TITLE: Closer: Bhakti Part 01/08
AUTHOR: BioGirl
RATING: PG
CATEGORY: MSR/RST
DISTRIBUTION STATEMENT: Gossamer, Ephemeral, Xemplary, IRSB okay. All
other
archives please ask unless I have already given permission to post
other stories.  Thanks.
FEEDBACK: Please feed me at biogirrl@netscape.net and don't feel bad if
I don't get back to you ASAP.  I'm a busy girl.  And visit my other
stories at http://members.xoom.com/BioGirl/fanfic.shtm or go directly
to the Closer page at
http://members.xoom.com/BioGirl/fanfic/series/closer/closer.shtml
SPOILERS: post-all things, pre-requiem.
SUMMARY: Scully rumminates on what happened after she fell asleep on
Mulder's couch.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: This was originally larger but I broke it up into
smaller vignetts when I continued with more post-ep stories as season 7
progressed.
DISCLAIMER: All things X belong to FOX and 1013, even though this was
my script idea first!  Anyway, the paternity is mine, since CC hasn't
claimed it, but I'm willing to share joint custody of the baby.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER 1: BHAKTI

"It speaks to that which is innate in everything, and the unity of life
energy and all of us and of all things."
--Gillian, defining the title of her episode "all things"

May 2, 2000
3 AM

Scully turned her key and jiggled the handle just to be sure the
tumblers had slipped the lock into place.  Mulder's door had been
kicked in so many times, the lock was a bit unruly.  She didn't
understand why he hadn't replaced both the lock and the door, but then
again this was a man who'd slept on his couch for thirteen years and
used his bedroom as a junk drawer.

Scully shook her head in amusement and took a moment to run a finger
over the brass 42 on his door.  The 2 was missing a screw and tilted at
her touch.  The small smile that had graced her lips since waking last
transformed into a brief but brilliant grin.  After a second to compose
herself-- she didn't want to meet one of Mulder's neighbors in the hall
with a silly expression plastered on her face-- Scully was ready to
go.  The slight upturn of her lips did remain, however, as she finally
forced herself to walk toward the elevator.

If there hadn't been a budget meeting at eight am, she would have
stayed, but without a change of clothes and in need of some hair
styling products and fresh makeup, Scully had forced herself from his
bed at dawn.  How they had ended up there still seemed like a dream,
but the quite words they had spoken in his bedroom ensured that if it
was, it was going to be a reoccurring one.  Hopefully a frequently
reoccurring one, she thought, tampering down that love-sick grin until
the elevator doors closed on her.

Her words from the night before seemed to echo through the hall.  "What
if there was only one choice, and all the other choices were
wrong. . . .  All the choices would then lead to this very moment."
She hadn't really expected that moment to become something so
profound.  But then again, she hadn't expected to fall alseep either
and it was beginning to seem as if the most important changes in her
life took her by surprise.  It had been that way for seven years,
actually, but she had only just realized it.

Alone for the trip down, Scully let her mind wander back to the dark of
night and how it had come to be that she found herself making love with
her partner.  They had shared his bed several times in the recent past,
each time in the midst of a crisis, but it was nothing but platonic.
Padget was the first time, and it had started to become a trend.  It
was never discussed, but that night they had spent, wrapped together in
his bed.  Nothing had happened of course.  She was shaken up and he was
fully dressed aside from his shoes.  After that came Pfaster and the
death of Mulder's mother.  Months later she was still unable to take a
bath in candle light and her heart continued to ache at the memory the
painful tears her partner had wept the night she'd dashed his hopes of
murder.  If he hadn't been so weak from the emotional release, if she
hadn't been so exhausted from lack of sleep, and if Skinner hadn't
arrived to jet them away, Scully was sure it would have happened then.
It wouldn't have been a happy consummation, but rather one of rage
against grief and loneliness.  She was glad the fork in the path had
taken them apart that early morning.

Mulder did not speak of what had happened to him in the moonlight
woods, but Scully knew it was part of the reason last night had finally
happened.  He had been freed of his past that February night just as
the past two days had freed her from her own most hated demons.  When
she had woken on his couch after midnight, the pull down the hall had
original been to relieve her bladder.  She'd been prepared to head
straight for the front door after completing her task, but had made the
mistake, or good fortune, of peering into his bedroom.

She'd found him there in a tangle of sheets and a pair of boxer
shorts.  As had happened frequently during the past couple of days,
everything seemed to slow down and present a clarity that she would
have normally missed.  Suddenly, she saw the choices and the full
extent of their consequences with her desire rather than her logic.
And oddly, the needs of her heart felt entirely logical as she stood
above him in the darkness and a storm howled outside.  She realized,
more fully than earlier, that she was not the same woman she had been
ten years ago or two days ago.  The vision in the temple had changed
her in some deep, fundamental way she couldn't yet comprehend.  She
did, however, understand the change she'd seen in Mulder's eyes after
he'd emerged from the forest that night.  She saw it now, in her own
eyes, reflected in the polished metal of the doors.  It was that
revelation, the knowledge of that something shared and wonderful, that
had made her choice startlingly clear.

Filled with a new purpose, and without hesitation, she had stripped
down to nothing and slipped under the covers beside him.  Her movements
had woken him, startling him only momentarily.  He'd smiled in surprise
but had not spoken, perhaps feeling the spell, the lengthening of time,
that she had.  So, for a while, they had just looked at each other.
He'd shifted onto his side to face her and one of his bare legs and
found hers.  A slender-fingered hand had hesitantly found her hip and
his eyes had widened slightly at the discovery of her nakedness.  An
unsure grin had quirked his mouth.  A silent question, followed by a
trademark Mulder observation.

"You seem to have misplaced your clothes, Agent Scully." A nervous
laugh had escaping his throat then.  In his eyes she had read his
desire, hope and fear; she had been quick to assure him that his unease
was unfounded, aware of the many contradictory messages she had sent
him over the years.  "I could help you misplace yours too, Agent
Mulder," she'd replied, moving to press herself against his side.  He'd
stilled at the contact and she'd known he was restraining until she
made it perfectly clear.

Turning his face so that she could look into his eyes again, she'd
smiled, and for once her own eyes were lit with her delight.  "It's
time, Mulder," she'd said, then to be sure he was really was reading
her, "Isn't it?"  The nervousness had faded from his expression.

"You're ready?" He'd whispered, as if it was obvious that he had been
waiting for this inevitable moment when she would express her desire to
take the next, logical step.  The hand on her leg had moved slowly up
her side to show his readiness.

She'd smiled and ran nimble fingers through his tousled hair, speaking
while touching him.  "All the paths in my life, chosen or unchosen...I
believe they all have led to you...to me.  To us.  Here," she'd
explained, caressing his face and feeling the stubble on his heated
skin like never before.  "The past is behind us.  It's time to create a
future.  Let's be free together, Mulder."

Their mouths had moved closer during this, and she had stopped focusing
on his face as he'd erased the line in the sand forever.  "Yes," he'd
agreed, lips brushing hers barely.  "God I love you."  She still wasn't
sure which one of them had said that, but the words were spoken again
later as they'd laid together, naked and entwined, trying to fight the
pull of dreamland.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER CHAPTER 2: MAKYO

Outside the storm had mostly abated, leaving a light rain falling from
the gray sky.  Normally Scully would have cursed her misfortune of
having to traipse a block through such weather.  This morning, however,
she took her time, walking with her face turned up to let the fat drops
bathe her heated skin.  She realized with a start that a storm had
raged outside when they'd made their first step as partners.  Closing
her eyes she could still picture that night in Bellfluer, Oregon when
she'd been scared of mosquito bites and Mulder had quietly allowed her
into that deep recess of his soul where a boy of twelve had resided for
almost twenty years.

"Thank you," she mouthed to the weeping heavens, hoping that God in
whatever form, heard her thanksgiving.

The quick spong bath in Mulder' bathroom had not removed his scent from
her body or the latent tingling between her thighs.  Damn Skinner and
his budget meeting.  Mulder's sleepy requests for her to stay had
nearly won over her common sense, already losing the battle to the
endorphins rushing through her veins.  But even a vision and the best
sex of her life could not change her that fundamentally.  She was still
logical at her center, and showing up at work in a wrinkled suit that
smelled of sex, hospitals, and insense would not be a good thing.

Quite damp by the time she reached her car, Scully shrugged out of her
jacket and tossed it over the passenger seat.  She keyed the engine and
pulled out in the flooded streets of Alexandria.

Not many were out at such an early hour and she made it to Georgetown
in good time, considering the rain.  It had begun pouring again, and
she dashed up the front steps of her building, passing a neighbor with
a reluctant German Shepherd.

"Home sweet home," she uttered, peeling off her clothes after shutting
the door to her apartment.  Scully hopped on one foot and then the
other as she pulled off her pumps.  Rain-ruined wool was tossed
carelessly on the bathroom tile.  She shivered and turned the shower
on.  Steam poured into the small room, swirled by the fan in the
ceiling.  "Ohhhhh yeeeeaaaah," she groaned when the hot spray hit her
skin.

Scully turned to let it pound against her back.  Slowly the aches from
sleeping upright on Mulder's couch were leached out of her muscles.
She quickly grabbed her shampoo from the back ledge and squirted a
dollup into her palm.  After rubbing her hands together to distribute
the scented goop, she lathered up her hair, massaging her scalp for
several minutes before tilting her head back into the hot water.

While conditioner worked its wonders, Scully bathed her skin with a
yellow nylon puff and raspberry shower gel.  She scrubbed the remnants
of make-up off with a washcloth and conducted her usual inspection for
stubble that needed taming.  Her legs were smooth enough to hide under
suit pants without annoying her, but she lathered them with shaving gel
and quickly smoothed them again while absently wondering if she should
get them waxed.  She couldn't remember the last time she'd done that.
Probably while dating Ethan her last year teaching at Quantico.  She
had to laugh at herself, aware that she was shaving her legs in the
hope of having sex in the near future.  Somehow she knew that if she
did end up naked with Mulder again tonight he would make some crack
about it.  He was too damn observant at times, but he wouldn't be the
amazing profiler he was if not for being able to tune into people
around him so well.

Scully rinsed her legs and hair before deciding to do her arm pits
too.  She considered redefining a long lost bikini line, but decided
that if Mulder didn't care she wasn't going to go through the
discomfort of razor burn *there*.  Not that she would alter herself for
Mulder's sake, of course.  Riiiight.  Like you don't buy those
expensive tight suits to get his attention, she chided self as she
gently slid a sudsy washcloth between her thighs.  She shuddered at the
sense memory of Mulder's tongue caressing her where the rough terry
cloth caused her skin to tingle.  Her mouth opened in a silent 'O' but
she refrained from touching herself.

Scully shut the water off and stepped onto the bath mat.  She pulled a
bath sheet from the nearest rack and toweled herself off before pulling
out her hair dryer.  Her hair being short, dried relatively quickly.
She massaged lotion into her soap-dehydrated skin, and padded into the
bedroom to dress.  It was already six and she had promised to pick up
breakfast before picking Mulder up.

She considered a skirt, but rain and pantyhose did not mix.  Instead
she settled for a dark gray pantsuit, a mauve turtle neck (to hide
several hickeys), and her black zip-up boots.  Dawning her trench coat,
Scully grabbed an umbrella from the hall closet and headed back out.

The drive to the coffee shop was the longer part of the trip.  She
fought a crowd of other rush hour caffeine junkies in downtown
Alexandria to get two tall lattes and large frosting dripped cinnamon
buns.  Usually she got a bran muffin, but Scully decided to splurge.
Her sluggish metabolism could survive one sweet.  Besides, she'd work
off the calories investigating either an X-File or her partner.

While waiting for her order, the pastry still baking in the back,
Scully slumped into a chair beside the window and watched her fellow
Americans scurrying about.  The usually suited business people were
interspersed with high school and college students.  There were a few
people in jogging attire who had braved the weather.  An elderly couple
was sipping frothy beverages and sharing a large cookie at another
window table.  Scully wondered what she and Mulder would be doing when
they were octogenarians.  Fending off mutants and aliens with their
walkers?  That image dissolved when a lilting giggle caught her
attention.

Coming back to reality, Scully noticed a little girl had pushed through
the crowd of customers and was grinning up at her the way small
children did.  She was maybe five or six, or younger and tall for her
age like many kids these days, with long brown hair that had failed to
escape the rain and damp bangs that dripped rainwater in her eyes,
sticking to her long dark lashes.  Her shoes, knee socks, and the hem
of her red crushed velvet dress were also wet along with a matching
coaker.  She looked dressed for some occation, or had before drenching
her clothes. No doubt the girl had not headed her mother's warning
about jumping in puddles.  Scully never had.

"Hi, my name's Dana," Scully introduced, glancing around briefly to
look for the child's mother somewhere in the long line of wet people.
She'd also never followed the no talking to strangers rule having spent
so much of her childhood on military bases.

The little girl stepped closer, no doubt excited to be noticed by an
adult.  Little kids tend to be ignored when behaving.  "Hi," she said.
Instead of giving her name she giggled, and smiled brilliantly,
shifting from side to side in her Mary Janes.

Scully smiled.  She was quite an adorable little girl.  When she got
older other girls were going to envy those lashes.  For a moment her
chest tightened at the memory of her own little girl, but she'd learned
to push that away at inappropriate times.  Falling apart in a coffee
shop certainly constituted one.  "I like your dress," she
commented, "are you going someplace special?"

Obviously that was the topic the child had been hoping for-- children
always seemed to assume adults would figure out what they wanted to
talk about.  Her mouth contorted into a skeptical frown as she removed
her thumb from her cupid's bow mouth.  "I hafta go see my baby brother
and sister with Mommy."

She scrubbed her face with one hand before popping the thumb back in
her mouth.  Scully raised her eyebrows in interest.  "Oh, did you're
mommy have twins?" She asked, slightly confused why the girl would be
going with her mother to the hospital.  But then again, little kids
were often confused.

"Naw.  Mommy says they're gonna take pictures though."  She shrugged,
obviously confused by that.

Scully laughed lightly, understanding she probably meant a
sonogram.  "Oh, well, I'm sure you'll be a wonderful big sister," she
told the girl smiling brightly.

The child seemed to consider this and nodded.  "You kinna look like my
mommy.  But you don't have a big tummy.  Are you a mommy?" She asked
innocently.

"Um no, I'm not," Scully answered, sadness creeping into her voice.
The girl smiled sweetly and patted her knee.

"That's okay.  You will be."

Huh?

"27!"

Scully's head snapped up at her order number, breaking her own confused
expression.  An unhappy teenager was holding her bag and a cardboard
drink holder.  She looked back down to say good-bye to the girl,
finding the space she'd occupied empty.  Scully stood abruptly and
craned her neck in search of the child.  She couldn't have gone far.

"27!"

Pursing her lips, Scully hurried to claim her order.  "27," she
confirmed, handing over her order number.  "Did you see where the
little girl in the red dress went?" She asked, not quite sure why it
mattered to her if the girl had already gone off with her mother.

The kid shrugged disinterestedly.  "Sorry, didn't see her.  She yours?"

Scully blinked.  "Uh...no."  She took the bag and cups.  "Thanks," she
muttered turning and walking quickly out of the store.  She scanned the
street in both directions, her heightened perception slowing everything
down before her.  She took everything in, everyone in the rush-hour
crowd, but the little girl had gone.

Shaking her head, Scully, dashed the several yards to her car at the
curb and buckled herself in.  As she pulled out and headed toward
Mulder's she couldn't shake the feeling that something about the child
had not been right.

She made it Mulder's before the coffee had lost all of it's heat and
headed up the front steps.  She passed his landlord on the way to
elevator and the older man smiled at her.  She'd swear he knew.  Had
they been that loud?  She was sure the storm had drown out most of the
screams....  Blushing, Scully punched the 4 and took a long swig of her
latte.

Her heals clicked on he fake wooden flooring of the hallway.  She
glanced uneasily at 41 as always, recalling the odd man that had lived
there with nothing but a bed and a typewriter.  And she'd thought
Mulder was minimalist.  She shook that memory away and knocked on
Mulder's door.

"Just a minute!" He called from what she guessed was somewhere in the
hall.  No wonder his landlord complained about noise all the time.
What kind of insulation did this place have?

A moment later the lock clicked over and Mulder opened the door.  He
was dressed in an Armani as usual, sans jacket.  His blue dress shirt
was still unbuttoned revealing the white t-shirt he sometimes wore
underneath.  His tie hung around his neck.  His hair was still wet a
spiky from a shower.  She could smell freshly applied afershave.  Yum.
It surprised her how good it felt to allow herself to desire him openly
even in her mind.

Mulder grinned at her and laughed softly.  "You didn't need to bate me,
Scully," he remarked.  Before she could even look confused, he leaned
in and ran his tongue over her upper lip before kissing her soundly.
When he pulled back he smiled at her flushed expression.  "Yum."

Great minds think alike, Scully thought, allowing a small giggle to
slip free.  "I was wondering why your landlord was looking at me
funny," she explained.  She wiped at her upper lip.  "Come to think of
it, that guy at the light on Michigan looked at me the same way.  I
thought it was the afterglow of great sex, and here it was a frothed
milk mustache."

"Hey, if you were a spokesperson for that milk mustache campaign I'd be
addicted to the stuff," he leered.

She tried not to smile at his come-on but failed.  "So, you about
ready?"

He nodded, loosing enthusiasm immediately.  It never ceased to amaze
her how bipolar Mulder's moods could be.  "Change of plans.  Skinner
called us in to a crime scene.  Something about a turncoat tobacco
employee dying under mysterious circumstances."  He shrugged.  "Maybe
he was angry The Insider didn't win best picture at the Academy Awards."

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER CHAPTER 3: MATAJI

Saturday May 13, 2000

She'd shaved her legs for nothing.  Two and a half weeks later and
there had been no repeat of Tuesday morning.  Not because neither
wanted to, but because Mulder was wasn't even allowed in the field yet.

Tap tap tap....

"Mulder!" Scully warned for the fourth time, looking up from her laptop.

He set the pencil down and sighed.  "Sorry," he apologized and scrubbed
his face with his hands.  She saw him glance at the trash can beside
his desk. Another Saturday at work...just how it had all begun.  Of
course, this time it was on Skinner's assistance to finish up the case
work, put off until Mulder could make it to the office.

Now she sighed.  She'd been so overjoyed that the nicotine therapy had
cured him that it had never occurred to her that it would addict him as
well.  Apparently he'd smoked back in his ISU days just as she had
gotten through the stress of med school with the happy Tabasco plant as
her friend.  She still got occasional urges to light up when she was
under pressure, and sometimes she caved to the craving.  But that was
infrequent.  The last time was San Diego.  Mostly it was a supplement
for having no one to talk to.  Smoking had been an outlet for her
inability to express her emotions in the professional world of men.
She supposed the hell of Bill Patterson's reign had pulled Mulder in,
although he claimed to have chain smoked occasionally in high school
and college.  The product of a shitty childhood, he'd said after the
meeting with Skinner earlier.  Scully still remembered vividly the
first time she'd snuck out onto the back porch with her mother's
cigarettes at the age 14.

"Mulder, you know you can't."  She'd explained that with the nicotine
in his blood from the treatments, just one puff would be a lot more
powerful than usual.  Mulder was a strong man, but some drugs were
stronger.

"Well, I need something more effective then these," he rasped, flicking
a sunflower seed like he was punting a paper football.  Scully
remembered her brothers making them just to try and punt them at her
head.  Slouching in his chair, he tried his best leer on her.  "I have
a good idea how to supplement this particular craving."

She felt a responding tingle between her legs by tried very hard to
ignore it.  "Mulder as tempting as that sounds, you're still on
doctor's orders to absente from any physical exertion that would put a
strain on your respiratory system.  Your alveoli are still enflamed and
your oxygen intake compromised.  You can't--"

"I love it when your talk dirty, Scully.  It really turns me on."  He
wagged his eyebrows.

Scully groaned in frustration--both with her partner and her ragging,
unsatisfied libido--and lowered her forehead to the desk blotter where
she banged it several times.  She had no doubt that Mulder was sporting
a fine hard-on behind his desk.  Contrary to the belief of most men,
they don't hide them very well.  After seven years she had become well
versed in the workings of Mulder's penis.  If only she could erase the
memory from her mind of all the things she'd done with it two and a
half weeks ago, the office wouldn't be growing so damn hot.

"Can't we just go home?  Skinner can't expect us to organize expense
reports for another week just because some redneck smoked deadly
cigarettes in my presence?" Mulder whined.  "It's Saturday!"

God she hated it when Mulder whined.  He hated it when she whined and
she was getting very close to her limit as well.  "Actually, Mulder,
you get to organize the reports alone.  I'm temping at Quantico until
Skinner okays you for field duty.  Saturday classes."

Mulder groaned, but to his credit, didn't whine about it.  "You'll
stop  by place later and make sure I haven't asphyxiated myself in my
sleep?"

"Haven't I every other night?"

"Just making sure.  You supposed to keep me guessing right?" He quipped.

Scully smiled and gathered up her things for her class.  "I'll see you
tonight, Mulder.  Don't impale yourself with a pencil," she said,
glancing up at the ones he'd added to the ceiling that morning.

He grinned, but his eyes showed his sadness at her departure.  Closing
the office door behind her, Scully made her way inconspicuously out to
the parking garage and got in her car, glancing at Mulder's several
spaces over.  Somehow the benign sedans he leased just didn't seem to
fit his personality.

The drive to Quantico was long due to an accident on the beltway.  She
just made it into the parking lot of the Academy with five minutes to
spare.  Clouds were building to the west with promise of another mid-
spring thunder storm.  It would probably start pouring just as she was
going home and had to run all the way to the outer regions of the lot
to get her car.  She hoped Mulder hadn't dismantled the new smoke
detector so he could smoke in the office.

Although it had not been that long since she had last been to the
complex at Quantico, Virginia, it had been years since it was in a
teaching capacity.  Usually she helped out doing regular autopsies if
there was nothing to do in the X-Files department for whatever reason,
and that was infrequent given their buildup of expense reports.  The
last time she'd taught a class here was back when she and Mulder had
been separated by Blevins after the execution of Deep Throat.

She shook her head.  How far we have come from the paranoid Phantom of
the FBI and the by the book Ice Queen assigned to debunk his work, she
thought.  She didn't even recognize the woman she had been seven years
ago, and for the most part she was glad.  She didn't like that woman
very much, the one who was known as Dana.  The girl in the hat who
hadn't seen anything wrong with sleeping with a married man because it
was his fault if his family fell apart.  Thank god she had gotten some
sense along with that letter from the FBI.

Scully dismissed the depressing thoughts of her troubled youth and
entered the locker room in the teaching morgue.  Quickly, she stripped
off her suit and pantyhose, changing into scrubs and comfortable
shoes.  She clipped her hair back on the way to the autopsy bay.

She found her students chatting amongst themselves, most avoiding the
sheet-covered corpse of the middle-aged man who had donated his body to
science.  As much as she admired such people, she didn't think she
could ever submit her body to such abuse after knowing the things that
were done.  With her luck she'd end up one of those stolen stiffs at UC
Irvine.  Mulder was badgering Skinner to let them investigate, claiming
that with CIA connections something sinister had to be going on.  It
did seem a bit fishy.

"Dr. Jennings is out sick today, so I'll be filling in," she announced,
making her presence known.  The young cadets quieted some moving closer
to the body and others hanging back.  She recalled a number of her
students in the past making a beeline for the bathroom once she started
pulling out intestines.  She snapped on latex gloves and pulled the
sheet back, getting some groans of disgust from her students.  She
pulled the chart from the stainless steal counter top as she introduced
herself.  "I'm Dr. Scully.  You probably know of me as Mrs. Spooky or
the Ice Queen.  Make any little green men jokes in my presence and I
will shoot you."

She looked up and some of the young men and women were practically
quivering in their paper booties.  When had she gotten a reputation for
being dangerous?  Well, there were those times she'd burst in on
various superiors and yelled at them.  She had shot Mulder, and some
would say an unarmed man in cold blood.  She still couldn't think about
Pfaster without shivering.  She attempted a smile.  "I'm kidding.  I
left my gun in the locker room."

---

Two hours later everything was as dissected as it could be and Scully
was wondering why she had ever enjoyed teaching.  One student had
passed out and two others had thrown up.  Her feet were killing her
from not being able to take things at her own pace, and she was
beginning to think that the poultry in her chicken-salad sandwich had
not been cooked thoroughly.

She pulled off her gloves and tossed the sweat-dampened things in the
hazardous waste bin by the door.  She cracked her spine and washed the
power off her hands in the sink before leaving the body for someone
else to deal with.

As she stepped under the hot spray of the shower in the locker room she
tried to picture her life as it would have been had she not accepted
the assignment to the X-Files or left after that first bizarre case.
Lord knows she had been tempted, but Mulder had been more tempting.
The man was born to wear glasses!

Scully giggled at the sense memory of her reaction to that first
glimpse of Fox Spooky Mulder.  She had not met him before that March
sixth evening, or at least knowingly.  Apparently Mulder with his
photographic memory recalled an incident when he'd been at VCS and
worked at Quantico.  It was some time not long after he'd begun reading
X-Files as a hobby.  She'd been late for a class or a meeting
apparently and run right into him.  She vaguely remembered the
embarrassment of nearly knocking someone over in a hallway and
muttering a mantra of 'sorry's' while helping to pick up scattered
papers.  If he'd had any reply, she was too preoccupied with her
thoughts at the time to commit them to memory.  Funny how so many of
the major events in their relationship took place in hallways.

But if their paths had never crossed, well she was sure they would have
eventually, but if that had not been the time, she probably would still
be Dr. Ice.  Students would still be making fun of her for being
detached and asexual instead of dangerous and volatile.  Not that some
people didn't still see as cold.  She was trying to change the color of
her wardrobe that had grown increasingly monotone over the years.  She
had taken the vogue black look to seriously with the diagnosis of her
cancer and never really resurrected herself from the darkness.  After
all, enough tragedies had followed the cancer.

Would she have been married?  Jack would still have gone by the wayside
when she'd seen herself repeating Daniel all over again without the
wedding ring.  She had tried to break the cycle with Ethan Minette.  He
was actually a year younger than her and had been a semiserious lover
for five months before the X-Files and sadly only two months after.
She'd argued with herself that it was the hours that had forced her to
break up with Ethen, but years later she could silently admit that she
was just to damn in lust with Mulder.  When she'd started having the
sexual dreams about him, she'd feared letting something slip in bed
with her lover.  It was well known that she spoke in her sleep
occasionally.  Usually it was inarticulate mumbling, but occasionally
bad things got out.  That was how Jack had discovered he was unable to
satisfy her in bed.  Scully was pretty sure he'd at least perpetuated
her Ice Maiden reputation if he wasn't responsible for starting it in
the first place.

So, would she have stuck with Ethan?  Met up with Daniel again, or met
another man that could woo her enough to settle down and do the
domestic thing?  She couldn't picture it at all.  She hadn't pictured
it then outside the abstract.  It had always been a far off in the
future thing.  Now it seemed to be in the past.  Perhaps there would be
a time when she and Mulder would marry?  It didn't seem possible.
Neither of them seemed like the marrying type, but then again they had
not seemed like the best choices for partners back then.  She was
guilty of unconscious dreams about a future in which she wore Fox
Mulder's ring and legally shared his bed.  Of course those dreams
usually included little Samantha-Emily hybrids with murky, hazel eyes.
And it wasn't like that was ever going to happen.

She hadn't thought of the little girl in the coffee shop since the
Morely investigation had begun, and now the niggling of something
important returned to the forefront of her mind.  She grimaced as she
stepped out of the shower, both because of the thought and the
increasing nausea.  Why did I eat the cafeteria?  I should know better!

Scully dressed and dug through her bag for some Ibuprofen.  She
swallowed the little pink tablet dry and shouldered her bag of shower
supplies.  She hoped Mulder wouldn't be put out if she didn't stop by,
but all she wanted to do was slip into a bubble bath and then curl up
in her bed and go to sleep.  She realized suddenly that she was falling
asleep on her feet.

Traffic was not as bad as she had anticipated and in about an hour and
a half she was pulling up in front of her apartment.  Scully just about
dragged herself up the front steps.  She leaned against the back of the
elevator and wished it would rise more quickly.  She actually dropped
her keys trying to open the door.

"Bubble bath," she muttered happily, kicking the door shut.

"Want company?"

She jumped and whirled around to find Mulder standing between her
living room and dining room.  "Jesus, Mulder, you scared the hell out
of me.  What are you doing here??"

"Well, since you didn't feel up to dropping by to see me, I thought I
would drop by to see you."  He was frowning when he stepped into the
light of the entryway.  "You look like shit, Scully," he observed in
his overly-gravely voice.

"Thanks, you really know how to hand out the compliments, Mulder," she
growled, feeling even worse when he pointed it out.  She dropped her
bag by the door and he came up to her, placing a hand on her right arm.

"Seriously, Scully, you look kinda pale," he said, placing the back of
his other hand on her forehead and frowning deeper.  "Didn't I warn you
about that sandwich, Scully?"

She sagged against the door.  "Shut up, Mulder.  I'm taking a bath."
After brushing past him, she regretted the words that sounded too much
like a dismissal.  She turned her head back and found him by the door
contemplating whether to go or defy her implied meaning.  "Come on,
Mulder, you can shave my legs."

He raised an eyebrow at her, mimicking her patented expression.  "Later
can we paint each other's toenails read Cosmo??" He teased.

Scully just smiled in response and began shedding her clothes as she
went.  Mulder made himself useful, picking up her wayward clothing
while she started the water.  He had obviously learned some things from
those phone calls that always interrupted her baths, because classical
music started up in the living room.  She wondered if he called then
because he knew she was wet and naked?

He walked into the room just as she sank into the bubble-topped water
and leaned against the door frame.  "You know I used to call you every
Saturday night at eight just to catch you wet and naked," he remarked
with a sly grin that turned confused at her giggle.

She shook her head.  "I was just wondering if that was your intention.
I guess I have you pretty well pegged, Mulder."

"Oh, you don't know all my secret plans, Agent Scully," he said,
walking up to the tub and taking a seat on the bath mat at the end
opposite her.  "Gimme your feet, woman," he ordered playfully.

Scully complied and placed a wet washcloth over her eyes. Mulder
located her loofa sponge from the counter and began gently scrubbing
the balls of her feet with the wetted object.  She moaned in
appreciation as he moved over the arch of her right foot and then to
her toes.  Damn, if she'd known Mulder was so talented she would have
invited her over every Saturday night to help her bathe.

"Feeling better?" He asked.

She nodded.  "A little.  That feels wonderful, Mulder," she added.  The
nausea was fading a bit but she still felt like going into
hibernation.  The last thing she was aware of was Mulder's hands moving
up her calves.

Scully woke up in the familiar warmth of her bed with the weight of
Mulder's arm across her middle.  He was spooned up behind her with his
nose buried in the nape of her neck, tickling the hairs there with each
exhalation.  She was just nodding off again, absently wondering how she
could have slept so many years without Mulder in her bed, when she
realized it was quite light out.

Work!  She sat up abruptly and was immediately struck with a coughing
fit that jarred her partner awake.  The hand that had been resting on
her stomach slid to her shoulder as the bed shifted, indicating that he
was sitting up.  "Hey, you okay?" He asked, patting her back lightly to
help quell her spasming chest.

"F-Fine," Scully finally answered, getting control of herself.  "I'm
probably just coming down with...."  Her sentence died when her gaze
moved to her pillow and found several spots of crimson there.  Her
fingers immediately went to her nose and when she pulled them back she
was unable to stifle the gasp.  Mulder turned her bodily before she
could find the motor skills to do so.

"Sculleee," he said, her name a gravely sigh.  He held her hand by the
wrist, looking at the bloodstained finger tips.  She had a feeling of
deja vu to just a few weeks ago when she'd held up his blood hand.  For
what felt like hours but was probably only moments, they sat frozen
like that.  She was jolted back into motion when Mulder released her
and handed her a wade of tissues from the box on the night stand.  "I'm
calling your doctor," he announced in his best 'don't argue with me'
tone.

She grabbed his hand.  It couldn't be back.  Her last oncological exam
was only a month ago.  "Mulder, it's nothing.  I'm fine.  I just got a
clean bill of health, remember?  Everybody gets a nosebleed at least
once."

Scully clutched the damp Kleenex to her nose and announced she was
going to clean up.  Mulder didn't look satisfied, but didn't argue
either.  She took a wash cloth and cleaned the blood from her face, for
the first time really realizing that Mulder had bathed and dressed her
after she'd fallen asleep in the tub.  As much as she hated being taken
care of, his dedication was comforting.  There had never been anyone
else she could fall asleep around and allow to touch her in intimate
places without startling awake.  Mulder always complained that the
littlest brush of someone passing in the aisle of an airplane would
rouse her while he could throw her over his shoulder without her being
the wiser.  She'd thought that was a bit of an exaggeration, but
obviously it wasn't.  He didn't see it as the compliment it was.

While rinsing out the terry cloth, Scully felt the telltale signs of
nausea returning.  She couldn't count the number of time she'd woken
nauseous during the cancer.  She suspected that Mulder had had some
idea as to why she occasionally showed up late, but after the third
time she'd thrown an 'I'm fine' at him, he'd let the issue drop.

The feeling intensified more quickly than she had anticipated, and she
slumped onto the closed toilet lid, and lowered her head between her
knees.  She was feeling a bit lightheaded and when she closed her eyes
and opened them slowly, dark spots danced for several seconds.  Scully
attempted to stand, but didn't get very far, falling forward on her
knees to the bath mat.  She winced at the pain in her kneecaps and
leaned her forehead against the cold tile border on the wall.

"Scully?  Scully?"  A hand lightly slapped her left cheek and she
squinted at her partner who looked thoroughly frightened.  "What's
wrong?"

"Nauseous," she managed to mumble through a grimace.  She saw him nod,
some of the fear fading at her explanation.  She seemed to have lost
her ability to form sentences.  God, it felt really bad.  She clutched
her stomach and whimpered.  She'd always hated stomach viruses as a
child, driving her mother up the wall when she had a stomach ache.

He slipped an arm around her.  "Do you feel like you're going to throw
up?" He asked, rubbing one large palm up and down her back.  It felt
wonderful.

She took several deep breaths.  "I don't know," she answered honestly.

"Do you want to stay here or go back to bed?"

She thought a moment.  "Bed," she decided, shifting to lean against
Mulder's side, her face against his t-shirt.  She wished she could
appreciate his scent, but her stomach was still doing somersaults.
Scully raised her arms so he could help her stand.  She swayed and
grabbed his arm.  He encircled her before her knees buckled.  "Dizzy,"
she said between deep breaths to try and calm her stomach which didn't
like the altitude change much.

He practically carried her back into the bedroom and pulled her up and
under the covers where she curled up in a fetal ball and moaned into
her pillow.  She saw that Mulder had removed the stained case.  He slid
in beside her and began rubbing her back again.  "Have you been having
symptoms?"  For a moment she was angry that he was accusing her of
hiding from him, but she realized it was just a concerned question.

"Not since yesterday," she answered, then added, "Well, I've been tired
lately, but the past few weeks have been stressful.  Probably made me
more susceptible to--"  She cut herself off when it became obvious that
the trip back to the bedroom had been the wrong choice.  Mulder must
have felt her tense up because he moved away.  She didn't have time to
make it out of bed, and she was thankful for having replaced her wicker
waste basket with a metal one a month ago.  He thrust it at her just in
time.

After several long minutes of retching into her trash can, Scully
groaned and set it on the floor on the other side of the bed.  The
acrid smell of digestive juices filled her nostrils and she
grimaced.  "Sorry," she apologized, although she wasn't sure why.
They'd both seen each other throw up enough times.

"For what, missing me?" Mulder quipped with a light chuckle.  He
stroked her hair back from her face.  "Feel any better?"

"Yeah, actually," she replied, surprised at the realization.  Usually
throwing up just made her feel worse, but the nausea seemed pretty much
gone.  She shifted under the covers, discovering that her bladder was
quite full.  "I um have to pee," she said, getting up.  Bodily
functions had long since lost any embarrassment between them.

She picked up the can and took it with her, aware that Mulder was
watching her warily.  She left the can on the floor to deal with later
and relieved herself.  After brushing her teeth thoroughly, she
returned to the bedroom where Mulder was buttoning his jeans.  "I was
going to find some breakfast.  Are you hungry?"

She didn't think she would be, but she was.  She nodded and told him to
make something while she dressed.  Five minutes later she found him
scrambling eggs.  She wasn't sure if she could stomach that, but the
toast looked stomachable.  She picked up a slice and munched on it,
glad when the nausea didn't return.

Mulder handed her a plate of eggs and sat down with his own.  They ate
in silence, and after their plates were cleared his expression grew
serious.  He set his fork down and so did she.  Mulder cleared his
throat.  "Do you want to call in sick tomorrow?" He asked.

"I'm feeling better now.  I'll see.  It's probably just a 24 hour bug,"
she said.

He was silent for a moment.  "You don't look like you've lost weight,"
he observed, something that he'd associated with her cancer.  Even if
she knew it hadn't come back, that observation probably made him feel
more assured.  Mulder pursed his lips and furrowed his brow
slightly.  "Actually, I think you've gained weight.  Not that I was
looking intentionally," he added quickly with a boyish grin.

Scully blushed despite herself.  He was right.  She'd gained two pounds
the last time she'd check her bathroom scale several days ago.  Too
much take out food the past week.  "Well, you'll just have to help me
take off those extra pounds then.  Got any suggestions?"  She wondered
if the rain would come down in torrents like it had that night, soaking
them as they ran from her building to one of their cars.  The sky was
dark outside and the wind was blowing the cord of the venetian blinds,
making a familiar clacking sound.

He wagged his eyebrows.  "Oh, I've got plenty, Agent Scully."

She grinned back.  For the first time she picked up on the sound of the
percolating coffee maker.  She hadn't gotten around to filling it and
setting the timer the night before.  As it choked to a halt, Mulder
stood and took his plate to the sink.  He filled two mugs with the
steaming liquid and set one before her.

"Thank you," she replied automatically with a slight smile as she
reached for the small porcelain creamer container she kept on the
table.  She spooned some of the powder in a began to stir it.  A copy
of USA Today that Mulder must have picked up to read while waiting for
her the night before was folded open on the counter by the phone, and a
brightly colored add for a florist service caught her eye.  'Place your
Mother's Day Order for Sunday!' the caption said.  For a moment she
felt her heart constrict, but the feeling passed.  She had come to
terms with her inability to have children, but it still took her by
surprise at times.  It was the little things like newspaper ads that
sometimes got to her.  Scully wiped back a tear before Mulder could see
it.  There was no use dwelling on the past.  That was something she had
recently learned.  She was happier than she had been in a long time and
she was going to enjoy this Sunday, regardless of any national holiday.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER CHAPTER 4: DARSHAN

"I have often thought about it. But how will he, who is so hard-
hearted, go on in this world? Will he not consider himself superior,
will he not lose himself in pleasure and power, will he not repeat all
his father's mistakes. . .?"
--"Siddhartha", Hermann Hesse

Sunday June 18, 2000

He watched helplessly as she fell, the bullet ripping a hole through
her skull.  It entered just aboveher right eyebrow and exited with an
explosion of blood, bone, and brain matter.  Fox Mulder screamed, and
turned his gun on her murderer, but the faceless man had disapeared.
They were always faceless, and always gone before he could make sense
of things.  He ran to her then, dropping his gun at her
side.  "Sculleeeee!" He wailed, looking into her lifeless eyes.  They
were cold, but her flesh was warm.  He threaded the fingers of his left
hand through hers.  He knew he should call someone, but it didn't seem
important just now because his life had ended.  He could not grasp it.
It was too much.  Tears spilled hot from his eyes.  "Oh God no!"
Mulder burried his face in the wrinkled material of her jacket and
wept.  "Nononono!"

"Mulder."

He could hear her voice in his head.  His conscious had begun to sound
like her years ago.  That was all he had left now.  Her voice in his
head.  Mulder picked up his gun.  "Scully," he hicupped, exahusted with
grief.  It wasn't supposed to end this way.

"Mulder.  Mulder wake up!"

Her blue lips moved and Mulder gasped, his eyes snapping
open.  "Jesus," he sighed, shutting his for a moment to compose
himself.  When he opened them again he was not in a dusty warehouse,
but an imaculate bedroom with his partner looking down at, concern in
her sea-green eyes.  "Scully," he breathed her name on exhail and
pulled her down to him.  He hugged her tightly against his chest for
just a moment, feeling the thudding of her heart and the heat of her
belly through his skin.  When he was sure that she was real, he let his
arms fall limply to his sides and the tension leach from his body into
the mattress.

"Bad dream?" She asked, reaching over and brushing a lock of hair from
his sweaty brow.

"You have no idea," he replied, swallowing and finding his throat dry.
Mulder sat up enough to take a long gulp of water from glass on the
nightstand.

"Wanna talk about it?" Scully asked, sitting and propping herself on
her side with her elbow.  She didn't bother to cover her nakedness, and
the moonlight painted her torso in blue and gray shadows.  Her breasts
rose and fell a little faster than normal.  He must have scared the
bejesus out of her.  Nightmares were a common occurance in his life and
Scully had often woken him from them, coming into his motel room at
night because he had been crying out various things, thrashing around
in sleep.  He always woke tangled in the bedsheets, sweating profusly.

"It was the usual," he said.

She arched an eybrow and ran a hand over his face.  He realized he'd
been crying in his sleep.  Nothing new there.  "The usual?" She asked.

Mulder sighed and shrugged.  He never shared these particualr dreams
with her.  Sometimes he'd let slip that one involved a certain case
senario, sometimes they had been about his sister and he could tell her
about that.  But he didn't dream about Samantha anymore--in a bad way,
anyway--which left more time slots for the ones about his
partner.  "The usual you get killed and I can't do shit to stop it," he
finally answered, surprised at his honesty.  Sometimes it was violent
like a replay of Modell's protoge with someone else playing the gunmen
and other times it was worse because he had to watch her waste away
slowly.  The cancer would come back and he would have to watch her
heart slowly fail and her body turn on itself.  That one was the worst
dream.  He ran his hands over his face and sighed again before looking
at her.

Her eyes were watery and Mulder wondered at this growing closeness of
the last year when she had begun displaying things like this more
freely.  She opened her arms to him and he met her half way in a
comforting embrace.  Scully pulled him down until they were prostrait
again, his head resting above her left breast.  "Do you have
nightmares, Scully?" He asked in a hushed voice while she dragged her
fingers through his damp hair.  "I don't mean monster of the week
nightmares.  But ones you are so sure they are real that you want to
die."

She kissed the crown of his head.  "More often then I would like,
Mulder."

He closed his eyes.  "I'm sorry."

"Me too, but it's no one's fault."  She ran a hand over his
spine.  "Sometimes I dream that you didn't escape that boxcar or I
couldn't save you in Alaska."  Scully paused.  "And then I have this
one that seems so real I sometimes wonder if you were right."

"Right?" Mulder asked, craning his neck to look at her.

She smiled slightly.  "I have this...senario in my head where I walk
into that bank...you know to cash your check.  Then you show up because
you didn't endorse it.  We try to talk to Bernard but he won't listen
and then he shoots you in the chest and..." Her voice hitched, "you
fall and I know it's bad.  The exit wound is...big and your lung is
collapsed.  I try to remain calm to negotiate with him, but all I can
think of that you're dying in my arms. My hands are covered in your
blood and you're getting cold.  Just as I feel your heart stop Bernard
flips the switch and...well you know."

"Kaboom?" He said.

"Kaboom," she nodded.  "You think that could have happened?"

Mulder shifted in her arms, regarding her in the darkness.  He'd come
to learn over the past few weeks that Dana believed a lot more than
Scully let on.  'I have to keep you in line at work' she'd explained
with a coy smile one night.  "It's very possible, Scully," he replied,
stroking her cheek with the back of his hand.  "I think that was one
very long Monday."

She smiled and looked at the clock.  "Well, we've still got 28 hours
before this Monday."  Scully crawled over him and straddled his chest.
Her pubic hair tickled his abdomen and he was instantly errect.

"What do you suggest we do with those 28 hours, Agent Scully?" He
asked, mirroring the grin that lit up her face.

"Well," she said, trailing a nail down the midline of his chest, "I was
thinking we could celebrate Father's Day.  Seeing as you were so nice
to me on Mother's Day...."

"Well, I try," Mulder replied, gasping when she grabbed his cock in one
medically trained hand.  She began slithering down his body.  Oh good
lord.  He'd keep the nightmares if he got this every time he woke up
from one.  The woman gave back as good as she got, and obviously she'd
liked what he'd given a month ago.  Not that he could have done much
for himself, anyway.  Still not up to par after 'the beatle incident',
there wasn't much of chance she would have allowed him to get any that
night.  Not that he hadn't enjoyed pleasurng her.  He'd always enjoyed
cunalingus, and bestowing his skills on Scully was just pure heaven.
Speaking of which....  "Sweet mother of God, Scully."

"Ysth, Mu-er," she replied, eyebrow cocked and...he almost laughed at
his own mental pun.

"I mention lately that I...oh god...love you?"  He was alreadypanting
and she was taking him in and stroking his balls.

"Yes, but I like hearing you say it," she said, coming up for a deep
breath before taking him all the way in one movement, and scrapping her
teeth lightly over his length.

Aparently her roomate at Berkeley was one of those odd people who liked
to impress others with their unusual bodily tricks like wiggling their
ears and turning their hands 360 degrees or...in the currently relevent
case, swallowing a banana hole.  He'd been witness to such inventive
displays at many a frat party, and he remembered someone commenting on
teaching that to some of the hotter sorority girls.  Scully may not
have been a sorority girl, but she was as hot as they came, and good
lord could she relax her throat muscles.  "Why the hell
weren't...jesus...guys beating down doors to...oh yeeeaaah...get a
piece of you?"

She didn't answer until she'd climaxed him, swallowing every last drop
of him.  Scully slid off of his slowly softening penis and
smiled.  "Who says they weren't, Agent Mulder?"

He laughed and pulled her head down to kiss her.  He liked the way he
tasted on her lips.  He liked the way she tasted on his lips.  Perhaps
he'd give her a 'thank you note' later.  "Don't ever change, Scully."

"You won't ever get tired of me poking holes in all your therories and
continuing to disbelieve even when it's absurdly obvious that you're
right?" She countered teasingly.

Mulder grinned.  "Oh, well Agent Mulder will probably be ready to kick
your ass, and a fine ass it is I might add, but I think he'll realize
that the benefits outway such trival ocupational hazards," he replied,
trailing kisses down her body as she had just done to him.

"Yeah, like what?" She asked.

He stopped above her stomach and smiled.  "I can think of a few
things," he said before placing a chaste kiss bellow her navel and
moved south to her pubic hair.

She would make such a beautiful mother, he thought.  Maybe it was
because they were involved now, but it seemed that thought crossed his
mind a lot lately.  It hurt somewhere deep inside that it would never
happen for her.  For them.

"It's three in the morning, Mulder.  Why don't we take a rescess until
the sun comes up?"

"I guess I am kind of tired," he admitted.

"I wore you out, old man?"

He scoffed.  "No, I think the adrenaline rush from my...dream...just
wore off and the endorphines aren't helping.  But the early present was
much apreciated and I promise to repay you in kind...when the sun comes
up."

"I'll be counting on it," Scully giggled.

He loved her giggle.  It was so innocent that it made him forget how
hard these years had been on both of them.  "I love you," he murmured
against her heated flesh, then crawled back up to kiss his lover once
more before embracing her and rejoining her in sleep.
--

Fox was standing on a beach.  An African beach if he believed what had
happend those months ago when he was in the hospital.  While his brain
activity had increased, driving him to physical and mental exhaustion,
he had been able to escape to this place.  Somehow, he believed, his
subconscious had tapped into Scully's and allowed him to see through
her eyes without being aware of it.  His mind, taxed by the strange new
ability, had woven her landscape into a dreamscape, mingling it with
his own internal thoughts and emotions.

He hadn't dreamed of this place since returning from the hospital, but
just as then, he was aware that it wasn't real.  He knew it was an
imaginary reality, and once again he wondered how much of it was his
own creation.  The first time he had come to this place, it had made
him wonder of God's existence for the first time.  He'd been lost from
any spirituality for a long time.  Seeing Samantha after his recovery
had helped to strengthen that budding faith, and now, Fox had the
distinct feeling that something powerful was about to take place in
this nonreality.

Fox expected to meet the boy as he walked along the shore, but when he
reached the sandship he found a girl instead.  He was very surprised to
recognize her.  She was two or three years old with long brown hair and
eyes like the ocean.  She wore a red, crushed velevet dress that
billowed in the breeze.  Seven long years ago he had glimpsed this
child several times, but her identity had eluded him in Samuel's death.

"Hi there," he greeted, not knowing what to say.  Back then he had
wondered if she was an image of his sister, pulled from his memories to
give him hope, but now that he saw her up close, and having seen his
sister dead, he knew she wasn't Samantha.

"You're right," she said, splashing her small bare feet in the water.

He forrowed his brow.  "Right about what?"

She rolled her heavy lashed eyes.  "I'm not your sister."

"You can read my thoughts?" Fox asked, stunned.

She rolled her eyes a second time.  "This is all in your head, Fox."

"Oh."  For a moment he ahd forgotten that.  It made sense.  The boy had
read his thoughts too, but then again he was the boy.  "What should I
call you?"

She smiled up at him and clasped her hands behind her back.  "Sam is
fine."

He blinked.  "Pardon?"

"I don't have a name yet.  So...."  At his bewildered expression she
giggled just like Scully and reached out, indicating that he should
take her hand.  "Just call me Sam."

"So who are you, Sam....?" Fox asked, taking her tiny hand in his.  It
felt odd to call another little girl that name.

Sam began walking around the ship.  "I, Fox William Mulder," she
said, "am your daughter."

He stopped them.  "My...I don't understand.  That's not possible.  I--"

"Anything is possible in the eyes of God, Fox," she interrupted.  "You
and Dana have suffered more losses than most and it was time to set
things right.  You are going to face a separation soon. I am here now,
Fox, to tell you things of the future.  I will be with Dana to help her
through your absence for it will be long and hard.  You have both grown
very close in these past months."

Fox swallowed hard.  His mouth felt dry and cotteny.  Scully was
pregnant?  His knees felt weak, which was odd he supposed since this
was all a dream.  It was so hard to fathom, and yet it explained so
many of her actions lately.  "What's going to happen to us?  Where am I
going?  I wouldn't leave her know that--"

"I know, Fox," the girl interupted again.  "It has to happen this way.
It is all part of the greater plan.  You will learn things in your
absence and more upon your return.  In order that you follow this
through, you won't remeber this dream until it is too late to return.
But I will be there with you just as I will be with Dana.  You're mind
has been altered.  Given you a conncetion with each other.  You may not
realize the physicallity of it right away, but in time it will manifest
itself."

"The voices?" Fox asked, remembering again how he could feel her when
she was near.  He'd known when she was in the hospital.  He'd seen
snapshots of what she did.  She'd told him afterward how she'd found
Dr. Symons in the hospital, but couldn't explain knowing he was in the
stairwell.  She'd said it was like a voice had told her so.  Fox had
not explained that it was his voice she'd heard.  "How?"

"I can't tell you that now.  There isn't time."

"How is it going to happen?  How can I leave her now, even if I don't
remember this?"

Sam placed her free hand on the side of the ship and with a loud hiss,
the grains of sand fell to the ground, exposing a gleaming black metal
hull.  Fox gasped and reached out to touch it.  His hand penetrated
some kind of distortion in the atmosphere and ressonated so quickly he
thought it would snap his wrist.  He pulled back quickly.  A bright
flash blinded him momentarily and when it faded he wasn't on a beach
any longer, but in a forest.  Mulder looked down at the girl.  "I don't
understand," he said.

"When you reach through it, you will remember.  But the pull is too
strong.  You will not be able to resist.  It isn't your fault, Fox."

Fox was silent for several minutes.  He let go of his daughter's hand
and looked around the landscape.  It was very familiar.  The clearing
that ship rested in.... "Bellefluer," he whispered, eyes growing wide.
Suddenly he understood.  "I'm going to be abducted."

"Yes," she confirmed.  "It's happening again.  You'll be next.  After
they take Billy Miles.  The ship will crash but will not be damaged
enough to be found.  Someone will have to find the ship before it
rebuilds itself.  You and Skinner will come here, lured by Alex
Krycek.  He will not be able to save you.  Despite his deals with
people you distrust, he thinks very highly of you, Fox.  He will stop
at nothing to find you.  He will keep Dana safe."

Fox nodded absently.  "Where will she be?  Dana?"  How strange it still
felt to call her that.  Dana.  His lover and now the mother of his
child.  He felt like weeping out unadulterated joy and unspeakable
terror.

"In Washington in the hospital."

"The hospital?"  God did he get her hurt again?

"You didn't hurt her, Fox.  She's twelve weeks pregnant.  Your
connection is very strong.  She collapses when you come near this spot
where she earlier experienced the...forcefield if you will.  It's in
the hospital, after your taken that she finds out about my existance."

Fox bit his lip and clenched his fists, feeling trapped.  "Oh god," he
cried to the circle of blue sky above the clearing, "why is this
happening?  Why now?  Why me?  I just want it all to end!"  He wasn't
sure if he was actually addressing any diety or just expressing
frustration.  He seemed to always have an endless supply.

Sam reached out and grabbed his arm, immediatly sending a calming
feeling that leached through him like herroine flowing through an
addicts veins.  "It will end, Fox.  It will all be over soon and you
will be returned to Dana.  You'll be with her when I'm born and you
will both have your answers."  She paused.  "Well, the important ones.
I'm not saying that your quest will be over, but the path will have
changed drastically.  You will come to see your true role in all of
this, Fox.  You will understand."

"But I don't want to go," he wept, feeling ashamed for his tears.  This
was only a dream.  But he knew it wasn't really.  He only wished it was.

"I know, Fox," she empathized, rubbing her small hand up and down his
arm.  "Most people who are chosen for such things are unwilling at
first.  Do you think Jesus wanted to be crusified?  I'm sure he would
have much rather lived out his days in some small village shacked up
with Mary Magdalaine," she quipped, a sly, familiar smile gracing her
cupidsbow mouth.  Such words from the mouth of a three-year-old seemed
do very strange.  "But there are some paths you cannot control.  Free
will only goes so far, Fox.  Some of us have a fate that we must
fullfill no matter how painful it is for us and those who love us.  You
must trust in God that you and the others will be saved.  I know that
at times it will seem that there is no greater power, as men like
Spender preach, but that is only because they fear Him and a horrible
fate they will face in death.  They do not want to believe in such
repayment even if they know it will be deserved."  She smiled
grimly.  "But you've done nothing wrong, Fox, despite what you
believe.  You've taken nothing away from Dana.  That was not your
doing.  Her loyalty was her choice as much as it was controled by God.
Souls that are meant to be together are never separated for long.  Even
by death.  But don't worry, Fox.  It won't come to that this time."

He could only nod imperceptibly and wipe at his reddened eyes.  "She'll
be okay?" He asked, throat closing on him.

"She is strong, Fox."

"The strongest," he sighed.  He'd always admired her strength.  In that
way she was his hero.  "Will she know I'm okay?"  He couldn't ask if he
would be okay and didn't want to know.  He'd expereinced pain about as
excruciating as it got short of child birth, and he hoped he could face
that again if he had too.

"You can tell her yourself when you get there."
--
Mulder woke with a start, his breath catching and coming out in a
weezing gasp.

"Mulder, are you okay?  Did you have another nightmare?" Scully asked,
caressing his sweaty forehead.

"I..."  He closed his eyes and knited his brow, trying to remember.
There was a fleeting image of a forested area and then nothing.  It was
gone.  Mulder shook his head.  "I don't know, Scully.  I guess it
wasn't important."  He offered a small smile.

"Okay.  You want breakfast?  I'll put on some coffee."  She crawled out
of bed and disapeared before he could answer.

Mulder staired up at the ceiling.  It was raining again and the light
refrected through the drops on the windowpain danced on the celing.  He
couldn't shake the feeling of forboding and he didn't like how helpless
that made him feel.  Something very bad was going to happen.  He had a
hunch.  And Fox Mulder's hunches were right 98.9 percent of the time.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER CHAPTER 5: GRABA GRHA

"Whenever Mulder leaves Scully, she does something interesting, like
she has a baby."
--David Duchovny

June 2000

Skinner hadn't responded and she didn't know what more to say.  If he
didn't leave soon he was going to witness a side of Dana Scully that
few people knew existed and she couldn't handle that, no matter how
much she respected her boss and sympathized with his guilt.  It had
taken years for her to let even Mulder see it.  Why had she let him go
alone this time?  Why did she finally listen to him when she knew that
no one could watch Fox Mulder's back as well as she could?  Damn it.

Scully bit down hard on her bottom lip and made a poor attempt at
composing herself.  She was losing the battle fast and knew that
Skinner could see it.  She saw in his expression many words of
consolation that he didn't know how to say.  They wouldn't have helped
anyway.

"Dana...." He said, the shock on his face drying some the earlier tears
that had failed to fall.

She shook her head quickly.  "I need...." She hiccuped a sob.  "Could
you...."  She  gestured toward the door and then covered her face with
her hands.  When finally she heard the door close behind his fading
footsteps she rolled onto her side, curled up as tightly as she could,
and let the tears flow.  She had cried tears of confusion after her
father's funeral and purged guilt in her mother's arms after New
Mexico.  The cancer had brought despair for leaving those she loved and
Emily had just left bewilderment.  But never in her life and she felt
so abandoned and abused.  She wept unabashedly, soaking the pillow she
clutched, a lifesaver for a drowning woman.  Life had been taken from
her before, but never had the outcome seemed so utterly unfair.  God
had an awfully sick sense of humor, and inside Scully laughed
maniacally at the cruel irony of her life.
---

The sandstorm burned as the grains bit into her skin.  The dark linen
of her dress fluttered loudly in the gale like a flag on the mast of a
wind-tossed ship.  Scully wrapped her arms around herself and trudged
through the desert in search of her missing cross.  It was always this
way.  Had been since the morning before Emily's funeral.  Sometimes she
really hated her mother for giving her this secret ability see.  Who
would have thought that Dana Scully, Queen of the Skeptics, would have
prophetic dreams?  And they always seemed to turn into nightmares
later, which only made them worse.  Why she never had good glimpses of
the future made her wonder if her life wasn't ever going to be happy.

The cross was quickly being buried by the sand, and Scully bent to pick
it up just as it disappeared from view.  She brushed away the grains,
but only found more sand.  Frantically she began digging, finding
nothing.  She hated the reminder that she had lost a part of herself
again and felt on herself on the verge of panicking.  It was supposed
to be here!  Gone just like Mulder.  Vanished without a trance.  If
Samantha Mulder was dead, it was quite possible her brother had joined
her in the starlight.

"I think that was more of a metaphysical idea, Scully."

Her eyes grew wide, and Scully leapt to her feet again, the sand
clutched in her right hand, draining through her fingers to the
ground.  She found herself face to face with Mulder, dressed in the
clothes he must have had on when he'd disappeared.  The gold chain of
her necklace glinted beneath the collar of his jacket.  "Oh my god,"
she whispered, stepping closer.  With a tentative and shaking hand she
reached out to touch him.  He was solid but she'd half-expected it to
go right through.

"Looking for something, Scully?" he asked, pulling the piece of jewelry
from it's hiding place, so that the cross dangled in front of the
zipper.

She blinked.  "How did you know that I--"

"It seems to be the norm around here.  Telepathy," he explained with a
small grin.  "From the far side anyway.  But I had a hunch anyway."

"Here?" She asked.

Mulder shrugged.  "Where ever.  I don't know where we are.  Another
plain of existence?  Maybe it's where Spirit walkers go.  Too bad I
can't seem to reach Albert."  He moved both hands to her arms and
squeezed lightly.  "How are you doing, Dana?"

"I'm...."  She didn't know what to say.  She didn't know if this was
happening.  With all the stress and hormones....

"It's really happening, Scully," he assured her.  "And no, I'm not
dead.  I can't really explain where I am.  Well, right now my
conciousness...spirit...whatever you call it, is in this place with
yours."

He was alive!  She had to believe it.  Tears flooded her eyes.  "How?"

"I'm not sure.  I'm not sure if I'm in control of it.  I've tried...I
called you once when I was in New Mexico to tell you I was alive."

She was crying silently now.  The sand storm had stopped.  "I know,"
she replied softly.  "So...you're okay, Mulder?"

"Pretty much," he said.

"Pretty much?" She echoed.

"It's not the alien version of Club Med," he joked, "but it's better
than that Russian Gulag."  He shrugged and ran his hands up to her
shoulders and back around her shoulder blades to encompass her in a hug.

Her voice was muffled against his jacket.  "Are you coming back?"  She
didn't want to ask, but she had to know.  She had to know if it was
worth having any hope.

"Yes."

It was amazing what the utterance of one word could mean.  Scully let
out a relieved sigh and hugged him tighter.  "When?" She demanded.

"Soon, I've been told," he said cryptically.  He massaged her back and
she shivered.  Parts of her body that shouldn't have became aroused at
his touch.  He smiled.  "It's okay, Scully."  He leaned down and
brushed is lips over hers.  She moaned with regret when he pulled
back.  "Not long."  If this was a dream...even if it wasn't, she didn't
want to wake up.

"Don't leave me, Mulder," she pleaded, pulling back to look into his
murky eyes.  "I need you.  So much.  Especially now...."

"I know."  He kissed her forehead and brushed back her hair.  "Don't
worry.  I'll be back before she's born."

"You...how did you...she?" Scully stammered.

He laughed but didn't answer.  "That was a busy couple of days, huh?
Visions, healings, and miraculous conceptions.  Don't worry about me,
Scully."  He brought one hand down to her hip and around to her abdomen
where he pressed gently.  Reverently.

"Mulder," she cried, "I don't know what to believe."

"Believe what you have always believed, Dana," he replied.  "You told
me once that you believed God's hand could be witnessed."

She sniffled.  "You did this just to get me to admit that I believe in
aliens, didn't you?" She said, trying to lighten the strange mood.

He grinned.  "You've got me pegged, Scully," he laughed, then removed
his hand from her stomach.

"I miss you so much already," she exclaimed, finally letting an
anguished sob escape her throat.

Mulder pulled her back into a quick embrace.  "Oh, love, I know.  I
miss you too.  But it had to be this way."

"Why!?" Scully demanded, burying her face in her chest, unwilling to
allow him to step back.

"I don't know yet.  But I will," he answered, sounding honest, and
extracting the cloth of his jacket from her fists.

Resigned, she stepped back and searched his eyes.  "Mulder...."

"They're coming, Scully.  Somebody has to stop them."

"And it has to be you?"

He shook his head, for the first time looking as lost as she was.  "It
wasn't my choice to make.  I didn't want to go, Dana, you have to
believe me.  I will come back soon.  All of us will.  I know it seems
impossible now, but it will happen.  I promise."  He said it with such
conviction and honesty.

"I believe you, Fox," she said, his name sounding odd on her lips.
She'd never called him that before even in bed, but it felt right.  He
smiled brightly and she knew it was.

"I have to go," he said.  His eyes were liquid and seemed to plead
differently with something she could not see.

Scully raised up on her bare toes once more and kissed him
passionately.  "Will you come back to me...here?" She asked, when they
parted breathless.  Where ever this is, she silent added.

"I don't know if I can."

She nodded.  She wanted to ask more about their child and other things,
but it felt so good to touch him and be touched.  Why had she
implemented the no sleeping together on the road policy?  She wished so
badly now that they'd made love that night in Bellefluer.  If only
she'd let him call a doctor....  She shut her eyes and squeezed back
tears.  When she opened them again, he was gone.

"No," she gasped, spinning around.  The wind had picked up again and
the sand blew around her.  "Come back!"  She cupped her hands around
her mouth and wailed his name.
--

"Dana."

"No!  Huh?"  Scully woke with a start and blinked at her mother who
ceased shaking her arm.  For a moment she was disoriented, wondering
where the motel had gone.  Then she remembered.  Hospital room.  Mulder
was back in a UFO somewhere hovering above the earth.  Was it all a
dream?

"Mom.  How long have you been here?"

"I just walked in," Margaret Scully replied.  "You were having a
nightmare.  Calling his name."  Her expression was pained and Scully
wondered, not for the first time, what her relationship with Mulder
was.  The two had become close during her abduction; and although they
rarely saw each other since then, her mother always asked about
him.  "Mr. Skinner told me what happened to Fox," she said, sitting
down in the chair beside the bed.  She took Scully's hand and brushed
back some hairs that had stuck to her temples with the dried
tears.  "I'm so sorry, dear.  Whatever you need.  You know I'll be
here."

Scully wiped tears from the corners of her eyes with her other hand.
She smiled her thanks and squeezed her mother's hand.  She promised
herself not to shut her mother out from her personal struggle this
time.  Just as sure as she had figured things out.  She could not dump
this on the woman now until she understood it.  "I know," she added
feeling teary-eyed again.  She blamed it on hormones.

Her mother ran a thumb over the back of Scully's hand.  It was a
gesture Scully remembered since boughts of childhood illness: her
mother sitting beside her, holding and caressing her hand.  "Melvin
told me you collapsed at the office.  He and his friends are very
worried about you," she finally said.  "Your doctor was with another
patient when I got here.  What is it, Dana?  Mr. Skinner
looked...well...it isn't good news is it?  Has the...cancer returned,
Dana?"  She asked the last sentence in a hushed voice as if that would
make it less possible.

Her mother looked about to cry herself.  An inappropriate giggle
escaped her throat.  Good news.  It all depended on the point of
view.  "No, mom it isn't the cancer," she assured her and watched the
older woman deflate with the release of worry.  "I'm fine, really.
Just a little dehydrated."   There were some things she could tell her
now, however.  Scully wet her lips and took a deep breath.  She wasn't
feeling so good suddenly.  Now that she knew, it seemed impossible to
have not recognized the symptoms no matter what the doctors had told
her.  "Mom," she began, "about two and a half months ago Mulder and
I...we became...involved."

The surprised excitement on her mother's face faded quickly and was
replaced with even deeper sadness than before.  "Oh, honey, I'm so
sorry.  You'll find him.  Mr. Skinner said he wouldn't give up
looking."  Scully had known for some time that her mother wanted them
together.  She'd hinted at it occasionally and often chastised Scully
for the times she rebuffed Mulder.

Her nose was beginning to run from emotions and she sniffed
loudly.  "What if he doesn't come back?  What if I have to do this
alone?  I don't think I can."  She wished she was strong enough to
admit that the 'this' was more than a life's work, but a new life.

"Dana...."  Her mother hugged her again.  "You will be okay.  Fox
continued on and found you."

Scully smoothed the sheets over her abdomen, momentarily wondering how
long it would be before she began showing.  Mulder had been right about
the weight gain a month ago.  It had continued, centered in the area of
her waist.  She'd begun using a looser hook on her bras as well.  "Mom,
Missy told me that when I was taken you...had a dream."

"I did," her mother replied, pulling back and looking at her
strangely.  "Why?"

"I've...had dreams too," Scully said.  Never before had she admitted
them to anyone, always wanting disbelieve something so unscientific.

"About Fox?" She asked, seemingly not surprised that her daughter had
prophetic dreams too.  Melissa had been known for her ESP as well.  It
was a Scully woman thing.

"It started with him," Scully explained.  "When I thought he was dead
in New Mexico.  He came to me in a dream and said he was coming back.
That he was alive.  I've also had dreams about Emily.  And I've had
other...visions occasionally of other things.  Other people.  I haven't
talked about most of them.  I didn't want to believe them for a long
time."

"But now you do?"

"I...before you came in...when I was asleep I had....  Mulder was
there.  He told me that he would come back.  That everything would be
okay.  I want to believe that so much, Mom, but what if none of it was
real?  What it was all in my mind?"

Her mother looked at her sagely, a woman familiar with these
experiences since childhood.  "I don't believe it was all in your head,
Dana.  You wouldn't have told me if you did.  Fox will come back to us."

Scully returned a quivering smile and wiped at her eyes.  "Thank you.
I love you, Mom."

"I love you two, baby girl," her mother replied.  She planted a kiss on
her forehead and stood just as the door opened and a white-coated man
entered.

"How are you doing, Dana?" He asked.

"I'm going to get some coffee," her mother said, giving her hand one
final squeeze.

"Good.  Tired, kind of nauseous," Scully admitted.

"Well."  He took the chart from under his arm and made a show of
looking it over.  "The preliminary results have come back on the amnio
and blood work.  Everything looks spotless.  The fetus is healthy.
Strong heartbeat, normal size for twelve weeks.  I don't see a need to
keep you here any longer.  Kathy can give you some referrals for a
regular OB if you need some.  Any questions?"

"Aside from how it's possible, I guess not," Scully replied.

He smiled and nodded, closing the chart.  "Well, then.  Make sure to
get more sleep, take naps when you feel tired, and eat throughout the
day.  You don't want your stomach to get completely empty or full.  The
dizziness and lightheadedness will probably become less severe if you
slow down a bit.  The tiredness should decrease along with frequent
urination as your uterus continues shifting upward.  If the vertigo or
nausea get too bad, you want to get in touch with your doctor right
away.  The rest of the test results should be back in a week probably
two for the genetic tests."

Scully smiled in appreciation.  "Thank you."

"No thank you, Dana," the doctor said.  "It's not every day that I have
a pregnant, barren woman as a patient.  But it does happen."

"But not usually with the same extenuating circumstances."

He chuckled lightly.  "No, that's for sure.  You have one impressive
medical file.  I'm surprised they haven't named a wing after you."

"Yeah, me too."  You should see my partner's file, she thought, but he
was already saying his good-byes.

Scully sighed heavily and scooted to the side of the bed.  She hung her
legs over the edge and stood gingerly, her muscles sore from disuse and
strain from being shaken by the...forcefield?  It was a wonder she
hadn't miscarried.  Her clothes were on the dresser by the bathroom and
she collected them before entering.  The suit was winkled but it was
better than her backless blue gown.  She pulled on her white blouse and
buttoned it, noticing, not for the first time, that it was tight around
the bust.  And here she'd thought it had shrunk in the drier.  Scully
shook her head and pulled on her slip and skirt.  She tossed her ruined
pantyhose in the trash and exited the bathroom.  Her jacket was still
hanging over the bed tray by the door.

She had been avoiding it, but she couldn't really leave it there.  She
pulled it on and was assaulted with the odor of sweat, takeout food,
and most of all, Mulder's aftershave.  It made her eyes water.  Why
hadn't she kissed him in the hallway?  It was after hours.  No one
would have seen them.  Her last physical memories were a hug in the
Hoover Building and cuddling in Mulder's motel room.  If she focused
hard enough she could feel his arms embracing her and the heat of his
body leaching through the covers.  They'd fallen asleep like that and
Billy Miles' call the following morning had been too urgent to allow
time for any more than brief brush of lips before heading off to
separate showers.

A shiver ran down her spine.  Shuddering she shoved her hands in the
pockets and looked out at the dark sky of her room.  The stars were
hiden by city lights and that made her infinitly sad.  She couldn't
even see where he might be, stuck in this steril room.  Scully forced
herself to shake off such meloncholic thoughts and the chills faded as
they had, wrapped in Mulder's arms, spooned up with him in Oregon.
Don't go there, Dana.  It will only hurt, she scolded.

She pulled her hands free of the rough fabric and turned toward the
door, halted a moment later by the soft sound of metal on linolium.
Looking down, the florecent light glinting off something between her
feet.  Scully bent to pick up the small puddle of gold and gasped.
There, from the short gold, fine-linked chain, hung her cross pendant.
It couldn't be.  Had Mulder slipped it back in her pocket without her
noticing?  She was so sure he'd been wearing it when he left.  Scully
closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath.  Some things had
to be taken on faith.  Perhaps this was one of them.  A sign, another
sign that he would return.

She'd gotten word of Mulder's joke about sharing rooms to cut back on
spending; when he came back she was going to make sure they never slept
apart again.  Her secret was going to come out pretty soon, anyway.  In
another seven weeks or so she wouldn't be able to hide it under the
biggest sizes of her fat wardrobe.  And maternity clothes were just as
good as slapping a big "I'm Pregnant" sign on her ass.

"Life is never dull with you, Mulder," she muttered ruefully, refasting
her necklance before she opened the door.  Scully walked down to the
nurses' station to sign herself out and retrieve her service weapon.

"Congratulations, Dana," one of the oncall nurses said brightly.  "As
much as I enjoy your stays, darling, I hope the next time I get the
chance it's to visit you up in maternity."

"Um...thanks," she replied remembering the woman's face from a number
of stays in the hospital.  I really should have a wing named me, she
thought.

"Where's that handsome, accident prone man of yours?" She asked,
handing over the holstered gun.

Damn.  I am not going to break down into hysterics every time someone
even alludes to Mulder, she chanted like a mantra in her
mind.  "He's...ah on a case."  It wasn't a complete lie.

"Did you tell him?"

"Marianne, stopping sticking your nose where it don't belong," a
heavyset woman, scolded as she walked behind the counter.

"What?"  Marianne said innocently.  "Have you seen him?  I'd leave Jim
for her partner, I'll tell you that.  But he can have an awful bedside
manner when Dana isn't around to distract him."  She winked on the
second to last word and Scully blushed.

They continued arguing and Scully looked up and down the hall.  Her
support group was no where to be found so she suspected they had either
gone to the cafeteria or departed.  "If my mother comes looking for me,
could you tell her I caught a cab home and that I'll call her later?"
She interrupted.  "And please don't tell her.  I...I need to figure out
some things first."

"Sure thing, honey," the other nurse said with an understanding
smile.  "You take care, now."

"Don't come back for six months!" Marianne called after her and Scully
smiled to herself as she walked down to the elevator.

She rode up with a young intern and male nurse who looked like they'd
been stuck with a double shift in the ER.  Her floor was first and she
wrapped her arms around herself as she made the short trip to her
destination.  Her heals clicked rhythmically on the floor and it felt
like she was alone and yet part of everything.  Dividual.

Scully smiled politely at a pregnant woman in labor, pacing the long
hallway with her attentive mate.  She had never dared imagine herself
in that position accept in dreams she could not control.  Silently she
prayed that Mulder would be there when she need him most.  She needed
him to be with her when she was the one pacing these halls.  For a
moment she closed her eyes and allowed herself to picture it.  Mulder's
long arms barely encircling her swollen, ripe belly.  Feeling their
child moving within.  It wouldn't be long before she would feel the
baby moving inside her.

She refused to cry and continued on toward a small group of people.
She stopped at the large soundproof window of the nursery and peered in
at the new lives, wrapped in pink and blue, squirming in their
bassinets.  People said all babies looked the same, and ethnicity
aside, she had to agree.  But they already had their personalities.
Some were still and others restless.  One little boy didn't like his
blue knit cap and kept pulling it off and revealing his head of curly
black hair to the dismay of the peds nurse.  A pair of identical twins
seemed discontent to be separated by the clear plastic.  Her fellow
watchers conversed in hushed tones and she deduced them to be the
grandparents, aunt and uncle of the uncapped baby.  "His mother kept
doing that too," the grandmother laughed.  "Oh, she was a wild one!"

Scully tuned out the rest of their conversation, feeling bad for
eavesdropping.  She was startled when a familiar reflection appeared
behind her in the glass.  She spun around.  "Frohike?  I figured you
and the guys went home."

"Naw, we just went down for coffee.  Wanted to make sure you were
okay.  Your mom was looking for you.  I volunteered to look around," he
explained.

"I told one of the nurses to tell her I would get a cab."

"Nonsense.  We can take you home if it's a problem for your mom,"
Frohike insisted.

Scully smiled.  He was always so thoughtful.  Looking out for her and
Mulder.  "It's not that, Frohike.  I just need to be alone."

"Oh, I understand.  I was thinking about going out and getting
smashed.  You're welcome to join me, Agent Scully," he said, glancing
in at the newborns.

He always reverted to titles when he was feeling nervous.  She laughed
mirthlessly.  "You can call me Dana, Frohike.  And thanks for the
offer.  I appreciate it, but I'll have to take a rain check on that
one."

Frohike stared at the new lives behind the glass, his expression
telling her that he felt Mulder's pain for her.  She wanted to tell
him, but couldn't.  Her mind was still spinning.  Mulder was gone and
she was pregnant.  How was she ever going to deal with this?  Scully
patted the stocky man lightly on the bicep.  "He's coming back soon,
Frohike.  He doesn't want us to worry.  He has to do this."

He looked at her quizzically.  Agent Scully didn't say things like that
and his expression made her giggle.  She hung her head and shook it
from side to side several times.  "Walk me to my cab, Melvin," she
said, turning toward the elevator and ushering him along with  hand on
his shoulder blade.  What if the dream was just a dream?  No, she had
to believe that it was real.  The doubts would come without her
encouraging them.  Right now she had to believe or she would shatter.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx


xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER CHAPTER 6: AVATARA

MARITA: If he finds the ship, then what?
CSM: To possess it, is to possess the answer to all things. Every
possible, imaginable question.
--"Requiem"

Thursday February 1, 2001
8:15 PM

The office was silent.  Her partner Agent John Dogget had gone home
promptly at five with his usual, "Go home."  He knew she never
listened.  Standing with difficulty from her desk chair, Scully
walked...or waddled...the length of the small basement room and back.
She'd tried so hard to keep it the same, but Dogget had, by necesity,
moved his stuff in.  He'd also brought a desk.  She'd never had a desk
and it didn't seem right that he'd taken it upon himself to requisition
one.  And it didn't feel right to call Mulder's desk hers.

She opened the desk drawer and pulled out his name plate.  She'd
finally gotten her name on the door...to replace his.  Sighing, and
wiping at her eyes, Scully set it back beside his desk plate and shut
the drawer.  She looked at the bulltin board and Mulder's I Want To
Believer poster. She'd ripped it down when she was in her angry phase
and then sobbed over the shreaded peices when depression hit hard.
She'd told him it was a gift from Karen because she'd known that he
felt bad about her death, because she'd acted like a jelous bitch the
entire case, and because she'd felt uncomfortable giving him something
so meaningful.  When barganing hit, Scully had spent hours searching
Internet auction sites for another one so that it would be there when
he came back.  As if replacing it would somehow gaurante his safe and
prompt return to her.  She'd replaced it, but he was still gone.

'I am not going to cry' had become her silent montra but it didn't work
very well.  She blamed the pregnancy hormones, but she knew it was
really just a broken heart.  Sometimes she thought she was losing her
mind.  In the middle of interogating a suspect she would hear his voice
in her head telling her what to ask, assuring her he was okay.
Sometimes he spoke of the baby, of his joy and concern for her.  Had
she begun reconstructing his psyche inside her head?  Was she that far
gone?

The tears slipped down her slightly fuller cheeks and Scully leaned
against the front of the desk weeping silently.  "Damn it!" she swore,
not caring if the place was bugged.  It wasn't like she hadn't cried in
the office before.  "Damn it, Mulder, I can't do this!  I can't do
this," her voice hitched, "without you."  Scully wanted to scream out
all of her emotions, but she was too tired.  In the end, she just
sounded pathetic.  Her nose was running now and she grabbed a wad of
tissue from the desk and blew.  She looked at the red-stained Kleenex
and groaned.  Shit, another nose bleed.

In the bathroom Scully tossed the bloody wad of Kleenex into the trash
can and looked at herself critically in the ladies room mirror.  Few
people ventured into the basement, so she had the two stalled facility
all to herself.  She'd wiped off a significant portion of makeup,
revealing her now slightly blotchy skin.  Red eyes and nose from crying
hadn't helped her apearence in her opinion.  "Pregnant glow my ass,"
she muttered, digging in her purse for some concealer and foundation.
Then she shrugged.  The hell with it.  Who stayed at the office this
late anyway?  Scully adjusted her suit jacket over her disdended
abdomen and exited the bathroom.

She startled at the sound of someone digging around in the office.  For
a moment she hoped...but it was fleeting and made her feel stupid.
Scully stepped over the treshold, the click of her heals, altering the
intruder to her presence.

"I thought I told you to go home, Scully," Walter Skinner said gruffly.

"I was just heading out, Sir.  I had some things I wanted to finish
up," she lied.

He sighed, and closed one of the file cabinet drawers roughly.  "Dana,
you shouldn't even be working anymore.  Even Agent Doggett thinks so."

"I think I should be the judge of that," she replied defensivly.  "I
feel fine."

"Like this morning in the budget meeting?  You looked...I don't know,
like you weren't in the room half the time."  His tone was guilty.
Skinner blamed himself for losing Mulder and by association blamed
himself for the pain her partner...her lover's loss had caused her.

Scully ran a hand through her hair, which was growing like she'd
incorportated Miracle Grow into her diet, and leaned against Mulder's
desk.  She could not think of it as hers even if she was the acting
senior agent of the division.  "I'm sorry, I haven't been sleeping that
well.  Which isn't unusual," she added, resting both hands breifly on
her belly.  The baby kicked, causing her left one to jump.  She rubbed
the spot and sighed.  "I'm fine, Sir, really.  I can't stop looking
while I still can.  I'll lose enough time when the baby is born."

He looked ready to argue that but simply shook his head.  He knew what
battles to fight.  "Go home, Agent Scully.  And don't come back until
you've gotten some sleep. Take tomorrow off.  I don't want to see you
here until Monday.  Understood?"

She opened her mouth to protest, but in the end exhaustion got the best
of her.  "Yessir."  He nodded, gathering an expense report from some
old file, and restrieted from the room.  She rubbed her belly again and
walked over to the coat rack.  She took down her black trench and
pulled it on.  She didn't bother to tie the belt, since it barely fit
around her waist.  She turned off the lights and headed out into the
hall, locking the office door.

The building was mostly empty as Scully exited through the main
entrance.  Carl, the security gaurd, smiled and wished her a good
night.  She tried to avoid most people at work who knew her and Mulder,
which was almost everyone.  The pittying looks were too much to bear,
and the wispered comments in evelators and conversations in ladies
rooms....  Well, a lot of people thought they knew the two least liked
agents in the FBI, and didn't seem to have anything nice to say about
Mulder in his absence.  The paternity of her baby had not been
officially announced, but most people were pretty sure who it was.
Several times an off-handed comment in her presence had sent her to the
refuge of the basement restroom to weep her guilty, hormone enhanced
tears.  It didn't help that her new partner had to be so...damned by
the book about their cases.

She cried at the most inane things these days, and just when she
thought she'd finally reached some kind of acceptance after months of
denial, anger, and depression she'd start balling in the most
embarassing places...restaruants, budget meetings, in the car with
Doggett.  Scully wiped at her eyes again as she decended the steps to
the Metro.  The winter air was cold, but her body was generating enough
heat that she didn't really notice.  She used the monthy pass she'd
bought after her little feet could no longer reach the peddales of her
car safely, and stepped out onto the platform.  Her companions tonight
were three businessmen with their ties hanging loose, a woman in
hospital scrubs, and Lucky.  He was a homeless man who'd taken up
residence underground during the winter.  She'd learned this from one
of the Metro police one night when they were flushing the place of
vagrants.  He paced the station looking for handouts until the police
came around.  Tonight he was lounging against the wall at the head of
the platfrom.  He was always polite to people, asking how they were in
hopes of money or food.  She'd never seen him with alcohol or drugs.

He staggered to his feet upon a new person to approach.  "How you
do'n?" He asked, tugging at his green knit army cap.  He was the right
age to be a Vietnam Vet, but she'd never asked about that to the police
or Lucky.  He probably had no idea she even knew his nickname.  If he
remembered her as a frequent passanger, he never alluded to it.  The
policewoman had told her that he was schzophrenic.  Sometimes she saw
him talking to people that weren't there.  But who was she to judge,
she did that a lot now too.

She smiled and dug into her coat pocket.  "Tired.  You?"  She pulled
out a couple of small bills and handed them to the older man.

"Getting ready to go," he replied, shoving the cash into the pocket of
his soiled jeans.

"Oh, where are you headed?"  Scully glanced down the tunnel for the
train.  She'd never seen him get on one of the subway cars.

"Don't know yet.  They'll tell me.  They always do," he said, nodding,
brow pinched as if he was trying to figure it out anyway.

She heard the hum of the resonating rails.  "They?"

He tugged on his cap again and for the first time she noticed tinfoil
sticking out with his grungy black hair.  "The aliens," he replied,
suddenly nervous.  He scratched the back of his neck.  "I've tried to
stop it, but they always call.  I can feel it come'n on, like the calm
before a storm," he wispered menacingly.

The train arrived with the sreech of breaks.  As Scully turned and
began walking toward the first open door, a hand snagged her sleeve.
She looked back, and found his face level with hers, uncomfortably
close.  The stench of his breath made her gag.  "You watch out for
Them, now.  They'll take your baby," he hissed, before releasing her
and stalking back to his bedroll by the wall.

Scully stumbled, stunned and greatly unnerved, into the car.  She
dropped into the first seat she came in contact with and burried her
head in her hands.  The ride to Mulder's Alexandria apartment was
longer than to Georgetown, but she'd pretty much abandoned her
apartment after spending most nights and weekends at Hegal Place.  She
needed to feel close to him.

She was practically asleep on her feet as she trudged up the steps.
Her back was aching terribly and she knew her ankles were the size of
her knees.  At least the baby had been lulled to sleep by the sway of
the train.  Scully rode the elevator to the fourth floor and dragged
herself down to the end of the hall.  She inserted the key that still
had a scrap of masking tape on it, although the 'MULDER' had worn off
years ago.  The tumblers in the lock turned over and she pushed the
door open.  The familiar glow of the fishtank greated her, and after
slipping off her shoes, Scully padded over to the tank and gave
Mulder's aquatic pets some tetrameal D for a late dinner.  They were
another reason she'd moved to his place.  She could not come frequently
enough to feed them otherwise and sometimes Frohike was unable to make
it.  She'd moved in completely the day after coming home from a case
and finding the little silver one belly up in the tank.  She'd cried
for hours over that poor fish.  Another part of Mulder gone....

For herself Scully heated up leftover Chinese, and took the box into
the bedroom, well aware that she should eat something more nutritious
even if her due date wasn't that far off.  She peeled off her suit,
then her stockings, bra, and underwear.  After pulling on Mulder's gray
baseball jersey, she crawled under the covers and turned on the
televsion.  She ate her musho pork while watching ER.  It just wasn't
the same without Doug and Carol.  Why couldn't Mulder's disapearance
have been as simple as the loss of a job?  An actor tired a with
television series?  She shut her eyes trying very hard not to think of
the man she loved and drifted off with the box still resting on her
chest as Mulder had probably done many times.

---

The smell of damp pine needles assaulted her nose when Scully woke.
Her back still ached terribly and the mattress felt incredibly hard.  A
shiver ran through her entire body.  Her mind protested waking
completely, but her body was cold and sore.  Had the heat broken last
night or had she not turned it on?  Scully groaned and sat up, rubbing
sleep from her eyes.  When she brought her hands away, she gasped
loudly.

She wasn't in bed at all.  Darkness covered most everything, but not
enough that she couldn't make out her surroundings.  She was sitting in
the middle of the forest, surrounded by snow covered trees.  "What
the...."  Scully looked down at herself.  The baseball jersey she still
wore was damp with snow melted by her body heat.  Her bare feet felt
numb.  This has to be a dream, she thought even though it was very
real.  She wrapped her arms around her torso and pulled her knees up
against her stomach.  The baby shifted, woken by her rappid heart
beat.  Her teeth began to chatter.

Another shiver, not at all related to the weather, ran up and down her
spine.  The fauna looked like the Pacific Northwest, but how the hell
did she get here?  She couldn't easily drive and no sane person would
let her on a commercial flight this late in her pregnancy.  A less
rational theory learked in the back of her mind.  'You watch out for
them, now.  They'll take your baby....'  Had she been abducted?  How
long had she been gone?

Her left ear began to ring and Scully placed her palm over it to stop
the annoying sound.  Only it spread to her other ear and grew louder.
She realized then that it was no longer a vibration in her inner ear,
but an audible noise.  Scully stagegred to her feet, panic rising from
the pit of her belly.

Scully shivered again.  She needed to find shelter.  She stepped down
the small incline she'd woke up on and stepped on something hard.  She
squatted with some difficulty and ran her hands through the wet, brown,
needles.  Her fingers brushed over something smooth and she grasped
hold of it.  Pulling her find close to her face in a small patch of
light, Scully's mouth gaped.  "Oh my god," she gasped.  It was a laser
sensor.  New enough that it hadn't been there long.  About seven months
actually.  She was in Bellefluer!

A brisk wind picked up, disturbing the pine trees and undergrowth.  The
clouds parted just long enough for her to make out a rather spacious
clearing several yards in front of her before she was enshrouded in
total darkness again.  It was only for a moment, though, and then she
was blinded by an intense whiteness.  It flooded her dialted pupils,
the intensity burned on her retnas for several more seconds before she
was able to make out the landscape again.

The light stretched down from above the clouds into the clearing,
illuminating a perfect circle or bluish-white light.  Scully felt her
heart pounding wildly, blood screaming in her ears.  It was just like
eight year ago, only this time she had a front row seat.  They were
being returned.  They had to be.  Her right hand went to her neck on
instinct to grasp her necklace that had mysteriously apeared in her
jacket pocket after his abduction.  She'd given it to him as he grabbed
last minute things at the office, an odd feeling having settled in his
stomach that he wouldn't be coming back in a few days like he had
promised.  He'd looked at her funny when she'd stopped his hasty
shuffling and reached around his neck to clasp it there.  "You always
bring this back to me, Mulder," she'd told him, her throat closing up
irrationally.  He hadn't understood her anxiety any more than she had.
Even after that display, after his plane had taken off from Dullas,
she'd dismissed her silliness.  Of course he would only be gone a
couple of days.  A couple of days that turned out to be 207.  She'd
counted every one of them.

The wind died down just as the first fugured materialized in the light
like Scottie had just beamed them down.  The person was short, femanine
in stature and was quickly joined by and second and then a third
individual.  In a matter of seconds the clearing was filled with almost
two dozen people.  Scully scanned them desperatly looking for him
amoung the taller members fo the group.  She'd almost given up when he
appeared at the back.  The last taken, the last returned.  Her heart
was in her throat and tears threatened to spill over.  The beam of
light was extinguished and darkness ruled again.  She heard the crowd
murmuring.  She couldn't wait any longer.  "Mulder!"

There was a brief stretch of silence before a very familiar voice
responded a confused, "Scully?"

---

"Over here!"

"Where!"  Mulder looked around at...well nothing.  The sky was clouded
over.  His boots crunched in snow.  Snow?  He shivered at that peice of
information.  It didn't snow in July.  In most of the northern
hemisphere anyway.  The clouds parted just for a moment over the
gibbous moon and he caught just a glimpse of her red hair.  But it was
enough to find her.  He jogged over a small rise to where he estimated
her location.  He'd judged about right when he felt the heat wafting
off of her in their cold surroundings.  "Scully?" He voiced, just
checking to get her location exact.

"Right here, Mulder," she replied from a few feet ahead.

They met half way.  He snaked his arms around her and pulled her
tight.  Her smaller arms enricled his torso as much as she could.  He
felt rather than heard a sob run through her small form.  He burried
his nose in her damp hair and thought he felt a few pine
needles.  "Snow," he said, knowing she must understand the question.

"Yes, Mulder," she said against his chest.

He swallowed hard.  He could hear the others talking.  He made out
Theresa and Billy conversing.  Wondering the same as him.  "How long,
Scully?"

She sobbed again, this time aloud.  "Seven months, Mulder," she
whispered.  "Seven very long months."

"Oh god," he exhailed, squeezing his eyelids tightly.  "I didn't know,"
he said.  He felt he had to.  "I didn't know it was me."

She nodded against him.  "I figured it out too late.  I don't know how
we missed it, Mulder.  They all had abnormal brain activity triggered
in the last year.  I'm so sorry."

They were silent for a moment, drinking each other in.  Finally,
something occurred to him.  "How did you know to come here tongiht?"

She laughed and brought her arms up a little to encirle his chest
bellow his armpits.  "I have no idea, Mulder.  I went to bed three days
ago and woke up about ten feet from here only a few minutes ago."

Mulder blinked down at her in the darkness.  He didn't know what to say
to that. Had she been abducted too?  She gasped, suddenly and pulled
away.  "Scully?"  He heard her murmur something that may have been a
profanity.  "Scully, what's wrong??"  He reached out for her in the
darkness, finding her shoulder lower than expected.  She was hunched
forward.  He thought of the health problems she'd been having before
he'd...disapeared.  "Scully, tell me!" He insisted.

She gulped for air, straightened slightly and groaned.  "Mulder...this
isn't how I planned on telling you this...." She said into the
darkness.  "I didn't believe it at first either...."

"What, Scully?" He asked, moving closer and lowering his voice.  He
found her face, and cupped her cheek.  She was breathing quickly and
unevenly.  "I spent seven months at the Reticula Club Med.  There's
very little I won't believe at this point," he encouraged, making his
tone light.

"I'm pregnant."

Mulder blinked.  She didn't just say what he thought he'd heard.  The
aliens must have fucked up his hearing.  "Say that again?"  She moaned
instead, and it sounded like was in pain.  Her posture shrunk again,
she wavered on her feet, breaking contact with him and he feared she
might fall down.  Mulder reached out and found her hips.  She
pracitccally fell into him, her pants of hot breath warming him through
his jacket and turtleneck.  But a far more instence warmth radiated
from her middle.  Her fists clenched bunches of fabric at his sides and
Mulder held onto her tightly with one hand.  She shifted against him,
and his hands slid over her stomach, swollen and heaving with each
labored breath.  Oh Sweet Jesus! he mentally gaped.  It was
impossible.  She couldn't be....

"Mulder, I have to get a hospital," she exclaimed through what sounded
like clenched teeth.  "My water broke."  She panted several
times.  "I...I think the labor must have started a while ago.  I just
woke uooooh god!" She cried out through a contraction.

"Scully...." He began not clear at all what to say.  If ever there was
a time in his life taht he needed cue cards....  Luckily the wail of
police sirens saved him.  Someone must have noticed the distubrance in
the sky.  A few short minutes later, search lights from a hilocopter
illuminated the forest.  Engines of patrol cars cut out near by.
Mulder looked around at the group of others, trying to move toward the
police vehicals in the scattered beam of the search light.  He steadied
his partner and she pulled away slightly.  Just enough that he was able
to run his eyes over her body briefly.  She was indead very pregnant.
And her scant pajamas were saturated with aniotic fluid.  Under any
other circumstances he would have been touched by her choice in sleep
wear.  Not the welcome home he'd expected.  "You really do keep me
guesing, Scully," he said as a Sherrif's department officer approached.

"That's why they pay me the big bucks," she groaned, relinquiching her
grip on his clothes as the contraction ebbed.

"Ma'am are you all right?" The officer asked, touching her arm and
taking note of her minimal clothing.

She answered with a pained moan.  The man paled a bit and shouted over
his shoulder at another office who was rounding up the others.  "Hey,
Joe, I got a woman in labor over here!  I'm gonna take her in.  Get
some EMTs out here to bring all these people in!"  He turned back to
them.  "Ma'am, Sir, this way.  The hospital isn't far."  He took Scully
by the arm and began escorting her to the patrol car.

Mulder crawled into back with her, feeling like he'd just stepped into
the Twilight Zone. Scully was practically howling, starting to do that
weird breathing thing that woman who took Lamaz Class did.  Hee hee
hee.  Hoo hoo hoo.  The officer gunned the engine and the car began to
bounce over unpaved ground.

Mulder glanced over at his partner, curcled up on the other side of the
bench seat looking pale and beaking out in a sweat.  The car bounced
onto the road and their driver increased the speed.  She let fly a
particulalry colorful profanity at the man that he figured would have
either made her sea fairing father proud or embarased.  "Oh God, I have
to push!" She shrieked.

"DON'T PUSH!" both he and the other man shouted at the same time in
panic.  The officer had to be more confused about this situation than
Mulder.

"I have to!" she cried back.  And she did.

"Awe shit!" the officer swore, slamming on the brakes and pulling the
car to the side of the road, and skidding on some ice long enough to
scare the crap out of all of them.

---

The fact that she was a doctor and had delievered a baby before did not
seem to make her friendly neighborhood police officer any calmer.  He
looked ready to pass out and she guessed he was green on the job as
well as green in the face.  The labor had definitly started before she
woke up, by more than a few hours if it wasn't a precipitus birth.  She
knew where the hospital was, and either way they were not going to make
it in time.  Whether she was ready or not, her body was and the baby
was coming now!

"Eeeeeaaaaaahhhhh!" She cried, arching her back and leaning her head
back into car door.  The contraction ripped across her abdomen, back,
and even her legs.

"Scully...." Mulder said.  It seemed about all he was capable of since
finding out she was in the family way.

"Yes I need an ambulence!" the officer was yelling into his radio.

"Oh God...Mulder!"  She grabbed despeartly for his hand and squeezed
hard, causing him to wince.  Of all the senario's she had for his
return, delivering their child was not one of them.  How long ago was
it that he'd seen that birthing video at the Academy?

"Are you in pain?" the young man asked.

Fuck yes!  Scully just wailed and bore down again.  She'd tried to
explain to Mulder and their little buddy here what to do, but the
latter didn't look competant enough at the moment and her partner was
pretty much tongue-tied.  His adam's apple bobbed up and down.  She
couldn't really blame him for being in shock.  She was borderline
herself.  A feral noise Scully couldn't believe she'd made escaped her
throat as she felt the baby's head stretch her open.

"Oh wow, Scully!  I can see the head!"  Mulder had finally snapped out
of lala land and looked positivly euphoric, if not still a little
terrified.

"Oh Gaaaauuuuuud!" She howeled, baring down involuntarily and letting
her body do what it wanted.  Why did something so wonderful have to
hurt so much?  She felt her body stretch open more as the baby's head
emerged completly.  Scully grit her teeth and conitued to push through
the never-ending contraction.  Finger tips brushed her inner thighs to
support the infant's head.

"Oh man," the officer declaired before she lost sight of his head above
the door frame.  He'd passed out!  She closed her eyes and tried to
catch her breath.

"You have...have to clear the baby's mouth," she panted to Mulder,
proud to have gotten all that out at all.

"O-okay...uhhh..."  She peered up at him again.  His face, lit by the
flashing blue and red lights held an expression of utter disbelief.
His hands worked between her legs, arms shaking in the dim light.  She
was still pretty disbelieving herself that this had all happened.  She
gripped the apolstery again and pushed, feeling as one, then the other,
shoulder slipped free.  One final turn and the baby slid out completely
in a rush of blood and fluid.  A loud, scratchy cry filled the air and
Scully let out a huge sigh of releif and collapsed back onto the
seat.  "Oh god thank god," she moaned, both happy for the end of labor
and a sign that her baby was healthy.

She hadn't realized her eyes had slipped shut from exhaustion until she
felt Mulder's fingers flitting over her forhead.  She opened them just
enough to see him.

"Here Mom," He said with a goofy grin before offering her a squalling
newborn, wrapped in a now bloody green jacket.  "I should check
him...He hit his head pretty hard."

"Mulder...." she gulped, still trying to catch her breath.  Tears of
relief had replaced the ones of agony and fear, cuasing his face to
blur all over again.

"Shhh," he interupted, brushing his lips over hers.  When he pulled
back she was barely able to get her eyes open again.  "I should go
check on our friend...looks like he hit his head pretty hard...." she
heard him saying.  An amublence wailed in the distance.  She'd let the
paramedics deal with the afterbirth.  God she was tired though.  She
clutched the baby to her chest and let her eyelids droop again.  The
last thing that registered in her mind was that it was snowing.

When Scully opened her eyes again, she realized that she had fallen
asleep in the patrol car.  Obviously not even the ambulence ride had
woken her.  Mulder was seated at her hospital bedside and he smiled
gently at her, leaning over to his lips to her forehead.  "I love you,
Dana," he said, and his voice was filled with more emotion than she had
ever heard him express before.

She brought her hand up to his face and cupped his jaw, feeling stubble
against her damp palm.  There were tears in his eyes and she felt her
own slipping down to her chin.  "I love you too, Fox," she replied, a
bit wary of using his given name for only the second time in the eight
years she'd known him.  Somehow it had just become a rule to call
him 'Mulder' after that discussion in his car outside Eugene Tooms home.

As in her dream, he didn't seem to take offense, turning his head just
a little to kiss her palm.  "You did good, G-woman.  Eight pounds, one
ounce.  23 inches.  A basketball allstar!"

Scully chuckled.  "Great.  Someone else to make me look short!"

He shared her laughter but looked a bit sullen.  "I should have been
there for you," he said, sorrowfully.

She furrow her brow.  "You're here now.  Where it counts.  That's all
that matters, Mulder.  I can fill you in on all the rest later."  She
pulled his head down and kissed his lips.  She felt him smile against
her mouth and smiled as well.

A nurse cleared her throat and they pulled apart.  "Someone wants her
mommy," the thirtyish brunet woman said with a big grin as she turned
on the overhead room light.  She was pushing a plastic bassinet
containing a crying bundle of pink.

---

Mulder rubbed his eyes several times and squinted.  The florecent
lights were doing a number on his eyes, and he wondered if it was due
to having mind-erasing chemicals squirted in them.  It wouldn't have
been the first time.  It seemed to get better the longer he was in the
light, but every time he was in darkness.  Perhaps he'd suffered
photodeprivation.

"You ready to give this a try?" The nurse asked, messing with Scully's
gown.

"Absolutely," she laughed.  "I feel like my breasts are about to
explode."

Mulder sat down on the other side of the mattress to allow the nurse
some room to assist her.  He watched, facinated, as Scully brought the
little girl's mouth to the nipple of one engored breast.  He hadn't
noticed in all the comotion how much her body had changed.  She'd put
on a few pounds, but not enough that her figure had disapeared.  Her
face was a little rounder, her hair longer, and maybe her figners too.
He wasn't sure.  The most marked difference was her breasts, and of
course her still slightly rounded belly.

It took some coaxing on the part of both her and the nurse, but finally
the infant did take interest.  Scully gasped at the initial sensation,
a wide smile breaking out across her face.  She giggled.  "Wow, that
feels...weird!"

The nurse laughed too and stood up.  "Just wait till she starts
teething," the woman said with a look that spoke of personal
experience.  "I'll leave you three alone.  Just hit the call button if
you need anything."

Scully nodded.  "Thanks."  Once the woman had gone she looked over at
him, shifting her position to face him slightly.  "So...how is
officer...?"

"Phelps," Mulder supplied with a bemused smile.  "Just a nasty bump.
More damage to his ego than his head."

"I guess it wouldn't be normal for us if I gave birth in a hospital,"
she remarked, fussing with the baby's pink cap.  She pursed her lips
and after a moment exclaimed, "Well, I think she needs a name, don't
you?"

Mulder shrugged.  "You've had more time to think about that, Scully."
He hadn't even give that a thought, really, still snowballed by this.

"Maybe, but I'd like your input.  I hadn't come up with anything
final.  Aside from my brother Bill, my parents didn't have a clue what
to name any of us until after we'd come home from the hospital.  It was
actually two whole weeks before I became 'Dana Katherine' officially.
And that was the shortest it took them to decide on a name.  Probably
because I was the only delievery my father was actually on shore leave
for.  I think my mother was waiting until he got home," she
hypothesized.

Mulder nodded imperceptibly.  No wonder Dana had been her father's
favorite.  He didn't know what he would have done if he had missed
their daughter's birth.  Although he had never met William Scully, he
felt that for the first time he could understand the man a little and
even relate to him.  And maybe to his own parents for that matter.  In
a matter of hours his entire life had been turned upside down.  The
vertigo was finally clearing and he felt more alive than he ever
had.  "I honestly don't know, Scully," he said.  "Just no woodland
creatures, though."

She grinned.  "I already figured that.  I knew a girl in high school
named Bunny.  I always felt sorry for her," she giggled.  "Now, Bamby,
I don't feel sorry for."

Mulder rolled his eyes.  She was still stuck on that bug
woman?  "Sometimes I wonder why I didn't change my name," Mulder said
with a chuckle.

"Becuase it suits you so well?" She replied with a teasing smile.

"I hope you're not implying that I'm crazy, Scully."

She laughed.  "I was going for the more physical description, but that
works too."

"Ha ha.  Thanks."

She touched his hand.  "Anything to boost your ego, Mulder."

He smirked and peered over her shoulder at the baby's, eyes, wide with
sensory overload.  Blue just like her momma's.  "So, what names did you
like?"  Before she could answer he noticed something.  The gold glitter
dipping into the neck of her hospital gown caught his eyes.  He reached
out and lifted it up, finding the tiny cross dangling at the v created
by gravity.  He'd noticed it was missing when one of the doctors did a
preliminary examination of him and had been wondering how to tell
her.  "Back one more time," he said, intrigued.  Her eyes teared up but
she didn't cry, probably having exhausted that during and after the
birth.  "I had a dream that you would come back to me," she whispered
after he released the peice of jewelry to it's rightful place above the
valley of her breasts.  That small chain of gold had more reaons to be
cursed than the Hope Diamond, and yet it brought them an odd kind of
luck again and again.  You just couldn't get rid of the damn thing.  It
was like an inatamate, very stubborn homing pigeon.

"It was in my pocket after I woke up.  Spooky huh?" she added with a
satisfied gleam in her eyes.

"Almost enough to make one believe in miracles," he remarked.

She arched an eyebrow.  "Almost?"

He shrugged.  "Or alien transporter beams.  Someone has to remain the
skeptic in this relationship."

She giggled.  "I don't think you could pull that off if your life
depended on it."

He hung his head.  "Yeah, you're probably right.  You'll always be my
skeptic."

"Even when I'm not so skeptical anymore?" She quierried.

"Well, the logical one, then?"

"That's true.  Your illogic is boggaling at times."

"Boggalingly correct."

"I don't think 'boggalingly' is a word, Mulder.  You sure the aliens
didn't hit you over the head, or did you just sleep through your
english classes at Oxford?"

He snorted.  "I was a psych major.  I never took any english classes."

"Oh, well that explains everything."

He stuck his tongue out.  "Shut up, Scully."  She giggled again.  It
felt so good when she bantered with him.  It had taken her a while to
stop roling her eyes and participate in his inane conversations, but
the last few years they had become so much closer and she'd accepted
his bizzare sense of humor.  It only took him six years to wear her
down!

Scully rearranged her arms around the suckling baby.  "I think she's
got your appitite, Mulder."

"You were missing for three days, Scully," he pointed out.  "You were
dehydrated and malnurished."  He didn't want to discuss their
disapearances now, but the longer they waited the more facts might be
lost.

Her expression slakened and became serious.  Agent Scully was taking
control.  "What do you think happened to me?  To you?  Do you remember
anything?"

He shook his head.  "The last thing I remember is setting up the lazars
with Skinner.  I followed them to a point where they just...ended.  I
reach out and...."  He trailed off and shrugged.  "It's a blank until I
heard you call my name in the forest."

"Do you think I was...abucted too?" She asked, her voice uneasy.

The fact that she said 'too' did not escape him, but he would not press
her on her beliefs now.  "Maybe.  I don't know.  It seems logcial given
your cloths," he said.  "Of course you could have been drugged, but the
doctor said he didn't find any toxins.  But after three days, he said
they could be out of your system."

"I'm not sure which makes me feel better," she admited.

"We can have a joint regression session when we get home.  Pay for the
rent on Werber's summer home."

She raised her eyebrows and shook her head in dark amusment.  The baby
finished nursing and rolled the wet nipple around with her pink
tongue.  She coed and smiled, although the later was probably due to
gas.  "Hey, your finally full," Scully remarked.  "Okay, we'll try
burping.  This I have some practice with," she said, moving the baby
gently to her shoulder.  "Charlie's kids both had collick," she
explained.

Mulder scrunched his nose, relieved to have the subject changed even if
he still felt they should discuss what happened.  He wasn't looking
forward to remembering.  "And they drafted Aunty Dana to watch them
when they couldn't take it anymore?" he played along.

"Something like that.  It's sounds horrible, but I was actually glad
when they moved to Texas, just in case they had another one."

"That is cruel, Scully.  Now Bill, I can understand...."

"He's not that bad, Mulder," she countered, patting the baby's back
lightly.

"He hates me, Scully," he pouted.

"He does," she agreed, "but I stopped caring what Bill thought when I
was in kindergarten.  He just hasn't gotten that through his thick
skull yet."

A loud burp resounded from her shoulder and Scully let out a tittering
laugh.  Mulder worried his bottom lip.  "So, how did he take it?"

"Take what?"

"I'm sure he wasn't pleased that I knocked up his little sister."

She made a humming noise in her throat.  "He doesn't know, Mulder."

He blinked in surprise.  "Seriously?"

She nodded.  "He was out to sea until just a few months ago.  I made my
mother promise not to tell anyone, especially him. Tara spent the
holidays with her family.  Charlie on the other hand...."  Mulder
cringed and she laughed.  "He isn't going to kill you, Mulder.  He's my
baby brother and besides, he's made it his mission in life to disagree
with Bill about everything since they got in a fist fight before
Charlie's wedding which resulted in the groom getting a cocussion and
passing out at the reception.  He's never forgiven Bill for that and I
can't blame him.  My sister-in-law hasn't come to a family gathering
with Charlie since then and he spends every holiday giving Bill the
evil eye."

"I guess I'd better make sure Bill keeps his high opinion of me, then.
I think I'd rather have Charlie on my side."  He'd been wondering about
that wedding she'd attended way back when.  She'd never really answered
his question.  He was about to ask again but she interupted his thought.

"Speaking of everyone, I should call and let them know.  I bet Skinner
is going to be wondering where I am in a few hours."  She suddenly
looked worried.  "And the boys of course.  Oh no!  They've been calling
me every morning for months.  I guess to make sure I don't do something
stupid.  They must be going out of their minds!  They probably called
Skinner and...."  She pulled the now sleeping baby from her
shoulder.  "We can talk names later.  Hold her for a bit?"

He'd have to ask it later.  Mulder reluctantly took his daughter,
trying very hard not to josle her while getting his hold on her right.
She didn't seem worried, though, continuing to doze, her small chest
rising and falling with each even breath.  Scully seemed to know
naturally just how to support her and he felt rather clumsey, but
assumed it would get easier as he got used to it and she got bigger.
---

Genesis Margaret Mulder.  Gena for short.  It had taken hours of
nonstop brainstorming to come up with something fitting that was
neither too original nor to blaze.  He thought the name was fitting.
Her birth was definitly a beginning in their lives.  A time to move
forward on a joined path.  It was also testiment to the mystery that
lead to his abduction, and perhaps her conception.

Mulder had returned from the restroom five minutes ago.  He'd stopped
short of entering her room, though.  Skinner's prompt arrival had taken
him by surprise.  Scully had phoned the Gunmen, who had been frantic.
Her mother was worried sick, and Skinner...well he'd actually been on a
flight to Oregon after the boys had told him of UFO activity in the
pacific northwest over the weekend.

Mulder wanted to enter the room, but felt like he would be intruding.
Scully was rocking Sam in her arms, or Sara...they hadn't decided what
was the best nickname.  Perhaps they would just call her Faith.
Sometimes he wondered why his parents hadn't called him by his middle
name, but then again Willy wouldn't have been a good nickname.  It was
better than Lesslie though.  He squinted at the scene through the small
window in the door.

Skinner was standing by the window where snow fell lightly outside.
They were talking adimantly and Mulder felt a niggling of jelousy.  It
wasn't taht he thought something was going on with them.  He'd known
Skinner was attracted to Scully for years, and supposed Skinner knew
the same of him.  Walter was a moral man and Mulder trusted him when it
came to his partner.  It was just that it always seemed that when
something happened to Mulder, Scully spent the hours at the hospital
during his unconsciousness developing a bond with the older man.  It
didn't seem fair.  Skinner hadn't dropped anything to come to the
hospital while Mulder had waited for his partner to come out of a deep
coma.  But to be fair, they hadn't really known Skinner then.

Mostly he was just angry with how life had always treated him.  After
finally getting so far...getting the X-Files back, discovering what
might be the beginning of like on earth, finding the truth about his
sister, finally having Scully return his feelings and then some....
And then she'd be told a miracle had occurred and he wasn't aloud to
experience it with her.  Twelve weeks along.  Conceived their first
time together.  There wasn't any doubt since work and her reluctance to
move quickly had limited the total sack time to three.  They would have
in Los Angeles if not for...complications.  They should have figured it
out sooner.  He should have called a doctor that night in Bellefluer
when she'd come to his room dizzy and shivering.  He would have
insisted they both go back to Washington and forget about the invisible
ship.  So far he wasn't having any revelations about his expereince.
No memories that would have made it positive or negative.  None of the
others had remembered either.  They were getting on with lives right
away, used to disapearing for months at a time.  He wondered how anyone
could get used to such a thing. To get sucked into the sky one night
and come back with a different President in the Whitehouse.  Children
older and parents deceased.  Like going off to war and coming back with
amnesia.  No way to bridge the gap.  It jsut wasn't fair.

Finally he couldn't stand being on the outside anymore.  Mulder knocked
lightly and saw them both look his way through the small window in the
door.  Scully smiled and Skinner stared like he was looking upon a
ghost.  Mulder stepped into the room and shifted akwardly on his
feet.  "I didn't expect to see you here so soon, Sir."

Skinner laughed and presented a breif and rare smile.  "I didn't expect
to ever see you again, Mulder," he admited.  "I hope this time we
really had something.... I'm damn glad your back...and in one peice
this time."

Mulder was more than a little shocked when the burly man stepped
forward and gave him a hug, slapping his back several times before
pulling away.  "You had us worried."

"I'm sure not everyone.  Kersh must have been laughing his ass off,"
Mulder said still a bit uneasy at his boss' display of affection.  He
was only used to good natured threats of kicking his ass and the
ocational hand shake.

"Well, Kersh in an asshole," Skinner said.

"So we finally all agree on something then," Mulder joked.

Skinner chuckled.  "When I got into Portland and Langly called me I
couldn't believe it! I just had to see you for myself, and of course
the biggest rumor in the Washington Office," he added, gesturing to
Gena.  "It's the biggest question in the halls of the FBI since 'who
killed Laura Palmer'."

Scully smiled and Mulder couldn't help curving the corners of his mouth
heavenward.  Scully had informed him that her temporary partner in his
absence had been a former cop who was a good, honest man, but a royal
pain the butt.  At least he'd watched her back successfully.  That was
something to be thankful for.

"Will they break us up?" Mulder asked.  "I know the FBI isn't thrilled
about interoffice relationships that aren't even in the same
deparatment."

"I doubt it will be a problem," Skinner said.  He sounded confident as
if he'd been ivestigating the very thing.

Scully explained.  "Most of the huff OPR makes about this kind of thing
is discrimination.  But not what you would think.  They don't care so
much if the relationship goes bad, but rather if the involved agents
place each other's wellfair above that of the other agents in the
department that they work closely with.  We're the only two people in
the department, Mulder, so I don't see how they could argue against
us.  Besides, we could always sue them if they did.  Several agents
have before."

"I'll have all the paperwork taken care of when I get back," Skinner
said.  "Doggett can take care of things until you both get back to
work."

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER CHAPTER 7: SHAKTI

Wednesday February 7, 2001


Skinner had offered to drive them to the airport upon Scully's release,
three days after Mulder's return and the birth of their child.  Mulder,
himself, had been poked and prodded at both his boss' and partner's
demand.  As far as anyone could tell he was about the same as he had
been the day he'd disapeared.

Mulder looked back at Scully in the backseat of the rental car crooning
to her daughter in motherease.  Skinner slowed to a halt at a stop
light and Mulder took off his sunglasses to rub his eyes.  They didn't
hurt so much with the glasses on.  His eyes felt sensitive to light, as
if he'd just woken from the worst hangover of his life.  He's thought
the florecent lights were bad, but sunlight reflecting off the snow-
covered ground was hell.  The doctors hadn't found anything wrong of
course.  His pupils were perfectly dialted.

An impatient driver behind them honked his horn and Mulder wondered
where anyone had to go in a hurry in the middle of nowhere.  He
couldn't even figure out why there was a signal here.  So, maybe it was
longer than it should be.  He'd give the guy that.  Mulder finished
rubbing eyes, aware that Skinner was glancing at him with
concern.  "I'm fine, Sir," he said prefunctorily, not returning a
look.  Instead he glanced up at the obscenly long light.  The glow of
filament through the red colored glass, or plastic?, burned into his
retinas and Mulder shut his eyes, seeing unfocused red dots on the
insides of his lids.  He opened them again and blinked several times
before the spots faded.

The light finally turned green and their companion accelerated around
them.  The guy in the little strawberry red covertable was driving with
his top down, scarf billowing like a WWI fighter pilot's, staring
frostbite in the face and laughing.  Skinner cured under his breath at
the man and Mulder tugged out the bottom of his shirt to clean the
lenses of dust accumulated in the hospital gift shop where sunglasses
had not been a hot item for months.

The cornflower blue sky was scattered with storm clouds, and a mass of
them finally obscured the sun.  They were hoping to get the last flight
out before the storm front moved in entirely.  Mulder set his
sunglasses on the dashboard, glad for a reprieve.  His nose was
starting to get that annoying mark on the bridge.  He never liked
sunglasses, having always had a terrible time finding a complementing
style.  Scully wore them less than he did, although he thought she
looked good in anything.  He looked over his shoulder at her and
smiled.  Gena was alseep again and she was gazing down at the baby
soft, awestruck eyes.  His heart clenched in his chest and he silently
gave thanks to any deity listening for sending her this miracle.  He'd
never seen her so content with the world or herself and that made him
happier than he could remember.  She had never looked so beautiful.
There was something strikingly different about her.  About everything
really.  He wondered if it was some new outlook aquired from his
experience.  Scully had said her vision in the temple had made the
world different to her.  Had slowed things down in a way she'd never
known before and allowed her a new perspective.  Perhaps that was what
he had gained.  She got slowness and he got brightness.  The sun came
out again and her auburn hair shimmered like fire, a halo of orange,
gold, and red.  And Mulder had an epiffany.

Red.  It wasn't a philosophical or even theological transformation that
had occurred in his mind.  It was an a physical rewiring of his mental
harddrive.  Red.  Her hair was red.  Not red like the car or the
traffic light, but a mixture of red and other colors that he was
familiar with.  Orange was orange, not washed out yellow.  And red
was...well it just was.  Before, for seven years actually, he'd looked
at his partner and thought her hair quite lovely, but it had always
been a hazy mishmash of yellow and a brownish color that obviously
wasn't really quite brown since he couldn't see the red.

Mulder rubbed his eyes again just to make sure it was real.  Yup, still
red.  He turned his around to the other side and looked out at the tree
line on his side of the car. The trees weren't gray, they were a
deep...well forest...green.  And he could make out the differences in
the colors of the bark.  Some were dark brown and others a slightly
darker shade than Scully's hair.  So that was what cedar looked like.
Wow.  The doctors were right, nothing was wrong.  They probably didn't
even know that something should have been.  No one had them he was red-
green color blind.  It hadn't even occurred to him, so used to having
his medical records handy or recited by Scully.  She'd been busy with
other things.

He looked in the side mirror and watched the line of green pulling away
closer than they appeared.  Mulder refocused on his face and then his
eyes.  They were the color of the foliage, mixed with specks of brown
and gold.  He realized that he'd never seen his real eye color before.
People always told him that they shifted between a variety of hues,
which he knew was true since most days they apeared gray to him, but
occationally they were more blue.

He didn't realize the car had stopped and the engine cut until Skinner
cleared his throat.  "Mulder, we're at the rental lot."

"Huh...oh right."  Mulder shook himself mentally and unhooked his
seatbelt.  He got out and went about assisting Scully with the car seat
while Skinner grabbed their bags from the trunk.

She looked at him warily once everything was out, the baby snuggled in
the crook of her neck.  "You sure you're okay, Mulder?  You were
staring out the window for hours.  I don't even think you were
blinking."

He grinned and leaned down closer to her.  "Can I tell you a secret,
Scully?"

She arched an eyebrow.  "A secret?"

He nodded.  "I know what they did to my eyes."

Hers widened with both fear and inticapation.  "You remember?" She
whispered back.

"No, I figured it out.  Silly I didn't right away...well after we got
to the hospital, anyway.  It seems the aliens fixed my brain."

She knitted her brow in confusion.  "I don't understand.  What does
photosensitivity have to do with 'fixing' you brain, Mulder?"

He straightend just a bit and gestured to the shuttle by the small
rental car office.  "See that van?"

"Sure, Mulder."  She didn't sound amused.

"What color is it?"  She rolled her eyes and opened her mouth to reply
before he interupted.  "It's green," he said.  "But the logo is red and
the stripes down the side...the top one is also red with the thinner
one bellow a darker green."

She blinked.  "Okaaaaay.  Mulder, what's your point?"

He forgot sometimes that most people weren't aware of how he viewed the
world.  He knew she knew, but the topic hadn't come up in years.  He
glanced over at their boss, talking with the attendant.  "My point,
Scully, is how do I know what color it is?  Sure I could tell you it
has to be either red or green, becuase it most-likely isn't gray.  But
I shouldn't be able to discern with shade is red and which is green.
But I can.  My eyes aren't photosensitive, Scully, my brain is just
interpretting more visual information than it's used to."

Her jaw had begun to go slack at some point in his monolgue when the
meaning had dawned on her.  "Oh my god," she gasped, "you...you're not
color-blind anymore??"

Mulder smiled and reached out to finger her hair, tucking a strand
behind her ear.  "I'm glad I didn't know what I was missing, Scully,
because I'd have been devistated if I knew your hair was so lovely and
couldn't see it correctly."

She blushed, her eyes got a little watery and she touched his face with
her free hand.  "Mulder...how?"

He shrugged.  "I figure if they can cure parapaligics and give me
telepathy, brief as that intersting experience was," Mulder said with
brief scowl at that memory, "then what's a little color-blindness?"

---

Gently, Scully laid her daughter in the oak wood crib that had been a
Christmas gift from the Gunmen.  She smiled down at the tiny, sleeping,
new person and tucked the soft, slightly warn miniature quilt around
the baby; it had been a gift from her mother, created by Scully's
maternal grandmother Katherine especially for little Dana who she
insisted shouldn't have to use a hand-me-down from her older sister.
Not that Scully would have known one way or the other.  She liked the
feeling of connection and heritage that she got from the small swatch
of sown-together-cloth.

Katherine Elena O'Flahtery had passed on before Scully was old enough
to have any conscious memory of the woman, having to rely on stories of
her relatives and older siblings.  Everyone said they were much alike
in both personality and features, and Scully often wished she had
gotten a chance to know her grandmother.  She hoped her own mother
would be around long enough for her daughter to get to know the strong,
and loyal woman who had raised four great children.  Well, Bill is a
bit questionable, Scully amended with a barely audable snort.  Her
older brother was still unaware of becoming an uncle again and Charlie
and their mother had been sequestered with the information until told
otherwise.

Oh, the trouble we went through to bring you into the world, she mused
down at her baby girl.  Indead, seven years of courtship under the
guise of friendship and love as occupational loyalty was as much an X-
File as anything she and Mulder had investigated together.  Scully
liked to think it was better that way, though.  There were so many
relationship therapists and books on the matter because people took
that step before they were ready.  And then the couple suffered
together because neither had healed as an individual.  Mulder had
needed to come to terms with Samantha and was well aware of that.
Sometimes she truly wondered if he'd payed attetion in any of his
classes to get that psychology degree, but at the very least he had
known for years that he needed to heal that wound before devoting
himself to another person completely.  She, however, had not been so
clear.

She had thought she was ready but didn't want to be.  Mulder would call
her the Queen of Denial, which she now admitted had often been the case
over the years.  In the end, she too had need to come to terms with her
own past guilt and find closure.  Only a few months had passed in
interim of their "epiphanies" as she silently refered to them.  His in
the forest in the bland little town of Victorville, California, and
hers in a Buddhist temple down the block from a hospital.  Scully was
glad that months had not been years, because looking back after that
first night in his bed, she had realized that her rebuffing of his
serious flirtations hurt deeply.  He knew he was ready and couldn't
understand why she kept pulling away.

Scully touched the mobile in the corner where wind from the open window
would disturb it once spring brought warm weather back.  It was a gift
from Coleen, who was certain that aliens had nothing to do with the
miraculous pregnancy, although Scully was still not quite so
sure.  "God has owed you a boon for some time, Dana," she'd said upon
learning of the baby in Scully's womb.  "Don't question it.  Accept
this gift and the new path it will put you on."  And then she'd told
her about Mulder's abduction and broken down in tears.  She was glad
those unbarable first few months were over.  She honestly didn't think
she'd make it at times if not for her small support group.  Often she'd
resented their presence and goding her to take care of herself and the
baby, but now she didn't think she could ever replay them.  The Gunmen
especially had devoted themselves to caring for her.  "We didn't do so
well when you were missing," Byers had told her, speaking of her
abuction.  "Mulder was...well we were really scared when we found out
some of the stuff that happened.  And that was only a month.  We didn't
think it would hit him so hard.  We really didn't know how importnant
you were to him even then."  Frohike had nodded in agrement.  "And we
aren't going to let you go to that dark place he was in."

There had been many times when the pain of grief had been almost too
overwhemling, but she had forced herself to go on.  It was a little
easier after the baby had started to make it's presance known with
small flutters and then strong kicks.  Oh how she wished Mulder had
been there for those, but she didn't want to dwell on that now.  There
were pictures she'd taken and vidoes made with a digital camera
borrowed from Langley.  Even several ultrasound tapes.  Someday soon
she would show them all to Mulder, when he didn't feel so overwhelmed.
To him the past seven months had not happened; and their relationship
had gone from secret weekend rondevues to parenthood.  "We sure made up
for those seven long years of...well whatever that was," he'd joked
before leaving the Oregon hospital for the airport to take their
daughter home.  They certainly did.

Convined that Gena was not going to wake up again until some time in
the earily hours of the morning, depeninding on jetlag, Scully turned
on the baby monitor and turned off the nursery light.  Aside from the
crib and changing table it wasn't decorated as anything differant then
the spar room it had been.  She had spent more time at Mulder's, but
his apartment didn't have the space for another person.  So, the
nursery had been hastily set up with the secret hope that it would
never have to be decorated.  That Mulder would come back and they could
get a bigger place that didn't have memories of assassins and serial
killers to sully her daughter's childhood.  Sometimes it felt like the
energy of those things remained in the air of their apartments, but
with their work they had grown immune.  She'd often found that guests
sensed something odd.  Coleen would probably say she had bad karma
hanging around the place.  Hopefully they would move soon.

Scully yawned as she walked out of the room, lingering in the doorway
to look back at the moonlight streaming over her baby.  She heard
Mulder's muffled footsteps behind her and a pair of arms snaked around
her waist.  He placed a kiss on her right collarbone, expose wear her
pajama top had falled off her shoulder.  "Come to bed," he whispered in
her ear.  Scully smiled, shivering.  It was a shame there would be no
consumation of his return for six weeks.  Maybe they'd be able to do
something sooner than that.  It seemed like a very long time, but then
again everyone told her that as soon as she got used to round the clock
feedings, sex would be the last thing she wanted.  Scully shook off
that debate for now and turned to let Mulder lead her by the hand to
her bedroom.

The covers were pulled back and she greatfully sunk into the mattress.
It struck her, as his weight countered hers, that this was the first
time they had slept together since that night in Bellefluer, and the
first time they had actually gone to bed together intentionally without
the preclusion of sex.  She sensed he was unsure of what to do.  In
their short period as lovers she had been reluctant to show her
vulnerability outside of that context and expressed a desire to temper
their lovemaking until they'd felt out this new step in their
relationship; this was no doubt why he had been so surprised at her
arrival at his motel room door.  In her expereince, sex had been her
only stage for letting go and needing a partner.  Outside of that, she
had been rather closed off to her lovers, giving Jack Willis the motive
to dub her "The Ice Queen" after she'd ended the relationship.

But the past seven months without Mulder had extinguished that fear,
which seemed rather silly now in light of how much she trusted him.
Plus, he was much more tactile than most men, something she attributed
to his emotionally-deprived later childhood.  Every night since his
abduction she'd regreted her physical boundaries.  Scully had spent
many hours wishing she'd said to hell with the FBI and fears of jumping
head first into the pool of love.  If she could turn back time she
would have spent every night possible in his arms.  She rolled over to
face him and saw that he was watching her.  He flushed slightly at
being caught and she smiled to let him know it was okay.  "What are you
doing way over there, Mulder?"

"Wondering how I'm going to make it through the next six weeks wtihout
ravishing you," he cracking with a grin, but the tone was strained, the
one he used when he was feeling confused or isolated.

Scully giggled anyway and reached out under the covers to find one of
his hands.  "I was just thinking something similar a few minutes ago.
I really wish we could," she said, her expression growing serious, "but
since that's pretty much out of the question for at least a few
weeks...."  She took a deep breath, and took the step forward onto a
much needed path in their relationship--emotional honest.  "It's sounds
corny saying it...but I'd like it if you would hold me."

A smile slowly spread across his face, showing that he was obviously
happy with the alternative option.  He tugged on her hand and moved
slightly closer to the center of the bed.  "Come here, Scully."

She didn't hesitate, moving into his arms and wrapping him in her own.
It was almost painfully good to feel him again this way.  His sleepy,
musky scent, the softness of his cotten t-shirt beneath her cheek.  His
legs entwined with hers.  She didn't realize she was crying until she
heard him pleading softly not to and asking what was wrong.  Scully
sniffled and hicuped a sob.  "I missed you so much!" she whispered into
his shirt.  "I didn't know what to do if you didn't come back."

"I'm sorry, Scully.  You have no idea how sorry I am," he murmured into
her hair before kissing her forehead.  He rubbed her back several times.

She nodded against him and took a shakey breath.  "Don't you ever do
that again, Mulder, or so help me I will hunt you down and I'll be
shooting to kill."

He chuckled and kissed her skin again.  "I don't doubt that, Scully.  I
can't promise things I have no control over, but I do promise you that
as long as it's in my power I will never leave you, and even if it
isn't I will fight to stay."  He slid one hand between them and took
her necklace between his thumb and forefinger.  "I will always come
back to you, Scully.  Not even death could keep me away from you."

Scully pulled her head up from his chest and looked at him through her
water-filled eyes.  "Let's not test that last one, okay?"

He smiled and this time kissed her lips.  "Okay," he agreed.

"Good," she replied as if he had just recanted believing in some obsurd
paranormal occurance that she knew was total bunk.

He laughed again, deep in his throat, and pulled her close
again.  "Good night, Scully."

"G'Night, Mulder," she muttered, her voice muffled by his shirt,
slightly damp from her tears.  For a moment she thought maybe she
should let him get up to change it, but exhuastion overruled that idea
and she quickly fell into a deep dreamless sleep.
---
The light was blinding, even behind closed lids.  He could see the
blood pulsing through the vessals and capilaries there.  Pain assualted
his body and he felt water spilling out from his tear ducts.

<Dont be afraid> the voices always said.

<This is for the best>

<We don't wish to cause you pain>

That was when the pain first disapeared along with the darkness.
Mulder found himself, looking up into poilished metal that reflected
down the hellish things being done to him.  He was strapped onto a
large table that reminded him of Leonardo DeVivinci's Universal Man.
His limbs seemed pinned down by invisible bonds.  A device anchored his
head still just like in Spenders operating theater.  And then it was
all gone.

Darkness.

He could no longer count the number of times he had been here.  First
he'd feared that he was dead and having an out of body expereince.  The
second time he had begun to wonder.  The third time, he realized that
the aliens had the technology to separate the consciounss mind from the
physical one.  The psychologist's ultimate brain in the vat experiment.

Today, tonight, whatever time it was, They had his skull open again,
prodding his brain with lasers and strange metal instruments...so They
sent him here while They toiled away.  They told him that he should be
honored They thought enough of him to spare him the pain, for he was
special.  He didn't understand how They could understand honor and not
any other human emotion.  He didn't understand what They were doing,
but They aways seemed quite taken by his brain.  He was glad he did not
have to remain and watch...and feel.  That one time that he had
resisted the experiment was bad enough.  He'd learned then that he had
power, but that their collective was much stronger....

Mulder also didn't understand how the disconnection worked, but akined
it to spirit walking.  He could enter dream-like places similar to the
ones he'd halucinated during the more earthly brain surgery or the sky
place he'd gone during the Blessing Way ceremony.  He could even
communicate with the others on the ship when another one of the
abductees was in this limbo place...assuming that the aliens allowed
him to communicate.  If he protested, they often cut off his
conversations.  But he tended to be good now, the longer he was there.
The others made the passage of time easier.  Just having someone
to 'talk' to.

But it was his connection to earth that worried him the most, because
the aliens knew about it and aproached it like They did his brain
surgeries.  They were always discecting his thoughts because They
didn't know how he could still do it when they cut him off.  Why he
could so easily isolate her while they blocked him from the other 6
billion plus minds on Earth.  Because They could not stop him, they
made him invade her mind with the threat of terrible punishments for
refusing.  That was the first time he refused. They did not disconnect
him during the tests.  Mulder had thought he would die.

That had happened very soon after his abduction, Mulder now was sure.
Originally he hadn't been able to gage the passage of time before or
during the tests.  When he'd discovered that he could search out and
hold Scully's thoughts regardless of the aliens' mental restrictions on
him, he'd been elated.  He'd been so worried about her.  Those first
few minutes of her thoughts, when he'd seen how much his absence hurt
her, made him want to die just as much as the tests.  But that was only
for a second before he learned that she was pregnant...and the aliens
found him out and disconnected him to try to sever the connection.
When that failed They knocked him unconscious.  But They needed him
aware for the tests.

So, They let him go back to her of course, but with their monitoring
after that.  The news of the "offspring" as They called it made Them
giddy, if that was possible for the expressionless little grey freaks
and as the baby neared it's birth They're minds were abuze.  Sometimes
when They weren't caging his thoughts he could pick up on their own.
They were considering bringing her here.

He didn't understand how he could automatically translate the odd
noises of their telepathic language.  It just happened, like the
connection to Scully that They had yet to understand.  And it terrified
him to think that They might abduct her and open her head too.  He
wished he could communicate to her.  Oh, how he had tried, but the
connection was one-sided.  With ease he sought out her mind, blocking
out the other thought of the others on the ship.  It wasn't hard when
They had silenced everyone else on Earth.  She was a solo performer,
her thoughts entering his mind, as clear and sparkling as waterford
crystal.

She was tired.  Tired and worried, sleeping in his bed again.  Scully
rarely spent time at her own apartment anymore, even though the
communte was shorter.  He watched through her senses as she pulled off
her clothes and examened her body in the full-length mirror by the
closet.  He could see her through her eyes her image in the mirror.
She was so beautiful, round and great with child.  Maternity suited
her.  After that horrible case in Home, when he'd first thought about
her as a mother, he'd secretly decided that Dana Scully would make a
radiant pregnant woman.  For the sake of his life, however, he had
never told her that, but now he wished so badly that she could hear
him.  Know he was at least aware.

Under the covers she picked at Chinese take-out and he tasted the
spices on her tongue.  He really missed food....  She was contemplating
ER as her thought became disjointed from exhaustion.  He waited, hoping
to catch a dream, even if he felt more intrusive experiencing her
unconscious thoughts.

It didn't matter.  They brought him back into his body, startling him
into severing the connection.  His eyes were still open and Mulder
looked up at his relfection.  They'd closed his head up nicely.  There
was never any evidence of incisions.  That was too crude a method for
Them.  Now he could move his neck again.  It was sore as always, the
muscles tense from being held stationary.  Mulder looked around at the
Greys.  So small, but so powerful.  He wished They were as nice as the
one in that fungal induced halucination.  Damn, he wanted to find the
turh 'out there' and the aliens thought it was in his gray matter.  How
ironic is that? Mulder snorted, causing several to look at him.  He was
usually quiet since their torture test.  Sometimes he was tempted to
force his suicide, but that would mean never getting a chance to see
Scully again and never meeting their child....

They were cleaning up his table and working on one to his right.  It
was time to bring in someone else.  He'd been here along with Billy and
Thereasa as well as others he had not met in Bellefluer, but recognized
from their files.  He hoped They would send him back to...wherever.  He
wasn't conscious out of the testing room, which was where he was also
sent when They didn't want him with Scully.  This time, They left him
alone, and Mulder wondered if They had a new test.  They were blocking
his intrusion into Their thoughts and that angered him.  Why couldn't
he know until They were doing it to him!  It wasn't like he could
escape.  He glared at them, even though They didn't understand anger or
the physical expression of it.  Not even when he killed them....

The light was turned on again and he winced.  Damn light.  What the
fuck did They need it for?  Couldn't They beam people around without
it?  He shut his eyes and was awash in a world of red.  Red?  RED!?
Mulder felt on the verge of panic.  He could see red.  He knew what it
was too.  Could he see green?  Was that what a half year of tests had
been for?  To give him full color vision??  The light faded and Mulder
reluctantly opened his eyes.

<Don't be affraid> They were thinking.  Not to him, though.  The
cluster of aliens around the other table disbanded and Mulder's eyes
grew wide.

'Oh God' he wanted to cry, but They'd cut off his speech again,
probably for clearing his throat earlier.  The fucking anal bastards.
Scully was strapped to the operating table, nude as all the test
subjects were.  And she was conscious, looking up at her own
reflection, her mouth open in a silent scream of confused horror.
Something peircing the back of her neck from the base of the table.  He
had not had the oportunity to try it while in his body, but Mulder
conscentrated on her thoughts.  He got nothing and it frustrated him.
Where They were blocking him or could he only do it outside of his
body?

They were paralyzing her.  He and called to her, her name, with his
mind, but got no reply.  Her body went slack.  They had sent her to the
nothing place.  They let him, forced him, to watch Them open her head
and do the same things to her as They did to him and the others.  He
wondered if she could sense him there like he had her?  Her body was
just an empty hull on the table, nothing more than an incubator for the
life growing in her womb.  It was one thing to see her view of her
herself, but quite another to see her with his own eyes.  And to see
her in full technicolor too.  Everything was so much brighter, cripser
and more beautiful even in this hellish nightmare.  Her hair...but he
couldn't look at what They were doing there.  Parting her firey
tresses....  He'd fallen in love with her mind first, but he didn't
want to actually see it.

Mulder moved his eyes south, catching glimpses of flesh not blocked by
the gray rapists.  The rudy thatch between her thighs that he had ached
to bury his face in for years was teased by the constant airflow he
assumed was some kind of central ventalation.  Her chest rose and fell
on auto-pilot.  Her dark pink nipples, stretched on her milk-duct
swollen breasts.  He wanted to touch her abdomen, stretched tight and
round like an over-ripe peach.  He wanted to lay a hand on her belly
and feel their child as she shifted visibly beneath her mother's pale
skin.  Their little girl.  She knew it was a girl.  He'd caught her
rumminating on a vision she'd had once....

Some of the creatures touched her their, brushing long-fingered hands
over her stomach.  Mulder stiffened, terrified that They would harm the
fetus in some horrible way that abductees claimed.  But his fear
quickly ebbed.  Their touch was almost...reverent, he thought, and very
fleeting.  They refocused on their surgery, the child inside their
patient forgotten or respectfully left alone.  He wished he could hear
Them.

Hours must have passed as he took in her body and the limited world
with new eyes...or was it new brain cells?  He saw her body go rigid
and then loose.  She worked her neck as he had.  Her skull was closed
up like nothing had happened.  Slowly she turned her head his way and
started at him.  He blinked.  <Mulder>  His name reverberated in his
head.  Someone was crying.

---
3:36 AM

The gibous moon was slowly aproaching the western horizon when Mulder
woke with a start.  Silvery light filtered in through the sheer
curtains that covered the window, bathing the bedroom in pale shades of
blue and exagerated shadows.  Scully was absent from the bed, and he
heard he consoling Gena over the baby monitor.  Her wailing had
obviously woken both of them

Mulder sat up and took several deep breaths running his hands over his
face.  Jesus.  His mind was now flooded with images of bright lights,
metal, and willoy beings.  And Scully, terrified and nude on that
examination table.  He shuddered.  He felt on the verge of vomiting.
He barely made it to the bathroom in time and was vagluely aware of
Scully crouching at his side moments later, calling his name and
touching his forehead.

"Mulder, Mulder, talk to me.  What is it?  Are you sick??"

He swallowed, tasting bile in his mouth and shook his head.  "I
remember, Scully," he said with a sigh.  "What they did to me.  What
they did to you."

After a sharp intake of breath she whispered.  "To me?"

He reached out and touched the back of her neck just to be sure.  She
froze.   "It's gone...the scar."  The pad of his finger pressed against
the skin of the nap of her neck and he heard her tremble as she
swallowed.  "It's gone."

Scully stood abruptly.  "No, it can't be.  Mulder, it can't be!"
Panick was quickly overtaking her as tried to see for herself in the
mirror.  The baby was crying again.  Two large hands caught her
shoulders.

"Scully stop."

"But--"

"Stop and calm down.  Now," he ordered, rubbing her shoulder
blades.  "I know you're scared.  But I don't think you need to be.  I
think...I think They healed you when you were taken.  I watched them
remove the chip.  They did some kind of surgery on you like they did on
me.  But I think it was meant to cure your cancer completely.  Either
that or Spender injected you with something that did.  Miracles aside,
that's the easiest way to explain your returned fertility.  You know he
wouldn't have been able to remove the chip without you noticing
aftward, and even if it's medical purpose was made irrelevant--"

"I could still be...called," she said, her breathing shallow.  She
shook her head.  "But They would want me to have it, wouldn't They?"

"Not if the Colonists that abducted us were part of the resistance.
They burned those people so they couldn't be used to carry out
Colonization.  It would make no sense for the real Colonists to heal
either of us.  They don't want telepathic humans."  As if something
dawned on him, Mulder suddenly pulled back and raked his hands through
his hair.  "That's it, Scully, telepathy.  If we can do it to, then we
should be able to read Them.  What They're going to do.  That's why the
Consortium needed Gibson.  He was a natural fluke that could read the
aliens' minds.  And obviously I and those other people had some genetic
predisposition to it...to switching on the dormant genes that controled
telepathy.  Maybe the trigger was exposure to the written language.
But for some reason it didn't work right.  I don't know what the key is
to controling it, what they did to my brain, but obviously something
can't be fixed after birth without some kind of intervention.  An
operation, probably, like Spender tried to do but failed."

She bit her bottom lip and looked toward the nursery.  "Mulder, I'm
scared," she said in quiet whisper.

"I know, Dana," he replied, taking her in his arms for a brief hug.  He
kissed her forehead lightly.  "Go to her.  I have to brush my teeth,"
he said, smiling sheepishly.

After she departed, Mulder brushed his teeth and gargled some
mouthwash.  He was surprised that he was no longer phazed by his
returning memory.  Pain aside, he felt confident that the tests were
beneficial.

As he walked back into the bedroom and laid back down on the mattress,
he listened to the silence.  It wasn't really that quiet in an
apartment complex.  Outside a dog barked, one of those little yipping
ones, and it made him think of Queeqeg.  How he'd loathed that
pomeranian.  Well, not loathed....  It was true that he disliked dogs
that didn't bark.  That yipping just grated on his nerves and they were
so small that you couldn't really do anything with them like you could
a lab or a retriver or even a nice mut.  But to be truthful, he was
jelous of that orange ball of fuzz that Scully had pampered like a
child.  He hadn't gotten over his self-absorbtion yet and realized what
the X Files was costing her.  She spoiled that horrible little canabal
because it was the only normal thing about her life.  And he couldn't
really blame the dog for it's actions; his goldfish had sacrificed
several of their own over the years when he forgot to feed them.  There
was nothing worse than coming home to a mutilated fish corpse....

Mulder shook those morose thoughts away.  Although it was a good image
to keep in mind for getting through the next five and half weeks.  He
blocked out his own thoughts and just absorbed the sounds of the
nighttime world.  The dog was across the street in a courtyard.  A
nightingale was singing a sorrowful song outside the window.  In the
apartment above Scully's, the muffled sounds of two people having sex.
Bellow someone was playing an old jazz LP.  Over the baby monitor,
Scully's soft motherease and the sucking sound of his nursing child,
filled his ears was interupted by the transmition of a plane coming
into Regan National.

Things took on an amplification here.  The moans from the couple above
filled each of his exhalations.  The needle caught in one groove, stuck
on the last line of "What a Wonderful World"  The world slowed down and
slowly exhaustion from the last three days began to claim his mind
until he fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
---

Thursday, Feb 8, 2001
7:57 AM

Scully came awake slowly with the growing brightness of sunlight
penetrating her bedroom window curtains.  She blinked and quickly shut
her lids against the offensive light, rolling to face the other way.
She came in contact with an umoving warm mass that smelled distinctivly
like one Fox William Mulder.  She smiled in her not quite awake state
and burrowed into his chest, inhailing his scent and absorbing his body
heat on the cold winter morning.  Oh, it was so nice to have her love
back, and to have him in her bed!  Why had she ever made them take
things so slowly after that wonderful night?  Seven years was damn long
enough.  Too bad they had to wait five weeks to repeat their first
brief but memorable couplings....

Scully tried to force herself back into sleep, but she was just aware
enough to realize that her bladdar was full and her breasts ached.
Finally she had to force herself from the warm coocoon of her bed.  It
was just going on six-thrity accroding to the clock.  She slipped on
her gray, shag slippers and terrycloth robe before padding down the
hall to use the guest bath.  She didn't want to disturb Mulder's
sleep.  Part of her wasn't even sure if last night had happened.  She
touched the back of her neck.  Yup, it was gone.  She hoped Mulder was
right about everything.

After relieving herself, she peered into the baby's room and found Gena
awake and peering at her mobile with pale blue eyes.  She cooed when
her mommy's face loomed over the side of the crib.  "Morning, baby,"
Scully whispered, lifting the infant.  She quickly discovered a need
for a clean diaper and took the girl to the small changing table.
Having babysat Charlies kids as well as Bill's one, diaper changing was
one thing she had mastered.  She tossed out the old one, managed to
make use of a wipe without too much fussing on Gena's part, applied
powder, and taped on a new daiper.  She was proud of her skills, but
knew she would tired of the job as the months wore on.  Hopefully potty
training would come sooner rather than latter.  Her mother always joked
about her youngest daughter being old enough to change her own
diapers....  She hoped that wasn't true.

Carrying her own daughter over to the rocking chair, she sat and
craddled the baby to her chest.  "Hungry?" she asked, parting the sides
of her robe and unbottoning her pajama top.  Gena's answer was to latch
onto her left nipple and begin sucking like mad.  Scully smiled and
caressed her tiny, peach-fuz covered head.  Her hair was reddish brown,
but she suspected it would become more auburn or even chestnut as she
got older.

"Do you have any idea how precious you are?" she asked softly.  Most of
her life, even when she had been able to bear children, Scully had not
seriously entertained the thought.  There had always been vague
generalities about future motherhood, but never had she planned
anything down to quiet, winter mornings, breastfeeding her child.  The
sensation was to enormous to describe.  It was both errotic and
humbling.  She felt connected to her female lineage back to "Lucy" and
her fellow first hominids.  Just as billions of women before her,
Scully was nurturing a life created from the blood and tissue of her
own body.  It also made her feel...soft, something she had been so out
of touch with for so long.

She had prided herself on being made of steel.  Unflinching under any
circumstances.  The past seven months had melted her.  Mellowed her.
Maybe even diluted her.  Scully had reconnected with the femaninity she
had burried to persevere in the boys' club of the FBI.  She had reached
a point in her life where she was ready to assert the differences of
her gender instead of surpressing them to become more male.  She no
longer cared if people thought that she had lost her edge.  That edge
had only gianed her the nickname of 'Ice Queen'.  She did not need to
be distant to do her job.  Respect was something she had stopped caring
about several years ago.  She wanted to remain assertive and strong in
her search for the truth, but she wasn't going to compromise her
personal life for that anymore.  So what if the FBI didn't like
partners "consorting".  It wasn't a written rule and she wasn't going
to subvert her feelings because of duty as she had before Mulder's
abduction.  She was going to hold his hand during a stake out if she
felt like it.  Sleep in one motel room in the same bed because she
didn't want to ever spend another night apart from him.  Even just
separated by a thin wall with a connecting door.  She could follow the
rules, but she could also bend them and break them when it suited her
better judgement.  And these changes were definitly for the better.

"Morning ladies."

Mulder's gruff morning voice made her smile wider and Scully looked
sidelong at him in the doorway.  His hair was sticking in every
direction.  Probably was last night too, but she hadn't noticed in the
comotion.  "Sleep well?"

"Aside from that minor interruption," he replied, padding in and
crouching beside the chair.  He gazed down at their nursing daughter.
His hand twitched, restless to touch her, but hesitant to disturb her
activities.  Finally his resolve gave and he stretched a finger out to
caress her rosey cheek.  She responded by taking hold of it with one
tiny, perfect hand.  Mulder laughed under his breath.

"She likes you," Scully said with a grin.

"You think so?" he asked, looking skeptical.  He looked truly troubled
at feeling so awkward.

"It's okay, Mulder.  She isn't going to break."  He nodded and she
regarded him for a moment before walking over to the rockingchair and
seating herself, shifting Gena more comfortably as her tiny mouth
continued to suck at her breast.  Mulder crouched beside her.

"You make her feel safe," he whispered, almost sad.  She knew he was
disapointed that he had missed so much and feared that their child
would somehow know that he wasn' there.  It was just like him to do
such a thing.

"I think it will be quite obvious that she's already enamoured of her
father, Mulder," she tried to assure him a second time.

He worried his bottom lip and brushed back a lock of her hair.  She
hadn't looked in the mirror, but suposed she had bed hair.  She had
washed it in Oregon and not had the time or energy to straighten it.
Mulder claimed he liked the wild, waves of her hair's natural shape.
She supposed with the baby she wouldn't take the time to blow dry and
brush it to perfect straighteness.  She didn't have to look
professional in her livingroom.  "You think?  I mean, she's only known
me for three days," he argued.  "She's known you quite a bit longer.
She knows you.  Your touch, your scent, your voice.  I'm just some guy
who happened to be there when she was born."

He sounded so depressed and Scully felt tears building in her eyes.
Mulder was a man of guilt and he was going to feel a huge amount of it
for not being with her through this, even if it was beyond his power.
But she did understand that he had a right to feel left out because of
that absence.  He had been forcibly taken and not allowed to be a part
of something he obviously wished he had.  "Mulder, that is so not
true," she insisted.  "For on thing, you were not just some guy.  You
delivered her.  You're the first person she saw.  And she knows your
voice.  I made sure of that."

He blinked, confused, his still muzzy mind not comprehending.  "How?"

"Tapes.  You made a lot of audio tapes for field journals.  And
presentations.  And then there was that horrible Cops episode Frohike
taped and had to mention every time we saw him.  Thank god he had it
burned onto a DVD or I would have broken the stupid thing," she laughed.

"Hey, I liked that episode.  It's the best one they've ever done!" he
defended a smile breaking his meloncholic expression.

"Mulder, you never watched Cops."

"Well, the guys do and they thought it was the best.  Even the TV Guide
people thought so.  That says something."

"Maybe...."

His smile softened considerably and he stood just enough to kiss her
lips without relinquishing his finger from the baby's grasp.  "Thank
you," he said, settling himself down on the floor again.  "You have no
idea how much that means to me, Dana."

"You're welcome, Mulder.  But I did it for me as much as for her.  I
needed to hear your voice too.  It was so quiet without you.  God, I
even missed your damn 3 am phone calls about cases."

He laughed and shook his head.  "That's pretty rough, Scully."

"Yeah, it was.  No more ditching, intentional, unitentinal, emotional,
whatever.  Deal?"

"Absolutely."

"Good.  I don't ever want to lose you again, Mulder.  I don't think I
could bare it," she said, honestly.

"I can't lose you," he countered.  "It isn't an option.  You've been my
reason for getting up in the morning for years.  The truth...the X-
Files...it was all an elaborate excuse to see you in those form fitting
suits and spend countless hours cooped up in rental cars with bad leg
room," Mulder chuckled.  "Honestly, Scully, I was so juvenile when I
think about it.  Before I came to terms with things and decided what I
really wanted from a future with you, my subconscious was out to get me
in trouble, treating you like some grade school crush."

"Bully the one you love?" she giggled.

He grinned.  "Yeah, something like that.  And I craved every moment
with you, every touch.  Every oportunity to hear your voice.  You know,
I made up just about every one of those 3 am calls?  There were no
leads.  I was just my usual, lonely, pathetic, insomniac in need of a
Scully fix."

She laughed.  "A Scully fix?"

Mulder flushed slightly and shrugged.  "You're my drug of choice,
baby.  I'm high on your love," he joked with a mock leer.

"Your right, Mulder, you are pathetic," she giggled.  "Thank god I like
you that way."  She ruffled his hair.  Gena was asleep at her breast
now and Scully gently pried her away with a pinkie between small lips
and wet nipple.  She came away with a soft pop and Scully gently freed
Mulder's finger and swaddled the baby up in her blanket.  "Put her back
down?" she whispered.

Mulder looked hesitant, as she always did when asked to handle her.
He'd expressed his nervousness about harming her.  He'd never dealt
with newborns before.  But he was slowly becoming more confident and he
very carefully lifted her from Scully's arms and carried her back to
the crib.  He laid her down and Scully rose to join him.  She adjusted
the blanket again.

"You should go back to sleep, Scully, you look exhausted," he remarked
rubbing her shoulders.

It was true.  Months of searching and pregnancy had worn her out.
There really wasn't a reason to stay awake accept for one thing.  "I
need a bath," she sighed.  She could settle for a shower, but she
hadn't taken a bath since she was six months pregnant.  After that
getting in and out of a bathtub had been an impossibility.

"Want company?" he whispered in her ear.

Did she?  Scully hesitated, worrying the sash of her robe.  His hands
came down from her shoudlers and encricled her thinner but still not
flat abdomen.  "I think you're beautiful, Scully.  Don't ever worry
about that."  She shivered as he placed a kiss behind her right ear.
Had he been reading her mind of was she that obvious?  She laughed at
her own self-consciousness and turned in his arms.  She stood on tiptoe
to kiss his lips and then he pulled back and took her hand, tugging her
toward the master bathroom.
---

She had no reason to feel selfconscious.  She would have been gorgeous
to him no matter what!  She always had been.  Mulder leaned his head
back against the rim of the clawfoot tub and continued tracing circles
around Scully's bellybutton.  Her tummy was still slightly rounded and
pillowy soft.  She complained, but he liked it.  Soft Scully was
something entirely new to him, and although he knew she needed to get
back in shape for work...to tone herself as close as she could get to
her pre-baby figure, he was going to enjoy this temporary change in her
body.  It still amazed him that only days ago the tiny life he had just
held in his arms and been bellow his hands, inside a womb that he'd
thought barren.

Scully yawned and shifted, her petite form resting against his chest.
Her breasts floated teasingly in the soapy water and Mulder was tempted
to starting things in a direction they could no go yet.  After seven
years of holding out, though, he was more than content to just sit
naked in steamy water with the woman he loved.  They'd never taken a
bath together, although they'd intended to at the hotel in Los Angeles.

Mulder thought back to that night in Oregon, as he had many times since
Sunday night.  He'd wanted a future for her with children, even if they
could not be her own.  He hadn't seen himself as being a part of that.
There had been answers to find and he'd naivly thought, for the second
time, he might convince her to leave the X-Files.  He should have
learned better after Antacrtica.  Although he did not feel comfortable
probing her thoughts without her permission, it had taken him until
this morning to properly control this new ability.  He knew, for
certain, that she was not ready to give them up even if she was tired
of the fight.  Mulder,too wondered if he should return.  Agent Doggett,
although Scully found him annoying, was a compitant, honest agent.  He
wanted to end this search soon, for their daughter's sake, but he also
needed answers about thier abductions and the plans for colonization.
If they could get enough answers about his telepathy and Scully's
fertility, perhaps they could cut back on work.  Work part time or quit
completely and become consultants like Frank Black had, working only
cases with a...paranormal bouquet.

He wanted to settle down, something Mulder never would have thought
about two years ago.  But he had grown tired of running as forty got
closer, and realizing his love with Scully had given him yet another
reason to want the little things, not just for her, but for him as
well.  In that hotel room he'd told her things he wanted for her
future, but he secretly longed for them.  If he could attain them with
her as well, all the better.  And now, that life was within both of
their grasps.  He intended to make it a reality.

"So, when are we getting married?" he said after minutes of silence.

"What?"  Her relaxed posture stiffened and he felt guilty for
disturbing her hard-earned peace.

Mulder chuckled softly.  "You heard me."

Scully shifted in his lap, tuning to face him.  Her breasts bumped
against him in the unsettled bath water.  "I...," she said, her mouth
agape.  "Mulder, we never talked about marriage.  And so much has
happened with your return and the baby....  It's too much too soon."

"Maybe," he said, conceding her argument.  "It doesn't have to be
today, Dana, or even tomorrow.  But I do want to marry you.  I have for
quite some time you know whether or not we ever discussed it.  I did
ask you once, you know."

She blinked, obviously confused for a moment.  Then one eyebrow
arched.  "Mulder, you were joking.  You just wanted to anoy me on my
vacation."

He smiled.  "My intention was not to anoy you, Scully, although you are
cute when your feathers get ruffled.  No, I was just my usual, lonely,
pathetic self without you.  You know, it seems like nothing ever
important happens to me when your not around.  I sit around in my
underwear and dribble my basketball until the neighors call the
landlord or take silly trips to Graceland.  You see God, the Devil, and
angles...or have babies."

With a soft, lilting laugh Scully shook her head.  "Well, at least more
interesting stuff happens to you when you'rre gone.  I get killer dolls
any psychoaths with talking tattoos.  You get ghost ships, exploding
train cars, and telepathy."

"Touche," Mulder agreed, dropping his hands to the small of her back to
caress the auraboris tattoo there.  Since her return from Philidelphia
they hadn't spoken about Ed Jerse and that marking until their first
night making love.  He discovered that he didn't really dislike it
afterall.  It was quite a beautiful symbol of the cycle of rebirth, and
in a way he could say it reminded him of their first kiss since Frank
Black and the Millennium group, who were fond of that snake, had
brought about their New Years peck.  And now there was their own new
beginning in that life cycle.  Perhaps he'd get a tattoo somewhere too
to comemerate her birth.  But first he had to settle this.  "Do you
want to marry me?"

She didn't bat an eye.  "Of course."

"Then when?  At least give me something to shoot for," he said,
caressing her lower back.

Scully sighed and leaned forward, resting her forehead against his and
closing her eyes.  He expected a fight and was surprised when she
said, "Okay.  Soon."

"What, no further argument, Agent Scully?  You must be losing your
touch!" he chuckled

"I'm tired of fighting you about personal things, Mulder," she replied,
resigned.  "I do want to marry you.  I've thought about it constantly
since learning I was pregnant and it crossed my mind before that.  Even
before we were lovers, although briefly and not in any serious
conotation then.  I'm just worried that this is rushing you.  I've had
seven extra months to think about this."

He sighed and moved forward just a couple of inches to kiss her
lips.  "Scully, I have wanted to spend my life with you for years.  I
wasn't always consciously aware of that, but I honestly think that I
knew from day one that we should end up as husband and wife.  I don't
need a piece of paper to prove anything to me, but I would like to
prove it to the world.  Prove that we made it work when so many doubted
us.  Believe me, seven months is nothing on seven years.  I am way
passed ready to say 'I do'."  He kissed her forehead.  After a moment,
he said, "Have I mentioned lately that I love you?"

She opened her eyes and smiled.  "Yes.  But you can keep saying it.  I
won't let it go to my head."  Mulder grinned and kissed her
again.  "You're going to get us in trouble if you keep doing that," she
warned before he kissed her a third time.

"I don't recall any rules against touching."  He dipped on hand into
the warm water and found her hip.  He slid around the delicous curve of
her to the tender skin that led to forbidden territory.  "So, when is
soon?"

"Oh!" she gasped, when he gently fingered the wiry curls that guarded
her sex.  She arched her hips and pressed her chest to his.  "March
sixth."  Scully laid her head on his shoulder and moaned.  "Touch me,"
she pleaded.

"You're sure?"  He really didn't know what was kosher.  "It's okay?"

"The date or touching me?" she replied wrly with a quick grin.  "There
wasn't any tearing.  It's fine.  Just be...gentle."

Mulder complied, brushing his fingers over her labia major, his mind
supplying an visual of her reproductive anatomy.  Gently he parted her
folds.  He was carful to avoid any penetration, instead locating her
clitorus and lightly fondaling the tiny bud of nerves with the pads of
his fingers.  She thought he couldn't remember a date if he life
depended on it, and that was what she was thinking.  He didn't even
have to read her mind; her eyes always spoke volumes.  March sixth,
however, was one day he would always remember.  Had he thought about
it, he probably would have decided on the same date.  "You don't think
I know what March sixth is do you?" he teased.

Scully moaned and squirmed in his lap, her hot, short puffs of breath
teasing the small hairs on the back of his neck.  She giggled.  "Do
you?"  His erection was becoming harder and more instant by the moment,
prodding her tender belly every time she moved.  Suddenly her body went
rigid and she gasped against his skin.  He'd heard redheads were
suposed to orgasm more easily and she certainly didn't have a problem
coming with or without stimulation during sex, but in the few times
they'd made love, she had never come so quickly or with so little
encouragement.  Scully made an "Mmmm" sound and molded her now limp
body to his.  For several minutes she laid their, and Mulder wondered
if she had fallen asleep, and how she could with his head beating so
loudly.

Finally she sat up and smiled at him.  "I do," he replied and then
cracked a smile after realizing he'd just talking about saying that.
She arched an eyebrow in silent question and he kissed her.  "That was
the day this really stuck-up young FBI agent encroched on my territory."

She snorted.  "Stuck up?"  She tried to sound anoyed, but he could tell
she was pleased that he remembered the day they met almost eight years
ago.

"Maybe not stuck up."  He shifted, and a certain part of his anatomy
jabbed her again.  They both looked down at his engorged penis, jumping
with anticipating under the water.  "Sorry about that," he
apologized.  "I have no control over that thing."  She laughed and
reached down, grasping the base in one hand.  He hissed and she licked
her lips.  "Scully, you don't have--"

"Yes I do," she interupted.  "Mulder, I have spent seven very long
months wanting to make love to you in a vast number of ways."

"Vast?" he squaked.

"Mhm.  This isn't exactly original, and honestly I've never liked doing
it, but I've also never liked my....client quite so much.  I never
agreed to marry any of them," she quipped with an impish smile.  Before
Mulder could reply with a commet about those 'others', she had scooted
down, slid her hands under his ass and lifted his hips which
instictively followed her nudge.  She'd given him a blowjob once
before, but once did not prepare him for the feel of her.  When her
mouth closed on his tip, he thought he would die right there!  Somehow
he managed to hold out for several minutes as she took him in as deep
as she could...which was very surprising.  He would have wondered how
she could relax her throat muscles like that if all the blood in his
brain hadn't drained south.  She cupped his balls and fondeled them and
after one final stroke of her tongue, Mulder gripped the sides of the
tub and came.

When he opened his eyes, not recalling having shut them, Scully was
sitting in his lap again, wiping his semen from her chin.  "That wasn't
so bad," she said.

"No?" he replied, catching his breath.

"I rather enjoyed it," she said with a smile.  "Although I think some
of your sperm are going to be swimming out to sea."

He laughed.  "Well, seven months with no release....God, my body missed
you even if my mind didn't."

---
Mulder raked fingers through his hair and clicked off the television.
Four hours of C-Span and CNN and he felt up-to-date on the current
crises in the world.  The Palastinians and Isrealies were still
disagreeing over Jerusalem, Saddam Husain was still a power-hungry
asshole, Kathlee Gifford was scheduling a reuinion show with Regis
Philbin, and rumors about Survivor II were running rampant.  Maybe he
should audition for the next one.  He'd certainly kick some serious
ass.  Of course, he didn't really need the money....

Mulder looked at the mantal clock.  It was almost noon and his stomach
rumbled.  After the bath, they'd thouroughly scrubbed down in the
shower and returned to the bedroom slipping naked under the blankets.
He'd been unable to fall back to sleep in the bright daylight, however,
and wandered out into the livingroom.  Scully was aparently more
exhausted than she let on, because she was still dead to the world when
he'd put on his jeans a half hour ago.  It had taken some hunting
around to find the clothes he'd stashed there that past Mother's Day
weekend, but his noise hadn't disturbed her at all.

Mulder was pulled from his thoughts of lunch when Gena began to cry.
She was either wet, hungry, and lonely.  Mulder padded into the nursery
and found her staring up at him with big blue eyes.  He wasn't as
comfortable with handling her as Scully, and doubted he would have been
even if he had been given seven months notice.

"Okay, shhh it's okay," he cooed, praying she didn't want her mommy
specifically.  He gently supported her head...when was she going to be
able to control it?...and lifted her from the crib.  With a little
juggling he got her against his chest, on palm cupping her small silky,
no longer cone-shaped, head.  The baby sniffled and huckuped, but
stopped wailing.  Mulder rubbed her back, feeling the vertebrae beneath
her terrycloth jumper and rosey skin.  The faint odor of urin keyed him
into her plight.  Okay, diaper.  He'd watched Scully and the nurses do
it dozens of times since Sunday, and it wasn't like he'd never seen
someone diaper a baby before.

Mulder gently laid her on the changing table and unsnapped her
jumper.  "Okay, here's the deal.  You don't move and I'll help you get
food."  Gena just looked up at him, scowling at her unfresh plastic
underwear.  He was glad he didn't remember that early in his childhood
because she obviously found it very unpleasant.  Biting his lip, Mulder
untaped the sides and pulled the diaper open.  Gena wiggled her legs,
marginally apeased.  "Let's see here...."  He carefully lifted her
pelvis and pulled out the dirty thing.  It didn't smell that terrible,
but the OB nurse had said to wait a couple of weeks and that would
change.  Yippie.  He opened the cylindrical pale in the corner and
added the diaper to the small collection already sealed up there.
Alright, whipes were next.  That was not very apealing either, but then
again, he supposed none of the nurses and orderlies every liked
changing his bedpan.  The messy stuff acomplished, Mulder sprinkled on
some baby powder and slapped on a new diaper.

"There, all finished!" he declaired, quite proud of himself.  Gena
didn't give a hoot about that, she was just glad to have a dry
butt.  "It's better than a foley cathetar, believe me," he told her,
lifting her up and carrying her against his shoulder.  Her tiny hands
searched out the neck of his sweater and took small fistfulls of it.
Mulder inhailed the fresh scent of unadulerated skin, babypowder, and
milk; it was heavenly.  Better than any expensive perfume.  He hadn't
believed in love at first sight until now.  He would die for his
daughter and take down anyone who meant her harm.

He carried her into the bedroom where Scully was in the slow process of
waking.  She scrubbed her face with one hand and sat up, the sheet
falling free and exposing her engorged breasts.  Her hair was an
adorable fright, mostly dry now and curled beyond recognition to anyone
who only saw the straight bobbed Agent Scully.  He really wished she
wouldn't straighten her hair.

"Mulder?" she murmured blinking sleep from her eyes.

He smiled.  "Yeah, someone wants lunch.  Well, two someones, but I
figured I'd either fend for myself or get something with you."  Gena
cried out in impatienence and Scully sobbered, piling up pillows and
reaching out to claim her daughter.  "Unpackaged and ready for
consumption," he laughed.

Scully blushed and groaned.  "You're horrible, Mulder."

"Yeah, but you love me anyway."

"God only knows why."

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

CLOSER EPILOGUE: VRATA

March 6, 2001

His heart was pounding so loudly in his chest, he was sure the sound
was echoing off the church walls.  Nervous on the inside, Mulder tried
to apear calm without putting on his panic face.  The woman before him
did not need to think he was having second thoughts.  He cleared his
throat and took her hands, not for the first time thankful for a
photographic memory.

"Scully...Dana," he began smiling at the intentional correction.  "I
have no adequate words to express what you mean to me.  Perhaps it
sounds cliche, but you are my everything.  My life.  Eight years ago
today you walked into my life, and although I tried very hard to hate
you, I knew from the moment we met that you were not there to answer to
anyone but your own conscience, and of course science."  Mulder paused
and she smiled.  "I wouldn't want anyone else watching my back, even
though you did shoot me that time...."  She giggled and Mulder caught
Father McCue's raised eyebrows in his periferal vision.  "You have
proven your strength and compassion time and again.  I have never met
anyone stronger than you.  You are my partner, my confidant, my friend,
my confessor, my lover, my hero.  First you gave me your trust and your
friendship.  Now your have given your heart and the chance for a future
I never thought I even deserved.  You are my human cradential, Scully,
because without you by my side, I would apear foolish or have died a
long time ago.  We have had months and years when I was certain
everything would collapse beneath our feet; but somehow we endured and
became stronger.  You forgive all my faults even when I cannot.  I
regret every time I have ditched you, ignored you, or made you feel
less than equal.  You are more capable than I will ever be."  He
squeezed her hands.  "I loved you before I even understood what it
meant to truly love someone.  I can't imagine my life without you in
it, and I am honored and humbled to call you my wife."

Scully smiled and sniffled, tears blurring her vision.  She took his
hands in hers again.  "When I first heard about the great Fox Mulder,
you were an enigma.  People said that you were crazy.  That you were
brilliant.  Even that you were psychic.  Mostly, they were afraid of
you.  You amazed them and they couldn't, did not try to understand
you.  Perhaps you never let them.  For some reason, you let me in.
Into your bizzare, fantastic world.  Yes, you were a bit crazy, and too
brilliant for your own good.  And those hunches of yours are just
plain...spooky."  They both chuckled.  "Until I met you, I was lost,
although I would never had admited it then.  I was a nomad, looking for
a life that I belonged in.  It never occured to me eight years ago that
that life would be with you.  But when I look back, it is very clear
that all the paths I took led to you.  My sister would have called us
soulmates.  I don't know any better discription than that.  I am
connected, bound, to you so irrevocably that I no longer know where I
end and you begin.  That used to terrify me.  Now it comforts me...to
be so deeply understood...cherrished by another.  Although it took us
years to say the words, myself a little bit longer, you have proven
your love a thousand times over.  You made me redefine myself into a
person that I respect.  You made me understand that showing weakness
does not make one weak.  When I was missing you never gave up and that
endurance gave me the strength to keep looking when you were the one
taken from me.  You gave me the gift of motherhood, something I had
resigned myself never to know."  Scully had to wipe tears from her
eyes.  "You have gone to the ends of the earth for me, Mulder, and I
would do the same for you in a heartbeat."  She took a deep breath.  "I
never thought this day would come.  It feels like a dream that I never
want to wake up from.  I've always known I was your equal, Mulder, even
when you seemed to forget.  You never tried to usurp my idenity, but
somehow enfused it to yours.  For eight years you have walked beside me
on this jounry in many roles."  She paused.  "And I will cherrish this
one for as long as my soul lives on."

Father McCue smiled.  "Do you have the rings to exchange?"

"Yes," they both replied.

He handed Scully's ring to Mulder. "Please repeat after me. I, Fox
Mulder, take thee, Dana Scully to be my wife."

With trembling fingers he took hold of her left hand. "I, Fox Mulder,
take thee, Dana Scully to be my wife."

"To have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer and for
poorer, in joy and in sorrow and I promise my love to you," Father
McCue continued.

"To have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer and for
poorer, in joy and in sorrow and I promise my love to you," Mulder
repeated feeling tears pricking the backs of his eyes.  He couldn't
believe this was finally happening!

"With this ring, I take you as my wife, for as long as we both shall
live."

Mulder took a shuddering breath and pushed the ring over her knuckle.
She hadn't wanted an engagement ring because of their work, so instead
her platinum band had an inset pearshaped solitare diamond flanked by
two small amethysts-Gena's birthstone.  "With this ring, I take you as
my wife, for as long as we both shall live."

Father McCue handed Scully the other ring and said, "Please repeat
after me. I, Dana Scully, take thee, Fox Mulder to be my husband."

"I, Dana Scully, take thee, Fox Mulder to be my husband," she said, the
smile clear in her strong voice.

"To have and to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer and for
poorer, in joy and in sorrow and I promise my love to you."

Scully caressed the fingers of his left hand.  "To have and to hold, in
sickness and in health, for richer and for poorer, in joy and in sorrow
and I promise my love to you."

"With this ring, I take you as my husband, for as long as we both shall
live," Father McCue ended.

Scully slid the ring onto the slender digit.  She'd always admired his
hands.  They looked like they belonged to an artist...a pianist.  She'd
spent years fantasizing about what he could do to her body with those
fingers. "With this ring, I take you as my husband, for as long as we
both shall live."

Traditional vows completed, they moved closer, threading their fingers
together tightly.   Father McCue wrapped up the ceremony.  "Never have
I met two people so dedicated to one another and, Fox and Dana as the
two of you come into this marriage, I ask that you always remember the
respect that foreged this bond.  Now, by these vows and the exchange of
these rings, I now declare you to be husband and wife! Congratulations,
you may kiss your bride."

Mulder grinned and lifted the veil that obscured Scully's face.  Tears
had trickled down her flushed cheeks and he brushed them away as he
bent to capture her mouth with his.  It was a breif kiss, compared to
many before, but it was full of a new promise.  When they parted,
smiling with satisfaction, the small crowd of guests burst into
applause.

"I should have objected!" Frohike called from the front pew, and
everyone laughed.

XxX

The end
      or is it?

--
The farther you enter the truth, the deeper it is.
-bankei