by Pam Gamble
I12blv2@cs.com

MSR

Date: Wed, 16 Aug 2000 01:15:13 GMT

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story is a sequel to Fifteen. Many people asked for
one, which I take as a compliment.  I was never really moved to write
one until the events of Season 7. Because of the time difference
between the two, I don't know if it will do for people what they wanted
it to, but here it is.  And yes, you MUST read Fifteen for this to make
any sense. It's at the Haven, Gossamer, Clinique's, etc. I also
reposted Fifteen at Ephemeral along with the original post of this
story, for your reading convenience:) All my stuff is at:
www.geocities.com/area51/crater/3303

TIMELINE: Fifteen was set at an indeterminate time; The Last Word is
post -Req.
 

********************************
"Do you believe in ghosts, Scully?"

The rich, unmistakable timbre of his voice startled her awake, and she
sat up as quickly as her body would allow.

"Mulder?"

The echo of her own voice faded into the stillness of the room.

Disappointment clung for only a moment, the tremor of her lip
unnoticeable.

His words still hung, caught on a forgotten snag of memory. An old
case, a conversation in the car, she couldn't remember where or when.

But why those words, why now?

Ghost.  Was he telling her he was dead?

<He is not dead...not dead>

A swift kick in the abdomen seemed to admonish her for just the thought.

She clamored to hold on to the shred of his voice, its resonance still
trapped in her ears.

Had she been dreaming about him?  She couldn't remember.

Probably.

Shaking off those thoughts with the rumpled sheets, she stumbled into
the kitchen, eyes falling disappointedly on the pile of dirty dishes
she'd left the night before.

Soon nylon bristles were scraping against metal, the cascade of running
water bouncing off plates, murmuring against silver and skin.

Mesmerized by the movement of her fingers in the stream of water, she
heard the knock at the door, but did not respond with any urgency.

The view from the peephole did nothing to flatter Melvin Frohike.

"Come on in, guys."  She waved them toward the couch. "I'll go get
dressed, make yourselves comfortable."

In her bedroom, she absently noticed that they had been awkward, almost
strangely quiet.  She assumed it was because she was still in her
pajamas, or maybe she was showing a little more.

Or maybe they had just seen an upsetting rerun of Star Trek.  Who knew?

Scully reentered her own living room, obviously interrupting a quiet
argument.

Warily she sat down in the armchair, regally granting them an audience.

Langly elbowed Frohike, nodding towards Scully.

Frohike cleared his throat, scooting toward the edge of the crowded
sofa.

"Scully," he began, then regrouped. "Dana..."

For the first time it occurred to her that they could be here to
deliver bad news, to confirm the premonition which had woken her that
morning.

"Oh, god, no."

Byers was immediately at her side, gently grasping her elbow.  "No,
Scully, it's nothing bad. We haven't heard anything else."

She sighed heavily, saw Byers shoot a glare at Frohike, and watched his
answering meek nod.  Whatever they'd come to say, it seemed Byers had
now been appointed to say it.

Rising, John went to the kitchen, returning with a chair which he sat
directly in front of her.

There was no escape now, from whatever he was going to say,  from what
it would make her feel.

"Dana, when you were ill, when you found out that you had cancer, we
assisted Mulder in breaking into the facility where Dr. Scanlon was
working at the time.  Mulder found several things, things he chose not
to tell you about."

Scully nodded.  There had been many secrets between them, and she
begrudged Mulder very few of the things he had done in his misguided
sense of her own preservation and protection.

"While Mulder was inside the facility, he was led to a storage room."
He paused, and Byers reached for her hand.  "They were cataloging and
storing...the things they took away from you, from the other women."

She didn't need to ask.  She'd always wondered how Mulder had known so
much about her infertility, known things she'd never told him. The
tears cascading down her face fell on her lips as she began to speak,
then changed her mind.

Byers' next words were so quiet, so quick, she couldn't believe she had
heard them, anymore than she believed she'd heard Mulder's voice that
morning.

"They offered him one vial, and he kept it, Scully."

Scully closed her eyes tightly, trying desperately to take herself back
to that hallway, to remember what he had said that night and what she
had felt, in light of what she now knew.

A shiver ran through her, and she pried her eyes open.  There was more,
and she braced herself for it.

At that point, though, she felt Byers pull away, seeming to let Frohike
take over.

"Mulder should be the one telling you this, Scully.  We were only
supposed to tell you, if, well, if something happened to him."

"We weren't going to tell you, and please don't take this as a sign of
our pessimism," Byers chimed in.  "But we decided that we don't own
this knowledge, and that it should belong to you."

"There is more, Scully. But we want you to have the choice." Frohike
nodded toward her.  "Do you want to know?"

Scully sat, stunned by this sudden onslaught of the past.  She always
felt Mulder more strongly around his friends, but now, surrounded by
vital memories of what they once were, what they had been through...how
could she not want more of that?

"Tell me."

And they did.

And with their words she could see this man, who she had always been in
love with but only recently truly loved, face the anguish of an
impossible decision.

She could imagine his frustration, his disgust, his resignation as he
made the only choice he could live with.

She could imagine the wonder in his eyes as he had realized he had
created life.  With her, only without her knowledge.

How had he faced her in the office every day, without telling her?
Without blurting out what he had done?

How had he felt, watching her pain over Emily, unable or unwilling to
comfort her with the knowledge of his actions?

How could he have fought with her, clung to her, hated her, loved her,
watched as she cheated death again and again, and not told her?

How could he have not told her?

Had he tried to tell her?  Had he wanted to?  Before they became
involved?  After?  Sorting through millions of conversations she knew
she would never distinguish the one or ones that differed due to an
omission.

Some feelings would crush you if  you tried to live your whole life
with them, day to day.

Langly's voice brought her back to the present. "You still with us,
Scully?"

She nodded.  "Where are they now?"

"They're safe," Frohike assured her.

"Where?"

Frohike looked at his cohorts, resignedly reaching into his vest
pocket.  He handed her an envelope.  "The address is in there. You'll
need the form in there, and the passwords are in there too. It's a very
secure facility. They won`t let you in without them."

Byers opened his jacket, reaching into the inside pocket. "You will
also need this. We always kept them separate, just as an added
precaution."  He placed the key in her hand, a small gold key, alone on
a silver key ring.

Scully let her hand close around the items, the weight of so many lives
heavy in her palm.  Fifteen. Fifteen possible children.  Possible
genetic combinations of the two of them.

Her hand fell to her stomach.  Yet this was the one she held within
her.  The one she would feel grow inside her body, the one that was
granted to her when it should have been outside the realm of
possibility.

She would not make any immediate decisions.

She would wait until Mulder came home.

Swallowing, she stood slowly.  "I need some time alone, if you don't
mind." Not caring if they did, of course, she was already at the door,
holding it open.

As they shuffled into the hall, Frohike turned, the soft look in his
eyes nearly her undoing. "We'll help you with anything, Dana. You know
that."

She closed the door behind them, winding her way into the bedroom.
Whether from her fitful sleep or the overload of information, she was
suddenly and completely exhausted. No one would begrudge her a little
mid-morning nap.

Tucking the envelope into the journal on her nightstand, she clung to
the key as she drifted back into her dreams.
************************
<"Do you believe in ghosts, Scully?"

"You mean like Casper?" She had smiled.  "I believe that certain
circumstances of death can leave a field of electromagnetic disturbance
in a room or house. And I further believe that this field is
detectable, although we probably haven't discovered the tools to do so
as of yet."

He hadn't responded for several minutes.  Perhaps her new open-
mindedness had startled him into silence.

"Do you think Sam was a ghost?"

Oh. She'd thought this was work banter, not a personal discussion.

"Mulder, I think that you believe that you saw your sister, and..."

"But do you think she was a ghost?" The plink of a shell in the
wastecan.

Folding her arms, she reversed the question. "What do you believe,
Mulder?"

His brows shadowed eyes deep in thought.  After a long pause, he spoke
with consideration. "I don't know. But I do believe that people can
transfer their energies, if they have a strong enough connection with a
person, but only if that person is willing to receive that energy."

"So you think that living people could do this, this transferring too?"

He nodded.  "I think that Sam knew I was looking for her, and was able
to show me what I needed to see, what I needed to believe that she was
really gone. If she'd been alive, I think she could have shown me that
too, but I honestly don't believe that anymore, Scully."

"Signs and portents, Mulder? Isn't that a little simplistic?  And
besides, how would the person receiving the energy know it was actually
from the person they were trying to reach?  Presuming they were trying
to reach this person anyway, wouldn't it be conceivable that they had
just caused the action or vision themselves, or that they were
attributing things to someone else because they wanted so badly to
receive a message from that person?"

He'd smiled at her then, and stood up. She'd known the discussion was
over, but Mulder always had to get in the last word.

"I think they would just know, Scully.  They would just know.">

***************
Heat from the midday sun caused her to struggle uncomfortably
underneath the covers, finally waking her completely.  At first the
Gunmen's earlier visit seemed dreamlike, and she focused her eyes on
her journal to check that the envelope was really there.

It was all so much to absorb, so many decisions to make.  Decisions she
hadn't been faced with that morning.  And now, faced with making them
alone...

If she could only know he was coming back.

If she could only know how he felt about their relationship, about the
baby he didn't even know existed.

Panicked, she remembered the key.  It was stupid to have slept with
such a small....

Oh.

Not only had the key remained in her left hand, the silver ring had
somehow worked its way to the base of her ring finger.

Somehow...

"I think they would just know, Scully.  They would just *know*."

The End