Date: Fri, 09 Jan 1998 16:06:31 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully are the property of CC, 1013, and Fox. No
infringement is intended.
Medicine Head (1/1)
"Don't be a medicine head. Try Sudafed."
--Sudafed commercial
I walk into the building, feeling the Comtrex pills I took hit me very
hard. I'm glad I wasn't driving when it happened. Otherwise, I'm sure
there would have been a wreck.
My whole body is weak, as if I have been exercising for hours and gone
into muscle fatigue, where your body simply refuses to work anymore.
I have a brief flash of fear that I will not make it to the elevator
that takes me down to the bottom floor, and I know I'll never make it
down the stairs.
But I suck in a breath and push aside the sleepiness and head for the
bank of elevators.
By the time I get there, my legs are weaving out and in and I feel as if
I am in shock from a horrible accident. I clutch at the wall of the
elevator and press the number and try to keep my briefcase from toppling
me down.
Once on the floor that leads to the basement stairs I must stop for a
moment and keep my balance. It feels as if the floor is swinging out
from under me.
Walking down the stairs takes forever and I curse my own idiocy for not
looking on the bottle to make sure it said non-drowsy. My head, at this
very moment, can float away into oblivion and I will never notice.
I finally make it to the door proposing the idea that Mulder is behind
it and actually doing some work with the brass name plaque.
I swing open the door and manage not to fall on my face, although I am
very surprised I don't, since my limbs feel heavy and my head like a
balloon.
Mulder looks up at me as I sink to the chiar across from his desk, the
weariness in my eyes mkaing him frown.
But in his eyes I see this look that makes me wonder if I have put on my
suit right, or if my slip is showing, because he seems very smug and
tickled at something.
I look at him and shaked my head.
He smiles suddenly, in that I-know-a-secret-way and I try to ignore him
as best I can.
But it's hard to ignore Mulder.
"Did you have a good sleep?" he says and I shoot him a look that says
'butt out' and he smiles again.
"Don't start with me, Mulder. I took some medicine and I'm just about
dead."
"Oh. I thought the purpose of medicine was to make you feel better."
He gets another nasty look from me and his eyebrows form a little ridge
all the way across and I realize that I am watching his face too much to
really be good for me, but it's the stupid medicine and I can't stop the
foolish ideas that spring in my head.
He still looks as if he's got a fresh new case that he knows will get me
all riled up, so I get right to the point.
"Do we have a new case Mulder?"
I hope not; I haven't finished the reports from the one we just got back
from.
"No, no case."
I look at him from the corner of my eyes, wondering, really and truly,
what the hell is going on.
"So, I'll just go on up to-"
"No, you'll have to stay down here and do them." he says.
My mouth drops open.
What?! Stay down here, commanding me around as if -
"No, Mulder, I'm going up to my desk where I can work on flat space and
not have a neck cramp from staring at my little laptop all day trying to
do the reports in this cramped, poorly lit, office."
I'm not exactly yelling, but I'm pretty cranky because of this stupid
cold medicine and I feel bad for going off on him, but also, I feel
justified.
"No, Scully. You can't anymore. Your desk upstairs is gone."
What? They thought I would die, huh? Took out my stuff that fast?
"Look behind you Scully." he says softly, a laugh coming into his voice.
I slowly twist around, thinking the whole time that Mulder will do
something obscene behind my back, so it takes a few moments to register
what is before my eyes.
"A desk." My lips find the word before my brain does.
He smiles as big as a stupid horse and I look at him in utter shock.
"You got me a desk?"
He stands and I remain sitting dumbly, still unable to comprehend the
peice of furniture sitting right there behind me.
He takes my hand and lifts me up, pushing me to my feet.
"Call it a late Christmas present. With everything that happened, I
didn't get it till last night."
My face, I know, must be beaming like sunray or something because it's
echoed back in Mulder's face and I wonder what he had to do to get it in
here.
I laugh and run to my desk, my desk, and drop away the sleepiness of
before. I sink gratefully into a leather, very nice, very expensive
chair, and smile in the absolute sheer bliss of it.
I open my eyes to see him laughing behind the stoic look.
"Oh, Mulder. Thank you so much." I say, sighing as if this is the very
greatest thing I have ever gotten in my life.
And from him, it practically is.
He smiles and comes over to me, putting his hand on my head fondly, as
if I were his child, and says, "Well, the desk is your old one, but I
had them bring it down here. But the chiar, I got especially for you."
I look at my desk and realize that everything is exactly like it was
upstairs: Post-it notes sticking to the drawers and my thick stacks of
notes for our previous case all in the exact same places.
"What did you do? Keep everything on there as you moved it down?"
He shakes his head and smiels. "Nope. It's that eidetic memory in work."
I smile and his hand remains resting on my head and I feel almost like a
child with an extra present under the tree that I hadn't been counting
on.
I stand suddenly, causing his hand to fall away and I hug him
spontaneously, pressing my cheek into his chest.
"Thanks Mulder." I say, unsure how to say what this exactly means to me.
"I know it's important to you." he says softly, and strokes my hair with
a hand, a gesture I never receive unless close to death.
I feel healthy, even if tired, though, right now.
He smiles and pulls away.
"Back to the case reports, huh? No more cramps in your neck, I promise."
I smile and start to open the folder when his next words catch me.
"If you do, I'll make them go away," he says and wriggles his fingers at
me.
I feel shivers spike through me and I feel my heart pounding too fast.
Must be the Comtrex.
end
adios
RM
(1/1)
Date: Sat, 30 Aug 1997 01:24:55 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: M&S belong to CC.
Rating: MAJOR A, R-one bad word, disturbing images
Hey, I'm branching out here. Tell me how it goes.
Melancholy (1/1)
I am watching this butterfly dart among the pitiful flowers in the
apartment's yard, searching for meager sustinance, and not finding it.
And I am thinking that this is so symbollic it's almost cliche.
I hate things that are cliche.
Or things that fit way too perfectly to my life.
And this lone creature's struggles to make it are incredibly, strikingly
relevant.
I don't want to think of it anymore.
I turn and walk back into my apartment.
That's enough fresh air and sunshine.
I thought that getting a bit of healthy sun would make the pale skin of
cancer fade away for awhile, but it's not working.
Death's palor cannot be disguised.
I face an empty apartment and I am so beyond caring that I'm not even
able to feel depressed.
I'm sure this is what depression is, because I have zero energy for
anything, and my concentration is nil, but I don't feel it.
It's odd.
I decide to sleep now.
There's nothing else to do, now that I'm not allowed to work.
It kind of went that road because I cut my finger on a pair of scissors
and didn't even feel it. I was sitting at my desk, slicing away,
bleeding like a donor, and Mulder walks in and looks horrified at me.
That wasn't even embarassing.
I'm a lot more free than before.
I have nothing to lose.
I think I'm about to fall asleep.
~~
"Ah!"
I'm awake!
Slow that rapid pulse . . . calm that floundering heart . . . ease that
shaky breath.
Only a dream.
Only a dream.
I live a nightmare.
They don't frighten me anymore.
Only dreams do.
So perfect and happy, shoving in my face what I can't have.
Killing my hope bit by bit with each one, dreams are the night terrors.
A knock.
That's what woke me.
It comes more persistent now.
I must have been out of it.
I get up, forgetting the robe, forgetting until I see Mulder's face when
I open the door that my T-shirt covers nothing.
"Scully?"
"That's me." I say.
"Scully." He frowns in disapproval.
I don't need his frowns.
"Scully. Can I come in?"
His words are said like he was going to speak of something else.
I shrug and allow him in.
"Guess so."
He comes in and leads me to the couch. "Scully, do you have a robe?"
I shrug. I really can't remember.
He shakes his head. "No matter."
I know he loves me, he knows I know. So what does a robe matter?
So we make love, or we don't. So I drive him crazy with a peak, so I
tease.
So what?
I will be dead soon.
Might as well.
"Scully. I need you."
Came a little sooner than I thought.
I wonder, if I say no, and then tease him mercilessly, will he go so far
as to rape me?
"You have to come back. Get over this melancholy, get back into living
again."
"Why? It's pointless."
If I make him mad enough will he hit me?
I once made him feel enough, made myself feel enough to tell him I loved
him.
And right after that, he left me for a month, to find a cure he said.
He came back with nothing of course. Nothing but wasted time.
I wanted to cry. I don't have that kind of time.
But crying is far removed now.
He may love me, he said he did.
But it doesn't matter.
"Damnitt Scully!"he shouted. "Do something! Hit me, swear at me, scream,
something. I said I was sorry! I said I was sorry!"
Funny, I'd just been wondering if he would hit me, or scream at me, or
rape me.
Wonder what he'd do if I raped him.
I smile.
His eyes grow lighter, thinking maybe I have forgiven him.
Thing was, I have already forgiven him. That's not a problem. It's just
getting back my life that's the problem.
I lean forward until I am breathing on him, and then I kiss him.
To my horror, he takes my wrists and pins me, taking my lips roughly
with his.
I panic.
For a moment.
Then I get that cloud of funk over me again and it doesn't matter that
he's kissing me senseless.
He leans back, with me still trapped and then grimaces.
"I'm going to make you respond, Scully. This melancholy is killing you
faster than the cancer. I . . . I need you, don't you understand?"
I sit there, like a willful child, eyes closing, not caring.
He does rape me.
Well, I could have fought.
And I suppsoe it's not technically rape since it never went all the way.
It hurt.
The first thing that had hurt me in a long time.
I stare at him, hating him for pulling me from my cocoon, loving him for
saving me.
And then, with my shirt oddly around me, pulled up so that my bottom
half is completely naked, I fall into his arms.
And I cry.
I cry.
end
adios
RocketMan
(1/1)
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully belong to CC, 1013, and Fox. No
infringement is intended.
Summary: Mulder and Scully observe a ritual few know of.
Midnight
I am watching this wonderfully horrible movie called "The Fly" when she
calls.
"Mulder." I answer.
"Hey. It's me."
I smile and click off the television.
"Hey, you."
She is smiling too, I can just see it.
"Mulder, are you all right?"
I raise an eyebrow. She's asking me this? She was the one who looked
about ready to cry earlier today.
"Um, well. I'm all right." I say, hoping she will come over tonight.
I glance at the clock.
It's ten thirty.
That's perfect.
"Do you want me to come over tonight?" she says.
<And you have to aks?>
"Yeah, if you would."
I try to make it sound like I need her to come over, not the other way
around. I do want her over here, but she won't come if she finds that
she's the one needing help.
"All right. I'll be there in about thirty minutes."
We hang up and I smile to myself.
I stand and walk to the fridge, getting out some milk and pouring it in
her glass. I found out last time that she likes skim milk. It helps her
relax at night, puts her to sleep.
But she doesn't like it too cold.
So if I pour it now, it'll be ready for her when she gets here.
I pick up a few dirty clothes and some underwear I haven't had time to
clean yet, and stuff them in my bedroom.
Scully never remarks on the state of my apartment, but hers is so neat
all the time that I think she works better when things are neat.
I straighten some of the cushions and wander around my living room,
waiting for her.
I think about our case.
It wasn't particularly dangerous, nor conspiracy related, but it was
disturbing. A father went nuts and gone on a rampage, kidnapping his
children aling with two of their friends and later killed them.
We were too late.
It weighed a lot on her the whole plane trip home.
She needed to stop thinking for awhile, so I had told her to go home,
get some rest.
Evidently she hadn't.
So she was coming over tonight.
About once a week now, she came over. Either because of me, or because
of her.
Tonight it was her.
I sit down on the couch and wait for her.
A light tapping on my front door signals that she's here and she walks
in as I stand up.
In jeans and a T-shirt, with her hair pulled into a ponytail she looks
comfortable, easy going. I smile.
"Hey beautiful," I say softly.
She doesn't smile but her eyes glow.
Tonight is the only time I could get away with that.
She walks over and I take her hand and seat her on the couch, giving her
the milk.
She smiles because I've remembered, and takes a long gulp, as if the
milk could drown her problems.
She sets it down and leans back, closing her eyes.
I am reminded of the last time she came over, near midnight.
She came then because of me, and sat on the couch just like this as I
made us hot chocolate. I walked over and gave her the mug and she looked
up at me and told me with her eyes that everything would be just fine.
Her eyes always heal me.
She sighs loudly and I watch her for as long as she stays that way.
Then she opens her eyes and looks at me.
"You know this has really affetced me, don't you?" she says.
I nod.
Her face stops putting out that aura of self-control and she seems to
crumple.
I open my arms and she crawls into them, resting her head on my chest.
I know she needs this. She comes to me when she has nothing left of
herself because she knows she can be anyone with me, and I will still
love her.
I caress her hair, reveling in the scent and the feel, as she closes her
eyes.
I lay her down, stretched out across the couch, her head pillowed in my
lap. I run my fingers over her forehead, lightly smoothing away the
frown lines and trace her eyes with a fingertip. She shivers and shifts
under my touch.
I've noticed she likes to be touched, although she'd never realize it.
She needs that closeness with another human being, especially after
cases where it seems like the whole world is cruel and crazy. Her family
was so close and together that I know it is hard for her to keep them
away all the time. She feels truly alone with them because so much of
our job is classified and no one understands.
I'm the only one who knows everything.
I'm the only one she can run to.
I always take her when she seeks me; I need her just as much.
She likes to feel someone's warmth on her face, in her hand, on her
back, or just holding her. I almost am a teddy bear in a way, something
that she can be human with again.
She likes to be touched, because she likes to know she is alive.
In that she is beautiful, and I gladly hold her to me.
I like sliding my fingertips over the smooth planes of her face and the
contours of her soft skin. She sighs under me and her lips move against
the skin of my palm. A whisper of her breath sends shivers of molten
lava through my blood.
She shifts and her face turns into my stomach, lips brushing across the
skin that becomes sensitive to her every movement. I lay my hand on her
head, palm to her cheek, fingers snarled in her hair, as if my touch can
give her heavenly benediction.
And it seems to.
Her breathing slows and her muscles ripple into smooth pools of
strength. I run my thumbs along her high cheekbones and her lips brush
my palm again.
"Mmm," she murmurs, and I can't describe what that noise from her does
to me.
"Everything seems better when you touch me," she says.
I'm sure she doesn't know what that does to me. My blood feels like it
will burst from my veins and my body could run a mile in a second.
She shifts again and I smooth my fingers around her face, then trail
down her arms to her stomach, leaving trails where I've forged this new
territory.
I like touching her and she likes to be touched.
I glance at the clock and see it's midnight.
Just like last time.
I look back to her and she is asleep.
I guess I do something that puts her at ease.
She won't wake until morning I know.
I kiss her forehead and lean back in the couch, holding her.
I can fall asleep now.
end
adios
RocketMan
(1/1)
Date sent: Fri, 01 May 1998 23:24:55 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully belong to CC, 1013 and Fox. No
infringement is intended.
Warning: MSR.....Danger, danger Will Robinson......MSR......
SPOILER__Everything from US5.
Midst of Space
=======
"I wish the real world would just stop hassling me."
--does anyone know who wrote this? I forgot.....
=======
"To realize itself, love must violate the rules of our world. It is
scandalous and disorderly, a transgression committed by two stars that
break out of their predestined orbits and rush together in the midst of
space."
--Octavio Paz, "The Labyrinth of Solitude"
=======
It was odd, watching the stars moving when they were usually so cold and
still to him. They never showed anything other than a faint promise
breathed upon the sky by some ancient god with a penchant for humor.
At the planetarium, the stars moved and changed and evolved and you
could either listen and learn, or watch and be lost.
He chose to lose himself in the blindness of fake stars.
Laying stretched out on the uncomfortable seats, his body slumped into
awkward postions, Mulder could see for miles in the tiny space of dome.
It was as close to being invincible as he could come.
He sighed and watched the stars eventually fade and a specific
constellation appear; he supposed this was when the official audio
cassette started. He had no interest in the raw scientific material. He
wanted the myth of the stars; the real truth of their existence.
A tape could not tell him where the stars had spirited his sister to.
A tape could not tell him why his life was crumbling before him.
He left before he could remember who he really was.
A lonely old man looking for something he'd lost a long time ago.
His soul.
~*~*~*~*
The memory was offensive.
Dana Scully scrubbed her hands harder under the faucet, rubbing her skin
raw where the touch had been.
Emily.
But it had not been Emily. It had been a girl she had led off to
slaughter after promising to protect her.
It made Scully sick to think she would have let her go.
She let Emily go.
That's what hurt the most. Knowing as she did what would happen when the
girl saw the seraphim, knowing this and letting *Emily* go. Would she
abandon her daughter that way?
She choked again on her tears and frustratingly rubbed her face. Rubbed
it hard and fast to get rid of the tears, get rid of the sight of her
eyes.....
Oh God, take this away.....
She heard the door thud and she jerked up, heart beating too fast, mouth
drying as her palms sweat.
<Let it be Mulder.>
She walked quickly into the living room, running head on into a large
man and stifling a quick cry of alarm.
"Scully."
She stiffened in his tensed arms, waiting for him to let her go, to back
up and allow her some private time to think.
"Scully."
"Mulder, not now."
"Scully. Something's going on. Tell me."
"Mulder, I didn't ask for your-"
"That's okay. I'm here anyway. You're going to tell me because right
now, I don't care what happens. Do you understand?"
"Mulder. I *do* care what happens."
He groaned and his lips came roughly to hers, tasting of salt and fear.
"Mulder!" She jerked away, yanking her arms from him, but not running.
"Tell me. Tell me the truth. I want this, Scully. You're alive again . .
. I'm not wasting that."
"What truth do you want to hear, Mulder?"
He reeled back, for a moment losing the strength of his planetarium
stars, for a moment realizing he was mortal, capable of being hurt.
But then he saw them moving behind her eyes. The stars moving out of the
birth place of the heavens and into her fire.
"I want your truth. I want to hear you cry over Emily. I want to see
your lips tremble as you remember and I want to hold you as you heal."
She glared at him and sniffed. "Are you drunk?"
"Only on starlight and a certainty of my own mortality, Scully."
"Mulder, get out while you still can."
It was like she had slapped him. He remembered where he was, what he had
been thinking, how he had wanted to pull her onto the floor and screw
her senseless, how he had wanted to hear her scream his name, yet also
how he longed to simply have her trust - over all things.
"Scully, get out while *you* still can." he whispered urgently.
"I'm not in anything I don't want."
"Yes, you are. You're trapped in this image you've built around yourself
and you don't know how to start over. You thought the cancer, after the
cancer, you thought you could do it. You *can* do it, Scully. And I can
change too. We don't have to stay the same."
She smiled softly at him. "Mulder, you *are* drunk."
He let out a frustrated growl and moved to her.
She put out a hand. "Mulder, if you kiss me again, I'm-"
"What? What will you do?"
She stared at him, mouth hanging open and doctor eyes roving over him.
He didn't appear drunk.
He came forward and let his thumb run over her cheek. "What will you do,
Scully? Cry? Laugh? Kiss me back?"
She felt nothing below the flushing of her face and the heat of her
skin.
She gave him a weak smile. "Probably kiss you back. But we can't have
that, though." Her lips were slowing, making her words into murmurings,
her eyes into drugged lids. She could feel the intensity of their
unspoken words charging through them, like a kind of powerful volt of
electricity. She could barely make herself remember to breathe.
His fingers traced down her chin, along her neck, pausing to her throat,
feeling the rapid pulse there, the telltale sign that she was barely
controlling herself.
"And just why can't you kiss me?"
His fingers stopped on her collarbone, tripping along the lines there,
to her arm, sliding down seductively in a manner that was intensely
intimate and yet rightly familiar.
"I can't. We can't."
But she was not moving back.
"Yes we can."
His lips came close, his nose trailed her cheek, moved to her ear and
traced her lobe, letting a faint breath create whispers of pleasure
tingle through her body to her center.
She wanted to whimper, but she could barely make a noise. Her hands were
gliding to him, reaching for the fabric of his shirt, feeling the
stiffness of its starchy dry cleaning.
"Why can't you kiss me?"
She wanted to. She wanted a chance to forget things, to lose herself in
the feel of love again. She wanted to forget Emily for now and wake up
tomorrow not feeling so bad because she finally had something to soothe
her.
He wanted to hold her while she healed.
She wanted to heal.
Her lips found his skin, then his mouth and she was high on him. His
lips, his taste, his faint scent of a long ago shower and natural oils.
The roughness of his chapped lips, the scratching of the spot he missed
while shaving--all was in her senses and in her touch.
They were rushing together full speed at something indefinable,
something healing and new.
She let go of his shirt as she realized they had pulled away.
His eyes were drained, lifeless again, and she shivered.
"I want your truth, Scully. I want it now."
She wasn't sure what he was saying, whether he was trying to be poetic
or romantinc or spooky.
"Tell me." he said and she knew what he meant.
"Emily?"
"Tell me."
"She's dead, Mulder. I don't have her anymore."
His silence made her nervous and she wondered if it had been right,
kissing him like that. Had he simply kissed her to make her weak, to get
her to talk to him, to reveal her deepest, darkest secrets?
He led her to the couch and sat down and pulled her across from him, so
that only his fingertips were touching hers.
A little smile ghosted his lips and he cocked an eyebrow. "So, are you
going to talk to me, or must I kiss you crazy again?"
She eyed him, as if considering. "How about some more of your insanity?"
He laughed and drew close, his fingers making patterns on her knees.
"One thing first," he suddenly said.
She sighed.
"Do you like the planetarium?"
~*~*~*~*
adios
RM
(is the end good enough?)
(1/1)
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder, Scully, Emily, and The X-Files belong to CC, 1013,
and Fox. No fringe intended.
Summary: Please read the first to understand. MSR
Midst of Space
=====
"I did not believe because I could not see
Though you came to me in the night
When the dawn seemed forever lost
You showed me your love in the light of the stars."
--Loreena McKennitt, "Dante's Prayer"
=====
Dana Scully sat silently in her room, needing the familiarness of the
things around her, the warm glow of life reclaimed that her bed and
walls and things gave off.
The light came in the window and spilled around her limbs, stretching
over them and playing along her skin as the day passed her by.
She waited until it was dark before rising to meet her demons.
First the smell.
She had never been consciously aware of the smell of a little girl
before, of her little girl: the way her hair always gave off the scent
of summer and grass and whispering to friends treasured secrets: the way
her skin breathed of fading life and one time happiness: the way death
had slinked into her smell and exuded throughout her in the distinct
odor of fear.
The smell of fear from her Emily came to her that night.
She shivered and pushed it to the front, needing that remembrance of
things she would never have.
The phone rang.
She jerked and slid through the rooms of darkness to the telephone and
picked it up.
"Scully?" the voice came to her.
"Yes."
"Hey, it's me."
"Mulder...."
"Look, I know you're probably busy so I'll be quick."
<No plans, unless you count torturing myself.....>
"I'm going to a convention tonight, on government conspiracies and
stuff. Supposedly it's serious stuff, but I think Frohike's a little too
excited for this to be serious. So, I'll be gone all of tonight and get
back tomorrow morning. Okay?"
She was silent.
"Scully?"
"I'm . . . surprised you told me."
"Well, I figured you deserve to . . . Well, you know...."
"Yeah," she murmured. She felt better after his assurance. The darkness
now felt oppressive and she flicked on a light.
"Okay, well, I'm going."
"Okay."
She heard the shuffle and yelled, "Wait."
"What?" he said immediately, as if he'd been listening for her words to
come.
"Thanks."
She hung up.
****
The wooden benches were slick with the sweat of a humid Mother Nature,
warning that summer would be miserable.
She sat in the church wishing she had not come, yet knowing she needed
the healing to start, that she needed to burn the wound so it would scab
over.
Father McCue was giving the sermon on the importance that mothers' play
in their children's lives, just as Mary had done for Jesus.
She had the feeling she would not soon stop hurting on Mother's Day.
Mother's Day.
It was a hurting day, really. A mother's hurt to rival the pain Mary
must have felt when Jesus called out in pain on the cross.
A tight ball of acid roiled in her stomach and the smell of death, of
Emily's death, came back to her.
Emily would always make her think of a coffin of sand, a glittering
cross around her neck, and the smell of hospital death.
She closed her eyes and felt her mother's hands closing around her arm
and leg.
She smiled at the common pain they now shared and looked to see mirrored
sorrows in her mother's eyes.
Such a horrible thing, to be alive when your child is dead.
She wasn't supposed to live longer than her daughter.
It made her sick, even now, to sit here and watch the mothers smiling,
the little girls smiling, the choir smiling, the church smiling like the
world was one big happy place.
But she remained silent.
****
Later that day, her mother's friend asked that the class pray for a man
who had been driving back from a convention with some friends and had
gotten in a wreck.
The color drained from her face and she forgot the pain of mother's in
that one instant.
"Do you know the name?" she asked suddenly.
The woman shook her head. "It just happened near me . . ."
Scully felt her body crumpling in and she fought to keep the panic out.
It couldn't have been Mulder. It couldn't have been.
He was fine.
Please, God, he was fine.
****
She came out of church about noon and the bright sunshine glared right
through her, as if beating the pain into her harder.
She felt the hitch rise up through her and she bit her lip and let her
mother lead her to the car.
Her mother laughed.
Scully looked up from the sidewalk and her misery to see Mulder.
Her breath rushed from her and the accumulation of the day's fears and
hurt came exploding out and she could not help but run and hug him.
He laughed at her sudden outburst and hugged her back, planting a small
kiss on her forehead.
She pulled away and saw why her mother had laughed.
He was in shorts and a T-shirt that read "The Feds are out to get us"
and his sneakers had holes in the toes.
She smiled and rolled her eyes as he let her look at him.
"Scully. Have fun at church, playing good?"
She raised an eyebrow and turned to her mother, but she was already
waving good-bye and telling her to go have fun, tell her about it later.
People began laughing and smiling, or simply staring at Mulder, so she
pushed him into the car and got in after him.
He started the engine and looked at her, suddenly serious and sad.
"It's Mother's Day, Scully." he said softly.
She nodded and looked out the window at the women with their daughters,
smiling as the sun smiled with them.
"How are you?" he asked.
She turned and he felt the sickening thrust of sorrow in her dead eyes.
"Not happy. Not . . . real."
He nodded and pulled the car out of the parking lot of the church, then
onto the interstate.
Scully said nothing, but let him put a hand in hers and hold it. It felt
like he was holding onto her heart, keeping it together.
****
"Here we are, Scully," he said softly, waking her with a small nudge.
She had fallen asleep in the car as he had driven into D.C. Looking
around her now, she saw the streets were silent without the common suits
walking around, ready for their government jobs.
He got out of the car and came around to her side as she got out, then
took her hand again.
They were standing in front of an enormous building, it's domed roof
reaching to the sky almost, and she wondered why she'd never even
noticed it before.
"Where is here?"
"The planetarium." he said.
She followed him into the cool darkened entrance, feeling the welcome
breath of air conditioner on her face and swirling her skirt.
She realized she had the beige dress on, a sort of symbol of her
reaching for faith, reaching for the strength she needed to grasp her
loss.
His hand in hers was sweating and she smiled at the way this seemed to
be so juvenile, so Mulder.
He led her into the back entrance of the theatre-like dome and up to the
top row, then sat her down.
On the screen above them was the vast expanse of stars, stretching
forever into space and looking far away and untouchable.
He took her close to him and wrapped his arms around her, nosing his
face into her hair and closing his eyes.
Today, the stars were for her.
Scully felt the pull of them, even though they were projections on a
screen, but she saw them instead as real, as fire far in the sky, fire
burning and being consumed.
She wanted to be consumed by the stars, their cold looking light was her
own self, her emotionally detatched self. She wanted to let Mulder close
enough to burn, to be burned by him, to find the explosions of fire
within herself.
She hated the numbness of death that rose in her. It was Emily and it
was cancer and it was faithlessness.
It was fear.
"Mulder?"
"I'm here."
"I'm glad you brought me here."
"They're for you, Scully. The stars are here for you just like I'll
always be here for you."
"I know. I just sometimes don't see it."
He was silent for a moment then traced the lines of her face with a
finger.
"You're my star, Scully." he said roughly.
She bit back a laugh at the way he had said it, the way it had been so
foreign in his mouth.
He stiffened and she took his hand, letting him know she wasn't laughing
at him.
"You are. I can touch the stars when I touch you. I can see space, I can
see its life, its basic elements, and its foreverness in you."
She smiled and felt her tears dropping down, lifting away the fears in
her.
"Mulder . . . You . . . I . . "
He kissed her before she could say it, but she knew it was too soon.
Too soon to burn him in the stars.
****
====
"Though we share this humble path, alone
How fragile is the heart
Oh give these clay feet wings to fly
To touch the face of the stars."
--Loreena McKennitt, "Dante's Prayer."
====
(1/1)
Umm...before I start this story I have a question. Who is Uniblonder? Is
that Marita? I can't write the One sipper without knowing who she is,
huh?
Thanks
Title: Might Have Been (1/1)
Author: RocketMan==> ([email protected])
Date: May 31, 1997
Disclaimer: This was inspired by Madeleine L'Engle's book, A Swiftly
Tilting Planet. If anyone hasn't read her stuff, the young adult stuff,
go read it. It's great. Oh and you might not understand with great
clarity about some of the stuff but it doesn't detract from the story.
Distribute: Go ahead, make my day.
Rating: PG
Content Warning: refrences to Swiftly Tilting Planet, and Scully cancer
Spoiler: all of season 4 except Geth. "make believe it doesn't matter"
-Thomas Gifford, The First Sacrifice
Classification: V, I think
Summary: Ummm... Scully has to deal with some things, has a dream.
Might Have Been (1/1)
She was at the place again, only this time, she could move and she knew
it was a dream. This time she was the little girl, climbing the rock
with the little boy, not her brothers, and claiming she could do it all
by herself. And the boy let her go up, carefully watching her and made
sure he was ready to catch her if she fell. She was about four, he was
eight, and so much taller than her, like the rock that rose before them
almost. And in her dream she could recognize him as being someone
important, someone who would take care of her, but when she would wake
up it was a blur. She was determined to know who it was this time, and
remember it.
The boy climbed up behind her and they stretched out on the flat top of
the starwatching rock, its nickname, and listened to the crickets so far
below. The boy watched the clouds and she watched him, studying every
line of his face so that she would never forget. A plane roared overhead
and the boy frowned, hating the interruption of nature and she smiled
slightly at the way his eyebrows met and his lips seemed to take on a
life of their own. She knew him, knew who he was, even though he had
never been in her childhood, and she didn't even know if she had ever
seen pictures of him as a child to call up this vision. But there they
were, on the starwatching rock, watching things other than what the rock
was named for.
"Dana?"he asked, turning to face her.
"Yeah?"
"I'm glad you're happy. I like this happiness. I never had this
hapiness in my childhood." he sighed, and she caught the brief flicker
of the adult he had grown up to be in him.
"I know. And I'm glad I could share it with you."
He nodded and smiled and it was the first genuine smile she had ever
seen on his face, with real emotion behind it. He turned back to see
her, his face away from the clouds and blue brilliance and watched her
for awhile. His body was long and it seemed to her to go forever on,
compared to her small frame at four. Her hair was bright copper colored
and tousled by the wind and she had impatiently pulled it back in a
clip. His hair was thick and more brown now with the same deep dark eyes
and funny set mouth. His nose was still in the baby stage and so was his
chin, but it was him. And she was glad he was with her. He seemed to be
able to keep away the bad dreams about death and cancer and needles and
men asking if she was alright and being afriad, so terribly afraid......
Dana woke suddenly from the dream and felt an aching in her heart that
she had to leave the wonderful dream reality her mind had created for
the stark no-more-innocence place she lived in constantly. Every morning
she had to deal with it all over again. She took it slowly,
concentrating on every part of her body, reminding herself that she felt
good, healthy, and that nothing was wrong. <I'm fine.> Then she added,
so far. I'm fine so far. Nothing wrong yet.
cancer
The word hit her fast and hard, like a shot to her stomach. Cancer. She
had cancer. It still took her breath from her body when the realization
came thundering in. She had to face it now. Deal with the new day,
though she longed for the carefree wonder of the dream. Her mind
wandered off track, thinking of the familiar boy and just who was he
again?
cancer
Pounding its way in again and she *had* to deal with it, and she took a
tight breath and admitted it. <I have cancer.> Yes, she had cancer. But
for now, I can still be there for the people that need me. The person
that needs me. <Who was that little boy?>
cancer . . . cancer . . . cancer
It no longer pounded, but instead, thrummed, a steady beat in the
background, to which her life now arranged its melody, to which Mulder
now arranged his harmony. It was a constant in her life, and although
she needed constants, she didn't need them like this. As it faded back
to elevator music, Scully let out a deep cleansing breath.
And thought of the boy. Mulder! It was Mulder helping her climb the
rock, telling her he was grateful for being there, looking out for her.
<I'm hardly a four year old, and though Mulder acts like a child, he's
not eight.>
She wished it represented something. That the rock would be her life,
with Mulder there to make sure she didn't fall, and it flat on the top,
where she could stretch out in the sunshine and sleep for awhile. What
might have been if Mulder had been a childhood playmate, or even her
brother? <Abduction...> What if Mulder had grown up in her family and
not his, with its verbal abuse and pain and guilt? And she had been in
his family? Would she believe? Should she believe?
cancer
Scully sighed and decided that she had accpeted her situation for the
day, but not that she would die.
die
Oh no, please, I . . .
die
Mulder. Here and alive and a little boy and caring for me and watching
to make sure I don't fall and might have beens everywhere but he can't
stop me from
die
no.....I won't. I won't. He needs me to find that starwatching rock and
he needs me to guide him there and make the might have beens disappear
into things that are
die
NO. I'm fine. <might have been fine>
AM FINE!
die and the world dies with you, live and you live alone
This has got to be some twisted dream. How did that little saying come
in my head? I'm not dying, I'm not. It's just cancer and Mulder will
save me, he'll find the truth and the truth will save me, save us, and
the Might Have Beens will disappear and Mulder will be watching to make
sure I don't fall on the starwatching rock
die and Mulder's world dies with you
No, please
live and you live all alone . . . still, as always, nothing ever
changes, he won't see it and neither will you because the danger will be
past
No more, no more. I'm not letting this be a Might Have Been. I'm not
letting it....
Scully woke with a jerk and realized she had fallen asleep while still
in bed, trying to face her cancer. <I must be more tired than I
thought.> The dream clung to her like a death shroud and she couldn't
shake it off. Tears where in her eyes and on her face and she remembered
it all.
The phone rang and she jumped and cleared her thraot before answering.
"Scully, it's me. I just had a weird dream. You were climbing up a
rock, as a child, and I was behind you and watching to make sure you
could do it and you fell."
Her breath caught in her throat. <You fell......you fell.>
No more Might Have Beens.
"Mulder, I'm afraid I am falling. Are you still here to catch me?"
The End
Starwatching rock and the Might Have Beens comes from A Swiftly Tilting
Planet by Madeleine L'Engle.
The dream is my own pyschosis. Thank you very much, hold the applause.
Adios
RocketMan
-- End --