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ieattaperecorders · 2 years

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Lost Cat, Do Not Find

Chapter 6 - My Less Piercing Gaze

Martin researches. Jon sees shadows. Time begins to run out.

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By the time Jon woke again the cold had receded and dawn was leaking through the blinds. He dug himself out from the blanket and went to look at Martin, who was finally asleep in his bed, making soft, not-quite-snoring sounds into his pillow.

There was little to do then but wait. He spent a quiet morning on his own, padding around Martin's flat, pacing, nibbling on the chicken left from the night before. Eventually an alarm came from the bedroom followed by a quiet moan and the sound of shifting in bed. Jon stayed curled on the couch, leaving Martin his privacy as he went through his morning routine. When he emerged he looked at Jon for a long moment, as if confirming that yes, all of this was still real.

". . . Morning," he said awkwardly. Jon meowed.

He stretched as Martin put the kettle on and replaced the water in the cereal bowl. Martin didn't speak, and there was nothing Jon could say to him, so the flat was quiet as the morning came slowly into waking. (The most noteworthy moment of it all was seeing the look on Martin's face after he heard the toilet flush and saw Jon walk out of the bathroom. Clearly hadn't considered how he'd been handling that particular problem in the archive.) Before long Martin began readying himself to leave, and that was when he turned and addressed Jon again.

"Do you mind if we take the tube this time? I don't know if another rideshare would let you in, but if I keep you zipped in my coat no one should bother us on the train. If you're okay with that, I mean."

A number of things fought for space in Jon's mind. Embarrassment at the need to be treated like an animal in public, anxiety about being a cat in the open chaos of a city, and an absolutely humiliating pang of longing that he did his best to ignore. But he had no ability to voice any of it, and his feline face expressed little.

"Right. Okay."

He allowed himself to be picked up when Martin reached for him. It was fine, he didn't really want to repeat the uncomfortable ride from last night either.

Even the short walk to the station was dizzying. He'd thought he'd gotten a handle on his feline senses, but a crowded city during morning commute through the eyes, ears and nose of a cat was still a hell of a lot. There were no empty seats when they got on so Martin stood at the back with Jon tucked into his windbreaker, one arm supporting him, the other holding onto the pole. Out of habit, Jon listened to the first few stop announcements, then let his thoughts slide away from his surroundings. There was plenty to occupy them, after all. He tried to take stock of things, separate the facts from his fears.

The Lonely had a hold of Martin. That was well past undeniable by this point. And Martin wasn't a fool, he had to realize how deep he was in it. He'd been isolating himself since he began working with Peter Lukas, making himself unnoticed and unreachable. Calling it closer every day, fading away in private where no one else could see him.

It had a hold of Jon, too. It had formed the body he occupied, one that kept him from being recognized by other people, kept him from being heard or understood. An alley cat without home or companionship, chased from every doorway like the poor creature in that poem.

They were caught in the same tide, both drowning. But they saw each other now. Even if he couldn't speak, he was there and Martin knew he was there. Maybe they could save each other?

"Hello there."

He felt Martin go tense, and turned to see an older woman standing beside them. She was dressed for office work, leaning in and smiling.

"Your cat is cute," she said.

"Oh --" Martin blinked. "Thank you?"

"What's his name?"

He paused for perhaps a little too long, then-- "Jon. His name's Jon."

"That's adorable, I love when pets have people names. He must be such a little gentleman."

"Ah . . . well . . . I don't know about that."

Jon felt a surprising irritation at the woman's intrusion. Perhaps he just lacked a taste for hearing himself talked about like a pet. Martin was obviously uncomfortable as well, anxious at this disruption of the polite anonymity of the train car. Given where his thoughts had just been going, Jon wasn't sure if that was a good or bad sign.

"How old is the little man?" the woman continued.

"I -- I, don't know?"

There was a very, very long pause, which the woman broke with a confused ". . . Oh."

"I mean," Martin fumbled with an explanation, "he was a stray, when I found him. So. . . ."

"Oh, the poor thing. . . ."

As the woman opened her mouth to make another unsolicited comment, she turned her gaze back to Jon and her eyes met his. She froze then, mouth half-open, her friendly expression gone uncertain as she tried to process what she saw in his eyes. Something dark passed across her face and she took a step back, glancing first at him and then Martin with new unease.

"Well," she said. "I should -- yes. Goodbye."

Without further conversation, she shouldered her way through the crowd and went to stand at a far door, staring fixedly at it without looking back. Martin let out a tense breath as she went.

"Suppose people just come up to you when you have a cat in your jacket, huh?" he muttered.

The train jostled its way onward, towards the institute. Jon watched the woman's back until the doors opened and she hurried out, clearly not caring what the stop was. She didn't glance back at them once.

* * *

It was a surprise to find they'd arrived at work. Eyes closed, tucked into Martin's jacket, Jon had only recognized their approach by the heavy, looming presence that surrounded the building, pricking at the back of his neck.

He blinked dreamily as awareness returned. He hadn't been asleep, but the gentle rocking of the train and the solid warmth of Martin's chest had been lulling, and he felt like he was rising out of a daze. Not the uncomfortable haze he felt when the book confused his mind, this was something more mundane. It reminded him a little of the times when he and Georgie were together -- lying on that tatty dorm couch, her playing with his hair while watching one of her shows, him ignoring the screen all together as his thoughts faded into the background. A relaxing, pleasant mindlessness.

He shook himself out as Martin released him onto the floor. Martin hung his jacket on a hook and sat down in his desk chair, looking thoughtful. Jon couldn't help but notice the untidy pattern of cat hair that was now dusting his shirt -- a sight that was, under the circumstances, both entirely expected and indescribably strange.

"There's got to be a solution, right?" Martin said. "Like . . . how Basira got away from the Unknowing. Or that guy from the statements who escaped the Sandman by blinding himself. I mean --" he laughed uneasily, "hopefully we don't have to go that far, but you know what I mean. There's a trick of getting out."

Debatable. As far as Jon could see, there was no reason to assume there had to be a way back. Just because some traps let their prey escape by gnawing off a limb or two didn't mean every manifestation of fear had a secret escape clause. But there was no point in thinking like that. If there was even a slim chance of getting out of this situation, it was worth trying to find it. He meowed, as his contribution to the conversation.

"I'll try looking through the statements to see if something similar happened to anyone else. It's a place to start, at least." He paused, and when he continued his voice had a sardonic edge. "Who knows, maybe something will just come to me again."

Emboldened now by a plan of action, Martin started down the hallway. The archive was hauntingly empty as they traversed it, but Jon didn't have the energy to even try to Know where the others had gone to. Upon reaching document storage, Martin pulled out a box of files seemingly at random and settled at a table to sort. For his part, Jon went to pace the stacks as he'd done before, hoping his connection to the Beholding would point him towards something useful.

It was . . . difficult. He paced, pressed, and listened until his head began to ache and his vision swam. Occasionally he felt something, but it was like glimpsing a shadow in the corner of your eye only to lose it when you turn to look. It was growing harder and harder to use the Beholding. He'd been relying on it too much lately, pushing past the limits of what he'd previously tried, and actively fighting it at times. Meanwhile, he hadn't been taking statements, had only fed the Eye occasional, secondhand glimpses of terror by listening to Martin read. Having the hungers of his body satiated with chicken and rice only drew attention to the greater, deeper hunger that was pressing into him.

Feed it, or it will feed on you, Jude had told him. He hadn't forgotten. The power to which he was bound was greedy, and it didn't appreciate him taking while giving little in return. If Martin started to fade again, Jon feared he wouldn't be strong enough to pull him back a second time.

Frustrated and with nothing to show for it, he returned to Martin, who was still reading quietly -- only glancing up once as Jon leapt onto the table to join him. He watched as Martin pulled statements from the pile and skimmed them, reading just enough to determine that nothing was useful. He'd then set that one down and repeat the process, over and over. Idly, Jon eyed the statements still in the box, even sniffed at them as if that could give him any information. They smelled like old paper and stale fear, and if they held any answers the Beholding wasn't telling him.

Noticing Jon's interest in the box, Martin raised an eyebrow. He held out the statement he'd been reading, extending it towards him as if looking for notes. "Getting anything from this one?"

Out of obligation, he sniffed. Nothing. Martin shrugged and took it back.

"It's a real one. I mean, I can tell by now, right? Even if I don't read it out loud, I still feel it . . . that eyes-on-the-back-of-your-neck-times-a-hundred feeling. Never get that with the fake ones, so I know it's real. It's just . . . it's so cheesy?" he laughed softly. "I feel bad saying it, I mean, I know it was really upsetting for that poor woman. But it's about talking cats. Talking with the voices of dead people, sure, but still talking cats."

Marginally better than a story about mummies, Jon supposed. Though just from that short description, it didn't sound related to the book, more likely connected to the End than the Lonely.

"Don't think it's the same as what happened to you. I mean, her cats were already cats, and this sounds more like they were possessed or something." He paused, frowning. "Possessed . . . God, I hadn't even considered -- did you switch bodies with a cat? Is there someone who looks like you running around out there chasing mice?"

Direct communication might have been beyond him, but Jon sincerely hoped the look he gave Martin was withering enough to convey his feelings on that idea.

"Right, right. Suppose if that were the case someone would have found you -- or it -- or whatever by now. I'm just going to assume I won't have to lure a fully grown man out of the tunnels with catnip. Because that -- that would be . . ." he shook his head, visibly uncomfortable. "Yeah."

He tossed the statement into a little pile he'd made and reached for another one. Jon settled in. He suspected this would be a long search.

* * *

For what must have been hours, Martin continued going through statements as Jon rested on the table nearby. He found himself dearly wishing that Martin might read even one of them out loud. Skimming them without recording was faster, less exhausting, it just made sense, but it was maddening to see. Being in document storage was starting to feel like dying in the desert surrounded by bottles of water that he couldn't get open. And this? This was like watching helplessly as someone else opened each bottle, took the smallest sip, then threw the rest over their shoulder. After a while he gave up, closed his eyes and rested his head on the table.

It wasn't clear how much time had passed before he noticed the stillness. The sound of pages turning and occasional muttering had stopped. Jon looked up to find Martin leaning on the table, head resting on his arms, looking at him.

"I get it, I think. Why you came to me," he said. "I mean, Melanie's Melanie, and Basira isn't really patient. And Daisy . . . who even knows with her. I'm guessing they just tried to chase you out."

Well. Not untrue. Jon rose to a sitting position, wondering where he was going with this.

"I still say it'd be better if they knew, and if this is about pride or something, I don't think it's worth it. But I don't really want to try explaining this to them either, so here we are. And I'm grateful for --" he glanced off to the side,"what you did back there, in your office. But I -- I don't even know what'll happen if Peter finds out about this." Martin paused, looking thoughtful. "Actually. Maybe there's something he can do. I mean, that was supposed to be the deal if I worked with him, maybe he knows a way to--"

A loud, angry hiss cut off whatever else Martin was going to say. Jon felt his ears flatten against his head, he couldn't believe what he was hearing. That he would even still consider--

". . . Yeah, okay." Martin agreed. "That's fair. That's probably a terrible idea."

Terrible to say the least. Jon walked across the table towards him, growling his displeasure. Martin sat back and folded his arms.

"Stop, Jon, don't -- I don't trust Peter any more than you do. But all this stuff about the Extinction . . . it's the only way I can help," his frown deepened. "If I still can, anyway . . . I can't let these past months be for nothing."

Jon went silent. A part of him understood that. Another part was absolutely unmovable, hard and stubborn. For a moment, he thought that he could see himself through Georgie's eyes, back when he was chasing down peril to stop the Unknowing. He could almost understand it now, her frustration at him. How the fate of the world hadn't been enough for her to accept what he was doing to himself.

Quietly, he remembered when he'd told Basira that she'd been taking everything onto her shoulders, charging off without telling anyone. He wondered if everyone he'd ever worked with would pick up his own bad habits in the end.

Martin sighed. "I don't even know how much you're getting of this. Sometimes it seems like you understand me, and then sometimes it's like I'm talking to an actual cat. I mean . . . can you understand me? Meow once if you can."

He didn't bother trying to respond. They'd already been through this, that sort of communication was beyond him.

"I know it's you in there, I mean, I capital K Know it now, I guess." Martin rested his chin on one arm. "But are you just . . . Jon's brain in a cat's body, or are you Jon with a cat's brain?" He shook his head. "And if it's the latter, who am I even talking to?"

You're talking to me, Jon thought, straining his mind, hoping that sheer force of will might be enough to make the Eye carry his thoughts across to him. I hear you. I understand every word. I miss you Martin, so, so much.

There was no recognition in Martin's expression. He sighed with resignation.

"Guess you can't answer. Or you don't understand me. Or both," he said. "Still on my own in this, I suppose."

Jon felt profoundly useless as Martin turned his attention back to the box of statements, pulled out a new one and returned to work.

* * *

Though it was well past midday, the archive remained profoundly silent. Even when Martin left document storage to have lunch and refill his tea, every room they passed had been empty. It was, of course, possible that the others simply hadn't come in to work. Possible as well that there was no one looking to give a statement today, that the custodial staff had finally deemed the archive too creepy to enter anymore. But under the circumstances Jon was inclined to pin a supernatural cause on how naturally and seamlessly Martin avoided other people.

It took a while but eventually he began to notice the shadows. Two figures, roughly human in size and shape, projected onto the far wall of the room. They were only just visible, barely darker than the wall they fell on, and Jon might have missed them if his predator's eyes weren't attracted to movement. One was gesturing, as if in conversation with the other.

He approached to get a better look. The shadows were soft at the edges, and they faded at the floor. There was nothing in the room that could logically be casting them, but there they were all the same. And the more attention he paid to them, the more distinct the figures became - he was almost sure he recognized Basira's stout figure, her stern profile, and the smaller one had short, dense hair that resembled Melanie's.

Not taking the day off after all, he thought ruefully. He considered how Martin always made himself scarce, how he never happened to be in a room at the same time as anyone else. He wondered how many times Martin had been standing just a few feet away, invisible to him, as he'd gone obliviously about his day. Himself only a shadow on the wall, a faint reminder of a world Martin was leaving behind.

The figures were speaking animatedly now, it seemed that they were having an argument. Pressing an ear against the wall, he swore he could hear something, fading in and out. . . .

*̴̮͒͗*̶̯̅*̵̻͒̐̉*̵̻̺̬̉̔͂--not about you. It's my decision--- *̶̛̙̖̻̼͗̊̂*̶̧̛͈͓͍̯͑ ̵̛̛͓̞̮̝͆̇̑ͅ-̶̻̯̃̄̂͊͜͝*̶̨͈̯̂̃͑_̷̖͓̺̫̉*̴̨̖̦̰̉ ̴̛͎͙̦*̸̢͓̠̼͒͜*̸̨̨̤̔̏̿ -- can bet she would say the same thing if she were here--

--Stop. You've got no right--- _̷̖͓̺̫̉*̴̨̖̦̰̉*̶̯̅*̵̻͒̐̉ ̴̛͎͙̦ ---about her, no right at all. You weren't even there.

The latter was Basira's voice, Jon was certain of it. Her tone was hard and cold, whatever they were discussing, she wasn't taking it well. The conversation faded out for a moment, becoming too faint to hear, until Melanie's voice rose again.

I'm sorry. But maybe it's for the best. I mean, you know how badly she was doing. Sooner or later she was going to ---

"Jon?" Even from across the room, Martin's voice was loud enough to startle, and Jon's head snapped in his direction. He was looking at him with concern. "It's getting late. Maybe we had better call it a day."

Pausing, Jon turned back towards the shadows. Or shadow, singular now. Whatever had transpired while he'd turned away, Melanie was gone. Basira's shadow was folded into a chair now, pressed against a desk with her head in her hands. Behind him, he heard Martin cough.

"Would you rather stay here tonight?" he asked uncertainly.

Absolutely not. Jon turned to follow him up the stairs.

* * *

No one approached them on the ride back, at least as far as Jon could tell. In truth, he hadn't managed to keep awake for most of it. The strain of another day passed without satisfying the Eye had been enough to burn through him, leaving him exhausted. Martin made them both dinner, staring at his phone while he ate. The evening passed quietly, with both of them drained -- Martin from a day spent buried in secondhand terror, Jon from a lack thereof. It had weight and shape, the silence between them. Not awkward, but not a comfortable silence either, if pressed Jon might describe it as empty. It was a distance, one he didn't know how to cross.

That night, he lay on the little cushion and shivered as an unearthly cold filled the room once more. It was undoubtedly a nightly occurrence, something that had been there for weeks or months. He wondered if Martin used to shiver in it too, if it had pained him more at first, until time eroded the parts of him that wanted to be warm. Did Jon shiver because he felt the cold more keenly than Martin, or only because he felt it differently? Perhaps Martin had grown to need it now, the way Jon needed statements. Or he'd just resigned himself to whatever it was doing to him.

When Jon was very small, still unmarked by the Spider's strands, he'd seen a stray cat trembling in the snow. His grandmother had taken him along on some errands, and as it had been an unusually cold winter the ground was covered in a thin blanket of white. He'd tugged at her sleeve as he spotted the little creature in a public park. It looked very miserable, the damp bench it was curled under providing little protection from the elements. Seeing his distress, his grandmother had assured him the cat would be fine, that the outdoors was its home. That it had a nice fur coat to keep it warm, and they ought not bother it.

She may have been right. There were, after all, countless strays that survived in places colder than Bournemouth. And the animal he'd felt such childlike pity for might not, in fact, have wanted attention from humans. Looking back, he couldn't say whether his grandmother had believed her own assurances or had only wanted to avoid hours of stubborn insistence that they take a feral, possibly diseased animal home. Either way, it worked. He let the matter go, satisfied by her assurance.

. . . For a few hours, at least. Until day turned to evening turned to night, bringing a deeper chill with it. Until they were back at home, and it occurred to him that the cat had no home of its own to go to. From the warmth and brightness of his grandmother's living room, he stared out the window, troubled by the cold and dark beyond. He slowly became fixated on the phrase she had used, "a nice fur coat." He wondered if that would really be enough, to keep warm even out on a cold, snowy night.

That was how he'd ended up sneaking into the hall closet after his bedtime, and slipping on his grandmother's Sunday overcoat -- fake fur, not that he'd have known the difference. He'd come to a decision. He would sit in the snow for a while, and if he found the coat was truly enough to keep him warm, he would be able to stop worrying about the cat. Wrapping himself up, he slipped outside -- without shoes, since he reasoned that cats had to press their feet to the ground -- then sat down in the snow and waited.

In hindsight, it's unlikely that he'd been out there long before his grandmother found him. Though it was still enough time for his feet to go numb, for his small body to shiver and his teeth to begin chattering. She scolded him first for soaking the bottom of her coat, then when she realized he was barefoot, for being so foolish as to sit in the snow and let himself freeze. She sternly lectured him about hypothermia and frostbite, and his simple, childish fear became beautifully complex -- worry over the cat mingling with fear for his own flesh, layered over with loneliness as he tried and failed to explain his panic to his confused, tired caretaker.

His dreams that night were empty, as he watched himself stumble through a snowy field that was littered with severed cat's paws. His dream-self desperately tried to gather them up, calling for his grandmother, crying out unanswered pleas for help. Finally he looked behind him and saw his own feet lying in the snow, severed cleanly at the ankles -- a cartoonish, child's interpretation of his grandmother's warnings about losing toes.

Frostbite wasn't something he would have to worry about here. This wasn't the sort of cold that killed. It didn't take toes, fingers, patches of skin. Instead, it took comfort. Easy sleep. It took the things you liked about yourself, memories that brought you solace, pieces of your heart. It slipped in slowly, eating away, until you couldn't remember true warmth..

Jon made a decision. Shaking himself from the blanket, he climbed off the cushion and leapt onto the foot of the bed. As before, Martin was awake. His eyes were unfocused in the dark as he turned to look at Jon.

"You all right?" he asked softly. "I can get another blanket."

Another blanket wouldn't help against this cold. On some level, Martin surely knew that. Jon just stood for a while, waiting for him to understand. Martin looked at him sadly, shaking his head.

"You don't want -- trust me, the cold is worse up here."

He was right. As far as Jon could tell, the center of it all hovered around the bed itself, not that that deterred him for a moment. Slowly, deliberately, he walked to where Martin lay and curled against his side, tucking his paws under himself.

Martin let out a long, slow breath, and Jon felt the chill of it in his fur. The cold was deep enough here that his muscles ached, but if he kept still and curled into a tight little ball, it was just about bearable. Stubbornly, he pressed into Martin's side and rubbed his face against his arm. There was a soft noise in response, and he couldn't tell whether it was relieved or pained, but Martin didn't pull back so Jon stayed put. He'd stay there the entire night if he could bear it.

The cold wouldn't kill him, after all. It wasn't a cold that killed.

#cat!jon #cat!jon au #jonmartin #tma #tma fanfic #do you ever wonder what the janitors at the institute think of the archive #emptying burned statements out of the wastepaper baskets #noticing a new hole's been punched in the wall every week #steadfastly ignoring the nerd staring into their souls while they replace the paper towels

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cecilysass · 10 months

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False Front

Read on AO3 | Tagging @today-in-fic CW: suggestion of possible rape / sexual assault (from canon) written for the X-Files Flicked Switch Fanfic Exchange

He’s doing everything, every single thing he can think of, but Mulder’s getting nowhere and he knows it. He blusters around Skinner’s office, he fires off orders to the Gunmen, he drives back to her apartment and searches over every square inch. Of course he calls her cell countless times. You never know when she might be able to pick up.

It’s actually the cell phone that finally does it, that makes him give up on her apartment and go home.

He’s on the floor methodically sorting the contents of her wastepaper basket—tissues, an empty tube of makeup, two endearing chocolate wrappers—when Frohike calls and tells him that it appears that the signal never actually left her building.

He finds the phone in her desk drawer. Turned off. Silent. It’s devastating. All day it has been absorbing his diligent calls here in this drawer. Not anywhere near her.

Mulder closes the desk drawer slowly, observing absently that his hands are trembling. He locks up her apartment and walks out to his car. He’s been through this so many times now, a familiar refrain: she’s gone, maybe forever, he has to bring her back, he has no idea how. It only gets harder. Because one of these times they won’t figure it out. One of these times the worst is bound to come true.

It’s very important at this stage not to give in to his darkest anxieties, that fear and that dread. Keeping his face impassive helps; that’s an old trick, predating his partner. His mind can be an even more useful ally, and it’s straining to go into profiler mode, reaching out instinctively for every possible scrap of information he has.

On the drive to Alexandria he keeps mentally revisiting those emails, all that fabricated correspondence between the account of Dana Katherine Scully and this unknown Cobra. Those missives turned out to tell quite a tale.

I think about how much of a mark I could have left on the world, had I not ended up in the F.B.I., had I been free to pursue what I wanted.

I wish you and I could meet like normal people do, just have dinner, wine and challenging conversation. I want that so badly. I daydream about it.

You and I — we understand one another, don’t we? That’s so rare and beautiful. Often I feel like there’s no one in my life who really understands anything about me.

This isn’t Scully. These aren’t her words. It’s creative writing from someone else, likely C.G.B. Spender himself. The moment the Gunmen told him these emails existed, Mulder knew this.

Even so, the fabricated words get under his skin. They bother him deeply. At a fucking cellular level.

Maybe it’s that the smoking man doesn’t sound so far off? Maybe because little bits and pieces do sound eerily like something Scully could say—maybe, possibly, under the right circumstances. Mulder doesn’t like that. It makes her feel farther away somehow.

When the Gunmen said Scully had been writing to someone named Cobra, he’d so easily dismissed them. No. She would have told me, he’d said. That utter confidence haunts him now. Because even if he were right in this case, it turns out there’s quite a bit she hasn’t told him.

Mulder pictures Spender smiling to himself, typing away at home in a cloud of smoke, dreaming up this fictional romance between Scully and her Defense Department confidante.

He suspects the smoking man likes the idea of Mulder, his supposed son, uncovering this. He probably got some sick little thrill imagining Mulder discovering Scully’s tawdry secret online relationship. Look, Mulder, your loyal girl betrayed you. What an extra little zing that must give him. In addition to the heady exhilaration of murdering his son’s adored partner.

Mulder slams his palm down on the steering wheel angrily.

How could she go anywhere with him? How could she believe any word that came out of his mouth? Was she threatened? Blackmailed? What could possibly make it worth it?

He’s breathing much too fast. He takes a long, extended breath and releases it. No point in asking all these questions. There’s too much he still doesn’t know.

Something else keeps poking at his mind, though.

It’s the second time in just over a year that some would-be writer has presumed he knows Scully well enough to attempt to represent her inner life. That someone has been inspired to write the complex heart and mind of Dana Scully.

Such utter, arrogant bullshit. Why would anyone delude themselves that they could know Scully like this? What is it about Scully that makes men think they can read her? As far as Mulder knows, no one has ever understood her heart. Certainly not Phillip Padgett. Not C.G.B. Spender.

Not—all too clearly—Fox Mulder.

Mulder’s fingers tighten around the steering wheel, his knuckles going white as he tries to rein himself in. Thoughts, not feelings, he reminds himself. Mind, not heart.

*** At home he’s restless, because there is nothing productive for him to do there. No leads to follow up on. Nothing to do but wait.

He’s hungry—who even remembers when the fuck he last ate?—so he walks into his kitchen and bangs around impatiently looking for something to eat. There’s an unopened bag of bagels in his fridge along with a tub of sealed cream cheese. These items weren’t purchased with him in mind, which depresses him. But he’s got to eat something, and well, here they are. No point in passing out. He begins slathering cream cheese on a bagel.

The last time they had sex—the fifth time overall—was a little under a week ago. Here, his place.

She showed up at his door, that determined look in her eyes. No discussion, no words, exactly like the other times, a pattern Mulder finds both hot and disturbing. Sudden, fierce, take-no-prisoners kissing, the pulling open of clothing, the hitching up of her work skirt, a frantic fuck against his front door.

Afterwards she’d clung to his sweaty neck to catch her breath, and he’d buried his face in her rosemary-scented hair. He’d wept just a little—he couldn’t help it. The emotions involved are titanic, completely beyond his ability to cope with. It is amazing, everything, but something is off, too, and he doesn’t know what to do to correct the course.

He could tell by the way she tightened her hold that she noticed his tears, but she didn’t ask about them.

Much to his relief, she had changed into his tee-shirt, crawled into his bed and stayed the night—a first—leaving that rosemary scent behind on his pillowcase, plus several strands of copper hair.

The next morning they got up, dressed, had coffee, and discussed their case. Matter-of-factly. Like Mulder and Scully. Like nothing was different. Like she had dropped by for coffee before work. Like this incredible sex they kept having existed only in his imagination or in some alternate dimension. He didn’t ask any questions, and neither did she.

Now he’s got nothing but questions. He’s haunted by fucking questions. What if he never sees her again? What if she never eats any of these bagels he optimistically bought hoping she’d stay over again soon? What if he never has the chance to find out what she meant by any of it, what it could have meant if it had continued? What if it’s his fault she’s gone, what if it’s all because she’s been used as a tool somehow to get to him?

Not everything is about you, Mulder.

He sits on his couch and forces himself to focus on eating, polishing the bagel off in a few large ravenous bites. He licks every bit of cream cheese off his fingertips. He still feels hungry.

Brushing stray crumbs off his shirt, he remembers guiltily that he should update Mrs. Scully. When he called her the day before yesterday, to find out more about Scully’s nonexistent family emergency, she’d been worried—in her controlled, subdued way. Asking only basic questions—she’s been through this too many times, too. He’s only updated her once since, with pathetically little to go on. It’s probably time for another check-in.

When he looks at his phone on the desk, he practically jumps out of his skin.

There’s a flashing light. A fucking message. He leaps to his feet. How had he not seen it? Why didn’t he check his messages right away? What was he thinking?

He rushes to the button, presses it, waits.

“Mulder, it’s me.”

He stumbles back and falls into his desk chair in boneless relief.

“I’m on my way back. I’m coming straight to your place. I’m going to be about two hours. Will you ask the Gunmen to be there, too? I have something important to show you. Something I think could… change lives.”

She sounds all right, he marvels. Upbeat. Not like a recent victim. His shoulders droop in a release of tension, and he folds his hands over his forehead, taking a deep breath.

Not dead, not dead, not dead. The worst did not happen.

For a moment he lets himself just sit on the couch. Emotions pass over him like clear water through jagged rocks.

*** The thing is, he doesn’t know how to love Scully, and he assumes that’s probably the problem.

He knows how to feel. He has always been a proficient feeler of feelings. He feels all sorts of things when it comes to her in particular, a whole panoply of finely tuned emotions.

Love isn’t feeling. He knows that. He’s not the most experienced with love as a practical matter. He’s not been a big relationship guy in his life, and the love in his family, while present, hasn’t flowed as freely and easily as in other families. But he knows enough to know that love isn’t a question of emoting. He knows it’s a question of impact, of touch, of effect. Of every action having a reaction.

He knows it’s his actions that perpetually disappoint her. He’s painfully aware of that. She often needs him to be something, and he disappoints her. He can say all sorts of beautiful words to her. He can fuck her exquisitely, as he’s learned recently.

But he can’t seem to do what she needs. He can’t figure out how to love her. Not in the way that matters. Not in the way she can touch and discern and trust and rely upon.

Not in the way, he worries, that would allow her to really love him back.

*** He’s been carefully listening out for her, distracted even while the Gunmen are talking to him. So he knows she’s walking up his hallway before she gets to the door.

He swings the door open just as she raises her hand to knock.

“Mulder,” she says, her face pink, a trace of a smile. She looks uninjured and hopeful. She steps closer, and he knows she expects him to put his arms around her.

“The prodigal partner returns,” he says casually. He doesn’t step forward to greet her, and her eyes widen, betray a trace of worry.

Behind him, the Gunmen rise from the couch and stand in a tight trio in that way they always do, like they’re a chorus in a goddamned Greek tragedy.

“It’s good to see you alive, Agent Scully.”

“We thought you were toast.”

“Mulder was losing his shit,” Frohike adds.

“I’m sorry to make everyone worry,” Scully replies. Her eyes turn questioningly back on Mulder’s. He turns around brusquely to walk into the living room.

“Did you get the tapes, Mulder?” she says, following behind him. “I sent you tapes in the mail. Tapes I recorded of our conversations, from a wire I’d hidden on me. I’d expect them to be here by now.”

“I didn’t,” Mulder says, sinking onto the couch. He looks up and makes sullen eye contact with her. “I got a message on my machine about a family emergency. And a secondhand message from Skinner. That’s the extent of the communication I received.”

“I couldn’t communicate easily,” she says. “It was a singular opportunity. I was trying to get information out of him. I needed to get his trust, make him think I was accepting his story.”

Mulder slumps down further on the couch. It sounds somewhat understandable, like something he would do, but it doesn’t make him feel better. “And what was his story?”

Scully produces a plastic case. “It came down to this,” she says, holding it out to Mulder. Her voice is excited; her eyes light up. “I think this could actually be something significant. I got it from a man who went by the name Cobra.”

Mulder doesn’t miss Frohike and Langly exchanging knowing glances. He doesn’t take the case from her hand.

“Yeah,” he says. “We’re familiar with Cobra. A man working on a shadow project for the Department of Defense. Your email account has been having a somewhat flirtatious relationship with him for the past six months. You set up an in-person meet-up with him recently.”

Scully is taken aback. She eyes the Gunmen, and then gives him a significant look. “Mulder.” She drops her voice. “You know those emails weren’t really from me, don’t you?”

“Of course I do,” he replies. “There were a lot of feelings revealed in those emails. Didn’t really seem like you.”

Frohike clears his throat. She presses her lips together and holds out the small square case to Langly. “This disk,” she says to the Gunmen. “Please see what’s on it.”

Langly takes it from her hands, nodding, and the three Gunmen begin to huddle around their computers.

Scully hesitantly moves to sit next to Mulder on the couch, her eyes on him.

“If I’m right,” she says, “then everything that’s happened these past few days will be more than worth it, Mulder.”

“Your death wouldn’t have been worth it.”

“That’s familiar,” she replies back tightly. “Only usually it’s me who says it to you.”

He can’t answer her. Actually, he finds he can’t even look at her, even though he knows in his heart he’s being unfair.

“I had to take the risk.” Her voice has hardened.

He swallows and rises to his feet, pacing to release some pent-up energy before settling in the door, clinging to the door frame while the Gunmen work.

After a moment, the Gunmen look at one another awkwardly.

“There’s nothing on this,” Frohike mutters.

“It’s empty,” adds Langly.

“Completely.”

“No.” Scully springs from her seat. “It can’t be,” she insists. She bends over to look at the computer, as if somehow she will be able to conjure something the Gunmen can’t. “It can’t be. It’s got to be on there.”

Langly looks embarrassed for her, Byers openly sympathetic.

Mulder can’t help but make eye contact with her now. She’s looking back at him as if afraid of his reaction, and he knows that should bother him.

He can only stare at her in silent frustration, gripping the door above him.

*** They sit around his table and listen to her tell her story.

He can tell Scully’s rattled, but she makes a game attempt to hide it. She speaks in her very best authoritative agent voice, as though she is making a report to Skinner. She sticks to the facts, offering very little commentary, but she keeps repeatedly licking her lips, pushing her hair behind her ear, her most obvious nervous tics.

“I didn’t understand exactly what he wanted,” she says. “But I thought there was something to be gained by playing along. Seeing what I could find out.”

“Something for him to gain, maybe,” Mulder says. “Cobra’s trust.”

The Gunmen’s eyes bounce from her to him.

“I think there was more to it than that,” Scully says emphatically. “He seemed to sincerely want to convince me. It’s why I thought he… it’s why I believed the disk was real.”

There is a painful silence. Langly doesn’t seem to know where to look.

“It’s funny, it’s like he imagines himself to be a kind of silver-tongued Richard III,” Byers comments thoughtfully. “Convincing his own Lady Anne to bend to his will.”

Scully rotates to look at him. Frohike raises his eyebrows.

“What, you guys don’t know your Shakespeare?” Byers says. “The villain who uses charm as a weapon? Richard III? ‘Was ever woman in this humor wooed?’ It’s a famous—”

“I know it,” Scully cuts him off sharply. “Richard’s charm works on Anne, Byers. Spender’s did not on me.”

Mulder bites back what he wants to say: didn’t it, though? Didn’t you do everything he wanted you to? He must not be hiding his thoughts as well as he thinks, because Scully, glimpsing his face, flushes.

He suspects Byers is right, that Spender imagines himself a kingly mastermind, using Scully as a pawn to be easily moved about. Like she’s some early modern female character in a Shakespearean tragedy, passive and at the mercy of men.

“Mulder, I went to his office,” Scully says forcefully. “We can go there right now. You and me. There could be evidence there.”

Both of her fists are clenched. He can practically feel her desperation crossing over into anger, radiating off of her in waves. If there’s anything he knows about his partner, it’s that she never wants to have been anyone’s pawn—anyone’s passive placeholder—ever again.

“Yeah,” Mulder says softly, meeting her eyes. “Okay. Let’s go.”

***

She asks him to drive, and she calls out the instructions to him in a resolute, crisp voice. As she does, he steals glimpses at her in the passenger seat. She doesn’t notice, looking ahead, her posture stiff and straight.

He suspects his standoffishness is starting to seriously piss her off. He doesn’t himself quite understand why he’s still so intensely angry with her. He wishes he weren’t. It’s like he’s experiencing a powerful torrent of emotion, an opened fire hydrant, and he can’t stop.

“If someone offers you valuable information,” Scully says to him out of nowhere, pronouncing each syllable very clearly, “you have to pursue it. Even if you’re not sure it’s entirely reliable. You have to find out. You know that.”

Mulder is quiet.

“Is this the cold shoulder, Mulder?” Her voice sounds bitter. “You’re very fortunate that’s not how I chose to respond to every one of your in-the-moment miscalculations.”

“Why would you not tell your partner, Scully? Why keep it a secret from me?”

“I told you, he didn’t want me to,” she says tightly. “He told me the offer was only good if I didn’t.”

“Really raises some questions, doesn’t it?” Mulder asks. “Why would he want to separate you from your partner? What does offering you the cure for the world’s diseases have to do with me?”

“I sent you the tapes,” Scully says sharply. “I didn’t listen to him. You act like I had no agency.”

He laughs darkly. “You had exactly the amount of agency he wanted you to have.”

She sucks in air. More and more pissed off. Still, she has to be able to see, doesn’t she? He wonders if she really believes they will find evidence at Spender’s office, or if she’s only clinging to that idea to protect herself.

“He knew he didn’t entirely have me,” she comments decisively after a pause. “He tried everything to get in my head. He even attempted a little pop psychology, and he did it badly.”

“Oh yeah?” Mulder says, risking a look at her. “What kind of pop psychology?”

“Let’s see.” She tilts her head and recites facetiously. “I’m attracted to powerful men, but I fear their power. I keep walls up. I’m devoted to you on one level, yet I live alone. I’d die for you, but I won’t let myself love you.” She gives him a scathing look and turns to gaze out the window. “Cosmopolitan magazine level insight, really.”

“Sounds like it,” Mulder says gruffly. If she’s intentionally lobbing a grenade, it found its target. His mind is spinning trying not to read into these statements, trying not to parse what parts she’s insinuating are ridiculous.

“He’s like anyone else, Mulder. He has weaknesses.” She gazes straight out the front window. “Whatever else is true, I’m sure of that much.”

“We all have weaknesses,” he mutters tightly. “Which is why we have partners and we don’t just … go off on our own.”

She turns and fixes him with a slow, deadpan look of disbelief. She doesn’t even need to say it. They both know perfectly well what a patently absurd thing that is for him to say to her.

With an exasperated shake of her head, she turns back to the passenger window.

In the silence that follows, Mulder contemplates the impressive depths of his own hypocrisy.

If he’d been approached in the same way, with the promise of some information he’d wanted badly, he knows he would have gone, too. He knows he would have because he’s done exactly that sort of thing before.

He just has this tendency to hold her to a different, only-for-Scully standard. This isn’t the first time he’s done it. It’s actually an embarrassing pattern.

Sometimes, he expects her to be more rational than he would ever ask himself to be. He expects her to be more prudent than he ever is. He expects her to leave aside her personal biases when his are woven into the fabric of their entire work.

Why does he do it? Is it because of their respective genders? Does it come from his deep feelings for Scully, his overwhelming desire to keep her safe? This all might factor into it and affect his professionalism, but he thinks it comes down to something more.

He’s come to depend on Scully playing a certain role in their partnership. And when she veers off course—makes him guess—it both delights and unnerves him. She plays the same familiar theme in their shared duet, the perfect counterpoint to his, the well-matched half of their mutual composition. If she suddenly seems to go solo, to improvise, to take up the fucking sitar or the ukulele or something, he doesn’t always cope well.

He glances over in the car to look balefully at the back of her head, still intently focused out the window. He can’t keep her in a box. He’s probably held her back for too long.

Then he thinks about Spender’s fucking emails, his fucking pop psychology, getting Scully to board some goddamn boat to meet some man for him.

Come on. This road trip with the smoker isn’t her pushing her limits. It’s not her spreading her wings. It’s her possibly getting killed. It’s beneath her. It’s just … stupid.

He suppresses the urge to slam his hand down on the steering wheel again. Next to him, she sighs.

***

What was once set up to appear to be Spender’s offices is now a completely empty building. Mulder is faintly surprised. He thought maybe it would turn out to be a legitimate office building who’d unwittingly played landlord to a liar. He thought they’d find a bunch of bewildered receptionists and cubicle dwellers who responded in confusion to their questions.

Instead, the whole thing turns out to be a mirage. Empty room after empty room. Everything and everyone evaporated into thin air.

This is an elaborate ruse just for Scully, he ponders, staring at an abandoned pad of sticky notes on the floor. Spender spent some money on this sham. Why go to all this trouble and then leave the most important loose end alive? It sends a shiver down his spine.

Scully is upset, of course, and he’s trying to be more understanding. She’s making it hard. She sounds unacceptably, uncharacteristically credulous, like she’s never even heard the word “skepticism” before in her life. It’s grating on him.

“Mulder, I looked into his eyes. I swear what he told me was true,” she says stubbornly.

“He did it all for himself—to get the science on that disk,” Mulder’s voice is taut. “His sincerity was a mask, Scully. The man's motives never changed.”

“You think he used me to save himself—at the expense of the human race.”

“No, he knows what that science is worth, how powerful it is. He'd let nothing stand in his way.”

“You may be right... but for a moment, I saw something else in him. A longing for something more than power. Maybe for something he could never have.”

Mulder wants to yell at her that that’s complete horseshit. He wants to take her shoulders and shake her and ask her what the fuck is wrong with her. But he exercises some restraint.

“And what is that something he can’t have, Scully? Compassion? Redemption? You really think, after all this, he cares about any of that?”

She wraps her arms around herself in a protective gesture, looking up and down the walls of what had apparently once been his false office. Her back is to him.

“Aren’t you the same person who once told me ‘the truth is out there, but so are lies?’” Mulder pushes. “Where’s that Dana Scully?”

She walks to the window and stands in front of it, still hugging herself and looking out into the afternoon light. From Mulder’s vantage point she looks only like a silhouette, an outline of herself.

“I get it,” she says after a heavy beat. “I see what you’re saying.”

Now there’s a melancholy timbre in her voice, a sound of defeat. He hears it rarely, for all of their struggles, and he doesn’t like it.

She doesn’t turn away from the window. Her head tilts forward until her forehead rests lightly against the glass.

“I was duped, clearly,” she says, her voice expressionless. “Please. Can you just take me back to your apartment so I can get my car and go home?”

*** On the drive back, her face is as inaccessible as a marble statue’s. For a while she shuts her eyes, but he knows she isn’t asleep.

“Hey, are you hungry?”

“Not really,” she says, stretching her neck from side to side as though it is sore.

“You sure? When did you last eat?”

“I don’t feel like eating, Mulder.”

“You’re a little pale.” He refuses to sit in silence.

“I’m tired,” she says with a tone of finality. “I didn’t sleep very well last night, thinking about the sunrise meeting.”

Mulder nods in an attempt at sympathy, sending her repeated sideways looks. Something in what she just said nudges at his thoughts, bothers him.

“The meeting with Cobra was at sunrise?”

“Yes,” she says shortly.

“But you didn’t come back to my apartment until one,” Mulder says. “It’s not that long a drive.”

She shifts in her seat, apparently attempting to get comfortable. “No.”

“You didn’t come straight back?”

“I made another stop,” Scully says evasively.

“Another stop? For a few hours?”

“Yes.”

Her lack of communication is again making him angry.

“Where could you possibly go between here and Milford, Pennsylvania?” He knows his tone is too nasty. “Philadelphia?”

She exhales sharply. “Do I need to account for all of my time now, Mulder? And is that little rule going to apply to you, too?”

“I was looking for you,” he snaps. “I was worried sick about you. Where would you go before trying to call me?”

“To the hospital,” she replies hotly.

His head spins to look at her. “Why?”

“Just to get … something checked out.”

Every muscle in his body seizes up, alert. “To get what checked out?”

She pauses. “I had them do a rape kit.”

He swallows, aware that his heart is pounding loudly in his ears. The sides of his vision begin to narrow until he can only see a tiny fragment of the road ahead. He starts pulling the car over, guiding the car into a grocery store parking lot.

When he has safely maneuvered them into a spot at the back of the lot, he turns to face her.

“Why did you have them do a rape kit, Scully?” he asks quietly. His voice is shaking.

She’s meeting his eyes, but her face is difficult to read, a complete mask. “They didn’t … find any evidence of anything.” She extends her fingertips and meticulously picks a piece of fuzz off of his sweater. “We had been in the car, driving for many hours, and I fell asleep. When I woke up, I was in different clothes. Pajamas. In a bed. Obviously, it unsettled me, and I kept thinking about it, so … a rape kit.”

He’s ashamed at how badly he’s reacting, how frightened he is to the very core. He knows that it’s her who should be comforted. He tries to calm himself, reaches out and clasps her hand.

“Scully,” he whispers.

“It had been close to 36 hours at that point,” she continues in an even, formal voice. “So, as you know, that affects the quality of the forensic evidence. I did bring the underwear I was wearing, just in case.”

“Oh Jesus,” he says. He feels physically ill. “Scully.”

“I don’t think anything happened,” she adds. “I went just because I kept thinking about it, but I didn’t think his agenda was…” She drifts off, bites her lip. “I admit that I wonder a little more now.”

They’re both too familiar with the process of testing for forensic evidence of rape and sexual assault. A thousand possible scenarios pass through his mind. He knows they have passed through hers, too.

“They found nothing?” he whispers.

“A small fragment of latex in my clothes … concerned them,” she says softly. “But it’s latex from latex gloves, and you know… I have lots of latex gloves. It could have easily come from my car, from the autopsy I did earlier in the week.”

“Scully,” he says urgently. “You could have called me. In the hospital. I would have come.”

“It’s… okay, Mulder. It was very likely nothing.”

“You thought this was possible,” Mulder says, in a sudden explosion of feeling, “and you stayed? You stayed in that house with him? Anything could have happened, he could have…”

He stops himself, seeing her expression. “I’m so sorry,” he says, instantly penitent. “I’m so sorry.” He leans over and presses his cheek into the palm of her hand. “I know why you stayed. You needed to finish the job.”

“You would have done the same?” Her voice sounds unexpectedly small, like someone else’s.

It doesn’t happen to me in quite the same way, he thinks. Sometimes ex-girlfriends attempt seductions when I am down for the count. Sometimes my brain is violated with surgical knives. But it’s not like this. Not like this.

“I would have,” he promises. He scoots over as far as he can in the car seat and tentatively threads his arms around her, pulling her against his shoulder. “I imagine you know this,” he says roughly, “but I have to say it, especially because I’ve been such a dick to you since you came back. None of this is your fault. You were trying to find out all you could. So you could do the right thing, like you always do.”

“I know, Mulder,” she says, her voice a soft whimper against his shirt. “I know, but I should have known better.”

“We can’t always know better,” he replies into her hair. “We take risks, and sometimes they pay off, sometimes they don’t. We can’t second guess. It’s the job.”

She pulls her face back to look at him, and her lip is slightly trembling. “I think I wanted to believe him,” she says. “I wanted it to be real, because if it worked, it would mean everything we’ve gone through all these years would turn out to have an actual impact. Would turn out to have real meaning after all. I could make it all make sense.”

He thinks about that: his little Catholic, wanting so badly to turn her suffering into redemption.

“Listen, of all people, I understand that,” he says, swiping her tear away with his finger. “I know all about wanting to believe.”

“And it felt like he was approaching me seriously,” she says in a hushed voice, like it’s a dark secret. “As an adversary, an intelligent mind. The way he deals with you.” Practically in a whisper. “It–it probably flattered me more than it should have. I’m embarrassed about it.”

“Scully—”

“No,” she says quickly, her face flushing. “It’s true. He’s always seen me as …a test subject. A lever used to motivate you. A chess piece. And he was talking to me like I was … a player. Mulder, he must have known how I’d respond to that.”

She’s so ashamed of this tiny manifestation of pride, this smallest and most sympathetic of vanities. Mulder runs his thumbs lightly up and down her jaw bones.

Her voice is low and terse. “And this possible touching thing, thinking about it now. This dress he had me wear...” She peters out in disgust.

Mulder’s insides are churning. Holding firmly to each side of her face, he pulls it close to him, so he can stare closely into her pale eyes. “I’ll kill him, Scully,” he says hoarsely. “I’ll fucking kill him.”

He can so easily imagine doing it— the satisfaction of killing Spender. Extinguishing the life out of the man’s arrogant eyes, the surprise as he realizes he’s lost, that he can’t do whatever he wants after all.

Scully, eyes wide and glacial blue, shakes her head almost imperceptibly from within his hold on her cheeks. And he understands, from his experience of her in hundreds of different situations and hundreds of discrete moments, exactly what she’s trying to communicate. That doesn’t help, Mulder. That’s not what I need. This isn’t his story to write.

“Okay,” he says gently, lightly pushing her hair back from her face. “Okay, yep, I get it. I won’t do anything unpredictable right now.”

“Thank you.” She exhales, tilts her head down.

He tucks a lock behind her ear, his mind racing. “What if we left your car at my place?” he asks. “I could take you home. We could pick up some food on the way. You could get to your bed faster that way.”

She looks up to him, her expression guarded. “And what about you?”

He hesitates, wondering what she wants him to say. Every moment of physical intimacy they’ve ever had has been initiated without words; he doesn’t have a precedent of using language to approach it. He decides it’s safer not to assume.

“I could take a cab home,” he suggests politely. “Or call the Gunmen and ask them for a ride. You might want some peace and quiet.”

Her expression scarcely changes, but he can tell from the smallest twitch of her mouth that it was the wrong answer.

He opts for another approach. More direct.

“Or … I could stay with you,” he offers.

She lifts her lip just a fraction. It could be the beginning of a smile. “Hmm,” she says.

“I, uh, like that option best,” he adds. In for a penny, in for a pound, he supposes. “Because you’ve been gone, and I’ve been worried and what you’ve just told me worries me, too. So it would make me feel better to be around. That’s usually comforting to me, and, uh, I hope it is to you, too.”

Her eyebrows raise. He hopes that his unbearable awkwardness is at least coming across as sincere.

“I appreciate that, Mulder,” she replies.

“It’s up to you, obviously.”

She turns to face the front windshield, nodding slowly. “Why don’t you drive to my place?”

*** She doesn’t cry again. But that night, she tugs him into her bed with her and wraps her limbs tightly around him, pressing her cheek against his chest.

“I’m sorry you were so scared,” she mumbles into his shirt. “I would have been scared, too.”

“If I did something uncharacteristically rash like run off and get myself lost at sea, you mean?”

“It’s not outside of the realm of extreme possibility.”

“Hey, you said you saw something else in him,” Mulder says. Part of him doesn’t want to bring it up, but he worries Scully is still torturing herself with self-doubt. “You said he was wanting something he could never have.”

She’s quiet a beat. “I was probably deluding myself.”

“I don’t know,” he says. “I was just thinking—he’s always spinning webs of lies, always writing this bullshit involving the lives of other people, setting up false fronts. Sometimes it must occur to him that he doesn’t interact with anything real.”

“Yeah.”

“I wouldn’t want that,” Mulder says softly. “Maybe you perceived him having a moment of … clarity. That nothing in his world is genuine.”

“If he even cares about that,” she says dismissively. “Like you said. There’s no reason to think so.”

“You said you saw something in his eyes,” Mulder points out. “That’s a good enough reason. Your perception, your judgment. I don’t doubt that.”

She lifts her head and stares at him for a moment, her expression enigmatic. Then she kisses him gently on the lips, the fingers of one hand moving slowly through his hair. He tries not to tense up, but she’s never kissed him like this before. In this unhurried, tender way.

She then lays her head down right below his collarbone—where she can probably hear his heart thumping quickly—and he curls his arm around her.

“I would die for you, you know,” she says. “He was right about that much.”

He knows what she’s referring to, Spender’s claim into her psychology. If his heart wasn’t racing before, it is now.

“I know,” he murmurs. “I know you would. But I would never want you to.”

“He wasn’t right about all of it,” she adds.

I love you, too, he thinks. And to show her, he draws her in, ever closer.

#the x files #xfiles fanfic #x files fanfic #fox mulder #dana scully #x files #en ami #fanfic exchange

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