From rhonilak@icontech.com Sun Mar 23 19:37:41 1997
Subject: The Armor of Her Eloquence by Lynn Gregg
From: Rhondda Lake <rhonilak@icontech.com>
--------

I *DID NOT* write this, once again I am posting for someone without List
access, but who would like response from readers. Please respond to:
pythia@aye.net

Catagory: MSR, V

Rating: NC-17


The Armor of Her Eloquence
By Lynn Gregg

<Deny everything.

<Words to live by. I should know. I'd already made a career of it long
before I ever came here, before I ever accepted this assignment. Deny that
anything ever troubled me, confused me, shook my faith or awakened me
screaming. Deny that I ever felt anything, that any messy human emotion
might ever crack my facade of cool composure. God! When I look back over my
life since I left Quantico I am astonished by my arrogance, by my utter lack
of foresight. So certain I could handle anything. So certain of the
invincibility of Dana Katherine Scully, M.D.

<Make that Dana Katherine Scully, Idiot!>

She looked up, away from the blinking cursor on her laptop's screen, across
the room to where her partner presided over the minor landfill he called a
desk. His God-awful purple and lime-green tie was askew; his dark hair stuck
up in unruly spikes; he was frowning at his own computer, oblivious of her
scrutiny.

<I've lived my life with the mathematical precision of the scientist,> she
continued, fingers accelerating in their dance across the keyboard as the
words spilled forth, tumbling over each other, trampling the last of her
internal defenses in their mad rush to be born. <And then into my neat
equation came a random factor, in the form of Fox Mulder. The formula
shifted; since that day I've never gotten the same answer twice.

<I was attracted. I acknowledged that; it was nothing I couldn't control,
after all. If I gained anything from the Jack fiasco it was that ability to
compartmentalize, to separate "Agent Scully" from "Dana." So I felt a sexual
attraction to my new partner; what of it? My social life may be dead but
dammit, I'm not; and who would be the wiser if on occasion I indulged in a
harmless fantasy or two? It had nothing to do with our work, no bearing on
my ability to function in a professional capacity.

<What I didn't count on was the way our relationship began to develop. How I
came to trust him, to care for him. How he became my best, sometimes I think
my only, friend. The bond I feel between us now defies my attempts at
analysis; I've never known anything else like it, never even considered the
possibility.

<And I've wondered--every other day, it seems--replayed in my mind like a
lovesick teenager the things he's said and done for me, to me, with me.
Scrutinizing every word, every action, his & mine--dissecting them &
examining them microscopically, knowing all the while that my findings are
biased, distorted by my own desires, my own fears.>

Silence in the basement office, broken only by the click of keys, the soft
drone of Mulder's radio. Whatever ghastly station he had chosen, it seemed
capable of playing only sappy love songs. Presently, Yvonne Elliman was
wailing "If I Can't Have You." Grinding her teeth and cursing the 1970's,
Scully resumed typing, pounding the keys in an effort to drown out not only
the song but the aching erratic pulse of her conflicted heart.

<What do you think of me, Mulder? What do you see? Do you know my constant
struggle to remain detached, to keep from flinging myself into your arms and
possessing you, as you seem to have possessed me? Do you see my desire, and
my terror, in my eyes? I would walk willingly to my death before I would
jeopardize what we have, what we've built; in a world I no longer recognize,
you are the only solid thing left to me. I don't even want to consider what
would happen were I to lose that. I know that I already own the greatest
things anyone could offer me: your respect, your friendship, and above all
your trust. And yet, it isn't enough. I feel like I'm drowning with the need
for more--to join our
bodies as we've joined our minds and spirits until our symbiosis is
complete. I feel so alone out here. Open yourself to me, Mulder. Open the
door to your darkness and let me-->

Her head snapped up. The damned radio was playing ELO now, the bouncy groove of
"Shine A Little Love."

Mulder was singing.

Biting her lip to hold back a scream, Scully finished the thought:

<--let me in.>

"Let me out," she whispered, and held her head in her hands.

"Scully? Hey, Scully!"

"What?"

"I'm about ready to wrap up here. Can I ask you a favor?"

"Sure." Anything. Please.

"Can I borrow your laptop? I've got to finish up this report, but my system
at home is--"

"Sure. No problem." She shut it down, packed it up, fairly threw it at him.
He looked at her curiously.

"Everything all right?"

"Fine. I'm fine. Just tired." She forced a smile that never quite reached
her eyes. "I'll see you in the morning, OK?"

She fled as though demons nipped her ass.


                          *     *     *

"Shit," Mulder grumbled, rubbing his tired eyes as he attempted to retrieve
his files from Scully's hard drive. As he scanned the list of folders, he
couldn't resist opening a few, reading over her notes and reports from past
cases. It warmed him, hearing her calm voice in his head, made him feel
closer to her. Ever since his return from Siberia she'd seemed strange and
distant, unusually tense. Ever since. . . God, the look on her face when
he'd burst in on the hearing, the way her enormous eyes devoured him--had he
just imagined that? He thought Arthur might've looked that way, when at last
he stumbled upon the Grail--like the most precious thing in life had at last
been returned to him. And the way, as soon as recess was called, she'd leapt
from her seat and launched herself into his arms, heedless, her usual
discretion gone. . .

She'd barely met his gaze since.

Closing the file he was in he went back to the directory, hunting his notes,
but an intriguing title stopped him: "Eros/Agape." His hand stopped,
hovered, ready to click, afraid to click. Was this the Secret Life of Dana
Scully, preserved in cyberspace? Was there someone in her life? There
couldn't be, could there? She'd tell him, wouldn't she?

He'd just *know*, wouldn't he?

He clicked.

The documents in the folder were dated, not named, and Mulder selected the one
bearing the date of his return. The screen came alive, densely packed with
words. He began to read.

<I knew the moment he walked into the courtroom. No, that isn't true; I knew
some time ago, but it was in that moment that I was finally forced to admit
it to myself. God, what an entrance! He burst through those doors and I felt
my heart start to beat again for the first time since we lost contact.

<Those patronizing, sanctimonious bastards. They thought I'd cave, thought they
could bully me into selling him out. They could've fined me, fired me,
imprisoned me, fucking keel-hauled me and I wouldn't have breathed a word.
Somehow, somewhere along this road we've traveled these past four years, his
safety has come to mean more to me than my own.>

Mulder found his own heart had started beating again, a bit faster than he
liked. Ignoring for a moment the confusion of his own thoughts, he continued
reading hers. A passage near the end of the document jumped out and smacked
him with the force of a sledgehammer to the skull.

<I try to still the wanting but I can't. It's become almost a nightly ritual
with me: I writhe awake, sweating and slick, the heat of his skin in my
dreams still upon me. His name on my lips a prayer or a curse, my heart
knocking arrhythmic against my ribs, my body singing with fatigue and
frustration. It's always the same, my hands sliding over my glistening skin,
and in my mind--Mulder. In my mind it is you who touches me, who comes to me
in the darkness to trace the contours of my need. Your gentle hands, your
lips upon
my breast, your face I see beneath me as I rise, stretch myself upon you,
feel your warm solid strength against me. The burn of your skin where it
presses mine, the salty sweetness of your mouth, the hard presence of you
filling me as at last we connect. . . 

<Can you hear it, the longing in my voice when you call me late at night? Do you
know how I wish you were here beside me, so that I could hold you and
comfort you until you fall asleep in my arms? Sometimes I am abrupt with
you, in the night, and I can hear the hurt in your voice, the regret at
having awakened me. It isn't lack of concern that puts the edge on my words;
it is instead sheer frustration, wanting you with me, not knowing how to
ask, wishing it was you I held so close to me and not the sterile cold
plastic of the phone. . . >

His eyes would no longer focus on the words. Grabbing jacket and keys he was
gone. The abandoned laptop's screen glowed on softly, lighting the empty room.


                          *     *     *

Dana sighed in her sleep, shifting as in her dreams she burrowed closer to her
partner's long body, seeking his heat as a lizard might seek a sun-warmed
rock at day's end. An arm slipped around her; a hand gently stroked her
back. She tucked her head beneath his chin, her face against his neck,
breathing in the musk of his sleep-scent. She heard him whisper her name and
pushed up more tightly against him, murmuring acquiescence. He spoke again,
softly, his hand gliding down to cup the curve of her ass.

"Dana," he groaned, muffled against her hair.

"Fox," she breathed, eyes flickering open.

It was at this point that she realized she was awake.

And that she was not alone.

Scuttling away like a startled crab Scully huddled against the headboard,
clutching the sheets up to her chest. "Mulder! What the Hell  "

She stopped, eyes like saucers. She had all the sheets. He had no clothes.
Naked, aroused Mulder. In her bed.

Very naked. Very aroused.

Very dangerous.

"Dreaming," she muttered, wiping her hand across her eyes. "Dreaming," she
repeated firmly, taking her hand away.

Naked, aroused Mulder. In her bed.

Looking at her.

"I'm not dreaming," she said weakly, feeling the hot flush of complete
mortification spread across her face. "Ohhh. . . my God. My laptop. I loaned
you my laptop and you read. . . Ohhh, shit, Mulder."

          "I know," he consoled her, easing the sheets from her death-grip.
"I'm a nosy bastard. I suck, actually." He considered. "I probably should be
spanked."

"Why did you come here?" She demanded abruptly, apparently unaware that he had
divested her of sheetage, baring a heady expanse of creamy skin. He smiled
lazily, inching forward like a snake.

"To give you what you wanted. What I've wanted. Didn't you know, Dana? Isn't it
obvious?"

"No. I never thought. . . I mean, I'm not  "

"You are. You're my partner, my best friend, my lifeline. I want you, Dana.
All of you. You're not the only one who wakes up sweating."

He rested his head on her thigh. She was still staring at him, scarcely able
to speak. "I'm scared," she told him simply. "What if it doesn't work?"

Peering down at his raging boner, Mulder wryly replied, "Oh, I'm sure it'll
work, Scully."

Her flush deepened to crimson. "That's not  "

"I know what you meant." He touched his lips to the inside of her thigh,
feeling the tremor race through her. "I love you, Scully. In every way you
can think of. Even if we don't work out as lovers. . . I can't imagine a
life where you weren't the best and brightest part of it."

"Good answer." 

"Uh, Scully?"

"Yeah?"

"D'you think we could fuck now? I mean, I can't keep this up forever."

A wicked smile played at the corners of her mouth. "So where do you suggest we
begin?"

"Well. About that spanking. . . "


                               END