From partous@total.net Mon Oct 07 09:02:37 1996
BOUNDARIES (1/1)

by Madeleine Partous
email: partous@total.net



* SPOILER ALERT: 4TH-SEASON OPENER STORY FOLLOWS * 

The 4th season opener -- don't know the name yet, I'm
ashamed to say -- raised a few questions for me. Some of you
know by now that last season's finale really made me crazy and
led me to write the Puppets trilogy. There's a fine line between
suspense and shameless manipulation.

I liked the opener a lot better, although I still feel the
conspiracy arc is beginning to get muddled and rudderless.
Oh Captain, my Captain, don't neglect your first-born at the
expense of Millennium. Please?

One thing I've often been curious about is what happens
between M&S after those few scenes CC throws at us where
something intimate and personal happens. There's always some
kind of cutaway that hints at something going on that we're not
privy to -- an intriguing tactic, actually. Oddly enough,
Pusher, despite its much-touted MSR overtones, felt fairly
complete to me. In other instances, though, you really do
wonder how the hug ends, or what happens right after that
meaningful look.

So. Apart from the fact we still don't really know what's going
on, I came away from the opener with two other questions: How
does Scully deal with being dumped once again by Mulder on a
self-serving mission, and what really happened right after
that strange, sweet, tentative hospital scene? As far as I can
remember, it's the first time Mulder's cried in front of her.
And then bang -- they're sitting next to the bed. Except
they're *very* tender.

On with the show.

Category: MSR. Rated R.

************************************************************
DISCLAIMER: Fox & Chris Carter own it all. Just for fun. No
financial gain.
************************************************************




Dana Scully's face was tight with worry.

And as trite as it seemed to her under the circumstances, she
was also embarrassed.

Which only added to her embarrassment.

The fact that AD Skinner had just chewed her head off didn't
make it any easier.

A dozen palpably resentful agents milled around the hospital
corridor, muttering, their hands dug deep in trouser pockets,
and she tried with little luck to ignore one of them who kept
alternately glaring at her and leering.

Where the hell was Mulder, anyway?

Something had gone seriously wrong, no question about it. He
should have been here by now.

Scully tried to relax the knot in her stomach. She'd been the
dutiful little soldier once again. She'd sounded the alarm,
mustered the troops; she'd even got Skinner concerned and on
the case.

It would be just like Mulder not to show up.

Scully shook her head quickly. It was just the worry talking,
the fear.

As if from a distance, she suddenly heard a little voice in her
head, a familiar voice -- her own.

The voice kept repeating the same words over and over again
under the stream of her thoughts.

Please God don't let him be dead pleaseGoddon't...

Scully drew a deep breath.

She was a rational woman. Rational enough to know that part of
the problem was she was angry at him.

Hell. She was royally pissed.

Mulder on yet another escapade. Yet another fool's errand.
Yet another foray into the pages of his own unique agenda.

An agenda from which, more often than not, he excluded her.

This time, though, he'd gone too far.

Barking orders at her as he ran like a fool after Jeremiah
Smith, dodging the Terminator -- as she'd started to refer to
the clone or alien or half-human hybrid or whatever the hell
that unkillable monster was -- and expecting her to follow
behind, clued out, lost in the dark as usual like a goddam
puppy.

"Get the car, Scully." Right. Mr. Mulder's chauffeur -- that's
what she'd become.

Or worse: an abjectly loyal, idiot Sancho Panza to a Don
Quixote from hell.

Which only made her the bigger fool of the two.

And then, to add insult to injury, he'd fucked off on a bloody
boat with Smith, leaving her to fend for herself in the middle
of nowhere without so much as a nod in her direction.

Scully was a liberated woman, but there were limits to what
she'd put up with.

He'd heard her calling out to him. She knew he'd heard her.

She knew he'd decided, for whatever reason, to ignore her.

Bastard.

He hadn't so much as called his mother in a year, but suddenly
her survival was all that mattered to him.

Hypocrite.

"He called you. This time, he called." The voice again.

Scully told the voice to screw right off.

But it was too late: that, in a nutshell, was the reason she was
still willing to care for the son of a bitch.

He'd called, and he'd made a point of telling her he'd called
because he wanted her to know he was all right.

That was certainly a first.

Dandy. Meanwhile she'd been sitting in her car all night with a
damn alien-killing stiletto to her neck and Arnold
Schwartzenegger in the back seat packing one hell of an
attitude.

Not to mention he'd almost snuffed her once already that day
and she hadn't had a chance to let Mulder, the suddenly
dutiful son, know about the near-death experience he'd left
her to face alone.

She couldn't wait.

Assuming, of course, he came back and gave her a chance to
let him have it.

A diminutive nurse suddenly stood next to her. God. Finally
someone in the damn hallway who was actually shorter than she
was.

Scully barely heard her. Something about how all the G-men
around the place were interfering with patient care.

She barely heard her because she knew, somehow, that Mulder
had arrived, even before the other agents parted and she
caught a glimpse of his white shirt amid all the dark suits.

God. He looked lost. Preoccupied. Incidental.

Insane.

"Oh God. Mulder."

She saw Skinner turn towards her as she broke into a trot.

Mulder's eyes roamed aimlessly. His face was bloodied, covered
in dirt.

As she neared him, she recoiled at the unmistakable heady
smell of gasoline.

Jesus. He'd drenched himself in gas.

Her mind flipflopped. He'd finally lost it. He was going to
immolate himself and throw his flaming body over his mother's
bed or something equally ridiculous.

Scully was close enough to hear him as he walked by her,
looking for all the world like an absentminded professor.

"I can't."

"Mulder..."

"There's nothing."

Mulder. A hysterical giggle rose in her chest as the cheesy
words of Jose Chung rose unbidden in her mind. Mulder: a
ticking time bomb of insanity...

She grimaced and reached for him.

Mulder. Don't...

And gasped as her hand connected with his arm.

"You're freezing!"

Shock. That explained it. She kept her hand on him as he
walked.

"He's in shock," she started to explain reasonably to Skinner
before turning back to her partner. "Mulder, you're in
shock."

She had to reach him. Somehow. Before he did whatever he
intended to do.

Mulder swivelled suddenly towards a broom closet, his hand
out, blind.

"Oh, dear. No..." She shook her head and led him to his
mother's door before she knew what she was doing.

Scully could feel him tremble against her.

She'd stay with him. She'd make sure he didn't do anything
crazy.

Hadn't she always?

Right now, she knew he needed to see his mother.

Right now, it was the only thing that mattered to him.

There'd be time enough for the rest of it later.

"Mulder," she hissed as they approached the door. "Tell me
you're not going to kill yourself in front of all these people."

"Wha...?" He looked at her blankly as he tried to focus on
her.

"The gasoline. You're covered in it."

Mulder shook his head, but there was a sudden spark of
humour in his eyes. "Bees. Scully..." He pushed passed her
into his mother's room.

Bees. That made a lot of sense.

But the humour was good. The humour was sane.

He'd heard her.

She followed him in.

Scully was oblivious to the other agents, to Skinner himself,
although she could feel him in the doorway, his features
creased with concern.

Mulder stood by his mother's bed as Scully reached for a
blanket to throw across his shoulders.

Damn. It would be so much easier if he wasn't so tall.

She shivered. Something had changed. Something in the room.

For no reason at all, she knew what it was.

Mulder was letting her in.

God. Scully breathed. She'd never felt anything like it from
him.

He wanted her there. Only her.

Scully barely registered the sound of the door clicking shut.
Apparently, the AD had felt it too. With a rush of gratitude,
she knew that Skinner would stand outside that door and let no
one else barge in, come hell or high water, until they were
done.

There were things to resolve. Things that couldn't wait.

Scully suddenly knew that if they waited, the damage would be
irrevocable.

And at some level, despite how far away he was right now,
Mulder knew it too.

"She'll never know."

Mulder looked down at his mother and her complex network of
tubes and wires.

He looked stricken. Undone.

Scully stood by his side, running her hand up along his cold,
cold arm, and said nothing.

She watched, fascinated, as his eyes filled with tears.

Tears. He'd never let her see him cry.

He inhaled shakily.

"She'll never know." His voice was ragged, low.

And then, almost imperceptibly, he turned towards her, his
eyes still on his mother.

Just that. Nothing more.

Just that one tiny opening for her to do with what she would.

It was more than he'd ever given her.

Scully felt the last tattered threads of her anger melt away as
she stared at him, reaching up, up, up with one hand to draw
his bruised head down to her shoulder.

He came without a struggle, his arms snaking up her back to
close gently on her shoulders as he buried his face in her
neck.

So gentle, she thought distractedly as she held him. As
though he thought she'd break. As though he thought he'd
lose her too.

The sweet smell of gasoline filled her nostrils as she held him
tentatively, cradling his head lightly, carefully.

It was so new. She was almost frightened to touch him.

He was crying. Just crying.

And then he ground his face into her shoulder, gasping,
suddenly, as he clutched her to him.

All at once, he was anything but gentle.

He wrapped his arms around her, his lips and cheeks wet
against her neck, and held her in a vice, rocking against her.

Scully fought down panic as she swayed against him, her hand
still in his hair.

God. He was smothering her.

Mulder. This is Mulder. He'd never hurt you.

Not deliberately.

No. He'll never hurt me.

Her instincts screamed at her to fight back, to pummel him, to
get away, to get out of his clutches at any cost.

Closeness meant danger. She remembered. High school.
Snatches of a backseat struggle played in front of her eyes,
memories of her hands flailing, a large man over her, pinning
her down, touching her, probing...

Long ago.

Long before anyone had coined the term "date rape."

Her hands curled into fists.

Mulder.

This was Mulder.

Scully was suddenly aware again of his need, his sadness, his
desperate confusion.

Mulder would never hurt her.

Her hands relaxed as she felt her arms wrap themselves
around his neck.

He moaned against her.

"Scully..."

"It's okay, Mulder. It's all right."

"God, Scully."

She was amazed to feel her lips open against his throat. She
could taste the gasoline, the sweat, the dust on him.

Her lips nibbled his Adam's apple, her tongue dabbing at the
creases near his jaw.

He moaned again, one hand dropping down to her buttocks to
press her against him, the other grasping her chin softly as
his mouth moved up over her cheek, her eye, before running
softly down the line of her nose to her lips.

He was kissing her.

At first there was only a kind of shock, but then her mouth
opened to feel his tongue leap inside, his breath hot against
her teeth.

She could feel the tension of him, the hard maleness of him
against her, but she thought maybe this was something she'd
process a little later.

For the time being there was this kiss, and she felt herself
responding with something like the same hunger.

They parted finally with what felt like mutual agreement.
Mulder's eyes were intense, but they were sane at last.

She looked at him.

Quite frankly, she didn't know what to think.

His breath was uneven, but a familiar crooked grin raised one
corner of his mouth.

"Well."

Scully looked down.

"Well, Mulder. Well, well, well." She smiled.

He took a deep breath.

"Really, Scully. We shouldn't be doing this in front of my
mother."

Her eyes blazed up at him, suspicious. His held only mirth,
warmth, and what looked like a strange kind of gratitude.

She cleared her throat. "I agree."

Mulder nodded. He looked serious suddenly, but there was a
new light to his face.

A light she didn't believe she'd ever seen there before.

"Stay with me awhile, Scully?" He pointed to a chair.

She continued to gaze at him.

"Feeling better?"

"Much." He smiled, but she could see the sadness behind it. 

Scully smoothed down her skirt and perched on the end of the
chair, crossing her legs.

She sighed. The enigmatic Agent Mulder.

He sat down next to her and brushed a hand against her knee
before steepling his fingers over his face.

Silence grew as the hum and tick of the life-supporting
machines gradually rose around them once again.

Scully studied Mulder as he watched his mother's inert form.

"I could've saved her, Scully..."




Much later, the man fingered an unlit cigarette as he gazed
down on the tube-riddled body of the woman he'd once loved.

Once? Well, it was possible, just possible, he loved her still.

He loved her enough, certainly, not to smoke in her hospital
room.

He'd shown few others such consideration.

Her son continued to be a problem, though.

Although, in his own way, he was proud of him.

As proud as a father might be.

He smiled grimly.

She had to live.

He'd tell the other it was for the sake of the bigger picture.
For the sake of the plan. He'd tell the one who could save her
that she had to live because, without her, Mulder would have
nothing to lose.

And a man with nothing to lose is a man willing to risk
everything.

Except he knew it wasn't true.

There was one final card they could play.

His mother's death would devastate him, but that was nothing
next to what Mulder's partner meant to him.

This the man knew.

He'd have Mulder under control as long as Scully stayed safe.
If anything happened to her, he'd be a loose cannon.

One day, this fact might come in useful again.

For the time being, though, the man's version of the truth
would do.

He looked down at the woman on the bed.

He didn't want her to die. For his own reasons.

For his own reasons, he'd make sure she lived.




END