Title:  The F/X-files X-over... [R]
Author: Niklas "Hawk" Jonsson ( hawk@telia.com )

Summary:
What happens when two Mutants, two FBI agents, two NYPD officers and two special effects wizards teams up. Will the veil of lies the two Mutants surrounds themselves with bring the whole team down? What are the three Immortals doing to do when they suddenly find themselves ending up in a prison? What is Cancerman going to do when his pack of Morleys are thrown into filthy trash? What will our team do when they all suddenly find themselves extremely aroused back at the penthouse they all share?
People are having *sex* in this fanfic, consider this your last warning...

DISCLAIMER:
Certain characters in this fanfic belong to either Chris Carter, 1013 Productions, Fox Television, Marvel Comics, Rysher entertainment, Hallmark entertainment, Mark Reinhagen, White Wolf Game studio or what/whoever else my greedy mind has ripped ideas or characters from. ;) HawkTech, The fairies, Erik and Niklas Jonsson are all mine though. If anyone is crazy enough to actually use them, hey go ahead but I want to know about it! :)
I'm from Sweden so English is not my native lingo, please forgive any grammatical, spelling or whatever other errors I've made. Feel free to send me corrections if you want, my knowledge of foreign accents is also rather non-existent so some of the dialogue might seem strange.
RATING:
Hmmm, dunno really. R I think. Feel free to correct me if this is wrong.
I'm not to graphic (most of the time...), but there are some references to sex, violence and bad language in almost all my stories, this one is no exception. ;D I trust that you won't be too offended, it's all a part of life and I won't start edit things like this out of my stories just because some people don't like reading about it. You have been warned...
FEEDBACK:
Greatly appreciated and *very* wanted, feel free to send anything except flames to:
hawk@telia.com
Or why not take a peek at my diary, new'n updated fanfics and other stories at Hawk's Galaxy:
http://hem.passagen.se/hawkgts/
ARCHIVE:
Go ahead, but I want to know about it first!
THANKS:
Everyone I know, everyone I'm related to, everyone I've ever met, everyone I've ever e-mailed or talked to over the telephone. A couple of big hugs and kisses goes out to all feedbackers.
OTHER:
This fanfic assumes that similar events as in the F/X fanfic "Sharing a bed" occurred with one important exception. Angie and Rollie did not jump into bed with each other in this universe. But they did meet Erik during the making of the movie "Le Mat - Assassin" where he played the leading role. One he knows *very* well since he really is Le Mat, an assassin so skilled and ruthless that he makes Victor Loubar seem like a newborn baby. The events in this story are set about two weeks after the events in "Red storm". By the way, Rollie and Angie loves each other, if this goes against your oppinion, get professional help!


The X-files timeline is somewhere before "The End", the two agents are still working on the X-files and their office hasn't been torched yet. I'm defenetively a 'shipper, so if the idea that Mulder and Scully actually loves each other turns your stomach, get professional help!

The Highlander timeline is sometime after Duncan found out that Adam really is Methos, the oldest known Immortal. I'm also assuming that Connor has found out about this, but that he hasn't really learned to be comfortable around Methos.

In X-verse, it's set right after the events in "First flight, take two...", comicbookwise this takes place around Onslaught, only Onslaught was destroyed before he ever managed to cause any real damage. ( Except from sending Xavier into heavy angst that is... ) Niklas recently (re)joined the X-men after returning from a future where he already had been a member of the X-men for a few months. He joined again, but nobody really trusts him. Especially not Emma Frost who was viciously attacked and threatened when she shut off his powers in an attempt to gain entry into his mind.


"....." = Speech
*.....* = Screams/Emphasis
/...../ = Thoughts
*/.../* = Telepathy/Projected thoughts
~.....~ = Translations
+.....+ = Sounds/Radio/Telephone/Computers
***     = Changing POV ( Point Of View )
---     = Moving ahead in time without changing POV


"Highlander!" Duncan stiffened and slowly turned around to face someone he hadn't seen in a long time. /Talbot!/ he thought in a slightly panicked state of mind. "We meet again Highlander." said Talbot stiffly. Duncans practiced eyes swept across his old foe and widened slightly as he realized that Talbot wasn't carrying a sword. He was dressed in a elegant dark blue suit, carried a small portfolio in his left hand. Most of his face was covered in his bright red beard, a large ugly scar went across his forehead. Duncan cursed himself, he should have been more alert then this. He had been so deeply submerged in his thoughts that he hadn't noticed the telltale buzz of another Immortal. That was the sort of carelessness that could lead to the loss of his head.

"Long time, no see Talbot." said Duncan carefully, even if Talbot didn't seem anxious to fight right now, he couldn't dismiss the possibility that Talbot had helpers hidden away somewhere, just like the last time they had faced off against each other.

"You will see me, or one of my friends, very soon again Highlander. We know where you are now, you can't get away. If you survive today’s encounter that is." spat Talbot with contempt. "Here is someone I don't think you have met before, but I think you know his father, after all, you killed him." said Talbot and smirked evilly. He stepped out of the dark alley and Duncan heard his steps echo as he moved away. Duncan threw all caution to the wind and pulled his sword out. /New York. Sometimes I think that there's more Immortals here then in the rest of the world added together./ he thought to himself as he tried to locate the Immortal he knew was somewhere in his vicinity. He turned against a dumpster where he had heard someone move, a second later a dark shape moved out from behind it, a old broadsword in his or her hands. As the shape moved out of the shadows, Duncan saw that it was a youngish looking man.

"You killed my father you... you... murderer!" spat the other Immortal.

"Who?" asked Duncan cautiously as he circled around, unwilling to make the first move.

"You killed him... and you don't even know who he was? Die!" screamed the young man and charged. /Of course, he could be even older then I am even if it's highly unlikely if he thinks I killed his "father"./ Duncan deftly parried the sweeping strike from his opponent only to be surprised by the sheer speed as the sword was pulled back and another strike initiated that Duncan was unable to parry. He winced as the heavy broadsword dug into his right arm. "That is just the beginning!" yelled his opponent and Duncan desperately parried another incredible swift cut. His opponent was faster then anyone Duncan had ever seen before, he handled the heavy broadsword as if it had been a rapier. The wide blade whizzed through the air with a speed Duncan was hard pressed to match. The only thing that saved him was the apparent inexperience of his opponent. If he was old, he couldn't have much experience of fencing, but he was blindingly fast. /Sweet Jesus!/ thought Duncan as the broadsword almost dug into his throat, if he hadn't stepped back, his head might very well have been lost. Duncan parried a powerful overhead chop, stepped in closer and pushed his opponent off balance with his shoulder. As the man staggered backwards, Duncan kicked his legs out from underneath him and stepped back to regain his breath. His opponent slowly got back on his feet and Duncan noticed that he was breathing heavily, he was drenched in sweat and his eyes were unfocused. He shook his head and stared madly at Duncan. "It was supposed to be finished by now..." he muttered and then charged again. Duncan clearly noticed a difference now, his opponent was slower, much slower. Duncan slapped the broadsword out of the way and then swung his sword back, passing the neck of his opponent on the way. He blinked in suprise, he had almost thought that it was a ruse, that his opponent had pretended to be slower just to catch Duncan by suprise. But he hadn't been fast enough to avoid this, his head dropped to the ground and his body followed a second later. Duncan took his sword in both hands, raised it to the skies and prepared himself for what was about to happened.

***

Niklas stared down at the abruptly ended fight with fascination. He had been on his way back from feeding when he had been diverted by the sounds of steel hitting steel. He had leapt over the rooftops, heading in that direction only to find the two men down in the alley fighting with swords. He had watched the display in silence, not wanting to interfere. Now when it was all over though, he intended to question the winner, bring him in to justice if it was necessary. He patted the Katana he was carrying, hidden underneath his trenchcoat. He pulled out the Beretta 92F from his ankle-holster and made sure it was loaded. It was almost ten meters down to the alley, a little to far to take in a single leap so Niklas aimed for the fire escape on the other side of the alley and was just about to jump when he suddenly felt *it* and saw the strange lights. The decapitated body was slowly rising into the air, strange lights were mysteriously flowing across the alley. The survivor looked as if he was in some kind of ecstasy, his eyes
were wide open, his mouth was opened in silence as lights flowed into him from the dead body. Niklas leapt, halted his fall as his left hand shot out and grabbed the fire escape. He leapt the remaining four meters down and landed softly. He aimed his gun at the survivor who suddenly screamed, weather it was in pain or pleasure was impossible to tell. Niklas yelped in suprise as the glass in the windows overlooking the alley suddenly exploded, the fire escape flashed as if electricity was being directed through it, the container filled with garbage exploded and rotting garbage rained down all over the alley. Niklas closed his eyes and looked down to protect his eyes from the smelly downpour, when it seemed as if it was finally over, he looked up again as the unknown man was slowly standing up. He had apparently fallen down on his knees when Niklas attention had wandered.

"Don't move mister." hissed Niklas and aimed his gun at the stranger. "Drop your sword, now!" The stranger slowly turned around, the sword still in his hands. "Drop it!" ordered Niklas again and slowly moved closer. "I don't know who you are mister, but I've got a lot of questions to ask you."

"Are you law enforcement?" asked the stranger skeptically.

"Not really. So you'd better drop that thing right now!" hissed Niklas and looked around swiftly. Heads were looking down at them from the broken windows, a few people were staring at them from the end of the alley. Niklas sensed that the stranger moved before he saw it, he pulled back and squeezed the trigger without bothering to look at the sword-vielding maniac first.

+boooom+

He saw the bullet hit it's victim in the left shoulder but a blink of an eye later, his pistol was torn from his right hand by a lightening fast sword. His left hand pulled out his own sword faster then lightening and a second later the two swords banged together between the two of them.

"You hid your Quickening?!" exclaimed his opponent in suprise. /My what?/ Niklas used all his skill, but he hadn't met an opponent this skilled ever before. Logan came close, but this guy was better. Niklas wasn't able to get his sword to touch his opponent, but his opponent hadn't managed to draw any blood yet either.

"Who are you?" exclaimed Niklas as he crouched and kicked at his opponents legs. The stranger leapt back and his sword almost chopped Niklas leg off but he managed to pull it back without any worse damage then a cut in his trousers. He briefly considered using one of his Kindred disciplines to make himself faster, but he ignored that impulse. It was challenging, too challenging for him to consider cheating. Niklas had thought that his opponents damaged shoulder and arm would slow him down, but he blinked as he saw that the wounds had healed. /A mutant with healing factor.../ he thought with suprise. /Why can't I feel him? My superpower sniffing ability ought to be able to locate him.../ wondered Niklas and gasped as his opponents sword slashed across his face. Niklas had pulled his head back in time, the wound wasn't very deep but it stung like hell.

***

"You'll pay for that." snarled Duncans opponent and Duncans knees almost caved in as he parried a very powerful overhand blow. Duncan hastily looked over their surroundings, he heard sirens coming closer. Some of the bystanders must have called the police. Duncan stepped back and then charged furiously, his sword moving in complex patterns with all the speed Duncan could muster. His opponent was definitively a experienced fighter, Duncan couldn't quite place his style though. He thought he could detect at least fifteen different techniques that he recognized and many more that he couldn't really place. /This guy must have been around for quite some time!/ Duncan looked up at his face again, the cut he had given his opponent was healing, no doubt about it. But it was slow, extremely slow and without the telltale blue lights as it healed. /It must have something to do with the fact that he's still hiding his Quickening./ thought Duncan and grunted in satisfaction as his sword plunged into his opponents chest.

***

Niklas gasped in pain as the sword dug into his chest, he snarled like an animal and struck his opponent with a powerful left uppercut. His opponent flew backwards and the sword was torn out of the chest, Niklas went down on his knees and gasped. /This guy is dangerous!/ he thought with a slight measure of panic as he drew upon his Kindred healing powers to heal the wound in his chest. He staggered up to his feet and raised his sword as his opponent slowly made it back to his feet, Niklas noticed the sirens though. They were really close now, he couldn't afford to hang around here any more.

"We'll meet again." he growled and sheeted his sword. He leapt up into the air, grabbed the fire escape and pulled himself up. He climbed up a ways and then leapt over to the other side of the alley and pulled himself up on the roof. He didn't look back as he ran as fast as he could, he couldn't afford being arrested and revealed as a mutant half-vampire.

***

"Bloody hell!" exclaimed Duncan as he staggered up the fire escape, he winced as a bullet dug into his left leg. Too much was happening, first the battle with the young Immortal who had been under the influence of a drug he had been given by Talbot. Ducan had gotten that piece of information after he chopped the head of his opponent. Talbot had killed the young mans adoptive father and blamed Duncan, given the young man a drug that would increase his speed for a short period of time and then shown him the way to Duncan with some sort of electronic device, some sort of tracking system. After that, the battle with the Immortal who could hide his Quickening and now he had the police on his tail!

"Freeze!" screamed one of the policemen down in the alley. A second bullet grazed his back the second before he threw himself up on the roof. He looked over to the other side of the alley without finding his mysterious opponent. He had gotten away, Duncan just hoped that he could do the same. He used the gun his opponent had dropped to blast away the bolts that held the fire escape in place, it started to wobble and Duncan pushed it away from the wall. /The landlord is going to get a lot of crap for this./ though Duncan absently, the fire escape was in a horrible state, the worst he'd ever seen. He grunted in satisfaction as the wobbly thing collapsed and crashed down into the alley, he heard the pained screams and ragged gasps of the officers who had been buried underneath it all, he hoped that they would be all right. He wobbled away and jumped from building to building. His jaw still hurt, he thought it was broken. That stranger had packed a mean punch, Duncan had landed almost four meters from the place he had been standing. His sword in his hands only because he had held it in a very tight grip that hadn't let go of the sword dispite the excruciating pain from the unexpected blow. /We'll meet again he said./ thought Duncan, he would be looking forward to it. This guy intrigued him, he would ask Joe Dawson about him, perhaps the Watchers knew something about this mysterious Immortal.

***

Dana Katherine Scully walked into the office and knew at once that her partner had a new case all prepared. She saw it in the way he was sitting, the way he turned around and smiled when he saw her. /Oh god, it's another one of 'those' cases./ she thought as she saw that smile. The smile he only smiled when it was something really crazy going on. It wasn't his there's-aliens-involved-perhaps-I-can-find-out-something-about-my-sister smile, it was his it's-so-darn-crazy-that-we-just-have-to-look-into-this smile. During the years since she first stepped into this office, she had learned to interpret him better then anyone, she knew him almost as good as she knew herself.

"All right Mulder, what is it? I know it's not aliens, perhaps it is... Let's see... Poltergeists?" she asked and shook her head when she saw him. "Noo, no poltergeists. How about buildings moving on their own?" He smiled even wider, not his she's-right smile, it was his she's-*way*-off-on-this-one smile. "All right, I give up." she said and fought to keep a smile off her own lips. /Damn but he's cute, sometimes I just want too.../ She stopped that thought before it got out of hand. She furiously hoped that she wasn't blushing, it wasn't proper, thinking about her partner in that manner. But it was getting harder and harder for every day that passed, the secret line that separated friends from lovers was getting harder to see for every day that passed. She sometimes caught herself looking at Mulder with desire in her eyes, feeling herself wanting him more then anything else. She sometimes felt him looking at her as well, but she hadn't been able to look up or turn around fast enough to see how he looked at her. She cleared her mind from those thoughts, she shouldn't be thinking them.

"No, no poltergeists or buildings with feet." he said and reached out behind him, he grabbed a thick pile of papers from his desk and held it up beside him. "Do you know what this is?" he asked and wiggled the pile of papers.

"No." she admitted.

"Each and every single one of these papers represent a murder. The last five years, there's been 189 murders where the corpse has been beheaded under mysterious circumstances." he said and slammed the wad of papers down on his desk with a booming sound.

"What mysterious circumstances?" asked Dana, her curiosity piqued.

"Strange lights, explosions without explosives, cars destroyed, windows blown out from every single window in the vicinity, reports about bodies levitating, men and women fighting with swords. At 02.27 Saturday morning, the police arrived at an alley in the Bronx. Several people had called because their windows had shattered, their lights had went out. Two men playing poker claimed to have seen two people down in an alley, fencing. One guy decapitated the other and a few seconds after that, the windows burst, strange lights flowed down in the alley and a container exploded. Eye witnesses on the street reported the same thing. Seconds after this, a third man aimed a gun at the killer. They screamed at each other before the man with the sword slapped the gun out of the third guys hand. A shot went off and no less then nine people swear that a bullet struck the fencers left shoulder. The man with the gun also pulled out a sword and they fenced for a while, until the killer stabbed his sword into the chest of the man with the gun. The wounded man threw a punch that made his opponent fly almost five meters backwards, still with the sword in his hands. The guy with the wound in his chest sheathed his sword, jumped three meters up into the air onto a fire escape, climbed a little bit higher, jumped six meters over to the other side of the alley and hoisted himself up onto the roof of the building there and vanished. The other man sheathed his sword, picked up the gun and made his way up the fire escape. The police arrived and shot him four times, but he still managed to get up onto the roof where he sabotaged the fire escape. It crashed down on the police officers, killing one of them and seriously injured another. Both men are still at large and unknown at the moment." he finished and took a deep breath. "I arrived here yesterday at nine in the morning and did some research, this is just the cases from the last five years." he said and gestured at the pile of papers. He pointed to a pile of books and printouts that seemed just on the verge of falling down from my chair that he had moved over to his desk as an extra storage space. He picked up the book on top. "This book describes how roughly the same thing happened in France, only this occurred the year 985. The first of these mysterious beheadings with following fireworks that I have managed to find happened threehundred years before Christ." He carefully picked out two books from the pile but it fell over anyway, he didn't appear to care much as it spread out all over the floor. Scully looked closer at the books, they both seemed very old and very valuable. He put them beside each other and opened them at spots he had marked with pieces of paper. "Look at these pictures Scully." he said and pointed at a page in each book. She bent down and tore her eyes away from his masculine hands to look at the pictures. They both resembled a man in his thirties, dark hair and a appealing face. She didn't doubt for a second that it was the same man on both pictures even if his haircut was slightly different. Mulder then placed a fax next to the two books, she looked at that as well. It was the same man again, once again with his hair in a slightly different manner.

"It's the same guy." she simply said. Mulder smiled at her, it was his I've-got-you-now smile, a slightly gloating one filled with mirth at the fact that he had her just where he wanted. He pointed at the first book.

"This book was written by a French monk in 1741." He pointed to the second book. "This one was written by a Arabic merchant in 1832." He pointed at the fax. "This is the image the police scetch artists came up with from the witnesses descriptions yesterday. The two books describe how this fellow decapitated someone with his sword and the strange phenomenon’s afterwards. He turned a page in the book written by the Arabic merchantman and pointed at the drawing of a sword on the other page. "This is the sword he used, it fits the description of the sword the monk claimed that he used and it fits the description of the sword used in the latest murder. It's the same man!" said Mulder, almost jumping with excitement.

"That's... impossible." exclaimed Scully. "He would have to be more then two hundred years old. It goes against all logical..." she fell silent. "Just like half of all the other cases in here." she said sourly and gestured around the room. "When do we leave?" she asked, knowing that Mulder had already made up his mind. She also couldn't help being curious about this weird case, she had faced a lot of things that was flat out impossible in the past, that someone was more then twohundred years old and still fit to run around decapitating people wasn't that strange compared to some of the others things she and Mulder had investigated.

"Well, the car is stocked with snacks, I've talked to Skinner and my suitcase is already in the trunk." said Mulder and his eyes sparkled, this was just the sort of cases he enjoyed the most. /As do I./ admitted Dana silently to herself.

"You could have warned me in advance, you were here all Sunday after all." she complained and looked around the room. "From all the junk in here, I'd guess you were here all night as well."

"Call of duty, an FBI agent never sleeps."

"No, he just passes out in the middle of the day from lack of sleep." she retorted.

"I'd rather pass out with you then anyone else." he said and winked at her.

"Don't get your hopes up 'Spooky', what sort of girl do you think I am?"

"A bad one, I thought we'd already established that."

"Tell you what, you clean this mess up and I'll go home and pack. When you're ready, come by my apartment and then you can sleep while I drive." she suggested.

"It's a deal." he agreed and looked around with a frown. "I really did make a mess of the place, didn't I?" he asked and shook his head.

***

"Here's your target." said David Talbot and threw the file over to the man on the other side of the table. "I placed a tracker on him, with this device you'll be able to follow him." he said and slided a little electronic device over the table. "He's only here temporarily and since he knows that I'm after him, he'll probably move around a lot."

"Any fancies?" asked Victor Loubar as he looked the device over.

"Not really, grenades, a shot in the head, a bomb, sniping, knife or whatever, it really doesn't matter. Just do it."

"The money?" David sneered and slowly pulled out a thick envelope from his portfolio. He handed it over.

"I don't work for pennies." said the man without even looking inside the envelope.

"Inside, you'll find ten thousand dollars as a proof of my good intentions. You'll also find all information necessary for you to use a bank account in a very helpful little bank in the Caymans. There's one million dollars in the account, if you succeed, I'll make it another one." said the man simply. Victor Loubar looked doubtful but he finally nodded and put the envelope inside his trenchcoat. Talbot left with a slight nod, never really taking any notice of the small disgusting fly that was sitting on Loubars left shoulder as he quickly browsed through the file. He had a few more meetings scheduled today, he wanted MacLeod to suffer, his last days in life spent like a hunted animal. The tracker David had fired into his leg with the rifle hidden in his portfolio made sure that he would be easy to find, he would become hunted like an animal, never allowed to rest. David smiled as he thought about it, he had spent years preparing this moment. The Immortals he had gathered, all of them with one or another reason to hate MacLeod, the mercenaries he had hired, the equipment he had gathered. He pulled out a small jar, filled with a dark fluid. /The drug I researched./ he thought and smirked. The effects wore off quickly, but while it lasted it made the one who had injected it faster, much faster. It had it's downsides though, it burnt a lot of energy, so once the effects wore off, it would turn the one taking it sluggish, tired and unable to really concentrate for hours. He wasn't planning on using it himself, but he had offered the ones after MacLeods head a dose if they wanted one. It increased the chance of a fast victory, but if the fight took more then a few minutes, they didn't have a chance in hell of keeping their heads on their shoulders.

***

"Well mister Duncan MacLeod, you are dead, whoever you are." muttered Victor Loubar and stabbed his finger between the eyes of the photograph in the file. "When you're out, I'll do Rollie Tyler." He hadn't planned on taking another assignment, but after the warehouse with all his equipment blew up and his three hirelings ended up in the hospital, he couldn't go on with his plans for Rollie Tyler until he had replaced the equipment anyway. So when this person called him up and requested his services, Loubar accepted. He briefly considered to actually drink the cup of coffee he had ordered, but there was no telling what might have been put in it. It might be poisoned and Victor didn't intend to take any chances, the client had picked this place to meet in so Victor automatically treated it like a hostile zone. He picked up the file and got up, he absently brushed an annoying fly off his shoulder and then walked out, without noticing that the fly followed him and settled down on his right shoulder until it was caught in a sudden gust of wind and pushed off. Someone who had been able to follow the fly's slightly panicked movements would have seen it fly around like crazy, gain altitude and slowly spin around, as if it was searching for something. When it apparently didn't find this something, it followed the street until it found a small time hoodlum loosely connected to the mob. The small fly settled down in the mans curly black hair. If the same someone who could have been able to follow the fly had possessed the ability to move in closer, see the fly up close, would be suprised to notice that the fly wasn't organic. It's tiny legs were made out of metal and equipped with small metallic claws. The wings were made out of an plastic-metallic alloy unknown to the general population, the eyes were in reality the lenses of a camera so small that it was able to fit into the head of the tiny construct. The rest of the "fly" consisted out of circuits, engines and a satellite uplink that connected it to what looked like a common communication satellite. What was unusual about this particular satellite was that it didn't belong to any country, news network or a research laboratory. If it hadn't employed stealth technology and transmissions sent on a frequency that no other devices were able to reach, it might have been noticed and confused with a spy satellite. That guess wouldn't have been far off... The images from the camera in the tiny 'fly' was sent scrambled over to the satellite who sent the signal back towards earth, down to a satellite dish on top of a nondescript skyscraper on Manhattan. It was passed along super-conductive shielded cables down to a computer, in front of that computer sat what looked like any other simple secretary or perhaps accountant. The eyes of this man never left the monitor in front of him, showing not only the images the camera in the fly recorded at the moment, but also a plethora of various readings that revealed the speed the fly moved in, the angles, the wind around the fly, temperature and the amount of energy left before the fly would run out and simply fall to the ground. The man held two joysticks in his two hands, his feet were placed on two pedals and all this controlled the so called 'FlyCam', currently seated in the hair of a mobster. The information that was of any interest was passed along the network over to a small groups of computers where it was categorized and stored on the enormously large harddrives for possible future use. Before the computers left the information completely alone, a voice>text conversion program as well as a image>text conversion programs processed the information and compared it to a few lists with keywords. It would have passed through relatively unnoticed if it wasn't for the fact that one of the list with keywords had the name Rollie Tyler in it. This caused an e-mail to be sent where it notified the receiver that a video clip where the name Rollie Tyler was mentioned was available. The e-mail was opened within seconds, the clip was opened two seconds later and caused the one watching it snarl in wrath. A little searching revealed that the watcher wasn't the only one who had shown interest in Rollie Tyler lately, the watcher now knew that his own cousin had discovered a certain Victor Loubars wish to crush Rollie Tyler. A extended search on events concerning Victors latest employee and target revealed a video of the swordfight, the watcher gasped as he saw his cousin trying to apprehend Victors target and the following fight. Erik Jonsson smiled, he wouldn't mind a little assistance and he knew that his cousin could provide him with as good assistance as any he could get within his organization, probably better. His almost unrivaled skills in swordplay would probably come in handy when there were Immortals involved. He just hoped that Niklas would be able to sneak away from the X-men for a while.

***

"Go back there? Are you crazy? People will recognize me!" exclaimed Niklas and looked accusingly at his cousin.

"I've checked the police reports, nobody got a good look at you during the entire fight. Here's the scetch the police are working after at the moment." he said and pulled out a drawing from his coat pocket. Niklas took the paper and studied it.

"Looks like Robert Redford." he commented after a while. "People must be blind." he remarked and shook his head in confusion. "Black hair? This guy looks like he's in his early fifties for gods sake! Do you have the one of the other guy?" asked Niklas suddenly.

"I can do better then that, here's the file we have on him including his picture." said Erik and pulled out a thin folder from his briefcase.

"Duncan MacLeod, a picture, a small list of places he might visit here in New York and some rumors of sightings. 'Immortal, one of the ten most likely to survive The Gathering?'" quoted Niklas. "What is this crap? Immortal? The Gathering?"

"You don't know? I figured you Vampires should have at least some knowledge of these dudes."

"I might have had, but I lost a lot of shit from my head in that other world. I don't have any now, that much is for sure anyway." replied Niklas slowly.

"Well, Immortal is just about what it sounds like, almost. They can heal any wound in record time, any wound except a head severed from the body that is. From what I've noticed, it's the only sure way of killing one of them. Blow them apart, they will heal. Burn them, they will regenerate the lost tissue. Throw them to starved animals and they will chew for a while, then refuse to eat no matter how hungry they get. Lost flesh regenerates. Shoot them, they flinch and two minutes later there's no wound. Poison, alcohol, viruses, mind control and whatever you care to mention, they burn off the effects sooner or later even if it seems like they can become addicted to drugs'n shit like that. It seems like all Immortals are waiting for something called 'The Gathering'. It's supposed to be some big meeting where they fight until the end, until there's only one of them left alive. It's unclear what will happened then, apparently it's supposed to bring great powers, Omnipotence even." Erik shrugged. "It's all based on the accounts of a Immortal we took prisoner and did some research on a year or so ago, how much and what is the truth, well, we just don't know."

"I can't recall seeing any of this in the HawkTech files I've read." said Niklas slowly and his stomach churned at the thoughts of the "research" on the Immortal prisoner. /Poor bastard!/ he thought in disgust.

"Probably depends on the fact that it's not commonly available. Some of the stuff I don't even think my own organization is capable to handle is stored in my own private computer, not connected to the HawkTech or any other network. Some things about the Kindred I don't want to be common knowledge, Immortals, magic and a few other little tidbits that the world isn't prepared to handle at the moment."

"I have to check it out sometime. Anyway, when is this Gathering?" asked Niklas curiously.

"No idea, it could be over already for all I know. It could be thousands of years into the future, it might never happen. Who can tell? But the information we have gathered, both from our prisoner and other sources indicate that Duncan MacLeod is someone who has a *very* good chance of surviving until the final gathering."

"If it's thousands of years into the future, he's going to have one hell of a hard time surviving until then." smirked Niklas.

"Perhaps not, you see, Immortals don't age. An Immortal we have more information on is at least ninehundred years old, as long as they keep their heads attached to their bodies, nothing can stop them from surviving." Erik looked annoyed for a few moments. "Just got an e-mail, a FBI team is going to look into the shit that happened here. Normally, I wouldn't worry too much about it. But these two are a little... unconventional."

"Mutant Affairs?"

"No, but they're certainly weird enough to fit in there, no these guys are from something called 'The X-files'. They are the whole department, two Special Agents. No clerks, no budget to talk about, just a basement and two people. I haven't managed to find out much about it, but I've picked up a lot of rumors about them. But no matter how much they seem like total loco's, they do get results. I wouldn't put it pass them to actually manage to find something out in this sordid little affair. Perhaps I should have them assassinated?" mused Erik seriously. Niklas shook his head.

"How about teaming up with them? That way we know everything they find out, we'll know what they are planning and how much they know."

"Teaming up with them? Masquerade as government agents?"

"Yeah, why not? We could pose as FBI-agents from Mutant Affairs, the paranormal happenings after a beheading *could* indicate mutant activity, checking it out by sending a team from Mutant Affairs seems reasonable."

"How do you suppose we might pull that one off then? Do you have any contacts in the FBI that I don't know about?" asked Erik smugly.

"Nah, but you do. I came up with the idea, you make sure we can pull it off." replied Niklas with a pleased smile. "Shared responsibilities y'know?"

***

Mulder jumped in his seat and awoke from his slumber covered in sweat. /Samantha!/ he thought and shivered nervously.

"Your phone Mulder..." said Scully and Mulder nodded. He pulled out his telephone from his pocket and hit the reply button.

"Mulder." The conversation over the telephone was rather one-sided since it was the assistant director Walter Skinner in the other end, Mulder grunted and gave one-syllable replies and finished with a disgruntled "Bye." before he hung up.

"What's the matter Mulder?" asked his partner, the gorgeous Dana Scully. He tried to filter away the gorgeous part from his thoughts, she was his partner, nothing else.

"That was Skinner on the phone, we are going to team up with another set of agents on this case."

"From Violent Crimes?" asked Scully curiously but kept her mind mostly on the driving.

"No, Mutant Affairs. They seem to think that the fireworks afterwards have something to do with mutant powers." he snorted.

"Well, it might. You know that a large part of our 'strange' cases has involved mutants in one way or another. Telepaths, telekinesis, pyrokinesis, rapid healing, shapeshifting and so on, this might very well be the case here as well." said Dana reasonably.

"I know, I know." sighed Mulder.

"But you don't think so?"

"Some of the incidents described happened hundreds of years ago, there weren't many mutants around back then, most of them have manifested the last twenty or thirty years or so. Some of the people back in the middle ages who were accused of witchcraft and black magic might have been mutants, but there isn't any proof of that. Scientists say that mutants are a recent thing, the older events I've found cannot have mutants involved unless mutants evolved a lot sooner then commonly believed."

"So, where are we meeting them?" asked Scully.

---

"Nice view." commented Mulder as he looked out through the window. "Hey, the garden is just across the street." he murmured. "There was a beheading in the garage there in... 1984 I think it was. A second beheading followed shortly afterwards, the culprit was identified as a man named Victor Kruger who lost his own head before he could be arrested. All three of these beheadings were followed by the strange phenomenon’s." he explained as he looked out through the window.

"When Mutant Affairs plan an operation, they sure do it with flair. Renting the penthouse of a classy hotel, eight separate bedrooms and just look at the bathrooms!" exclaimed Scully, he wasn't sure if she had been listening to him or not. "This sure is a *long* step from our usual sleazy motels." she said and nodded her appriciation.

"One of the upsides of having a large budget." said Mulder neutrally. But he was confused, he wouldn't have thought that Mutant Affairs could afford to throw their money around like this even if they had a enormous budget. "Shall we go take a look at that alley? The other team clearly isn't here and hasn't left any messages for us either."

"All right, but lets unpack and give them a chance to show up first Mulder, it would be disrespectful to begin without them."

"Okay Sku-leeh." he replied. "Whatever." He frowned suspiciously. "This wouldn't have anything to do with the enourmous bathtubs in the bathrooms now would it?"

"I'll only take a quick bath." said Scully and looked at him, pleading silently with her eyes. He couldn't resist her when she did that, he couldn't resist her when she wasn't either but he didn't want to think about that.

"Want some company? Those tubs look big enough for two."

"In your dreams Mulder, in your dreams."

"Yeah... probably." he said with a dreamy smile.

***

"Found anything?" asked Scully after looking through the entire alley. "Mulder?" she asked when she didn't see her partner.

"Up here Scully." he replied and Scully looked up to see him standing on a ladder almost up in roof level with one of the buildings that created this alley.

"What are you doing up there Mulder?" she asked curiously as she looked upwards.

"The guy who jumped from the fire escape pulled himself up here. Do you want to hear something spooky Scully?"

"What?" asked Scully in a resigned note.

"There are claw-marks here, the guy didn't quite make it from the looks of it. But it looks as if he scratched his way up to the roof. There's blood here, but not as much as expected from someone who just took a sword right through his chest.

"Claws?" asked Scully. "What are you talking about Mulder?"

"I'm telling you, this guy must have had claws, either natural or some sort of tool to simplify climbing. I'd guess that his jump was about a feet to low. He used the clawthingies to reach the roof and then pulled himself up. I'll get some samples for you." he said and put some fragments down into a small plastic bag he pulled out from one of his pockets. When he was finished, he slowly made his way down again. "Will you catch me in your strong arms if I fall Scully?" he asked and smiled down at her.

"Don't fall and you'll never have to find out if I would have caught you or not." she retorted.

***

*Flashback from scenes in or around events in "First flight, take two..." available on my homepage for the curious ones.*

Angie Ramirez shivered slightly as someone stepped out of the shadows on her side of the street and waved at her. She thought he looked slightly familiar but she couldn't quite remember where she might have seen him before. She slowed in and halted a few meters away from him, even though he seemed to radiate honesty and friendliness he certainly didn't look that way in his black clothes, trenchcoat and shades.

"Hey miss, I was wondering if you'd like to do me a favor?" he asked sweetly. She looked around, trying to locate any possible ambush or anything else out of the ordinary.

"What sort of favor?" she asked cautiously.

"Put this letter in the mailbox over at Tyler FX." he said and held out a simple envelope and a hundred dollar bill. Angie tensed at once but tried not to show it. /Why can't he deliver it himself?/ she wondered and looked more closely at him. He saw her study and moved back a step where the shadows hid more of his features.

"Why can't you do it yourself?" she asked suspiciously.

"I don't want to get involved, but that is none of your concern. Deliver this letter and the hundred dollar bill is yours." he said and held the envelope and the bill up in front of him. He bent the envelope, pressed it together and even opened it to show her the simple printout in it. She was to far away to see what it said though. "See, no bomb. No poison on the paper. No hidden needles or anything like that. Just deliver a simple letter and you'll be able to shove this hundred dollar bill into your wallet. Here, I'll leave it here on this parking meter and move away so I won't be able to grab you or anything." he said, left the envelope and the bill on the meter and backed several meters.

"How do you know that I won't just run off with it?" asked Angie.

"I don't. But it is a matter of life and death, it is very important that Rollie Tyler reads this as soon as possible." said the stranger and folded his arms. "I won't pay you more if that is what you're waiting for, sooner or later I'll find someone else willing to deliver this letter. But if Rollie dies because he didn't get it in time, you're the one responsible." he said coldly and Angie shivered. She grabbed the letter and bladed over towards the loft as fast as she could. She didn't care to grab the bill so that fell to the ground behind her. She looked behind her and noticed the stranger bend down to pick the bill up, no sign of pursuit or anyone else nearby.

"Blue, open!" she shouted and heard the click as the door was unlocked.

+thunk+

Angie stared as a throwing knife with a hundred dollar bill pinned on it struck the door.

"You forgot your money!" shouted the stranger and then disappeared into the shadows. Angie carefully took the knife down with a handkerchief preventing her hands from touching it. Perhaps she could get Francis and Mira to dust it for fingerprints. She removed the bill and put that tucked underneath the knife. The bill did have the strangers fingerprints on it, of that she was sure because she had seen him hold it. She stepped inside and looked around the loft, she didn't see Rollie anywhere and there was a note taped on her workstation that said he was out shopping. Angie sat down in the sofa and opened the envelope, she carefully took out the letter. She was wearing gloves just so she wouldn't put her prints all over it.


Rollie Tyler.

You don't know me and you probably don't have any reason to trust me, but I have to try anyway. Your life is in danger, when I was conducting my affairs, I happened to stumble across a warehouse where I encountered three persons talking. They had been hired by an international terrorist I think you might know, a certain Victor Loubar. They were talking about how they had been hired to act as decoys when this Victor Loubar were going to take his revenge out on a certain Rollie Tyler. I checked all Rollie Tylers in USA and you were the only one who has had any dealings with Victor Loubar in the past that I could find. The three decoys are probably in a hospital right now where they are being treated for a mysterious loss of blood, if the police and the fire department was alert enough, they should have found them next to a burning warehouse earlier today. The warehouse and a lot of equipment that Loubar had gathered was destroyed in the fire so he'll probably have to spend quite some time getting replacements for the destroyed gadgets, but if you are the correct Rollie Tyler, he'll probably still try to get his revenge on you. Stay alert.


Angie reread the note once again and then put it back into the envelope. /Loubar.../ She shivered and wiped a few drops of perspiration from her forehead with the back of her left hand. She hadn't really believed that he had been killed, the only thing that would have been enough to convince her would have been to see his rotten corpse with her own eyes. If the letter had warned for any other threat, she would have laughed it off. But even if she had received this strange warning in a very suspicious way, she decided to treat it like the real thing.

"Blue, open." She jumped as she heard the muffled voice of her partner, Rollie Tyler outside the door. After a second or two, he kicked the door open and walked in with his arms filled with large bags. "Ang." he greeted her. "Great, can you help me out a little here" he asked and kicked the door shut behind him as he tried to balance the mountain of things in his arms. She carefully relieved him of a few bags and he sighed in relief.

"Rol." She didn't quite know how to start, so she just said it. "Loubar is back."

+clong+ +bonk+ +thud+ +crash+ +bing+ +thud+ +crash+

Angie yelped in suprise as Rollie dropped his bags and stared at her with his eyes wide open. The floor was a mess and he was standing in a puddle of ruined foodstuffs and F/X supplies, people would have been suprised to know how much of their effects were created with the aid of things anyone could buy at a common grocery shop.

"How did you know?" he asked and blinked in suprise. "Was he here?!" he asked and scanned the area and her with piercing eyes, a look filled with concern, worry, love and a hate-fueled rage that almost scared her when she saw it in his eyes. She calmed herself and studied him closer.

"You don't seem very suprised by this." she said calmly, trying to keep her voice from sounding accusing. He lowered his gaze and swallowed.

"Ever since he got away... I've kept my eyes out, tried to track him down." admitted Rollie. "I got a pretty good tip earlier today when you decided to go rollerblading. He was apparently holed up in some old warehouse, but it was burning as I got there. The fire department and police was all over it, so I couldn't even get close. Sorry Ang."

"You've been trying to find Loubar for almost a week... Without telling me about it?" asked Angie and this time she didn't care that she sounded accusing. "Rollie!" He tensed and looked really guilty and miserable as she gazed straight at him. "We agreed! We agreed that we weren't going to let him take over our lives, we were just going to drop it all, drop it!"

"You agreed, I never did. He *will* die for what he did." said Rollie and his eyes shone with hatred. She sighed, it was no use arguing about it now. "How did you know? The last thing Mira found out was that he had left town and I haven't been telling either her or Francis about my private search yet."

"I was asked to deliver a letter to you, since it was so suspicious, I read it." admitted Angie and told Rollie all about the strange encounter.

"Where was the police unit? They're supposed to keep an eye on you all the time." commented Rollie after reading the strange message.

"I got tired of having a car following me everywhere I went, so I lost 'em in order to blade in private." replied Angie. "Don't come wining about it!" she snapped before he had time to say anything. "You know as well as I that if the situation was the other way around, you'd sneak away from your guardians as soon as you got the chance. Besides, if the police leave, we're supposed to call for another unit or stay here with the door locked. You just left." Rollie sighed and Angie nodded, he couldn't complain about her behavior when he wasn't behaving himself. He looked at the letter again and read it over one more time.

"So he really did use that warehouse. I guess I have to tell Francis and Mira about this, they need to question his helpers. Perhaps they know something, this letter and the knife has to be dusted for prints. The guy who warned me might know something else, something that can lead us to Loubar."

***

"Well?" Rollie asked as Mira and Francis arrived the day afterwards. He had been up all night, trying to locate Loubar. He didn't really think he would, but he just couldn't bear the thought of sleeping in his bed. /The same bed Angie and Loubar used.../ he thought and felt his stomach heave. He tore his mind away from it, if he dwelled more upon it he would have to throw up in front of his friends.

"Hell Rollie, you look like hell!" exclaimed Mira. "Where's Angie?"

"Still asleep in the extra bed you brought." replied Rollie and yawned. "Well, what did you find out?" he repeated, he wouldn't let them get off track.

"The helpers didn't know anything of importace, they only met him once and never did find out what he had planned. They were supposed to have a briefing with him, but something happened. They were waiting for Loubar when the man was struck by an electrical surge that dropped him to the floor. The women spun around and barely managed to see a man reaching out for them as they too dropped to the floor. All three had been electrocuted, not lethal, only a stunning amount that rendered them completely unable to move. Then they all got a whack in the head that knocked them unconscious. They didn't come too until at the hospital." explained Francis.

"They were all more or less all right, but the man had lost a lot of blood. The doctors were baffled, he didn't have any injuries and he had been examined by his personal doctor just a week earlier and was perfectly healthy then. Here's a scetch of the description the women gave on the man they saw." said Mira and showed them a crude drawing. Rollie studied it, the man looked slightly familiar but he couldn't quite place him. 

"He looks... I feel like I should know him. I have seen that jaw and the nose before, where have I seen it?" wondered Rollie out loud. He heard a gasp behind him and was suprised to see Angie standing behind him, looking at the picture he was holding. "Morning Ange, didn't know you were awake." he said.

"That's him! That's the guy who left the message!" exclaimed Angie. "Sunglasses and all!"

"Are you sure?" asked Rollie at the same time as Francis and Mira asked the very same thing.

"Well, it's no photo. But it sure looks like him anyway." said Angie and studied the drawing more closely. "I just wish I could figure out who he reminds me of." she exclaimed. "It's driving me crazy!"

"You recognize him too?" asked Rollie and looked at the drawing again. "I thought I had seen him before somewhere, but now that you mention it, it's probably just that he reminds me of someone."

"We're both right..." mumbled Angie. "I know that he reminds me of someone, but I have seen him as well somewhere. But who is it that he reminds me of and where have I seen this guy before?"

* End of flashback sequence*

***

Mira looked down at the corpse and shuddered, the cut that had sewered his head from his body was clean as a whistle, it looked so clean and even that she suspected it had been the work of a laser or a surgeon with access to proper equipment. It didn't look like a wound she expected to see from what apparently had been a duel with swords. There hadn't been any witnesses to this one, not any of the weird electric disturbances that had accompanied the latest beheading either. /Just two men who suddenly decided to try and kill each other with swords./ she thought dryly. /What is wrong with the world? Why swords? Why not guns, knifes, grenades or whatever? Walking around with a sword and keep it hidden from plain view must be bloody difficult./

"Mira? Look over there." said Francis suddenly and Mira turned around and looked at the two men in suits, bent over something a little ways off.

"Who are they?" she asked suspiciously as she looked at them. /Suits. Impeccable. Government, maybe the feds./ she concluded to herself before he answered. /Why do I get the feeling that I've seen them before?/ she asked herself as she tried to get some answers from her subconscious without succeeding.

"Dunno, I didn't see them here before." he replied hesitantly and moved towards them as Mira moved closer, but kept behind him. Prepared to give him cover if it turned out to be necessary.

"This is a sealed area gentlemen. Unless you can give me some proper ID's, I'm afraid you'll have to leave." said Francis in his calm, yet commanding voice. The two men slowly rose and turned around. What Mira first noticed was their looks, they were almost mirror images of each other. They only thing that truly set them apart were the fact that one wore a pair of black sunglasses, the other didn't. At her second review, she noticed that the one with the glasses had slightly shorter hair and didn't appear to care much about shaving. It was apparent that he hadn't shaved for at least a week. She also noticed another thing, the one without the sunglasses had one green eye and the other one had one of those funny lenses that youngsters found so amusing, it was a yellow smiley face. She blinked in suprise as she saw it, it didn't seem to fit with the expensive suit he was wearing. He winked at Francis with his smiley-eye and smiled as he slowly reached into the side pocket of his pants and whipped out his wallet.

"Special Agent Tom Olsen of the FBI." The other one also brought out a wallet and flipped it open, revealing another badge and an FBI ID-card.

"Special Agent Jim Olsen, I'm with the Jehovah Shriners." he said with an amused chuckle.

"I thought the FBI wasn't supposed to have humor." commented Palmira and smiled dispite herself.

"Occasionally, one gets through the system." replied Tom dryly. "He just doesn't know when to quit. So miss and mister NYPD, what can you tell us about the recent beheadings?"

***

"Agents Mulder and Scully?" asked Erik as he stepped into the hotel room he had arranged to function as a temporary base of operations. The two people sitting at a table in there got up on their feet and nodded. "Pleased to meet you, I'm Special Agent Tom Olsen and this is Special Agent Jim Olsen." he said and indicated Niklas who walked in after him. Niklas smiled at the mention of their false identities, he didn't care much for the idea of posing as brothers but they were too much alike to pretend being unrelated. The problem was that the FBI would never team up two people with such a close personal relation as partners. They walked up to the two real FBI agents to greet them up close. Erik took the hand of the man, a tall dark-haired guy.

"Special Agent Fox Mulder" he introduced himself. Erik moved on to the woman and Niklas reached out to shake hands. Mulder repeated his introduction.

"Hey, we've got the same first two names." said Niklas with a slight smile. Fox Mulder returned it and his eyes sparkled. Niklas turned to the woman, a lovely rather short red-haired woman with a quiet sensuality.

"Special Agent Dana Scully, MD." she introduced herself.

"The love doctor..." said Niklas with a smile that lighted up the whole room. He saw Fox tense out of the corner of his eyes. /Ouch, sore spot there. Mental note, do not hit on the doctor./

"Hardly, she slices and dices up dead bodies." said Mulder and smiled in what most likely was an attempt to hide his feelings on Niklas friendliness towards Scully. Niklas noted at once how he stepped up closer and sort of hovered over Dana Scully.

"Are you two related?" asked Dana as she looked between Niklas himself and Erik.

"Brothers actually." replied Erik. "We're not usually teamed up like this, but my partner ended up at the hospital after a confrontation with a telekinetic, Jim's partner went on a vacation so they made an exception and sent us out to investigate the mutant decapitator."

"I don't think it's a mutant." said Fox suddenly and picked up a wad of papers from the table he and his partner had been sitting at when Niklas and Erik arrived. Niklas and Erik swiftly leafed through the research the agents had managed to gather up. They exchanged e-mails between each other with the aid of their Mioplants, 'talking' about everything they read. They were both astounded at the amount of information, hints and clues that the two agents had managed to dig up.

"Interesting." said Niklas as he put down his share of the files after a while. "So either if our man or woman is a mutant or not, we're dealing with someone or several someone’s who have been doing this for centuries unless it's some sort of cult or organization of decapitators that has been around since before Christ? Normally I would say that this rules out mutants, but there are some really old ones. En Sabah Nur AKA Apocalypse for instance, he's milleniums old. There are some other mutants almost as old as him, there is evidence of mutant activity a few hundred years after Christ as well. But speculation in this is fruitless until we find out the one or the ones responsible. Why are you staring at me like that?" asked Niklas and looked over at Fox Mulder who blinked in apparent suprise.

"Well... Normally when I show my research or in some cases, even evidence, I'm usually met with amusement, disbelief or a combination of the two. You guys didn't even blink."

"When you've stood eye to eye with guys like Magneto, it's very hard to become suprised by anything a bunch of papers have to say." replied Erik and smiled apologetically. "But this is really an astounding amount of information you guys have managed to dig up, some day I have to go down into the basement and see just what you guys are hiding in there." /A relationship perhaps./ Niklas thought to himself as he watched how close the two agents stood and how they behaved, looking at each other, exchanging silent messages with their eyes as if they had some kind of telepathic ability. He didn't feel any indication of superpowers from anyone of them however, they were normal human beings. He looked once again at the tie Fox Mulder was wearing. /Well, more or less normal anyway.../ he added to himself.

"Well, we've been waiting for you two. You weren't here when we arrived so we checked out the crime scene and then returned to wait a while longer."

"Well, there was another decapitation a few hours ago. We decided to go play investigators." replied Erik with a slight grin.

"Oh yeah, that reminds me!" exclaimed Niklas and slowly brought out a sword from the folded trenchcoat he was carrying, holding it with one of the arms of the trenchcoat separating it from his hands. He put it down on the table the two real agents had been sitting at and studied it closely.

"Heavy saber, French, maybe Spanish. Early 16th century or late 15th." commented Erik calmly as they all stared at the blood coating the sword.

"Where did you get this?" asked Agent Scully, her voice somewhere between curiosity and accusation. Niklas looked at the sword in silence for a few seconds.

"I nabbed it from the latest murderscene. It could be the murder weapon, but I'm inclined to believe that we're looking at the weapon of the looser in this duel. I didn't want it getting caught up with the police, especially not if it meant a struggle between the FBI and the NYPD over who would do the honors of examining it. We'll get someone to look at it and then we'll hand it over." said Niklas and walked over to the entrance where he placed his trenchcoat on a hanger, making sure that neither his Katana nor his shotgun was visible.

"You stole evidence from a murder scene!" exclaimed Agent Scully, stating the obvious.

"I didn't steal, I merely... borrowed it for a while." he replied and chuckled to himself. "Aw *come* on, you are the prime gossip of the FBI, your unconventional cases and reports are legendary. Don't tell me that you accomplished all that without ever bending the rules a little?"

"Not to this extent." mumbled Agent Mulder but he didn't seem all that sincere about it. Niklas winked at him and smiled. /"Not to this extent" my ass!/ An e-mail from Erik arrived and he opened it, another body had been found, died of a sharp object going through his throat. According to three witnesses, the dead man had pulled out a submachinegun and tried to kill an unknown man in a trenchcoat with it. The unknown man had taken several hits and went down, when the soon about to be dead man walked up to the downed man, he suddenly rose and shoved a sword into the throat of the man with the smg. The wounded man had staggered away, thrown himself in the East river and simply vanished. The police assumed that he was dead, unaware of the fact that if it had been Duncan MacLeod, he wouldn't need to come up for air.

***

Duncan grabbed the anchor line of the small boat and slowly climbed aboard. He slowly checked it out and sighed in relief as he found it unoccupied. A quick search revealed some canned food that Duncan heated on the simple stove after leaving a few dollar bills in their place. He soon found himself sitting on the edge of a bed, sipping on a cup of hot soup as he forced his body to relax. It felt darn good to finally be able to actually sit down and rest, he had been hunted like an animal ever since the first meeting with Talbot, he had seen him twice more since then. Not getting close enough to fight, because Talbot hadn't come without company any of the times. There hadn't been any more Immortals for a while now though, only mortal humans. He didn't like killing them, especially since most of them didn't seem to have any idea of what they were up against. /Probably hired killers./ he thought to himself. It didn't make him feel any better though, they were most likely the scum of the earth, but their corruption didn't make him feel any better. He had seen the Immortal who hid his Quickening once again but the other hadn't noticed him. Perhaps he wasn't able to sense anothers Quickening when he hid his own? Duncan didn't know, whatever the reason, he had been able to slip away before being noticed. The other Immortal had changed into a somber suit with a trenchcoat over it. The favored way of hiding a sword for all male Immortals and quite many of the women as well. Duncan put those thoughts out of his mind though, he decided to sleep for a while. He hadn't slept since Saturday, whenever he had hired a room somewhere or tried to doze off in a dark alley somewhere he had felt the presence of another Immortal closing in. He hoped that this might throw Talbot and his toadies off his back for a while, he really needed some rest right now. If an Immortal came along, the Quickening would warn him. If a mortal came along, Duncan hoped that he would wake up or that the mortal wouldn't take his head off. But he was only distantly aware of the fact that he might die in his sleep, he really needed it now. He wasn't aware of the fact that his hands put down the empty cup of soap on a small nightstand until he leaned back and rested his head on a heavenly soft pillow.

***

Talbot stared out over the harbor, MacLeod was out there according to the tracker. He briefly considered going after him, but he guessed that he could allow his old enemy an hour or two of rest before the hunt would start anew. Of course, there was also the possibility that some of his hired helpers managed to track him down. None of them was aware of the fact that Duncan was an Immortal though, there were only hired to inflict more pain, take his stress to all new levels as he was hunted through New York. It could wait, Talbot had waited for this moment for several years now, he could wait a few hours longer. He pulled his trenchcoat tighter around his body and stepped away from the pier, a sinister smirk on his lips as he made his way over towards his car.

***

Connor MacLeod stepped out of the cab and his features twisted as he once again inhaled the stench that was New York. He held out a few bills to the cabby and mumbled something incoherent as the cabby thanked him for the generous tip. Connor tensed as he felt another Immortal nearby but relaxed slightly as he saw who it was. He was still fully prepared to whip out his sword and do whatever was necessary though. He never really understood why Duncan was able to treat this man with such ease.

"Hello Connor." said the other man silently. "I still haven't found him." he said before Connor was able to even ask the question.

"Hello Methos." replied Connor and saw the other man cringe slightly at the mention of a name that only a few Immortals believed in and even fewer knew belonged to this man, the oldest known Immortal.

***

"Yes Charles. ... No, I don't know when I will be back. ... Personal business. ... I can't reveal that. ... Yes, I will explain everything when I return. ... It will be a good one, promise. ... Yeah, bye." Mulder carefully closed the door to his bedroom and considered the strange phonecall Jim had made. It didn't make any sense. /Personal business? He's got a case, hasn't he?/ Mulder shrugged, perhaps it was simply some girlfriend he hadn't told what he did for a living. But Charles didn't sound like a woman, he could be gay of course, it wasn't that uncommon these days. But for some reason, Mulder didn't quite believe that he was. He listened at the door separating his room from Scully's, he heard her moving around in there so he knew that she was awake. They had all been up late last night, another corpse had been found. This guy wasn't decapitated though, he had been stabbed in his throat after a failed murder attempt. There hadn't been any of the mysterious phenomenon’s, but they had all left to check it out anyway. Agent Tom had sent the sword away to be examined, but the results wasn't back yet. They had no leads, no suspects and the corpses had no relation to each other what so ever. It seemed as if the guy killing them just picked people at random even if Mulder had to admit that it looked as if he was just defending himself. But even if it had been self defense, he still had to brought in for questioning. Mulder knocked at the door that separated his and Scully's rooms.

"Hey Scully, are you decent?" he asked quizzically, entertaining a brief hope that she would reply "No, but please come in anyway.", as usual, no luck in that department.

"Yes. It's open." Mulder shrugged, it always was. It was a tradition they had agreed on in the beginning after one to many stays at crappy motels in the middle of nowhere. Whenever possible, they got rooms next to each other with a door separating them. The door was usually closed but never locked, neither of them walked in to the other without first checking if the coast was clear. It allowed for easy access to the other and still gave both of them the privacy they both needed. He stepped inside and found her sitting on her bed, wearing a large white T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. She was bent over her own legs in concentration as she clipped her toenails. He smiled and lept onto her bed, bouncing slightly as he crossed his legs and studied her intently. "What?" she asked absently as she finished her right foot and moved on to her left. He intercepted her, grabbed the sissor and placed her left foot in his lap. She smiled and rolled her eyes at him but didn't say anything as he finished what she had started. She leaned back and relaxed, leaning on her elbows and studied him intently with a slight sparkle in her eyes. It wasn't the first time he did this, the first time she had been shocked and looked at him with bewilderment after he had offered to do it for her. After the first couple of times, she had simply accepted it, grateful to have someone else do it for her. He snipped off the last offending piece of excessive nail from her pinky toe and then moved up her right foot in his lap as well. He silently gave her a foot massage. She made a content noise and leaned back, rested her hands on her stomach.

"Enjoying yourself mam?" he asked cheerfully.

"Oh... yeah!" she replied and rolled her eyes.

"Perhaps a full body massage would be in order mam?" he asked and winked at her. She closed her eyes and giggled.

"Promises, promises." she sighed. /Wow, I wouldn't mind giving her a full body massage. I wonder if she was serious?/ he thought to himself. There was a knock at the door and it opened a few centimeters.

"He's been located." said Jim simply. "We're leaving in five if you want to tag along."

***

Scully jumped on one leg as she tried to get the last shoe into place, the others were sitting in the car with impatient looks on their faces. Mulder had offered to go alone but she had refused, he had been running off alone far to many times for her to let him out of her sight when she didn't have to. Sure, he would have been in the company of two other agents, but she preferred when she herself could keep an eye on him. She had spent many hours being worried over him and she had tried to imagine her life without him. She couldn't, a life without Mulder at her side wasn't a life as far as she was concerned. She sometimes wondered exactly when he had managed to get under her skin to this extent. She had liked him from the start, or well, she had been attracted to him from the start. His fame, his looks and his way of being had made her fall for him, but it was only a minor crush. She had expected it to fade away into nothing, sometimes it had, but it always returned with more and more power until she one day realized that he had become such an integral part of her life that she couldn't imagine keeping on living without him by her side. Whenever he did something as sweet as this morning when he had started clipping her toenails, she always felt her emotions towards him rise to even higher levels. If they hadn't been interrupted, she wasn't sure what might have happened between the two of them. She darted inside and yelped as Tom floored it before the door had closed. She strapped herself in and finally managed to get the shoe on right.

"So, where is he and how was he located?" asked Mulder curiously as Tom placed a siren on the roof and speeded through town at a breakneck speed.

"Pure blind luck! An hour ago, a family intended to go on a little trip with their sailing boat. The father noticed that someone had been on it and sneaked onboard, he looked in through a window and saw a man sleeping on one of the beds, cradling a sword in his arms. He called the police and they notified us. They have the pier surrounded and there are a few police boats in the area, surrounding the boat from all directions. I've gotten them to wait though, they won't do anything until we show up, unless sleeping beauty does something rash of course."

"Did he..." started Scully but never got to finish her question before Tom answered it.

"Match the description? Yep, the father looked at the scetch the police had and gave a positive ID, it's our man or at least someone who looks a hell of a lot like him."

***

Palmira Sanchez turned around at the noise, just like everyone else. The screeching of tires and frantic honking of a carhorn certainly got the attention of everyone in the area. She swore and reached for her gun as a black Cadillac suddenly spun around a corner, barely avoiding a policecar parked right in it's path. It stopped a few inches away from another car and four people leaped out of the car, two of them looking slightly nauseous. It was the sibling Agents and two others that Mira didn't recognize. All four of them jogged until they were standing in front of the command center. All four of them pulled out FBI identification and badges, a frantic conversation was held and something was apparently decided upon.

"Yo Mira!" exclaimed one of the agents, the one without the sunglasses. She searched her memory for a while until his name resurfaced.

"Yeah Tom, what is it?" she asked and walked closer. She hadn't been invited to the command center, it was headed by some thickheaded captain, a colonel from the National guard and a representative from the Mayors office.

"Jim and I are leading the strikeforce, do you and Francis want to be the NYPD representatives?" he asked and Mira nodded fiercely. She couldn't conceal a gasp as she saw his eyes, he now had one brown and one blue eye. /That green eye could also have been a lens, or it might have been his real eyecolor. Damn this guy!/ she thought to herself. "Great, grab yourselves some Kevlar and get down to the pier." he said and pulled out a shotgun from underneath his trenchcoat. Mira raised an eyebrow at that and the two other suits he had arrived with also looked a little suprised. The other agent, Jim, earned a few more raised eyebrows as he also pulled out one and leaned against his right shoulder.

***

"Mulder." said Scully hesitantly. "How in gods name did they manage to conceal those things in the car?" she asked and pointed at the shotguns.

"Beats me." he replied and accepted a pair of Kevlar vests that a guy from a SWAT team handed him. He gave the smaller one to Scully, pulled out his gun and walked down to the pier where Tom and Jim were waiting. Tom had taken command, dismissing the police, National guard and the Mayors representative without hesitation. He just ordered them to stay out of his way and take the guy out if he tried to escape. They were soon joined by the policewoman Tom had shouted at and with her came her partner.

"Palmira Sanchez and Francis Gatti, meet Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. Mira and Francis are NYPD, Mulder and Scully are with the FBI. We'll also be joined by Schwartz and Greene, SWATs. But they will be in the water, prepared to take the guy if he tries to dive into the water." Jim introduced and explained before looking around. "Well, no use staying here until retirement. Let's go." he said and smiled in anticipation. Mulder slapped the Kevlar vest a couple of times, it's weight was uncomfortable but it was reassuring to know that he had at least some protection. Judging from the previous encounters, it didn't seem like the guy had any firearms. But they were going to be close enough for him to use his sword, Mulder didn't really like the idea of Scully being that close to a madman with a sword. But she could take care of herself and wouldn't appreciate if he tried to convince her to stay out of this.

"Hey?! What is that diver doing on the pier? Schwartz, Greene, where are you?" barked Tom into his radio.

"Schwartz here. Under the boat as instructed."

"Greene here. Covering the boat from a little way off."

"Then who the hell is on the pier?" asked Jim and pulled out a pair of binoculars to get a better look at him. "Loubar!" he hissed and held on to the shotgun with his left hand as he pulled out a large pistol that Mulder didn't recognize. "Get moving! That is Victor Loubar, international terrorist!" he barked and started to run. Tom was running half a second later, but had overtaken Jim within a second. Mulder followed close behind but noticed that the distance between him and the two twins was increasing by the second. The diver noticed them, threw something onto the boat and threw himself into the water. As Jim and Tom reached the end of the pier, the boat exploded and the shockwave threw them into the water. Mulder stopped and covered his face as the heat and shrapnel came sizzling through the air. He looked behind and saw that guy Francis just a few meters behind himself, the women a few meters behind Francis. He nodded, they were safe. He started to run again, the two agents had resurfaced and was swimming for the pier so he directed his attention towards the burning ship. He stopped and looked at the inferno, the boat was a single burning flame. He had to back away, the heat was unbearable.

"Mutant or not, Loubars hide is *mine*." snarled Tom as he hauled himself up onto the pier and bent down to give his brother a helping hand. Mulder noticed the ease with witch he pulled his brother up with only one hand.

"Are you guys all right?" asked Mulder with concern as Francis and the ladies arrived. Scully was fussing over them at once, checking for injuries.

"Yeah, dripping wet but that is just about it." replied Jim and sighed.

"Something grazed my left hand, but it's just a scratch. My cat has done worse to me on several occasions." said Tom and looked at the palm of his left hand. Mulder saw a wound, perhaps four centimeters long. It didn't bleed, the cold water must have taken care of that. "Did you see anyone leaving the ship?" asked Tom and looked at him. Mulder felt a little discomfort at those strange eyes, one eye was brown and the other was blue. It was very unsettling to look at.

"From that inferno?" he asked and raised his eyebrows.

"Some mutants are very resistant to fire." replied Jim and shrugged.

"Screw that." said Mira suddenly. "You saw Victor Loubar? The terrorist and assassin?" Jim nodded.

"Yeah it was him all right, I recognized his face at once. He hadn't pulled on the goggles or his face mask yet and it was him in all his glory." he replied and spat into the water.

"How did you recognize him, his face is supposed to be unknown?" asked Francis.

"We had a little scuffle with him a while ago, we saw him before he set off a bomb and escaped." replied Tom swiftly.

"A while ago, I thought the two of you just recently teamed up together since your partners were both unavailable?" asked Scully and Mulder nodded, he had also thought to ask about that.

"It was a joint operation, three pairs were sent to catch him." replied Jim calmly.

"Three teams, from Mutant Affairs?" asked Mulder in disbelief.

"Are you guys with Mutant Affairs?" asked Mira curiously. "Do you think Loubar is a mutant?"

"He was suspected of it at first, his mastery of disguises could have been the result of some sort of shapeshifting ability. But after raiding his hideout, we discovered a large amount of makeup and sophisticated equipment. He was handed over to other departments until his status as a mutant could be either confirmed or denied." replied Jim and pulled up his radio. "Tell the buggers in the boats to make themselves useful, I want them to check every fucking inch of water out there with their sonar. If they find someone swimming down there, I want him flushed out. Over."

+How do you expect us to do that? Over.+ asked a respectful voice in the other end and Mulder identified it as the representative from the Mayors office.

"I don't know! Call the army, drop some bombs in the bay, tell everyone to start drinking this stinking water until we can see him or electrocute the whole got darn river, I don't care. Just flush him out! Over and out." snapped Jim and threw the radio into the East river.

***

Duncan groaned underwater, his flesh still felt like it was on fire. /So much for rest!/ He didn't even know what had happened. One minute, he had been asleep, the next he had woken up in extreme pain right in the middle of a burning inferno. He sank downwards with the wreck and just drifted where he was, held down by the roof over him. He waited for about ten minutes or so, until the worst of his pains had faded away. He slowly made his way closer to shore by simply walking on the bottom of the river. It was hard to tell where he was going exactly, the line of sight was hardly more then a meter. There was a lot of crap floating around down here. But he was walking upwards, that much he knew. A few quick steps brought him closer to shore and suddenly his head was above the water. He stopped and just looked, he hadn't seen this many officers of the law and their cars for quite some time. He shrugged and walked up the rest of the way. He was wet all through, he was hungry and he wanted the head of whoever it had been who had set him on fire! But the first thing he needed to take care of was his wet clothes, he needed dry clothes and preferably something warm to eat as well.

***

Victor Loubar hissed as he removed the scubagear, his left arm hurt like hell. He had been forced to dive into the water and disregard his wounded shoulder, it had been all right on the way over, it had been all right during the two hours he had spent in hiding just to make sure it wasn't a trap. When the police arrived, well, he had to set his plans into motion anyway and hope for the best. He dug into a pocket on his right arm and got a hold of a small canister. He removed a couple of white pills and swallowed two of them. He blinked and sighed as the wondrous pill did it's magic. Dyzeril was highly experimental, but it sure as hell removed pain like nothing else he had ever tried. No side-effects, not known ones anyway and it was swift. He was already hooked on them, he would have to buy himself a small stock for emergencies like this. It had only been ten days since that bloody bitch had shot him as he was escaping in the water. He had planned for anything and a small container of oxygen had been taped to his left leg. He had been able to make his escape underwater without coming up to the surface, he had left the city at once but he had been yearning for his revenge so he had returned only a few days after the incident, planning on how to end Rollie Tylers life as painfully as possible. Then that bloody warehouse exploded and the cannonfodder he had planned to use ended up in the hospital and later arrested by the police. He was desperate for hard money, money that wasn't already tied up in his old accounts, accounts that Tyler and his friends might be able to find by now. He wasn't quite sure how much they had been able to get from his computer before it blew up, but even the suspicion that they had his accounts had made him afraid of using them. So when he was offered this job, he just had to accept it. He reached for the tracking device and planned to get rid of it when he saw movement! He looked at it again and saw how his target was in movement, on dry land according to the map.

"How did the motherfucker survive the explosion? The fire?" roared Loubar until he noticed that people were staring at him. He jumped into his car and drove away at a breakneck speed, he couldn't afford to remain in the area with all the cops nearby. He would have to pull back and try again, sooner or later he would get another chance. He just hoped that he would get it before he ran out of money.

***

Niklas brought out a bottle of Whiskey as they gathered back at the operation central, he placed six glasses on the table and poured everyone a generous splash of Whiskey. Francis and Mira had been invited as well, it was Erik's idea and even if Niklas didn't like being around more law enforcement then strictly necessary, we wasn't about to protest when Erik made a suggestion. Niklas was fully aware of the fact that Erik quite possibly was one of the fastest minds on earth. If he invited them, he would have at least one reason for it. He took a chair around the large table and leaned back with a sigh.

"So, what do we think? Is Loubar the mysterious decapitator or what?" he said and looked at the others.

"He was out there on the pier, no corpse was found in the boat, no body showed up on the sonar search. It could have gotten away of course, but Loubar was there. The entire area was sealed, the chances of him making it into the perimeter are very small even if I have to admit that he did manage to get out of it without being detected." said Erik and gulped down the whiskey in one swift swig. "He is a master of disguises." Erik shook his head and poured himself another glass. "Your thoughts?" he asked and looked around the table.

"I don't think it's him." said Agent Mulder slowly. "He hasn't been around long enough."

"As much as I'd hate to admit it, I have to go with Agent Mulder on this one." replied Agent Scully. "Victor Loubar masquerading and chopping peoples heads off with a sword? It just doesn't seem right."

"Loubar was there, he has shown some slight tendencies of insanity in the past. Just because we can't see a reason it doesn't mean that he doesn't have one." said Mira slowly. "I think he might be our man."

"Slight?" asked Francis and made a face. "I'm with Palmira on this one, I think it's Loubar."

"I think Loubar is our man." said Niklas slowly.

"I don't." said Erik finally. "3-3. How about this, we look for both Loubar and the mysterious decapitator?"

"I'll drink to that!" said Mira and drained the remains of her Whiskey.

"Amen!" replied Francis and followed her example.

"Do you have some sort of grudge against Loubar?" asked Niklas and looked at the two NYPD representatives curiously.

"Yeah, he's been harassing two of our friends a couple of times. We've got them under police surveillance now, I think we'd better move them to a safehouse though now when we've got confirmation that he's in town." replied Francis.

"Loubar is bound to know every bloody place in town though." said Mira with disgust. "We'll probably have to move them somewhere else for a while."

"Why? We've got four extra bedrooms here. Move them in here instead and put two boys in blue in the last two bedrooms. Nobody knows that we're using this place, not even our superiors. They won't know until we leave them the bill when all this is over." said Erik absently. He pulled out his wallet and slided four extra keycards over towards Mira and Francis.

"Are you sure?" asked Mira. "It won't cause any trouble?"

"Hell no, we've paid for the rooms, we might as well put them to use." said Erik. Niklas frowned, it was something that he knew he ought to remember, but he couldn't remember what. He shrugged and hoped it wasn't anything important.

"They'll probably want to bring a cat, is that all right?" asked Francis.

"Not at all, I love cats." said Niklas and smiled. If they had a cat, it had to be nice people.

***

"Rol? Tell Bluie to stop scaring poor Chiops!" said Angie and held her cat protectively in her arms. Chiops was staring suspiciously at the metal and electronics construct. "Hear that Bluie? Stop scaring my cat!" she ordered the little construct.

+woff+ +woff+

Angie didn't know if she imagined it or not, but it seemed like Bluie had a much deeper and louder bark now then before, sometimes it seemed like Bluie actually had a mind of it's own. Of course, she knew that it was impossible. She knew his software like the back of her own hand, he had a slight amount of AI but she did knew that there wasn't a chance in hell that it would be able to deepen it's "voice" and make it louder just because it wanted to scare her cat. But it was hard to believe when she looked at Bluie, the darn thing even looked pleased as the camera was directed at her or perhaps the scared cat in her arms. It was hard to tell. She put her cat down on top of a Werewolf dummy and Chiops promptly settled down on the creatures hairy head. The cat had adapted marvelously to it's new environment, with the single exception of Bluie that scared Chiops out of his mind every time the sinister little device rounded a corner and barked at Chiops like it had been a real dog. She looked down at Bluie, it *was* staring at Chiops. She saw how the camera was directed at Chiops where he snoozed on top of the dummy. "Stop that Bluie." she ordered firmly and watched as Bluie slowly backed away from her. /It couldn't, could it? Naw!/

"Did you say anything Ange?" asked Rollie from another part of the old brewery. Ever since they had agreed that Angie should stay at the loft for the time being, he had been trying to make some room for her. They did love each other, but neither her nor him was ready to get intimate with each other just yet. She had thought that once they admitted to each other that they really did love one another, things would all work out according to her fantasies. She sighed. Real life just wasn't as simple as her dreams. That first night, when they had fallen asleep in each others arms, after waking up like that she had thought it might work out. But she just couldn't join Rollie in the bed, not after her memories of what she and Loubar had been doing in that. He didn't seem to have any problems even if she actually hadn't seen him use it. But he must have slept, it had been four days since she moved in after all. He must have slept sometime, he was an insomniac, he probably dozed off after she had fallen asleep and then just woke up before she did so he was up and working when she roused herself out of one of the extra beds Mira had brought to the loft.

"I asked you to get Blue to stop harassing my poor Chiops before I throw him in the trash!" yelled Angie over towards where Rollie was working. /That was out of line. I don't live her... I didn't use to anyway. Perhaps I'd better suck up a little./ she decided and went to make some tea.

***

"That time of the month again." said Rollie sourly to himself. Usually, he wouldn't let something like this bother him. But he had been awake most of the time during the last four days and hadn't slept very good before that either. He hefted the hammer he was holding and struck, driving the last nail into the board with more force then necessary. He took a step back and admired his work, his eyes was bleary from lack of sleep but it looked pretty good to him. He yawned and made a face as he realized that he wasn't finished yet, he still had to clean and move in some pieces of furniture he had selected for Angie. Rollie sighed in exhaustion and reluctantly started to clean up the mess he had made. He had specifically forbidden Angie to set foot in here or raise a hand to help him until it was finished. He vacuumed, he mopped, he dusted, he polished and then he ( with the aid of some gadgets ) moved heavy pieces of furniture into what now was a separate room in the loft. He hoped that Angie wouldn't need it for long, then it could always be used as a guestroom or a silent office. He was just carrying one of Mira's foldable beds into the new room when Angie called.

"Hey Rol, d'ya want some tea?" Rollie panted and looked down upon himself, he was covered in dust, sweat and glue.

"Can I take a shower first?" he yelled back towards the kitchen.

"You'd better!" she replied and he smiled. Apparently she'd calmed down and became a little more reasonable. He hung up the door on the hinges, closed and locked it. He also sprayed the handle with a substance that would turn florescent yellow in strong ultraviolet light. He took a swift shower and changed clothes into a worn pair of jeans and a black T-shirt, he sighed and looked at the gun. If someone had told him two months ago that he would be carrying a gun by now, he would have laughed in their faces. After Loubar, after what he did... Rollie had bought a pistol on the black market as well as a holster he carried on his back. It was extremely subtle and the gun was almost completely invisible. The pistol was a Glock 17, a automatic with seventeen 9 millimeter rounds in the clip. He had one extra clip attached to the holster and he always carried it, he had been carrying it around even in the loft when he was working on Angies new room. He sighed again and holstered the pistol, making sure it was securely settled underneath his T-shirt before he walked over towards the kitchen. He silently walked into the kitchen and stopped, looking in silence at Angie who was staring out through the window. He quietly sneaked up behind her and wrapped his arms around her. She jumped at first and he cursed himself for being so unthoughtful, but as he removed his arms, she grabbed them fiercely and pulled them back. She leaned back against him and made a content sound deep in her throat. He smiled and placed a kiss on top of her head. He took a deep breath through his nose and sucked in the smell of her, he was temporarily distracted by another smell though.

"Is that cinnamon rolls I'm smelling?" he asked curiously and looked over towards the table. His eyes sparkled at the sight of hot tea and two plates with cinnamon rolls.

"Sorry I snapped at you like that before." she murmured and turned around in his arms, wrapping her own around his chest.

"Shhh, I understand." he replied. He sniffed again. "Now you have two choices Ang, either you distract me or you'll have to stand here and watch as I throw myself at the table and stuff one of those rolls into my mouth." he said, trying to lift her spirits.

"Distract you? With what?" she asked in suprise and pulled back a little to look up at his face.

"Oh, I can think of many things that might be able to distract me..." he said and bent down to kiss her. She playfully hit his chest.

"You big lunkhead." she murmured and wrapped her arms around his neck instead, pulling him into her lips. He pulled her up into his arms and stood up straight, pinning her against the wall beside the window. He reluctantly pulled away after a few minutes and stared into her eyes, nose to nose with her.

"I'd love to carry on Ange, but if I don't get something to eat I'm going to faint." he admitted. He had been working non-stop for eight hours and he hadn't had any breakfast either, the current lack of oxygen after their kissing wasn't helping either.

"Wouldn't it be worth it?" she asked and her eyes sparkled.

"Yeah, probably..." he replied and kissed her again. "But I wouldn't want to hurt you, pulling you with me in the fall." He lowered her to the floor and caressed her cheek, stroking it gently with his left hand. They sat down at the table and gorged themselves on tea and cinnamon rolls in silence. When it was all finished, Rollie leaned back in his chair. "I've got a suprise for you." he said and looked at her.

"Really?" she asked.

"I'm finished with your room." he announced happily and pulled out a key from one of his pockets. He dangled it in front of his face. "Do you want it?" he asked teasingly.

"Gimme!" she exclaimed and held out both her hands. Then he pulled up the UV lamp with his free hand, turned it on and laughed as he saw the bright yellow color on her right hand.

"You were snooping!" he accused. "Good thing I locked the door hmmm?" he asked and smirked at her. "You promised to stay away until I was finished." he said and tried to keep a stern face, failing badly as amusement crept into his voice and finally conquered his face as well. He took her right hand and led her away to the door, unlocked it and told her to close her eyes.

"You're such a big baby Rollie." she accused and then closed her eyes. He opened the door and slowly lead her into the room, he took one last look around to see if he had forgotten something and then told her that it was all right to look now. "Oh Rollie!" she exclaimed as she looked at the room, slowly taking everything in.

"See something you like?" he asked. She turned around and looked at him.

"Yes, as a matter of fact I do see something I like *very* much." she said and jumped up at him, wrapping her legs around his waist and covered his face with kisses. He stumbled back and his knees almost buckled at the sudden weight, but he managed to maintain his balance and he straightened up and pressed her closer to him, enjoying the feeling of her body against his own. He hadn't felt this strongly for anyone, he wanted to rip her clothes off and make love to her on the spot. He wanted to see into her eyes, he wanted... He didn't want to push her into anything, he wasn't going to take the first step. He would wait until she was ready, no matter how long it would take or how much he would suffer in the meantime.

"Hrm." Rollie blinked and looked at Angie, it couldn't have been her, could it? "Hrm!" He was relatively sure that he had heard something. "Hey!" He spun around, still with Angie practically glued to him and laid his eyes on Palmira and Francis who where staring at them with huge silly grins on their faces and eyes sparkling with amusement.

"Omegawd, hi!" exclaimed Angie as she pulled her lips away from his and turned her head around to see who it was.

"G'day." said Rollie, slightly out of breath.

"Since I'm not sure that you heard me the first time. Hey." said Mira and chuckled.

"Sorry to disturb you like this." Francis started to say but stopped to laugh silently as Angie slowly unwrapped her legs and dropped to stand on her own two feet. "But it's urgent. We're moving you away from here, Loubar really is in town so it's not safe to remain here anymore." he said, suddenly drop dead serious again.

"You're what?" asked Rollie in disbelief.

"Getting the hell out of here for the moment, Loubar really is in town." replied Mira.

"We feared that we might have to move you guys out of town for a while, but we got a offer from a couple of feds we're working with at the moment so now you'll be staying at the penthouse of a fancy hotel with four FBI agents." said Francis and fell silent. "We don't want to risk any leaks, so there won't be any added protection. We rely on secrecy this time, nobody, not even Van Duran knows at what hotel you'll be staying. The four FBI agents and us are the only ones who will know exactly where you'll be."

"Can I bring Chiops?" asked Angie worriedly and looked at her cat, sleeping on top of a dummy bear while Bluie was on the prowl. She was certain now, Bluie really was harassing her cat. "Butt out Bluie!" she snapped and the little robot walked away, sulking. She would have to take a look at his software one of these days, his behavior had been nothing short of odd lately.

"Yes. I asked and they said it was okay." replied Francis.

"When do we leave?" asked Angie.

"How soon can you get packed?" asked Mira seriously.

***

Emma Frost raised an eyebrow as she saw Niklas on the other side of the street. It wasn't any doubt about it even if he had changed into a splendid dark blue suit and wore a black trenchcoat over that. His sunglasses were of a different model then he usually wore, his hair was combed even if he hadn't bothered to shave. He was in the company of three other suits, one of them looked so much like Niklas himself that she closed her eyes for a few seconds and then looked again just to make sure that she wasn't seeing things that wasn't there. The spitting image differed in some ways though, he didn't wear any sunglasses, his hair was slightly longer and he had bothered to shave. Then there was a tall lanky man, dark hair, clean shaved and sunglasses walking close to a petite red-haired woman who was quite lovely. Emma frowned, if she didn't know Niklas, she would have been prepared to swear that they all were government agents. The one who looked so much like Niklas must be Erik Jonsson, his cousin. The other two might be bodyguards of some sort but the woman didn't look like someone who would take up guarding people for a living. The man didn't have that look either. Emma memorized the name of the hotel they had came out of and decided to do a little snooping. She had heard that Niklas had left the mansion to take care of some "personal affairs" as he had called it, she didn't trust him, not for a second. If he was up to something, she wanted to know what it was. But at the moment she just wanted a moment to herself, away from the stress of it all. The meeting at Frost enterprises was over, she had the whole afternoon to herself and she'd be damned if she would spend that tailing after someone as unimportant as Niklas Jonsson. Not when she could send her driver to do it for her.

***

"'Another decapitation with following fireworks, out to investigate. Make yourselves comfortable. There's food for the cat in the kitchen. Batman, Robin, Little red riding hood and Casper the friendly ghost.'?" read Mira from the note that had been left on the table.

"I'll bet you ten to one that Jim wrote that one." commented Francis with a slight smile. "We'd better stay here to make the introductions when they arrive." he continued.

"You stay, I want to check out this latest murder." said Mira and dropped the note on the table.

"Be careful." said Francis worriedly as he weighed his duties as a partner against protecting Rollie and Angie until the feds arrived.

"I can take care of myself Francis, it's just a crime scene investigation, not a raid against a drug cartel." she snorted fondly and patted his cheek. "Take care of them." she said and walked out to the car where she soon found out about the murder on the police radio. It must had come up when she and Francis had been at the loft, waiting for Angie and Rollie to pack.

***

Rollie looked at the bed and sighed in extreme contentment. Since Loubar had made his escape, he had only slept one full night. The first night when he and Angie had fallen asleep on the couch in the old brewery. He hadn't been able to use his bed since he couldn't even be in the same room as it without thinking about what Angie and Loubar had been doing in it. He hadn't touched it since he found out, it had been left exactly as it had been when they... He closed his eyes. He had managed to snatch a few hours of sleep here and there, in chairs and in his couch. But he had been plagued by horrible nightmares, so he had resigned himself to searching for Loubar or building a new room for Angie. He had just finished it when Mira and Francis arrived to take them away from the loft. As he looked at this bed, he realized just how badly he had missed a good nights sleep during the latest two weeks. At the moment, he felt so exhausted that he was fully willing to let his friends and the feds do all the searching for Loubar while he just rested here. He unclenched his hands and slowly willed Loubar out of his thoughts, if he kept thinking about him, he'd never be able to go to sleep.

***

Niklas looked down at the notepad in disgust, he had taken statements from seven witnesses and drawn scetches after their descriptions. He looked at all seven, he hadn't allowed any of them to see the pictures he had previously drawn so they wouldn't be able to copy someone else’s descriptions. All seven pictures were relatively alike, either everyone lied through their teeth or they had another Immortal on their hands. He walked over to Erik and handed him the notepad, Erik looked at the pictures and nodded slowly.

"This guy has been spotted with Duncan a few times. I didn't know that he was an Immortal though." said Erik slowly. "He must be here for a reason, probably to help Duncan. Of course, he could be here to kill Duncan as well, with Immortals it's hard to tell. MacLeod has taken quite a few heads lately, he might just be the most powerful Immortal around. A weaker Immortal might ignore their friendship just to get Duncans power."

"Ruthless bastards, aren't they?" said Niklas slowly.

"Not any worse then some humans, some of them are better then most humans. Duncan is one of them. I wished you had been able to subdue him, I don't think I want the ones chasing him cutting his head off." he shrugged and looked around. "Where are Agents Mulder and Scully?" he asked curiously. "I didn't see them leave."

"Me neither." replied Niklas and looked himself without finding them.

***

"Rick? Rick Frodin?" asked Mulder into his cell phone.

+Spooky? Is that you? God, I haven't heard from you since graduation!+

"The good 'ol days huh?"

+Yeah. So, I assume that you're not calling me after all these years just to say hello, what can I do for you?+

"Ricky, always straight to the core of matters." said Mulder and smiled a little. He really regretted loosing touch with Rick after they both became Special Agents. He was one of the few people who Mulder actually could tolerate and one of the even fewer who could call him 'Spooky' to his face without hurting any feelings.

+Did you expect me to change Mulder?+

"Not really." said Mulder and grinned. "Actually, I called to ask you a couple of questions about two of your coworkers up at Mutant Affairs."

+Gossip! Oh Mulder, you remembered! Who are they and what do you want to know?+

"Jim and Tom Olsen, anything you can think of really."

+Jim and Tom Olsen? I am pretty sure that I've never heard of them Mulder. Are you sure that they're Mutant Affairs?+

"That's what they said." said Mulder and felt a cold feeling spread through his body.

+I should have heard something...+ murmured Rick in the other end. +Wait and I'll look through the personnel records here, but if I don't remember them, there's not any gossip going around or else...+ he fell silent for a few seconds. +We do have a Robert Olsen, but no Tom or Jim Olsen. They're lying.+

"Can you do me another favor, run a search of the entire FBI and see if there's two brothers named Jim and Tom Olsen in any department."

+Sure, hold on.+ Mulder tapped his foot impatiently and waited for almost a minute. +No Tom or Jim Olsen who are related to each other in any way. Not even cross departmentwise. I even checked the Shadow departments.+

"Impostors then." sighed Mulder. "I suspected that."

+Your instincts again Spooky, trust 'em everytime.+

"Always have, always will Rick." Mulder considered things. "When I get back, would you like to go and have a couple of beers, catch up on old times?"

+Muu-ldeer! Have you finally seen the light?+

"Gone gay you mean? No, there's no chance of that happening anytime soon." He chuckled, Rick never changed. He looked over at Scully through the corner of his eye and saw her smiling. /No chance, not with her around to keep me straight./ he thought. "Thanks again Rick, I'll call you."

+The cute ones always say that, but they never do. Bye Spooky.+

"See ya Rick." Mulder chuckled as he tucked his phone away.

"Well?" asked Scully who hadn't heard the entire conversation.

"Jim and Tom aren't who they seem to be, they certainly don't work for Mutant Affairs and there are no brothers in the entire FBI with those names. They are lying through their teeth."

"I knew it! I knew no government agency would fork out the money for the accommodations we have here. They don't exactly seem like the real thing either, they're to weird, even for Mutant Affairs."

***

Niklas had all seven pictures laid out in front of him and pretended to use them to draw a final scetch. In reality, he was looking at a surveillance picture with the aid of his Mioplant, the computer connected directly to his brain. He looked down at the picture he had drawn, removed the carbon paper and handed the copy to a Inspector from the New York police just as Mira arrived.

"Here officer, flush him out and call this number as soon as he's spotted. Don't approach him on your own, call us and keep him under surveillance until we arrive."

"He's a murderer, what right do you have to give us orders?"

"Have you or have you not been ordered to give us any and all assistance we require?" asked Niklas and raised an eyebrow.

"... Yeah." replied the Inspector reluctantly.

"Clear it with your boss if you wish, but nobody does anything until either me or my brother arrives. I don't care if the President himself shows up and orders the officers on the scene around, nobody does anything except surveillance until me or Tom agrees to it."

"Who is this guy?" asked the Inspector and frowned, Niklas could feel the resentment shooting out of the Inspector, he *really* didn't like being ordered around.

"That's what we're here to find out." said Niklas and frowned. "Excuse me a moment." he said and walked over towards Erik who was staring silently as a pair of black vans arrived and a group of men in dark suits jumped out. When Mulder and Scully turned around a corner and the suits spotted them, they all frowned and approached the two agents with disapproving looks. Niklas and Erik moved into the shadows where they slowly approached the two now surrounded FBI agents.

***

"Agents Mulder and Scully." said the apparent leader of the group. "Why am I not suprised to see you two here?"

"Do we know you?" asked Mulder slowly. Dana thought she recognized one or two of the men surrounding them, she had seen them at other times. /They're with *them*!/ she thought in panic and her hands itched to hold her gun pointed at them.

***

"Mira!" hissed Niklas as the policewoman moved over to stand at his side. "Butt out!" he whispered as loud as he dared. "But do it quietly!"

"Why?" she whispered back.

"Just do it."

"Dream on, I wouldn't want to miss this for the world." she said and pulled out her gun. Niklas sighed and slowly slid his trenchcoat aside so he could pull out the Winchester Defender shotgun he was carrying hidden in there.

"As you wish. Wait for me or Tom to make a move, when or if we do... Just follow our lead."

"Who are the suits?" whispered Mira curiously.

"Hush-hush government department most likely, a blend between mobsters and CIA operatives. We're talking guys who perform illegal research on innocent civilians, kidnap and murder people who knows to much and do things that criminals wouldn't even consider."

"Our government?!"

"Hush, every government has at least one department like that. Now silent, I'm trying to hear what they're saying!" he whispered in reply.

"How can you, they're ten meters from here and talking silently!"

"*Schh*!" said Niklas as another man made an appearance.

***

"Agents. I really hoped you would have given up by now. You are poking your noses into things you cannot possibly hope to understand." said a cold, humorless voice and Mulder stiffened as the stub of a cigarette was thrown in front of his feet. He slowly turned around just to see a familiar face just as he put a fresh cigarette between his lips and lighted it.

"You." said Mulder slowly and clenched his fists. The man nodded graciously.

"Me." he replied. "You two really should have learned to leave things best unmeddled with alone, I'm afraid that your involvement in this in a unknown factor we cannot possibly allow at this time. You will have to come with us, you will not be harmed... permanently. You will be released when you won't pose a threat to our interests any longer." Mulders hands itched to reach for his gun, but he kept them clenched into fists. Prepared to knock the living daylights out of the first one to lay a hand on Scully. He glanced over at her, trying to tell her to run as soon as she got the chance and don't look back. He looked into her eyes and knew that she wouldn't, her eyes conveyed that yeah-right-keep-on-dreaming-Mulder look he had seen before. She wouldn't leave him, not now, not ever. It was comforting, but he didn't want her to be held prisoner by these men, he wouldn't allow it. He suddenly realized that the smoking man had asked a question.

"What?" he asked and turned his attention over towards the Cancerman.

"I asked if you would come along peacefully or if you wanted to do this the hard way?"

"The police..." started Mulder but fell silent as he noticed that another team of suited men had just finished moving everybody else out of the alley and were approaching. None of them had pulled out any weapons, yet. But they were outnumbered, he saw twelve men in addition to the Cancer man. They wouldn't be able to make it, not with six to one odds.

"Won't be able to help you, even your two mysterious friends vanished." said the smoking man and smiled a humorless smile. "You are alone, outnumbered and chanceless. This is your last chance, come peacefully or unconscious?"

+cli-click+

"I think they'd prefer to walk out of here on their own!" yelled a voice and Mulder blinked in suprise as Tom jumped out of the shadows with a shotgun in his hands.

"One move and the coroner will have to spend a few hours pulling lead out of your sorry asses!" said another voice from behind Mulder. /Jim!/ "Mulder, Scully. Go, we'll meet you back at the place. Mira, you go with them."

"No fucking way."

+cli-click+

"Way?" asked Jim.

"Way." replied Mira nervously and joined him and Scully as they slowly walked out of the circle of frustrated men in suits.

"Ah-ah-ah." said Tom. "Smoking will kill you, but if you move you'll see that a shotgun round will kill you even faster then smoking." The Cancer man stiffened and stopped slowly shuffling backwards. "What are you three still doing here? Move!" snapped Tom and cast a swift look over his shoulder. "Run!" he screamed and for a brief instant, Mulder saw his eyes glowing red at the edges. He turned around and ran with the women at his side, running just as fast as he did.

***

"Ten minutes. That should do it." said Erik after a while and looked over at Niklas.

"Probably. Keep your nooses pointed at the wall, don't move or the police will have to scrape you guys off the wall!" snapped Niklas and slowly backed out of the alley with Erik by his side. When they were almost out and the light became better, they tucked away their shotguns, turned around and ran. They leaped into a HawkTech Cruiser that Erik had called over, Niklas jumped into the back seat while Erik leapt into the front seats. The car took off after a swift transmission from Eriks Mioplant and then they were safe. For the moment...

***

"I want them!" snapped the smoking man and looked around the alley for any signs of his wallet, cigarettes, lighter or gun. "I *want* them *dead*!" The men were searching the alley inch by inch and they finally found their wallets, weapons and belongings in a garbage can, covered with filthy yucky stuff that smelled *very* bad. The Cancerman looked as his soggy cigarettes and snarled. "I want them tortured, then killed!"

***

"Who's there?!" asked a firm voice from the other side of the door.

"Relax Francis, it's only us." said Mira and opened the door with her keycard. She stepped inside with the two FBI agents and closed the door behind everyone. Francis looked carefully at all three of them, all covered with sweat, the FBI agents looked confused and troubled, Mira looked worried.

"What happened?" he asked as he looked them all over for signs of injuries.

"I'd like to know that too!" snapped Mira and looked at the two FBI agents. "Who were those guys in the suits and the geezer with the smokes?!" Mulder and Scully looked at each other, volumes passing between the two of them from a single glance. Mulder sighed and sat down at the table.

"During the course of our investigations, we've crossed paths with the smoking man a couple of times. We believe that he works for a Consortium somehow connected to our government, how they're connected and how much the government really knows about what they do is something we haven't found out yet. What they do however is covering up the truth, kidnap and sometimes even murder all innocents who gets in their way. I also firmly believe that they're covering up the existence of Alien activities on earth."

"You mean like, Skrulls and Kree?" asked Francis.

"Other aliens but I suppose Skrulls and Kree might also be involved, we've just never come across any of them." replied Agent Mulder.

"What makes you think that the government is involved?" asked Mira.

"I can't reveal that." replied Mulder. "Would you care to reveal who 'Tom' and 'Jim' really are?" he asked and looked up at Mira and Francis.

"They're with the FBI." replied Francis and wondered what brought this about.

"No they're not." replied Agent Scully. "We checked them out, they're not on the FBI payroll."

"Aren't you working with them?" asked Francis.

"No, we've never met them before we arrived here in New York." she replied.

"What's all the noise about?" asked Angie as she walked out of her room right next to Rollies.

"Angie, this is Special Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. Agents, this is Angie Ramirez."

"Oh yes, the pair who was threatened by Loubar." said Mulder and snapped his fingers. "I had forgotten about that." he admitted.

"Rollie is in there." said Francis and pointed towards a door from witch they could all hear soft snoring. "He's been asleep ever since they arrived, never even stirred." Everyone suddenly turned towards the door, Francis shoved Angie into her room and closed the door before he followed the example of everyone else as he pulled out his gun and directed it at the door. They had all heard the door unlocking.

"Geez, what a reception!" exclaimed 'Jim' and smiled at everyone. He slipped out of his trenchcoat and hung it up. 'Tom' followed him inside and got rid of his as well. Then they seemed to notice that the guns still were directed at them. "We can't both be Loubar." said 'Jim' and yanked his nose back and forth. "See, it's the real thing."

"Who are you two, really?" asked Mulder. "We know you're not who you two claim to be, so who are you?" They didn't even blink, no change of expression whatsoever.

"All right, I guess you deserve to hear the truth." said 'Tom' slowly. "I'm Da..."

"Is it all right to come out now?" asked Angie and peeked out from her room. "You!" she exclaimed. "And you!"

"... Erik Jonsson, pleased to meet you all." Francis raised an eyebrow, Erik hadn't even blinked but just changed what obviously would have been another lie and then given what had larger chances of actually being his real name.

***

"I'm Niklas Jonsson, Eriks cousin." admitted Niklas reluctantly as he looked upon the surprised face of Angela Ramirez. "Nice to see you again miss Ramirez."

"You've met him Angie?" exclaimed Mira in suprise.

"I've met them both! Erik was the male star in a movie me and Rollie worked on a while ago, he saved our lives! Niklas is the guy who delivered the warning message."

"That's why you two looked so darn familiar!" exclaimed Mira in suprise. "I've been screaming at myself for days now because I didn't know where I'd seen you two before."

"It could also be because they're two of the richest men alive. Erik is the sole owner of HawkTech, the computer company. Niklas owns the European software branch."

"This is all your fault you big moron." sighed Niklas accusingly at Erik.

"How was I supposed to know that Angie and Rollie was the pair who needed a safehouse? Now will you please put down those guns before I take them away from you?" he snapped at the four gunwielding men and women in front of them.

"I don't think so..." said Mulder slowly. "I for one would *very* much like to hear why you two are pretending to be FBI agents."

"Put the guns down." ordered Erik calmly. "Or I *will* disarm you all." Niklas sighed as he received a radio transmission from Erik.

+On three?+ +one.+ +two.+ + three!+

They both leapt into action, throwing knifes were fired out of their sleeves and into their hands, before anyone had even seen them appear there, four knives shot out and struck four pistols. Two seconds later, Mulder, Scully, Francis and Mira found themselves standing on their toes with knifes at their throats.

"I've never really liked having a weapon pointed at me, but since you obviously have problems realizing that I guess you must really enjoy it?" said Erik slowly and coldly. "Now that we all know that we can kill you all before you'd even know it, I suggest a more friendly conversation, without weapons pointed at each other. Is that acceptable?" he asked but didn't wait for an answer. They both shoved their knifes back into their sleeves, picked up the other knifes and the guns. Erik shoved Francis and Scullys gun into their holsters and then took a chair at the table, Niklas made sure the safety was on and then he casually tossed the guns over to Mira and Mulder before he took another chair and waited.

"Oh Angela, I guess you'd better wake Rollie up as well so we won't have to repeat this." said Niklas as he noticed the snoring coming from one of the bedrooms.

***

"Well, time to play twenty questions I guess." said Niklas and smiled as Rollie staggered out and took a place at the table a couple of minutes later. He raised an eyebrow at Niklas and frowned as if he was thinking about something.

"So, shoot." said Erik calmly and Rollie turned against him.

"Erik! What are you doing 'ere?" exclaimed Rollie in suprise.

"At the moment I'm just about to be asked why I was posing as an FBI agent with my cousin." replied Erik.

"That's the one, yeah." said Mulder. "Why on earth are you two posing as FBI agents?"

"I am about to tell you something that cannot be revealed to anyone outside of this room." said Niklas since he and Erik had decided that this was the best course of action. "I am a mutant and a member of the X-men under the codename Hawk." he said calmly. "I witnessed one decapitation and tried to detain the survivor for questioning. He was acting in self defense, there wasn't any doubt about that." said Niklas. "But the fireworks afterwards made me think that he might just be a mutant. If he is, he is in *serious* need of aid if his powers run wild like that. The X-men can provide training, aid and counseling. Help him get both his powers and life under control. But, the police arrived and I had to leave. I decided that I should look him up before one of his firework displays kill or hurts anyone innocent. Erik offered his help and I accepted. We knew that we would have to investigate any future crimescenes, so we got ourselves these cool fake ID's and pretended to be from the FBI."

"You're a mutant? What is your powers?" asked Mulder curiously and leaned over the table.

"Enhanced physical traits and shapeshifting." replied Niklas openly, trying to seem as honest as possible.

"That's at least easy to prove, prove it." said Mulder and leaned back in his chair. Niklas reached out, copied Fox Mulder and slowly turned into him, forcing sweat to appear on his forehead. He didn't want this to look too easy, he had no intentions of revealing just how powerful he really was. As Mulder, he raised his hands and looked at them. Looked down on his new body and chuckled.

"Well mister Mulder, proof enough for ya?" he asked and winked at Mulder before he returned to his own body and sagged in relief, as if he had just been through a horrible ordeal.

"Are you also a mutant, a X-man?" asked Mulder and looked over at Erik.

"X-man? Hell no, I'm way to busy to fool around as a superhero. Running HawkTech is just about all I can handle at the moment. The only reason I'm doing this is because Niklas promised to improve the security systems protecting HawkTech from nerds trying to break into our computer network, like Angie over here." replied Erik and pointed an accusing finger at Angie.

"I was sorta hoping that you had forgotten about that." said Angie and smiled apologetically.

"When we were driving over here, our Assistant Director called and ordered us to cooperate with you two. You must have connections in high places..." said Mulder slowly. Neither Niklas or Erik said anything. "Who are they and where are they?"

"I admit that I have a few contacts here and there, even a few in the FBI. But I won't reveal any of them." said Erik and crossed his arms over his chest.

"We could arrest you..." said Scully threateningly.

"I suppose you could, but who'd then haul your sorry asses away to safety when Cancerman comes knocking on your doors?"

"Do you know who he is?" asked Mulder, tension oozing out of him.

"No."

"Do you know the people he works for?"

"I'm aware of them, I can't really claim to know them though." Erik shrugged. "I've been trying to gain access to their computer network for almost three months now, without success."

"You should have called me." said Niklas and smirked.

"Yeah that's right, Hawk wasn't it?" said Angie suddenly. "You're the guy behind Hawk's Virus Workshop and Hawk's Fucking Great Privacy encryption right? The worlds most infamous Cracker."

"I'm retired from the hackin' an' crackin' bit." said Niklas and winked at her. "Although you might be interested to know that I plan to release HFGP v2.0 next week, cracking that code should take about 2048 times longer then HFGP v1.75."

"We could arrest Niklas here." suggested Mulder and pointed at Niklas who raised an eyebrow.

"I could kill you from a hundred paces with a quarter, but you don't see me looking around for loose change, now do you? Let's just cut the crap, try to arrest me and I'll start looking for Loubar and this decapitating mutant on my own. You'd never be able to find me and various law enforcement people would be doing a fruitless search for me all over the world when they could be doing something useful instead." said Niklas. "Onwards to other questions Agent Mulder, pointless threats are just that, pointless."

"What are your plans about Loubar?" asked Rollie who had spent his time rousing himself from the sleepy fogs that had clouded his mind just after waking up. Niklas pulled out a knife and slowly moved it over his own throat.

"Does that answer your question?" he asked and sheathed the knife again.

***

"Agent Mulder, we've been through this several times already. I will not reveal anything about the X-men and Erik won't reveal any of his contacts. We're not intimidated by your empty threats at all. So why don't you just give up? My patience is wearing thin..."

"As if that is supposed to intimidate me." huffed Mulder.

"It should Fox Mulder, oh yes it should intimidate you. You've been exposed to mindcontrol before haven't you?" asked Niklas after a tip from Erik over the Mioplant. "I can feel it, see it. Your mind is like an open book, your surface thoughts and emotions are projected *very* strongly. I don't even need to be a very skilled telepath in order to see into your head. The loss of your sister, your partners abduction, memories erased, the Consortium, your Assistant Director... A mind as open as yours is a mind very easily manipulated, I could make all of you in here forget ever meeting us. Make you all lose memory of this entire conversation as well as any memories you have of us not being who we claim we are. The truth would be lost, the truth distorted. What a shame..." said Niklas and leaned back in his chair.

"So why don't you?" asked Scully. "It would obviously be the best for you."

"Perhaps... But erasing memories aren't something I enjoy doing, Oh I will do it if really becomes necessary, but I'd rather not."

"So what do you want? A sworn promise that we won't reveal your secrets?" asked Mira. "Enter o