Title: "May Children Run Free, Without Fear of Bees"
Author: Heather Horn
Rating: PG
Category: MSR
Spoilers: Fight the Future
Summary: Just think the HWS with no bees...
Archive: I would be delighted if someone actually thought my story was actually good enough to archive! Please do, just keep my name attached and e-mail me to tell me where you are putting it.
Feedback: I am always looking for ways to improve my writing. E-mail me at actingislife@chickmail.com with any comments or suggestions you may have!
Disclaimer: The X-Files is copyright of Chris Carter, 1013 Productions, and The FOX Network. No money is being made off of this. No copyright infringement is intended.
Dana Scully walked out of the conference room, a grim appearance plastered all over her face. The young agent had just given Skinner her resignation.
It was a two-for-one deal.
No Scully,
No Mulder.
It was as simple as that, yet it was so complicated.
While Scully debated weather or not to tell Mulder the news in person, Diana Fowley brushed pass her.
Nothing like a sight for sore eyes to make a bad day even worse, Scully thought, remembering the fling Agent Fowley had with Mulder not to long ago.
The sight of Diana had made Scully's face burn. She stumbled out the door, not quiet sure of where she was going.
But somehow, she ended up at Mulder's apartment.
The door was open, but she gave a knock on the wooden frame anyway, for old time's sake. If the phrase "knock on wood" worked, maybe this wouldn't be so bad. But Scully's heart melted when she saw the hurt puppy dog expression on Mulder's face.
"What's wrong?" Mulder asked her.
"I just gave Skinner my letter of resignation."
Mulder turned his head away from Scully so that she could not see the tears welling up in his eyes. He swallowed his pride and slowly began, No, Scully; my heart's in you
"You can't quit now, Scully."
"I can, Mulder. I debated whether or not even to tell you in person, but - "
"We are close to something here! We're on the verge!"
"You're on the verge, Mulder. Please don't do this to me."
"After what you saw last night, after all you've seen, you can just walk away?"
"I have, I did, it's done."
"I need you on this, Scully."
"You don't need me, Mulder. You never have. I've just held you back. I gotta go."
Mulder stared at the door for a long moment, watching the love of his life run out of his grasp.
He couldn't let this happen.
He wouldn't.
"You wanna tell yourself that so you can quit with a clear conscience, you can, but you're wrong!" He cried.
Scully paused in the middle of the hall.
"Why did they assign me to you in the first place, Mulder? To debunk your work, to rein you in, to shut you down!" She yelled irritably, yet with a sense of compassion.
"But you saved me! As difficult and as frustrating as it's been sometimes, your strict rationalism and science have saved me a thousand times over! You've kept me honest; you've made me a whole person. I owe you everything Scully, and you owe me nothing."
Scully looked down at her shoes, her eyes filling up with tears as he continued on.
"I don't know if I wanna do this alone," He said. "I don't even know if I can. And if I quit now, they win.
Scully's tears began to silently flow. Her bottom lip quivering with emotion, she fells into him, holding him tightly as his arms enfold her. She closed her eyes as her tears fell onto his shoulder.
Scully pulled back and kissed him on his forehead, then gently rested her own forehead on his, still crying. Mulder slowly pulled her face back so he could look at her, his hands resting on the back of her head. She looked into his eyes, her hands resting on the back of his head as well.
They saw something in each other's eyes that told them they were both thinking the same thing.
Smiling affectionately, Mulder and Scully bobbed their heads and indulged in a long, shining moment of pure satisfaction.
The kiss that each had yearned and ached for the past five years was now their own.
Each pair of lips like shimmering silk, glowing affectionately as they caressed. It was a moment in history that they wished would never end. Eventually, it had to though. The kiss broke off, and although Mulder wondered how long it had been, he had no concept of time at that particular moment.
Both agents looked down at the dirty honeycomb pattern of the hallway floor, blushing deeply in embarrassment. Scully scuffed the toe of her high heel shoe childishly on the ground, not able to look Mulder in the eye.
Mulder made a clicking noise with his tongue, then sighed and looked away, twiddling his thumbs and studying the immaculately interesting dirt between his nails.
"I gotta go." Scully murmured again, still not able to glance up at her partner. She turned on pointe of one foot, making her way wobbily towards the elevator, a sick, fluttery feeling growing in her stomach.
Mulder stood there, watching Scully go. Is this the last time I'll ever see her? He wondered. Or will she stay, now that...
Mulder was paralysed. He stood there long after Scully had stepped on to the elevator and the heavy medal doors had close, concealing her face from Mulder's view.
After an hour or so, Mulder found himself able to move again. He was still in shock, but was slowly recovering. He placed a hand over his lips, where Scully's own lips had been not long ago. Mulder pinched himself several times. He didn't want to wake up, but he needed to know. To his satisfaction, the only effect of the pinching was a small pink circle that formed around his lower left arm everytime he grasped a small bit of skin between his fingers and dug his nails into it.
Mulder squared his shoulders and rolled his neck, feeling dizzy. He needed to sit down. Slowly he staggered back towards his apartment, the door still standing wide open. He lunged onto the couch and sat there for hours, starring off into space, think of all that had changed in such a short amount of time.
He had no idea how much time had passed, but the next thing that Mulder remembered was the light knocking on the frame of the door. Damn it, Mulder thought. You forgot to close the door again! He acknowledged that Scully was there, but continued to stare straightforward into the darkness. Scully ventured over the threshold, her heels clicking as she walked towards Mulder cautiously.
"Mulder?" She asked.
No response.
"Mulder?" She called again, her voice calm but with a bit of irritability.
Still, she received no reply for the man, who was off in Mulderland doing his Mulder thing.
"Mulder, I'm staying." Scully said flatly.
Now she had his attention.
He turned to her with the biggest grin on his face that Scully had ever seen in all her years. Scully had now reached the edge of the sofa and Mulder put his hands over hers, looking up at her with a content smile that could light the world.
The phone rang; then, interrupting all of the agents thoughts, snapping them out of the daze they had been so gleefully caught up in.
"Mulder," Mulder said into the phone, not trying to sound as ticked of as he really was. The smile on his face grew into a grave line, his eyes widened as he hung up the phone.
"Mulder, who was that?" Scully asked, coming towards him and touching his arm tacitly.
"That," Mulder began. "was Skinner. Do you remember Diana Fowley?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
Mulder gave Scully a light smile of sympathy.
"Well, I've just been informed that she died earlier today, apparently of anifilatic shock." Mulder said without emphasise or feeling.
Scully nearly gagged when she heard the news, and began coughing simontaniously to keep her from breaking down in laughter. At that particular moment, she wanted to cheer out in song. However, she ended her coughing fit and sighed, giving Mulder the deepest and most sincere apology she could muster.
Mulder just nodded, too involved in something that he was looking at to voice a reply.
He stared at Scully; a smiled pursed tightly across his lips. She caught his eye and stared back, never blinking, never skipping a beat.
What had happened earlier that day was history.
They would never speak of it; only daydream about it and fantasise what they wish had happened. It was an unspoken pact of theirs. They never expressed their feelings for one another to each other. They loved each other, they both knew that, and that was one thing that would never change. A great man once said, "The rest is silence", and that's exactly what it is.
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"May Children Run Free, Without Fear of Bees" by Heather Horn was written
on March 5, 1999
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