Without the Bee

By Jessica Lackaff a.k.a. Starbuck

E-mail – tashtego23@hotmail.com

Rating – PG

Category – MSR, post-FTF

Spoilers – FTF

Keywords - Mulder/Scully

DISCLAIMER: The characters of Agent Fox Mulder and Agent Dana Scully and such other references of the copyrighted X-files are the sole property of its creator, Chris Carter, and its owners, 1013 Productions, and FOX television, a unit of 20th Century Fox, Inc. No copyright infringement is intended.

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

Here are three versions of what might have happened in the hallway if that wretched bee hadn't shown up when it did!

Scully's version

She is definitely not going to stick around and watch Mulder fight the

Justice Department over the X-Files while flirting with Agent Fowley and

dragging her, Dana, out of bed in the middle of the night anytime he wants an

autopsy done. This is no longer a healthy situation for her. Dead end. But the

last two days have been a strange accumulation of experiences twisting

together in her psyche: the shock waves of a bomb explosion; long, endless

gravel roads; the charred ruin of their office; helicopters chasing her

through a field of corn; glowing apiaries filled with a billion bees;

humiliation in front of the OPR panel; and the hurt look in Fox's eyes all

suddenly boiling down to this moment, here, now: they are exchanging a deep,

slow kiss and she is too exhilarated and too exhausted to question it.

Time goes into a slow whirl; when next she is cognizant they are in his

apartment, sitting on the couch. A crisp silver light comes from the window

and the fish tank glows beside her. Scully puts her arms around his neck and

leans her forehead against his. She wonders why, since she met him, the rest

of the world seems filled with imbeciles, and only Mulder makes sense. He's

more sharply in focus than other people. "How's this going to look on your

field report?" Mulder whispers, tracing his thumb along her throat. He says

that he thinks she is throwing in the towel.

"I just think that you haven't seen all the angles yet, Scully," he says.

He can't keep his hands out of her hair. "There's more going on than you

think, than either of us think. What you saw last night---that was nothing.

They would have killed us had it been more important."

They try to give each other a look of serious, thoughtful consideration,

but there's a loss of resolve and then he's kissing her again.

"We're good friends, right?" Mulder asks. "Together, we're a force to be

reckoned with."

"I didn't mean to push you into anything," she says. "I don't think this

will change my mind."

"This doesn't have anything to do with the X-Files." He looks perplexed, as

if for once he can't word his thoughts. "I don't want you to go somewhere you

won't be happy because you think you're dissatisfied with your work, when it

may be something else entirely. I don't know, I feel like I've driven you

away. And, Scully, it's so crucial that you stay. I'm not speaking on a

professional level. Well, I am. But on different levels, you're so important

to me."

"I know, Mulder, but I feel like if I stop to think about it, I'll lose my

momentum." Salt Lake City, she thinks, will I ever see it? She has held his

hand many times, but never so self-consciously, looking down at their

interlocked fingers, his leg against hers. She loves his smell. Pheromones,

she thinks, that's all it is, the damned things. "Undoubtedly you'll be

allowed to continue with your work. You'll be assigned a new partner, one who

won't give you as much grief as I have. I'll file my medical reinstatement

papers, start rebuilding my career."

"Oh, God, Scully," Mulder says wearily. "What have I done to you? All these

years with me...have they been worth it?"

Scully cannot speak. Mulder gets her a drink of water and she makes the

obligatory facetious remark about the hallucinogenic properties of his

drinking water. "I should be so lucky," Mulder says gently.

When he looks at her shyly she feels a rush of confidence. She tries not to

paw him, even though she's dying to put her hands inside his t-shirt. Now, no

matter what happens, she carries a sureness inside her. She doesn't doubt that

they will go back to their old ways, that, in the future, they will pretend

that nothing has come to pass, that he will be as critical, temperamental, and

lost as ever, as will she. She also knows that when the occasion calls for it

he will be protective and considerate--her same old Mulder. But she will also

have this night, when they understand each other completely. The deepest

truths have always remained unspoken between them. She feels they have entered

one of those things he is always talking about--a time capsule, an isolated

capsule of existence, something that seals them away from the rest of the

world.

It is raining. Her feelings swing from elation to deepest despair and back

up. She can't come to a decision just like that. She is starving, and walks

around his kitchen looking for something to eat. She loves everything he has,

dirty dishes and all. She throws a fond glance at a can opener. He seems to

live on canned soup. At some point in the evening he leans over to her ear.

"Sweet nothings," he whispers wryly. She sees it as a metaphor for their

relationship. They relate to each other in a manner once removed, code-worded,

out of sight. Even they don't know the true nature of it, or the implications

thereof.

There comes a moment. They are slumped together on the couch, their feet

entangled on the coffee table. Mulder's arm is around her. The t.v. is on.

They are discussing the direction Scully's medical career might take. Mulder

is tracing a triangle in the open palm of her hand. Suddenly, the bee stings

her, she goes into anaphylactic shock, and we resume the plot of the movie.

**********************************8

Okay, here's Mulder's scene in glorious technicolor.

Set to the tune of 'One'.

Although she seems bent on leaving he goes after her, pours out his heart

and entreats her to stay. She gives him her level, honest gaze from those

heartbreaking eyes. She hugs him, marks him as hers with a kiss on the

forehead and presses her brow to his because they understand each other, they

always have, if only he had let himself see it. He feels speechless. He frames

her face to look into it, and an unfathomable pull, a magnetic sensation,

draws him closer until incredulously he is kissing her and she is kissing him

back and he doesn't think he will ever be able to stop. He can't believe she is

going for this. Scully! He had forgotten what kissing is like. He can't feel

the top of his head.

One of his neighbors opens a door and Fox pulls her back up the hallway to

his room and slams the door. They stand looking at each other. His heart is

thumping against the front of his shirt. He wants to touch her again. She lets

out a breath and smiles at him, turns herself around as if disoriented, and

sits down on the couch. He eases down beside her and takes her hand, and they

stare at each other in elation and amazement.

"Whew!" says Scully, shaking her head. Then, as if making sure he is real,

she kisses him again. "Just checking," she says.

"Checking what?" he asks, but she only smiles faintly. She seems on the

verge of tears again. He doesn't know if he can stand that. He puts his arms

around her and smooths her hair. He knows they will get the X-Files back

because together they are invincible, two halves of a whole, two wrongs make a

right, the whole cliche, except suddenly it seems fresh and truthful. The

color of her hair has always seemed to him to be a manifestation of all the

marvelous things going on inside her head. She seems more real than other

people.

It is dark and they are talking and talking. He is uneasy thinking he is

putting her in more danger, his mind jumping from Kurtzweil to what they found

in Texas to whatever the Bureau is up to, but he can't stop sitting there

memorizing her fingers with his and looking toward the window where they used

to put the X. A streetlight glows outside. He thinks how now Deep Throat and X

are both dead, and what a dangerous operation he has Scully involved in.

Scully starts flipping through his old photo albums lying on the floor. She

confesses that she got weak in the knees and had to sit down the first time

she saw a picture of Samantha. "She was so little," she says. "I didn't expect

that." Mulder cannot speak of Samantha, not right now with his game plan in

jeopardy. He sees now that his quest is in as much limbo as ever, but that for

once he has found something, an irreplaceable element, a blueprint to a

conclusion.

He feels stunned by the direction events have taken. He wants to get out of

the apartment, he wants to press her down upon the sofa, he wants to walk the

cold streets for hours or put his arms around her and sleep for days. The

consequences are still too much to face. He wants to run. He closes his eyes

as Scully draws her finger down his profile and everything balances out inside

him. Enter the bee, and life as he knows it is over for a bit.

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

The Non-definitive, Politically Correct Non-Shipper Version!!!

Mulder: "It's been fun, Scully, see ya!"

Exit Scully and the bee, a happy pair until Scully realizes there is a bee

in the car and panics, causing a minor car wreck. The bee escapes out the

window and goes and lives on the flowers at the Vietnam memorial for the rest

of its days. Scully hauls her cookies to Salt Lake City, Utah, where she

shacks up with an Agent named Murdoch who looks kind of like Mulder AND has no

problems sleeping with her.

The End

I made this!

All stories by Starbuck