By X-Phylia
xphylia@yahoo.com

Disclaimer: They *are* ours, so sue us all if you dare!
:)
Category: MSR, angst
Spoilers: Within/Without, Deadalive
Rate: PG13
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Shrine.
Summary: A tormented, paranoid Mulder finds comfort in a
simple thing.
 

"A simple thing"
by X-Phylia

Mulder stirs in the bed, moaning and whimpering in his
sleep; plagued with visions he wishes were just
nightmares and not memories. But dreams don't have the
right to be so real, and the pain they evoke shouldn't
make his muscles twitch in agony. He screams, he reaches
out, but he cannot move; his arms and legs are
immobilized against a hard metal chair, the soft skin of
his face is torn every time he tries to change his
uncomfortable position. The bright, blinding light hurts
his eyes adjusted to the dark and all he can see are
blurry figures around him. He he feels so exposed, so
humiliated. He is poked, probed, hurt by rough inhuman
hands and there's nothing he can do to prevent it; he
trembles from the cold and trepidation of what they are
going to do next. Over time, pain and fear had replaced
all other sensations or emotions, wiped-out an otherwise
perfect memory. He's going to die soon and he knows it.

Scully tries hard, but she cannot comfort him. Mulder
continues to scream with such desperation that her heart
aches, and she thinks it's so unfair that she feels so
powerless once again. After all those months of
impotence, of not knowing what else to do to find him,
where else to look... he's right beside her now,
suffering, and she still can't help him. Sometimes
Scully believes only his body came back, the Mulder she
knew was left behind either in the ship or in his grave.
This man struggles to re-locate himself in the world of
the living, but something's missing, something vital,
and she can't make out what it is.

Mulder wakes up drenched in sweat, his throat sore from
the screaming, his eyes swollen with tears. He gets up
automatically and rushes to the bathroom, he knows he's
going to be sick the next minute. This has become a
routine after he was released from the hospital and the
numbing effect of the drugs wore out. He is disgustingly
healthy now so there's no excuse to be admitted again,
even though there are times he misses having sedatives
fed up his veins, making him oblivious to a painful
reality he isn't ready to face yet. He wonders if he
should ask Scully for something to help him sleep, but
he's afraid of how she might react to that request.

His breathing slowly goes back to normal and he washes
his face, wincing at the burn of recently healed scars
on his hands and cheeks. He bents over so he won't have
to see his reflection in the mirror, he's too afraid of
what he might see. It takes all the self restraint he
has left not to smash the offending object into shards.
As he walks back to his room, Mulder wants to remember a
time when he found comfort and peace in the arms of the
woman lying on his bed. It's so unfair that he feels so
lonely once again. After all those months of crying out
for her, of wishing she were there to take away the
pain, Scully is right by his side, waiting, and he
couldn't go to her. His life previous to the abduction
feels like somebody else's. In his most paranoid times,
Mulder imagines himself still prisoner in the spaceship,
his naked body covered with wires and sensors, and his
skull penetrated by electrodes sending impulses to his
brain. What he calls life is nothing but a distorted
perception of it, realistic but not real. So many things
don't add up, he feels like a zombie; a living dead
walking around in search of his soul.

He lays himself back on the border of the bed, as far
from Scully as he can manage, and she notices his intent
to stay away. He cries quietly, as if not wanting to
disturb her sleep, not realizing she's wide awake and
watching him. Scully begins to think it was a mistake to
try to force intimacy when Mulder is still so
emotionally raw, but she has to do something before he
is lost in his depression forever. It would be the
mother of all ironies, Mulder alive and physically
healthy, but irremediably lost to her due to a mental
illness. An irresistible yearn to hold him and protect
him fills her whole being, making up her mind.

She crawls closer to him and tentatively calls his name.
Experience has taught her not to initiate contact
without warning, he can barely handle being touched at
all. She finds that so heartbreaking, the things they
must have done to him to make him so scared even of her
caresses. Her eyes fill with tears when she remembers
Mulder snuggling against her after making love, all that
warm, naked skin for her to adore, and his contented
sighs as her hands roamed all over it. Now he sleeps
curled up and fully dressed; socks, sweatpants and long-
sleeved t-shirts. He has become extremely self-conscious
of his body, he can't stand the sight of the scars left
by the alien torture. Clothes give him a sense of
security he didn't have for a long time.

The sound of his name in her lips brings a litany of
bittersweet memories. It once meant everything to him,
he couldn't bear the thought of being away from her...
until it happened. He didn't think he could survive the
separation... and here he was, alive. He never imagined
*she* could move on so easily without him... but she is
eight months pregnant. He needs her to understand how he
feels, and yet he can't speak about what happened to
him, there are no words to describe such horror. Mulder
doesn't remember being 'dead', just like he never
remembered being in a coma, but he knows he spent three
months in a coffin buried six feet under and the thought
terrifies him. What if he had woken up down there? He
likes to think he would have died immediately of a heart
attack. Or maybe he would have used the cell phone
Frohike claims he left in the coffin, because "With you,
Mulder, you never know. I'm starting to think you're a
Highlander." He never told Frohike how much comfort he
takes from that joke.

Gentle fingers run through his scalp, and strangely
enough, it doesn't startle him. It feels good, it brings
nice memories. He used to love it when Scully fondled
his hair. He recalls quiet evenings eating take-out
Chinese, after dinner they'd sprawl on his couch and
he'd lower his head to her lap to watch TV together.
Scully's hands invariably ended up caressing him
somehow. Mulder misses that kind of closeness, but feels
largely inadequate to deserve it in any way these days.
He's afraid of physical contact, he's been hurt too much
and his skin is overly sensitive. But the pads of her
fingers are so soft, so soothing...

She whispers an old tune that sounds like a lullaby and
indeed has that effect on him, it calms his frayed
nerves. Her hand descends to his shoulder, her thumb
draws small circles on the back of his neck. Mulder
allows himself to relax a little, lulled by her actions.
Maybe he is back into the real world after all, he's not
being projected all this in his mind. Tenderness is not
a concept the aliens would understand.

It wasn't such a bad idea to let Scully to stay for the
night, after all. It's hard for him to admit that he
doesn't need her as a lover, but as the figure that
would redefine the meaning of life itself. He knows it's
irrational, but he envies the baby inside her, safe in
her womb, innocent and unknowing of the horrors in this
world. His own innocence has been brutally raped and
destroyed forever, he'd never feel safe again. The sight
of the stars would always bring him grief and
desolation, a permanent reminder of his failure.

Scully suffers at his all-too-evident pain. She wonders
if there is hope for Mulder, if he'd ever get over all
he went through. Tonight he sees him fighting the fear
that chained him to the darkness, desperately trying to
break free. But freedom can be scary after a long
seclusion. As sad and lonely as he is, Mulder has
learned to live like this. No one could blame him for
being afraid of stepping out, he had paid a terrible
price for the answer he spent his life looking for. He
can't take any more hurt. When she considers this,
Scully is immensely grateful for being able to touch him
again, if only a little.

As she tucks him in, Mulder sighs relieved. She doesn't
intend to take this farther than he can allow it, and
her gentle caressing is slowly permeating the thick wall
he has built around himself. It had taken her almost
seven years to claw her way to him the first time, how
long will it take this time? Mulder doesn't want to be
alone, but will she understand what he needs? And what
about what *she* needs? Certainly there isn't shortage
of men willing to do whatever is necessary for her.

He wants to stretch his arms to her and burrow against
her chest, but he has trouble letting go. So many times
his mind had played tricks on him, in the ship he'd have
these wonderful, vivid dreams of Scully's arms around
him, saving him from the ongoing torture. Her voice was
clear in his head, her touch warm and soft against his
abused skin. The fake comfort usually ended with harsh
lights blinding him; and yet another round of endless
tests that warned him not to rely too much on his senses
anymore. The aliens could fabricate very convincing
perceptions, but in the end, the only thing that was
real was the pain -both physical and emotional.

Scully senses Mulder's doubts and decides to take the
first step. She intuits he needs her close, a touchstone
to find his way back. It doesn't matter if he won't
whisper beautiful words in her ear, or touch her the way
he used to, driving her to ecstasy. Tonight is about re-
establishing contact, and there has to be something she
can give him to lead him home. Still murmuring the words
of an old song from her childhood, she carefully pulls
Mulder's shoulder towards her and rolls him to his back.

Their eyes cross for a fleeting second and Mulder
immediately lowers his, unable to meet her gaze. Far
from feeling rejected, she kisses the top of his head,
accepting his insecurity. When he instinctively tries to
curl up again, Scully restrains his long, slender legs
with her own and draws him closer; gingerly guiding his
head to her shoulder. Mulder jerks and whimpers for a
while, but she doesn't let him go, and he doesn't try
too hard. It's like his body is adjusting to a
temperature shift, his arms are still tightly wrapped
around his chest. Hers, on the contrary, are fully
stretched to hug as much of him as she can. After a few
minutes his agitation subsides and she hears him
inhaling deeply into the crook of her neck. Scully holds
back her tears as he nuzzles against her hair and
relaxes in her embrace. She doesn't think she ever loved
this man so much.

Mulder feels the fog starting to clear as he is claimed
by exhaustion. His lips curve in a brief smile. Amongst
the complexity of this life, of the previous one and of
the frightening gap between them; a simple thing has
changed the odds. The betrayal of his main senses has
been redeemed by the one that hadn't been tampered with,
that functions just like he remembers it. The first
glimpse of reality he can really trust comes in the form
of a smell. Mulder takes another deep breathe and
rejoices again in the unmistakable scent of Scully's
shampoo, a distinct memory of nights spent in her arms,
when they both thought nothing and no one could ever
tear them apart. Her soft perfume acts like a balm on
the rest of his senses, so basic and genuine that no
alien electric impulse could possibly duplicate.

He cries now with sweet relief, not bitter angst. He
feels her tears slide from her cheeks down to his own,
close as they are. Maybe soon he'll recover enough to
let her touch him -*really* touch him- but tonight he
is contented with the smell of her comfort, something
that had transcended the boundaries of torture and death
intact, unblemished.

Such a simple thing.