Chapter Text
It’s not the first time since she’s entered this office. But it’s been…god, it’s been more than twenty years since life has taken her down to the basement. Scully swallows a lump in her throat as she allows her mind to wander back to her miraculous, weird, beautiful year.
Her hair was longer, shoulder pads were in, and she was young and green. She had an embarrassing crush on her new coworker and she was fresh out of a breakup with her former instructor. 1993 Dana Scully had been innocent and naive.
That year had also been one of the most exciting and dramatic years of her life. She’d seen things she still can’t quite explain, even to herself. She’d lived more in that year than in any year before, or since.
The secret yearning for that life of adventure and excitement propelled her to accept Assistant Director Skinner’s invitation to rejoin the newly reopened X-Files. She knows it’s crazy, but maybe it’s a midlife crisis. She remembers the excitement and danger, the joy and fear. And she wants it back.
Admit it, Dana. You want to see him again. Scully sighs as she glances down at her phone. It’s still too early to open the door. To step foot into an office that’s probably changed in so many ways. She’d kept discreet tabs on him throughout the years. He’d spent more years back in the X-Files with a stream of partners that never lasted. And then he got married. She had no idea what happened after that. She married herself, and then left the FBI for decades.
She has discreetly taken a peek at social media, listened to a few podcast episodes and YouTube videos featuring her former partner. Her attraction, dulled over years and years of distance, came roaring back with a vengeance. God, he’s…
Fucking hot. She smiles slightly as she thinks about how Melissa would phrase it. But after a moment she schools her expression into the cool distance she needed to portray. She’s not going to behave like a giggling schoolgirl.
She knocks on the door, brought vividly back to the past. She wonders if he even remembers her. It’s been twenty years.
She steps inside, and finds the room empty. Odd, he’s not here. She’d have expected him to be here. His old self had practically lived in this musty old room. But he’s not here.
She glances around seeing a few signs of modernity in the slightly updated computer. Other than that, it looked as if the room hadn’t changed a bit. But as she looked, she saw traces of changes. A picture of two boys on his desk. They must be his sons.
A wave of sadness and almost jealousy passes over her as she thinks about it. She swallows and forces her gaze to shift to something else. No sign of a woman in this office. His sons, but no wife. Perhaps they divorced?
“Oh…wow..” She turns her head as the door opens. “Sorry, the line at the coffee shop was crazy.”
She stands up, taking one look at her former partner. He looks…good. Oh sure, he does look older, but it looks good on him. Very good. In fact, it’s entirely possible he looks better than he did before. He was terribly good looking, but he looked so boyish. Now, there is no mistaking that she’s in the room with a man.
She tries to keep herself from betraying the sudden wave of attraction and something else. Memories of being friends. Of trusting each other. Of caring for each other. She had felt deep sadness when they were separated. It took several years for her to not feel the instinctive desire to call him up and talk. And she couldn’t say she’d ever fully forgotten him, even if they had never seen each other again. They had developed a deep and enduring bond that lasted throughout the years apart.
She steps forward, holding out her hand. “Mulder…you…wow, this does bring back a lot of memories.”
He smiles, and it’s as if no time at all has passed. “Well, apart from the hair and clothing, you look exactly like you did. Are you sure you didn’t time travel? Or wait, possibly a vampire.”
She chuckles. “Touche.”
He shakes her hand, and after a moment, she does something extremely out of character. She hugs him. God, it’s embarrassing, but she just can’t resist it. He doesn’t shy away as he might have done so many years ago. Instead, he hugs her back, affectionate. She breathes in, suddenly aware of just how long its been since she’s been held by a man who wasn’t related to her.
She stares at him. “It’s been so long…but…I don’t know…this place hasn’t changed.”
“It won’t. It never does.” He gestures to the other desk in the corner. “It’s a bit of an odd angle, only way it will fit.”
She sets her purse down. She notices a nameplate on the desk. Diana Fowley. Interesting. She has never heard that name. She places the name plate back on the desk. “Ghost of my former deskmate?” She asks.
She holds up the nameplate. To her surprise, his face drains of color, and he reaches for it. “Oh…I forgot to remove it. Haven’t used that desk in a long time.”
She senses there is more to that story than he’s telling her. But she puts it aside. She sits down, opening up a file. “I know everything is online, but Skinner gave me this file.”
“I prefer old school paper.”
“So do I. Drove the nurses crazy. Told them I didn’t want to have to depend on screens and batteries.”
She stands up, walking over to his desk and seating herself on the other side. She opens the file. “What have we got here?”
“Hopefully something good.”
She sighs. “Ah…brain leaking computer viruses.”
“Has potential.”
The case involved half a dozen teenagers who died suddenly, their brains having been quite literally liquified. All of them had clicked on a link in an email, and seemingly were killed by a computer virus.
“There is no way a computer virus could cause this.” Scully objects. “There has to be some kind of environmental trigger.”
“Nothing was found at the scene.” Mulder objects. “None of them ate the same food, breathed the same air…”
She smiles. She’d forgotten how fun these puzzles were. Forgotten how much enjoyment she got out of a big debate with her partner over the plausibility of his theories.
“Well, I guess we’re heading for Merced, California.” She grins.
“Right on it.”
Some things have changed. Dana Scully has not. Oh…she’s probably not Dana Scully anymore, last he heard she’d gotten married, but she sure looks the same. And she acts the same too. In a world of change, it’s a refreshing sense of stability.
She’s drop dead gorgeous. That red hair that looks so smooth and silky, with just a hint of a curl at the ends. Big blue eyes that are wet and doe like, but betraying a fire that shows her strength and determination. Her clothing shows off her figure like her old boxy suits never did. Her skirt is short enough to show off her extremely shapely legs and those heels…they should be illegal. They must be five inches and so spindly, and they make her look lethal. She’s more overtly sexy now than she was when he knew her before. Part of it is the changing times. It’s a lot easier being a female agent now than in 1993.
There is confidence about her. A steadiness. And a softness. He finds it refreshing in a world of cruelty and dishonesty. Beyond her physical beauty, her intelligence and quick thinking attracted his immediate attention. Intelligence had always been his weakness. And there is no denying that Dana Scully is brilliant.
He’d had a major crush on her back when they were working together. How could he not? She was beautiful, kind and intelligent. She lit up his dark life and he was drawn to her. But after just one year working together, they were separated, and eventually, she left the FBI. And from there, they simply stopped interacting.
Yet he never wholly forgot the captivating woman named Dana Scully. He’d considered asking her out on a date not long after they’d stopped working together, but had never quite had the courage. And not long afterwards, she’d announced she was dating someone. From her past.
He’d done a little digging. Doctor. Much older. Divorced with one daughter. But there was nothing questionable about Daniel Waterson’s pedigree. Not long after, Scully was married. He had been glad her life seemed to be doing well. She appeared happy.
A few years later, Diana made her entrance back into his life. She’d done what she always did. Marched in and took over. She insisted they move in together. She got pregnant. They got married. And then she died only a few months after Richard and Simon were born. It was hard to regret it too much, considering she’d been playing him for a fool the whole time.
Her husband must be nearly eighty now. Mulder glances over at Scully, her skirt now a trim navy instead of black. Her black pumps have been replaced with dark blue ones with a fetching little bow. She carries with her an effortless sexyness he finds remarkably appealing. If he’s honest, at least half of it is her spirit. She’s…radiant. He can’t explain it. Even if he couldn’t see her. Touch her. He’d still feel it.
“So…it’s been a long time. Marriage? Family?”
Her face pales and he realizes it was the wrong thing to say. She swallows. “My husband, Daniel, passed away three years ago. And we didn’t have any children.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“You?” She studies his face, her eyes intent.
“My…wife…” He still hates that term, knowing Diana only married him to sell him out. That Simon and Richard were nothing but a method to trap him with her while she did god knows what to the world. “She died in 1999. I have two sons, twins. They’re both eighteen now. Just moved into college a couple of weeks ago, actually.”
She must have done the math, calculating that his sons were infants when their mother died. Scully looks at him gently. “I’m sorry, that must have been very difficult.”
He shrugs. “They kept me company. And sane.”
She smiles, “I’m sure they did.”
He finds a trace of sadness in her. Despite her exemplary career as a doctor, she appears listless, almost depressed. Her life would be the envy of many. A promising career. A husband. Probably even a dog somewhere. And yet, he senses that her life lacked joy or purpose.
His own life had been far different than he imagined. Despite their origins, his sons are his entire existence. He will never regret them, even if he has questions regarding their paternity. They’re his. He raised them. They love him. And he loves them. He doesn’t care if they’re not his by birth.
“My husband was sick for nearly 10 years. He had dementia.” She swallows. “I was his primary caretaker. When he passed, I was relieved. It sounds cruel, but…my husband died when he was diagnosed. When he lost his memories. And he went through so much suffering.”
Perhaps that was the cause of her persistent sadness. He nods, unable to really understand. Diana’s death had been violent, quick and stabbing. He’d been left with anger and resentment, unable to process the betrayal she’s thrust into his lap. All the love he’d once held for her had been turned into a bitter nightmare. She claimed until the end that she loved him, but sincerely doubted she was capable of anything but a selfish sort of possession.
“You took care of him. That’s the important part.”
She nods, and he can see the way her shoulder hunch in. He senses her discomfort, and moves on to other topics.
Mrs. Richardson, their first victim’s mother, is kind but completely out of touch. She has no idea what her son does online. She stares at them blankly as they ask her about social media.
“I don’t know.” She says. “He was always online, but I never knew what he was doing.”
“Suspicious?” Mulder surmises as they stop at the local diner for lunch.
“Not really.” Scully leans back, surveying the menu. “She’s a typical mother of her age. She has no idea what social media sites are popular or what to do. And since Jason was doing well in school and popular, she had no reason to worry.”
“Except he was gay. And she didn’t know it.”
“Yes.” Scully places her menu down on the table. “And it’s possible that’s what the UNSUB is targeting.”
“If so…why the diverse range of victims. Apart from all the kids belonging in a rough geographic region, they don’t share any other characteristics. Race, sexuality, gender. And they don’t know each other.”
“Isn’t that unusual?”
“It is. Killers typically target those within their own race or within a target race. Yet we have one African American male, one white female, and one Asian male. They’re all from different socioeconomic backgrounds. Jason was gay, but the other two were straight. They didn’t go to the same school.”
“There has to be some other connection.” Scully muses.
She orders a salad and he smiles. “Some things never change.”
“What?”
“You and your salads.”
“Well, considering my metabolism has changed in the last twenty years, it’s not a surprise.”
“Come on, Scully. You haven’t gained a pound. In fact, you look like you’ve lost weight.”
She rolls her eyes, “Flattery will get you nowhere.”
“Not flattery, just a statement of fact.”
She taps her fingers on the table. “I guess I didn’t gain the weight back from cancer.”
He stares at her. Unable to process. Scully with cancer?
“You’re…”
“I’ve been in remission for almost twenty years.” She murmurs, sighing. “I had Stage 3 ovarian cancer. The doctors basically told me to sign my will. That I was going to die. And…”
She looks up. “Daniel threw a stink. He called everyone he knew. Got me a special, experimental treatment. It worked. I went into remission. But…”
He waits for her to continue. “Cancer changed me. And of course…the total hysterectomy.”
She shrugs. “Sorry, oversharing. I guess…I just…it’s been a long time since I could talk about this.”
“No, it’s not oversharing.” At one time, they’d been best friends. He still feels that connection to her.
“That's why I never had children. I told myself I’d have more time. But…I got cancer. And then it was too late.” She stares at him. “I learned my lesson. Never count on tomorrow.”
He nods. “Good lesson.”
She glances at her salad. “God, sorry. I sound like an idiot.”
“No, you don’t.” He gestures to her with his fork. “Sometimes I wonder…”
“Wonder what?”
“Wonder what life would have been like if we hadn’t been separated.”
She nods. “I don’t know.”
“Much calmer life, I’m sure.” He answers. He knows more than she could ever know how lucky she was to get away.
“Probably.” Her wry smile makes him give her a reluctant smile back. “Probably more exciting though.”
“Well, we’re not dead yet. And we still have a computer virus exploding kid’s heads.”