From: Nynaeve Date: 11 Aug 1999 09:41:31 -0700 Subject: NEW: Almost Home 1 of 1 by Nynaeve From: "Nynaeve" TITLE: Almost Home AUTHOR: Nynaeve E-MAIL: scully@on-net.net RATING: PG CATEGORY: S KEYWORDS: Scully angst, MSR (implied/impending RST) SPOILERS: let's say all up to "Two Fathers/One Son". SUMARY: Set before "One Son", Scully remembers some childhood events that lead her to question her platonic relationship with Mulder. No-Romos head for the hills - this one is sweet and syrypy. DISCLAIMER: Chris Carter... yadda, yadda, yadda ... 1013 ... blah, blah, blah. Bottom line: not mine. DEDICATION: A and J as always. FEEDBACK: Yup. Love it. Keep it all in little folders, specifically marked for each story. Respond to all of it too. AUTHOR'S NOTES FOLLOW Almost Home The week had been a long one. Background checksand other scut work. Kersch had even loaned them out for surveillance work for a few days. Friday evening traffic had been predictably bad and Scully was exhausted, irritated, and bored. Unbelievably, there was a decent parking space in front of her building. Killing the motor, she checked the mirror before opening the door. She figured having her door ripped off by an un-looked for speeder was *not* the way she needed to end this day, this week. No other cars were in sight. She opened the door and stepped into the cool dusk air. There were still traces of snow here and there from the last winter storm. Her breath misted as she exhaled and somehow that made her smile. It took her back to her childhood. She and her siblings had always eagerly awaited the time when the weather would turn cold like this. Maggie would bundle them up and send them out to play. Sometimes Ahab had been assigned to places where there was snow and sometimes he hadn't. In the snow they had made snowmen, slid down hills, thrown snowballs at one another and the other children who came out to play. They would stay out until their cheeks were red, their noses ran, and they couldn't feel their fingers. If there was no snow to play in, they would haunt the parks, play hide and seek, often in large groups with other Navy brats, and not come in until it grew dark and they could hear Maggie calling. Wherever they were, these rituals had given them a sense of familiarity, a sense of belonging, of being at home. They had lost those rituals as they grew older and their time was consumed by the commitments common to growing children. Melissa and Scully had been herded into dance classes and piano lessons. Although of differing opinions about the dance classes, both girls had rebelled against the piano lessons. As she grabbed her briefcase and laptop from the back of the car, Scully smiled a bit ruefully. She had never acquired those 'graces' her mother had, at one time, deemed so precious. Climbing the stairs, she recalled one winter. They had all been older. Melissa and Bill probably in high school, Scully finishing middle school, and Charlie starting. Too old and sophisticated to enjoy the rituals of their common childhood. Ahab had been home from his latest cruise, his first as XO aboard a destroyer, and a grueling nine month separation from his family. As a celebration, their parents had taken them to the mountains for the week between Christmas and New Year's. They had skied, gone sledding, even ridden snow mobiles one day. One evening after dinner, Ahab had taken them out to stargaze. Melissa, old and sophisticated as she saw herself, had not been able to resist the temptation to dump two large handfuls of snow down their father's back. Before long there had been an all out war: Scully and Bill and then-Commander Scully against Melissa, Charlie, and Maggie Scully. After nearly forty minutes, they had all been exhausted. Their clothes had been soaked through and hair clung damply to foreheads and cheeks. Their sides had ached from laughing. Maggie had called a truce and shooed them inside, where she made mugs full of hot chocolate and they roasted marshmallows in the fireplace. It was the last time they had all been together like that; the last time life had been so simple and uncomplicated for all of them. In a few short years they had all scattered to the winds. Melissa off 'finding herself'; Bill at the Academy; Scully at Berkeley and then University of Maryland; only Charlie still at home for a while. Opening her front door, Scully sighed heavily. By now Maggie and Ahab should have had a horde of grandchildren to spend holidays with. They should have all met somewhere for skiing, sledding, and even some snow mobile riding. One night Ahab should have taken them out to stargaze and Melissa should have been unable to resist the temptation to dump two large handfuls of snow down his back. It should have been an all out war: Scully, Bill, their spouses and children, and Ahab against Melissa, Charlie, their spouses (well, with Melissa probably a life partner), and children, and Maggie. Nothing had turned out like it should have. It had all gotten complicated. Ahab and Melissa dead; Scully unable to have children and her relationship with Bill strained nearly to the breaking point. Still, somehow, each time she woke up to frost etched windows, a part of her brain wanted to call out the names of her siblings, to invite them to run out with her and play. For a moment she could smile before the real world swept back in on her, reminding her that wasn't going to happen. Entering her apartment, she tossed her keys on the coffee table and laid her pocketbook next to them. She shrugged off her suit coat and stepped out of her heels. Her gun and badge went on the table next to her keys. She picked up her coat and shoes and walked into her room. The coat she hung up neatly on its proper hanger, replacing it in its assigned place in her closet. The shoes filled in the gap in the neat line on the floor. She shed her skirt and hung it on its correct hanger. Her hose came off and, in her one concession to untidiness, she balled them up and tossed them in a corner, making the usual Friday night mental note to wash out the week worth's of hose tomorrow. Her blouse came off and went into the hamper, along with another mental note to wash these things this weekend. She slipped into jeans and a thermal knit shirt; her feet went into the ridiculous, oversized slippers decorated with alien heads that Maggie had given her for Christmas. She smiled at the slippers - the aliens were gray. Wouldn't Mulder be pleased with that accuracy? Walking back to her kitchen, she took out a bottle of wine and poured herself a glass. Hunting in the refrigerator for something to eat, she exhaled in disgust. There wasn't much. She wasn't really hungry anyway, so she took her glass of wine back to her living room, sinking gratefully into her couch. She laid her head on the sofa's back and stared at the ceiling. Shifting her feet, her toes encountered the detritus of her life. Keys. Badge. Gun. Gray Aliens. She closed her eyes and thought about this Christmas, just a few weeks past. She and Mulder had exchanged gifts, then sat on his couch and watched an old movie. "The Day the Earth Stood Still." No one would have expected Fox Mulder to watch Christmas movies around Christmas, would they? She had fallen asleep against his shoulder. At six a.m. he had woken her up and reminded her she was due at her mother's. She had smiled sleepily, thanking him. Despite her invitation to join her, he had refused, stating that he was probably the last person with whom Bill wanted to be inflicted. He had kissed her forehead and told her Bill could consider that Mulder's Christmas gift to him. Scully had grinned wordlessly, squeezing his hand in acknowledgment. The day had been pleasant. Matt had been a typical year old, far more interested in the paper and boxes than what was in them. While he napped, the adults had opened their gifts. Scully had laughed delightedly at Maggie's find. Bill had gotten a sour look on his face and turned away from the little pair of big-eyed aliens. Scully had looked at her brother and thought sadly of the big brother who had once stood in the snow shoulder to shoulder with her, firing snowballs at their now-dead sister. She had wondered when exactly Bill had lost all sense of humor. In the afternoon, as Tara and Bill had played with their son and his new toys, Scully had helped Maggie in the kitchen. They had fallen into the easy rhythm of mothers and daughters who enjoy one another's company and who take pleasure in doing small tasks together. Maggie had spoken at last, "How's Fox?" Scully had smiled at her mother. She had long ago given up on getting Maggie to call him Mulder. "He's fine." "How is work?" "Work," she had said flatly, sighing. "Let's just say I'm not exactly making that difference I thought I could." Maggie had covered her daughter's hand with her own. "I'm sorry." Another smile had twitched at the corner of Scully's mouth. "No, you're not," she told her mother. "You're thrilled I'm doing something safe." There was no malice in Scully's voice, only the recognition that Maggie, like all mothers, was glad her child was in a safe job, at least momentarily. "All right, yes, I'm glad you're safe," Maggie had agreed with a laugh. "But I *am* sorry you're not satisfied." Changing the subject, Scully had said, "I love the slippers, Mom. They're adorable." "They had them in men's sizes, too," Maggie had said slyly, giving her daughter a sidelong glance. "Oh, Mom - you didn't?" "You take them home with you and give them to Fox sometime." Maggie had paused. "You could have invited him, you know." "I did. He declined. He said it was his Christmas gift to Bill." Mother and daughter had both dissolved into giggles. It *had* been a good day. As it grew dark, Scully had stepped outside, into the back yard. The night was dark and cold. Experimentally, she had exhaled and smiled as her breath floated visibly away from her. She had heard the door open behind her, watched the patch of light fall into the yard. A shadow had loomed into the light, filled it. Bill. He had shut the door and walked over to her. She had turned her face back skyward and silently recited the constellation names Ahab had so lovingly taught her. "Hey," he had said softly. "Bill." He had followed her gaze. She had almost been able to feel him doing the same thing. The stars in their disordered precision called out to the Scully siblings. Ahab's legacy of love drew them closer with remembered affection. "It's cold out here, sis," Bill had said at last. "I know." "Let's go inside. I started a fire," he had told her. She had shaken her head. "Not just yet, Bill. You go." He had looked at her. "You always loved it when it got cold out." She had nodded this time. "It seemed to be when we kids were the closest. It reminded me no matter how much we moved around, we always had each other. Even when we were awful to one another, there was something magical about this kind of weather. It always made it feel like home to me. Sometimes it feels like a long time since I've been home." Bill had been silent, making no move to go in. "You remember that one year? Mom and Dad took us to the mountains for a week." She had laughed a bit. "And that one night we all had that huge snowball fight..." "All because Melissa dumped snow down Dad's back," he had interrupted. "She had to do things her own way, didn't she?" "Yes," Scully had nodded. "She did." Bill had looked at his sister again. "We used to be on the same team, Dana. Remember?" She had turned to face him. "Bill, we're still on the same team." "No," he had said angrily, "we're not. You don't listen to your family anymore. You only listen to Mulder." "Jesus, Bill! You think I don't have enough character to make my own decisions, is that it? And since I'm incapable of making those decisions, I have to take orders from someone? Is this some sick sort of competition to see who can control my life?" "No," he had responded emphatically. "Dana, I didn't mean it that way..." "I think you did, Bill. I really think you did. And I think you're jealous." Bill had snorted. "Of Mulder? Why would I be jealous of that sorry son of a bitch?" Scully's face had gone white and her jaw clenched. When she spoke, her voice had been perfectly calm, her tone muderously low; she enunciated every word carefully. "Don't you dare call him names. You have no idea ... you know nothing about him." "I know he's almost gotten you killed; he's the reason all these things have happened to you," Bill had said desperately. "Oh, Bill, stop it. He is not. He's saved me more times than I can count and before you tell me I wouldn't have needed saving if it weren't for him, I don't just mean physically." She stopped. Bill had been glaring at the night sky, his jaw also clenched. Scully had taken his hand. "Bill, I've made my own choices in life and I'm not disappointed where they've led me. I don't look at my life and think about all the things I don't have." She paused, then continued, "Bill, when everyone else had given up on my being found, who didn't? Who never stopped believing I would be brought back?" Bill had stared at her. She had arched the Scully eyebrow at him, demanding silently "Who?" "Mulder," Bill had mumbled. "But Dana, if you hadn't known him..." "Bill, when I got sick, I learned about groups of women, all who had the same experiences I had had. None of them knew Mulder. Who's to say it wouldn't have happened anyway? If I hadn't known Mulder, everyone might have given up on me. I might very well be dead." "Let me tell you a few things, Bill. When I was returned, in that coma, I wanted to leave. I saw Ahab and I wanted to join him, but something in me knew my work wasn't done, my time here wasn't over. I think I knew Mulder believed I would be all right. His belief brought me back. When I first was diagnosed with the cancer, Mulder refused to believe the prognosis. He risked his life trying to find answers, answers that would save me. And he did. You may not like the answers he found, but he's the only one who found any. Mom brought me a priest to save my soul. I'm not sorry for that, but you all were ready to let me die. You gave up on me. I know you told Mulder he should let me die with dignity." Bill had coughed. Scully had continued, "The thing was, Bill - he wasn't willing to let me die, at all." She had paused again, taking a deep breath. "How much of Sunday school do you remember?" "Changing the subject?" he brother had asked. She had shaken her head. "Remember they always taught us God has a plan?" "And all of this was part of God's plan for you? To what purpose?" "I'm not certain, Bill. But, you see, that doesn't matter. God knows what the plan is and He knows my part in it. But I will tell you what I think... You may find Mulder's ideas far out and wild, but he's right about a good many things. I've learned that over the years. There are things going on that you don't even want to imagine, things that have the potential to, at the very least, drastically alter every life on this planet. Mulder and I ... well, we're trying to find a way to thwart all that. And the thing is ... I don't think Mulder could do it alone. I think the people who we are working against would have been able, a long time ago, to discredit him, to relegate him to the ranks of latter day madman." "He's not?" Bill had asked incredulously. Scully had shaken her head again. "Far from it. And I think together we've made progress." Bill had looked at her. "So you think God's plan is that you save Fox Mulder's ass time and again, both physically and mentally, so he can go on chasing little green men?" "Gray," Scully had told him. He had glared at her. "But, essentially, yes. I know you don't believe it. I have a lot of doubts about what we do, but I do know that there are forces at work here and abroad that threaten our way of life. And I do know that Mulder and I will find a way to stop them." Brother and sister had faced one another again. "Bill, we're still on the same team. I need you to realize that, and to know it's all right to let someone else join us now. Mulder doesn't threaten your place in my life. You will always be my big brother." Bill had looked at her for a moment. "If I had some snow, I'd dump it down your back," he told her. Scully knew their rift was not healed, but a truce, uneasy though it may be, had been called. "Let's go see if Mom can whip up some hot chocolate. Also, didn't you say something about having built a fire?" He hadgrinned at her. "I hope Mom has marshmallows." Opening her eyes and taking another sip of wine, Scully's eyes fell again on the items on her coffee table. Keys. A fair number of keys. Keys to her apartment, to Mulder's, even to the basement office. They must have changed the locks and just never asked her for her keys. Badge. Special Agent Dana Scully, Badge # blah blah blah. She snorted softly, her chest barely rising with the action. That badge meant so much to her, or it used to. Lately, it just represented a mundane place where she did mundane things with generally mundane people surrounding her. It had been true what she had told Bill. She believed she and Mulder were a threat to these people. She hoped they could stop them, in some way, though that possibility seemed to dim with each background check, each hour spent on bank fraud surveillance, each dotted 'i' and crossed 't' on reports. She wasn't making a difference anymore, as she always had with Mulder and the X Files. They *did* have a higher than average case closure rate, even if their explanations were outside the mainstream. She had lost count of the people whose lives they had affected. She had taken pride in her integrity, her unwillingness to compromise her principles in order to advance her career. She had never done what they had expected. She had been unable to debunk Mulder's work to her own satisfaction and unwilling to lie about that. He had told her, months before that she kept him honest, that without her he was nothing. She knew that to an extent that was true, also. Without her steady hand and strict rational approach, Mulder probably would have been out of the Bureau long ago. What they did was difficult enough, it would be next to impossible without the resources of the Bureau. And what they did was indeed crucial; she had seen enough to believe in the conspiracy. It was these things - the importance of their work - that had kept her away from Mulder physically and, for a large part, emotionally. Not at first. At first, she had kept herself apart from him because of Bureau protocols, common sense, and that Catholic guilt she had not quite been able to escape completely. After her return, everything had been different in subtle little ways. Mulder was so obviously guilt stricken, but there had been more, far more... she had seen things in his eyes that she had chosen to overlook. She had needed to then. She had felt a new drive to uncover what had happened to her, but it was not until later, when he had discovered that thing aboard the train, the one she believed to be a leper colony victim that she had come to realize how destructive any non-professional relationship would be. His quest had become hers, irrevocably, upon the death of her sister and she would do nothing to jeopardize it. A few months after relegating the idea of a life with Mulder to the back reaches of her brain, she had found herself in love with him. Since that moment, and it had come to her in one single, breathtaking moment, she had done all she could to ignore it. Even their strictly platonic, professional relationship had been used against them. They had taken her to Antarctica in an effort to neutralize Mulder. They had failed, but Scully had seen all over again, how vulnerable they already were, with the words unspoken. So, they had continued. Mulder had confessed his love and she, fighting every urge to respond, had put him off. She finished her wine and her mind came to rest at the fact it was circling. The reasons were in the past. Their enemies thought them both effectively neutralized. The excuses she clung to were habit, bad habit, at that. It was time to let go of those habits, time to let go and find her way home. She picked up the phone and dialed Mulder's. He answered on the second ring. "Mulder, it's me," she told him. "Scully! Everything all right?" "Yeah. Well, no. I don't have anything in the fridge for dinner, can't stand the idea of pizza, and thought..." "You want me to pick you up?" he asked. "Yeah." "I'm on my way." They ate a late dinner at an Italian restaurant both of them had heard about, but hadn't had time to try. They shared a bottle of wine and good conversation. It was nearly midnight when they finished. Outside, the temperature had dropped precipitously and the skies looked ominous. Scully insisted Mulder come up with her, having remembered Maggie's Christmas gift to him. He sat on her couch while she retrieved it from its place on her closet shelf. He was a bit surprised that Maggie had gotten him a gift. Scully had never mentioned her slippers, so he had no idea what was in the well wrapped box. He laughed when he saw them. His shoes came off and the slippers went on. Like a little kid, Scully went to her bedroom and came back wearing hers. Mulder laughed even more. "So I guess now I really can chase little gray aliens," he remarked. Scully dissolved into more mirthful giggles. She turned to look out the window, where frost had etched its lacy patterns on the window. "Mulder!" she exclaimed, "It's snowing. Let's go out." He looked at her like she was going around the bend and exceeding the speed limit while doing it. "C'mon," she whined. "Let's see if aliens like snow." "We'll freeze," he reminded her. "I don't think so," she told him. "Besides we can always come in and drink hot chocolate and toast marshmallows." "No fireplace," he pointed out. "Gas stove," she countered. "Dangerous." "We need a little danger," she told him. "C'mon." Still looking at her like she might need to be measured for a coat that buttoned in the back, Mulder finally agreed. Out they went. Snow fell thickly around them, coating the streets, the cars, the overhead lights, and tree branches. It had been snowing longer than she had realized, as a decent accumulation had already built up. In the silent whiteness, her laughter sparkled like the unseen stars, named constellations to his ears. Hating to break the moment, Mulder told her he was cold. "Really?" she asked. He nodded. "That's too bad then," she said. He started to ask why at the same time she dumped two handfuls of snow down his back. There wasn't enough snow for an all out snow ball war, but they did a fair job of it. It ended when Scully tried to blitz past Mulder and he caught her. Caught her and did the first thing that occurred to him. He kissed her. To his surprise, she kissed him back. They stood, in the soft glow of lamplight and snowfall, kissing for long moments. When at last they broke apart, he looked down at her, brushing a damp strand of hair from her cheek, and told her, "I'm not cold anymore." "Me neither," she said softly. "But let's go in and see about that hot chocolate anyway." Half an hour later, they sat cuddled on her couch, empty mugs of hot chocolate on the table before them, alongside a plate sticky with melted marshmallow goo, sticky chocolate, and graham cracker crumbs. "Why now?" he asked her, playing with a lock of her hair. She shrugged a bit. "I'm tired of running from what's between us. There's no point to it anymore, Mulder." "The job...the truth?" "The job is just that these days. We're where they want us." She sighed and twined her hands in his. "As for the truth, we'll find it." "You've been running?" She traced circles on the top of his hand. "Running and hiding, reaching for every excuse I could." "You're not anymore?" She shook her head. "No, I'm done. Being with you is like coming home and it's time for me to do just that. I need to rest. I need to let my soul find peace." "You can do that with me?" Mulder was slightly incredulous. "Yes. Absolutely. No matter what I go through Mulder, I know I always have you. You are constant and unending, a great wide space into which I can fall and still be buoyed up." He had no answer for her, so he kissed her again. Tired in body only, they slept in her bed, comfortably nestled against each other, the night's cold locked well out. As Scully drifted in and out of sleep, she was conscious of Mulder's arms, holding her tightly, his breath falling lightly on the back of her neck, and his legs stretched out against hers. She thought that there would always be regrets in her life, but she had been lost for too long in the ache of old good-byes. Grateful that Mulder would not be one of those lost moments, she sighed and let sleep find her. END AUTHOR'S NOTES: Let's see ... yes, my grammar is not 100% perfect - a few sentences end in prepositions and there are some fragments out there. This is a casual and relaxed story, so I let my standards slide a bit. Also, listen to the show carefully - even the guy with a Bachelor's and Master's degree in English wrote dialogue that ended with prepostions. And yes ... I know her father was a Captain - however, unlike "Star Trek" where promotions are handed out like tissues during cold season, the Navy doesn't really work that way. At the approximate time I set the winter flashback, it is far more likely William Scully would have been a Commander. And yet another yes ... this is *technically* song fic. I have to thank Mary Chapin Carpenter for her wonderful song, "Almost Home". 'lost in the ache of old good-byes' is not my line and I'm indebted to her for its poignant beauty. Lastly, sorry if I sound snarky. My ISP blew a circuit around lunch time today - about 13 hours ago and I can only hope thye'll have it fixed manana. So, I'm ready to post and have no 'net access. Cranky!Nynaeve is the result. Withdrawl is terrible.