From: spookycc@webtv.net (spookycc) Date: Mon, 22 Nov 1999 16:19:54 -0500 (EST) Subject: Fwd: Touchstone 1/1 Source: direct NEW: Touchstone 1/1 by spookycc Title: Touchstone 1/1 Author: spookycc E-Mail: spookycc@webtv.net Rating: PG Spoilers: 6E, 6E:AF Category: VA, UST - implied MSR, but I'd call it fairly noromo-friendly :) Summary: Partial fill-in-the-blank for time period between Scully's rescue of Mulder and the Doorway Scene one week later. Includes both of those scenes. I know V Mosley has written for this time period, (I haven't read it) and my work doesn't compare to hers, but it's a good read. Feedback: Sure! I'm at spookycc@webtv.net Archive: Anywhere, as long as my name and email are attached. Disclaimer: That kiss wouldn't have been on the forehead if they were mine :-) They're not. Author's notes follow story. Dedication: To Fox's Vixen, the slasher who keeps me coming back to my shipper roots :-) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx The keycard slipped cleanly through the coded lock, and the door obligingly slipped open. The room was cool and dark. A stark table sat in the center of the room, looking like a ghostly "X" - or a white cross... and on it... Scully was at his side before she was aware of having moved. He lay motionless, but she noted without preconscious thought that his chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm. A sooth- ing rhythm. A rhythm that bespoke life, and hope. She ran her hand gently across the side of his bandaged head. God, what had happened here? What had they done to him? "Mulder... Mulder, you've got to wake up," she whispered, not really expecting a response, but knowing she couldn't move six feet of comatose partner by herself. "I've got to get you out of here." Again in hushed tones, though there was no one around to hear. "Mulder, can you understand me?"She'd known when she visited him in Georgetown Hospital that he could understand her - more - even know what her thoughts were without hearing them verbalized. But this Mulder looked so much leaner, more haggard, and most certainly unaware of his surroundings at present. He surprised her then, a slight grimace as if in pain, then his eyes opened, just a bit. She paused and watched him, a hopeful expression on her face. A faint sound from his mouth, then silence. "Mulder, you've got to get up. I don't know how much time we have." More insistent now. Who knew when someone would be by to check on him? Although he no longer had sensors attached to his head, several were affixed to his chest. She had no idea how long he'd been lying there, alone. "You've GOT to get up Mulder!" His face tight- ened again, his eyelids fluttering. "No one can do it but you." Secretly in her mind, though, she knew she'd pull, drag and carry him out if he didn't regain consciousness. Leaving him here was *not* an option. "Mulder, *help* me," she implored, leaning her head in closer. "Please, Mulder..." Frustration and fatigue crackled in her voice.Tears welled in her eyes, and the first tear slipped off her face, falling onto Mulder's closed left eye, before running down the side of his face toward his ear. She leaned her face closer to his, so tired she almost didn't feel his head moving beneath hers. She pulled back a bit, as his breath caught in his throat - an attempt to speak. How simple an act, yet she had not heard him speak for weeks - not since she heard him yellling for her from within a padded room, before she'd left for Africa and answers. Mulder pursed his lips, took another breath. "You..." almost inaudible, as she leaned her head back closer to him. ...."help......*me*. He leaned up as much as he could then, his emaciated wrists slipping easily from the rings on the table, and embraced Scully. She held his head close to hers for a precious moment. They had no more time to spare if she was to get him out successfully. Scully unbuckled the shackles at his feet, and helped him to a sitting position. Elbows on his knees, Mulder rested his head in his hands, weak and wobbly, while Scully searched the room's cabinets for something to clothe him in - the standard issue sheet he now wore would be difficult to manage, at best. Finding a hospital gown, she returned to his side. He didn't move - remained sitting but not upright, hands still cradling his head. "Mulder, c'mon. Help me get you into this." He nodded meekly and raised his head a bit, sat dazedly while she pulled the monitor pads from his chest. The instrumentation on the other side of the bed displayed its alarm at having the source of its signal removed, but no one came to check. Scully bit her tongue in anger when she realized no one was coming to check at all - he'd been left either to live or to die, and his captors hadn't cared which. After successfully getting him into the gown, Scully threw the sheet aside and moved to the next hurdle - getting Mulder on his feet. "Gimme a hand here, Mulder," she requested his assistance and got it - well at least all that he was able to summon at that moment. In a few seconds he was standing beside the table, leaning heavily back on it. Scully gave him a moment to collect himself - it didn't look like their escape would be inter- rupted anyway. Half-seated against what had been his cross, he held his head again in his hands, as though his neck could not support it. Scully slipped a shoulder under one of his, and he used her assistance to stand fully upright. "Easy, Mulder," Scully let him balance against her - he seemed to have none of his own. "One step at a time." Mulder nodded slowly, and with Scully's help, they made their way through the halls of the DOD installation. "Sorry I couldn't park in the pickup zone," Scully led Mulder outside and through the parking lot to the street, where she had left her rental. Slipping the key out, she unlocked the passenger side door, then eased her partner inside, taking care not to bump his head - she thought bitterly to herself. Once he was seated, she slipped his legs in and buckled the seatbelt around his slim frame. God, he'd lost so much weight in such a short time .... Scully levered the seat back just a little so he could rest more comfortably, and closed the door. She drove in silence for a long time, Mulder sleeping - or unconscious - beside her. Her first instinct was to take him to a hospital, but she discarded that idea. They had no more idea what he'd just been through than she did - actually they had less, since she'd deciphered most of the Navajo code. She still didn't know precisely what had happened at the installation they'd just left, but she had more of a handle on what was going on than the doctors who had been treating him before his disappearance. Scully opted for her apartment, since she had more medical supplies there than in the small bag she kept in the trunk of her car. Mulder had needed medical attention so many times in the course of their investigations that she was usually able to put together whatever they needed. she chided herself. Pulling into as near a space to her building as she could find, she levered the car into park & walked around to the passenger side. God, she was so tired. Forty winks on Mulder's desk yesterday and another forty on the floor of her apartment last night was not enough.... Unbuckling the seatbelt, she slid it off Mulder and set about re-awakening him for the trip inside. "Mulder, wake up." She tapped his cheek light- ly with the backs of her fingers. "Come on, Mulder..." Finally he acquiesed, his eyes opening to the merest of slits, but open, at least. Scully helped him from the car and waited with a shoulder un- der one of his until he gained some semblance of balance. Together they navigated the stairs to her apartment, and she released a tired sigh when she was finally able to lay him down on her couch. Sitting beside him, Scully gingerly felt around the bandaged area of Mulder's head. When she hit a sensitive spot, Mulder's face twinged, and his eyelids fluttered again. "Sorry, Mulder... she whispered. "I'm so sorry....." Scully shook her head softly and headed into the extra bedroom to get her medical supplies. She cut the bandage carefully from Mulder's head, and inspected the very small incision she found underneath. It was neatly closed, at least. They had given him a fighting chance, in that category anyway. But what had he been infused with? Or, what had been removed? She used a smaller amount of gauze to rewrap the area, and laid his head gently back on the couch. He had not even fully awakened under her ministrations. She felt she should awaken him, maybe even try to keep him awake, but she simply didn't have the heart. she thought wryly. Having done all she felt comfortable doing, she went into her bedroom, leaving the door to the hallway open. She didn't even bother changing clothes - she just laid atop the covers and fell into the sleep of the exhausted. "Scullleeeeee!" She sat bolt-upright in bed, her mind defuzzing - what had awakened her? "Scullleeee!" On her feet in a second, she ran into the living room, where she found Mulder thrashing on the couch. She sat next to him and tried to hold him down. She pinned his flailing arms easily - he was so much more tired than even she was - and held him down. "Mulder, it's me. Calm *down*, Mulder." His struggling ceased as if a switch somewhere had been turned off. Scully released her grip on his arms, and felt his forehead - hot, but not necessarily a fever. Not an earthly fever, any- way.... Scully sat at the end of the couch and put his head in her lap, stroking his face softly. "Its alright," she whispered. "I'm here." Mulder's eyes slipped open then, and he gazed directly into Scully's face. His breathing slowed to a normal level, and his hand reached for one of hers and held it tightly, as if it would convince his mind she really *was* there. "Mulder, can you still-" "N....No, Scully." "Then how did you know I was going to ask if you could still read minds?" Scully queried. "I still have whatever ability I had *before* I saw the etching, Scully." A soft smile graced his tired features. Scully allowed herself a smile as well... DNA testing would confirm it, but she was pretty sure she had *her* Mulder back. "No more voices?" He shook his head. "And the white noise?" "Gone," he assured her. He closed his eyes for a moment as if to confirm it to himself as well, and then reopened them. "Nothing." . Scully could see Mulder as an adult version of Gibson Praise, could see him learning to use the ability. But then he made uncanny leaps of logic anyway. Mind-reading might have made him absolutely insufferable. She smiled just a bit. He would also have learned the depth of her feelings for him, if he hadn't already ascer- tained that when she visited him in the ward.... "Penny for your thoughts," "What were you dreaming about when you-" "Armageddon, Scully. And I don't mean the movie. It was right outside my window. =A0 I *knew* it was going on, but I was too tired to watch it, too tired to get involved. Too tired to care, until..." "Until what?" "Until you came to me in my dream and told me I was a traitor, a deserter, a coward." "Mulder, I would never say those things to you. You *know* that." Mulder nodded. "But they were true. I would have given up if you hadn't exhorted me to Fight the Fight. I was so tired. I *am* so tired...." "I know. It's ok, sleep..... " Scully tousled the little shock of Mulder's hair that wasn't encased in gauze, as his eyes slipped closed once more. She laid her head on the back of the couch, and within a few minutes, she was once more asleep herself. Each day afterward found Mulder sleeping less and more aware of his surroundings. His bal- ance improved, and Scully drove him to the hospital and had an imaging scan run - it de- tected no scar tissue - in fact it detected no oddities at all, which was an oddity in and of itself... She finally allowed Mulder to stay at his own place, after she rode with him while he drove, to make sure there was no motor func- tion impairment, whether it showed up on a scan or not.... One week after the "rescue", Scully drove to Mulder's apartment. She was quiet, pre- occupied with the bad news she had to impart to Mulder. He wasn't due back at work until next week, and she knew he'd still been sleeping quite a bit (well, more than three hours a night was quite a bit for Mulder), so she was fairly sure she'd find him at home.... She paced from the elevator to his door, not even pausing to look at #43, still vacant last time she'd asked Mulder about it.... Her series of short knocks brought Mulder to the door. "Scully, what're you doin' here?" Mulder asked. "Actually, I was - I was just gettin' dressed to - to come see you, but I couldn't find a tie to go with my victory cap." He tapped the bill of a NY Yankees cap atop his head, and had the good sense to look a bit worried when Scully gave him one of her stern *looks*. "Mulder, no work," Scully admonished. She pulled his ball cap off, revealing the smaller bandage he still sported. "You have to go back to bed." She tried to pull his necktie from around his neck, but he grabbed the other end of it and laid it back under his collar. "Ho, wait - tie goes to the runner," he quipped, then smiled uneasily. Scully permitted a small smile despite her reason for coming to see Mulder, and then lowered her head. "Scully, I uh... I was comin' down to work to tell you that Albert Hosteen is dead. He died last night, in New Mexico. He'd been in a coma for two weeks...." Mulder paused as he watched disbelief play across Scully's pale features, then continued. "...so there's no way he could have been in your apartment." Scully's face showed denial. "He was there, we - we *prayed* together." Mulder pursed his lips and nodded slowly. He knew she needed time to assimilate everything she'd seen.... "Mulder, I don't believe that. I don't believe it. It's impossible." Scully was adament, Mulder was patient. His voice dropped to a whisper. "Is it any more impossible than what you saw in Africa.... or what you saw in me?" Scully looked towards the floor, trying to reconcile thoughts which would not be recon- ciled. She shook her head defeatedly. "I don't know what to believe anymore." Mulder stepped closer, sensing her confusion, her frustration. "Mulder, I was so determined to find a cure to save you," Scully spoke softly, her voice break- ing, just a little. "that I could deny what it was that I saw. And now I don't even know. I don't know what the truth is, I don't know who to listen to, I don't know who to trust." Her voice broke a bit more.... Mulder looked downward. Surely she could still trust him? Before he could interject a thought, Scully took a deep breath and continued. "Diana Fowley was found murdered this morning." She could barely meet Mulder's sorrow-filled eyes, and did so only briefly. The hurt in them was evident, but there were no tears. "I never trusted her, but she helped save your life, just as much as I did. She gave me that book..." She spared another glance at Mulder. "It was her key that led me to you." Silence stood between them for a moment be- fore Scully gathered herself and continued, "I'm sorry.... I'm so sorry, I know she was your friend," her voice breaking again, Scully allowed her welling tears to escape, and stepped into Mulder's arms, to comfort him. As things played out, Mulder comforted her, as well. "Scully I was like you once," Mulder whispered. "I didn't know who to trust and I chose another path, another life, another fate, where I found my sister." Scully cried quietly on Mulder's shoulder as he explained himself, giving comfort even as she received it. "And even though my world was unrecogniz- able and upside down, one thing remained the same," he stepped back and took Scully's face gently in both hands. Their eyes met, his convincing and hers still brimming with tears. "*You* were my friend. And you told me the truth." Scully rested a hand atop Mulder's as he went on. "...and when my world was falling apart, you were my constant... my touchstone." Scully sniffed, taking a deep breath, before she answered him. "And you are mine." Mulder smiled softly, nodded almost impercept- ably. He had felt this need of hers, underlying her concern, when she had visited him before her trek to Africa to try to save him. A long moment passed between them. Neither moved, neither spoke, yet it was not awkward, each giving strength, each receiving it from the other. Scully put a hand on each side of Mulder's head and pulled him closer, planting a long but gentle kiss on his forehead. She put his baseball cap back in place over his bandage, and he smiled like a child rewarded. Scully's hands travelled down his cheeks. Her thumbs lingered for the briefest of moments on his lips, then she turned and walked away. Mulder stood in the same spot, his smile fading slowly as his thoughts turned inward. Scully paused on her journey back to the ele- vator that would take her away from this man. For however brief the time away from him might be, it would still seem too long. She glanced back at him, and was surprised to see that he did not meet her gaze. Instead, he still stared straight out into the hallway, his eyes glazed, his mind a million miles away... maybe more. Scully pondered where he was at that moment, before she turned and made her way home.... fini xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Author's Notes: I strayed from literary conform- ity a bit herein, in those instances where I didn't begin a new paragraph with every new open- ing of quotation marks, as one should do. I did this to separate the thoughts as *I* wanted them, rather than the way they would naturally separate themselves. I hope it wasn't too distracting for you. :-) Feedback welcomed at: spookycc@webtv.net Thanks for reading!