Title: Hoodoo 6 of ?  Author: Kory Rating: PG-13 Classification: X Spoilers: 
Like the first kind Keywords: red-eyes, sour mash, slaves. Disclaimer: If the 
x-files was mine, i would be on a beach somewhere. I don't own any of it. 
'Kay? 

"You don't understand," the man said in a surly tone, "We 
don't recognize your federal jurisdiction here. This 
is private property and we don't have to let you in."
"Would you rather go to jail then?" Fox asked him.
"On what charge?" he said, bristling.
"Aiding and abetting in the escape of a wanted felon," Fox 
said, "That blue car that just blew through here 
contained a fugitive and I'm completely within my 
rights to follow him under the law of hot pursuit. So 
get out of my way." Fox revved the engine and let the 
car lurch forward toward the man in front of the car. 
He moved to the side and as they drove by he yelled out, 
"We still don't recognize you!"
The protesters cheered from the highway and as Fox and Dana 
drove down the dirt road, Dana said, "Who were those 
guys?"
"I don't know," said Fox with a grin, "Didn't recognize 
`em." They both had a chuckle over that.
When they reached the trees, they drove in amidst them and 
parked among the other cars and trucks, about thirty 
in all. They sat there for a second expecting somebody 
to come meet them but nobody came. They exitted the 
car and Dana stood up and looked around. "There it 
is," she said, pointing to the blue car that was 
parked on the other side of two pick-ups and a station 
wagon from them. One of the pick-ups had a 
bumpersticker that read, " Any day you get to shoot 
some sumbitch is a good day" Dana craned her neck to 
look into the car and added "He's still in there."
"Get away from it. Don't let him look at you." Fox said and 
they walked out of the trees into a clearing that had 
a lot of people standing around a couple of smoking 
barbecues, drinking beer and looking at a man standing 
on a big pine round talking. "Let's go see what he's 
saying," said Fox and they started across the lawn 
toward the crowd. As they neared the edge of the crowd 
they recognized the orator as Cole Hunter. He said it 
was just a barbecue but he wasn't missing a chance to 
stand on his stump and spout quasi-religious garbage 
to the intermittently camo clad, gun totin', beer 
drinkin' masses. The two agents stopped and listened 
in back of the crowd keeping their eyes peeled in case 
the hoodoo man should come and do his dangerous magic. 
"....Hell..," Cole was saying, " Is what befalls those who 
fall along the path and let devils do what they may. 
And the muddied races among us are the devils that 
wait to snatch up the ruins of our lives and live in 
our empty skins that they covet so. Yea! Believe you 
me," He said,  "The colored races are liken to vipers 
and to go amongst them liken to falling into a pit of 
vipers." Cole pointed to a sheet of plywood on the 
ground and a burly man in full camouflage with an AR-
15 rifle in his hands reached down and lifted one end 
of the plywood and flung it aside revealing an eight 
foot deep pit with the bottom full of rattlesnakes.
"That must be his right hand man." Dana said to Fox.
"I don't know," said Fox, "We could have done a little more 
homework,  I guess."
Cole Hunter stood tall on the round of wood and looked out 
over the onlookers with a fervent glare. "This is what 
we're here for today folks," he said, "A little 
demonstration." Behind him, the burly man set up a 
large tripod with a big rounded store security mirror 
on top. He aimed it into the hole and said to the 
onlookers, "Can ya' see that?"  After their 
affirmations he went back and stood behind Cole again 
who reached down to his feet and picked up a little 
animal cage.
"Ya' see this here?" he said, holding it up. "This here's a 
poor little white rabbit. Look at those big frightened 
eyes. Remind ya' of anyone?" He sneered evilly at the 
audience. "Yeah, that's right. But you don't have to 
act like little scared bunnies anymore." He pulled it 
out by the scruff of it's neck and held it over the 
pit of snakes. "Yea, like falling into a pit of 
snakes," he repeated to the crowd while lowering the 
rabbit closer to the pit. "Yea, I say the time is at 
hand when we don't have to live with vipers whose 
fangs drip with venom at the smell of our blood." The 
throats of the people tightened as he lowered the 
rabbit closer to the pit while their hands clenched 
and sweated on the beers they held.
"Am I really seeing this?" said Dana to Fox from behind the 
crowd.
"Dana, these people are different from us. To them, a 
hundred pounds of plastic explosives is like a dream 
come true," he answered.
Cole Hunter looked up and clenched his free hand into a 
fist and raised it defiantly toward the sky, "Lord," 
he said, "I'm not gonna' be a poor little white bunny 
to be dropped into a pit of snakes." He looked around 
at the people's faces to see if they were sufficiently 
shaken. Their anxious looks told him that they had 
equated themselves with the unlucky bunny and were 
ready for his manipulatory climax. He turned the bunny 
and looked into it's face and looked back at his 
audience. He fixed a cold hard stare upon them and 
loosed his grip on the bunny. It let out a squeal when 
it hit the bottom of the pit causing many in the 
audience to wince or gasp. They looked into the mirror 
at the bunny in the pit surrounded by snakes that 
licked the air with their forked tongues to sense it. 
They looked back at Cole who waited patiently, his 
gaze fixed upon them in anticipation of this desired 
effect. They looked to him now as their savior and he 
didn't disappoint them. He reached behind his back and 
drew a .45 automatic from his belt. He held it up by 
his face, tightly clenched in his grasp and looked at 
it, just as he had looked the bunny in the face just 
before throwing it into the pit. "No sirree !" he 
said, sneering at the gun in his hand, "Lord, I'm 
gonna' fight back!" He lowered the gun at the pit and 
began blasting away at the snakes.
Some of the people watching whooped and yelled and ran up 
to the pit to look in. Cole's assistant pulled out a 
pistol then and emptied a clip into the hole.
"Do y'all want to be little white rabbits?" Cole said as 
they looked into the pit at the dead bunny. The snakes 
had never bit it but Cole's assistant managed to put a 
.22 bullet into it that barely left a mark.
"No way!" Said a bearded biker type in a faded Levi jacket 
as he shook his beer in the air defiantly. Some more 
people chimed in but it was anticlimactic and petered 
off quickly. As Cole looks on he sees the crowd start 
to look uncomfortable and lose interest as they begin 
to wander back to the beer coolers and barbecue 
grills. Cole's eyes shifted back and forth over the 
crowd and his eyes betrayed, ever so slightly, a panic 
through his angry countenance. "Do you all want to 
have the teeth of the viper sunk into your sorry 
asses?" He snarled out at the fading crowd.
"Hell, no!" The Levi clad biker yelled.
Dana and Fox had retreated back slightly as the crowd 
dispersed and now Fox said from where they stood by 
the barbecue grills, "That guy is a plant."
"I saw that the first time he yelled that." Dana said 
smugly to him. "Cole knows that these people wouldn't 
be here if they didn't at least have some passing 
gripe with other races. He's just trying to use these 
primitive manipulation techniques to bring it out in 
to the forefront of their minds."
"So who is this?" Fox said, motioning toward a group of 
five thuggish looking leather and camo clad 
individuals wearing holstered pistols and bowie knives 
and acting generally menacing.
"Well that must be the flight or fight bunch. You see we're 
getting into a little more sophisticated technique 
here. The idea is similar to chemical control in that 
a substance, adrenaline and even a host of other 
chemicals science isn't even aware of are manufactured 
by the body at times of stress. Create stress in 
certain situations and deny the stressee the release 
of a physical or emotional exertion to rid the 
chemicals from the body and it creates a variety of 
manipulatively useful reactions. It's been compared to  
sodium pentothal. Under the control of master 
manipulators it's really very effective." Dana 
expounded effortlessly.
Do you think Cole is one?" Fox asked her.
Dana looked over at Cole as he attempted to win back the 
crowd from his stump pulpit. "I'll tell you what 
you're going to do!" He yelled, "You're gonna' fight!" 
And under his breath, she saw him mouth the words, 
"God damn it."
Dana looked back at Fox. "I think we can rule that one 
out," she said. Their heads turned as the failing 
water pump on a straining, badly pinging engine 
screeched horribly as it headed out of the trees 
toward Cole and the pit of snakes.

What the hell is that?" Cole said to his camouflaged crony 
who was standing next to him sweating in nervous 
anticipation of his wrath at the disinterest of the 
crowd. He looked at Cole and shrugged. "Well, go check 
on it, dammit." Cole snarled to him while motioning 
toward the car with his hand. Camo guy took a firm 
grip on his assault rifle and walked around the pit to 
meet the car that had already stopped a few feet from 
it's edge. The widely dispersed people who formerly 
made up the crowd stopped what they were doing to 
watch what happened next.
 As camo guy walked around the front of the car it's door 
opened and the salesman stepped out and stood there 
supporting himself by leaning heavily on the open 
driver's side door. He looked around at the crowd and 
then at Cole. He paused for a second as he stared at 
his face and then let out a piteous wail that turned 
all heads to look at his pale emaciated frame just 
before he fell to his knees on the ground letting the 
car door swing closed. He looked up at Cole Hunter 
still standing on his round and in a pitiful drained 
voice said, "I'm here. I'm here at last."
"Camo guy looked up at Cole and said, "I'll get him out of 
here."
Cole held up his hand motioning for him not to as he looked 
out at the crowd's reignited interest toward something 
he was a player in. Cole looked down at the wretch 
before him and it made him feel that much more 
superior. "What's that brother?" Cole said loudly in 
his best preacher's voice. "Come closer."
The salesman crawled weakly toward Cole until he reached 
the edge of the pit. He stopped there and sat back on 
his knees and said, "At....Last....Yes," between big 
gasping breaths.
"What's that brother?" Cole repeated, keeping one eye on 
the crowd. "You say you're tired of feeling the teeth 
of the black viper sink into your sorry butt? Are you 
come to join up with our humble group and drive the 
viper from our land and live in god's light for all 
eternity?"
The salesman blinked his eyes and peered up at Cole still 
not believing his luck that all these rednecks see is 
the body of the white salesman who's strings he now 
pulled. "Vipers! Yes, eternity!" He said loudly. "Oh 
yes, lord, eternity!"
Cole grinned a wicked smile at this turn of events and as 
the crowd moved in closer to see this new spectacle he 
continued his harsh sermonizing with renewed 
intensity. "Oh, yeah, brothers and sisters, you see 
here in this poor wretch the results of the treachery 
of the black snakes. This miserable waste of a human 
being before us was once a proud white man. See how he 
shakes and cowers like a dog? The dark races would 
have us all in this condition. Who here has the guts 
to stand up and say no, you're not sheep to be shorn 
or chickens to be plucked? You don't have white skin 
so you can be separated from the herd and fed on by 
wolves? Do you want to end up like this miserable 
skinny excuse for a man?"
"What's wrong with `im?" A heavyset woman in the crowd 
asked out loud.
Another man looked into the window of the little blue car 
and said, "Look at alla' them bottles. He's a drunk!"
"The black viper's have torn from him the means with which 
to have a decent life and have left him in a hell of 
hard drink and sin. Heed my words, for it is me he has 
come to for his salvation in his time of need. For 
even in the depths of his depravity, in his lowest of 
lows, he recognizes me for the white peoples savior 
that I am." Cole pointed his finger in the air and 
shouted, "And I shall deliver him."
From their spot at the back of the crowd Dana and Fox 
watched anxiously, expecting something bad to happen 
any minute. "Boy, this guy is really something else," 
Dana said.
"He'd make a good televangelist," mused Fox.
"Pick him up." Cole said to his camoed lacky, "Pick him up 
and bring him to me."
"Oh, geez!" Dana said, "What's he gonna' do now? Try to 
heal him?"
"Here it comes, I'll bet," Fox said, "If they all start 
shooting, run like hell for the barbecues. We can make 
it to the trees from there."
Dana looked over her shoulder at his suggested escape route 
and then back at Cole and the camo guy who was helping 
the salesman to walk by holding him from the side. He 
brought him up to Cole and stood there with him. Cole 
looked at the pale thin face of the salesman and had 
to put his disgust for yet another version of what he 
considered a worthless human being aside long enough 
to think of what to do next. The crowd was silent as 
they waited for what was to come next. Cole opened his 
mouth to speak but a strong, deep, colored man's voice 
cut him off. It was the salesman, "At last," he said, 
"At last. Massa Huntah, I can have my rest now."
Cole's eyes widened and his lips shrank back into a hideous 
yellow toothed snarl as red eyes leapt from the face 
of the ragged man before him. A great dark shape 
formed around the eyes and the spectral wings of a 
giant black bat enfolded Cole's upper body. Cole 
screamed and struggled with the thing and slipped off 
of his stand and tumbled into the pit of snakes. The 
fangs of the rattlesnakes sunk into him again and 
again as he rolled around struggling vainly to shake 
off the evil creature. When the large amount of poison 
reached his heart he died in the pit, his face a 
mirror of true horror and his lifeless eyes staring 
into those of the little white rabbit he had 
sacrificed for his cause.
Cole Hunter's coveted audience had run off to their cars 
and only the agents were left standing there. Camo guy 
got up off of the ground where he had fallen with the 
salesman when the bat appeared and looked in the pit 
at his fallen leader. He noticed Scully and Mulder 
watching him and he turned and walked away into the 
trees.
Fox and Dana stood there in the silence wondering what to 
do with the disheveled salesman sleeping on the ground 
when a roar rose up from a distant hill. They looked 
across the highway to see the civil war being fought 
one last time by men who just couldn't let it die. The 
ersatz troops charged up a hill and into the trees and 
disappeared into them. The silence returned and Fox 
looked at the dead man in the hole next to his dead 
rabbit symbol surrounded by poisonous snakes and he 
said, "Maybe now all this will die for good." And from 
the pit came the sounds of snakes hissing and rattling 
out their oft unheeded warnings.

THE END.