Rating: NC-17
Classification: S/R, Humor (hopefully), Alternate Universe…people are actually happy here.
Spoilers: Everything through the first third of Season 7, close after the Millennium episode. Some license with the death of Melissa and Emily.
Keywords: confession, sex, and happy ending, with detours along the way.
Summary: Our heroes finally decide to do the dirty deed. Sex, love, all the rest. What might have occurred before the last two thirds of Season 7.
Disclaimers: You know, they’re not mine. They’re Chris Carter’s. Just using them for the fun, no money involved. Archive: Yes, anywhere. Just keep it intact.
Feedback: Yes, please. Folks, this is my first foray into fanfic, so be gentle. Might I also add that I had to write this as a response to the end of the last season.
Thanks: Much, much thanks to Alicia K., and Nikki B for their beta wisdom, general support and encouragement of this fledgling author. Thanks to Judith Weugel and the folks at Fran’s Fanfic Addiction. Judith wrote me a great e-mail that got me stoked to write more. Also, thanks to my teachers–writers like Bonetree, fialka, revely and jessemie’s evil twin. What you do with words!
Most of all, thanks to David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson for almost a decade of complicated, passionate, subtle portrayals of our favorite fighters against the apocalypse –Mulder and Scully
BOOK 1
Friday Night
“Shit!…Fuck!…Sorry…Sorry…S’cuse me…Yeah, I know I’m a real tool…”
Mulder’s expletives and half-assed apologies trailed after him as he charged down the 4th floor hall. He’d just escaped the annual audit. And he was free-free at last, thank god all mighty, free at last. Eight hours of his life had been sucked down the drain, highlighted by the droning, torturous indictment of how he and Scully spent the FBI’s money. He’d infuriated the poor accountant, offering only his usual wads of coffee stained receipts and not much more. When the poor schmuck finally gave up and sprung him, Mulder hadn’t even noticed that the guy’d called him a dick. After pushing his way past a raft of new recruits, one ASAC, and practically knocking over a file clerk, he slid into the elevator.
Punching the button with a vengeance, he descended to the level everyone else called the ‘LTZ ‘–‘Less Than Zero.’ Mulder checked his watch, it was close to six, and he panicked for a second when he thought she might have left and he’d be stuck with his own sorry ass. It was another sign of how far gone he was, and he didn’t give a damn. He’d taken that plunge when it came to his partner a long time ago.
Coming up on the office, he got a glimpse of her through the partially open door. Beautiful Scully. Click. Another photo in a file for his eyes only. Stopping just at the threshold, Mulder hovered just outside and drank her in. It was an involuntary act now, a necessary one. Beautiful Scully. His human credential, his single piece of evidence that his heart was still capable of love. But for longer than he could remember, he’d only allow himself to watch her when he thought she couldn’t see, to touch her when there was a crisis large enough to cover his aching need.
Beautiful Scully. Access Denied.
At some point in the dim and distant past, there’d been a reasonable explanation for his life of self-denial, reasons he couldn’t rationalize anymore. Samantha had been gone over twenty years and his guilt over her abduction and his solitary life seemed useless to him now.
He stood just to the side of the doorjamb, hands shoved in his pockets, aware of how everything else in the room faded around her. Beautiful Scully. His head was filled with thousands of images of her, bits of her, his secret pleasure. It was safer than risking everything, losing her by asking for more than she could give. He wanted to move forward, but he needed some catalyst, some sign that she was ready to end their fixed emotional universe.
His chest tightened with an ache that was now a fairly common occurrence, and out of nowhere he remembered a line of Yeats, “…one man loved the pilgrim’s soul in you, And loved the sorrows of your changing face.”
Seven years of sorrows had caressed that face. Beautiful Scully. There had been so many losses, missteps, so many times he thought he’d never see her again.
He took a deep breath and walked in.
Sensing him lurking nearby, she wondered what the hell was up with him these days. Was he watching her more or was she just noticing it more? Normally she’d care, but right now she was a little preoccupied. She was in his chair, staring at the ceiling, hurling pencils at the tiles just like she’d seen him do a thousand times. Hanging on her shoulders a little crookedly, Scully’s long, black jacket was unbuttoned — a sign that her carefully constructed façade had begun to erode. Her heart sped up when he came through the doorway and finally made his way to the desk.
Biting down on her lip and tossing back her hair, she shot one off as his footsteps came closer. Pretending to be utterly consumed with this fascinating activity, she sized him up out of the corner of her eye–he looked unsettled. She’d blown his customary cool. Good, she thought, turnabout is fair play. Allow me to rattle your cage, Agent Mulder, mine’s been rattled plenty.
Someone had rewritten the story of her life. Scully in Wonderland had fallen down the twisted rabbit hole and when she’d finally come to, casual death and random brutality were the order of the day. She never faltered, never flinched, even as the personal costs were salted into her very soul.
She shocked them all, throwing in her lot with his, and their lives became a pattern of interlocking sorrows: Samantha, their fathers, Melissa, cancer, Emily. What baffled her was how, in the midst of all of it, Mulder kept reaching out to her, and against her better judgment, she reached back. A powerful thing had locked them in each other’s orbit; and Scully had spent years cultivating plausible excuses as to what held them, what forged this bond.
Mulder would have said it was fate, bashert, ‘la forza del destino.’ He made her feel too much, want too much. Seven years ago, the idea that she’d be in love with him struck her as preposterous. But like so many things in this Wonderland, the preposterous had come true, and she was only now catching up to the truth of it.
More pencils shot to the ceiling. He had to be right behind her, she could feel it. She wouldn’t look, she might lose her nerve. It was astounding, really, how he made her feel. Even more astounding, she was going to do something about it.
What tore down the wall of denial was something as simple as a comment after her last check up. A week ago, she’d been siting on the exam table, after hearing she was fine, her cancer still in remission. On the way out, the nurse made an offhand remark, telling her to go home and celebrate with the man she loved.
Scully went home, and took a long hard look at her life, what she had, what she didn’t have, and why the hell the man she loved was only as close as a voice on her cell phone. Melissa and Emily were still dead. Serious, logical Agent Scully had tried to offer penance by not living herself. Tried and failed. A casual remark became a revelation. It worked on her all week, all day Friday, up until now.
This afternoon her last, brittle piece of reserve crumbled away. All that time, biting back the words, holding herself in check hadn’t kept her or anyone else safe, hadn’t evened any imaginary score. All it had done was kept her alone, waiting for someday. Scully screwed up her courage; she’d had enough. She was fed up with her own hesitancy, his too.
Mulder was going to get the full court press; and once and for all she would know what was really possible.
“Scully, what are…”
“Shhhh, Mulder! ”
“I thought you’d be halfway home by now. It’s way past 5, and last time I checked it was still Friday. Just what are you still doing here?”
She put the pencils down, straightened her jacket, smoothed her skirt and rose to meet him. They stood face to face in front of his desk. Scully spoke deliberately, and tried to hold back the smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “We’ve got to stop this. It’s time, Mulder.”
“Stop what?” Mulder felt his stomach knot, his mind race. He was about to hit the wall at 90 miles an hour. Time to crash and burn, he told himself, Hurry, you’re a smart man, say something, say anything. He opened his mouth, and she covered it with her hand.
“Shut up, Mulder, and listen. I’m on to you. I’m on to what’s been happening every weekend for the last three months. It’s Friday, and sometime between now and Sunday night you’ll call me with the ‘urgent paperwork needing to be done by Monday’, and when you show up at my door you’ll have little else in hand beside a pizza and a bad movie. Could it possibly be that you want to be with me? You’ve kissed me, I’ve kissed you. We’ve stayed in god-only-knows how many motel rooms, how long do you think it’s going to take you?”
His hazel eyes flickered with curiosity now, “How long is it going to take me to do what, Scully?” Maybe he had it all wrong, maybe she was going to throw him a bone, maybe he wasn’t doomed to be Monster Boy, forever dwelling in the basement.
Chewing her lip, she eyed him up and down, wondering if it might be easier just to kill him. My brilliant Mulder, box of clues here, she thought ruefully, pay attention. She decided to spare him, at least for the time being. But there was no way he was getting off the hook, even though it appeared his IQ had taken a serious plunge in the last few minutes.
“How long were you going to take to get it through your thick head that I kind of saw through your carefully orchestrated deceit? That I kept opening the door because I wanted to be with you?”
She’d just told him she’d been waiting for him…Jesus, this was too much. For once, he was mentally scrambling to keep up with her “Well, it’s just…I didn’t want to assume….”
He felt his face get hot — she was not going to embarrass him, he’d cowboy up to this monumental shift. All right, Scully, do it. I’ll be right behind you, he promised. Just make your move. I’ll be all over it, I swear.
Fingering his tie, she savored his shocked surprise. “I’m only going to say this once. Tonight we’re going to pretend we’re normal adults. We’re still relatively young and healthy. You’re coming to dinner at my place, at eight, and you are going to bring dessert. Is that understood? Nod once for yes, twice for no.”
Mulder nodded once and grinned.
Her hands slid to his lapels, her thumbs rubbing the fabric. “I don’t have to write this out for you, do I?” Her tone was serious, but her eyes were bright, teasing.
“I think you’ve made yourself perfectly clear.” Mulder matched her tone. “Normal people, dinner at eight, dessert. OK, I’ve got that down.” His eyes glinted with amusement and something feral. He was most definitely on the case now.
“Good. Well all right then, I’ll be leaving.” She let her hands fall away and looked away when she felt herself getting warm all of a sudden. “Okay, then.”
“Okay yourself.” Mulder crossed his arms over his chest and watched her leave the office and disappear into the elevator.
He paused for a minute and headed down the hall. He had things to do, and he knew better than to be late.
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Ten before eight. Scully managed to stop on her way home at a nearby market. Groceries were scattered on the kitchen table, and a bottle of a good white was chilling.
Mulder didn’t know it yet, but she was going to put him to work. She looked around her apartment. It was neat, orderly. No one laid around all Sunday, half-asleep on the couch pretending to read the paper. No one threw his clothes on the floor, or dragged her from what she was doing to take a shower with him in the middle of Saturday afternoon. No one ever grabbed her in front of the kitchen sink, sat her on the counter, and made love to her right there because he couldn’t wait. Her apartment, with its clean, quiet coldness said more about her than she liked.
She went to the bedroom closet and took out all the things she had put away after Melissa was killed. When she first found out, all Scully had felt was a searing pain, an urge to scream, smash everything, and pull the trigger of her revolver and shoot anything that moved. She knew if she let her feelings out she’d die in their wake. Or someone else would.
Instead, she was Icy Agent Scully; working with the forensic team, cleaning up her sister’s blood with her own hands. She ignored Mulder, ignored everyone, and did what she was trained to do. After everyone had left, she locked herself in the bathroom, knelt down in the shower, and cried out to God for the strength to get up and go on. Hot rivulets of water ran down her back and legs as she’d shook from sorrow and rage, sobbing until she could barely move. When it was done, she got dressed and silently went through the apartment boxing up anything that represented pleasure, passion, enjoyment; the things she shared with Melissa.
After she found Emily and had to watch her die, she walled herself in even more. Blaming herself every day for not nailing Alex Krycek, the Smoking Man, all of them to the wall. Scully carried around her grief and guilt, believing there would never be an end to it.
Tonight she took out the candles and the jazz recordings and loaded up the CD player. She lit candles everywhere she could think of and played music she’d almost forgotten she had. Scully let herself think about her sister, feel her presence. Tonight seemed like the night for more than one kind of resolution. Melissa had always been more open, taking pleasure in the moment, in the fact that your life happened now, with all its contradictions. Five years had passed and there was finally a hard-won peace, an imperfect one. Blame wasn’t a legacy Melissa would have left for her.
And Emily? A dead child in a litany of them. She’d done too many autopsies, too many exhumations, to not be haunted by their small ghosts. But Emily was hers, gone before Scully could ever know her. That loss was embedded in her heart like a stone. There would be no others. She had dreams about losing her, dreams of failing, and falling short. It was just a part of her life, who she was now, another one of the Mulder and Scully interlocking sorrows.
She stood facing the bedroom mirror and took a long, careful look, fingering the chain and the little cross that was always there, her personal talisman. She wore little makeup: lipstick, not much else. Her expression was soft, and she seemed younger to herself, not so austere. She’d carefully cultivated a game face for the job, she had to. It was essential to command the respect of fellow agents and back down suspects. More and more, she’d used it to hide from herself. Agent Scully here. Nothing but the facts, no, nothing at all.
Tonight, the face looking back at her was a different woman.
Still damp from the shower, her hair was slicked back, a darker red as she stood in the light. She pushed a strand gently behind her ears. She dared herself tonight, wearing clothes she bought with Melissa’s encouragement: a white, fitted sweater that left her neck and shoulders bare; panties; a long, black skirt that wrapped around her waist. She slipped into a pair of black heels and said goodnight to Agent Scully, Doctor Scully, autopsies, black oil, the way her SIG felt as she pulled the trigger. She wasn’t that woman tonight, she didn’t know about those things.
She wanted to be the woman in the mirror.
Something made her think of her last summer, and the phone message from one “Fox Mantle,” Mulder’s arms around her as she hit ball after ball into the summer night.
They’d sat on the hood of his car afterward, watching stars for a long time, Mulder touching the back of her neck with his fingers. And then there was the look he gave her–the kind of look that told her she could lay him bare. Over the last year, he’d let her know in small, subtle ways that he’d seen another side of her, that he felt drawn to it. She thought kissing him on New Year’s might make things different.
But neither one of them ever stepped across the invisible line between what they did, what they had to do, and what they wanted.
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Mulder stood outside her door; it was just now 8 o’clock. He was wearing a black dress shirt, black pants and his leather jacket. His duffel bag slung over his shoulder, carrying what he’d gotten for later. He was sure she wasn’t expecting what he’d brought. A quick run of his fingers through his hair, then he knocked and waited. There were the sounds of Billy Strayhorn’s piano from behind the door. He’d listened to those sensual jazz riffs on many sleepless nights. Sometimes, when he called her at three a.m., Strayhorn was on his stereo in the background. Once he’d even tried to explain his musical significance, but she cut him off, ‘Mulder, even though I’m a sailor’s daughter, I know who he is.’
Finally, the door opened and there she was. For a moment Mulder couldn’t move or speak. At last, his lips formed the words, “God, you look amazing.” Walking through the door, he set his bag of the floor of the foyer. She seemed pleased and slightly nervous, and if he was honest, he’d have to say he was too. He went on to let himself enjoy what she was wearing, and not wearing, realizing something else was going on besides than appreciation, amazement or nervousness. Something located further south.
“Amazing? That’s a pretty strong word.” Was she blushing? The hell with it, she didn’t care. The Gunmen had just done one of their regular bug hunts in the last week and came up with nothing. Scully sent them a silent thank you. No surveillance tonight. A small miracle. “You don’t look too bad yourself, Mulder. But I was wondering, are you planning on going to the gym later?” She took his jacket, hanging it one of the brass hooks just with arm’s reach, then cocked her head toward the bag.
“Oh, that’s for later, if you’re good.”
“Excuse me?” She tossed him a withering look.
“It’s dessert, nothing sinister. Unless, of course, you like sinister.” Mulder was cracking wise and feeling pretty good at the moment. She reached for the bag. His hand shot out and caught her wrist. “No, Agent Scully, I don’t think so.” He snatched the duffel and strolled into the living room.
“Someone is behaving like a little prick.”
“That’s a little harsh. Dana Katherine Scully, does your mother know you talk like that?”
“There’s a variety of bad habits I have that my mother attributes to you, as does Bill, by the way.” Scully hung his jacket in the closet. When she turned around, she saw he’d opened a window, and was sprawled on the sofa, feet up and grinning.
“It’s almost spring. And a beautiful night, I just wanted to enjoy it.”
“Make yourself at home, by all means. Is there anything else I can get you?” She hoped her sarcasm was not lost on him.
He waved her on. “You may bring me my dinner, woman. Go, go on.”
Scully walked across the living room to the sofa. She reached behind his neck and tried to pull him up by the collar. “Get up, Mulder. Now.”
He stirred himself and took his time getting to his feet. It felt too good too hurry.
She scanned his face with a kind of concentration that almost felt foreign to her, “Dinner is going to be a joint effort.” Taking one of his arms, she started rolling up one of his sleeves. “I guess we should get started. Allow me, it’s the least I can do for tonight’s help.” Without thinking, her fingers drifted slowly up and down his newly exposed skin. As soon as she touched him, she knew she wasn’t going to be making dinner.
The sounds of Charlie Parker’s sax drifted toward where they stood. He closed the gap between them, slowly shaking his head. “Sorry, Scully. I can’t wait. Change in plans, partner.”
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Mulder presses his warm mouth to hers, shuddering when her lips part and her tongue seeks his. Everything speeds up and whirls around him. His hands lace behind her head, his fingers tangle in her hair, his fingertips pressing hard on her skull. Kissing her over and over again, his mouth burning against hers. No more pain. No more remnants of past disasters. It was all dissolving into the distance. Something else was here for him. Mulder runs his lips over her brow, her eyelids, her nose, the lines of her jaw. It’s different now, Scully, he silently begs. You. Me. Now. Let me show you. Let me.
She lets go. Nothing is complicated or conflicted anymore. No more disillusionment. No more keeping it all at bay. Everything slowed down around her, stopped, and disappeared. Everything but them. She breaks away from him and presses open mouthed-kisses along his eyelids, his forehead, down his cheek to his jaw. Tenderly biting his earlobe, she moves to the ridge of muscle in his neck that run to his shoulder and relishes each move he made as her teeth graze his skin.
Mulder’s arms slide down to her waist, and he slowly pulls away. He needs to banish the last demon. “Last chance to save yourself.” Keeping his tone light, he pretends his whole life isn’t boiling down to this moment.
What he wants is no reservations, what he wants is to feel her pressing against him again, offering him everything he had dreamt about in his solitary bed.
Forty’s bearing down on him now, and some nights he tells himself maybe he’ll never find Samantha. He wants a real life, starting here, starting now. If she hesitates, if she says no, he’ll leave and try to pretend; he’s got years of practice under his belt. Fox Mulder can live with not having if he has to; he’s the world’s leading authority on the subject.
“Too late, partner.” She tries to seem calm as she asks what she has to, even though she knows the answer. What about you Mulder, in for the duration?”
No matter how terrified they might be, she knows there’s no going back now. She takes both his hands in hers and places them over his heart.
There was a moment’s silence.
“I’m in, Scully, I’m in.”
Her arms slide over his shoulders and she murmurs, “Prove it.”
Mulder pushes one of his hands underneath her sweater, dragging his fingers across her naked back. The feel of her skin courses through him, and arousal hardens him in a flash. “Beautiful Scully.” At last he can say it out loud. “You’ll never get rid of me.” Slowly tracing a path with his tongue down her neck toward its hollow, he makes his way toward the little cross. Mulder finds her collarbone, and pressed his lips against its curve. Against her flesh and bone he tells her over and over how much he loves her.
The ripple of muscle, the pressure of bone on bone becomes a flashpoint for her. Twisting against him, she has to have more. More. Not thinking, just feeling; she’s wet, her nipples hard. Twisting her fingers through his thick, dark hair, swiping his mouth with hers, something elemental and possessive rushes through her. Scully inches away from him a little, takes one of his hands and kisses each fingertip, tracing each whorl with her lips.
She marks him, making sure he understands. “Mine. All mine now.”
Aching with want by this time, he thrusts subtly against her, the crest of his hip locking against her pliant stomach. “You got me, Scully, whaddya you gonna do with me?”
And then they both start laughing. It’s throaty, wicked, unmistakably sexual. No more minimum safe distance. Grabbing each other, mouths and tongues moving, biting each other’s lower lip, hands fluttering under clothes, they cross the kitchen floor. Mulder takes the lead, backing Scully out of the room with shuffling, metered steps. Bending at the waist to keep himself head-to-head with her, his hands lock under the wrap of her skirt, her fingers curve around his belt loops. Out of the corner of his eye, he navigates the land mines, twisting around the furniture. Snaking her to the bedroom, he listens to the shuffle of their footsteps.
Pushing open the door with one hand, he keeps going.
The bedroom’s almost dark, the candles have almost all burned out. The music stopped playing and they’re alone in the stillness. A little out of breath, they make quick work of it: kicking off shoes, sliding out of shirt and pants, skirt and sweater, peeling away the rest. Scully turns back the bedding, cool white sheets rustling under her hands. He starts to move away, and she reaches up for him and catches him around the waist, pulling on him onto the bed. “No hope of escape,” she laughs softly.
“Don’t want to escape…Scully, let me look at you.” He’s smiling, but his eyes are dark, bottomless, “I need to remember everything.”
“Then let’s make a memory, Mulder.”
They stretch out on the bed half-covered, facing each other in the dim light and trace a map of their bodies: the slope of her breasts, the hollow of her stomach, the line of his thighs, the muscles of his back. They’re riddled with scars–the two of them, soldiers marked by the unforgiving and apocalyptic.
Scully’s unflinching eye scans the suture marks on his skull, and taking her thumb she gently touches the last place he was invaded, courtesy of Diana Fowley. The thin knotty scar underneath his ribs reminds her of the first time she’d seen a woman hurt him. Women always seemed to be hurting him. A grief she thought long over was reborn as she traced with her finger the spot where she’d shot him herself. She’d loved him enough to shoot him. Sad. Then she realizes how truly sad an offering she is: naked, sterile, gunshot–thanks to Ritter, traitorous cells lying dormant in her body, a chip in her neck that might be saving her or branding her. Everything that’s had been lost washes over her and she starts to freeze up.
No, not now, she silently prays. Please, not now.
Maybe what she wants was too much to hope for; that together they’re more than that.
She hates what happens next: she flinches–actually trying to pull away from the one man she wants. Mulder’s the love of her life, but seven years had taken their toll. She knows what she is, and what she isn’t. She’s no goddess, no prize, she’s long given up on happy endings and fairy tales. He couldn’t want…
Reaching for her, he’s insistent, almost desperate. “No… don’t….” He uses his body to tell her, to make it right. His arousal ebbing away, but it doesn’t matter. Mulder cups her face with one hand, and with the other, trails his fingers across her forehead, “Stay with me, Scully.”
He eases her head to a spot on his chest near the gunshot scar. “Here…just stay,” running his hand gently up and down her back. It’s like that for a long time. He can feel her start to cry without a sound, hot tears, tears that breaks his heart open.
Scully tries to pull herself together, hoping maybe she can stop it all from falling apart . She should’ve known better, should’ve kept things on an even keel, should’ve gone on like always. “My God, I’m sorry..I’m so sorry…”
Mulder seizes his chance. “This morning I woke up alone, and thought I would go to bed alone tonight…” He watches as her eyes slip shut, then moves in so that he’s a hair’s breath away from her. “This is who we are. All of it, everything…Look at me, Scully.” His voice reaches for her–begging, struggling to unknot her pain, release it. “I’m yours. As much as that’s a life sentence for you, I can’t help it.”
She’s still now, the crying comes at last, to an end. With a deep, deep breath, she shudders out the last of it. Her eyes open, and she begins to kiss him– full, rich kisses–earthy, luscious. Scully caresses the side of his face, covering his ears with her hands — blocking out the world, capturing him. There’s only her touch, her small, strong hands holding him fast, her mouth on his.
Grabbing her by the waist, he slides under her so that she can straddle him. Gripping his shoulders, her fingers lock around the ridge of bone.
Mulder’s fingers trace little circles down her neck, across her collarbone to her breasts. Then they dance over their curves, sloping forward, stroking her nipples. Scully barely notices how hard Mulder’s breathing beneath her. Looking down at him, her eyes narrow with pleasure as he takes one of her hands in his, easing them gently between her legs.
With his hand resting over hers, she begins to stroke her clit and revels in a surge of pleasure, finding the place in herself she thought was hidden for too long, or maybe killed off. All of a sudden, without a word, Scully takes her fingertips and places them on his lips.
He hungrily kicks her fingers, savoring her. Salty. Sweet. Heart pounding in his chest, the taste of her tore through him. He has to touch her, he can’t take it anymore. Mulder takes his thumb and teases his way through her thatch of reddish hair, groaning when he finds that gorgeous swollen clit. Tracing tiny circles around and around, moving lightly, slowly, mimicking the rhythm she’d shown him. He loves every inch of her skin, how she moves under the pressure of each circle. Beautiful…so beautiful…. so wet. There was some joke about blood rushing to the other head, but he couldn’t remember it now; he just has to be inside of her soon.
The breath flies from her in a sharp exhale. His thumb tenderly traces around and around her slick clit, and soon there are no more thoughts, nothing but Mulder touching, nothing but moving in waves against him. Her thighs start to tremble and the slow unfolding and release begins. Scully bends forward, her hands still holding him fast, her breasts rubbing his chest, her hair brushing his collarbone. Opening and closing, she can feel it all- -she’s coming, slowing and quickening, again and again.
Slowly caressing him, Scully needs him inside her. Guiding him slowly, at last she’s tight around him, sheathing every inch of him. Clenching around him, her thighs pressing down on his, moving back and forth, a rhythm of back and forth. A brief image of them dancing flashes in her mind. This was older than that, beyond music, beyond words, something in their bones, older than their sorrows, much older and stronger.
Mulder feels each of her slow thrusts, the hard planes of their hips, the grip of her hands. The charge is building, he doesn’t know how long he can last. He’s ratcheting tighter and tighter, and she’s bearing down, coming, and his cock’s surging toward every move she makes. She’s still coming–God, yes. Please. He’s losing it, he can’t hold on much longer. Yes, I can feel you. Mine. Beautiful Scully. Yes. There’s only one answer, now. Yes. Time seems to unravel, along with every lonely thing inside him.
Mulder has no idea how long they’d been like this when he shudders, releases and dissolves into her. He was gone, didn’t know anything, didn’t care. Scully. God, yes.
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They face each other, silent in the dark for a long time afterward. Hands brushed away the hair out of each other’s eyes, fingers traveled the outlines of each other’s face, burning the memory into the cells of their bodies. It was late now, and moments passed without a sound.
“Mulder…” Her voice was a mock-whisper.
“Hm?”
“I’m hungry.”
“God, so am I.” He began to kiss her neck.
Scully went on. “For food, Mulder, for food.” She stretched out the last word.
“Well, Scully, if we were to try to reconstruct the circumstances surrounding tonight’s invitation, I believe I was the one offered dinner, and yet…”
A whoosh, a soft splat, and shocked silence. Scully had hit him with a pillow. He waited a beat, then slid the offending item from his face. “I assume this means you want me to take care of this.”
“Well, you did bring dessert. I’ll keep your spot warm.” Scully watched him disappear. Outstanding gluteus maximus, she noted.
Mulder slid out of bed and loped toward where he left the duffel. He was back in a second and stood at the foot of the bed, swinging the bag back and forth. “You find me amusing, after I went to all this trouble.”
Scully looked up at him, and grinned from ear to ear. Blowing wisps of hair away from her face, she tried to get a better view of this enjoyable display. “Let’s see, naked man, swinging duffel bag…I think this makes for the stuff of comedy, don’t you?” Lunging to the end of the bed, she managed to snake her arms around his waist.
“Well, and what do we say when we want dessert?” Grinning and smug as hell, he held the bag at arm’s length, making sure it was outside Scully’s reach. His only answer was peal of laughter coming from her general direction.
“Bite me, Mulder.”
“I didn’t know we were talking about my cravings, Scully.” He kept dangling the bag, fully relishing giving her a hard time. “How ’bout whispering something soft and low…That just might get you something for your sweet tooth.” He glanced at her, then at the bag.
By this time, she was ready to exact her revenge. “I’ve got something for you,” she murmured. Leaning into him, she slid up his body slowly, tracing a path with her fingers along his chest. With precise detail, she ran her tongue against his earlobe and bit it. Exactly as she’d hoped, there was a sharp intake of breath and a stifled moan.
“Scully!”
Falling back onto the bed, laughing, she was truly pleased with herself. Mulder stood there for a minute, dumbstruck, then shook himself and regrouped. Strolling over to the dresser, he took out a cutting board, a hammer, and a cook’s slab of Belgian chocolate. In one swift motion, he hit the slab with the hammer, and she was mesmerized as it shattered into pieces. “You’re a deeply twisted man.”
“Scary, isn’t it?” Tossing her a piece, he crawled back into bed next to her. Mulder ate his, barely aware of how it tasted. Scully held all his attention. Taking tiny bites, licking her lips, she was blissful, rapt.
“Uh, Scully…”
“Shhhh. I’m having a mind-altering experience here.” Closing her eyes, she leaned back against the headboard, one hand lazily stroking her throat.
“I thought we had that earlier this evening.”
“Mulder, this is chocolate. It has the capacity to alter brain chemistry at the molecular level.”
“I’ve got something here that’ll alter your brain chemistry.” He traced the outline of her mouth with his finger, his mind already on another train of thought.
“Jesus, you’re unbelievable. Mulder, you leave me no choice but to shut you up.” Grabbing him by the back of his head, she pulled him down and ended his boasting.
************************************************
Saturday
It was before 9 am, late for Scully on a normal Saturday morning.
She stirred softly against his chest. They had fallen asleep half- sitting, her back to his front, bedclothes scattered everywhere. Their skin was warm, and the early morning light played over them. Rolling slowly to her side, she eased herself up to face him, and as she moved along his body she felt the simple pleasure of skin against skin, not knowing fully where she stopped and Mulder started. She let herself finger a lock of his hair and brushed his temple with her thumb.
His face was a breath away from hers when he’d begun to waken, his eyes blinking slowly, shaking off the last of a dream. The first fully conscious thing he saw was the contours of her face. He stretched and she began to roll away. In one quick movement, Mulder shot one arm around her waist and pulled her back. He slid them both down so they were facing each other, and threw his leg over her hip.
“Hey…” Scully cupped his chin in her hands and kissed him.
She couldn’t believe she’d waited seven years to do things that felt so natural. Simple things. Not that anything else about them or their lives could be called simple, it’s just that she’d stopped waiting for the promise of the hereafter to be happy. Still facing him, Scully propped herself up by the elbow. The sunlight lit her face and the tangle of her hair. She crooked a finger toward him, “I think you should come here.”
Mulder inched toward her and wondered if he looked a little goofy by now. Leaning in a little more, he planted a slow, lingering kiss on that outstanding mouth. And then another, biting her lower lip. Pausing, he let out a deep sigh, the back of his head sinking into the pillow, his eyes drifting shut. “Scully, what would Sister Margaret Mary say? No reward in heaven for you, young lady.”
After nuzzling the spot behind his ear, Scully whispered, “I suppose you could get up and ask her, but I’d rather you stay here.” She tickled his lashes with her tongue and felt him grab her shoulder. “If I’m going to hell, you’re not getting off the hook. Wherever I go, I’m taking you with me.”
Her partner, however, was not interested in the metaphysical any more, corporeal concerns were now much more compelling. Mulder could see it was time to rally the troops. Fuck the afterlife, Scully, he mused, or better yet, let’s just fuck. “C’mon, Scully, let’s raise the dead, let the laying on of hands begin! Teach me the Hallelujah chorus!” He rolled onto his back and threw his arms over his head, “I’m ready for the rapture, take me, Sister Scully.”
“And exactly what would I be getting out of this?”
“Name it…I aim to please, you know.”
“Honestly?” She chewed on her lower lip and squinted. He was going to have to wait a little before she jumped his bones, cocky bastard. Cocky indeed. “Hmmm…let me see…I really want some breakfast.”
“Are you sure I couldn’t interest you in something else?” His eyes raked their way up and down her body. Not a single shred of subtlety, but at least no one could say his objectives were unclear. Mulder made a brief mental assessment…I know, Scully…tacky, tacky, but it’s worth a shot, I got it bad, no doubt about it.
“Mulder, I’m starving, so much so that I’m willing to take the risk of sending you to the kitchen. And while you’re out there I’ll just get under the covers and wait for you.” With those words she slid away, snatched all the covers and left a naked Mulder on the edge of the bed. And he did what any self-respecting, badge- wearing, gun-toting, red-blooded male would do after being given the heave-ho. He got up and made breakfast.
Curled up on the far side of the bed, she’d cocooned herself so that only the top of her head was visible, a red blip in a sea of white sheets. She hovered in that shimmery state between wakefulness and sleep, barely able to keep track of her own breathing. Some time had passed and Scully thought heard noise coming from her kitchen, then movement coming down the hall toward the bedroom. The next thing she knew, someone was in her room and had set something on the dresser.
“It’s room service, FBI-style.” Mulder was standing by the edge of the bed, leaning over her, wearing yesterday’s clothes, his black dress shirt half tucked in. Miraculously, he’d found his shoes and socks. His hair was standing on end and he needed a shave, but he felt great. He caught a look at himself in the bedroom mirror, and grinched at his less than suave visage. He thought he might scare her off if she got a good look at him. Lucky for him, he was bearing gifts. He moved toward the bed and began to peel away the sheets. A tray with food was behind him. Mulder stood back up and handed her a plate. “Feeling pretty smug right now, are we? I suggest you start eating your breakfast soon–I’m not someone to be toyed with.”
“I seem to have gotten a different impression last night…Let’s see, what do we have here?…scrambled eggs and toast.” She wrinkled up her nose, made a minor performance out of sniffing the plate before her, and finally gave it the seal of approval. “Not bad, doesn’t appear to be burnt–I might actually keep you around, Mulder.”
Mulder watched, truly astounded as she put it away. But he’d been starving too, and trying to seem indignant was hard to do while stuffing his face. Between mouthfuls he warned, “I am a dangerous man, there’s no telling what I’ll do if pushed too far.”
Scully was a little distracted. “Dangerous man…Uh-huh…OK.”
Sex, food, sleep. One down, one underway, one to go. The basic animal instincts held sway over her at the moment; verbal jousting with the man across form her would have to wait. Her plate was just about clean and she paused to dab at her mouth with her napkin. “Almost done. How about you?”
Mulder swallowed a huge bite of toast. The two of them were devouring everything in fairly short order. But he was still hungry for something else. “Not even close to done, Scully,” and as he watched that gorgeous mouth, he licked at his bottom lip. “Believe me.”
The food, lack of sleep and last night’s exertion was catching up to her, and she curled back up under the covers. Her eyelids felt heavy. Just a little sleep…a little sleep would be good. Mulder flopped in bed beside her, “You still there?”
“Hmm,” she drawled. “It had better be important.”
He did his best seventeen year-old boy impression. “Well, I just wanted to say what a really good time I had and all…and uh, I was wondering if I could see you tonight?”
“I think you’ve seen just about everything there is to see, but I’m up for further exploration, if you are.” Her breathing had begun to slow down. She was still awake, but just barely.
Mulder let his fingers idly trace a pattern on the nape of her neck. “I’m going to let you get some rest. I should go home and change clothes anyway. I’ll come back later and we’ll do something.”
She roused herself momentarily, summoning the last bit of energy she had. It was time to stand up to ‘Mr. Entertainment’ and let him know exactly what she thought. “Let’s walk on the wild side, Mulder. No pizza, no videos tonight; just get back here and we’ll improvise.”
He cracked a wry smile. Man, I have got to start planning my nights better. “Understood, Scully. Maybe I’ll surprise you.”
“I think you’ve already done that. Just one more thing. Take that duffel with you and bring back some clothes. While you’re at it, don’t forget a suit for work. I’ve pretty much decided that you need to be quarantined.” She could see his jaw go a little slack. “Kiss me, Mulder, I just revealed my secret plan and I’m fading fast.”
And for once in his life, he followed orders, then watched as she fell asleep.
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Mulder bolted down the stairs taking two steps at a time. He wanted to get home, get some clothes and get back as soon as possible. It was noon by now. Amazingly, he had actually cleaned up after breakfast and managed to get out without waking her. Looking at this bag, he wondered how much he could stuff in it without looking like he’d just joined Witness Protection. He yanked open the door of his Taurus, threw the bag in the back and got in.
Mulder wondered what was the record time for a round-trip commute from Georgetown to Alexandria and back. Here’s an opportunity to achieve personal best, he thought. Scully always rode him about his lead foot and his apparent unfamiliarity with the speed limit. She was no better, the little speed demon, but she’d shut him up with an icy stare if he tried to give her any crap about it.
It was warm even for March in D.C., breezy and sunny–green shoots were already showing themselves in the trees. Mulder rolled down his window as he drove off. He silently offered up an apology to the sleeping object of his affections. It was too bad Scully wasn’t with him to enjoy this, but she needed her rest. He planned on keeping her very busy when he got back. Scoping out this Mars light, for a second he thought would be a great way to get through Saturday afternoon gridlock in Georgetown. Deciding against it, Mulder hit the gas instead.
Despite his initial attempt at speed, traffic was a nightmare. As he slugged along M Street and Wisconsin Avenue, Mulder noticed the upscale restaurants that dotted the streets. French, Japanese, Northern Italian, maybe she’d like one of those. He drove past a revival movie house; he knew she liked the classics, old black and white romances. Maybe they could catch a movie after dinner. Dinner and a movie in Georgetown? “That’s it? You’re pathetic.” He knew he was in trouble, he was talking to himself now.
Mulder grunted in disgust, and his hands tapped at the steering wheel. He stole a peek at himself in the rear view mirror, followed by the utterance of a few choice expletives. “Mulder, you sorry sonovabitch…You’re not ‘out of practice,’ you couldn’t find the goddamn game if your miserable ass depended on it.”
Mulder winced as his past love life ran through his mind. He had never developed a skill for courtship, never thought it important. Here he was, practically middle-aged, still essentially a virgin when it came to courtship. With Phoebe, he was in his twenties, living in England, and frankly, he was thrilled to be screwing anyone on a regular basis. With Diana, he’d just turned thirty, and was driven by his demons. They worked cases and fucked. He thought himself too hard-core to want anything else. They worked cases and had sex on the side. He’d cared for her, as much as he was able–trusted her even. Then she left him—her return, a homecoming he was unprepared for. It was a bitter lesson for him to learn that his trust was misplaced, and only Scully was able to heal that.
Once again, Mulder communed with himself in the rear-view mirror. Sadly, no mystical revelation concerning what to do appeared imminent. At least he wasn’t talking to himself out loud anymore. He sighed in exasperation, his hands tapped at the steering wheel as his monologue went internal this time. It’s official, I’m screwed. Think, Mulder, think.
Shops rolled by and minutes passed. Nothing. He squinted as his mind scrolled through postcard pictures of happy couples, reviewed the appropriate props, the set pieces. Mulder had a vague idea how this should go. He passed florists and boutiques, and for a minute thought maybe flowers would work, until his finely honed imagination drifted toward something that held an inexhaustible fascination for him. Lingerie. His mind flooding with images– cupping Scully’s breasts through a black silk bra, tugging down her panties with his teeth, biting his way down thigh high stockings. This erotic little epiphany ended abruptly with a slam of the brakes, a screeching halt, and Mulder stopping himself from causing a rear-end collision.
As the driver of the other car yelled a variety of comments concerning his parentage, Mulder gave himself a silent reprimand– -Focus, Agent, focus, and make sure you get rid of those videos. It looks like you won’t be needing them. And tell ‘Little Mulder’ to give it a rest.
After about an hour of crawling through weekend Georgetown traffic, he made it to the Key Bridge. For some reason, the traffic jam had broken up. He was still no closer to a good idea, but he pushed the pedal to the metal and cruised the expanse of steel. He could feel the wind on his face. 80 miles an hour in a 55 mile zone. That felt good, better than good. Mulder cut a path across the Potomac, enjoying the water glinting in the sun. He’d driven this way a thousand times, and relaxed as at last, he felt the dim beginnings of inspiration. The idea came. It was brilliant–he knew exactly where he was going to take Scully tonight.
The bridge rolled away underneath him. Let someone try to stop him. Water, wind, sky–it was a good day to be alive–he was going to go out on a limb and say he was happy. Score one for Monster Boy.
He made his way off the bridge and headed toward Alexandria, hitting Washington Memorial Highway. Home soon. No, not home, just the place where he kept his clothes. Home was somewhere else now. In counterpoint to the sunlight all around him, something suddenly crept into his mind–something he didn’t want to let himself think about. In the middle of this perfect day, fear began to work its way though him like acid on metal. He swallowed hard, shoving down the taste of bile. The only other times he’d felt fear like this was the night Samantha disappeared, and at Scully’s bedside watching cancer eat her away. Mulder’s heart was racing, his head was starting to swim, his panic palpable.
He remembered her sleeping in bed, what it was like to lay next to her, listening to her heartbeat. God help whoever tried to hurt her or keep them apart. He started to think about the ways he would inflict pain on anyone who became a threat, and stopped himself. He would finish those plans later, but not today. Mulder flashed on last night, kissing her, feeling alive, feeling something like freedom for the first time since Samantha’s disappearance covered his life with a shadow.
He got a grip on himself and whispered a promise. “We’re taking a break from the good fight, Scully. All of it. This weekend, it’s just you and me; Monday’ll be here soon enough and we can suit up then.” He took a deep breath, kept on toward Alexandria.
He finally made it to Hegal Place. His neighbourhood always looked unreal to him. Perfectly manicured lawns, sprawled in front of perfect Georgian homes, complete with Gap out-fitted families. He was sure they thought he was some kind of government-issue anomaly. The only reason he ended up here was this was where his finger landed when he closed his eyes and pointed to a map in a fit of frustration. He knew he freaked the shit out of his neighbors, this odd-as-hell FBI man, coming and going at all hours of the day or night. Sometimes broken and bleeding, sometimes half out of his mind. Spooky here, Spooky at work, Spooky everywhere except when he was with Scully.
The afternoon was spent going through his apartment trying to make it less the disaster area it usually was. He went around and emptied some drawers, made room in his closet, moved some of the things in his kitchen to lower shelves. Clothes, toothbrush, the rest of the usual stuff all got tossed into the duffel. Mulder managed to shove two suits in a carry-on, shave, shower and throw on jeans and a T-shirt.
As he dressed, his mind began to work out the details. They would probably stay at her place more; it was more comfortable, but at least his place didn’t look like The Lost World anymore. He gathered all the videos that weren’t his, and a surprising amount of magazines that didn’t belong to him either and piled them near the door. Frohike didn’t know it yet, but he was about to hit the motherload, courtesy of Mulder. The last task was feeding the fish, and as he watched their swirling frenzy, Mulder realized this was as close to a normal love life as he was ever going to have.
Much more than I deserve, he thought dryly, blinking at the green reflection coming from the tank.
And Scully? What about what she deserved? There was no way to give her back what she’d lost, but maybe he could staunch any future regrets. He’d try with a vengeance, starting tonight. Mulder told himself he’d make everything bad recede and convince Scully it was a just a dream. They could pretend there were no real monsters out there, that they weren’t warriors in some twilight world. He’d steal moments for her; he could do that. One day, after it was all done, he’d shock her with a truly extreme possibility…the chance to plan a future.
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A low ring pierced the quiet of Scully’s bedroom. She unwillingly rolled over and eased herself out of bed. Her cellphone was ringing on the dresser. She took a deep breath to rouse herself and picked up the phone, “Scully.” What she heard next startled her like a cold hand around her throat.
“Agent Scully, listen carefully, there isn’t much time.”
A voice, electronically scrambled to prevent recognition; Scully tried to interrupt, “Who is…”
“Shut the fuck up, this is about your daughter, say another word and you’ll never save her in time.”
Scully listened to the words, none of it made sense. Her head was reeling, her mouth was dry and she could feel herself start to shake.
“Can you hear me, Agent? Your daughter’s not dead, you saw what was in the coffin. She’s in Bellefleur, a nicotine-loving friend of yours has her. They’re in a hunting cabin just outside of town, just off the Forest Service access road. You have about eight hours, if you don’t get there by then she really will be dead. I wouldn’t waste any time if I were you.”
A click from the other end roared like a gunblast in Scully’s ear. She thought she tasted blood in her mouth; she was going to be sick. She made herself breathe slowly, swallowing back the fear and the nausea. She had to go, this was her chance to make it come out right, her only chance. She hit Mulder’s number.
“Emily’s alive, they still have her. Meet me at the airport in a half hour.”
Scully tore through apartment getting ready, everything becoming a blur. The only thing she clearly had a sense of doing was loading her weapon and making sure there were extra clips in her pocket. She ran out of her apartment got in her car and sped off. The streets, the highway, all of it washed past her, insignificant now. There was only this flicker of a chance; Scully knew she would bring Emily home this time or die trying.
She careened into the airport parking garage, and as she shoved the gearstick into park, she saw him pull up behind her. Leaping out of the car, she ran toward him. The lines of his face were pulled taught, his eyes gray steel, flinty. She stared back into his face and saw that he knew–this was the end game.
“Scully. I just have to ask you once, are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s go then, we’ve got a flight to catch.”
Again, all the details seemed insignificant, meaningless; Scully barely paid attention to how they got through the airport, how Mulder flashed his badge on the boarding ramp and got them on the first flight to Portland, Oregon; pushing their way onboard. She was aware of buckling in, the plane taking off; Mulder trying to talk to her, trying to connect with her, calm her down. She was a white hot point, intensely focused on the one goal in her life now. Scully heard herself mumble something to him, but she to gauge his reaction; he knew what was at stake. If the call had been about Samantha instead, she’d be right at his side, that’s how it was with them. The flight wore on, and all Scully thought of was Emily, her name like a silent prayer, repeated over and over in her mind.
The plane began to descend, and she checked her watch. It’d been about five hours since they’d left. They could make the rest of the way in about two more, leaving them little more than a half hour to stop the unthinkable. Scully pushed away any thought of disaster. No fear. No failure. No other options.
She tried to still the blood roaring in her head as the plane landed. Somehow, she followed his lead as he pushed their way out of the airplane and into the terminal. Before she knew it, he had them in a rental car, heading to Bellefleur. They’d been quiet for a long time; she was the first one to break the silence. “There could never be anyone else, Mulder….you know that, don’t you?” Her voice was ragged, and the sentence escaped like a eleventh- hour confession. It might be the last time she could say it. She heard him reply without skipping a beat.
“That’s my line, Scully. C’mon, let’s get everyone home and you can show me.” He tried to conjure up a semblance of his usual blase self. Mulder took one hand from the wheel and cupped her hand in his. “I better make sure I don’t disappoint you.”
They finally made it, passing through the town, the sheriff’s station, the previous scenes of a case file so long ago. Scully remembered how young she was then, so easily horrified by the monstrous, so shocked by the unbelievable, not like now. Battle- hard, she told herself. Maybe just brittle, and today they would finally find out how quickly she would break. “There’s the access road.”
“Yeah, I see it.”
A sharp turn and then he was on the gravel road. She could see a cabin at the end of the short distance ahead. Mulder pulled off road and parked the car behind some scrub pine. She checked her SIG, and checked her pocket for the extra clips. They exchanged a look, their signal. It was time. As she got out of the car she heard him say, “We can do this, Scully.”
Hidden by thick brush, they made there way to a dead end where a the shack stood, a flickering light coming from the windows. Mulder had Scully flanked on the left, and together they slipped quietly to the door, guns drawn. Scully gave a tiny nod and he broke down the door; they were just in time to see Alex Krycek drag Emily out the back and down into the woods.
Krycek was fast, very fast, and already had covered a lot of ground by the time they shot through the cabin and onto their trail. The path was hard going, winding, zigzagging, still icy in spots. She pushed herself to keep up, almost matching Mulder step for step. Scully felt the cold air rushing into her lungs, it stung, needle-sharp; and used the pain to urge herself on. They came to a flat clearing, and she heard the whir of helicopter blades. “Hurry, Mulder…We’ve got to catch them!”
All of a sudden she saw a dogleg that cut directly to where Krycek was dragging Emily. Mulder had already seen it and torn down the path, and Scully tried to follow, but her feet hit an icy patch. She fell and slid, so hard that it knocked the wind out of her. She was breathing raggedly, but she was not stopping, not now, precious seconds were being lost. Anger fueled her, and she dragged herself up by and knees, and steadied herself. Scully started to move, and when she did, she felt the hard, cold barrel of a gun at the back of her head. A waft of cigarette smoke curled toward her face, like an obscene caress. Her hand instinctively felt for her holster, but she knew the worst.
“Agent Scully, I believe this item must be yours. A hand dangled her gun just outside her reach. “Allow me to escort you to where Agent Mulder and your lovely daughter are. She’s a beautiful girl, just like her mother.”
“You’ve got me, but Mulder will get Emily, and Krycek will be dead soon.”
The Smoking Man’s reptilian features bent themselves into a unholy smile. “My dear, all good things in time. I believe we should catch up to Alex so that we can resolve our business for today.” He began to manoeuvre her over the rocky path, the gun still at her head; his yellow fingers gripped her arm like a vise. They made their way to the clearing, and Scully looked up just in time to see her world crash down around her. Mulder was on his knees with Emily buried against his chest, his arms shielding her. Krycek had his weapon poised at Mulder’s temple. In some desperate last gesture, Mulder rocked Emily, his voice fierce and heartbreaking, “Don’t look, baby, don’t look.”
Everything seemed to still around them, No wind, no sounds of animals or birds, nothing. Mulder looked up and caught Scully’s eyes. And then, the Smoking Man’s voice broke the silence; “Agent Scully, surely you know victory goes to the swift and the strong. Unfortunately, you appear to be neither today.” He motioned to Krycek, “Alex, finish this.”
Two shots, white light, and Scully heard herself scream.
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Scully jerked up, drenched in sweat and worn raw, hitting her shoulder against the headboard. A look at the clock on the night stand told her it was 5:30…in the afternoon…it was still Saturday. Breathing hard, she started to wrap her mind around what had happened. She’d been dreaming. Once again Emily died, but this was different. Now, so did Mulder. She lived and failed them both. A wave of terror gripped her stomach and knotted her gut.
She made her way to the bathroom and filled the sink with cold water, Plunging her head into an icy baptism, she hoped the shock of it would dull the panic that consumed her.
Scully pulled herself up, ran her fingers through her hair and wiped the water from her face. She took stock of herself in the mirror. Not good, she looked like some kind of drowned, terrified rodent. She tried to reassure herself. It’s just a dream, it’ll be fine. You couldn’t help what happened to Emily…It’s OK…You’re OK…You could never let him down, you know that. Your life for his in a second.
Something pressed heavy against her chest– it was getting hard to breathe. Scully forced herself away from the sink and into the shower. She was trembling and sick now, she needed to make this stop. Hot water, full force pummeled her body, and her mind formed single words, words she needed. Perspective. Discipline. Logic. They’d saved his life, both their lives more than once. Maybe now she’d lose it and choke when it counted most. A moment’s hesitation, a wrong move would give their enemies the chance they’d waited for.
Scully got dressed and told herself she could never let that happen, she was going to handle it, she wanted to, she had to.
Mulder loped his way down the hall to Scully’s door. Two knocks. A pause. “Scully! Get your bad self over here and open the door, Daddy’s home!” Nothing. Two more knocks.
“C’mon open up, I know you’re in there.” Two more knocks.
He’d slung his bags over his shoulder and unzipped his leather jacket. Running his fingers around the edge of the peephole, he thought heard her coming. “My hands are full here, open up.”
When the door opened, Scully greeted him wearing jeans and T- shirt; holding a hairbrush in one hand. It was clear she’d just finished getting dressed. “Think I brought enough?” He swooped in, dropping the bags on the floor, and then noticed Scully’s edge, her uneasiness. Maybe she’d changed her mind, maybe that was it, at some level she must know how insane this was. But he was hoping otherwise. “Is this still OK?”
“Mulder, even though I think there’s enough here to open a clothing store, yes, it’s still OK.” Scully put her focus on the very real figure right in front of her. Here he is; you wanted him to be here, try acting like it. She managed a crinkly smile, aware that Mulder had taken the same risk she had and there were no signs of him flinching. Maybe he knew something she didn’t. Scully remembered to breathe.
“I guess if you get on my nerves I can always have a rummage sale. So, where’s the copy of ‘Mars Attacks?’ I know your taste in movies.” No video, and apparently no dinner, either. “Mulder, there’s nothing here remotely looking like food. You don’t want to be around me once I get low blood sugar.” She tossed the hairbrush on the stand near the door
“Eidetic memory, Earth Girl,. You said no video, no pizza. And I plan on holding you to that walking on the wild side remark.”
She looked him up and down and sighed. Mulder seemed charged up, which usually meant they were in for a long drive to nowhere, followed by an all-nighter filled with Y-incisions, and formaldehyde.
“Scully, finish getting dressed, we’ve got to get going.” He was a little too full of himself and loving it.
“Mulder, please don’t tell me we’re about to drive to the middle of Podunk to investigate the spontaneous combustion of cheerleaders at Alfred E. Neumann High School, and there’s a charming little autopsy for me to do. Please tell me that’s not what happening.”
“Scully, get some shoes on, time’s a wastin’.”
Mumbling under her breath, Scully shoved her feet into her usual high-heeled boots, grabbed her jacket, and was about to get her ID and holster when Mulder told her it wouldn’t be necessary. He took her by the wrist, planted a big one squarely on her lips, and then they were off. He hustled her into the car and before she knew it they were plunging into the great unknown yet again. Scully’s Curiosity was getting the better of her. They hadn’t headed toward the Bureau, or the highway. About fifteen minutes later, he’d driven through several alleys and snaked his way through the north side, past restaurant row and the bar strip.
“Mulder! Are you going to tell me where we’re headed?”
“Where’s the fun in that?” and gave her his patented I-am-too- clever-for-my own-good look. “We’re young and in love and it’s Saturday night. The world is full of possibilities.”
“And you believe ‘young’ still applies to you, Mulder? You’re skirting dangerously close to forty…you might want to rethink that.”
“Say what you will, but you seemed quite pleased with what I was able to do last night, despite my advanced age. And as much as I’d love to continue this scintillating line of interrogation, we’re just about there.”
Scully kept trying to guess what was located in this part of town significant enough to pique Mulder’s interest, and the only thing of consequence was Georgetown University. “We’re coming up on the campus. Where exactly the hell are you taking me?”
“Some place that makes me think of you.” Mulder rounded past the majority of the University to the farthest northern end and pulled into the visitor lot. He parked the car, walked over to the passenger door and opened it. Leading the way toward a clearing at the far end, there was a small gap bracketed by buckthorn and hickory trees. It was the entrance to Glover Archbold Park. Not a park really; more like a strip of wilderness in the midst of the city. Suddenly, Scully remembered this place. Mulder said he came here when he had to find the thing that really mattered.
He took her deep into this secret wild place. It was seldom used this time of year, making it Mulder’s favorite time to be there. There was a thin line of bare earth that was used as a trail, a minimal path at best. It was staggeringly beautiful: wild grasses grew in thickets, dogwood had begun to bud, more buckthorn burst with new shoots, patches of reeds rustled in marshy bogs. He’d made sure to get here at twilight. The sky above them glowed violet, and the horizon was edged in burnished orange and gold; the end of day. Mulder kept his hand on the small of her back, silent until he thought they were far enough away from the city, their lives, the world. Finally, he murmured, “We’re here, Scully.”
She felt like she’d entered a dream. This was the world that mattered, simple, basic, real. She could smell damp earth, and the colors, the new leaves, hear the sound of the wind in the grass. He pulled her up onto a ridge and stood behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist.
He felt warm and solid, she relaxed into the length of his body. They were survivors, they had stared down the end of the world. What else could she possibly need to figure out? Scully knew what the next step was–seize this chance and not look back.
“Not bad, Mulder.” She tilted her head back, pulled him forward and kissed the side of his neck.
“Coming from you that’s pretty high praise. You’re not trying to stroke my ego, are you? Not that I’d try to stop you.” He loved her mouth on his skin, he loved how she touched him. This could not possibly be real. He used to stand right on this spot: alone and self-contained, trying to imagine the very thing that had finally come to pass, telling himself to want her the way he did was ridiculous, and actually having her would be impossible.
Her lips fluttered across his skin, and he thanked Yahweh, Buddha, Krishna, whoever, for the reality of her, for what she gave him, for making him a believer at least in the truth of this moment He took one hand and started to play with a strand of her hair, and felt himself unbelievably charmed to have even a single moment like this.
They were still and silent as minutes dissolved away and darkness began to drop and settle. “Scully.” No answer. Something unspoken was in the air, it was palpable, burgeoning. Something was wrong when he picked her up, he should have pressed her, should have gotten It all out in the open. Mulder tried to keep a teasing tone in his voice, but something had shifted, and instinct told him it wasn’t good. “Scully, are you still there?” Not a word.
Mulder guessed she was trying to find a way to make telling him easier on both of them. He was not the kind of guy that got the girl. Mulder knew without a doubt Scully loved him, and he also knew love alone was not always enough. His life was too weird, too empty of any real promise, and face it, he was not exactly the mental health poster child. His partner had a fine instinct for self-preservation, and he was sure that it had finally kicked into gear. She would tell him that they were better as partners, as friends. The distance they’d had before probably was the only thing that made their bizarre lives tolerable. Scully had seen enough carnage for a lifetime, bled enough, cut up too many corpses, closed the eyes of too many dead children to not want some sanctuary–some part of her life he couldn’t touch, or ultimately, ruin.
And until Scully, the only woman he’d ever really loved was his sister. Someone should really do his profile–maybe he’d do it himself. He’d be back to solitary pursuits soon enough. Mulder started to choke up, helpless, as the best thing that’d ever happened in his unlucky life slipped away. Desperation began to close around him like black water. He had to do something, say something, to thank her for even one night, for what he would replay in his mind over and over until someone lowered him into the ground and shoveled the dirt on his face.
Mulder silently resolved himself to what obviously needed to happen–I can fix this, Scully–just don’t go away completely.
He would fall on the sword first. Then he would drive her home, be friendly, crack a few jokes on the way and drop her off. After he saw her get in safely, he’d find the nearest bottle of Scotch, crawl in and find the black hole that had to have his name on it. “I know…it’s OK…you don’t have to do this. We can just wind back the tape and chalk it up to two best friends with too much time spent in the basement.”
Her entire body went rigid. What was she hearing? What could he possibly be saying? This was unbelievable. God, she’d been trying to get off the dime and tell him how much he meant–how much it all meant–how much she was afraid of losing him–how much she needed him. But this pronouncement flipped her from feeling insecure and vulnerable to livid. Her face flushed red, and her temples were throbbing. She gritted her teeth and she drew herself up into her full height. Scully was locked and loaded, ‘furious’ did not begin to describe what she was feeling. She’d show him the real meaning of ‘getting someone’s Irish up.’ “You’re not going to ditch me again, you stinking sonovabitch.”
“What?” Mulder was genuinely confused. He could just barely see her in the twilight but he recognized that tone. He’d never heard it coming from Scully, but there was obviously a first time for everything. He was about to lose his head–to be removed with surgical precision, no less.
“Is this some new variation on dumping me?’ I know you’ve exhausted all the usual ones. Oh, fuck it, if I start listing every time I’ll just strangle you.” Scully’s insides were vibrating, her hands trembling.
“I just assumed you finally saw what a train wreck life with me really is…that you needed to pull back and save yourself.” Mulder’s voice was flat, as if he’d already been left, as if it was a done deal. He rubbed his temples lethargically.
“And that was based on what? Was that before or after I slept with you?”
“Scully, my track record sucks, I thought maybe I could make it easy for you, protect you from…” It was dawning on him that he hadn’t figured out what the fuck was going on–he’d horribly miscalculated, and if he was still alive in a few minutes, he’d try to apologize.
Scully cut him off, her eyes bright as a flare, her face partially lit by the slow rise of the moon.
“Quit doing my thinking for me! Quit planning my life, my future! And since when do you give a damn about making my life easier?” Her voice was getting louder and she was breathing hard.
He tried making a move toward her and her hand shot out to stop him. “Goddamn you, Mulder! You make me completely insane! I should be committed! Why do you think I’m still here? Why do you think I’d tear anyone a new asshole who stands in the way of finding you when you disappear? Because I’m still spying on you? Because hanging out with you is a positive career move? Why? The words just kept pouring out her—she kept talking as if she stopped she’d collapse, or explode. “Yeah, I’ll say it…because you’re the only one for me. Do you get that? And no one’s leaving. You stay, I stay…we figure this out…or I swear I’ll make your life a living hell. Do you need me to speak slowly? OK…No one’s… going…anywhere…Mulder…Not now…it’s too…late…for that…Is that clear enough?”
“Yeah, I got it, Scully!” Mulder pressed on. He was strung out on a perverse combination of panic and optimism. Even though they’d fought before it’d never been like this, and frankly, he was floored. The only reason he could keep it together is if she was really leaving, she’d be calm, quiet, and the next minute, gone.
“There was something wrong when I picked you up, Scully…I saw it in your eyes. And just now, you weren’t really here…I’m more used to being alone…more used wanting you than having you. This whole thing’s surreal. You’re only the fucking center of my life. Fine. I’m an asshole, I don’t deserve you, I can’t handle the idea that you might really love me, as much as I love you. I need you any way I can get you, even if that’s only being my goddamn partner.” Now, his voice was loud, and he could feel his stomach and his back tightening up.
Scully somehow took pity on him and started to power down. There was enough moonlight now to see how completely wrung-out he looked. But she wasn’t quite done setting him straight. “Mulder, if I want to waste my goddamn life with you, it’s my goddamn decision. Don’t make me have to hurt you to get my point across. You know I’m capable of it.” She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and slumped onto a nearby tree stump. Exhausted, she wondered if it was always this difficult for two people who apparently loved each other. Only when you involved two of them– their history spoke for itself.
Scully felt oddly amused now, they were certainly well-matched– if she didn’t kill him first. “Oh it’s surreal, alright,” she muttered. As for Mulder, he’d heard her and came over to where she was splayed out. Crouching down on his heels, he’d calmed down too, and had a idiotic look on his face. Could he possibly be happy?
“Seeing as how you’ve pretty much made up your mind, I guess I’ll just go along for the ride. You’re one hell of a romantic, Scully.”
“Shut up, Mulder.”
“So, it looks like everything’s back to normal.” He held out his hands palms up, and waited for her to place her hands over them. She did, and he paused for a second. The moon had risen, three- quarter full, and he took her in, a changeling in the silvery light. He knew this was new territory for them, and hard place for Scully to find herself. Now he was serious, “Tell me what it was, I want to know.”
Scully’s face took on its usual somber lines. Haltingly, she began, “I…I thought this might have been a mistake…The truth is, I’m afraid, and I don’t like that feeling.” Her voice was measured now. She just wanted to get out one word after another and not fall apart. “I’m afraid of failing you, of losing you like Emily. And don’t say I’ll never be able to get rid of you, because it doesn’t help. This is more complicated than that. If finding the answers meant leaving me behind, we both know you would. That’s the way it is, Mulder, you and I both know it…it’s just harder now.”
She was right, and Mulder hated how fucking helpless he was to change any of it. “I need to have the answers, we both do. I guess my brilliant strategy of protecting you by just leaving pretty much was an abysmal failure. No more ditches, dumps, whatever. I mean it. If I had to go…we’d figure it out. You’d know what I was doing and why. And I’d do whatever I had to come back to you. I know it’s not enough, but it’s a start.”
She laced her finger in his, “You’d better. I’d hate to tell Bill and Charlie you were gone again.” He started laughing a little, and she thought maybe they’d get to the other side of this. “This part’s about me, Mulder. I used to think that holding myself back would give me the strength to deal with anything.” Scully looked away from him, to some imaginary point in the trees. She wasn’t going to break down. “I can’t keep you out anymore, so you see the problem…Even if you don’t leave, what if something goes wrong? I don’t know if I could handle it if I froze in the clutch, if I couldn’t get your back because I was afraid, because I didn’t think or move fast enough.” There were no tears; Scully had come too far to lose it. “And it terrifies me. It kills me to say it, but it does. I want proof it won’t keep me from doing what I have to…I have to know I could save you. At least I have to believe I’d have a chance.”
Mulder rose to his feet and pulled her up so that she faced him. “Scully, listen to me, you did that a long time ago. Don’t ever doubt it. I don’t know what other proof there is.” He spoke softly, every word was meant to find its way to the place inside her that needed something to hold on to. He hesitated for a moment, and went on. “What if I lose you? Another abduction, the cancer returning…I don’t know if I could deal with it.” Everything seemed to stutter and stop, all of it teetering in the balance. “So, what should I do, keep my distance? I can’t, I don’t want to. The truth is, I’m not even gonna try.” Mulder gathered his thoughts and spoke slowly. “I think there’s only one question, whatever’s going to happen, do we face it alone or together?”
Two choices. Mulder and everything that meant. Or she could have her cold, quiet apartment and her cold, quiet life all to herself. Scully felt lucky that for once she didn’t give a damn about anything except what she wanted. She wrapped one hand around the back of his neck and pulled his face close to hers. “I want to go home. Now.”
His mouth began to curve into a smile. Yes, there was something to smile about. He’d show her, maybe even take all night, just to be sure. “I know we’re beginners at this, but usually when the woman tells you to take her home this soon, it’s not a good sign.”
Scully leaned in, and with her mouth against his, made herself perfectly clear.
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She grazed his bottom lip with her teeth, parted his lips with her tongue. And oh yes, her hands had crept under Mulder’s jacket, and made their way under his shirt. She felt like the top of her head might float away. Scully was hungry to touch him, to let the feel of him wash over her. Good, she thought, it’s time for a reprieve from Navy-bred self control. Scully vowed then and there to leave it for case files, for Skinner, for Kersh, and for Monday morning. In the midst of the chaos that dogged her every waking minute, there would be a corner that belonged to her and to Mulder. A private life. A life.
She stopped kissing him and notices a look flitting across his face. His eyes glittered with something that was a little predatory and apparently aimed in her direction. Scully rubbed his lower lip with her thumb. “There’s some things I’d really like to do. With you. Get me back to my place in one piece and I promise you won’t be disappointed.”
For his part, Mulder was having somewhat of a problem snapping to. He was relishing the soft scrape of Scully’s mouth against his, and her hands…the feel of her hands stroking his back made him forget his name, what he did for a living, where he parked the car. He could hear her voice, saying something about taking her somewhere, and doing something. Amnesia? A fugue? He tried to string some coherent thoughts together. Oh yeah, you can show me anything you want, he mused. Anything you want. He smiled against her mouth, “I think you’ve got it backwards.”
With that, he nipped his way down her neck until he was treated to the sounds of her moaning. When she gripped his forearms, Mulder felt he’d done commensurate damage. Winding down, he shot her a look through slitted eyes. “What the hell are we still doing here? Let’s go.”
The two of them clambered toward his car. Mulder had sprinted all the way back, dragging her by the wrist behind him. Scully kept up a steady stream of yells and invectives, but he kept going.
Glancing back at her; she was laughing, hair flying in the wind, cursing a blue streak, eyes locked on him. Mulder wanted to make love to her on the spot, but kept running until they got to the car and piled in. He turned the key in the ignition and snuck a sidelong look at her. They were the stuff of archetypes, he told himself. He could be Tristan to her Isolde…No, too German…How ’bout Sid to her Nancy?… Jesus, that’s just too fucking morbid… C’mon…Steed to her Peel?…OK, getting warmer…Wait a minute… Moose to her Squirrel, the X-rated version. That’ll work. It’s you and me, Rocky, from here on out. He put pedal to the metal and peeled out.
Scully settled in and shifted her weight so she was leaning toward this insane person at the wheel. She felt proud she’d finally cut loose. As for Mulder, she knew he was just a loose cannon. Not her best clinical diagnosis, but it would have to do until she could get him home and give him a more thorough physical examination. Or something.
Mulder turned on the radio and scanned the dial until he heard ‘Otis Davis plays the dusties, the Old Grooves for you and yours.’ The next sounds were a blood-curdling scream, a thundering piano riff, some heavy base and a baritone voice–‘I put a spell on you.’ “Yessss! Scully, this is Screamin’ Jay Hawkins. Perfect! It’s kismet…this is our song!”
Scully rolled her eyes upward. Screamin’ Jay opened his act by emerging from a coffin and casting his undead love-spell on the unsuspecting women in the audience. The connection was obvious. How could she have thought for a moment that zombie-love would not be rearing its ugly head. “Nice song, although I have to say the image of a half-rotting corpse wreaking havoc is not the usual basis for foreplay.” But it was certainly Mulder’s. They survived the mutual meltdown of earlier tonight, and had begun to settle back into their play: the code-talking, the flirting, the sidelong glances. She knew they were better suited for the volley back and forth, it was the nature of their dynamic. Scully’s mouth turned up in a grin, “Bring it on, Mulder, bring it on.”
“Shhhhh, Scully you’ll ruin the moment.” With that, he cranked the volume until the air vibrated. ‘I put a spell on you…’cause your miiiiiine. ‘ Screamin’ Jay was in rare form indeed. Mulder tapped the steering wheel in time to the beat.
Now he was singing along with Jay, “…Cause you’re miiiiine.” He bit his lower lip and squinted as he and Jay cast their zombified love-spell, working their way back to Scully’s. “You won’t be able to ever resist me now. I’m workin’ my mojo hand and my black cat bone. Surely you realize you are powerless in the face of this much concentrated occult power.”
“You mean the talismanic use of items consecrated by a practitioner of voodoo, macumba, or Santeria for the express purpose of the male owner of said items increasing sexual potency and his ability to bend the object of his desire to his will? Is that what you’re referring to? ” Scully gave him a sly, slow blink. I see your bet, and raise you. And with that, she slid next to him and traced a slow path with her finger from his sideburn, down his throat to the edge of his collarbone. “I’m not really sure you need that.”
The pulse in his neck was pounding–No, Scully…I need something, though. “See, it’s working already.” Before she had to time to move her hand away, Mulder cupped it in his and started softly biting her palm and the soft pad of her thumb. No mean feat, since he was still driving. Thankfully, he recognized Scully’s neighborhood coming up ahead. Eyes still on the road, he heard he voice, low and breathy.
“Just drive the damn car, Mulder.”
It wasn’t too much longer until they reached her apartment building. Scully hopped out and was walking up the stairs to the door, Mulder watched her with dogged attention. As he eased out the driver’s side, he could hear his knees pop. Shit. It almost sounded like gunfire. Maybe he was getting a little out of shape, but he most certainly was not middle-aged. He just needed to run more. Or maybe he needed a vigorous program of horizontal calisthenics, administered under the strict supervision of his physician—whose ass by the way, just did not quit.
“Hey partner, are you able to get upstairs on your own, or do I need to give an elderly gentlemen a hand?” Scully had turned to face him and was rocking back and forth on her heels, waiting in front of the building entrance. She chuckled a little. “Knees sound good. Maybe I should have taken geriatric medicine as a subspecialty.” She bit the tip of her tongue and eyed him up and down. He needed a regimen of physical therapy, the application of compresses. She had an idea where she could find something warm and wet, although she thought about applying it to an entirely different part of his anatomy.
“Droll, very droll. You will, however, regret you said that.” With that, Mulder ran past her up the stairs, yelling en-route to her apartment. “Get the lead out, girl. I’m gonna teach you all about this man and his moves.”
She walked through door and made her way with a deliberate, measured gait. She was planning on being much more than an apt pupil, enjoying the sound of her heels in the hall, clicking her way toward Mulder and whatever his moves might be. I’ve got a few here of my own, Scully thought, a few you might find quite interesting. “Watch your back, Agent, here I come.”
She was coming up on her apartment when she saw the door was wide open. “Mulder!” Nothing. And then, him yelling and the sound of general commotion. Her adrenaline started pumping and she ran the rest of the way. Flying through the doorway, she saw him sprawled out on the floor. In his hurry to demonstrate his…agility, a certain someone had forgotten the luggage in the foyer. Splayed flat on his back, it was obvious someone had neglected to look where he was going. Scully walked up and stood over him, straddling her prone and slightly addled darling.
He made no move to get up, but just laid there with his arm draped over his eyes. Not the prone position she’d been imagining earlier, but somehow she suspected they were due for a geeky mishap.
“Don’t. Don’t say a word.” His arm slid away and he gave her a look that managed to be both a warning and self-deprecating.
Scully moved to his side and knelt down, feeling partly solicitous, partly amused. “Oh…. Sweetie, are you OK?” Catching the unfamiliar term immediately, she hoped to hell Mulder hadn’t. Sweetie? Hardly. What next? Baby? Not likely. She tried to play it off by checking the pulse in his neck, and mustered a more serious tone. “Talk to me, are you all right?”
For his part, Mulder had caught that little endearment immediately. Not wanting to waste this golden opportunity, he slid his hand to his head, and rolled back his eyes, “God, maybe I have a head injury. Scully, did you say what I think you said? Call me sweetie again and make it all better.”
“Perhaps cerebral trauma is involved, and given your pre-existing mental condition, you’re probably having auditory hallucinations.” Scully had gotten up and thrown her jacket on the hook on the wall. It looked like Mulder would live, although she wasn’t quite certain she’d be able to live down his teasing her about this for the rest of her life. What she needed to do was distract him. “Get up and get your clothes off.”
He shook the marbles out of his head. Well, nothing like cutting to the chase. She was being a little prosaic, but what the hell, he’d go with it. “Ooh, I love a woman who takes charge…But how ’bout a little quid pro quo?”
“What I was going to suggest is that you get undressed, get in the tub and take a hot soak. Given your recent swan dive and that percussive noise emanating from your knees, I think you might want to keep yourself from stiffening up.’
“I can’t imagine anything I’d want more than a little stiffness. As I recall, you seemed to enjoy it as well.”
Scully walked up to him, leaned forward and gave his cheek a play- slap, partnered with that rare, toothy grin of hers. To be used only in the case of children, and a certain demented Special Agent. “Why don’t you go and get in the tub?” She motioned him to get up, and pointed toward the bathroom. “Go on…I’ll bring you some supper while you soak.”
With that, she strode off to the kitchen, leaving Mulder on the floor considering his options. He could stay where he was or get off the floor, get served dinner by Scully while he luxuriated in a hot tub, and corner her in the bathroom later. Not a hard choice. On his way to there, he yelled, “Hurry up, don’t keep your favorite patient waiting.”
Hot water. Steamy vapor rising like clouds. Shallow breathing. Muscles relaxing. The image of pale moon skin, a woman’s calf, a breast, someone’s lower back where a snake dwelled, dripping with streaks of water. Mulder let himself linger in this lucid dream, his body stretched the length of the tub, his head resting against the back of Scully’s huge old claw foot, eyes closed. Her voice. She was here.
“Mealtime, c’mon, sit up. I’ve an Irish pub supper for you, me boyo. It’s a family specialty.”
Scully slipped in on bare feet, placed a tray on the floor next to the tub, and perched herself on the edge. The aforementioned specialty consisted of cheese, bread, apples, two shot glasses and one very large bottle of Irish whiskey. White wine and the niceties of a hot meal were going to have to wait for another day. She poured two shots and dangled one in front of Mulder.
He had a hot water glow, his eyes were heavy lidded, and his lips curved slightly. Water trickled down the curves of his chest, and his long legs were splayed against the side of the tub. From what she could see, he was beginning to assume the up periscope position. She wondered how long she’d be able to hold out before she’d strip down and slide herself over him, and thought she’d better not make any bets. Mulder held her wrist for a second before he took her proffered libation. In that split second, Scully felt another surge of something Father McCue would certainly term a mortal sin. Bless me Father, she thought without a single guilty twinge, for I am interested in nothing but sinning right now.
“OK, Scully, what’s the toast?”
“Mulder, use that brilliant mind of yours. Here’s your chance to impress me.”
He gestured to hold their up glasses and cleared his throat, “Ready? ‘There was a young lady from Kerry…’
Before he could finish, she cut him off, “A limerick, Mulder?”
She treated him to the sight of her knocking hers back with a practiced flick of her wrist. Her face twisted in a brief grimace, then relaxed.
It was Mulder who was impressed. Full of hidden talents, this one.
She tossed her head back and let out a little whoop. “Whoa….” She jutted her chin in his general direction. “No one likes a slacker. C’mon, Slainte.”
Mulder tossed his back, and felt the warmth spreading down his throat, his chest. He teared up a little, and someone snickered. That would not be tolerated. “Hit me.” Scully was not about to get away with insulting his macho sensibilities, plus the idea of them getting it on while hammered had an irresistible appeal.
“You sure about that?”
“Yep, unless you don’t think you can keep up.”
Three more shots each, actually. While not officially hammered– loose–free and easy, with special emphasis on the easy, definitely applied. Mulder started telling an elaborate story about selkies, Celtic sea enchantresses. Scully slowed the whole thing down by popping bits of bread and cheese into his mouth, explaining the importance of the four food groups and good nutrition for men approaching middle age. She also partook, shushing him as she savored this ancient family recipe. All in all, there was more laughing than storytelling. Until something made them change gears completely. Something as innocuous as a apple.
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Scully starts to offer Mulder a bite, but first she wants to clean it up, nice and proper. She polishes it against her T-shirt, pulling the fabric tight across her breasts. She shivers as the fabric slides against her nipple. The tips of them feel like a spark’s hit them, a spark coursing right between her legs, leaving her with a luscious ache. Stopping tolook at Mulder, she finds him watching her, transfixed.
He’s stroking his chin with the pads of his fingers, measuring her with granite eyes. She takes a bite of the apple instead, and the juice ran down her chin. Mulder raises himself up, kneels and leans toward her, licking it away. The apple falls, rolling across across the floor, and she hears herself murmur, “Messy, but what can you do?”
“I’ll show you.” He bites her earlobe, her neck, and reels from the soft crush of her flesh in his mouth. He tries stifling a groan deep in his throat, but it’s useless. He can’t contain the sheer pleasure that’s rushing through his body. Mulder climbs out of the tub, pulls Scully to her feet and strips away those pieces of fabric, dripping water everywhere. He’s quick and ruthless about it, pulling off her T-shirt and bra with one hand, stroking her with the other. Finding her nipples, he pinches them with his wet fingers, then trails his hands down her hips, and slides them around to the small of her back.
Mulder wonders what it would be like to lick the snake that lived there. Nothing could be more delicious. Imagining his mouth his mouth between her legs he knows he’s wrong, so very wrong. Almost as if she’d read his mind, Scully’s hands grips his shoulders and the dark and ravenous look in her eyes spurs him on. Stripping off the rest of her clothes, he kicks it all to the side. Finally, she’s naked and she calls his name, softly, urgently.
Unconsciously licking his lips, he remembers her fingers in his mouth, the smell of her, the slick tang of her, a stroke of pleasure against his tongue. His Scully, wet, wet, wet with wanting him. Mulder’s cock’s throbbing, hard and insistent. Soon he’ll bury himself in her, slip out himself, plummet into the fierce and tender and heat of her body, but he has to savor that wetness first. The hint she’d given him last night was not enough.
Barely making a sound, Scully keeps murmuring his name. She wants to say so much more, not the words of poets, she never had those– just some sign of her imperfect, devastating love. “Mulder.” She says it again and again, wanting to fill the room with the sound of it. She loves him, but words are pale, inadequate things now. He’s become her biology, as basic as bone marrow, as necessary as oxygen, his face, her last remnant of sight before sleep.
Holding him in place, possessing him, her fingers press down his back, her nails leaving little crescents. She trails her tongue across his chest, startling herself by biting just above his heart. But her shock only lasted a second. Murmuring “Alpha Female, you know…,” she licks the reddish welt of her mark on him.
She laughs softly as he pleaded, “Save me…No, don’t save me….”
“Maybe we should go to bed.” Scully turns to walk to the bedroom, but he stops her with a hand on her shoulder.
“Bed’s too far away. Have pity on an old man.” Mulder grabs the fresh towels from the top of the hamper, piling them on the sink. He has to have his mouth on her, undo her with his lips, his tongue, feel her come apart with his head buried between those creamy white thighs. “Here, sit.” Lifting her up by the hips, he eases her onto soft, warm cotton.
Mulder kneels down and rests his face on her thighs. He can feel her hands in his hair, her fingers rasping against his scalp. Slowly, he pushes her legs apart, first pressing with one cheek and then the other until she’s spread open. He strokes her inner thighs with the side of his face, left, right, back, forth. When he feels her start to tremble, he writes against her skin with infinitely slow kisses. She’s so warm, so smooth; so good, so unbelievably good. Pressing his mouth against her very core, he kisses his way around her soft folds until he finds her clit– lush, wet, swollen. Mulder sweeps the tip of his tongue across it, licks and kisses its center.
This. Yes, Scully, this. He nibbles her, teases her with his mouth, bites her thighs. He’s taking her to the edge, he wants her to fall to pieces, wants to feel her feeling it. She trembles against his mouth, and he keeps tonguing her clit with slow, maddening strokes, over and over. Moaning against her soft, moist flesh he whispers her name. Her legs tightened around his back, the muscles in her legs tensed, and his arousal careens when he hears her shallow, rapid breath.
She’s close, so close, and then she comes in a rush. It’s piercing, blotting out everything except what his beautiful mouth is doing to her. Spiraling back into herself and then out, out, over and over again. Her body never knew anything like this. Uncoiling upward and outward, not stopping, hot, hot waves of it rolling through her. Her arms and legs, her whole body, tenses and softens over and over. She hears herself, calling for Mulder like he was lost, or she was. She shudders as he moves upward, his lips, one long drag until he was kissing her, teeth touching, tongue seeking tongue. He offers her a taste what he’d savored, his lips warm and moist. She shakes her head as he pulls away. Too soon.
“Taste yourself, this is how wonderful you are.” Stroking the parchment column of her throat, the silk of her shoulders–he leans in, peppers her collarbone with tiny kisses, as if he was fixing a charm calling her back to Earth, back to herself. And then he stops, pinning her with a look that’s more than hunger, more than longing, something that tightens his throat and makes the blood pound in his head.
“I need to hear you say it…Tell me what else you want, Scully.”
She takes her right hand, curving her fingers, and licks the side from the wrist to the pinkie, curling it around his cock, he surges in her hand. No pretense, no room for anything but the pull of her desire.
“I want you.”
Mulder drapes her arms over his shoulders. He parts her with his leg, and with one hand, cups her beautiful ass. Taking the other hand, he braces himself by straight-arming it against the mirror behind them, then steps completely between her legs. His cock’s throbbing and as he eases himself inside her, he hears Scully tell him ‘yes.’ A plea from her, “Yes.”
He bites off a groan as he slides into her. Pushing into her, she matches every move, torturing him, delighting him. Wet and tight, he bites his lower lip as she clenches around him. Mulder’s eyes slam shut, he’s losing his mind. He wants to take his time, he wants to take it slow–but it was too good, too much. He thrusts into her; a blind, mute rush of love–foolish, desperate, fierce, driven–everything he was, everything he would ever be. In the last seconds he could think at all, the words raced through his mind–Take me. Take it all, Scully. A ragged breath, “Please,” and then the smash and shatter of love. Nothing was ever so frightening, so absolute, so binding to another person as this.
He falls forward a little, and the two of them slump against the mirror. They’re motionless, wrecked, drifting. The last pretense they have about being separate, about having some choice in all of this was eroding away. If one of them should disappear or die it didn’t matter. They’re tethered to each other, no matter what happens in this life, through whatever existed after that. Final. World without end. Amen.
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They began to return to themselves, their breathing calmed, and it all receded until there was just a man and a woman. Mulder stretched into standing and helped her to sit up. He stared at himself in the mirror to convince himself he was still here. A slightly drunk, freshly-laid face smiled back at him. He thought he could see someone he recognized out of the corner of his eye, and decided to take a leap and believe it wasn’t an optical illusion. He remembered he had the ability to speak.
“My God…you’ve killed me.”
“But strangely, you still seem to be talking.” Scully sat open- legged, bracing herself by holding on to the edge of the sink on each side. She was a little woozy, and moved slowly in the vain hope of concealing it from him. Blissed out and more than a bit smashed, she tried to eye him hoping to regain some kind of focus. Unfortunately, it was with less than a clinical perspective. Scully watched amusedly as Mulder’s eyes pinwheeled, as if he was trying to think under duress. He looked dazed, and happy, an oddly provocative look for him. She could hardly believe she was thinking about sex again so soon. This was all his doing, and she would straighten him out tomorrow. But that was tomorrow. Right now, she needed to get him to the bed, they had to get to the bed. But first she had to get off this sink. Sliding down, she stood at Mulder’s side, flatfooted as a duck.
Mulder flopped around and slumped against her “Help me to bed… heed a dying man’s last request.” He thought he’d given it the proper dramatic reading. It probably wasn’t a good idea to be nuzzling her neck, but he just wasn’t thinking as clearly as he should be.
They’d made their way down the hall, with Mulder playing the dying old man thing to the hilt. He leaned on her all the way, mumbling some crap about it getting darker, the light fading, but Scully would have the last laugh. She’d let him think this was all his idea–sometimes you fall back to overtake your opponent. After fumbling and stumbling down the hall, outmatched by about a foot in height and outclassed by about a hundred pounds in weight, she finally lugged him into the bedroom, and positioned him at the side of the bed. Winching up her most sincere tone, she asked, “Mulder, how can I make you feel better?” Then he gave her the opening she was waiting for.
In a microsecond, Mulder experienced a miraculous recovery. He stood tall, spread his feet apart and flung his arms open. He looked triumphant, irritatingly so. He flashed his most foxy, feral smile. He was Einstein, Heisenberg, Hawking–he’d gotten her back here and they were gonna do bad, bad things.
And then Scully seized the moment. Payback’s a bitch, Mulder. She shoved him right in the solar plexus, hard, and he fell back onto the bed. God, she was enjoying herself. “No, no…you shouldn’t do anything to risk further complications. As your doctor, I’ll have to insist. No more exertion for you.” The thud of him hitting the mattress was a delightful one indeed, for more than one reason. She was just about to turn to go back for the tray, haughty as hell, when she heard him throw down the gauntlet.
Mulder had to give her points for the stealth approach and the shot to the midsection. He studied his worthy adversary. Nice move, partner–good use of evasive maneuvers. But methinks thou doth protest too much. Playtime’s over–you need to get that delectable ass of yours in bed. “Are you certain you wouldn’t want to test that theory? This isn’t like you, Scully…” Mulder curled up on his side, and pulled down the comforter and sheets. He patted a spot and waited–one, two, and then, “I can’t believe you’d be satisfied making pronouncements based on sloppy research and pseudo-science, but hey, that’s just me. Honestly, you really sur–”
Before he could get out another word, she jumped him. As she licked her way slowly across his chest and down his stomach, Mulder made a final assessment. Gotcha, big-time, Scully…ya’ never saw it coming. Gotcha exactly where I want ya’. All Hail the King.
Scully chalked up her victory. “Gotta hand it to you…one minute I’m in the bathroom…the next…” Some strategically placed kisses along the line of hair that ran down from his navel, and her red hair tickling his groin, “How do you do it, Mulder?”
He tried to get the last word in, but…well, he was preoccupied.
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Sunday
The two of them made it to 11 am without any further detonations, declarations or personal demon chasing. Mulder was feeling quite chipper having slept from about 3 am until just now.
Scully had gotten up about two hours before, and was amazed at how energized she felt–but these were unusual circumstances. She watched him stroll through her living room to the hall, naked, of course, and was treated to the sight of him digging through his duffel for a pair of pajama bottoms. He threw them on and sauntered toward her with a gunslinger’s walk. Scully was half-way through breakfast when he finally made it to the kitchen table. He perched himself on the edge just next to where she’d spread her usual morning repast–some kind of thick, greenish health drink, fruit salad, and a fistful of pills-vitamins, echinacea, astragalus, bee pollen, and god-only-knew-what-else.
“That’s disgusting, Scully…vile, noxious, shall I go on?” Mulder screwed his face up in a combination of mock pain and revulsion. He’d gotten pretty good over the years at avoiding or ignoring her dietary attack on the unhealthy, the over-processed, the tasty. She was such a hypocrite–caffeine junkie. She’d be up making a huge pot of coffee any minute.
“No, this is healthy. What I got you is disgusting.”
“You got something for me?”
“Yes, even after I made dinner last night.” She cheesed a grin his way. He was about to say something and she cut him off. “Yes, I’m going to count that as cooking dinner. Don’t even try, Mulder. Anyway, one of us got up early enough to go the deli and get breakfast for a certain someone too lazy to get up at a reasonable hour. Oh, and good morning to you, too.”
Mulder sized her up–she had on no makeup, hair tucked behind both ears, gray sweatpants, a gray sweatshirt at least two sizes too big and sneakers; looking like a coed, a hot one at that. His mind started to wander…Maybe I could be the horny English professor…Jesus, it really had been a long time. He shook his head, not quite up to his usual multi-dimensional train of thought. “Well, here’s the thing–a certain someone who shall remain nameless fucked my brains out and I guess I needed to recuperate.”
He leaned in and kissed her, and also tried to cop a little feel, but got his hand slapped away. “Sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking. Good morning, Scully.” He could see her eyes glinting with enjoyment, and used that observation to confirm that he was, in fact, the Man.
Scully gave him a very, very slight smile. Even though she loved his early morning frisking, she was not about to break. “I’ll tell try to tell whoever it is to take it easy on you next time. Your breakfast is on the counter by the sink.”
Mulder peered into the paper bag and pulled out a huge bagel with lox, cream cheese, onion, and tomato, and a quart of O.J. How could he not love this woman? It was his usual Sunday special and she’d given him much shit about it the first time she’d seen him wolf it down. “You’re too good to me.”
“You’re just noticing that?”
“More so lately. Mind if I join you?”
“Only if you let me finish my breakfast in peace.”
“But, Scully,” he whined, “what’ll I get if I’m a good boy?”
“You might think about what you won’t be getting if I can’t finish a meal without being harassed.”
Pulling a chair right next to her, Mulder pointed it the opposite direction and plopped down. This way he could eat and watch her the same time. He knew he was working her nerves here, but he couldn’t help himself. “Ah, love, ain’t it grand?”
“Mulder, you realize there is plenty of room at the table. Is my life going to be nothing but this kind of aggravation from now on?”
“‘Fraid so. Besides, the view’s better here. Anyway, you seem fairly happy despite the tremendous burden this whole thing has placed on you.”
He took a huge bite out of his bagel, and she used the momentary pause in the post-coital frivolity to segue the conversation toward something she’d been thinking about before he finally dragged his ass out of bed. “I think we need some ground rules.”
Wiping cream cheese from the corner of his mouth, he rebutted, “Don’t you think that’s a little too much strict rationalism on your part?”
“Just look at it as an opportunity to become more of a whole person.”
“Touche. D.K. Scully shoots and scores. OK…I’m just guessing here, could it be you have something you’d like to throw into the hopper?”
“Well, now that you mention it, I do. Rule #1: No more dumps, ditches, or mysterious planned disappearances. I know you already said it, but I plan hold you to it, Mulder. I’m in too far now, and in case you haven’t noticed, so are you…which means giving up the luxury of deciding for both of us. You’ve got to trust me to understand what needs to be done.”
He smiled—‘The Divine Miss S’ was calm, cool, and not about to lose that gorgeous head of hers. It was back to business, not as usual, but business nonetheless. “You have my word. I can’t promise I won’t fight with you about it, but you certainly seem able to hold your own in that department…Can I finish eating now?” He took another mouthful, and washed it down with some juice straight from the carton.
“By all means.” That went surprisingly well, and Scully decided she’d go ahead and press her luck. She took a giant swig of whatever it was she was drinking and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. A little fortifying was in order before she plunged ahead. “Here’s Rule #2…we don’t let on at work and we don’t not let on. It’s nobody’s business but ours, anyway. Not even Skinner, especially not Skinner… Plausible deniability is a beautiful thing, Mulder, it’s time we made it work for us.” She took a deep breath, realizing that, miracles of miracles, he was actually paying attention.
Scully decided not to lose the momentum. “And as long as we’re talking about work–when we’re on the clock–we’re on the clock. Business as usual. Period. So don’t get any ideas while we’re out on a case. When we’re at home–well, that’s a different thing altogether. Surely you’d be able to come up with some mutual recreational activities for our off-time. And if you play your cards right, I might even surprise you and come up with a few myself.”
“I’m down with that, girlfriend. What do we do now, sign a blood oath?”
“Mulder…”
“Alright, Scully, absolutely, positively in agreement here. Permission to speak further, Agent?”
She ran a finger down his sideburn, “I love a man who respects the chain of command.”
“You know me so well.” He paused, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, and focused his thoughts for a minute. He’d never talked this way with any woman before; it was time to step up to the plate. “I’m not good at holding onto someone, in case you haven’t noticed.”
She leaned toward him a little more, “That’s something we both have to work on, I think. ”
“In my case, that would bring my lifetime record to…let me see…just one.”
“Mulder, I am not going to participate in your festival of self- flagellation, if that’s where this is headed. It’s too early for kinky stuff.”
“So, it’s just a question of timing, then? Remind me to get back to that one later.”
“Mulderrrr…”
“Listen, I just want to be better at this than I have been.” His voice was very quiet, and he paused before he went on. “It occurred to me ….now get ready for this one, because I know it’s a stretch ….” She looked at him again, her brows quirked, and he smiled. “I think you and I need to spend more time talking. Really talking. Not about cases. Not about work. About us.”
He stopped to take in what was clearly Scully’s look of wonder and amazement. “Yeah, it’s really me talking, I can barely believe I’m saying it myself. I know the shock of such a radical departure might kill us, but it’s a risk I’m willing to take…Pretty wild, huh?” Things were moving along in Bizarro world…maybe someone had darted them in their sleep and they were tripping big time.
Scully wondered if she should pinch herself or Mulder, and then decided that more physical contact might not be the best idea at the moment. Besides, pinching wasn’t what she really had in mind. “You have my word you won’t have to face possible death alone. I do think it’s interesting, though, that you’ve linked communication between the sexes and the risk of mortality. ‘Wild’ doesn’t begin to describe it. I was thinking more along the lines of …”
“Wait…there’s more. Just remember how fragile my ego is before you say anything.” He finished the bagel and juice to stall for time before he started in on this one. He was getting ready to put his head on the chopping block. “Screw it, here’s what I want, Scully. Let me make things safer for you. The Gunmen and I made a half-assed plan a while ago to beef things up, and now I want to make it happen and I want you to not go nuclear. I know it’s no guarantee, but I need to do it and you need to let me…There, I said it.” He shifted back in his chair and waited for the inevitable refusal and chewing out.
Scully took her vitamins, swallowed the rest of her drink, and took a deep, cleansing breath. “OK.”
That made him sit right up. “Beg your pardon? What about a nailing me to the wall for being Neanderthal, sexist, patriarchal throw- back?”
“It seems like too much work at the moment. Besides, we both know you’d torture me with it until I said ‘yes’ anyway. You can go ahead with this thing on one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“What they do for me, they do for you.”
“That’s it?”
“Yep, and it’s non-negotiable.”
“Deal, now how do we seal the bargain?” Mulder wiggled an eyebrow and offered up his best leer.
“Let’s do it the old-fashioned way.” And with that, Scully spit into her right hand and shoved it in his. “Wasn’t quite the warm, wet one you were hoping for, was it?” She was grinning from ear to ear.
“It’ll do, Scully, it’ll do. I’m gonna call ’em before you change your mind. Your cel’s still on the dresser, right?” She nodded. “I still need to dig mine out of my stuff.” Mulder got up, gave her a little nip on the side of her neck and started to lope off into the bedroom, when Scully grabbed his wrist.
“Thanks for the weirdest weekend of my life.” It wasn’t a joke.
He looked into those blue eyes and saw she meant it. “Weekend’s not over yet.”
As Mulder sprinted to the bedroom, Scully said to no one in particular, “That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.” It was time for coffee, lots of it.
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Mulder made the call and told Frohike that today was the day for the fix-up project they’d discussed with an add-on that included his place. Frohike put two and two together and called him and undeserving bastard and threatened him with bodily harm if Scully so much as lost a minute of sleep because of him. The call was also being piped through the speaker phone, so he was treated to Langly’s ‘I told you so, man, I told you,’ and Byers trying to rein everyone in. Finally, Byers won out and told him they’d be there in two hours with ‘the building materials.’
Mulder made his way to the bathroom, brushed his teeth, splashed some water on his face–no shave–going for ruggedly handsome in case anyone cared, and meandered his way back to his duffel. He snagged some sweatpants, a baseball jersey and his running shoes and slipped them on. No running though, and come to think of it, no underwear either. After all, it was Sunday, and a guy’s gotta chill out. Right. OK, time to see what Scully was up to. He made his way back into the kitchen just in time to see her finishing the breakfast dishes. He slipped behind her and started kissing her neck.
“Mulder, are you trying to seduce me?”
“Seduce you, get in your pants, prep you for the naked pretzel, pick one.”
“You know, that might’ve worked a little earlier, but there are people on the way.”
“Not for two hours, one hundred and twenty minutes of uninterrupted free time.’
“There’s where you’re wrong. You’ve got enough time to put away your stuff, change the sheets, and clean up the bathroom. Sheets are on the top shelf of the bedroom closet. If you hurry, you can join me on the couch while I start The New York Times crossword puzzle.” She kissed him just shy of his mouth, patted his rump, and waived him off.
“Do I get to say anything about this?”
“Only how much you’re gonna love taking a bath with me later and how good it’ll be to roll around with me on a freshly made bed.”
He couldn’t argue with that. So Mulder turned on his heels and skulked off.
“Hey, Mulder.”
“Yeah?”
“Love…ain’t it grand?”
After staking out part of the closet and the dresser and stowing away his belongings, Mulder finished doing the most housework he’d done in recent memory. Feeling he was quite the post-feminist ideal man, he weaseled his way onto the couch and joined Scully’s attack on the crossword puzzle. Actually, he managed to get her to play footsies with him under the pretense of working the damn thing…the things a man will do when he’s in love. She seemed pretty invested in what seemed to him to be a thinly veiled charade, pretending to make with the pencil and the scribbling even though they hadn’t actually come up with a single thing since his arrival. After a while, Mulder noticed she was a little distracted. “Hey, Scully…what’s up?”
Scully stopped chewing the end of her pencil and replied, “You know, I was thinking…” She ran her foot up and down along his calf.
“It’s a good thing one of us is still able to. As far as I’m concerned, there’s only one head paying attention right now, and it ain’t the big one. Well, actually…”
“Mulder, I’m trying to tell you something.” She stopped the whole leg thing.
“OK, let’s hear it.”
“I was thinking about the jerkoffs in the bullpen and I’m tired of ignoring their comments, their insults, their usual harangue. I hate the way they talk about you…about us. And I’m not gonna take it anymore. The next time I hear any of that crap coming from anyone of them…their ass is mine.”
“Isn’t that sort of telegraphing the whole ‘I’m his/he’s mine’ concept?”
“Not at all. It just maintaining the proper decorum and respect.”
“Remind me never to cross you, Scully.” There was a knock at the door.
She got up and peered through the peephole. Huey, Dewey and Louie had arrived. Langly was staring the ceiling, had his hair back in a ponytail, and was sporting a T-shirt that read ‘Reality is for People Who Can’t Handle Dope.’ His ensemble was completed by a fresh wad of duct tape holding the bridge of his glasses together. Frohike had on camouflage pants, an oversized Harley-Davidson sweatshirt, a baseball cap on backwards, and was fiddling with something in his pockets. Byers had on his usual dark suit and white shirt, but no tie. It must’ve been his casual look.
Frohike eased up to the peephole, so they were eye-to-eye, “Scrumptious Agent Scully, the calvary has arrived.”
She let them in feeling she would live to regret this. They brought stuff, lots and lots of stuff. Stuff in tool boxes, stuff in black bags, and stuff in a titanium briefcase with a combination lock. They all gathered in the living room, with the Gunmen and Mulder perched on the couch, waiting, until Langly piped up, “Jeez, are we gonna get started or what?”
“Well, why don’t you just tell me what ‘we’re’ supposed to be doing first.” Scully was standing with her hand on her hip looking all four of them up and down. God, they sat there fidgeting like guilty schoolboys, making her feel like crotchety old Miss Scully.
“Frohike? Byers? Mulder? One of you better say something. While I realize the pattern on the slipcovers is fascinating, it doesn’t require all of you staring at it with your mouths sealed shut.”
“It’s improved security, Agent Scully. We’re going to install new locks for one thing. Triple bolt, the best.” Byers fiddled with his collar and wished he had on a tie.
“That’s one. Keep going, guys.” Now she was tapping her foot, and shot Frohike a look that bored straight through to the back of his skull.
“Stupendous Agent Scully, they’ll also be motion sensor alarms and a tracking device we’re gonna install on your Fedmobile. The alarm sends off a signal that’s carried on broadband, which we’ll be constantly monitoring. If anything jumps off, we gotcha hot-wired to a secure line so that Mulder gets a call within 30 seconds. And vice versa. And the locator in your car is really a thing of beauty, if I do say so myself. We’ll be randomly hopping from GPS to GPS, using their pull and their range, but never staying long enough to establish a pattern of use. And it’ll all be cloaked and encrypted…our usual fabulousness. Nothing’s too good for our favorite government employee. And yeah, we’ll do Mulder’s place and once we’re done here. He doesn’t have quite the same hold on me as you do, but…”
Langly blurted out, “Yeah, now that you’re officially Mulder’s pistol packin’ cutie…Yeow!…You’re hurting me!…Mmmmfkrdm.”
Before she had a chance to react, Mulder had leapt up, yanked him off the couch and had a hand slapped over his mouth. Byers and Frohike shoved one of the tool bags into his hand and hustled Langly out the door. It had been unanimously decided that he was the ideal candidate to install the bumper buddies.
Mulder cracked his knuckles and stretched, “Didn’t think you’d appreciate the elevation to ‘cutie’ status.”
“Good call. Now, do I know everything I need to?” She locked Mulder in her sights, and began to pick imaginary lint from his jersey. “Well…do I?”
Byers began to fuss with the tool boxes and one of the black bags, while Frohike shoved the large silver suitcase toward Mulder. “You wanna handle that, Ace? That’s one’s exclusively your baby.”
“C’mere partner, I’ve got something special for you.” Mulder cocked his head and gestured toward the newly vacated space left by Langly on the couch. He guided Scully down by her shoulders and joined her. Byers and Frohike took their cue to make themselves scarce and got busy changing the locks on the doors.
“Am I going to regret this, Mulder?”
“Regret is such a negative word, we both know you’re too open- minded for that.”
“How about opening the case, before I express a sentiment a helluva lot stronger than regret.”
Mulder entered the combination, lifted the latches and treated Scully to a selection of firearms: Walther PPK’s, SIGs, Smith and Wessons. There was also a small leg holster and a stockpile of rounds. “Remember, nothing says ‘I love you’ like hardware.”
Scully’s mouth dropped open a little, “And these, I assume, are for me.” Apparently, she’d received a betrothal gift. Could this day get any stranger?
“Some of them are for you, I think you can see there’s a very smart, very chic holster with your name on it. The other stuff we hide them in different parts of the apartment, in the trunk of your car…I do the same at my place.”
“Then what, Mulder? Pose for the cover of ‘Guns and Ammo?’ Isn’t this a little excessive?”
“Scully, you said you’d go with this, don’t bail on me now. It’s not the answer to every threat, but it’s something. After Samantha..after everything…”
“Is it that important?” Even though the answer was obvious, she was still trying to get used to this level of devotion being out in the open.
“It is…I must seem pretty wacked, right?” Mulder ran his hands through his hair and waited.
“You mean at the moment, or just in general?” Scully shook her head but she was smiling…not a lot, but that was good enough for him.
“You must really love the nutcase type.”
“It’s the challenge of not being crazy with them that hooks me, although from the look of things I might be losing that one. By the way, how exactly did you get all this?”
“Scully, I’m a pretty persuasive guy. I have a couple of friends in the Bureau armory, and I told them I needed extra firepower for some extremely serious, extremely hush-hush undercover work. Plus, I threatened to tell Skinner I’d seen one of them getting some nooky in the storage cage with one of the women from records. Lucky for me, I pay attention to that sort of thing.”
“So, basically you blackmailed them?”
“Whatever it takes. Hell, I’ve even been known to wait seven years to get someone to sleep with me. Stalk ’em long enough, and it’s nothin’ but net.”
“And here I thought I was finally succumbing to raw, animal magnetism.” Scully rose to her feet and took his hand. Out of nowhere, she dredged up her best suburban housewife voice, “Honey, let’s put our new stuff away.”
The next few hours were spent hiding weapons and installing motion sensors in all the windows and doors, with Byers and Frohike showing them how to use the miniature controls so they could get around without tripping the damn things. The two Gunmen handled hook-up and Mulder and Scully, clean-up. Frohike was particularly proud he could get the controls down to the size and appearance of a keychain. Sometime during the whole thing, Langly reappeared, theoretically to get the Smith and Wessons to put in both their trunks, but really to see if his ass was still in a sling. He crept around the apartment, and Scully didn’t say a thing until he was almost out the door again.
Without batting an eye, Scully drawled, “Langly, you almost done, cutie?”
After almost pissing himself, Langly managed an ‘Uh-huh,’ to the sound of a massive, collective sigh of relief.
Finally, it was all done and the five of them were sprawled across the living room, with the Gunmen flopped on the couch, Scully in one of the overstuffed chairs, and Mulder sitting cross-legged at her feet. Someone had the brilliant idea of running out for Mexican take-out, and they stuffed themselves on enchiladas verdes and tacos al pastor. The Dos Equis washing it down didn’t hurt either. The four boys were arguing the finer points of North American Bigfoot sightings and Scully wondered how she ended up as the Anti-Cinderella, complete with her own Lost Boy Prince and three techno-fairy godfathers. She suspected Mulder had been right about fate, the bastard. But he was her bastard, after all. Stifling a yawn, Scully asked, “How did you pay for the rest of the stuff?”
Frohike explained despite a mouthful of enchilada, “It’s our treat…a little meal between friends.”
“No that’s not what I meant. How did you pay for the rest of the ‘hardware,’ Mulder?”
Langly was once again destined to stick his foot in it. “The account, Scully, you know.” Judging by the flash of unrecognition that passed over her face, Langly was able to deduce that no, Scully didn’t know.
Immediately, the Gunmen realized that they were running late if they wanted to get Mulder’s place done tonight, and they had to get going, and that Mulder could stay here, they could get into his apartment, no problem.
In order to stop the usual suspects, Scully barked, “Nobody move.”
Mulder hadn’t budged an inch from the spot at her feet all during dinner, and sure as hell wasn’t about to now. “There’s this last little thing…you and I and the boys have a joint account for emergencies.”
“What are you talking about? No, don’t tell me…Yes, you better tell me. What account? How much money?” Scully could feel the start of a headache, a good one. And it was apparent that today was, in fact, getting stranger by the minute.
It was Byers now, “Actually, I set it up, I sort of handle that kind of thing in general for us. It’s an offshore account…we have access to it, as does Agent Mulder, of course…and you. It was done a couple of months ago. There isn’t that much more to tell.”
“I beg to differ, it would seem there’s a wealth of information your boys need to let me in on. She lined Mulder up in her cross- hairs, “And you…You constantly bounce checks, and I have to buy your lunch more often than not…Now you have money. So, how much money is there, Mulder?”
Mulder was rubbing his forehead, working on his own headache at this point. “Two and a half.”
“Two and a half what?”
All three Gunmen chimed in, “Million, two and a half million dollars.”
Scully sat back in her chair and stared at them all. This was no warped Cinderella story…she was in Wonderland without a doubt, and had carnal knowledge of the Mad Hatter to boot. She wasn’t even angry, this was beyond getting angry about, there was no framework to even put this in. Congratulations, partner…you’ve achieved personal best in the ‘Blow Away Scully’ category. “You know, boys…” looking at the Gunmen, “Maybe you should be on your way. Your friend and I have things to talk about.”
In a matter of minutes, The Gunmen, their stuff, and the leftovers were gone. Mulder went to see them out and Scully thought she heard Frohike tell him to not be a total jackass and screw this up. She didn’t try to follow them, instead, she settled back into her chair, closed her eyes and tried to will away her headache. The whole thing was ludicrous, although Bill would be surprised to find out that Mulder was no longer a worthless piece of shit. He was a rich one, thank you very much. She heard the triple snick of the lock and footsteps approaching. This ought to be good, this had better be good. She opened her eyes and saw him sitting down on the edge of the coffee table facing her. “Would you care to explain?”
He hunched forward and leaned as close as possible without touching. “I wanted to have something put away for you in case anything happened to me, in case you got sick again, in case we were faced with a situation and couldn’t look to our friendly Federal government for help. Believe me, I was going to tell you tonight, Scully, I just wasn’t planning on doing it in front of Moe, Larry, and Curly.” Mulder inched a little closer, and she didn’t kick him, which he interpreted as an encouraging sign. “It’s part of my father’s estate. My family has money, you know that…I’m the failed product of a Vineyard upbringing. But I’ve pretty much lived on my own since college, so I never thought about it one way or the other until I got a call from my mother saying it was going to be turned over to me. I just wanted to…”
She stopped him, her voice calm but firm, “I don’t want the money. I don’t need it.”
“Maybe I need you to have it. Look, it’s not as if you landed Bill Gates here, Scully….It’s some money that I stumbled onto because I couldn’t completely escape what my parents thought I should have, and it’s money we might need. Only you would have a problem with someone trying to share a couple of million and change.”
“Go on Mulder, convince me.” She leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes again.
He was going to lay it all out for her, he would make sense, and she’d come around. Maybe. “What if they finally manage to close the X-files and we’re no closer to finding Samantha, then what? What it Kurtzweil’s right and his scenario happens one day? How are we supposed to fight then?…What if your cancer reappears? What about experimental treatments? The amount in this account couldn’t begin to cover all those possibilities, but at least it’s what I can offer. And something might happen to me…I’m sorry, but you don’t get to turn it down, it’s just part of the whole package. It doesn’t make you obligated to me.”
“You almost had me until that last remark. ‘Obligated’, Mulder? I think we’re beyond ‘obligated,’ wouldn’t you say?”
“OK. Strike that. We both have out crosses to bear, no pun intended. You get to deal with this terrible, terrible thing I’ve done to you and I get to deal with Bill and Charlie beating the crap out of me the first time you bring me to a family Christmas.”
“I still don’t want the money, and I plan on enjoying my brothers welcoming you to the family.” Scully’s voice was husky with fatigue, and a sigh she hadn’t meant to make slipped out. He was not getting this, and she wasn’t sure she could make him understand. We’re in it together, Mulder, but not like this.
“Scully, are you listening?”
She started to draw herself up slowly, “Yes, Mulder, I’m listening, but you’re the one not getting it.”
“Well, enlighten me, then.”
She sat all the way up and rubbed her knees. “We’ve spent seven years looking over our shoulders. Who’s disappeared now? Who’ll die first? When’s the end of the world? We’ve beaten the odds so far, Mulder, that’s what I want, not money…I understand why you want to make sure you can keep looking for Samantha no matter what. I also know that in the worst-case scenario we have to be able to fight back. But as far as the cancer’s concerned, I won’t let it define my life, don’t let it define yours, either.”
She waited for a minute, and when she spoke again, her voice was softer, almost hesitant. “It’s no way to live, Mulder. I plan on living, in case you haven’t noticed that, and you better start planning on living right along with me. I know this was important for you to do, I do. But you’ve got to understand that no amount of money could ever make things right if something happened to you.”
Scully reached for his hand, stroking his wrist with her thumb. “The way the apartment is tricked out is bad enough, but this account…I know it doesn’t make sense, but I feel if I say yes, it’ll only be a matter of time until what we have comes to a bad end. I want to believe in something else…I’m holding out for something else. You understand now?”
Mulder nodded his head, and took a hard breath. He got it. “I always had you pegged as a holdout, Scully. Point taken. No one can ever accuse me of being afraid of overkill when it comes to you.” He started to drum his fingers on her thigh, and offered her a look of mock-concern. “I’m a little worried, though. You made a persuasive argument, but I detected reference to a potential bad omen. You realize you sound, dare I say it, superstitious?”
“You see what hanging around with you has done to me?” She was perched on the edge of the chair now, looking as tired as hell, but there was something in her eyes that told maybe there was hope for him yet. “Listen, I’ll talk to Byers about contingencies, but not about cancer, and not about you dying either.” She arched an eyebrow, “It’s just not part of my plan.” With that, she got up and headed down the hall. Walking toward the bathroom, she yelled over her shoulder, “I’m taking a bath. It’s time for hot water and solitude.”
After watching her traipse away, he got up and rolled his neck, listening to every grisly pop. He took time to stretch and mentally assess the total damage. Well, Mulder, you escaped relatively unscathed that time. Unfortunately, you blew your chance at ‘bath-time with baby’…Nice work, you dolt. What’s your next move, genius? With nothing appetizing on the horizon, he thought he should try to squelch the possibility of boredom. It most definitely was time for a recreational shot of whiskey. Maybe she might get thirsty in a little while and he could bring the bottle. On his way to the kitchen, he heard, “Mulder!”
When he got to the bathroom, the tub was almost filled, and Scully had on that huge, white terrycloth bathrobe. It wasn’t fastened well, and there was enough skin showing to make him think she wasn’t completely exhausted. He certainly was feeling uplifted. Leaning against the door jamb, Mulder checked the situation out, “Yes…?”
“Were you ever planning on getting in here? Bath’s almost ready.”
“I thought when you said solitude, you wanted a break from me, too, despite how adorable I am.”
“Mulder, I just spent the day with your minions turning my apartment into a stockade. I meant I wanted some relief from that, not you. Besides, there’s an important point I forgot to make.”
“And that would be?”
“Over here.” He went right to where she was, and before he knew it, her strong doctor’s hands were yanking open his jersey. Against the sound of a button plinking on the floor, he tried to complain, “Hey…I really like that shirt.”
“You’ve got money, go get yourself a new one. I just want to make sure you know I only want you for one thing.”
Much, much later, as they were lying warm and dry and half asleep under the covers, Mulder did some final reconnaissance, “So, are we OK?” She pulled him to her side of the bed and whispered, “We’re more than OK, but remind me never to pick up a tab for you again.”
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Monday Morning
He shot up from bed with the sound of the Liberty Bell clanging in his ear. What the fuck was going on? He blinked and shook himself into something like wakefulness. Scully was gone and his cel had been placed on his pillow, strategically right beside where he’d been blissfully sleeping.
He snatched it up and growled, “Yeah. What?” The clock on the night stand read 7:30.
“Now what if that was Skinner, Mulder? Good morning, it’s time to get up.”
Scully. That tore it. “Where are you? And how fast can those little legs run when I come after you?”
Some laughter from her end. “I’d be careful if I were you, it’s a felony to threaten a federal agent. I’m in the kitchen, hurry up and get ready for work. You know…W-O-R-K, it’s what the government pays us to do, well, me anyway. C’mon…you’re going to be on time today. You’ve got about a half an hour.”
Mulder hauled himself from where he’d been sleeping the glorious sleep of the dead. The weekend had finally caught up with him and he was trashed, wiped, blown out. Apparently, he’d inadvertently discovered a cure for his insomnia, a healthy dose of Scully and getting it on. He’d have to talk with her about making sure he got daily treatment. Moving from the bed gingerly; he was stiff, and not in a good way. While he’d never admit age might be a factor, he was all too aware of the sounds of his joints creaking as he made his way to the bathroom.
Standing at the mirror, he smirked at his exhausted, albeit, delightfully spent self. There would have to be revenge. “Mark my words, Scully,” he muttered, I’ll do whatever it takes to wear you out…eventually. It may be my last act on Earth, but I’m looking forward to doin’ it to death.”
Having made that vow, he was able to ignore the voice in his head telling him he was hopelessly pussy-whipped. He shaved, showered and dressed, putting on his black suit and a starched, white shirt. The finishing touch was a tie even Scully would have to admit was a conservative choice. No cows, no flying saucers, no hidden couples illustrating poses from the Kama Sutra. He had to make a brief return trip the closet to fetch his Smith and Wesson, his Walther leg piece and holsters. He put them on in front of the bedroom mirror and let it settle in that in fact, the work week had arrived.
When he got to the kitchen, he was amused to see that Scully practically matched him in a black pantsuit and white blouse. She had her right foot up on a chair and hitched up her pantsleg in order to adjust the holster for her brand new SIG 239 9mm. Her waist holster was securely in place, and her SIG 226 rested securely against her hip. Once confident everything was going to hold, she stood, rolled back her shoulders and turned her head in his direction. “Lo and behold…nice to see you’re finally up.” She was definitely using the ‘back to business’ voice. Her brief case and their IDs and badges were on the table. She tossed him a granola bar and a banana.
“You can eat that later, we should go. I’ve got two autopsies to do, plus a 9 o’clock meeting with Skinner. What’s on your agenda?” She managed a smile, a pretty good one considering they were already off and running.
“Violent Crimes consult, that’ll be a great eye-opener. Nothing like five or six hours of hearing, ‘What do you make of all of this, Spooky?’
They grabbed their stuff, and he threw the granola bar on the table and shoved the banana in his coatpocket. The titanium case with the rest of the firepower was stowed in the hall closet. They’d decide later when to ‘redecorate’ at his place. Ready to head out, Scully led the way with her briefcase under her arm and her hand on his elbow. Securing all the necessary devices with her new ‘keychain’ once they were in the hall, she teased, “I’m going to avoid the obvious question and assume you’re glad to see me.”
They drove in separately, but he followed her, bumping up against her rear end at every red light, relishing in the obvious symbolism. He even thought he saw her blow him a kiss in her rear- view mirror, but he knew she’d deny it if he said anything.
After squeezing into the last ground level spots in the garage, they walked into the building and eased past the usual security. At the elevators, Mulder asked, “So, do you have to meet Skinner right away?” He needed a pick-me-up.
She checked her watch, it was about ten to nine. “No, I’ve got a couple of minutes.”
“I was thinking…I know you said you’d no longer suffer the slings and arrows of our beloved colleagues from the bullpen, but that was just blowing smoke, right? You’re not exactly the avenging angel type.” He leaned against the elevator bank and waited for her to take the bait. His eyes were lit up with barely concealed amusement. C’mon, Scully, just a tiny bit of fun before going back to the trenches.
And take the bait she did. Swallowed it whole, actually. “So you think that was idle talk?”
“Something like that. You could prove me wrong, though. I mean, we could take a stroll through the bullpen right now, before you’re your meeting and see if you can make good on all that tough talk. Of course, if you’d like to recant…”
“Mulder, get in the elevator. Hit the button…Let’s go. You’re on.” She knew exactly what he was doing, but the chance to hear the words ‘I was wrong, Scully,’ was irresistible.
They rode up to the fifth floor and made a beeline for the bullpen, and started down the long aisle of with rows of desks on either side. Sure enough, before they were a quarter of the way down, they heard someone’s voice, loud and clear. “How did that psych job end up with that primo piece of tail? I guess he must be getting his physicals on a regular basis.”
As soon as she heard the offending remark, she got a visual on its source and headed for one desk in particular. Mulder was in hot pursuit right behind her.
Judging by his youthful appearance and the background color of his ID, he was a new Academy grad. They came up on his blind side, so he was unaware that the proverbial boom was about to be lowered. He was leaning toward one of his cohorts, reveling in what a clever guy he was, when Scully tapped him on the shoulder. Seeing the approach of imminent doom, the cohorts immediately relocated to various parts of the woodwork. The kid seemed in generally good shape, although his face was round and pasty, like the Pillsbury Doughboy. Scully looked him up and down. Doughboy, it’s time you learned a little respect. His head jerked up and he sputtered, “Yyyesss…Oh, Jeez.”
“What’s your name, Agent?”
“It’s Walt, Walt Wisniewski.” He was beginning to look more pale, if such a thing was possible.
“OK, Agent Wiz..whatever your name is. Do you know who I am?”
“Yes, ma’am. You’re Special Agent Dana Scully.”
“And I take it you know who he is,” pointing to where the ‘psych job’ had parked himself on her right.
“Yes, he’s Special Agent Fox Mulder.” There was a thin film of sweat forming on Doughboy’s upper lip.
“And you understand we’re senior agents, correct?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You’re batting a thousand, so far, Agent Wiz. I had a question, though.” Pointing to his cronies, none of whom had the gonads to look up from their riveting work, “Were you talking to them about us just now?”
“No…no ma’am, not at all!”
“I see, so you were talking to yourself, then?”
“Well, not exactly…I mean, I…”
“C’mon, Agent Wiz, either you were talking to them about us or you weren’t.”
“Agent Scully, I wasn’t talking to anyone about you or Agent Mulder, I swear.”
“OK, let me get this straight…we were walking through the bullpen and you started talking to yourself.”
“Uh…well…Oh, Jeez.”
” ‘Oh, Jeez,’ indeed. Agent Wiz, when’s your next psych eval?”
“Next August, ma’am.”
“Agent Wiz, I feel like doing you a favor. I’m meeting with A.D. Skinner in a little while. What if I see if I can get your psych eval pushed up to, say…next week? How would that be?”
Doughboy’s face fell completely at this point and his hands went to the side of his head like he’d been hit with a sledgehammer. “Thank you for your help, Agent Scully.”
“Don’t mention it.” She turned to Mulder, “Do you have anything you’d like to add here?”
He furrowed his brow, waived his hands across his chest and mouthed, ‘No, no, no.’
She slipped her hand on his shoulder, “I guess we should be going…Agent Mulder?”
“After you, Agent Scully. Please, after you.”
As they sauntered back toward the elevator, Mulder didn’t say he was wrong, he said something better. “I’m scared of you.”
“You should be…” Just then her cel went off and she got it by the second ring. Gloating would have to wait for later.
“Scully. Sir, I’m on my way… Yes, Agent Mulder’s here…About out meeting…I see…” A very long silence ensued, with whatever was being said on the other line causing Scully to fix her gaze on the ceiling. “No, it’s no problem…I’ll handle the other matters tomorrow…It’ll be taken of…Yes, sir. Today…I’ll tell him, sir.” Conversation over.
Scully’s eyes narrowed and she locked looks with Mulder. Today’s taste of victory was brief indeed. “In case you couldn’t tell, that was Skinner. Whoever you saw in accounting on Friday complained to high holy hell and now you and I both have to go there and straighten everything out. Skinner said he didn’t give a rat’s ass how long it took us, just get it done and get it done right. By the way, your consult’s been reassigned, my meeting’s been cancelled and I have three autopsies to do tomorrow.” She put her cel away, and blew some air through pursed lips, “Let’s go, we’ve got a long day ahead of us.”
She started to get into the elevator when Mulder slid ahead of her, blocking her path. “What? No chastising, Scully? Not even a decent scolding? That’s not the woman I know and love.” He leaned toward her, “Is there something I should know about?”
Scully’s face was smooth and unreadable, except for her eyes. Something sly lurked in their depths for a minute, then disappeared. “I’ll take care of you when we get home tonight.”
Mulder moved away to let her pass. “I’m counting on it, Scully. I’m counting on it.”