Author's notes: Sad Lovers and Giants, the two things hardest to conceal.

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Sad Lovers and Giants 14/? ­ Far From The Sea

by Mik

"He’s just sitting down there, Sir." Agent Scully met me at the door of the Public Library. The place was still shut down as a crime scene, and even though it was Sunday, curious public milled around outside the yellow police tape, and a forest of microwave dishes on van towers sent news out to the world that a madman had been caught, and the daughter of a Senator had been saved. I’d even actually heard Mulder’s name mentioned as I pushed through the throng to find his partner.

She held out her hand. "Thank you for coming down. I didn’t realize you were no longer on the Task Force ..." She let her voice trail away curiously.

I took her hand, but not her offer to explain. "I don’t understand why you called me."

"He won’t be moved from that room." Her voice dropped to that discreet murmur she has. "A.D. Hopkins is threatening to file a 5150 if he doesn’t come out."

My heart pitched downward in my chest but I tried to keep it from my face. I was breaching nine kinds of protocol to interfere after I’d signed off this team, but I couldn’t let him break apart all alone. He may have been damaged years ago, but I’m the one who reopened the case he’d long ago filed away. "I still don’t understand ..."

"He keeps saying your name, Sir," she blurted. She blushed. "Just your name. Over and over."

I’m not sure what embarrassed her, Mulder’s behavior, or what she might have concluded about it, but I wasn’t going to think about that. "Show me."

"This way, Sir." She directed me to a door at the back of the main room of the library, a door still labeled with the familiar yellow and black civil defense sign we’ve all grown up with, and learned to ignore. The door was propped open, and we went downstairs into the fallout shelter, just the way I remember the drills in school. I could almost hear the siren, and my fifth grade teacher calling out, ‘Duck and cover. Duck and cover.’

We came down into a dimly lit room, clearly unprepared for what would be required in the event of an actual emergency. It was cluttered with boxes and books, and stacks of chairs. Propped against a wall there were dozens of cots that probably had not been moved in forty years. Some things had been moved and rearranged in the last few hours, making a wide path, undoubtedly for CSI teams and stretchers. There was still an acrid smell of gunpowder in the heavy, uncirculated air, and other, far worse smells. "You shot the suspect, Agent?" I asked, recalling one report I’d received.

"Yes, Sir." She was unrepentant. Unlike Mulder, who grieved every time he fired his gun, Agent Scully was very prosaic about the use of her weapon. She didn’t pull her gun needlessly, but she was always prepared to use it if she had to.

"And the victim?" I prompted.

"She’s been recovered, and is undergoing physical and psychological evaluations right now." She pointed to a hole in the far wall, where a steel door hung on one shattered hinge. "In there, Sir."

A young man from the local law enforcement approached me, looking frustrated. "I’m sorry, Sir. Crime scene, no one’s --" he stopped when he saw my badge. "Sir, I’m supposed to seal the area, but he won’t come out."

"It’s all right, Officer," I soothed. "I’ll take care of it."

It was horrible. That was my first impression. A small room, ten by ten square, reeking with smells worse than to be found in an open grave; debris and human excreta everywhere. A hole had been ripped open in the far wall, and there was evidence that whatever came out of that hole had been shot and killed as it did so.

The stench of urine and sweat and blood and feces made my eyes burn and my stomach revolt, but I couldn’t leave. I was held captive by the most horrible thing of all.

Mulder, in shirtsleeves and Kevlar, crouched against the wall, his head hanging forward, his hands wrapped around his body tightly, as he rocked slightly on his heels, and breathed in slow, labored checks. I wanted to enfold him in my arms, I wanted to pull him away, I wanted to comfort him, rescue him. I stood there. "Agent Mulder."

He didn’t look up. He didn’t flinch at my voice. He knew I was there. He just rocked slowly.

I forced myself closer, kneeling gingerly amid the squalor. "Agent Mulder, it’s time to go."

"He said it was my fault," he mumbled.

"Your fault? How could this be your fault?" I risked a hand on his shoulder. "You saved her, Mulder."

His head moved back and forth in denial. "Not enough. I didn’t save her enough."

"Mulder, she’s alive." I slid my hand under his arm and tried to urge him up. "That’s all that matters."

"No." He jerked away from me so violently I thought he was regressing again. "Sometimes still being alive is even worse." He lifted his head, and his face was streaked with tears. "What he did to her ..."

"Mulder, you need to get out of here." I stood, tugging him up with me. He resisted, of course, probably more out of habit than need, but I am bigger than he is, and I would have my way.

I wrapped an arm around his waist, and pulled, pushed and guided him out into the main room. The police officer was hovering anxiously a few feet from the door and he snapped to attention when we stumbled out. "Officer," I called, backing Mulder up to a stack of boxes. "Go find Agent Scully. Give her these keys." I held out my car keys. "Tell her I want to escort Agent Mulder out without any press or other interference. Tell her I want my car moved to the exit most efficacious for that event."

He reached for my keys, his brow wrinkling up. "I ... uh ... Sir?"

"Tell her to move my car around back," I snapped.

"But, Sir, I can’t leave the crime scene," he whined. "I’m supposed to --"

"I’ll be responsible. Now go." I kept a hand on Mulder, to make sure he didn’t bolt or fall. "Go on." I waited until he was disappearing up the wooden stairs before I looked at Mulder again. "Don’t worry. I’ll take you home, now."

"I can’t," he whispered. "I have to --"

"You’ve done what you need to do. You did what no one else could do." I couldn’t help it, I let my fingers work through his hair, sticky with the mud of sweat and dust. I’m not sure, but it felt as if, just for a moment, he leaned into my hand.

There was a step on the stairs and I pulled my hand away guiltily. It was A.D. Hopkins. "Skinner," he barked. "What are you doing here?"

I’m not sure if it was the guilt of being on scene of a case I no longer had any authority in, or with an agent over whom I no longer had any authority, or because I was touching that agent, but I was feeling guilty and belligerent about something and it came out in my voice. "Agent Mulder needed --"

My tone did nothing to improve his. "Agent Mulder is my responsibility now. You’re out of your jurisdiction here."

Mulder dropped down from the boxes where I’d put him. "Agent Mulder is Agent Mulder’s responsibility," he announced in a flat, beaten voice. "Agent Mulder is going home."

"I did not discharge you," A.D. Hopkins blustered. "You still have reports to file on this case. I need your debriefing."

Mulder’s shoulders sagged for a moment, and when he straightened there was an uncharacteristic and dangerous rasp to his voice. "I’ve been on this case over sixty hours without a break. My debriefing can wait until I’ve had some food and sleep."

He twisted away, staggering slightly, and I reached for him instinctively. He knocked my hand away, but as he did, his hand fell against my arm, and I was sure that time, he gave my arm a very slight squeeze. "Agent Mulder, find Agent Scully. She has my keys. I’ll drive you home if we can’t get you on a plane tonight." I shot a defiant look at Hopkins. "Unofficially."

"He needs to be debriefed," Hopkins persisted. "A suspect was killed in the course of performing your ­"

Mulder reached back and jerked his service weapon free from the holster at the waist of his slacks. For a moment I thought he was going to draw on Hopkins the way he had me. But he just thrust the gun under Hopkins’ nose. "Take a good whiff. I didn’t shoot him." He held it there. "That’s all the debriefing you need from me. I wasn’t even in the room when he was shot. I was with the vic." The gun trembled, and he lowered his hand. "I’m going home."

I turned to Hopkins angrily. "You’ve been given a gift, Hopkins. Despite Bureau opinion, he’s a damned fine agent. Use him wisely, and you’ll reap the rewards." My jaw clenched. "Screw with him, and he’ll go up in flames, and take you with him." I spun on one heel and followed Mulder up the stairs.

Up in the main room of the library, Agent Scully was arguing with Mulder about driving. "I can’t leave until IA is through with me," she was protesting. "You shouldn’t drive anywhere, much less all that way. Wait until -- there." She saw me and pointed. "Sir, your car is parked in the back, as requested."

"There you are, Agent Mulder." A woman I only recognized by her position in Internal Affairs, approached looking officious. "I need your statement."

Mulder looked as if the next word he heard would break him. He drew a shaky breath and faced her. "I don’t really have a statement to make about the incident. I had left the area before --"

"Did you instruct Agent Scully to ..." she paused to consult notes, "shoot the bastard?"

Mulder’s eyes widened, mystified. He looked to Scully. "Did I?"

She put her hand on his. "Don’t worry, Mulder. It had nothing to do with --"

"Agent Scully, please step over here while I speak to Agent Mulder." The woman moved between them. "Did you or did you not so instruct her?" she demanded.

"I didn’t instruct her to --"

"Then this report is a lie?" She pointed to the papers in her hands. "I have the testimony of two other agents present that you gave her those instructions."

"They weren’t instructions. They were ..." I saw his eyes go over her shoulder, searching for Scully frantically. "They were an excited utterance."

"You ordered your partner to kill an unarmed suspect?" she persisted.

"First of all, I didn’t order her to kill anyone, and I didn’t know he was unarmed. I still don’t."

"Then why did you tell her to shoot him?"

He shut his eyes in pain. "Just take my statement, will you?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

He emerged from the librarian’s office an hour later, looking worse, if possible, than when I found him down in the shelter. He walked, or staggered, straight to me, and said, "Take me home."

I said nothing to him until after we’d run the gauntlet of press and I got him maneuvered into the car. "You okay?" I asked.

He let his head fall back against the seat. He was pale, under the dirt and blood and tear streaks on his face. "Just take me home." He swallowed hard. "Please."

I started the car. "I don’t know if they bothered to tell you or not, but even though two of the agents repeated your statement to Scully in their deposition, all four stated that the perp lunged at Scully with a knife, and then and only then did she shoot."

"Skinner ..." his hand groped blindly ‘til it found my arm. "Please. No more."

I stayed quiet. He settled back in the seat, but he wasn’t relaxing. His body was shaking, his breath was shallow, and his skin was growing almost white. It looked as if he was going into shock. Anxiously, I glanced at my watch. He was in no condition to be put on a plane and we had to be at least three hours to his place by car, depending upon traffic. But it was two miles to the first exit with a Motel Six. I began signaling to get off the Interstate almost as soon as I got on.

He didn’t lift his head to see why we stopped. He didn’t seem to be aware that we had. All the same, I locked him into the car and took the keys before going in to register. I got him a room at the back, as far away from the sounds of traffic as possible.

It was only when I moved the car to the back of the boxlike building that he roused himself. "Wh ­ what ..." he struggled to put syllables together. "What’s going on?"

"A shower, Mulder. A force-feeding if necessary. A decent bed and a nap."

He turned, his red-rimmed eyes narrowed. "I have all of that at home."

"True, but home is several hours away, and you’d have no supervision there, and therefore no guarantee that you’ll actually do any of those things."

His voice was thin as tissue. "I don’t need supervision. I need a plane. Home."

"Yes, you do," I argued over him. "It’s either this or hospital, Mulder." I held up the key. "Your call."

He grabbed the key angrily. "You have no right to do this."

"I have the right of anyone who knows you, respects you or cares about you."

"Well ..." he huffed out breath, "you do know me. I guess that counts." He pushed the car door open and sent me an unfairly suspicious glance. "What are you going to do?"

I pointed to the drive through sign visible from across the interstate. "I’m going to get you some food. What do you want?"

He made an anxious face. "I don’t think I want anything right now."

"Too bad, because you’re going to eat. Go take a shower. I’ll be right back." I waited until I saw him go inside before I put the car in reverse.

Of course he didn’t follow instructions. I don’t know why I expected him to. I’m just glad I thought to ask for two keys, because when I got back to the room, he didn’t appear to be in any shape to open the door for me.

He was sitting, still in his Kevlar vest and filthy clothes, slumped on the edge of one of the beds, his mobile in his hands, looking as close to shattered as I had ever seen a man. I wanted to drop the food I had balanced so precariously, and run to comfort him.

Instead, I put things down on the table, keeping my back to him, but watching surreptitiously in the mirror, to see if he composed himself. But he did not. He just sat there, and tears welled and spilled freely, and he appeared unaware.

Finally I turned, bringing him an iced tea, and a napkin. I put the paper cup in his hand, and brushed the napkin over his face. "It’s okay, Mulder," I promised. I didn’t know exactly what I was promising, but I meant for everything to be okay. It had to be.

He lifted his chin, but his shoulders slumped even more. "I didn’t save her."

I felt something cold clutch me inside. "The Dolan girl? She died?" I was not informed that her injuries were that extensive.

"I knew it, but I didn’t want to believe it." He shook his head and looked down at the phone in his hands. "I just got confirmation ..." he stood and threw his phone with all his strength at the wall. "He raped her."

I stared at the place where his phone had disintegrated against the wall. "At least she’s alive, Mulder," I said stupidly. "That’s the important thing."

"Is it?"

Something about his voice made me turn. His face was slack, his eyes were empty. He wasn’t with me anymore. He just stood there, making fists and letting them go.

"He said it was my fault," he repeated, in a voice that wasn’t really his, but far moreso than the voice of the child I’d heard.

This time I said nothing. I moved nothing. I waited.

He opened his mouth to speak again. His tongue went over his lower lip before he bit down on it, hard. "My fault," he said again. "My fault she was taken. My fault my mother turned her back on him. My fault for everything."

I didn’t want to hear this. But I said nothing, did nothing.

"He said ..."he started to struggle with words, "that I ... that I owed him."

That bastard.

He was quiet for a long time. "He took me down to the cellar, where she wouldn’t see, wouldn’t hear anything." He was starting to shake. "And when I tried to get away, he tied my hands ..." He looked down at his hands, rubbed his right wrist with his fingers. "When I screamed he put tape on my mouth."

He turned away from me, walking slowly to the window. He pushed the curtain back and tipped his head up to let the afternoon sunshine spill on his face. "I tried to be good after that." His voice had taken on a thoughtful tone. "I tried everything not to make him mad. But I make people mad." He let the curtain fall back into place and turned around again, acknowledging me with a rueful smile. "It’s a gift."

I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to speak, or act. I wanted to act. I spoke. "How long did it go on?"

"A year. Maybe a little bit longer." He shrugged. "One day he moved out. And that was the end of it." His eyes slid around the room, looking for ways to avoid mine. They came to his shattered phone and he knelt and began gathering pieces. "As you can see, just being alive isn’t always a consolation."

I wanted to go to him. I went to the bed and sat, instead. Something was required of me. In the many roles I’ve played for this particular agent, in any of the roles I’d ever be allowed to play in the future, every single one of them demanded that I find some way of comforting him. "Mulder, I can’t even begin to understand how much pain you’ve been in. I can’t begin to understand what this little girl is facing. But I do know that this little girl, and her parents, and hundreds of other people are consoled by the fact that you’re alive."

"Ah, yes ..." he smiled again, grimly. "I spend my life in atonement. My sister’s probably dead. She probably ..." his voice warbled, "died a horrible death, very much like what was intended for Carrie Dolan. I didn’t save her. So I try to save everyone else."

"You couldn’t save her, Mulder. You were a child yourself. You know better than I how people need to find someone to blame when they lose a child. Your parents just chose you."

"Oh, I know that." He stood and pointed to the middle of his forehead. "In here." He carried the bits of broken wireless technology to the table. "But I can’t quite get it ..." he pressed that finger to his chest, "in here."

"What can I do for you, Mulder?"

He seemed surprised I would ask. "Oh, I don’t know. Be Superman, and fly around the world really fast, so that you can turn back time a few days?" he suggested with a weak laugh. "Or a few years?"

"Sorry, I left my cape at home."

He picked up a cold french fry. "You know, I always suspected you had one."

I looked at my watch again. "I should probably get on the road. Hopkins was right about me being out of my jurisdiction. But I want you to promise me you’ll eat and sleep. No one’s going to expect you in the office tomorrow. You can fly back in the afternoon."

"I wondered what you were doing here," he said, reaching for his iced tea.

"Agent Scully called me. She was concerned for you." I paused before adding, "She said you were saying my name."

He closed his eyes and drew a deep breath. "You told me the truth, Walter. And I thanked you by pulling my gun on you. I’m sorry."

The way he said my name made something in me go soft. "Are you going to be all right?"

He started to say one thing, one of his offhand ‘fine’s, but he caught himself. "Does this have anything to do with why you left me?" His mouth drew up in a regretful frown. "I wasn’t having nightmares, was I?"

I shook my head. "No."

"I should have realized when you asked me about MPDs. Was I disassociating? Regressing? What happened?"

I didn’t want to tell him. I didn’t want to embarrass him any further. "It’s not important now."

He caught my wrist in a steel grip. "It is important," he snapped. Then he lowered his voice. "It is to me."

"Whenever we ... whenever I tried to ... you fought me. You cried. You spoke like a small child." I let the words out in a rush. "You promised to be good."

His face remained impassive, but I could see it take a toll on him. I saw a muscle tighten and tremble on his neck, and his eyes got very dark. He closed his eyes after a moment, composed himself, and even managed a chuckle when he opened his eyes. "No wonder you got lost. That must have scared the hell out of you."

"It did. But I didn’t realize ... not then ... I thought I was doing something to you. I left because I thought I was the one causing you harm. I didn’t understand what had happened to you then."

He picked up more french fries and attempted to eat them with a disinterested air. "When did you figure it out?"

"I talked to an old Marine buddy of mine. Also a psychologist." I waited for him to react. "Do you mind?"

I think he did mind, because it took so long for him to shake his head. "No. I know you did it because you were concerned for me."

"That’s true."

"For the record, leaving me caused me harm."

"It wasn’t very good for me, either."

We looked at each other a long time. Long enough for me to imagine holding him in my arms again. I coughed, and looked at my watch. "Well, I’d better get on the road, that’s a rental car and I need to get it back before work tomorrow."

He put his hand my arm. "Stay."

~~~
 

"Stay." I don’t know why I asked. Fear of being alone with my new knowledge of myself, fear of being alone with memories, new and old, plain old-fashioned fear of being alone. I don’t know. Maybe it was just a need to be near someone strong enough to hold up the truth, even at gunpoint.

I will give him full marks for not letting the panic stay on his face too long. It shifted with appreciable swiftness to a quizzical frown. "Stay?" he repeated. His lips folded inward while he hunted for a way out. "Are you sure that’s such a wise choice, Mulder? After all, what you’ve been through --"

Embarrassed, I twisted away from him. "Fine." I don’t know where I’d gotten the idea that he still cared. Or maybe this was the truth that was just too much. "It’s okay. I won’t keep you." I saw the remains of food on the table. I wouldn’t accept any more of his charity. "How much do I owe you for the board and found?"

"Mulder," his hand fell on my arm. "I didn’t --"

"I said it’s okay." I wrenched out of his grasp. "Don’t worry about it. Go on." When he didn’t move, I shoved my hands into my pockets so he couldn’t see them shaking and hunted miserably for something to look at, something to say. I’d never had less to say in my life. In fact, at that moment I craved a silence so complete it wouldn’t even be broken by breath, or heartbeat. "Listen, my ... uh ... self esteem’s already taken a beating today, so," I pulled one hand free to gesture toward the door, "... if you wouldn’t mind --"

I stopped because, all at once, he was holding my face in one hand and the rest of me in the other. "Damn it, Mulder," he rasped, "you have nothing ... you have no reason ..." his eyes went over my face. "Oh ..."he kissed me. Skinner kisses the same way he does everything else, brooking no resistance.

I didn’t resist. I just sort of hung there, caught, as I was. But my mind was trying to tango with indecision. On the one hand, I wanted and needed this, him. But what I didn’t want was his pity or his obligation. And this kiss tasted a bit like both. This kiss also tasted just a little bit desperate to me.

He let go of me when he felt I wasn’t responding. "You’re right." He dragged his hand across his lips. "You don’t need this ... or me." It was his turn to hunt for something to say, but he didn’t have the same struggle I’d known. "I have treated you unfairly, Mulder, but please believe it was well meant, if misguided."

I nodded. The thing was, even though I believed him, it didn’t lessen the sting and even though I needed a rock to cling to more than I needed my pride, I had to admit I didn’t quite trust him not to do something else for my own good. I decided to lie to him. "When I asked you to stay, I didn’t mean ..."

"Oh." His face darkened. "Oh, no." So he decided to lie to me. "Of course not."

Okay, it wasn’t a complete lie. "I guess I just didn’t want to be alone." I was starting to feel even more miserable, if that was possible. I tried a weak smile. "It’s been a bad day."

"I understand."

I looked away from him. No, he didn’t understand. He probably never did. I felt dangerously close to a great deal of emotion and I was no longer inclined to share any of it with him. How could he understand, I didn’t really understand what was wrong with me. I wanted to rage and scream at the injustices visited upon Carrie Dolan and her unfortunate predecessors, I wanted to flagellate myself for my failures, I wanted to hide from all of it, I wanted most of all to hide from myself.

I couldn’t hide from me, though. I couldn’t hide from that laundry list of faults that defined Fox William Mulder, not the least of which was the failure within myself to recognize what had happened to me and how it had jeopardized my relationships and career.

I turned around and found him still standing there, watching me as if he feared I was going to explode. Well, I just might. "It’s okay," I promised. "Thanks for coming down."

"I don’t want to go, Mulder."

Oh, stiletto to the left ventricle. "Well, what do you want, Skinner? And could you make up your mind?" I made a show of looking at my watch. "I’m late for my nervous breakdown."

"I want to stay a while, keep you company --"

"Babysit?"

"No." He hunted for words. "As your friend, if nothing more. But maybe as someone who cares for you ... very much." He lowered his eyes to his hands. "I know that I handled all this badly, Mulder, but I never stopped ... loving you." The word came out with effort. "I don’t have any right to any expectations at this point, but I'd like to be here for you if you need me. I’d like to know you’re going to be all right."

I stared at him. "What do you think? Do you have any idea how selfish that is? You want me to be ‘all right’," I made those horrible little quotes in the air angrily, "so you can close the file and move on, no untidy loose ends. Sorry to disappoint you, Mr. Skinner, but I’m not ‘all right’. I don’t think ..." my voice caught and I looked away, ashamed. "Damn it."

His voice was too fucking gentle. "I didn’t realize you were so angry at me."

"Why shouldn’t I be angry?" I demanded, when I got my voice back under control. "You used me, and --"

"Used you?" he repeated, with a wry smile. "Isn’t that just a little bit maidenly? I didn’t --"

"Oh, thank you." I pressed the heels of my hands to my eyes. "Look. Just go. This ... this isn’t a good idea." I lowered my hands. "Go before one of us gets violent."

"I’ll go in a minute," he agreed, "but you have to understand something --"

"I understand plenty," I snapped. Why couldn’t I keep my mouth shut, let him make his speech, ease his conscience and get the fuck out?

He cocked his head at me. "Mulder, you’re the professional here. Is it really that effective to slap someone when they’re hysterical?"

"I am not hysterical," I assured him. "I’ve got at least thirty or forty seconds to go before I reach hysterical."

"Really?" He eyed me. "Prove it to me. Calm down and listen to what I’m saying."

I drew a deep breath and released it heavily. "Skinner, I’ve had ... a real shit of a day. In point of fact, it completes my collector’s edition shit of a week. It’s not reasonable to expect me to calm down. The only way I could manage calm right now is if I was dead. Now, please," I made a great sweeping gesture with both hands, "get out of my face, get out of my room, get out of my life!"

"You asked me to stay, Mulder," he reminded me without an ounce of reproach.

"Yeah, I know." I sagged against the wall and shook my head. "I really don’t know why. Please accept my apologies as a lovely parting gift. Now, go."

The bastard wouldn’t move. "I can’t leave you like this."

I looked up, made myself meet his eyes, even though mine were already filling with tears. "Sure you can. You’ve done it before."

That must have hurt him. He stepped back emotionally with the blow. "I didn’t mean to hurt you, Mulder," he repeated flatly. "I never meant to hurt you."

"Yeah, well ... you keep telling me what you never meant to do and it lines up pretty neatly with what you actually did." I had this rock in my throat and it was making breathing and speaking almost impossible. "Let’s assume you also didn’t mean to humiliate me, because that’s what you’re doing now. Just go."

He wanted to go, I could see it in his face, but he hesitated. "What will you do now?"

I turned enough so that my back was against the wall. I smiled bitterly. "Well, if I was any other person, I’d be allowed a melodramatic outburst like ‘kill myself’, but since I have a background in mental health, I know even an offhand remark could be considered a statement of intent to harm, and would qualify as a reason for you to put me on a hold. So, I’ll just say ..." I spread my hands out before me, in a gesture of emptiness, "I don’t know."

That didn’t exactly satisfy him. "Mulder, I’m worried for you." He took a step toward me.

I flinched, but I had nowhere to go. "Nothing to worry about, Skinner. I’m just tired and shaken. Like you said; food, shower and a nap and I’ll be fine." I slid along the wall because he was still moving. "Look, I’ll make a contract with you, if you’ll just go!"

"Mulder, I can’t leave you like this, you’re talking craziness."

"Craziness?" I laughed and the laugh got caught on that rock and came out jagged and torn. "I’ll tell you what craziness is, Assistant Director Skinner. Craziness is waking up one morning to find out that there are things about you that you didn’t know. Craziness is having a moment of clarity so powerful that the thing you knew as yourself is torn down, and all that’s left is rubble and smoke. Craziness is having to learn and accept that there’s a horrible dark place in your life, a huge black hole that’s been sucking everything out of you and you didn’t even know it was there. Craziness is ... it’s finding out that your own ... father ..." My throat closed up and nothing else could come out.

I don’t know why my knees chose that moment to buckle, but they did. He was there before my ass hit the ground. He lifted me, talking ... nonsense for all I know, but talking. His voice was deep and confident, and that’s all I needed. I just followed his voice. My hands went tight around his arms, and his stayed steady under mine. He guided me backward to the bed, turned me and made me sit.

I was shaking. "I don’t know what’s the matter with me," I protested as he knelt to pull off my shoes. "I don’t know ..."

"I do." He pushed me back on the bed and got my slacks off. "You haven’t eaten or slept for a week. Your metabolism is shutting down on you. You’ve had a very traumatizing experience today, coupled with receiving some very terrible news. The combined effect is making you sick. You’re not rational."

There was something reassuring, comforting in the take-charge tone of his voice. Everything was going to be okay. A.D. Skinner had arrived, like the cavalry, to rescue me and put everything to rights. This was the man I could trust. I heard the rip of the velcro tabs on my vest. "No," I agreed, lying limp as he pulled my shirt over my head without bothering with the buttons. "Not rational." I lifted my head and looked down. "But I am naked."

"Yes." He grabbed my arm and pulled it up across his shoulder. "It helps when you’re taking a shower."

"Skinner ..."

"Shut up," he instructed. "No more talking, no more thinking." He dragged me toward the bathroom. "That’s an order."

"But --"

"No buts." He flung the shower curtains back. "There are only two things that matter right now. That you saved a little girl’s life, and that I love you. Everything else is details."

I let go of him and leaned back against the door, trying to get things back in order in my head. "You love me?" Please tell me that’s true. If that’s true then everything else will be true. "Even though --"

"Even though." He was adjusting the temperature of the spray.

How could it be true? "But you left --"

His voice stayed matter of fact. "Because I loved you. I thought I was hurting you." He backed up. "Come on, can you get in on your own?" He held out his hands. "I loved you too much to keep on hurting you."

I ignored his hands. "Full circle," I muttered, stepping over the edge of the tub. "This conversation has gone full circle."

"Yes, and now it stops." He sounded very final. "I want you to stay in here as long as you can stand it, then you’re going to sleep." He put soap in my hand. "Understood?"

I nodded. "And you?"

He put towels within reach. "What about me?"

"What are you going to do?"

He didn’t even have to think about it. "Whatever it takes."

I made a face. "Well, it’s a little vague ..."

"Mulder?"

"Hmm?"

He yanked the shower curtain closed on me. "Shut up."

I backed up against the wet fiberglass of the stall and let the water run over me like my emotions. Shut up. Great idea. I wish I could get my brain to shut up. I was feeling anxious at every level. My stomach cramped, my chest clenched, my head throbbed, my limbs felt heavy and weak. My mind whirled images around like a Kinetoscope. Events of the last few days passed me in jerky motion, rushing toward me and then stopping so that I was suddenly subjected to the frame by frame experience of Skinner’s wrath, his face getting incrementally darker, spittle flying in a slow arc from his lips; of a naked and terrified girl emerging from a ventilation shaft, her dirty matted locks of hair lifting and falling like the wings of an ungainly bird; the bullet sailing almost lazily toward that chest, the blood spreading like a flower in full bloom, drops of blood floating outward like a free form lava lamp.

No, that’s not right. I turned the water off. I didn’t see Scully shoot that son of a bitch. I couldn’t have seen that. I pushed the curtain back to grope for a towel. And she shot him in the head, not the chest. I saw my face, peering around the shower curtain, reflected in the mirror. And I saw ...

"Oh, God!"

I don’t remember sitting down, but I was on the floor, arms wrapped around my knees when Skinner burst in. I looked up at him helplessly. "I killed him," I whispered.

"No, Mulder." Skinner dropped to his knees beside me, grabbing another towel and wrapping it around my shoulders. "You had nothing to do with it."

"You’re not listening. I --"

"Agent Scully didn’t shoot that bastard just because you told her," he stated emphatically, rubbing me hard with the towel. "He showed a weapon. He represented a threat to her and her fellow officers. She warned him to drop the knife."

"You’re not listening," I repeated, clutching at his shirt. "I killed him."

"No, you didn’t. You weren’t even in the room."

"I saw ... I saw the bullet ... and his chest ... and the blood ... I killed him." My entire body was turning to ice. My teeth were starting to chatter. "I wanted him dead. I made it happen. I killed him."

"Mulder, listen to me." He grabbed my shoulders and shook hard. "You might have wanted him dead, but you did not kill him. If anything, he killed himself by refusing to drop his weapon and surrender to Agent Scully."

"Scully wasn’t there," I told him, mystified. "She didn’t shoot him. I did."

Skinner’s face was strange. He put his hand on my brow. "Mulder, you’ve been through a lot recently," he said carefully. "You aren’t remembering things clearly. Agent Scully killed the perpetrator. Not you."

"No. Not him." I was choking again, trying to get the words out, trying to confess. "My father. I killed my father."

~~~
 

"Wh ..." I felt as if the words I couldn’t possibly have heard took the very breath from my body. "What did you say?"

He looked up at me. He did not appear feverish or irrational. In fact, he looked more lucid than he had in a week. "I killed him," he repeated. "My father." His fingers were knotted in my shirt, and they trembled slightly, but his eyes were clear and his voice was full of conviction. "I did it."

"Mulder." I put a hand over his mouth, and warned, "Don’t say another word. You’re confessing to a capital crime. I’m bound to report this if you persist."

He twisted away from my hand. "I know. And you should. I should be punished." He pulled one of his hands from my shirt to mop water from his eyes. "I did it. I remember it now."

"No." I used the towel I’d draped over his shoulders to wipe his face. "You’re remembering wrong." I know I was begging. "You’ve been through tremendous trauma the last few days. You’re not thinking clearly. You’ve --"

"I am thinking clearly," Mulder broke in. "Probably for the first time in years. I know you want to protect me, but you can’t." His voice quavered slightly and he turned his face away just enough that I could no longer see his eyes. "You can’t."

I wanted to. I wanted to gather him in my arms and hold him, ward off any other evil that threatened to touch him. But he was right. If what he was saying was true, there was nothing I could do to stop what would happen to him. But was it true? "How sure ...."

"Very sure." His profile wrinkled up in a rueful frown. "I know you don’t want to hear this, but I need to. I need to." He turned back just that fraction of an inch, as if seeking permission to go on.

All I could do was shift in my awkward position, crouched beside him, and dread what would come next.

"I haven’t ever been certain what happened that night. I remember what I told the police, and I think I thought that was the truth then, but it’s gnawed at me, ever since. It’s just been a murky shadow for me for years. Now there’s a bright light on it, and I can see what really happened."

He dragged dripping hair back from his face. "He was going to tell me something. I thought he was going to tell me something about his work, something he was sorry for." His eyes left mine, and his face hardened. "But he was never sorry for anything he did." He started to push himself up off the floor. "He went into the bathroom then ... to get some pills, I think." He staggered out the door, rubbing the towel over his face.

"Mulder, please," I implored. "Stop and think this through before you go on."

"Oh, I am thinking about it." He dropped down onto the foot of the bed. "I can’t help thinking about it. I can see it as if it’s happening again, right now."

"You’re seeing it wrong," I insisted. "You’ve just remembered a horrible crime that was committed and ... and ..."

He smiled at me sadly. "And you think I’m rewriting history so that I can finally have my revenge on my rapist?" The smile faded. "No." He nodded as if he was trying to convince himself. "I killed him. He’s dead. I shot him."

"Agent Scully and the local police found no evidence that you were the one who shot him," I pointed out. "Agent Scully actually ruled you out. Remember?"

"She ruled out my gun." He looked down at the towel in his hands. "I didn’t use my gun."

"Mulder, do you realize what you’re doing? You’re forcing me to turn you in."

He nodded. "I deserve to be punished."

"You’ve been punished enough."

He shook his head slowly. "No, you and I both know it doesn’t work that way." He held the towel out to me. "I was in the living room, waiting for him to come out. I heard him say something. Something like ...’What do you want?’ or ‘What are you doing here?’ I thought he was talking to me, but he sounded ... alarmed. So, I went in."

"You told police you didn’t go in until you heard the shot fired," I reminded him.

He nodded. "I don’t actually remember going in," he admitted. "I remember waiting in the living room ... hearing him say something. Then ... I remember standing there in the door, looking in." He looked up again. "He was there, you know. He was ..."

Mulder stood and went back to the bathroom door. "He was standing in the tub, with the curtain drawn ... like this. Dad was standing ... here." He moved around in front of the sink. "Kry ..." he swallowed, "Krycek had the gun aimed at him. He was saying something, something spoken very low and sort of threatening." Pain and confusion welled in his voice. "I don’t think it was English."

"Krycek? You’re sure it was Krycek?"

"Oh, very sure about that as well." He turned around again, facing the spot where he had indicated his father had stood. "He -- my dad was surprised I came in. Krycek wasn’t exactly surprised. He smiled. I remember that." He closed his eyes, his head tipping back as the memory rippled through him. "I remember that smile, it was insolent and ... cruel. My dad started to tell me to get out ..." something flickered over his face, "oddly. As if he was angry at me for getting involved."

I waited. Something was going on behind those hunted, hurting eyes. "And then?" I prompted finally.

He gave his head a little jerky shake. "And I yelled at Krycek. Started to pull my gun." His hand went to his back, as if reaching for a weapon that had been there that night. He paused again, looking bewildered. "I’m not exactly certain what happened next. My ... my dad moved toward me, and Krycek pointed his gun at me and I ..." he stopped. He pushed the shower curtain back farther and looked into the stall as if he expected the scene to play out for him again. "I think I tried to grab the gun. I know my dad pushed into me and I lost my balance over the edge of the tub."

Suddenly, he seemed to realize he was standing in front of me, naked, and he bent down to pick up another towel. "I fell into Krycek and he dropped his gun. Then ..." he shook his head. "Somehow Krycek got out the window. I used a towel to pick the gun up, and my dad ..." His fingers were clutching the towel so tightly his knuckles were as white as the cloth. "He was yelling at me. Telling me I let him get away, that I always fucked up everything, never did anything right."

His voice became very distant and sad. "I had the gun in my hand. He told me again how worthless I was. How d -- disappointed he was. How everything was my f -- fault. He grabbed my arm, I think. Or my hand. I don’t remember now. I just remember he twisted and it hurt. And he was yelling at me." He turned around and looked at me, very purposefully. "And I shot him."

"With the gun Krycek dropped," I said doubtfully.

He nodded. "I was holding it in the towel. That’s why there was no powder on my hands or prints on the gun."

"How did you manage to pull the trigger, if you had it wrapped in a towel?" I asked.

That puzzled him. "I ... don’t know. But I remember feeling the recoil in my hand. And he was dead."

"Did you mean to shoot him?"

He looked as if I had shot him. "He was my father."

"So, it was an accident?" I prompted.

"No." He looked regretful but resolved. "There are no such things as accidents. I must have meant to kill him. I didn’t think I did, but he’s dead, so I must have done it, right?" He wrapped the towel around his hips. "What are you going to do?"

"I don’t know," I confessed heavily. "There are some huge holes in your story, Mulder. I think you need to talk to someone, either fill in the holes, or recognize it as wish fulfillment. I am willing to let you talk to a therapist before I do anything else. But sooner or later, we’re going to have to take this to the authorities."

He seemed mildly relieved by my answer. "Fair enough. So ... what do we do right now?"

"What do you want to do?"

"I just confessed to a murder," he protested. "What do you think, that we should go to Disney World?"

"No, I don’t think you confessed to murder," I told him frankly. "I think you related a troubling image that you’re not sure is memory or dream. I’m not going to destroy your career ‘til we know which it is."

He was shaking his head. "That’s not right, Skinner. You wouldn’t give anyone else that chance."

I reached for his shoulder and started pushing him out to the bedroom. "I would if I knew his history, and knew there was some doubt about the facts as he remembered."

He turned enough to meet my eyes. "What if I wake up and decide to recant?"

"What if you do?" I guided him toward the bed. "I won’t let you off that easily. I’m going to give you a chance to talk to someone, sort things out. Then we’ll go to the police."

He eased back into bed meekly. "Okay. That’s good." He let me pull the bedclothes up to his chest before he opened his eyes and sought mine. "Are you going to leave now?"

"Why would I leave you?"

"Oh, because ..." He tugged one hand free and waved it vaguely toward the door. "You have a long trip home and ..." he paused to rub his eyes, "and you really shouldn’t be here and ..."

And just that fast he was asleep.

I should have left then. I should have located Agent Scully, advised her of Mulder’s fragile state of mind, and left the jurisdiction. But I couldn’t. Mulder had been betrayed too many times, not the least of which by me. For him to have confessed all and wake to find his confessor gone would have been the worst betrayal of all.

Many parts of his confessions, both of them, disturbed me. There were inexplicable gaps in both. I believed his allegations of abuse, but I believed there was more than he had related to me. I had the feeling he was still protecting someone -- his father, himself, maybe even me from the complete truth.

As for his confession of murder, I knew the police had never been wholly satisfied with the assassin-in-the-shower theory, and that, for a time initially, at least, Mulder had looked good for his father’s death. But physical evidence had cleared him of all but the most stubborn suspicions, and I’m sure that strings were pulled above his head to make even those go away.

Shuffling his description of the events with what physical evidence supported, I could paint a picture of my own. Mulder probably witnessed the murder, probably either failed to act, or failed in an attempt to thwart the attack. Now, in his grief, guilt and rage, he was assuming all responsibility. I’m no psychologist, but I knew Mulder well enough that such a scenario made sense to me.

And if Mulder had put the bullet in Bill Mulder’s chest, I had no doubt it was self-defense.

I was standing over the bed, looking down at him in the failing light of winter’s early evening, when my mobile jangled in the pocket of my slacks. I moved away from the bed to flip it open. "Skinner," I said quietly.

"Sir?" It was Agent Scully. She asked many questions in a single word.

"Yes, Agent." And I answered them all.

"His mobile doesn’t answer, Sir."

"It ... uh ..." I glanced at the wall where he’d flung it in a rage, "stopped functioning."

For a fraction of a moment she chuckled, as if she had seen many of his phones stop functioning. The laughter stopped abruptly. "He’s not home. A.D. Hopkins and IAB are looking for him. They’ve called me several times."

"Agent, we both know he was in no condition to travel today."

She took my rebuke personally. "No, Sir. But they don’t consider that ... er, relevant." She waited a moment, as if she was expecting something from me. "What did you ... do with him?"

"I fed him, put him in a motel room to shower and get some sleep." I glanced back toward the bed. Mulder had flopped over on his side with a restless sigh. "Stop worrying about him for now. He’ll be on a plane in the morning, good as new."

She didn’t respond right away. "A.D. Hopkins is going to make things difficult for you, Sir, and it’s my fault. I shouldn’t have brought you back in, but he’s not accepting my explanation."

"Agent Scully," I broke in firmly, "you did what was right for Agent Mulder. Don’t blame yourself for that. Despite what we’re always told, sometimes we need to look at the smaller picture."

"Yes, Sir." There was an uncharacteristic catch to her voice. "Thank you, Sir."

"And I plan to be on a six am flight to DC, so it’s possible that it might become a nonissue."

She sighed and it wasn’t a happy sound. "I hope so, Sir. Thank you again. For ... everything."

"Agent Scully," I asked impulsively. "Internal Affairs has cleared you of any wrongdoing, hasn’t it?

"Sir," she said carefully, "you know I can’t discuss that with you, not while the investigation’s ongoing."

I made an impatient noise. "I don’t care about the rest of the investigation," which was a lie. Mulder was the rest of the investigation, and I cared very much about that. "I just care that you personally have been cleared."

She was silent, much longer this time. "Thank you, Sir," was all she said, telling me she had not yet been cleared.

"You’re welcome, Agent," I answered. "Good luck. Goodnight." I ended the call.

I put my mobile down and looked back at the bed. There was no question that word would be upstairs by morning that I went out of my jurisdiction to interfere with a case into which Internal Affairs had been brought. Scully’s call wasn’t just about Mulder. It was a subtle advisory that I was expected back in D.C. immediately. But I wasn’t going. Not until Mulder was ready to come back with me. I wasn’t naive enough not to know it was a career changing decision.

The decision wasn’t that hard, really. They expected me to leave a fellow Agent, a former subordinate, a good friend, a possibly former lover and a man who was in such a damaged state of mind that he might be a danger to himself if left alone. I would have had qualms about leaving him behind on any level of relationship, but the combined circumstances of my involvement made it impossible for me to simply drive away and leave him sleeping in a strange motel room, unprotected from his own fears and memories.

Having made my decision, I returned to the side of the bed and began to disrobe. I had just decided to give away the future as I had always known it. All I wanted now was to hold onto the only future that remained.

He started, making a muted sound of protest as I climbed into the bed beside him. I slid my arms around him and stroked his shoulder soothingly. "Shh. It’s okay," I whispered into his hair. "I’m here. I won’t leave you."

~~~
 

TITLE: Sad Lovers and Giants 17/? ­ Your Skin And Mine
NAME: Mik
E-MAIL: ccmcdoc@hotmail.com
CATEGORY: M/Sk
RATING: NC-17. M/Sk. This story contains slash i.e. m/m sex. So, if you don't like that type of thing - STOP NOW! Forewarned is forearmed. Proceed with caution. Of course if you have four arms you can throw caution to the wind.
SUMMARY: A blizzard. A power cut. Finding their way in darkness.
ARCHIVE: Only with my permission.
FEEDBACK: Feedback? Well, yes, if you insist.
TIMESPAN/SPOILER WARNING: Nnnnnnnnnope.
KEYWORDS: story slash angst Mulder Skinner NC-17
DISCLAIMER: Fox Mulder, Walter Skinner, and all other X-Files characters belong to Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen Productions and 20th Century Fox Broadcasting. No copyright infringement is intended and no profit is being made from their use. I'd rather say that they really are mine, but I've been advised to deny everything. But when I become king...

Author's notes: Sad Lovers and Giants, the two things hardest to conceal.

If you like this, there's more at http://www.squidge.org/3wstop

If you didn't like it, come see me, anyway. Pet the dog.

Sad Lovers and Giants 17/? ­ Your Skin And Mine

by Mik

I woke with a jerk so physical I thought for a moment someone was trying to rouse me. But no one was touching me. Although, Skinner was lying next to me, something I did not expect. Nor did I expect the complete, alien darkness around me. And least of all I did not expect the way horrific images rushed back at me. Screams and smells and blood and terror and rage. I did not expect to suddenly know things that couldn’t possibly be true. But it all happened. I struggled out of the bed and staggered blindly to find a bathroom in this unfamiliar place, and throw up.

He was there beside me before I was through, his hand on my neck, his fingers combing my hair back from my eyes. "Is it…" I choked on my own bile, trying to get words out, "true?"

He didn’t speak. He just kept his hands on me, supporting me.

So it wasn’t a dream. It was all true. "Oh, God." I felt my stomach revolt again.

He remained beside me, silent only in words. His nearness, his touch, they spoke volumes. When it seemed my stomach had stopped reeling, he helped me to my feet and guided me back to the bed, drawing the blanket back to cover my shaking shoulders. "I’ll make you some coffee," he offered quietly.

I shook my head, tugging the blanket tight. "No. I don’t think I could keep it down." Elbows on knees, I let my head fall forward into my hands. "It’s so awful."

"I know, Mulder." He was doing something in the darkness near me. "Here." He pressed something against my shoulder.

The familiar and comforting smell of peppermint overtook my senses and I groped for the candy. Then I knew something else was true. "You stayed."

"Yes."

And that was all the discussion we had about it.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

We talked about other things, of course. Gathered around that little table, horrible hotel room coffee in front of us, we talked about strategies, finding a therapist for me, finding a lawyer for me, accepting the inevitability that I’d lose my badge for going forward with my confession. Where he was full of concern and anxiety about what lay ahead, my reaction was more ambivalent about the future. There was alarm, of course, fear of the uncertainty, what was beyond the cliff where the federal agent I was suddenly ceased to be. Who else would I be? Who else could I be? Was I really nothing more than my badge?

And yet, flowing over that cliff was a waterfall of relief ... of never again seeing the imploring, anguished eyes of parents, spouses, lovers, children waiting for me to perform miracles; of never again seeing the mangled, tortured bodies that were the pathstones of my failure. Never again hearing the voices, never again invited in to tour the worm-ridden minds of the men who taunted me with their corrupted souls and sociopathic fantasies. A pretty powerful compensation for surrendering my badge, I thought.

We also discussed the possibility of prison, and there was the closest he came to articulating our relationship. He just took my hand and promised me I wouldn’t face it alone. I took comfort in that, though. If I was convicted of killing my father, and I should be, everyone I knew would turn his or her back on the stranger I would become. No one would know me, the murderer. I didn’t recognize myself anymore.

Skinner didn’t see it that way. "You haven’t changed --"

"Oh, yes, I have," I cut him off. "I’ve become someone I don’t even know. Two days ago I was just a guy doing a job. Yeah, it’s a terrible job and I did it better than most." I waited to see if he’d argue that point with me.

He didn’t. He nodded in concession.

"Then suddenly, I woke up and I’ve become a victim of the kind of monster I hunt so well. And not only that, I’ve become the monster. I’ve killed."

"You’ve killed before --"

"In the line of duty," I reminded him. I pointed to my badge on the table between us. "Federally mandated executioner. The protecting piece of protecting and serving." I gave the leather case a not so gentle shove with my finger and it skittered to the edge of the table and teetered a moment before his hand closed over it and held it in place. "I’m a murderer now. I don’t know me anymore." My voice caught on a ragged breath and I struggled a moment with it before continuing. "If I don’t know this stranger with my face, how can any of my friends and colleagues? How can you?"

His free hand cupped my cheek. It was an endearingly gentle gesture, yet comforting and strong. "Because I do know you, Mulder. I know the man you are, the man you’ve always been, the man you will always be. That you were a victim of a monster breaks my heart, but it doesn’t damage my vision of you. That you killed this monster only makes me wish it didn’t have to destroy your career." His voice dropped to that lethal rasp I knew so well, yet there was an alien note of compassion I needed to hear. "I have no regrets he’s dead, Mulder. Only that his death causes you still more harm."

I covered both his hands with my own. "Skinner, look at me. Look at who I am. I ... killed ... my ... own ... father."

"I am looking at you," he answered very quietly. "All I see is the man I love."

Those words tripped through every cell of my being, washed over every strand of DNA, changed me yet again. From the monster I had been a moment before, I had become something redeemable. "I ..." nothing could come out from the tangled mass of my emotions.

He simply smiled. "I know." He slipped his hands from mine and stood, beckoning toward the bed. "Let’s get some sleep. We have an early flight in the morning."

"Flight?" I repeated, stupidly. "What about your car?"

"It’s a rental. I’ll pay the drop-off charge and fly back with you." He paused and I could see something in his eyes darken. "Circumstances deem I get back quickly."

I had a vague recollection of some threat passing between him and A.D. Hopkins at the crime scene and I realized this man had jeopardized his career for me once again. "Skinner, you should have left --"

"Should have, perhaps." He shrugged slightly. "No matter." He held out a hand. "Let’s get some sleep."

I dropped onto the bed heavily and watched as he set the alarm clock. What had he done for me? What had I done to him? "Skinner, I’m sorry that --"

"Nothing to be sorry about." He turned enough to look over his shoulder. "This was the right thing to do. There was no other choice. Even if I had nothing but professional respect for you I couldn’t have left you alone in your state of mind. And," he swung his legs into the bed, "I have so much more than just professional respect for you."

That gave me my first genuine, happy smile in weeks. "Yeah?" I said as he flicked off the light.

I heard him make a sound, not quite a laugh, but something real and convicted. "Yeah," he said.

I needed to be close to him. The need was sudden and overpowering. The moment he slid into the narrow bed beside me I rolled up against him, burying my face in his chest. He seemed to be so much bigger than all the problems in my life rolled together. His embrace seemed hotter than the flames of hell waiting for me. I couldn’t let that go.

He wrapped me up in arms that were strong enough to hold the whole world at bay, at least for the rest of the night, and pulled me tighter against him. "Shh," he whispered against my brow. "We’re going to get through this ... all of it."

I lifted my head, searching blindly until I found his mouth. The kiss I took was rough and demanding and desperate. I was terrified by so many things and I had to face every single fear at some point. Might as well begin. "Please." I kissed him again as I squirmed to get my body closer to his. "Now."

It seemed as if he didn’t quite comprehend what I was seeking, not at first. When my hands stroked down his body, he pulled back from my kiss, stilling my hands. "Mulder?" When I tried to answer with another assault on his mouth, he held me back. "Are you sure?"

No, I wasn’t sure. Not at all. But I was desperate. "Yes," I lied, pushing against him. "Please." I forced our hands between us, and began to squeeze his warm, spongy flesh. "Now."

He grunted as my hand claimed him, as his other hand tightened on my wrist. "Wh -- what do you want?" he asked in a choked voice.

I didn’t hesitate. "Fuck me."

He moaned a little. I know I heard it. I also heard the struggle for restraint in his voice. "Mulder, you can’t --"

"Yes, I can." I kissed him again and opened my eyes, searching to find his in the darkness. "I have to. You need to. Now."

I’m not really sure what convinced him; the desperation in my voice or the way my hand was using him like a pull toy, but in another moment I was on my back, and he was on top of me, just like the first time. "How do you want this?" he muttered into my hair while his body was grinding me into pulp.

"I ... uh ... I don’t know." He had passed on that fire to me and my entire body was smoldering, ready to burst into flames. "Like ... oh, shit, like this." I grabbed for his shoulders, my fingers digging into his flesh mercilessly. "I need ... I need to see that it’s you."

That was all he needed to hear. Pulling back on his knees, his big hands scooped under my thighs and pulled my legs apart. He licked two fingers and started to rub them against me. "I don’t have any condoms," he said in a tone that suggested it better not concern me.

It didn’t. I was only capable of two thoughts at that moment ... how big his fingers felt and how much I needed to be able to do this. "We’re both clean, aren’t we?" I panted. If ever there was a moment to apply the axiom Trust No One it was that one, but considering all the things that lay ahead of me, if I couldn’t trust Skinner, I was lost.

"Yes," he hissed, shifting between my legs, pushing his fingers inside me.

I felt myself jerk into rigidity. "Will you ..." I swallowed, "will you stop if I tell you to?"

He went equally rigid. "Do you want me to stop?" He started to pull away.

I clutched at his arms. "No. No! Just promise if ..." I hated how foolish I sounded, "promise you’ll stop if I ask."

He melted against me, his hands came up around my face and into my hair. "I won’t hurt you," he kept repeating fervently. "I promise, I won’t hurt you."

I wanted to believe him. Dread was seeping into me through every pore. I could actually feel control slipping away. "I know," I whispered but I didn’t really believe it. People had hurt me before, people who should never even think about hurting me. People could lie.

"And if ..." it was his turn to grope for words, "if you ... leave me ..." he shifted his body on me, "what should I do?"

My fingers gripped tighter on him. The answer to that was clear. "Don’t leave me."

Keeping his weight against me, almost as if to pin me down, I felt him reach under us both to adjust my legs.

I kept my hands on his shoulders, and tried to fix on his eyes in the darkness, tried to fix on the moment, the reality. It was growing increasingly more difficult to do that. On the edges of my consciousness, things pricked at me. The smell of dusty, stale air. The pressure of something hard against my chest. Panic. Whispered, frantic protests. The loud ripping sound of tape. Helplessness. Hard, raspy breath hot on my skin. Fear. Pressure. Betrayal. Pain. "Stop." I slapped my hands against his arms, but they didn’t feel like my hands. The pressure and pain didn’t stop. "Please." It didn’t sound like my voice.

I felt the memory of penetration before he actually entered me. My entire body arched in objection and agony. Even though he was moving very slowly I could feel the forcing, stabbing memory splitting me open, burning and tearing. I heard a scream that was not my own, and my nails raked over his shoulders. "Stop. Oh, God, stop."

I don’t know when I started crying, but I felt his fingers brushing tears away from my face. "I’m sorry," I heard him whisper. "I shouldn’t have. I’m so sorry."

I rolled away from him, and dropped to the floor, dragging in air as if I had been pulled up from icy water. "It’s ... my fault," I sobbed. It’s always my fault. I deserved this. "I’m sorry."

"Mulder."

I could see him almost lunging over the bed toward me, and even though I wanted to be still and be brave and not run, I flinched from his outstretched hand.

He seemed to freeze there, his hand reaching out to me. "No, Mulder." His hand went past me and found the switch for the lamp over my head. "It was not your fault."

Things weren’t so bad in the light. The sounds and smells and the choking sensation of tape shutting off my screams were gone. But I was left cold and empty and ashamed of myself. My teeth were chattering. I was shaking. I couldn’t make myself stop. "I’m sorry," I repeated. I could hear the words come out and hang in the room and yet it still didn’t sound like me. "My fault. I can be good. I promise."

"No." Something warm settled over me. He had pulled the blanket off the bed and let it fall into place on me, covering me, shielding me. "It wasn’t your fault." He backed away from me then.

I looked up and saw him gathering his clothing together, starting to dress. "Are you leaving me?" You promised, I thought, struggling to my feet. You lied.

He looked at me as he slid into his shirt. "No. I just thought you’d be more comfortable if I was dressed."

"Don’t leave me." I fisted tears away from my eyes. "I’m sorry."

"Mulder, look at me."

I looked up.

"Do you know who I am?"

"What kind of silly question is that? Of course I know who you are. You’re ... oh." I looked down at the bed. I straightened, drew a deep breath, and rearranged the blanket around me. "You’re Walter S. Skinner, my former boss, and a guy with whom I’m never going to have sex." I dropped down on the bed, sighing. "And I am so sorry."

"Oh, don’t say that." He touched my shoulder and when I didn’t withdraw from him, he gave it a reassuring squeeze. "We got farther this time than we ever did before ... who knows?"

"Yeah," I said without much enthusiasm. "If it matters at all, I really did want ..."

"No, you didn’t." He sat down beside me. "You wanted to prove that you could. Well, maybe someday you can, but right now isn’t that day." He patted my naked thigh. "And if it matters at all, I’m not going to abandon you just because we can’t fuck."

His use of the word made me snicker in spite of myself. "Hey, you didn’t run away screaming into the night this time. Maybe there is hope."

"You made me promise not to leave you even if you left me," he answered. "Do you remember that?"

I nodded, and rubbed my nose with the edge of the blanket. "And I didn’t leave you. Not entirely. It was the strangest sensation." I risked a look at him, and his face was so full of compassion and concern I wanted to start crying all over again, and for a completely different reason. "I’ve read dozens of case studies, but until you experience one, you can’t really comprehend it, how disabling it feels. It wasn’t like ... you know, a fugue state. I was here. I was with you. I was just having these ... flashes of memory. They seemed to be superimposed on us. And ... I heard ... I mean, when I spoke ..."

"It didn’t sound like you?" he prompted.

I nodded.

He nodded back. "That’s what always happened."

"Shit, no wonder you broke up with me."

"No, I broke up with you because I’m an idiot," he answered. "But I truly did mean to do the right thing."

"No." I leaned up against him. "This time you did the right thing."

~~~
 

Mulder slept, finally.

I did not.

After the roller coaster of disclosures the previous twenty four hours had wrought, I wasn’t sure I would manage sleep again for a very long while. I was wired and on guard for the next and more horrifying fact to appear. It reminded me of my nightmare of existence in Viet Nam. Again I was literally shell-shocked, lying in the midst of a war zone, this time psychological, and I couldn’t risk sleep, couldn’t risk letting the enemy catch me defenseless.

The reality was that there was no defense, not even awake. No caliber of gun could stop the demons running loose in Mulder’s memory now. I’d had too many frightening revelations about him, from him, to comprehend, in the last rotation of the planet, how on that same planet was he going to cope? He had described it as waking up a stranger to himself. How had he contained these monsters and done the job he had done all these years? How could he now?

The most painful revelation of all was that he would not. Convinced, as he was, that he’d murdered his father, he’d be in prison soon. He’d die there, a repressed, almost Catholic guilt preventing him from defending himself. Conviction and prison were inevitable. Loneliness, despair and death his ultimate fate.

Still, his recollections of the crime just didn’t make sense to me. It would never be acceptable to see him surrender to life in a steel cell, but I would be able to accept it more easily if I had some conclusive answers to the how and why it happened.

Mulder was not a violent man. In the years that I’ve known him, I’ve seen him endure a lot ­ in fact, too much for any one human to have to endure. Physical and emotional battering, grief, fear and rage and while he could struggle against bureaucratic restraints, rail against injustices and fire his weapon in defense of others, I had never seen him react violently toward anyone ... except the man he had always maintained was responsible for his father’s death. In witnessing his regressions to the wounded child he once was, I had only seen retreating submission, nothing to indicate he’d ever been capable of being provoked to violence, even in his own defense. In short, it just didn’t seem conceivable that Mulder would shoot his father deliberately, even if under attack.

My memory of the investigation was somewhat hazy at that point, but I did recall that there was no indication of a struggle in the small space where the shooting took place. If it had not been for a paint chip in the bathtub, which matched the peeling paint outside the window, there would have been nothing to support Mulder’s original claim of an intruder in the house.

The gun that fired the fatal bullet had been found next to Bill Mulder’s body, and the powder burns and splatter patterns on his shirt and the wall were consistent with a close range shot, but nothing about his son’s demeanor or person could support the initial supposition that Fox Mulder killed his dad. In point of fact, I could not recall any mention of a towel on or near the body to explain how Mulder could have picked up the intruder’s gun, as he now believed he had done, and killed his father. But no other weapon was present in the house or on the property, except Mulder’s own gun, which was ultimately ruled out. So, how did Mulder get the weapon, how did he manage to aim it at his father, get that close to him, without a struggle, and fire it without any powder burns or blood splatter on himself?

Mulder stirred again, rolling toward me, opening his eyes. Perceiving that I was awake, he lifted his head and frowned. "What’s wrong?" he muttered, rubbing his eyes.

I patted his shoulder. "Nothing," I lied. "Go back to sleep."

"They’re going to fire you for coming down here, aren’t they?" There was a slightly less than pragmatic note to his voice.

"No, they can’t fire me," I insisted a little too forcefully.

"They’re going to discipline you in some way," he concluded.

It was pretty clear he wasn’t going to let it go. "Yes," I admitted finally, "that seems likely."

He leaned into me. "I am so sorry," he murmured fervently.

I slid my arms around him and locked my hands behind his back. He was leaner than I remembered. "Hush," I said, not gently. "It’s going to be all right."

"Yeah," he agreed with a bitter laugh. "It’ll be dandy. What a great, romantic pair we’ll make. You’ll be suspended and I’ll be in prison." He sighed and shifted slightly as he meant to break the embrace. "You were better off when you told me to get lost."

"No," my arms tightened around him, "I was not."

He absorbed that and lowered his head tentatively until his lips met mine. He did not necessarily kiss me, not in an active, erotic way. He just kept his mouth on mine. It was not a gesture of hunger, just a need to be connected.

I wanted him. I wouldn’t even deny it if he asked. But he didn’t ask. He just stayed close. We both understood, without actually articulating it, that any further attempts at intercourse were impossible. At least, for a very long time. It was almost unbearable to consider that this might well be the last embrace, the last kiss. I wanted to make it so much more than it was, and yet I could only make it what it was, a need to be connected; to be understood, cared for, held fast.

When he broke the kiss, he rested his cheek against mine. "I’m not gay because he raped me, you know," he said very quietly.

I brushed my fingers over his back. His skin was warm and smooth. "I know that."

"So ... being in love with you ... that’s not an attempt to romanticize my relationship with him."

"I know." I stilled. "In love with me?"

He blushed. I felt his cheek grow hotter against mine.

"Mulder?"

He didn’t answer for a moment. Then he whispered, "Everything’s going to be all right."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

We were among the last to board the plane. We slept through the alarm. It was only the sound of my mobile ringing that woke us. I did not return the call until Mulder had stumbled into the bathroom. I needn’t have bothered. It was nothing more than a not so subtle warning that stepping outside my jurisdiction was going to prove detrimental to my cause. I did not bother to share my feelings on the subject. The powers that insist on being could not possibly conceive how trivial it was to me.

Mulder looked terrible. Every moment of the last few days, every horrific revelation was etched on his face. It was clear he was terrified of what lay ahead of him, but no more so than what he’d found looking over his shoulder. For one long, desperate moment, I wanted to grab him and run. Take him away from any need to confess, any penance to pay. For a long, desperate moment, he wanted to go. But the moment passed. It was not in either of us to run. Even if I could, Mulder couldn’t. Now that he knew, his innate sense of justice demanded retribution for his father’s life, even at the cost of his own.

Still, that didn’t make either of us dash for that plane. I borrowed an iron from housekeeping and pressed his soiled shirt and slacks. He borrowed my razor and toothbrush. We didn’t discuss what steps we would be taking once we stepped off the plane in D.C., but we missed no opportunity to touch, caress or just stand close to one another right up to the moment we boarded.

At that hour of the morning, it was the usual mix of commuters; businessmen, kids returning to school, a couple of mothers with babies, and a few men and women in uniform who’d missed the transport. Several of them cast us seemingly knowing looks as we scrambled aboard. Perhaps it was some latent guilt on my part but contempt seemed to be written all over their faces. I wanted to smack sneers away and announce to the entire planeload that the man next to me was a hero; children were alive because of him. I wanted to add that in fact, if it had occurred to either of us, one call to a no doubt rejoicing Senator Nolan would have gotten us a private plane.

Mulder scanned the plane, finding no two empty seats together and said, "I suppose we could ask someone to shift over."

I said something stupid. It wasn’t stupid when I formed the words in my head. There it made perfect sense. But outside my head, where he could hear, it became the second most foolish thing I’d ever said. "No, it’s all right." My voice even dipped down to a foolishly hushed tone. "We probably shouldn’t sit together anyway."

Now, what I meant was that seated together, hurtling toward disaster, one or both of us might behave inappropriately; running the gamut from clinging and crying to trying to dissuade him from his chosen course of action. What he heard, I’m sure, was a desire to hide or deny our relationship in public. He gave me a kaleidoscope of a look, from disbelief to pain to anger before it became a blank slate. "Fine," he murmured, "I’ll sit here." He slid, rather rudely, in between a chaplain and a woman with a baby.

I had no choice. I moved back three rows and took a seat on the aisle, where I could see the back of his head, and hoped I’d get a chance to move closer once we were in the air.

We never got into the air.

I did not notice him right away, but I did notice that Mulder noticed something. Something about the incline of his head and the way, when I caught his profile, his eyes were narrowed so that anyone who knew him would recognize as intent concentration.

I pulled my gaze from him to follow the direction of his concentration and then I noticed his target. Caucasian, well groomed, large, bordering on husky, the size of his hands and torso making the dark suit and trench coat look unnatural on him. He gave every outward appearance of being focused, even calm, his face was a mask of indifference, but his large hands revealed agitation, clenching and unclenching, occasionally sliding over the front of his coat as if reassuring himself that something was in place.

By the time I looked back at Mulder, he was looking at me. He had also shifted himself, slightly but decidedly, into the personal space of the woman next to him. She was clearly annoyed, but as yet not recognizing the danger or that Mulder was shielding her child.

Mulder and I exchanged looks, looks that weighed and discarded options. Unlike most air passengers, law enforcement agents are not required to relinquish their weapons when boarding, however, the small, overfull cabin of a commuter plane was the very last place for a firefight. If this guy could be taken down without gunplay, more people had a chance to survive.

Our suspicious looking individual did not move down the aisle, but remained at the front, his eyes scanning right and left, as if he was looking for an empty seat. There were a few, one, in fact, just opposite me, but he ignored it and remained standing.

Mulder scratched his ear with two fingers and then let his fingertips rest on his cheek. It took me just a moment to realize he was saying there were at least two of them on board. That ratcheted up my anxiety exponentially. My routine flight home now had two suspicious persons and at least one of them appeared to be heavily armed. I know that my fears were based on suppositions, maybes and conjectures but all of them were sitting squarely on the shoulders of Mulder’s feeling for phenomenon. That was enough for me.

One of the flight attendants moved up the aisle toward the man. I wanted to catch her attention, not let her get within reach of him, but she passed me without looking my way and approached him. "Sir, please take a seat, we’re about to depart."

He continued to scan the cabin as if she had not spoken, indeed, as if she was not there.

I sat forward in my seat, pulling my feet up under me, ready to jump. The young woman gestured back down the aisle. "Sir. Please. Take a seat." She pointed in my direction. "There’s one, now."

As she spoke, the passenger door was pushed shut and locked, with that heavy thud, like a giant Tupperware seal. With her attention directed toward the seat opposite me, she didn’t see him finally acknowledge her, and reach for her arm. I don’t think most of the passengers even saw it, and those who did observe the action weren’t really aware that something dangerous was about to happen.

The flight attendant didn’t even seem to understand she was in peril. She twisted in his grasp with a little gasp of indignation, and repeated her request that the man take a seat, or she would be forced to call the captain.

The mask of indifference that was his face broke then, and darkened. His eyes narrowed, and his lips tightened, and he said something harsh up close to her face. I didn’t need to hear the words to know exactly what he said. The way she paled and recoiled from him was enough to know he stated his threat to her.

Mulder started, but he was stuck between the chaplain and the mother. He shifted around in his seat to me. I couldn’t make any overt moves for my holster, not when I hadn’t identified the position of the second hijacker, so I slid forward slightly more in my seat, watching the struggle at the front of the cabin, while I let my hand rest on the release of my seatbelt, ready to jump when I had to.

Another flight attendant noticed that there was some kind of altercation taking place and started up the aisle. She was out of my reach before I let my attention be pulled from the couple in front, so I couldn’t stop her, either. She had started a protest in a brook no arguments voice but skidded into silent stillness at the sight of the large, serrated blade that was now held to her colleague’s throat. Then she screamed.

And then others woke to the danger we were in and they screamed. Men and women. People began scrambling to get out of their seats; or over them, or under them. A volcano of newspapers erupted into the aisles. Children cried, there was a great deal of pointless movement, and shouts and epithets and predictions of doom were hurled around the cabin. Homeland Security’s color coded propaganda made certain terror was no respecter of gender. One man even fainted.

Mulder must have seen something in the hijacker’s face that compelled him to act, because he unbuckled his seatbelt and levered himself up and turned to face the rest of the cabin. "Quiet!" he shouted, waving his hands for attention. "Everyone. You’re not helping." He waited a beat and added, "Panic is going to get us killed. Everybody." He lowered his hands slowly. "Sit down. Be quiet." He sent a look over his shoulder. "Let’s find out what’s going on."

Even that didn’t settle things immediately. It was the flight attendant’s squeal as her captor tugged the knife up tighter against her, and his snarled, "Listen to the man," that settled silence over the cabin like a heavy blanket. People forced themselves back into their seats rigidly, and save for some woman sobbing "Oh, my God, oh, my God," in a choked voice somewhere at the rear of the cabin, no one made another sound.

The hijacker then began speaking softly to the woman he wore like a shield. The expression on his face was calm, composed and sincere, almost suggesting romantic intent, but her reactions were clearly not those of a woman being wooed. She listened, and nodded and whimpered. Together, in an almost comical backward shuffle, they moved toward the cockpit.

Mulder and I exchanged looks again. We agreed, within those looks, that the hijacker couldn’t be allowed inside that cockpit. Mulder wasn’t yet ready to surrender his position in front of the woman and her child, and I was already on an aisle, so it was down to me to take action when action absolutely had to be taken. I let my seatbelt release as carefully as I could, but even still, the click was dangerously loud to me. I tried to move in slow motion so as not to bring any attention on myself as I worked my hand around to my gun. I had no intention of drawing my weapon, I just wanted access to it if I should need to draw it. It was more along the lines of what Mulder would call self comforting. Just the reassuring knowledge that I had lethal force within my reach, should the need arise.

Still, the act of going to one’s hip for a weapon is a singular and therefore telltale movement, and it evidently caught someone’s attention because, before I could fully form the plan for my next action, there was another singular and therefore telltale movement, not my own. I didn’t see it, but the result of it, also singular and therefore telltale, was unmistakable; the sensation of a gun barrel pressed behind my right ear.

~~~
 

You know, one would think that climbing down into the pit of mental excrement that was a pedophile, and climbing out with fecal matter clinging to your memories, confirming the fear that you were raped as a child, and that you killed your own father because of it, would qualify as probably the worst day of your life. But, no ...

I would have to say, speaking objectively, that the next day was twice as bad, and subjectively, I’d go so far as to say a thousand times, a million times, a googol times as bad. I began the day with the certainty that all those things I’d learned about myself the day before were realities and not just some horrible nightmare I’d carried off from a crime scene like toilet paper on my shoe. And I had to meet the eyes of the man I felt more for than any other person since my sister, or possibly Scully, knowing that he knew everything.

He told me not to surrender to it so easily. That there were people to talk to, things to be done before I held my wrists out for the cuffs. And even if all I said did prove true, he was going to stay beside me, despite my disclosures.

Disclosure. Interesting word. More apt than I realized. People always speak of seeking closure; of shutting a door, of sealing a tomb. But disclosure is quite the opposite. I felt as if there was no longer a door to shut out the evils in my life, that the grave had been ripped open, and all its putrescence and worms had been revealed.

To me.

To him.

And it just got worse from there. Try as he might to hide it from me, I knew he had basically been given the five minute warning on his career for coming down to rescue me from the pit swallowing me alive. He tried to be Skinneristic about it; strong and stoic, pish-tushing my fears like the father who sees the claws of the monster under the bed and still wants his child to go to sleep, but he couldn’t fool me. Not only had I fallen into the chamber pot, I’d pulled him down with me.

The thing about Skinner that I learned that morning was that he doesn’t like getting his hands dirty after all. When we boarded that cigar tube with rubber band propellers, and he had to look into the faces of all his peers, he couldn’t bring himself to admit that he’d touched something as flawed and messy as me. He found another place to sit.

So, what would make a morning like that just perfect? Sitting wedged between a fussy baby and a priest who was shuffling mass cards like a demented dealer in Las Vegas? Feeling as if I’d worn the same clothes for a week and they were threatening to become part of my epidermis? Needing coffee so bad I was actually looking forward to that death trap attempting to get airborne so I could get my hands around a styro cup of lukewarm instant Folgers? No, what I really needed to make that day complete was a terrorist hijacking. And guess what ...

I’m not sure what it was that first caught my attention. He seemed too big and bulky and ungainly for the sharply tailored suit and overcoat. Moreover, he seemed uncomfortable in it, as if he was out of his own skin. He was taking steps carefully, his arms tight to his sides, holding something more than himself together. Once inside, his eyes darted over the cabin, not lighting on empty seats, but on faces, searching. My skin started to prickle.

He wasn’t the typical terrorist. ‘Terrorist’ has become associated with Middle Eastern religious zealots, but anyone who means to cause harm to innocents for any cause no matter how righteous is a terrorist. The very definition of terrorist is a radical who employs terror as a political weapon. He didn’t look radical. He looked scared. But resolved. The most dangerous kind.

I shifted in my seat enough to catch Skinner in the farthest point of my field of vision. He’d seen it as well, and was sitting up, looking alert. The way the suspect was behaving suggested to me he was waiting for a signal or sign from someone else on board, which meant there was more than one person involved, and I tried to pass that message on to Skinner as surreptitiously as possible.

The flight attendant really started it. She approached him, trying to get him into a seat. I’m not all that sure that things were supposed to start that soon, because there was no concerted response. I’m guessing he panicked when she got close to him. Then she panicked. And then her colleague screamed and that really started a panic. People all over the cabin were screaming and throwing things and climbing over their seats. He didn’t like it. He was getting a very dangerous look in his eye.

When I stood up to try and get people to shut up before they pushed him over his very narrow and rapidly crumbling edge, I spotted the other one. Right behind Skinner. The two of them were a pair, and didn’t even know it. Both of them at the edges of their seats, both of them trying to oh, so carefully go for their weapons. Only ... the one in back got to his first. And he put it at the back of Skinner’s head. Now. Now my day was a perfect disaster.

I’ll give Skinner credit. He wasn’t betraying a thing. The minute he knew there was a gun aimed at his grey matter, he never let his eyes stray toward mine. When he was told to stand, he did, slowly, hands just ahead of him, so as not to give away the location of his weapon or his badge. The man who escorted him down the aisle didn’t say a word, just communicated by rough thrusts of the gun against Skinner’s hairline. As the two of them moved out into the aisle, there was another, smaller scale panic, consisting mostly of whimpers and ‘Oh, my God’s but it was quelled pretty quickly by a look from the one at the front of the cabin.

The one bringing Skinner up to the party looked more like a typical terrorist; wild-eyed and angry, in jeans and a flannel shirt. I had a feeling he worked at a Starbucks somewhere on the west coast before he got this hair up his ass, whatever it was. Yet he said nothing. Just kept his eyes on his partner and kept the gun aimed at Skinner’s thought processes, his body absolutely vibrating with emotion. That he was struggling to contain himself scared me. He was like a water balloon; overfull and ready to burst, he was just one pindrop away from exploding all over everything.

His counterpart waited until Skinner was just within arm’s reach and then spat, "You son of a bitch!" and backhanded him with the fist holding the knife.

My body tried to lurch forward in protest even as my reason kept me pinned into the chair.

Skinner didn’t respond. In fact, he almost appeared to simply move his head away from an annoying gnat. Only a tiny trickle of red at the corner of his mouth revealed that he’d been struck. He kept his expression even, not letting the fear or contempt that must surely be whirling in him to show.

That infuriated the man who held the flight attendant. For some reason, I was calling him Joe, because he looked like the average Joe, someone who just didn’t belong where he was. Joe showed his anger by yanking on the flight attendant’s requisite long blond hair and whirled her toward the cockpit door. "Open it," he rasped.

I didn’t hear what she said but I can guess she told him she couldn’t, because he shook her hard by the hair and it made her cry out. "Do it. Do it now, or I’ll cut your tongue out through your throat."

Next to me, the priest raised a hand. "A little compassion, man," he said. "These are trying times for all --"

"I’d shut up, if I were you," the man with the gun suggested in a breathless voice that sounded seconds away from hysteric giggling.

The priest flicked his tongue over his lips, debating whether God would want him to say more, and decided God felt silence was the better part of valor.

The flight attendant was screaming and banging on the door. I was surprised that even this bucket had a new security door between the cockpit and the cabin, and either the pilots were deaf, or they knew precisely what was going on, and weren’t budging.

"You’d better open this fucking door," Joe raged. "You know what can happen out here. You’ve read newspapers."

The flight attendant was screaming. The baby next to me decided to take up harmony.

Joe’s pal whirled toward our row of seats, his gun still pressed against Skinner’s head. "It would take me two seconds to shut him up," he warned.

The woman began to cry, and rock the baby desperately. I put a hand on her wrist and squeezed. Until Joe produced another gun or disposed of the girl he was holding, no one was going to shoot the baby. They wouldn’t take the gun off Skinner long enough.

When it became clear that Joe wasn’t going to gain admittance to the cockpit, he slammed the flight attendant against the door so viciously that she slid to the floor, leaving a trail of red much bigger than the one on Skinner’s lip. The woman next to me cried harder and hugged her child tight to her breast. A man two rows back flung himself forward, emptying his stomach on the back of the chair ahead of him.

I couldn’t sit still anymore. I stood and moved toward the crumpled figure against the cockpit door. Joe moved in front of me, brandishing the knife almost spear like. "Just let me see if she’s alive," I said, holding my hands up in as nonthreatening a manner as I could manage, which was a challenge when I wanted my hands around his throat, squeezing until his eyes bulged out of their sockets.

"You want to be next?"

"No. But just let me --"

"Are you a doctor?"

I didn’t even blink. "Yes." Well, I am.

He jerked his head and lowered the knife. "Don’t be stupid, Doc."

"No worries," I promised, dropping to my knees in front of the girl. I had no idea what to do for her, but I had to at least make it look as if I knew what I was doing. I fumbled for her wrist and tried to find a pulse. There was a tiny fluttering under my fingers but I didn’t know what that meant other than that her heart was still functioning at some level. "I’m going to reach into my pocket and get my flashlight, okay?" I called over my shoulder.

I felt the steel of his blade on my cheek. "Why?" Joe demanded, over the baby’s cries, which had gotten louder.

"I need to check for ... brain damage. Look, you can get it for me, if you’d rather." I stood slowly and indicated the correct pocket. The other guy was looking at the baby with increasing twitchiness.

Joe moved in and reached. There was an unmistakable scent of freshly unwound electrical wire and duct tape. He had a bomb under that expensive trench coat. Was he eager to use it? "Let the lady with the baby move to the back of the cabin," I asked as he fumbled in my pocket. "You don’t want to kill a baby, do you?" I asked him quietly. "That’s not what this is about."

He jerked the flashlight from my pocket and shoved it into my hands. "You." He pointed the knife. "Move. Back there. And shut that kid up, or I will."

So the answer was no. He didn’t want to use it. We just might be able to talk our way out of this. I opened one of the girl’s eyes with my thumb and flicked my flashlight over it, the way I’d seen Scully do a hundred times. The pale blue iris squeezed shut like an angry fist. I barely managed not to sigh in relief. So far, we had no body count. I wondered how long we could keep it that way. "I have to stop this bleeding," I called. "Give me something. A shirt, a tie, a towel ... something."

A towel was tossed at my head. I folded it and began to press it against a really ugly abrasion on the girl’s scalp. But I wasn’t seeing the cut, the blood, the towel, or the girl. I was trying to see what was going to happen. There was a piece to this I didn’t yet perceive. What was it? I couldn’t understand why the other guy hadn’t taken Skinner’s gun away from him. He knew it was there. He must have seen Skinner go for it, why else would he have revealed himself and taken Skinner hostage?

Evidently, whatever I was doing was convincing because Joe lost interest in me and turned back to Skinner. "You murdering bastard!" he yelled and hit Skinner again. "You’ve got one chance. Just one chance. And then everybody dies." He waved the knife around. "Everybody. You won’t just be killing him. You’ll be killing all of us."

Skinner’s voice was far calmer than mine would have been if our situations had been reversed. "What is it you think I can do?" he asked as if he truly wanted to know.

"I don’t think ... I know. You can get on that radio in there and have someone stop it. Or," he pressed the knife to Skinner’s throat, "do you really believe in it that much?"

I rocked back on my heels, twisting the towel in my hands, as the phenomena began to coagulate like the blood on the flight attendant’s brow. They mistook Skinner for someone else. Who the hell else was on this plane? Who else could motivate this kind of reckless, desperate act? Who was going to kill ... Son of a bitch! Local headlines leapt up at me. "You’ve got the wrong man," I asserted, wiping blood from my hands.

Joe was ignoring me. He was raging at Skinner.

I stood. Slowly. Hoping no one had noticed me palming my own gun. "That’s not Judge Fullerton."

Joe turned to me. One hand still held the knife toward Skinner, but one hand was creeping toward his coat. I moved in on him. Got in his space. "You’ve got the wrong guy."

Joe never took his eyes off me. Never took his hand off his coat. "Check him," he grunted.

"His name’s Skinner," I put in before his friend tried to make a choice between holding the gun on him or frisking a dead man. "Walter Skinner. He works for the FBI. I’ll grant you he looks a lot like the judge who sentenced your son to death, but it’s not him. I don’t think Fullerton’s even on the plane." Actually I knew exactly where he was. He was the one who’d left breakfast on his neighbor’s shoes.

"We got the wrong guy." The hysteria was welling in Mr. Tall Latte’s voice. "What are we going to do? We got the wrong guy."

Joe’s eyes had widened in alarm and disbelief but now they narrowed and he looked into my eyes and said, "Kill him."

I had to move. "Don’t be stupid." I thrust my hand between his hand and his coat, and pressed my gun hard enough so there was no mistaking what I was holding. "Is this the way you want to do this? It won’t change anything, you know. Killing innocent people is not going to encourage them to show clemency on your son."

"He’s only seventeen fucking years old. They’ve got no fucking right to kill him." There were tears in Joe’s eyes, but there was no grief in his voice, only rage.

There was no point in debating laws and penalties with him. "And killing us isn’t going to stop them. Might just speed up the process. Is that what you want to be the last thing you do for him?" I pressed a little harder. "Is it?"

One tear spilled over and ran down his ruddy cheek. "No one has to die if they just turn him loose."

I smiled sadly at him. "You know they won’t do that. They can’t do that. Right or wrong, good or bad, we’ve got laws in this country. If we break them, we have to pay the price. Breaking more laws isn’t going to stop that."

He was trembling now. "What do you know about it? Have you ever killed anyone?"

I didn’t let my gaze waver. "Yes," I told him.

He wasn’t expecting that response. For a moment he was just curious. "You did? Who?"

"My father." There. I said it out loud for someone else to hear, someone who wouldn’t move planets to protect me.

"You’re not punished," he sneered. "You’re free to walk around, you carry a gun. The laws --"

"Not for long. How do you think I know who he is?" I tipped my head in Skinner’s direction. "He’s taking me back to Washington D.C. so I can turn myself in."

Joe was staring at me as if I was the madman. "What’s the point?" he argued. "Don’t you know you’re going to be punished, like him? Do you deserve that?"

I let my eyes flicker toward Skinner’s for a fraction of a moment. He was watching me, a strange almost imploring look on his face. I stood up straight and drew a deep breath before I met Joe’s eyes again. "Yes."

~~~
 

It’s been a long time since I’ve been in a literal line of fire. I’ve been in political and emotional battle zones far more frequently than I’d like, but I’ve passed through them as part of the journey of my career and, more recently, my feelings for Fox Mulder, but it’s been a long time since I’ve actually been on the awkward end of a gun.

I should have been frightened. I’m sure I was on some base level, well below my awareness, but my initial response was more weariness than wariness. For the first few moments of the crisis, I had been an observer, not a participant, and I could focus on my concern for the other passengers, but that gun pressed behind my ear made it personal, and it actually made me angry. The big picture constricted in to a minute examination of what I truly defined as crisis; our floundering, gasping love affair. What more could go wrong between us? Wasn’t it bad enough that I was doing my very best to destroy our relationship? Wasn’t it enough he was trying to throw himself behind bars with a murder confession? Did we really need to throw in a hijacked plane?

There’s no debating that it was a selfish response, but I make no apology, it kept me sane, and possibly kept me alive. My senses were too acutely alert to him and what was happening to us to react to anything else, and thus actually missed opportunities to act foolishly.

I’m not sure what motivated Mulder to take action, although I knew all along he would. I’m not even sure what he was doing, except that caring for that girl had enabled him to get behind the first perpetrator. I had thought, for a while, he’d try some flank attack, never considering that the man who held a gun on me would see any move he made and kill him before he got close enough to do any damage. I agonized all the time he knelt there, trying to look as if he was capable of medically treating the flight attendant.

The man with the knife was railing at me, but I had no idea what he was saying. None of it registered. I was watching Mulder, and I knew the very moment that mental magic of his completed the trick. I was shocked when he stood and pronounced my name. Our status as law enforcement agents probably was best kept under wraps for as long as possible, but Mulder saw some need to reveal at least mine. For a moment I thought he was getting some sort of revenge for my stupid remarks as we boarded the plane. But Mulder wouldn’t play games like that if it meant endangering other lives.

Gradually, I understood. They had mistaken me for someone else, and that someone else was in greater danger than I could be. Mulder seemed intent on keeping both of us alive, though. He exposed his own weapon. He exposed much more.

When he admitted to killing his father, on that plane full of witnesses, that’s when I began to be afraid. Very afraid.

It wasn’t just a matter of his confession. That could be written off as an attempt to connect with a madman. There was something else, something perhaps he intended to communicate only to me; that he not only believed himself deserving of punishment, he actually sought it. Would he let himself be martyred just to set his soul free?

From the moment of his confession time slowed into interminable increments, taunting me that this might be his last breath, or this one, or this. I could barely make myself breathe, watching him. He was hardly calm, no matter how easily he spoke. His body was tense, there was a pulse in his throat that was visible even to me, several feet away. I had to stand there, behaving as if I had nothing more to be concerned about than my own life.

He kept his hand wedged against the man with the knife, and they stood there, nose to nose and those interminable increments ticked on, one after another, as slowly and surely as a drip from a nearly dry spout.

"You’re going to be punished, just like him," the hijacker told him, a solitary tear sliding down his cheek. "Do you deserve that?"

Mulder’s eyes drifted toward me, and then back again. "Yes," he answered simply, and with conviction.

The man stood there a moment, stunned by his reply, then something came over him; rage or fear, and he smiled meanly. "I’ll be happy to save the taxpayers the money." He moved his hand again.

Mulder jerked his hand, hard. "Not this way," he hissed. "Because it won’t just be me, will it? Don’t put any more blood on your boy’s hands. He killed an innocent man. He’s going to pay for that. And I’ll pay for what I did as well. But no one else here is going to pay the price with me." There was a sickening crack muffled between their bodies and the man winced and went up on the balls of his feet. "Not even you."

"Bastard," the man howled. "Son of a bitch. Kill him. Kill him!"

The other man, largely forgotten by all of us, didn’t immediately understand that he’d been given an order. Belatedly, he pulled the gun off me and lunged forward, arm raising to take aim. He shouted, sounding in as much pain as the man who had dropped the knife and was cradling his limp arm and swearing. Mulder, reacting purely on instinct, I think, threw whatever he’d been holding in his free hand. I only saw a flash of white as I thrust myself between the gun and Mulder’s body.

I felt the recoil. I actually felt the heat of the discharge against my chest. I heard the delayed pop of the casing as it spent. Passengers went from stunned silence to frenzied screaming. Despite the chaos that erupted, I heard a faint ‘ungh’ and I turned.

Mulder’s hand was against his chest, and his eyes were round in surprise as he started to drop forward. I reached for him, no longer caring about anything else, and as he sank into my arms, he groaned, "That’s what happened."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Agent Scully was charging through a throng of hospital personnel, police and security, brooking no obstacles to get to me. "Well?" she demanded when she reached my side.

I was dangerously close to tears. I had been fighting them since they put Mulder on the gurney. Now that I was face to face with his partner, I was no longer sure I could contain them. "I don’t know," I admitted. "He’s in surgery." It had been hours. Why hadn’t I heard anything by now?

Either Agent Scully didn’t fully comprehend my state or she was too politic to concede it. "Sir, Director Ashcroft will be here soon, he was leaving right on my heels." She risked putting a hand on me and drawing me as far away from curious passersby as she could. "Can you tell me what happened?"

I pinched my nose, hard, to hold back unwanted emotion. "No, Agent Scully, I can’t. I honestly don’t know what happened. One of the suspects drew his weapon on Agent Mulder, and I attempted to stop him. Somehow ..." I stopped, remembering the awful realization that I’d helped a man shoot Mulder, "... somehow the weapon discharged anyway. Agent Mulder sustained injuries as a result."

"Yes, I understand that part, but why did a man want to shoot him?" Scully asked patiently. "We haven’t received any official reports yet. There was a rumor of an attempted hijacking, but we haven’t even gotten that confirmed."

Judge Fullerton probably sealed the entire incident, to prevent other people from getting ideas about throwing the lives of innocent people into the cogs of justice. There might never be a complete investigation of the events on that plane. But I knew what I knew and no one could stop me from telling it. "Two men boarded the plane intending to divert it until they could force an Appellate Court judge, who was on board, to change his ruling regarding a death sentence." I was keeping my voice low, but Agent Scully was leaning in, canny enough to know this might be the only time she’d ever hear this information, and determined not to miss a word of it.

"It wasn’t a very well organized attempt," I continued flatly. "But the men were desperate enough to make them just as dangerous, or perhaps moreso. Agent Mulder was ultimately able to disable one of them by getting close enough to physically prevent him from triggering a crude explosive device he had strapped to his body. I believe ..." I paused a moment, to fully appreciate the amazing strength he had demonstrated in his own desperation to save lives, "he broke the man’s arm. His accomplice then aimed his weapon at Agent Mulder, and that’s when Agent Mulder was struck." I swallowed back bile. My shirt and hands were still covered in his blood. "With the plot basically unraveled and both men distracted, others were able to overcome and hold them until authorities could be brought on board."

"Are you all right, Sir?"

I looked at her sharply. I was falling apart. I might have killed him, he might be dying on the operating table while I cowered in a corridor hiding from the truth. I’d never be all right. "I’m fine. I sustained no injuries."

She gripped my hand, and saw the blood there. "Where was he shot?"

"In the chest." I demonstrated with my other hand. "In the upper left side of his chest." Dear God, I didn’t even have to close my eyes to see the blood leak through his fingers as he held his hand to the wound, or to see the astonished look in his eyes as he started to fall.

Scully’s mouth drew down. "An inch one way or another could mean life or death."

"He was still breathing when they put him on the Medi-Vac," I offered, hoping that her medical expertise would reassure us both that it was a good sign.

It must have been. Scully discarded the subject and started another, glancing around at all the security clustered near us. "Sir, I have to ask again. Why were you on that plane? You were warned --"

"As I believe I explained to you last night, Agent Scully," I broke in, "Agent Mulder was in no condition to be left alone. I would have been abdicating my responsibility if I’d left him on his own last night. I believe he could have harmed himself."

"Are you suggesting Mulder was suicidal?" she gasped.

I hesitated. No, that wasn’t exactly what I was suggesting. "No," I said, at length. "I believe he was exhausted and overwrought, having been through a very difficult ordeal, and wasn’t fully responsible for himself last night. It was in his best interest that he not be left alone."

"He hasn’t been himself for weeks," Scully conceded. "I’ve been very worried about him ever since that seminar in Buffalo." She looked up. "You saw him there. What happened?"

What happened? Almost everything. I know the guilt was painted on my face in vivid colors. I hoped she would attribute the shake in my voice to the events of the moment rather than the guilt and grief for the past. "I noticed nothing out of the ordinary in him that weekend, aside from the natural stress of being confined in a hotel with no power, no heat and no way to leave."

"Well, something happened," she insisted, shaking her head. "He hasn’t been the same since ..." she let the words trail away.

I turned and followed her gaze. A man in surgical scrubs was approaching us. "Mr. Skinner?"

"Yes," I disclosed. "How is he?"

He sent a look to the woman at my side. "Is she next of kin?"

Agent Scully and I both groped for each other’s hands. "No, this is his partner, Dr. Dana Scully. What is it, Doctor? How bad is it?"

He looked down at his own hands, gravely. "Let’s find someplace to talk," he suggested and reached out to guide us away from traffic.

As he did, Agent Scully seemed to stumble slightly, and I dropped my arm around her to hold her up, even though I was crumbling inside. We moved away from the wall and as we did a man cut himself from the throng of security people and came toward us. A tall, imposing man with a determined march, receding hairline and wire rim glasses. "Judge Fullerton."

"I want to see him," Fullerton said, with no preamble, not even to acknowledge his identity. "I want to see the young man who saved my life."

"Come this way, please."

We were led around a corner, up a small flight of stairs, and into the ante chamber of an intensive care ward. Through the glass on the other side of the nurses’ station we could make out what we hoped was Mulder’s dark hair against the whiteness of a bed sheet. The doctor turned then and took us in with a mournful look. "I don’t think we were able to save the use of his arm. The damage to muscle and tissue was too great to be repaired. I’m afraid this is going to end his career as an officer of the law."

"But he’ll live," Agent Scully demanded. Her tone of voice made it clear there was no other viable option.

That seemed a minor consideration to the surgeon. "Oh, yes, he’ll live." He flicked a hand in an economic indication of the room. "The only reason we’re going to keep him in ICU overnight is that he experienced some mild arrhythmia during surgery, probably due to blood loss. It’s a precaution, that’s all. But he will lose most of the mobility and strength in his left arm."

Agent Scully responded with a sound that could almost be called a sob and pressed her face against my bloodied shirt.

"Is he awake?" Fullerton asked. "I want to talk to him."

"Well, I don’t know --" the doctor didn’t get to finish his sentence because Judge Fullerton was pushing his way into the room where Mulder lay, barechested, bandaged, tangled in tubes, his left arm in a sling. We followed as far as we could before the doctor stopped us. "One visitor at a time," he insisted.

Scully and I, still clutching at one another, but now more in relief than fear, stood outside the room and watched, straining to hear whatever transpired inside.

It wasn’t hard to hear Judge Fullerton. His sonorous voice must be very effective on the bench, but it had to be very uncomfortable to patients in surrounding rooms. Mulder’s replies, however, were faint, and oftimes we couldn’t hear what he said. Sometimes even Fullerton had to lean in to hear them.

At one point, he drew back, smiling faintly, and looking regretful. "It doesn’t matter what I think, Agent Mulder. The law in North Carolina allows for execution of juveniles who were tried as adults, and as long as that law is in place, I will uphold it." He patted the hand contained in the sling. "I think you feel the same way."

"I spoke to my friend in Virginia, Senator Dolan, this morning," he continued. "I learned a good deal about you. He says he owes you his life. So do I, now. Is there anything I can do for you? Anything at all ... providing ..." he smiled again, "it’s within the law?"

He leaned in again, and Mulder, clearly with effort, made a request. It appeared to be somewhat detailed in nature, and at one point, necessitated gestures. Agent Scully and I could only watch helplessly, as he struggled to point with his left hand.

Fullerton straightened, at length, looked back through the window at us, and patted Mulder again. "I’ll do whatever it takes," he repeated. "I’m going now, others want to see you. You’re very brave. And remarkable. Yes, remarkable." He left the bedside. "Remarkable," he repeated as he passed us.

Agent Scully didn’t wait for permission. She simply darted inside as Fullerton left. I don’t know what she said to him. Fullerton commanded my attention.

"Why does he feel it might require judicial intervention to keep you employed?" he asked me.

I jerked away from the window. "I beg your pardon?"

"He asked me to do whatever it took to see that you didn’t lose your job. I thought you worked for the FBI."

"I do. I’m an Assistant Director." I sighed, sent another look through the window to where Agent Scully was holding his good hand tightly and speaking softly. "I disrespected a not so subtle command to return to Washington DC last night, in order to stay with Agent Mulder. If you spoke to Senator Dolan, you understand the nature of the case he was working on, and it was my opinion he should not be left alone last night." Judge Fullerton didn’t need to know it was in my best interest to stay with him.

"So, you put the well-being of one of your men above your own political health?" He arched a brow at me. "It appears that you’re remarkable as well."

I shrugged jerkily. "I don’t know that remarkable is the word. I just didn’t feel it was right to leave him alone last night. He was distraught to learn he had been unable to stop the perpetrator before the young woman was assaulted. You see, his own sister --"

"Yes, I got that history from the Senator," Fullerton cut in. "He feels things keenly, does he?"

"Some things," I granted. "This thing."

"He feels something for you, as well," he observed. "That he would ask me to make sure you are not penalized for your decision."

I felt color rushing to my face. "Well ..."

"He’s very obliged to you."

Obliged. That was the last word I wanted to hear. I’d been so worried wondering if he was going to live, I’d forgotten to worry if he still loved me. "And I’ve had reason, over the years, to be obliged to him. I guess it all balances out. Yes, Agent Scully?"

She was at the door. "He wants to see you."

I nodded to Fullerton. "Excuse me."

I couldn’t go in right away. I stood there in the doorway, unsure what to say, how much to say, how much to do. I wanted to pick him up and confess everything to him; every fear, every longing, every need. But what if he no longer had any use for those things?

I approached the bed with butterflies in my stomach ... no, more like a murder of crows. "Mulder?" I called softly. "You wanted me?" Please say yes. And then I can tell you I want you.

He turned his head slightly. His eyes were foggy with medication and pain, but they met mine and locked. "That’s what happened. I didn’t do it, did I?"

That’s why he wanted to see me. I sat carefully, at the side of the bed. "Do you remember, now?"

He made a sound as he shifted to give me room. "A little. Snatches. I don’t know why I threw the towel at him. It was there on the rack and I grabbed it and threw it. Krycek turned the gun on me for a moment and Dad started yelling at me." He shut his eyes tight. "And then he ... and then he ..."

"Easy, Son." I put my hand on his good arm. "Don’t try to get it worked out right now. The only thing you need to think about now is that you’re alive. And so is everyone else. You saved us all."

"I didn’t save him." His voice was dull. "I tried. When Krycek told him to shut up, I tried to knock the gun out of Krycek’s hand. It went off. Dad had been moving toward me, and he got hit. I didn’t save him."

"But that doesn’t mean you killed him," I pointed out as gently as I could.

"Same thing." He opened his eyes. "It’s just you can’t prosecute someone for failing to save someone else."

I couldn’t help smiling to myself. "No, you can’t."

"Are you ashamed of me?" he asked.

"Ashamed of you?" I was stunned he could even think in such terms. "My God, no. I’m proud of you. So very proud of you."

He looked at me oddly for a moment, then looked away. "I’m tired," he whispered.

"I know," I whispered back. I wanted so much to hold him, comfort him. I didn’t know how. I didn’t know if he needed that from me. I didn’t know if he’d accept it from me, even if he did. So I just sat there, being ineffectual.

He fussed slightly with the sling and grimaced. "The doctor says I’m going to lose the use of my arm." Reaching up, he brushed his hair out of his eyes, catching my gaze, briefly, between his fingers. "I guess I won’t go back to the Bureau."

"No, it doesn’t seem likely," I admitted. I didn’t want to add that I didn’t think he should ever go back into the field. I’d seen first hand the damage it did to him.

He looked away. "You sound relieved."

I struggled to explain. I wanted to hide everything; my almost crippling need for him, and how much I wanted to protect him and how much I owed him. I felt like a giant in a tiny room, enormous and undeniable, knocking things over with every movement. And my feelings were even greater. "Mulder, I ..."

He didn’t let me put the words together. "I’m sorry, Skinner ... for ... everything."

"Shh. Nothing to apologize for. You just concentrate on getting out of here."

His eyes slipped shut. "Skinner," he mumbled.

"Yes, Mulder?"

He was quiet. He must have drifted off. I reached for his hand and squeezed it gently. I didn’t care if anyone was listening -- or looking. I leaned forward and kissed his forehead. "I love you," I whispered.

I slid off the bed and turned around. Agent Scully and Judge Fullerton were nowhere around.

"Promise?"

His voice was thick and sleepy, and yet strangely wistful. I didn’t look back. I couldn’t. "I promise."

"Forever?"

Oh, just try and stop me. "Forever."

"No matter what?"

I started grinning. I couldn’t help it. "No matter what."

"You won’t send me away again?"

The grin faded. I could see his reflection in the window. He was staring at me intently. I met his eyes in the reflection. "I can’t live without you. If I sent you away, I’d just have to go out and bring you back."

He was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was much stronger, and tinged with what might almost be called laughter. "Then get your ass back here and kiss me like you mean it."

So, I did.

Because I did.

And still do.

END