Title : And A Good Night It Was
Author : Shawne
E-Mail : shawne@shawnex.freeservers.com
Rating : PG-13 ( only a few bad words )
Category: SRA, MSR, slight H
Spoilers : huge ones for Triangle
Keywords : post-episode fiction, Season Six
Summary : He got drugged... she got mad... they got a lot of stuff to work
out! (excuse the bad grammar)
Archive : Anywhere, but please drop me a line to tell me where.
Disclaimers : CC built a ship, see? Then DD & GA went on it, right? Do we
have that straight so far? I'm only a lowly construction worker, and I don't
even get paid for this! So leave me to labour in peace. Thanks.

Author's Notes : This piece takes place after the (in)famous episode,
Triangle. I don't think it's shippy enough to turn Noromos off it
completely, but I also hope it's shippy enough for the Shippers out there.
Talk about ambitious. :)

I've been waiting for this episode since forever, which any one of my
friends (especially my Net buddies) can vouch for. I loved it, in spite of
the hype and the spoilers and all that. It was beautiful, it was Shipper
Haven, it was Mulder and Scully electrified.

I originally wanted to do something so shippy and fluffy your brain would
have turned into sugar on reading it. But then, as the story came to life on
my computer screen, and the characters started doing things for themselves, I
realised that this story was turning out somewhat Noromo-ish as well. *groan*
Never mind, I think I fixed it at the end, with some angst thrown in for good
measure as well.

If you're a shipper, if you loved this episode as much as I did, if you like
sap... tell me if you like this.

======================================================

Part I

< Congratulations, Special Agent Dana Scully. You've achieved the
unprecedented. For the sixth incredible year in a row, you've won - hands
down, might I add - the illustrious title of F.B.I. Agent With The Most
Pathetic Life. And in this absolutely cut-throat industry, peopled with
computer geeks who live for binary numbers and pocket protectors, filled to
the brim with paranoid spooky freaks... that is one heck of an achievement.
Come on down here, and share with us the secret of your success!! >

She stomped in a most unfeminine manner down the long passageway, which was
beginning to feel a lot like an extremely embarrassing and lonely walk down
a very long carpeted red aisle at an awards ceremony. The orderlies and
nurses shot her curious and appraising looks, then shied out of her way when
she treated them to one of her trademark Death Stares.

This was not good. She could practically hear the enthusiastic and bouncy
announcer coming to life in her head, announcing the news to the whole wide
world that she was a loser. A loser who could have been a doctor. But oh no.

< Stand up for your principles, Dana! Why be a doctor? Don't just walk the
trodden path! > Hell, this sure wasn't the trodden path. She had thrown her
beliefs into her work, and had watched them receive the deluxe treatment in
Mulder's little Cuisinart of the paranormal. Her social life had disappeared
the moment she had stepped into the J. Edgar Hoover building, replaced by an
odd and often very worrying partner, a ton of bureaucracy and red tape,
years of sleepless and restless nights... all that PLUS Flukemen and Mexican
goat-suckers and communities of vampires.

And just as she was discovering that she was developing a common need to
see the X-Files to its end, just as she and Mulder were on the verge of some
kind of huge breakthrough... she was yanked out of her job, and forced into
doing grunt work under A.D. Kersh.  She was now routinely humiliated,
bullied and shoved around. Spender, that weasel, had the X-Files now. As did
Fowley, that bi...

But all that she could deal with. This was a lot of stuff for five years,
but she could handle it. She could deal with it. It was still, technically,
OK.

Tonight was an entirely different matter.

She had no idea where the anger came from. It had simply bubbled into
existence, out of nowhere. Or perhaps it had been accumulating since
forever, and was only manifesting itself now. She didn't know. But the anger
was there, the anger and the frustration and the annoyance.

Tonight, she had found Mulder's sorry carcass floating in the ocean. After
risking her job and hell knows what else to get to him, she found him,
dragged him out of the water before he drowned, and got him to the nearest
hospital. She had spent hours agonising over him, worrying that he'd die or
have some kind of severe head trauma from staying in the water too long. The
nurses hadn't told her anything, leaving her to stew in her own frantic
juices. She'd snapped at everybody. Byers, Langly, Frohike, even Skinner.

When she had found out he would be OK, she had been almost delirious with
joy. Softened, she'd waited by his bedside in eager anticipation, not
knowing what to expect. Then he had woken up, groggy, and told her that she
had saved the world. No thanks, no apology. Big whoop. He was obviously
delusional. He'd been hallucinating, having dreams - all the signs were
there. And he was knocked up high on drugs.

Then he had said, "I love you." The nanosecond after he had allowed those
words to fall from his lips, she'd been annoyed. Her immediate response was
nonchalant. "Oh brother." Simple, easy, rejection. Of course she was
annoyed. She'd gone through hell trying to save his butt. Landed herself in
hot soup with Kersch, allowed Spender to show his true weasel-brown colours,
got Skinner into a tight situation... kissed Skinner.

Oh GOD. She'd done all those things for him, and that wasn't even the
reason he had said "I love you." That burned, that hurt, that stung. Hell,
he was saying those words, now, after SIX years, because (a) he was so high
on drugs he should have been floating ten feet above his bed, and (b) he
thought she had saved the bloody goddamn world.

In his dreams.

This sucked. It definitely qualified as a major 'down' in Dana Scully's
life of valleys, valleys, and nothing but valleys. She'd left his hospital
room, irritated. She'd paced the floor outside for a while, scuffing trails
into the linoleum, itching to go back in and give it to him. She'd resisted,
for as long as possible, because she knew he was hurt, an invalid, laid up,
let him rest, not his friggin' fault etc. etc.

Then she'd exploded. It was more than annoying. It was beyond frustration.
It wasn't even exasperation. So she had gathered up her coat, her bag, her
wits, and had stormed off, trying to put as much distance between herself
and Mulder's hospital room as she could. She could not trust herself to go
near him at this point in time. Being in a hospital was convenient for him,
because he could get immediate first aid should she choose to do anything to
him. But it was also inconvenient for him because she was a doctor and she
knew how much pain scalpels could cause when applied in the right places.
And she knew, oh yes she knew, where to get scalpels.

This violence wasn't characteristic of her. She knew that. Personally, she
had no idea where it came from. She had not known she was capable of
enjoying the graphically bloody images she had drawn on her mind's canvas.
She certainly had no idea that her feelings could blow themselves so far out
of proportion.

Amazingly enough though, this felt good. After years of restraint, of
keeping a cool and imperturbable veneer, swallowing her feelings, this felt
great. Sure, she was still avoiding meeting with these jumbled emotions
head-on; she wasn't confronting Mulder, obviously. But the anger was like
the energy the Duracell batteries claimed to provide - it just went on and
on. It was almost a rush.

As for that award... she knew what she would say when she gave her
acceptance speech. < I'd like to thank my partner, the ever charming and
caring Agent Fox William Mulder, for giving me the life I have now. Which,
coincidentally, has just won me this fantastic award. Thank you for agreeing
that my life officially blows, and let's hope I'll set a world record next
year and go for the Big Seven! >

The elevator had come at last, after she'd stabbed the 'down' button so
many times and so ferociously that its light had flickered twice before
switching itself off. She hoped, in passing, that she hadn't broken it. Then
she swept into the empty lift, still moving on stores of furious adrenaline
she didn't know she had, and hit the button for the ground floor.

She had to get out of here.

*****

Part II

He could feel his entire left cheek throb in time with his heart, the blood
pulsing through his head seeming to pool around the bruise there... almost
as if it sensed that this was some place special. A place touched by the
gods.

Well, one god actually. OK, to be more accurate, one goddess. Scully had
punched him here. He fell back onto his pillow, a foolish grin plastered on
his face, slightly lopsided because he couldn't quite bring up the left
corner of his mouth to match the right. It hurt too much, and the bruise was
still spreading. He hoped she hadn't knocked any of his fillings loose. That
would be a load of orthodontist bills down the proverbial drain, so to
speak.

All the same, it was worth it. He could feel an idyllic rosy hue dancing
into his eyes and colouring everything he saw, much the way he imagined
schoolgirls saw the world when they had crushes. His hand drifted up
unconsciously to cup his cheek, and he fingered the tender area gingerly.
Scully's fist had connected with his face just about... he felt around, then
pressed the hollow just beneath his cheekbone. He winced. There.

As the white white room around him began spinning like a carousel, he felt
the giggles rising up in his throat, and his fingers dropped to his own
lips. Ah. Scully had kissed him here. Right here, on the lips. On his lips.
He smiled. The ceiling fan dipped down towards him, seeming to nod
approvingly at his thoughts.

She'd been so beautiful. Wearing that dress straight out of the 1930s, her
hair curled around her head, her face painstakingly made up. She never had
to pretty herself up too much to be breath-taking. All the same, some blush
made a hell of a lot of difference. He'd been mesmerised. Plus, even in an
old-fashioned get-up, she still had that spunk she always had. He'd grabbed
her and kissed her. Just in case he never got to see her again.

Then, for some reason, he had blacked out. Maybe because she'd decked him.

But when he had woken up, it had been to his usual Scully, and that had
been very nice too. Having her voice beckon him from sleep, seeing those
blue eyes the moment he opened his own... he had been in a very happy,
serene place. Heaven, maybe, and it felt like he was just floating up and
up... and Skinner had been there, with his little dog Toto, and Frohike had
been trying to sneak a look down Scully's blouse, then he'd told Scully he
loved her, she'd...

She'd... the world blurred. He couldn't remember what she had done after
that. She must have done the right thing, anyway. As usual. She should know
how serious he was, how he had meant what he had said one hundred percent.
Right?

Of course she did. The fact that the ceiling had just turned into a giant
panaroma of the Yellow Brick Road, with the Emerald City of Oz glittering in
the distance... and the fact that his bedside table had recently morphed
into Judy Garland... all that had absolutely nothing to do with it.

Then, suddenly, he slipped back into oblivion.

*****

Part III

Her feet had taken the initiative, and done the cliched thing. They had
tramped around the hospital for a while, trying to obey her mind's command
to keep moving so that the rest of the body could get warm. Then they had
gotten tired, and dragged themselves straight back to the beach.

It hadn't been a long walk, maybe about ten minutes in the bracing night
air. But here she was again, and there was the ghost ship, brought in even
nearer to land by the Coast Guard. Anchored to a rickety old pier, it was
swaying eerily in the moonlight, fading in and out of her line of vision so
smoothly it was surreal.

She tucked her hands more firmly into her pockets, and lifting her chin,
strode on past it. No sense getting even more worked up by re-visiting the
awful place. Turning back, she could still see the small pile of soon-to-be
kindling piled up on the dock, the vestiges of what had been Mulder's boat.
She shuddered.

Angry as she was, she couldn't help feeling a slight apprehension as well.
While looking for her irresponsible and incredibly stupid and dense partner,
she had wandered through that ship. Through the shroud of anxiety that had
surrounded her, she had noticed that the interior was astoundingly
well-preserved, despite the cobwebs draped over the antique furniture. The
wood paneling, she had noticed, had hardly rotted at all, which would have
been a logical next step in the process of decomposition.

This ship had been floating on the seas (and for some obscure reason had
never been detected) for almost six decades. The thick fog, if not the sea
water, would assumedly have found its way into at least the floorboards and
warped them. Yet... she had to admit this was baffling. There had not been a
single trace of human existence either. No bones, no dried gore, nothing. It
was as if the ship had floated out of this world in 1939 with its cargo of
passengers, and floated back intact sixty years later... its freight
deposited for safe-keeping elsewhere.

What exactly had Mulder done in that ship? Had he even managed to board it?
He could have capsized just before he reached it, and unable to survive too
long in the icy cold water, he might have blacked out and suffered his
unusual (yes, even for him) hallucinations. Possible. She would have to go
back and check if his description of the layout of the ship tallied with
hers.

This, she cautioned herself, would be done after she had calmed down and
after he made the appropriately grovelling apologies. She wasn't going to
indulge him and his far-fetched theories any more, not unless she started
getting the respect she deserved.

Suddenly, she realised that her feet were cold, and looking down at her
shoes, saw that she had stopped moving. Uselessly, she pulled her hands from
her pockets and blew on them, then stuffed them back in, wishing she had
thought to bring gloves with her.

< Well, that's it, Dana. It's either you get back on that ship, or you go
back to the hospital and give Mulder hell. > She contemplated her choices.
Both were attractive in their own ways.

Seeing that ship again, actually standing next to it, had dulled her
extreme anger and aroused the curiosity she had never acknowledged while
Mulder was still in trouble. It would be interesting - in a scientific,
logical, rational way, of course - to get back into it and observe it more
closely. Maybe she could determine the reason for its not rotting, or the
secret to its prolonged self-mummification. Purely in the interests of
science, of course... and women all over the world would kill for that.

And then there was the hospital, and Mulder. He needed a good scolding, and
for once she wasn't ashamed to feel like his mother. This was absolutely not
the first time he had dashed off helter-skelter, with no concern for her
feelings at all, and this had to be the last time. It was getting too
infuriating, and making her worry and age much faster than she would have
done naturally. Maybe the drugs he'd been plastered on would have worn off
by now.

She stood on the sand, a quiet figure, thinking and weighing her options.
It might be dangerous going on the ship alone now. It would be dangerous for
Mulder if she went back now. She should wait till the morning to check out
the ship again. By the same token, she should wait till dawn at least before
snapping Mulder's neck.

This called for her famous logic, but for once, when she summoned it, it
failed to respond immediately. A wave of panic threatened to wash over her,
but she pulled herself together. It had been a long day. Her brain needed a
rest, and her heart needed to stop putting so much pressure on her left
ventricle. She'd have to make this decision on, so it seemed, random
grounds.

So... she was here. The ship was here. Mulder was ten, maybe fifteen
minutes, away. Was this a good enough reason? She studied the imposing ship,
tried to find the words "Queen Anne" across the side in the darkness, and
pondered some more. There was a reason she wanted to go back in there. It
wasn't only because of the potential scientific merits of the research that
could be done.

There was something else, but she wasn't quite sure what.

"I'll risk it," she said out loud, pleased with herself for making a
decision which she would not have made under normal circumstances. "I've got
nothing left to lose." She had just crowned herself with the title 'F.B.I.
Agent with the Most Pathetic Life' for the sixth year in a row. Hell, seven
was a nice number. It was a lucky number. She might as well go all out and
put herself back into the running for next year.

Walking forward resolutely, she hurried down the poorly-maintained pier,
and paused to look up at the towering ship again. She swallowed the fear
which had crept its way up into her throat, and continued into the ship, the
same way she had managed to get in with the Lone Gunmen before.

Once inside, her resolve faltered. She hadn't the faintest clue what she
was doing back in here, and she just didn't have the strength or equipment
to start gathering forensic evidence. She had rushed through these same
corridors just a few hours ago, but that experience had been tainted by a
gnawing worry.

If she stopped moving, even for a second, she could sense some kind of life
in these walls. A shiver crawled slimily up her spine, and she shook her
head vigourously to get rid of it. These same halls had seemed so empty and
lifeless before... maybe because she had been looking for signs of Mulder's
life then, and had been instinctively disappointed.

She remembered hurrying down this hallway, calling his name, then
separating from the Lone Gunmen and exploring the fork on the left alone.
Now she didn't know if she had the courage to go through with it again. The
night wind that curled in through the knotholes in the side of the ship
whispered to her enticingly, and in the ebony shadows, she could almost make
out moving figures... ghosts of the past, haunting the present.

No. She couldn't do this to herself. Her imagination was simply working
over-time, making her see what could not exist. Her pace slowed even
further, and she moved almost reverently down the path she had walked
before, remembering it easily. Reaching out a trembling hand to the wall,
she touched sturdy wood, and felt her breathing become more even and
regular.

There were no ghosts here.

Her feet traced her own footsteps, and she looked around her with more
curiosity than before. Aside from the scuff marks on the carpet she had left
the last time she'd been here, everything was veiled in thick layers of dust
and cobwebs. But beyond that... the ship really was in pristine condition.
It hadn't just been a crossed signal that her subconscious had received in
her anxiety - it seemed almost as if the dust was protecting, guarding
secrets that were tightly woven into the very ship itself.

Then she came to a turn, one which she recalled having taken alone. She had
no idea why then, and she was just as baffled now... but when she had taken
the corner, still praying for Mulder's safety, she had felt something so
chilling she had paused in her search. At that point, she had been almost
frantic. Nothing short of a fire breaking out on the ship under her feet
would have made her stop.

Yet... she had halted, her motion choking off and dying. She had been
working with Mulder for so long that she had grown attuned to him, more out
of necessity than anything else (or so she liked to believe). And in that
moment, she remembered now, she had felt Mulder. She had felt him right next
to her, then passing by her, and that in itself would have been enough to
shock her numb.

But she had also sensed something else, an icy recognition of someone she
knew very well, and yet would never know personally. It had been the
slightest ghost of a feeling, just within her grasp yet completely
intangible. Despite the fear and reservations that had converged on her
then, she had still succeeded in pushing them aside and pushing on in her
search for her errant partner.

Now, she came upon that same spot, and her stomach clenched. There had been
something here. Someone. She had felt that other person. But she had seen
nothing. Her right hand balled into a tight fist, the fingers gripping the
thumb under them fiercely. She bit lightly into her tongue, and steeled
herself.

If it was only a manifestation of her heightened emotions at the time, she
would feel nothing now. But if there had indeed been something there, a
calling force, a kinship, maybe she could hope to feel it again. To figure
out what was going on.

She took one tentative step forward. And another one. And another one.
Finally, her foot came down with a startling finality on the other side. She
had rounded the corner.

And... nothing.

The knot in her stomach twisted itself sharply for a few seconds, then
began to relax. Was this relief... or disappointment? She pushed the ideas
away and kept walking, picking up her pace now. The faster she got through
with this, the better. She now had a sneaking suspicion what had driven her
back in here, and she didn't like it one bit. Particularly since she was
definitely not finding what she might have hoped to discover.

Breaking into a jog, she moved through passages and past closed doors,
beginning to fear for her sanity. She started to run, feeling the dusty air
being sucked into her lungs, hating the crusty sensation of the dust
settling inside her. At last, she arrived at the last place she had entered
before finding Mulder.

It was the remains of an elegant ballroom, once filled with lights and
gaiety, now hung with ageless cobwebs and spookily quiescent chandeliers.
She entered it, slowing back down to a walk as she struggled to catch her
breath. Did she... could she remember anything from here?

Her eyes darted over the still tables, draped with the spectres of milky
white cloths, into the shadows that veiled the darkest corners, sweeping
over the empty spotless dance floor.

Again... nothing.

She should have known. Her subconscious should have known. But it had held
on foolishly to the idea, hoping against all rationality that...

Crushed, she turned on her heel. Her shoulders slumped from fatigue and an
odd mix of disappointment and relief, she trudged back out the way she had
come. In ten more minutes, she would be back at the hospital. Back with
Mulder.

*****

Part IV

His head exploded into a few million cutting shards of light, whirling and
spinning dizzily before his eyes, which seemed to be floating in mid-air.
Then gradually, everything sort of drifted into place, and the world came
back into sharp focus. He blinked, then looked up at the ceiling.

It was a boring white, with a fan attached to it. Hospital. He looked
around him, and matched the heady perfume assaulting his nostrils to the
flowers on his night-stand. His senses all seemed to be curiously heightened
now that he had emerged from sleep.

He yawned. Why was he in here anyway? Frowning, he tried to recall what he
had done over the past twenty-four hours. He drew a blank. Stretching
carefully so as not to rip the I.V. out of his arm, he flipped onto his left
side and cringed.

Shooting pain in his cheek. Bringing tentative fingers to the pressure
area, he poked gently, and groaned immediately. That was one killer of a
bruise he had there. He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully, and tried to wiggle
into a comfortable position on the bed. What had happened?

Suddenly, he shot upright. Where was Scully? He looked around frantically.
If he was in here... could she be in here too? Was she hurt like him... or
worse? With the desperation of fear, he started to navigate his way on shaky
limbs off the confines of the bed. He had just about managed to achieve a
sitting position from which he could push himself onto his feet when the
door opened.

He fell off onto the floor. "Ow."

"Mr. Mulder!" It was a nurse. She rushed to his side and helped him back
up, propping him against his pillows. "You shouldn't be moving around so
much. The drugs we gave you are just about wearing off now, so you have to
be careful."

"Drugs?" he asked stupidly. "I'm on drugs?"

"You were on drugs, Mr. Mulder." Now that her initial panic was over, the
nurse regained her usual professional cheeriness and started bustling around
the room. She fluffed his pillow and adjusted his sheets efficiently while
keeping up a steady stream of chatter. "You were brought in here with some
pretty serious injuries, you know... we had to give you quite a bit of --"

"Was someone brought in here with me?" he interrupted her worriedly, trying
to squirm away from her hands. "A redhead, blue eyes, short... maybe about
5'3", pretty..." His voice trailed off, and he waited for the answer,
dreading it.

"A redhead? No." He exhaled. "No one was brought in with you. Though
someone matching that description did check you in here."

He sat up, pleased. "She did? Where is she?"

"We don't know, Mr. Mulder," she replied, starting to push him back down
onto his back. "I think I saw her leave about an hour or so ago. Maybe more.
I'm not sure." She grinned. "She your girlfriend?"

"No. No. She's not my girlfriend." Confused, Mulder laid back down
obediently. There was a gap in his memory which involved Scully, he knew. A
lot of Scully. He pressed his eyes shut with the tips of his fingers, and
concentrated, trying to reach into his mind to find his memories of the day
before. For some reason, he knew they were important. Very important.

Scully. The one word finally triggered it off in his drug-addled mind. He'd
kissed her. She'd punched him. That was essentially what had happened. Oh
yeah. She had saved the world too. And he had finally told her the truth -
he loved her.

Releasing the hold on his eyelids, he leaned back against the pillows, a
beatific smile on his face as he let the memories flood back. OK,
self-admittedly, he still wasn't too sure about what had gone on, and he
wasn't in the mood to analyse his misadventures in the Bermuda Triangle
yesterday. But Scully had been there.

That was all he really needed to know.

*****

Part V

She pushed the door into the room, and slipped in after it. The walk back
had been an introspective one, and she had finally managed to work through
what she had seen on the ship the second time around. Now, she really needed
to talk to Mulder, to at least get everything straight. She hoped he wasn't
asleep or doped up on drugs again.

Pausing at the door, she studied his face and groaned inwardly. He was
splayed almost casually across the pillows, a goofy grin on his face. Great.
He was asleep AND he was on drugs. She walked around his bed to get to the
chair that was next to the closed window. It looked like she would have to
wait for quite some time.

Maybe it would be a good idea to catch up on some sleep. She hadn't slept,
or even thought of sleeping, since she'd been thrown into high gear by the
Lone Gunmen's announcement that Mulder had ditched her. Again. She was
justifiably tired.

Almost thankfully, she sank down onto the slightly cushioned chair,
enjoying the rush of comforting warmth into her aching legs. She brought her
hands up to grip the arm-rests, then squirmed to find a better position.
Inadvertently, she shifted, and the chair scraped jarringly across the floor
with her.

Her eyes flew open, worried. Did that wake him up? She wanted him awake,
but only at his own pace - who knew how insensible he could be if she woke
him up before the drugs wore off?

"Hey." His head was propped up on his good arm, the one without an I.V.
trailing off it. There was a welcoming smile on his face, and an expectant
gleam in his eyes she wasn't entirely sure she appreciated. He'd been
watching her. He'd been awake, and he'd known that she had come into the
room.

"Uh..." Awkwardly, she pushed some loose strands of hair off her face and
straightened up in her seat. "Hey."

"Thanks, Scully," he finally said, after giving her a quick once-over with
those burning eyes of his.

Caught off-guard, she flushed, and fumbled. "For what?"

"I don't know. Lots of things. Everything. Take your pick."

This was starting to get annoying. If he was going to thank her for saving
the world, swear to God, she was going to give him a matching set of
beautiful blue bruises. "Why don't you pick?"

"OK," he agreed amiably. He seemed to be in good spirits, and also more
sober now. Maybe the drugs really had worn off. "Thanks for coming for me
today."

That was so cryptic she didn't know what it meant. Was he thanking her, for
putting everything on the line and rushing down to save his butt again? Or
was he thanking the Scully in his imagination, the one who had bravely saved
the whole world? Well... she'd take what she could get.

"You're welcome. Are you feeling better?"

"I think the drugs made me go woozy for a while there. I'm still not too
sure what happened yesterday... but it will come back to me. It's already
starting to."

So it was the drugs. He'd said he loved her, probably instigated by drugs
in the first place... and now, those same drugs kept him from even
remembering it. She felt her chest constrict painfully around her heart,
trapping it, keeping it from beating -- then, release. She took a couple of
deep breaths to get rid of the ache in her throat.

"Why don't you tell me what you think happened?" She emphasised the word
'think', to make sure he understood that she thought he'd only been having a
huge rollercoaster of a dream. "Maybe if you piece it together for me, I'll
know why you were floating face-down in the ocean like a corpse when I found
you."

He seemed unfazed by both her sarcasm and the barely-concealed animosity in
her words. "I'll be glad to." Leaning back against the headboard, he folded
his arms complacently across his chest, and launched into his story.

In a conversational monologue, he told her about how he'd been at the Lone
Gunmen's hideout when the Queen Anne had sailed into the picture. He'd
rushed off at once, of course, leaving his breakfast of doughnuts for Byers
to finish, and he was really sorry, but he hadn't thought to call her at the
time. Anyway, it didn't matter, since she was here now, did it? He smiled
winsomely, and she had to tuck her left hand under her leg to keep it from
following its immediate impulse to punch his lights out.

The details about how he got here weren't that important, he added
dismissively. He found the right place, saw the huge ship just a few hundred
yards off the beachline, and had rented the first boat he saw. In
retrospect, he should have made sure the boat wasn't leaking, and that it
could be steered properly. But it wasn't his fault, he was no seasoned
boatsman, so he had just gone with what looked the cheapest and best, since
Kersh was a real stickler for expense reports and he didn't want Scully to
have to stick up for him too much. Once again, he flashed her a charming
grin.

"I'm so touched by how considerate you are of my feelings, Mulder," she
interjected blandly.

"No problem, Scully." He waved her off dismissively, then continued with
his story. After that, he had somehow managed to paddle in the direction of
the ship, but had never realised how difficult it was to steer one of those
things, he'd crashed almost head-on into the Queen Anne, and he'd been a bit
shaken. He was resting in the water when he got hauled out by a group of
Irishmen, in the rain, and at first he wasn't sure what...

"Excuse me, Mulder. Did you say 'Irishmen'?"

"Yeah," he returned, a trifle irritated at being stopped. "They had Irish
accents. Do you mind?" He ignored the condescending look that flashed across
her face as she waved him on, and plunged back into his tale. He told her
how he'd been dragged all over the ship, then when he'd realised what was
going on, he'd decked a Nazi who looked a hell of a lot like Spender and
taken all his clothes. Anticipating her skeptical eyebrow, he added, "Yes,
Spender. And yes, I took his clothes."

Then he'd gone into the ballroom, and there she was, dancing with some old
guy. She'd pretended not to know him, of course, because Spender and other
evil people were on the ship, but then he'd been caught by Nazis who for
some reason had the Cancer Man as leader, and saw Skinner who didn't speak
to him at first. He'd let slip about Thor's Hammer, and been dragged in for
interrogation, they'd demanded that he identify the doctor who could make
the bomb that would change world history, and he'd said no, then they
started killing people.

"That's where you come in, Scully," he said proudly, and she winced. He was
still mixing up his dreams with reality. "You told them, but good. They were
going to kill you, and me too, but then the prisoners or something broke
free, and in the confusion I dragged you away. We ran like crazy, and almost
got shot, but Skinner, he was a hero. He gunned the Nazi down, and said 'God
Bless America' in a fake German accent or something."

Her heart was sinking ever lower in her body. He didn't even seem to be
making distinctions between the people in his mind and the people in his
world anymore. The way he was talking so animatedly about them and what he'd
done, she couldn't doubt the ring of truth in his words. But he could just
as easily be describing an especially vivid dream he had had after crashing
head-long into the ship and capsizing into the brine where she'd found him.

"I told you what you had to do, you had to turn the ship around to save the
world and history as we know it, and then I jumped off the ship, and when I
woke up, I was here, and you'd changed clothes and..." His voice trailed
off. He just sat there, smiling serenely at her.

She hoped he wouldn't go ballistic and completely lose his marbles when she
told him the truth. But he couldn't go on believing in this fantasy of his,
this dream of a time warp. "Mulder, that wasn't me. It couldn't have been
me. I was here, in the real world, looking for you the whole of yesterday."

He paused, as if taken aback, then grinned. "It was you, Scully. No one
else could punch me like you did." He indicated the purple discolouration on
the left side of his face like a proud father, beaming with joy.

"You mean I gave you that?" He nodded. She was pleased. At least he didn't
have her behaving like some submissive dainty slip of a woman in his
fantasies. The itch in her left hand went away.

"OK, wait a second, Mulder. You've even got me calling whoever that person
in your dream was 'me'. I wasn't there. I didn't save the world. Hell, the
best thing I've done all week is save you."

"I don't think it was a dream, Scully," he replied firmly. "I can remember
it all, pretty much, and where else would I have got this bruise?"

"Maybe when your boat smashed into pieces when you sailed blithely into the
Queen Anne, Mulder?" She was trying to be patient and logical, but his
adamance wasn't helping.

He paused for a moment, and studied her determined face carefully. She was
so beautiful when she was stubborn. Still, she seemed to be believing what
she was saying, and she was probably right. "Maybe it wasn't the 'you' now,
Scully. But it was you. You in another life."

"Me in another life," she repeated dully. "So you're saying you went into a
time warp and ended up living out sixty-year-old history at the same time
that I was living forward, in the present."

"Hey, you put that better than I ever could!" His eyes sparkled with barely
repressed mirth. "You're getting good at this, Scully. Stick with me a few
more years, and I'll have you believing yet!"

"I've already stuck with you for more years than I care to count, Mulder,"
she snapped, then recoiled. A blush stole across her face, and she clamped
her mouth shut. She hadn't meant for that to come out quite as harshly as it
had.

Immediately, the grin on his face vanished, and he slumped back
lethargically against his pillows. He couldn't believe what he'd just heard.
"I'm sorry, Scully. I... I could be wrong." His eyes dropped to his
bedspread, and he wished that he could turn away from her, to ease the
discomfort of the situation.

There was an extended dearth of communication between them, and finally he
looked up, unable to sit still any longer. His heart squeezed itself free of
blood. She was crying. There were tears in her beautiful eyes, just about to
break free and trail down her face.

"Oh God, Scully, I'm so sorry." He wanted to jump out of the bed and hug
her, to hold her till she never had reason to cry again. To protect her, and
to make her happy. But no matter how many times he wished he could do this,
he always ended up making her cry.

"You shouldn't have just run off without telling me, Mulder." The tears
rolled down her cheeks, and he watched them fall, horrified. She was crying
because of him, again. "You always do that. I wanted to die when I was
looking for you. I was so..." Her voice broke. "I was so scared. And then,
and then when I found you, I was so happy, but the nurses wouldn't tell me
anything, and then you woke up and you said you loved me and I didn't know
what to think and I'm just so tired..." Her words, overcome by her tears,
faded into her throat, and she began digging for a handkerchief in her
pockets.

Wordlessly, he tore a piece of tissue from the box next to his bed and
passed it over to her. Gratefully, she took it, and smiled valiantly at him
through her tears. She dabbed at her face delicately, and sniffled. Then she
forced a laugh.

"God, Mulder, I'm sorry." She swiped the tissue across her eyes
distractedly. "I don't know what came over me. I thought I was angry at you
for running off half-cocked again, and I thought I'd enjoy yelling at you."
She sniffed. "I guess I was wrong. I was just totally stressed out."

"Scully, I really am sorry." He reached over, and caught her hand in his.
She instinctively pulled her chair closer to him, still shuddering with the
force of her outburst. "I didn't mean to run off without you. I never mean
to run off without you. It's just that... when I find something I need to
know about, I have to go after it." He studied her face, and she looked
calmer, more accepting. "I can't promise that I'll never do it again,
because I know I probably will. But I can try not to."

"Thanks." She flashed him a quirky half-smile, and lightly squeezed his
hand. "I think I was just really worried, and I didn't know where to find
you. It... it got a bit embarrassing at the office too." Flushing, it was
her turn to drop her eyes to her lap. "Skinner helped me find you. And I was
so pleased, I... uh... kissed him."

"Really?" he laughed, incredulously, then added mischievously, "I kissed
you too."

The anger was gone, she realised. She didn't hate the fact that he had
kissed someone else. At least, in some fashion, it had been her he'd been
kissing. She just felt slightly... uneasy that she wasn't the one he'd
kissed. She could feel her face turning scarlet.

"I don't know what happened on that ship, Scully." His hand tightened
around hers again, and his other hand reached out to wipe a tear stain off
her cheek. "But I know it did happen. It wasn't you back there, maybe, but
it was someone just as wonderful as you."

She smiled, for real this time. Now it didn't feel embarrassing to admit
what she had actually gone back into the ship for. "I went back to the Queen
Anne just now, Mulder. I went in there to... to see if I could remember
anything."

"Remember what?" He looked puzzled. "Remember looking for me?"

"Whoever you saw on the Queen Anne, Mulder... it wasn't me." She looked him
directly, honestly, in the eye. "Whoever she was saved the world. Not me.
But..." She cleared her throat, and almost averted her gaze again. "I wanted
it to be me."

He didn't say anything. "I went back into that ship hoping I could see what
you were talking about, Mulder. And maybe even remember it for myself. But I
couldn't."

"You don't need to be anyone but you, Scully," he managed, bewildered. He
could feel her hand pressing against his in gratitude.

"I don't know, Mulder." Her tone was tired, resigned, but a great deal more
cheerful than it had been since she came into the room. "It's just that...
since we're having true confessions now, you said you loved me after you
woke up." She noticed him swallow uneasily. "It really threw me for a loop,
your telling me you loved me. It felt wrong, like it was only because you
thought I had saved the world. Plus... I don't think I need to say it, but
you were drugged silly." Pause. "It felt wrong."

Nervously, he released her hand, and started meshing it with the fingers on
his other hand. He opened his mouth, but only succeeded in impressing her
with a clumsy stutter. "Uh..." He closed his eyes for a few moments, knowing
she was waiting for his response.

What could he say? He knew he loved her, and she knew it too. She was just
angry that he had chosen to tell her only now, after he'd gone through an
understandably traumatic experience. He couldn't even be one hundred percent
sure that he hadn't said it because of the reasons she'd mentioned. What
could he say?

His eyes fluttered open, and he saw her sitting calmly on her chair,
beautiful and almost regal in the dim orange light flooding the room. Her
hair fell softly around her face, which was still lightly streaked with
tears. She looked strong, and as she sat there watching him, he knew he
loved her.

He loved her, THIS Scully, not because she had saved the world, not because
she had been feisty and spunky and glamourously made-up... but because he
knew her, he trusted her, and he needed her. He'd done so many things
wrong - he'd made her worry, he'd made her cry, he'd picked the wrong time
to tell her how he really felt.

Now he knew what he had to say.

"Scully, you said it felt wrong. But was it wrong?"

She hesitated for only a second. "No, it wasn't."

"Then I apologise, Scully, for telling you something so important at the
wrong time." He reached over, and grabbed her hand with both of his. "I was
delusional, I was high, I was on drugs. But even then, I knew the truth."

Smiling, he squeezed her hand lightly, then brought it to his lips. As he
kissed her hand reverently, he whispered, "I love you."

And, for the first time in a too long time, she laughed. A real laugh, a
happy laugh. "I love you too, Mulder." She brought her other hand up to cup
his, and now their hands were tangled together in a comfortable ball. "I
love you too."

They remained like this, holding on to each other with a determination that
neither could fathom, for quite some time. Their eyes spoke to each other,
spoke volumes, said thank yous, just spoke.

Finally, she broke the idyll - she yawned.

"Geez, Scully, you must be beat," he almost yelped, just beginning to
realise that she hadn't slept in about thirty hours. Breaking his hands
reluctantly away from hers, he checked the clock on the wall opposite him.
"You should get some rest."

"Yeah." She smiled at him, then rubbed her eyes. "I could sleep for a day."
As she said this, she began to get up, picking up the coat she had shrugged
off earlier. "I should get going."

"Where are you going to go?" He was worried. "Should you be trying to find
your way around a strange town at night?"

"Don't worry, Mulder. Skinner flew in here - he said for business, but I
think he was just concerned - and he reserved two motel rooms for us." She
patted his hand lightly, the magic of the spell that had surrounded them
minutes before already dissipating. She got all the way up, and turned to
leave.

"Don't go." The words came out of him before he could stop them. "Stay here
tonight."

"Here?" She looked shocked, then she added wryly, scrutinising his bed, "I
don't think there's room for the both of us."

"Hey, there could be if we squeezed a little." Shifting over to one side of
his bed to make his point, he extended his good arm towards her. "Come on,
Scully. There's only one bed here, and while I'm not kind enough to give it
up to you completely, it's only right that we share it for tonight. You did
save my life after all."

Once again, she hesitated, tempted.

"It's awfully late," he added hopefully. "The motel people won't look too
kindly on..."

"Oh alright." She laughed, again, and he was taken aback, both by her easy
agreement, and her beautiful inspiring laughter.

She dropped her coat back onto the chair, then sat down on the bed. It sank
down, a little, but in a nice way. With little consideration for his arm,
she pushed him a little bit more to the side, then allowed herself to lie
down next to him. His arm found himself around her, and if Scully could be
described as a snuggler, she definitely snuggled against him.

"Night, Scully," he murmured blissfully, tired. Holding her in the present
was a lot more rewarding than kissing her in the past. She was here, and
that was all that mattered.

He could feel her smiling softly against him, about to slip into sleep.
"Good night, Mulder."

And a good night it was.

======================================================

Added March 22, 1999