the SeaCrawler.
Under any other circumstances, Scully would have been thrilled to enter the command center of a Navy cruiser. During her father's lifetime she was never allowed to do this. But now she stopped abruptly as soon as she had left the staircase. In any case, they had now found part of the crew.
Again it was the click and the bright flash of the camera that broke the silence in the room when Kate captured the gruesome scenario on the small memory chip. Only then did Gibbs carefully work his way past the corpses lying on the floor, over to a high-backed armchair. On this sat the slumped figure of the captain. In his left temple there was a four-millimeter hole, from which dark streaks ran down his face and neck, down to his shoulder, chest and back.The left arm hung down, the bony open hand pointed to the floor on which a Smith & Wesson 38 caliber lay.
The silver-haired agent stared at the bizarre image for a tiny moment, then turned away and let his gaze wander around the room and over the four other corpses. Scully and Mulder, meanwhile, paced from one to the next, all of them in the exact same place they had been assigned before they died. On the radar, on the radio, on the sonar and on the navigation. And each of them had succumbed to serious injuries from a targeted shot in the chest area.
"He must have shot her. First her, then himself." Scully rose from a crouch and brushed the dust off her pants. "But why? What about the rest of the crew?"
There was no answer, and Mulder didn't seem to have heard his partner in the first place. His gaze was fixed on a black-bluish spot on the floor next to the captain's chair and his eyes narrowed when he took a few steps and quickly put on a pair of disposable gloves.He gently stroked the stain and actually something of an oily liquid stuck to his fingers. "Scully!" He rubbed the liquid on the glove, it was tough and thick without sticking, and smelled it carefully. Without a word he held out his hand to Scully. His eyes spoke volumes.
"Mulder ..." A grim suspicion sprouted at the sight of this substance in her chest. At the same time the cold shadow of fear crept up her back, the fear of the past that she had so much hoped to have closed. "Mulder, that can be impossible. That would mean ..." She fell silent and her gaze flickered restlessly from one eye of her partner to the other. For once, she wished that he was joking with her again, or that he was wrong. But she knew just as well that he would never lie on this subject.
Then they were rudely pulled back into the present. Gibbs had leaned down to the FBI agents, pushed his cap back a little, and was now looking from one to the other.His eyes sparkled. "Would you be so good as to tell us what that means? What is it that it scares you so much?" He had mistaken the stain for an old residue of leaked operating fluid. But obviously it was nothing of the kind that was harmless.
"Agent Gibbs ..."
Mulder jumped up before Scully could begin to explain. He tore the gloves from his hands and tossed them far away. "We have to get into the hold. Quick!"
"Mulder!"
He jumped to the door, almost as if he was fleeing from what he had discovered. But DiNozzo blocked his way. "My boss just asked you a question, sir."
For a moment, Mulder pondered the possibility of just getting this licked macho agent out of the way, then decided against it. He needed the NCIS. Now apparently even more urgent than initially expected. With a deep sigh he closed his eyes for a moment and then turned around again."Is it one of those horror tales that you want to tell us now?"
"I don't hold it against you for calling my expertise as such, Agent Gibbs." He looked up wearily. "But we will only be certain when we have checked the holds and autopsied the corpses. I do not want to make any false assumptions beforehand."
"He's right, sir. Based on this stain alone, we can't say with certainty whether our fears are justified. Neither could it be an unfortunate coincidence." Scully wrung her hands. "But we have to act quickly. You can be sure that we will put you in the picture as soon as we are certain."
Gibbs shook his head slowly, disbelief clearly written on his face. "It seems to be getting into the habit of working with you, can it be? I don't know what it is that upsets you so much. But to me this undoubtedly looks like a homicide on the part of the captain .First his crew, then himself, without any mysterious inconsistencies. "
“And why would he do such a thing?” Mulder growled inwardly. He was so tired of having to justify himself over and over again. He would have liked to investigate here alone with Scully, but obviously it was not granted to him. "Correct me if I'm wrong. But I think that a seasoned marine would by no means have determined an end like this for himself and his men. Men like you do not take suicide for no reason, Agent Gibbs." His brown eyes sprayed Lightning bolts. Impotent anger stirred deep within him. An anger that was not directed against the other investigators, but that had slumbered in him for a long time and was just waiting to come back to life to torment him again. The anger and sadness over the countless losses and suffering that had befallen him and his loved ones. He had thought he had at least won a small victory.If not a definitive one, at least impossible to continue in the long run. But he was wrong again.
“Don't touch it!” Both Mulder and Scully had spun around to the young NCIS agent and shouted the warning at her like one-mouthed. As a result, Kate paused in her movement and looked up at Mulder and Scully, terrified. Her fingers hovered only a few inches above the ominous stain. Then, very slowly, she withdrew her hand.
"Please ..." Mulder fidgeted his hair and then raised his hands soothingly as Kate frowned in annoyance. "Agent Todd, please. You must never touch this substance with your bare skin. If you absolutely need to touch it, or if you want to secure any part of it for investigation purposes, then please put on gloves. It is for your own safety. That applies for everyone here. Should we come across any further residues, never touch them. "Kate looked at the stain in disgust, then stood up. “Then maybe McGee should do that.” She smiled innocently for a moment and then took a few steps to put more space between herself and the stain.
"What the hell is this all about?"
Mulder pointed accusingly at the dark substance. "That there, this small, inconspicuous spot, poses a far greater danger than radioactive weapons ever could have. If our fears come true, then the SeaCrawler had loaded much more dangerous goods than previously suspected.
We call it the black cancer, or the black death. A virus unlike any other in human history. He turns man into a tool, a slave, a breeding ground that is completely destroyed when the being created by the virus is born. And these beings will wipe man from the face of the earth. They will be superior to us because they were here on this planet before us. "The NCIS team stared at the man perplexed.
Scully sighed deeply. She didn't expect Mulder to find words to convince the NCIS. "The fact is that this is a highly dangerous virus that attacks and damages the human body as a whole to a devastating extent. Its origin and development cannot be compared with anything known." Unhappily, she looked at the emaciated corpses. "Our concern now is that these men may have been infected with this virus and that they are still carrying it despite their deaths. And that it is still developing in them."
“To become what?” Kate smiles, amused. She found it extremely amusing by now how strange the FBI was looking at this case.
"To a being far superior to us."
"An alien!"
“No, not exactly.” Scully growled impatiently and could understand Mulder very well for that brief moment.It was terrible when you had to recite everything over and over again, down to the smallest detail, even though you knew very well that you could not convince the other person. “The virus, and the something it creates, suggests that it is extraterrestrial substances. But not in the sense of little gray men.” Her gaze flicked nervously to Gibbs, to anticipate a possible outburst in time to be able to pre-advise. But this did not make the slightest impression of losing patience. Which, if she was honest with herself, made her even more insecure.
Reluctantly, she continued her report. “The earth has been hit by meteorites quite often in its history. Most of them evaporated in its atmosphere, but a few actually hit, bringing with them substances that they had absorbed on their journey through space or those of their original ones Locations.One of these impact sites can be found in Tunguska, Russia. Nobody can say what they really brought with them from their travels, but it can be assumed that this very substance, which our little spot here is possibly made of, was brought to earth with one of these meteorites. "
“And how can it be that these marines contracted such a virus?” The voice of the NCIS team leader had something lurking and probably did not bode well.
"Well ..." She exchanged a quick look with Mulder. "Maybe he came into contact with someone who was already infected by chance, an unfortunate occurrence ... we hope."
“You hope?” Gibbs left his seat at the controls and walked slowly towards her. "And what if it wasn't like that?"
She looked restlessly for a solution and had to control herself not to back down in front of the other agent. "We have to see the hold and the ..."
"Autopsy the corpses, yes, you already said that.“He was silent for a moment, an excruciatingly long moment.” I don't like what cards you play with us. I offered you a cooperation, but for that I need openness and no half-silly horror scenarios. Can you tell me one reason why I should buy these stories from you. "
Scully was silent. She