Title: Since When Author: Calesta B. calesta@hotmail.com Rating: PG (one swear word, other than that I'm clean!) Spoilers: Movie, Season 5 - you name it Category: Story - MSR Summary: Byers tells the story of Mulder and Scully's happy ending to a surprise guest in the Bahamas Disclaimer: Just borrowing them to amuse myself for awhile, I wanted to give them a happily ever after ending, don't sue me. Feedback: gratefully & gracefully accepted Never in a million years would I have imagined that things would turn out the way they seem to be tonight. I am sitting in a bar on the beach in Nassau, Bahamas. An old Steely Dan song is playing out of the beat up speakers, seems appropriate somehow - 'you go back Jack and do it again, wheel turning round and round.' I am sitting at a table, drinking some kind of fruity rum drink with the obligatory umbrella lodged in pineapple. Across from me sits Susanne Modeski, also sipping a pink rum concoction. I ran into her just today, I was on my way down to the airport to pick up Langly. He's been in Switzerland, meeting his email pen pal, Inga. He claims he's talked her into joining us here, into marrying him. Frohike wants to know if she has any sisters, but he's all tied up with not one, but two women from the island here. They even know each other and don't seem to mind sharing the little troll. I stopped at the post office first, I was mailing a new software package to Mulder. I didn't she her first, she recognized me. I'm not sure how, I've changed some in the last twelve years. Lost the tie and the beard, got a tan. I was wearing a loud floral print shirt. Mulder would have been proud of me. He's been the topic of our conversation actually. I totally blew off Langly, I hope he forgives me. I think he will. Susanne and I have been sitting in the bar all afternoon, discussing the paths we've been on for the last twelve years. She's been here in Nassau most of the time. They let her go, on the condition that she never set foot on US soil again. 'Considering that the alternative was death, I chose to live. I hoped that somehow you guys might pick up where I left off. I always wondered . . . ' she trailed off, then flashed a smile that made my heart pound. 'I've thought about you,' she says. I can't answer that one, I don't trust myself just yet. I just raise my drink to salute her, and take a good swig, taking care not to stab myself in the nose with the umbrella. I don't mention that she's been the object of my fantasies for the last twelve years. Okay, so I had a few Scully dreams in there, too. Who didn't? Frohike wasn't the only one who lusted after her, We all did. But we all knew where her heart was. That's the story I've been telling her. The Mulder and Scully saga. I mean, really, that's where our lives were wrapped up, until a year ago. Until we gave up the hideout and came down here. That's where I'm at in my story. You should see me. I'm rambling on, telling the tale, making broad gestures in the air, I am not the quiet reserved John Byers that everyone knows. I am a man who lived through some extraordinary events, I am the man who just found the love of my life at a post office in the Bahamas and I am not going to let this moment pass me by. 'They exposed the consortium,' she muses. 'I thought something had happened. With the US President impeached, the shadow governments exposed in Eastern Europe. I figured something big had to have gone down. I never thought you guys would be at the centre of things. Especially that Mulder. I didn't know him for long, but he seemed to me to be institutional material. loyal to the FBI to the end,' She shook her head, remembering our adventure in Baltimore so many years ago. 'So skeptical Scully used her science to discover the vaccine?' I nod, not bothering to mention that after her trip to Antarctica, Scully was never very skeptical again. 'And they're the ones who delivered it to all of us?' She holds up here arm, showing off a scar not unlike the smallpox vaccination marks we all have, put there during an unprecedented world wide innoculation program. 'And you guys were there too!' 'We were on the periphery really. Just helping them out, anyway we could. Mulder and Scully, they took the real risks, they lost so much --' She interrupts me, 'But not each other?' 'Not each other. We were worried there for awhile, after Diana, his ex-wife showed up again, trying to take over the X-Files. But it was nothing, She was nothing, You should see these two Susanne, its eerie. They talk to each other without saying a word. They call each other by their last names, and they make it sound like an intimate nickname. They live in a world of their own. Nothing, no one can breach that world. They've literally been to the ends of the earth for each other. Its amazing.' 'You sound envious,' she comments, reaching for my hand. I shrug. 'Who isn't? They've truly found the other half of themselves. That's why it was so strange when they finally left the FBI. They did what none of us ever thought they'd do - they split up, Mulder went West, she stayed on the east coast.' 'I thought you said this story had a happy ending, or were you just talking about us?' She hasn't let go of my hand, I wonder if I've died or if I'm having some sort of Malaria like fever dream. I can hardly breathe after that one, so I go back to telling the story, trying t o get my mind off my body's reaction to her touch. 'It does have a happy ending, We just weren't so sure at the time. Mulder was offered a teaching position at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. Psychology in Literature or something. And so he went, just like that. Scully took a residency in pediatric oncology at Georgetown. We saw a lot of her that fall and winter. She would come over just to hang out, just like Mulder used to. 'We had emails from him all the time, and I'm guessing that she heard from him often as well, We never really talked about it with her. Frohike and I came up with some theories on our own, but I'm not sure we'll ever know why they spent that year apart. I think they just needed some time to heal, to live normal lives, to become somewhat normal people before they could try a life together. 'Then one day we had a call from Mulder. He was coming to town to discuss something with us, but we weren't to tell Scully that he was in DC. It was opening day at Camden Yards that weekend, we had to cancel on her. She was pissed off at that. 'Mulder came in, looking like a completely different person, he traded the Armani suits for a golf shirt and jeans, his hair was getting long, he looked,' what's the word I'm looking for? 'Peaceful.' ' ' Boys,' he says to us. ' I have a plan, its crazy, its diabolical, its the hack of a lifetime and its all in the name of justice, fairness, and getting even with what those bastards did to us.' 'He'd spent the last 9 months researching the financial connections of the consortium. It was a little easier now that we knew all of the players real names and positions. He'd found a series of bank accounts that ranged from Tunis to Switzerland to Canada. He wanted some of their money.' Susanne interrupts again, 'let me get this straight. You guys hacked into their bank accounts? This was Mulder's idea?' I nod. It was the most bizarre thing I'd heard at the time. But the more we thought and talked about it, the more sense it made. 'I want 6 million, he said. One million each for Emily, Melissa, Samantha, two for the children Scully and I will never have (you should have seen our three eyebrows raise in unison after that statement, Scully would have been proud), and one for my parents as well. We'll split the money 50-50, that being your commission for going after it for me. I have it on good authority that if we are successful there will be only a nominal investigation into the crime. No one will give a shit if its solved. In fact, most will prefer not to know.' He was dead serious. And suddenly, it didn't sound like a bad idea. 'So we did it. Six million taken from 30 different accounts. All rerouted to two accounts in the Cayman islands, one for Mulder, one for us. We didn't stay in DC too long after that. Not after Scully left anyway. We decided we could still do our work in a more tropical setting, Although there isn't much left for us to do. They exposed so many of the cover-ups we'd been trying to expose ourselves. With the dismantling of the military-industrial complex, there didn't seem to be the conspiracies we'd found in the early 90's anyway. 'We're tired, too. We fought the good fight. It was time to enjoy our retirement. Besides, seeing you here today, I think it must have been fate,' so bold John, I think to myself , must be the rum. I can feel the blush on my cheeks though. I hope she thinks my boyish charm is cute. 'Must be, ' she agrees with me. 'So what did they do? With their share?' I tear myself out of my vision of her and I tangled up in the sheets, back into my story, 'Mulder came to get Scully that spring. The three of us were over at her place, we were going to watch the Star Wards trilogy - to get us in shape for the new movie,' I guess my nerdishness never really goes away. Again, hope she finds it endearing. We were just settling in with popcorn when her computer beeped that she had email. I think she left in on all the time, waiting to hear from him. I can only imagine their phone bills. 'Frohike dashed for the computer, shouting about wanting to read any dirty letters Mulder might be sending her way. Scully just about tackled him on the way to the desk, she read the note, with the biggest smile on her face, and then let us read it.' I paused here to order more drinks. When I didn't start talking again right away she moved her chair closer to mine. 'Don't you have a big boyfriend or husband stashed away somewhere?' I blurted out, That would be the rum talking. I was horrified, but there wasn't much I could do to take the words back. I wanted so much never to wake up from this dream. 'Its hard to maintain a relationship when you've lived a life like mine,' she smiled a sad sort of smile. 'There aren't many people out there who understand my past and my frame of reference. Living with a death sentence, pronounced by your own, supposedly benevolent, government is not an easy way to live. But tell me, what did the email say?' '-Are you ready?- That was it, three little words, even through email those two had their private communication. Frohike was moaning about how disappointed he was in Mulder's smut writing ability, 'Things haven't been the same since he left here without his video collection,' he says. And all the while Scully was smiling like I'd never seen before. We clamored for an explanation, she wouldn't say much. Only that she'd been waiting for that message. Langly wanted to know if it was some previously agreed upon code. Scully smiled again and told us no, she just knew that message was coming. 'She left with him not too long after that. They bought a ranch near Calgary, Alberta, with a great view of the Rocky Mountains. I think Mulder really liked living in Canada, it was a clean break for him, from everything he'd been through down here. And once again, Scully followed him wherever he landed. 'We went up to visit just before we moved to the Bahamas. You should see them Susanne, they have it all. The house, the land is beyond description. Mulder is teaching a class or two at the University of Calgary. Scully has a pediatric practice in the small town near their place, she takes on mostly native kids, kids that need help, that sort of thing. They worked because they wanted to, not because they had to. Her nieces and nephews come to visit them during the summer. Get this - they even call him Uncle Fox. Langly and I almost died laughing when we heard that one. In the winter they hibernate inside their log cabin, they don't need the outside world for anything, not when they have each other.' 'And you envy them that?' 'Again, who wouldn't? To have endured so much, come so close to losing each other so many times, to lose almost everything else,' I shake my head. 'To see them get the happy ending, its . . . its . . .' I can't find the words, I feel choked up. We are all amazed that its come to this, the feeling is indescribable. Susanne seems to understand that. 'I get it,' she says quietly. 'I'm glad I ran in to you today.' That small statement sends me into a near panic. It sounds like I'm going to get the 'its been great seeing you again, lets get together again soon' blow off, I'm just not ready for that. I've found her after so long - and after I've just told her the Mulder & Scully story, I want a happy ending of my own. But I say nothing. I'm contemplating how many more drinks I'll need until it doesn't matter anymore. 'Do you live near here,?' she asks, and I nod, our beach house is not far from the bar. She signals for the bartender to ring up our tab. She stands and I'm wondering if I have the grace even to call her a cab. I don't think I do. 'Lets go home then shall we?' It takes awhile for me to understand that she's talking about me and her - going to my home - together. And I suddenly realize that my earlier feelings were right. This was fate, destiny, and I was very likely going to have my own happy ending. That night, as she slept, her head on my chest, I can't sleep. The story I told her today goes around in my end, along with the phrase from the Grateful Dead song that Langly is always playing, 'What a long strange trip its been.' ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com