New: Sixty Degrees of Separation (1/5)

Title: Sixty Degrees of Separation

Author: mmalone73@hotmail.com (Barbara D.)

Category: S, A, UST/MSR
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Disclaimer: The X-Files and all ancillary materials
pertaining thereto belong to Chris Carter, 1013 Productions, 20th
Century Fox, and whoever owns them. No copyright infringement is
intended and no profit is being made.
Archive: Gossamer yes. If anyone else is interested, just let me know.

Summary: Mulder takes the long way round to figuring out Scully's
response to his declaration at the end of Triangle.
Timeline: Between Triangle and Dreamland
Spoilers: Triangle, Dreamland, The Beginning
No real spoilers, but it helps if you've seen: Blessing Way, Paper Clip,
Never Again, Detour, The End, The Movie, Drive, Paper Hearts

Author's notes: I've used a phrase here which was coined (I think)
during the Cold War. Forgive me for using it out of context, or,
perhaps, chalk up its usage to Mulder's muddled state.

Thanks: (I tried to leave the schmoop out of the story, but had to put
it someplace. It ended up here <g>.) To Amy Seymour, for her eagle eyed
catches of embarrassing errors and awkward phrasing. Even sleepy!Amy
catches stuff I skim right on by. To Paula Graves, for time and effort
spent reading this story (that surely could have been spent doing better
things) and wonderful constructive commentary. And to marguerite, for
pointing out problem areas, and suggesting terrific ways to correct
them, when she should have been kicking back and enjoying feedback for
her latest amazing story. Thank you, ladies, for being wonderful writers
and teachers.

***

Part 1/5

He was racing down the long corridor, through intermittent patches of
stark light and murky shadow. The institutional lighting, combined with
the institutional shade of mustard yellow on the walls, was disorienting
-- both familiar and unfamiliar at once. He was running -- not away, but
toward something. Something remote, inaccessible, and... longed for. He
had the feeling that if sheer strength of will was enough, he could make
the object of his search appear. I can make it happen, he thought. I
can....

Out of the darkness, a door appeared. Despite his panic, he almost
laughed at the sound of his own voice echoing in his head. I'd like to
try door number one, Monty. His fortune, he thought.

His fate.

He pushed open the door so hard it banged against the wall. A woman,
sitting behind a desk in the dimly lit office that lay before him,
jumped in reaction to his abrupt entry.

"You--" she said, gaping at him.

He felt himself smiling, in recognition and self-congratulation. He had
found her. "Scully!"

"What are you doing here?" she demanded, apparently not happy to be
found.

"Scully?" he repeated, suddenly feeling foolish.

She rolled her eyes, then muttered an annoyed "Oh, brother," under her
breath. She got up and moved to the back of the office, toward a door he
had not noticed before.

"Scully, no," he said, and then, as she opened the door, "Scully!
Scully, don't!"

"Don't what, Mulder?" He felt a hand on his shoulder. "Mulder, wake up."

***

As his arm flailed outward and he jerked awake, he heard a thud and a
muffled curse.

"Are you OK, Mulder?" a voice asked, from a distance.

"Yeah." He took in his surroundings -- familiar ones. He was in his
apartment. He looked up at the source of the voice. "Scully?"

"Yes, it's me." She watched him warily as he adjusted to a half-sitting,
half-slumped position on the couch. She closed the distance between
them, and sat gingerly, about a foot away. "I've been here since we got
back from the hospital. Do you remember that? Do you remember..."

As if triggered by the sound of the word, memory came back in a flood of
images and sounds, action and emotion. The rented boat chugging through
the clear Caribbean morning, with him at the helm, feeling queasy and
excited at the same time. The sudden shattering, of first the air around
him, and then the deck beneath his feet. The oddly peaceful submersion
in a warm blue shroud, followed by the frantic kaleidoscope of activity
to the tempo of big band music. And in the center of it all, his anchor,
his lifeline. Scully.

He turned to her to reaffirm the connection, then stopped dead at the
look on her face. He'd had years of practice decoding the tiny clues she
let slip through her various masks. At that moment, through the blaze of
a headache that had crept up on him, along with consciousness, he saw
worry, puzzlement, and compassion... but not love.

He turned away and slumped back down. "You can go, Scully."

"Mulder, you just got out of the hospital, and you're recovering from a
head injury. I'm not going anywhere," she said.

"I'm not a holy day of obligation. You don't have to take the day off
just to tend to me and rack up grace points."

"Mulder," she said patiently, "if this is about what you said, I'd like
to--"

"This is about me having the mother-in-law of all headaches, Scully. I
just want to go back to sleep." To dream, he thought -- then wondered
why. What had he been dreaming about? It was hovering just beyond
memory.

"May we discuss it now?" she asked.

Asked in the same way she'd say 'May I have my root canal now?', he
thought bitterly. Just try to bring up anything personal, and you got
the best of Scully in a nutshell. Overly careful, cautious, and
restrained. He vowed not to look at her face again while she was still
in the apartment. He couldn't bear to see the pallid expression he knew
he'd find there, instead of the passionate one that he knew now he
wanted.

"You can go, Scully," he repeated, flatly.

"Mulder, stop acting like a child," she snapped back.

Setting the standard for the shortest commitment to a vow on record, he
turned to face her. "What?"

She sighed, and began rubbing the leather of the couch, moving her hand
in a distracted pattern across the foot of space between them. "Just
because I didn't want to discuss what you said last night, and again
this morning, in, of all inappropriate places, a hospital room, where
anyone could walk in...." She flashed a look in his direction, warming
to the subject. "Just because you couldn't make me say, or do, what you
wanted, when you wanted, you've decided to run away from the discussion
I'd like to have now."

She was trying to maintain her usual impassive facade, but cracks were
beginning to show. He really was a sorry son of a bitch, he thought.
Even having her angry with him made him a little happier -- anger was
passionate, at least. If they couldn't do the things he'd envisioned
them doing on this couch, maybe a rip-roaring argument would satisfy for
now. "I'm not the one who's been running away, Scully," he sneered, as
his opening salvo. Her eyes lit up in response. Oh, yeah, he thought.
This is good.

"Did that bump on your head reinforce your selective memory, Mulder?
What were you in the process of doing when you got it, if not running
away?" she said.

"Big difference, Scully. I was running toward something. Something
interesting and extreme. Something exciting. Something that didn't
involve fertilizer."

"Something that didn't involve me?"

"No..."

Oh, shit.

"And now after running out on me, leaving me to cover for you, not to
mention rescuing you -- now you're annoyed that I didn't react the way
you wanted to the stunning revelation you brought back with you? That I
didn't keel over, exclaiming 'Oh, Fox' on the way down to the ground?"

She launched herself off the couch, and, began to stalk toward the
kitchen.

"Jesus, Scully," he protested feebly, suddenly wondering if eliciting
her anger was such a good idea after all.

He backtracked and threw caution to the wind. "I told you this morning,
it all involved you," he called after her. "On that ship, you were the
center of it all. The reason I'm still alive, the reason we're all still
ali--"

She turned to face him, hands clenched at her sides. "That wasn't me,
Mulder. You had a concussion and a subsequent elaborate hallucination.
Whatever that... figment of your imagination said or did, she did it
because you were making it happen." She paused, crossed her arms, and
looked down. "It wasn't me."

"I didn't tell her what I told you, Scully," he said quietly.

She kept her gaze fixed to the floor. Thinking he was going to get no
response, he was surprised when she said, in a small voice, "What would
you have had her say if you did, Mulder?"

"Well, not 'Oh, Fox.' I'd rather hear 'Oh, brother.' than that," he
said, starting to get up. He had no idea what he was going to do when he
got closer to her, but the pain that had replaced her anger was tearing
at him. He had the vague idea that comforting her would make him feel
better.

He gasped as the effort of standing increased the pain in his head to a
nearly intolerable level. With a sharp look of concern, Scully moved to
his side and gently pushed him back down on the couch. He was in no
shape to offer resistance. She walked back to the kitchen, then returned
with a glass of water and a prescription bottle of pills.

"Take these, Mulder," she said, offering him the glass and two pills.
"Then lie back down."

He swallowed, then murmured, "I thought you wanted to finish this,
Scully," as he closed his eyes and slumped gratefully back onto the
couch. "I guess now I'm just supposed to call you in the morning."

"This is too difficult right now, Mulder" she said, brittle facade back
in place. "We'll discuss it another time."

"When?" he rasped, with a last burst of energy. "When you have all your
counter arguments in place? When you won't be able to react honestly
because you've mapped out a strategy to deal with this latest quirk of
old Spooky's?"

His bitterness was redirected, back where it belonged. True, Scully
wouldn't respond the way he wanted, but he realized now just how
thoroughly he'd fucked this up. He should have expected it, he should
accept it, he should just give in and wallow in it.

"I'm going to work in the kitchen," Scully said, as if from a far
distance -- moving away from him as rapidly as possible, he thought. He
didn't blame her.

He heard a click, then the sound of the television.

"Is American Movie Classics OK, Mulder? she asked. "The screaming every
five minutes on the SciFi channel makes it hard to concentrate."

"Sure, fine," He mumbled. Whatever.

He drifted, waiting for the pain to subside so he could start to plan a
way out of this latest mess. Eventually, the soft drone from the
television resolved itself into a voice. David Niven? Cary Grant?
Neither, he thought.

"What'll it be guv?"

He glanced over at the source of the voice. "Whiskey," he said. "Neat."

***

The jovial bartender, whose working class accent clashed with his formal
wear, banged a glass on the bar and poured a finger full of single malt.
"Yank, eh?" he said, raising his voice over the music coming from the
band behind them. "Oh, to be in the States, now that war is here. How
come you ain't hightailed it back home, Yank?"

Mulder blinked, then studied the shot glass. What the hell. He tossed
back the contents, then grimaced and wheezed, "Looking for someone."

"Oh? Must be a right proper little dolly bird. Can't imagine why anyone
would stick around here elsewise. Unless you want to join the fun -- rub
old Adolf's nose in the dirt for 'im."

Mulder took in the scene reflected in the mirror behind the rather grand
bar. Couples were swaying to the sound of an old standard tune he
vaguely recognized, the women in long gowns, the men in formal wear.
Small tables, scattered around the edge of the room, were each set with
an old fashioned telephone and crowned with a well-shaded lamp, perfect
for intimate conversation away from the press on the dance floor. A
supper club, he realized. It looked familiar... but that ship had
sailed, hadn't it?

"I am looking for a woman, as a matter of fact." He raised his voice to
carry over the music. "A redhead." Unfortunately, the band chose that
moment to finish its tune. His voice carried clearly across the softly
applauding crowd. In the mirror he saw several heads turn in his
direction, and then -- he saw her, sitting alone at one of the tables.

She had also turned her head at the sound of his voice, and a look of
surprise crossed her face. He whirled around on the bar stool. "Well,
that was easy," said the bartender. "I was going to wish you happy
hunting, but it looks like you've run the little vixen to ground." The
woman began pulling on a pair of long white gloves, looking as if she
had every intention of bolting.

"Thanks," Mulder said hastily, and reached into his pocket. Surprised,
he pulled out a handful of half-crowns, shillings, and pence, then
turned to look helplessly at the bartender.

"Cor, you Yanks," said the bartender, "I could bloody retire on the lot
of you, not bothering to learn our simple little system." He picked
several coins from Mulder's palm. Mulder shoved the remainder in his
pocket, then turned back, only to find the table empty.

"Where did she go?" he asked the bartender. "Did you see her?"

"Here, easy on, guv," said the bartender. "She just ran up the stairs."

"Thanks again," Mulder said over his shoulder, heading out the door.

"Don't mention it, Yank," called the bartender, "And thanks for the
tip!"

Mulder reached the stairs, then began to fight his way past the constant
stream of couples heading down toward the club. Luckily for him, his
redheaded quarry was caught in the same jam. By dint of longer legs and
poorer manners, he reached her before she got to the upper level.

He placed a hand on her shoulder. "Scully? Scully, it's me."

She shrugged him off, and, without turning, whispered under her breath,
"Grab me again, and you'll be singing soprano, buster."

He carefully put his hands at his sides, ready to shield any critical
target she might have in mind, then leaned over her shoulder. "Come on,
Scully, what's going on? Why are you running away? Why are you always
running away?" He winced at the pathetic note in his voice.

"As I recall, you were the one who ran. You told me a harebrained story,
insulted me, then jumped overboard." She leaned back into him to avoid
getting trampled by a particularly boisterous party pushing their way
past them.

Mulder blinked. "It's you?" he said. "But I thought... I thought the
boat..."

She turned to face him, so close he could feel her breath on his cheek.
She was standing one stair above him, so they were almost eye-to-eye.
"You thought I went down with the ship? Well that may have been your
plan, but I had plans of my own. I had a way off that ship waiting for
me, and I lived to fight another day," she said triumphantly. "Can't say
the same for those fascist pigs. We don't know what happened, but
nobody's heard from them again."

"Oh, Scully," he breathed, "Thank God. I thought I had sent you--
sacrificed you..."

"Stop calling me that. And aren't you full of yourself? Do you think
things happen just because you want them to? Who do you think you are?"

Stung, he said, "The guy who saved you and everyone else from those
fascists getting their hands on a doomsday weapon? The guy who told you
how to get rid of the fascists?" He swallowed hard, then said
helplessly, "The guy who kissed you good-bye, thinking he would never
see you again?"

She stared at him impassively. "Well, maybe you do have some reason to
be full of yourself," she said. "But what's past is past. I have another
job to do now, and I don't need you throwing a monkey wrench in it. It
would be better if you left, now." Her face softened a bit. "Please?"

She'd turned away from him when a drunken voice behind him said, "Hey,
bub, move it up or move it down, but just move it, will ya?"

Mulder closed his eyes briefly, then made a blind grab for her elbow.
"Dance with me," he said, surprising himself, "Just one dance, then I'll
leave."

She turned back to him, not pulling away from his grip, he noticed.

"This guy bothering you, lady?" said the voice behind him. "You want I
should get rid of him?"

"No," she said over Mulder's shoulder. "I'll handle this." She looked
back at Mulder. "One dance," she said, "One."

Is the loneliest number, Mulder thought wistfully, then turned to escort
her down the stairs. He stopped abruptly, and found himself looking down
into the ice cold eyes of Walter Skinner.

"Why, Mulder?" said Skinner, reaching up to tug Mulder's shoulder. "Why
are you still here?"

***

Mulder shook the hand off his shoulder, then felt himself falling. The
strong hand reappeared and stopped him from rolling off the couch.

"What--" he croaked, and realized his throat was parched. "What do you
want?"

"Mulder, why are you still here?" demanded a gruff voice. "You were
supposed to report for work this morning."

Mulder opened his eyes and regarded his former boss warily. "How did you
get in here?" he asked. He half-sat up, which did his pounding head no
good at all. "Where's Scully?"

"She gave me her key," said Skinner. "She had to go into work early, and
didn't want to wake you. She asked me to check on you when you didn't
answer the phone. It's a little easier for me to get away from work
these days than it is for her," he added grimly.

Mulder sat up the rest of the way and gulped water from the full glass
that was sitting on the coffee table. He grimaced. Lukewarm. Scully must
have left it last night.

"I want to go in to work," said Mulder abruptly, throwing off the
blanket that covered him. More evidence of Scully's care.

"It's a little late for that. I'm sure your absence has already been
noted," said Skinner. "Besides, you look like hell."

"I want to see Scully," said Mulder. "And I have to check on--" He
glanced at Skinner. "Check on something."

"Can't it wait?" asked Skinner.

"No." Mulder headed into the bathroom, trying to remember the latest
dream. He peered at his still bruised face in the mirror, and wondered
why he was feeling wary of Skinner in a way he hadn't felt for years.

End Part 1/5

New: Sixty Degrees of Separation (2/5)

Disclaimer in Part 1

Part 2/5

Mulder pushed open his apartment door, flung his coat on the coat rack,
and his keys in the general direction of the hall table. Tossing his
mail on the coffee table, he walked over to the fish tank, peered in,
and noted thankfully that no belly-up evidence of his neglectful
tendencies could be observed. He tapped some food into the tank, then
headed for the kitchen to feed himself. Unfortunately, nothing in his
unusually well stocked refrigerator appealed. Coming back with a glass
of water and a fresh bag of sunflower seeds, he pointed the remote at
the television, and was rewarded with a black and white vision of Ingrid
Bergman.

Going through the motions of shaking off his abbreviated day at the
Bureau, he thought over time spent sitting at the confining desk,
feeling Scully's eyes on his back. Of course, every time he'd turned to
look at her, she'd had her eyes glued to her computer monitor, features
neutral. He should have been collating fertilizer invoices with her,
looking for buying patterns. Hell, he should have been checking out the
self-proclaimed mole from Area 51, who had made been trying to pin him
down for a meeting for the last three weeks. Instead, he had
surreptitiously called up the results of the net and bureau data base
searches he had done before pursuing the Queen Anne, trying to identify
the Scully and Skinner facsimiles he had seen there.

Of course, he acknowledged, that fruitless search hadn't occupied all
his time. There were the few rash moments when he'd considered chucking
work, grabbing Scully's hand, and pulling her into one of the
stairwells. He'd tell her one more time that he loved her, then cleverly
rebut every rational explanation she could offer as to why that wasn't
really true, or why it was a really bad idea at this point in time, or
why she had to get back to work. Maybe, he had thought, maybe he'd just
been doing too damned much talking. And then a vision of Scully pitching
him down the stairs, after he tried substituting physical for verbal
persuasion, had put an abrupt end to that little reverie.

Eventually, his seemingly permanent headache had gotten too persistent
to ignore.

"Hey, Scully," he'd whispered softly, still drawing more attention in
the crowded bullpen than he'd wanted, "I'm gonna take off."

She had looked at him -- more compassion, dammit -- and said, "Do you
want me to drive you home, Mulder?"

He had been tempted, pride no match for the need to be with her, but had
decided that he was in no shape to pursue what he really wanted to
pursue with her. "No," he'd replied. "I'll check out a Bureau car --
tell them I have interviews tomorrow, or something."

Compassion had been chased across her face by wistful sadness. "I'll
call you later. Mulder," she'd said.

He'd been encouraged enough to touch her hand on his way past her desk,
the action shielded by his body from the rest of the bullpen. To his
surprise, his hand was caught and held in her small, strong grip.

Staring at her monitor, she'd said, "The doctor gave you that pain
medication for a reason, Mulder." Glancing at him out of the corner of
her eye, she'd murmured "Get some rest, OK?" He'd pulled his hand from
hers reluctantly, and headed out the door.

As he'd made his way home, he'd puzzled over what he wanted and how to
get it. Starting with one memorable moment six years ago, the things
that had defined his life -- his quest, his work -- had begun to undergo
an inexorable change. She had walked into his office, taken his hand,
and never really let go. And, as the years passed, he'd found that she
had taken his heart, as well. He just wanted her to know that, to
acknowledge it, to understand. Somehow, some way, he had gone about
telling her all wrong, and, in the process, pushed her farther away.

Marveling at his ability to elicit an atagonistic response from Scully,
over issues both great and small, he started to sort through his mail,
finally pulling the plain brown wrapper off a monthly indulgence. He
took a sip of water, stared at the pill bottle on the coffee table, then
shook two pills into his hand, and tossed them back. He congratulated
himself for adhering to Scully's wishes, even when Scully wasn't there
to see it.

What a changed character he was. Even if Scully couldn't -- or wouldn't
-- see that either.

He glanced back at the television, watching Humphrey Bogart watching
Paul Henreid watching Ingrid Bergman watching Humphrey Bogart. He shook
his head, then began to leaf listlessly through the magazine, noting
that none of the cheerfully displayed advertisements for plastic surgery
was attached to a face expressing anything close to the pure passion of
Ingrid Bergman... or the brilliant challenge of Scully.

Just in front of him, a voice sounding distinctly like Walter Skinner's
said, "What do you think you're doing with her?"

Curious, he glanced toward the television, and found Skinner staring
back at him, standing one stair below him and blocking the way to a
supper club dance floor.

***

The body language of the man before him gave the impression that he was
drunk, but his eyes were hard and clear. He started to speak. "She's
with m--"

"She's with him," said the red-haired woman standing beside Mulder. She
took Mulder's hand and pulled him down the stairs. "You have someone
else to keep track of, don't you?" she said to the other man, tipping
her head in the direction of the club.

Looking in the same direction, Mulder saw a woman dressed in black,
sitting at the bar. He couldn't quite see her face, covered as it was by
the large swath of black feathers sprouting from her hat. He looked back
at the woman grasping his hand, and realized she was exchanging a look
with the other man. He recognized it as one Scully had often bestowed on
him, in the very early days of their partnership.

I'll cover your back, it said. Will you trust me?

In a rush, Mulder's memory of the events preceding this exchange
returned. With a hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach, he followed
the woman back to the club, sneaking glances over his shoulder at the
familiar figure, standing with feet firmly planted, still halfway up the
staircase. "What's he doing here?" he hissed, noting that the Skinner
lookalike was dressed in black tie. "The last time I saw him, he was a
Nazi."

The mystery woman whirled around and settled herself into his arms, as
the strains of 'As Time Goes By' wafted across the dance floor. "The
last time you saw him, he was an undercover military intelligence
officer," she said, "my counterpart." She looked around his shoulder,
back toward the stairs. "My companion in the lifeboat that got us off
the Queen Anne."

He felt a surprisingly strong flare of jealousy at the fond tone that
colored her no-nonsense delivery. "So, you let him save you?"

She turned back to face him, staring straight into his eyes. "Maybe he
let me save him. Maybe we saved each other."

"You're partners now?" he asked, feeling more alone by the minute.

"Yes," she said. "And in a way, I'm glad you're here. So I can thank you
for that."

"Me?" he said. "What did I do?" Tell me so I don't make the same mistake
twice, he thought.

"Do you know what a honey trap is?" she asked.

"A severe test of fortitude for Winnie-the-Pooh?" he answered blankly.

"In intelligence circles. Have you ever heard the term?"

He had. "Is that what you were doing?" he asked gently. It pained him to
think of Scully -- any version of Scully -- wasting herself in
entrapment setups, used merely as bait.

"That's all any of us were allowed to do," she said bitterly. The men in
charge don't have very much imagination when it comes to assigning women
who want to do their patriotic duty. In their minds, the best position
for a woman is behind a typewriter, or on her back."

"Things will change," he said, softly.

She looked up at him, eyes bright with pride, and what might have been
tears. "I'll make sure of that," she said. "I have a little power of my
own now, thanks to my work on that ship. Thanks a bit to you, I guess,
and the big lug over there." She pointed with her chin over Mulder's
shoulder.

Mulder looked back and saw that her partner had moved down the stairs,
and was seated at the bar, one seat down from the woman in black.

His dance partner looked back at him and asked "What are you doing here,
by the way?"

"I don't know, I... think I was looking for someone." He looked down at
her, and then around the club. "And I just ended up here," he said.

"That's a pretty aimless answer for a man who seemed to have such a
strong goal on the Queen Anne," she remarked.

"I did have a goal, in the end, a-- someone to get back to," he
stammered.

"Someone.... Let me guess. A woman?" The flirtatious smile that
accompanied the question rocked him back on his heels. He stopped
dancing momentarily.

His partner looked at him quizzically, then tugged him back into the
dance. "Did you get back to her?" she asked.

"Yes, but..." he bit his lip.

"She wasn't as happy to see you as you were to see her?" she guessed
compassionately.

"No!" he protested. "She was glad -- she even came looking for me."

"Then she must care for you quite a bit," said his dance partner,
extricating herself from his arms and turning to clap in the direction
of the band as the song ended.

"She cares for me," he said sadly. "Just not... not the way I want her
to."

The music started up again. His companion began to move toward the
tables, but he grabbed her hand and pulled her back toward him. "One
more," he said softly in her ear. "Please?"

She turned slowly, glanced toward the bar, then up at him. "Sure," she
said, smiling again. "One more. I guess I owe you after the right cross
I planted on you." She reached up and touched his cheek carefully.
"How's that doing, by the way?"

He flinched a little at her soft touch, then murmured, "Fine," as they
started to dance again, to the tune of 'Someone To Watch Over Me'. He
stared down at her. "So what's with you and Skinner?"

"Who?" she said. "Oh, him. His name's not Skinner," she said with a
laugh. "And we're... partners."

She should be careful in her business, thought Mulder. She was almost as
bad a liar as Scully... his other Scully. Mildly confused, but delighted
to have kept any version of Scully in his arms for such an extended
period, Mulder decided to enjoy himself for as long as this -- whatever
it was -- lasted.

He gave her his best leer and said "Just partners? Is that all you are
to each other?" To his chagrin, her face hardened.

"In case you hadn't noticed, there's a war going on out there and we've
got a job to do, buster," she said.

"Sorry," he said.

"I suppose you think that all I've got in my silly head is catching a
man and settling down," she said, in a challenging voice.

"No!" he exclaimed. "No, I've never thought that. You remind me of my
partner, and I wouldn't want to work with anyone else. She's the only
one who will-- who can work with me," he added, somewhat forlorn.
"She's... amazing."

They danced in strained silence for several measures, until he realized
that she had turned her gaze back to him. "So you and this other woman
-- your partner? You say she doesn't feel for you what you feel for her.
What do you feel for her?"

It was so hard to look at this bright, beautiful woman, feel her in his
arms, and not think of Scully. He took in her vivid hair, the sparkle of
warmth and intelligence in her eyes, her soft mouth, quirked on the
brink of a smile he was aching to see again.

"I love you," he thought. At her startled look, he realized he had said
the words out loud.

"Her, I mean," he said quickly "I love..." he trailed off, helplessly.

She gazed up into his eyes, silent for a moment, then whistled under her
breath. "Did you tell her like that?" she asked.

"Yeah," he said, looking down. "She rolled her eyes and got away from me
as fast as she could.

Seeing the pity in his dance partner's eyes, he finished in a rush. "It
was something she wasn't expecting, I guess. When I tried to tell her
again, she didn't want to hear it." The frustration from that
morning-after conversation colored his voice. "I don't know why."

"You'd better start thinking, because you must have done something else
that was really stupid, something that kept her from reacting the way
you wanted. I'll tell you true, if things were different, and you said
it to me that way I'd..." she hesitated and bit her lip.

Intrigued, he asked "You'd what?"

She stopped moving and stood in his arms, then reached up to touch his
cheek again. "I would have asked you to kiss me again. And I wouldn't
have socked you, after."

The music ended. While the couples around them started to clap, they
stood still, gazing at each other. His companion gave a little shake,
then slipped from Mulder's arms, took his hand, and led him to one of
the side tables.

Mulder flopped down onto one of the small chairs, while his companion
stood by hers, one eyebrow raised expectantly. He jumped to his feet,
mortified at a hazy memory of once having had manners, and pulled her
chair out for her. He sat back down, and wondered if part of his problem
with Scully was that she thought he took her for granted. His companion
gave him an inquiring look. "Yes?" he said.

"Would you like some champagne?" she said.

"If you want some," he said.

She rolled her eyes. "You have to signal the waiter, buster. He won't
pay any attention to me."

As he sat up, and began looking for a waiter, the light at the base of
the phone on the table started flashing. His companion picked it up,
listened for a moment, then arched another Scully-like eyebrow in his
direction. She glanced over at the bar, and he followed her gaze toward
the back of the woman in black, now holding the bar phone to her ear.
His table companion handed the phone to him. "It's for you," she said.

Surprised, he took it. "Mulder," he said, into the phone.

"Fox," said Diana, "How are you?"

"W-What?" he stammered, turning back toward the bar.

***

His gaze was met by an infommercial for a food dehydrator, blaring from
the television. Pointing the plastic rectangle in his hand at the
television, he pushed buttons frantically, then realized his phone
wouldn't turn the television off. Dropping the phone, he scrambled for
the remote, and yelped at the sudden sharp pain in his head. Once he had
the television safely off, he bent over slowly to pick the phone up off
the floor. It rang in his hand.

He jumped, managed not to drop it again, and said "Hello?"

"Fox, what just happened?"

"I-- uh, I dropped the phone," he mumbled.

"How are you feeling?" Diana was at her most ingratiating. "I've been
worried about you."

"Fine," he said. "I was just..." Dreaming, he realized, though once
again, he had no specific memory of the events in the dream. "I was just
sleeping."

"Well that's good, I'm sure you need it," said Diana. "Have you eaten
yet? Would you like me to come over and fix something for you?"

"No!" he said, wincing at the volume of his own voice. "No, that's okay,
Scully, uh-- Scully is coming by later. She'll take care of everything."
Liar. Too bad. Good cause.

"I'm sure she will," said Diana, patently not buying it.

Annoyed, he got up and took his empty glass back to the kitchen. "I'm
really tired, Diana. I'll talk to you later, okay?" he said, knowing he
sounded abrupt and really not giving a damn. Scully might not be coming
by, but she'd promised to call, and he wanted the line free.

"Fine," said Diana, stiffly. "I'll see you at work tomorrow, perhaps."

"I doubt it," he said. "I don't get down to the basement much anymore."

"I really wish you could let bygones be bygones," she said, in a smooth
voice that failed to cover her irritation.

I really wish you would just be gone, thought Mulder, equally irritated.
"Well, Diana, thanks for calling, but I gotta go," he said. "I've got
tickets for the Ice Capades."

"Really? Who are you going wi-- Oh. Really, Fox."

He grinned at the click that sounded in his ear. That was only one of
the differences between Scully and Diana, he mused. Scully would simply
have told him to try and enjoy himself, and to leave his gun at home. He
flicked the television back on, settled on the couch, and found his
attention caught again by the dehydrator infommercial. Now that they
were doing a lot more stakeouts, it might be useful to stock up on
provisions.

End Part 2/5

New: Sixty Degrees of Separation (3/5)

Disclaimer in Part 1

Part 3/5

Entering the Hoover building the next morning, Mulder reflected on the
two phone calls he had received the night before. On the surface,
Diana's had started out warm and conciliatory, while Scully's had begun
in a typically cool and cautious manner. But by the end.... As he
trudged up three flights of stairs, he heard Scully's voice in his head.

"How are you feeling, Mulder?"

"Can you describe the pain?"

"How many pills have you taken today?"

"You can take two more tonight. What have you eaten?"

"Ketchup is not a vegetable, Mulder."

"Turkey jerky? No, I can't say that I have. Are you sleepy at all?"

"I don't remember any lullabies."

"Umm -- reading yesterday's paper and watching television -- I caught
the last part of Casablanca."

"I would have chosen... I don't know, Mulder. Who do you think I would
have chosen?"

"OK, I guess I'd have to say she made the right choice in Casablanca --
and the wrong choice in Paris."

"Because saying... making commitments... a commitment... is a very
serious thing. I... I think you should try to get some more sleep,
Mulder."

"No."

"I'm fine, just sleepy. Are you coming in tomorrow?"

"Mulder, you don't have to come in just to keep an eye on MacElroy."

"He is not a mutant soul-sucker sent by Kersh to spy on us, Mulder, he's
an accountant."

"Well, sometimes, I am right."

"Mulder, besides all the other things I have to think about where you're
concerned, I'm now starting to worry that your relationship with reality
is becoming estranged."

"Yes, always. It's practically a full time job."

"I... Umm -- take care of yourself, Mulder. Call me if... Let me know if
the pain gets worse."

"The pain in your head, Mulder."

"Are you still there?"

"Good night, Mulder. I want-- hope you'll... feel better... See you
tomorrow."

With that, he had drifted into dreamless sleep, carried on the sound of
her voice. Not loving, perhaps, but caring and concerned, as always.

Smiling cynically at his newly sentimental self, and puffing slightly,
he opened the door from the stairwell and started down the hallway
leading to his new... area. Oh well, at least Scully had a real desk
next to his, now.

"Fox!" He heard behind him. He winced. Her voice wasn't loud, but it
carried. He put his head down and kept walking.

"Fox, please stop, I'd like to speak with you," he heard, this time
right beside him.

Suppressing a sigh, he stopped and turned to look at her. "Diana," he
said, in a neutral voice.

"I hope you're in a better mood today," she began.

"As opposed to what?" he asked, just to see if she'd swallow her
inevitable annoyance for the sake of whatever agenda she was pursuing at
the moment.

"I thought you might like to hear about a case we've been working on,"
she said, her face carefully composed. "An X-File." He felt her hand
come to rest on his arm.

Ordinarily, those magic words would have caught and held his attention,
but his attention was suddenly caught by something else. He turned his
head at the sound of voices coming down the hall, and got an eyeful of
Scully, in animated conversation. With Skinner.

"Actually, Scully and I are working on something pretty interesting
right now," he said absently. As far as he knew, the last time Scully
and Skinner had exchanged this many words outside Skinner's office, they
had been pointing guns at each other.

The approaching pair came even with Mulder and Diana just in time for
him to hear Scully say, with a smile that made his heart do a little
backflip, "...but the coffee at Georgetown General is much worse. You
should try it sometime."

Skinner replied, with a smile that affected Mulder in another way
entirely, "I'm sure Mulder will see to that."

Scully and Skinner slowed to a halt, and the four of them formed an
uneasy rectangle on the linoleum.

"Agent Mulder, Agent Fowley," said Skinner.

"Director Skinner, Agent Scully," said Diana.

"Agent Smart, Agent 99," said Mulder, under his breath.

"Mulder," said Scully, under hers.

Skinner cleared his throat, then said, "How are you feeling, Agent
Mulder?"

"Still damp enough to grow mushrooms," replied Mulder. "Thanks for
asking, sir."

"I thought you were in a minor traffic accident," Diana said
suspiciously. "Was it near some water?"

"According to Scully, only in my mind," said Mulder, not able to figure
out how to shake off Diana's hand without drawing too much attention.

Diana shot Mulder a perplexed look, then turned to Scully. "Fox was just
telling me that you and he have found something very intriguing to work
on since moving up out of the basement."

"He did? said Scully, with a blank stare, which was rapidly replaced by
a look that only Mulder knew well enough to interpret as a glare.
Particularly since it was directed at him. "Did he?" she asked again.

"Yeah, you know," said Mulder, finally breaking contact with Diana by
leaning down and speaking near Scully's ear, "the anomaly in
accounting."

"Oh," said Diana, brightening, "a fraud case? How... thrilling."

"You have no idea," said Scully. "Let's get to it, shall we, Mulder?"

"I thought you'd never ask," said Mulder.

"Perhaps we can take a rain check," said Diana, speaking over Scully's
"It's been nice talking with you again, Sir," to Skinner.

Mulder said "Sir," to Skinner, and "Yeah, sure," to Diana, then turned
to overtake Scully, who was halfway down the hallway, after bidding
Skinner a warm good-bye, and Diana nothing at all.

Reaching her side, he said, "Morning, Scully. Alone at last," hoping to
get one of those smiles she seemed to be throwing out freely this
morning.

"Mulder," she said.

S.O.L. there, he thought. "Umm -- I'm feeling much better, " he
volunteered.

"Good for you, Mulder," she said, entering the bullpen and moving toward
her desk.

"So you and Skinner will probably have to postpone that date at the
Georgetown General cafeteria. Just thought I'd warn you," he said.

"Why, that's considerate of you, Mulder," said Scully, turning on her
computer and depositing her briefcase in a bottom desk drawer, which she
closed with a controlled shove. "I guess that rumor about you being up
for FBI Humanitarian of the Year is true, then. You can stop lobbying
now. I'm sure Agent Fowley has already cast her vote."

If he'd been capable of the expression, he would have gaped at her. "You
hear some nasty rumors Scully," he said.

"Agent Scully," said a timid voice behind him. He turned and came
face-to-face with a bow tie, then looked up into a bashfully eager face.

"MacElroy," said Mulder.

"Oh," said MacElroy, looking down as if seeing Mulder for the first
time. "Good morning, Agent Mulder." Looking over Mulder's head, he
continued, "How are you this morning, Agent Scully?"

Scully looked up -- way up -- and delivered the second smile of the
morning that missed Mulder by a mile. "Very well, thank you, Harvey,"
she said. "Have you finished with the invoices?"

"Yes," said MacElroy, beaming. "I thought you might like to see
something interesting."

"What could it possibly be?" said Mulder, voice full of wonder. He got
the glare that seemed to be on special today, just for him, from Scully.

"I'll be right there, Harvey" said Scully, and waited for the other man
to smile happily, and walk back to his own desk. "I know how much this
sort of thing bores you, Mulder," she said. "I'll take care of it."

"You're too good to me, Scully," said Mulder. "Now if only I could
figure out a way to get you to go to the dentist for me and write
birthday cards to my Aunt Mabel. You know, the rich one."

"You still don't get it, do you, Mulder?" said Scully, selecting several
folders from the file organizer on her desk.

She moved around her desk and stopped in front of him. "You'll never get
me to cover for you, to make excuses for you, or to save your ass --
unless I want to. Lucky for you..."

Mulder's heart almost stopped. The smile that had kept missing him all
morning hit him full in the face.

"Lucky for you," Scully continued, as she brushed past him, "I want to."

Mulder dropped into his chair and reached up to touch his bruised cheek,
which was suddenly throbbing with heat. He checked his pocket for the
bottle of painkillers, then strolled over to the water cooler in the
corner. Along the way, he rediscovered, to his dismay, what he and
Scully had been missing all those years cloistered in the basement:
extreme and unseemly interest in their every move, poorly disguised as
camaraderie. He carefully avoided the gazes that tried to engage his,
and mumbled a general "Morning" in response to the ragged chorus of
"Mulder"s that met him at the water cooler. He tipped his head back to
wash down the pills, and fought the sudden tilt of the ground under his
feet.

Back at his desk, while checking if Frohike had gotten any more
information on the SS squadron assigned to board the Queen Anne, he was
met with a message from his Area 51 contact. Sighing, he considered
trying to get Scully to go with him... then remembered that he was
having a hard time getting Scully do anything he wanted her to, these
days.

But if she wanted to.... He drifted into a reverie in which he and
Scully discovered, to their mutual delight, that they each wanted the
same thing, at the same time.

He grimaced as he heard furtive whispering behind him. Didn't these
people have some investigating to do? The whispering increased in
volume. He turned irritably and started at the sight of Scully, seated
at her desk. When had she gone past him? His eyes shifted to the
indistinct figure of a man, leaning over her and pointing out something
in the papers Scully was holding. Jesus, MacElroy, he thought, are you
that desperate? He brushed away the memory of the many times he had
manufactured an excuse to lean over, across, or closer to Scully.

Scully was biting her lip, and both Mulder and the other man became
transfixed at the sight. Taking unfair advantage of his nearness, the
man behind Scully reached around her and placed his hand on her cheek.
She stopped talking and looked up at him. He tipped her head further and
kissed her gently.

"Hey!" Said Mulder.

Startled, the couple jumped apart.

Scully looked embarrassed. Skinner looked furious.

***

"What's going on?" demanded Mulder.

"What business is that of yours?" said Skinner, his voice belligerent.

Mulder moved toward Scully's desk. "She's mine," he growled, startled at
the venom in his own voice. He halted in his tracks at the sight of
Scully, standing up and moving in front of Skinner, as if to shield him
from Mulder's approach.

"I'm not a possession, buster," she said. "Not yours, not his."

Mulder noted with satisfaction the disappointment that flickered across
Skinner's face. He looked back at Scully, who had moved around the desk
and was approaching him. He took an involuntary step backward. "Scully,"
he said, "I can't believe you--"

"I am not Scully," she interrupted. "And if this is the way you treat
her, I'm not surprised that she won't love you." She halted in front of
him.

"How do you know...." He looked around, and realized that he was back in
the shadowy office he had stumbled into before, the one where he thought
he had found -- and lost -- Scully.

"You might be a pretty persuasive kind of guy," continued this dream
version of Scully, "You certainly were on the Queen Anne, when you
talked me into turning the ship around, even though it was suicide. You
almost did it again, last night in the club, when you tried to sweet
talk me into falling for you."

Marching back to the other man, she took one of his hands, relaxing it
from the fist it had been clenched in ever since Mulder had appeared.
"But I'm through with having others choose how my life goes, and that
goes for you, too. I choose what I want to do, like I chose to believe
you on that ship. And like I chose to love him."

Though Mulder knew instinctively that this was a Scully and Skinner
conjured up by his own imagination, he still felt a flash of jealousy at
the intimate look they exchanged following the woman's last declaration.
"You're a lucky man," he said to the man before him.

"What makes you think it was luck?" said the Skinner lookalike. Do you
know how long I've waited for her? Do you know how rare it is to find a
woman like this?"

Better than you, thought Mulder bitterly. "So how'd you do it? Tell me
your secret," he said, only half-joking.

"Well, I tried being reserved and respectful. I tried being protective.
I tried flirtation, innuendo, and charm."

Now I know I'm dreaming, thought Mulder.

"In the end. I tried loving her, just loving her, and trusting her to
make the right choice," the lucky man continued. "It wasn't the easiest
plan -- but it seems to have worked," he finished in wonder, looking
down at his red haired companion, who smiled at him, then turned back to
Mulder.

"All that aside," she said, the business-like tone belying the glow on
her face, "we still have a job to do. One for which a man of your
persuasive abilities would be perfect. Will you help us?"

Mulder was eager to find a way back to his real Scully. "I don't think
I..." he began, and was struck dumb by the sight of a large white
rabbit, walking through the back door of the office.

"Did you ask him?" said the rabbit, to the couple standing before
Mulder. "What did he say?" The rabbit turned, and placed a large paw on
Mulder's shoulder.

"Agent Mulder? Agent Mulder," said MacElroy. "You have to help us."

***

Mulder jumped up as he came back to consciousness, then watched in
bemusement as Agent MacElroy jumped much higher. "If you could shoot,
MacElroy," he said "I'd call up Van Gundy, take my ten percent, and
retire."

MacElroy replied, with a puzzled look. "I may do mainly paperwork, Agent
Mulder, but I still maintain an excellent firearms proficiency rating."

"Well that's a relief," said Mulder, "since you never know when we might
run into a rogue gang of tax analysts." It felt as if hours had passed
since he'd walked into the bullpen, but a glance at his watch confirmed
that he'd zoned out for just a few minutes. "Uhh -- where's Scully?"

MacElroy brightened. "She's at my desk," he said. "We were just about to
get started, when she asked me to come get you. She needs clarification
of some notes you made in Buhl."

"I made some notes?" said Mulder. "Oh, yeah, Buhl. That's where we made
the Elvis sighting."

"Elvis is dead, Agent Mulder," said MacElroy, disapprovingly, as they
began to walk across the bullpen.

"Oh? Then why was he ordering so much fertilizer?" said Mulder.

"You-- He--" sputtered MacElroy behind him. "Agent Scully didn't mention
that."

"Agent Scully," said Mulder, turning to face MacElroy, "exercises
extreme discretion when it comes to matters of National Security. You
should know that." His mouth curved in an almost imperceptible smile.
Leaving the other man standing in confusion, he turned and made a
beeline for Scully. He grabbed the chair next hers, the one that
MacElroy had obviously set up for himself.

Mulder let his smile develop a bit, to the beatific stage. He directed
it first at MacElroy, forced to pull a chair over from the next desk and
sit across from them, then at Scully. She arched an eyebrow at him but
made no comment on the new seating arrangements. A faint glimmer of
memory told him that he had usurped this place from someone other than
MacElroy, but he couldn't for the life of him remember who that might
be. He hitched his chair closer, surreptitiously making contact with her
shoulder. As she leaned toward him to show him some figures on the
papers she had spread before them, he turned his head so that his cheek
just brushed her hair, releasing a hint of sweet Scully fragrance.

There was something he had to tell her, he thought. No, that wasn't
right. There was something he had to let her tell him. He felt a tremor
of anticipation at the thought of what that might be. Ah well, it would
come to him. He would make it happen.

End Part 3/5