**************************************************************** Kipler's e-mail address has changed to: FanficKipler@verizon.net **************************************************************** From: kipler@aol.com (Kipler) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: "Time" part 1 of 2 Date: 5 Jun 1995 17:37:06 -0400 Do not archive anywhere other than Gossamer without the author's express permission. TIME (Part 1 of 2) by Mary Beth Clark (Kipler@aol.com) Comments welcome. .......................................................................... ........................... Please note: This story has an expiration date of September, 1995 - the season premiere episode of the X-Files. After that, the point becomes moot. So, read it in the summer. All characters are the property of Fox Broadcasting, Chris Carter, and Ten-Thirteen Productions. No copyright infringement is intended. .......................................................................... ........................... TWENTY-FIVE MINUTES: The car lunged again and then settled back into jostling. These roads were so poorly maintained - pitted and hard, full of bumps and potholes. The constant jarring motion wore at Scully's nerves. She didn't want to slow down. She should go easy. She was damaging the car. Why didn't they fix these roads? She reached over for the third time and checked the cellular phone. It was set and ready to receive. She needed to hear it ring - needed to hear from Mulder. He had been cut off. It had been interference - Scully was sure of that. Just a quick fade-away of Mulder's voice. It had happened often enough. Damn these phones. For a moment, she wondered if they wouldn't be better off without the portable phones. At least then, it wouldn't bother her so much if she didn't hear from him. Twenty-five minutes. He should have called her back by now. What could he have seen that would keep him from calling her back? She pulled the car into the driveway of the small house. Albert Hosteen, the grandfather, must have seen her driving up; he met her outside. "Where is Mulder?" Scully asked brusquely. The old man looked into her eyes for a moment. His mouth grew tight. The boy. She had forgotten about his grandson. "They went into the canyon," he said. "They left on the little bike about an hour ago. What is wrong?" "I don't know..." Scully stammered, trying hard not to cause Albert any more alarm. "I got a phone call from Mulder, but we were cut off. He wouldn't...he doesn't leave me like this, not knowing what's going on." "I can take you there," the old man said, slowly, "but it will be very hard, by car. The trail is very old." FOUR HOURS: Part of it was psychological, she knew. The bitter, acrid smell of burning made her think of heat and ash and dryness. But some of it was real, physical. Even in April, the air here was desperately dry. It was as if the sun were stealing the moisture from her. Her throat burned; she was parched. If only she had water. They would be here for all the long afternoon - maybe into the night. Someone would have to bring them water. It must be someone's job - to cart water and food out into the hills for people like her, people who had to wait. Thomas the son arrived, finally. The son of old Albert, but the father of the young boy - the boy who had gone with Mulder, the one whose bike had turned up on the ridge, the one who was missing now, with Mulder. Scully could hear the man's keening in the background. As for the grandfather, he remained silent. Scully wondered for a moment what common voice told this old man, told her, to be so silent now? She didn't look at the family. This was not something to be seen. She was always surprised at how different it was from TV news broadcasts, where the grief was small and distant and clinical. She knew that if she looked at this father, here, at this moment, the power of his cries would overwhelm her. Three local police officers climbed down into the blackened hole in the ground, down into the bitter, dark dust, but she knew they would find nothing. She had been down there herself. There had been an explosion, and then fire. This fire had been designed to burn and destroy. She had heard about fires that burned with such heat - a heat that liquified watch crystals, a heat that melted fillings, a heat that ate through bone. This fire had begun to melt the very walls of the boxcar. There would be no evidence. The fire had taken everything. Fire. Of all the ways that he... Scully pushed the words out of her mind. Not now. That one thought would ruin her, would be her undoing. She sank down on the hillside, in the orange dust that passed for soil. The ground was hard. She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath, suddenly realizing how weary she was. She fingered the cross around her neck, drawing it back and forth on the strand of gold. Her fingers trembled, and for a moment the chain picked up the vibrations; she felt it thrumming against her neck. Her legs ached and her back was strained. Her eyes burned. She needed water. She pulled her knees up to her chest, and lowered her head, shading her eyes from the parching sun. She would wait here until the men were finished with their work. She would wait here all the long afternoon. EIGHTY-NINE HOURS: The clothes, the shoes, everything that had been with her at the boxcar still carried the lingering scent of burning. It seemed to cling, to hang on like a stain. She wasn't sure that it was burned into her things; she suspected that it was branded into her mind. She packed her bag and glanced out the window of the hotel room. How different leaving was. The trip out to New Mexico had been so complex - she had had to worry about the logistics of traveling in secret, of staying awake, of guarding the files, of constantly monitoring Mulder in his weakened condition. But the trip home would be a light one. There wasn't much to pack. A few clothes. No paper files, no disks, no casettes. No facts. She had nothing to protect, now. She knew she should care more about the missing files, the ones that had disappeared. Mulder would care. Would have cared. But she doubted she would see the documents again. Thoroughness was a watchword of the men who had taken them. Still, Mulder would try to find the files. She should, too. Maybe soon the files would become important to her again. At least Albert Hosteen's family was back in some semblance of order. The boy had been found, delerious with fear and dehydration, but alive. He had been wandering in the hills a few miles from the site of the boxcar. Two days ago, when Scully had learned this, she had felt a brief prick of hope. But the boy was no help - he had no memory of the boxcar, or, for that matter, of the last week. There was no evidence that he had even gone with Mulder down into the hole. No sign that he had been near the burning. Scully sighed. There was nothing more to do here. Skinner had wanted to question the Navajo family further, to ferret out the truth. He had been startled at Scully's indifference, at her willingness to go along with the family when they refused their cooperation. But he didn't know what she did about memories, about the price of losing them. Skinner had thought - perhaps even hoped - that Mulder had been with the boy. But Scully did not believe it. She had spoken to Mulder on the phone. He had told her his whereabouts, just before... Yes, the boy might have been taken away, kept safe from the fire, but he was not the one they were after. They didn't need to hurt the boy. They needed to hurt Mulder. So logic told her that he was gone, that the boy could not help her. Maybe the specific truths - the methods, the time frame, the cover- ups - would come out eventually. Albert the grandfather said that they would. But the importance of these small truths was eclipsed by the one large truth that filled the corners of Scully's mind. There was a hesitant knock, and the door to the hotel room opened. It was Skinner. "Agent Scully, the car will be here in twenty minutes." "Thank you, sir," said Scully, her voice even and calm. It had begun to surprise her - how steady she could make herself seem. She wondered briefly if Director Skinner were surprised, as well. "Agent Scully..." came the man's voice after a moment, "If you need..." Scully cut him off. "No, sir." She looked out the window again, the words in her mind chanting what she wanted to say: "Leave. Leave now. Please. Leave. Leave me alone." But politeness governed Scully's mind. How strange, and how strong it was. It overpowered the voice in her head. She could not violate the laws of politeness, even when her mind was screaming. Even when the only natural thing to do was to scream out loud. ELEVEN DAYS: Scully opened her eyes. Sunlight streamed through her bedroom window. It was a beautiful morning. She loved the spring. Why had she slept so late - had her alarm failed?... But then, quickly, it came back to her, as it had every day this week. No alarm. No meetings. No flights. Not for now. The surprise did not hit as forcefully today as it had yesterday. A small flutter of pain crossed her chest. Was she getting used to it, already? In her mind, she spoke the thought that had become her ritual every morning. A seven-day ritual. "So this is what it is like for him to be gone." It was not what she had imagined, before, when she had seen that this time could come. She had somehow thought that Mulder's absence would register, immediately and intuitively, in her brain. After two years, she had begun to believe that there was some connection between his mind and hers, that the closing of one would startle the other. She should have felt it - should have known right from the moment of the fire. It would have made sense. But now, even now, the thought wouldn't register, and she had to keep reminding herself, every morning. She checked the clock. It was only nine-thirty. All week she had been waking at eleven; the sleep she had missed in New Mexico must have thrown her body clock off. But now, today, she couldn't imagine why she was awake so early. And then the knock on her door repeated. "Who is it?" she called, hoarsely. "It's me, Dana." Her mother. Scully burrowed deeper into her sheets as she heard the key turning in the lock. She knew the plan. Get Dana out of the house. Take her out to breakfast. Bring her coffee. Visit her every day. Talk about the garden, discuss current events. Keep her occupied. It was some comfort. Her mother understood loss. More importantly, she knew the struggle that came on top of loss - the pain of having someone torn away like this, taken suddenly, in violence. This woman, more than anyone, understood, and there was comfort in her presence. But it was weak and diffuse. Her mother couldn't know, couldn't possibly feel, this specific loss - the departure of Mulder. And her mother could offer her no protection from the certainty of flames. Scully closed her eyes as the thoughts regrouped and marched back into her mind. The danger came in considering that last instant. That was the moment that held all the questions: Had he known? Had he seen the fire coming towards him? Had he felt it? In that one second, had there been time for him to be afraid? To feel alone? And the one thought that always followed, naturally, after these: What if I could have helped him? What if I had gone with him? At least I would know. At least I would have been with him. Scully's head pounded. From the kitchen she could hear her mother's cheerful, chattering voice. She shook her head slightly, and leaned into her pillow, burying her face, releasing a long, heavy sigh. Her mother would come in the bedroom, and Scully would move from bed. She would brush her hair and put on clothes. They would go out for a meal. Scully would not eat, but she would have to order coffee, would be forced to form words. For an hour, maybe more, the thoughts would be blotted out. THREE WEEKS AND TWO DAYS: The drizzling rain had stopped, and the cemetery had cleared out. People were shuffling back to their cars, back to their houses, out of the damp sea air of Martha's Vineyard. Scully took one last look at the two new stones on the ground. One lay at the head of a mound of fresh earth, but the other sat over a rectangle of emerald grass. There had been no need to disturb the lawn to lay this second marker. It was more efficient this way, with no body. And cruel. There should be some disturbance of the earth, some sign that something was wrong. Scully watched Skinner pay his respects to the mourners. She hadn't spoken to him at all today. She hadn't asked him to come, and wasn't sure why he had. Her brain operated on two levels, now. One level was here, thinking about this place and this day. Evaluating Skinner. Was he putting on a show for the Bureau, or could he be trusted? It didn't matter. Even if he were here for Mulder's sake, for the family's, she didn't think she could trust him. She wasn't sure - this was all so new to her - but she believed that she had lost that capacity. She would have to go speak to Mrs. Mulder. When Skinner had gone, she would. Scully watched him from across the grass. He seemed to be respecting her unspoken wishes. He wasn't trying to make contact. He nodded at the grey-haired woman and began to walk away. Soon Scully would have to look into Mrs. Mulder's eyes - into Mulder's eyes - and form some appropriate words. As if she had any comfort to give. But even as she planned the logistics of her contact with Mulder's mother, her brain was working on that other level, too. It was constant, now, this replaying of her mental tapes. Half of her mind - at least half - was back in New Mexico; she watched the fire, watched Mulder in the brief second when he realized what was happening, saw his eyes widen in fear... She wondered at the capacity of the brain - at its ability to do so many things at once. If a stranger had verbalized the thoughts that swirled in Scully's mind, she would have diagnosed a near- breakdown. And yet, here she was, perfectly able to dress herself and eat and talk to the grieving mother, all the while carrying with her these images of heat and smoke and fire. To anyone else, to her normal self, the pictures would seem horrifying and dark. But now they were her constant companions, no longer frightening but familiar, playing in her mind with the regularity of her heartbeat. She moved closer to Mrs. Mulder. The woman stood alone, now, except for the older man who gripped her elbow, supporting her. "Mrs. Mulder," Scully started, "I'm Dana Scully. I am... I was his partner." The eyes pierced Scully. They were glassy and dazed. Doubtless the woman had been sedated. But they were Mulder's eyes. Scully looked into them, long and hard. She might not see them again. "Director Skinner pointed you out to me." said the woman in a broken voice. "He said that you and Fox are - that you were - very close." Scully's eyes burned, and her throat constricted. She could feel the threat of tears. Why now, suddenly, she didn't know. "You must tell me," Mrs. Mulder continued, "The fire... he was so afraid of fire, you know...did he feel any pain? Did they hurt him? Did he - " Scully cut her off. "No, Mrs. Mulder." she said. "He never knew. He didn't feel anything. It was too fast. He couldn't have." Scully blinked back the lie. Maybe, after all, there was some small comfort that she could offer. And maybe, if the world were not entirely cruel, the words she spoke were not entirely false. The woman squeezed her hand and backed up a bit. She was distracted, her mind moving elsewhere. Scully squeezed back and looked one more time into the eyes. "Agent Scully," said Mrs. Mulder abruptly, staring hard at her, "They've taken everything from me. Every. Thing." Scully only nodded. _______ =========================================================================== From: kipler@aol.com (Kipler) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: "Time" part 2 of 2 Date: 5 Jun 1995 17:37:29 -0400 TIME (Part 2 of 2) by Mary Beth Clark (Kipler@aol.com) Comments welcome. .......................................................................... ........................... Please note: This story has an expiration date of September, 1995 - the season premiere episode of the X-Files. After that, the point becomes moot. So, read it in the summer. All characters are the property of Fox Broadcasting, Chris Carter, and Ten-Thirteen Productions. No copyright infringement is intended. .......................................................................... ........................... FOUR MONTHS: The desk drawer was cluttered, as it had always been. She had left it like that. Every morning when she came in, she had looked at the desk, and had been with him as nearly as she could. He was here, in the clutter and the files and the posters. Now, for the first time, she opened the drawer. She was going to have to go through with this. She couldn't keep feeling this way, every day - as if half of her were missing, as if she were working with a handicap. She had hoped that time would give her back the X-Files, that she would begin to feel some drive, some of Mulder's thirst for the truth. But she hadn't. Mulder was this place, and without him there was no place here for her. Damn the truth, anyway. She didn't understand it. The last words Albert Hosteen had spoken to her replayed in her mind, over and over. "He was willing to sacrifice himself to the truth." Damn the truth. He had sacrificed her to the truth. Had he known he was doing that? No. He wouldn't have. She had never let him know. But whether he had been aware of it or not, the outcome was the same. She should have told him. Some of the items in the desk were impersonal - pens and paperclips, glue sticks and notepads. She sorted through these first, testing the pens to see which ones worked, tossing the others in the garbage bag, sorting through miscellaneous phone numbers and addresses scribbled on scraps of paper. It was difficult to throw away the papers that carried his script, but she managed. She had a few letters, at home, some funny postcards he had written her. She would remember his handwriting. There were seven hours until her meeting with Skinner. She knew that he would approve her request. She believed that he would approve anything she asked. It wasn't intentional, this guilt she had inflicted on him. But she could not cover the look in her eyes. She had given up trying. And he was an honorable man. She believed that now. He would approve her request in an impossible attempt to make up for the things he could not change. Seven hours until the meeting, and that would be that. She wanted to take away the important things today, before it was official, before anyone knew that she was transferring. Once they found out, the office would no longer be hers - would no longer be his. She had to get the important things home, to her own apartment. She lifted a crumpled plastic bag, sending a shower of sunflower seeds across the floor. Such a labor-intensive food. She had never understood his need to eat these. She picked one up and put it in her mouth, rolled it around, tried to crack the shell with her teeth. She failed miserably. It must be a practiced skill. Mulder had made it look so easy. She pulled out a small silver frame. It held a snapshot. Scully didn't think she'd ever seen this one before, and that surprised her. It showed two children in the ocean, squinting into the sun, smiling wildly. A boy and a girl. Mulder and his sister. They were tanned and silly. So young. Imagine Mulder, silly... She should send this to Mrs. Mulder. But she knew she wouldn't. It wasn't fair. All that time in Martha's Vineyard, even after Samantha had disappeared, they had had Mulder with them. Years and years. And all that time they had spent wishing for some other ending to their story, letting Mulder know that he was not enough for them, that they needed someone else to be there, someone that he couldn't give them. They had had him all those years. She had lost him so quickly. She wouldn't give back this little piece of him. She would keep it for herself. She felt a familiar inertia growing in her mind. It happened often, now. She would have to stop what she was doing and let her thoughts play out. She tried to do it only when she was alone. Once in a while it happened in front of her mother. Sometimes in a meeting. She knew she scared the other agents when she acted this way. She was living something that they didn't want to think about. There was a special, unspoken, spooky society for agents whose partners had been killed, and she was part of it now. Bob Carlson from the third floor understood her. Once, he had given her hand a gentle squeeze under the table, right in the middle of a meeting with Skinner. It meant something, to not be entirely alone. Her thoughts drifted, but they were kinder these days. The fire scenes had retreated to the back of her mind. Now she could think of Mulder in other times. Today it was that fevered night she remembered. How worried she had been. He was so sick and so confused. She had been afraid he would be taken off to jail, that she would lose him. She had been so afraid that she had hurt him, wounded his shoulder, to keep him from damning himself. She had hurt him as little as possible, but had hurt him nonetheless. It was the right thing. He had been given back to her for just a day, with his clear mind, and he had forgiven her. That night of the fever, when he showed up at her door, she had thought it was hard. And then, later, when she had hurt him, she had thought that was harder still. But those times were only hard because she knew they might be a precursor to this time - to this day when she had to clean out his desk drawers, sort through his things, dispose of him. This was the hard time. She would take back the night of the fever in an instant. To see his eyes, to feel his cheek, to watch him sleep and know that he was safe for a moment. She recalled his face with tenderness, how his eyes had finally rested, giving up their struggle for control, how he had trusted her to guard his sleep, to watch him through the night. She sat lost in thought for a long time, and when she at last looked up at the clock her face was damp. If only she had known to memorize every detail of that night. If only people knew how close they were to the ending of their time... FIVE MONTHS: Scully finished up in forensics and headed out to the parking lot. She shivered as she stepped out into the open air. It was chilly. She put her sweater on. It was already the sixteenth of September. Five months. Summer was over. Where had it gone? A whole season of days had filed by, and she couldn't remember a single one. No picnics, no concerts, no walks in the park. The days were lost to her. Autumn was coming. She wondered if she would notice it. It was five o'clock on the dot. This assignment was calm, regular. She got in every day at eight o'clock exactly, and left every afternoon by five-fifteen at the latest. Her eight hours were filled with work that consumed both her time and her thoughts. The people here, especially Jane O'Hara, were friendly and helpful. There was no conflict. Everyone was polite, and everyone left at five o'clock. It was calm. Scully's brain shifted into automatic pilot. Twenty minutes later, as the car pulled into the parking space in front of her building, she realized that she couldn't remember driving home. She pulled the remote from her purse, and noted that she had forgotten to set her alarm system this morning. Damn. She couldn't afford to keep slipping like this, to keep being careless. If anything happened to her now, there was no one to... But then, what would happen to her now? Who would track her now? Who would be interested in her at all? But already the paranoia about her personal safety had been reactivated. She got to feeling this way every few weeks; it had been like this since last November. It would pass. It always did. You couldn't live forever in this state, hackles up, eyes darting. The body wouldn't allow it. But for the next few hours, she knew that she would be watching, listening. So she came through her front door on the alert. When she began to feel that something was not right, she tried to dismiss it. The doorway looked fine. No sign of any entry. There were dishes - a plate and a glass - in the kitchen sink. They must have been there when she left this morning. They must have been her breakfast dishes. She didn't remember eating breakfast. But then again, she didn't remember driving home tonight. No surprise. She kicked off her shoes and sank down on the couch, putting her feet up on the coffee table. She closed her eyes, and tried to relax. She needed a nap. Sleep wasn't coming well at night anymore. She began to feel the odd thoughts of pre-sleep creep into her mind. She heard disembodied voices talking to her, whispering important secrets that would vanish as soon as she woke. In the mist of drowsiness, her brain made connections that were impossible, crystal clear. It saw relationships that were so logical and truthful that they did not fit into the waking world. She gave the thoughts permission to move under their own power. They flowed by. She knew that smell from before. Her eyes snapped open and her mind snapped awake. She grasped and tried to hold the hazy thought. She said it out loud so the words would stay real. She sniffed. At first it was indetectable, lost to her waking senses. But she breathed gently, calmly, and again the scent danced around the back of her mind. Her heart began to race. Something had happened here. That smell. My God... She reached in her purse and pulled out her gun. She didn't wear the holster anymore. She walked slowly, cautiously, arms held in front of her. It had been months since she had had to do this, months since she had been in danger. The smell was coming from her bedroom. She would have known it anywhere - it was the black smell of dust and ash and burning. It shouldn't be here. It belonged in the orange sand of New Mexico. She had thrown out all the clothing, every belonging that held this smell - the bitter smell of that day. She turned the corner into her room, heart pounding in her ears. And as her eyes focused on the bed, her mind began to shout, to repeat its new mantra: My God. My God, my God, my God. NINETY-SIX HOURS: Three or four days, as far as he could tell. That was all the time he could account for. It was a rough estimate, he knew, and the only evidence he had to support the estimate was the clock of his body. He knew that his shoulder had hurt, at first. But that pain had been an ache, a soreness. Now it was a flame. The wound was growing angry and red, and the poisons from the infection were beginning to affect the rest of his body. He felt the fever climbing, felt his thoughts becoming blurred. It would have taken several days for an infection like this to develop. He remembered bits and pieces of the last several weeks, but not much. He knew that the wound in his shoulder was somehow connected to a gun and to Scully - that it had been his fault. Something had gone wrong with him, not with her. He remembered another fevered night, and a cool cloth, and pills that took the flame out of his head. He had to walk, since he didn't know where his car was. Not to mention his wallet or his keys. It was all right. He was not far away. Scully's apartment was close by. However he had gotten here, whoever had brought him, had dropped him at a convenient location. He glanced around as he walked. Something was strange, different. The trees looked out of place. His fever must be higher than he thought. He was glad he was near. He had no key, but he knew where she kept the extra. He carefully let himself into the familiar entryway, and headed straight for the kitchen. He was ravenous. He didn't remember being so hungry the last time he was sick. He poured himself a glass of milk, and devoured two donuts that he found in the refrigerator. "You need to rest. I want you to lie down." He remembered these words. He would be fine, if he just replayed the scene he remembered. She would come. He lay down on the bed, closed his eyes. "Right now you need to rest, OK?" Sleep came quickly. He was halfway there. FIVE MONTHS AND NINE HOURS: The hospital room was sterile, as usual. And not private. But she would not leave. She sat with him through the night, resting her hand on his hot cheek, checking the shoulder wound compulsively. It was the same wound. There was no doubt. She had tended it before, for two long days, and knew every detail of the point of impact and the exit wound. It had been her fault. She would have remembered it years from now. She ignored the questions running through her mind. Maybe someday, all the questions would be answered. It didn't matter. They were only details, the petty wishes of her rational mind to find the truth. They were overshadowed by this one wish granted, beyond understanding, beyond belief. But Skinner could not ignore the questions. He came into the room, and looked for a long time at Mulder. Then he clutched her upper arm and gently pulled her away, out into the relative privacy of the corridor. This would rob her of time. "I don't know, sir," she explained quickly in the harsh white light of the hallway. The nurse looked up from her station; Scully suspected that she had spoken a bit too loudly. She glared back at the woman, and continued. "I don't profess to understand. But I am telling you the truth. That wound is the same one that I inflicted on Agent Mulder over five months ago. And judging from its appearance, it has been healing for approximately seven days. No more. I can't explain it. You can ask the doctors. They concur with me." Skinner looked hard into her eyes, then left to find a phone. Doubtless he would make a report to someone. Scully didn't dare think about that. This moment, right now, was a reprieve. Never mind what came later. She returned to the room and sat there into the night. Her hand was on Mulder's cheek when his eyes opened. She began to tremble. She willed herself to breathe, but her body did not respond. He would have to speak first. "I'm sorry for letting myself into your apartment," he started, hoarsely. "But I knew you'd be back soon. I owe you a couple donuts." He smiled weakly, days of weariness playing across his features. Only days. But she saw his face change, watched his eyes cloud over, as his gaze met hers. She knew that her own features must show the weariness of months. He looked at her, questioning, raising one hand to her temple. She laid her own hand over his, pressing it to her cheek. She felt the shaking in her fingers move through her skin and into his. Her lungs drew in a deep breath as her body remembered to inhale. "Scully?" he tested quietly, eyes intent on hers. "It's OK, Mulder," she stumbled, looking at the eyes, trying to memorize them. "It's going to be OK."