TITLE: A Better World
AUTHOR: Olivia Severini
EMAIL ADDRESS: severini@atmos.ifa.rm.cnr.it
DISCLAIMERS: They don't belong to me. I just borrowed them for a while. :)
DISTRIBUTION STATEMENT:  Anywhere; just drop me a note!
SPOILER WARNING: Up to Biogenesis. Strong ones for Redux, Emily and Two
Fathers/One Son.
RATING: PG
CONTENT WARNINGS: Post colonization story.
CLASSIFICATION: X, S, A, UST
SUMMARY: Scully's cancer is back and, in order to save her, Mulder has to
travel back through time and find another chip.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: English is not my first language, I just study it at school,
so ... be good with me, okay? ;)  And by the way, I do live for feedback.

This one is for Patty.

***********************
A Better World
Olivia Severini
***********************

Resistance Secret Headquarters,
December 2000.

     She was asleep. The doctor said they had to give her morphine to ease
the pain that night. And he hadn't been there. Despite knowing that he could
be of no use now, even with the risk of waking her, Mulder simply couldn't
leave her room.  Sitting at his chair near the bed, he suddenly realized he
wasn't there for her.  He was there because of his own damned selfishness.
The truth was, he wanted to wake her. He knew how much she needed and
deserved some rest, but he wanted her to awaken.
     And, almost as reading his thoughts, she opened her eyes. "Mulder."
     "Hey, girl." He sat on the edge of her bed, doing his best to make his
smile credible.
     But Scully didn't smile back. "Are you okay? I was worried about you."
     "I had to leave for a couple of days."
     "I noticed."
     Even on her death-bed, he kept on worrying her. "I'm sorry", he
whispered, "but I think I've found something."
     Scully closed her eyes. She just wanted him close. She had gotten too
weak to play her old self. Everything had gone to hell and he was all she
had left. "What?"
     "Never mind, I'll tell you later. You need some rest now."
     There was something in his voice Scully didn't like at all. "Mulder,
what have you found?"
      Mulder diverted his eyes to a spot on the wall behind Scully's bed,
nervously chewing on his lower lip. "You know that we stole the secret of
temporal voyages from the aliens."  He finally said.
     Scully narrowed her eyes, striving to focus her attention on Mulder's
words. She felt sick. All she knew was that the Resistance was leading
experiments. And that a couple of months ago a man had been lost in the
space-time continuum. The thought that time voyages were possible was
strange, but a lot of her scientific faiths had crumbled in the past year,
so she was willing to accept this also. The world she knew had ended and her
own life was near to follow it. Her science had lost, as well as the human
race.
     "They need volunteers", Mulder kept on, "to go back before the
colonization and gather information that will help us fight them."
     No. Not him. Not now.  "That's one of the most stupid things I've heard
from you. Mulder, they lost a man just few weeks ago.  We still don't know
enough about time or time travel, I mean, you could find yourself in ancient
Egypt or ..."  For a moment the old Scully had come back, but she could no
longer afford her old passion.  A sudden wave of nausea hit her, compelling
her to drop her words and take some deep breaths.  "Mulder, don't go.  I've
never asked anything of you before.  But please, I don't want to die alone."
     "I won't let you die, Scully." Mulder had resolved not to tell her
about the faint hope he nourished, he didn't want to deceive her; but
neither could he let her believe that he was leaving her just to follow his
own path once again. God knew how much he would have wanted to have the
strength to resign himself, to finally let his grief and feelings go and
just enjoy every second he had left with her.  But as long as he knew there
was still something left untried, he couldn't let go.
     "Mulder, stop fooling yourself.  We both know there is nothing to do.
Why can't you..."
     "I need just twelve hours."
     She shook her head sadly.
     "I want to enter the Department of Defense again and take another
chip."  He suddenly said.  "I'll go back right before the aliens blew it up.
Doug Scribner will give me his old ID that gives access to the fourth level.
I just have to do what I did two years ago."
     "You will go anyway."  It wasn't a question, it was a statement because
Scully knew that nothing  she could do or say would have the power to make
him change his mind. The sky had crumbled to pieces and Mulder was still
digging to find some relics of truth. But she wasn't like him, she didn't
want to believe again. It hadn't been easy to convince herself that the word
hope was meaningless; even in that stifling basement building where light
failed to reach and there was no difference between day and night. Her
family had been exterminated by aliens as well as the 80 percent of the
human race and she herself was dying of cancer; but deep inside she knew
that as long as Mulder was part of that dreary world, she would have been
dangerously liable to hope. Why the hell was he doing this to her?
      Mulder nodded. "Yes, I will. Scully, I have to try." Silence fell over
the small room. Mulder took Scully's hand and didn't leave it till she had
fallen asleep.

     He spent the rest of the day with Scribner and the small team of
scientists who was settling things for his voyage. After the Colonization a
lot of the men who had survived had joined the Resistance and they lived in
underground refuges that scattered all through the country, trying to build
something capable to fight the aliens.  But first and foremost, trying to
survive.
     The time machine was nothing impressive. It resembled one of those
gadgets for virtual-reality experiences the Lone Gunmen used to be crazy
for. He didn't care to know how the device worked, how time could be
manipulated although this would have interested him once. All that mattered
now was that the past could give him a last hope to save Scully's life.
Mulder also didn't care to betray the Resistance's trust using
temporal-voyages for personal endings. He had no loyalty left; just a wide
sea of rage and despair that was slowly swallowing him up.
     Scribner was the only one who knew. Once he had found out what the
Consortium's real plans were, he had been subjected to Scully's same tests.
He had recovered from cancer thanks to the same chip. But the bastards
hadn't abducted him a second time to remove his chip as they had done with
Scully, a year earlier.
     When Mulder had asked to be sent to the DOD in order to gather
information, Scribner had understood everything. Mulder had threatened to
kill him if he would have spoken, but the man said he was on his side.
Scribner himself had grown very fond of Scully and it seemed he wanted her
to live almost as bad as Mulder did. On other circumstances Mulder would
have been almost jealous.
     "How is she?" Asked Scribner when the others couldn't hear him.
     Mulder shook his head. "Doug, I have to be back in twelve hours."
Then, raising his eyes from the map of the DOD building Scribner had just
given him, "I have to assume I won't find you there."  He already knew he
couldn't meet Scribner, that he couldn't change either his or the man's
past. Because changing the past, he would have changed the future as well
and they didn't know what the repercussions could be.  The scientists
believed it was the reason the lost man never returned.  They believed he
returned to a different future, a dimension created by the changes he had
brought to the space-time continuum while in the past.
     "I'd already joined the Resistance by then."

     Of course Mulder couldn't sleep. He was to leave for October 1999 the
next morning. In a few hours he would see the sky again, standing above the
old world made of crappy motel rooms, theories to argue above and
conspiracies to reveal. The world where Scully wasn't sick yet. They had
taken her away again in December 1999. God, was it really just a year ago?
The cancer had developed almost at once and the doctors of the Resistance
headquarters had been able to do little for her. They hadn't enough medical
structures or drugs to try a therapy. As her usual self, Scully had done her
best to be strong; but the last months had been a nightmare and now she
spent her days laying in that bleak small room. She slept most of the time
and they probably would've given her more painkillers, but Mulder decided to
check her room all the same. Just to see if she was okay.
     She wasn't okay. The place was dark and all he could see was Scully's
back shivering. He had to take a deep breath before entering the room.
"Scully?"
     Scully squeezed her eyes, burning of tears. She didn't want him to see
her crying that way. And she wasn't in the right mood to speak. Maybe if she
laid still, he could believe she was sleeping. "Please, leave me alone."
     His voice was a little more than a whisper. "Does it hurt?"
     "Not so much. Mulder, it's late." For a moment she was afraid that he
would leave and she would  never see him again. They couldn't leave like
this, but she hadn't the strength to fight. Her head ached so bad.
     "I just wanted to say goodbye. I leave tomorrow at dawn."
     "Try not to do anything stupid. And send a postcard."
     Her voice was low and tired. And she didn't turn to look at him. For a
moment, Mulder felt his determination fading. "Scully, I will be back. If
you still trust me ... I won't leave you. But I have to try. I don't know,
maybe I'm doing this for me, to silence my broken conscience. I've never
been able to do something for the others. I was blind and selfish and I'm
probably still so. " Then, after a long pause, "I'm so sorry."
     The tears now flowed free down her cheeks. "Don't go." She wanted to
say something more, to say that she was sorry too. And scared. Scared to
feel so vulnerable, scared because, in spite of all, she didn't want to die.
She needed some release to the tide of fear pressing inside, but once again
the words didn't come out and she had to set her lips to choke sobs. Why the
hell did hope have to hurt so much? She almost hated him for allowing her to
have hope again.
     "Scully, I ..."
     "Don't leave me alone tonight."
     The tension was still tangible, but they had both made an effort to
voice their feelings. Mulder sat awkwardly on the usual chair in front of
the bed, taking her hand and squeezing it tight.
     Dawn found them so.

     He had been watching her the whole time.  Musing about life.  And time.
Just a few years ago the idea of temporal voyages seemed a dream holding
countless possibilities. Now that dream had come true, but it had proved to
be almost useful. The past can't be changed. You are the living proof of
each single step you have taken. He could turn back and prevent Duane Barry
from taking her, but somewhere in a time that would have no longer belonged
to him, there would have always been this Scully, his Scully, dying alone in
a world where man had lost.
     Okay, the past is past and the present is nothing but the last fragment
of the past. But what about the future? It wasn't possible to go forth in
time, and that seemed to prove that there wasn't a future already waiting
for us. That free will existed. That you can fight the future.
     That was the meaning of the word hope, the reason why he had to try.
Maybe it was a desperate enterprise, but he hadn't failed yet.

     Scully didn't hear Mulder leave. She'd slept of a thick dreamless
sleep, the kind of rest which painkillers allow. She would have wanted to
talk with him till morning, saying all the things that needed to be said
from a long time, and she hadn't been able to tell him goodbye either. Now
he  was gone. Scully knew that he truly intended to come back, but she was
also aware of the possibility that a single, unwilling change could condemn
him to a different reality. Even if she wasn't sure it would have been a
punishment for him. He had poor chances of happiness in this world, so ...
what right did she have to blame him if he would have chosen another road?
She wanted him to be happy, but her weakest side, a side that was
dangerously spreading lately, couldn't help wanting him back as soon as
possible.
     It was ten past seven. She had no way to know how long ago Mulder had
left her room, but somehow she felt that he was no longer there. Scully was
just gathering the strength to leave her bed to see what was going on, when
Scribner peered cautiously through her door.
     "You awake?"
     "How is Mulder?"  She asked propping up against the pillow.
     The man took a couple of steps toward her as his lean face stretched
into one of his sad smiles.  "He's okay.  We took him back to October '99
successfully."
     Scully took a deep breath.  They couldn't check people during time
voyages, they were just going to re-open the passage when established,
hoping to bring him back.  There won't have been news from him till that
moment.
     "I was bringing you a book that perhaps you haven't read yet."  Added
Scribner handing her an old book of a French writer she'd never heard of
before.  Scribner had brought a lot of books with him and Scully believed
she had read all of them already. Forced in a place without tv, phone and
windows, she had become a greedy reader.
     Scully shifted her eyes from the book to the man's face. "Thank you,
Doug."
     "You're welcome."
     A moment later she was alone again.


October 1999

     Mulder couldn't help sitting on a bench a few blocks away from his
target.  It was a mild morning and from time to time the sky was crossed by
swift clouds.  Everything was just like he remembered it in his best dreams.
Not perfection; but life, possibility, noises, wind.  Always busy to pity
himself, he had scorned these things too often; and now that he was able to
appreciate them, they had lost their meaning.  That world no longer belonged
to him.
     It was supposed to be the 5th of October, but finding a newspaper,
Mulder found out that his friends had made their first mistake. It was the
10th of October and he had just a few hours before the aliens would take
control of the Department of Defense. That meant that the building would
already be full with aliens. His proverbial luck.
     He remembered that day very well. He'd heard the news through Scully,
who had received a phone call from Skinner. Still then, she refused to use
the word 'Aliens'. They were just terrorists, or at best people dealing with
the Consortium. They'd had another harsh quarrel, he'd explained to her what
Smoking Man and Kurtzweil had told him about the colonization, and when she
had still refused to believe, he had left the room slamming the door. The
following days they had barely talked to each other. Then the DOD building
was destroyed with more than two hundred of innocent people inside. Once
again, they were together when the news had spread. Scully had closed her
eyes and took a deep trembling breath. Her stubbornness and hardness had
been aggravatingly increasing from the reopening of the X-Files, but now he
saw how it was just her way to fight against that spreading irrationality,
her desperate effort to keep their world together.
     Then the nightmare had begun. The aliens had even taken the White
House, it was like a scene from the movie Independence Day. Only this wasn't
a movie where the good always win. Millions of men had been killed, enslaved
or abducted. They had taken Scully, held her for an endless week and then
threw her away on a roadside in the middle of the night. Afterwards, she
hadn't uttered a word for two days, till she crumbled and broke down. She
remembered everything that time, she knew they had removed her chip and knew
what the consequences would have been. She'd cried and cried and cried and
he'd held her tightly, whispering that they would get through this, that
they were stronger than this. He never knew if she'd really believed him
that night, believed his lies; but she'd relied upon him, finally letting
part of her fears and weaknesses come to surface.
     She was already ill when they had joined the Resistance. They were as
close as they'd ever been before, but no happiness was allowed to them. His
mom had died and they had not even come in time to save Scully's family.
They had succeeded in flying to San Diego through countless dangers, just to
find out that Mrs. Scully, Charles and Bill's family had been already taken.
Scully, once again, sought refuge in his arms and they had shared their
first kiss. A sweet, light brush of lips he will have never forgotten. He
wasn't so insensitive to take advantage of that tragedy, she was as
shattered and vulnerable as he'd ever seen her before and he knew he could
have been easily taken the next step, but that would have meant betraying
her trust.
     They remained the same since that day, half friends, half lovers.
During their trip back from Miramar her condition had gotten worse and she'd
gotten to their underground refuge burning with fever. Afterwards, they had
slept in the same bed, but it had always been after one of her nightmares,
when she woke up in the middle of the night calling out names of people that
were no longer with her. Mulder could sense her need to feel his presence to
assure her that he wasn't going to leave her too, but he could also perceive
how that new physical closeness somehow scared her. In his favor, there was
to say that he had always behaved as a perfect gentleman. Or a perfect
friend.
     But he was living the past again. It was time to work for what could
still be.


December 2000

     She could no longer read. Her temples had started throbbing again and
the pages had become blurred. Sighing deeply, Scully closed the book and
switched the lamp off. The book was just one of those serial stories of
young rich ladies who fall in love with penniless poor men, but it was good
to distract her for a while. The emergency lights on the corridor were
always on, so her room was never dark, even at night. All  day, that same
cold neon light. God, she hated that place. If it was dark, she could have
at least pretended to be in her old bed, in her old apartment. But that
suffused light excluded any self delusion.
     Turning her back to the door, Scully closed her eyes, fancying to wake
up with Mulder at her side again. But sleep didn't claim her for a long
time.


     Scribner's ID had worked. No one had stopped him. No one had noticed
that he wasn't who he claimed to be. There were three floors left to get to
Level Four, but he got to it unnoticed. The whole building was in an odd
hurry and Mulder wondered whether that state of rush wasn't helping him
after all. He knew that many of the people he crossed were aliens, but the
chances they would have recognized him were very poor. They probably were
too busy trying to hide their presence to care about him and they couldn't
know all the faces of the DOD's employees anyway. He just hadn't to betray
his fear.
     These were more or less Mulder's thoughts as, for the second time in
his life, he used a fake ID to open the door of the last hope he had left.

***************

     Time cognition slid away little by little.
     She didn't know how long she'd been there, lost in reveries. Time just
began flowing in a different way, like a river carrying driftwood taken from
banks already crossed.
     The stories her dad used to tell her when, as a little girl, she was in
bed with a cold ...  Emily's huge eyes ... the case  when they had pretended
to be a married couple. Rob and Laura, she smiled into her pillow as she
remembered. She had enjoyed so much those few twinkles of normal life . You
just want to play house, Mulder had accused her then. He was right; all she
would have wanted was to stay like that for ever; teasing him about his way
to squeeze toothpaste tubes. And the hell with the truth.
     Relics from her past combined with relics from futures that will never
be into a meaningless and useless whole. Perhaps she was traveling through
time herself. Or perhaps she was just dying.

     He had the chip. It had almost been too easy, it was right where it had
to be. Same shelf, same box. And, as he remembered, there was still a vial
left.
     He was already sneaking away with his precious spoil, when an
unexpected meeting of a small group of conspirators along an empty corridor
forced Mulder to stay hidden in a dark room for more than an hour. They were
just outside his door, so that he could hear a good part of their
conversation. Everything was planned. They knew they were going to seize the
building when there was a lot of people inside. It wasn't a symbolic action;
they wanted to kill as many people as possible.
     How could he, knowing everything, just turn his back and wait for his
temporal passage to re-open? He had to choose between Scully's life and that
of hundreds of people. It wasn't easy for his conscience to believe that all
this had already happened, those people were already dead. It was so hard
because he knew it wasn't altogether true. No one had actually come back to
prove it, but it was common opinion that the past could be changed. The
obstacle was to accept that someone could be both alive and dead at the same
time, but the doubt that he could do anything to save these lives was
strong.

     It was already 4 pm when Scully woke up again. She felt a little better
and her head was relatively clear. She had been thinking about Mulder right
before falling asleep, but just now she realized she didn't know exactly
when he was supposed to come back. He'd said he would have left at dawn, but
when there isn't a sun the idea of dawn becomes pretty vague. What if he'd
left at four a.m. and was right to be brought back? What if the door had
already been re-opened and he hadn't come back?
     Right then, she glimpsed Scribner passing by through the glass of her
door. Leaving the bed as quick as she could, she went to the door just to
see his back turning left at the end of the narrow corridor. Without knowing
why, Scully began to follow him.
     Why was he so eager to help them anyway? The question crossed Scully's
mind almost against her will. It was ridiculous, she was becoming as much a
paranoiac as Mulder. Doug Scribner was a friend. He had always been kind
with her, sometimes even kinder than Mulder himself ... It was silly of her
to even doubt him. The atrocities she had been through had left a deep mark
in her; they had taken her innocence away, sharpening her, bringing her to
trust no one but Mulder. Why was Doug so eager to help them?
     Sometimes she wondered whether her caring for Mulder, if her love,
hadn't something insane or morbid in it. It wasn't easy to keep one's
balance in that hell.
     But when Scribner gingerly entered the area where time experiments were
lead, Scully wondered whether some paranoia couldn't be helpful in certain
cases.


     He could have saved a lot of human lives.
     Maybe it was worth trying, but he was to ignore it. He had to trample
over his conscience, over common sense. Mulder would have lived with this
burden too, but he was more than willing to kill what was left of his
humanity if that was the price to save Scully.
     All he had to do was close his mind and heart for a while and stay
there in the darkness, waiting to be brought back to her.


     Poking her face in the door, Scully saw Scribner taking a note from his
pocket and slope over one of the many computers which occupied the central
desk. He was bypassing the surveillance systems and entering the program
which controlled the time-machine.
     There was no one else around. Scribner was moving fast and she wasn't
sure she had time to think. It wasn't a risk she was willing to run anyway.
"Doug?"
     The man turned abruptly, his hands momentarily frozen over the
keyboard. "Dana. You shouldn't be on your feet."
     Scully couldn't make out his face. His surprise had lasted but a blink
of an eye and he seemed extremely at ease now. Almost detached. "What are
you doing?"
    "Just checking the system."  He answered casually as his fingers began
typing again. "Go back to bed."
    His attitude was quite convincing, but Scully wasn't giving up. She knew
that Scribner wasn't a computer technician. Taking a step forward, she saw
he was entering  temporal coordinates in the system.

*11/27/1973*

     Her heart froze. He was about to bring Mulder back to the day his
sister had been abducted. But why? Scully cursed herself for being so slow.
By reflex, her hand went to her side, but of course she had no gun. Beside,
it was still hard for her believe that Scribner was doing wrong by them. She
strove to trust him for a split second more, and so doing gave Scribner the
time to complete his work.
     "It's for the best, believe me." He muttered, staring at the message of
confirmation now blinking on the screen.
     Mulder was back in 1973.


     The gleam became more and more defined. A blurred dot at first, now it
shoved itself for what it really was. A TV screen. Its brightness increased,
revealing two kids sitting on the floor.
     Samantha and himself.
     Even in the state of dizziness he was in, it didn't take long for
Mulder to recognize the scene he had lived thousands of times in his
nightmares.  He watched them playing Stratego and quarreling about the tv
program they were going to see.  In a few minutes the light would go out and
then ...  No, he didn't want to live all this again. Why the hell had they
sent him there?  What was he supposed to do?  Let his little sister pay for
his parent's dirty mistake once again?
     He didn't want to choose.
     He was no longer a helpless twelve-years-old brat now. He could protect
her. He didn't care a damn what the consequences for his father and his
crappy work with the Consortium could be. He hated his parents, hated the
Consortium and all that happened because of them from that day. No. Not just
everything. Of course he didn't hate Scully. She was as innocent as Sam.
     The light went out. God, they couldn't ask him to choose.


     She didn't utter a word. She watched blankly as two guys of the
time-voyages team (she couldn't say whether they were aliens or humans) came
to monitor the machines and found Scribner meddling with their toys. And
since Scribner pressed his willingness to admit his fault and didn't offered
resistance, no one paid great attention to her.
     The Consortium had bidden him to get rid of Mulder. Through the chip
they'd implanted in his neck. He couldn't help following their orders when
they played with his mind in that way. So he said. It would have been
mistaken for an error of the time-machine, Mulder would have never come back
and no one would have been hurt.
     Scully found herself grinning bitterly.  The consortium who followed
pacifist methods, but it wasn't so absurd after all.  They knew that Mulder
wouldn't be able to witness his sister's abduction without lifting a finger.
Mulder would try to save his sister and therefore change his future.  He
would no longer exist in her time.  He would not longer be a problem for the
Consortium.
     "What time was he supposed to come back?" She suddenly asked,
interrupting Scribner explanation. No one raised their voice, whether human,
alien or clone, the members of that underground community were all extremely
self-controlled and professional. Her Eden, Mulder had teased her once.
     The three men watched her as she had just jumped out of a
jack-in-the-box and Scully held their stare rising an eyebrow.
     "5:30 pm." Finally answered the oldest one checking his watch. It was
ten past five.
     None of them really cared about Mulder; their only concern was that a
spy had entered their system. The single individual hadn't any importance
compared to the 'whole'. That was probably the only way to survive for them,
but that wasn't living, just going through the motions. And then maybe
Scribner was right, it was for the best. In a few minutes Mulder would have
found himself in a world where his sister had never been abducted, where the
X-Files had probably never existed, they had never met and maybe where he
could still live under the sky. And she ... She would have missed him at
first, but it wouldn't have lasted long. She wouldn't have last lasted long.
     The place was crowding and the air was getting stuffy. Scully was
vaguely aware that she wore only her nightgown, but that concern was so far
away and so small that it slipped out of her mind as soon as it entered. She
had been months in only a nightgown, besides, she doubted her aspect could
have been defined as provocative. Sitting heavily on a plastic chair, she
watched the men gathering around the monitors. Their voices were reduced to
drones, their backs mingling together in a blurred whole. The Resistance.
She wasn't sure at all she still wanted to be part of that whole, that she
wanted to resist. For some reason she thought back of their old office. They
had built it again after the fire, but fire and destruction had come back
and won. But even this thought was far and small, and it faded too. So she
just stayed on that chair, staring at the Resistance's backs.


Nov.1973

     Sam was crying, calling him. Mulder had always wondered what kind of
person her little sister would have been growing up. He'd seen grown women
who claimed to be her, but now he knew they probably were nothing but
clones. That night they had both been robbed of their futures, yet ... The
words that woman had said to him in that dinner that lonely night came to
his mind. Whoever she was, she was with that smoking bastard, claiming to be
his sister. She had cried and called him Fox ... What if it was really her?
She said she had a home and a family ... What if that was true? If she
really had had a chance for a normal life? He couldn't know it for sure.
Then why was it so painful to hear her cries and watch her float through the
window? Because he was her big brother and was supposed to protect her. His
father knew what was going to happen that night and had let him stay there
knowing he wouldn't have been able to help her. He had failed as a
twelve-year-old boy and was failing now as a grown man.
     Mulder clutched the vial with the chip in his fist and closed his eyes
shut. He was wasting away what he had always craved for; a second chance.
But how could he save her sister condemning Scully to death? There were
still chances Sam was alive or that at least she had lead a happy life
before the Colonization, while Scully ... She deserved a second chance more
than anyone else.
     A wave of nausea washed over him and when he opened his eyes again Sam
was gone. Darkness enveloped him, but he could hear distant voices. The
voices became louder and reaching down, he discovered he was sitting in a
leather chair. He was back. Stumbling out of the time-machine, he found a
crowd of faces staring at him.


     Someone was calling Mulder's name, asking if he was okay. Scully
clutched her fists, trying to breath evenly; but when she heard his voice
muttering something affirmative, she couldn't help jumping on her feet.
     He was there, nodding to a man who was explaining what had happened to
him.
     "That's right, I lied!  If I'd told you the truth you wouldn't have let
me go."  Mulder discovered that Scribner had betrayed them, the resistance
knew why he went back.
     "You used us for personal gain!"  A scientist with thick glasses
yelled, accusing him.
      "How can saving a life be a personal gain?  Besides, you used me!
Everybody uses everybody, that's the game!  I'd do it again."  Mulder
finished on a softer note, knowing that Scribner would be punished for his
part.
     Scully knew it was pointless to argue with them, but Mulder was angry
and clearly upset and ... Maybe it was time to stop him before he would say
something really wrong. "Mulder?" Thanking God, her voice sounded quite
firm.  Scully couldn't make out his face when he saw her. He stared at her
for a brief moment - God, she had to look awful - then managed a strange
smile.
     "Hey; I didn't expect to find you here."
     "She found Scribner" The man said hastily. Tension was still high.
     "I knew Mulder was going to take the chip, I'm as guilty as he is."
Scully felt the tide of panic slowly wash over her. The faces got blurred
and she had to close her eyes. He had let his sister go to save her and now
he was even going to pay for this. She had never felt so useless and stupid.
Someone led her to a chair and re-opening her eyes Scully saw Mulder
kneeling in front of her.
     "You okay?"
     She just nodded, striving to keep back the tears. Now she felt
humiliated too. They were all staring at her.
     "You are worn out, Scully; you need some rest."
     No, she didn't want to go back to bed; she wanted to stay there, to
help him. "I'm fine now."  She whispered; hating her thin voice, hating her
weakness.
     "No, you aren't."  Taking her hands, Mulder drew her to her feet. Then,
placing a hand gently on the small of her back, led her toward the door,
while the men's stares followed them silently. As soon as they were out of
the room, Mulder's arm circled her waist. "Can you walk?"
     She nodded. Her head spinned and she had to do her best not to stagger,
but she was firmly determined to get to her room on her feet. Once there,
she sat wearily on the bed. In the heartbeat of silence that followed, she
silently pleaded him not to pity her. Angry as she was with herself, that
would have been the last thing she needed.
     He said nothing and didn't even help her to slide under the blankets.
She was starting to relax a bit when the contact with the unexpectedly
chilly sheet caused her to shiver violently. And it was than that Mulder's
eyes pitied her. A hazel mixture of sorry and concern she just couldn't
stand.  "Why the hell did you come back, Mulder?"  Her voice was low but
firm, almost reproaching. "To find me like this?  Look at me, I'm not going
to make it, Mulder. It's too late. I was there when Scribner sent you back
to 1973, and I couldn't stop him.  Actually, I can't even stand on my feet."
Her voice creaked a bit.  "If the chip doesn't work, you would have given up
everything for nothing."
     "I came back because I would have missed you. My stubborn pain in the
ass. I would have regretted this very moment and all the time we have left,
no matter how much it will be. I've spent my whole life in regret and I'm
tired now. Then ... I really like this place. Nice rooms, time machines,
friendly aliens everywhere ... Where could I find another place like this?"
As he spoke, Mulder kept on smoothing her quilt, smiling sadly. Even in her
condition, he wasn't used to taking care of her. He had always been the one
to need her cares, her concern. Amazingly, she was still the strong one,
worrying about him and the consequences of his deeds. As much as he would
have wanted nothing more than shield her and protect her for once, he felt
hopelessly clumsy.
     As sensing his discomfort, Scully took his hand and said: "You go now.
I will be okay."
     Mulder stared at her for a long moment. Even if she had grown so thin,
even if her hair had lost part of it's fierce brightness and her eyes were
reddish and watery, to him she was still beautiful. "Sure you will", He
whispered finally, leaning down and brushing lightly her lips. Their second
kiss. She just gazed at him, sniffling. Mulder was at the door when he
turned back. "And Scully? Do something for your nose. It's as red as a
beetroot."
     "Listen who's talking about beaks."  Muttered Scully, pretending to
sound sulky. A shadow of their old selves was back. Scully couldn't seize it
thoroughly, but she knew it was important.

     A few hours later, he was there again. "Don't do this for me, Scully,
do this for yourself. You deserve life."
     "Is it life, Mulder? What kind of future can I expect? All I can do is
do it for you, Mulder. Not because I think I owe you my life, but ... Cause
you are the only reason I've left."
     "Scully ..."
     "No, let me finish. I tried to trust Scribner, I believed he was our
friend and this gave me some hope, but ..."  Her eyes dwelled on the book
the man had lent her, "He was just another of their puppets. And I don't
want to become like him. They've taken everything from me, I have only
myself and what little dignity I have and I'm not going to let them take
this too."
     Mulder dropped his eyes. "We don't have proof that Scribner was
controlled."
     "Damn Mulder, I don't want to be a lab-rat once again!"
     "You will never be, Scully. I won't let them." After a long
negotiation, they had agreed to put the chip in Scully's neck on the
condition that they would have checked her from time to time to study any
eventual change in her behavior as well as in her health. They needed to
know how the chip worked and if Scully could betray them as Scribner had
done.
     "What can we do, Mulder? I mean, even if I would live ... What are our
hopes at best? I hate this place, hate Scribner, hate ..."
     "We can go on. Together. Trying to stop hating, to believe in the
future. That's not much, but it's all we have and I think we could make it."


     Once out of her room, Mulder leaned against the wall, biting his lower
lip. Back in the time-machine room, she had really scared him. He'd told her
that hating the Resistance wasn't right, but he was the first one to be full
of anger. Why the hell had no one seen she needed care?  And Scribner, their
supposed friend. He didn't know whether he had acted on his own will or he
was really an instrument of the Consortium, but the prospects weren't rosy
anyway. Men here had become just like the aliens: cold, indifferent, wary.
They didn't trust each other, how could they hope to defeat the Consortium?
It had already won, destroying not just their world, but also their spirits.
     So why did he ask Scully to live? Just because he couldn't stand the
idea to be left alone. Selfish bastard. He needed to know she was there, to
see her eyes, hear her voice. And maybe take her hand, hold her, kiss her
... Stop here, Spooky.
     And even if the chip worked, could he really protect her from becoming
a lab-rat? Mulder closed his eyes, welcoming the coldness of the wall. He
stayed there a long while, partly because he couldn't think of anything
better to do, partly because he was unwilling to leave the wall that divided
his need and her right to choose for her own life.
     He stayed there till she called him.


***************

     Two weeks had passed, and the chip had brought no improvement.
     Scully felt guilty because in spite of his sacrifice, she was going to
die. And she wondered whether it was because she simply didn't want to live.
She was so tired she couldn't even cry and even Mulder's presence had become
a source of pain. He'd never left her bedside and his strength, his will to
believe, seemed these of the old times. Irrational, stubborn, almost blind.
How could she tell him?
     They had done it again. She could still feel their invading presence
inside her head. No, they weren't there now, the daily 'checks' had
finished, but it wasn't so simple to take hold of her will again. The idea
that she was nothing but an instrument to test a chip was hard to accept.
What she had feared most had come true; they had finally stolen the little
dignity she had left.
     Scully turned restlessly in her bed and finally threw the pillow on the
floor, resting her head on the cold sheet. Mulder was at the door.
     Sensing that she had spotted him, he took his way inside, retrieving
the pillow, and replacing it gently under her head. After a moment of
hesitation, he brushed her forehead looking for signs of a fever. She was
cool enough, but something was still wrong with her. It was her hair. Her
beautiful auburn hair was all ruffled. It was supposed to be a trifling
thing, especially considering what she was going through, but it struck him
all the same, because Scully's hair was *never* messed up. "What's wrong?"
The question left his lips before giving him the chance to value how silly
it was.
     She beckoned toward the tray of her unconsumed breakfast.  "The service
in this hotel is awfully poor."
     Mulder nodded with a faint grin, but kept on staring at her.
     "Mulder, I'm tired." She didn't want him to gaze at her that way. Why
can't he just keep her  company without always trying to 'understand'
everything? Why the hell had she allowed him to know her so well?
     "Does ... do they check you?" Mulder stumbled, finally dropping his
eyes.
     That was really enough. "Would you please leave me alone?" She uttered
slowly, emphasizing the word 'please'.
     A moment of thick silence followed, then he slowly stood. "I'm sorry, I
just wanted ... Well, if you need something, I'm in my room."
     He looked so sad. For the first time, Scully wondered whether his
strength and enthusiasm was nothing but a mask that he was putting on for
her. Mulder knew her better than anyone else and it was hardly possible that
he hadn't sensed that something was wrong. He probably just didn't dare to
ask. Yes, the truth would hurt him, but she was already hurting him with her
silence and her hostile attitude.  Yet the words were hard to find. She
hadn't behaved fairly with him. Always sulky and unwilling to talk, she had
shut everything out trying to protect both of them. Clutching the
bedclothes, she watched him get to the door. She opened her mouth to tell
him to stay, but the words remained in her throat, together with all the
things she had never said. It was then that he turned, as if sensing the
unspoken plea.
     "Scully, let it out. Please, let me help you."
     Scully buried her head in the pillow, avoiding his eyes. "They're
testing the chip on my brain, on my will." Mulder was silent, so she went
on. "They give me orders through it and monitor my reactions. I can feel
them, Mulder; I feel their will battling with mine to take the upper hand."
Her voice failed her she had to bit her lower lip to stop its trembling.
     "God Scully, why didn't you tell me?" He looked at her trembling form
and was struck at how fragile and strong she was at the same time.  The chip
he had stubbornly wanted wasn't just saving her life, it was further
tormenting her last days.
     Surprisingly, when she watched him, her eyes were perfectly dry and
quiet. Much too quiet. She looked straight at him, and when she spoke her
voice was steady and detached again. "Because you can do nothing, Mulder. I
gave my consent and they are just testing the chip."
     She shrugged and Mulder thought that he preferred the upset Scully of
few moments before. She was putting distance between them again, wearing her
usual sturdy mask; but it occurred to him that maybe that was the only way
she had to deal with such painful matters. It was okay, as long as she kept
a door opened. He relaxed a bit and managed to sit. He would have wanted to
smooth her hair, but he respected her too much to invade her space.
     It followed a long awkward moment when Mulder found himself suddenly
unable to look at her. He was scared, and scared to be scared; because he
knew that the least he owed her was to be for once the strong one. He'd just
asked her to let it go, but the truth was that he wondered whether he would
even be able to handle the thought of his life without her, if he would be
able to handle the guilt. It couldn't end that way, he wasn't ready and
above all SHE wasn't ready. Then something came to his mind. "Scully, I've
an idea."
     She allowed a weak smile to cross her lips. The fact that her partner's
endless source of ideas hadn't exhausted was somehow reassuring. A splinter
of her old life. But when their eyes met, she saw in his a dangerous
wildness, followed by equally wild notions.
     "The time machine; it can bring you back before your illness, or even
before your abduction. That was the turning point when everything started to
go to hell, so changing the events of that night ... You have to kill Duane
Barry. Kill him before he takes you, when he's still outside your apartment.
Then I'll bring you back to the present, granted, it will be another
present."
     "Mulder, stop talking nonsense."
     "No Scully, now just listen to me ..."
     She shook her head. What just a few minutes before had seemed
comforting, had become threatening. Scully wondered whether those sudden
changes of mood may possibly be connected with her brain cancer, but she
hadn't time to worry about that now, because Mulder's source of ideas wasn't
just exhausted, it was overflowing. "Mulder, I'm tired now." She turned her
back to let him know that the matter was definitely over and was startled to
feel his hand grab her shoulder. His eyes were coldly determined and Scully
found she had no choice but listen to him.
     "That's the only thing to do. It will last just two or three minutes,
you will shoot at him and it will be over. I think you have enough strength
to hold your gun and fire."
     "I don't want to kill anyone."
     "Duane Barry will die anyway."
     His coldness was scaring her. She shook her head half angry, half
pleadingly and tried to get free from his grip, but Mulder held her still
with both hands, pinning her to the mattress. Scully felt a rush of panic
wash over her.
     "I'm not willing to watch you die, I'm ready to do anything and I feel
this will work. If I can give you another chance ..."
     But she wasn't listening. All the terrible moments when she'd been held
against her will came back to her mind while she struggled madly to free
herself.
     Mulder was caught by surprise. "Scully ..."
     "Let me go." She panted.
     He let her go and stared at her cringing in her bed with wide eyes.
"Scully." That was all he managed to say, as to make sure she was still his
Scully.
     "Go away."
     Mulder grazed her hand, but he felt tears come to his eyes when her
hand slid away. The door was closed shut. "I've never meant to hurt you,
Scully." He whispered before leaving the room.

     Lying stretched on his bed was the best thing Mulder was able to do for
the following hour. He wished he had some alcohol to keep him company, but
that was one of the countless luxuries that the Colonization had taken away.
Fault number two thousand forty two of that underground world: too much time
to think and too few means for forgetfulness.
     He was still staring at the low ceiling when she knocked.
     "I couldn't sleep."
     "Me too." Muttered him, fixing his eyes behind her, vaguely surprised
to find her there.
     Another dreadful gap of silence. There was so much to say, but they
were all dangerous things. Overwhelmed with her old fear, she almost
retreated, but the sight of a Mulder fumbling awkwardly with his hair
brought unexpectedly to surface the feeling of something pure and beautiful,
which might have been and was not. Is that is? It is regret she could see
looking back? She had nice memories too, but somehow they were always dotted
with unspoken feelings and doubts. Having never been able to show her
feelings, she'd always assumed that people knew. She knew she'd been loved,
but did anyone really glimpse the love she had always kept hidden in a
corner of her small tidy world? It was an unbearable question. How
frightening her truth was now. But she had to know. There was no more time
to be afraid; her small world had faded away and all she could do was to
save its last fragments a moment longer. "Mulder, I know you would never
hurt me."
     Mulder closed the door and sat on a chair. "You wrong Scully; I did it
a thousand times." Then, after a long pause, "But I didn't mean to hurt you
... physically. I promise it will never happen again."
     "It's okay." She whispered, sitting on his bed, as near to him as she
could.
     "Yeah," He nodded. "Listen to me Scully, you have to do that."
     She shook her head wistfully. "Please Mulder, I've not come here to
talk about this."
     "Why are you here, then?" He waited her answer for a bunch of seconds,
then; "Trust me, it's a good plan."
     She didn't want to waste the time they had left together quarreling and
fighting each other, to play their usual script till the curtain would have
fallen. But she was tired and slow, unable to cope with her partner's
stubbornness. "You won't give up, won't you?"
     "No, if I can give you another chance. You would begin everything
afresh."
     "Maybe I'm too tired to begin afresh."
     "But everything would be different. If you weren't abducted that night,
you would have never contracted this illness. You would live, Scully."
     "Yes, but how? How can I know what could have been of my life if I
wasn't abducted? I could find myself ... everywhere."
     Mulder studied her for a moment. "Yeah, but there are good chances
you'll find me still buzzing around you." He smiled, but the smile never
reached his eyes. "Scully, it could really work. I know how to set the time
machine and it won't be difficult to escape the
surveillance."
     Scully remained thoughtful a moment, her gaze bent on the floor.
"You'll go with me."  It wasn't a question, but a statement.
     "I can't, someone has to make the machine work."
     "Then I won't do it." She closed her eyes, uttering the words as
quietly as possible.
     "I'll be okay."
     His voice had gotten softer and this made Scully's battle against tears
even harder. "How? What are you going to do?"
     She sounded as helpless and desperate as a little girl, and Mulder had
to fight an impulse to forget everything else and just soothe her. He was
almost ready to let it go, when it occurred to him that she probably didn't
want to be even touched by him. Everything was going to hell, and of course
it was because of him. "I will dream about you, Scully." The truth had
always been his leading principle, his mantra, but he had never been able to
show what he really felt inside. A life time ago he'd told her that the
truth would save them both, and maybe now it was time to test this theory.
"Clean stuff, don't worry. You marrying a loving brilliant doctor who is
crazy about you, you having two or three red-haired and blue-eyed brats, a
normal job and a nice white house ..."
     "You think that would be the life I wished for?" She asked dryly.
     "I think that's what you would deserve."
     "And the X-Files?"
     Mulder shrugged. "It was just a dream." He said clumsily. He wasn't
sure he wanted to talk about this. Besides, he'd always had troubles
imagining a happy future together with Scully, no matter how many times he
had tried.
     Scully would have wanted to cry that he had constantly been the main
character in her reveries for more than eight years, but what reached her
lips wasn't so sweet. "It seems we don't share the same dreams."  Her
favorite dreams were about babies. The best one saw Mulder and herself
sitting on a couch with his arm around her shoulder, just like they had been
at the home of the president of the home owners association when they had
pretended to be married. Just it was true this time, and she was pregnant.
Significantly, even one of her worst nightmares involved *their* baby. She
came out of the bathroom after a perfect shower and found Mulder sitting on
a rocking chair in the nursery of their perfect home, with their child in
his arms. But when she drew nearer, she saw that the fluffy pink quilt was
empty. She felt the need to tell him how sorry she was and how many times
she had wished she could left something able to outlive her, but he
prevented her with a sad smile and one of his silly remarks.
     "Hey, I was avoiding the dirty parts!"
     The smile reflected itself bravely on her face for an instant, but then
her brow contracted to a frown and her lips pursued in a pale quiet despair.
     He had seen her frowning so many times, and often had futiley wished to
place a tiny kiss right in the middle of her brow, a stupid idea to dissolve
her pains and worries. But they had always needed their own space and he
sensed that things weren't changed too much. All he could do was to sit near
her and hold her hand.
     "Am I going to forget everything?" She finally breathed. A tear run
quietly down her cheek and she promptly wiped it away.
     "I don't know, but it might be." He couldn't lie to her, not now.
     He looked at him with gazing eyes. "I don't want to forget."
     "I will remember for both of us."
     "I'm so sorry." She whispered. Deep inside, she had always believed
that there would have been a time to voice all the unspoken things and now
she had to give up that hope too.
     "Don't be." Scully's hand was cold. "You cold?" It was reassuring to
move a step in less dangerous waters.
     "I'm ..."  Then, realizing how silly it would have been pretending to
be fine; "A bit." A moment later she felt Mulder's arm around her shoulders.
He was still afraid to touch her and she had to smile at their awkwardness.
Closing her eyes, she rested her head on his shoulder and took some deep
breaths to light the tension of the moment.
     Slowly rubbing her thin back, Mulder found out that it was too late to
change things between them. Admitting now how much he loved her would have
meant to keep her there. And that - no matter how alluring it was - would
have been wrong and terribly selfish. So he just held her a bit tighter,
praying that she knew. "You'll go tonight, right before dawn. We'll find at
worst a couple of guards, probably humans." He felt her stiffen, but he
didn't give her the time to protest. "That's the better thing to do, Scully.
Trust me." It was 2 am, they had just few hours left together, but she was
clearly worn out. "You should get some rest."
     Scully felt something moist over her upper lip and brought her hand to
wipe it. Blood.
     "Scully ..."
     "I'm fine Mulder, I just need a tissue."
     Mulder fumbled nervously inside a drawer and handed her a clean
handkerchief. "Sorry, this is all I have."
     "That's fine." She pressed it under her nose, feeling a vague sense of
nausea.
     "I bring you some water."
     He rushed outside and Scully crawled inside his bed, sitting with her
back against the wall. The water was fresh, and she felt better at once. He
had sat on the floor with the back of his head against the bed edge, and
watching him Scully was reminded of that rainy night in that motel in Oregon
during their first case. This was their last night and they were just the
same as then. Yet, they were no longer the same persons and that dreary
motel had probably been destroyed. She wondered if she was going to at least
remember what had happened before her abduction.
     Mulder couldn't see her, but from her even breath he guessed she had
finally fallen asleep. He closed his eyes and let his mind slumber across
memories of the past. Then she broke the spell calling his name. His first
name. She was fully awake and he suspected that she had been watching him
the whole time.
     "I was sure your first name would have brought you back at once" Scully
teased him.
     "I wasn't sleeping."
     "Sure you weren't."  She held his hand, letting her gold necklace slip
onto his hand. "That's not an original gift, but shops are all closed at
this hour of the night."
     Mulder stared at the shining thing which held so much meaning for both
of them for a while, then clutched the cross in his fist. "Scully, you
should get dressed."
     Scully's heart leaped and she wrapped her hands before herself
protectively. No, she wasn't ready yet. She needed some more time to get
accustomed to the idea of saying goodbye to Mulder, to make sure she was
doing the right thing.
     "I need some time to arrange things and make an inspection of the lab
alone." He explained approaching her on the bed. She had bent her head and
he could see her eyes filling with tears again. Feeling himself something
threatening in his throat, Mulder silently prayed her to be strong.
     On her side, Scully was doing her best to comply with his wish, but her
sight was suddenly blurred with tears and the world started to spin
merciless around her. "Come with me, Mulder. Ask Scribner to set the machine
for us." She pleaded.
     "You know we can't trust him."
     "Why not? We can at least try. We ... " She paused as her voice broke
with emotion. Clearing her throat, she continued; "We could start everything
afresh together."
     He knew it wasn't a wise thing, but he couldn't help wrapping his arms
around her, holding her tight. He felt her stiffen at first, then relax
against his body, finally allowing the too long held tears to flow freely.
It was then, rocking her gently and stroking her hair, that he really
realized how much he was going to miss his Scully. There would be no more
quarrels about his mad theories, eyebrows raised, late night calls, moments
pure and tender like that ... There would be no more hope of more between
them.  He would never fall asleep spooned against her and awaken at morning
to find her sleeping peacefully at his side. That was an unbearable thought,
and the only thing which gave him the strength to go on was that he wouldn't
have to watch her die, that he would have the hope that somewhere else she
was happy. The desperate hope that in another time and in another space, she
might have been happy with him. "You have to promise me that you won't miss
Duane Barry, Scully." He whispered hoarsely in her hear; "That you won't
come back here."
     She squeezed her eyes shut, tightening her hands around his waist. She
was wasting away the last chance she had to tell him how she felt because of
those stupid tears that kept on streaming hot down her face.
     "Promise me."  He repeated, lifting her chin with his middle finger.
     Unable to speak, she just nodded.


     It was all over. The sky hadn't fallen down, and what was left of the
world hadn't crumbled the moment she had left it. It was just a bit drearier
and empty. The man to which he was still pointing his gun looked at him with
sad and weary eyes, in which Mulder believed to behold a shadow of sympathy.
It was something that flowed deeply, a sheer stream that he had glimpsed
from time to time, but he couldn't deny it was there. It was the need to go
on, to preserve what that meant, there, in the middle of nothingness. He had
perceived that Scully, with her loyalty and her strength had helped this
stream to approach the surface. A lot of people liked her and he allowed
himself to hope that maybe they would have understood what he had just done.
     Dropping his gun, he sat on an uncomfortable chair, holding his head
with his hands; it was the same chair where she had sat when he'd come back
from 1999. It had been no more than twenty days before, but all that seemed
to have happened in another life. And in a way, it was true. A new chapter
had just begun, and what was he left with? Was it only loneliness and
regret?
     The guy had left the lab, he had probably gone to call some of the big
bosses. He didn't care what would have been his punishment, he really didn't
think it would be too hard anyway. Moreover, there was still a spark of hope
to find some sympathy. Hope. It occurred to him that was what she had left
him, her last precious gift. He'd given her another chance and she'd paid
him back with a hope that was going to last for ever. She might be happy.
     Then he had the past to keep him company. The messy basement office,
the long car trips, the mingled smell of night and the grass of a baseball
field. Scully would always be part of this, the best, purest part of
everything he had seen and done. He would have grown old in this place
without sun, but she would have remained bright like her gold cross for
ever.
     Yes, he was going to remember for both of them.

The End.

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Feedback greatly appreciated. Please, I'm just a stupid Italian girl! ;)
<severini@amos.ifa.rm.cnr.it>   And thanks for reading. :)
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