Part IV The cast-iron gate stood before her proudly, like a sentinel. She supposed that in a way, that was exactly what it was: a guard protecting the barrier that seperated life from death. It creaked open under her weight, the giving way a sort of symbol signifying that she had been judged and found worthy of entry into this world of unseen ghosts. She passed over the older headstones and moved into the new section. Not knowing exactly where Emily's grave was located, she was forced to wander among the plots looking for it. After a quarter of an hour of fruitless searching, she was ready to give up. Suddenly, she spotted it. The section was apparently reserved for children; the plots seemed unnaturally small. Scully shivered involuntarily when she realized how many tiny graves were contained in the area. She had never really considered the fact that there were other mothers screaming, fighting, cursing God for their loss. She had been so confined in her cage of grief that she had never thought to look around at the other women locked inside with her. Scully dropped woodenly to her knees at the head of her daughter's grave. Touching the cold stone that had so effectively scarred her forever, she felt the walls begin to crack. Without warning, they crumbled completely, releasing the hurricane that had been locked inside her for so long. She screamed her rage and agony to the trees, the sky, the earth that had claimed her child. She cried out Emily's name with a wail of such despair and grief that even the most remote gods could not have failed to take notice. If she was heard, though, she was unacknowledged; Emily remained lost under the same earth that Scully pounded in her fury. Her energy completely spent, Scully collapsed onto the ground above her daughter's body. She lay immobile for several minutes before her strength was restored enough to allow her to move into a sitting position. Her eyes finally clear, Scully looked around and noticed for the first time the pair of flowers carefully layed across the foot of the grave. Curious, she picked them up and turned them over in her hands. They were still fairly fresh, not more than a day or two old, she hypothesized. Very odd, indeed. Who could have left them? Scully decided that the mystery was better left to someone who had not just completely exhausted their energy supply. Placing the buds back where she had found them, she slowly and painfully got to her feet. After touching the headstone once more, she turned and walked back toward the gate; back to the land of the living, very deliberately not looking back. ********** When she returned home, Scully fell immediately into her bed and was unconscious almost instantly. She slept the dreamless sleep of the dead; her rest finally undisturbed by nighttime wanderings through the otherworld and Emily's haunting voice. She awoke in the morning feeling truly rested for the first time in months. She puttered about in the kitchen, making coffee, and then moved to the couch to drink it. Thankful that she had a couple of days remaining of her vacation, she leisurely thumbed through the morning paper, focusing most of her attention not on the latest news from Bosnia, but on the comics. A knock at her door shattered the peaceful silence. Scully glanced at the clock and groaned; at eight a.m. it could only be one person. Gazing regretfully at her cooling coffee, she got up and moved to open the door. He was dressed for work; his freshly pressed suit not yet displaying the signs of wear it would inevitably show by the end of the day. Scully could not suppress a smile at the sight of his tie: black, with a pattern of gray alien heads marching across it. Skinner was gonna *love* this one. Her amusement quickly faded, however, when she took note of his apparent state of mind. He seemed highly agitated, shuffling from one foot to the other, and alternately shoving his hands in and out of his pockets and running his fingers through his hair. "Mulder, what's up? What's wrong?" Her voice was worried. "Scully, I need to talk to you about...aah, I need to ask you something...it's kind of complicated, but umm....can I come in?" "Of course," she said as she stepped back and opened the door wider. He sat down on the couch, still obviously jumpy and uncomfortable. Scully chose to sit next to him, rather than in the chair opposite. She was just close enough to comfortably extend her arm and touch his hand, which she did, attempting to calm him. She ignored the shiver that electrified her bones with the contact. "Ok, Mulder, talk to me. What's going on?" He squirmed. "Well......there's this doctor. A gynecologist, in New Hampshire. He has a private practice, but he also does some research on the side." He paused, giving her a quick glance. She nodded for him to continue. "Well, he recently stumbled across an unorthodox treatment for infertile women. It hasn't been tested yet, but it looks promising. He has discovered how to....artificially manufacture an ovum using DNA from the potential recipient. Once it's placed in the body, theoretically it will function like a naturally produced egg." He stopped again, the silence dragging out over several tense seconds. "He would very much like to try the procedure on you, if you are willing to be a test subject." Scully stared at him, wide-eyed, while he chewed his lower lip nervously. The minutes ticked by; he waited patiently for her to say something. A thousand thoughts ran through her head, and an equal number of emotions pierced her heart. Her feelings ran the gamut from shock, to disbelief, to hope, and finally settling on complete and utter trust in the man proposing this outrageous idea. Finally, she found her voice. "Mulder, I.....I don't know what to say. This is all so sudden, so...so soon after...Emily...I don't know if I could..." Her voice faltered, and she stopped. "Scully, you don't have to decide now. You can think about it for a few days. I don't have to give him your answer until the end of the week." She relaxed slightly when she was taken off the spot. To make a decision like that now was just too much, too monumental. She tried to listen as he explained the procedure as well as he could, considering that many of the aspects were well beyond the scope of his comprehension, but her brain, still somewhat in shock, was too fuzzy to absorb most of the information. She was, however, able to discern that it was a relatively risk-free procedure, and that if the doctor's theories proved correct, it should be nearly a hundred percent effective after only one operation. It didn't sound like such a bad idea, she had to admit to herself. There was just one thing.... "Mulder, why? Why would you go to so much trouble?" "I just want you to be happy," he said sincerely, but a shadow of doubt remained on her face. "Scully, I can't give you Emily back. If I could, I would do everything in my power to bring her back to you. But I can't." He shrugged. "Giving you another chance to be a mother seemed like the next best thing." Scully's eyes widened; she didn't quite know how to interpret this piece of information, and she was almost afraid to pursue the subject further. Curiosity got the better of her, though, and she couldn't resist moving forward with it. "What exactly are you saying? You never seemed to care about Emily before." Her voice broke as the months of bitterness began, finally, to surface. "It was almost as though you *wanted* her to die." Her eyes filled with tears, and she knew that he could hear the pain and anger in her voice. "Scully," he said softly, pulling her into his arms in a fierce hug. "I fell in love with Emily as soon as I laid eyes on her, even before that. The fact that she was *your* daughter meant that I loved her before I even saw her. But I knew, I *knew* in my heart that you were going to lose her, one way or another. I didn't want you to go through that, so I tried to convince you to distance yourself. But it didn't work, and all I managed to do was make you hate me for it. I'm sorry, Scully," he finished in a whisper. He could feel her sobbing in his arms, and at that moment, the only thing that mattered in his world was making her pain stop. He hadn't planned on telling her any more, not yet, not today. But the time felt right, and with a deep breath, he continued. "Scully, I had another reason for coming here, for proposing this idea to you." She looked up, her eyes questioning, but said nothing. Her face, streaked with tears and grief, shattered his heart, and the last of his doubts melted away. "I was wondering...ah, I was hoping...." His composure was slipping. He pulled himself together and attempted to regain some measure of self control; difficult, considering the way his heart was pounding. "I wanted to ask you if you would consider letting me be the father of your children." She gave him a small, sweet smile. "Mulder, are you offering to be a sperm donor?" A hint of amusement danced in her eyes, but he didn't smile. Her hand reached up to brush an errant strand of hair from his forehead, and he grabbed it, holding on to her like a lifeline. "No," he said softly, "I'm not. Scully....Dana, I'm asking you to marry me." End Part IV ~~~Moon https://members.tripod.com/~Ms_Spooky/index.html