From: Parrotfish svdf49a@prodigy.com

Subject: Forget to Remember
Date: Sun, 16 Jun 1996

I'm still getting a lot of e-mail saying folks aren't seeing one or
another part of this story, or that their server only has the version
of part 4 that's cut off in the middle. So I hope I'm not breaching
netiquette too badly by posting all four parts yet again.

_____________________________

Greetings, X-Philes. I've been enjoying so many of the stories here --
and I hope some of you will enjoy this.

I've tried to include my favorite elements of the show and the fan
fiction:
-- Conspiracy.
-- Mystery.
-- Character study.
-- Mulderangst.
-- Scullyangst.
-- The kind of M-S bonding that makes the show so intriguing.
-- The kind of M-S relationship we'll never see on the show.
-- The kind of graphic sex we'll never see on broadcast television.

I have absolutely no right to be appropriating these characters, their
stories, or anything else about the X-Files. It all belongs to Chris
Carter, Ten Thirteen, Fox, and probably Rupert Murdoch himself. But I
sure had a lot of fun with 'em.

Comments welcome at svdf49a@prodigy.com.

Forget to Remember
Part 1 of 4
written June 1996
by Parrotfish
NC-17

Saturday, April 27, 1996
8:42 PM
Washington, D.C.

The features faintly illuminated by a dim glow were delicate and
strong. The light from the computer screen reflected off the twin lenses
perched on either side of Dana Scully's nose, creating tiny squares of
blue where her pupils belonged. She was deep in thought, at a
momentary loss for the words that would best complete the report she
was eager to get done so she could get on with her Saturday night.

Get on with her Saturday night? The prospect loomed: an evening with
a gallon of Swiss fudge swirl and 70s sitcom reruns. She inwardly
cringed, allowing herself a moment of self-pity before returning her
attention to the screen.

A loud knock on the door broke her concentration.

"Who is it?" she called without rising.

"It's me."

Scully sighed, removed her glasses, rubbed her eyes with a forefinger
and thumb, then stood and walked to the door.

Opening it, she said, "It's Saturday night, Mulder."

"And you have a hot date with your PC?"

Scully sighed and stepped aside to admit him, her welcoming manner
belying the cold greeting she'd given him.

The bounce in Fox Mulder's step piqued Scully's curiosity. The petite,
red-headed woman with shockingly blue eyes and her taller, darker
partner were FBI agents who specialized in solving cases labeled
"unexplained phenomena" -- X-Files, as the bureau had dubbed them.
They had shared so many bizarre experiences that challenged their
understanding, their beliefs, their very sanity, that something as simple
as a walk telegraphed much meaning. Scully knew Mulder had
something he wanted to tell her, something related to his personal
obsession with the paranormal, something he didn't expect her to
believe but needed to share with her anyway.

So she was surprised when he stopped in the middle of her living room
and the
first words out of his mouth were, "Let's order Chinese."

She didn't argue. She picked up the phone, pausing only long enough
to inquire, "Mu shu?"

"Yeah. Extra pancakes."

"Goes without saying."

Twenty minutes later, the two sat cross-legged at either end of the low
coffee
table, assembling their food. Scully carefully spread hoisin sauce on a
thin pancake, doled out steaming shredded pork and vegetables in a
sensible amount, and rolled the whole thing up into a neat cylinder.
Mulder plopped a huge dollop of sauce onto his pancake, added fully a
quarter of the pork mixture, folded the whole mess over as best he
could and took a huge bite, squirting greasy liquid across the table.

"Did you come here to lube my furniture, Mulder, or was there
something on your mind?"

Mulder grinned wickedly. "There's always something on my mind. It
happens
that this time I can tell you about it -- and it doesn't involve lubricant."

"As though you'd ever spare my delicate sensibilities." Scully could see
her partner was practically bursting at the seams, so she added, "Come
on. Give."

"I think I've found an alien visitation area -- right here in D.C."

Scully merely blinked in confusion. "Visitation area?"

"A region of high U.F.O activity marked by multiple reports of
missing-time phenomena."

"Here? In D.C.? Aren't these types of things generally reported in rural
areas with low population density?"

"Yup. That's what makes this such a novelty."

"Where did you get this information? Who reported the missing-time
experiences?"

Mulder hesitated a moment before replying. "I did."

Scully stared in quiet disbelief. "You did?"

"Yes. That's what makes this worth investigating. Reports of missing-
time
experiences are notoriously unreliable. Subjects who claim to be unable
to
remember the events that transpired during a given period of time are
often found to be lying to cover up their real activities during that time,
or simply to have fallen asleep without realizing it. The fact that I
experienced missing time myself, twice, in exactly the same location,
means that I can discount the possibility of alternate explanations."

"Why? How can you be sure you didn't fall asleep?"

"Twice? In the same area? Besides, I was standing up on both
occasions at the
end of the experience."

"And where is this mysterious region?"

Mulder hesitated again. "Arlington National Cemetery."

Scully didn't reply for a long moment, staring at Mulder with her
eyebrows raised high on her forehead in an expression that said she
wasn't sure if her leg was being pulled. Mulder's look of wide-eyed
innocence served to reassure her that he was serious.

"Mulder ... thousands of people visit Arlington National Cemetery each
week.
I've never heard any of them report a missing-time experience."

"Just because they didn't report it doesn't mean it didn't happen."

Scully sighed exasperatedly.

"Mulder, that's absurd."

He flashed her a wide smile.

"Yeah, but it's true. I went to the cemetery two days ago after work,
just to take
a walk. I like it there. I was walking through those endless rows of little
American flags when it happened. I had my Walkman with me to listen
to the game. One moment the Knicks were down by two -- and the next
moment, they were up by five. I checked the next day -- more than two
minutes elapsed between those scores. So I went back again tonight.
This time, I just made sure to keep checking my watch. Sure enough, as
I stood on practically the exact spot where I'd lost the time two nights
earlier, seven minutes suddenly went missing. It's as though my watch
were reset -- I looked once and it said 7:22, then I looked again, what
seemed like the next moment, and it said 7:29. Something happened
both nights to make me lose that time."

"Mulder, if a place as much visited as Arlington National Cemetery
were actually in its own unique missing-time zone, don't you think we
would have had some indication before now?"

Mulder was silent for a full minute before responding. Scully watched
his face
carefully. After so many shared trials and tragedies, she could read his
expressions easily. She was sure she caught a glimpse of a crack in her
partner's cocky facade, and behind that crack -- fear.

"Yeah, that thought had crossed my mind."

"And?"

"And that's why I came to see you."

"What do you think I'm going to do about this?"

Mulder's hazel eyes met her blue ones before he replied, "Come back
there with me."

"To the cemetery? Now?"

"Yes. I need to know if you experience it, too."

Scully sighed, knowing she was about to accede to this strange request
and slightly baffled by her ready willingness to do so.

"Let me get my jacket."

_____________________________________________

The key clicked in the lock and the door swung open. Scully flicked on
the light mid-sentence.

" ... believe I sat in a damp cemetery for four hours. I'm half-frozen.
You want some coffee?"

Mulder followed her inside and closed the door. "Yeah."

He crossed to the couch and sat heavily, placed his elbows on his knees
and leaned his forehead on the palms of his hands. Neither spoke until
Scully returned with two steaming mugs, handing him one and sitting
next to him.

"We'll have to go back tomorrow."

"Mulder ..."

He raised his voice to drown out hers. "And if it doesn't happen
tomorrow, we'll
go back the next day, and the next day, and the next. Until it does
happen."

"What if it doesn't?"

He paused. "It will. It has to."

"No, it doesn't have to."

She knew there was no point pursuing this now. He wasn't going to
listen to reason. And she understood why. They had both seen so many
things that remained unexplained. Here was another one, and it hit very
close to home because Mulder had experienced it himself, alone, with
no one there for verification. She knew how frightening it was when
these things became
personal -- after all, she had disappeared for three months and
remembered almost nothing about it. At least everyone else believed
she'd disappeared, even if they didn't believe, as Mulder did, that she
had been abducted by aliens. Mulder's lapses might have lasted only
minutes, but he couldn't even prove they were real. She didn't believe
his explanation of alien visitation, and she knew he knew she didn't
believe. She wondered how much that bothered him.

"Let's see what's on." She picked up the remote and flicked on the TV.
______________________________________________

Sunday, April 28, 1996
9:22 PM
Arlington National Cemetery

To a casual observer, the couple sitting on a blanket spread between
graves in the dark cemetery might have been taken for lovers with
some pretentious aesthetic notions about romance and death. It's
unlikely anyone would have been imaginative enough to come up with
an explanation so outrageous as a pair of FBI agents waiting for an
alien visitation. That thought made Scully giggle.

"What's so funny?"

"You. Us. This."

Mulder leaned back on his elbows, stretched his long, jeans-clad legs in
front of him, and smiled.

"At least I didn't bring my shovel."

"Thank heavens for small favors. But the Chianti was a nice touch."

"I even remembered the corkscrew."

A companionable silence fell between them, filled with nothing but the
sounds of distant traffic and nearby crickets. A warm night breeze
lifted a lock of rich, red hair and drew it across Scully's face. She
pushed it back behind her ear in a gesture that always made Mulder's
breath catch.

"Why do you do it?"

"What?"

"Humor me."

"Can't you guess?"

"No."

"A Fox in the hand is worth two stranded alone on a train without a cell
phone."

"Very funny."

"Who's joking?"

Mulder thought her answer over, probably giving it more consideration
than
she'd intended him to. He knew she had actually told him the truth. She
followed him on these wild goose chases to keep an eye on him. He
knew she worried about him and wished she didn't, even though deep
down he was grateful for her concern. Mulder found that having
someone worry about him was something of a burden after all the years
he'd spent cultivating an almost pathological freedom from the need for
human contact. Even before he'd recovered the memory of the event
that had become the touchstone of his life -- the abduction by aliens of
his beloved sister Samantha -- he'd been barricading his emotions from
the outside world. It saddened him to think how much he'd put Scully
through because he kept reverting to type, leaving her behind so he
could work alone, reckless and unchallenged.

And yet the very fact of her had penetrated even deeper than that
carefully
constructed wall he'd built. It was never the same now, when he ditched
her and
ran off to follow some lead slipped to him by a mysterious contact
from the shadowy world of the not-quite-government. In the back of
his mind, he remembered that Scully would worry ... and follow. She'd
pulled his fat out of the fire so many times now -- anyone else would
have lost count, but not he. Mulder looked at her now as she leaned
back on her hands, staring up at the stars that shone brightly on this
clear spring night.

She caught him staring.

"It's not happening, Mulder."

He sighed. "No, it's not."

"Can we go home now?"

_________________________________________________

Wednesday, May 15, 1996
10:25 am
J. Edgar Hoover Building, Washington, D.C.

The Arlington aliens, as Scully had dubbed Mulder's cemetery
experiences, were soon superseded by more pressing matters. There
was a trip to Wyoming to investigate reports from a small town of a
number of deaths by electrocution of people who had been nowhere
near any known source of electricity. They found no explanation
whatsoever for the mysterious deaths. That was followed by a case in
California in which several parents claimed their young children had
suddenly become virtually catatonic for no apparent reason. It turned
out that all the parents belonged to a cult that advocated family
"discipline" that could only be called child abuse. In the end, they
turned up a number of dead children belonging to the same families.

They had been back from California for three days, and Scully hadn't
fully recovered from the drained feeling that last case had left her with.
Of course, none of her FBI colleagues had any notion just how drained
that was. Like Mulder, Scully had spent much of her life carefully
cultivating some protective walls -- in her case, an air of absolute
detachment from the horrors of her work. Those who were inclined to
be kind called it extreme professionalism. Everyone else called her the
Ice Queen.

Mulder was the only one who knew the truth. He'd never had to ask.
With his uncanny knack for intuiting the motivations of others, he
knew right from the beginning that Scully's air of clinical detachment
was the best way she knew of to keep functioning when the world
seemed to have devolved into an evil, mad place. Behind that facade,
there was an altogether different response -- a raw, emotional pain that
made her soul bleed -- a response that, had she allowed it to see the
light of day, would have prevented her from doing anything about all
the evil madness she confronted so courageously. Mulder had a lot of
firsthand experiences with emotional defense mechanisms, so he knew
one when he saw it.

He was sitting at his desk in their shared basement office, wondering
how much longer it would take for Scully to lose the look of
uncomfortable tightness in her shoulders she'd worn since their return,
when his phone rang. He picked it up, listened, grunted assent.

"Skinner wants us."

Scully sighed, knowing this news meant a new assignment. She didn't
feel ready yet. She didn't have a choice.

________________________________

"Agent Mulder, Agent Scully, please take a seat." Assistant Director
Skinner was all business. At least this won't take long, Scully thought.
He just wants to give us the meat and potatoes and get rid of us.

They sat, and Skinner handed each of them a file. Mechanically,
Mulder and Scully opened the manila folders on their laps and began
scanning the contents as the AD spoke.

"There are four missing children involved, all of whom disappeared
from the same area of upstate New York. As you can see from the
records, there doesn't seem to be anything obvious linking the victims.
They range in age from seven to 15. Three boys, one girl. No obvious
signs of kidnapping -- they've just disappeared without a trace. And the
strangest part is they all seemed to have disappeared between the hours
of 10 and 11 PM on the night of May 5th."

Scully leafed through the pages before her -- police reports, statements
from family members, school records -- the usual stuff.

"Sir, according to these statements, there were relatives in two of these
cases who claim to have been at home at the time of the
disappearances. They say they remember nothing unusual, but each
person is unsure of their exact actions during the time in question."

"That's correct, Agent Scully. This is not unlike a number of X-files
you and
Agent Mulder have investigated. I thought this would interest you."

Scully glanced at Mulder, surprised he had said nothing so far. He was
staring at
the file before him. Something about his manner struck her as odd. By
now, his eyes should have been glittering with the eager curiosity he
normally demonstrated when confronted with anything that smelled
this unusual. She was disconcerted by his apparent absolute disinterest.

There was an uncomfortable pause, Skinner and Scully both obviously
expecting Mulder to say something -- ask a question, make a
wisecrack,
announce that he and Scully would leave for New York immediately.
When he
finally spoke, he shocked them both.

"Could be a lot of things."

Skinner drew his eyebrows together in response. "A lot of things?"

"Sure. Several people working together -- a carefully coordinated
multiple kidnapping."

"With no ransom demand? No motive?" Scully asked, her voiced
betraying
sincere surprise.

"Maybe they're waiting for something."

"Waiting? Why?" Mulder ignored Scully's baffled question.

"And what of the family members who should have witnessed
something?"
Skinner added.

Mulder shrugged. "Maybe they're lying."

"Lying?" Scully was truly confused. This was exactly the kind of case
Mulder
should have been jumping at. It had all the hallmarks of an alien
abduction scenario, though even Mulder would not have made a
definitive judgment at this early stage. She could not understand what
seemed to be his reluctance to pursue the case.

Neither could Skinner -- and he was not inclined to indulge the
younger man's
inexplicable indifference.

"You two will leave tomorrow morning to head this investigation."

Scully began to rise, assuming the meeting was over, knowing she now
had her
orders.

Mulder didn't follow suit as she'd expected.

"Sir, I believe our involvement in this case is not warranted."

Scully fell back into her chair, frankly staring at Mulder.

"Why not, Agent Mulder?" Skinner asked.

"The local office should be able to handle this. It's a standard serial
kidnapping.
No need to get us involved."

Scully glared at her partner. His voice was calm and even, but she
noted a spark
in his eye that seemed to indicate -- what?

"Nevertheless, I want you to check it out," Skinner was saying.

"But sir..."

"That's all, Agent Mulder, Agent Scully."

"But..."

"You are dismissed."

Scully and Mulder rose and left the AD's office, case files in hand.

They hadn't gone three steps down the hall before Scully spoke up.

"What was that all about?"

"What?"

"'No need to get us involved?' Since when? You ought to be jumping
all over this one. It's got all the signs of an authentic alien abduction --
or at least, that's what I'd expect you to be saying right now."

Mulder grinned weakly. "Well, I wouldn't want to be predictable."

"Not something you've ever been accused of."

"Wouldn't want to start now."

_______________________________________

Scully sat by a window in the small commuter plane carrying them
from La Guardia to Oneonta, staring idly at the fluffy white nothing
that slipped by below.

She still hadn't gotten California out of her system. Her daydreams
pulled her
back again and again to the image of a five-year-old's eyes staring
vacantly from a head crowned with soft, white-gold curls. Blue eyes,
blue as an ocean of unfathomable pain. Scully frowned, remembering
that the case had not been closed to her satisfaction. Battered children
were known to enter catatonic states -- it was a way of shielding the
mind from the impossible paradox of brutal violence received at the
hand that nurtures and feeds. But for all the children in this case to
have reacted the same way -- there had to be something more.

Scully let her mind wander, images taking the place of linear, rational
thought. She had learned this technique from her years working with
Mulder, though she didn't consciously realize it.

Mulder had made a name in the FBI at a remarkably young age doing
stunningly accurate profiles of serial murders, and the name he'd made
was not flattering. Spooky, most agents called him. But it was a name
everyone knew and held in awe.

Scully had watched him work, observed the mental leaps that seemed
like
creative genius to everyone else, but to him were just trains of thought.
On some
subconscious level, she'd learned to follow his thinking. It was simple,
really, once one abandoned reason and allowed oneself to explore the
realm of imagination. The trouble with most people is that they were
too frightened by what lay in that mental realm to let their minds roam
their unfettered. For Mulder, it didn't make much difference. Reality
was equally frightening. And after all she'd seen, the same was
becoming true for Scully. She closed her eyes and let the images wash
over her.

One by one, she reviewed the faces of the California children. They
were all so young ... so vacant ... faces so fragile they looked as though
a hard slap would shatter them into helpless shards of humanity ... all
so lonely, only children, and incredibly beautiful ... ideal images of
childhood ... ideal ...

The word stuck in her mind, and without conscious thought she sucked
in a painful breath.

"Scully?" She turned and found Mulder watching her with concern.
"You okay?"

"Yes. I ... I was thinking about California."

"It's hard to stop thinking about California."

"Yes. But ... I was thinking ... those kids. The ones who zoned out. I
was wondering why they'd all become catatonic. Sure, they'd all been
horribly abused, and their siblings had actually been beaten to death.
But -- did you notice how beautiful all those kids were? It was as
though ... as though they were left alive on purpose. As though it was
no coincidence they'd survived while their siblings hadn't. They were --
selected. Chosen." The last statement came out in a sure voice that
surprised her. She didn't know she knew it until she'd said it.

Some minutes of silence followed, during which Scully was lost in
thought. It
took her a while to notice that Mulder had said nothing. She looked at
him and
found he was staring past her, out the window, into the fluffy white
nothing. Her
surprise lasted only a fleeting moment -- until she realized that Mulder
himself had been similarly chosen. His father, a pawn in some
mysterious conspiracy, had been forced by his superiors to send one
child to god knows what fate. Mulder believed his sister had been taken
by aliens. But whoever had done it, Samantha had been taken. Fox
remained. The son had learned of the choice from his remorseful father
minutes before the elder Mulder's violent death.

Realization dawned, and Scully looked at Mulder with horrified pity.
Mulder had seen the pattern all along. In California, he had seen the
choice. He knew the sweet temptation of building impenetrable mental
walls like the ones that left the vacant stares on those children's faces.
Mulder had built himself many walls, but they were not impenetrable.
Scully knew that because he'd let her in. She didn't know how he could
stand the raw pain of such intimacy, but he did with her. Only with her.

She prayed silently this next case would not hit so close to home.

***END PART 1***

===========================================================================

From: Parrotfish <svdf49a@prodigy.com>
Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative
Subject: REPOST AGAIN: Forget to Remember 2/4 (NC-17)
Date: Sun, 16 Jun 1996 10:25:26 -0700

Intro and disclaimer in part 1.

Forget to Remember
Part 2 of 4
written June 1996
by Parrotfish
NC-17

Thursday, May 16, 1996
9:06 AM
Oneonta, N.Y.

The police station was small and old-fashioned. The furniture in the
interrogation room looked to be as old as the building itself, its smooth,
dark wood stained by sweat from the palms of 75 years' worth of
nervous suspects and witnesses. As the teen-aged brother of one of the
missing children was led in, Scully idly wondered how many crimes
had been confessed at this table -- crimes of passion, greed, and sheer
stupidity.

The boy who sat across from her was about 14, tall and gangly,
inexperienced eyes betraying every bit of fear and sorrow that lay
behind them. Scully stole a glance at Mulder seated at the end of the
table. Her strong-featured, graceful, handsome partner must have
developed from just such a boy.

She turned her attention to the questioning, going over the same ground
already covered by the local authorities. The story Jim De Vry told her
differed in no significant way from what he'd told them. He'd been at
home, watching TV in the living room. His 10-year-old brother, Louis,
had been downstairs in the basement playing Nintendo. Their parents
were out. Suddenly, Jim found himself upstairs in his parents' bedroom,
lying on the carpeted floor. He had no memory of how he got there, nor
did he remember any unusual sights or sounds before or after the event.
His unexplained relocation happened sometime between 7:15 and 7:30
-- he knew the time because it was during the second half of The
Simpsons -- and it must have taken a number of minutes, judging from
the fact that the closing credits of The Simpsons were on when he
walked back downstairs. Jim had gone to the basement looking for his
brother. The Nintendo was still on, the controller was on the floor
where his brother usually sat to play, but Louis De Vry was gone. Jim
had searched the house from basement to attic, then phoned his parents
who had called the police.

Scully listened to the story, taking careful notes, occasionally asking
for clarification or more details. Much to her surprise, Mulder hadn't
said a word. While he usually allowed her to take the lead when
questioning a witness, he generally threw in some off-the-wall inquiries
that brought the whole thing around to whatever far-fetched theory he'd
hatched. Scully sighed inwardly, wondering if this case, like the one in
California, was cutting too close to the bone.

Jim De Vry's story had wound down. Scully had nothing left to ask, but
she knew what was coming next. Mulder would ask the boy if he'd ever
been hypnotized, then suggest the technique might help him remember
what had happened the night his brother disappeared. That's what
Mulder always did in these situations. That's what Mulder had been
through himself in order to retrieve memories of Samantha's
disappearance.

The silence stretched on, and no one in the interrogation room spoke.
Scully was staring at Mulder, who didn't meet her eyes but instead
gazed steadily at the blank notebook page before him. Mulder never
took notes. He had an eidetic memory. He didn't need to.

"Can I go now?"

Scully tore her eyes from Mulder and nodded slowly. "Yes. Thank you,
Jim."

"You're welcome, Agent Scully."

The boy walked out, leaving the two agents alone.

"Mulder?"

"Hmm?"

"Didn't you have anything you wanted to ask him?"

"No. You covered it."

Scully's mouth fell slightly open.

"I covered it?"

"Christ, you can handle the simple things!"

Scully's mouth snapped shut as she felt the words sting. Mulder hadn't
raised his eyes. Had he looked up, he would have seen only a hooded
gaze that gave no hint of her reaction.

Scully rose slowly, gathered her files and papers, and turned to leave.

"I'll be reviewing the other statements," she said as she walked out.

It was as though the sound of the door closing behind her was his cue.
The breath Mulder didn't know he'd been holding was released as his
shoulders sagged and his head dropped into his hands, palms pressed
hard into his eyes. It was some minutes before he went to find his
partner.

_____________________________________

Scully could see where this investigation was heading. Nowhere.
Again.

No answers anywhere. No motive. No eyewitnesses. No forensic
evidence. No evidence at all. Nothing. Just some missing kids.

She hated it. She'd always hated the unknowable. She wanted to live in
a world where, if there had to be evil, sorrow, hatred and suffering, it
would at least be mundane and without mystery. She wanted to believe
that, when one could not prevent bad things from happening, one could
at least find out who made them happen, and punish that person or
persons accordingly.

She wanted order.

Ever since she'd begun working on the X files, she'd found less and less
of it. And since her own disappearance, which left her missing any
recollection of three whole months of her life, she hated the lack of
order so much it caused her a pain that was almost physical.

After a day of combing through statements, looking at crime scenes,
and talking to neighbors and teachers, she was beat. Sitting alone in her
motel room, her severe g-woman suit hanging over a chair back,
clothed now in comfortable sweatpants and T-shirt, she lay back across
the bedspread and stared at the ceiling.

The case was bad enough. Then there was Mulder.

She'd never seen him this way. Faced with exactly the kind of case that
usually energized him, that brought out a kind of wired intensity in him
that bordered on obsession -- no, that *was* obsession -- he had said
and done next to nothing all day. He'd just followed her around,
watched her work, listened to her talk, and spoken only when asked a
direct question. Even then, he'd offered no new ideas -- not so much as
a factual observation, let alone the kind of wild speculation she'd
expected.

She was just beginning to drift off, her mind morphing a water-stain on
the ceiling into a pair of large, black eyes staring down out of a
greyish, elongated head, when a sharp rap on the door brought her bolt
upright.

"Yes?"

"It's me."

She sighed, standing slowly. She really wanted to sleep -- just let
herself sink into a liberating, though temporary, oblivion. She
considered for a moment telling him to come back in the morning.

Then she remembered the silent shadow that her partner had been all
day, and she relented. She needed to hear whatever it was Mulder had
come to tell her.

She let him in and walked back to the bed, falling heavily on it as he
closed the door and stood just inside it.

She waited for him to speak, but he didn't. He just stood there, still
wearing the too-stylish-for-a-g-man suit he'd had on all day, the top
button of his dress white shirt undone, his tie loose. His face was slack,
betraying a profound fatigue but nothing else -- no hint of whatever he
might be feeling or thinking.

Looking at him standing there, Scully remembered in a flash that he
was handsome. It was funny, how that had become something she
remembered only occasionally. At first, when they'd just started
working together, she was always aware of it, always on her guard
against it. It would have been too easy to respond to his looks rather
than to him -- to like him because he was so attractive, to fall in love
with him because he was so sexy, even to hate him because of the way
other women responded to him. At various times, she'd found herself
experiencing each of those reactions, and she'd had to check herself
harshly. It wasn't that she was so unwilling to like, love, or even hate
him. She was just unwilling to do it for the wrong reasons. The
exercise in constant self-control had paid off. She found she'd come to
know him, and he her.

The minutes stretched on, and still she watched him stand there, saying
nothing. Yes, she knew him. But did she know how she felt about him?
What emotions had the knowledge spawned?

Did she like him? Yes, she told herself. She did. She genuinely liked
him. It was a liking born of respect. He was a man plagued with guilt
and self-doubt, certainly. His way of compensating for those feelings
made him flippant, a trait many who knew him hated. But Scully saw
something else there. She saw a raw honesty that made Mulder
unwilling to brook fools or to tolerate the abuse of power. Yes, he was
often rude, but never for the sake of being cruel.

Did she love him? Her mind veered away from that question, as she
always forced it to whenever that question arose. Things were
complicated enough.

Did she hate him? No. Never. There had been times when she'd been
angry with him -- furious, even. More than once, he'd allowed his
carefully bred sense of isolation to lead him away from her, lead him to
act as though he were alone in the world. At those times, he had hurt
her deeply. But after each of those incidents, there had been a healing
and a strengthening of the bond between them. He never asked her
forgiveness, and yet he did, every day and in many small ways that
only she understood.

And then there was the trust. When she had fallen prey to the effects of
an experiment in mind-control, when profound paranoia had been
planted deep in her mind, he had reached out to her, hunted her down
and pulled her back.

"You're the only one I trust." That's what he'd said. Coming from
Mulder, those words had monumental significance. She would never
forget them, and never, ever betray them.

She realized that many minutes had passed. She had been staring at
him, and he had been staring at nothing.

"Mulder? Sit down."

His eyes focused on her slowly, locked on hers for a moment, then
broke away.

He crossed the room and sat in a chair at the foot of the bed.

"Mulder, you haven't said ten words all day. What's the matter? Is it
this case?"

"Yes." He spoke quietly, almost in a whisper.

"Look, I know this looks like the classic alien abduction scenario. I
know these things are hard on you. But why don't..."

"You don't understand." He spoke so softly she couldn't make out the
words.

"What?"

"You don't understand!" Suddenly, he was yelling, thrusting his hands
forward as though he was pushing something away violently.

"Understand what? Mulder, how can I understand? You have to tell me
-- what's bothering you? What is it?"

His agitation drove him back onto his feet and across the room, then
back again as he began pacing the small motel room, his long legs
eating the space from wall to wall.

"I can't remember any more," he said through clenched teeth.

"You can't remember what's bothering you?"

He stopped his pacing and looked at her, a tiny smile suddenly playing
at the corners of his mouth.

"Sort of." He took a deep breath. "I can't remember Samantha's
abduction."

Scully's forehead creased as she drew her eyebrows down in confusion.
"But ... you never did remember. You had to be hypnotized before you
remembered."

Mulder sat down on the bed next to her. This close, she could see how
tired he really was.

"I didn't remember before I was hypnotized. But when the memory was
restored through regressive hypnotherapy -- or seemed to be restored --
it stayed with me. For the last couple of years, I could recall the whole
thing clearly. Playing Stratego with Sam ... the light ... the sound ...
Samantha calling my name as she floated into the light. I remembered
it all. But now ..." He paused, and his voice was quiet when he
resumed. "I can't remember any of it. It's as though it never happened."

"Wait -- I don't get it. You just described it to me. How can you say
you don't remember it?"

Mulder paused before replying as though he was searching for a way to
describe a vaguely remembered dream that evaporates in the morning
light.

"I remember the memory, not the event itself. Scully, is there a story
your parents have told you about yourself, maybe something really cute
you did when you were little, and you don't actually remember having
done it, but you can almost picture it because you've been told about it
a thousand times? Sometimes you almost think you remember it, but
you know you don't really. You know you're remembering the times
you were told about it."

"Yes," Scully replied quietly. "I know what you mean. It's like the time
my parents caught me trying to make pizza by pouring tomato sauce on
my Play-Dough. I don't really remember doing it, but I've been told so
many times that I did it, ever since I was a little girl, that I can almost
see it in my mind."

Despite the frustration still evident in his features, Mulder smiled wide
for a moment, the image of a little red-headed girl making a Play-
Dough pizza proving irresistibly amusing.

"So that's why you're having trouble focusing on this case," Scully
went on. "You're questioning whether hypnotherapy is in fact the best
way to approach the alien abduction issue."

Mulder leaned back on his elbows, forcing her to twist her body on the
edge of the bed to look at him. "You still don't get it, Scully."

"I don't."

"No. You don't. I'm questioning the existence of alien abduction."

For Scully, it was as though her partner had just said he was really
Nancy Reagan in disguise. It was absurd. It was a joke. It had to be.

She stood up and walked to the window, looking out at the near-empty
motel parking lot, the blacktop starting to shine under the chilly spring
drizzle that had just begun.

"You don't believe in alien abduction?"

Mulder sat upright. "No. I don't think I do."

Scully didn't turn around. "After all the things we've seen? The
government cover-ups, the lies, the unexplained phenomena?"

"You've said it yourself a thousand times, Scully. There are any
number of explanations. They could be trying to make people believe
in alien abduction in order to hide something else, something worse."

"Mulder, every time I come up with one of those explanations, you
counter it with one of your own -- something about hidden UFOs in
silos, alien DNA, whatever. Why don't you buy those explanations
now?"

"Because, Scully, they were always based on something so strong that I
couldn't deny it -- my memory of Samantha's abduction. That was the
anchor that all the rest was attached to. Now, it's all adrift. There's no
anchor any more. The center is missing."

"But you did remember it. You just finished saying you remember the
memory."

"Yes, but that's not good enough. Maybe those who argue that
recovered memories are really implanted by the therapist are right.
Maybe the memory was never true to begin with, and that's why it's
faded away. And if that's true ..."

Scully crossed the room and kneeled by the bed, placing a hand gently
on his knee.

"If that's true, then Samantha is probably dead," she finished for him.

Scully could see Mulder's throat muscles work as he swallowed the
lump that must have been there ever since he'd walked into the room.
His eyes met hers for a fleeting moment, telegraphing a pain she'd
never seen there before -- the pain of loss, grief and mourning.

"I thought you should know," was all he said before he rose and left her
room.

___________________________________________________

Tuesday, May 21, 1996
11:21 PM
Washington, D.C.

*Who am I?*

Over and over, like words echoing in a gigantic, empty room, Mulder
silently asked himself the question. It became a soundless soundtrack
accompanying the silent, blue flickering of his muted television.
Without seeing or thinking, he steadily clicked the channel changer on
the remote so that the picture changed, changed, and changed again in
a random parade of images, forming a surreal curtain of light that
reflected in a pulsing pinpoint from his dilated pupils.

John Wayne. Perry Mason. Max Klinger. The Little Traveler. Soloflex.
Max Headroom. Burning building. Bill Gates. Sea spray. How to make
a million in real estate. Hot air balloon. Montana Freemen. Psychic
Friends. Air conditioning and refrigeration. Tardis. Stone Temple
Pilots. Number Six.

*Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?*

Click. Click. Click. Click.

A knock startled him so badly that he jerked to his feet, banging his
long legs into the coffee table and spilling Scotch -- his third -- over
scattered papers and magazines.

"Shit."

This loudly enough to be heard on the other side of the door.

"Mulder?"

Scully's voice. Mulder sighed and went to open the door.

Squinting into the dark apartment, Scully could make out only his
outline in the doorway, but that was enough. It wasn't so much the
rumpled, untucked T-shirt or the bare feet. It was the sag in his
shoulders. She knew he was in a bad way.

"Can I come in?"

Mulder just walked back into the apartment, and Scully took that as an
invitation to follow, closing the door behind her.

She smelled the liquor before her eyes adjusted to the dimness well
enough to see the bottle. It made her pulse race slightly with
apprehension. Drinking on a Tuesday night was a very bad sign.

She sat on the couch next to him. He didn't look at her -- just stared at
the television. It was an old show she barely recognized. A man in a
black blazer with white piping was running across a beach, running
frantically to escape a large, white sphere that bounced along behind
him. Reaching for the remote, which was lying wet and sticky in a
puddle of Scotch, she turned the TV off, leaving the room in almost
total darkness.

"Mulder, you've been walking around like a ghost ever since we got
back from New York."

"Sorry if I haven't been adequately entertaining. Maybe you should ask
the manager for your money back."

"I'm worried about you."

"That's a change." His voice dripped sarcasm. She chose to ignore it.

"Mulder, you say you can't remember Samantha's disappearance. Does
that really change things? She still disappeared. You still don't know
what happened to her. You can still try to find out."

He continued to stare in silence at the dark TV screen.

"Talk to me, Mulder."

"There's nothing to say."

"Nothing to say? Your personality is disintegrating before my eyes, and
there's nothing to say? Dammit, Mulder, I will NOT allow you to do
this!"

"You don't have any choice."

"Yes, I do. I'm not going away until you've at least made me
understand why you're digging yourself a hole so deep you'll never be
able to climb out. I've never seen you like this."

By this time, Scully's pupils had dilated and she could see his face in
the shadows. She could see the corners of his lips turn up in an almost-
smile, and she was baffled. What had she said that finally got through
to him?

*I've never seen you like this.* The words touched Mulder's heart.
She'd seen him just about every other way, but not like this. That's
because the last time he was like this was when she was gone, abducted
by unknown forces. He was very much like this. And she wasn't there
to see it.

Scully's abduction had left him so despondent. He had had no idea
what happened to her. He had had no idea whether she was alive or
dead. Even after she'd reappeared, she was so deep in coma that he still
hadn't known whether she was alive or dead.

Not knowing.

Before he could stop it, before he was even aware of it, a tear slipped
from his eye and rolled down his cheek.

"Mulder?"

Gently, Scully reached out and brushed his face with her palm, wiping
the salty drop away.

"Mulder, please let me help."

His head fell, and he stared at his hands folded in his lap.

"You can't help, Scully. No one can."

"I can."

"How do you know?"

"Because I want to so badly."

He looked at her and sighed.

"Scully, have you ever been on one of those amusement park rides
where you stand inside this big spinning cylinder, up against the wall,
and then all of a sudden the floor drops out? The centrifugal force
keeps you pasted to that wall, but your mind keeps telling you you
should be falling."

"That's what you feel like?"

"Yeah. Scully, ever since I recovered the memory of Samantha's
abduction, I knew something no one else seemed to know. It was real."

"You believed."

"That's what I called it. But if you think about it, the word 'belief'
merely describes the believer's state of mind to the non-believer. To the
believer, it isn't belief, it's knowledge. Absolute certainty. The
Christian fundamentalist _knows_ he's been saved. To say he 'believes'
he's been saved is to say he is not certain. 'Belief' is what the non-
believer calls that knowledge. The believer _knows_ the truth."

"And you don't know it any more?"

"No. I don't."

"The bottom has dropped out."

"I'm just waiting to start falling."

"But Mulder, I still don't understand the depth of this depression. After
all we've been through, after all we've learned, the extreme possibilities
still exist. Just because you don't _know_ doesn't mean they're not
true."

"Oh, come on, Scully." Mulder's voice turned suddenly bitter,
surprising her. "I've been walking around with such a cock-sure
attitude about this stuff for years. Everybody knows whacko Spooky
Mulder and his insane beliefs. Do you think that's an easy thing to live
with? It's hard enough when you know you're right."

"You're no whacko, Mulder."

"Says who? 'There goes Spooky the Clown.' Now I know what that
looks like, Scully. I look in the mirror now, and I see myself with a red
rubber nose and Bozo hair, running around the circus ring with a bunch
of little gray men. It's tragic, really -- the way all clowns are tragic.
Misfits who are so bizarre they make people laugh."

"Stop it, Mulder!" The fury in her voice stopped him dead. But when
he looked up into her face, he was shocked at what he saw. Her face
was streaked with the tears she must have shed as he spoke.

"Don't you dare do this to yourself," she went on. "Just stop it."

"How, Scully? Don't you think I want to? But I can't see it any other
way. I used to be the guy who believed in extreme possibilities. Now
who am I?"

"You're Fox Mulder, and you always have been. You have to believe
that. _I_ believe that. Jesus, Mulder, if you can't think any better of
yourself, then what about _me_? Do you take me for such a fool that
I'd go traipsing around the country with a pathetic kook? Is that what
you think of me?"

"Actually, I never understood why you always came along." She could
barely hear him.

"Mulder, when I came back, I told you that I had the strength of your
beliefs. I still do. Back then, they were something for me to hang onto.
They brought me back from the abyss. They still have that power. You
just said that, to the believer, belief is knowledge. Well, I _know_ who
and what you are."

Mulder stared at her. His eyes locked with hers and held them for so
long she was beginning to be afraid he was angry. Until suddenly, he
leaned forward, reached out, and circled his arms around her, his face
resting on her shoulder, his embrace so tight she could barely breathe.
She held him as minutes passed, and slowly she felt the knotted
muscles in his back begin to relax, heard his breathing slow.

Suddenly self-conscious, Mulder eased himself away from her, his eyes
lowered. Once again, there was physical space between them -- but
now, the emotional gap was almost nonexistent.

On an impulse she hadn't know until that moment she was going to
indulge, Scully chose to close the gap -- completely.

"Mulder," she said quietly, almost whispering. "I don't know if I can
give you back what you've lost. I can only promise to try. But maybe I
can give you something new to believe in."

***END PART 2***

===========================================================================

From: Parrotfish <svdf49a@prodigy.com>
Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative
Subject: REPOST AGAIN: Forget to Remember 3/4 (NC-17)
Date: Sun, 16 Jun 1996 10:27:33 -0700

Intro and disclaimer in part 1.

Forget to Remember
Part 3 of 4
written June 1996
by Parrotfish
NC-17

Was she saying what he thought she was saying? No, it wasn't possible.
He knew it would be asking too much. Slowly, he raised his eyes to
hers, to read what was written there in a language only he knew how to
read.

She *was* saying exactly that. He knew it a split second before she
made her move.

Leaning forward, she touched his lips with hers and retreated.

He didn't move.

"Mulder?"

"Don't do this, Scully."

"Why not?"

"The last thing I need is your pity. Leave me some self-respect."

"Pity? You think that was pity?" She smiled. "Mister, you are _sadly_
mistaken." She leaned forward again. This time, the kiss wasn't a gentle
brush. The contact was hard and urgent. She drew his upper lip
between hers, sucking and plunging her tongue forward until he
admitted her into the soft warmth of his mouth. It certainly didn't feel
like pity.

Slowly, she withdrew, licking his lower lip just before breaking
contact. He hadn't realized he'd closed his eyes until he reopened them,
staring at her in disbelief.

"Well?" she whispered, her voice coming in a gasp. "What do you
say?"

He smiled -- an honest, wide-open smile that filled her soul. "Now
_that_ was something I could believe in."

Reaching out, he placed a hand on either side of her face and pulled her
toward him, on top of him as he lay back on the couch. He brought her
lips back to his, this time feeding his own hunger with the sweet
warmth his tongue found inside her. She followed him down, lips glued
to his, until she lay on top of him, their bodies pressed together, the
palms of her hands resting against his chest. He probed her mouth with
long, slow strokes, his tongue seeking every corner it could reach until
her breathing was ragged and her heart raced.

The warmth of their kiss spread like fire down her throat, into her lungs
and her belly. She could feel the heat swirl through her body like
strong liquor swallowed on an empty stomach. Her mind responded by
losing all ability to think in straight lines.

"Scully?" Slowly, she pulled her head back ever so slightly.

"Mmmm?"

"I have never wanted anything as badly as I want you now."

His words reached through the haze and stood with absolute clarity
before her. She knew how badly Fox Mulder had wanted certain things
in his life. To find his sister. To find the truth. The magnitude of his
statement was her absolute undoing.

She smiled at him, a smile as open as his had been moments before.
"For once, I can give you exactly what you want."

She brought her mouth back to his for just a moment, then kissed her
way back across his cheek, across his jaw, and brought her tongue out
to lick the soft spot behind his ear.

His response was so immediate it took her breath away. Her thigh,
draped across his groin, felt him grow and harden. It was intoxicating.
She darted her tongue back to the delicate skin behind his ear, and he
groaned.

"I think I just found some truth," she said, her mouth just centimeters
from his ear.

His hands moved down from her back to her hips, and with one sudden
twist, he flipped her underneath him, thrusting his hips forward to press
the bulge in his jeans against her pelvis. She gasped, and he did it
again. And again.

Her hands roamed eagerly across his back and down to his ass, feeling
the flex of the muscles he was using to rub himself against her.

Suddenly, unexpectedly, he stopped. Placing a hand on either side of
her, he raised himself so that only their legs touched.

His eyes searched hers. "Are you sure? Because in 20 seconds I think
it's going to be too late."

"Mulder -- I am very, very sure. I want to make love with you so badly
my eyeballs hurt."

A moment later, his lips were on her eyelids. He reached his hand up
and brushed her silky, auburn hair back, moved his mouth down, and
sucked her soft, fleshy earlobe. He was delighted by the deep growl
that came from the back of her throat as her hands tightened against his
buttocks, pulling his erection more firmly against her. He knew now
that it was really happening. He was making love to Dana Scully. This
wasn't one of the myriad dreams he'd had since he'd started to work
with her. This was real.

He brought his mouth back to hers as he unbuttoned her shirt. When it
lay open beneath him, he locked his elbows again so that he hovered
above her, looking down.

Her shirt fell open on either side, and he stared at the whiteness of her
breasts wrapped in a white satin bra. No lace. No color. Very simple
and tasteful. Very Scully.

Shifting his weight to one arm, he placed his palm gently against her
left breast, feeling the hard nipple through the sheer fabric. Slowly, he
lowered his mouth to the rounded flesh above the line of her bra and
gently kissed her, using his hand to push her breast up so it enveloped
his lips. His gentleness amazed her, and she reached up to push his
head away.

"What's wrong?" he asked, worried she had changed her mind.

"Nothing," she replied, sliding herself up and out from under him.

She stood by the couch as he rose to his knees, facing her. Reaching
back, she unhooked her bra, slid it off her shoulders and let it drop to
the floor. Mulder watched, mesmerized. Her fingers found the button
of her jeans, then the zipper as she kicked off her shoes. As she
lowered her jeans, revealing white, cotton panties that stretched tight
across her belly and thighs, Mulder reached out for her. He clasped his
arms behind her, pulling her to him, his face nuzzling the hot space
between her breasts. Suddenly, she grabbed him by the shoulders and
pulled him up so he was standing before her. Fumbling for the hem of
his T-shirt, she tugged it over his head and off. Then, she went for his
fly, undoing his jeans deftly, bending over to pull them down. They
stood for a moment, looking at each others' bodies, she wearing only
panties, he, boxers.

Turning, she pushed him back down onto the couch and straddled his
hips. He gazed up at her and saw her tousled red hair framing her
flushed face. "Scully, you're beautiful," he said.

The words made her heart flutter as she felt a gush of warm wetness
spread into her panties. Reaching down between them, she stroked his
erection, now rock hard, through his underwear. He pushed his hips
forward, rubbing himself in the palm of her hand, and groaned.

With a sudden movement, she yanked the boxers down and off of him,
and he kicked them away. Scully leaned down and kissed his swollen
mouth, lingering on the full, lower lip, the sight of which had always
given her the shivers. Her head moved lower as she licked his chin,
down his neck, across his chest. Finding a nipple, she gently licked it,
then planted her mouth on it firmly and sucked hard. Mulder bucked
beneath her, his hands clutching her shoulders.

Scully let her mouth travel lower still, kissing her way down his flat,
firm stomach, until her chin rested against the tip of his penis.

She stole a moment to glance upward and was rewarded by the sight of
her lover's head thrown back in anticipation, teeth gnawing at his lower
lip in joyful agony, his back slightly arched. She lowered her head and
slid his erection into her mouth.

The wet heat of her mouth nearly did Mulder in then and there. His
hips practically jumped off the couch as though he'd been burned,
pushing him to the back of her throat. The fact that she didn't gag made
him glad she had such an intimate knowledge of physiology. She'd
been ready for him.

Slowly, keeping her lips wrapped tightly around him, she raised her
head until just the tip of his penis was inside her mouth.. She swirled
her tongue around and around the sensitive head, then slowly slid back
down the length of his shaft. She repeated the move once, twice.

"Scully..."

She ignored him.

"Scully!" With a desperate gasp, he pushed her head back and off of
him. "I want to be inside you. Please..."

Sliding back up his body, she brought her lips to his. He tasted the salty
cream she had milked from his now-raging hard on. Pulling her lips
away, Scully slowly stood and crossed the room. In a daze, Mulder
watched her smooth, curvaceous body as she walked to the spot where
she'd dropped her purse and bent over, giving him a luscious view of
her cotton-clad buttocks. She turned and caught him staring and
smiling.

"What are you looking at?" she asked with a slow smile.

"I'm looking at the woman I love."

Scully darted forward, crossing the space between them in a flash, and
threw herself on him, pressing the length of her body against as much
of his much longer form as she could. Her lips found his again, and
then he felt her hand close around his throbbing cock.

After a few long, sensuous strokes, she pulled herself off him,
straddling his thighs. With one hand, she cupped his aching balls, and
with the other, she unrolled a condom onto him. Once again, it was all
Mulder could do to maintain control.

Mulder watched her face above him as Scully slid her hips forward,
coming to rest directly above his groin. Reaching down, she brought
him to her and lowered herself slowly down the length of his penis.

She felt every inch of him, his thickness stretching her. The pleasure
was so intense she could barely breathe. Part of her couldn't believe it
was happening. Part of her groaned out loud.

She remained motionless for a long moment, then slid up and down
his length again. His hips thrust up to meet her. Before long, her
motions were fast and frenzied. Mulder watched as she moved against
him, around him, finding the ways he fit inside her that felt best, that
stoked the fire of her passion.

When she came and he felt her hot sheath clutch at him, he was awed
by the beauty of the sight. As she fell forward toward him, he quickly
twisted to flip her beneath him, at the same time thrusting into her hard.
He felt her spasm again, and it drove him wild.

Scully drew her knees up so that they were nearly at her shoulders,
letting Mulder push so deeply inside her she felt as though his stiffness
was touching her heart. His thrusts became faster and harder, and she
could feel her moist cunt clench around him again and again until
finally, with a rasping cry, he came powerfully and fell breathless on
top of her.

Gently, she stroked his hair, feeling his hot breath tickle her shoulder.

"I love you." She said it as though she'd said it a hundred times before.
He turned to look into her eyes, and realized he'd seen it there a
hundred times before.

"Scully?" he whispered. "What should I do?"

She wrapped her arms and legs firmly around him, encasing him in her
warmth.

"Let's go see Dr. Werber. He helped you recover those memories in the
first place. He can probably do it again."

She felt Mulder smile into her shoulder, and barely heard his sleepy
words. "How can you be so damn practical at a time like this?"

"Go to sleep, Mulder."

She didn't need to tell him twice.

____________________________

Wednesday, May 22, 1996
10:00 AM
Washington, D.C.

"Ah, Agent Mulder, Agent Scully. Come in."

Scully eyed the short, balding psychiatrist warily. She had never really
liked him, never trusted him. His absolute certainty that he was helping
patients retrieve lost memories through hypnosis, despite the lack of
hard scientific evidence for the veracity of such a claim, had always
annoyed her. Ironically, this time she was hoping -- praying -- his
claims were true.

"Thank you for seeing us on such short notice, Dr. Werber," Scully
said as she lowered herself into one of the deep, pastel-colored
armchairs across from the doctor's huge oak desk. Mulder took the
chair next to hers, taking no part in the conversational pleasantries.

"I always have time for Agent Mulder," the older man said in the faint
German accent that made his seem more like a caricature of a
psychiatrist than a real one

"So, what seems to be the trouble?" Werber asked, crossing the room to
stand by a black filing cabinet and idly closing the second drawer.

Scully looked at Mulder, waiting for him to speak. When it became
clear that he wasn't participating in the conversation, she answered the
question.

"Agent Mulder feels that he's ... lost ... the memories you helped him
recover. The memories of his sister's abduction."

"Lost? That's most unusual."

"Is it?"

"Yes. Patients who have claimed to recover lost memories, then
retracted those claims, describe the experience quite differently. They
do not claim to have 'lost' the memory, but rather never to have had the
memory in the first place."

Scully was surprised by this explanation based on the single word,
"lost," which she'd used casually. She would have expected Werber to
probe further, ask questions. But he seemed content to prattle on. *I
guess regressive hypnotherapists tend toward the eccentric,* she
thought. She watched him nervously finger the handle on the drawer
he'd closed when they'd first sat down. *High-strung, too.*

"Dr. Werber, we'd like you to repeat the procedure that helped Mulder
recover those memories before."

"Agent Mulder, you're very quiet. Is this what you want?"

"Yes." It was obvious he wasn't going to volunteer anything more.

"Very well then," Werber sighed, crossing to stand before Mulder.
"You know how this works."

Scully watched, somewhat appalled, as Werber began the litany of
supposedly hypnosis-inducing words and actions. It was all so
unscientific. If this stuff is sending Mulder into a trance, she mused,
why isn't it sending me into one? Why would repressed memories be
liberated by a bunch of 'you-are-getting-sleepy' mumbo-jumbo? And
why the hell would a man of Mulder's high intelligence buy this crap?

It was the last question that really gnawed at her. But buy it he did.
And her part in this was to support that belief unquestioningly. She
hoped she could swallow her doubts long enough to do just that.

At last, Werber brought Mulder back to that room in Chilmark,
Massachusetts, on that fateful evening -- the place and time that had
served to shape the person who was to become her partner and friend.
She listened carefully.

"Fox, where are you?"

"At home."

"Who are you with?"

"Samantha."

"What are you doing?"

"Playing."

"What are you playing?"

"Stratego. I'm winning. I always win."

"And what happens next, Fox?"

"I ... we ... we play the game."

"What else?"

"We talk about Jimmy Richards."

"What about him?"

"He's such a creep. We can't stand him."

"And what else?"

"Nothing else."

"And what happens?"

"I don't know. We play."

"Does your sister disappear, Fox?"

"Yes."

Scully felt her stomach clench, dreading the trauma she knew was
about to be released.

"How, Fox? How does it happen?"

"How does it happen?"

"Yes."

"I ... I don't know."

Scully released the breath she didn't realize she'd been holding all this
time. *He doesn't know.*

Werber's voice drones on. "How do you know she's disappeared, Fox?"

"My parents tell me. They tell me Samantha's gone. They ask me what
happened to her. They're really mad at me."

"But weren't you there when she disappeared?"

"I ... I guess so."

"So what happened?"

"I don't know."

"What do your parents tell you happened?"

"They tell me Samantha's gone and they don't know where she went.
My father tells me I was supposed to watch her. He whips me good."

"He whips you?"

The knot in Scully's stomach rose to her throat as she saw tears well in
Mulder's eyes.

"Yeah. It's my fault she's gone. My Dad knows that."

"Fox, what happened to Samantha? Where did she go? Who took her?"

"I don't know. I don't know! I DON'T KNOW! I DON'T KNOW! I
DON'T KNOW! I DON'T KNOW!"

His anguished screaming ripped at Scully's ears, slashing a path
directly to her heart. Leaping to her feet, she found herself screaming,
too.

"Stop it! Stop it now!"

"Please, Agent Scully! He'll be all right," Werber spoke, his tone one of
professional consolation. "I'll bring him out of it now."

Slowly, Mulder opened his eyes. "Scully?"

"I'm here, Mulder."

"What happened? Did I remember?"

"What do you think?"

"I don't think I did."

"You didn't."

"Oh."

Mulder fell silent, his eyes fixed on a nondescript region of mint green
carpeting in front of him.

"I'm sorry, Fox." Scully thought she heard Werber's voice catch as he
spoke the apology.

"It's okay," Mulder said.

"C'mon, Mulder. Let's go home." Scully couldn't bring herself to thank
the psychiatrist. Despite her intellectual contempt for his methodology,
she found herself sincerely disappointed at the outcome of the session.
She had wanted Mulder to remember.

***END PART 3***

===========================================================================

From: Parrotfish <svdf49a@prodigy.com>
Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative
Subject: REPOST AGAIN: Forget to Remember 4/4 (NC-17)
Date: Sun, 16 Jun 1996 10:29:17 -0700

Intro and disclaimer in part 1.

Forget to Remember
Part 4 of 4
written June 1996
by Parrotfish
NC-17

Wednesday, May 22, 1996
9:25 PM
J. Edgar Hoover Building, Washington, D.C.

--DING--

The sound of an elevator broke the absolute silence of the basement
hallway. The opening of the elevator doors was louder still -- not the
silent, well-machined 'whoosh' of fine machinery, but the painful groan
of aging government property.

Scully stepped out into garish fluorescent illumination that only
emphasized the red rims around her eyes. She walked down the
hallway, her sneakers squeaking on the waxed linoleum floor. The
diminutive agent looked lost in the extra-large T-shirt and sweatpants
she wore. Lost in the unrelentingly drab, silent hallway. Lost behind
the sad, unfocused blue of her glazed eyes. Left abandoned by the
terrible loss of faith she had witnessed that day.

When they had left Werber's office, Mulder had asked Scully to drive
him home. He hadn't said a word in the car or in the elevator as they
rode up to his floor. When they'd entered his apartment, he'd just
shrugged off his suit jacket, lain on the couch and threw an arm over
his eyes. After 10 minutes, during which Scully just stood by the
window and looked out, she'd asked him what he wanted to do.

"Sleep," was all he'd said.

"What shall I tell Skinner?"

"Tell him I don't feel well. I'm not coming in today."

"Okay."

She had crossed slowly to the door, trying desperately to think of
something to say. With her hand on the knob, she turned to him.

"This isn't the end of it, Mulder."

He'd said nothing, hadn't even moved his arm from in front of his eyes.
At a loss for words, she'd left.

It had been a long afternoon of paperwork, to which she'd paid very
little conscious attention. Instead, her mind reviewed the session with
Werber. Over and over again, she heard his questions and Mulder's
answers. Something gnawed at her, but she hadn't been able to put her
finger on it.

That's why she was coming back so late, long after the paperwork was
done, long after any prying eyes and ears might disturb her.

Once inside the tiny, messy office she shared with Mulder, Scully
walked directly to the filing cabinet and retrieved an audio cassette.
Bringing it back to her desk, she opened the bottom drawer and
removed an old, beat-up tape recorder. She popped the tape into the
machine.

"Fox, where are you?" Werber's voice came from the cheap recorder,
his German accent made more pronounced by the device's tinny
speaker.

"At home." Mulder's voice. Scully had heard this tape several times
before, and each time she'd thought he sounded like an adolescent boy.
Tonight, he sounded just as he had earlier in the day -- lost and
frightened.

"Who are you with?"

"Samantha."

"What are you doing?"

"Playing."

It was eery, hearing the words she'd heard just that morning, knowing
this recording had been made more than three years earlier.

"What are you playing?"

"Stratego."

"And what happens next, Fox?"

"I ... we ... we play the game."

"What else?"

"We talk about Jimmy Richards."

"What about him?"

"He's such a creep. We both hate him. He's always mean to Sam."

"And what else?"

"Nothing else."

"And what happens?"

"I don't know. We play."

"Does your sister disappear, Fox?"

"Yes."

"What do you see?"

"I ... I see ... a light. Very bright."

"What do you do?"

"Nothing. I can't move."

"What do you hear?"

Suddenly Scully reached out and slapped a button on the tape recorder,
then another and another.

"Does your sister disappear, Fox?"

"Yes."

"What do you see?"

Again -- stop, rewind, play.

"What do you see?"

Stop.

Scully stared at the tape recorder, on her face an expression of deep
concentration. Suddenly, she bolted from her chair and spoke to the
empty room.

"Not what do you see. What happens next. What happens next! HE
ASKED WHAT HAPPENS NEXT!"

She closed her eyes, fists clenched at her sides, lower lip trembling in
anger. Suddenly, in a burst of violence, she hurled the tape recorder
across the room and bolted out of the office.

_______________________________

"Mulder."

The voice at the other end of the phone sounded exhausted.

"Mulder, it's me. did I wake you?"

"Yeah."

"Look, Mulder, I need you to meet me at Werber's office right away."

"Werber's office? Why, you need some emergency dream
interpretation?"

The hint of Mulder's familiar, dry humor somewhat loosened the knot
in Scully's stomach.

"No. Look, I'll explain when you get there. It's important."

"Okay. Be there in 20."

She hit the off button as she pulled up to the curb in front of the office
building she and Mulder had visited that morning.

The outer door was locked, so she pounded on it. When a security
guard appeared in the dimly lit lobby, she pressed her ID against the
glass and yelled. "FBI! Please open the door! This is an emergency!"

A bleary-eyed old man shuffled to the door and unlocked it.

"Don't know what all the commotion is about tonight," he muttered as
she hurried past him.

Scully was in the elevator before the words hit her. "All the commotion?"
She hadn't been the guard's first surprise visitor tonight. Her gun
was out before she reached Werber's floor.

The hallway was brightly lit and quiet as she stepped out, her weapon
held at the ready. She walked carefully to the door of Werber's office
and listened. Nothing. She tried the knob. It was unlocked. That didn't
seem right.

Sucking in her breath, she threw the door open, stepped inside and
leveled her weapon at -- nothing. The waiting room was dark and
silent. She crossed it and stopped again at the door of the inner office,
listening. Still nothing. She burst in, her gun pointed toward the center
of the room. The room was pitch black. She edged over to the wall and
groped for a light switch. It was right where she expected it to be, and
the room brightened.

She was too late.

The office was in shambles. Furniture was overturned, papers strewn
everywhere. A floor lamp that had been activated when she turned the
lights on was lying on its side. She bent over to pick it up -- and saw a
foot sticking out from beneath the overturned sofa.

Scully holstered her gun and pulled the sofa upright.

Werber lay beneath. He was on his back, an ugly red hole in the exact
center of his forehead. Execution-style.

At a sudden noise behind her, she drew her gun and whirled around.
Mulder raised his hands to calm her, then saw what she'd been looking
at.

"Jesus!"

Mulder stepped into the room, glanced around at the carnage, then
crossed to stand above Werber's body. The open, lifeless eyes stared up
at him from a face streaked with dried blood.

"He tried to help me," Mulder whispered.

"Maybe at first."

Mulder turned slowly to face his partner.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that, somewhere along the way, they got to him."

"They?"

"Yes. They. Whoever it is that always works against us. The
Cancerman crowd."

"How do you know?"

Instead of replying, Scully crossed the room, stepping around and over
the debris. She stopped in front of a filing cabinet. Mulder remembered
seeing Werber standing in front of it that morning.

Scully opened the second drawer and began rifling through the files.
She went all the way through the drawer, front to back.

"Shit. They must have gotten it."

Mulder crossed the room and stood beside her. Their eyes met. They
said nothing, but Scully knew he was beginning to understand. The
something that had been missing lately when she'd looked into his eyes
was back.

Mulder turned to the drawer Scully had just gone through and started
again, flipping through filing tabs until one caught his eye and he
stopped, pulling the folder out and handing it to her.

"Rex F. Oldum," she read aloud, nodding. An anagram. Werber hadn't
wanted this file to be easy to spot.

Scully flipped it open and began reading. "'May 22, 1996.' The latest
entry is from today. He must have made it after our visit this morning,"
Scully said. Mulder merely nodded, and she went on. "Subject's
conditioning appears to be complete. Even under deep hypnosis, absent
specific trigger questions, erased memories were not accessed..."

Scully looked up to find Mulder standing stone-still, his eyes closed.
Gently, she reached over and rested her hand lightly on his cheek.

"Come on. Let's get out of here."

He opened his eyes and nodded.

__________________________

Back in their basement office, in the wee hours of the morning, the two
agents stared dejectedly at the meager contents of the file they'd taken
from Werber's office and spread across Mulder's desk.

"How is it possible?" Mulder said, breaking the silence that had reigned
for the last hour. "This records in some detail a brainwashing process
that must have taken some time to complete. I don't remember
anything. How could they have done it?"

"I don't know." Scully removed her wire-rimmed glasses and rubbed
her eyes with both fists. "A couple of weeks ago, you reported some
short periods of memory loss. Maybe the process hadn't yet been
complete, somehow causing those lapses."

"But how? HOW??!!" Suddenly, Mulder was on his feet, slamming his
hand against the desktop.

"Maybe they entered your apartment while you were sleeping and
drugged you. Maybe they kidnapped you right off the street, then
somehow erased the memory. Obviously, Werber was a part of the
plan. Mulder?" Scully stood and put her hands on his shoulders.
"Mulder, I know this is frustrating. But at least we learned one thing --
you didn't just forget Samantha's abduction. It was erased. That means
you might be able to get it back."

"Get it back?"

"You could try hypnotherapy again. Werber's not the only person who
can do it."

"No. It's out of the question."

"But why?"

"Because they would only go after anyone I went to for help. It would
just be the same thing all over again."

Scully let her hands fall back to her sides. She knew he was right.

"DAMN!" Mulder was pacing the tiny office like a caged leopard.
"There isn't even anything we can use in this file as evidence of a
conspiracy! No names, no mention of why Werber did it! Nothing!
Werber's dead, a piece of my personal history has been ripped away,
and I have to just walk away like nothing happened. SHIT!"

Scully moved in front of him to stop his restless movement.

"Then you'll have to accept it on faith, Mulder. I know it's a different
kind of faith -- not a memory, but still an absolute knowledge that
Samantha was taken."

Mulder sighed. "Like a story I've heard a thousand times."

"Exactly."

"It's not the same, Scully."

"I know. But it will have to do."

Mulder shook his head sadly. "I feel like I've lost so much."

Scully watched her partner stare off into space as though searching for
the memory that had been stolen from him. How could she help him
find it? She didn't know. She wasn't even sure he would ever find it
again, not the way he'd had it before. And if he didn't, how could he
mourn the loss of something so intangible?

It was all too obscure for her at such a late hour. "Mulder -- go home
and get some sleep."

"Yeah. Sure."

____________________________

Friday, May 24, 1996
10:05 PM
Scully's apartment

Where had he gone? She had no idea. Mulder had called in sick
Thursday morning. On Friday, he hadn't even bothered to do that. But
deep down, she knew he'd turn up at any moment.

The question was, what would happen next? They hadn't spoken about
the intimacy they'd allowed themselves a couple of nights earlier. Had
it opened a new chapter for them, or was it just a night of extreme
measures to cope with extreme circumstances? She knew what she
thought it was, but she had no idea what he thought.

When she heard the knock, she didn't jump. She didn't even flinch.
Somehow, she wasn't surprised at all. And she didn't wonder for a
moment who was at the door.

"Where have you been?"

Mulder came in and sat down on the couch before answering.

"Chilmark. Home."

She sat beside him. "And?"

"And it was really weird. Mostly because nothing has changed at all. I
walked into the house ... and it was all the same. The house where I
grew up. Where Samantha didn't get a chance to finish growing up.
You were right, Scully. In a way, my not remembering doesn't actually
change anything. I still have to find her."

"I know." She paused. "You look tired."

"It was a long drive."

"Didn't you go to your apartment?"

"No. I came here."

A long silence fell between them. Finally, Scully broke it.

"Mulder ... about what happened ..."

"Please don't say it, Scully. Can't we just forget it?"

She frowned, wondering what he didn't want her to say and what
exactly he wanted to forget.

"I can't forget it, Mulder. Can you?"

"No. I could never forget it. But ... I don't want to go through the
explanations and reasons. You'd only be right, anyway. Just ... please,
Scully, don't leave me. Nothing has to change."

Now she was really confused. Which explanations and reasons? What
would she be right about?

"Mulder, I can't even tell if we're both having the same conversation,
let alone understanding each other."

He sighed. "Okay. Look, I needed to see you tonight -- to know that it
would be okay, that we would be okay. That we could go on working
together and ... that you won't leave me."

"You think I regret it."

"Don't you?"

"Do you?"

She locked her eyes on his as she waited for his reply, and she was
shocked at what she saw there: terror. He couldn't even bring himself
to answer.

"Oh, Mulder." She touched his face gently. "Why do you do this to
yourself? Why do you always assume the worst?"

His lips curled slightly into a half-smile. "Because that's what usually
happens."

"What do you want to happen? Just tell me. Please."

She watched him search for words with which to answer her. He didn't
find any that suited. Instead, he took her hand from his cheek and
pressed his lips into her palm, then raised his eyes to hers.

She gave him her biggest, brightest grin. "That's exactly what I want,
too."

"You're sure? Scully, being together this way could be the most
dangerous thing we've ever done."

"Not being together would be worse. We'll be careful. We can do this."

She watched him grapple with the fears she knew always haunted him.
For someone who wanted to believe, he doubted so much. She stood up
and pulled him to his feet.

"Come on, Mulder."

"Where are we going?"

In reply, she led him down the hall, stopping at the linen closet to
retrieve two large bath towels, then proceeded to the bathroom.

"Scully?"

"Hmm?"

"What are you doing?"

"Giving us a clean start."

She tugged his shirt from his jeans, unbuttoned it and slid it off. He
watched as she leaned over, untied his shoes and removed his socks.
When she stood and went for his pants, he suddenly grabbed her hand
and stopped her.

A cloud passed over her face. He was going to back off. He won't
allow himself this.

"Scully..."

She tensed, afraid.

"Scully." With one hand, he raised her face to his, forced her eyes to
meet his. "I can't possibly be anything but trouble to you. But I love
you. God, I love you."

Her breath caught.

"Mulder, you can't possibly be trouble to me. I couldn't go on without
you."

She slid her hands behind his head and pulled his mouth down to hers.
This time, he let her unzip his jeans and pull them down, taking his
boxers with them. His lips held hers as he undressed her, quickly
removing clothing and underwear.

She broke away and turned the shower on, carefully adjusting the
temperature until steam began to fill the room. She stepped into the tub
and he followed her, sliding the glass door shut.

He looked down at her as she stood with her back to him, face raised
into the hot spray, red hair plastered down her neck and back. Reaching
around her, he placed his hands gently on her belly and leaned over to
nuzzle her neck. Her small groan of pleasure made him smile.

He reached behind him for the soap.

"Y'know, Scully, I once had a dream like this," he said as he started
working up a lather, eyeing her with a mischievous glint in his eye.

"Oh? So what did Miss August do with the soap on a rope?"

"Miss August wasn't there."

"Bummer. Isn't she your favorite?"

"Well, Miss August has her points," Mulder said as he pulled Scully
back against him and out of the spray. His long arms circled her and he
began stroking soapy trails across her stomach. "But I was really
amazed by what _you_ can do with soap on a rope."

"Mulder." He could hear her smile. "I've never done anything with soap
on a rope."

"Don't argue. I was there."

"Mmmmm." She didn't sound like she was going to argue, he thought
with pleasure. He worked his hands higher, cupping her breasts and
running the edges of his thumbs along the tips of her stiff nipples. She
responded by pressing back against him, her hot, wet back trapping his
erection against his belly. The feel of her soft skin drove him wild, and
it was all he could do not to plunge himself into her immediately. But
he knew he wouldn't. He wanted -- needed -- to show her how much
she meant to him, mind, body and spirit.

By now, he was boldly stroking and grasping her breasts. The feel of
his strong hands sliding and gliding across her marvelously sensitized
nipples made her lightheaded with erotic pleasure.

Turning in his arms, she pressed her soapy torso against him, sliding
the soft mounds of her breasts across him. Mulder bent down and
rested his head against her wet, sweet-smelling hair, sliding his hands
down her sides, across her hips, cupping her buttocks, pulling her hard
against him.

"Pass the soap," he heard her mumble into his chest.

"No."

"No?"

"I'm not done with it."

"Oh."

He worked up some more lather. With her face buried in his chest, he
reached behind her and began rubbing circles around her shoulders,
working out the tension there until he felt her relax into him.

"Turn around."

"But it feels so good right here."

"Turn around." She obeyed, and he began stroking her back more
firmly, starting at the base of her neck and working all the way down to
the hollow above her ass. She braced herself against the wall to let him
dig in and rub really hard.

With a suddenness that made her gasp, he reached in front of her and
down, massaging soap into the tangle of red curls between her legs.
Again, she pushed back against him. He dropped his head to place
light, delicate kisses on her shoulder. He had just begun to nibble her
ear when his fingers reached lower still, probing the hot, slick folds of
wildly sensitive skin there. When he heard her moan in earnest, he
slipped a long middle finger deep inside, his other hand fondling and
stroking first one breast, then the other. He wished he could see her
face, but her sounds of building ecstasy were enough to tell him he was
getting it right as he slowly moved his finger in and out.

He could feel all the tension he'd rubbed out of her back and shoulders
start to build again, her muscles twitching as her passion built. He was
incredibly hard now, but he knew his own satisfaction would wait, and
it would be the better for the delay.

He was bearing much of her weight now as she lost herself in the
feelings he was giving her. Mulder drew his finger out and stepped
forward so that Scully was standing directly under the hot water jet. He
touched the tip of her engorged clitoris, and she jumped in his arms
with a high cry of pure joy. Adding some pressure, he started stroking
back and forth against the point of her pleasure. He kept up the motion
as he brought his other hand down and again slipped a finger inside.
Within seconds, she bucked hard against him, her cunt clenching in
spasms around his finger.

"FOX! FOX! OH GOD!"

The sound of her calling his name in orgasm brought tears to his eyes
as he gently withdrew his hands from between her legs and wrapped
his arms around her, supporting her suddenly boneless body.

When her shudders stopped, he turned the water off, slid the glass door
open, grabbed a towel and wrapped it around her. She turned around,
standing now on her own two feet, and looked up into his smiling face.

Standing on tiptoe, she kissed him, plunging her tongue deep in his
mouth.

He stepped out of the tub and wrapped the other towel around his
waist, then turned and offered her his hand.

"Does the code of chivalry cover helping a lady out of the shower?"
Scully asked.

"Mine does. Come on." With that, he darted out of the bathroom and
down the hall, pulling her behind him to the bedroom.

He stood her next to the bed and slowly unwrapped her towel, rubbing
and buffing her skin and hair until she was relatively dry. Then, he
gently pushed her onto the bed so she lay back, her feet on the floor.
He dropped his towel and knelt before her.

Frowning, she sat up quickly and drew her knees together. Her
position, his position, had made her feel incredibly vulnerable. He
could read her thoughts in the change of expression on her face.

"Mulder, I can't..."

"Shhhh." He put a finger on her lips. "You can. We can."

"I just don't think..."

"Don't think. Scully ... Dana ... don't you see? I love you so much ... I
want every bit of you -- to touch, to smell, to taste. There isn't anything
about you that isn't beautiful to me. You turn me on so much I can't see
straight. I can't breathe when I look at you, when I touch you."

He placed a warm palm in the center of her chest and shoved gently.
She let him push her back onto the bed and part her legs.

When his tongue found her most erogenous places, she gasped and
bucked. His mouth was relentless, licking, nipping and kissing her to
the wild edge she'd only just fallen over minutes earlier. This time, her
climax brought with it an inarticulate, animal cry that reached directly
to his groin.

Mulder stood quickly and urgently pushed her up so she lay all the way
across the bed. Scully opened her eyes and saw he'd produced a
condom from somewhere, which he applied to himself quickly. A
moment later, he was above her, on her, inside her, and she felt
incredibly full.

He had held back as long as humanly possible, and he had no self
control left. His strokes were frenzied, slamming his throbbing cock
hard and deep into her. She wrapped her legs tightly around him and
pushed up into every thrust, eyes locked on his as she watched him race
toward his own release.

"Come into me, Fox," she hoarsely whispered. "Now. Let go. Be with
me."

Her passionate coaxing cut through the fog and reached directly to the
pleasure center of his brain. Her name was a wild yell on his lips as he
pumped his hot seed deep into her, then collapsed.

It was many minutes before he rolled off her, discarded the condom
and gathered her into his arms under the soft comforter.

"Dana?"

"Mmmm?"

"What if I don't remember any of this in the morning?"

He felt her smile against his chest.

"I'll remind you."

***END OF IT ALL***