From: MystPhile@aol.com
Date: Thu, 4 Feb 1999 16:59:18 EST
Subject: NEW:  What's In It For Me? (1/1)

Title:  What's In It For Me? (1/1)
Author:  Mystphile@aol.com
Summary:  Post-Tithonus, Scully muses about her life.
                 Pre-mytharc Depression Alert!
Distribution: Anywhere; just ask
Classification:  V, SA
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Anything up to and including Tithonus
Disclaimer:  They're not mine


What's In It For Me?
by MystPhile (aol.com)


So, here I am, alive and well. Not exactly well.  Let's say, physically
healthy.  Quick recovery after the wound.  Even the scar will become less
prominent with time.

I should be goddamned happy to have escaped with my life.  Unfortunately, I'm
not--not entirely, when I think about what my life has become.  Yeah, it's
nice to be alive and all that shit.  But what do I have to return to?

ITEM:  Sifting through shit.  Literally.  That's what I've been doing for
nearly six months.

And when not on the fertilizer watch, it's been even worse, if possible.  Here
I am, a doctor, a scientist, a teacher, a special agent.  And I've been
spending days and days--and days!--questioning guys whose brains are so fried
they can't even remember their past drug use. Can we say overqualified?

ITEM:  Then came a sudden reprieve.  A trip to New York.  Chance to play
special agent again.  A restoration of status--of sorts. If you don't count
the fact that I was on probation.  And being spied on.

Of course, there were also some problems with the arrangements.  I couldn't
take Mulder with me.  And I couldn't leave my reputation behind.  I entered
New York with a load of baggage and a (temporary) partner who nearly killed
me.

ITEM:  Said partner has been bounced from the bureau.  Farewell, Agent Quick
Draw.  As I sit here, he's probably out making his own fertilizer purchase.
Wonder what his first target will be. 

ITEM:  Before I left for New York, I asked Mulder if he was ready to give up.
I was being facetious, but his response wiped the smile right off my face.
He's staying to spite his enemies?

What ever happened to the quest?  Or should that be The Quest?  He's no longer
interested in finding the truth about all the unbelievable things we've seen
and experienced over the last five years?  If he sincerely believes in an
impending alien invasion, shouldn't he be sticking at the Bureau to have a
shot at thwarting it?  Not just to annoy the opposition? Like a petulant
schoolboy. What's happened to his belief?

ITEM:  Since we lost the X-Files, I have knocked myself out searching for
information in my spare time.  I have enlisted the Lone Gun Men, who've turned
out to be princes in disguise.  Bless them for their hard work and never-
ending loyalty.  They are my heroes.

We have been studying my DNA, Gibson Praise's DNA, and all the scientific data
we can get our hands on.  We haven't found out enough to replicate the anti-
viral formula that saved me in the Antarctic, but we are making progress.  I
am fully engaged in this battle now.  But my most fervid ally seems to be
taking a break.

ITEM:  We (my private princes and I) have also been trying to find out what
Fowley was doing all those years she spent abroad.  Her activities are pretty
murky.  She herself both puzzles and repels me.  What's she doing here, and
why does Mulder still trust her?  I could not believe it when he suggested I
was asking him to choose between Fowley and me.  That rocked my world, not in
the good sense. How could he?...And I felt he might actually have chosen her.
The mind boggles.  And the heart...cracks.

ITEM:  High on the list of information I need.  What WAS it--or IS it-- with
Mulder and the Foul Fowl, as I not so fondly think of her.  A sensible person
might say, why don't you ask Mulder.  Can't do it. Not just because I'm
chickenshit, which I am. Not just because I dread hearing the answer, which I
do. Who wouldn't, after what he said the last time we worked with Fowley.

We've never pried into each other's personal lives.  I'm hurt that he hasn't
told me more about her.  Voluntarily.  It's always so vague.  Scully, you
don't understand her, you don't know her.  So, tell me about her; help me
understand her.  Not him.  For such an impulsive person, Mulder can be as
closed as a clam.

I remember how angry he was back when I had cancer.  When I didn't tell him
about seeing visions of the dead at the bowling alley.  He said not sharing
what I saw endangered our work.  Doesn't the same go for the Foul Fowl?  She's
involved in the work.  On so many levels, I need to know all about her.

ITEM:  My rewards in this job have diminished to the point of invisibility.  I
entered it thinking I could save people.  Even last summer, I thought we could
defeat this plague.  I wanted to believe.

But the reality of these last months, since we lost the X-Files....
Scut work, dead ends.  Losing Gibson Praise like a rookie.  What's happened to
that poor kid? Watching Skinner spin like a top, never knowing if he's friend
or foe.  Being berated by Kersh like an errant schoolgirl.  This is far from
what I came here for.  Painfully far.

A promising career down the tubes.  Ironic.  Now that I'm back to work, I wish
I were back at the hospital. At least there I could do nothing honestly.  Now
I have to do nothing while appearing to be busy and productive.  Act when I
have no heart for it, any of it.

The lack of accomplishment is amazingly debilitating.  Everything's dead in my
life, it seems.  Dead ends, dead people, my own dead spirit.  Has Fellig
somehow crept into my bones?  Will he, or his dark, despairing spirit, live
forever, in me?  Maybe he didn't completely die after all.

ITEM:  So many losses, so many defeats. I came here hopeful and naive, a
Clarice Starling wannabe.  Like her, I would defeat the monsters, solve cases,
save lives.  Instead, I've lost...nearly everything.

I might not feel so down if I at least had Mulder for company in this dark
night of my soul.  Misery, as they say, loves company.  But, close as we have
sometimes been, and at times that has been achingly close, now I feel us
drifting apart, closing ourselves off.  Or maybe it's just me, feeling that
it's all been a waste.

Are we partners?  Equal partners?  I fear I've been kidding myself.  He throws
out an occasional remark about how much he needs me and it feeds my own need
for maybe half a year.  I'm easy, far too easy.

ITEM:  The truth--and we certainly ARE concerned with the truth here, as
always--is that Mulder has a quest, capitalized or not.  He wants his answers,
not *the* answers, *his* answers.  Our cases through the years have evolved
around his beliefs, his life, his theories, while we worked from his office.

Even while I was on the verge of dying from cancer, Mulder chose that time to
take off--another ditch, surprise, surprise--and find a quack to drill a hole
in his head.  To recapture his childhood memories.  Selfish bastard.  Put in
those terms, it doesn't look as if I'm an equal part of this equation.  Maybe
I'm 1/2X.  Or less.

Sure, he'll move heaven and earth to save my life when it's in danger.  But
he'll do that for anyone, really.  I suppose it feeds into the Galahad image.
Knights engage in noble acts, willing to sacrifice themselves if necessary.
Even if they die, they get the glory.

ITEM:  I am seeing no glory in this for me.  I see a career in ashes, a life
devoid of many of the options I had six years ago, and failure at every level.
Personal, professional.  I see that I've devoted myself to a man who has
failed to return that devotion, or even loyalty, when his ex-chickadee
wandered onto the scene.

I see a partner I can't talk to, and one who won't talk to me. 

ITEM:  The scar on my abdomen will fade and heal.  The one on my psyche is
growing larger and speaking louder.  It's leaping up and down, shouting to get
my attention.

I wanted to serve humanity in some way.  I was willing to sacrifice.  But not
this much.  What's in this for me?

ITEM:  Maybe it's time to walk away.

END