Disclaimers, etc, in chapter one.

PREPONDERANCE
By Alanna Rabun

Chapter Nine. 

+++++ 

He awoke to darkness. 

A languid, satisfied pulse coursed through his body.  Mulder immediately
thought of the cliche, of someone looking for all the world like they'd gotten
laid the night before.  He imagined that anyone who saw him would notice the
contentment rolling off his skin. 

One arm stretched across the bed for her, seeking out her warmth and beauty. 
Instead, his arm moved over cool, empty sheets.  Immediately he panicked,
thinking she had left him.  Rising up on one elbow, he searched the room and
couldn't suppress a sigh of relief when he saw her sitting in front of the
window, where dawn slowly broke. 

Stepping out of bed, he murmured, "Scully?" 

She didn't answer.  He walked over to the window and found her staring off into
the middle distance, her knees pulled up to her chest.  She had put on her
clothes from the day before, and her mussed hair shone like a halo in the
waxing sunrise. 

Mulder placed a hand on her shoulder, but her body barely reacted.  Then, after
a moment, she wordlessly raised one hand and pressed something into his palm.  
He opened his hand.   A clump of bloody tissues. 

He nearly fell to the floor. 

She spoke, her voice equal parts bemusement and melancholy. 

"I never expected anything like this, growing up.  Never expected to be a
fugitive wanted for first-degree murder, or to be dying because I deliberately
removed a microchip designed to keep me alive.  A *microchip* -- God, how
ridiculous is that?  Certainly wasn't mentioned in my copy of Gray's Anatomy." 
She paused.  "But do you know what's really strange, Mulder?" 

He didn't respond, and as the silence stretched, he wondered if perhaps she did
want an answer.  "Instead, the past six years have made it plausible.  Hell,
they make me believe it.  When did I lose that innocence, that surety of self? 
I think it was probably the day I walked into your office." 

Mulder couldn't tell if the thoughtful tone in her voice was regret, but he
felt pangs of guilt all the same. 

She still had not turned to face him, but instead kept talking.  "I don't blame
you -- you have to understand that.  But God, Mulder, I feel like I've lost all
sense of control in my life." 

Her body seemed to freeze, and a chill coursed through his own.  He wanted so
much, so goddamned much, to take her back into his arms and hold her close.  To
make her feel anything but this.  Instead, he let her speak. 

Then she said the words that had the power to kill him. 

"I don't think we should have.... done that, last night." 

And she still wouldn't look at him. 

Despair hit him first, then quickly was replaced by a rush of something dark,
almost close to rage.  He stepped around her chair and wedged himself between
it and the window, fully intending to lash out at her. 

And then he looked at her. 

Her knees were pulled tightly to her chest, and she looked unbearably small. 
In the morning light, fresh, still-damp tracks of tears shone, and carmine
stains of blood on her upper lip made them seem fuller, more dangerous. 

Instead of the fury he'd expected them to carry, his words sounded plaintive,
bereft. 

"You regret it?" 

She finally met his gaze, and he saw something there he had not expected. 

Fear. 

"I..." her voice trailed off, unable to sustain the words. 

Voice stronger this time, "Do you regret it, Scully?" 

Still, silence. 

Tears threatening to spill over his eyelids, he pled once again, "Do you regret
--" he almost said 'sex', "-- making love with me?" 

Her voice was small, so small.  "No." 

"Why did you come to me, then?"  He had to know. 

"Because I wanted you.  Because I needed to make love with you before...." 

He knew what she was trying to say, as his palm opened and the bloody tissues
fluttered soundlessly to the floor. 

Before she died. 

All her earlier bitterness seemed to have melted into a deep sadness. 

"Before I die, Mulder." 

Her words suddenly infuriated him.  "Damn you, Scully!" 

"What?"  Her eyes widened, startled. 

"Damn you for being so selfish.  Did you think you could just fuck me to see
what it felt like, then walk away and die?"  He clenched his fists to suppress
the urge to lash out at her.  "Dammit, Scully.  I thought it meant something to
you.  I guess I was wrong." 

Mulder angrily moved from the window and walked toward the back of the room,
pacing back and forth. As the wind his movement created hit his skin, he
noticed that he was still naked.  Despair had made him see only her, but now he
had to cover himself, to press the anger further within him.  He grabbed his
jeans from the floor and hurriedly pulled them on, yanking on the zipper so
hard that it nearly tore, and almost crying out in pain as some of his pubic
hair caught in the teeth. 

"Mulder, listen to me," she called in a small voice.  He heard her rise from
the chair but he didn't turn around to face her.  "Listen to me!"  she
repeated. 

He froze, chest heaving with furious breath. 

"Do you know what I realized last night?"  He didn't answer.  "When we made
love -- as you came inside me -- I realized that I love you." 

The words flowed over him, their heat sizzling over his cool skin. 

"I love you, Mulder.  And I just wanted you to feel that before.... before I'm
gone." 

He found his knees refusing to hold him, and he crumpled to the floor.  As the
shockwaves of contact bit at his bones, suddenly she was there, her arms
pulling him close. 

"You're not going to die," he chanted through his tears.  "You're not going to
die, Scully." 

She didn't respond, and he felt wetness on his shoulder and her sobbing chest
pressing into his side. 

He felt a desperate need to tell her everything, to tell her the details of the
deal he'd only mentioned in vague terms the night before.  "I called the
Cigarette Man last night.  I told him that we would leave them alone, if he'd
save you." 

"How..."  Her voice trailed off in a question. 

"I told him that if the chip were put back in your neck -- I still have it,
Scully!  I took it from your cabin and it's in my wallet."  He interjected
excitedly, "I told him that they had to promise it wouldn't be used to control
you in any way.  That they'd leave you alone." 

She didn't speak, and he turned in her arms to see her face.  She still had a
look on her face of interest mixed with something close to horror.  "How do you
know they'll live up to that promise?" 

Mulder finally felt triumphant for the first time in ages.  "I told him that if
we found out it was being used to control you, or that if you--" he couldn't
bring himself to say 'died', "--I'd expose them.  I'd tell every reporter in
America what they'd done to you, and to everyone." 

And then she did the thing which he least expected -- she laughed. 

The room chimed with the sound of her amusement.  "Wonderful, Mulder.  I'm not
sure that would necessarily bring them to their knees, but it's a wonderful
plan." 

He couldn't resist chuckling a bit too.  "We're going to win.  I know it." 

Then he kissed her. 

She stiffened for a split second, then returned the kiss with fervor.  Her lips
tasted of the peculiar iron taste of blood.  He bathed her face with kisses,
then moved his mouth to her hair, short and black and so different from before.
 Between kisses, he whispered, "I don't care what happens when we get back to
D.C.  As long as you're alive, Scully, we've won." 

They lay together on the floor, bodies meshing into one another, until time
ceased to exist. 

+++++ 

Tonight we are at a Howard Johnson's just outside of Indianapolis.  From our
room I can see the lights of the interstate, mocking me with the knowledge of
only one more day on the road before we are back in Maryland. 

We have just found each other, but have only one more day to be together before
we are torn apart. 

We're still unwilling to risk a dinner out in public, so Scully remains in the
room while I drive around the neighborhood, looking for some promising
take-out.  We probably could have managed another couple of hours on the road,
but we journey under the unspoken agreement that this trip must last as long as
possible.  Besides, I want one long night with her before.... 

I refuse to say the words. 

At the next off-ramp, I spot a Fridays and head inside to the bar, where I
place a to-go order full of all sorts of foods:  teriyaki chicken for two,
caesar salad, potato skins, and some dessert called a "chocolate sack". 

Next door is a bank with a drive-thru ATM.  I hesitate a bit before withdrawing
as much as my daily limit will allow.  Since we're going back to D.C., our
enemies' tracking us down through my transactions doesn't alarm me as much as
it might have before. 

Just as I'm turning to head back to the freeway, I find a women's clothing
store in a shopping strip.  Remembering that Scully has not had a change of
clothes since yesterday morning at the ranch, I select several plain pairs of
underwear and bras -- not quite as plush as Scully deserves, but certainly more
practical in the long-run. 

I suppress the thought that long-run could easily mean incarceration. 

Arms laden with bags, I return to the motel. 

When I let myself through the door, I find Scully stepping out of the shower. 
She doesn't bother to tuck the towel around her body as she finishes drying
off, and I'm a bit surprised at how comfortable with me she seems to have
become since we made love last night. 

As she settles down on the bed, something close to delight on her face upon
seeing the shopping bags and selection of food, she speaks.  "I realized
something while you were gone." 

"Yeah?" 

"I haven't had a nosebleed since this morning." 

I'm speechless. 

She must have caught the look on my face, because she hastily adds, "It doesn't
necessarily mean anything, Mulder.  When I was first getting sick last year,
sometimes I'd go for days without a nosebleed." 

I raise my hand and brush some wet hair away from her brow, still a bit taken
aback at how different it is, short and dyed black.  "Still, Scully, it's a
start.  That's good."  She looks at me for a long moment, and I continue, "Why
is it that you can never be truly optimistic?" 

She does a slow double-take. 

Before allowing her a word in edgewise, I continue.  "You just told me
wonderful news -- that you haven't had a nosebleed all day.  But instead of
being happy about it, you take the negative angle, immediately qualifying the
statement with a disclaimer that it ultimately means nothing." 

She's gaping at me now. 

"Why can't you just be hopeful for a change?"  I can feel something like
frustration pooling in my stomach. 

And then it turns to nausea as she murmurs, "I can't afford the luxury of
hope." 

I clench my jaw, and turn to face her full-on. 

"Hope is the only luxury we have, Scully." 

She holds my gaze for a moment, then brings one finger up to my jaw, tracing
the still-tense muscles.  Her voice is a whisper.  "I'm trying.  God, I'm
trying." 

"I know."  Our whispering voices twine around one another, like strands of DNA
-- the double-helix of hope and fear and pain and love.  "But sometimes you
just have to stop trying so hard and let it happen." 

Her fingers continue to trace the contours of my face, touching me as if I am
being baptized, when in reality she's the one finally allowing the idea of hope
to wash over her with its cleansing holy water. 

And we finally begin to make love, letting the emotions surround us, floating
within them.  It is beautiful and bittersweet, all the more so because of the
knowledge that, as the world closes in around us, hope is all we have. 

+++++ 

As they drove through state after state, the world seemed to become surreal, as
if they had moved out of it and into another plane of being, where only the two
of them existed. 

They never spoke of what awaited them in Maryland. 

The time was spent in laughs and discussions and lovers' murmurings.  What did
you want to be, growing up?  Do you remember such-and-such case?  What are your
fantasies, and how can I help fulfill them?  Scully and Mulder learned more
about each other's inner souls than they had in the past six years.  And for
the first time they truly felt comfortable with one another, both as lovers and
as dear friends.  Honesty and good humor can be a panacea, but also a mask,
hiding the demons they would soon have to confront. 

She laughed for the first time in ages -- a gentle, true laugh of
effervescence.  Laughter is contagious, and he shared in the smiles. 

And then, they passed a sign announcing the Maryland state line, and reality
cruelly beckoned them, pulling them kicking and screaming out of the idyll they
had created.  Only a couple of hours to D.C. 

Scully could physically feel the electricity in the Explorer change from a
positive to a negative charge.  She had to remind herself to breathe, to inhale
the free air and appreciate it before it was gone. 

Her lover approached the shift indirectly, as he was wont to do.  "Do you know
what's strange, Scully?" 

"Mmm?" she murmured her response. 

"I don't feel anything." 

She turned to look at him.  "How do you mean?" 

He continued to drive, always staying less than five miles an hour over the
speed limit.  They passed the Maryland welcome center, which trumpeted, "So
Many Things To Do,  So Close Together",  but she couldn't smile at the slogan. 

"I spend nearly my entire life searching for my sister.  And now I've found
her, so to speak.... but I can't feel anything about her being dead." 

Scully bit her lip, trying to stave off the crushing guilt for just a while
longer. 

"The night before I saw you in that interrogation room, the Cigarette Man came
to see me, and told me that the woman you shot was the real Samantha." 

"And you believe him?" 

"I don't know."  Scully heard him sigh deeply.  "I do.  I'm not sure why, but I
believe him.  I had the pathologist who did the autopsy run some blood tests,
and her type matched mine.  My mother--" he paused, "My mother was going to run
DNA tests, but I don't know if she ever did." 

"You know they can manipulate DNA, Mulder." 

"Yeah, I know," a note of frustration crept into his voice, "but if this woman
was a clone, do you think they would allow her to even be autopsied?  If they
wanted to hide something, or if she wasn't biologically human, the body would
have been long gone." 

Scully wasn't sure whether she shared his confidence, but she listened to him
continue to speak. 

"The weird thing is that everything tells me I should be mourning -- hell, I'm
a psychologist.  Man discovers the sister he has been searching for his entire
life has been murdered -- by his best friend, no less.  My textbooks would then
say that man goes apeshit and has a nervous breakdown." 

His voice had a note of rising panic, and she began to feel the same in her
veins.  Then his voice quieted, and she listened to him breathe. 

"But I don't even really feel upset.  I mean, I'm upset, I'm disturbed -- but
not heartbroken.  God, maybe all my years of investigation have erased my soul.
 Maybe I'm too damaged to care anymore, and I've made her into a construct
rather than a true person, and that's why her death doesn't really make much of
an impact on me." 

Under other circumstances, Scully would have kept silent, slowly inching away
from him, trying to distance herself from his emotions.  But they were involved
too deeply for that. 

"Or maybe, Mulder, you've become so involved in helping me through this that
you've lost sight of that other side of yourself."  She wanted to reach out and
lace her fingers through his, but she kept her hand at her side.  "Maybe you
just haven't started to feel the true impact of it yet." 

"Maybe," he murmured, and was silent once again. 

She turned her head and looked at him.  His eyes began to glaze over as he
watched the road. 

"Maybe," he repeated, his voice barely a whisper. 

Rockville came closer and closer.  They would be home by that evening.  A
question which had remained in her mind begged to be asked. 

"I have to ask you something." 

His voice dropped, as if he heard the gravity of her voice.  "What?" 

Scully wasn't quite sure how to approach the issue, so did so outright:  "I
heard that your family was going to file a lawsuit against me." 

The car jerked slightly, but his face didn't show the shock his reflexes seemed
to be feeling.  She continued to watch him, awaiting his answer, as he seemed
to measure his words. 

"It was my mother's idea.  I didn't have anything to do with it." 

She weighed the thought for a moment, then murmured, "I believe you." 

And she did. 

+++++ 

"ROCKVILLE, NEXT 5 EXITS", a kelly green road sign trumpeted. 

Mulder could barely breathe.  They were there.  Panic took hold of his heart
and began to flow through his veins, crushing the oxygen in his blood. 

She couldn't turn herself in.  Not yet.  //not ever// a voice inside him
trumpeted.  But they couldn't run any further.  Vanishing off the face of the
earth was a heavenly prospect, but he knew that they would be found in whatever
Valhalla they created for themselves. 

Instead of taking the exit which would lead them to the police headquarters, he
continued to drive, steering the car toward his apartment.  She only glanced at
him in confusion once,  then seemed to know exactly what he wanted to do. 

As he parked the car, Mulder prayed that his apartment wasn't under police
surveillance.  If it were, it would merely speed up the inevitable, but he
needed just one more -- one more -- night with her.  Free. 

A small part of him knew the defeatism of that thought.  One night could easily
turn into two, then three, and they'd wake up one morning to find the police
had come for her, and the pain would be too much to bear.  He smothered the
thought.  It was already too much to bear. 

Mulder pulled the rental Explorer into a parking space not his own and she
exited the car behind him.  He took her hand and led her to a dark side of the
building, within sight of his window.  He whispered, "When you see my light
come on, go in.  If it's not on in 10 minutes, just go.  Leave." 

She nodded.  Come inside if it was safe;  go to the police station if it was
not. 

He tore himself away from her side and entered his building, fumbling in his
pocket for the key.  The elevator ride up seemed to take ages, lifting him up
to some brief safety, some brief refuge.  Then it finally stopped on the fourth
floor.  Slowly, he walked the hallway to his door, measuring his steps,
watchful for anything out of the ordinary. 

It all felt so ordinary, so untouched by the hell which had become his life. 

The key turned easily in the lock, beckoning him inside.  Immediately he sensed
that someone had been there.  The place was empty, but the air seemed to shift
with an unfamiliar presence.  He knew that someone -- the police, perhaps --
had been there while he was gone, though they'd not disturbed his things. 

Mulder flipped on the light, calling Scully up, then set about reclaiming his
place as his own. 

As he looked around the collection of rooms, he wondered if, perhaps, the
apartment was cleaner than he'd left it.  Then again, he barely remembered the
time when he left; it blended into a collection of images -- fear, fury, and
confusion.  The clock in the kitchen read 7:53 -- they had so little time left,
so little time to postpone the inevitable.  As he checked for dirty dishes in
the sink and picked up a can of air freshener, he heard a knock at the door. 
Mulder was startled for a moment until he remembered Scully didn't have her
key;  indeed, she had nothing of her own in her possession. 

He walked over to the door and let her inside, then, unable to resist, pulled
her into a strong embrace.  She stiffened for a moment then leaned into him,
and the room echoed with the sounds of their labored breathing. 

Neither of them spoke.  The knowledge that tonight was all they had left hung
in the air between them. 

In his teenaged years, back before he knew the vagaries and potential cruelties
relationships could bring, he had been an incurable romantic.  Fox would spend
his time in sophomore chemistry writing love notes which would never be
delivered to crushes, or sneaking into Love Story while his friends --
acquaintances, really --  from the basketball team were busy crunching popcorn
at a spaghetti western.  It had all been furtive, until his secret was
discovered when he'd left a notebook full of scribblings in a classroom.  The
teasing he'd endured nearly soured the whole idea of romance.  Love was
elusive, love was adult.  Love was something he fell into on a daily basis, but
only when he was older did he realize that while he loved the idea of romance,
he couldn't quite handle the reality of *love*. 

Sometime in the past six years he had discovered that reality with Scully. 

Clasping her hand, he led her into his bedroom -- the bedroom he'd been saving
for her for so long.  In all his fervored, aroused fantasies, he'd never
expected that that time would come on what could be their last night together. 
But he determined to savor it, to make it last.  His stamina wasn't what it
once was, but it would be tonight, he vowed. 

They stood in darkness. 

In the sliver of light peeking through the blinds, he saw her face.  Fine lines
had appeared where there had been none.  But though she seemed to have aged a
decade in the past two weeks, she had never looked as young, vulnerable, and
trusting as she did at that moment -- eyes wide, face somber. 

He unwrapped her like a treasured birthday gift, an orchid which would last
only one day before the bloom faded away.  She watched him, eyes still trusting
and cherishing, as he slipped the clothes from her body.  Bare before him, she
raised her hands and did the same with him, and he grew still as her hands
moved over his body.  Touching him in ways he'd never experienced before. 

Together, they stepped over to the bed and he lay her down upon it, captivated
by the sight of her pale skin against the dark spread.  Mulder knelt at the end
of the bed then pulled her toward him, spreading her legs and resting them on
either side of his shoulders.  He leaned forward to taste her.  His tongue
skimmed over the soft skin of her thighs, then moved forward to the reddish
skin at her apex, teasing and caressing the folds, reveling in the amazed and
heightened sounds his mouth created in her.  As she stiffened then softened
under him, the sensation was incredible.... 

And unbearable, as she slowly came down from her peak and he realized that this
glory would soon be gone. 

He looked up at her, tears smarting in his eyes, and he knew she understood. 
Climbing onto the bed next to her, she pulled him into her arms, her touch
gentle and sad, and his tears began to flow. 

God, why did love have to hurt so much? 

They spent the rest of the night together, making love again and again as if
they could squeeze a lifetime's worth of tenderness into a few short hours. 
Every time he thought he might collapse from exhaustion, the light through the
blinds -- so dark, then slowly suffusing the room with dawn -- reminded him of
what awaited them far too soon.  He tried to smother the panic, the fear, but
didn't always succeed. 

For not the first time, he wanted to run away with her, to a place where pain
and danger and murder didn't exist.  For not the first time, he realized the
impossibility of the dream. 

Sometime after eight that morning, she finally withdrew from his embrace and
stood, her body bearing the redness of their love.  He had marked her and she
him, scars which would carry them through their forced separation.  In a hoarse
whisper, she murmured, "We have to go now." 

He nodded, fighting back more tears. 

They showered together then he dressed, choosing a black suit from his closet,
needing the colors of mourning that day.  He watched her slip into a pair of
his khaki pants and a white dress shirt.  She rolled up the sleeves and cuffs,
but the fabric seemed to swallow her, as if the old Scully was slipping away
into a void of bland colors and smothered desires. 

Thawed bagels from the freezer provided their breakfast, then Mulder watched
her gaze around one last time as they reluctantly left the apartment.  He
forced himself to lock the door and lead her down to his car, leaving the
rented Explorer to be returned later.  Even with the rush hour traffic, the
drive to Rockville passed far too quickly, as if the inevitable refused to be
delayed any longer. 

With a heavy heart, he pulled into a parking space at the police headquarters. 
As the car shuddered to a stop, she reached over and took his hand.  Mulder
didn't want to face her, to see the sadness and fear in her eyes, but he turned
and found in her face what he'd expected. 

He refused to whisper a farewell.  Not now, not ever. 

Never "farewell". 

And together, they got out of the car and walked, hand in hand, to the
forbidding doors of the police station. 

+++++ 

END, Book One. 
+++++alannabaker+++++
http://alanna.net
"i'm a fountain of blood
in the shape of a girl" -- bjork.