his wisdom was at times most insightful.  True Delenn was the same, but he felt that her way of thinking for once, would be of little or no use here.
A shadow fell over him...he whirled around and looked puzzled.
Kosh!  What was he doing here, so far away from the Vorlon quarters?
"Ambassador" he said, once he had gotten over the shock.
Kosh inclined his head and spoke, his voice accompanied by that strange bell like tinkling sound.
"There are stories of creatures that hunt for sport.  They hide in plain sight.  What is invisible can be made visible.  Straighten the light" and with that he faded into the shadows.

The security squads did their best to track the life forms. 
They caught brief, tantalizing glimpses of the creatures, but Zack assumed that that was deliberate.  He figured that they were trying to goad his men into a trap somehow.
He was right...

One of his men rounded a corner, firing wildly into the darkness of the rafters.  A triangle of red lights fell on his shoulder.
Zack saw it, and yelled a warning, but it was too late.
There was the sound of a weapon discharging, and the man fell backwards, his right arm severed neatly at the shoulder.
Zack swore heartily and fired himself and he thought he heard an angry shriek.  Had he hit it?
The report came in that the lift shaft was now empty and the other one had attacked and almost killed a Minbari scholar as he walked towards the elevator.
Garibaldi's squad suddenly came into view.
"Did I get it?" asked Zack
"Maybe" said Garibaldi.  He raised his right hand.
It was moist with a luminous green liquid.
"What the hell?" said Zack.
"Judging that there's a trail of this crap, I'd hazard a guess and say it's blood.  We will need Franklin to conduct tests to confirm it.  It's hurt, and that means the son of a bitch can be killed.
But being hurt is bad news too, that's when an animal is at it's most dangerous when it's injured and on the run."
Zack added, "What will happen if we corner the thing?"
Garibaldi replied, "It will do what any other cornered animal will do, it'll come out fighting"

                                                                                                    END OF PART 3

Franklin sighed and rubbed tired eyes. 
Garibaldi's hunch had been correct, the luminous sample under his macro scope was indeed blood, but after several hours, he still couldn't pin a species too the specimen.
He closed down his work station and suddenly went cold.
Someone was behind him, of that he was certain.  He wheeled around and caught at his chest.
He waited for his heart to go back to where it belonged before speaking,
"Ambassador Kosh, is there something I can do for you?"
Kosh's head inclined and then there came the bell like tinkling that herladed the fact that Kosh was about to break his customery silence.
"Look not ahead, but rather look too the sides if you seek answers"
"Now what in the name of hell does that mean?" asked Franklin.
"Your enemy doesn't nessecarily come from the realms you know.  Speak to G'Karr, he will understand"
Even as Franklin shook his head in puzzlement, he was aware that Kosh had once again vanished into the shadows.

"Look Vir, it's simple.  We tell that Drazhi that we can offer him a good price but as the goods are damaged, not a good a price as he would like"
Londo was getting more and more exasperated, Vir could tell, but Vir knew that Londo's latest scheme was more than a little dishonest. 
Inwardly he knew that this was not the kind of activity that an ambassador should indulge in.
"But the goods are not damaged!" Vir said again.
"Vir, by the Great Maker, is there anything inside that head of yours?  They aren't damaged now, but they will be.  Transit is a hazardous thing.  We tell him that the goods he offered were damaged on their way here.  He won't have the time or the patience to examine the goods, the Drazhi are lazy Vir! 
We buy the 'damaged' goods and then we sell them on for a better price, stressing too the next customer how much work went into getting the goods repaired when in fact, there was nothing wrong with them at all.
The Drazhi would rather take our word for it then actually bother to examine his own wares!  Trust me Vir, we stand to make- wait what was that?"
"What was what?" asked Vir...and then saw the triangular pattern of red lights slowly travelling across Londo's chest.
"Watch out!" he yelled, even as the bolt flew towards it's target.  But the bolt caught Vir, high on the right shoulder and threw him into the wall of the corridor.
"Vir!" Londo yelled, aware that his empty headed friend had just saved his life.
But he wasn't out of danger yet.  Something dropped too the ground behind him with a soft but distinct thud.
Slowly he turned as he heard a low growl, mixed with a sound that resembled a large cat purring....

"Speak to G'Karr?" Sheridan said, truly puzzled, before taking a sip of his Minbari Wine.
"Yes, that's what Kosh said, but G'Karr isn't here, and isn't due back for several days yet" replied Franklin.
"And that's only if, and it's a damned big if, if he can get past the new blockade in sector 4.  The Centauri have that part of space locked tighter than a Duck's backside"
Garibaldi said.
"Wait a minute" said Ivanova, "G'Karr may not be here, but N'Toth is."
Sheridan smiled as he raised his comm unit too his mouth.

Londo dodged the first swipe of his opponent's blade but not by much.
A few locks of his hair landed on the floor. 
The creature was large and bulky, but moved like a snake.  Swift, lithe movements belied it's stocky build.
But still Londo could fight if needs be and he saw that the beast seemed to be bleeding from a recent wound.
He lashed out with a feint too the right, his own left hand clutching his ceremonial dagger, coming in low even as the creature tried to parry the right hand attack.
Indeed Londo swore as the creature's blade, sliced a three inch long gash in his inner arm.  Londo felt the blood flow but also felt his knife strike home.
In a human, this would have pierced a lung perhaps but who knows how this beast was constructed?
The creature snarled as it realised the hunter had become the hunted.  Green blood flowed freely after Londo withdrew his knife and then delivered a backhanded slash that caught it across the left cheek.
It bellowed in pain or in rage and lunged again, but Londo had taken a half step backwards, shifting his weight too the backfoot.  He then brought his leading foot up sharply with a kick that would have made a human martial artist proud.
A tooth broke as Londo's boot caught it square in the jaw and he prepared to strike again, but something flashed through the air towards him. He ducked barely in time as a circular blade buried itself into the metal of a vertical support beam.
"Great Maker!" he hissed and then got sent reeling backwards as his enemy back handed him across the face.
The beasts blade glistened.
Londo tried to rise but the creature's foot pinned him down. 
"Vir, run!" he moaned, but Vir was still down.  He closed his eyes, waiting for the death strike that would deny G'Karr the pleasure of doing it as he had vowed to do so.

N'Toth walked into Sheridan's office and sat down and listened too what the humans had to say.
"Kosh thought G'Karr would know?  So why ask me?"
"Because" said Sheridan, "You are not without brains and you are a Narn that has great knowledge too"
"Please don't try and flatter me" she said with an amused expression, "Though of course I do appreciate it.  But I assure you this species is unknown too me. 
But Kosh saying look too the sides?  Well, Narn scientists did come up with a theory that there are paralell dimensions where creatures dwell.  If the Shadows can live in hyper space, then why not?  But how does this...wait of course!  The creature can hide itself, camouflage it's actions.
Think about it, how many people are there aboard this station, yet it can move without being seen by anybody?  Doesn't that strike you as odd to say the least?"
"It can make itself invisible" whispered Ivanova, "So how do we fight that?"
Sheridan shrugged, "We work out how it does it and find a way to combat it.  What we could do with is a specimen for studying.  How the hell do we get our hands on one without getting ourselves killed in the process?"

Londo looked into the eyes of his killer.  Now the time had come, he wasn't a afraid at all.  In fact, he was mildly surprised about how calm he actually felt."Go on then, do it.  Kill me" he said softly and then...the sound of a PPG discharging, once, twice, three times.  The creature flew backwards as the bolts hit home. Londo looked up at Zack Allen and then fainted dead away...

"As far as I can tell, apart from a bruised elbow and a minor fracture of his ribs, Londo is fine.  Vir on the other hand is a different story.  Whatever that energy bolt was that hit him. it did more than make a mark.  Intense burns and a nasty, deep wound that despite being partially cauterised, has done some severe damage to Vir's muscles and tendon's in his left arm.  He won't lose the limb, we have just got to pray that he comes out of the coma" , Franklin said with a dry throat. Sheridan could see his friend was tired, almost dead on his feet. 
"Steven get some sleep. That's an order"  Franklin gave a mock salute and grinned weakly, for once he wasn't going to complain about following the order.  As he left the surgery, his eyes drifted over to where his team was now performing an autopsy on the dead alien.

Garibaldi rubbed a hand over tired eyes.  One of the beasts had been killed, but intelligence told them there was at least one more of them still at large on the station.  It was a situation he could handle, but didn't like at all.  Whoever, or whatever these things were, they were armed too the back teeth. 

Garibaldi studied the items on the bench in fronty of him.  A disc or chakra style weapon was the most exotic one he noticed.  It bore a strong resemblence to a weapon used by the ancient Greeks on Earth.  Then there was the cannon or laser that had been mounted onto the shoulder of the creatures body armour, next too that lay a chronometer or maybe a radio device that had been on it's wrist. A strange box had been attached too the other wrist, that on closer examination, contained a two piece instrument that the medical crew assumed was some kind of first aid device.

Finally there was the matter of a net made of micro filament designed to cut the flesh of anything that struggled inside it, right down too the bone. He studied the Chakra again.  That bad boy had been removed from a steel girder for Pete's sake!  What kind of metal could cut through another like that?  None that he knew of.

"Nice toys" muttered Ivanova, as she stood next too him.  "Garibaldi, I have an idea as to how we can find the surviving creature.  Now for one, I am surprised that I'm the one to suggest it, and two, I'm also shocked nobody thought of it sooner.  Why don't we see if Lita Adams can track it"

Garibaldi raised an eyebrow, "You suggesting we use a Psi?  Whew never thought I'd live to see the day!  Okay why not?  We've got nothing to lose Susan.  Big question though, you gonna ask her or shall I?"  Susan shrugged, "It's my idea Michael"

The sole survivor raised it's head and shifted it's vision through different spectrums.  Infra red, Ultra Violet....there, there was his next target!  He purred softly to himself as it raised it's weapon and took aim.   Doctor Steven Franklin walked towards his quarters, unaware of the hidden death lurking above him....