Date sent: Mon, 22 Dec 1997

Rating: PG (language), MulderAngst (remember when this takes place), hints
of MSR
Spoilers: up through "Duane Barry"/"Ascension" (season 2)
Summary: Mulder is falling... and he calls an old friend to help him slow
the fall.

Author's Note: This is my take on what Mulder was like during the time
immediately following Scully's abduction.

Conversations Between Old Friends: "Duane Barry"/"Ascension"
by Christina Shuy
cshuy@netcom.com

"Mulder! I need your help! MULDER!" A voice screamed.

A bright white light... a sharp drilling noise... pain throughout the
body, but concentrated in the abdominal area. She tried to scream, but
found she couldn't... she couldn't even move, and could only barely
breathe.

The woman, a different one, sat up, startled, in her bed, drenched in
sweat. A scant few moments later, the phone rang.

"Victoria Jensen..." she scrambled for the phone.

Dear gods... what was that?!' she thought, recounting the images in
the dream which had roused her.

"Victoria... it's me..." There was a crackling of static in the
background. Not only that, the person on the other end sounded terrible.

"Mulder? Where are you?"

"Uh... Skyland Mountain... I think..."

"You think?"

"Uh... yeah... Scully's gone."

"I know."

"I mean *gone* as in: I can't find her because someone took her."

"Mulder, I know."

"I didn't wake you did I." It was not a question.

"No... I got jolted awake by the recurring nightmare I have had
recently, though tonight it felt much more immediate."

"White light? Drilling noise? Pain? Scully's eyes?" Mulder
muttered, only just coherently.

"Yes, Mulder..." Though there is more to it than that, she thought
but didn't say.

"Thought so..." A heavy sigh from his end.

"Mulder, you're a wreck."

"Like this is news?"

"When was the last time you got any sleep?"

"Week, maybe... I hadn't been sleeping well before this anyway, what
with the X-Files closing, and all... and now..." There was a stifled sob.
"Victoria, did I ever tell you... I mean... I didn't even tell her, so I'm
not sure she knows... or even if... Did I tell you?"

"You didn't have to, Mulder... I know. And I think she does too."

"It's... so hard..." He sounded almost half dead... which, to her,
was a bad sign. She remembered the last time this happened. Phoebe Green
had just finished getting her claws into him at Oxford, and he was verging
on suicide. She'd only barely managed to pull him through it then... and
she knew she needed to do so again because there was a lot to live for.

"Mulder, go back to your car and sit in it. No use talking to you
while your teeth chatter. And you can't get sick. You have to find her.
I know you will."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Mulder, do you remember you have always had faith in things like
that I have told you? I remember warning you about Phoebe... and this is
not an I told you so'..."

"Yeah... I remember..." There was not much hope in his voice.

"Mulder, listen to me... I believe Scully knows how you feel.
However, there is no point in blaming yourself-"

"Like hell there isn't. If it wasn't for me, she'd not have been
abducted... I brought her in on this, it's my own fault that she's gone
now."

"Mulder, it was her choice to help you with the Duane Barry
investigation. As I recall, she was assigned to you, and you initially
thought she was sent to spy on you."

"I was wrong then..." A note of hope, which died when she heard his
stifled sob.

Victoria smiled, though she didn't entirely feel it. "I know,
Mulder... I know. She turned out to be the only person in the area you
could trust, and with me out of the country, you found yourself talking to
and trusting her more and more."

"Victoria, you've never been *in* the country, at least not on a
permanent basis."

"That's beside the point, Mulder, and you know it."

"Yeah, I guess I do."

"I know there is no point in asking if you're going to be alright.
You're not."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." Mulder's voice was faintly
sarcastic.

"Mulder..."

"Look, Victoria, I gotta go, okay? I need to figure out what to do."

"They're going to reopen the X-Files soon..."

"So?"

"Mulder, I know how important those are to you."

"Not without Scully..."

"I know, dear... I know. Go home and get cleaned up. I think you
should meet with her mother and let her know what has happened."

"And give her back Scully's cross."

"I have the feeling she will want you to hang onto it and give it
back to Dana yourself."

"Still... I gotta go."

"Okay... 'night Mulder."

She dropped the phone back on the hook, and turned over in her bed,
hoping that the nightmare would not rouse her again, but knowing better.

-The End... for now.-

"The Truth is Out There. Trust No One."- from "The X-Files"
"I was told once that the best way to regenerate body heat is to crawl
naked into a sleeping bag with someone else who's already naked."-Mulder
"Maybe if it rains sleeping bags, you'll get lucky." Scully(tXF-"Detour")
Pursuing a BS degree(Electrical Engineering)-Winter 1998(EE211,Phil380,EE210)
"In the moment that you think you can't, you'll discover that you can." -
Celine Dion - "Power of the Dream" "Let's get Dangerous!" - Darkwing Duck.
Looking for work and a place to live... somewhere in the SanFran Bay Area.