This Her Fever - 1/3
SUMMARY: It is, she thinks, a fitting coda to her life that Mulder and Father McCue should cross paths in this room, both trying to offer her salvation.
RATING: Strong R verging on NC-17 for language and sexual content.
SPOILERS: Redux II and Detour
DISCLAIMER: Breaking seal constitutes acceptance of agreement. Proceed at your own risk. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. For recreational purposes only. Driver does not carry cash. And, as always, thank you for choosing Aloysia Airlines for your direct flight from 1013 to fanfic.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: This story was written for xf_is_love . It wasn't supposed to be nearly so long, but it just kind of snowballed and, well, here's what it turned into. Many, many thanks to dashakay , leucocrystal , andscarletbaldy for their amazing job on helping me to get this story written and edited in just four short weeks. You ladies are the best!
The story that Scully remembers about the Milky Way is from L.M. Montgomery's The Story Girl.
Author's notes continued at the end, spoilers contained therein.
***
O wrangling schools, that search what fire
Shall burn this world, had none the wit
Unto this knowledge to aspire,
That this her fever might be it?
And yet she cannot waste by this,
Nor long bear this torturing wrong,
For more corruption needful is,
To fuel such a fever long.
John Donne, A Fever
***
His Eminence, James Cardinal Hickey, D.D.
Your Eminence:
I am writing to tell you about a woman in my parish in the hope that you can guide me in my attempts to minister to her. She is currently being treated for a very serious - possibly terminal - type of cancer, and is also experiencing what can only be termed as a crisis of faith. The woman is a doctor and it seems to me that she feels a need to choose between her vocation and her faith.
Her mother is a very dear friend of mine from years back, and approached me in hopes that I could help her daughter come back to the Church during this dark time. She is extremely anxious that her daughter should be reconciled with her faith. I am always grateful for a chance to help minister to those who have strayed, though I have made it clear to the mother that too much pressure can turn a troubled soul even further from the path of righteousness. To this end, I have done my best to approach the woman in a non-aggressive manner.
However, she has so far been quite resistant to what I have had to say, and seems almost offended by my presence. I don't want to push her away, but as you surely know, Your Eminence, these are the times in life when having one's heart open to the love and healing of Our Savior is most critical. I feel I must press on to be true to my calling, but I do not wish to alienate her from the Church.
I thank you for taking the time to read this. I await your guidance, and know that through Jesus all things are possible. I continue to pray on the matter.
I remain your humble servant in Christ,
Thomas McCue
***
When Melissa was killed, Maggie Scully thought it only natural that the world should stop and grieve with her. She was bewildered that horns should beep and people should laugh and babies should try and play peek-a-boo with her in the following days.
Her sons came home. Charlie, whose cell phone kept ringing with calls from cities she'd never heard of, and Bill, who guided her about town like a seeing eye dog; helping her do things like pick out a coffin and flowers. Tara had just suffered another miscarriage and couldn't travel, but she called twice a day to listen to stories about when the Scully children were small. Maggie wondered if it was harder to lose a baby you never even got to hold or a woman you thought had made it well past the danger zone.
She wondered too what her other daughter - for whom death was her bread and butter - thought of it all. She knew Dana had a clear picture in her head of what had been done to Melissa's body by the cold hands of the medical examiner. Dana heard the kinds of jokes police officers tell at crime scenes. Maybe she had even told them sometimes. Maggie wasn't sure what Dana did anymore. She wasn't even sure who Dana was anymore.
On the day of the funeral, Maggie watched them lower her little girl into a dark grave and bit her tongue against crying out that Melissa was scared of small spaces, that she had hated them as a child, and that someone had to get her out of that awful box.
Her husband's earthly remains were scattered across the wide sea he had loved and the knowledge comforted her. The world was waterlogged and when she missed him, as she often did, she imagined his essence scattered through raindrops, soaked up by trees, and swirling through the waves that buoyed the ships he had sailed on.
But Melissa was contained and finite, held in place by satin and oak. She would have hated the stiff formality and the dam of Maggie's grief broke for a moment to admit a wash of regret. Her sons made a wall behind her (in case she fainted?) and Dana squeezed her hand when the earth thumped against the hard wooden lid. It was too late now. Melissa's soul was with her Maker and ashes to ashes and dust to dust and we exalt Your name in the highest Thy kingdom come Thy will be done forever and ever, Amen.
Maggie couldn't be sure if it was simple logic or merely to preserve her own sanity, but she didn't blame Dana for Melissa's death. To do so would be akin to admitting she would have traded one for the other, and all Maggie knew was that watching Dana peer into a grave that could have been her own made the blood freeze in her veins.
Blink forward a few years. Charlie couldn't make it, but Tara's pregnant again, Bill's in town, and Maggie's sitting with Dana and discovering that having your child unexpectedly killed and watching your child die with agonizing slowness are two very different - though equally horrific - experiences. She finds herself thinking how these deaths suit her girls. Melissa, with her rash impulsivity and Dana, who measures everything thrice and still cuts with marked deliberateness.
Dark thoughts, but these are dark days.
And then there's Fox. Fox who is there even when he isn't there because his absence makes Dana anxious and distracted. Maggie wants to take her pretty, clever daughter by her bony shoulders and shake her until she can come up with some explanation for this absurd infatuation. Maggie has seen the way he touches her and - more significantly - the way she lets him.
They're sleeping together. They have to be. She knows Dana, knows her weakness for men in positions of authority. ("Paging Dr. Freud!" as her sister Olive would say.) Maggie remembers the interlude with a married professor in med school (she only discovered that by very accidentally overhearing a phone call between Dana and Melissa because she picked up the phone and obviously she couldn't just hang up because the girls would hear the click and it would just be so awkward, really), and there was that obnoxious Jack Willis when Dana broke her father's heart and joined the FBI.
But neither of those two had ever had a hold on her like this. Fox Mulder talked her daughter into putting a microchip in her neck. And this doctor, this Zuckerman fellow, hadn't batted an eyelash at it. Just sliced Dana's neck open and stuck God knows what in there. She is infuriated by her sense of helplessness, reduced to fetching ice chips and blankets because she has no miracle cures to offer like the man who holds her daughter in thrall.
"Mom," says Dana, whose voice is still stuffy. She's been chewing the ragged edge of a hangnail on one of her spidery fingers since crying in her mother's arms.
"What is it, honey?" Maggie twirls a lock of Dana's brittle hair, thinking about malpractice attorneys.
"I'd like it if you could call Father McCue."
Maggie snaps to attention like one of the middies her husband used to parade past the family. "Dana?"
"I believe that, based on the PET scan and my cessation of conventional treatments, it would be best if I were in a state of grace." Dana's voice is returning to its (often infuriating) cool neutrality.
Maggie closes her eyes for a moment, then looks at her daughter's hollow face. "I'll call him right now," she says, trying to keep the panic from creeping around the words.
"I'll be okay until morning. Right now I'd just like to rest, but if you could have him come when I get up in the morning..." She trails off casually, but the implication is unmistakable.
Maggie wants the priest there now, and she wants to keep her daughter awake until he arrives. She doesn't like the way Dana's eyes are burning too bright against her translucent skin. It makes her think of the frosted glass votives she sets out at Christmastime. Fragile shells full of fire, ringing out the year.
"It's afternoon. I'm sure it's no trouble for him to come out. I could just go ahead and -"
Dana's smile is genuine, if exhausted. "I'm not going anywhere just yet." She reaches for her mother's hand. "I promise. I just don't think I have the emotional energy left today. But if you could ask him to come first thing tomorrow, I'd be very grateful, Mom."
"Okay," Maggie says, ashamed of having needed to be reassured. "First thing tomorrow."
"I'd like to go outside for a bit. Do you think you could get the wheelchair, Mom?"
Maggie sighs. "You know Dr. Zuckerman likes you to wait at least forty-eight hours before going out into the sun after chemo."
"I haven't really seen the sky in ten days. I'll carry an umbrella."
"Your immune sys- "
"Never mind." Dana turns onto her side, her strangely luminous eyes fixed on the window. "I just want to get out of here," she mumbles against the pillow.
"You will." She arranges the blanket around her daughter's shoulders like she did when all her children were young enough to let her tuck them in. "Get some rest, Dana."
"Mom?"
"Yes?"
"I'm sorry I never told you things." She is already more than half asleep.
Maggie bites back a sob at the past tense. "It's who you've always been. Please don't apologize."
Please don't die.
***
Scully has her own ideas about absolution, and she curses Mulder for being too stubborn to let her take the blame for the shooting. Why had he come this morning with his mind made up, full of riddles and determination? She absently touches her hand to her cheek, in the place where he had kissed her. It is, she thinks, a fitting coda to her life that Mulder and Father McCue should cross paths in this room, both trying to offer her salvation.
Since Mulder left she has been unbearably anxious over the thought that he is, even now, on his way to federal prison. She knows he'll call when he can. Still, she was grateful when Father McCue arrived, if only at first for the distraction.
Receiving Last Rites had been surreal. Her mind kept slipping back to her sister's hospital room, imagining the same priest going through the same motions. The Scully girls were not long for this world, apparently.
Her mother's careworn face had implored her, appealed to her desire to give of herself, and Scully had bowed her head and clutched the rosary. The rhythm and cadence of the familiar words was hypnotic, all of it coming back to her in the presence of Father McCue the way tidbits of medical knowledge were resurfacing during her tenure as a cancer patient.
Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help, or sought thine intercession was left unaided.
Oncologic mutations on p53 typically occur in the central DNA-binding core domain.
Now sanctified, Scully fidgets against the coarse sheets and her longing to leave the hospital - either dead, dying or cured - has nearly become an obsession. She asked the nurse about the possibility of getting out for some fresh air. But the nurse - like Bill and her mother - toed Dr. Zuckerman's line, though Scully knows damned well her care is more palliative than curative at this point. She's been keeping the curtains drawn, as the view out the window torments her; a fly against the glass.
Scully glances over at the phone, itching to call Mulder and find out what happened at the hearing. Why doesn't he believe it's Skinner? Mulder and his damned hunches. But she trusts his hunches enough to have put a microchip into her neck, so why resist this? Fine. Skinner's not dirty. Mulder will tell her everything.
Provided he's not in custody.
She grimaces when a fist of nausea punches her in the stomach. She received her last round of chemo thirty-six hours ago, but the deleterious effects on her system are still lingering. She's grateful, at least, that the alopecia hasn't been pronounced, though the GI symptoms seemed to be doing their best to make up for the follicular shortcomings. She wonders what side effects Mulder's magical shrapnel will present.
As awful as the chemo has been, it was the radiation that had truly terrified her. Something about using radioactive materials to treat mutated cells seemed inherently flawed, and she'd shuddered through the procedure each time. Though it is a testament to the current perverseness of her life that her interstitial radiation therapy was applied via a device known as an implant. She had meant make a joke about it to Mulder, but the right opportunity had never presented itself.
A thump against the window startles Scully and, cautiously, she gets to her feet. She shuffles across the chilly floor and draws the blind up, looking around the courtyard. A movement on the ground catches her eye. There's a sparrow with a broken neck lying among the chrysanthemums. She blanches, willing it to die quickly.
"What are you doing out of bed?"
Scully turns at the sound of her brother's voice. "Bill, I didn't hear you come in."
He pushes the door closed, offering his sister a stern look tempered by a slight smile. "I was trying to catch you misbehaving."
"I was looking out the window, not running a marathon." A quick check reveals that the bird has gone still. She closes the blinds and turns, leaning against the radiator.
"How's your, uh…I mean, how are you feeling?" Bill scratches his elbow, looking self-conscious.
Scully is annoyed at her brother for dancing around like this. Bill, for all his faults, is scrupulously honest and prides himself on straightforwardness. Scully resents the patronization implicit in his avoidance. "Dr. Zuckerman has been monitoring me since the chip was put in and nothing worrisome has happened."
"But no improvement either."
"No."
Bill walks further into the room and sits on her bed. Scully watches the mattress sink, blankets and sheets settling around him. This bed, she thinks, is used to acclimating itself to new visitors. She wonders who will come to die in it when she's gone, then immediately chastises herself for being morbid and self-pitying.
"Dana, are you having some kind of relationship with your partner?"
That's the Bill she knows. "Some kind of relationship? That's a little vague, Bill. I suppose humans have 'some kind of relationship' with nearly everyone, haven't they?" She's not so far gone she can't needle him.
"You know what I mean."
Scully crosses her arms. "Yes, I do. And if I were having 'some kind of relationship' with Mulder, would that affect what you think of my decision to try out his treatment option?"
He sighs. "I don't know, Dana. I really don't. I just know that you've changed a great deal in the past few years and I'm worried about you."
"And you think that's because I'm having an affair with my partner?" Scully wonders briefly why the hell she hasn't bristled and denied things yet, instead of stringing Bill along.
"For crying out loud, Dana, I'm trying to figure out what's going on in your increasingly bizarre existence." Bill's on his feet at this point, his voice raised. "But you know what? You're right. It doesn't matter. What matters is that you, a doctor, have abandoned conventional medical treatment in favor of sticking a Cracker Jack prize in your neck!"
Scully finds herself oddly calmed by his loss of control and walks to the bed, sitting next to the place recently occupied by her brother. "Father McCue came by this morning."
"Mom told me."
"And what if I had decided to abandon conventional medical treatment - which isn't working anyway - and put my healing in God's hands? What then? Would we still be having this conversation?"
Bill runs his tongue over his top lip in the same way as his sister, then sits back down. "That's not the point. That's not what you did."
"But it's a fair question, don't you think?"
He laughs. "I always thought you'd have done better in law school than med school. You could have been anything you wanted, Dana."
She stiffens. "I am."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean -"
"I know." She leans against his arm, which he raises to put around her shoulders.
Moments pass in the silent room. "I wanted to meet the baby," she says at length.
"You will," he assures her, though Scully can hear the tears in his voice. "I prom-."
"Doesn't the Bible say something about not making promises? Swear not at all; neither by heaven or the Earth or Jerusalem or…I can't remember."
"Close enough for government work. Book of Matthew. Did you study up for Father McCue?"
"I used to be a nice Catholic girl. Or have you forgotten?"
He watches her in a way that makes her stomach squirm, and she can't for the life of her decide whether it's pity or kindness. "Take us the little foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines put forth tender grapes," he murmurs.
Scully flinches and looks away.
"Are you in love with him, Dana?"
"We're not sleeping together."
"That's not what I asked you." He touches the edge of the gauze on her neck. "Come visit Tara and me for Christmas. The baby will be here by then."
She looks up at her brother, feeling exhausted down to her oxygen-deprived marrow. "Bill, I can't make any plans that far away."
"Just say you'll come." His eyes are pleading.
She nods, and doesn't turn away when the hot tears drip down onto the faded cotton of the hospital gown.
***
Mulder's sitting on his couch, alternately bouncing his basketball against the floor and the wall. Chesapeake Crime Cleaners removed the bloodstains from the floor and carpet, and the minute particles of bone, hair, and gray matter from the rest of the vicinity. On the street below his window, a noisy construction crew is busting up the asphalt to repair a broken water main. Life is mostly back to normal. His brand of normal, anyway.
He hears Sa-man-tha over and over in the rhythmic bouncing of the ball. Could it really have been his sister, after all this time? Mulder, while open-minded, is not naive. He'd chosen Scully over Samantha once before, and, yesterday, he'd been prepared to choose Scully over himself. But he'd realized the lie was deeper than both of their lives, and that if he had to, he'd sacrifice them both for it.
Blevins. The pieces had come together in a flash so sudden that he'd made the accusation before the thoughts had finished forming. Rumor is that Blevins had swallowed nine millimeters of regret, though Mulder has his suspicions over how voluntary that decision was. He suspects it would be in poor taste to recommend Chesapeake Crime Cleaners to the higher ups at the Bureau.
He turns onto his back, cradling the basketball on his chest. His thoughts turn to Scully and the chance she has taken on his say-so. He wonders if her brother will kill him if she dies.
He wonders if he'll put up a fight.
Mulder pushes the thought of losing her from his mind. His head lolls back against the couch, and the stress of the past few days finally hits him full force. Mulder falls into a sleep so deep that he is oblivious to the jackhammers and shouting on the sidewalk below. The ball rolls from his hands and bounces a few times. Dreamless hours pass.
***
A muffled chirp interrupts his slumber. Mulder's eyelids drag open like a pair of iron portcullises. The chirp comes again, and, after a brief search, he retrieves his phone from between the couch cushions. "Mulnrf," he mumbles into it.
"Mulder, thank goodness! I've been calling all evening and didn't want to check in with Skinner until I heard from you. What happened at the hearing? Are you in trouble?"
He sits up, rubbing his eyes. "Scully, I'm sorry. I fell asleep. No, I named Blevins and all of the interest in Scott Ostelhoff has mysteriously vanished. Skinner's got nothing to do with any of it."
"Blevins?! Mulder, the day he assigned me to you, the Smoking Man was in his office. How could I have been so stupid not to see it?"
He imagines the infuriated look on her face. "Don't beat yourself up, Scully. I didn't figure it out until I was in there talking, and even then I wasn't positive. Just a hunch."
"Well, it was quite a hunch. Listen, can you come to the hospital tonight? I know it's past visiting hours, but I spoke to Dr. Zuckerman and he said it would be fine."
His stomach knots. "Scully, what's going on?"
"Everything is okay, Mulder. I want to talk to you about something and I'd prefer it to be in person."
"I'm on my way." Mulder hangs up and sticks his phone back in his pocket. Scully's idea of what constitutes everything being okay is enough to make him grab a roll of Tums off the desk as he heads out. He pops a few into his mouth, crunching them as he runs downstairs and summons a cab.
The ride to the hospital is a short one. He tosses cash over the seat to the cabbie, shuts the door, and is on his way to Scully's room when he is stopped at the nurses' station by a cranky looking woman in dog-print scrubs.
"Visiting hours ended over two hours ago," she informs him flatly.
"I know. But I spoke to my friend and she told me her doctor said it would be okay. Scully. Dana Scully."
"We don't have a Dr. Scully here."
Mulder bites his cheek to keep his temper in check. "She's the patient."
The nurse scans a chart. "Oh, yeah. Uh-huh. Let me see some ID, okay?"
Mulder hands the woman his badge and tries to smile in an agreeable fashion as she jots his information down with agonizing slowness. He takes the badge back a bit too snappily when she holds it out.
The nurse gives him a hard look, and then hands him a Visitor pass. "Don't make trouble," she warns him in a stern tone. "These people are sick."
Mulder half-runs down the hallway, stopping at Scully's door. He twists the knob and enters the room.
Scully is sitting up in bed, looking expectant and composed. The feverish sheen has gone out of her eyes, and something very like a smile is twitching the corners of her dry lips. "Mulder." Her voice is warm.
Mulder pushes the door closed. He feels like a Labrador retriever at a bridal shower in this space full of delicate objects and flowers. And, of course, there is the woman at center stage. He walks to her, then sits tentatively at the edge of the bed, taking her hand. "Scully, what's going on?"
"Dr. Zuckerman came by a few hours ago to make sure that there was no inflammation or anything at the incision site in my neck. And when he leaned over, I could smell his cologne." Scully looks up, searching Mulder's face to see if he understands what she's saying.
Mulder, still muzzy from exhaustion, looks blank for a moment before the pieces fall together. "You can smell things again? Scully, that's fantastic! Does he think it means you're improving?"
"It's more than that, Mulder. I had them do another PET scan, and there's nothing there."
"What do you mean there's nothing there? You mean the chip? Did it dissolve or something?"
Scully shakes her head, appearing to savor his puzzlement. "Mulder, I mean there's nothing there. No tumor. It's gone. I can smell because there's nothing compromising my olfactory nerves." She pulls a large manila folder off of the bedside table and opens it up to pages full of cranial images. "Look," she says.
Mulder stares at her, his mouth hanging open. He wants it to be true so badly that the ache is a palpable lump in his throat. He wants to believe she's unharmed and alive, and that he will not have to watch her go into the cold ground before the closing of the year. But he's seen too much. Samanthas, Crawfords, Gregors, Eves, shapeshifters…she could be anyone. Or anything.
Scully must sense his hesitation. She unbends her arm and picks at a scab on the inside of her elbow. "Red," she whispers when blood runs down over her skin.
He stares at the drops falling into the bed. "I don't…it isn't…"
She's beaming now. "I know. Really, I know. Dr. Zuckerman did several other scans and there's nothing. No visible trace of the tumor. He ran some bloodwork and the tumor antigens are gone too. It's like…well, I don't know what it's like, actually. I've never heard of anything like it." She laughs a giddy laugh, running her thumb over her fingertips in an unconscious gesture which immediately identifies Scully as Scully.
Mulder feels his throat constrict and he lunges forward to engulf her in his arms. He holds her close, breathing in the flat chemical scent of the hospital toiletries and laundry detergent, sifting past them for the familiar base note of her skin. He presses his nose to her hair as she tucks her head under his chin. Her prominent ribs curve like boomerangs, winging their way back.
Scully's half-laughing, half-crying, holding him so tight that her fingers dig painfully into his back.
She lied because I asked her to.
He wouldn't ask her to loosen her grip for the world.
After a few more moments she pulls away, wiping at her cheeks. She still appears well past the point of exhaustion, dark shadows bracketing her bloodshot eyes. But her smile is radiant, and he touches her face.
Scully's eyes slide closed as his fingers curve against her jaw line, tracing the indentation below her earlobe. They open when he takes her hand again.
"Where's your mother?" he asks, finally trusting himself to speak. "And Bill?"
"You're the only one I've called." The words are rough around the edges, the smooth polish of her voice gone ragged and husky. "You were the first one I called when I got sick. I wanted to tell you this first too."
Mulder watches her eyes fill up and he swallows, letting go of her hand. He reaches over to take her cross gently between his thumb and forefinger, brushing lightly against the slim white column of her throat. "Father McCue must have put in an awfully good word for you with his boss, Scully."
She smiles. "We'll probably never know what happened."
He drops the necklace, resting his hand on her thigh without realizing it. "And you're okay with that? With not knowing?" Mulder's voice is infinitely gentle. "Because I think what's happened to you represents the very core of what we've been working against. But it's up to you, of course."
"I didn't want to die," she says frankly. "It terrified me, knowing that, statistically, I had no chance of survival. I was afraid to go to sleep. I don't know if it was Dr. Zuckerman or God or this chip or what, but I just want to walk away and never look back." She lifts her chin up a little, as though daring him to challenge her.
"Okay," he says, feeling awkward. She has never discussed her fears so openly before and he isn't sure how to respond. He pulls at a loose thread on the blanket. "Scully, whatever you need, that's fine. That's what we'll do." He looks at her again, then down at the pages scattered across her lap. He tries not to wonder at what price this comes.
"Mulder?"
"Yes?"
"Take me outside."
He looks up, confused. "What?"
"Outside. I've been cooped up in this room for a week and a half except for when they cart me around for tests. This is a momentous evening. Don't make me spend all of it in here."
There is something faintly shrill in her voice, as she widens her eyes in an obvious attempt to look appealing, but the effect in her too-thin, too-white face is, instead, simply heartbreaking. If he saw her on television as the face of a charity, he'd send money immediately, whatever the cause.
"It's past ten o'clock and you may not have cancer anymore, Dr. Scully, but you're not quite back to yourself." He points at her dinner tray. "Look at this. Half a sandwich. Unfinished Jell-O. What kind of an invalid are you?"
"I'm not anymore. That's the point. Come on, Mulder. It's still summer. Technically." Scully gives the wheelchair in the corner a soulful gaze.
"It's September. Not exactly the dog days. When did Dr. Zuckerman say you could go home?"
"He just wants to do a few more tests."
"Fine, don't answer. He doesn't think you should be going outside until tomorrow at least though, does he? I'm guessing no one else would spirit you away from here, or you wouldn't have asked me."
Scully looks uncomfortable.
Mulder watches her for a moment. He considers that she came in here to die, and has been granted a reprieve. He also secretly likes the idea of her goading him into rule-breaking. "You have to wear a robe."
"Okay," she says quickly.
"And a blanket."
"Yes."
"Socks. And slippers. And you have to bring the rest of the sandwich and you have to eat it."
"Fine, fine. Whatever."
"And you have to speak in iambic pentameter."
"What?" She looks at him incredulously.
"Just making sure you were actually listening." Mulder gets up and walks to the wheelchair. He pushes it over to the bed, where Scully is putting slippers on over her little white ankle socks. He grabs her robe off of the chair and hands it to her.
He watches Scully tug the robe on, making a square knot of the belt at her waist. He holds the wheelchair steady as she climbs into it, then passes her a blanket
Scully tucks it around herself. "Thank you," she says.
"Don't thank me yet," he says, handing her and the remains of her sandwich. "That nurse out front seems to think I'm some kind of troublemaker."
"Imagine that," Scully says dryly.
"Be quiet and eat, Agent Provocateur." He wheels her out into the hall, peering around in the way that only a near-decade of sneaking in and out of covert government facilities can teach.
"There's a service elevator that way," Scully says, pointing to the left. "I bet we can take it down to the basement and come back up the main elevator to the lobby. Or there's probably a delivery entrance."
Mulder is amused by these James Bond shenanigans. She's a grown woman and can check herself out of the hospital any time she wants, much less go outside for some air on a temperate September night. But he's glad to see this playfulness at work in her; a spark he thought had gone out.
"Should I knock out an orderly and steal his uniform? Disguise you as a sack of laundry?"
"Mulder, shut up."
"Sandwich," he says warningly.
Scully takes a bite and gives him a baleful look. "It tastes terrible."
"That's how you know it's good for you. Where's the elevator?"
"See the wall on the other side of that vending - yeah. Turn right here."
Mulder follows the hallway to an elevator covered with lumpy green paint. He presses the down button and the doors slide open right away. He pushes the wheelchair in and selects the basement level. They ride down in silence, Scully nibbling at the gluey white bread.
They exit into a dimly lit hallway. Mulder follows signs on the wall to a delivery bay, and pushes the wheelchair up a ramp and out into the night air. He smiles at the exultant look on Scully's face.
She drinks in long drafts of air, craning her neck around the building. "There's a walkway to the courtyard past that tree, Mulder. Do you mind…?"
He turns sharply towards the walkway. "As long as you promise not to give me any grief when I make you go back in and call your mother in the next half hour or so, okay?"
"Scout's honor."
They pass under a narrow awning of elm and oak, emerging in a small courtyard bordered by the hospital on four of five sides. Scully looks up at the sky and sighs. "It's good to be outside," she says.
"Mind the mosquitoes," Mulder advises, smacking at his arm. "They're still afoot. Awing. Whatever." He enjoys the sight of her looking so relaxed.
"I doubt I have enough blood to tempt one after today," she laughs. "They were making pretty free with my samples down in the lab."
"It's good to see you like this, Scully." He wants to say more, to tell her that he now has a resurrection to pin his own faith to, but it feels cheap and clumsy against the simplicity of the moment.
"You brought me that chip."
"So you do believe that's what cured you?" He hadn’t meant to press her, but the words left his mouth without his full consent.
She smiles at him. "You love having all the answers."
He rests his hands on her shoulders, her collarbones an anchor under his fingers "No, that's your job. I just like asking the questions. We're a good team, I guess. Yin and yang, or something equally transcendent. It's undoubtedly cosmic."
Scully reaches one hand up, resting it on top of his. "I regret to inform you that my sister once told me that we do not share astrological compatibility, Mulder."
He squeezes her shoulder. "Say it ain't so."
"It's true. Pisces and Libra do not go well together. You are, apparently, capricious, dreamy, and loquacious. I am given to introspection, and can feel neglected by your ethereal tendencies. I am also given to whining and scolding."
He smiles broadly. "Why do I put up with you then?"
She doesn't answer, and Mulder cocks his head to see her blushing. "Aha," he says. "There is some measure of non-professional compatibility somewhere."
"The entire concept is absurd, Mulder," she informs him in a clipped tone.
He lowers his face to her seashell ear. "You don't believe in fate?"
"I don't believe our lives are preordained by the stars."
He straightens up, gesturing at the sky. "You believe in heaven, in the intercession of saints. There's a theory that starlight contains the souls of those who were taken up to avoid pain and suffering. Maybe they're all variants on the same kernel of truth."
Scully pats his hand, then drops her own to her lap. "When I was a kid, I read a story about how the Milky Way was formed. There were two archangels who loved each other so intensely that God had to separate them, because they loved each other more than they loved Him. He banished them each to opposite sides of the universe as a punishment. But, over eons, their yearning for one another crossed the space between them and built a bridge of light. Eventually, the two halves joined in the middle, and the archangels crossed the bridge and were reunited. And God let the bridge stand, because even He cannot destroy a thing built by love."
Mulder blinks a few times, having been lulled by her calming voice. "You've got me sold. A bridge of undying devotion across space and time is far less prosaic than billions of enormous nuclear reactors." From the corner of his eye, he sees her twisting in the wheelchair to follow his gaze. She leans sideways against the back of the seat, the armrest at her waist.
"They're just old light," she says, drawing her knees up and wrapping her arms around them under the blanket.
"Don't be so dismissive,'" he chides, facing her again. "We're looking back in time, Scully. That's its own kind of magic."
Scully tips her head back until she's staring straight upwards, and he imagines the stale hospital air being purged from her and replaced with something finer. Dr. Zuckerman doesn't know everything.
"Scully, you have to go call your family."
"I know." She drops her head, chewing on her thumb.
He wonders why the idea of the phone call makes her anxious. Mulder gets to his knees on the flagstone walkway, crossing his arms on the back of her seat and resting his chin on them. "Your mother's going to want to stay with you, isn't she?" he asks.
Scully nods gloomily.
"Are you feeling guilty for calling me first?"
"No. I'd feel guilty if I hadn't. But maybe you should make yourself scarce when they come. Bill is…well. You've seen." Scully leans forward to kiss him on the cheek. She's far too close to his mouth for propriety, but they've never been particularly concerned with conventional personal boundaries. Still, he is faintly surprised.
Mulder thinks of binary stars - two bodies orbiting a common center of mass - and watches Scully as she yawns under a fall of silver light.
***
Bill leans against the wall as his mother clutches Dana like she just dragged her from a burning building. Dana's smiling awkwardly, patting her back, and saying the kind of reassuring nonsense that has never come easily to her. He notes with dark pleasure that his sister's partner is nowhere to be seen. He's firmly convinced she's mistaken codependency for love.
Maggie finally sits back and wipes her face with her sleeve. "Dana, this is simply a miracle. Isn't it, Father McCue?"
"It most certainly is, Margaret. I'll be writing the Archbishop in the morning." The priest is looking at Dana like she's a sacred relic.
Dr. Zuckerman, who hasn't stopped grinning since he came in, adds, "It's definitely one for the books. I've never seen such a rapid recovery in my thirty-two years of medical practice."
"Dana's an over-achiever," Bill says, feeling buoyant. He's just gotten off the phone with Tara, who burst into tears of relief at the news. "Now you have to make good on that plane ticket."
His mother looks around, puzzled. "What plane ticket?"
Dana takes her hand. "Bill made me promise to come visit over Christmas. To see the baby."
A concerned crease appears in Maggie's forehead. "And what does Dr. Zuckerman say about that?"
Dr. Zuckerman smiles reassuringly. "Mrs. Scully, she'll be back to herself well before then. As long as she takes it easy now," he adds, waving a stern finger at Dana.
"When can I go back to work?"
Maggie looks horrified. "You need to concentrate on getting better. The FBI can do without you for a while."
Bill is unsurprised by the question. Dana made it to the ninth grade science fair - and won - with the flu. Still, he shakes his head in dismay. "You had untreatable brain cancer when you woke up two days ago. Let's give it some time, huh?"
"I just wanted an idea," she says defensively. "I've been gone a while."
Father McCue laughs. "You haven't changed since you were a little girl, have you?"
Dr. Zuckerman smiles. "A step at a time, okay? By all indications, the tumor is gone, but you still have a lot of recovering to do. And being in remission isn't the same as being cured." He checks the chart he's holding. "I'd particularly like it if you could at least get back up to a hundred pounds before returning to work."
"Okay," Dana agrees, looking faintly embarrassed.
Bill glances at his sister. He realized she'd lost a lot of weight, but the shapeless hospital gown disguises it to some extent. He was five years old when his parents brought her home from the hospital. He was allowed to hold her carefully on his lap while Melissa looked on enviously. He suspects she wouldn't feel much heavier in his arms if he went to pick her up now.
"It would also be good if there were someone who could help you with day-to-day things while you get your strength back. Your depleted bone marrow needs some time to reestablish itself, and you body's going to be devoting many of its resources to regaining equilibrium."
"I'll be staying with her," Maggie says quickly, as Bill knew she would. She's beaming at his sister, patting her hand comfortingly.
Dana offers a wan smile. "Mom, that really isn't necessary. I've got someone to come by and do all the cleaning, and I can handle the cooking. The grocery store delivers and really, there's not much else to do since my dog got eaten."
Dr. Zuckerman and Father McCue both look like they want to ask for the details of this story, but say nothing.
Bill suspects that Dana, even in her weakened condition, will prevail on this one, but his mother has a firmness to her face that should make it a hard-fought victory. He's not entirely regretful that he lives three thousand miles away from the pair of them.
"I won't hear another word about it, Dana. You need looking after. You let yourself get too run down."
"I appreciate your concern, Mom, but if there's some kind of crisis, you can walk from Cathedral Heights in fifteen minutes. There's no need to stay with me." Dana's voice is still friendly, but there's a subtle hardness in there too.
"I am not going to -"
"Margaret." Father McCue reaches across the bed to rest a hand on Maggie's shoulder. "This has to be Dana's choice."
She drops her head for a moment, then looks up. "You’re the doctor. I’m sure you know what’s best.”
Bill catches Dana's eye and sees the flicker of a smile in them.
"Thank you, Mom," she says. "I'd prefer to stay by myself, but I would love it if you'd come over to keep me company. I'm going to have a lot of hours to fill."
"But you'll be resting, of course, won't you? Taking naps when you get too exhausted?"
"Mom."
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." She smoothes Dana's hair off of her forehead, a doting look on her face. "You just never stop worrying."
Bill thinks about his unborn child, and as sympathetic as he is towards his sister's independence, he already knows he'd be acting exactly as his mother is if he were in her position.
They all turn when the door creaks open and a tall, bald man walks in. He looks uncomfortable and somewhat stern, but his face softens at the sight of Dana, who offers him a tentative smile. The man inclines his head a fraction in the briefest of nods, and a look of relief settles over Dana's face.
Bill wonders who he is, and what they have just forgiven one another for.
***
Mulder is now officially officially among the undead. Which, in his case, means he's back at work now that the federal government has decided that Scott Ostelhoff most definitely was attempting to use deadly force, necessitating Agent Mulder to discharge his weapon. No mandatory leave. Nothing. Mulder has been brooding over these facts for most of the day. It's getting late afternoon and all he has to show for himself is two paper cuts and a stapler fort made of binder clips.
His phone rings and he's pleased by the distraction, though he hadn't been doing much anyway. He draws little devil horns on a photograph of an allegedly psychic lobster as he answers the phone.
"Jed's Taxidermy Service. You snuff 'em, we stuff 'em."
"That's really more my forte, isn't it? I just wanted to let you know I am homeward bound in about two hours."
He sits up, smiling. "You are? Scully, that's excellent news."
"You have no idea. One more day in here and I think I would have gone crazy."
Scully does not take well to confinement, though her ingrained doctor's horror of non-compliance generally makes her follow medical orders. "Have you managed to avoid having your mother move in?"
"The results on that were what I had hoped, yes."
"She standing right there?"
"You bet."
"You're not going to do anything desperate, are you, Scully? Because sometimes you shoot people and
it-"
"I'm sorry, but I don't have any advice for you on that, Mulder. You should really see a specialist about an anti-fungal cream. I'll call you tomorrow. Have a nice evening." The line goes dead.
Mulder closes his phone and laughs. He wants very much to go and visit her at home later on, but doesn't think deliberately baiting her irascible brother is the best idea for her recuperation. Now that there won't be a funeral, Bill should be on his way home to his pregnant wife before long. And Mulder can generally charm Mrs. Scully enough for his purposes.
There's a knock at the door. Merely a formality, apparently, since Skinner comes into the office before Mulder can even ask who's there. "Any word on Scully?"
Mulder parks his stapler in its new shelter. "Just got off the phone with her, actually. She's headed home shortly."
"It's incredible. After that hearing, I really thought…" Skinner shakes his head in amazement.
"Sir, the men behind this -"
"The men behind this are dying at an expeditious rate. Scully's in remission. Let it go." There's a distinct warning note in his voice.
"Is that advice from you personally?"
"You're so paranoid. What more do you want? What better ending could there have been to this whole affair?"
Mulder remembers seeing her in the ICU, the way he felt as though the wind had been knocked out of him. She still doesn't know about the ova. His stomach clenches at the thought of having to one day tell her. Or worse, having her discover she's been the unwitting egg donor for a clutch of Crawfords or Samanthas.
"You're right," he says quietly. "She's okay. That's good enough."
Skinner looks sympathetic. "Go home and get some rest, Mulder. I don't even know why you came in today."
Mulder shrugs and gets to his feet. He grabs a newspaper clipping from his desk and glances down at Raphael the Psychic Lobster as he and Skinner walk to the hall. "Someone has to ask the tough questions, I guess."
***
Scully wakes up at nine-thirteen to the smell of bacon. Waking up to the smell of anything is still a novelty, but since she rarely ingests anything other than coffee and sarcasm before noon, the bacon is particularly noteworthy. It means her mother is here, getting into things. Moving them. Disorganizing her life. The next two weeks (she has already decided that is her maximum level of tolerance) are going to be very long.
She rubs her eyes, luxuriating in the feel of her own linens. Last night she'd talked her mother into letting her walk upstairs alone, slithered into her pajamas, and crashed into bed, too exhausted to properly savor being out of the hospital.
Dr. Zuckerman spent the day prior running every test he could think of, then released her with a heartfelt hug and an inch of paperwork. Scully climbed into her mother's car like it was the last helicopter out of Saigon, slamming the door with great satisfaction. She would have rather had Mulder see her home, because he's quiet and lacks her mother's nerve-wracking control freak tendencies, but Scully had more sense than to indulge that desire.
She sits up, the cool slide of silk pajamas feeling delicious, and swings her legs over the edge of the bed. Nothing clicks or beeps or winds treacherously around her ankle when she stands. Scully yawns widely, lacing her fingers together as she stretches and cracks her back. She tightens the drawstring on her pajama bottoms and pads to the bathroom door.
Cleansers, creams, and scrubs, all in pretty bottles on the shelf. Scully lingers over them, sniffing things and becoming reacquainted with her skincare regimen. She brushes her teeth with toothpaste that doesn't taste like it's been stored in a tin can. She laughs at herself for delighting in toilet paper that is white and fluffy instead of crinkly and grayish. Feeling fragrant and human, Scully is now prepared to face life as a convalescent.
She walks through her bedroom door, and sees that the flowers from the hospital are in vases on various surfaces. She moves farther into the living area and observes that her mother, who is emerging from the kitchen, has set the table for three. There are little napkin pockets for the silverware.
"Good morning, Mom."
Maggie nearly drops the tray of toast. "Dana! You startled me. Good morning. Here, let me just…" She sets the platter down, then kisses Scully's cheek. "Bill should be here any minute. He ran out for some orange juice. How did you sleep?"
Scully eyes the food. There is a lot of it. A whole lot. "Good. Great. You didn't have to make breakfast."
"You have eight pounds to gain."
She laughs. "Not all in one sitting." Scully pulls out a chair and settles into it. "But thanks, Mom. Everything looks delicious."
The front door opens and her brother comes in holding a plastic bag and a cup of coffee. "I didn't know if you liked pulp or not, so I got both kinds." He shuts the door with his hip, then walks to the table and sets the orange juice down. Bill leans forward to drop a kiss on the crown of Scully's head before sitting next to her. "Welcome home."
"Thanks Bill." Scully helps herself to a piece of toast and spreads it with strawberry jam.
"There's butter," Maggie says helpfully, as she reaches over to slide bacon onto Scully's plate. "I left it out to soften."
"I don't care for butter, but thanks."
Maggie sits across from her children. "Have some eggs then. And cheese."
"Wouldn't it be ironic to survive cancer only to die from heart disease?" Scully wonders aloud. She feels faintly guilty, but the temptation was irresistible.
"Dana!" Maggie is aghast.
Bill coughs, and Scully suspects he's trying to muffle a laugh.
"Sorry," she says, crunching on a slice of bacon. It has occurred to her that every calorie she ingests brings her a little bit closer to returning to work.
"Bill, what time is your flight?" Maggie asks, gesturing with a section of orange.
"Three-forty."
Maggie gets up when the tea kettle whistles from the stove. "We'll leave for the airport at two," she says over her shoulder. "Dana, after that I'm going to go out and get some all natural cleaning supplies because I don't think you should exposed to all of those chemicals even if you're not doing the cleaning yourself."
Scully opens her mouth to protest, but Bill pinches her elbow.
"Ow, dammit," she hisses.
"Just shut up and let her," he hisses back.
"She's going to take over my life."
"Be a good girl, get better, and then you can go back to work and risk your neck, all right?"
Scully glares, but says nothing when her mother returns with the kettle.
Maggie drops a teabag into Scully's mug, then fills it with steaming water. "This has peppercorns and mint and things in it. It's supposed to improve your appetite." She then fills her own mug.
"Sounds intriguing. I want to go to church later, Mom."
Maggie sits back down. "Oh?" she says, sipping at her tea.
Scully is not fooled by her casual tone. "Whatever happened to me, it didn't happen to all of the other people in that oncology ward. Who's the patron saint of cancer patients?" she asks.
"Saint Peregrine. I have a chaplet. "
"Of course you do." And you've probably worn the polish off the beads, Scully thinks. She feels ungrateful and it makes her waspish.
"We'll go after the airport, then. I have to say this is a surprise, Dana."
"No atheists in foxholes," Bill says, smirking around a mouthful of egg.
"That's incredibly condescending, Bill," Scully snaps. "I'm sure atheists are just as certain of their beliefs as you are of yours."
"The point of being an atheist is that you don't believe in anything."
"No, they just don't believe in God. That's not the same as 'anything.'"
He washes his eggs down with coffee. "Do they believe in aliens?"
"Unlike you, I don't presume to know what people believe." She takes a dainty bite of toast.
"Bill, Dana." Maggie scolds, as though they aren't in their thirties. "Let's try and be pleasant."
"Honestly. I mean, I'm really sick here, Bill." Scully coughs on her brother's shirt.
"Dana's getting germs on me. Make her stop."
"Tattletale."
"Midget."
Maggie shakes her head when they cackle at one another.
Scully pushes her chair from the table, dabbing at her mouth with a napkin as she stands. "Everything was great, Mom, thanks. I'm going to go hop in the shower and get dressed." She doesn't want to admit that this short visit has already left her so fatigued she suspects she could easily sleep for the rest of the day. The long bones in her arms and legs feel bruised and throbbing.
She walks to her bedroom, uncomfortable in the knowledge that her mother and brother will be talking about her once she's out of earshot. Scully takes her pajamas and underwear off, tossing them in the hamper. She sits down on her bed, holding her head for a moment when her vision starts to swim.
Finally feeling steady enough to get up, she takes small steps to the bathroom, guiding herself along the wall to the shower. The water gets cranked to as hot as she can stand it before she climbs in. Scully works her shampoo into a lather, then rinses it out and covers her hair in rich conditioner. She stands there until her knees start to buckle and she slides down the tile.
Scully sits in the bottom of the tub and cries, letting the steamy water sluice over her aching body.
***
Frohike glances in the mirror and straightens his collar. He is eager to see Scully, though not eager enough to have broken out the tux again. He's willing to admit that was overkill, even if she does have an obvious weakness for a man in a suit. His new approach will be subtle and suave.
The doorbell rings. He, Langly, and Byers exchange excited glances. Frohike goes to the wall to admit the visitors, but his face falls when the security camera reveals only Mulder and two large paper bags in the hallway. Sorely disappointed, he buzzes the door open.
"Why isn't Scully here?" he demands as the taller man edges past him to the table.
Mulder plunks the bags down and looks annoyed. "Nice to see you too, honey."
Frohike glares, crossing his arms. He feels cheated and cantankerous. "Can it, princess. I can look at your ugly mug any old time."
"Yeah, where's our favorite medical miracle?" Langly asks as he lopes over, presumably in search of his wonton soup.
Mulder flops into a chair. "Mrs. Scully wouldn't let her come out and play."
Frohike gapes, trying to imagine the fearsomeness that must be embodied by Scully's mother. They've only met briefly. "You can't be serious."
Mulder opens a package of chopsticks and uses them to pick up a broken transistor. "In essence, yes, I am."
Langly look incredulous. "Does she know about the advance copy of An American Werewolf in Paris? Because that won't even be in theaters 'til next month."
"I did my best, boys. Sorry."
Byers sits down next to Mulder with a carton of lo mein. "How's she been since she got home? We haven't seen her since one visit to the hospital and she didn't look very well then. She dozed off after we were there for five minutes."
Mulder sighs, and abandons the transistor for a chunk of broccoli. "She's good." He chews his food dispiritedly.
This lack of exuberance is unsettling. The world has twice come perilously close to existing without Scully in it, and both experiences left Frohike rattled and heartsick. He cannot accept the possibility that she is once more in the valley of the shadow. "She is okay, isn't she Mulder?" he asks, anxiety churning his stomach like a whirlpool.
"Stellar." Mulder throws his chopsticks at the sink.
Frohike isn't sure what's going on, but he's certain that he doesn't like it. He's known Mulder for a long time now. Long enough to see him fraying at the edges the way he does when he's cornered. "But the chip worked, right?"
"Oh, yeah, it worked. It worked great," Mulder says bitterly. He gets to his feet and paces the room. "You guys wouldn't believe it. It's practically like she was never abducted, returned in a coma, and given cancer. It's a fucking fairytale." He slams his hand against the wall.
Frohike winces. Langly and Byers look shocked.
"Isn't it though?" Byers says softly after a moment. "Isn't this a happy ending?"
Frohike is, once more, grateful for Byers' background in public affairs.
Mulder stares at him. "This isn't magic. This is a chip, engineered to cure an engineered disease. You think this was benevolence? Why is everyone acting like it's all over now? If anything, something new is cooking here. The three of you should know that better than anyone."
Frohike looks at his friend, who appears sleep-deprived and hollowed-out. "Mulder, you may be right, but what can we do? They have to move first, and then we'll get the bastards who did this to her."
"We'll go Mortal Kombat on their asses," Langly asserts.
Mulder shakes his head. "No. It can't continue like this. She can't keep being bait for them to use. I need to make her leave the X-Files."
Can he really be so oblivious? "Mulder -"
"Frohike, they gave her cancer for Christ's sake. What comes next, huh? How do you up the ante after that? Ebola? I'm getting Skinner to reassign her."
Frohike walks over to Mulder and puts a sympathetic hand on his arm. "Mulder," he says quietly, wishing he didn't have to do this. "That won't stop them from using her against you if they have to. They don't… they don't just do it because she's your partner." He clears his throat, feeling uncomfortable, and sees Byers look away.
Mulder closes his eyes for a moment. "I know." The words sound as though they’ve been pulled reluctantly from a place deep inside of him, somewhere he thought they'd be safe from prying eyes and ears. "But what else can I do?" he continues. "How can I ask her to stay after all she's been through?" He sits on the floor, looking weary.
"How can you ask her to leave after all she's been through?" Byers asks.
Mulder looks at him, uncertainly at first, and then as though he hates him a little for the validity of the question. His face falls and he draws his knees up, resting his head on his arms.
Melvin Frohike was once a champion tango dancer, and he knows when to leave the stage.
***
Part 2
RATING: Strong R verging on NC-17 for language and sexual content.
SPOILERS: Redux II and Detour
DISCLAIMER: Breaking seal constitutes acceptance of agreement. Proceed at your own risk. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. For recreational purposes only. Driver does not carry cash. And, as always, thank you for choosing Aloysia Airlines for your direct flight from 1013 to fanfic.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: This story was written for xf_is_love . It wasn't supposed to be nearly so long, but it just kind of snowballed and, well, here's what it turned into. Many, many thanks to dashakay , leucocrystal , andscarletbaldy for their amazing job on helping me to get this story written and edited in just four short weeks. You ladies are the best!
The story that Scully remembers about the Milky Way is from L.M. Montgomery's The Story Girl.
Author's notes continued at the end, spoilers contained therein.
***
O wrangling schools, that search what fire
Shall burn this world, had none the wit
Unto this knowledge to aspire,
That this her fever might be it?
And yet she cannot waste by this,
Nor long bear this torturing wrong,
For more corruption needful is,
To fuel such a fever long.
John Donne, A Fever
***
His Eminence, James Cardinal Hickey, D.D.
Your Eminence:
I am writing to tell you about a woman in my parish in the hope that you can guide me in my attempts to minister to her. She is currently being treated for a very serious - possibly terminal - type of cancer, and is also experiencing what can only be termed as a crisis of faith. The woman is a doctor and it seems to me that she feels a need to choose between her vocation and her faith.
Her mother is a very dear friend of mine from years back, and approached me in hopes that I could help her daughter come back to the Church during this dark time. She is extremely anxious that her daughter should be reconciled with her faith. I am always grateful for a chance to help minister to those who have strayed, though I have made it clear to the mother that too much pressure can turn a troubled soul even further from the path of righteousness. To this end, I have done my best to approach the woman in a non-aggressive manner.
However, she has so far been quite resistant to what I have had to say, and seems almost offended by my presence. I don't want to push her away, but as you surely know, Your Eminence, these are the times in life when having one's heart open to the love and healing of Our Savior is most critical. I feel I must press on to be true to my calling, but I do not wish to alienate her from the Church.
I thank you for taking the time to read this. I await your guidance, and know that through Jesus all things are possible. I continue to pray on the matter.
I remain your humble servant in Christ,
Thomas McCue
***
When Melissa was killed, Maggie Scully thought it only natural that the world should stop and grieve with her. She was bewildered that horns should beep and people should laugh and babies should try and play peek-a-boo with her in the following days.
Her sons came home. Charlie, whose cell phone kept ringing with calls from cities she'd never heard of, and Bill, who guided her about town like a seeing eye dog; helping her do things like pick out a coffin and flowers. Tara had just suffered another miscarriage and couldn't travel, but she called twice a day to listen to stories about when the Scully children were small. Maggie wondered if it was harder to lose a baby you never even got to hold or a woman you thought had made it well past the danger zone.
She wondered too what her other daughter - for whom death was her bread and butter - thought of it all. She knew Dana had a clear picture in her head of what had been done to Melissa's body by the cold hands of the medical examiner. Dana heard the kinds of jokes police officers tell at crime scenes. Maybe she had even told them sometimes. Maggie wasn't sure what Dana did anymore. She wasn't even sure who Dana was anymore.
On the day of the funeral, Maggie watched them lower her little girl into a dark grave and bit her tongue against crying out that Melissa was scared of small spaces, that she had hated them as a child, and that someone had to get her out of that awful box.
Her husband's earthly remains were scattered across the wide sea he had loved and the knowledge comforted her. The world was waterlogged and when she missed him, as she often did, she imagined his essence scattered through raindrops, soaked up by trees, and swirling through the waves that buoyed the ships he had sailed on.
But Melissa was contained and finite, held in place by satin and oak. She would have hated the stiff formality and the dam of Maggie's grief broke for a moment to admit a wash of regret. Her sons made a wall behind her (in case she fainted?) and Dana squeezed her hand when the earth thumped against the hard wooden lid. It was too late now. Melissa's soul was with her Maker and ashes to ashes and dust to dust and we exalt Your name in the highest Thy kingdom come Thy will be done forever and ever, Amen.
Maggie couldn't be sure if it was simple logic or merely to preserve her own sanity, but she didn't blame Dana for Melissa's death. To do so would be akin to admitting she would have traded one for the other, and all Maggie knew was that watching Dana peer into a grave that could have been her own made the blood freeze in her veins.
Blink forward a few years. Charlie couldn't make it, but Tara's pregnant again, Bill's in town, and Maggie's sitting with Dana and discovering that having your child unexpectedly killed and watching your child die with agonizing slowness are two very different - though equally horrific - experiences. She finds herself thinking how these deaths suit her girls. Melissa, with her rash impulsivity and Dana, who measures everything thrice and still cuts with marked deliberateness.
Dark thoughts, but these are dark days.
And then there's Fox. Fox who is there even when he isn't there because his absence makes Dana anxious and distracted. Maggie wants to take her pretty, clever daughter by her bony shoulders and shake her until she can come up with some explanation for this absurd infatuation. Maggie has seen the way he touches her and - more significantly - the way she lets him.
They're sleeping together. They have to be. She knows Dana, knows her weakness for men in positions of authority. ("Paging Dr. Freud!" as her sister Olive would say.) Maggie remembers the interlude with a married professor in med school (she only discovered that by very accidentally overhearing a phone call between Dana and Melissa because she picked up the phone and obviously she couldn't just hang up because the girls would hear the click and it would just be so awkward, really), and there was that obnoxious Jack Willis when Dana broke her father's heart and joined the FBI.
But neither of those two had ever had a hold on her like this. Fox Mulder talked her daughter into putting a microchip in her neck. And this doctor, this Zuckerman fellow, hadn't batted an eyelash at it. Just sliced Dana's neck open and stuck God knows what in there. She is infuriated by her sense of helplessness, reduced to fetching ice chips and blankets because she has no miracle cures to offer like the man who holds her daughter in thrall.
"Mom," says Dana, whose voice is still stuffy. She's been chewing the ragged edge of a hangnail on one of her spidery fingers since crying in her mother's arms.
"What is it, honey?" Maggie twirls a lock of Dana's brittle hair, thinking about malpractice attorneys.
"I'd like it if you could call Father McCue."
Maggie snaps to attention like one of the middies her husband used to parade past the family. "Dana?"
"I believe that, based on the PET scan and my cessation of conventional treatments, it would be best if I were in a state of grace." Dana's voice is returning to its (often infuriating) cool neutrality.
Maggie closes her eyes for a moment, then looks at her daughter's hollow face. "I'll call him right now," she says, trying to keep the panic from creeping around the words.
"I'll be okay until morning. Right now I'd just like to rest, but if you could have him come when I get up in the morning..." She trails off casually, but the implication is unmistakable.
Maggie wants the priest there now, and she wants to keep her daughter awake until he arrives. She doesn't like the way Dana's eyes are burning too bright against her translucent skin. It makes her think of the frosted glass votives she sets out at Christmastime. Fragile shells full of fire, ringing out the year.
"It's afternoon. I'm sure it's no trouble for him to come out. I could just go ahead and -"
Dana's smile is genuine, if exhausted. "I'm not going anywhere just yet." She reaches for her mother's hand. "I promise. I just don't think I have the emotional energy left today. But if you could ask him to come first thing tomorrow, I'd be very grateful, Mom."
"Okay," Maggie says, ashamed of having needed to be reassured. "First thing tomorrow."
"I'd like to go outside for a bit. Do you think you could get the wheelchair, Mom?"
Maggie sighs. "You know Dr. Zuckerman likes you to wait at least forty-eight hours before going out into the sun after chemo."
"I haven't really seen the sky in ten days. I'll carry an umbrella."
"Your immune sys- "
"Never mind." Dana turns onto her side, her strangely luminous eyes fixed on the window. "I just want to get out of here," she mumbles against the pillow.
"You will." She arranges the blanket around her daughter's shoulders like she did when all her children were young enough to let her tuck them in. "Get some rest, Dana."
"Mom?"
"Yes?"
"I'm sorry I never told you things." She is already more than half asleep.
Maggie bites back a sob at the past tense. "It's who you've always been. Please don't apologize."
Please don't die.
***
Scully has her own ideas about absolution, and she curses Mulder for being too stubborn to let her take the blame for the shooting. Why had he come this morning with his mind made up, full of riddles and determination? She absently touches her hand to her cheek, in the place where he had kissed her. It is, she thinks, a fitting coda to her life that Mulder and Father McCue should cross paths in this room, both trying to offer her salvation.
Since Mulder left she has been unbearably anxious over the thought that he is, even now, on his way to federal prison. She knows he'll call when he can. Still, she was grateful when Father McCue arrived, if only at first for the distraction.
Receiving Last Rites had been surreal. Her mind kept slipping back to her sister's hospital room, imagining the same priest going through the same motions. The Scully girls were not long for this world, apparently.
Her mother's careworn face had implored her, appealed to her desire to give of herself, and Scully had bowed her head and clutched the rosary. The rhythm and cadence of the familiar words was hypnotic, all of it coming back to her in the presence of Father McCue the way tidbits of medical knowledge were resurfacing during her tenure as a cancer patient.
Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help, or sought thine intercession was left unaided.
Oncologic mutations on p53 typically occur in the central DNA-binding core domain.
Now sanctified, Scully fidgets against the coarse sheets and her longing to leave the hospital - either dead, dying or cured - has nearly become an obsession. She asked the nurse about the possibility of getting out for some fresh air. But the nurse - like Bill and her mother - toed Dr. Zuckerman's line, though Scully knows damned well her care is more palliative than curative at this point. She's been keeping the curtains drawn, as the view out the window torments her; a fly against the glass.
Scully glances over at the phone, itching to call Mulder and find out what happened at the hearing. Why doesn't he believe it's Skinner? Mulder and his damned hunches. But she trusts his hunches enough to have put a microchip into her neck, so why resist this? Fine. Skinner's not dirty. Mulder will tell her everything.
Provided he's not in custody.
She grimaces when a fist of nausea punches her in the stomach. She received her last round of chemo thirty-six hours ago, but the deleterious effects on her system are still lingering. She's grateful, at least, that the alopecia hasn't been pronounced, though the GI symptoms seemed to be doing their best to make up for the follicular shortcomings. She wonders what side effects Mulder's magical shrapnel will present.
As awful as the chemo has been, it was the radiation that had truly terrified her. Something about using radioactive materials to treat mutated cells seemed inherently flawed, and she'd shuddered through the procedure each time. Though it is a testament to the current perverseness of her life that her interstitial radiation therapy was applied via a device known as an implant. She had meant make a joke about it to Mulder, but the right opportunity had never presented itself.
A thump against the window startles Scully and, cautiously, she gets to her feet. She shuffles across the chilly floor and draws the blind up, looking around the courtyard. A movement on the ground catches her eye. There's a sparrow with a broken neck lying among the chrysanthemums. She blanches, willing it to die quickly.
"What are you doing out of bed?"
Scully turns at the sound of her brother's voice. "Bill, I didn't hear you come in."
He pushes the door closed, offering his sister a stern look tempered by a slight smile. "I was trying to catch you misbehaving."
"I was looking out the window, not running a marathon." A quick check reveals that the bird has gone still. She closes the blinds and turns, leaning against the radiator.
"How's your, uh…I mean, how are you feeling?" Bill scratches his elbow, looking self-conscious.
Scully is annoyed at her brother for dancing around like this. Bill, for all his faults, is scrupulously honest and prides himself on straightforwardness. Scully resents the patronization implicit in his avoidance. "Dr. Zuckerman has been monitoring me since the chip was put in and nothing worrisome has happened."
"But no improvement either."
"No."
Bill walks further into the room and sits on her bed. Scully watches the mattress sink, blankets and sheets settling around him. This bed, she thinks, is used to acclimating itself to new visitors. She wonders who will come to die in it when she's gone, then immediately chastises herself for being morbid and self-pitying.
"Dana, are you having some kind of relationship with your partner?"
That's the Bill she knows. "Some kind of relationship? That's a little vague, Bill. I suppose humans have 'some kind of relationship' with nearly everyone, haven't they?" She's not so far gone she can't needle him.
"You know what I mean."
Scully crosses her arms. "Yes, I do. And if I were having 'some kind of relationship' with Mulder, would that affect what you think of my decision to try out his treatment option?"
He sighs. "I don't know, Dana. I really don't. I just know that you've changed a great deal in the past few years and I'm worried about you."
"And you think that's because I'm having an affair with my partner?" Scully wonders briefly why the hell she hasn't bristled and denied things yet, instead of stringing Bill along.
"For crying out loud, Dana, I'm trying to figure out what's going on in your increasingly bizarre existence." Bill's on his feet at this point, his voice raised. "But you know what? You're right. It doesn't matter. What matters is that you, a doctor, have abandoned conventional medical treatment in favor of sticking a Cracker Jack prize in your neck!"
Scully finds herself oddly calmed by his loss of control and walks to the bed, sitting next to the place recently occupied by her brother. "Father McCue came by this morning."
"Mom told me."
"And what if I had decided to abandon conventional medical treatment - which isn't working anyway - and put my healing in God's hands? What then? Would we still be having this conversation?"
Bill runs his tongue over his top lip in the same way as his sister, then sits back down. "That's not the point. That's not what you did."
"But it's a fair question, don't you think?"
He laughs. "I always thought you'd have done better in law school than med school. You could have been anything you wanted, Dana."
She stiffens. "I am."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean -"
"I know." She leans against his arm, which he raises to put around her shoulders.
Moments pass in the silent room. "I wanted to meet the baby," she says at length.
"You will," he assures her, though Scully can hear the tears in his voice. "I prom-."
"Doesn't the Bible say something about not making promises? Swear not at all; neither by heaven or the Earth or Jerusalem or…I can't remember."
"Close enough for government work. Book of Matthew. Did you study up for Father McCue?"
"I used to be a nice Catholic girl. Or have you forgotten?"
He watches her in a way that makes her stomach squirm, and she can't for the life of her decide whether it's pity or kindness. "Take us the little foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines put forth tender grapes," he murmurs.
Scully flinches and looks away.
"Are you in love with him, Dana?"
"We're not sleeping together."
"That's not what I asked you." He touches the edge of the gauze on her neck. "Come visit Tara and me for Christmas. The baby will be here by then."
She looks up at her brother, feeling exhausted down to her oxygen-deprived marrow. "Bill, I can't make any plans that far away."
"Just say you'll come." His eyes are pleading.
She nods, and doesn't turn away when the hot tears drip down onto the faded cotton of the hospital gown.
***
Mulder's sitting on his couch, alternately bouncing his basketball against the floor and the wall. Chesapeake Crime Cleaners removed the bloodstains from the floor and carpet, and the minute particles of bone, hair, and gray matter from the rest of the vicinity. On the street below his window, a noisy construction crew is busting up the asphalt to repair a broken water main. Life is mostly back to normal. His brand of normal, anyway.
He hears Sa-man-tha over and over in the rhythmic bouncing of the ball. Could it really have been his sister, after all this time? Mulder, while open-minded, is not naive. He'd chosen Scully over Samantha once before, and, yesterday, he'd been prepared to choose Scully over himself. But he'd realized the lie was deeper than both of their lives, and that if he had to, he'd sacrifice them both for it.
Blevins. The pieces had come together in a flash so sudden that he'd made the accusation before the thoughts had finished forming. Rumor is that Blevins had swallowed nine millimeters of regret, though Mulder has his suspicions over how voluntary that decision was. He suspects it would be in poor taste to recommend Chesapeake Crime Cleaners to the higher ups at the Bureau.
He turns onto his back, cradling the basketball on his chest. His thoughts turn to Scully and the chance she has taken on his say-so. He wonders if her brother will kill him if she dies.
He wonders if he'll put up a fight.
Mulder pushes the thought of losing her from his mind. His head lolls back against the couch, and the stress of the past few days finally hits him full force. Mulder falls into a sleep so deep that he is oblivious to the jackhammers and shouting on the sidewalk below. The ball rolls from his hands and bounces a few times. Dreamless hours pass.
***
A muffled chirp interrupts his slumber. Mulder's eyelids drag open like a pair of iron portcullises. The chirp comes again, and, after a brief search, he retrieves his phone from between the couch cushions. "Mulnrf," he mumbles into it.
"Mulder, thank goodness! I've been calling all evening and didn't want to check in with Skinner until I heard from you. What happened at the hearing? Are you in trouble?"
He sits up, rubbing his eyes. "Scully, I'm sorry. I fell asleep. No, I named Blevins and all of the interest in Scott Ostelhoff has mysteriously vanished. Skinner's got nothing to do with any of it."
"Blevins?! Mulder, the day he assigned me to you, the Smoking Man was in his office. How could I have been so stupid not to see it?"
He imagines the infuriated look on her face. "Don't beat yourself up, Scully. I didn't figure it out until I was in there talking, and even then I wasn't positive. Just a hunch."
"Well, it was quite a hunch. Listen, can you come to the hospital tonight? I know it's past visiting hours, but I spoke to Dr. Zuckerman and he said it would be fine."
His stomach knots. "Scully, what's going on?"
"Everything is okay, Mulder. I want to talk to you about something and I'd prefer it to be in person."
"I'm on my way." Mulder hangs up and sticks his phone back in his pocket. Scully's idea of what constitutes everything being okay is enough to make him grab a roll of Tums off the desk as he heads out. He pops a few into his mouth, crunching them as he runs downstairs and summons a cab.
The ride to the hospital is a short one. He tosses cash over the seat to the cabbie, shuts the door, and is on his way to Scully's room when he is stopped at the nurses' station by a cranky looking woman in dog-print scrubs.
"Visiting hours ended over two hours ago," she informs him flatly.
"I know. But I spoke to my friend and she told me her doctor said it would be okay. Scully. Dana Scully."
"We don't have a Dr. Scully here."
Mulder bites his cheek to keep his temper in check. "She's the patient."
The nurse scans a chart. "Oh, yeah. Uh-huh. Let me see some ID, okay?"
Mulder hands the woman his badge and tries to smile in an agreeable fashion as she jots his information down with agonizing slowness. He takes the badge back a bit too snappily when she holds it out.
The nurse gives him a hard look, and then hands him a Visitor pass. "Don't make trouble," she warns him in a stern tone. "These people are sick."
Mulder half-runs down the hallway, stopping at Scully's door. He twists the knob and enters the room.
Scully is sitting up in bed, looking expectant and composed. The feverish sheen has gone out of her eyes, and something very like a smile is twitching the corners of her dry lips. "Mulder." Her voice is warm.
Mulder pushes the door closed. He feels like a Labrador retriever at a bridal shower in this space full of delicate objects and flowers. And, of course, there is the woman at center stage. He walks to her, then sits tentatively at the edge of the bed, taking her hand. "Scully, what's going on?"
"Dr. Zuckerman came by a few hours ago to make sure that there was no inflammation or anything at the incision site in my neck. And when he leaned over, I could smell his cologne." Scully looks up, searching Mulder's face to see if he understands what she's saying.
Mulder, still muzzy from exhaustion, looks blank for a moment before the pieces fall together. "You can smell things again? Scully, that's fantastic! Does he think it means you're improving?"
"It's more than that, Mulder. I had them do another PET scan, and there's nothing there."
"What do you mean there's nothing there? You mean the chip? Did it dissolve or something?"
Scully shakes her head, appearing to savor his puzzlement. "Mulder, I mean there's nothing there. No tumor. It's gone. I can smell because there's nothing compromising my olfactory nerves." She pulls a large manila folder off of the bedside table and opens it up to pages full of cranial images. "Look," she says.
Mulder stares at her, his mouth hanging open. He wants it to be true so badly that the ache is a palpable lump in his throat. He wants to believe she's unharmed and alive, and that he will not have to watch her go into the cold ground before the closing of the year. But he's seen too much. Samanthas, Crawfords, Gregors, Eves, shapeshifters…she could be anyone. Or anything.
Scully must sense his hesitation. She unbends her arm and picks at a scab on the inside of her elbow. "Red," she whispers when blood runs down over her skin.
He stares at the drops falling into the bed. "I don't…it isn't…"
She's beaming now. "I know. Really, I know. Dr. Zuckerman did several other scans and there's nothing. No visible trace of the tumor. He ran some bloodwork and the tumor antigens are gone too. It's like…well, I don't know what it's like, actually. I've never heard of anything like it." She laughs a giddy laugh, running her thumb over her fingertips in an unconscious gesture which immediately identifies Scully as Scully.
Mulder feels his throat constrict and he lunges forward to engulf her in his arms. He holds her close, breathing in the flat chemical scent of the hospital toiletries and laundry detergent, sifting past them for the familiar base note of her skin. He presses his nose to her hair as she tucks her head under his chin. Her prominent ribs curve like boomerangs, winging their way back.
Scully's half-laughing, half-crying, holding him so tight that her fingers dig painfully into his back.
She lied because I asked her to.
He wouldn't ask her to loosen her grip for the world.
After a few more moments she pulls away, wiping at her cheeks. She still appears well past the point of exhaustion, dark shadows bracketing her bloodshot eyes. But her smile is radiant, and he touches her face.
Scully's eyes slide closed as his fingers curve against her jaw line, tracing the indentation below her earlobe. They open when he takes her hand again.
"Where's your mother?" he asks, finally trusting himself to speak. "And Bill?"
"You're the only one I've called." The words are rough around the edges, the smooth polish of her voice gone ragged and husky. "You were the first one I called when I got sick. I wanted to tell you this first too."
Mulder watches her eyes fill up and he swallows, letting go of her hand. He reaches over to take her cross gently between his thumb and forefinger, brushing lightly against the slim white column of her throat. "Father McCue must have put in an awfully good word for you with his boss, Scully."
She smiles. "We'll probably never know what happened."
He drops the necklace, resting his hand on her thigh without realizing it. "And you're okay with that? With not knowing?" Mulder's voice is infinitely gentle. "Because I think what's happened to you represents the very core of what we've been working against. But it's up to you, of course."
"I didn't want to die," she says frankly. "It terrified me, knowing that, statistically, I had no chance of survival. I was afraid to go to sleep. I don't know if it was Dr. Zuckerman or God or this chip or what, but I just want to walk away and never look back." She lifts her chin up a little, as though daring him to challenge her.
"Okay," he says, feeling awkward. She has never discussed her fears so openly before and he isn't sure how to respond. He pulls at a loose thread on the blanket. "Scully, whatever you need, that's fine. That's what we'll do." He looks at her again, then down at the pages scattered across her lap. He tries not to wonder at what price this comes.
"Mulder?"
"Yes?"
"Take me outside."
He looks up, confused. "What?"
"Outside. I've been cooped up in this room for a week and a half except for when they cart me around for tests. This is a momentous evening. Don't make me spend all of it in here."
There is something faintly shrill in her voice, as she widens her eyes in an obvious attempt to look appealing, but the effect in her too-thin, too-white face is, instead, simply heartbreaking. If he saw her on television as the face of a charity, he'd send money immediately, whatever the cause.
"It's past ten o'clock and you may not have cancer anymore, Dr. Scully, but you're not quite back to yourself." He points at her dinner tray. "Look at this. Half a sandwich. Unfinished Jell-O. What kind of an invalid are you?"
"I'm not anymore. That's the point. Come on, Mulder. It's still summer. Technically." Scully gives the wheelchair in the corner a soulful gaze.
"It's September. Not exactly the dog days. When did Dr. Zuckerman say you could go home?"
"He just wants to do a few more tests."
"Fine, don't answer. He doesn't think you should be going outside until tomorrow at least though, does he? I'm guessing no one else would spirit you away from here, or you wouldn't have asked me."
Scully looks uncomfortable.
Mulder watches her for a moment. He considers that she came in here to die, and has been granted a reprieve. He also secretly likes the idea of her goading him into rule-breaking. "You have to wear a robe."
"Okay," she says quickly.
"And a blanket."
"Yes."
"Socks. And slippers. And you have to bring the rest of the sandwich and you have to eat it."
"Fine, fine. Whatever."
"And you have to speak in iambic pentameter."
"What?" She looks at him incredulously.
"Just making sure you were actually listening." Mulder gets up and walks to the wheelchair. He pushes it over to the bed, where Scully is putting slippers on over her little white ankle socks. He grabs her robe off of the chair and hands it to her.
He watches Scully tug the robe on, making a square knot of the belt at her waist. He holds the wheelchair steady as she climbs into it, then passes her a blanket
Scully tucks it around herself. "Thank you," she says.
"Don't thank me yet," he says, handing her and the remains of her sandwich. "That nurse out front seems to think I'm some kind of troublemaker."
"Imagine that," Scully says dryly.
"Be quiet and eat, Agent Provocateur." He wheels her out into the hall, peering around in the way that only a near-decade of sneaking in and out of covert government facilities can teach.
"There's a service elevator that way," Scully says, pointing to the left. "I bet we can take it down to the basement and come back up the main elevator to the lobby. Or there's probably a delivery entrance."
Mulder is amused by these James Bond shenanigans. She's a grown woman and can check herself out of the hospital any time she wants, much less go outside for some air on a temperate September night. But he's glad to see this playfulness at work in her; a spark he thought had gone out.
"Should I knock out an orderly and steal his uniform? Disguise you as a sack of laundry?"
"Mulder, shut up."
"Sandwich," he says warningly.
Scully takes a bite and gives him a baleful look. "It tastes terrible."
"That's how you know it's good for you. Where's the elevator?"
"See the wall on the other side of that vending - yeah. Turn right here."
Mulder follows the hallway to an elevator covered with lumpy green paint. He presses the down button and the doors slide open right away. He pushes the wheelchair in and selects the basement level. They ride down in silence, Scully nibbling at the gluey white bread.
They exit into a dimly lit hallway. Mulder follows signs on the wall to a delivery bay, and pushes the wheelchair up a ramp and out into the night air. He smiles at the exultant look on Scully's face.
She drinks in long drafts of air, craning her neck around the building. "There's a walkway to the courtyard past that tree, Mulder. Do you mind…?"
He turns sharply towards the walkway. "As long as you promise not to give me any grief when I make you go back in and call your mother in the next half hour or so, okay?"
"Scout's honor."
They pass under a narrow awning of elm and oak, emerging in a small courtyard bordered by the hospital on four of five sides. Scully looks up at the sky and sighs. "It's good to be outside," she says.
"Mind the mosquitoes," Mulder advises, smacking at his arm. "They're still afoot. Awing. Whatever." He enjoys the sight of her looking so relaxed.
"I doubt I have enough blood to tempt one after today," she laughs. "They were making pretty free with my samples down in the lab."
"It's good to see you like this, Scully." He wants to say more, to tell her that he now has a resurrection to pin his own faith to, but it feels cheap and clumsy against the simplicity of the moment.
"You brought me that chip."
"So you do believe that's what cured you?" He hadn’t meant to press her, but the words left his mouth without his full consent.
She smiles at him. "You love having all the answers."
He rests his hands on her shoulders, her collarbones an anchor under his fingers "No, that's your job. I just like asking the questions. We're a good team, I guess. Yin and yang, or something equally transcendent. It's undoubtedly cosmic."
Scully reaches one hand up, resting it on top of his. "I regret to inform you that my sister once told me that we do not share astrological compatibility, Mulder."
He squeezes her shoulder. "Say it ain't so."
"It's true. Pisces and Libra do not go well together. You are, apparently, capricious, dreamy, and loquacious. I am given to introspection, and can feel neglected by your ethereal tendencies. I am also given to whining and scolding."
He smiles broadly. "Why do I put up with you then?"
She doesn't answer, and Mulder cocks his head to see her blushing. "Aha," he says. "There is some measure of non-professional compatibility somewhere."
"The entire concept is absurd, Mulder," she informs him in a clipped tone.
He lowers his face to her seashell ear. "You don't believe in fate?"
"I don't believe our lives are preordained by the stars."
He straightens up, gesturing at the sky. "You believe in heaven, in the intercession of saints. There's a theory that starlight contains the souls of those who were taken up to avoid pain and suffering. Maybe they're all variants on the same kernel of truth."
Scully pats his hand, then drops her own to her lap. "When I was a kid, I read a story about how the Milky Way was formed. There were two archangels who loved each other so intensely that God had to separate them, because they loved each other more than they loved Him. He banished them each to opposite sides of the universe as a punishment. But, over eons, their yearning for one another crossed the space between them and built a bridge of light. Eventually, the two halves joined in the middle, and the archangels crossed the bridge and were reunited. And God let the bridge stand, because even He cannot destroy a thing built by love."
Mulder blinks a few times, having been lulled by her calming voice. "You've got me sold. A bridge of undying devotion across space and time is far less prosaic than billions of enormous nuclear reactors." From the corner of his eye, he sees her twisting in the wheelchair to follow his gaze. She leans sideways against the back of the seat, the armrest at her waist.
"They're just old light," she says, drawing her knees up and wrapping her arms around them under the blanket.
"Don't be so dismissive,'" he chides, facing her again. "We're looking back in time, Scully. That's its own kind of magic."
Scully tips her head back until she's staring straight upwards, and he imagines the stale hospital air being purged from her and replaced with something finer. Dr. Zuckerman doesn't know everything.
"Scully, you have to go call your family."
"I know." She drops her head, chewing on her thumb.
He wonders why the idea of the phone call makes her anxious. Mulder gets to his knees on the flagstone walkway, crossing his arms on the back of her seat and resting his chin on them. "Your mother's going to want to stay with you, isn't she?" he asks.
Scully nods gloomily.
"Are you feeling guilty for calling me first?"
"No. I'd feel guilty if I hadn't. But maybe you should make yourself scarce when they come. Bill is…well. You've seen." Scully leans forward to kiss him on the cheek. She's far too close to his mouth for propriety, but they've never been particularly concerned with conventional personal boundaries. Still, he is faintly surprised.
Mulder thinks of binary stars - two bodies orbiting a common center of mass - and watches Scully as she yawns under a fall of silver light.
***
Bill leans against the wall as his mother clutches Dana like she just dragged her from a burning building. Dana's smiling awkwardly, patting her back, and saying the kind of reassuring nonsense that has never come easily to her. He notes with dark pleasure that his sister's partner is nowhere to be seen. He's firmly convinced she's mistaken codependency for love.
Maggie finally sits back and wipes her face with her sleeve. "Dana, this is simply a miracle. Isn't it, Father McCue?"
"It most certainly is, Margaret. I'll be writing the Archbishop in the morning." The priest is looking at Dana like she's a sacred relic.
Dr. Zuckerman, who hasn't stopped grinning since he came in, adds, "It's definitely one for the books. I've never seen such a rapid recovery in my thirty-two years of medical practice."
"Dana's an over-achiever," Bill says, feeling buoyant. He's just gotten off the phone with Tara, who burst into tears of relief at the news. "Now you have to make good on that plane ticket."
His mother looks around, puzzled. "What plane ticket?"
Dana takes her hand. "Bill made me promise to come visit over Christmas. To see the baby."
A concerned crease appears in Maggie's forehead. "And what does Dr. Zuckerman say about that?"
Dr. Zuckerman smiles reassuringly. "Mrs. Scully, she'll be back to herself well before then. As long as she takes it easy now," he adds, waving a stern finger at Dana.
"When can I go back to work?"
Maggie looks horrified. "You need to concentrate on getting better. The FBI can do without you for a while."
Bill is unsurprised by the question. Dana made it to the ninth grade science fair - and won - with the flu. Still, he shakes his head in dismay. "You had untreatable brain cancer when you woke up two days ago. Let's give it some time, huh?"
"I just wanted an idea," she says defensively. "I've been gone a while."
Father McCue laughs. "You haven't changed since you were a little girl, have you?"
Dr. Zuckerman smiles. "A step at a time, okay? By all indications, the tumor is gone, but you still have a lot of recovering to do. And being in remission isn't the same as being cured." He checks the chart he's holding. "I'd particularly like it if you could at least get back up to a hundred pounds before returning to work."
"Okay," Dana agrees, looking faintly embarrassed.
Bill glances at his sister. He realized she'd lost a lot of weight, but the shapeless hospital gown disguises it to some extent. He was five years old when his parents brought her home from the hospital. He was allowed to hold her carefully on his lap while Melissa looked on enviously. He suspects she wouldn't feel much heavier in his arms if he went to pick her up now.
"It would also be good if there were someone who could help you with day-to-day things while you get your strength back. Your depleted bone marrow needs some time to reestablish itself, and you body's going to be devoting many of its resources to regaining equilibrium."
"I'll be staying with her," Maggie says quickly, as Bill knew she would. She's beaming at his sister, patting her hand comfortingly.
Dana offers a wan smile. "Mom, that really isn't necessary. I've got someone to come by and do all the cleaning, and I can handle the cooking. The grocery store delivers and really, there's not much else to do since my dog got eaten."
Dr. Zuckerman and Father McCue both look like they want to ask for the details of this story, but say nothing.
Bill suspects that Dana, even in her weakened condition, will prevail on this one, but his mother has a firmness to her face that should make it a hard-fought victory. He's not entirely regretful that he lives three thousand miles away from the pair of them.
"I won't hear another word about it, Dana. You need looking after. You let yourself get too run down."
"I appreciate your concern, Mom, but if there's some kind of crisis, you can walk from Cathedral Heights in fifteen minutes. There's no need to stay with me." Dana's voice is still friendly, but there's a subtle hardness in there too.
"I am not going to -"
"Margaret." Father McCue reaches across the bed to rest a hand on Maggie's shoulder. "This has to be Dana's choice."
She drops her head for a moment, then looks up. "You’re the doctor. I’m sure you know what’s best.”
Bill catches Dana's eye and sees the flicker of a smile in them.
"Thank you, Mom," she says. "I'd prefer to stay by myself, but I would love it if you'd come over to keep me company. I'm going to have a lot of hours to fill."
"But you'll be resting, of course, won't you? Taking naps when you get too exhausted?"
"Mom."
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." She smoothes Dana's hair off of her forehead, a doting look on her face. "You just never stop worrying."
Bill thinks about his unborn child, and as sympathetic as he is towards his sister's independence, he already knows he'd be acting exactly as his mother is if he were in her position.
They all turn when the door creaks open and a tall, bald man walks in. He looks uncomfortable and somewhat stern, but his face softens at the sight of Dana, who offers him a tentative smile. The man inclines his head a fraction in the briefest of nods, and a look of relief settles over Dana's face.
Bill wonders who he is, and what they have just forgiven one another for.
***
Mulder is now officially officially among the undead. Which, in his case, means he's back at work now that the federal government has decided that Scott Ostelhoff most definitely was attempting to use deadly force, necessitating Agent Mulder to discharge his weapon. No mandatory leave. Nothing. Mulder has been brooding over these facts for most of the day. It's getting late afternoon and all he has to show for himself is two paper cuts and a stapler fort made of binder clips.
His phone rings and he's pleased by the distraction, though he hadn't been doing much anyway. He draws little devil horns on a photograph of an allegedly psychic lobster as he answers the phone.
"Jed's Taxidermy Service. You snuff 'em, we stuff 'em."
"That's really more my forte, isn't it? I just wanted to let you know I am homeward bound in about two hours."
He sits up, smiling. "You are? Scully, that's excellent news."
"You have no idea. One more day in here and I think I would have gone crazy."
Scully does not take well to confinement, though her ingrained doctor's horror of non-compliance generally makes her follow medical orders. "Have you managed to avoid having your mother move in?"
"The results on that were what I had hoped, yes."
"She standing right there?"
"You bet."
"You're not going to do anything desperate, are you, Scully? Because sometimes you shoot people and
it-"
"I'm sorry, but I don't have any advice for you on that, Mulder. You should really see a specialist about an anti-fungal cream. I'll call you tomorrow. Have a nice evening." The line goes dead.
Mulder closes his phone and laughs. He wants very much to go and visit her at home later on, but doesn't think deliberately baiting her irascible brother is the best idea for her recuperation. Now that there won't be a funeral, Bill should be on his way home to his pregnant wife before long. And Mulder can generally charm Mrs. Scully enough for his purposes.
There's a knock at the door. Merely a formality, apparently, since Skinner comes into the office before Mulder can even ask who's there. "Any word on Scully?"
Mulder parks his stapler in its new shelter. "Just got off the phone with her, actually. She's headed home shortly."
"It's incredible. After that hearing, I really thought…" Skinner shakes his head in amazement.
"Sir, the men behind this -"
"The men behind this are dying at an expeditious rate. Scully's in remission. Let it go." There's a distinct warning note in his voice.
"Is that advice from you personally?"
"You're so paranoid. What more do you want? What better ending could there have been to this whole affair?"
Mulder remembers seeing her in the ICU, the way he felt as though the wind had been knocked out of him. She still doesn't know about the ova. His stomach clenches at the thought of having to one day tell her. Or worse, having her discover she's been the unwitting egg donor for a clutch of Crawfords or Samanthas.
"You're right," he says quietly. "She's okay. That's good enough."
Skinner looks sympathetic. "Go home and get some rest, Mulder. I don't even know why you came in today."
Mulder shrugs and gets to his feet. He grabs a newspaper clipping from his desk and glances down at Raphael the Psychic Lobster as he and Skinner walk to the hall. "Someone has to ask the tough questions, I guess."
***
Scully wakes up at nine-thirteen to the smell of bacon. Waking up to the smell of anything is still a novelty, but since she rarely ingests anything other than coffee and sarcasm before noon, the bacon is particularly noteworthy. It means her mother is here, getting into things. Moving them. Disorganizing her life. The next two weeks (she has already decided that is her maximum level of tolerance) are going to be very long.
She rubs her eyes, luxuriating in the feel of her own linens. Last night she'd talked her mother into letting her walk upstairs alone, slithered into her pajamas, and crashed into bed, too exhausted to properly savor being out of the hospital.
Dr. Zuckerman spent the day prior running every test he could think of, then released her with a heartfelt hug and an inch of paperwork. Scully climbed into her mother's car like it was the last helicopter out of Saigon, slamming the door with great satisfaction. She would have rather had Mulder see her home, because he's quiet and lacks her mother's nerve-wracking control freak tendencies, but Scully had more sense than to indulge that desire.
She sits up, the cool slide of silk pajamas feeling delicious, and swings her legs over the edge of the bed. Nothing clicks or beeps or winds treacherously around her ankle when she stands. Scully yawns widely, lacing her fingers together as she stretches and cracks her back. She tightens the drawstring on her pajama bottoms and pads to the bathroom door.
Cleansers, creams, and scrubs, all in pretty bottles on the shelf. Scully lingers over them, sniffing things and becoming reacquainted with her skincare regimen. She brushes her teeth with toothpaste that doesn't taste like it's been stored in a tin can. She laughs at herself for delighting in toilet paper that is white and fluffy instead of crinkly and grayish. Feeling fragrant and human, Scully is now prepared to face life as a convalescent.
She walks through her bedroom door, and sees that the flowers from the hospital are in vases on various surfaces. She moves farther into the living area and observes that her mother, who is emerging from the kitchen, has set the table for three. There are little napkin pockets for the silverware.
"Good morning, Mom."
Maggie nearly drops the tray of toast. "Dana! You startled me. Good morning. Here, let me just…" She sets the platter down, then kisses Scully's cheek. "Bill should be here any minute. He ran out for some orange juice. How did you sleep?"
Scully eyes the food. There is a lot of it. A whole lot. "Good. Great. You didn't have to make breakfast."
"You have eight pounds to gain."
She laughs. "Not all in one sitting." Scully pulls out a chair and settles into it. "But thanks, Mom. Everything looks delicious."
The front door opens and her brother comes in holding a plastic bag and a cup of coffee. "I didn't know if you liked pulp or not, so I got both kinds." He shuts the door with his hip, then walks to the table and sets the orange juice down. Bill leans forward to drop a kiss on the crown of Scully's head before sitting next to her. "Welcome home."
"Thanks Bill." Scully helps herself to a piece of toast and spreads it with strawberry jam.
"There's butter," Maggie says helpfully, as she reaches over to slide bacon onto Scully's plate. "I left it out to soften."
"I don't care for butter, but thanks."
Maggie sits across from her children. "Have some eggs then. And cheese."
"Wouldn't it be ironic to survive cancer only to die from heart disease?" Scully wonders aloud. She feels faintly guilty, but the temptation was irresistible.
"Dana!" Maggie is aghast.
Bill coughs, and Scully suspects he's trying to muffle a laugh.
"Sorry," she says, crunching on a slice of bacon. It has occurred to her that every calorie she ingests brings her a little bit closer to returning to work.
"Bill, what time is your flight?" Maggie asks, gesturing with a section of orange.
"Three-forty."
Maggie gets up when the tea kettle whistles from the stove. "We'll leave for the airport at two," she says over her shoulder. "Dana, after that I'm going to go out and get some all natural cleaning supplies because I don't think you should exposed to all of those chemicals even if you're not doing the cleaning yourself."
Scully opens her mouth to protest, but Bill pinches her elbow.
"Ow, dammit," she hisses.
"Just shut up and let her," he hisses back.
"She's going to take over my life."
"Be a good girl, get better, and then you can go back to work and risk your neck, all right?"
Scully glares, but says nothing when her mother returns with the kettle.
Maggie drops a teabag into Scully's mug, then fills it with steaming water. "This has peppercorns and mint and things in it. It's supposed to improve your appetite." She then fills her own mug.
"Sounds intriguing. I want to go to church later, Mom."
Maggie sits back down. "Oh?" she says, sipping at her tea.
Scully is not fooled by her casual tone. "Whatever happened to me, it didn't happen to all of the other people in that oncology ward. Who's the patron saint of cancer patients?" she asks.
"Saint Peregrine. I have a chaplet. "
"Of course you do." And you've probably worn the polish off the beads, Scully thinks. She feels ungrateful and it makes her waspish.
"We'll go after the airport, then. I have to say this is a surprise, Dana."
"No atheists in foxholes," Bill says, smirking around a mouthful of egg.
"That's incredibly condescending, Bill," Scully snaps. "I'm sure atheists are just as certain of their beliefs as you are of yours."
"The point of being an atheist is that you don't believe in anything."
"No, they just don't believe in God. That's not the same as 'anything.'"
He washes his eggs down with coffee. "Do they believe in aliens?"
"Unlike you, I don't presume to know what people believe." She takes a dainty bite of toast.
"Bill, Dana." Maggie scolds, as though they aren't in their thirties. "Let's try and be pleasant."
"Honestly. I mean, I'm really sick here, Bill." Scully coughs on her brother's shirt.
"Dana's getting germs on me. Make her stop."
"Tattletale."
"Midget."
Maggie shakes her head when they cackle at one another.
Scully pushes her chair from the table, dabbing at her mouth with a napkin as she stands. "Everything was great, Mom, thanks. I'm going to go hop in the shower and get dressed." She doesn't want to admit that this short visit has already left her so fatigued she suspects she could easily sleep for the rest of the day. The long bones in her arms and legs feel bruised and throbbing.
She walks to her bedroom, uncomfortable in the knowledge that her mother and brother will be talking about her once she's out of earshot. Scully takes her pajamas and underwear off, tossing them in the hamper. She sits down on her bed, holding her head for a moment when her vision starts to swim.
Finally feeling steady enough to get up, she takes small steps to the bathroom, guiding herself along the wall to the shower. The water gets cranked to as hot as she can stand it before she climbs in. Scully works her shampoo into a lather, then rinses it out and covers her hair in rich conditioner. She stands there until her knees start to buckle and she slides down the tile.
Scully sits in the bottom of the tub and cries, letting the steamy water sluice over her aching body.
***
Frohike glances in the mirror and straightens his collar. He is eager to see Scully, though not eager enough to have broken out the tux again. He's willing to admit that was overkill, even if she does have an obvious weakness for a man in a suit. His new approach will be subtle and suave.
The doorbell rings. He, Langly, and Byers exchange excited glances. Frohike goes to the wall to admit the visitors, but his face falls when the security camera reveals only Mulder and two large paper bags in the hallway. Sorely disappointed, he buzzes the door open.
"Why isn't Scully here?" he demands as the taller man edges past him to the table.
Mulder plunks the bags down and looks annoyed. "Nice to see you too, honey."
Frohike glares, crossing his arms. He feels cheated and cantankerous. "Can it, princess. I can look at your ugly mug any old time."
"Yeah, where's our favorite medical miracle?" Langly asks as he lopes over, presumably in search of his wonton soup.
Mulder flops into a chair. "Mrs. Scully wouldn't let her come out and play."
Frohike gapes, trying to imagine the fearsomeness that must be embodied by Scully's mother. They've only met briefly. "You can't be serious."
Mulder opens a package of chopsticks and uses them to pick up a broken transistor. "In essence, yes, I am."
Langly look incredulous. "Does she know about the advance copy of An American Werewolf in Paris? Because that won't even be in theaters 'til next month."
"I did my best, boys. Sorry."
Byers sits down next to Mulder with a carton of lo mein. "How's she been since she got home? We haven't seen her since one visit to the hospital and she didn't look very well then. She dozed off after we were there for five minutes."
Mulder sighs, and abandons the transistor for a chunk of broccoli. "She's good." He chews his food dispiritedly.
This lack of exuberance is unsettling. The world has twice come perilously close to existing without Scully in it, and both experiences left Frohike rattled and heartsick. He cannot accept the possibility that she is once more in the valley of the shadow. "She is okay, isn't she Mulder?" he asks, anxiety churning his stomach like a whirlpool.
"Stellar." Mulder throws his chopsticks at the sink.
Frohike isn't sure what's going on, but he's certain that he doesn't like it. He's known Mulder for a long time now. Long enough to see him fraying at the edges the way he does when he's cornered. "But the chip worked, right?"
"Oh, yeah, it worked. It worked great," Mulder says bitterly. He gets to his feet and paces the room. "You guys wouldn't believe it. It's practically like she was never abducted, returned in a coma, and given cancer. It's a fucking fairytale." He slams his hand against the wall.
Frohike winces. Langly and Byers look shocked.
"Isn't it though?" Byers says softly after a moment. "Isn't this a happy ending?"
Frohike is, once more, grateful for Byers' background in public affairs.
Mulder stares at him. "This isn't magic. This is a chip, engineered to cure an engineered disease. You think this was benevolence? Why is everyone acting like it's all over now? If anything, something new is cooking here. The three of you should know that better than anyone."
Frohike looks at his friend, who appears sleep-deprived and hollowed-out. "Mulder, you may be right, but what can we do? They have to move first, and then we'll get the bastards who did this to her."
"We'll go Mortal Kombat on their asses," Langly asserts.
Mulder shakes his head. "No. It can't continue like this. She can't keep being bait for them to use. I need to make her leave the X-Files."
Can he really be so oblivious? "Mulder -"
"Frohike, they gave her cancer for Christ's sake. What comes next, huh? How do you up the ante after that? Ebola? I'm getting Skinner to reassign her."
Frohike walks over to Mulder and puts a sympathetic hand on his arm. "Mulder," he says quietly, wishing he didn't have to do this. "That won't stop them from using her against you if they have to. They don't… they don't just do it because she's your partner." He clears his throat, feeling uncomfortable, and sees Byers look away.
Mulder closes his eyes for a moment. "I know." The words sound as though they’ve been pulled reluctantly from a place deep inside of him, somewhere he thought they'd be safe from prying eyes and ears. "But what else can I do?" he continues. "How can I ask her to stay after all she's been through?" He sits on the floor, looking weary.
"How can you ask her to leave after all she's been through?" Byers asks.
Mulder looks at him, uncertainly at first, and then as though he hates him a little for the validity of the question. His face falls and he draws his knees up, resting his head on his arms.
Melvin Frohike was once a champion tango dancer, and he knows when to leave the stage.
***
Part 2