By Mary Kleinsmith (Buc252@aol.com)

Spoilers: all things

Keywords: Missing Scene

Summary: Scully's thoughts after she awakens in Mulder's apartment.

Rating: PG

Classification: MA, UST/MSR

Archive: Yes, anywhere

Disclaimer: Mulder, Scully, and everything related to them belong to Chris Carter and 10-13, with magic added by David and Gillian. I'm only borrowing them.

Feedback: Please, please, please, please, please, please, please?

Author's Notes: Everybody's biggest question about "all things" seems to be whether or not they slept together. What got to me most was the hurt look on Mulder's face at the beginning of the episode, when she spoke so harshly to him. This, hopefully, will resolve both things. And yes, I am a shipper - I just didn't think they had the energy to do anything that night.

Some Things

By Mary Kleinsmith (Buc252@aol.com)

It's a strange feeling to see yourself from a perspective outside your body, but that's what I'm doing. I see myself walking down a hall - drawn toward a room in a house I've never seen before. I draw nearer and notice there's no door, just a doorway. My gun is quickly drawn and I'm poised for anything I may find in this mysterious room from which I sense such foreboding. I realize I have no control over this version of myself, as my urging for her to proceed faster goes unheeded. I round the corner, drawing back in shock as I encounter my partner on the far side of the large, otherwise vacant room.

Mulder's eyes meet my own, or her own since she is me and yet is not. They're imploring, begging, as the flames leap at him, effectively blocking his way to me and freedom. He's trying to put out the flames with his jacket to no avail. He will be burned in a matter of moments if I don't do something, and do it fast. I'm so busy watching Mulder that I only hear the blast - the explosion erupting from the gun the other me is holding as the lead invades my partner's body, driving him to his knees. His expression has changed, his eyes now full of hurt that is less physical than it is emotional. That look will haunt me, I realize, as simultaneously I have the feeling that I've seen it before. Still, it soon slides from him to be replaced by an emptiness that indicates the absence of life.

The other Scully may have fired the shots, but I know just as surely that it's my fault. As the flames continue to lick at Mulder's body, I can't fight the eruption from my own throat.

"Mulder!" is the scream that comes from me before I can assimilate my surroundings. I'm in Mulder's livingroom, covered by a throw, and despite its warmth, I can't stop myself from shivering. It was too real, and too frightening. I pull my knees up to my chest and pull the blanket even tighter around me. What did it all mean? Did it mean anything at all?

Okay, Dana, I think to myself while I try to slow my breathing. You took a unit of psychiatry during med school. Think rationally about this.

Mulder was in the middle of some threatening flames. Okay, that's not too tough. He's threatened every minute of his life by this thing we're chasing. His "quest" as he puts it. So the flames embody the men responsible for all this. That black-lunged son of a bitch and his rat-bastard right hand, and all the others in the consortium. Nothing too odd there.

What happened next in my dream is the part that really rattles me. Why would I kill Mulder? He's my best friend and then some - I'd never want to see any harm come to him. And to do it by my own hand, for no reason? Never.

The barely formed thought is pushed away and replaced by a vision. Not a dream, this time, but a memory. That same hurt look in his eyes - the one that had seemed so familiar in the dream - after I'd figuratively shot him down in our office three days before. After I'd announced I had no intention of accompanying him, he'd worn that look as he told me he'd cancel my plane ticket to England .

Damn. Even if I didn't want to go, I shouldn't have spoken so harshly. I didn't just attack going to England - I attacked his life, his beliefs, and even his intelligence. I hurt Mulder, sure as if I'd fired those shots for real, only instead of hurting his body, I'd hurt his heart. How could I have done that to a friend?

And despite that, despite what I'd said and not even thought twice about afterwards, he'd sat with me on this couch last night. Talking about my deepest doubts and insecurities in the choices I've made in my life, as well as the random elements that bring us to any given moment in our lives. He never even asked for an apology - probably didn't expect one, if past history is any example. I know Mulder pretty well, and while somebody else may hurt him, sure as the sun comes up in the morning he'll find a way for it to be his fault. He deserved it. I wish I had a dime for each time I saw that look in his eyes. The self-derision from that very first day when I entered the office of "the FBI's most unwanted".

I owe him an apology. In seven years, I've never once heard anybody apologize to him, and I've done it damn seldom myself, but this time I have to make things right. I'm sorry I hurt him. I'm sorry I wasn't more open to what he was saying. Truth is, I went into that office, my arms full of lunch, closed off from whatever idea he had brewing. Call it PMS or just irritated over being called into the office on a Saturday, but I was bristling and made no bones about communicating that to Mulder.

So I sent him to England to investigate crop circles by himself. How must that have felt to him, I wonder now. Like I wasn't backing him? I wasn't. Like the first in many similar instances? Perhaps. I have to make him understand that I hadn't planned on making a habit of this.

Suddenly, I'm feeling as alone as Mulder must have that day he left the X-Files office by himself. I need to talk to him. I need to know that he understands and forgives my selfishness. I wonder if Mulder is awake on the other side of this wall.

I rise from the couch, creeping on pantyhosed feet into Mulder's bedroom, watching for the slightest sign that he's awake. The quilt that's normally on his bed lies discarded, his blanket and sheet tangled around him, leaving both an arm and a calf exposed. His body rises and falls with the even breaths of sleep while the moonlight shines on his face, but I can't tear myself away to return to the livingroom sofa. I draw even closer, fighting the temptation to purposefully knock something over so I can make up a story about it being an accident after he wakes. But our relationship has always been based on honesty, and I can't tell him even this slightest of lies now. I'm sure he's still smarting from the lies I told when I was taken in so thoroughly by good old CGB a few weeks ago.

So I stand here, still and silent, as I watch his face. He doesn't appear to be dreaming, but there's still something in his face that's not right. Perhaps my eyes adapt to the meager light in the room, because soon I can see him more clearly, and what I see are marks on his face. If I didn't know better, I'd say those are tear tracks . . . and I don't know better. Now I notice his entire posture. His arms are wrapped around himself as if he's the only person in the world to ever want to enfold him as such, and the picture of us that is on his bedstand is turned face down. I remember noticing it when putting him to bed after his mother's death. The only other picture, one I'd noticed that night depicting his sister, was missing from the table now. She was gone from his life for good, and he'd accepted that, putting her picture away.

And now, he'd turned my picture down. Did he think I was slipping away, too? It's not like I had given him any reason to think otherwise except for last night's brief respite, at which point I'd unceremoniously fallen asleep in the middle of a discussion which could have cleared the air between us. He needs reassurances of our partnership, of our friendship, and of that special something which I've never been able to define that makes us two halves of a whole.

Before I can stop myself, I'm peeling off my suit. I'm not worried that Mulder will see anything - he's soundly asleep, and he's seen what I have before anyway. One of his sweatshirts, almost reaching to my knees over my underwear, is an ideal substitute for pajamas. I stealthily crawl under the covers, snuggling in close to Mulder and wrapping my arms around his body. He moves unconsciously to make the perfect cocoon for me, securing me in the haven of his arms, and I sigh a breath of contentment as I smell his closeness.

Somehow, I'm unable to resist pressing my lips to his forehead. "Good night, Mulder," I whisper.

"Thanks, Scully," he murmurs in my ear, startling me to pull back to look into his face. His eyes are not open, but I can sense consciousness there. "Are you headed home?"

"I thought I'd stay awhile," I admit with a smile. "This feels like where I belong."

"Always," he says, drifting off again.

I know I'm not far behind him, but as I snuggle in closer, I whisper, "of course, I'll have to leave early to get home and change before we're due to meet with Skinner."

"Uh huh," he says, nodding slightly. "I'll see you in the morning."

And I know, somewhere deep inside, that we'll see each other for many more mornings. Perhaps at the office, perhaps here in his own bed. But I'm not going anywhere and intend to do some things to prove it to my intensely stubborn partner.

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