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Dana Scully lay in her hospital bed and looked out the window to
her left as a small smile tugged at her lips.
Somehow, someway she was pregnant, and whilst the doctor had left
her alone to consider how a barren woman could conceive, the only
thing she could really think or care about was how she was going
to tell Mulder the spectacular news when he returned from Oregan.
And - though she knew she was probably jumping the gun quite a
lot now - she couldn't stop herself from imagining what their
life together as a family would be like...She was yet to confess
how much she really did love him, but that was just a formality
that she could fix when he came back home and she told him about
the child they had created together against all the odds.
Of course, it was only an assumption that he would jump for joy
at such news (she knew that he would for her, but even as far as
their relationship had developed she wasn't wholly certain if he
would be happy for himself), but after all she'd lost over the
years, there had to be something she could aim for in this
life...He had certainly been the one to give it to her...
Snapping out of her reverie, she turned to look at the door as it
clicked open - her heart's rhythmn picking up pace as she
anticipated seeing her partner's tall figure standing in the
doorway. When she observed the Lone Gunmen slowly entering the
room, though, and quickly shutting the door behind them she
wasn't sure whether to be surprised or confused.
Ten minutes later Scully knew *exactly* what she felt as her
dreams for the future shattered into a billion microscopic pieces
and their words haunted her soul:
"Mulder's been abducted."
XXXXXXXXXXXX
'What the hell do I tell her?'
Skinner sat in his car in the Georgetown Memorial Hospital's
parking garage lost in thought...unsure of how he was going to
break the news to Scully about what had happened in Bellefleur.
'I mean, how do I word it? "Dana, I let
Mulder get abducted"? "Hey,
Agent Scully, you know you asked me to watch Mulder's back in
Oregan?...Well...I didn't"? It won't
matter how I tell her, will it? It still comes to the same truth:
I screwed up big time and lost Scully's partner - her closest and
most trusted friend.
'...The amount of times over the years they covered my ass, and
I'm their boss! It was supposed to have been my responsibilty to
watch over them...Well, I did try by being Krycek's and the
Smoking Man's puppet, but in the end Mulder and Scully looked out
for each other better than any sacrifices I made did. So, when
Agent Scully begged me to make sure Mulder returned home safely
(a request I know must have been important for her to ask of me
in the first place), that should have been my oppurtunity to make
up a little for all the times I had failed them...But...
'...God...
'...How the hell am I supposed to break it to her when I know
it'll break her at the same time?'
XXXXXXXXXXXX
A hand rested on her stomach and then another as the room door
quietly closed after the last Gunman (the very same moment at
which a door was slammed shut on the happiness she knew she had
been almost foolish to even consider feeling just prior to their
visit).
Was everything really such a 'Give-To-Receive' situation? The
price she had had to pay for her miracle conception was Mulder?
After everything she had lost over the years, why couldn't she
just have two important things in her life? ...She didn't need
the big house with white picket fence or anything like that -
just this baby and Mulder, that was all! Just...
The dice didn't appear to want to roll that way for her, though,
and right in the shadow of learning about her miraculous
pregnancy she'd received the word that her partner, her friend,
her lover, her *soulmate* had been taken away.
Maybe it shouldn't have come as such a shock - Happiness wasn't
exactly a frequent visitor at her door, and the feeling of worry
had really started to sink in after she'd realised the connection
between Mulder and those that had been abducted...But then she
had passed out before she'd been able to try and get a warning to
him and it had all seemed like a bad dream...
...Or was she dreaming now?
What if she had collapsed and she was still asleep?
She left her hands on her abdomen and rested her head down on the
pillow as her eyes slid shut. She knew that it wasn't true, but
she had to believe that there was a slim hope of waking up to
find him sitting at her bedside as he had done during her Cancer.
"Mul-der..."
~~~~~
Unable to sleep, Scully turned in his arms to find him also wide
awake and staring intently at her.
"Are you okay?" he asked, anxiously, running a hand up
and down her back.
She considered the question for a few seconds as he carefully
wiped a tear from the corner of her left eye - knowing that
whilst she had come in here feeling unwell, it wasn't only her
physical discomfort that he was showing concern for.
"If I quit now, they win," she almost whispered,
placing a hand against the t-shirt that still covered his chest.
"There doesn't have to be an end, and I won't turn away
until you do as well."
"Scully, you can't-"
"I once told you I loved this job, even though my father had
been opposed...I did and I still do, but that's not the reason
for my staying anymore - I have too much invested now to just
turn my back on."
His eyes closed briefly as tiredness and concern tore at his
senses. He didn't want her to ever leave his side, but at the
same time he secretly knew his life was running short because of
the brain disease he had suffered from earlier in the year, and
he had to push her away so that he couldn't drag her down with
him - leaving her nowhere else to go when he died. "I
don't..." A pause for thought and a hard swallow. "What
I mean is that you've lost too much already and I can't bear the
thought of you having to..." Yet again he had to stop
talking because there was so much he wanted to tell her that he
just didn't know how to say. "Seeing you with that baby...it
was the final straw..."
She moved the hand up from his chest to wipe at the stream of
tears that had started to trickle down his own cheeks. "What
is it?" she whispered.
"Maybe if you'd asked somebody else you would have got that
miracle - would have gotten the second chance for what you
originally lost because of me." Mulder snatched in a sharp
gasp and stared into her deep blue eyes. "You could have
been a mom..."
Oh, the attempt at IVF.
She had asked him to be the donor to father the child she had
hoped to create with the ova he had managed to salvage two years
after her abduction because he was the only one she truly
trusted, secretly loved...and - in opposition to the anonymous
donor suggestion - just the thought of creating something that
would be half of each of them had outweighed any other
possibilities. But at the time of asking him, she had considered
it her own selfish attempt to make one of her dreams come
true...Until the night she had returned to her apartment with the
news that the final attempt - final chance - had failed. Standing
there together as he struggled to rebel against the defeat that
had apparently claimed her, and told her to 'never give up on a
miracle', Scully had realised that it had, in fact, been *their*
dream - something they had both desperately wanted to come true.
"You gave me a reason to hope," she told him quietly,
using her other hand to smooth out the furrow in his brow. Yes,
she could have been a mother - he could have been a father - but
at least he had always been there for her every step of the way,
through the highs and the lows...and he continued to do so as
strong (if not more) as ever. "You *still* give me a reason
to hope, and that's why I'm not leaving you."
God, it was bad enough that he really didn't want to do this. The
last thing he needed now was her making it a hundred times more
difficult! ...So, instead of trying to make her shut up (as he
should have done), he silently lay there and continued to stare
into the depths of her watery eyes.
"Everything I've gained and everything I've lost; everything
I've felt and everything I've witnessed...Everything I
am..." she continued, "...Without you, I'm nothing. I
asked you to help with the IVF because of that very reason -
there is no one that I trust more or care for more."
It was no use - she'd said the magic words. Mulder pulled her
closer against his body and kissed her forehead before lowering
his lips to capture hers. "Who are you? What did you do with
my Scully? What happened to my little eye-rolling, independant
partner who's obsessed with second-guessing me?" he chuckled
against her skin.
She flashed him a smile, but then closed her eyes and grimaced as
the pain in her stomach resurged.
Noting her discomfort, Mulder reached a hand down to rest over
her abdomen (just as he had done on the night she'd been told
that there was no longer any chance of her being a mother). He
couldn't bear to see her unwell...see her suffering...and his
concern for her health intensified when his brain came up with
the terrifying thought that the Cancer had returned. "Are
you okay?"
She gave a slight nod, but kept her eyes shut for a moment longer
as she tried to swallow the bad taste in her mouth. "I'm
fine," she answered with her usual mantra. "Just,
please..." He silently, intently watched her as she
contemplated her next words, and then fulfilled her wish as she
whispered, "Hold me."
Only a matter of minutes later she was fast asleep in his
embrace, and he wasn't far from being the same. But before he
could let himself rest, he knew there was something he had to get
off his chest and tell her - whether she heard him or not.
"No matter what happens," he breathed, feeling a lump
of emotion forming in his throat, "whether we're near or
far, I'll always be with you...I'll always love you."
A kiss on her pale cheek, one more look at her relaxed face and
then he too started to lightly snore.
~~~~~
Scully started awake and her eyes frantically looked around to
gain some sense of bearing.
She was still in the hospital.
...And Mulder wasn't at her bedside.
She sniffed and swatted at the tears that were tumbling down her
cheeks.
'Get a hold of yourself,' she chided herself, looking over at the
large window. 'He's not dead - he's just disappeared...You can
look for him! Besides, it's not as if he was anything other than
your partner...It's not like-'
Oh, who was she kidding? He'd been her best friend, her
touchstone...Her reason for living...And now it was all lost!
She turned at the sound of the room door opening yet again, and
any thread of hope she may have been clinging to that the Gunmen
had been wrong snapped as she watched A.D Skinner approach the
bed alone.
XXXXXXXXXX
THE END
DISCLAIMER:
Not mine - never have been and sadly never will be...All credit
(and lots of it too) to Chris Carter, David Duchovny, Gillian
Anderson, 1013 etc. etc....
bravenet.com