From: Ebrulf@aol.com
Date: Sun, 13 Jun 1999 19:39:28 EDT
Subject: NEW: That Catch In Your Chest


TITLE: That Catch In Your Chest
AUTHOR: Grace
FEEDBACK: ebrulf@aol.com, and I solicit it without shame.  :)
CATEGORY: VA (I was aiming for Angst, hopefully I came close)
RATING: PG, but really, it could be G
SPOILERS: Post-Milagro, and a li'l bit of that entire Diana Fowley shindig
ARCHIVING: Gossamer yes; all others: go ahead, but I'd appreciate a note if 
you're going to archive it so that I can pop in for a visit.
SUMMARY: Scully is recovering from the attack in "Milagro" and considering 
the realizations that this attack has forced upon her.
DATE: Posted June 13, 1999.

Author's Notes at end.

That Catch In Your Chest
by Grace

I don't want to talk right now.

I don't want to feel.  I don't want to think.  I don't want to *be*.

She felt tears stinging her eyes and blinked angrily.  The staccato shake of 
her head was disjointed, sharp, and fierce.  The fists clenched on the desk 
were white and shaking with the effort she put into keeping them still.

A sharp hitch in her chest made her gasp involuntarily, and she breathed 
heavily, gasping really, panic sliding around the edges of her consciousness.

The doctors had said that she was healing nicely; amazingly well, in fact; 
amazing, they had said, but that was when they thought she was out of earshot 
or sleeping, and then they discussed her chart with the voracity that a 
scientist will always focus upon an anomaly of nature.  After all, that was 
what a scientist did, really.  They didn't study nature.  They studied 
anomalies of nature.

Upon waking in the hospital post-surgery, she had entertained the wild, 
horrified thought that there were fingerprints upon her heart.  That, were 
her chest cavity to be exposed and her heart examined, there would be 
distinct prints all around the perimeter of her beating heart.

He had heard her harsh pants for breath and the little mewls of terror 
escaping, despite herself, from her mouth.

In an instant he was at her side--although in reality he had never left 
it--and was gripping her hand tightly, whispering soothing sounds into the 
space around her, his other hand awkwardly caressing her shoulder as she 
shook and struggled to remember where she was and why she was.

She recovered quickly and slowly her shaking had eased and then stilled.  His 
hands lingered a moment longer, then retreated slowly.

It's all right, he had said, his low voice meandering out of the darkness and 
reaching her ears.  She had noticed then that his voice had been husky, and 
now she realized that it had been from fatigue.

She heard his words and shook her head, not denying his words, but not 
accepting them either.  For a moment or perhaps for a minute they each sat, 
her in the bed and he in the chair, only breathing, and then she stiffly 
settled back into the bed and pulled the covers around her shoulders.  She 
refused the urge to pull the covers over her head, but just barely.

It was a week and a half later, and she was back, although back to where she 
couldn't really have said.  Back in her apartment, certaintly.  But she felt 
a stranger in her own skin, and her chest constantly ached even though she 
knew that the stitches had healed and there wasn't even a scar worth 
mentioning, at least not one that would compare to the scar on her abdomen.

And now she was left with nothing but anger.  He had tried to offer his help, 
at least for the duration of her enforced recovery leave from work, he had 
said, but she had refused and was alone in the apartment, all alone.

She unclenched her hands, unfurling her fingers one by one, then brought one 
hand up to her chest and laid it down lightly.

She remembered these same hands gripping a gun, firing desperately, as she 
choked on her horror when she watched the bullets slip out of the man and 
lodge into the wall.  She remembered, even now, having the strangely calm, 
ridiculous thought: maybe he's solid and I'm not and my bullets aren't and 
the wall isn't and maybe he's solid and nothing else is and so maybe this is 
a dream, all a dream . . .

The pain was by now a vague memory.  Pain tended to fade over time, unlike 
other sensations, she had noticed.  She had thought at the time that, if she 
lived, she would never forget it, but here it was, not even two weeks later, 
and all she could remember was that it had hurt, unbearably, and she had 
cried and couldn't wake up.

He had been found dead, his still-beating heart clutched in his hand, and 
although she hadn't yet seen the crime scene photos she could imagine the 
scene.  Because she had lived it.  She could imagine his long, agile 
fingers--artist's fingers, she had thought upon meeting him--clenched around 
the perimeter of his heart, bloodied and gory and scarlet red.

Mulder had asked her, in his way, telling her that she could tell him what 
had happened, when she was ready.  He had gazed at her with his soulful 
eyes--a martyr's eyes--and assured her of his safety.

She remembered shaking her head, and then nodding, then muttering something 
about the case they were working on.

He hadn't mentioned it since.

Which, really, was nothing less than she expected.  She didn't expect him to 
keep pushing her, when she was so patently unready to speak about the 
incident.

Terror.  That was what was so wrong with the picture; that was what she 
couldn't tell Mulder about.  She had felt terrified.  Utterly.  And 
completely.  It was many-layered: the horror of a stranger clawing at her 
skin as he stared into her eyes with the grim irony of an executioner, the 
knowledge that Mulder was only a few floors below and yet could do nothing to 
help her, but worst of all . . . nothing--nothing, absolutely nothing, had 
terrified her more than the concept of dying at the hand of this man before 
she could finish . . .

Finish what she had begun.

She knew that if she died then and there, she would have nothing but the 
memory of Mulder's face at the moment he had rejected her theories about 
Diana Fowley.

Scully didn't want that.  She wanted . . . resolution.

Dana Scully didn't leave things unfinished.

So when Mulder had burst into his apartment and she had clung to him and 
sobbed into his neck, she had promised herself that she would finish what she 
had started.  She would speak to him about Diana again, and pray that he 
would understand.

And if he didn't . . .  She knew that she couldn't stay.  Scully knew that 
she could not stay as his partner if he once again blatantly rejected her 
theory before even considering it.  What this near-death experience had 
accomplished, that others had not, was making her realize that she was tired. 
 Scully was tired and terrified and needed somebody besides herself to 
survive.

Padgett had shown her that, damn the bastard.  He had shown her that she 
needed human contact after all these years.  How else could she explain her 
urge to speak with this man--this *stalker*, for God's sake--to go into his 
apartment when she knew full well that he could be dangerous.  She had needed 
somebody who would speak with her rather than at her or around her.  She had 
needed another person who would treat her like a person and not a . . . not a 
sidekick, or a pesky little sister, or a tormented victim.

And what had she gotten for it?  The horror of feeling a hand groping inside 
her skin--UNDER her skin--reaching for her still-beating heart.  Ready to 
pull it out and place it in her hand and make her face the spectre of death.

And now it was time to fulfill her promise.  Finish what you start, Dana.  
Look Mulder in the eye and tell him what you believe and prepare yourself for 
that crushing blow when he makes that cutting gesture with his hand and eyes.

Scully did her best to ignore the potential parallels.

Scully realized she had been staring out of the window with her hand over her 
heart for the past fifteen minutes.

She turned away, and sat down on the bed, and sighed.

Tomorrow.  Tomorrow, she would tell Mulder what Padgett had made her realize. 
 She would be ready to talk.

Tomorrow.

END

Author's Notes: Hope you enjoyed.  I personally wasn't too happy with my 
ending, but then again I've never been very strong at resolution.  Don't be 
shy--if you can think of ways to improve this fic, drop me a line, because 
I'd really appreciate any suggestions.  I'm completely willing to revise this 
fic, if only for my own personal satisfaction.  Thanks for reading.