By Oracle
apollostemple@yahoo.com
Classification: SRA
Rated: Strong R
Spoilers: None
Key Words: Mulder/Scully Romance, major angst,
not sallie-safe
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Summary: His body has already been carved with pain.
His head is full of scars.
Notes: Many thanks to Lib, for being there when I needed
her urgent beta, and for her fantastic advice and
encouragement! :)
Thanks also to Circe Invidiosa, who has generously given
my stories a beautiful home:
http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle
Comments: I'll be posting this story as a series, but it
is *not* a WIP. I assure you, it's beta-ed, edited and
complete on my hard drive, and I plan to post one part
per day. However, as I'm going on vacation over the
weekend, there will probably be a break between parts
for a couple of days. Rest assured, I'll have the whole
thing posted for the Spooky due date on October 1st.
I didn't put time stamps on different sections,
because I felt this would disrupt the flow of the
narrative. However, note that sections written in the
present tense are happening in the present. Sections
written in the past tense happened in the past.
Caution: This story *is not* rapefic, non-con, or
character death. However, it is a very dark, very
angsty story, and although I won't go into detail
here, I advise that you read at your own risk. Some
images may be disturbing.
---
"oh beautiful release
memory seeps from my veins
let me be empty
and weightless and maybe
I'll find some peace tonight"
--Sarah McLachlan, 'Angel'
1.
Mulder wakes slowly from the nightmare, his eyes squeezed
closed as his mind adjusts. The whole length of his body
aches. His throat is raw from screaming.
When he opens his eyes, he recognises the darkened master
bedroom of the house Scully rented. He can hear the ocean
roaring somewhere outside, driven by a howling wind. The
windowpanes rattle violently in their frames.
He concentrates on the quieter sounds. A clock is ticking
to his left, and someone is breathing softly, right
beside him.
"Mulder, it's me."
He realizes Scully is sitting on the bed, her legs folded
onto the comforter. Her face is blank in the gloom, her
eyes like voids. Her fingers, smoothing his hair, feel
clinical. She waits until his breathing evens before
briskly removing her hand.
"Would you like a glass of water?" she murmurs, standing
briefly to straighten his tangled bed sheets.
Mulder shakes his head, but can't bring himself to speak
just yet.
He wishes Scully would leave him to this humiliation. He
doesn't want her to see him like this, weakened
and speechless, lying soaked in a cold sweat. Completely
pathetic.
And he's crying. Scully starts dabbing at his cheeks,
making soft shushing noises and whispering nonsense
words to him. He's suddenly glad that he can't read her
eyes. He doesn't want to see her pity, or worse, her
professional detachment. She's his nurse now, not his
partner. She should be getting paid for taking care
of him.
She shouldn't even be here. He's a burden. She must be
sick of this by now.
"I'm sorry," he whispers, turning his face
aside. "Scully...I'm so sorry."
"It's only been a week," she replies, squeezing his
hand. "I understand, Mulder. I'm here. You don't have
to apologize."
Mulder swallows, trying to calm down, but he can't block
the images from his dream.
//Scully, naked and covered in blood, folded into the
trunk of a car.
His navy blue tie wrenched around her wrists.
Broken glass crunching under his feet. His fingers,
dripping with blood, as someone clicks on a pair of
handcuffs. Harsh police lights flashing all around.
Voices, telling him to write a statement,
telling him to confess,
telling him that he'll burn in hell.
A pen nib pressed against his skin.
Blood, everywhere, drowning him.//
He takes shallow breaths, telling himself that it's all
right, Scully's here now, there's no blood, although he
knows it will never stop. His body has already been carved
with pain. His head is full of scars.
"This isn't going to get better, Scully. I think you should
go home tomorrow."
"Mulder..." Her small arms try to wrap around him.
He doesn't move.
"Scully, get out of here. Go tomorrow."
"No."
What can he say to make her leave? He wants to sound cold,
distant. He wants her to hate him.
He tries, "I don't want to see you again," but all he
hears is his pain.
Scully clasps his unresponsive hand and presses a kiss to
his forehead. "Mulder, no."
"You aren't helping me, Scully. I don't want you here."
"I'm not going anywhere," she says firmly, curling onto
the bed. She embraces his rigid body as best she can.
She's shivering, her icy feet pressed against his thighs,
and he can't help but lift the covers for her, letting
her slide in beside him. He can't help warming her feet
with his hands, running a thumb over her smooth instep.
He bites his lip to stop from kissing the small freckles
along her collarbone.
"Mulder, I want to be here," she insists to the top of
his head.
Wincing, he pulls away and leaves her to the cold.
He wishes he could believe her. And if not for what
happened a week ago, maybe he still would.
---
It was his last day in the hospital, and she brought him
his clothes. A grey T-shirt, some black jeans and a
leather jacket. He'd always liked this ensemble, but he
felt ashamed to be donning it now.
"Here," she whispered, when she handed them to him. She
looked shy for a moment, her eyes downcast, and he
suddenly realized why.
"Look, Scully...you don't have to stay and watch me dress."
"Yes I do." Her shyness was replaced with briskness, and
she looked up at him. He recognised her determination.
"Mulder, you know I have to stay with you."
"I'm really not going to -"
She shook her head, her eyes hardening, and at that moment
he knew she didn't trust him any longer. She still cared
about him, in a way. That was all.
"Okay," he said quietly. He kept his eyes on hers as he
stripped off his hospital gown.
She didn't flinch at his nakedness. Slowly, almost casually,
she ran her eyes over his body. Searching for something.
He decided to shorten the process for her, turning his
arms so she could see the jagged scars running vertically
along his wrists. Sewn shut scars that were still
slightly puckered and red.
Her eyes filled with disgust.
That was all.
---
--Two Months (2/7)--
by Oracle
apollostemple@yahoo.com
http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle
headers in part one
2.
Mulder sits alone on the beach, looking out to sea,
unaware that Scully is watching him.
Every few minutes she uses binoculars, just to bring
him closer, if only in appearance. He's been sitting out
there for three hours now, wearing a blue-grey sweater,
some faded jeans, and a scowl.
It's five in the afternoon and he hasn't said a word
to her all day. Not even a 'good morning' when she woke
up in his arms, half-pressed into the mattress with his
face against her neck.
He just extracted himself and rolled out of bed,
avoiding her eyes.
It's been a week and she's tried talking to him every
day, until now. No sense pushing it, after what he
said last night.
He told her to leave. While she was stroking his hair and
drying his tears, trying not to cry herself, he told her
to leave.
She should have realised it sooner--should have known
from his terseness and emotional withdrawal, instead of
regarding this behaviour as a symptom of shock.
She should have known straight away, just by seeing
the guilt in his eyes.
Mulder has decided she's going to leave him. He believes
that even if his enforced distance doesn't push her
away, her anger at his decision will do the trick.
Of course, there's no way she'll go. Nothing he can do or
say will drive her away--not now, not ever. Why can't he
understand that?
She's afraid to keep her eyes off of him for more than one
second. Even letting him sleep in his own room was a big
concession on her part.
She takes comfort in the fact that it could be worse. She
could be just as badly scarred.
Fortunately, whatever the hell Krycek and his cronies did
to her brain, it certainly worked. She doesn't remember a
thing about her missing time, and hasn't been plagued by
nightmares or flashbacks.
Their technology must have improved, she thinks,
sarcastic. Good for Them.
Mulder knows all of this. She's told him everything she
remembers, which isn't much.
There was a bright light in her motel room followed by
Alex Krycek's hands on her shoulders, pulling her into
a car. A shock of one event melding into another, with
no connection between them.
---
By the time she'd woken up properly, Krycek was speeding
through the night.
They were in the wilderness somewhere, judging by the lack
of streetlights and the moon's cool luminescence over
everything. Forest around them maybe. Scully didn't waste
time with the details.
"What the fuck is going on?" she demanded, trying to grab
the wheel.
Krycek easily knocked her pale, needle-marked arms aside.
"I saved your life, Scully."
"Oh, really?" She started struggling with the door lock
but it wouldn't budge. "Where the hell are you taking me,
Krycek?"
"Why are you even asking, Scully? You know I won't give you
a straight answer."
"You kidnapped me out of my motel room...you took me against
my will..." she looked down at her arms, taking in the
bruised puncture wounds. "What the fuck did you do to me?"
she screamed, throwing herself against him.
She wanted to push him right off the road. She wanted the
car to explode. At that moment, she was perfectly willing
to go up in flames if it meant he did too.
But she was weakened, and he was resolute.
"I should have waited to wipe your memory," he whispered,
tightening his grip on the wheel. "I should have fucking
waited. Then you'd just be a shivering, whimpering wreck
like you were when we got you out of the facility."
"Facility?"
"No straight answers, remember?"
She rubbed her wrists, looking out at the night sky and
resigning herself to imprisonment, at least for now.
"You really expect me to believe that you rescued
me," she said, dryly.
"Always the skeptic," he smirked. "I like that about you.
Mulder does too, you know. You're such a stubborn little
bitch."
She felt Krycek's eyes sliding over her, sizing up her
reaction, but she was impassive.
"Anyway," he said, attention back on the road, "I got you
out, whether you believe it or not. With a little help
from my friends, of course."
"Why the hell would you help me?"
"The times are a' changing, Scully. Tides are turning.
And you know me, I always go with the flow."
She decided not to say anymore. She would wait it out,
gather her strength. So she kept silent, staring through
the window as the monotonous countryside passed by.
And then, without meaning to, she fell asleep.
When she awoke, it was broad daylight and they were stuck
in traffic somewhere outside DC. She recognised the road,
the buildings, but there were some changes. A new
apartment block had sprung up. There were Christmas
decorations on the streetlights.
"Why, good morning, sleepy head," Krycek drawled. He had
the window wound down and was smoking a Morley, his
shirtsleeves rolled up. Some women might have found
him attractive, with his smooth features, his dark
green eyes and cat-like grace, but Scully's skin crawled
just looking at him.
The car stank of his sweat after driving all night, and
she longed to get out. She found herself actually
craving Mulder. Physically craving his presence, his
scent. His embrace.
She kept her face carefully blank. "How long was I gone,
this time?" she asked.
"Two months," Krycek replied, flicking his cigarette
butt out the window. "Give or take a few days. I found
out They were holding you after a month, and it took me
another to get you out."
Two months. She noticed some dirty snow on the sidewalk.
It was early January. He wasn't lying.
"Where are you taking me?"
"We'll be there soon."
---
Later, Scully told Mulder all of this. Word for word.
She even described Krycek, right down to his rolled
sleeves, his sweat. Mulder just nodded. He didn't
meet her eyes. He didn't argue or apologize.
That was how all their conversations went, at the
hospital. She and Mulder were like acquaintances at a
bus stop.
She talked and he listened, nodding. Sometimes he'd be
watching baseball and she would ask who was winning.
Only then would he reply.
Sometimes he'd eat the sunflower seeds she brought him.
Sometimes he wouldn't even open his eyes for her.
---
--Two Months (3/7)--
by Oracle
apollostemple@yahoo.com
http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle
headers in part one
3.
It's evening now, close to seven-o-clock. Scully sits in
an old rocking chair by the window, a fire blazing in the
hearth beside her. Every few seconds she glances up at
Mulder, who hasn't moved from his place on the beach.
Sometimes he glances down at his wrists, gazing at them as
though he can see right through his sweater sleeves to the
scars. She wonders what he's feeling.
Although he hasn't told her anything, she knows what
happened to him during the two months she was gone. She's
read the newspaper articles, the police reports, the
witness statements and the evidence for both sides.
She's seen the crime scene photographs and read the
autopsy findings.
She's read Mulder's own statement at least a dozen times
now. At first she kept expecting to find something in it,
some way to reach him. Now she's given up that hope.
There will be no easy way.
Even so, she can't help re-reading his statement. It's
all she has of his version.
She picks it up, out of a manila folder on the coffee
table, and skims over it.
//We worked on the case until about seven. I drove us
back to the motel. We said good night and went into our
separate rooms. I watched TV for a while. I could hear
Scully taking a shower. I dozed off on the bed.
When I woke up I was in our rental car. It was night. I
was on a bridge. I heard police sirens behind me. I got
out of the car. My feet crunched on broken glass. I
realised the car had smashed into the railing of the
bridge.
An officer was yelling at me to put my hands in the air.
Someone said there was something in the trunk.
They made me look in the trunk.
Scully was in the trunk.
They told me she was dead. I said she wasn't. They
pushed me up against the car, handcuffed me, and read
me my rights. They said there was blood on my hands.
I said she wasn't dead.
They made me look in the trunk again. Scully was naked.
There was a lot of blood. I looked at her face. Her
eyes were gone.
I told them she wasn't dead.//
His handwriting is a jagged, spidery scrawl, and Scully
is crying. She wipes her eyes with her sleeve and shoves
his statement back into the folder.
When she looks up, Mulder is standing in the doorway,
watching her. Before she can say anything, he turns
away and walks into his bedroom.
---
--Two Months (4/7)--
by Oracle
apollostemple@yahoo.com
http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle
headers in part one
4.
After another week of near silence, she and Mulder go
out to dinner, to little restaurant next to a quay.
They walk down a splinter-rough wharf, past piles of
lobster pots and boats adrift in the black water. A
biting wind swirls around them. Mittenless, Scully
subtly tries to take Mulder's hand for warmth, but he
purposely widens the gap between them.
The restaurant is crowded for so early in the evening.
They sit in a small corner booth, a topsy-turvy barrel
as their table. A thick white candle stands burning in
its centre, half-jammed in an old whiskey bottle.
Mulder watches the flame and remains silent, forcing
Scully to order for both of them. She asks for five
oysters, half a lobster and a bowl of white chowder,
hoping he'll like at least one dish.
A weather-roughened waiter with huge, callused hands
delivers the food. "Best lobster in the world," he says
gruffly, setting it down in front of Mulder, who doesn't
touch it.
"Mulder, eat," Scully finally insists.
He shrugs unapologetically, still not looking at her.
After a while he pushes his plate away, his lips curled
in distaste.
Scully swallows her hurt, reminding herself of his
motives. She's not going to let him get rid of her.
"Would you prefer the soup?" she asks softly, reaching
over to switch meals with him.
He holds up a hand to stop her, and his sweater sleeve
slips down a few inches.
For a second she stares, just stares, at the scar. It's
relatively smooth now, shiny and earthworm-coloured in
the candlelight. She wants to reach out and touch it,
curious to how it must feel, but a part of her also
recoils.
The idea that he harmed himself like this...the idea of
the pain he must have felt, to do this to himself...
It's too much for her. She can't stand the thought of
his pain. It's tangible to her. While the scars are a
part of him, in some way, they feel like a part of her
as well.
When she first saw them, in the hospital, it was agony.
It was like the aftermath of being shot in the gut, when
the shock fades and the pain breaks lose, burning from
the wound.
It hurt so much she almost bent over. She almost started
screaming.
Now, in the restaurant, she goes through the same
flashes of pain, the same inevitable anger.
She sees Mulder in a prison cell, a pen in his hand.
Mulder sitting there and putting the pen to his wrist
and somehow drawing it right through his own skin,
even as his blood spills out onto the concrete floor.
Mulder, caged and defeated. Trying to bleed himself
dry because there's nothing left.
Everything has been taken from him, by all the nameless,
shadowy men. The assassins, spies, double agents and
scientists. The politicians and informants. The murderers.
They did this to him, Scully thinks. They drove him
to this.
And as she stares at Mulder's scar, she fills with
fury and disgust.
When she finally snaps out of it, she realizes Mulder
has been watching her closely, cataloguing her reactions.
She tries to meet his eyes, to reassure him, but he
suddenly stands up, almost upsetting his plate.
He grabs his coat and strides out of the restaurant,
into the frozen night.
---
--Two Months (5/7)--
by Oracle
apollostemple@yahoo.com
http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle
headers in part one
5.
When Mulder had been in jail for a few days, Mrs.
Scully came to see him.
She spoke to him over an old rickety table, a guard
watching their every move.
Mrs. Scully wasn't wearing any make-up, but she had
Scully's gold cross around her neck. She was dressed
in mourning black.
Mulder pretended he was somewhere else.
"I know you didn't do it, Fox," she told him.
He didn't say anything.
"Fox -" her voice broke. "Tell me you didn't do it.
Tell me you didn't kill my baby girl."
For a moment he was pulled back into reality. He
saw Mrs. Scully sitting in front of him, trying not
to cry as she tugged at the necklace.
"I know you loved her," she said.
It was too much. It slid into his mind like a metal
spike between the eyes.
He pretended he was somewhere else.
---
Mulder remembers every day he was in that place, down
to the finest detail. Two months of jail time in
perfect surround sound, with digital quality picture.
And out of all those remembered moments, his one
meeting with Scully's mom stands out in his mind.
He's not sure why. Maybe it was the way she touched
the necklace, or the color of her eyes. Just like
Scully.
He sits huddled in the corner of his bed, listening
to the waves cutting into the coast outside, carving
the black, jagged rocks along the beach. The noise
is somehow satisfying.
It blocks out the sound of Scully's yells, her hands
jiggling the doorknob.
"Mulder, open the damn door!"
He closes his eyes, wondering if she'll try to break
it down. After he got back from the restaurant, he
jammed a sturdy chair beneath the knob. He knows she
won't get through.
This is it, he tells himself. After this, she'll be
so angry with me, she'll have to leave.
His success would make him smile, if it wasn't so
horrifying. When she's gone, he'll...
When she's gone.
And suddenly he recalls the way it all ended.
---
As the second month drew to a close, he stopped
talking altogether. He stopped eating and sleeping,
too. Skinner still came to see him, every day, in
an apparent effort to reason with him.
"Mulder, you can only get out if you want to get out."
"The trial is coming up in a week. You've got to
get it together."
"Mulder, listen to me, you didn't kill her."
"I know how you felt about her. You didn't do it."
"Damn it, Mulder! She wouldn't have wanted this."
"Mulder, talk to me."
"Say something."
Eventually Skinner made them send Mulder to a
psychiatrist, who left a steel-nibbed pen on the edge
of his desk while he went to the bathroom.
Mulder was handcuffed to a chair. Getting the pen and
tucking it into his sleeve was a difficult maneuvre.
Difficult, but manageable.
He didn't even have to think about it. The action was
almost automatic. He'd stopped thinking, by then,
because there was only one plan left. One thought.
That night he waited until all the lights were
turned off.
Then he took out the pen.
---
--Two Months (6/7)--
by Oracle
apollostemple@yahoo.com
http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle
headers in part one
6.
Scully leans against his door, crying silently into
her hands. Somehow she's handled him in exactly the
wrong way, but she can't pinpoint what she's done.
Maybe she's been trying too hard. Maybe not hard
enough. Maybe there was nothing she could do to
begin with.
She tries again. "Mulder, please." She's begging now.
She's reduced herself to this for him, but he still
won't let her in. "Please, Mulder, just open the door."
Doesn't he feel anything any more?
She sinks down onto the carpet, curling up beside
the door.
The rented house, shadowed and empty around her, seems
utterly bleak. There are no family photos on the walls,
no homey ornaments. She should never have brought
him here.
"Mulder, I'm still waiting. Please come out and talk
to me."
She waits and waits, but she doesn't hear him move.
There's only the sound of the wind and the ocean,
driving one another into the rocks.
It's hopeless, she thinks. He's gone. I've lost him.
Still, she refuses to give up.
"Mulder," she yells, turning her head against the door,
pressing her cheek to the smooth wood. "I'm not leaving.
Do you understand? You're not going to make me leave."
She's almost screaming at him now. "Mulder, damn it,
do you hear me? I'm staying. Not because you want me
here, or because I feel obliged to be here."
Finally, she hears a footfall behind the door. The
creak of his new dress shoes.
She pulls herself to her feet, staring at the blank,
white door, but picturing Mulder in front of her. "I'm
here because I want to be here," she yells. "How many
times do I have to say it? I'm not leaving, Mulder.
I'm not leaving, I'm not leaving...do you hear
me, Mulder?"
She's bruising her knuckles against the door, and she
realizes that if he doesn't come out of the room, she'll
break her way in on adrenaline. She'll rip right through
the door, head first.
The door swings open.
Mulder is standing in the darkness of his room, staring
at her through a calm mask of suspicion and mistrust. He
doesn't have to say that he doesn't believe her.
She's tempted to ram her fist into his nose, but decides
she doesn't want to deal with the blood.
"Mulder, instead of trying to drive me away, why don't
you leave?" she whispers. "If you really want to go, I
don't know how I could stop you."
"Good idea, Scully," he says, flatly. Immediately, she
knows he's misunderstood.
Before she can protest, he strides back into his room
and tears open a cupboard, nearly pulling it off the
wall. He starts ripping his clothes out and throwing
them onto the bed.
"Well, Scully," he says, without looking at her. "If
you want me to get out of here, can you get my suitcase?
I think it's in the hall closet."
Scully presses a hand to her mouth. She finds she
can't move.
Mulder is visibly shaking as he starts folding a dress
shirt. His tears, shining on his face, could be blood
in the darkened room.
Scully wills herself into action, knowing she has to
do something before he walks out of the house. She
snatches the shirt from his trembling hands, thinking
he's too misery-weakened to put up a fight.
She's wrong. He wrenches the shirt from her and she
stumbles, tilting backwards until she knows she's
going to fall.
The room spins, the floor coming up to meet her.
Mulder pulls her into his arms before she can hit
the ground.
"I'm sorry, Scully," he says, tucking her against his
body. "Oh God, Scully, so sorry. I never want to hurt
you. You know I don't want to hurt you."
He nuzzles her neck, murmuring into her ear. He smells
of fear and tangy sweat.
She pulls his hands from around her waist. Before he can
figure out what she's doing, she has tugged his sweater
sleeves down to his elbows, uncovering his scars.
His muscles tense in her grip. When she looks to his
face, he closes his eyes, a few more tears slipping
from beneath his lashes.
"I was weak, Scully. I know I was. You can...you can
say anything you want. I already know what you think."
She traces his left scar with her thumb, amazed at the
soft, silky feel of a mark that almost killed him. "What
do I think?" she asks quietly.
"That I...that I wasn't strong enough. That I should
be pitied." He swallows, his face hardening in pain.
"And deep down, that I disgust you."
She understands now, what she's done wrong.
"No, Mulder," she whispers. "That's what you think."
Slowly, she lifts his wrist to her mouth and kisses
his scar, feeling his pulse hum beneath her lips.
---
7.
Mulder's eyes snap open, as her nose brushes his palm,
her tongue flickering around the scar. "Scully, how
can you...?" he breathes. "What are you doing?"
She pulls away, but her small, warm hands remain on
his arm. "Kissing you."
He waits, still watching her, as she brings his hand
to cup the side of her face. The wind is calming outside,
its wail fading into a mournful whisper. He places his
other hand on her shoulder, his thumb stroking her
collarbone. "Scully, I don't understand."
"Why do you want me to leave, Mulder?"
"I don't..." he leans his forehead against hers, his
voice catching, "you know I don't want you to leave."
"You asked me to leave."
"You should leave."
Her arms wind around his neck, pulling him closer,
closer, until his mouth brushes hers, until his tongue
is tracing her full, ripe lips. She tastes of life.
He stops after only a second, pulling away from her
as his emotions finally boil over.
"I don't want to see you hurt, ever again," he says, and
each word sounds like a ripped-open wound. "When I close
my eyes I see your body, twisted, in the trunk of the car.
There's too much blood."
"Mulder, it wasn't me. It wasn't even a person."
"It looked exactly like you." He sinks onto the bed,
curling into himself and pressing his palms against his
eyes. "They told me I raped you," he whispers, "before I
slit your throat."
He feels her sit down beside him, her hand tentatively
stroking his back.
"Did you believe them?" she asks.
"Not at first, but the evidence spoke for itself. Even
the Gunmen believed it, you know. They wouldn't say it,
but they believed I did it."
"You can't know that."
"I could see it in their eyes, whenever they came to
visit me. They checked everything out, Scully, all
the evidence, and they found nothing to clear me."
He takes sharp breath, "So I started to believe it too.
It began as nightmares, of me...of me hurting you..."
Scully drops to her knees in front of him, pulling
his hands from his face to uncover his eyes. He keeps
them closed.
"You would never hurt me," she tells him.
"I couldn't get the images out of my head," he
continues quietly. "That's when I knew. I knew what
I had to do."
"No," she says, and suddenly she's kissing his eyelids,
his cheeks, and down across his stubbled chin. "No,
Mulder, no..." Shaking, she holds onto him like he's
keeping her afloat. "Mulder, you would never hurt me.
I can't...it's too much..."
"Shh..." he whispers, his hands soothing her
back, "shh, Scully..."
"Mulder, I thought you were okay...thought you would
be waiting for me. And then Krycek pushed me out of
his car in front of the hospital, and he told me you'd
tried to...that you'd..."
"I'm so sorry," he murmurs, burying his face in the
smooth curve of her neck. He rocks her gently, back
and forth, as she sobs.
---
"I want to kill them for what they did to you," Scully
says at last, between shuddering breaths. "I want to
torture them, like they tortured you."
Her voice is sheer ice, disgust crawling beneath the
surface, and he finally understands. She has never pitied
him, never loathed him. She loves him.
He allows himself to breathe in her scent, murmuring
her name as he presses his lips beneath her jaw.
"I want to kill them too," he whispers, "after all
they've done to you. They took you, Scully, not me."
And who knows what they did to you this time, he
almost adds.
She shakes her head, "I don't remember anything -"
"It doesn't matter. They took another two months from
you."
He pulls away slightly, and she stiffens in his arms.
She knows what's coming, what he's going to say.
"Mulder, don't -"
"I know you don't want to quit," he murmurs, staring
into her eyes. "I know you're strong, Scully. Stronger
than me. But it isn't safe -"
"No, Mulder," she says, putting a finger to his lips.
"I'm not giving up now, and neither are you. *We'll*
fight them, Mulder. *We'll* bring them down."
---
She slides her finger along his lower lip, strokes
the corner of his mouth, and leans forward to kiss his
cheek, her tongue soothing his skin.
An invitation.
He replies by pushing her onto the bed and kissing her
shoulders, her neck, her face, until he finds her mouth.
The initial taste is an explosion, a flash fire. At first
they can't stop kissing, just kissing, as an inferno
builds.
Thought is slowly replaced with a desperation for release,
an ache for skin against skin. She tells him what she wants
with her mouth on his neck, her hands tugging at his belt
loops. He responds with a groan, a nip at her earlobe.
They begin to bruise each other with teeth and nails, moaning
helplessly, kissing until they nearly suffocate. Their
clothes are torn away in the struggle, their flesh burning
for connection, and for a moment it hurts like a rush of
saltwater over a graze.
Then they become lost, tangled in each other. He is reminded
of his massive blood loss, of the spiraling darkness, only
this time he's drowning in light.
He sinks into her and she takes him, shifting under him,
until they are one.
A hush settles around them, of soft breaths between kisses,
of hands tracing across bare skin.
Outside, a gentle rain falls, swirled by a breeze into
the calming sea. Inside, the air is flushed with warmth
and whispered words, the gloom draped over their bodies
like velvet.
When they finally succumb to the quiet, inescapable pull
between them, it is like riptide, like gravity.
---
End
---
Thanks again to Lib for her wonderful beta, and to Circe
for creating such a gorgeous site for my stories :)
Also, muchos thank yous to everyone who has supported me
through the gradual posting of this story. You guys rock!
Although she'll never read this, I also want to thank my
best friend, who has stuck by me through the craziness
of this year, even in my worst moments, and even in hers.
---
Liked it? Hated it? Do you think I'm spooky?
Feed me back: apollostemple@yahoo.com
For more of my fic: http://www.invidiosa.com/oracle