Disclaimer: Not mine. I'm just playing. I'll put them back when I'm done.

Rating: PG-13

Synopsis: A mysterious message sends Mulder in search of his sister yet again, this time in Alaska.

Mount McKinley
September 3

The wind howled through the treetops, whipping up the powder snow, sending cascades of rainbow colored flakes down over the hard-packed, frozen ground. Icy spikes hung from the bare branches of the trees, glittering like lost jewels in the last rays of the setting sun.

Below the glittering branches, three dark-clad shapes trudged along through the snow in single file. The leader used a long stick to test the treacherous ground ahead of him with every step he took. He was the guide and he had reluctantly agreed to lead the two people marching along behind him up Mount McKinley at this time of year; a hazardous entertainment at best.

He glanced back over one shoulder to make sure they were still with him and regarded the woman for a moment before he let his eyes trail to the man walking behind her. The guy was sick. He had apparently been sick when they had arrived in Anchorage. The woman had insisted over and over again that he rest until he was well again, but he had refused, set on getting up the mountain as soon as possible.

They had been looking for someone to fly them up to the cabin, but that was impossible. Due to the weather conditions, no helicopter would go anywhere near the mountain, so they had been dropped off a good 20 miles from where they wanted to go. They would have to trek the rest of the way and Beau Zoltaire had been more than reluctant to take on the trip. But, as he had also pointed out several times, he was the only one in the area who was crazy enough to do it.

So here he was, fighting his way through snow and ice, more of the latter and less of the first, toward a cabin near the edge of the highest point of the mountain. Zoltaire sighed deeply, readjusted his scarf covering his mouth and nose and continued up the mountain.


Dana Scully kept her eyes sternly on the ground in front of her feet, wondering why the hell she was out here in the snow; cold and miserable. But she knew why. When Mulder had announced that he was going to go up Mount McKinley, she had thought it was a joke. He had pneumonia and was in no obvious condition to take a long walk to anywhere. Climbing up a snow-covered mountain in September was among the things that Scully would have advised strongly against, but once again he had overruled her, not willing to tell her what was so important about this particular trip. The burning determination in his eyes along with the fact that she knew she wouldn't be able to stop him had made her decide to come along. Mainly because he was sick and shouldn't go alone. Somewhere in the back of her head she also knew that she did it because she cared and because she was extremely worried about him as it was. This trip was not going to improve his condition.

The trip to Anchorage, Alaska had worn him out. By the time they had stepped off the plane, he hadn't so much been breathing as wheezing, every gulp of air a strain for his over-exerted lungs. He had allowed her to force him into a day's worth of rest before he had insisted they should carry on. And he had time and time again tried to make her go back home. He had told her to leave, to go back, it wasn't her quest. But she had refused, in her own way as stubborn as he was.

And now they were out here, walking among trees that were petrified with frost, and all she felt like doing was turn around and go back home; to sit in front of a warm fire, drink a glass of wine and just relax. With nothing short of super-human strength she suppressed a groan and forced her mind away from such thoughts to focus her attention backward to her laboring partner and friend.


Mulder was walking mostly on reflex now. Some time ago - he could no longer remember when - the dull ache in his chest had erupted into a flaring pain, which throbbed through him with every step he took, every breath he hauled into his over-exerted lungs. But he would not stop. He could not. He knew that Scully was right and that he belonged in a hospital on a severe and probably long-lasting antibiotic-treatment, but the information he had received only five days ago had made it impossible for him not to put his life on the line to find what he had been promised would be waiting at the end of this trail; the one thing he had spent his entire life searching for. The leads were too good, the severity behind them too strong. He had been promised his holy grail and he could not pass up the opportunity to put his greatest and longest-lasting quest to rest once and for all.

The first real clue to Samantha's whereabouts had fallen into his hands by accident a month ago. His digging into the case had stirred up a lot of attention, but someone had finally taken pity on him and had handed him the coordinates for the destination he was heading toward.

He had never intended for Scully to come along, but he just could not make her back off. She would not leave his side, mainly because he was sick and needed treatment for his increasingly severe pneumonia. He had contracted it while searching for clues after finding what he considered concrete evidence that Samantha was not only still alive, but also on the planet. And he needed to find her.

He had ignored a flue and had labored on, intent on finding the information he was looking for. He hadn't slept, hadn't rested and definitely hadn't been eating right. The flue had developed into bronchitis, but he had still ignored it. When the pneumonia had set in, Scully had almost had him committed for not looking after himself. Only his relentless pleading with her to give him some more time had gotten him off the hook. The first severe fever had of course started the evening before they had left. But he had not called her.

On the morning of their flight, Scully had been able to tell that he was worse off than he had been the day before. He was unable to walk more than a few steps at a time without trying to cough up a lung, so the first thing she had done was give him a verbal overhaul, telling him how much she resented that he was so indifferent about his own health. And still he hadn't told her what they would probably find at the end of this trail. He had not tried to justify this trip to her in any way. She had given him an injection of antibiotics, coming prepared as always, and then she had told him to tell her if he started to feel worse. He had promised he would, but had not kept that promise. He didn't want to be slowed down by medication and her constant concern.

Now he was starting to wonder if it wasn't slowing him down that he didn't cry out every time something felt a little worse. By now, he was too weak to even raise his voice, so he kept his mouth shut and harnessed his reserves to maintain a certain speed. He was sure that they would soon reach the cabin. Once there, he could rest. There would be some time where they had to wait for the promised sign and during that time he could sleep; get the rest that Scully so desperately wanted him to have. So he trudged on, his mind focused solely on keeping his feet moving and his body upright.


Zoltaire stopped briefly to consult with his compass, glanced ahead for a moment to lay out the best course, and then turned halfway to address his companions. "The cabin is still far, but we should make it before sundown if we keep this speed," he announced, unable to ignore how Mulder staggered when he came to a halt. He had fallen behind and was hard pressed to keep up with them.

Scully nodded, and then looked back at Mulder. "How are you holding up?" she asked.

Mulder merely raised a hand, waving her concern away.

Zoltaire regarded both of them for a moment, then shrugged, turned around and walked on.

Scully gave Mulder another glance, and then set off herself, following in Zoltaire's footsteps. She wanted to reach the cabin as fast as they could. Not for her own sake, but for Mulder's. She wanted him to get some rest, to sleep. She would haul him through a severe treatment of antibiotics and herbal medication once they got there. She had both in her backpack. But it of course depended on them getting there in the first place.

Mulder stared after her for a moment, and then forced himself back into motion. There was nothing he could do about the way he felt and the last thing he could do right now was give up. But somehow he had made that calculation without his ailing body. After only two steps, his knees simply gave way underneath him and he dropped down on them in the snow. He reached out with both hands to brace himself and wavered for a moment before attempting to get back up. But the strength had left his legs and he simply could not manage that rather simple task of regaining his feet.

Scully glanced back over her shoulder to make sure Mulder was following and found him on his knees in the snow some way behind her. "Oh my God," she gasped, turned and ran back to him. Dropping down on her knees in front of him, she pulled the black scarf away from his lips and felt herself pale at the sight of the dried blood at the corner of his mouth. Turning her head, she looked back for their guide and found him still trudging along without them. "Zoltaire," she yelled, causing the man to stop and look back. "Get back here."

Mulder was having a hard time breathing and was trying hard to stay conscious. Debilitating pain ripped through his chest when he started coughing.

Scully grabbed a hold of his shoulders, but was unable to stop him from keeling over while a thin rivulet of blood oozed from his lips. Desperate, she glanced back again to find Zoltaire closing in on them with a frown on his face. He had pulled his snow goggles and scarf away from his face and looked utterly annoyed.

"Now we're never going to make it," he growled, staring down at Mulder with an expression saying more than his words.

"We have to," Scully insisted. "The longer he's out here, the worse it's going to get. He needs to get warm. He needs to sleep."

"What he needs is a hospital. And there ain't no hospital in the area. So why don't you just do the guy a favor and shoot him right now. He's going to suffer a cumbersome death in these parts. Because there ain't no doctor around to heal him," Zoltaire said curtly, never having been one for paying attention to other people's feelings.

Scully stared darkly up at him, her expression on the verge of exploding into pure, unadulterated hatred. "I am a doctor," she snarled. "And if I shoot anybody it's going to be you."

Zoltaire glared angrily at her, but made no further comment on that. For a moment, he just stood there, staring off into the distance, then he sighed, shrugged out of his backpack, hauled a small axe out of it and headed into a stand of low pines. Within half an hour, he had created a primitive stretcher, covered with pine branches which were tied together with a role of nylon rope he always carried with him. Dropping the crude contraption beside Mulder, he nodded at it. "We'll load him onto that and drag him the rest of the way. Cover him with some of the left-over branches to keep him warm. Not that I think he'll survive this trip," he said, sounding as sour as he looked.

Scully had to compose herself before making any move to reply to this. Instead she helped Zoltaire to get Mulder onto the stretcher, a task which was severely hampered by the fact that her friend had passed out. They covered him with the branches after Scully had used most of the contents of his backpack and hers to cover him up. By the time they were done, it was twilight time.

Zoltaire glanced in the direction they had to go, then shouldered the makeshift strap on his side and looked over at Scully. "Better hurry it up. We don't wanna stay outside in the dark longer than we have to. There are wolves and bears in this area and there's nothing which attracts them faster than the smell of blood," he told her.

Scully copied his actions by shouldering the strap and grabbing the end of one stem of the two pine-trees tied together and looked back over at him. "Let's get moving, then. I don't want to be out here any more than you do," she told him.

With a bit of effort, they started moving and within a very short time, they had found a steady rhythm that allowed them to make good speed despite the extra weight they were dragging along. Scully kept glancing back at Mulder, hoping for a life-sign, but continuously found him unconscious.


After what seemed like forever to Scully, the cabin finally came into sight. Rising out of the darkness, it wasn't at all as small as she had thought it would be. Zoltaire stopped at the foot of the stairs leading up to a snow-covered veranda and let his burden drop before he went up to open the door.

Scully eased her side of the make-shift stretcher onto the ground and squatted down next to it, worried that she might find that Mulder wasn't with them any more. Shoving a hand under the coverings after removing one glove, she found his face and sighed with relief. Although the burning hot skin under her hand wasn't a good sign, at least it meant he was still alive.

She got up again and looked around her, taking in the breathtaking but deadly vista surrounding them. It was beautiful it its ferocity. But one wrong move in this environment and they would die. She knew that and she had a healthy doze of respect for Mother Nature.

Again she wondered what it was that had driven Mulder up here at this time of year. She was certain it had something to do with his sister, but what exactly it was she didn't know. Mulder had not volunteered any information and she hadn't pushed hard enough to get a reply. Now she regretted it. If she at least knew why they were here, she would have an easier time accepting the unacceptable. That she might be forced to sit here and watch him die.

She turned back to the house and squinted at the darkness beyond the door. "Zoltaire," she finally called.

The man turned up in the doorway, looking annoyed.

"Help me get him inside. He needs to get warm," she told him and started pulling the pine branches away from Mulder.

Zoltaire glared at her for a moment, found that it had no effect, and stomped down the stairs to help her.

With a bit of effort and a great deal of complaining on Zoltaire's part, they managed to get Mulder inside. Zoltaire left Scully behind with him once he had been dropped rather unceremoniously on the bed in one of the bedrooms.

Scully preferred it that way anyway and went about examining him. She didn't need to be a doctor to know that his pneumonia had worsened considerably, but she figured he might stand a chance if she kept him in bed and on a heavy-duty treatment with the antibiotics she had brought along with her.

He was cold and hot at the same time. His arms and legs were icy while his face and chest seethed with heat. Scully didn't like that development at all. The first thing she did was strip him down to his shorts, where after she piled every available blanket on top of him, making certain he was well covered.

After giving him another shot for the infection that raged in his lungs, she settled down in an old rocking chair after wrapping a blanket around herself and actually managed to fall asleep in that position.


Sometime during the night, the snow, which had stopped somewhere along their trek toward the cabin, had picked up again. It had snowed heavily all through the night and when Zoltaire opened the door the next morning, he was met by a completely blank and white landscape. Most of the trees and shrubs in the area had been covered. The sky was a steel-grey and heavier than water-soaked cotton. Staring up at it, listening to the stillness surrounding the cabin, he knew that the storm he had heard about on the radio was just about to let lose. It wouldn't take long before the snowfall picked up again. And if he interpreted the signs correctly – and he usually did – it would be a hell of a storm on top of it.

He ground his teeth together and felt compelled to get a hold of his protegees and get them the hell out of here. Right now. He closed the door again and turned around only to find that Scully was standing a few feet behind him, arms crossed over her chest, her expression questioning.

"We have to leave," Zoltaire said and ran a hand through his thick, black beared. "Right now."

"Leave?" she asked as if she didn't understand the word. "We can't leave. Mulder is too sick. If we take him out in this weather, he'll die for sure."

"Yeah, well, he'll die up here if we stay, sweety," Zoltaire replied, trying to keep a lid on his feelings. "Look, I know this area and I know the weather that comes along with it. We are about to be hit by one hell of a shit storm. If we stay here, the likelihood that we survive it is zero. Do you understand me? Temperatures are going to drop. They've already dropped from yesterday. And although this cabin is stocked with enough canned food to keep all three of us alive for a few years, I'm not staying here, no matter what. I'm not taking that chance. It's just to damned dangerous. So, let's just load your husband back on that stretcher, wrap him up real good and get the hell off this mountain. They don't call this baby Fear Mountain for nothing."

Scully was in two minds about the situation. Partially she knew that Zoltaire was probably right and partially she knew what it would do to Mulder is she took him out of here. The chances were that he wouldn't survive it. The fever had not broken during the night and he was still unconscious. Besides, he had come up here for a reason and he had defied his own health to do so. So it had to be pretty important to him to stay.

She thought it over for a moment and finally shook her head. "I can't take him out of here while he's still unconscious. His chances of survival are zero if we leave. Is there any way we can stay up here despite the storm? I mean, is there firewood enough?"

"There's plenty of wood and food and the snow gives you an ample water supply, but consider this. Nobody knows how long this storm's gonna last. There is no way in hell that you can contact anybody anywhere once this thing breaks loose. I give it about three or four hours before the hounds of hell start howling out there and I ain't gonna be around when that happens. So either we get moving right now or I'm gonna go alone," Zoltaire said, the tone of his voice very urgent.

Scully glanced toward the bedroom door, then back at Zoltaire. Finally, she sighed. What else could she do? "We're staying. Just come back up and get us when it's over. Or send somebody else. I am not taking him out in a potentially hazardous storm. I'd rather take my chances here," she said.

Zoltaire shrugged. "Fine with me. If you wanna die up here, be my guest. I'll send somebody up to check for you once the storm's over. But don't expect anybody to turn up before that. And it might be days. Storms have been known to last for weeks up here."

"Thanks for the warning," Scully said dryly. "Shouldn't you get going? You wouldn't want to be caught in that storm, now would you?"

Zoltaire gave her a sour glance, then stomped off into the bedroom he had spent the night in to get his stuff. Once dressed and ready to go, he stopped at the door and looked back at her. "You're nuts, lady, you know that? You and your husband both. I just hope you know what the hell you're doing," he said. "Keep the doors inside closed. And never let the fire die out. It might be damned hard to light another if your frozen stiff. Heed my words. You're not gonna like this."

Scully stared at him, hoping that her doubts did not show on her face. She didn't feel comfortable about being left behind, but she would not chance the trip back down the mountain either. She figured they stood a better chance up here. After all, this cabin was still standing despite all the storms that Zoltaire had mentioned. It had to be a sturdy structure and much more safe than running around out there, freezing their butts off.

"Thanks for the advice," she said sarcastically. "Have a safe trip back."

Zoltaire shook his head in defeat, opened the door and stepped outside. The frosty air had a sharp edge to it and it wouldn't take long before the temperatures on this level would be too low for anybody to be outside for long. Glancing back over his shoulder, he tipped his fingers to his brow, closed the door behind him and walked off into the white nothingness.

Scully shuddered despite the heavy sweater she was wearing. It was cold already. Glancing around her, she decided to do a bit of investigating once she had looked in on Mulder again.


Around noon, a good three hours after Zoltaire had started his trek back down the mountain, the wind picked up in intensity. Within a very short time the temperatures had plummeted nearly 15 degrees and what hadn't been frozen before was now. The increasing wind kicked up the snow on the ground, mixing it with the heavy snowflakes falling from the sky.

Scully stood next to the front door in front of a window, staring out at the swirl of white out there, and felt the intense cold coming from the panes of glass. It was 5 p.m. and she couldn't help feeling very apprehensive about the coming night. If it was this cold this early, how cold would it get after the sun had set completely? Closing her eyes, she heaved a deep breath, finding it almost hard to do just that, and sighed.

"How's the weather?" she heard a hoarse voice from somewhere behind her.

She swirled around and found Mulder standing in the doorway to the bedroom, although the word standing didn't really apply to what he was doing. He was leaning heavily against the doorframe, his right hand holding the blanket over his shoulders together in a tight yet weak grip.

"You shouldn't be up," she admonished him, closing the distance between them in a few long strides. "You need to be in bed, Mulder. And no arguments, please," she added and wrapped an arm around him to guide him back into the bedroom.

"No," he wheezed, trying to make his voice work with little luck. "It's too cold in there," he managed and started coughing.

Scully nodded and instead helped him over to the couch. He more or less collapsed, still burning hot to the touch. Going for the remaining blankets, she decided that he needed to wear something other than just his shorts. This place was just too damned cold for him to run around literally butt-naked under a blanket. She picked up a t-shirt and a pair of sweat pants and brought it back to the livingroom, closing the door to the bedroom behind her.

"Here, put this on," she told him, handing him the clothes. "You need to keep warm at all times."

With more than a little help from her and a near-faint, he finally settled back on the couch and let her pile blankets over him with vague complaints about being too hot.

"You are hot, yes," she agreed. "But this place is freezing. It won't take you long to lose the excess heat from your fever if you're not covered up. And I don't want to know what that would do to your system." With a heavy sigh, she settled down on the edge of the couch and stared at him intently. "Damn it, Mulder, what are we doing up here?" she demanded. "Why was it so necessary to risk your health and life on this trip? What do you hope to find up here? There's nothing but snow out there. Nothing but endless fields of snow. And we're in the middle of a major storm now. Nobody's coming up here again for at least a few days." She shook her head and tried to make sense of it all, but couldn't. "We might die up here. Is it worth that?"

Mulder watched her wearily for a long while, his expression somber, then he dropped his gaze. "If I had gone alone, yes. Now that you're here with me ... I'm not so sure. You should have stayed at home, Scully. You shouldn't have come. This isn't your quest."

For a moment, she closed her eyes. They'd been through this before. They would probably go through it again unless she stopped it right now. "That's where you're wrong, Mulder. This is my quest. You made it my quest when you told me about Samantha. I take it that she's the reason for us being here?" she asked and he nodded, looking slightly surprised that she had guessed the reason so easily. "Well, Mulder, I would follow you to Hell and back again if I thought it made a difference. But the matter of fact is, I came along on this trip because of your failing health. Not because I believe you will find your sister on this mountain. What in God's name gave you the idea that she would be here?"

"Proof," he whispered, not looking at her. "They gave me proof. They say she ... she's up here."

With a sense of exasperation, Scully found it hard to reason with him for a moment. He would jump at anything that had to do with his sister. No matter how far out it was. No matter how stupid it was.

"Mulder ... what would she be doing up here? Why would anybody choose to hide out up here?" she asked, then shook her head in defeat, knowing that she didn't get anywhere with this now. He was too weak and too close to being delirious to give her a reasonable answer. "Never mind. Rest. You need it badly."

She didn't give him a chance to say anything, but instead got up and went into the small kitchen to find something edible. Opening one of the cupboards, she stared at the array of cans standing there and frowned. She feared she would very quickly tire of canned food, but at least there was something to eat.

She grabbed a can of soup and studied the label for a moment, noting that the expiration date was a few years in the future. With a sigh, she searched the kitchen drawers for a can opener and found several. Her next quest was for a pot, which she found on a shelve in what seemed to be a pantry. There were faucets over the kitchen sink, but opening them gave her nothing. They were probably frozen shut. Zoltaire's words came to mind and she turned to the window and gazed outside at the snow cover which had reached the window on this side of the cabin. Without further ado, she opened the window and dug the pot into the snow, scooping it full. Bringing it back inside, she closed the window again and started putting more fire wood on the wood-stove. She kept both the stove and the fireplace in the living room area alight all the time, afraid of letting either die out.

Putting the pot on the fire, she waited for the snow to melt, then for the water to boil before she poured the contents of the can into the pot. Within minutes, the smell of tomato soup spread throughout the kitchen. And all the while she watched the darkness and the snow outside, unable to put her concerns to rest.