From: literate.wench@gmail.com
Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:43:37 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Last Step Before You Fall or Fly
Source: atxc

Title: Last Step Before You Fall or Fly
Author: Wicked Wench
Rating: NC-17
Classification: MSR
Spoilers: Season 8
Synopsis: Season 8, Mulder and Scully finally choose to face facts.
There's never going to be anyone else, for either of them.
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully belong to The Fox network, 1013, and
Chris Carter. Not me.
Feedback: yes please
Archive: ok, just let me know so I can squee with joy at being valued


"Last Step Before You Fall or Fly"


She wasn't his ordinary fare. He knew his own tastes, both as a
younger man and as the man he had become, and she fit none of his
fantasies or nightmares. She wasn't sly and knowing and dangerous; she
wasn't witty and wanton, aggressively ready for anything. She had
class and style and modesty, and oceans of reserve. She was subtle.
She fought her body on that score; her body was as dramatic as an
explosion, colored patriotically: hair like a house on fire, eyes like
the sea, skin like skim milk. Packed tightly into a tiny frame he
could fit in a golf-bag if he tried hard enough. He'd never met a
grown adult he could fit in a golf bag. Except maybe Frohicky. They
were almost the same height. Experimentally, he looked across the
office and lifted his thumb. He closed one eye and lined the thumb up
on her frame - it completely covered her, obliterating her from the
room. Perhaps that was a bit of overkill though; his thumb was too
big. He squinted and swapped thumb for pinkie, tipping his head this
way and that. Nope, she was bigger than his pinkie, poking out around
the edges. He dropped his hand and opened his eyes to see her staring
at him in silent bemusement; he shrugged, unapologetic. She sighed and
shook her head, returned to the file she was sorting through.

She knew when he looked up at her and resisted returning the look for,
oh, almost a minute. He's bored, Dana, she told herself. No cases for
a week and he's done with resting up, he's ready to move on to the
next thing so he's bored and that's a bad thing, so just leave it. You
know you'll regret it if you look... She looked. He was squinting at
her, one eye closed and his little finger held up. She stared. After a
moment he opened his eye and dropped his hand, caught her gaze and
blinked; he looked disconcerted for all of a microsecond, before
shamelessly shrugging and grinning at her. She refused to show any
reaction; she returned to her papers. She could hear him sorting
through his desk, looking for something, but she resolutely tuned her
attention strictly to the reports in front of her. No matter how mind-
numbing they were she was determined to make the most of this
downtime, this lull in the stormfront of her life. She wasn't bored,
she told herself; she wasn't addicted to the chase the way he was. Oh
no, not at all.

He hunted through his desk for a pencil. All he could find was the
mechanical kind, and you can't sharpen plastic. Well. You could, in
theory, but the structural integrity of the plastic would... his hand
found the tape, wedged in the back of his drawer, buried in office
debris. For a moment he wondered what on earth it was, then recognized
it: it was the tape Phoebe had left him.  Not the one he'd thrown out,
but the first one, shoved into his desk and forgotten.  Phoebe. His
brain wandered off again. He stared blankly at the desk.

He pondered love. It was such an enormous term, with so many meanings.
He'd been convinced he was in love before. In high school. What had
been her name? He couldn't even remember, anymore; she'd been a
blonde. His first kiss, the coy and cunning high-school crush who had
flirted and dumped him. Had never really been his, but oh how he had
dreamed... Had known even then he wasn't good enough for her, despite
being on the basketball team. He felt bemused by his adolescence, as
though it were a foreign country. Had he won her he would have found
her boring, inevitably. They would have children and she would be a
part of the local PTA or some such, nattering on about how
disappointed she was in the school board's funding decisions, and he'd
be some sort of politician, bored and desperate for anything to liven
up his day... for a moment the vision was so strong he shuddered in
horror. He blinked. That had never been love, merely the sexual
obsession of a teenaged boy. There were things to be grateful for in
age.

His first love could have been Phoebe, or perhaps she had merely been
an another obsession; these days his emotional reaction to her seemed
distant, almost bizarre. More youthful folly. Completely logical
though, if you looked at it strictly from a psychological view. He'd
been away from home for the first time ever, hanging onto his maturity
and control so tightly in the unfamiliar rigid academic environment.
Being so very rational, carefully fitting himself into the Oxford
school world of ancient ritual and bloodthirsty academic competition.
He'd been forgiven much for being a foreigner, and accepted into the
most serious group of students, discussing deep and meaningful topics
late into the night over tea spiked with brandy. They had all been so
pretentious back then. And Phoebe had seen right through him from the
start. Just getting over his awkward years, just beginning to feel he
wasn't too tall and too lanky and too skinny. She'd seduced him with
mischief and daring and bravado, teased him mercilessly until they
fell into sex like starved wolves.  Used him up, spun him around until
he loved her, until he matched her pranks with wit and daring, until
she decided he was too eager to please. Then - and in hindsight it was
so obvious - she staged the discovery of herself in his roommate's
bed, wearing the black lace that made his mouth water with lust. He'd
been broken, furious, completely baffled. She'd laughed. It was, he
thought, perhaps a brittle laugh; she tried very hard to be completely
unashamed of her actions, but with the benefit of hindsight he thought
perhaps she had been alarmed at her own feelings as well as his. She'd
flirted remorselessly with everyone he knew, until he'd retreated
again into academia in search of some explanation. He found it; it was
easy once you started looking into the psychology of it. Then she
turned her attentions back to him again, contrition and daring in her
black eyes, and he'd told himself not to... He hadn't listened, of
course. And she'd done it all over again. Second time was the charm in
that case; he left Oxford a vastly different man than he'd arrived.

Not love he decided, spinning around once in his chair. It squeaked.
Her red hair and pale face were a blur as he went around again,
turning the office into horizontal streaks. He spun around again and
decided: yes love. Just not the sort that lasts; it had been a burning
thing, consuming and destroying. A fragile species, killed by hard
rains or high winds; a deadly species which eats itself out from the
inside. Phoebe turned to dust in his memory and blew away, and he let
her go with relief. Felt better for it. He stopped squeaking the
chair. She was looking at him again. This time the eyebrow was up. He
grinned at her. She snorted, a delicate and unladylike expression of
derision and disbelief, and turned back to her reports. He was
irritating her... It was fun. He leaned back and stared up at the
ceiling, tossing the tape into the trash without looking at it. Good-
bye, Phoebe.

His cynicism didn't survive his return to the US after college. His
choice to join the FBI had been such a carefully thought out impulse.
He knew he could do anything, go anywhere; his family was neither poor
nor without connections. But to combine service to your nation with
the cunning of solving puzzles, with the electric taste of the hunt -
the FBI satisfied his desires in every way. And there he met Dianna,
with her witchy smile and her long body, and once again he lost
himself. Her pale hands and brown hair, her long legs. Her steady
sensuality like a river, completely unlike Phoebe's fizzing
excitement. She was the antidote to Phoebe, the witty and wild
intellectual he could talk to without fear of being mocked or cheated
on. He loved her, trusted her - fell head over heels, convinced that
this time it would be fine, convinced that her differences from Phoebe
rendered her both safe to open his heart to and faithful. She was
indeed faithful. He had merely forgotten that Phoebe's flaws were not
the only flaws a lover could posses. She had a career, and plans, and
he wasn't in them; he thought perhaps her feelings had been genuine.
Just not strong enough to keep her there with him. She left him, broke
him again in new and different ways. And so he turned the scalpel of
his mind inwards, slicing his desires into manageable chunks to be
digested separately. Love was for family, for friends; it was utterly
apart from sexual gratification. Lust was fine, should be acted on;
love was never to be combined thusly again. Not for him.

He committed himself wholeheartedly to his rebellion, reverting to
teenaged habits of release, avoiding closer relations. He became a
master of the flirt and flee. He analyzed the situation - you had to
have the release, but you couldn't trust anyone to give it to you. Not
to get that close, not really. After an expensive experiment with a
phone-sex line and a cost-benefit analysis on the time and effort
expended on dating, he determined that pornography was the fastest and
least expensive way to gratify his body and shut off his mind. It was
like novocaine, numbing him, keeping him safe and happy while he
turned all his energy to his work. To his growing obsessions. And then
they stuck him with Scully.

She walked in as the enemy with her head held high, wearing her
discrete pearl earrings and her tastefully understated clothing, and
he felt the lust latch on in his gut like a fishing line. She was
composed and proud and soft and god, her lips were made for erotic
dreams; but he had no problems killing those desires enough to work
with her. He was a past master now at sublimation and distance. Touch
and smirk and tease, keep it light and don't get involved. Use the
tension as a barrier gate between them; she'll never cross that line
so it's safe to walk along side it, safe to stand there and leave a
light touch on her back because although she's right here next to you,
within herself she's standing so far away. He's aware of the currents
moving under the surface, and sure he won't get caught up in them and
drown; from the first moment he sees her he knows she'll never make
that move. It would be unprofessional. Unethical. Irregular. A bad
decision, one she's not capable of making; and so instead of keeping
his distance he relies on her to keep hers. He relies on his reading
of her personality, which is a problem; because he feels like he knows
her from the moment he sees her, and what he sees isn't for him. Never
could be. She's the sort of woman who marries a dentist and has three
kids and drives a minivan. She's a mother and a lover, a woman. It
irritates him, so he pokes at it like a sore tooth. Scully, are you
sure? A little mockery in his voice... Touch here on the back, catch
her necklace with his finger. He knows why it's wrong but the devil
inside, oh that one whispers away. About how hot it would be. About
how she'd look, up against the wall, on satin sheets, in the shower.
Everywhere. He sees it every time he looks at her, and he likes it. He
mocks himself for it. Stupid man. But it's ok, a familiar mockery.

Then he screws up. Starts to trust her. Starts to get close to her,
see her as a person, as though she'd ever let him see her any other
way. And the killer is that she wants him too - it was plain to see,
sitting there between them like an elephant in the room. They both
felt the desire. If she had acted on it, if she had flirted or been
receptive to his flirtations, he'd have backed off faster than... but
she never had, never would, and that left him in a cognitive
dissonance the likes of which no man should endure. He wanted her,
wanted her to want him; she wanted him, he knew it but she wouldn't
act on it. If she'd acted he would not want her. He was kidding
himself. He would want her if she weighed an extra hundred pounds and
lost all her teeth, he'd still feel this bond, this fascination and
attraction. And it just...sat there, unresolved, untouched and
untouchable. He ached for a while and then did as he had in the past:
made the decision not to see her that way. To kill the desire, the
same way he'd killed it before; he was a psychologist, for god' sake.
If he couldn't change his own behavior he should turn in his badge and
check himself into a mental ward. Half the bureau thought he belonged
there anyways. A little operant conditioning: think of Scully in any
situation aside from the professional, punish himself by thinking of
the consequences. Tie the two together in his mind until the desire is
inextricably linked to the knowledge of disaster waiting beneath the
surface.

It didn't work. He kept on wanting her. He felt like an idiot. He felt
out of control.

He tried flirting with everyone but her. He almost tried dating, but
interacting with women on a social basis - the trade of flattery and
blushes - was uninteresting on so many levels. The steps you had to
take to get to sex were too steep, too bound up in relationships. He
knew there was damage, that he wasn't whole and healthy. It didn't
actually matter; that was a conclusion he'd come to long ago, when he
began his pursuit of the greater truths. You didn't have relationships
- not whole and healthy ones - when you had a mission, an overriding
obsession. They did not live comfortably together, dedication to a
cause and dedication to a person. And so his flaws - that he didn't
want someone who wanted him, he wanted a chase, he wanted the
unattainable with the prospect of winning it over... those flaws were
irrelevant, ignored, left unfixed and unregarded. Allowed to exist
within, as he didn't want to fix them; they were useful flaws,
protective ones. Functioning choices he'd made to become who he was.

The trouble with the unattainable was when it wanted to be attained.
Scully was unattainable without the prospect of ever being won, and
yet she wanted him. He could have her for the price of a kiss, he knew
it; and if he kissed her it would end, and she'd be gone. She'd never
work with him and sleep with him. He saw Phoebe again and felt the old
fascination, felt relief that he could lust after her in the old and
terrifying way he used to. But still, even turning his desires
outward, even eyeing every breathing woman he met on the street with
intent, still he wanted her. His partner. It didn't stop him from
wanting the others; it settled in alongside those desires like a
watchful cat, ready to wait out the long haul with infinite patience.
It nestled inside him, curled up in his guts and waiting. Made itself
at home; moved in to stay. He laughed at himself, in disbelief; at his
hubris in thinking those flaws he'd accepted - been pleased with -
couldn't be reached, at the cunning of life in slipping that little
knife into his vulnerability. But he never, ever made the move.

They got past the bit where you're awkward because you're a man and
she's a woman and you're alone together. They traded keys. They
learned which foods had the seal of approval and which would wind up
in the fridge for a week until they had to be thrown out. They got
drunk once, even, and managed to remain on opposite sides of the
couch. They never really spoke beyond work; they never socialized, not
really. There was so much risk in it, in seeing each other as anything
more than a workmate. Such a delicate balance, a dance they performed
with the cliff on one side and the sea on the other. They lived with
the thread of desire for so long that it lost it's importance; it had
never been as important as the respect and trust and partnership. And
yet it could have sliced those emotions so easily, if it had ever been
freed; like a cable snapped free from too much strain. They knew that
the tension they kept on their desires were what stabilized it, kept
it from slicing their worlds to ribbons.

He stopped flirting with her after a while; then he stopped flirting
with anyone at all. She had never been overly social with men, and
over the years - after too many disasters - she stopped dating
altogether. They ceased to bother looking for others to share their
lives; who could they ask into such a world as theirs? Which innocent
would they choose as a hostage to fortune, were they to fall in love?
And how do you love another when you are so deeply enmeshed in the
life of one person already? There simply wasn't anyone else out there.
But by then the pattern of denial was ingrained, cemented into place
through fire and flood and death itself. Calcified, fossilized, frozen
by habit; they no longer bothered to be cautious about socializing,
they could trust themselves to hug. There was even the New Year's
kiss, a careful testing of the waters...see? We can do this, it's no
big deal. We're grown adults in control of ourselves and a quick kiss,
that's just fine. That his lips tickled with the texture of hers for
days after was enough of a warning that he didn't repeat the
experiment. That she felt breathless she ignored with the ease of long
practice. And then she broke the rules.

It was a perfectly ordinary night, which in it's own way was strange
to her. There has been no drama this week. At work they have been
finishing up paperwork, closing out files. She even stole... borrowed,
she'll bring it back... a bottle of the stinking pink disinfectant
from the upstairs cleaning closet and attacked their keyboards, mice
and desks. Mulder took one sniff and fled on the flimsiest of excuses
about having forgotten some papers with Skinner; he did manage a
belated, over-the shoulder peace offering to fetch the nicer upstairs
coffee with the hazelnut creamer she loved which the bureau never
stocked below-stairs. She found them over an hour later in the
executive level breakroom, Skinner waving his hands about and making
some point about football and Mulder leaning casually against the
cupboards with a skeptically amused quirk to his eyebrow. Skinner
froze when she walked in, and Mulder straightened up and glanced at
his watch with some chagrin. She gave them both her best Disapproving
Special Glare and retrieved a cup of coffee for herself. She added
extra creamer, just to make the point, and left with her heels tapping
out an extra-firm tattoo on the floor.

That night he stopped by after work, bringing Thai food from the place
on Route 1. It was out of the way from the Bureau's building to her
house, and the extra driving time was his apology. She dished it up in
bowls and they sat and talked as they ate, nonsensical daily
complaints and routine responses. Old conversation, like a well-worn
quilt; a comfort. She got up and rinsed the dishes, came back into the
living room where he was sitting on the couch. He looked so
comfortable there, his tall frame slumped on her furniture. So out of
place, his dark clothing against her creams and beiges and greens,
against the subdued femininity of her living room. He was wearing a
long-sleeve t-shirt and jeans; she thought of his suits, the formal
Mulder and this informal man on her couch, in her home. She looked
down on him and thought: he used to be thinner. He's filled out a bit,
these years... it looks good on him. And she thought: I will never
have sex with anyone but him. If I don't have sex with him I'll never
have sex ever again. It was so obvious, such a simple conclusion;
hardly even a surprise. It went both ways; she knew he had not had sex
with anyone else for years now; she thought, he will never go looking
at another woman, not as long as I am alive. We have become celibate
together, faithful unto each other. Will we live our lives so forever?
Is this the rest of our lives, until death?

There was no drama to her thoughts. They felt like dominoes falling in
slow motion. She studied the top of his head a moment, as he studied
the batteries on her remote with a frown. His nose, his cheek, the
long hands she'd once dreamt about.  There was no decision to make.
Her breath caught in her throat. She ceased to think entirely, ceased
to contemplate her actions and decisions. Stepped up to him, took the
remote from his hand and set it down. Took his large hand in her
smaller ones and tugged him to his feet. His knees popped; he wasn't
as young anymore as when they'd met, and time and damage had taken
their toll. He stared down at her quizically. He was oblivious; she
felt a giddy sense of power, looking up into his face. A complete
reversal of their physical positions: she looked up at him and knew
herself the conquerer, the queen of this domain. He blinked, looking
at her with the expectancy and trust no other human had ever given
her, and she thought: oh yes. She lifted her hand to the back of his
neck, let it conform to the column of it, fingers touching the fine
hairs that were starting to grow out of his short haircut. Her fingers
were cool from rinsing the dishes and his neck was warm. She looked at
his lips, studied them as she gently bent his head down towards hers.
Felt the shock to his system like electricity in her hand as he
realized her intentions. Felt his tremor as he bent his head,
submitting to her gentle hand. She stopped feeling anything but his
lips when they touched.

His soft lips, the breath from his nose on her cheek, the smell of him
like concentrated lust coming into her brain with every inhalation.
Her body woke up with a shock. What? Kissing? We're kissing now? Tiny
cheerleaders rushed about in her stomach, pom-poms fluttering in
confusion and delight. His neck was hot under her hand, and his hands
were there in her hair, holding her like something fragile, with such
control and care. His fingers on her skull, cradling her face. His
kiss was so very careful. She felt dizzy with delight at her success.
Forever and ever they stood there, until she thought the dizziness
would become a faint; there was a rushing in her ears. She thought she
was hyperventilating, or perhaps not breathing at all. Giddy, but
there was such a central core of relief and stillness inside her,
spreading through her like slow lava... her nipples ached and the heat
from her hand on his neck seemed to trace a line directly down her
arm, into her abdomen.

Slowly, ever so carefully, they pulled back; his forehead pressed to
hers, their breath shared in perfect synchronicity. In and out. He
slowly lifted his head, looked down at her. She lifted her eyes and
thought: I will remember this forever. His eyes, grey and glowing and
so utterly intensely focused on her face; while his fingers traced her
jaw with the delicacy of a man holding a hollow egg. His ragged
whisper. "Scully..." She smiled. She wanted to cry. She whispered
instead.
   "Come to bed with me."
   "Scully...." his breath was a shudder, as though he were trying to
awaken from a dream.
   "Yes." An answer to the question he wasn't asking, not a response;
and still he wasn't completely persuaded. His pause, the way he
shifted his gaze from one of her eyes to the other; she knew his
thoughts, unspoken, sitting just there on the back of his tongue.
"I'm sure, Mulder. I've never been so certain." Disbelief and wild
hope in his eyes, surety in hers.  Wonder in his as he understood what
she was saying.... She stepped back from him, trying to regain some
control, some perspective. It was a shock to realize that the room and
house still existed around her, she'd been so consumed by him. She
turned, knees weak, and walked with deliberately steady strides back
into the bedroom; she stripped off her oatmeal-colored sweater on the
way, and heard his indrawn breath behind her. She didn't look back.
She walked on, stripping off her white t-shirt, revealing the beige
bra. Plain and serviceable, a tastefully neutral color with a hint of
lace on the edges. She knew her tattoo was a bright circle on her
lower back, a contrast to every subdued thing about her. It matched
the pale scars in that respect, in the denial of her frailty. He was
watching her, and he'd be watching that tattoo... She could feel his
eyes on her back. She paused by the bed, reached behind herself to
unhook the clasp, felt his fingers catch her hands and stop them. His
hands held hers as he brought them around to her front, as he wrapped
his arms around her. Bent his head and pressed his lips to the side of
her neck, his front to her back. He was still wearing his clothing;
his sweater was warm and rough against her shoulderblades.

His hands hold hers still before wandering away to her sides; they're
so large they cover her from ribs to the waistband of her jeans. He
runs them up and down, slides them across her belly; she leaves her
own hands on top of his, and it's as though she's caressing her own
body; the discontinuity of sensation tips her head back, her hair
falling over his bent shoulder. His lips on her neck, slipping down
her collarbone, catch her breath and steal it away. He slides his
hands down and grips her hips, pulls her bottom against his front so
that the evidence of his arousal is a hard length against her back.
She moans his name, and he slips his hands up to her shoulders, turns
her around. He's so close, the heat of his body is radiating against
her like a fire. He's towering over her and she feels so very small,
like spun glass. He moves forward and she must move back; the back of
her knees brush against the bed, and then she's sitting there while he
gently presses her back; he's got one knee on the bed beside her hip
while his eyes slide down to her jeans. She's breathing quickly,
breasts heaving while his fingers slip the button from her jeans and
the sound of the zipper going down is stunningly loud in the room. His
hands slide the jeans from her legs, leaving her exposed, aroused,
staring at him from eyes which want to close so she can focus on what
his hands feel like on her legs. All she's wearing now are the beige
bra and panties and her little white ankle socks. She should feel
silly, with those socks; but he wraps those hands around her calf and
tugs them off her feet, one and the other, with so much concentration
that there's no room for her embarrassment or amusement. This is not
giggling sex or rough and tumble. This is the cumulation of almost a
decade of their lives together, and wonder and terror accompany it in
equal measure. He's still dressed. She stares up at him. He lifts his
eyes from her ankles to her face. Runs his hands over her legs; her
eyes flutter. He bends his head, presses a kiss to her stomach. Rests
his forehead there for a moment while her hands tangle together in his
hair.

He straightens, looks back in her eyes; he was close to crying. Is
trying not to cry now as he grabs his shirt and strips it off, his
eyes never leaving hers; his hands don't linger on his fly, but strip
his jeans off quickly and precisely. No fumbling, no hesitation. His
gaze is expressionless except for his eyes, which are devouring her.
Then he's stripping off his boxers and he's there, naked before her.
It's nothing new. She's seen him so before. Her fingers have a
visceral memory of every time they've touched his skin; of the feel of
needle and thread in her hands, of slime on his skin and applying tape
to his arm and pressing down to stop the blood from seeping out of his
wounds. So many injuries. She has a map of his body imprinted on her
mind, every muscle labeled and tagged, every injury highlighted. But
never like this.

Never aroused, looking at her. Not when she's still wearing her own
underwear. Those scraps of satin and lace are suddenly intensely
erotic, covering her from his eyes when he's revealed to her; he
stands there a moment, measuring her carefully. To see if this is
real, what she wants. She shifts, forces her eyes up from his nudity
to his face. It's not exactly easy; that sight of his erection has
sent her body into a sexual panic. She can't think; she doesn't know
what response to make, except that she wants to grip him in her hands,
take him into her mouth. She lifts herself on her arms, shaking, ready
to reach for him; but whatever he sees in her is what he needed to
see: he's leaning over her, one knee on either side of her stomach,
arms levering his torso off of her while his lips descend onto hers
again. This kiss is not so reverent. This kiss is hungry, beginning to
become impatient, nibbling and sucking at her lips while they part and
gasp. This kiss trails down her neck and finds her collarbone, the
curve of her breasts. Her fingers trail hard through his stubbly hair,
half massage and half demand for more. His hands suddenly catch her
under her arms and push her further onto the bed; she's lying across
it now and his lips are on her belly, snaking a hot trail down past
her navel. Then his hands move down, caress her hips and slide beneath
her; she lifts her bum off the bed so he can slide the underwear away.
His breath is on the curls of her sex before she can lower her hips
again, his hands on her hips holding her steady while his lips nuzzle
into her mons. When his tongue laps out and slides one long stroke up
from cunt to clit her wail of shocked arousal breaks the panting
silence that's held until now. He does not show her mercy, but sends
his tongue writhing against her folds, lapping up the juices which are
flowing freely now. She can't hold on, can't even begin to comprehend
how quickly it's come upon her; she's over the edge like going over a
waterfall, crying out his name and convulsing. He keep at it up 'til
she's gasping and every pale round limb is lying weak and lip upon the
covers; the bed is a wrinkled mess, and sweat dampens the curls of red
hair at her forehead.

He lifts his head and crawls up her body, his lips trailing in reverse
the path he took down. She shudders and sighs, her eyelids fluttering.
His kiss is gentle but insistent; she has to respond, albeit she does
so in a daze of satisfaction. The taste of her salt on his lips sends
a shudder through her, and a tiny lurch through her hips; he deepens
the kiss, slips his tongue deep within the caverns of her mouth,
traces her teeth. Keeps the kiss going while his hands find the clasp
of her bra beneath her shoulders, lifts her - her red hair trailing
back like a banner onto the bed - and undoes her last bastion. The bra
comes free, exposing the hard pink nipples and creamy globes of her
breasts. He groans and bends his head, takes them into his mouth. His
tongue is so very clever, sliding over and over until she begins to
gasp and the tension is spiraling again; then his teeth, ever so
gently, tugging and nibbling at the sensitive peaks. She stirs on the
bed under him, hands roaming his sides, tracing the muscles that flex
in his back as he looms over her. And then there's a pause, and he's
looking down at her, and she opens her eyes; her eyes are the color of
the sea, dark as night. He stares down into her eyes and she stares
back as he slowly slides his erection up her leg, against her thigh.
The trembling in her parted lips undoes him; he slams into her with a
soft shout, an inhaled gasp of her name. Dana. Dana Katherine. His
Scully. He tries to go slow. He tries but she's so hot and wet around
him, tighter than anything he's felt before, muscles flowing like wet
silk on his shaft. She's so tiny. Her hips raise up and her legs lock
around his thighs and he's thrusting helplessly into her. One hand
tangles in her hair and pulls her face into his shoulder; the other
tries to prop his weight up and off her, to keep from crushing her
while his hips move far beyond his control. He couldn't stop now if
the world were to catch fire. His expression is one of pain, almost
buried in the bed and her hair as his hips flex and pound her into the
bed. She's digging her nails into his ass and that's it, that's the
final straw; he convulses and feels his seed rip from him, pour into
her heat. She cries out and he feels her cunt clasp his shaft like a
fist, again and again as waves of orgasm flow through her; he's
incapable of anything but a desperate twitch of the hips as she wrings
the last drops from him with her pleasure. He collapses, trying not to
land completely on top of her, and her legs unlock from his thighs
with shuddering completion.

He's whispering her name, over and over, and she's crying; tears are
leaking from her closed lids. He's still shaking as he presses his
lips to her eyelids, kisses her eyes. Those blue eyes that see right
through him, those windows to the most serene soul he's ever met. He
feels like someone has hollowed him out with an ice cream scoop; he
feels empty, pithed and drained. He manages to roll onto his back,
dragging her over on top of him; he manages to snag the comforter of
her bed with one long arm and wrap it around them so she won't get
cold. His feet are sticking out the bottom of the bundle they make on
her bed. Her bed. It smells like her. He presses his nose into her
hair, kisses the top of her head. She's still trembling, as though
this were a disaster; as though she had just lived through an
earthquake or a bomb. He closes his eyes and holds her until they calm
down, until she relaxes in his arms.

The smell of her is like a drug. He's surrounded by it. He's sticky
and knows what the sweat and semen are doing to her comforter; it's a
quick flash in his mind, her room gone over with a UV light showing
these stains on the bed. He doesn't care. He shifts a little and feels
her breasts against his chest, and feels the response from his groin.
Again? It's a surprise; it's unexpected. She feels it, lifts her head;
her hair is a tussled mess but her lips, oh god, her lips are swollen
with his kisses. That's done it then; the look of a languidly sated
woman on Scully's face stiffens him into complete arousal. Her eyes
widen a little. He disentangles his hand from the covers; hates to
take it from where it rests on her ass but has to. He brushes the hair
back from her face and smiles, just a little, gazing into her eyes.
She shifts against him again in the confines of the comforter; his
smile becomes a little strained. She wriggles just a tiny bit,
mischief in her eyes, and his hips flex against her involuntarily. He
closes his eyes, lets his head fall back with a thump. "Dana..."

She flips the comforter off him, the cool air rushing onto his skin
and dropping the level of desperation building in his genitals. He
feels her move away and feels bereft; lifts his head and arms in
protest but the shock of her mouth closing over his shaft sends his
brain away. His back arches; his hips flex up, thrusting
uncontrollably. His hands fist at his sides and his breath strangles
in his throat. He feels like he's going to come right there, right
then. Her lips slide down, hair brushing his thighs; and her tongue...
oh god, she's a witch. She's a witch and he's ensorcelled, she's a
fairy queen and he's her Tam Lin. He hangs onto the comforter while
her little mouth slips and slides and her tongue flicks at his head,
while she sucks away the bitter juices of their sex as though it were
wine. He's going to come. He lunges down, grabs her under her arms;
her expression is the pout of a child denied candy. Her lips are wet.
Frantically he pulls her hips over his erection, thrusts into her wet
cavern from below; the pout vanishes into a wide-eyed surprised "o",
and that's too much for him. He comes almost immediately, hips bucking
and back arched as it rips through him almost painfully. She's still
there on top of him, a peculiar expression on her face; half-guilty,
half amused. He rests a moment, catching his breath; lets his hands
slide over her calves and bent knees, up her thighs. Keeps his
expression innocent while his fingers slide between them, tweak her
under her pubic curls; the startled expression on her face is his
reward. He lets his fingers wander and slide for a minute. Her eyes
slip closed; she's a goddess above him, pale breasts so round and
plump, nipples erect. Her head tips forward, a look of concentration
on her face, a little frown between her eyebrows while she focuses on
the feeling of his fingers between them. Her hips rock in response,
and his soft length almost slides out of her; he grabs her hips and
shifts her back, positioning her against him, slipping back inside
her. She makes a surprised noise when he rocks his hips. He's watching
her face so carefully. What does she know about sex?  What's too much,
what's just right? He knows so much about her. Knows instinctively
where to touch; but this, how is this? His soft length rocking inside
her, how does that feel to her, that soaked soft slipping motion?

It feels good; her eyes are loosing focus, her breath coming in quick
pants. He keeps his hips going - slowly, slowly - slides his hands up
to brush gently at her swollen nipples. Every touch, every caress
elicits a little moan, a response. Drawing it out, moving slowly,
steadily, until her hips rock faster against him. Sweat in the valley
between her breasts. Eyes closed, face focused, intent on the feeling
between her thighs; on the heat and slickness, the strange feel of a
man soft inside her. Not so soft, not now; the friction is working
it's magic on him. He wasn't sure it would, wasn't sure he'd be able
to get it up again so soon; it's been so long and his equipment is a
little out of practice. Even soft though he knew he could bring her
over, make her come. Knew it. He's not soft now though; he's hard
again, and it's almost beginning to be painful. Three times so
quickly, his body's not used to this at all. He moves suddenly,
rolling them over, keeping inside her as he does; her eyes fly open in
shock. He needs a bit more control than the other position allows. He
positions himself, positions her legs, pulls them up against his
sides. Tucks her under him, braces on one arm and slowly flexes his
hips. Her eyes widen, lips part. Yes. He has some control now, since
he's spent himself twice already; he doesn't have to flail around. He
can be an engineer this time, build her arousal like a tower; place
each piece carefully. Butterfly kisses along her cheekbones. The
fingers of his free hand on her breast, her side; catching her hands
when they wander and threaten to send little fires along his skin with
their nails. He holds her hands above her head, pins her there, and
moves his hips against her. Slow, deep thrusts, all the way in and
almost all the way out; going down and down to her womb. Her eyes
close. Tears leak from her lids and he feels it building inside her,
not a violent explosion but a deep wave that runs from the base of her
spine to her scalp. He can feel the electricity of it, smell it on her
skin with the sweat. His own orgasm is a quiet one, like an
afterthought or an echo; he isn't sure there's anything left inside
him to spill but the little wave of pleasure rocks up from his balls
to behind his eyes anyways. And then he's done, finished, complete;
undone and unmade, and utterly exhausted. She's lying there as still
as death, just trying to breathe. He slowly tips onto his side beside
her. The blankets are a hopeless tangle. He doesn't try to unknot
them, merely pulls whatever is loose over their bodies, snags the last
pillow left on the bed and tucks it under his head, and wraps his free
arm around her waist. Pulls her in beside him and falls asleep; she's
almost there already herself, and the feel of him naked pressed to her
side is a comfort beyond anything she's ever felt. The world is right
in ways it hasn't been since her childhood, in ways her childhood self
never dreamt of.

It changes nothing, and everything. This act between them. It wasn't
possible until it could change nothing; it was always possible from
the beginning. But this, together; he sleeps there the night through.
He's never slept like that. The dreams are strange ones, dreams he's
never had before; dreams where everything is all right. It's not real,
of course; the threats remain as they always have - but even the
threats that haunt him are made harmless in these dreams. They beam
their approval like benevolent demons, and pat his back in delight.

In the morning his teeth feel like fur grew on them overnight; she's
awake and looking at him, her blue eyes clear and gentle. He smiles at
her blearily. Guesses at his breath, and despite the wonder which
permeates his body like a light remembers and keeps his lips closed as
he carefully, slowly presses a kiss to her lips. They disentangle
themselves, and he helps her strip the bed and transport the linens to
the laundry basket. They made a mess last night, that was certain. He
contemplates offering her the first shower, but can't resist; instead
he pulls her in with him, naked, and slides the soap over her skin.
Over her breasts, her throat; runs his hands through her hair and
massages her scalp. She returns the favor with her wicked little
hands, and what began as a way to clean up ends with her back pressed
to the cold tile wall with hot water streaming down between their
bodies, over his back and her face while he braces his feet against
the lip of the shower floor. Her legs are wrapped around him and her
head is thrown back, wet hair streaming dark as garnets, curls and
whorls of it sticking to the tiles as he thrusts into her again and
again. His hands cup her buttocks, hold her in place with bruising
force. The shower was never made for two people, and the
contortionist's dance they perform is only possible because she's so
very small. His legs are shaking and aching when they finish, from
being bent and supporting her weight.

She pours cereal for breakfast, and they can't help but watch each
other. She blushes a couple times when his eyes are too intent and his
lips smile intimately, but there's no awkwardness. No shame, no
discomfort of worry. They learn again to be cautious of casual touch
when he brushes her jawline with his fingers in passing and they end
up with him leaning against the doorframe and her body arched against
him while they kiss the longest kiss. She leans her forehead against
his chest, and his fingers wander through her hair, trace her delicate
ears.

"You have to go, Mulder," she says to his t-shirt. He nods, his jaw
bumping the top of her head. Their reasons for not consummating their
desire are now their reasons for concealing it; the world of law does
not account for love in any respect save motivation. She sighs and
pushes back from him. Tips her head back to see his face. Studies him
intently and dispassionately, as though he's a sculpture to analyzed
for artistic merit. Then she smiles and moves away, and he collects
his things. Pulls on his shoes. He's at the door, turning to say one
last goodbye, and she's in her white robe watching him go; she steps
over to him and the moment repeats itself, a sense of deja-vu, an echo
of the rest of his life. She's more important to him now than anything
else. More important than his quest, more important than the truths
he's hunted so assiduously for so long, more important than the
personal answers and public exposure of national lies. Her fingers
curl about the back of his neck and she kisses him. It's so familiar
to him. It's a moment he's replayed in his head a million times
without ever experiencing it once; this morning, with the light
streaming in through the blinds of her windows; her red hair, her
white robe. The way her lashes lie on her cheeks in little sunburst
curves. The thread that leads from her lips to his belly pulls taut,
draws his breath out like a sigh; he looks at her again and goes,
slipping from her home and listening to the locks click shut behind
him.