From: XF1013@CompuServe.com Date: Mon, 09 Feb 1998 22:05:18 GMT Subject: Revived in the Shadows.EMCarter.atxc Revived in the Shadows By EM Carter Rating: PG Classification: SRA Spoilers: Memento Mori Keywords: Mulder/Scully Summary: Scully struggles through another night. Disclaimer: Chris Carter, 1013 people, and FOX folk could sue us all, but they are in fact, hidden romantics, who, when not searching for filming locales in LA and debating gender salary differentials, are reading Paula Graves and cursing the day they so adamantly and prematurely anointed the most long-standing and sexually frustrated fictional relationship in the history of American television. Um, so everyone belongs to them. Except for Sarah McLachlan. I think she belongs to the heavens or something. Note: I don't write this stuff but when I do, I'm not too concerned about getting it out when it's still topical. This one happens to have been lying around for about 5 months. My first story took 6 to get posted. Alas, I post this because I'm sick of looking at it in my file cabinet. I know this is horribly outdated but it was such a good plot while it lasted. And a thank you to Karen and Amy for archiving this for me initially. It's much appreciated. Feedback to XF1013@CompuServe.com. I write back! ************************************************ But if in some dream there was brightness If in some memory some sort of sign Then flesh be revived in the shadows Blessed our bodies would lay so entwined --Sarah McLachlan, "I Will Not Forget You" *** It's funny how I never noticed the nighttime before. I mean, of course I noticed it but I never really *felt* it quite so acutely as I do now. Before, I would sense it for moments, quick moments while walking hurriedly through the Bureau's dark parking lot, short minutes before falling asleep or during the occasional late-night wake up call from Mulder to get up and make the world safe from mutants and governmental conspiracy. I'd take a look around, acknowledge the absence of day, and that was it. Now I feel the night. I feel it. It creeps up on me faster and faster. The days are shorter, sunshine and safety brief residents in my life. I miss them. Mulder tells me I don't sleep enough. Of course I don't. I inherited his bad habits. Thank God he never inherited mine. He's so predictable these days. I'll walk into work on time, he'll have been there for hours already, naturally. We'll exchange the prerequisite "good mornings" and then he'll start to stare. I can see him doing it. I can feel it. He thinks he's being so very smooth about it too. Right. Sometime around eleven he'll finally get up the nerve to do it. "How are you Scully?" He's trying to make sense of the mess I've become, trying to process those hours of staring at my tired face and my thin body into some sort of reasonable hypothesis. But first he needs to ask. Because maybe, just maybe, today will be the day I actually tell him. Hasn't happened yet. "Fine Mulder. Good Mulder. Great Mulder. Never been better Mulder." And oh, how that pisses him off. He thinks I'm trying to spare his feelings. Not true. I'm just cowardly. I do not want to deal with the truth, as has been the case in all we do, everything we are to each other. He embraces the damn thing and I run away clutching science or reason or consequence or whatever the hell it is that I can rationalize as a good deterrence from belief or acceptance. He *needs* to know. He needs to know it all. Not just how I am and how much I slept but all of it. Because it isn't happening to him. He needs to know what it feels like to be dying. I know he's been in some dire situations and the man has come close to death too many times to count. But he's never known in advance that his time here was limited. He's never known that he will in fact die and it will be soon. He's never had that gnawing anticipation and crippling burden of hope. Hope that the situation could be resolved somehow. Miracles and magic serums. Underground testing facilities and the blessed cure. And so I know that will be the next question in his quest for the truth. "What does it feel like to be dying Scully?" As much as he needs to know, he can't bare to share this particular experience with me. He who has shared so much of my life with such solidarity and such compassion. He can't cross the line to know this truth. It will mean his destruction. He needs to be the motivator. He needs to be the anchor. I used to need that from him. When this started, I shrived off his strength. I swallowed as much as I could cup in my hands. It kept me fairly optimistic for awhile. But it doesn't work anymore. Like some favorite toy you wind up every day and then one day you wind it up and it just sits there. I've sapped him dry of all the strength he has and it's never enough. I know this is very difficult for him to handle. Sometimes I think this is even worse than when I was missing, though I wasn't here to see what that did to him. I've heard lots of stories though. But never from him. He never talks about that time. Sometimes I think this is hurting him more than Samantha. I don't think it's egotistical to think that. I didn't know him when that particular wound was fresh but I see him now. I understand how his pain has not subsided, only matured into a darker, quieter manifestation. But I see the same look in his eyes when anything related to my cancer comes up. That look that used to be dedicated solely to his missing sister. But it's a blacker time I think. He has the emotions of a man when it comes to me. He'll always be a little boy for her. So I lay here with thoughts of Mulder and the night. I feel its darkness all around me, smothering in its bigness and so painfully distant in its encompassing embrace. I wonder how many more nights I will suffer through this inability to ignore it. I wonder if I will ever be able to simply turn roll onto my side and sleep without dreams. Without nightmares. Without terrifying, yet forgetful images and sounds interrupting sleep and thrusting me back into the unforgiving night. He's awake somewhere. I know it. I've spent too many nights listening to his restlessness on road trips not to know that. I could call him. I could tell him what it's been like these past few months. Tell him about the nightmares. Tell him how I really am. Tell him I'm not fine. That I can't sleep anymore. That I'm afraid of the dark again. Haven't been since I was a kid but it's back. But I can't share it with him. I can't let him know that I'm slowly becoming him, even when he is so desperately fighting to remain strong now. Because I'm afraid. Of what it will do to us. We never wrote a set of rules or discussed the game plan but from day one it's always been about Mulder's pain and my ability to fix it. He is allowed to fester in his darkness and mourn his sister, the injustices in his life and the futility of his struggles against those who have plagued him so. He is the one to get angry, to get depressed, to completely embrace his uncontrollable emotions. And I am the one to ground him and give him release. To allow him to be the haunted man he is. To make it possible by quelling the consequences and piecing his broken soul back together. And we've both accepted these roles as necessary to our unique and intensely dependent friendship. We need our roles as much as we need the other to fill the counterpart. But our situations make this arrangement comical now. How am I to hold him up when I can hardly stand myself? How am I to ease his pain when it is due to my mortality? I don't think we know who to be now. We're lost in the absence of our prescribed stations in life. I cannot be the emotional one as much as he cannot be the mender of a tattered heart. But we cannot continue as though nothing has changed. Our lives have been turned upside down by this. I wonder what he's thinking of right now, if he's thinking of me. I'm thinking of him so maybe it's not such a strange possibility. I just hope he's not thinking dark thoughts in relation to me. I can see the moon from my bed. It's a half moon, almost perfect. There's an orange haze about it. Beautiful. I've been laying here for quite awhile, I realize. Maybe tonight I will just go all the way. Open eyes until twilight, watch the early morning news and get dressed. Maybe I'll be the one to be in the office for hours when Mulder arrives. That would throw him off completely. I'm tempted. As I seriously consider it, I am startled by the phone beside my bed. Jesus, not another case. Not now. And I know it's him. Who else would call at.2:19 in the morning? I let it ring, hoping to convince him that I'm sleeping soundly, even peacefully. It rings three times before the machine picks up. "Scully, are you there? Scully?" His voice is controlled, bored even. Then hopeful. Then troubled. "Are you home Scully? If you are, pick up." He sounds so much like that little boy my heart nearly breaks from it. Still I can't bear to dissolve back into reality tonight. I simply cannot get up and face the world and another impossible mystery to solve. Let him do it alone. He'll have to soon anyway. He should start getting used to it. "I really need to talk to you Scully. Please." I cannot ignore the final word. It is spoken with such naked need. I pick up the phone. "What Mulder?" I'm nearly ashamed by how annoyed I sound. "You're there.hi." He's breathtakingly happy about it too. It's almost pathetic to me how little it takes. My very existence? That I breathe? That I respond? For now. "Where else would I be Mulder?" Still, I'm riddled with such rabid cynicism. Why tonight? "I'm sorry Scully." Oh god. Now I've hurt him again. "I woke you, I'm sorry." "No you didn't. I was up." Why have I just admitted this to him? What's wrong with me tonight? "Oh." He is suddenly brutally quiet. That one word uttered with such feeling behind it, like he has finally uncovered some great secret. I answer his unspoken question. "I'm fine Mulder. Just couldn't sleep tonight. So what's going on? A case?" Please don't let it be a case, please don't let it be a case. "No, I just.I don't know why I called. I'm sorry.I just." He can't find the words. I can't find the words. I imagine the two of us, lunatic mutes caged up somewhere staring dumbly at each other for the rest of our lives. It almost makes me smile. "I know Mulder. I'll see you tomorrow, ok?" There is a pause. I strain my ears to pick up its silent messages. He sighs. "Mulder?" "I'm sorry Scully." What is this? I'm suddenly afraid of him, of me, of this night. I can't hear anymore but I can't let go of the phone or him. "Why Mulder? Why are you sorry?" He says nothing but his breathing grows heavy, labored. I hear a soft hitching from his throat. He's crying. Oh god, not this. "Oh Mulder," I whisper. It's all I can manage now. He has reduced me to so little so quickly tonight. I let him cry, saying nothing. I listen to him as he tries to control himself and then, as if in internal battle with himself and decides otherwise, gives in and continues. I have been waiting for this since that day in Allentown. I have been waiting for him to come to me like this. I have feared it. And as much as I know Mulder, I knew this would have to come out one dark night. Perhaps this is the reason for my restlessness. "Dana." It is choked, heavy. I have heard it so few times I hardly remember that it is my name. That my family calls me that isn't enough to give me identity. I am Scully. Because that's what I am to him. This foreignness frightens me further. Still I cannot say anything. What is there? I tried to show him my heart in those journal entries, too afraid to allow him access to them. He is running head first into the task of showing me his. He's always been the act without thinking type but never where we were concerned. But tonight he is. "I can't.oh Scully.please." He sounds so alone, so helplessly lost. I cannot help him. I have no words. I have nothing left. I know he needs to hear something. "Mulder, it's ok. It's going to be ok." I don't know what I'm referring to really. I realize I'm just saying words that cover all of our situations. They are pointless and powerless. I have failed him again. Again and again. "No it's not Scully.oh god.what am I going to do?" I don't understand now. I still haven't heard him tell me why he is hurting tonight. I don't know if it's me or Samantha or his father. I don't know. "What do you mean Mulder?" "Please don't go.please don't." Over and over he says it. So it *is* me. I should promise him that I'm not going anywhere. I should say something really beautiful about how nothing will ever separate us and that I'll fight this forever. That I love him and that's all that matters. I don't. "I have to." Why did I do it? Why did I say that to him? Why did I choose tonight to be so horribly blunt with him? I can't bear his sobs in my ear. He seems to have forgotten that his mouth is pressed up against the phone. He is deafening me with his raw sounds of pain. "Mulder, I can't do this on the phone. I can't." There is nothing left in me for it and so I hang up. I don't even say goodbye and he was still sobbing when I put the phone down. This might be the cruelest thing I have ever done. Only when I am again laying against the pillows do I realize my face is soaked with tears. I must have been crying the whole time. I hadn't even noticed. What's the matter with me? I continue crying, now audibly with Mulder far away again. My jaw aches with it. When I told him I couldn't do this on the phone, I expected him to bring it up tomorrow at work. Actually, I expected him to ignore it altogether and never bring it up again. I didn't expect him to let himself into my apartment and plant himself in my bedroom while I slept. I wake up with him staring at me from across the room. I suppose I should be scared as hell to find him here. I was surprised but oddly not annoyed and never thought for a moment it was anyone but him. I could sense him in my sleep I think. It pulled at me. Glancing at the clock, I notice we had only gotten off the phone a couple of hours before. I fell asleep quickly, exhausted from crying. I don't know how long he has been here. He continues to stare at me. It's unnerving. "Mulder." Accusation in my tone. I am sorry Mulder. I don't mean to make you feel bad about this. "Why are you here?" "I don't know." He looks down finally, his gaze leaving my face for the first time in I don't know how long. "I just wanted to see you." I motion for him to come closer, so that I can see him, have him leave the shadows to face me completely. I need to see his face, to see if he is still hurting as much as he was on the phone. A foolish part of me thinks he might have had enough time to get himself together. For my sake anyway. Any night but tonight Mulder. Please. He creeps towards my bed and I am somehow thrilled by his approach. Under any other circumstances, in any other life, I would draw him to me entirely. To my bed, to my body. It seems too late for these developments now. I am weak. I am dying. He'll find another bed to share. Another body to possess. He stands just at the edge, looking down at me. His face is tight, his effort to control his rampant emotions obvious. But he is still so beautiful. I hate him for it. I can see him now. He's in the sweatpants and Knicks t-shirt he sometimes sleeps in. I guess he came over here in a hurry. And god Mulder, did you really drive over here barefoot? What's the matter with you? I think about sitting up so I don't just lie here prostrate and useless, weak and pathetic. But I am so tired. The effort doesn't seem worth it. "I should go," he says so quietly. "No, Mulder." I say it before I even think, which I should've done. I just don't care anymore. I'm too tired to consider things so much. I cannot be myself. I have to be myself. This night is in my veins and won't leave. "Please stay until I fall asleep again. Please." It is not desperate but I do need him so badly right now. He nods slightly, barely, then moves towards the armchair near the window. I call his name and he turns. I just stare, hoping he'll understand. He does. He comes back to the side of the bed and I move to give him room. He lies on his back as far away from me as possible. I don't know what I expected really. For him to hold me? Make love to me? I don't know what I expected. I almost ask him to forget it but instead I roll over and succumb to my exhaustion. We are strangers. We are lovers. We are nothing tonight. When I wake it is morning. The night has left me finally. My eyes are closed but I can feel the sunlight on my face. The room is warm. Peaceful. Mulder has not left yet. And his hands are on me. Everywhere. I can feel him run his fingers through my hair, over my face, my neck and arms. He traces over my features, playing particular attention to my mouth. He is close. I can feel his breath on my face and his body nestled close to my side. He thinks I am still asleep. I open my eyes and he appears horrified one moment and then guilty. But I won't let him. My face is calm, devoid of any surprise or accusation. I don't want him to stop. He does. He rolls onto his back leaving me. I hear him sigh loudly. He is ashamed, I think. That I found him doing it. I don't know why. If he wanted to, why is he ashamed that I found him? I did not protest. There is a reason I don't understand now but I need to. "Mulder? Why did you touch me like that?" He is silent. Thinking of a good answer or perhaps afraid to tell me the real reason. I'm not sure. "I'm sorry. I won't do it again. I thought you were asleep." He sounds so distant. So unlike the man who just moments before was blessing me with his fingers. "Don't be sorry. I'm not. I just want to know why." He seems shocked by this. I think he expected me to be angry with him. He turns onto his side, leaning over me slightly, again looking at me so pensively. His fingers run over my cheek, trace my jaw and land on the pulse in my neck. "I was trying to." He shakes his head. He can't bear to tell me. I am now curious but also so scared. I can feel the tears welling in my eyes already and he has said nothing. "I was trying to memorize your face." "Why?" It is all I can manage. His voice is just above a whisper, so delicate. "Because.I don't ever want to forget it." I laugh softly. "Mulder, you have a photographic memory." He doesn't laugh with me. He just continues staring, so serious, his fingers reaching back up to my face, stroking my cheek, my lips. "It's not the same. Not for you." I am crying now. It is too much. "I'll give you a picture then." I cannot tell him that he can see my face whenever he wants. That he can never forget it right in front of him forever. But these are promises I cannot make to him. I will not make them. A small tear escapes his eye and runs down his stubbled cheek. I watch it with fascination. There is so much of him I will never know. He looks right into my eyes, through me maybe. "I don't want a picture Scully. I want you." He's said it. And I cannot accept. This is not how I thought we would end up. He can't bear to have me leave and I cannot help but go. What is left to say? We've said everything and nothing in the space of two minutes. In the end I just cry. And he cries. But he holds me finally. He falls onto me, clutching violently like some madman who refuses to release a hostage. We roll to our sides and he buries his face in my hair sobbing. I can only lie there in his arms. This is all I've ever wanted to know anyway. I can hear him whisper my name over and over again. Mulder is speaking some universal language using only, "Scully." It's all he says. Again and again. How strange it is to survive the night and face this. How beautiful and how awful. We clutch each other tightly, so tightly. He is kissing my face. My temples, my forehead, my eyelids. He is everywhere. Still he cries. His tears soak my face, run into my own. We are like saline blood brothers. I am thinking nonsense thoughts with his lips over mine. So warm. Soft. Like his fingers before. Like his breath when he whispers "I love you" before claiming my mouth again. His hands roam freely and I give him the claim without thought. I am his. For as long as I can be. I feel his hand, now cold from its brief absence from me. It slips under my shirt, fingers barely touch the warm skin of my stomach. The chilled digits find shelter here, warmth, life. I am amazed by it. They move up and over my ribs. He traces them so lightly and continues the journey upward. I wait for his palm to cup my seeking breast but he stops. His thumb lies on my sternum, his fingers under the slight weight of my left breast. He is feeling my heartbeat. It thunders in this new light he has brought me. To the night my life has become. I may survive the darkness once more. I may not be alone this time. Just maybe I will survive it all. END ************************************************