By Susan Esty (AKA Windsinger)
Windsinger@aol.com

Date: 26 Nov 1995 15:53:31 -0500
 

Ok, this is for all Romantics and angst lovers and those who want a what
happens if Mulder gets a girlfriend story. I love e-mail. Let me know what
you think.
 

By S. Esty (AKA WINDSINGER)
begun 7/26/95 sent to EMXC 11/13/95

Teaser: Years after they had gone their separate ways, Mulder and
Scully meet once again at Dana's husband's funeral. Hey, you all
know where this is going but this is a little different and the joy
and the sadness is in the journey. A poignant coming apart and
coming together. Romance, Romance, Romance, Romance. I'm not going
to try to admit that its anything else.  GP-13. No violence, no
explicit sex, no ghosts this time (at least none of them having
speaking parts), more pathos from Windsinger. Brits, this one's OK
for you.

Author's notes: Since there has been a lot of discussion about
Mulder's getting a little 'friend', I thought this was a good time
to post this one. Amazingly, this was written largely in July, way
before there was any talk of CC giving Mulder a little 'friend'.
Scinut on EMXC can vouch for me on that. I sent it to EMXC and then
asked her not to post it because I started writing Lady and the
Tiger with Steph which had some similar elements and there were
other stories coming out that also had similar elements or styles.
There have been even more since, especially 'Sleeper' by Yvonne
Harrison and 'Renewal' by Amy Vincent both of which I highly
recommend, but the similar ideas are coincidence. We are all
writing in a very small universe here.

Disclaimer: As always to CC and company for these marvelous
characters and Gillian and David and all the X-Files fanfic writers
for inspiration. No stepping on toes intended.
 

FOR EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON
by Windsinger

Chapter 1

Baltimore, Maryland
October 2004
 

     Dana Scully Thompson looked over the top of her husband's
casket to find herself staring into Fox Mulder's eyes.

     Oh, she could still lose herself in those eyes. Even though
the skin around them was creased with years and care, they still
looked beautiful to her. Their expression today, however, was even
more sad than usual.

     The gloom was not because Mulder had known Peter Thompson
well. Mulder had been too wrapped up in his own affairs during the
good years to get to know the man who married his one time partner.
No, Mulder had to be thinking about Cathy, this funeral reminding
him of hers. How many years ago now? Four?

     Dana had loved Peter Thompson but she had Mulder to thank for
her being able to love him. Being with Fox had taught her the
meaning of love, also taught her that holding back gained you
nothing. Only after Mulder had moved away from her had Dana finally
been able to admit to herself that she had been in love with her
intense, long-limbed partner. Only too late did she realize that
she had been waiting for him. No, she had to be fair, both had been
waiting for circumstances to change so that they could try for
something more than their partnership - wonderful, special, and
amazing as it was.

     But case followed case, and the pressure, the danger, was
always too great. There was always the fear, always the barrier and
neither were willing to give up the job, to give up the ability to
be with each other, day in, day out, for something that might not
work out. And then there was the very basic fact that they
desperately needed each other during those years just to survive.
The time never seemed right. Or did the right time simply slip them
by unnoticed on a night between a liverwurst sandwich and a root
beer?

     The argument was mute, anyway. Mulder met Cathy.

     Cathy Haines worked for the CIA. She was very intelligent,
very good, very committed, very nuts. Mulder's equal in a spook
suit and a very well-endowed spook suit, too. Cathy was outrageous
and beautiful. Dana heard only years later that she and Mulder had
been assigned to work with Cathy and her partner on this New York
case specifically so their mutual acquaintances could place bets
and watch the fireworks.

     And fireworks there were.

                               ***

New York City
April 1996

     Dana Scully watched her partner pace, up and down, up and down
the hotel room. "Mulder, you are making me dizzy."

     He hadn't heard. There was fire in his eyes. "Haines is going
to get us killed!" he swore continuing to pace, running his hand
through his hair till it stood on end. "Taking off like that. She
could have scared off Markson and his little gang and, if she has,
it will take more than the combined efforts of this alphabet soup
of ours to run them to ground again. I don't even know why we were
sent here. This is no X-File." He spun on Dana's patiently waiting
form. "And who the hell does she think she is anyway? And what
makes her think that she's senior officer on this investigation?"

     "We need to learn to work together," Dana sighed, knowing her
words were falling on deaf ears.

     "Well, she's a prima donna and irresponsible! I've already
sent one complaint to her superiors. She jumps in with no plan, no
backup. Her theories have no foundation. She doesn't study the
problem in any depth, just rushes in, to who knows what kind of
situation and expects us to pull her butt out."

     <Talk about the pot calling the kettle black,> Dana mused. "I
think her ideas have some merit, Mulder. So do yours, so do mine
and her partner's. We need to sit down calmly in the morning and
look at this drug problem from all angles. We need to build on our
strengths. You two yelling at each other all day will get us no
where."

     Mulder grumbled, loosened his tie and unbuttoned the top
button of his shirt. His shirt sleeves were already rolled up. Dana
could detect signs of a long night ahead. He picked up a stack of
documents and scanned them, his eyes flitting like fireflies. "Were
we that loud?" he asked, petulantly.

     "I thought New York's finest were going to throw us out of
their precinct house for disorderly conduct. For a while there I
thought we were in the tenements. Where did your mother teach you
such language, Mulder?"

     He smiled wanly. "That's school yard stuff, Scully. Those
Catholic schools your parents sent you to slighted your education.
Anyway, Haines started it."

     Dana rose from where she had been sitting on his bed, very
weary. Keeping those two apart, and on a topic which had something
remotely to do with the case, had been exhausting. "You don't have
to stoop to her level, Mulder. She's gotten her reputation by
intimidating people. Something, you, of course, know nothing
about." She headed to the door. "I'm tired. I'm going to get a soda
and then go to bed. You want anything?" She sent him a slow, fond
look. "I think I saw a Lipton's."

     But Mulder was concentrating and waved her off. Dana smiled
and headed down the hall towards the floor's elevators where she
had seen some vending machines. Just as she reached the end of the
hall the elevator doors opened and Cathy Haines stepped out. She
had changed from her business suit into a red button-down shirt
which she wore with fresh, moist matching lipstick. The shirt was
tucked into tight jeans that left nothing to the imagination. Dana
had to admit, Agent Haines certainly had a figure men would die
for. Dana just hoped that she and Mulder and the woman's partner
did not have to take the fall for Cathy's excessively dangerous
methods.

     "Dana? Hi," Cathy said in friendly greeting. "I had some new
ideas and I came up to see if you two were still awake and felt
like kicking them around."

     Dana yawned. Hearing Mulder and Cathy fight was the last thing
she wanted at the moment. "Mulder's awake, I am not. Bother him if
you want, but keep it down, will you? I want to get some sleep
tonight."

     Cathy smiled good naturedly. "I can take a hint. I guess we
were pretty loud. Mulder's so much fun to fight with though. I had
three brothers. I learned to fight early."

     <That would explain it,> Dana thought. <You probably enjoyed
pulling wings off flies, too. You found every button in Mulder's
psyche in one day, well, all the normal ones anyway, and enjoyed
pushing every one.>

     "He's so inventive with his words," Cathy was going on. Her
voice lowered conspiratorially. "Is he as inventive with other
things?" the tall, blond asked, her eyes twinkling in girlish
anticipation for some good gossip.

     Despite herself, Dana found herself smiling. When she wanted,
Cathy Haines's good humor was infectious. "I wouldn't know. We
don't do that sort of thing."

     "Oh, sorry," Cathy apologized, disappointed. "I just assumed."
Then she did not seem so disappointed after all and headed off down
the hallway, hips swinging in a natural, unaffected rhythm. Dana
watched her knock at Mulder's door, saw the door open, heard
Mulder's voice, obviously surprised to see her. He let her in, then
closed the door. Soda in hand, yawning, Dana headed back to her own
room, decided she did not want the soda after all, climbed into her
pajamas and fell instantly asleep.
 
 

     Dana stared blearily at the clock. Just after two am. She lay
for a second, knowing in her bones that something must have
awakened her. In a moment she heard it again. A thump, a moan,
muffled cries from the room next door. Mulder's room.

     With a sigh, Dana pulled herself out of bed. Nightmares again.
She should have expected it. That damn woman! Tense cases almost
always brought on the nightmares. Dana knew the routine. She would
go in his room, wake him as gently as she could, if he was not
already awake, wrap him in a blanket, hold him until the shudders
passed. Then she would get him a glass of water and two ibuprophen.
The mild muscle relaxants in the pain killer relieved the tension
in the tight muscles, made it easier for him to get back to
something like sleep and make him less achy - and less bitchy - the
next day.

     Groggily, Dana collected the pills from her overnight bag,
and, after knocking softly and getting no response, which she did
not expect since he was probably still asleep, walked into his room
through their unlocked connecting door. By the blue light of the
silent TV, Dana expected to see him thrashing about in his sheets.
She had also expected him to be alone.

     Taking in immediately what was going on, Dana ducked,
coloring, back into her room but not before she heard a woman's low
laugh and a rough "Shit!" from her partner.

     Ten minutes later a soft knock came from the opposite side of
the connecting door. Dana was curled up in the chair by the window
as far from Mulder's room and its noises as she could get. All the
lights were on and she was trying to read some cases.

     Mulder walked in wearing those damned, black silk boxers. Dana
looked up and caught her breath. He had never looked so beautiful
to her as he did at that moment. His hair was a mess, but his eyes
were as bright as diamonds and his skin positively glowed. Gone, at
least for the moment, was the tense and depressed expression he
seemed to wear all the time since Duane Barry, Alaska, and New
Mexico.

     "Dana, I'm sorry -" he started, but from the tiny cat's-got-
the-canary grin on his lips it was obvious he was not.

     "I'm sorry for interrupting, Mulder. I thought you were having
a nightmare." She cocked an eyebrow at him. "Wasn't a nightmare,
was it?"

     He gave her a beguiling smile which sent chills through Dana's
body and she realized she was jealous. Jealous of Cathy. Wishing it
were her invigorating his body with this animal-like excitement.
"No, it wasn't." There was an uncomfortable pause. "You all right?"

     Dana nodded weakly. "I'm fine. I'll just read some of these,"
she indicated the files, "to help me get back to sleep."

     He shuffled his bare feet looking all of about sixteen. "Well,
I just wanted to check. See you in the morning, Scully."

     He turned but was caught by Dana's words, "Don't let this
affect the job, okay, Mulder?" She looked at him troubled. Their
work was dangerous, Cathy and her partner unknown elements, Cathy
a live wire.

     "I won't," he assured her, knowing what she meant, but he
could not duck back into his room fast enough. Though he tried not
to be too obvious about it, Dana heard him quietly throw the dead
bolt on his side of the door.
 
 

     Over the next forty-eight hours, both Mulder and Cathy behaved
erratically, but, all in all, not so differently from their first
day. Their fights during the work day could be heard two buildings
away - ideological stalemates and posturing on a grand scale -
followed by other kinds of noises in the night that could be heard
floors away. Dana knew. She slept next door.

     As the days passed and the tension surrounding the case became
worse, their disagreements increased in intensity, only there was
a difference. It was in their eyes.

     <This case will be over in a few days,> Dana rationalized,
<then Cathy will be gone. Mulder will strut like a cock for a while
and then all will be as it was.>

     But that was not how it happened. On the fifth night, the four
of them crept towards a warehouse that informants hinted was the
location of a major drug manufacturing operation. The four agents
should have been able to take the place by surprise, but the
dealers were ready for them. Just as they came within ten yards of
the main loading dock, the entire front of the building exploded
with a tremendous rush of air and heat and sound like a hundred
cannons exploding in their faces. All four were thrown back at
least forty or fifty feet. Dana knew she blacked out for a few
minutes. Her ears were ringing so badly that when she came to she
could scarcely hear the roar of the fire even though it was close.
Nor could she hear the sirens coming until much later. What she
could feel, however, was the flame's heat and her whole body which
ached from where she had been thrown up against a pile of wooden
crates.

     How pleasant it felt just to lie there, the raging fire just
a glow on the horizon. Dana considered going back into the dark,
but a thought sprang into her head. <Mulder?> She shouted his name.
Despite the pain, she found her feet and shouted again though she
knew her voice was weak and shaky and sounded odd in her ears. The
sound probably did not travel very far, either.

     Where was he? His mass was much heavier. He would not have
been thrown so far. <Please, God,> she prayed and hoped he had been
thrown clear. Then she saw a man-sized crumpled heap closer to the
fire and ran to it, but she found, not Mulder, but Cathy's partner,
just coming around. Her hand on Johnson's shoulder, Dana looked
frantically around, and finally she saw the silhouette of a trim
female figure sitting on the ground holding her head and another
silhouette of a lanky man crouched by her side, obviously checking
her condition. Dana's stomach twisted and sank, knew she was being
irrational, but could not help herself. Mulder had gone to Cathy's
aid before coming to her own.
 
 
 

     The explosion destroyed the evidence and closed down the
manufacturing operation, so the case was filed as being
successfully concluded, even though the organizers undoubtedly
escaped to set up elsewhere. The word, however, had gotten out
about Cathy and Mulder. They would never be assigned to the same
case again - not that that kept them apart.

     Most would say Cathy and Mulder were perfect for each other.
Both were driven, obsessive work-a-holics with intense passionate
natures that bordered on the manic-depressive. Both just needed to
explode from time to time. Luckily, when one was having a bad day
the other was usually around to blow away the doldrums. Dana made
the mistake, however, of walking into the X-Files office one night
when both were 'down'. Not a pretty sight. She wondered if they had
managed to achieve that particular shade of purple from screaming
at each other, drinking too much, or both.

     When both were high, they were insane. Dana had no doubt that
all she heard was true - bungy jumping, rock climbing, sky diving,
hang gliding. And those were their tame diversions. As if their
jobs were not hazardous enough. And much to Dana's surprise Mulder
kept amazing healthy through it all.

     Fortunately, for both the FBI and the CIA, Cathy had to travel
a lot overseas, so Mulder was able to pay at least some attention
to his job. Once she hit town, however, Mulder was useless. Scully
considered herself lucky if he was able to drag his well-strung ass
into work by noon the day after Cathy returned from one of her
assignments.

     Dana was silent through it all. Tried to understand. She never
thought he would withdraw himself from her like this. Mulder had
had some horrible years, however. During the nearly three years
they had worked together, she had never known him to take a
vacation and she knew the years before, when he was assigned full
time to the VCS, had been so bad that the X-Files seemed like a
vacation to him in comparison. The dangers they had faced, the
ridicule, the betrayals, the nightmares, the insomnia, the too many
times they had both nearly died. All had taken their toll. How
could she blame him for taking a break. In time he would come back
to her and their work.

     But a year passed and Dana began to seriously wonder if Mulder
was coming back. The X-Files began to slip. All of his pet cases
that were never officially assigned, those went first, but because
he kept up with the special assignments from the VC group his
reputation actually improved. He had become a regular Joe. Well,
no, not exactly. Mulder could never be a regular Joe. He was still
spooky, his logic still escaped close scrutiny, but he brought in
the verdicts and that was what counted.

     The pressure from the Shadow people backed off. The search for
Samantha kept on but at a slower pace.

     And Mulder was happy. Happier than Dana had ever seen him. She
should have been pleased for him. She tried to be. Cathy, however,
must have had money to burn, because she always seemed to be
around, even when Agents Mulder and Scully were on assignment in
Oklahoma or Oregon or Maine. While staying at odd little motels in
the middle of the night, Dana would hear the sound of a door open
in the room next to hers, then whispered voices, then no voices,
then the unmistakable sounds of very energetic coupling. Very
energetic.

     Mulder slept very well those years, but Dana didn't. Even the
ear plugs would not help. And she was getting very, very lonely
eating breakfast and often dinner alone on the road when Cathy was
in the country and within flying distance.

     Then one hot, July evening, Mulder walked in front of a car.

End of Chapter 1

===========================================================================

From: windsinger@aol.com (Windsinger)
Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative
Subject: NEW: For Everything There is a Season 2/3
Date: 26 Nov 1995 15:53:42 -0500
 

FOR EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON  2/3
by Windsinger@aol.com

Disclaimer: As always to CC and company for these marvelous
characters and Gillian and David and all the X-Files fanfic writers
for inspiration. No stepping on toes intended.

Chapter 2

Washington, D.C.
July 1998
 

     Dana stood on the corner of the dingy street and sent Mulder
a look of shared sympathy. This was definitely one of their least
favorite assignments. The President of the United States was
hosting a major international trade conference so every law
enforcement official the State Department could get their hands on
were assigned to assist the Secret Service. So far that day, Agents
Scully and Mulder had helped in sweeping what were considered the
critical areas - the meeting location and the route of the
motorcade.

     If the weather was good, such duty might be considered a
vacation. If the weather was bad, like now, it was drudgery.
Tonight it was hot and sticky, typical Washington in August. Wet
blanket weather. No wonder that before the advent of air
conditioning the government would shut down in the summer.

     They had been assigned to patrol the back streets near one of
the hotels where some of the minor delegates would be staying.
These must be VERY minor delegates to be housed way out here in the
less than savory part of town, Dana thought. The agents were
dressed casually in jeans, inexpensive athletic shoes and cheap
black jackets <Nothing worth stealing here, punks>, but they were
well aware that they still stuck out like light bulbs in this
neighborhood at night. Hot, humid nights always sent the residents
out to prowl and tempers were often high, but, at least tonight,
not abnormally so. This was fortunate because the two agents knew
they were not here to do anything about maintaining the tense truce
the street gangs seemed to be holding. They were after bigger fish.

     Still, when a woman screamed, Mulder moved into action. That
was just part of his nature. Dana drew her gun carefully but kept
it out of sight and followed some distance back to keep a wider
view of the disturbance.  A large, heavy-set man had taken the arm
of a wiry woman, probably his wife or girl friend and the woman
wanted none of it. Unfortunately, there were at least three boom
boxes blaring out at full volume so there no one way Dana or Mulder
could understand what the couple were arguing to each other about.
It was amazing that the woman's scream had cut though the noise at
all. This had all the ear marks of a simple domestic squabble but
best to be prepared. Mulder was concentrating on the woman who, by
the way, was doing a very, very credible job of defending herself
against her much larger companion  - when he stepped into the
street.

     At that moment a car, moving amazingly fast for this narrow
street which was little more than an alley, careened around the
corner, tires squealing. Dana cried out a warning, but Mulder could
never have heard. Besides the distraction of the booming, throbbing
noise from the mini-woofers, he had had a long, hot, unexciting day
and his timing was off, his reaction time slow. He probably felt
the car's rumble through the soles of his feet before he heard it,
and hesitated a second too long before leaping aside.  The whipping
rear end of the vehicle, which the driver had only barely under
control, caught Mulder in the hip and sent him flying, spinning at
a sickening velocity, to be thrown with a painful thump and a crack
against a parked car.

     The speeding vehicle was gone as quickly as it had appeared
and all noise on the block - the blasts of sound from the boom
boxes, the screams of the woman, the laughing jeering voices of the
gangs of teens - suddenly ceased as Mulder slid bonelessly to the
ground. As she ran to his side, Dana replaced her gun in order to
pull out her cellular to call 911. She was almost amused to see
three other cellulars pulled out of expensive leather jackets at
almost the same time to make the same call.

     Mulder groaned. His face was filled with pain but also
embarrassment. "Stupid, stupid," he was muttering as she knelt down
beside him. "Get the license number of that train, Scully?" His
face was the color of paste in the halogen street lights except
where the blood was running down from a cut above his eye. Dana
knew that looked far worse than it was. The fact that he was not
only conscious, but coherent, was a good sign.

     Before she could even take her own jacket off to cover him,
two women came out of apartments nearby bringing blankets. Dana
nodded to them in gratitude. She covered him with one and put the
other gently under his head. In frustration, Mulder tried to move
which only sent a shooting, blinding pain up his entire left side.

     "Don't do that," she warned in her level, soothing voice as
his teeth clenched down tight and he went even paler than he had
been before. "You know the drill, Mulder."

     "Yeah, yeah." He tried to lie still as they waited for the
paramedics, but it was obvious he was very uncomfortable. Something
was definitely not right. "Damn, I think I broke my arm."

     She looked at the way he was holding one leg. "At least that,
Mulder. You're lucky you didn't break your head... permanently."

     They could hear the sirens coming closer. Only a few moments
more. The buzz of the significant crowd was all around them, but
for Fox and Dana they could just as easily have been alone. His
dark eyes, dilated from the pain and shock, sought hers. "I'm
sorry, Scully. Guess you have to pick up Humpty Dumpty and put him
back together again."

     "Not this time, Mulder," she said, not letting her voice
betray her relief that he was not injured more severely. He could
easily have been killed. "We're not in the wilds of Montana so you
don't have to rely on Agent Scully's Doc-in-a-Box remedies. We're
going to take you to an honest-to-goodness hospital. GW is just
down the street. Do you still have a running tab there?"

     "Probably," Mulder admitted grumpily. "Think they'll give me
my old room?"

     Absently, she brushed the blood matted hair out of his eyes.
"Maybe if you ask very, very nicely, which I know you can do," she
replied sarcastically.

     The rescue squad's lights began to strobe over them,
alternating red and white. Mulder reached out with his good arm and
touched her shoulder. "Scully," he asked a little awkwardly, "could
you call Cathy for me? I don't think I'm going to make it home for
a while and I don't want her to worry."

     Dana found a reason to look away and down the cracked, pot-
holed Washington street for a moment. The sweat trickled down both
their faces. She had been so scared for him and had felt, for a
moment, their old closeness back again. But he had ruined that, had
known what he was asking, but Dana knew he was not completely
insensitive. He was careful not to mention Cathy's name around the
office, and never discussed the feelings he had for his wild, blond
bed mate any more than he had ever discussed his feelings for Dana
Scully. They just were.

     Finally she turned back, her face composed. "Sure, Mulder,"
she promised, "if you are a good boy and do what the doctors tell
you."

     "Yes, Ma'am," he smiled gratefully as the paramedics came
forward with the backboard.
 
 

     <Just like home,> Dana thought, as she set in George
Washington Hospital's Emergency room. By this time, she knew all
the nurses by sight, if not by name, and most of the doctors. She
knew where the best carry-outs were within walking distance and
what day of the week they served meat loaf in the cafeteria. As she
flipped through the ancient copy of 'People' magazine, Dana
considered ordering a subscription of 'Newsweek' for the waiting
room. At least then there would be something decent to read. From
where she was sitting on one of the chairs which were lined up
outside the row of curtain-draped cubicles, she could hear Mulder
swearing as the doctor examined him. She knew it hurt and she
reminded herself to congratulate him on keeping the show 'R' rated
rather than 'X'.

     Suddenly, Dana heard running footsteps and a blond, pink and
cream bomb burst around the corner of the hallway calling her name.
Dana looked up at the disturbance. "Damn," Dana muttered under her
breath. Cathy.

     The tall blond was wearing very short pink shorts, a matching
halter top and lots of skin. Lots and lots of skin. Her blond hair
was a huge, wild cloud of pale gold.

     "Dana, Dana, I got your message. Where is he? Is he all
right?" the young woman was frantic. Dana's eyes widened. She had
never seen the irrepressible Cathy Haines so distraught. It was an
interesting character study.

     "He's banged himself up," Dana told her evenly, magazine still
open on her lap. "As I said on the message I left on your answering
machine, he got too close to 2000 pounds of steel going about
ninety. Sprained ankle, broken arm. He'll live."

     Dana's eyes had drifted unconsciously to the curtained area on
the left. Cathy hesitated, but when she heard the next colorful
expression from the familiar voice she threw aside the curtains and
stormed in.

     For the next few minutes Dana ashamedly listened with rapt
attention and with no small degree of amusement to the little
melodrama going on behind the curtain. Such crying and caterwauling
from Cathy. You would think Mulder was going to die right there in
the ER.

     And Mulder? Mulder was trying to calm this street tough CIA
agent with sweet endearments the like of which Dana thought she
would never, ever hear coming out of Fox Mulder's mouth. Then there
was the soft words of the doctor trying to get Cathy to move out of
the way so he could finish his examination. The physician's voice
became harder and less patient as the minutes passed.

     Finally, the doctor emerged from behind the curtain. He was
not one Dana had seen before on her visits. He was tall and good
looking in a rugged, outdoors way with a few creases on his
forehead and some laugh wrinkles around his eyes. Those eyes rolled
in exasperation in the direction of the curtained alcove from which
now issued the sounds of frantic smooching and sugary comments.
Dana chuckled and the physician turned his attention to the serene
and long-suffering Dana Scully ... and he smiled.

     Seeing she had his attention, and that he seemed to feel the
same way she did about the goings on, Dana couldn't help but point
a finger to her open mouth to indicate she thought she was going to
gag. It was a silly gesture to make, not a Dana Scully thing to do,
but she was frustrated by the antics, the whole situation. The
constant hurt. She went back to her magazine. She only half
listened as the physician conferred with the head nurse, ordering
a cast for the arm, a heavy-duty muscle relaxant for the muscles
spasms in Mulder's back and an air cast for the sprained ankle.

     Suddenly, the white-coated figure was sitting down on the
chair beside Dana with a tired sigh.

     "Hello, I'm Dr. Thompson," he introduced himself, extending
his hand. "You examined Agent Mulder at the scene?"

     Dana's took the hand, liking the feel of this man's warm
handshake. "Agent Scully... Dana Scully."

      "The nurses seem to know the two of you pretty well. You're
a Pathologist, they say. I'll tell you, I'm impressed. Your
diagnosis was right on and without X-rays."

     "I know Mulder's body." she replied.

     "When I saw you sitting out here I thought you were his wife."

     Dana smiled broadly and wondered why she did that. She smiled
so seldom these days. "I don't know his body THAT well. He's my
partner."

     The doctor indicated the thick file in his lap. "I guess you
HAVE had a lot of experience. His medical records are pretty
extensive."

     "Don't I know. There have been times when I've wondered if I
was hired specifically to be Mulder's personal physician." She was
aware of a good-looking pair of man's eyes on her, and wished she
wasn't wearing a cheap plastic jacket and old jeans and that her
shoulder holster wasn't showing.

     "Taking care of Agent Mulder does sound like a full time job,"
the physician commented sympathetically, "but doesn't sound very
exciting for you."

     "Oh, it can be VERY exciting."

     "That's not what I meant," he responded with a gleam in his
eye.

     And so Dana Scully met Dr. Peter Thompson and that sparkle
came back into her life.
 
 
 

     Peter was intelligent and caring, committed and energetic with
a keen sense of humor. He made love in a gentle but wholly
satisfying manner that left Dana breathless and eager for more of
his warm embraces, more sensation from the electric glide of his
fingertips. Within six months Dana asked for a transfer to
Quantico. Mulder was clearly disappointed but approved the
transfer. He understood.  He had looked positively repentant the
one time they talked about those two years from the time he met
Cathy until Dana met Peter. He had known what he was doing to her,
she who had been his best and only friend, shutting her out of his
life, but had not been able to help himself. It had taken time but
Dana had come to accept that love had a way of making one do some
pretty strange things.

     A year after Agent Scully's departure, Mulder also quit
working on the X-Files. Dana and Peter got married and Mulder moved
in with Cathy. Actually, since that fateful assignment in New York,
he had only used his apartment when Cathy was out of town and he
was in town, something he tried to arrange not to happen too often.
The fact that it took him so long to make even this move spoke to
the volatility of their relationship. And there was still no talk
of marriage. Cathy was a free spirit and did not want to be tied
down. Not by anything, not even by Fox Mulder.

                              ****

Baltimore, Maryland
October 2004
 

     Dana said good-by to her mother at the cemetery and gave
Margaret Scully assurances that she was fine and would come by that
evening. When she turned, there he was again.

     Mulder looked terrible now that she could observe him closely.
There was grey in his hair and his much-worn suit hung on him. The
dark patches under his eyes, which she had not seen during the
Cathy years, were back.

     Dana remembered the end of the Cathy years.

                               ***

Washington, D.C.
June 2000
 

     Dana stood outside the town house and checked the address
again which was scrawled on a scrap of paper in Skinner's
handwriting. The building looked so - ordinary. Not the sort of
place where she expected to find Cathy Haines and Fox Mulder.
Correction, she would only find Mulder there now. The word had come
down while Dana was visiting the University of Southern California
on a recruiting assignment. Cathy Haines had been killed while on
assignment in South America, some botched job dealing with drug
traffickers and petty dictators.

     Reliable sources reported that Mulder had closed himself off
in this house and refused to speak to anyone. "He needs you, Agent
Scully," Director Skinner said, worry obvious in his voice. "I
can't think of anyone else he'll listen to."  Sympathy, she knew
how to give. She had given it to him before and when she had been
in less of a condition to give it.

     In was deep dusk as Dana stood at the bottom of the steps. She
took a long, slow breath, strengthening herself to face this man
who at one time had been the most important person in her life and
who, over time, had become almost a stranger. Almost. She could
still feel Peter's lips on hers from the kiss he had given her
before she left. "Take whatever time you need," she could hear him
saying. "I'll manage." Without understanding - there was no way
anyone besides she and Mulder ever could - Peter accepted that Fox
Mulder, even in his absence, retained a very special place in
Dana's life.

     Dana knocked, but there was no answer. She tried the door, it
opened freely. "Mulder! It's Scully." There were no lights on. She
took a few steps inside and could just see his form sitting in the
dark living room. The only light was a fading rose glow from the
remains of the sunset coming in through one of those sliding glass
doors all modern townhouses have. "Mulder, can I turn on a light?"

     "What's the point?" came a voice which only resembled in small
ways the voice she remembered. "There's nothing worth seeing."

     Dana had to pick her way through the debris on the floor to
reach him. A neighbor had called the police and reported a
disturbance, noise like a barroom brawl. Screaming, but from only
one voice. And weeping. Just Mulder venting the anguish in his
soul. Just Mulder giving physical expression to his agony. He had
learned that from Cathy. Let it out. It had made him healthier but
more volatile to be around when the bad times came. This was about
as bad a time as there could be. He was lying on the couch, not his
old one but one just like it, one arm flung over his eyes. He was
dressed in a suit, the same one, from the look of it, he had been
wearing when the CIA had called him with the news. They had dropped
the bomb over the phone. What a sensitive bunch of jerks!

     As she approached, he struggled upright to make room for her
but his eyes were not welcoming, just black pools of despair and
loss.

     The violence of his grief and anger may be gone, but Dana knew
this was just a temporary lull. For the moment he was exhausted.
The anger would come back, the need to hurt something, anyone, the
way he was hurting would come back when his batteries recharged.
For the moment he had turned inward like he used to back in the
VCS, like he used to when the X-files got bad. Lock it all away.
Since he had trashed their home, their physical possessions, he had
retreated to the inner world to destroy what was left - his heart,
his hopes, his happiness.

     "Mulder, are you all right?" she asked, realizing too late
what a stupid question it was.

     "She's gone, Scully," came his dead voice out of the darkness.
His voice was rough, hoarse, as if he had shouted or cried it out.
"And I can't even go to her. They are not letting anyone into the
country."

     Dana sat beside him but did not touch him. "I know, Skinner
told me. When they finish with the autopsy they'll bring her body
back. Maybe in a couple of days. They'll let you know when you can
see her."

     His head was moving side by side aimlessly, his eyes stared at
the blank wall which once held a picture, now smashed, its subject
matter unrecognizable. "She did something stupid, I know she did.
She was always acting first and thinking later." A black smile
touched his lips. "I seem to remember saying that to you the very
first day I met her." He wrapped his arms around his knees and
began rocking gently. His face raised to the last of the sunset
showed no fresh tears, just old ones. He was all cried out, at
least for now. She could see that on his face. There was only a
dark wound full of pain.

     "You need to sleep, Mulder," she told him. "How long has it
been?"

     "I don't know," came a small voice. "Can't sleep and I don't
want to. I see, feel her. It's so lonely." He turned his grief-
ravaged face towards his old friend. Her face smooth, sad but
controlled, spoke to him of peace and strength and acceptance.
"Scully, how did you bear it?. When I turned from you those years
before Peter, how did you bear it?"

     His voice cracked at the end and Dana felt her eyes begin to
burn and sting with her own tears, the ones she had never shed for
him because he had withdrawn from her so softly. "You just do,
Mulder," she told him as she opened her arms. And he crept inside
the circle of her embrace like a little boy and somehow, despite
his size, he seemed to fit. "You just do." As she stroked his hair,
she felt the silent, tearless sobs begin in this man. How could she
have ever thought of him as a stranger.

     The minutes passed. Neither was in a hurry. There was no where
to go for him. For her? There was no denying he felt good to hold,
so right. Four years had passed since she had held him during his
nightmares, but, she realized with surprise, this time it felt
different. There was no surge of hormones. Only tenderness, the
love one feels towards a beloved child, or a brother. Love, yes,
love overwhelming, sweet and painful, but not what it had been.

     She got a mild sedative from her bag and he took it without
complaint. After he fell asleep in her arms, she laid him on the
couch, covered him with a blanket and sat by his side. She had time
and she had somewhere to go - into Peter's arms - and she would
return to them when she was no longer needed here.

     For a week Dana sat with Mulder often, usually for hours at a
time, with her mind turned off as he talked about Cathy. He needed
to talk, he needed to remember, he needed someone to be there, he
didn't need her to listen. She held his chill, damp hand and gave
him sleeping pills or a sedative for an escape that didn't involve
breaking the furniture or running himself into exhaustion.

     She helped him pack up his things from the townhouse. Cathy
had never updated the simple will the CIA had required her to
complete when she joined so Mulder was not mentioned. Everything
went to her family. Her parents were in the State Department
assigned overseas and would not come until the day of the funeral.
Her brother who was local told Mulder he could have anything he
wanted, but Mulder wanted nothing which had been hers except for a
small memento or two. In the end there were so few of his things
left. So little he wanted to keep.
 

                              ****

     Dana saw him through the funeral. Helped him find a little
apartment near his old one. Helped him as he listlessly unpacked.
Then he disappeared.

     Six months later Mulder reappeared, dropping by her office at
Quantico with a pizza for lunch, talked almost normally just as if
nothing had happened. He was thinner, darker, more tired but,
reportedly, was working. Had quit the Bureau and become a kind of
freelance trouble shooter for weird stuff, some VC, some
paranormal, some abduction cases. He had the reputation, the
contacts, and the change gave him time, or so he said, to pursue
his own interests. He told her he was still looking for Samantha,
but Dana had a feeling the quest was just something to do. All of
the work he did was just something to do. The light had gone out of
his eyes. He worked because that was all he knew.

     Dana's marriage was a good one. She and Peter had a loving,
respectful relationship. They both worked long hours but not so
long that they did not make time for one another. During those
years, only Mulder's continued unhappiness plagued Dana with a
distant sadness.

     Three years after their marriage Peter had his accident. A
drunk driver. Head injury. Irreversible coma.

     Nothing to be done.
 

End of Chapter 2

===========================================================================

From: windsinger@aol.com (Windsinger)
Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative
Subject: NEW: For Everything There is a Season 3/3
Date: 26 Nov 1995 15:53:49 -0500
 

Did  I remember the '2/3' in the title of the last post? If I didn't
that's what it was.

FOR EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON  (3/3)
By Windsinger@aol.com

Disclaimer: As always to CC and company for these marvelous
characters and Gillian and David and all the X-Files fanfic writers
for inspiration. No stepping on toes intended.
 

Chapter 3

Northern Virginia
August 2002
 

     Dana never could remember how many days she lived at the
hospital. Day and night fused into one, broken only by reports from
yet another surgery. The news was always bad. She slept on a cot
beside her husband's bed when she could no longer hold her head up
as she kept watch and prayed for the impossible - for Peter to wake
up and smile at her. She watched and with acceptance saw was the
gradual, horrible unraveling of all their dreams.

     When she finally forced her nerveless body up the sidewalk
which led to her the house she and Peter had shared, Dana saw him
standing beside her door, Mulder, a tower of dark light to
illuminate her greater darkness. She wondered later how many days
he had kept his lonely vigil waiting for her to come home.

     They did not speak much, at least not in words. There was no
need. They had years of experience taking care of each other.
Mulder led her to the kitchen, gave her tea and a sandwich and
stood over her while she forced down a few bites. In the bedroom he
took her shoes off for her, helped her undress and get into pajamas
when her mind and her fingers faltered and then wrapped himself in
a blanket and slept on the floor beside her bed to keep away the
bad dreams.
 
 

     Mulder appeared at her door often those first weeks, always
within a few minutes after she returned home from the hospital,
whenever that might be. He came with a pizza and a shoulder to cry
on. He did that again and again, sleeping on the floor beside her
bed or on her couch. And he was always gone in the morning.

     As life became routine, Mulder came less often, no longer
slept over and left after the pizza or the video was over. But he
would appear out of the blue every few weeks or months. Never more
than two months went by without a visit. He never called but then
Dana was almost always home except when she was at work or when she
went to the hospital to watch Peter become thinner and more twisted
as the rigor in his muscles and his joints increased. At those
times when she had to be away for a few days, she always left a
number where she could be reached with her answering service, just
in case either of them needed her.

                              ****

Washington, D.C.
October 2004
 

     Those years took a lot out of her, too, Dana thought,
pondering Mulder's appearance as he stood looking at her in her
mourning clothes. Splitting her time between the hospital and her
job, left very little time or energy for anything else. She and
Mulder must look like they were cut from the same cloth now. Worn
down by life.

     "Want to go out for pizza?" his beautiful, deep voice quietly
asked. She nodded. He put his hand behind her back as he used to do
so many years before, almost as if he were leading her in a dance,
and guided her to her car.

     The restaurant he took her to was one they frequented back in
the old X-Files days, a little Mom and Pop place with plastic red
and white checked table cloths. Nothing had changed.

     "I'm sorry about Peter," he told her over an untasted glass of
wine. "He was a good man and good men shouldn't have to suffer like
that."

     "He didn't suffer," Dana told him dry-eyed. "Not since that
night two years ago."

     "Good women shouldn't have to suffer either." Mulder stared at
his pizza. "I'm sorry there weren't any children, Scully. I know
you and Peter wanted children."

     Now Dana felt her nose getting stuffy. Trust Mulder to get her
crying when nothing else had all day. She and Peter had lost a
child a year before his accident. They had grieved, picked up the
pieces of their lives and moved on. They were fertile, that wasn't
the problem, and they told themselves that certainly the next time
the odds would be in their favor. And they had been trying, doing
the temperature bit, tracking the cycles, calling each other home
in the middle of the day to do the 'dirty' deed... then time had
run out.

     Dana wondered why Mulder had brought that up and then she
remembered, wondered how she could have forgotten.

                               ***

Washington, D.C.
July 15 1999

     Ragged out from the sweltering July day, Dana staggered
through her front door. She stopped only long enough to turn down
the thermostat on the air conditioner before heading for the
bedroom and collapsing across the bed she and Peter had shared
continuously now for more than eighteen months. Dana tried to tell
herself that she was recovered, that it was just the awful commute
in the heat and humidity from her job at Georgetown Hospital which
had sapped her strength so. But there was more, there was much
more. The bed made her think of what they did here when they were
not sleeping, and that made her think of Peter and how empty the
evening and the night would be without him. That was part of her
uneasiness. But not all of it.

     Peter had gone to Seattle to attend an Emergency Medicine
conference. He had been gone two days and would be gone another
two. Coming home a little early so that they would have some time
to say good bye, they had lain curled together naked in the heat,
glad to be rid of the sticky, constricting business clothes, and
both too worn out to do anything more than hold hands.

     Only an hour remained before he had to leave to catch his
plane, and for the hundredth time he asked if she would rather he
stayed home, considering what she had been through. He was the lead
speaker for one of the sessions, however, and Dana would not let
any husband of hers back out of a commitment because he wife was a
little depressed.

     With her eyes clear, her breathing steady, Dana was determined
to send him off convinced that she was fine. She began by
scratching his chin through his thick, well-trimmed beard, then
worked her fingers in between the buttons of his shirt to stoke the
firm, strong chest. As he took her in his arms his eyes had
alighted with pleasure and relief for since she had gotten out of
the hospital he had been waiting for a sign from her that she was
ready. What Dana found was that she was more than ready and so was
he and in the love-making that followed, more passionate than any
they had yet shared, they both poured out not only their love but
their shared grief.

     Dana laid on her stomach on the cooling bed, her cheek against
the soft bedspread and wondered if there was a new child started in
her. Probably not, not yet but maybe. And would this child be like
the other? Would it come forth no larger than her own small hand,
incomplete to too many ways, take two feeble breaths and fade in a
whisper to a tiny, still corpse? Dana knew the odds. They each
carried the lethal gene. No alien magic, just human genetics and
statistics.

     "You're my one in a million," Peter had told her as she sat in
his lap in the big chair in her hospital room, his voice rough with
his hours of tears.

     "And you're mine," she admitted through her own. Those were
the chances that two people each carrying the rare recessive trait
would meet and marry. And only a one and four chance that a child
conceived by them would get a matched set of the defective
chromosomes and a sentence of such an early death.

     "We've beaten the odds, Sweet. Maybe after this we should go
to Las Vegas."

     She had put her finger to his lips. She knew he was trying to
help, but it was not helping. Nothing helped.
 

     Now a month later and she had no idea where she was in her
cycle so there was a chance she had conceived again. Not much, but
enough to hope. Hope was all she had ever asked for. It had carried
her far. There were years when she would have said that hope had
carried THEM far, meaning she and Mulder, but that had become just
her now, too afraid that thinking of 'them' would automatically
include Mulder. But that was changing, she could sense that in
herself, in the way she had come to turn toward's Peter's light the
way she use to turn toward's Mulder's.
 

     Dana raised her head. A odd pounding seemed to be coming from
the front door, pounding not knocking, but not too loud. She rolled
off the bed and went to the door. A glance through the security
hole showed the top of a bowed head of sweaty, wind-blown brown
hair. Surprised, for she had not seen him in months, she swung wide
the door.

     Mulder. He was slouched against the pillar beside the door,
but was not still, his chest heaved as he tried to catch his
breath, his lungs sounded far more congested than they should have.
Swollen eyes raised to lock onto hers, desperate for something but
she knew not what. The muscles of his face worked, all pain and
grief. He dripped from the humidity of the horrible summer day. His
suit was darkly splotched and he smelled strongly of wet wool and
male sweat. He had run to her from somewhere, in this heat, in his
suit and in those heavy wingtips he wore for work.

     "Mulder, what's wrong?"

     But he did not move, as if afraid that he would not be
welcome. He had not been to her new home, she didn't even realize
he knew where it was. Dana reached out and took his limp, wet hand
and led him in. At the touch of her hand so tender, so gentle with
caring, his knees had given out. As he crumbled from the exertion
and some horrible grief, she had to catch him. Bowed under his
greater weight, she led him to the couch, the same one, she noted,
where he had slept many a night away years before. She doubted he
noticed, however.

     There were no tears, not like she expected. The water dripped
off his face, and if not all was sweat, his crying was silent.
Instead it was all inside, but so close to the surface he was
afraid to speak. Dana had never seen hopelessness on his face like
this. Not knowing what else to do, Dana got him a box of tissues,
a cool wet towel and a glass of water and sat close to where he
leaned over his knees, his body trembling, face in his hands in
that silence that was no silence.

     Gradually, his gasps relaxed to smaller whimpers between
trembling lips and he reached out for her hands and his wet, red
eyes so full of grief looked into hers.

     "Try Mulder. Try to tell me what's wrong"

     "S-She lied." He swallowed hard. His eyes, which stared into
empty air, were full of not anger, just infinite sadness. "She went
to a clinic last week," he began his voice tight, the words barely
recognizable. "Scully, she told them she wasn't married. Well,
that's true, but she also told them that she had been raped and
didn't know by who." Mulder raised his ravaged face to see
comprehension dawn on Dana's drawn features.

     "No." Oh, God, she didn't. The realization of what Cathy had
done threw Dana back into her own black despair. She had watched
Peter, their dying child in his gloved hands, his grief-stricken
eyes staring helplessly over his mask at her as she lay emotionally
and physically drained to exhaustion on the birthing bed. And Cathy
had done this. Dana knew there were reasons, good reasons, she was
no pro-lifer, but the coincidences were such that the pain was just
unbearable. And what she had seen in Peter's eyes she now saw in
Mulder's.

     "She had them take it, Dana. Her baby, OUR baby, mine."
Somehow Dana knew this would come, had wished the woman had more
sense and had been more careful. She knew how it was with Cathy
well enough, no strings, no attachments, no plans for the future.
Only the here and now." Dana felt her empty womb cramping within
her in sorrow. Mulder did not know about her loss, hers and Peter's
and she had not intended to tell him. She certainly would not tell
him now. Dana could think of nothing to say. What comfort could she
give, she who needed comfort herself? So she just let him squeeze
her hand and hoped he would not break any bones.

     "How could she do that, Scully? HOW?" his voice rose thin and
plaintive. "She owed me at least that much, didn't she? I never
knew! I had to find out about it from a damn bill!"

     Dana was unable to keep from looking at those dead eyes. In
addition to the baby that would never be, the part of Mulder that
would never be, Cathy had turned her back on him. Said as plainly
as day that, love her though he may, he did not hold her. Never
would.  Without ever giving him a chance she had done what she
wanted as if what he wanted was of no significance, as if he did
not have heart to break, as if she did not know or care that he
loved her, that she was everything to him and yet a stranger.

     "Was she afraid you would make her keep it?" Dana asked
softly. "Is that why she didn't tell you?"

     Mulder stopped to stare at her, the damp towel in his hand
which he had been using to wipe the sweat and tears from this face.
"Scully, I'm not a monster," he told her, slowly shaking his head.
"You know there is no way I could have MADE her keep it, short of
taking her to court and that would have killed everything."

     "Then she must have been afraid, afraid that if she gave you
the chance, the time, that you could have convinced her." So Cathy
was afraid he might have a hold on her after all. Mulder gaped at
her, his breathing still not normal but coming in little gulps. She
saw a flicker touch his eyes.

     "I hadn't thought -" The muscles in his face contracted as he
forced back the wave of deeper grief. Somehow the fact that he
might have been close made it worse. "Certainly I would have tried.
Maybe we could have gotten a surrogate -"

     "Long before she could possibly have known she was pregnant,
it was too late for that, Mulder," she reminded him gently.

     He ran a shaking hand through his damp hair. "I knew that. I'm
sorry. I'm not thinking straight. Then maybe she could have just
carried it, I wouldn't have made her keep it."

     Surprised by the frenzy in his voice, Dana stared at him,
shocked by the disturbing depth of his love for this woman. He
wanted so much but was willing to settle for so little. Was this
love? Or a relationship based on fear, fear of losing what they
had, all he had. "Mulder, you would have put the baby up for
adoption? You would have done that to yourself for her?"

     "Better that then - "  The unnatural color that had been in
his face from the running had drained away leaving him very pale.
"When I found out, I had to run, had to do something  - find you.
While I was running I thought that maybe next time, maybe next time
someone I knew would take it and love it for me." His voice was
shaking so, Dana could hardly understand him. "Someone I knew so I
could be a part of its life a little."  He rubbed his eyes with one
hand then turned to her slightly. "Dana, I know I don't have any
right to ask this, but you're the only one I know, the only one I
really trust. It's too late now, but if this happens again would
you and Peter consider..."

     He did not finish, but looked down at his empty hands and
swallowed convulsively.

     Dana sat absolutely still. "Consider what, Mulder?" she asked
fearfully. Fearfully because she already knew what he was trying to
say.

     "If this should happen again, if Cathy would agree... would
you -"

     Dana closed her eyes. "Oh, Mulder..."

     "She, or he, wouldn't ever have to know who her real parents
were," he pleaded, speaking hastily while she still let him. "If I
could just see her sometimes..." The tears finally began, but he
swallowed them down fiercely. "This is stupid. It's selfish," he
hissed angrily in a rough shaking voice, "I know... not fair to
Peter, or to you..."

     He put his hands over his face again and bowed so low his head
was on knees. And he cried and Dana rested her arm  across his
broad back and rested her cheek against his shoulder. <Raise your
child? A baby to hold, to care for, to ease the emptiness.> If it
didn't work next time Peter had told her they would start thinking
about adoption. But Mulder's baby? Just the thought made her dizzy,
made the tears for her own loss begin again mingled with the tears
for his.

     But the question, she never answered. He knew her answer
already. She had walked through fire for him, if need be she would
do this for him and it would not be like fire at all.

     They did not talk much. There was no need. All the old trust
and comfort in each other's company had come back. When the tears
had dried for both of them, leaving stiff tracks on checks and eyes
burning, both knew it was time to go. This was far too much like
old times and neither could afford to look too closely.

     Dana pushed him to his feet, led him to the door and sent him
home to confront Cathy. With a weak smile of gratitude and without
a backwards glance, he went, for he knew who Cathy was, had known
who she was and ever would be. No entanglements, no ties. Love was
like that sometimes.

                               ***

Washington, D.C.
October 2004

     "Scully, that day I came to your house, why didn't you tell me
about the baby you lost?" He was looking down at his wine glass,
swirling the contents. "I felt like such a clumsy, stupid fool when
I found out."

     "How did you find out?" Dana asked.

     "Your mother called me over for Thanksgiving the year you flew
to Dallas to be with Peter's family. Your brother's orders had
changed and she didn't see any reason why both of us should be
alone."

     "And you went?" Dana asked amazed.

     He raised an eyebrow, just one and one very far. "Surprised
you, didn't I. Surprised myself. The hermit does come out of his
shell sometimes. I guess I can still change." He raised the glass,
just let the wine touch his lips but did not drink. The glass was
set down again to be turned nervously in those long fingers. "You
wanted children, why didn't you try to have a baby after Peter's
accident?"

     "Artificial Insemination, Mulder? I was forty-two when the
shock wore off enough to consider it. That's late for a pregnancy,
but not impossible. But by then I was working and seeing Peter
almost every night. And I never wanted to raise a child alone."

     He nodded, understanding. Dana wondered why he was so down
tonight. But then he was always down. His old humor, what she saw
of it, had become as dry as a dead bone. But tonight he was even
more depressed than usual. Here they were sitting in their old
place and Mulder still had not eaten a bite. He got up awkwardly,
excused himself, and went to the rest room. Dana noticed when he
returned that he limped and held one arm stiffly. There was a new
scar on the once smooth cheek she did not recognize and she noted
again how grey his hair was. She tried not to stare. Tried not to
cry. Life had not treated him gently. Not treated either of them
gently.

     He settled back into the booth across from her, looked at his
plate but still made no attempt to eat. "D-Dana," he began, oddly
bashful.

     She looked up quickly. He hardly never called her 'Dana'.

     "What is it, Mulder?"

     He still seemed to be having trouble starting this. "Would you
like to have dinner with me on Saturday?"

     Dana did stare now. She felt that she would never be able to
expel the breath she held in her lungs. There was a beautiful chill
flowing over her body she had totally forgotten. She had not felt
the effect of these particular hormones for years.

     "Mulder, are you asking me out?"

     He face grew sad, embarrassed. Clumsily, he stood up, almost
spilled his wine. Lunged for it with the stiff arm that sent a
spasm of discomfort over his features. "That was a really stupid
idea. Oh, God, Scully, you just buried your husband today." Before
her eyes he seemed to shrivel back into some internal hole of
loneliness, back into his shell. His voice was very soft when it
came again. "Let me take you home."

     Hastily, Dana reached over and touched his hand, felt the
warmth travel up her arm from that touch. He stopped, stood as
still as a person can, eyes cast to where her hand lay upon his.
"No, don't say that," she corrected. "It wasn't a stupid idea. I'd
love to go out with you, Mulder. I can't think of anything I'd
rather do."

      Slowly he nodded and slowly sat down. And that was when Dana
felt her eyes begin to burn. She knew her face was puckering up
with the strain of holding back. She knew she could not hide this,
not from him who after all these years, knew her too well.
Suddenly, he was beside her in her booth, his arm around her.
"Don't cry," he pleaded, very close to tears himself. "Oh, please
don't cry. I shouldn't have said anything."

     "It's not you," she managed to get out. But that wasn't true.
It WAS him. Her life suddenly felt right, that for too many years
had felt so wrong.

     Wrong? No, not wrong, only torn. 'Torn' was the word Dana had
been looking for all these years. Loving Peter but never not loving
Mulder either. This man with his arm, warm and tender around her.
Comforting and seeking comfort. They always seemed to be doing
that.

     He buried his face in her hair, leaned against her as if he
would bury his entire self in her if he could. "Oh, Dana, I'm so
tired," he whispered. "So very, very tired. I don't think I can
play the games any more. I don't want to play the games."

     "Whose games?" she asked barely above a whisper.

     "Theirs... mine... ours."

     "Is that why you stopped looking for Samantha?" Dana asked
very carefully. "Were you too tired to play?"

     Slowly, he took her face in his hands and stared deep into her
eyes, knowing that she did not mean to hurt him but that she really
wanted to know. It had been such a long time since anyone had
really wanted to know what he thought. "I never stopped looking,
not entirely." Something almost like a smile touched his lips. He
whispered. "THEY only think I have." The smile vanished. "But it's
hard, very hard to keep going alone." He paused, sighed and forged
ahead. "I really miss having someone to watch my back."

     Dana leaned back in the booth, not breaking contact, neither
wanted to let go but so she could better see his face. "To watch
your back?"  This was a bit of Mulder's old humor, but spoken from
a heart bleeding with his unfulfilled hopes and dreams.

     "Someone to stand by my side and tell me I'm brilliant..."

     "Or that you're insane," Dana finished catching the rhythm as
if it were eight year earlier and they had never been apart.

     "Someone I can be proud to point to and say, that person, I
know her, and she is so amazing, so intelligent, so strong...."

     "And so stubborn."

     He came closer into the cloud of her scent and lost himself in
it. "Someone I can hold onto in the dark..."

     "And be held," she offered from the deepest part of her.

     He raised his head and took her chin in his long, slender
fingers. "I am so tired of being alone. I need a partner."

     "What kind of a partner?" Dana asked trembling.

     "The best kind. The only kind. You. Marry me, Dana."

     Dana blinked, stared into his swimming eyes, never to know if
his eyes looked blurry because his were full of tears or because
hers were. Curling her body within the strength of his arms, she
began to weep softly and he held and rocked her until her tears
slowed. "We'll talk about it later," he muttered, his deep voice
rough. Then he hugged her tight as if he never wanted to release
her.

     In time Dana came up as if from a bottomless lake of deep and
encompassing emotion into the air. She put one hand on his cheek,
covering the fresh scar. "Mulder, I'm tired, too. I'm tired of
waiting. For the last year I've been waiting and I didn't even know
I WAS waiting or what I was waiting for. Just that life was
going... nowhere." She paused wondering if she was going to destroy
it all, but she had to be honest. Dana Scully was always that.
"Mulder, I don't regret marrying Peter."

     His voice unsteady when he tried he speak, he chose instead to
turn his face and kiss the palm that had lain against his cheek, to
stroke her hair. "And I don't regret knowing Cathy, I only regret
causing you pain and losing the years we could have had. But at the
time I needed and I could not have you. I felt if we were closer
they would hurt you to hurt me. And then once I met Cathy -" He
looked suddenly so young staring down at the floor repeating words
she had heard before. "I guess I got in over my head."

     Dana reached for his hand and kissed his finger tips.

     "We'll never forget them, they are part of us, but this is our
season now. Make love to me, Mulder," she whispered, losing herself
in his startled, bemused eyes. Touching his chest she felt his
heart beat quicken under her hand. Calculating rapidly, she
whispered, "Give me a baby, Mulder." He stiffened, but she detected
a hint of humor sparkle in the corner of his eyes. "Give us both
one..." she whispered from the deepest empty part of her. Then she
smiled impishly. "That is if you think you can get it up, old man."

     He stared down, down into her eyes probing her very soul. Was
she joking? No, that would be too cruel, she would never. Suddenly,
he felt her take his head in her hands, twine her fingers in his
still thick hair, and begin to gently lick the salt of his tears,
the velvet tongue on his face sending a wash of pure electric
happiness through his body. And here he had gone years thinking
Cathy was the only unpredictable one. The roguish smile Dana had
not seen for a long, long time lit up his face and his beautiful
eyes.

     "I guess we'll never know unless we try," he breathed. "Create
our own little X-File, full of unexpected mysteries? I could go for
that."  And he kissed her deep with a kiss that woke slumbering
joy.
 

The End (No, I don't plan a sequel, there are 'second generation'
stories a-plenty in the works. Let them have their privacy. They've
earned it.)

Here's my current story list for those who are interested. All are
on the OSU site and all but 'Lady and the Tiger' and 'All Hallow's
Eve' are on cs.nmt.edu. For some reason I can't set anything on
CS.NMT.EDU any more.
 

Windsinger's Index as of 11/15/95

My big work is my series REVELATIONS. (Note a fan fiction piece
which is not mine came out in October 1995 called REVELATIONS so
don't be confused.)

About the series: REVELATIONS. The initial story of this series,
takes place after episode 5 of the program. The rest of the series
takes place in the latter half of the first season, after FIRE and
after TOOMS ('I wouldn't put myself on the line for anybody but
you, Mulder.') and before the ERLENMEYER FLASK.

1.   REVELATIONS (working title): In process, due winter-spring
     1996.
2.   THE BOX (On cs.nmt.edu and OSU) released 3/95
3.   THE VACATION (working title): In process, due winter-spring
     1996.
4.   THE ABDUCTEE (On cs.nmt.edu and OSU) released late July 1995.
5.   MILE HIGH (Released late July 1995.)
6.   MEMORIES (On cs.nmt.edt and OSU) original version released
     3/95. Revision released 7/95. Please read the revision.
7.   JUST THE TWO OF US: Under construction. (Gosh, this is going
     to be as long as THE ABDUCTEE. Trying VERY hard to get this
     out before Christmas 1995.) The real finale to REVELATIONS.
8.   SKUNKED AGAIN: A little epilogue. Due winter-spring 1996.
 

Not in the REVELATIONS series:

     DO NOT GO GENTLE (on cs.nmt.edu and OSU) posted 3/95
          (A Colony/End Game missing scene)

     DELIVER US FROM EVIL (on cs.nmt.edu and OSU) posted 4/17)
          (A post-Calusari story)

     THE WEDDING, version B (The Action-Adventure Version) an
     adjunct to MacSpooky's GENERATIONS series and with her spirit
     and support. (on cs.nmt.edu and OSU) posted 8/95

     THE LADY AND THE TIGER (with Steph Davies) On OSU site. posted
     8/95.  (A post Anasazi story)

     ALL HALLOW'S EVE (On OSU site) posted Halloween 1995. (A post
     Anasazi, post-Blessing Way, post-Paper Clip, post Clyde
     Brookman Halloween thriller.)

     FOR EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON (On OSU site) posted 11/95.
          (A poignant coming apart and coming together Romance.)
 

--------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------
             "Goodbye," said the fox,
             "And now here is my secret:
             It is only with the heart that one can see rightly;
             What is essential is invisible to the eye."
                  A. de Saint-Exupery