Subject: NEW! "Through His Many Gabled Gardens" by Brinson <1/1> From: mrskrychek@aol.com (MrsKrychek) Date: 18 Oct 1997 02:51:51 GMT -Please archive at Gossamer and anywhere else as long my name's attached- Title: Through His Many Gabled Gardens Author: Brinson Rating: G Classification: SA Spoilers: If haven't watched Memento Mori yet, what the heck are you doing reading fanfiction?? Disclaimers: Chris Carter, yada, yada, yada. Summary: In a desperate attempt to find a cure, Scully approaches the Cigarette Smoking Man in his unusual garden. Much Thanks: You know the drill. This one is an extra special dedication to CiCi, who has graciously humored me through a rare week of fanfictioning like you've never seen and the Freakish One, who is proof that you CAN gain friends through feedback. - - - - - - - - - - "grin as your judgment is passed I hear he likes confidence and understanding for he is a sinner himself" -taken from the poem "Forever" by Brian Fink- Perhaps an arbitrary reminder of the rarity of time, her hair is short now. Coming in like bloodied sprigs of summer grass, it is not of length yet to be caught by the sea wind, nor toyed with by the idle hands of men. To her, it is the gruesome decoration of slowly shattering skull. It is like the plate tectonics she learned of in school; thin ridges of bone, being bullied from within to mold themselves into a new globe of decaying gray matter and dead eyes. The beast within her is scratching on the walls of her head, the dirty fingernails eroding the fragile shell in which sits the pearl of her intelligence. She knows that one day the clam will snap open and the beast will finally win. It will add her pearl to its string, a black treasure clicking to a rest quietly among many other such harvested gems. She is no different than a million others united on the thin strand of a headhunter's pride. She is dying as she wanders through his many gabled gardens. Dying as her pale skin disappears amongst the wash of Moorish arches; dying as trickling ponds reflect a fleeting image of herself in the eyes of gilded carp. The clawing has become incessant, a beating heart of a ticking clock. Reminding her, yes, she is dying. Dying as the sting of a thorn catches her palm drifting lazily over a bed of roses; her blood cold as she sucks it into lifeless lips. It is here where her carefully measured footsteps falter, her bony hips swaying with the boughs of olive limbs; the malnourished branches forming ironwork scrolls so intent upon locking the dark heavens from her tired reach. Why she reaches anyway when the beast is upon her back-- lead upon her shoulders--is beyond her. She is too drowsy from the exertion of clawing at the sky for the mysteries; the shadows and the unseen. She is her own beast and fears the clouds will never hatch her a pearl. Yet she has come to these stoned pathways for redemption. She knows not of the man waiting for her; her die was long cast among the labyrinth and she knows her gamble is nothing but the shining reward of a segue-way into another life. She has numbed herself to the consequences; that is why to sense the warm prick would be to feel. And she has no desire to. For the blood is tasteless on her tongue and she knows that she is nothing more than a corpse lost among roses; vulgar flowers that should be anointing her casket in sprays of red, pink, and white. They should be permeating her indifferent nose with their lovers' fragrance; clutched across her breasts by apathetic hands. Not filling her vision in carefully laid rows; blocks of blossoms waving in eerie synchrony. Petals filling the air like snow, rushing past her in sudden blistering gusts. Settling on currents of air, they float on unseen surf, swelling in like whitecaps only to crash at the whitewashed wall of the garden. "You came," a weathered voice says, from within the eclipse of an arch at the foot of a tea rose patch. She looks wearily into the blinding glare of the delicately curved gable, mesmerized as a hand pinches a creamy bud and drops it disdainfully, fluttering to the pebbled ground. She stares as the bulb scampers across the pebbles, carried on the body of the wind to the sea; against all odds absurd tears reach her eyes. "Agent Scully." She blinks at the name, thrown so carelessly in the breeze of colorful petals. A shadow of shoulders, neck, and legs dissolves and remolds itself against the blank face of the garden wall, smoke curling around the wrist of an elegantly suited man. "Yes," she says, her eyes drawing this figure in, the jagged lines of a craggy face married to the soft edges of time bought wrinkles. "Why have you come to me?" he asks, fingers twirling a stump of a cigarette absentmindedly; the glittering ashes falling in rings, soon swept up by the wind. He looks away, watery eyes finding the sea with a bored sigh. "Because I'm dying," she says, eyes darting over the passage of a dim cloud of withering rose petals. The beast within scratches feverishly; she can feel the cold clash of its ivory talons marring her fragile skull. "Are you sure?" he asks critically, taking in what little remains of her previous shape: reedy curves accentuated by a pair of jaded blue eyes. "I've got a tumor the size of a fist in my head. I think I'm dying," she says, words forming a blank monotone. He doesn't laugh. His face furrows into a gnarled squint as he leans down, plucking another rose. He jerks off a yellow petal and rubs his fingers together thoughtfully, releasing the silky bit of flower to the sea gusts. "I'm have cancer," he says, looking at the cigarette before sending it on a flickering arc over the wall. "I'm not surprised," she says in a low voice reminiscent of sadness. Beasts begetting monsters. The world has never changed, just her perception. It harbors monsters and always will. The greedy always prosper; the beast shall have another polished beauty for its dirty thread. "Nor am I. It's only ironic that the god be struck down by his own creation." He opens his jacket, withdrawing another slim cigarette from the gray satin lining. "You think yourself a god?" "I'm not divine." His lips curl ravenously around the orange butt. "You're not my god," she says, staring at the blood seeping across the minute cracks of her hand. It will soon dry into a hard crust, but she doubts she will ever have the time to see the white scar creep across her palm. "But you believe in me. How strange." He produces a lighter, shining like mercury as he flicks it with unsteady hands. "No I don't." A flame leaps from the poised lips of the lighter; he lifts it to the cigarette and sets it smoldering in a moment of quiet thoughtfulness. "Then why have you come? Surely it's not for my roses," he says harshly, toppling her angry glance with his own glare. "They're beautiful," she mutters uneasily. How strange, indeed. They--both unwilling vessels defiled by the presence of a beast--meet in a garden of rose petals drifting on the wind like buoys lost to the currents of the ocean. The soiled stand righteously in the garden of the pure. "They're dying." He sighs, an ashen cloud forming arcane scribblings of smoke before being dispersed by the wind. "I've tried everything. Yet they wilt." His soft gaze washes over the neatly clipped rows, lips forming silent words. "My science refuses to heal them," he says, raising his eyes. A gust rushes through the branches above her, screaming in the eerie tongue of a banshee. "So it's fallen to me, the humble man. I am the caretaker; I sprinkle them with holy water and they bloom." "Yet they're still dying," she murmurs, running cool fingers over her brow. "Yes. They're dead, Scully. Saint's relics preserved under the guise of faith, I should say." He moves an errant patch of gray hair from his eyes. "But look at them. They still dance in the wind; it only strips them slowly of their beauty." His eyes clutch hers in a cold embrace, asking for comprehension in the liquid depths of her watercolor eyes. "Is it a cure you still want?" She swallows, a grating sound weaving an intricate loop into the slow whirlwind of petals and rhythmic plodding of water into the base of a fountain; in the distance, the hiss of drawing waves and the cymbal clap of wind-chimes. The scrape of the beast's desperate fingers drones past her ears. "Yes." "Then show me a testament of your faith." Her legs sink beneath her; she clutches the thorny stem of a white rose and wills herself up. "I have nothing." Her voice is strong, nearly resentful. "I'm sure you do." He exhales deeply, removing the cigarette from his mouth. She stares at her feet while her arms wander over the bones protruding from her back, picking their way up to her neck. She pauses; biting her lip. Her fingers fumble, unhooking a miniature clasp. She looks momentarily at the crumbled mound of a gold and flings it at his chest, streaking like a falling star over the roses dancing, charmed snakes in the breeze. He flinches as it falls to his feet, and leaning over, he retrieves it from a tiny bowl of pebbles and dirt. "This is but a trinket, Scully," he says contemptuously as his eyes sway back and forth with the pendulum swing of a tiny cross. She watches in dim shock as he turns and heaves it over the garden walls, a shimmer of gold disappearing into the dark sky. "I have nothing else to give you!" she seethes, throwing her dripping hand into the air with a drizzle of blood on the snowy roses below. "I'm know you do," he says carefully. Her next words fail to reach her lips they meet, quivering. She thrusts her hand into her pocket and produces a glass tube, a deadly bead rattling within. "Is this what you want?" she asks breathlessly, grasping the slippery container glazed in both her figurative and literal blood. "I don't know. What is it?" His eyes narrow. "An implant. A metal chip pulled from my neck," she says through grinding teeth. "Ah. That will serve," he says, oddly amicable as he extends a misshapen hand. Her eyes flare, briefly twin Roman candles as she pulls her hand back to her breast reflexively. "Scully, give it here! I don't have time for this," he says, with an irritated puff of smoke punctuating the words. "What will you give me?" "Your precious cure," he wheezes. "Why haven't you been given it?" The ghostly remains of her eyebrow hunches. He winces, a shaking hand catching a pink petal streaming past his face. "Because I don't wish to become the roses," he says simply, watching as her expression falls. As does the tube, rolling in flashes of glass and metal into a pond, plopping softly into the water. Her mouth gapes as it comes to an anonymous rest among a bottom filled with gleaming stones; her thighs fold into her calves as she lets out a hushed moan. "Agent Scully." She doesn't bother to look up; she can feel the dig of the beast's nails as it grasps her mind like a vice. "Scully. You will have your panacea. Leave me," says the voice, burdened with an unreachable sadness. Her eyes snap open; searching through the twisted Medusa hair of rose stems, she glimpses and instant of blue through the sea of deep green. She drags herself to an embarrassed stand, wiping off her legs as tremors race through her spine. A trail of smoke leads her to the hurrying figure of the man, heels clicking across the rocky paths as he pulls a shining, dog-eared photograph from his jacket. Her head pivots, following the man as her mind races to find words of thanks, hope; of question. But it is quelled when she sees the familiar smile of a small pigtailed girl beaming at her over the shoulder of an unknown man through a haze of time and smoke. Her heart dips with alarm; yet strangely, the beast is silent. ~bmt 10/17/97 - - - - - - - - - Author's Notes: If any of you have followed my fanfiction (Ha!), you may notice some similarities between this and "She Sells Seashells", which are wholly intended. (Heck, this is "She Sells" reiterated. I'm not afraid to admit it.) Though neither sequel nor prequel, they are companion pieces--the original title of this short was "By the Seashore". And, as always, feedback is greatly appreciated at MrsKrychek@AOL.COM, so throw me a line! Don't make me beg......