Traveler
Title: Traveler
Fandom: X-Files/Firefly
Rating: PG
Prompt: 065. Passing
Words: 746
Spoilers: None for Firefly, a few for X-Files (Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose, Tithonus, Jump the Shark).
Notes: First-person POV (Scully).
The Smoking Man was a lying bastard. Almost all the things Mulder believed in were lies. In some ways it feels good, I can’t deny that. After being wrong on so many cases, it feels nice to be right. No invasion, no viral infection that wipes out all but the top of the shadow government, nothing. There wasn’t even alien life. I was right, and I was right when it counted.
But it’s not like Mulder was there for me to rub it in his face. No, he’d died decades ago. Just like everyone else.
It was the car accident. That was when I realized something wasn’t right. It killed Mulder and it should have killed me but it didn’t. Not a scratch on me. I woke up about three feet from the smoldering remains of the sedan. My first thoughts were to get him out, but I was far too late for that. He was long gone. And once that set in, it occurred to me that I should’ve been long gone as well. There was no way I would’ve been thrown from the car. I should have been in that car.
I started remembering things. Clyde Bruckman telling me I don’t die. Alfred Fellig looking at Death for me. It seemed impossible, that someone could live forever. It wasn’t possible. The scientist inside of me had to have answers, but I had nowhere to turn for them. The Gunmen were dead. I couldn’t get anywhere near the FBI, and even if I could, I knew no one there who’d help me, not since John and Skinner quit and moved to Massachusetts to get married. I had to look into old sources and find new ones.
No one had ever heard of someone who could not die.
Ignoring common sense, I experimented. Razors didn’t cut my wrists. Guns didn’t fire when I pointed them at myself. I tried jumping off of a cliff, but I just blacked out halfway down and woke up unscathed at the bottom.
Eventually I stopped trying to die. Eventually the pain of losing my loved ones subsided. When you live forever, you find there’s always enough time for these things to pass.
It’s funny now, the idea of an alien invasion. In a way, I suppose it did happen. Only we were the aliens. Using up our own resources and invading other planets, making them like ours. And I watched it happen, watched it unfold like no one else did. Generations came and went during the transition, and there I was.
My medical experience got me work, and I saved. Whenever I need more, there’s always somewhere looking for a doctor, especially on the Border planets. As old as I am, I look young, I look healthy. There is so much now that I’m almost glad that I’ll live forever. It’s lonely, but how many other people have lived on eleven planets? I’ve farmed on Beaumonde, seen the ocean on Bellerophon, lived in the cities of Ariel and Orisis. I’ve seen worlds founded and destroyed.
So I have a definite advantage over most people. My lifespan is such that I’m not a tourist. I can actually settle down and experience these places for years, for lifetimes. I had always wanted the chance to travel and I got it. But I have realized that I didn’t really travel. I immersed myself in different cultures. Became a part of them as they became a part of me. But I never traveled, never looked out of the window of a ship and wondered where we’d be docking next. And so I decided to try it out.
And that’s why I came here. Over 550 years since I was born, nearly 400 since I left Earth that Was, and here I am, standing on Persephone looking for a ride. Listening to a girl talk about her ship like it’s her daughter, trying to convince me that hers is the ship for me. And she has me convinced, not because the ship seems better than any of the others, but because she looked delighted, not confused, when I said I didn’t know where I was going this time.
“Oh, we’ve had passengers before didn’t know where they’re goin’,” she says with a smile so genuine it’s contagious. “Long as you can pay, we’d love to have you on board.”
I can pay. She grins again and takes my bag.
“Welcome to Serenity.”
Fandom: X-Files/Firefly
Rating: PG
Prompt: 065. Passing
Words: 746
Spoilers: None for Firefly, a few for X-Files (Clyde Bruckman’s Final Repose, Tithonus, Jump the Shark).
Notes: First-person POV (Scully).
The Smoking Man was a lying bastard. Almost all the things Mulder believed in were lies. In some ways it feels good, I can’t deny that. After being wrong on so many cases, it feels nice to be right. No invasion, no viral infection that wipes out all but the top of the shadow government, nothing. There wasn’t even alien life. I was right, and I was right when it counted.
But it’s not like Mulder was there for me to rub it in his face. No, he’d died decades ago. Just like everyone else.
It was the car accident. That was when I realized something wasn’t right. It killed Mulder and it should have killed me but it didn’t. Not a scratch on me. I woke up about three feet from the smoldering remains of the sedan. My first thoughts were to get him out, but I was far too late for that. He was long gone. And once that set in, it occurred to me that I should’ve been long gone as well. There was no way I would’ve been thrown from the car. I should have been in that car.
I started remembering things. Clyde Bruckman telling me I don’t die. Alfred Fellig looking at Death for me. It seemed impossible, that someone could live forever. It wasn’t possible. The scientist inside of me had to have answers, but I had nowhere to turn for them. The Gunmen were dead. I couldn’t get anywhere near the FBI, and even if I could, I knew no one there who’d help me, not since John and Skinner quit and moved to Massachusetts to get married. I had to look into old sources and find new ones.
No one had ever heard of someone who could not die.
Ignoring common sense, I experimented. Razors didn’t cut my wrists. Guns didn’t fire when I pointed them at myself. I tried jumping off of a cliff, but I just blacked out halfway down and woke up unscathed at the bottom.
Eventually I stopped trying to die. Eventually the pain of losing my loved ones subsided. When you live forever, you find there’s always enough time for these things to pass.
It’s funny now, the idea of an alien invasion. In a way, I suppose it did happen. Only we were the aliens. Using up our own resources and invading other planets, making them like ours. And I watched it happen, watched it unfold like no one else did. Generations came and went during the transition, and there I was.
My medical experience got me work, and I saved. Whenever I need more, there’s always somewhere looking for a doctor, especially on the Border planets. As old as I am, I look young, I look healthy. There is so much now that I’m almost glad that I’ll live forever. It’s lonely, but how many other people have lived on eleven planets? I’ve farmed on Beaumonde, seen the ocean on Bellerophon, lived in the cities of Ariel and Orisis. I’ve seen worlds founded and destroyed.
So I have a definite advantage over most people. My lifespan is such that I’m not a tourist. I can actually settle down and experience these places for years, for lifetimes. I had always wanted the chance to travel and I got it. But I have realized that I didn’t really travel. I immersed myself in different cultures. Became a part of them as they became a part of me. But I never traveled, never looked out of the window of a ship and wondered where we’d be docking next. And so I decided to try it out.
And that’s why I came here. Over 550 years since I was born, nearly 400 since I left Earth that Was, and here I am, standing on Persephone looking for a ride. Listening to a girl talk about her ship like it’s her daughter, trying to convince me that hers is the ship for me. And she has me convinced, not because the ship seems better than any of the others, but because she looked delighted, not confused, when I said I didn’t know where I was going this time.
“Oh, we’ve had passengers before didn’t know where they’re goin’,” she says with a smile so genuine it’s contagious. “Long as you can pay, we’d love to have you on board.”
I can pay. She grins again and takes my bag.
“Welcome to Serenity.”