From: Spooky fox Date: Fri, 11 Feb 2000 00:41:31 -0500 Subject: NEW: Cowardice (1/1) Spoilers for SUZ Cowardice By Spooky fox Classification: VA Rating PG-13 Spoilers: Sein Und Zeit...I think that's it Disclaimer: Not even in my wildest dreams.... Author's notes: This is just my reaction to SUZ. I haven't really written much, but I've been in a mood, and I just had to add my two cents here. This is unbeta-ed. So any and all mistakes are mine. Feedback: Pretty please with a cherry on top. My inbox is bare, and I've had a very bad day. Have pity on me. spookyfox42@earthling.net ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Why must I always speak in terms of cowardice, what I guess I should have told you right from the start."--Barenaked Ladies, "Break Your Heart" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Teena Mulder is dead. Killed by her own hand. I cannot believe I have to go in there and tell Mulder that his last remaining family member is dead. I just can't do it. But I have to. At the very least he deserves to hear it from someone close to him, a friend. I have no idea how he's going to take the news. Especially now during this case, since the loss of his sister is so fresh in his mind again. Every time the wounds close even a tiny little bit, they just get torn wide open again. Mulder hasn't had a very easy life, by any means. And now this, on top of everything else. I can't put this off any longer. With a tentative hand, I open the door to Skinner's office, and tell him, straight out. There's really no point in beating around the bush. No matter how I phrase this it's not going to change anything. I wish it was just the two of us, alone, but I need to tell him now. He needs to know. --------- I can't believe he wants me to do the autopsy on his own mother. Doesn't he know what this is going to do to me, how this is going to affect me? Granted, I hardly knew the woman, but Mulder is my friend, and this is someone that he loved. This is not just some random body to examine. As a doctor, know I have to remain objective, detached. It's easy to cut them open and to find the circumstances of their death when it's a stranger. I don't know how I can do this, but of course I will, because it's Mulder. The man could tell me to do almost anything, and I'd do it. Maybe I'm crazy, certifiable probably, but that's the way it is. Even though I know she killed herself, I have to do this to give Mulder the closure he so desperately needs. He needs answers, and I have to be the one to give them to him. To prove to him that there is no conspiracy here, no plot of murder carried out by men who frequent smoke-filled rooms, just an old woman who obviously took an overdose of Diazepam and ended it all. -------- Just as I suspected, there was no homicide involved. I almost wish that I had found something unusual in the autopsy, for Mulder's sake. A murder might be easier for him to handle. But, Mrs. Mulder was suffering from a terminal illness, and obviously didn't want to live anymore. From what I know of Paget's carcinoma, it is an awful disease. Cancer. I still don't see how she could have done it. When I was suffering from my cancer, all those years ago, I often thought of suicide. After all, I was going to die anyway this would just lessen my pain. I came to accept my eventual demise, and thought of hastening it. But I could never actually go through with it. Suicide remained an option only in my mind, because it seemed like the coward's way out. And Scullys weren't raised to be cowards. Ahab had instilled a number of values in his children, and bravery in the face of adversity was one of them. Still, if that had been the only thing holding me back, I might have gone through with it. But there were, of course other factors to consider. Like family. And Mulder. Always Mulder. In my mind, it always came back to what it would do to Mulder if I actually went through with it. He would have blamed it on himself. I know he feels guilty about everything that happened to me, as if it was somehow his fault. I know him well enough to know that. I also know that he contemplated suicide when I was dying. I could never be that selfish, that uncaring as to go through with it and lay that burden on his shoulders as well. Apparently his mother did not have that problem. What she did was an act of both selfishness and cowardice, and I hate her for what she has done to Mulder. As if killing herself was not bad enough, she had to rub salt in his wounds one last time by leaving that message on his answering machine. Making him feel guilty for not calling her back sooner. Not to mention offering him some promise of answers that he obviously is never going to hear now. She didn't even have the decency to tell him she was dying. All these years, she's been hiding some knowledge about his sister from him, knowing that he's spent a large majority of his life searching for her. All she had to do was say a few words, and all that could have been avoided. Years of not knowing could have ended then and there. A quarter of a century of pain, guilt ,and nightmares, She held all the cards. But, apparently that was too much for the woman that called herself his mother, the woman that was supposed to care about him and love him. She couldn't bring herself to tell him, and after and endless search for the truth, he's still left wondering. I just cannot believe the things this woman has allowed her son to go through. If she was still alive right now, she'd have one livid Dana Scully to deal with. How anyone could do that to their own flesh and blood, especially someone who's as sensitive as Mulder, who feels everything so deeply...is beyond me. And yet, I know he loved her, in spite of everything, because she was his mother. That's just the way he was. Now, he has no one left, except me. I will stick by his side, as I always have, even when his ideas were so out there, no sane person would believe them. Because I am his partner, and his friend. Over these past seven years, I have even grown to love this man, God help me. His quest has become mine. Together, we will find Samantha, no matter what happened to her. I owe it to Mulder to help him find her...because no one else will. END ~~~~~~~~~~~~~