From: ephemeral@ephemeralfic.org Date: Fri, 3 Mar 2000 20:30:41 -0600 Subject: Niveus Agape by Juliette Riesling Source: direct Reply To: firefly_ecstasy@yahoo.com Title: Niveus Agape Author: Juliette Riesling Archive: Knock yourself out (but tell me too, please) Episode/Timeline Warning: This is set post-"Closure," but the only real spoiler is a minor reference to the Anasazi trilogy Rating: PG Category: MSR Summary: With freedom comes release, amidst a gentle fall of snow Feedback: The prospect terrifies and invigorates me all at once. I am new at this. So, go ahead. Fire away. Tell me how bad I am, and send me a list of all the things I could be doing to better humanity rather than annoy it. firefly_ecstasy@yahoo.com Disclaimer: 1013, Fox, CC, yadda yadda...but who are they kidding? They belong to the masses now, just as all good things should. Author Note: You know how you always think about the little things you would love to see M and S do (you know, the things CC will never *let* them do)? Well, this is mine. Snow, snow snow! Snow, CC, snow! Additional Note: "Niveus" is Latin for snowy, and "agape" is the Latin word for the highest form of love...a love beyond lust and infatuation. The kind of love that is the mating of the souls. Niveus Agape By Juliette Riesling *************************************************************** "I love you, not only for who you are, but for who I am when I am with you." -Anonymous "The soul that can speak with its eyes can kiss with its gaze." -Anonymous ************************************************************** They had both remained silent during the ride back to the motel, each one locked in a reverie of the past, each one hesitant to break the ethereal silence that hovered between them. A sleepy pattering of snow had started, gently whispering through the air, each flake dancing and then falling to join the thick carpet of white that already blanketed the ground. A lazy stream of jazz mingled with the soft tap of Mulder's finger on the steering wheel, creating a subtle symphony and the perfect complement to the dreamy atmosphere of contemplation. It was so soothing that Scully did not at first notice that the ride was over, that the car was parked, and that their adjoining rooms loomed before them, two faint blue doors that shifted through the windshield and the prancing patterns of white. "Are you planning on spending the night out here, Agent Scully?" His eyes shined and his lips curved slightly into a gentle tease, combining to create one of those looks she knew he reserved only for her. She returned the gesture with the playful smile and amused eyes that she reserved only for him. "It's probably safer Mulder. This place isn't exactly stamped with the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval." "Nothin' but the best for you, Scully." Smiling, they both stepped out of the rental car, out into the swirling artistry of the winter around them. Everything sparkled, lit by the hazy light that poured down from the two lone street lamps that towered above them. Instinctively, they both paused, arching back to look up through the intoxicating banter of white, each trying to separate the stars from the snow as the two elements blended against the ebony-blue darkness of the midnight sky. Long moments passed between them. A quiet space of time, shared by two people who needed no words to communicate. Then, suddenly, Mulder dropped out of the corner of her peripheral vision, falling from his position next to her and into the deep bed of snow behind them. "Oh my god! Mulder! Are you okay?" In an instant she was at his side, kneeling down into the cold drift, trailing her hand slowly up to his temple. "He he he hee..." The low chuckle hit her ears before she had time to hide the worry that flitted into her intense blue eyes. That emotion passed right through them, quickly changing as the minor trick he had played on her began to register. "Mulder," she sighed, punctuating her remarks with a brief rolling of her eyes, "What are you doing?" The only response he gave was a more insistent deep-throated laugh, and, after a moment, the slow butterfly movement of his legs and arms through the snow. "Oh...please tell me you're not making a snow angel, Mulder." "Come on, Scully." His eyes gleamed. "It's your turn next." "No, Mulder...really. As much as I would love to frolic in the snow with you, this suit is new, I am cold, and all I want right now is a nice hot shower." As she spoke, he rolled from his prone position and onto his side, balancing on one elbow, running his index finger in circles through the snow. "Frolic?" he asked, making larger circles, scooping the snow into one fist and packing it against the other. "What other games did you have in mind, Agent Scully?" "Mulder- don't even *think* about throwing that at me. Don't. I mean it." "Who? Me? Scully- I'm shocked. I would *never*..." As he spoke, the pile of snow grew larger, growing into a formidable ball next to him. He pulled himself up to sit next to it, dragging snow from all sides to add to it, packing it and shaping it with his gloved hands. "Oh...now what? A snowman, Mulder? If you're going to sit out here and build a snowman-" "Really, Scully...I think I'm more creative than *that*." The sight of him, curled over his progressing project, his eyes dancing and his tongue peeking out between his pursed lips, brought a warm smile to her face. She sensed where this was going. "Oh, sorry," she said, stifling the small giggle threatening to break through, "What then? A snow *alien*?" Immediately, his hands stopped drifting, stilled for a moment, and then began to demolish the work that lay before him. "Ha ha...no. I guess you'll never know now, Scully." "It was! It *was* a snow alien, wasn't it?" The giggle could no longer be repressed, and leaped out from her throat, softly tinkling through the crisp night air. She glanced down, trying to restrain herself. When she glanced back up, he was standing. With a devilish grin on his face and one fist hidden behind his back. "Mulder! I mean it! Do not throw that at me! I warned you...don't. Or else-" "Hoo...or what?" The grin on his face grew wider, the glint in his eye more amused. His left hand slipped from behind his back, and poised in midair. "I mean it!" she cried, backing two steps away, then spinning on her heel to bolt for the turquoise haven of her motel room door. Three steps into her retreat, the snowball nailed her squarely in the back, sending bits of ice and cold under her collar, shocking the warm skin of her neck. For a moment, she froze in midstep, hands held out, mockingly displaying her surprise that he had done what he had just done. Slowly she began to turn, carefully retaining the look of utter shock that played across her face. He looked back at her, grinning like an idiot. "Oh, I warned you. I warned you, Mulder." In seconds, she had hunched down, swept up a handful of snow, and nailed him in the shoulder. After a brief open-mouthed pause, he cocked his head and squinted his eyes thoughtfully. "Did you feel that, Scully?" "What?" "Deja vu...I swear...you there, me over here, something hitting my shoulder..." Her eyes narrowed as she realized he was mocking her, teasing her about the bullet she had fired to save him so long ago. She smiled at him. A playful but deadly smile. And then all hell broke loose. The snow flew, they ran, they dodged, they chased, they laughed. More than once Mulder nearly fell in his retreat from Scully, whose tiny hands proved powerful weapons when it came to packing her weapons. Eventually, breathless, he allowed her to overtake him, and overtake him she did, grinding a chunk of icy wetness into his hair as he bent over and surrendered to her. They each stood there as the moments passed, panting and laughing, wiping snow from their clothes and tears from their eyes. And then, eventually, the laughter simply died, and there was only silence between them once more. That same comfortable silence that they always shared together with such ease. The snow had stopped. Scully's eyes drifted back up, back up to the stars that were shining clearly now. Mulder's eyes drifted to Scully. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes sparkled, and her mouth curled into a pink grin of satisfaction. She blinked once, then twice, her dark lashes sweeping down then up, then down and up again. Her chest heaved, still calming her from her exertion. She was beautiful. As beautiful perhaps, he thought, as he had ever seen her. Without thinking, he reached out to her, first tucking an errant strand of her thick red-gold hair back into place, then lightly brushing ice dust off the shoulder of her dark jacket. Small touches. But they got her attention. They always did, even when she didn't acknowledge it to him or even to herself. They always got her attention. She turned to him. And in that one second, the second that their eyes finally locked, something in the air around them changed. Something that had been building for years, something that had been toyed with between them but never fully addressed. Something that had lain buried in those silences they always shared, something that had always existed but had never been given a voice. Due to fear. Due to obstacles. Due to doubts. Due to all the walls that they had to tear down to get to each other. But most of all, due to the fact that it had never really been right. Somehow, they had each been waiting for something to give, for something to break, for something to show them that the moment had at last come to speak these things between them. With that one gaze, both knew that moment had finally arrived. They each had often wondered when it would occur, when that final spoken step over the line of friendship would be taken. In truth, the line had been crossed long ago, so long ago that neither could quite recall a time when the change had even occurred. It was easier for them not to attempt to place the start of an emotion that seemed to ignore the boundaries of time, a love that was so strong that every moment together was its own beginning and end. Every time they touched, every time they spoke, and every time their eyes met, they fell in love with each other all over again. And now, here they stood. In the snow. Falling in love. "Mulder..." "Shhh..." His hand reached out as he placed his finger over her lips, quieting the words that his heart already knew, the words that he did not need to hear her utter. They were words she had said to him more times than she would ever know. She smiled, reading his mind, knowing that he understood her, knowing that he knew what she had wanted to say. Her eyes slipped shut as he pulled his finger away from her mouth. "I love you, Mulder." Her voice was a whisper, but the smile stayed on her face, growing stronger as the words left her. She had longed to hear herself say that to him for too many years, and hearing them ring through the air hit her as hard as it hit him. It was spoken as it always should have been, in a time when both of them were ready to devote themselves to each other. For even though they had always belonged to each other, neither had truly been free to let themselves fall completely. They had been waiting for each other, waiting until the moment when the darkness of the past had finally slipped away, leaving only the glowing light of the future before them. When she opened her eyes and looked back up to him, he was crying. Without a word, he drew her to him, seeking her lips, opening her up with a kiss that was the synthesis of all his hopes and tears and love for her that had accumulated through the years, building and building since that first day their souls had touched. It was a defiance of all the death that had clung to them, all the pain that had twisted into their lives and battered their hearts. It was a prayer, a fire whisper that cried out for the future and all the glorious light that it held. But most of all, it was a sob of love, a perfect hurricane of emotion that plunged them openly and forever into the love that had always lingered silently between them. When they finally parted, still breathless in their delirium and dizzy with flashbacks of the past, they could not speak. But it did not matter. They had never needed words. As the snow began again to sigh softly down from the heavens, Mulder lifted her into his arms, carrying her away to love her as he had always longed to love her. As he had longed to love her his entire life. ~Finis firefly_ecstasy@yahoo.com