Any Other Name Part 8 - Chapters 16 & 17 by Louise Marin mibosh@earthlink.net www.angelfire.com/la/xspot SIXTEEN: It was a struggle getting Mulder back down the street and into the house. By the time they made it through the front door, he was damn near passing out. Scully talked to him and shook him, doing whatever she could to keep him conscious as she dragged him into her bathroom. She made him climb into the tub, and then she turned the tap to cold. "Dana," he whimpered as the water doused him. "I'm sorry. We have to get that fever down. Stay still here," Scully told him before she ran to the kitchen. She simultaneously filled a pitcher with ice for the bath and phoned the Gunmen. On her way back to Mulder, Scully paused in the living room. Her hand shook the glass pitcher as she turned her chin up to the ceiling and called to anyone who might be listening, "Are you still there? We could use some help here, you murdering bastards!" There was, of course, no answer. The phone didn't ring, and twenty minutes later the Gunmen were the only people to arrive at the house. Ishmael ushered them into the bathroom, then went to Mulder. He gave the man a sweet little lick on his hand and then lay down next to the tub. Scully didn't look up from the cold towel she was washing over Mulder's face and head. "Is that bringing it down?" Byers asked. Scully slipped the thermometer from Mulder's mouth, read it, and then looked up at her friends. Tears flooded her eyes. "No, it's not." "Shit," Langly said. "We'd better get him to the hospital." "I didn't want to do that to him. If this is related to...what he is, they probably won't know what to do anyway." Byers stooped down next to her and put a gentle hand on her knee. "Scully, I really don't think we have any other choice. We can't do anything more for him here." "And we have to do something. I know," Scully whispered. She let Byers tug her away from the tub while Langly and Frohike went to Mulder. "Mulder!" Frohike called as he leaned over and patted his friend on the cheek. "Wake up, buddy. We gotta get you out of here." Scully draped the jacket Mulder had worn to the carnival over his shoulders as the Gunmen helped him into the van. Ishmael had followed them out, and he growled at Scully when she tried to take him back to the house. With a sigh, she let the dog hop into the back of the van. Then she followed him in, cuddled Mulder to her, and pressed the cold, wet towel back onto his forehead. Mulder dropped his head to Scully's shoulder and went to sleep. They arrived at the emergency room twenty minutes later. Mulder's fever was still high but he was semi-conscious when the hospital staff moved him from the van to a stretcher. As they entered the hospital, Scully hurried along at his side, as did the Gunmen and even Ishmael, who Frohike insisted was his 'service dog' when the nurses tried to shoo the animal back outside. "What's your name, son?" an older doctor asked Mulder as the orderlies wheeled him into an exam room. Scully, her heart in her throat, was about to answer the doctor when Mulder spoke up for himself. "Ssssam," he rasped. "Got a last name, Sam?" the doctor asked. Mulder simply looked at Scully and then closed his eyes. "I don't know his last name," Scully told the doctor. "I just met him tonight." Because of the calming effect she had on him, the hospital staff let Scully stay with Mulder even though she wasn't immediate family. She sat vigil next to him now as he lay resting between ice baths. She had tucked Ishmael unassumingly under the bed. The doctors had performed every test and treatment they had on hand, but nothing could explain or reduce Mulder's temperature. He was sweating and shivering and slipping in and out of semi-consciousness, and Scully's heart broke every time he looked to burrow into blankets that weren't there. He whispered nonsense about nightmares through cracking lips. When his eyes were open, he suffered a barrage of hallucinations driven by the fever that was burning his life away. Byers approached Scully quietly as she stroked Mulder's arm. "I love him," she whispered. "I love him." "I know," Byers reassured her. "We all do." As she forced a smile, a tear slipped down Scully's cheek. "A soul so sweet and noble I have never met," she said. Then, sniffling, she wiped the tear away and looked up at Byers. "Or have I?" "Mulder was a complicated creature. And we loved him for that. This one," Byers said, nodding toward the bed, "we love for his simplicity." Scully nodded. Then she looked hard at the man in the bed. Her fingers shook as she brushed the hair from his forehead and caressed his cheek with the back of her hand. "But the soul...it's not the same?" she couldn't keep from asking. Byers knelt down next to her. She turned to him when he touched her elbow. "The same but different, I think," he said gently. "Mulder's soul without all the abuse he took during his lifetime. Makes a different man, all that living." "Oh, Mulder," Scully whimpered as she crumpled slowly forward. Byers' arms went around her and she began to cry into his lapel. Mulder was gone. Scully felt as though he was bleeding out of her with every tear that washed her face. After a moment, she took a deep, shaky breath and pulled back from Byers' embrace. "I'm sorry," she told him as she smoothed her blouse and pushed her hair behind her ears. Her chest still fluttered with sobs. "No, Scully. Don't be sorry," Byers insisted as he touched the back of Scully's hand with the tenderness of a brother, or a father, of someone she had missed for so very long. "I've been waiting a year and half for you to cry on my shoulder. We all have." "And so have I." "Mom," Scully whispered at the sound of her mother's voice. Scully had called her hours ago, and she had finally arrived. Overwhelmed, Scully stood, threw her arms around her mother, and buried her face in her neck. "Oh, my baby girl," Maggie whispered as she held and rocked her daughter. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry." "He's not getting better, Mom," Scully said through her tears. "He's gone." "Shh. It's okay. It's okay to cry now. I love you, and oh God Fox loves you. It's okay now." "Not Fox, Mom, Mulderrrrrrr," Scully keened into her mother's neck. "Yes, Mulder loved you too, dear. I know, I know. He did," Maggie told her. "But he's gone now. He's gone." "I know," Scully squeaked. Then amidst her sobs she felt herself fall away. She knew only the sting of her tears, and the heat of her heartbreak, and the perfect white of her unwritten future. Minutes passed by like eons as Scully fought that white. She clawed against it, searching for any sign of darkness in which to hide. But she found none and eventually she tired, and she succumbed, and she let her control go. She began to simply float, and peace began to fill her. Sounds found Scully slowly. A man's voice, deep and powerful. A woman's, soft and caring and protective. What a joy, Scully thought, to be held again by her parents. She could almost remember the day she was born, feeling warm, and safe, and naked. But when Scully lifted her face from her mother's neck, she found not her father, but her boss. She wiped her cheeks and tried to meet his eyes. "Where are the guys?" Skinner looked at her with equal degrees of heartbreak, fatigue, and suspicion. "They went down to the cafeteria. I'm sorry I took so long to get here. Scully, the hospital doesn't have a Fox Mulder admitted. Why is he here as a John Doe?" Scully shook her head, feeling tears creep up on her again. She turned to the man in the bed, took his hand and brought it to her lips. His skin was still so hot. He was whispering something in his sleep, something about a phone call, but his words made no sense. "I don't know if it matters anymore." "I don't understand." "His name." "What is his name, Scully?" Tears began to roll down Scully's cheeks again, and she kept her face turned away from Skinner. "Are you feeling better, Sir?" "I was," Skinner said. His voice was tight. "I was. Scully, is he dying?" Scully squeezed Mulder's hand. "Yes, he is," she said. Then she gasped when Mulder squeezed her hand back. "Not...as bad...as I look," he rasped as his eyes cracked open. Scully saw fear there, deep and profound, but he did his best to return her smile. "Don't cry." Scully swiped at the tears on her cheeks again. "I'm sorry. I know, I need to be strong for you." Mulder shook his head. "Need...Gray-haired man." "We can't find him," Scully whispered, her heart breaking. Mulder simply shook his head again. "Phone," he said. "Kry...phone." And then he closed his eyes. "Oh my God. Oh my God, Mulder, I'm so sorry." Scully slipped Mulder's hand into her mother's. "They should have never left you with such an idiot," she lamented as she flew to the chair that held Mulder's jacket. It seemed like weeks had gone by since Krycek had given them his phone. "So stupid," Scully grumbled again as she pressed the phone's red button and waited to hear Krycek's voice. "You had a tough night, and morning," Mulder murmured, but Scully just shook her head and listened to the phone ringing in her ear. "Yea," a man finally answered. "Tell me what's wrong with him, Krycek," Scully demanded. "Scully. He's fallen ill already? Interesting." "What the hell do you mean interesting? Did you do something to him?" Scully took a moment to inspect the high tech phone she'd let Mulder keep in his pocket for hours, too many hours, the night before. "Is it this phone? Is the phone making him sick?" Krycek laughed, and Scully wished the man was there in the flesh so she could gouge his eyes out. "Your boy? No, not him." "Talk to me, Krycek, or tell me where I can find your boss. Now." "You want the Smoking Man, Scully? Why don't you ask Skinner," Krycek hissed. Then there was a click and he was gone. Scully pressed the red button again, but this time no one answered. She slid the phone to her cheek, held it there, her mouth open, her hands shaking. Skinner. Had Skinner betrayed her again? "Scully," Skinner was calling to her. "What did he say?" Scully noticed again that her boss was looking peaked. A ring of sweat was forming around his collar. She stepped between him and Mulder. "He said to ask you." Skinner's eyes darkened, as though he was about to take offense at Scully's words. But then he simply looked down at his feet, ashamed, and for the first time ever the sight of his shiny, bald head sickened Scully all the way down to her toes. She bit her lip to keep the tears from filling her eyes. "Where is the Smoking Man? How can I find him?" Scully demanded. Skinner took a deep breath. "Don't do this to me. Find another way." "Don't do this to you? How could you do this to me?" Scully snarled up into Skinner's face. "I want whatever you know, and I want it now." Skinner's eyes snapped up to Scully's. "He'll kill me," he said, deadly serious. "He's got me by the balls, same as he always has, and he'll kill me over this one, I swear to you." "He'll kill you." Scully bit her lip. Her nostrils flared with fury. "My God have you been holding out on me." Skinner simply shook his head noncommittally. "How long?" "Long enough," Skinner grumbled. "How long?!" Simply for emphasis, Scully poked Skinner's broad chest with Krycek's cell phone. But when the device touched him, he doubled over and wrapped his palms around his head. "Scully..." Surprised, Scully's studied the phone in her hand with wide eyes. She noticed a tiny catch on one side. When she pushed on it, the little phone split down the center and flipped open. Inside was a small, gray LCD screen that displayed a graph. She couldn't even guess at the graph's parameters, but when she pressed one of the buttons next to it, Skinner groaned and fell to the floor. "Oh my god," Scully whispered. "Sir?" Skinner looked up at Scully with dull eyes. Sweat dripped from his chin. "Get...rid of that thing," he pleaded. "What is it?" "C...control," Skinner rasped. Then he drew a sharp breath, a sudden realization, as he met Scully's eyes. Squeezing the phone in fury, Scully felt a shimmer of power travel up her arm. She closed her mouth and hardened her jaw. "Are you ready to talk now?" Skinner tipped his chin up. "No." There was a hard edge of challenge in his voice, as though he was daring her to torture him, to punish him for his betrayal. As angry as she was, Scully's heart hurt at the thought of her boss suffering, maybe dying, at her hand. The graph on the phone showed that the level of whatever the device had activated in Skinner was already high. Her thumb quivered over the button next to it. She could hear Mulder whimpering and sniffling through another fever-induced nightmare behind her. "How long have you known about Mulder, about the Mulders?" Scully demanded again Skinner grunted, struggling for words. "Since...the beginning." "What do we have to do to bring this fever down?" Skinner shook his head. "Where is the smoking man?" "Can't...say." Scully turned the device in her hand so Skinner could see the power she held. "Can't? Or won't?" Skinner narrowed his eyes defiantly. The sweat that had been pooling in their corners ran down his cheeks like tears. "Please, Sir, don't make me press this button again," Scully growled. "I don't think that will be necessary," said the Smoking Man from the doorway. He wore a white lab coat and a hospital I.D. tag, but Scully knew he was no doctor. "Don't look so shocked to see me, Agent Scully." Scully slowly shook her head. "I'm just stunned that I didn't smell you coming." "Tsk tsk, Agent Scully," the Smoking Man said as he and four thugs-dressed- as-orderlies entered the room. The Smoking Man casually slipped Krycek's phone from Scully's hand and turned it off. "I told you last night I have something you need. Politeness would certainly bring you closer to that end." As the Smoking Man crossed to Mulder, Scully searched the small of her back for her gun. It wasn't there. It was with her jacket where she'd draped it over the chair across the room. So much for having any amount of power, she thought as she clenched her fists at her side. One of the thugs hauled Skinner up off the floor and held him. Another took Scully's mother from Mulder's bedside. Maggie protested as the big man dragged her with him into the doorway were he could keep watch. Out of the corner of her eye, Scully saw Ishmael's head perk up and a low growl came from where he lay beneath the bed. Subtly she signaled him to stay where he was. Mulder didn't seem to realize the Smoking Man had taken his beloved Maggie's place bent over his dying body. His eyes remained closed, flickering restlessly beneath their lids. With a tenderness that made Scully stomach turn, the Smoking Man brushed the sweat-soaked hair from Mulder's forehead. "A little bird told me you've been quite rebellious and uncooperative lately," he said. "We can't have that, can we, my son?" "He's not your son," Scully snapped. The Smoking Man never took his eyes from Mulder's face. "I had him made. That's close enough, don't you think?" Before Scully could remind the man of the twelve other 'sons' he'd had murdered, Mulder's eyes fluttered and opened. He glared at his self- proclaimed creator. "Help me," he rasped through dry lips. "Oh, I will." The man stroked Mulder's cheek. "You be a good boy now. Close your eyes and let me fix you." Mulder jerked his head away from the man's hand. "No. Tell me what you're going to do." The Smoking Man's eyes darkened. "Do you really want to know?" "Tell us," Scully demanded. The Smoking Man nodded to his henchmen. One moved to Mulder and began strapping him to the bed. Scully's beloved charge struggled against the restraints, but he appeared so weak and scared that she lost control and launched herself at the bed. The remaining thug slipped an arm around her waist and held her back. "All right," the Smoking Man began, "we're going to start over." He drew two syringes from the pocket of his lab coat. One was filled with yellow fluid, the other orange. He held each syringe up in front of Mulder's frightened face. "The yellow liquid is your medicine. To avoid this fever you will need it once a month for the rest of your life. It will be supplied by me. Is this acceptable?" Mulder looked at Scully. "For now," she said gravely, never taking her eyes from the mysterious orange syringe. The Smoking Man nodded and then held up the other syringe. "This one," he said to Mulder, "will wipe your memory of the last five weeks." "No!" Mulder snapped as he began to struggle against his restraints. "Yes." "No. No! Dana will remind me who I am. Dana!" "That's why I'll be injecting her too, and Mrs. Scully. And those three...geeks Mulder called friends will have be dealt with as well." "No!" Mulder howled again. "No! No! No! No!" He struggled hard against his restraints and whipped his head from side to side. "Dana!" "You can't do this," Scully said to the Smoking Man, her lips quaking. The Smoking Man quirked a sick little smile her way. "Of course I can," he said matter-of-factly as he pulled the plastic cap from the orange vial's needle. "He's mine. And even if you could, you wouldn't stop me, Scully. I'm giving you what you want-one more chance to get your precious partner back." Shocked, Scully looked at Mulder where he writhed in his bed, tangled his sheets, and cried like the world was ending. Which it was. She closed her eyes. The Smoking Man was right. This was her very last change. "No," Scully finally growled as she began again to struggle against the thug's embrace. "He's a real person, his own person. You can't do this. Don't do it!" Mulder seemed to calm a bit at Scully's plea, but an instant later the Smoking Man was lowering the needle to his arm. "Dana!" he cried. "Mulder!" Scully screamed, and then she had a moment of clarity. "Ishmael!" Finally cued, the dog shot his head out from beneath the bed. With a growling bark, he wrapped his jaws around the Smoking Man's leg. The man's head dipped as he reacted with surprise to the attack. His wrinkled face was so close to Mulder's smooth one. In the desperate instant before the henchmen could come to the rescue, Mulder whipped his own head up, smashing the Smoking Man's nose, driving it back up into his brain. Blood splattered in all directions. Mulder's head dropped back to his pillow. The Smoking Man's dead eyes were locked on Mulder's fiery ones for a long, slow moment before his body collapsed onto Mulder's chest. Both syringes slipped from the man's limp hand and rolled off the edge of the bed. They landed softly on the back of Ishmael's neck. Shocked, the thug released Scully. She dropped limply to her knees. She caught her breath and then scooped up the syringes and held them against her racing breast. Skinner worked himself free as well. "Get out of here," he growled as he shoved the thug that had held him toward the door. "You don't work for him anymore." The strange men did as they were told and filed out of the room as Scully rose. She went to Mulder to find him scared and in shock. He gripped the Smoking Man's shoulders, his hands alternately squeezing and shaking. Skinner helped Scully lift the man's body away, revealing a pool of blood where his head had been on Mulder's chest. Scully stripped Mulder of his hospital gown as Skinner laid the Smoking Man on the floor. With a cool cloth she washed the blood from Mulder's skin, cooing to him until he closed his eyes again. Then she turned to the two syringes she still gripped. Her hand tingled as though tendrils of fire nipped at her fingertips. The power of the orange solution tempted her, tore her resolve and her loyalty between the past and the future one last time. She could have Mulder back again. The Smoking Man was gone, and no one was left to pull the strings but Scully herself... "Let me dispose of that with the body," Skinner said, touching the orange vial with his fingertips. Scully pulled the syringes away, gripping them protectively. "Shouldn't we save it for analysis?" Scully asked. "This is evidence, Sir, that Mulder acted in self-defense here." Skinner shook his head gravely. "Forget about evidence, Scully. I can... I'll make this just go away. It's the least that I can do." "Sir?" "I withheld information from you. I..." Skinner swallowed hard. "I took Mulder's body, the first one. I made it available to...them. I wanted to give him back to you. I thought they could," he admitted as he nodded to the dead man on the floor. "But they couldn't," Scully said slowly. "And neither could I." With a sigh, Scully handed the orange syringe to Skinner and then looked down at the Smoking Man. "Take it. And take him. We don't ever want to see him again." "You won't." Feeling suddenly exhausted, Scully shook her head and laughed. "He's probably had himself cloned three or four times already anyway." Skinner said nothing. He bent down and began to remove the Smoking Man's lad coat and hospital I.D. badge. Scully looked suspiciously at the yellow syringe she still held, the one the Smoking Man had called medicine. "What are the odds Old Smokey really did come here to help Mulder?" She ran her free hand down Mulder's arm. "Or was he planning to kill the last of his 'sons' after all?" "If you don't give him the injection, will he die anyway?" Skinner asked. "Yes. Soon," Scully whispered. Biting her lip, she injected the yellow liquid into the big vein in Mulder's forearm, saving the last few drops for future analysis. His eyes cracked open as she removed the needle. "Want to go home," Mulder murmured. "We will," Scully assured him. She bent over to give him a kiss and a cuddle. As Maggie came quietly over to do the same, Scully knelt down beside the bed. She lowered her head, pressed her lips to Mulder's arm, and began to pray. Four hours later, Mulder's temperature had dropped back to normal. His doctors said it was a miracle and wanted to keep him overnight for observation. Scully explained to Mulder that this was standard procedure, but he refused to stay in the bed where he'd killed the Smoking man. She could hardly blame him. He paced the room, whined, and tugged on her sleeve for a mere twenty minutes before Scully caved. She checked him out at the front desk and, smirking to herself, charged the hospital visit to her FBI credit card. At home, Scully tried unsuccessfully to tuck Mulder right into bed. He needed rest, she told him. He had almost died. But he would do nothing but float quietly and restlessly around the house. Eventually he found his way into Scully's shower, stripping off his clothes as he went. She waited until she heard the water running and then she decided to join him. She found him sitting on the tiled floor with his back against the shower wall. The hot spray beat down on his head. Water streamed down the backs of his long hands as he held his palms pressed firmly to his eyes. Scully stepped carefully between his legs. She closed the shower door behind her and then knelt down in front of him. "Talk to me," she whispered as she pulled his hands from his face. His eyes were so dark and sad. "Please." He shook his head, worked his jaw. "I... What I did... I killed him. I'm just like him." "Oh, Mulder, no. You did what had to be done. I hurt Skinner, a man I've been aided and betrayed by for the last six years. I hurt him because I needed to save you, and I was out of options, and you're everything to me. Do you think less of me now?" Mulder dropped his head to Scully's shoulder. "I killed a man, Dana. That's forever." "You did. And you won your freedom." Scully rubbed the back of his neck. "We don't have to be afraid of him anymore." "But that doesn't make killing him right, does it? Do we kill everyone who frightens us?" "No. No, we don't. But what you did tonight was the human thing. You did what was necessary to save yourself. And me." "I didn't mean to kill him," he whispered. Scully could barely hear him over the swish of the shower. "Of course not. It is also human to feel the sorrow you do now," she tried to assure him. When he began to sob into her neck, she pressed her palms to his cheeks and made him lift his head to look at her. "You are the gentlest man I have ever met. That will be forever as well, if you just be yourself." Closing his eyes, he reached up and wrapped his hand around hers, holding it against his face. "Thank you." Scully rose up to kiss his rugged cheek. She could feel him still sobbing against her. "Stop crying," she ordered with a tiny smile. She poked him playfully in the ribs, tickling him. He began to laugh through his tears, his body convulsing with emotion in Scully's arms. "I'm free now," he said quietly once the laughing and crying had worn him out. He cradled Scully against him and brushed intense little kisses over her face, and lips, and neck, and shoulders. Scully buried her face in his hair. "Make love to me again?" she requested. "Like last night?" he asked as he shoved open the shower door. Scully smacked a kiss on his neck and then said, "No. Better." Three days later, the man who Scully couldn't seem to stop calling Mulder moved from her house to his own apartment. In an attempt to atone for his duplicity, Skinner had procured a place for him in his building. The A.D. had also made arrangements for him to prepare for and take a high school equivalency test. Grudgingly, Scully had admitted she was glad Skinner would be close enough to keep an eye on him. Knowing it would be too painful to leave him by himself in his new place, Scully kissed the man goodbye in the morning and went to work. Maggie and the Gunmen were giving him some furniture and other necessities, and they would help him move while she was gone. Some time apart would be best for both of them, Scully had agreed. But the tears in the man's eyes when she left broke her heart yet again. Scully herself felt as though she'd been crying for days and days, and she cried some more as she explained her recent preoccupation with her dead partner's clone to Agent Carr. Once he recovered from his shock and got over his disbelief, Carr offered kind words, a smile, and a hug. Scully drank these in like she had found water in a wasteland. A short time later they went to work on their next case. That night, Scully unlocked an empty house. Her beloved was gone, and she had sent Ishmael along with him. She didn't panic, though, at the dark and the quiet. She simply went from room to room turning on the lights. At his room she paused, drew in a sharp breath. The space was empty now but for a vase of fresh red roses and the unsigned note that was attached: Wait for me, my Dana. I'll return when I know who I am, And when you know it's me that you miss. I love you forever, and forever, and forever... SEVENTEEN: Eight weeks had passed since Scully had seen him. This was in fact longer than he had been with her. They spoke on the phone every Friday. She made sure he was all right and then hung up before either of them could start to cry. She missed him terribly, naturally, and she worked hard to fill her time in his absence. In recent days she had managed to maintain a peaceful, almost enjoyable relationship with Jon Carr. She also saw her mother twice a week, had joined a very relaxing Yoga club, and learned to play Quake with the Gunmen over the Internet. She had also gotten into the wonderful habit of leaving work early, which she did today. As she drove home, Scully passed a carnival. It was a small one, probably sponsored by a nearby school or church. The venue was packed with colorful rides and joyful children. She rolled down her window so she could hear the children's laughter, and as the carnival disappeared from view, she found that she was laughing as well. Five minutes later, she passed her house and turned her car toward Arlington. The cemetery appeared peaceful, almost inviting, as dusk covered it in the warm gold and pink of spring. Scully parked her car along the street and then made the long trek across the grass to Mulder's grave. His plot was neat and well looked after, but there were no flowers propped up against the headstone. Scully wished she had brought some. She knew no one had in a very long time. As she knelt down in the grass she didn't think twice about the fact that no body filled the ground beneath her. She and his mother had laid Mulder to rest here over a year ago, and Scully had to believe this was where his soul had finally come to find peace. With reverence, she brushed the dust from the top and front of his headstone. Then she leaned her head against it. Her eyes grew hot and wet and she closed them tight. "Mulder," she breathed. "I'm so sorry it's been so long since I've come. I was having trouble making sense of some things in my life, making sense of you. But, I think I'm doing better now. I miss you. Oh, God, I miss you. It's good to be here again." Scully rubbed her forehead back and forth over the stone. She could feel the grooves of his name cross her skin. "I couldn't stay away anymore, Mulder. Because I love you. I've always loved you. I should have told you. I couldn't forgive myself for never telling you, for not taking care of you. And for letting you die. But I'm telling you now, and I'm telling you I'm sorry. And I know that you forgive me. Because you were my best friend. And because you loved me too. "I also wanted to tell you that someone new came into my life not long ago. He's away now, but I think he'll be back. I hope. You'd like him. He's just like you. And he's totally different. You and I always played a perfect counterpoint, Mulder. He and I...our hearts beat together. I don't know how else to explain it." A tiny smile tugged at the corner of Scully's mouth. "Anyway, I expect you to be watching diligently over the both of us, Mulder. Together we'll keep the demons away, and maybe he and I can find some peace as well." Sighing, Scully turned her side to the stone and tried to relax against it. The wind had kicked up. The trees rustled like the sound of spirits all around her. Scully let her mind relax, let her body fall into the rhythm of the trees. She didn't hear anyone or anything approach, and she was startled when something cold and wet bumped into her face and began licking her nose. She opened her eyes to see the big, familiar, fuzzy face of Ishmael. With a smile, Scully shook off the dog's kisses. Automatically she reached up to dig her fingers into his thick fur and scratch behind his ears. The implication of Ishy's presence was just beginning to sink in when she heard a deep, beautiful voice call her name. She stood and spun around to find him standing just a few feet away. The same wind that tickled her ears was blowing the hair off his forehead. He wore neatly pressed khaki pants, a dark gray sweater, and a navy blue sport coat, all of which Scully had never seen before. An overstuffed duffel bag lay on the ground next to his feet. "Mul..." Scully began, but then she paused, slowed, feeling suddenly cautious and afraid. "Who are you now?" His face was serious, but his eyes sparkled as he reached into his coat and pulled out a simple, black wallet. He flipped it open and then held it out for her to see. Inside was a shiny new Virginia state personal identification card. The card displayed a recent photograph, a social security number, and a name: Sam Scully. Scully covered her mouth as her lips began to quake. She forced herself to look up into his eyes. "I spent so much time reading his journals," he explained. "They were written to Samantha. But I always felt like he was talking to me." "How...how did you get here?" "Maggie drove me." He turned to the street and waved at the familiar old Buick that waited by the curb. Scully's mother waved back and then drove away. Scully frowned. 'Sam Scully' looked down at Mulder's headstone, caressed it with gentle fingers. "I wanted to see him. And then we saw you standing here. I have something for you." He pulled a file folder from his bag. It was an X-file, the one Scully had upset him with weeks ago. "I took this from your house when I left," he explained. "I've been…thinking about it." "Have you?" He removed a large piece of paper from the file. "The children all had different symbols etched into their skin when their abductor returned them," he said as he unfolded the paper and held it up to show Scully. "This symbol is part of a ancient Celtic protection spell. It is also..." "It's all of the small markings we found on the children connected together to make one big symbol." Scully reached out and traced the thick circles and triangles etched on the paper. "Someone was trying to protect them." "That's what I think," he said as he folded up the paper again and tucked the file back into his bag. "Does it make you feel better about the case?" "Well, we still don't know what the abductor was trying to protect the children from. But this is...this is excellent work. This is a huge step closer to the truth." Scully bit her lip to keep the tears out of her eyes. "Why did you do this?" "Because... Dana, I don't want to join the FBI. Mr. Skinner is going to help me enroll in college. I'll study animal behavior, or maybe veterinary medicine, I don't know. What I do know is that Mulder was special, and some of his gifts were passed on to me. And if I can use those gifts to help you, then I will, always." Touched, Scully went to him. "Come here," she said as she pulled him to her. She slipped her arms around his waist and planted a gentle kiss on his lips. "Mulder...I mean, Sam, I..." Scully frowned, disappointed in herself. He shook his head and touched her lips with his fingertips. "I don't care what you call me, Dana. I just want to come home." The tears finally streamed freely down Scully's cheeks. She threw her arms around him and buried her face in his neck. "Please come home," she whispered. He wrapped his arms around her and squeezed her to him. "I never expected to find you here. Maggie was going to bring me to your house after here so I could ask you if you still wanted to be my family." Scully smiled up at him. "I will always be your family, Mr. Scully." The smile he gave back to her was crooked, and sweet, and bashful. He slipped his warm palm onto her cheek, tipped her mouth to his. His kiss was soft but deep. It was both a slow declaration of love and the promise of a future by her side. Scully pressed her chest to his so she could see if his heart truly did beat in time with hers. It did. "Let's say goodbye," Scully said when they parted. She picked up her purse and then bent over to kiss the top of Mulder's headstone. "I'll come see you again soon, Mulder," she whispered. Sam Scully stooped in front of the stone. "I'm sorry about what happened to you, Mulder," he said as he tenderly traced Mulder's name with his fingertips. "And I'm sorry I've been too afraid of my humanity to see what a good man you were. Please forgive me, my brother." Then he kissed the top of the stone as Scully had done. He took up his bag and then, to her surprise, offered Scully his arm. Scully took it and they began the long trek back to her car. As they walked she noticed that the man at her side stood extra tall. His chest was puffed up and his face was both confident and serene. "Sam, are you strutting?" Scully asked, a little smirk curling her lips. He looked down at her, puzzled. "Am I what?" Scully laughed. "Never mind. You have every right and reason to strut. You've come a long way, my love." "So have you." "Maybe I have." Scully nodded, pleased with herself. "So, where should we go now?" "Everywhere," Sam roared with a smile so big and shimmering and full of life that even his face with its large features could hardly contain it. He dropped his bag, lifted Scully from the ground, and spun her around joyously. Her heart fluttered. She suddenly felt like the heroine of a very, very long movie, and she was finally getting her happy ending. Then she took a moment to wonder when she had turned into such a big pile of mush. "How bout we start with the carnival?" she suggested, sill laughing and spinning. "But we've already been there," Sam said as he finally put her down. Breathless, Scully brushed her cheek against his and whispered in his ear, "No, we haven't." (End Ch. 17/17) End Notes: I feel as though I've lived several lifetimes since I started work on "Any Other Name." The story found its conception in February of 1999 while I was on a ski vacation in Mammoth Lakes, CA. The X-files was halfway through season six, Chris Carter was promising us 'answers' which he never did give, and Mulder was acting like a selfish bastard. As the Scullyist I was during season six, I took Mulder's attitude and behavior that February very personally, and I was deeply hurt. I'd recently developed an inflammation in my lung, and that illness forced me to spend my vacation alone in our cabin nursing my broken heart. I had just finished revising my very first fanfic ever, "Cubed," it was snowing outside, and I began to imagine how nice it would be if a nude, beautiful, weather-beaten Mulder were to show up on my doorstep. I was very lonely. However, I didn't want season six Mulder. I wanted "Momento Mori" Mulder, or "Redux II" Mulder, sweet and tender. I wanted his attention locked on nothing but his partner. I was afraid that on the show we were never going to see that Mulder again. So I started to plan, and then I started to write. And then things in my dull little life started happening. "Any Other Name" ended up on the back burner between September of 1999 and June of 2000. I didn't write. And I didn't post. But I promise you the story never ever stopped spinning in my mind. It's been with me for two years of my life (almost to the day), and now I'm finally ready to let it go. This story has elated me, frustrated me, made me cry, and scared the hell out of me. It has enjoyed a thousand influences, but I think the most important include Penny Daza's wonderful fanfic entitled "I Have Known A Boy Named Fox and A Man Named Mulder," Robert A. Heinlein's "Stranger In A Strange Land," and the X-files episode "Demons." "Any Other Name" itself started out as a story about Scully and how she deals with loss and intimacy and emotion, and about Mulder and the man he was compared with the man he could have been. It ended up, however, a story about me, and about my own relationships with two very remarkable men. In itself, this is not at all surprising. The author always ends up fused with the work in some way. But the real-life "X-File" here is the fact that the vast majority of this story was completed six months before I even met one of these men, and almost a year before the death of the other. I'm still not sure what to think of this. It's eerie, and it scares me, and I love it. When I first started "Any Other Name," I honestly didn't believe it would be read and enjoyed by many. It carries the stigmas of a major character death, and of a /other romance. But it has won awards and garnered attention, and it has brought me a morbid amount of pride and joy. I think the appeal here is that this is a love story, one in which the characters not only learn to accept the love they have had for each other from long before day one, but they also learn to love themselves, enough to grieve, enough to forgive, enough to accept their pasts (or lack thereof), and enough to move forward. I will always be a writer. And I believe that little bits of this story will make their way into everything I create for the rest of my life, that every story I write in the future will be both a love story and a labor of my own heart. And this makes me happy. Finishing this story has been the most difficult thing I've ever had to do. I hope you've enjoyed it even half as much as I have. I ask only that once you've reached the end, please, please don't spoil it for others. Thanks for reading, and for all your support, especially if your name is ytwolf or Narida Law. You two are, of course, the best. Warmest Regards, Louise Marin February, 2001 Louise Marin - mibosh@earthlink.net - www.angelfire.com/la/xspot