Standard Disclaimer: The following story is rated NC-17. Minors should not go any further.

The characters do not belong to me and I make no claim on them. Everything else is © Jane Mortimer.


                                  A Bitter Taste on the Tongue

                                          By Jane Mortimer

He didn't look that pleased to see her, she thought.

"Scully. What a surprise. You don't usually drop by unannounced." Again, there was that complete lack of affect in his tone, the
sense that something else was going on behind the words.

"You aren't answering your machine," she pointed out. When he didn't respond to that, she looked pointedly up and down the
hall. "Can I come in, or would you rather talk out here?"

He held the door open and she walked inside, past him, suddenly uncertain. For a second there she felt the way she felt
brushing by a murder suspect; somebody you had to be ready to defend yourself against. Somebody outside the range of
predictability, who might do you harm.

Jumpy. Too much caffeine. Her heartbeat was little too high, that was all.

She reached the center of the living room, then turned to face him, ready for his explanation. He just waited.

Finally she said, "Do you want to tell me what's going on? What's this about giving Skinner your resignation?"

"Did he send you?"

"He doesn't need to send me, Mulder, he's quite capable of reaming into you all on his own. As am I."

"All your own idea, then."

She stared at him. He wasn't even making sense. She said, "Why didn't you answer my messages?"

He sighed. "Maybe I wanted to avoid this conversation. Go home, Scully. Get out of here while you can. Go... build your
career."

Build your career. In a voice as burnt-out as yesterday's coffee. Whatever was wrong, he was obviously in pain, and she
reacted instinctively. "Tell me, please -- " she said, her voice softened. She touched his arm.

He flinched away as though from a hot stove. That wasn't faked, that was a genuine reaction, from the soul, and the hurt of it
slid into Scully like an icepick.

Then he suddenly said, "Why not?" He grinned crookedly. It was the same cocksure, empty-eyed smile he gave agents from the
Bureau who annoyed him. "You tell me first, Agent Scully, why should I stay? What have I accomplished in the Bureau worth
sticking around for?"

She blinked. "Do you want me to repeat back every case you ever did? You've gotten closer to the truth than anybody I've
ever known. You're practically married to it. How can you start doubting yourself now, after all we've been through?"

"Interesting choice of pronoun, Special Agent. I like how you slide that 'we' in there."

She didn't know how to respond to that. He took a step closer and she resisted the impulse to take one back. She'd never been
alarmed by his invasions of personal space before, and why should she be now? It wasn't as though he would ever try to hurt
her.

"You've made an enormous difference," she said firmly. "Otherwise, why would they keep trying to stop you?"

"Yeah, what a guy." He wasn't listening to her. His eyes were staring right into hers, dark and challenging, but not about anything
she was saying. In fact, she could swear he was looking at her as though... no, that thought had to be coming from her. And this
was no time for her subconscious to be generating this kind of embarrassing distraction, when her partner obviously needed her
help. 

"What about Tooms? He'd still be napping between snacks, if not for you." Probably that faint edge of heat was from her desire
to offer some kind of comfort, she thought, trying to analyze it clinically. It was distracting, though. Usually she had better
control than this. "And what about, uh... " Funny, she couldn't think of the name. The pregnant cop who turned out to be a killer.
Damn, it was hard to concentrate with him looking at her that way. 

What way? Stop it, Scully.

She wet dry lips. "Your commitment -- "

"Right, I'm a prince," he interrupted. He stepped forward and clasped her wrist, lifting her hand. "Cheerleading doesn't become
you, Dana. The team's already left the stadium." She swallowed hard and took an unconscious step back. He moved with her.
"So tell me, Agent Scully, just what was it you wanted to know?" His hand was like warm metal on her wrist. "I'd be glad to
answer any questions you've got. My life is an open book." He brushed his thumb gently over the pads of her palm.

"What are you doing?" It came out scared. She was breaking the unwritten rule; she never questioned it when he touched her,
always acted as though it were perfectly normal, perfectly professional... 

"I'm answering your questions, Scully. I'm trying to be helpful. Didn't you want me to be helpful when you came over?"

Her back was against the living room wall, and she wasn't at all sure how she'd gotten there. She ought to pull her hand out of
his grip, and she had every intention of doing so, just as soon as she could get that arm to obey further commands from her
brain.

Caffeine, right.

With his other hand he traced the side of her face, the curve of her neck; ran a fingertip over the collarbone just outside the
v-neck of her blouse. The hand moved down, stopping to cup her breast. And stayed there. She could feel the warmth radiate
through the crisp cotton shirt.

Tell me that's professional. She had to move, had to retreat, get out of here, talk to him on the phone after he was sane. After
she was sane, too. Reality was getting a little fuzzy just now. He tore up the rulebook first.

She just didn't seem to be up to the complex business of movement. He leaned in, but not to kiss her. He said, very warm and
soft, near her ear, "Don't pass up the opportunity. Once in a lifetime. I'll tell you anything you want to know." That voice was
going to suck the strength right out of her knees.

But she could still fake it. Couldn't she? She cleared her throat. "Mulder, I... "

Oh, good. Talking was still possible. That was nice. 

She went on, "I'm sorry, but I don't think of you that way."

Not bad. She'd done pretty well at controlling her voice, considering that the warmth emanating from his hand seemed to be
running through her entire body. 

His voice didn't change. "And to think you used to be my standard for honesty."

"That's your ego talking. Let go of me."

He said, not letting go of her with his eyes, "Dilation of the pupils is a sign of sexual arousal."

"It's a sign of cocaine use, too." If he didn't move his hand she was going to faint pretty soon. There was no way he couldn't feel
that heartbeat.

There was that edged smile again. "I wonder how your eyes would look if I said I had every intention of taking you into the
other room and making love to you until every cell in your body came simultaneously?"

She looked down at once. He laughed. 

She'd imagined sex with him any number of times, but never like this. Something tender, gentle, after confidences shared... It
was not a vision she could afford. She couldn't let go of that last hold on her own separateness, her own normalcy -- her roots
in a life apart from mysteries and her fear of being lost in the dark. Maybe Mulder could handle it, but she wasn't up to the strain
of living without a map.

And yet here she was, with something several continents away from her fantasies, and she was more than ready to go into that
other room, for the sex alone, and whether the admission was humiliating or not.

"Let go of me." She was going to collapse if he did. The hand holding her wrist was pressed against the wall, half supporting her.
It didn't matter, though. It was more dangerous than a case of homicide, being here, and she had to get to the door one way or
another.

He took his hand off her breast, filling her with a sense of relief and physical disappointment. She raised her eyes again. 

He picked up her other hand, rubbing it between his fingers. He lifted it to his lips, still meeting her eyes, and kissed it, touching
his tongue to the very center. She barely suppressed a groan. He slid the back of her hand against his cheek, then opened the
lax fingers and placed her palm against his chest. It was impossible not to imagine what the skin felt like beneath the shirt. She
swallowed hard.

He tugged at both her wrists, stepping away. "Come on. Come in the other room."

She was halfway across the room before a stab of sanity, or her familiar, welcome fear managed to penetrate. What the hell
was she doing? 

She pulled away and darted for the door, her knees shaking. She must look like an idiot, with this rubbery walk. He didn't
follow her. She hurried out as though a killer was after her, was through the door and down the stairs without waiting for the
elevator. Later. She would figure it all out later. She would talk to him later. On the phone. Possibly from another county.

In the street outside, she managed to get her keys out of her pocket -- thank god she hadn't brought a purse -- and slid in
behind the wheel. Her hands were trembling as she turned the key. She shouldn't drive like this.

No, but what if he was watching from the window? She was damned if she'd give him the satisfaction of knowing how out of
control she was. Traffic was light. She could make it around the block, park somewhere out of sight, and pull herself together.

Which she did, barely. She hadn't parallel-parked this badly since she was seventeen, and the curb was still some distance
away, but the hell with that. 

She adjusted the rear-view mirror, saw nervous eyes stare back at her. Now there's a reassuring sight. She took a few deep
breaths. What the hell just happened, anyway? Don't blame the water on this one, Agent Scully. He's drinking bottled now.

Of course, her own behavior was open to question as well. But we'll skip over that for the moment... Damn, she shouldn't
have run out the door like it was a rough frat party. That was embarrassing. There was obviously something seriously wrong in
the life of Fox Mulder, and she ought to at least call him on the phone. She reached for her cellular.

And what? Have a nice chat? Damn it, he'd talked to her as though -- as though he didn't know her.


                                                #

Back in his apartment, Mulder grabbed his sweatshirt and shorts, not bothering to disentangle the pile. He could change in the
car at the track. He was too angry, too frustrated, too wired in general, to even attempt to stay in tonight. He stuffed his keys in
his pocket and headed for the door. 

Why the hell did he have to do things like that? Like playing around with the wound would make it feel any better. Why this
compulsion to dive right for whatever nerve was raw and open and just asking to be touched?

Just asking to be touched... Excruciating pain can be so much fun. He yanked the door open.

And ran right into her. He stared, thrown off balance. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Mulder, I -- "

He'd regained control. "Leave something behind?" He pulled out his keys and tossed them to her. "But I forgot. I already gave
you keys. Take whatever you want, you've got everything else." He started down the hall. "Lock up when you're through. Not
that I know why I bother."

She ran after him, grabbing his arm. "I came back for you."

Determined, concerned, just a touch of brave uncertainty. You had to hand it to her. 

"Please," she said. "Tell me what's wrong."

It must be the eyes, he thought, those big, clear, hazel eyes. If he hadn't seen the evidence for himself, if he hadn't heard it, he
never would have believed it. Fox Mulder, known paranoid, and he would have gone on trusting her with every secret he had,
right down to his private thoughts. You looked into those good-soldier eyes and you thought, "Can't lie to Scully -- she's on my
side."

"You came back for me?" he asked, mockingly. "Well, I offered you me, but you didn't seem to -- "

"Stop it!" Her voice was sharp and miserable. "Will you just talk to me? Come back inside and talk to me!" 

Talk to me, don't make love to me -- it's much more productive.

Maybe he should go back inside with her. Maybe he'd learn something.

He said coldly, "Don't we spend enough time together at the office? Do you have to take over my private life, too?"

She actually flinched. He could be wrong, but it looked as though he were really hurting her. Well, it had been two years -- she
must live the role.

Not hurting her enough, though. The impulse spiked through him to say worse things, to watch those eyes cloud up with pain.
Of course, he'd be hurting himself, too. But he deserved it. He'd failed to do what he had to do to reach his goals. He'd let
himself soften up. She was performing her job, he'd failed to perform his; he deserved to be punished even more than --

I shouldn't go back inside with her, he thought suddenly, uneasily. I don't think it would be a good idea.

"Please," she said, and she reached out and took his hand with a gentle, little-girl uncertainty. As though she was afraid he might
explode on her, but cared too much about him to stop. As if she loved --

"Please come in and talk to me."

"Sure," he said easily. "If that's what you want."


                                                #

Thank god. She stepped inside and waited for him to hit the light switch.

And waited. "Aren't you going to turn on the light?"

"I'm saving on my electric bill." She could just see him in the faint glow that came through the Venetian blinds. "We don't need it,
do we? Just to talk." He picked up her hand again, absently, as though he were thinking of something else. "You'll need to name
a subject." He started to stroke it, at the base of the wrist, over and over. 

It wasn't fair. She was still sensitized from before. She was conscious of an overwhelming desire to step into him, as though into
a warm blanket, to bury her face in his chest.

"You said we could talk."

"We are talking. We could do the weather." He touched his mouth to the base of her neck. "Nice amount of rain lately. Good
for the farmers." He moved gently over her shoulder, pulling the blouse out of the way. When his mouth wasn't on her she could
feel his breath as he spoke. "Then there's political history. When in the course of human events... it becomes necessary... for one
people to dissolve the bands that have held them to another... "

"Political bands," she said.

"What?"

"Political bands," she said again, a little desperately. "That have held them to another."

"My, you're good, Scully. You're extremely good. But we knew that already." He was unbuttoning her blouse. 

"We're supposed to talk about you," she insisted, then hissed, "oh, god." Her bra had snapped open and his fingers rubbed
against her nipple.

"Front-loading bra, Agent Scully, I approve. A good soldier is always prepared."

"I... mean it," she said. "I... oh, god... listen to me..."

"You don't want the weather? You don't want politics? Oh, I see. You don't want general information. You want to help me."

His fingers circled her breast lazily, out of sync with his voice. "Yes. I. do." Dammit.

His mouth moved up to her ear. His whisper was low and hoarse. "Then help me. This is what I want. This is what I need."

The tone, the undeniable truth of what he was saying, pounded through the last of her defenses. She couldn't not respond to a
need that strong. She had to cling to him to keep from falling down. 

He backed her up, lifting her to the edge of the desk. He said, "Open my shirt for me. I want to feel your hands doing it."

This whole thing had to be a mistake, she thought vaguely; it was feeding into something, into someplace, wrong. But she no
longer felt able to stop it. She could ask him to stop it, but she couldn't do it herself. Her psyche felt tender and raw, like an egg
taken from boiling water.

"There's something wrong with this," she said.

He didn't answer her; he wasn't answering her anymore. He bent and put his mouth on her left nipple, still aching from its last
contact with his fingers, and suckled until she was lost in the rhythm. She wasn't sure when he stopped. She continued to feel it,
like some kind of stereo bass, throbbing through her whole body.

Afterwards she watched herself unbuttoning his shirt, slow and dreamlike, stopping to slide her hand over his skin. At the
moment her mind was totally blank of anything else to do, except possibly leave, and that was out of the question.


                                                #

He'd lost the edge of his anger in the face of her obvious response, and that bothered him. He needed the edge. 

Her hands on his chest felt exquisite... soft and gentle, clean and honest, everything he'd used to think she was. She muttered
something when one of the buttons fought back.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing." It was hard to tell in the faint light, but he thought she colored slightly.

"Tell me." You tell me something, Scully. Let's get some information coming in.

"I said, you're better at this than I thought you would be."

He laughed before he could stop himself. "I had a hard teacher." Then the chuckle faded. "Been wondering about this for a
while, have you?" He'd never really known what she was thinking, had he, not in anything. And yet she'd made him laugh, made
him react normally, made him forget for a second what the truth was. 

Nobody did that to him.

"What teacher?" she said.

"What?" he asked, puzzled for a second. He put his mouth on her other breast until he felt her arch. Then: "You met her," he
said. "Pay attention, there'll be a quiz." He slipped his hand inside the band of her skirt, stroking her. "I wouldn't want you to
miss any... biographical details." His hand moved over her stomach in long, slow circles. God, she was soft. It would be easy to
get ahead of himself here.

She must have thought so too, for she moaned and he felt her legs go around him. 

She did it at the same instant he'd imagined it. It must be valuable, he told himself, for an undercover agent to be in tune with
their target's thinking processes. But then, Scully was superb in everything she did.

"Not yet," he said gently, disentangling himself. 

She made a protesting sound, but let him do it. He pulled off his necktie, hanging loosely around his neck, and looped it around
her wrist. 

She looked down at it, slow, dazed. "What are you doing?" 

"You said you wanted to help me," he reminded her. 

"But not... I don't think this is a good idea... "

He'd already tied her wrists together. "Wait."

He moved away, bending to retrieve his briefcase from the other side of the desk. When he came back a second later he saw
her sitting there, vulnerably, hands in her lap, like a girl scout. She looked about twelve. Although he supposed twelve-year-olds
didn't generally have figures this lush, more the pity for twelve-year-old boys. He lifted the handcuffs and attached one end to
the hot water pipe beside the desk. He tested the pipe first to make sure it was cool; can't have twelve-year-old girl scouts
getting burnt.

Her eyes widened at the cuffs. "You can't... listen to me, Fox, please, I don't want to... "

She was far gone. She was asking him, not telling him. 

He felt an immediate stirring of sympathy, and suppressed it. So she was afraid -- she'd been afraid from the beginning, for
whatever reason. Maybe it was something in herself. Or maybe they'd told her not to get involved, and she was breaking their
rules. Or maybe they'd told her to go along with him, and she wasn't ready. That could have been what brought her back so
quickly; a phone call, and orders.

So she was afraid. So what? It was nothing to do with him. Let her take care of herself.

She had reservations. She could get over them. He certainly had no intention of respecting them.

He kissed her mouth for the first time, feeling her lips stiffen, then relax. He moved his tongue and felt her open against it. She
still offered herself to him freely, and he felt ashamed of what he was doing to her. He ignored it, tongue clinging to her, his
mouth pressed against hers as though he would suck back everything he'd lost in her. And the whole time it went on, he thought:
I want my life back.

Finally he took his mouth away. She looked dazed and spent, and so, he suspected, did he. He clicked the other end of the cuff
shut around her wrist, and said, "Don't call me Fox."


                                                #

She'd been out of control for some time, but the metal on her wrist was a concrete admission of that fact. Although he'd seen
that it wasn't physically uncomfortable.

He moved in close in front, arms around her, sliding his hands up along her spine, under the open shirt. "It bothers you?" 

She couldn't admit her doubts, which anyway were far too complicated to try and express right now, so she gave the second
reason. "Where I come from, cuffs are for bad guys."

"Ah. So you want me to take them off?" He'd found the spot at the base of her neck and was kneading it, gently, but deeper
each time. She let her head fall back and her eyes close, floating. "Scully, are you listening to me?" he asked, his voice amused.

"Not if... not if you want them. Please don't ask me, I can't..." She was genuinely disturbed. Right now she wanted whatever he
wanted, she couldn't help it, and it wasn't fair to ask her to try and refuse. 

"All right." He moved his hands through her hair. "Never mind." 

She ached to put her arms around him, but she couldn't. She ached for more than that, in fact, and was torn between wishing he
would keep doing what he was doing, forever, and wishing he would go faster.

It was all slow. He moved gradually over her shoulders and her chest with his mouth, stopping, sucking, so that there wasn't an
inch still dry. He explored her right breast slowly, tonguing the aureole, clockwise, thoroughly, before he took the nipple in his
mouth. She groaned and tried to pull him closer with her legs. His hand slid down, finally reaching between her thighs.

Thank god. She heard her own hard breathing. Her body was one, long, sensitive ache. It felt as though she'd been running for
hours. Shivering, she felt his fingers trail through her until he touched the center of the ache, the place where she was throbbing,
the heart of the engine. He scraped it once, teasingly. It was like being shot with electricity. She moaned at once and felt her legs
tighten around him. 

He touched it lightly again, then withdrew. She was going to lose her mind. She was going to explode. He couldn't stop now.

He put his lips to her navel. Oh, god. "Please. Don't stop."

"I'm not stopping." Her stomach, her whole lower body, was melting. 

"No, I mean, don't stop the -- what you did before."

"You're a doctor, Scully. Be specific."

"Oh, jesus. Oh, god."

He tongued the navel gently, one hand cupping her breast. "You're still being general."

"I can't stand it." The fingers played with her nipple. 

No one had ever taken her on a tease this long before. He clearly believed in giving roughly the same amount of attention to
foreplay as Leonardo da Vinci had given to The Last Supper. Art was a wonderful thing, but she was going to die in a minute. 


                                                #


He wasn't sure when the idea had gotten hold of him. but the way she'd gone pure quicksilver when he first touched her
suggested she wanted him, had wanted him for a long time. Lied about that, too, huh, Scully?

Her body, at least, possessed a certain clarity. It communicated beautifully. 

He wanted to take something away from it. Nowhere equal to what she'd taken away from him, but it was a start. He moved
upward along her length, aware of her disappointment, putting his mouth against the hollow of her neck, tasting her skin and his
own self-loathing. The skin was still fresh against his tongue, even slick with her sweat and his saliva. He could feel the energy
boiling beneath the surface, like the pool inside a volcano.

He empathized with it. He felt the same way. He wanted to end the tease, to be inside all that energy and all that fresh heat.
Everything he did to her he did to himself.

...But tormenting yourself was irrelevant if it gave pain to your enemies.


                                                #


"This is... this isn't fun anymore."

"You noticed that too," he said thickly. 

"I mean it." She wanted to take hold of his hair, make him meet her eyes, but he'd taken that option away from her.

It was no longer a tease, it was virtual torment, over the line into some kind of abuse. (Can see myself explaining that to a judge,
she thought dazedly; "Your honor, he abused me with extended foreplay.") But it wasn't lovemaking, she was aware of that, and
abuse was the only word that seemed to fit. 

His gaze did look up to meet hers, coolly defiant.

"You're saying, I should stop fucking with you, unless I fuck you."

"Yes."

"Well, if you want me to go... " He pulled himself free from her legs, stepped away from the desk. She stared at him, panting.
His voice was untouched, but his eyes were as cloudy as hers must be, and his own expression flattened with need.

Would he really walk away? Probably not, he was pretty far gone.

Not as far gone as she was, obviously, or he would be inside her, where she wanted him to be.

She swallowed. The idea of his leaving now was physically painful, like being dumped, naked, into a blizzard. She didn't even
like the idea of his being two feet away. She wanted him back, now, she wanted his hands on her now. What if he didn't untie
her right away? Her body was burning up, charring into bits. 

"I don't want you to go."

"You're sure."

"Dammit, I said it."

"Okay, Scully, no need to be so gracious." Then he knelt down in front of her.

Could it get any worse? Apparently it could. He teased her, quickly, in a thousand directions, never satisfying anywhere. This
time when he moved up, over her body, she arched, unable to stop responding even through the hurt. Her nipples ached,
throbbing. 

"Please finish it. Please come inside. I need you." She was distantly surprised by the note of entreaty in her voice. She'd never
begged for anything in her life. 

"In a while."

"God. Now, please, you have to." She didn't seem able to stop. It was like a reflex.

He kissed her forehead, almost chastely. "You're repeating yourself, Scully. That's not like you." 

She was hardly aware of what he was doing; she couldn't seem to concentrate on anything but the vacuum of need that had
caught her up, covering everything else in a dark whirlwind. "You can do anything you want. But you have to finish me. Please."
She realized what she'd said. "I'm sorry. I can't stop. I can't stop." 

His face was just before her then, and she looked into it as she spoke. Into darkened eyes only a few inches from hers, lips
compressed with effort, a forehead sheened with sweat -- all at odds with his voice, but most of all the eyes. What she saw
there shocked her from her own hurt. She had never seen him look that way at anything that wasn't part of the Quest. She had
never seen him look that way at anything that wasn't destroying him.

"I'm sorry," she heard herself say again, no longer clear on what she meant.

And saw him flinch.


                                                #


Scully, on the brink of torture, apologizing for a breach of good manners. 

How could she hold on? Where was that strength coming from, and how could she give it -- all that certainty of devotion -- to
people like the ones who'd torn up his life and so many others? How could she look at him as though he was the one she held
on for, as though she trusted him, even now, no matter how much hurt he caused -- 

He was going to break in a minute, he thought suddenly.

It didn't matter what his mind knew, his body and his soul wanted to believe, right now, and he could feel control slipping. It
wasn't even about his cock. It was about those eyes, and the knowledge in them that he was loved and understood no matter
what he did here. It was about wanting to --

-- believe --

How could she be so strong and he be so weak? That protective wall of anger was falling. He could see the bricks going down
and he couldn't stop it. He didn't know what was in his face, but she said softly, "It's all right. It's all right."

It pushed out the last brick. He took her in his arms, unable not to. They were both crying.

Then he was inside her and falling apart.


                                                #


It was like being impaled on the spinning point of the universe. She had never felt anything like this in her life.

Rocking back and forth in the darkness, birth and death, pain and joy, complete triumphant dissolution... 

She felt that fine dotted line that kept them separate, that kept her out of the darkness, disappear; and she was no longer
frightened by it.

She wrapped her legs around him and they clung together. 


                                                #


He felt it when the line disappeared. He was losing himself, he knew, but since he couldn't stop it from happening he allowed a
sense of relief to wash through him. He'd been trying to lose himself for years. The comfort was both peaceful and erotic.

He told himself that she was a traitor. That what he was holding in his arms was false, an illusion. 

Some illusions are worth any price you pay for them, he thought, unable to keep from giving himself over to it. 

Much later, when he could, he unlocked the cuff. Her arms went around him immediately, hands touching him everywhere. 

He smiled. He could stay lost for a while longer.


                                                #


She woke up in the bed, where he'd carried her a few hours ago. She woke slowly, happily, secure, like waking to the sound of
lake water lapping. She wanted him, and he wasn't there, so she sat up. The sound of an electric razor came from the bathroom.
Judging by the bars of sunlight slanting through the blinds, it was late morning. They ought to be at work.

She grinned and mentally reported to Skinner: "Couldn't come in, sir. I was raising Agent Mulder's morale. I did it for the
Bureau, sir." She giggled.

The sound of the electric razor stopped.

A second later it started again, and a minute later he came out, freshly shaven, in clean underwear. He looked at her, his
expression unreadable. "How do you feel?"

She smiled, a wicked, sated smile. "Like the Allies on V-E Day."

After a minute he said evenly, "You have a way with words."

Her smiled faded. "What's wrong?"

"I have to get dressed." He took his pants from the chair and started pulling them on. 

This wasn't the way she'd thought it would be. She hesitated. "Are you going to work?"

He let out a deep sigh. "Yes, Agent Scully, I am going to work. You win. Skinner wins. The Bureau wins." He took a white shirt
off a hanger, put it on, and began to button it. "Everybody wins."

She stared at him. It wasn't quite as it had been yesterday; he was on a different planet from the one he'd inhabited then. It just
wasn't the same one she was on. How was it possible, after what they'd felt and done... and known, with a wild certainty, an
ordained surprise... well, she'd felt it, anyway.

No, damn it, he'd been there with her. She was sure of it. He was in some kind of denial, but why? Why did he have to deny
being happy? 

She watched as he buttoned his cuffs neatly, then sat down to don shoes and socks. She rose from bed, still naked, and walked
over beside him. He froze for a second, watching her. She put out her hand tentatively. "Let me -- "

He raised his own hand, palm out. "No. Just... no. Excuse me."

He stood up and went into the bathroom, grabbing a tie from the door-rack on the way.


                                                #


He stood in front of the mirror, tying his tie.

He should go on with her, he should use her the way she'd used him. He could feed false information through her -- that was
what you did with double agents, wasn't it? But god, it was hard.

She'd turned him inside out. Even now he was still vibrating from it. Even now he wanted to believe, wanted her to take the pain
away for a while.

He'd had everything on his side, right up to regulation law enforcement equipment, and still he'd lost. He'd willingly chosen an
illusion over the truth. 

She walked up behind him and slid her arms around his waist. She leaned on him, her cheek against his back, her voice
half-muffled. "Whatever it is, let me help," she said.

He pulled away from her hastily. He strode out into the living room, glanced around for the keys, grabbed them, and went for
the door. He was vaguely aware that she'd followed, and was standing in the bedroom doorway, staring at him. He didn't know
it from looking back, though, because he didn't.

He slammed the door on his way out and stopped in the hallway, his hand pressed against the wall, breathing hard. He looked
at that hand. It was trembling.

He should have taken his gun with him, but he wasn't going back in there.

Yesterday she'd been the one afraid. Today he was.

Good work, Agent Mulder.





Alert readers will notice that the initial scene with the cuffs is eerily similar to a scene from "The Hand We Were Dealt." At the
time I wrote "Hand" I didn't anticipate posting this fragment, and thought I may as well cannibalize the remark about the
radiator, as it had a certain utilitarian value in establishing the tone of what was going on. Trust and harm, those familiar issues.

This fragment also inspired a more coherent view of the same issue -- the story "Betrayal," by Laura Anne Gilman, available on
the Gossamer Archive. I recommend it highly.



            

© Jane Mortimer
Tuesday, September 9, 1997