From: ephemeral@ephemeralfic.org
Date: 26 Aug 2002 14:44:35 -0000
Subject: Survivors (1/1) by Li\'l Gusty
Source: direct

Reply To: lil_gusty@hotmail.com


Title: Survivors
Classification: SAR
Keywords: Mulder/Scully Romance, implied Mulder/Other, Post-
          Colonization, AU
Spoilers: Requiem 
Rating: PG-13
Distribution: anywhere, just let me know
Disclaimer: these characters don't belong to me, they belong to 
            Mr. Chris Carter, lucky bastard
Timeline: for the purposes of this fic, assume that seasons eight 
          and nine never happened
Note: you may notice some similarities between this fic and 
      "Always Running," but they have nothing to do with each 
      other.  I just happened to really like those snippets and 
      decided to use them again.
Feedback: please, to lil_gusty@hotmail.com

Summary: "How could you tell the one person you'd pledged your 
          life to that you'd given up on them?"

<><><><><><>

In the end, he'd only wound up searching for her for six months.

He had no way of knowing how long he'd been unconscious in the 
woods with the others, but judging by his hunger and the 
condition of his body, it couldn't have been more than twenty-
four hours.  His first jumbled, hazy thoughts had been of her - 
where is she, is she hurt, is she alive - before he realized that 
she was safe at home in Washington.

He'd failed to consider when he'd left her the previous morning 
that, if extraterrestrials would travel millions of light years 
across the galaxy, it would make no difference to them that their 
target was on the opposite coast of one tiny nation.

The others were just as confused as he was and could offer no 
explanations as to how they'd come to be in their present 
location or what had happened to them during their individual 
periods of missing time.  Some of them he recognized from his 
last case, knew how long ago and under what circumstances they'd 
disappeared.  Others, he knew nothing of and could only guess.

They all walked out of the woods and onto the main road together 
- they'd figured that, because they couldn't see anything under 
the thick cover of the trees, it must be approaching either sun 
rise or sun set.  When they emerged from underneath the foliage 
and looked at the sky, they realized that they had been wrong.

The sky was faintly orange with black particles floating in the 
air - ash.  The smell of burning flesh and wood floated down to 
them.

He knew right then that leaving her had been a mistake.

He would never give up, or at least he told himself he never 
would.  There were cars for the taking, if one didn't mind them 
not having an engine or a battery or gas.  There were roads for 
the walking if one didn't mind stepping over charred bodies.  No 
planes, no trains.  No way to get home, but he found a way to get 
there anyway.  Once back on the East Coast, he went to what had 
once been the nation's capitol and was greeted by what he'd bid 
farewell to on the West Coast and he knew that she was likely 
dead.  It was probable that only he and the others from the woods 
survived; they were taken so that their lives could continue.

Once, late at night, as they'd sat eating unbuttered popcorn on 
his couch, he'd promised her that if this ever happened, he'd 
find her, if only so that he could have a place to be buried 
himself.  He did not break his promises.

The months were long and tedious, filled with hard work from dawn 
until dusk.  He and the others tried to stick together as much as 
possible, forming their own little community, as it were, and did 
what they could to survive.  They hunted, fished, made their own 
clothes and houses, and grew their own vegetables.  It was odd, 
though, that there was an exactly equal number of men and women 
among the survivors and, with their families and friends dead and 
missing, they consoled each other through their mourning in the 
most primitive of ways.

There was one woman, named Holley, who had short auburn hair and 
bright blue eyes.  She was young and attentive to him, always 
coming to check on him when he woke up screaming in the middle of 
the night and never asking him who the people were that he chased 
in his sleep.  It was almost as if she knew that if he ever 
started talking about them, he'd never stop.  He'd let his grief 
drown him until there was no hope of him pulling himself up and 
living through another day.

Over time, he began to lose hope that he would ever find her.  He 
had searched for his sister for twenty-seven long, frustrating 
years before learning that she was dead from almost the 
beginning.  The pain and futility still lingered heavily in his 
mind and he didn't know if he could stand to be disappointed yet 
again when he found her ashen body where her apartment building 
had once been, knowing that it was his choice that put her there 
instead of him.

He never stopped searching; he merely began to do so passively.  
If information somehow made its way to him, he would pursue it, 
but he would not go seeking it out.  He would keep waiting for 
her to come walking down one of the roads one day, healthy and 
whole.  He missed her.  He loved her.

He had to move on with his life.

If one was technical, one could call it an accident that he found 
her at all; an accident that he would regret for many long nights 
ahead.

<><><><><><>

They'd discovered some vegetables missing from their garden one 
day.  After chasing the thieves away, he and the other men had 
followed them into some sort of underground structure.  After a 
heated discussion tinged with fear and excitement, he and the 
others realized that they weren't the only ones left after all.  
Others had known what was coming as well and had been summoned 
together so that they would survive, like he and his companions 
did.  They established trust with the new survivors quickly and 
by the end of the day, had been invited to move underground; the 
two communities meshed seamlessly into one.

One of the new party was very ill and had been for a while.  Some 
days, they'd said, she'd be up before any of them, cooking and 
working.  Some days, she wouldn't get up at all, clutching at her 
swollen stomach and writhing in pain.  The other underground 
dwellers took turns taking care of her on such days.  She was 
valuable, they'd explained; she was their doctor.

He didn't even give that statement a second thought.

Over a hastily prepared feast, much like the Pilgrims and Indians 
must've shared on the first Thanksgiving, he'd mused, they'd all 
heard her moan from the other side of a tightly closed bedroom 
door and gone silent, looking at each other in confusion and 
helplessness.  One of the older women got up and walked into the 
room with some food, shaking her head and sighing exhaustedly.  
"Dana," they'd heard her whisper.  "You need to eat.  You haven't 
eaten all day, the baby's hungry.  Come on, sit up.  You need to 
eat.  You need to at least try."

At the mention of that long forgotten - no, not forgotten, un-
thought of - name, his head snapped up and he dropped his fork, 
the pieces of the puzzle clicking together quickly in his mind.

As the old woman emerged from the room, he met her at the door.  
"May I see her?"  He asked urgently, needing to know if it was 
true.

The woman looked at him with tired eyes.  "She needs to rest, 
son.  She should be better tomorrow.  We have a little first aid 
kit she put together if -"

"No," he said in a low voice edged with impatience, "I need to 
see her.  I think...I think I can help her."

After a moment, the woman nodded and opened the door again, 
allowing him to follow her inside.  The sick woman lay there on 
the single bed in front of the fire place, curled into a tiny, 
fetal ball around her much too small for seven months stomach.

"She's had a fever most of the day," the woman whispered.  "She's 
burning up now, I think she may be hallucinating.  She won't eat 
or drink anything even though I try to tell her it would be good 
for her baby.  I don't even think she cares, to tell you the 
truth."

Mulder looked at the woman with hard, pain-filled eyes.  How she 
was pregnant was beyond him, but she certainly cared about her 
baby.

The woman left him alone in the room with her, not saying another 
word.

He took off his heavy boots by the door, walking soundlessly 
across the bare wooden floor to kneel beside her bed and trying 
not to block the minimal heat to her from the fire.  Pushing her 
sweat-slicked hair back from her reddened cheeks and forehead, he 
leaned in close and whispered against her skin, "Scully..."

She moaned and shifted under the heavy covers, her lips working 
to voice unheard syllables.

"Scully," he whispered again.  "Open your eyes.  It's me, Scully.  
Open your eyes and look at me."

"Mulder?"  She asked groggily, licking her dry lips.

He almost smiled for the first time in six months.  "Yeah.  Open 
your eyes and look at me, Scully, please.  Just for a second."

She shifted again, placing a hand on her stomach and squinting 
her eyes in pain.  Fascinated, horrified, perplexed and excited, 
he covered her hand with his, the blankets the only barrier 
between them.  Slowly, her glassy eyes blinked open, having 
difficulty focusing on his face in the flickering light.  
"Mulder?"  She asked again, trying to sit up.  "Mulder?  Oh, God, 
Mulder.  Mulder."

"Shh, lay back down.  You're sick, Scully, you need to rest."

"Mulder?"

"Yeah, I'm here.  It's okay.  I'm here," he soothed.

"Where've you been?"

He struggled not to repeat the question to her.  "Oregon, 
remember?  But I'm back now."  

She nodded, struggling to keep her heavy eye lids open.  "Stay 
with me," she breathed.

"I will.  I won't leave you, not again."  He lay his head beside 
her, wondering if he could feel her baby move through the fabric.

He thought she fell into sleep after that, but as he rested his 
head against her stomach and relaxed for the first time since 
he'd left her, her hand snuck out from under the covers to stroke 
his hair.  "Mulder?"

"Hmm?"  He moaned, almost asleep himself.

"I thought I'd never see you again," she slurred.

"I told you I'd find you, didn't I?"

"Yeah."  A pause.  "Mulder?"

He opened his eyes and looked at her.  "What, Scully?"

"Do you want a girl?  I think it's a girl."

"What?"  He asked slowly, sitting up again and leaning his 
forehead against hers, feeling too much heat off of her.

"Do you want a little girl?"  She said again, like it was the 
most natural question in the world.

"How, Scully?"

"I don't know."

He took a deep breath, suddenly very cold.  "And it's...it's 
mine?"

Blinking her eyes open, she looked at him like she thought he was 
joking.  "Who else's would it be?"

"Oh my God, Scully."  And he felt very guilty for only passively 
looking for her.

"I love you, Mulder.  I didn't think I'd ever see you again," she 
repeated.

He lay his head between her breasts and stomach as small, hot 
tears began to slide out of his eyes.  "I love you, too, Scully," 
he whispered into the blankets.

She smiled dreamily.  "Don't leave."

"I won't."

And he didn't until the next morning.

<><><><><><>

When he finally emerged from her bedroom just after sun up, 
Holley was still sleeping on the couch in the living room/den and 
the old woman who'd taken care of Scully last night was stirring 
a pot of something on the stove.

"How is she?"  She asked, not looking up at him.

"Her fever's gone down and she's asleep."

"Any nightmares?"

"No," he said after a hesitation.

"She has them often, during her fevers, mostly.  Sometimes, she 
ends up huddled in a corner until day light; we can't coax her 
out."

He covered his face with his hands, struggling not to cry again.  
He'd lain awake beside Scully all night, crying for all he'd 
missed in her life - and the life of his daughter - over the past 
six months and for the life that he had now, a life that didn't 
include either of them.

"Of course, she wouldn't keep getting sick if she'd stay inside 
more often," the woman continued.  "Some nights, she never even 
comes inside.  She sleeps out there - once, we didn't see her for 
almost a week.  We don't know where she goes, but we know she 
likes to go alone."

"It's too cold for her to be doing that," he said softly, staring 
at his socked feet.

"She's stubborn and she won't listen to anyone.  I wouldn't mind 
it so much if it were just her, but she has that baby to worry 
about, too.  She doesn't act like she cares about it, though."

He nodded, for the second time hearing those words.  "What do you 
mean?"

"It's obvious that she doesn't want to have that baby.  I guess I 
could understand that, what with the world the way it is," she 
paused, swallowed, then started again, "but she doesn't have much 
of a choice now and you'd think a doctor would take better care 
of herself.  Even if she didn't want the baby, we'd take care of 
it.  It deserves a chance just like the rest of us."

How could she not want this, he thought.  Do I want this?

Yes.  I do.

Taking a deep breath, he walked over to Holley and sat down on 
the floor beside the couch, shaking her slightly to wake her.

"Hey," she murmured once awake.  "Are you okay?"

"Yeah.  Tired."

She smiled slightly.  "I was waiting for you.  We have our own 
room - private."  The excitement leached into her voice and made 
his stomach twist into a knot.

"It's Scully," he said simply.  "She's here."

Sitting up, her eyes went wide.  "What?"

"Scully's here, she's the one who's sick."

"She's pregnant?"

His head bobbed up and down, numb.

"You said she was dead," she whispered so that the old woman 
won't hear.

"I thought she was - I thought that everyone was.  I just 
assumed, but it makes sense.  The only thing I can figure is that 
she was called here by the chips in her necks to be saved -" 

"Fox, what are you talking about?"

He made his decision quickly, standing and covering her with the 
blanket.  "I'm leaving," he said.

"What?  Fox -"

"Keep your voice down."  He looked over his shoulder, listening 
for sounds that Scully was awake.  "I'm leaving.  I can't...I 
can't be here."

"Fox!  That's crazy, you can't survive on your own!"

Staring down at her, he realized that he almost didn't need to 
keep his eyes closed when he was with her.  He could've just 
pretended with his eyes open and been careful not to call her by 
the wrong name.  "She won't remember that I was here, she was 
delusional last night from her fever.  When she wakes up, don't 
tell her that I was here, okay?  Promise me you won't tell her," 
he commanded, shaking her slightly with the vehemence of his 
words.

Mouth hanging open, she nodded.

"Tell the others, too.  She can't know I was here."

Her eyes followed him as he walked out the door to their complex, 
cold November air leaching in after him.  She's learned not to 
argue with him when he gets like this.

<><><><><><>

Scully felt well enough that morning to join the others for 
breakfast and, after meeting their new companions, was more 
convinced than ever that Mulder was not ever coming back, despite 
his promise.  Holley had done her job; Billy, Teresa, and the 
others from Oregon had steadfastly denied that they had seen 
Mulder after they'd awoken in the woods and she believed them 
simply because she was too tired to believe anything else.

The meal was eaten in silence until one of the original members 
of Scully's group spoke up and started asking questions.  "Dana, 
were you married?"

She'd not been secretive about her past, but she didn't offer up 
any unsolicited information, either.  No one had ever asked and 
she had never told.  "No."

His eyes darted around to everyone else's, who all knew the 
secret by now.  "So, who's the, uh, father of your baby?"

She fixed him with an icy glare and he sat back, not breathing 
again until she looked away.

"I know it's hard to talk about our pasts, Dana, but it might 
help."

She'd had a dream about him last night, but she dreamed of him 
often.  He'd come back to her and she'd told him that he was a 
father.  He'd sounded happy and told her that he wouldn't leave 
her again.  When she woke up, he was gone.  It was always 
difficult to recall her dreams of him and she often ended up in 
silent tears for days as she worked; this morning, she couldn't 
talk about him.  She simply shook her head instead, stood up, and 
said in a shaking voice, "I'm going for a walk."

"He was here," he said simply.  "Mulder, isn't that his name?  He 
was here last night, but he left this morning and told us not to 
tell you.  I didn't think it was right, though."

The blood drained from her face and she suddenly got very dizzy, 
whirling around to face them all.  "He was here?"  It wasn't a 
dream?  "He left?"  How could he?

"Yeah."

"Where did he go?"  She asked frantically.

He shrugged and the others avoided her eyes, including Holley.

Not saying another word, she turned around.

"Dana, no," the older woman said quickly.  "It's snowing again."

Nodding, she walked out the door, her teeth chattering 
immediately.  No one knew where she went on her long walks and 
she intended to keep it a secret for as long as she could.  She 
planned to die out there eventually.

A few months after she and the other survivors had determined 
that they were the only one's left - before they knew of the 
Oregon survivors - she'd come out into the woods and dug a grave.  
When she'd finished, she simply filled it back up again, telling 
herself that she was burying her mother and brothers, sisters-in-
law, nieces, and nephews.  And Mulder.  She had thought that it 
was necessary to have something tangible to mourn over, some 
place where she could go and feel close to her family and loved 
ones again.  At the time, she'd thought that it was a little 
silly, but it gave her peace and a place to pray, not that she 
believed in God anymore.  One short visit a week had quickly 
turned into two longer ones and before she knew it, she was 
spending many nights out here, curled on top of the frozen dirt 
and speaking to her loved ones as if they could hear her.  Most 
often, she talked to Mulder.

She sobbed when she talked to him, telling him how she missed him 
and loved him and wished she could do more to find him.  The 
group needed her, she would explain, and she knew that he would 
find her.  He'd promised her.  

The first time the baby kicked, she'd clawed at the earth until 
her fingers bled, desperate to be with him, before she realized 
that he wasn't really there.  After that, she stopped caring.

She had to be with him and if she couldn't do so in life, she 
would do so in death.  Her baby would follow and they'd be a 
family, just as he'd wanted but never told her.  She was so weak 
without him and he was gone.  He wouldn't leave her behind again.

That morning, she laid down beside her grave and cried angry, 
painful tears for herself, her baby, and the Mulder that had 
promised he'd find her, the Mulder who told her he would not 
leave her, until she vomited.  Her stomach twisted and lurched, 
the baby desperate for warmth, and she ignored it.  If she had a 
miscarriage out here, she'd bleed to death and no one would find 
her.

Eventually, she cried herself to sleep, screaming softly for 
Mulder to come back to her and find her, to take her away, to 
make her strong again.  

<><><><><><>

He got as far as the iced-over river before he turned around.  

What a selfish man he was, abandoning her like that again.  She 
needed him, she was sick, she was pregnant with his daughter, and 
he'd left her.  At the time, it had seemed like the best solution 
to his problem: how could you tell the one person you'd pledged 
your life to that you'd given up on them?  It seemed easier just 
to let her wonder about him and continue on with her life the way 
it was.

By the time he'd reached the underground again, it was well after 
dark and the snow was up to his ankles.  All eyes in the room 
turned towards him as he walked through the door, making a bee-
line for her room.

"She's not in there," Holley said softly, watching him carefully 
from her seat by the stove.

"Where is she?"

"We don't know, son," the older woman said.  "She went for a walk 
this morning and she hasn't come back yet.  She must've gone 
looking for you."

"You told her?"

No one answered.

Cursing under his breath, he went back outside to find her.  He'd 
promised her he would.

"SCULLY!"  He screamed into the bitterly cold wind.  "SCULLY!  
SCULLY!"

It was dark and he'd stumbled into the woods, again coming across 
her by accident and at first thinking that she was dead.  
"Scully?"  He ran to her as quickly as his frozen toes would let 
him, knelt beside her, and felt for a pulse under her too-thin 
jacket.

She was cold and blue, breathing shallowly.  He took off his coat 
and wrapped it around her, picking her up and carrying her back 
to the underground.

She didn't move the entire time.

There were collective gasps as he kicked the door in, his hands 
full, and walked into her bedroom.  Setting her down on the bed, 
he stripped her of her damp, icy clothes and put her under the 
sheets nude, hollering at someone to run a warm bath for her.  He 
heard water running and turned to put more logs on the fire.

He bathed her slowly, marveling at the swell of her abdomen and 
more than once letting his hand linger there as his daughter 
kicked at him, happy to be indoors again.  It brought stinging 
tears to his eyes and he bit his lip until he'd stifled his sob 
and returned to his task, picking her up and drying her off after 
the water cooled and the blue left her lips.

After he put her to bed, he stripped off his own damp clothes and 
slid in behind her, holding her tightly against him and squeezing 
the baby too tightly - Katherine, he decided, after her mother.  
They could call her Katie.

A few hours later, Scully awoke from a nightmare, screaming his 
name.  This time, he was the one to soothe her back to sleep, 
turning her towards him and cocooning her with his body.  
"Mulder?"  She asked shakily.

"Yeah," he whispered against her skin, kissing her lightly.  "I'm 
here."

She started to pull away, collapsing against him from weakness.  
"You left me."

Taking a deep breath, tears already threatening to fall, he tried 
to explain.  "I'm sorry.  So many things have happened since I 
left for Oregon...I couldn't expect you to understand it all.  
And the baby...I didn't know, Scully.  If I'd only known -"

"She's going to die," she said flatly.

"What?"

"She's going to die, Mulder.  She's too small and weak.  Even if 
she is born, she won't survive."

With the covers pulled so tightly around them, their words and 
hot breath bounced off each other's faces, warming them.  "You 
just have to take better care of yourself.  She'll survive, 
Scully.  She's strong, like you.  She kept kicking me earlier."  
He grinned slightly at his last phrase.

"No.  She's going to die."

"Is that what you want?"

Her voice still had no emotion.  "They're going to take her away 
from me anyway.  That's the reason They let me get pregnant.  
They knew about us and They knew what would inevitably happen.  
The Smoking Man must've done something to me...They need her and 
I'm not going to let Them have her.  I'd rather kill her than 
give her to Them."

"Scully, you don't know that."

"I do."

"We can protect her."

"We?"  She whispered.  "You've left me twice now, how can I be 
sure you won't do it again?"

"I won't.  I promise."  He kissed her again, this time on her 
lips.  She remained stiff and unfeeling.  "Were you looking for 
me today?  In the woods?"

"No," she said, suddenly louder.  "I was mourning you.  That's my 
grave, where I go to be alone.  Where I buried everyone, 
including myself.  I wanted to die there after they told me you'd 
left."

"I'm so sorry, Scully."  He didn't know if he could ever say it 
enough.  "I love you."

She sniffed, laying her head beside his on the pillow, not 
touching, and went to sleep.

<><><><><><>

She was only eight months along now, but Katie didn't know that.  
She was too anxious to see what was left of the world.  He was 
there to hold Scully's hand and tell her to push, the old woman 
doing her best to deliver the baby.  Scully was still sick and so 
tired that she eventually lost consciousness, not wanting her 
baby to be born.

After nearly two days of labor, the old woman finally managed to 
coax the little girl out into the cold, harsh air.  She was so 
tiny - she could easily fit in the palm of Mulder's hand - and 
red and wrinkled.  He quieted her and kissed her forehead, which 
was the size of his mouth, promising again to protect her and her 
mother.

When Scully awoke, she didn't want to see Katie, despite Mulder's 
urgings.  His pleas of, "She needs to eat, Scully.  She won't 
drink from a bottle.  Scully, please, she needs it," fell on deaf 
ears.  She laid listless, staring into the fire, slim tears 
sliding across her nose and temples.

At night, Mulder sat up with Katie, rocking her, walking with 
her, managing to get a few sips of milk into her, while she cried 
almost endlessly.  Mulder cried, too, not knowing what else to 
do.  Scully was right: as long as she refused to feed her, their 
daughter would not survive.

Holley came to him one day during a fortunate period of quiet and 
announced that she and the others had found another pocket of 
survivors in Pennsylvania.  They were going to join them, but 
they couldn't support a healing mother and a premature baby.  The 
Pennsylvanians had their own doctor, too, she explained.

"Come with us," she'd whispered close to his ear.  "They won't 
make it much longer."

"This is my life.  I'm not leaving it," was all he'd said.  The 
next day, they'd left the new family alone in the underground.

"You should've gone with them," Scully chided him later, her 
voice rough from nearly two weeks of dormancy.

"Why?"  He asked simply, genuinely curious.

"You were sleeping with her.  She loved you, she could've given 
you more children.  Healthy, strong."

He sat down on her bed, pulling her head into his lap and holding 
Katie on one shoulder.  "She's not you, Scully, and that's what I 
want.  All I want is you and Katie.  Anything else is just a 
bonus."

She slipped her fingers into his and held onto his hand like a 
lifeline.  "I'm sorry, Mulder."

"Don't be," he soothed.  "I have everything I need right here."

"I do, too," she whispered.

They sat staring into the fire until it died out, the chill in 
the air contrasting with the heat of their bodies until they 
didn't notice it any more.

<><><>An End<><><>

Notes: this fic proves that when the muse talks, one must listen.  
It's a total departure from what I'm used to doing, so feedback 
would be especially appreciated, good, bad, and ugly, to 
lil_gusty@hotmail.com