by Absinthe
Visit the
author’s homepage, Under The Pink, an archive full of “Xena,
Warrior Princess” fanfiction.
Summary:
Xena/X-Files crossover.
Rating: PG-15
WARNING: This may
be confusing.
Disclaimer: Scully and
Mulder belong to Fox and Chris Carter, etc etc etc; Xena and Gabby and Hower
and Argo belong to Renaissance and Universal. This story takes place in the
X-files universe, through the episodes Duane Barry, Ascension and One
Breath(though it later jumps ahead). I think those were the titles. If I'm wrong,
somebody tell me please? The Xenaverse is decidedly not in any particular order
presented here. Sorry about that.
Part One:
No, not now. Not again. Xena felt a familiar tugging at her ankles. She tried
to close her eyes but she had no control over her own body. She looked down
toward her feet. A child, no more than one or two years old gazed up through
glassy dead eyes at her. She didn't need to ask who had killed it, she knew.
She was just beginning to register the smell of smoke, the sounds of an army,
her army, chaotically tearing apart the homes and lives of- of a village of
anonymous people. People that had thoughts and feelings and needs. She heard a
woman screaming, she turned to see... she couldn't move, she couldn't do
anything to stop this. It was in the past. You can't change the past. She heard
her own voice rip from her throat, "Kill them ALL!" and she broke a
little inside.
"Xena," Gabrielle crooned, "Xena, shh." Gabrielle, roused
by the sound of her friend's distress had moved to comfort the warrioress who,
in her sleep, was laid vulnerable. The sleeping form in Gabrielle's arms
whimpered.
"Oh Xena." She sighed, a
tear running down her cheek. She wanted to wake her warrior, but knew better.
Xena was as likely as not to hurt her before she had fully wakened, her
well-honed reflexes causing her to reach for her sword unconsciously.
Xena sobbed once and jerked awake, pulling away from Gabrielle's grasp. Her
face was pale. Gabrielle squeezed her hand gently, then let Xena withdraw back
into her dark musings. It was useless to do anything else. Xena would do all
she could to keep from exposing her past to the bard, even though it seemed
inescapable. Gabrielle looked up from her hands to see that Xena had pulled her
knees up to her chest, unable to control her emotions; the nightmare spilled
over into reality.
Feeling Gabrielle's gaze, she choked out, "Go back to sleep,
Gabrielle."
"Xena, I won't sleep with you like this." The red head frowned
sternly. "What was it this time?" she asked again, as she did every
time Xena woke herself like this. Ice blue eyes met light green. "Please
Xena." She begged, not for the first time.
"Gabrielle..." Xena ran her fingers through her dark hair, her elbows
resting on her knees.
"Yes?"
The warrior forced herself to rise, to leave the campsite before she could say
more. She left the warmth of the dying fire; she ran but did not feel it. She
wanted to exhaust herself in order to fall into the dreamless sleep of the
weary. She wanted to make a small escape from her thoughts and from the
nightmares.
Gabrielle watched Xena's back as
she left. Sighing, the bard fought the urge to chase her down and force her to
let it out, but she knew better. Callisto had forced the Warrior Princess to
confess to her crimes in front of a crowd of people once, and despite its
privacy, Gabrielle's prying would be no less heinous than that. She did the
only thing she could do, she lay on her back, and started counting the stars.
Scully woke sweating and breathing
hard as if she'd been running. She looked around, momentarily disoriented.
Flinging aside the blankets, Scully wanted to look for her sword but instead
shook off the remaining wisps of the dreamscape. The bathroom light was on. She
must have forgotten to switch it off in her need to get to bed the previous
night. Mulder was driving her crazy. Even though they weren't allowed to work
together any longer, he was really getting in over his head.
Wearily, Scully flicked the light off, glanced at her clock and realized she'd
neglected to call Mulder about the implant that had been taken from Duane
Barry's neck. It was either very late or very early. Considering that Mulder
had never hesitated to wake her from much needed rest, she picked up the phone.
She reached his answering machine and was in the process of leaving a message
when she realized that she was not alone. The window behind her shattered.
Scully went for her gun, but an arm wrapped around her legs, sending her to her
knees.
"Mulder, I NEED YOUR
HELP!" she screamed into the phone before it was wrenched from her grasp.
"Xena? Xena? I need your
help. Is Mount Nestos north or south of the Sibar River?" Gabrielle gently
shook the warrior's bluish face.
"North of the Sibar River..." Xena gasped out, feeling numb and
exhausted. The bard sighed as the warrior's eyes slid shut again. The knife
wound in Gabrielle's leg was beginning to show signs of infection, but she
would go on. She gazed sadly down at the fallen warrior on the litter, wishing
that she could go back in time and stop the trap that had so severely wounded
her lover. She looked around for a few more moments, resting, before urging
Argo forward. Xena bounced about excruciatingly in her fur-lined bed, trying to
ignore the cold and the throbbing pain that seemed to engulf her entire body.
The litter hit a stone and the warrior mercifully passed out of consciousness.
The wailing of police sirens woke
Scully from her stupor. She tried to peer out of the tiny air hole that was
drilled in the trunk. She couldn't hear very clearly what was said once the car
halted. The officer and her kidnapper spoke for a few minutes before the voices
approached the trunk.
"I'll have to take a look in there, sir."
"I have nothin to hide." Duane cooly replied.
Scully pounded furiously on the roof of the trunk with her bound hands,
squealing through the rag that gagged her lips. The trunk popped open, and she
made eye contact with the police officer, and then it was over. The uniformed
man fell, blood gushing from a fist sized wound in his chest. Duane Barry
hefted the still warm shotgun in his hand and frowned at his captive. Scully
stuck her head out over the rim of the trunk, hoping that the tantalizingly
near patrol car had a camera in it, and that the camera was running, and aimed
in her general direction. She cast a piteous glance at the car before the trunk
lid closed over her head once again.
In the dark, Scully was left to contemplate her situation while the car
screeched down the road. At the absolute best, that patrol vehicle contained a
camera that had gotten both a look at Barry and herself as well as the license
number of the car. Scully clenched her jaw to keep from sobbing. All she could
do was try to sleep, to let the dreams come.
This time, Xena was wearing
something other than her leather warrior's garb. Dressed in a red and blue
bodice with transparent baggy pants, she stood or rather cavorted, in an
opulent dining hall. There were a dozen or so other women, all scantily clad,
all dancing. Before the warrioress rested a box with a bronze hand print inlaid
on its lid. Her eyes fixed on the box even as she moved away from the rest of
the dancers and set to work being more provocative. The man at the head of the
table watched her, occasionally calling to her and making lewd gestures. Xena
smiled under the diaphanous veil that covered much of her face and fawned at
him.
She approached the box carefully and was about to reach for it when she was
foiled by the sudden appearance of a richly dressed man, King Gregor. There was
some fuss, and in the end, the King left the room with the box. Pandora's Box.
Xena turned panicked eyes to the man still sitting at the head of the table. He
smiled at her, and with a gesture, commanded that she be taken up to his
quarters for "later."
The warrioress lounged on a richly
appointed feather-bed. Several hours later, she was joined by the man from the
head of the table. He was the king's advisor, Nemos. He slid onto the mattress
behind the Amazonian woman and inhaled deeply of her hair.
"Ohhh, you smell soo goood." He sighed.
"Have no fear, I wish no
pain, only pleasure." Nemos added, taking her stiffness for nervousness.
"I wish only to take your responsibilities from you, if only for a little
while." Xena smirked behind her veil.
"Where is the king?" she
added coyly.
"Just a few doors down."
"Am I really on the same floor as the king??" she tried to sound
awed.
"Enough about the king. You spoke of pleasure." He leaned forward to
nibble at Xena's neck. Her fist met his forehead instead, and he fell back onto
the bed.
"And you spoke of pain," she growled and ambled off to find the
King's chambers. Gregor was easily immobilized, but as Xena was about to beat a
hasty retreat with the Box Nemos stormed into the room.
"Ohhoh. Xena. I'm sure you
won't get away this time." His palace guards fanned out behind him.
"There are few things in life that I'm sure of." Xena fluttered her
lashes at him. "But I'll betcha this'll surprise ya." She dove
headlong out the window. Her hair brushed the dirt, and Xena twisted up to
untie the curtain pull she'd secured around her ankles to break her fall.
Scully jerked awake to find the
rope binding her ankles undone. The dreams were becoming more vivid each time.
She had to shake her head a few times to clear the mists of this one from her
mind. The car had halted again, but this time it wasn't for gas. No light
filtered in from a street lamp. Scully lay perfectly still, listening to Barry's
footsteps approach the rear of the car. Almost before she realized what was
happening she was outside being marched across a grassy field. Duane kept a
tight grip on her. A growing roar made it impossible for the captive FBI agent
to distinguish the words he was screaming. A bright light appeared over the
edge of the hill, blinding them both. Scully experienced a faint tingling
sensation just before she blacked out completely.
Scully fell into the grip of a
dream, but this time it was different, this time, she seemed to be looking
through someone else's eyes. She was balanced on a tree limb, moving with the
silent grace of a cat. Just below her, a red haired girl sat staring at the
ashes of a fire. Argo stood saddled and ready to go nearby. Xena/Scully grinned
ferally as she leaped quietly from her perch, landing a bare meter from
Gabrielle. The bard stumbled to her feet, reaching belatedly for her staff.
Xena/Scully scowled at her.
"You're lucky that was me." The warrior rose to her full height.
"Xena!" Gabrielle twirled her staff teasingly, a challenge in her
eyes. "I've been practicing." Xena laughed affectionately and flexed
her knees, inviting the bard to attack. The anger washed from her features.
Gabrielle stepped forward, preparing to attack. Xena suppressed the amusement
that threatened the rise to her face. Her bard was getting cocky. She
sidestepped a blow easily, then caught the end of the staff on its follow
through.
"Maybe a little too showy, huh?" the red head asked, suddenly finding
herself lying on her back in the dust.
"Oh just a little." Xena grinned. She leaned down to help the bard to
her feet. Gabrielle tried to use the leverage of her position to tug the
warrior down onto the ground with her, but Xena refused to join her friend and
instead straddled the smaller woman.
"Oh? Really?" she demanded. Xena pinned Gabrielle's arms over her
head with one hand, and with the other she proceeded to tickle Gabrielle's most
sensitive area, her exposed stomach. Gabrielle screamed and thrashed under the
larger woman, trying to wriggle free and escape this torture. When Xena finally
decided that the bard could take no more, she stood up, leaving Gabrielle to
pull herself to her feet.
Argo bumped the warrior impatiently. Xena still had a hint of a smirk on her
face.
"I owe you for that." Gabrielle did her best "menacing"
voice. Xena just smiled. They walked in uncharacteristic silence for a few
moments. Gabrielle was too busy plotting her revenge to chatter.
"Gabrielle? I can hear you
thinking, don't even bother." The warrioress glanced at Gabrielle through
the corner of her eye.
"So what am I thinking
then?" The bard jumped in front of her friend, holding her staff out to
block Xena's path.
"GabriELLe!" Xena simply knocked the staff aside and pulled Argo
onward.
Mrs. Scully straightened in her
seat by her daughter's bedside. She gripped Scully's hand more tightly and
yelled for a nurse.
"Nurse! She smiled!" The haggard woman looked hopefully at the RN
that rushed towards her. A glance at the comatose woman's face revealed nothing
out of the ordinary.
"Maybe you should get some rest, ma'am," the nurse patronizingly
suggested. Mrs. Scully frowned. She hadn't imagined it, her daughter had just
grinned.
The firelight penetrated poorly,
but where it touched was lit with bloody intensity. Xena/Scully crouched before
the flames, staring at imagined scenes deep within the writhing flames. She
almost unconsciously ran a whetstone down the blade of her finely crafted
sword. Gabrielle sat directly across the campsite from the warrior.
"Dinar for your thoughts?" Gab broke the silence.
"Not now, Gabrielle." Xena firmly replied, trying not to look at her
bard.
"Xena, it helps to ta-"
"I KNOW, I know, we've been down that road before. Go to bed." Xena
returned her attention to the flames. The subtle (and not so subtle) signals
the bard had been sending over the past few weeks weren't lost on the warrior.
Far from it. Despite her desire to reciprocate, she feared unleashing any more
of herself before the little bard than she already had. Xena knew the strength
of her passions and the power of her body to carry through on them. She dared
not approach Gabrielle as anything other than a friend; it simply wasn't safe
for the smaller woman. Xena's thoughts roamed back, over the many lovers she'd
had in the past. Willing and unwilling, not that they weren't all won over in
the end.
Gabrielle roused several hours later. "Xena?" she demanded. "Get
some sleep."
Xena shot her a look. The bard clambered
out of her bedroll and circled around the warrior. She stopped to rest her
small hands on Xena's shoulders. "Please?" She whispered. Xena rubbed
her eyes with her calloused hands.
"All right." She ignored the heat that rose to the spots on her skin
that the bard had touched and followed her obediently to bed.
She was sitting in a small boat. A
rope attached it to a little dock on the shore. A tall man with sleepy eyes
stood on the planking there, with an older woman. After an interminable period
of time, the tenuous connection between Scully and the shore snapped, allowing
her to drift ever farther out into the mist. She longed to call out but
something prevented her from making the slightest of movements.
The man and woman on the shore
were abruptly replaced by a cheerful looking woman wearing white. She called
out, beckoning to the boat and its precious cargo. Scully felt herself being
pulled back towards to the dock, to safety.
Xena smiled in her sleep just
before she jerked awake. She glanced around anxiously to be sure all was right.
Gabrielle snored softly nearby. The warrioress sighed, brushing off the strange
shakiness that her dream had left for the waking world.
Scully was happy to be going back
to work after her long incarceration at the hospital. She felt surprisingly
refreshed, as the memories of her abduction beyond the long ride in the trunk
of Duane Barry's car were mercifully dim. The dreams, however; they were as vivid
as they were every time she woke from them. It seemed to take longer and longer
to regain her footing in reality every morning. Scully was more than ready to
return to work, to get back down to business, as it were. She was being
reassigned to the X-Files. Skinner briefed her first thing on her first day
back.
After a hug that was slightly longer than necessary, she and Mulder settled
easily into their old partnership. Almost immediately, he tossed a manilla
folder in her direction and began to brief her on his current case. Scully
focused on him for the first few minutes, but seemed to lose him after that.
She was running in the dark, her booted feet not making a sound. Dodging around
trees and leaping growths of underbrush, she dashed in pursuit of something....
something just out of reach, and only slightly visible as an occasional
rustling of the leaves. "Gabrielle?" she called hopefully.
".....so I think we...." Mulder took the pencil from behind his ear.
"Scully."
A tall man with a sleepy voice and hazel eyes peered at her as though waiting
for her to say something. Xena stared right back.
"Who are you!" She demanded.
"What are you talking about, Scully?" His face filled with concern.
"Are you all right?" He placed a hand on her shoulder. Xena glanced
at the offending hand, and before the man could react, she had him pressed to
the wall by his throat, his feet dangling several inches off the floor.
"Who ARE YOU." she spat.
"I'm Mulder, Scully... lemme down.." He clawed at her fingers,
choking. Xena dropped him like a bag of rocks. She turned away from him and got
a glimpse of her own reflection in a pane of glass. She touched her face with
her fingertips. It wasn't her face. She saw a short redhead wearing strange,
flimsy clothing.
"Scully??? What is it?"
"Who is this..Scully?"
"She's you..."
Xena shook her head as everything flooded back.
"Mulder... I'm sorry, are you ok?" Scully knelt in front of her
partner, prying his fingers away from his throat to examine him closely.
"Scully? What happened?" Mulder coughed.
"It don't know."
"What do you mean you don't know? Scully... you tried to strangle me. Not
to mention you were able to lift me clean off my feet." He stood up,
towering over the diminutive red head.
"I'm sorry Mulder," she stammered.
"Sorry? What's going on with you Scully? Are you sure you're fully
recovered?"
"I don't KNOW Mulder," she snapped, then glanced up at her partner
apologetically. "I've been having these dreams...."
"Ya wanna tell me about it?" Mulder gingerly took a sip from a
conical paper cup.
"Well...."
"Scully. Come on...."
"I'm having these dreams in which I am.. I'm a warrior woman, always with
a little red haired woman named Gabrielle... I don't think they're... er...
adhering to a linear timeline. Things change..." Scully's face flushed
bright red.
"What things?" Mulder demanded from his seat on a corner of his
desktop.
"Well, Mulder, sometimes, the little redhead and I, we're lovers,
sometimes we aren't yet, sometimes.... sometimes things are just different. But
they're all so vivid, and I don't forget them like ordinary dreams. Just
now..." Scully said, watching her partner swallow, "I was dreaming
again."
"Could it be a result of your abduction?" Mulder asked over the rim
of his paper cup.
"I suppose it could, but-"
" Scully, I want you to see a hypnotist."
"WHAT? Mulder, you know how I feel about hypnotism."
"I don't know about you, but I have no desire to meet up with your ‘dream warrior'
again." He teased, rubbing his throat conspicuously. Dana Scully quirked
an eyebrow at her partner.
"I don't think that hypnotism is going to help anything. I won't let it
happen again."
Seeing the determination etched
into her face, Mulder refrained from arguing any further. He loosened his
unimaginative tie a bit to check his neck for bruises in the monitor of his
computer. He glared significantly at his partner before he continued to brief
her.
It wasn't until they were well on their way to the scene of the disappearance
of a prominent vulcanologist that Mulder noticed she wasn't wearing her little
gold cross.
"Did the chain break?" he asked.
"Did what chain break?" she irritably replied.
"On your cross. I've never seen you without it on before."
A strange, wild look passed briefly over the red head's face. The gods have
never done much for me, she thought, but said aloud, "It was a relic
from a dead faith, Mulder." Scully watched the scenery through the car
window.
"Why now?"
"What does it matter Mulder? Maybe I just decided I didn't like it with
this jacket!" I can't explain it. She pondered, but Xena
wouldn't have worn it. Scully turned her attention to her partner's
profile. And such a lovely profile it is too. She smiled unconsciously
at him. He caught the look, if only for a second, before she turned away.
"What was that for?" He asked playfully.
"Just thinking."
"About what?"
"Shut up and drive." Scully flashed her partner a look of anger that
said ‘You talk too much' more clearly than mere words ever could have.
Xena/Scully stood behind
Gabrielle, tying a gentle knot in a blindfold.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Xena asked.
"Yes. I trust you, Xena." Gabrielle assuaged her warrior's fears
before the taller woman voiced them.
"Suit yourself." Xena shrugged and waved her hand in front of the
bard's face to check the blindfold. "All set then, let's go." Xena
started forward at her normal pace, tugging Argo along behind. Gabrielle
listened to her lover walk away, then started tremulously forward. Her feet
managed to find almost every uneven spot in the dusty road, and she stumbled
along for a while before Xena returned to her side.
"How DID you manage this? This is really scary." Gabrielle grabbed
Xena's shoulder as though it were a lifeline. The warrior said nothing.
"It was my idea, I know," the bard sighed, "I know." They
continued to make slow, painstaking process, the bard chattering only when she
wasn't tripping.
Around midday, Gabrielle tripped over her own left foot and tumbled headlong to
the ground. Frustrated, she wrenched the cloth from her eyes and squinted into
the noontime sun. Xena peered down at the young woman sitting in the dirt with
her hazel eyes half closed and laughed aloud.
"Tired of this game already?" the warrior teased.
"Are you tired?" Mulder
looked worriedly at his partner. Scully had been staring out the window in
total silence for two hours. She cast confused eyes on her partner for a
moment.
"Tired?"
"Yes, are you tired? Do you need me to stop?"
"No... Mulder, I'm fine." Mulder continued to stare at her for a
moment, she glared back at her partner.
"Pull over," Scully abruptly demanded.
"What for?"
"Pull over... please." Mulder glanced in her direction, puzzled.
Gravel crunched under the sedan's tires as it came to a halt in the emergency
lane. Scully climbed out and circled around to the driver's side door. She
opened it and ordered Mulder out. He seemed irritated , but something in her
expression kept him from protesting. There was a fire in her eyes that he'd
seen only once before.
Scully jerked the seat forward to accommodate her shorter legs, and after
making all the other necessary adjustments, glanced in the rearview mirror and
floored the gas. Mulder's head was jerked painfully backwards. The tires
produced an agonized scream. The grey sedan squealed out into the stream of
heavy interstate traffic, leaving a trail of rubber behind it. Mulder bit his
tongue to keep from saying anything that might upset his suddenly touchy
partner. She turned on the radio and flicked through the stations, only
stopping when she found one that played vaguely Celtic new-age music. Mulder
shrugged helplessly.
Part 2:
After that moment of relative calm, Scully kept her hands firmly on the wheel,
and Mulder maintained a death-grip on the dashboard.
"Scully, I think you may have some un-aired hostility to deal with,"
he muttered through teeth clenched in a grimace. The red-head ignored him and
continued to weave through traffic with the pedal pressed to the floor. Finally
noticing her partner's distress Scully let up a bit on the gas , although she
continued to pass anything moving slower than 84 mph. To take his mind off the
world outside which moved oh so quickly past, Mulder began to yammer about a
book he'd read on volcanoes.
By the time they reached a hotel the Bureau expense account allowed them, Scully
was feeling more exhilarated than she had in years. Her partner, on the other
hand, was exhausted. After four hours as Scully's passenger, he was ecstatic to
see the world stop whizzing past and to hear no more angry car horns. He
wondered, as he stood in the shower, if Agent Dana Scully was suffering from
Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. Of course, after their ride down the interstate
today, maybe Mulder was the one with PTSS.
As the elation of Scully's power
trip wore off, she began to wonder why. She had never before felt inclined to
speeding. Now however, she was seriously contemplating trading in her four-door
sedan for a sportier model. Maybe a Trans Am. Never much liked the new ‘Vettes
she thought, or maybe I could find a Sting Ray in decent shape...this will
require further research. Scully tossed her suit jacket onto the sagging bed,
relieved to be free of it. Her skirt slithered to the floor, and she almost
sighed in relief to be able to move her legs freely again. Scully kicked her
pumps across the room, leaving two distinct imprints in the plaster.
She stared at them in mild astonishment, then proceeded to strip off her
blouse. She bounced on the balls of her feet, enjoying the freedom of her state
of undress.
"Scully!" Mulder hollered through the door. Scully jumped, only
barely remembering to wrap up in her bathrobe before opening the door.
"What is it Mulder?" She was strangely pleased to see him.
"Are you alright? I heard some noises." His hair was still wet from a
shower.
"Yeah...fine," Scully met his hazel gaze for a moment.
"Really? Are you? " Mulder watched her face intently through the
three inch opening in the doorway. Scully glanced at the doorknob, pushed her
hair behind her ears and pulled the door open a few more inches signifying her
permission. A line from a Paula Cole song drifted through Mulder's head:
"But now my anger is my best friend, be careful I may bite your head
off." Scully sat cross legged on the edge of the bed and proceeded to pick
lint balls off the coverlet. Through the corner of her eye she saw Mulder
settle his lanky frame into the only chair in the room. The silence stretched
out for thirty seconds that lasted a week.
"I think you need more time to recover," Mulder started off limping.
" I told you-"
"You don't need to lose any more time, I understand. But today, in the
car. You're not yourself." Scully offered her partner a condescending
smile.
"Oh no, I'm more myself than ever." Scully looked at Mulder, long and
hard. "You don't really expect things to be exactly the same do you?"
Mulder's face took on that sad, heartbreaking look that could make even his
partner feel for him. "I'm sorry. Things have changed. A lot. I spent 2
days in the trunk of a car, and there are three months of my life that I can't
remember. I feel more alive now....than...than..." Her voice trailed off
weakly. When their eyes met again, Mulder's contained a look of understanding.
"Would you mind if I drove from now on?"
Xena walked in her usual silence,
Argo plodding behind her. Gabrielle pushed ineffectually at the heavy
underbrush with her staff.
"Xena? Are you sure you know where you're going?" the bard was
favored with a look of pure irritation for that remark. Xena pushed a branch
down and ushered Gabrielle past her. The skeptic bard stepped into a small
mossy clearing. She spotted a tiny pool in the approximate center of the clear
patch. The puddle (well, that's what it was) was kept fresh and cool by a
minuscule spring, accumulating a few bare inches before it was absorbed by the
surrounding soil.
Xena stood at its edge, peering down at her reflection. Gabrielle stepped up
beside the warrior carrying their flagging water skin. Their reflections gazed
into each other's eyes, Xena's placed a possessive arm around the bard. Sleepy
hazel eyes met electric blue, the spell was broken. The pair grinned stupidly
at each other and went about the business of replenishing their water supply.
Gabrielle stood up, brushed the mud off her knees, and was abruptly grabbed from
behind. Xena wrapped her arms around the bards bare waist. Gabrielle twisted in
her grasp and their lips met for a quick kiss that soon escalated to-
*Bleep* *Bleep*
Scully blearily slapped the alarm
off. She sat up as slowly as she could, wiped the sleep from her hazy vision,
then trudged into the bathroom to prepare for a *lovely* trans-continental
flight. It was 5 am, Mulder, no doubt, was still asleep, or had not gone to
sleep at all. A pounding from the other side of the room's left wall let her
know that her partner was very much awake.
"Tell me again how this is saving someone money?" Mulder demanded on
the way into the flight terminal. Scully didn't bother to reply. How driving 6
hours to avoid using the DC international airport to catch a six am flight to
Washington state was beyond her. They suffered the usual hassle that carrying
firearms onto an airplane involved with a minimum of arguing.
When at last they were allowed to go to their seats, Mulder , for once, did the
gentlemanly thing and gave Scully the window seat. She knew she should study
the case file that had been so painstakingly assembled, but couldn't
concentrate on anything but the view. Eventually though, even that palled and
Scully managed to read through most of the information.
"I want anyone who can walk
out on the wall. No food and water for those who can't fight." Xena made
eye contact with all the walking wounded in the infirmary.
"Xena, I need these people!" Gabrielle protested "These men will
DIE without food and water!"
"It won't matter if we can't defend the compound." Xena grasped the
bard's shoulder in a parody of a comforting gesture. The warrior stalked out,
leaving her bard to decide who lived, and who died.
The head of the cornered Athenian Army was more than happy to hand control over
to the infamous Warrior Princess. She spent a few hours planning and making
sure the men knew that SHE was very firmly in power. She prepared a simple
ruse, a light attack out the front gate of their stronghold to draw their
strange enemy, the Horde, into the heart of their defenses. Once inside, not
one of the foreigners with their strange tongue and even stranger weaponry
survived. Xena made sure of that. She slit a man's throat with his own weapon.
Caught up in the fire of the battle, she killed an escaping man with that same
blade. Despite the great personal satisfaction she felt, she knew that the toll
they'd managed to take was merely a drop in the bucket of the Horde forces.
Through the crowd of cheering Athenian soldiers, Xena caught a glimpse of
Gabrielle's horror-struck face. Not even seeing that look on the face of her
beloved could turn the warrior from her chosen course of action. She would get
them out of this alive, if it cost her her chance at salvation. Xena could
harness the lust and fury of the old days, and maybe get Gabrielle out; whole
and well, that the bard remained so was her top priority. Her own soul came
second.
"Please fasten your safety
belts and turn off all lap-tops, we are about to land." A tinny voice
echoed through Scully's head. She jumped, nearly spilling the papers that
rested on the tray in front of her. Mulder was already belted in and was
folding up his "Convenience Tray," obediently. They got off in
Washington State to yet another not so unexplained X-File. A missing
Vulcanologist, a silicon based life form that parasitized the human body, all
in all, nothing out of the ordinary. Scully gained another impressive addition
made to her medical resume, and Mulder found two more names to add to his list
of people who thought he was crazy. After a suitable quarantine period, the two
agents were flown back to the east coast. The flight back though, took them
directly to D.C. Scully doubted that she'd ever understand bureaucratic logic.
Safe back in her own home, Scully searched the web for information about sports
cars, cars in general, and the internal combustion engine. She came to the
conclusion that what she wanted was a Corvette Sting Ray in wine red. Of
course, black would do just as well. Scully yawned hugely and glanced at the
clock. It was already near midnight, and she had to work in the morning.
The full sized bed somehow seemed too big, too empty to be slept in. When she
tried Scully found she couldn't get comfortable. The mattress was too soft.
Grumbling under her breath at 1:30 a.m. Scully gathered up the coverlet and
camped out on the hard-wood floor where she slept soundly the rest of the
night.
Steel sang through the morning
air. Its wielder stood at the center of a forest clearing, her every movement
poetry. The light glinted off of the finely crafted sword with its brass hilt
as she wove intricate patterns with its tip. She spun it through the air,
twisting the blade perilously close to her sides, her back , her left arm. Her
mouth twisted into a animalian snarl and she completed the dance with a
ferocious thrust to eh left that might have opened an opponent's rib cage. The
grimace was replaced by a dazzling smile matched only in its incongruity by her
blue eyes of liquid fire.
The warrior tossed her black hair roughly and sheathed the weapon. The sudden
applause from behind her served more to delight than startle.
"You're up early." Xena stated without turning around.
"Couldn't sleep once you left. I was cold," Gabrielle smiled as the
warrior turned to face her, one dark eyebrow arched. It was hot enough to make
even the warrior princess uncomfortable.
"Drill. I'll watch you." indicating the bard's quarter-staff, Xena
leaned patiently against a tree trunk. Gabrielle took up her staff and went
smoothly through the movements that Ephiny and Xena had so patiently taught
her. Wiping the sweat from her face, Gabrielle looked to her lover for some
sign of approval. Xena nodded appreciatively then turned to tend to Argo.
Scully banged her head on the bed
frame when her alarm woke her. Rubbing her forehead irritably, she quickly
oriented herself. She gathered the blankets up from the floor and folded them
carefully on the bed. Mulder was supposed to meet her at the shooting range for
target practice this morning. She stood at the foot of her bed and examined the
bedroom. It was empty. Not of furnishings no, but it was lifeless, only
disturbed by Scully herself. A small sigh escaped her lips before she snapped
herself back together. It was your decision. The Work first, you gave it up,
You and no one else. Shaking her head silently, Scully slipped out and into the
sedan.
The target range was surprisingly empty. Mulder was already standing in his
usual alcove, his glock gripped in both hands like they taught at the Academy.
Scully stood watching him, her eyes critically reviewing his use of the gun,
and its effectiveness. His face mirrored the slight disappointment in hers when
he failed to exactly center his shots. A look of pure malicious joy crossed the
red head's face. Mulder noticed her presence at last as she stepped into the
alcove next to his.
Scully pulled her gun from its holster. She ran a finger lovingly down its
stock in a proprietary, almost sexual manner that was, fortunately, not seen by
her partner. She fired five times, one shot directly to the center of the head,
one to the heart, one to each shoulder and for good measure, a second to the
head of her paper target. Though Mulder was impressed, a trainload of aliens
bearing smallpox vaccinations couldn't have dragged such an admission from him.
Part 3:
Right here, a long time passes.
Part 4:
By the time her tumor was diagnosed, Scully had already begun to suspect that
something serious was wrong with her. At first, just before her abduction, the
dreams had a minimal effect on her life. Sure, she improved vastly in
hand-to-hand, and she found herself the owner of a Corvette Sting Ray, but who
was to say that was really a result of the dreaming? The instances of the Xena
personality creeping into her waking thoughts and behavior were rare, if
violent. But now.... One morning Scully woke up and proceeded to roll her
blankets into a bed roll and pack up to leave. Luckily, a precipitate phone
call brought her back to reality.
The tumor was her explanation of choice. Mulder was doing his best to be
solicitous and understanding, but he wasn't exactly at his mental best either.
Come to think of it, Scully had no idea WHAT Mulder would be like if he ever
WAS at his mental best. She slapped herself a bit and unrolled her bedding.
Realizing that she was running somewhat late, Scully ran into the bathroom to
brush her teeth and thought she caught a glimpse of raven hair in the mirror.
She pretended she hadn't seen it and made a mad dash to work.
Mulder seemed a tad dazed that day, but really no more so than usually. They
moved through the motions of their appointed tasks in the robotic fashion that
had prevailed ever since the Eddie Van Blundht incident. She didn't like it,
but what could she do? What could be said to rectify such a bizarre situation?
It looked like the relationship between Scully and Mulder had some...er....
knots to work out before they'd be on joking terms again.
Xena watched in horror as her bard
came at her with a sword. Perdicus's sword. She would never forget that moment.
Teach me how to kill her.... come on Xena, teach me HOW to KILL her. The feel
of Perdicus's blade biting half heartedly into her stomach, the crazed
expression on that usually serene face. The choice had been easy...no matter
how important Gabrielle's blood innocence was to the bard, the red head's life was
more important to the warrior. Xena had taught Gabrielle a little. Not enough
to go up against Callisto surely, but it didn't matter. Xena had resolved at
that moment to ensure that the bard never had the chance to pit herself against
Callisto, even if it meant killing the bitch herself.
It was four am, and the phone was
ringing. Even in her sleep grogged state, Scully realized that it had to be
Mulder on the line.
"Mulder? What's wrong?" She mumbled. And of course, something WAS
wrong. Incredibly so. Only Mulder would wake up in a strange hotel room covered
in someone else's blood with no memory of what he was doing there. Scully made
a mental note to check his water supply again before she took her big red
‘vette on a pell mell drive to a holiday inn. She found Mulder sitting in the
shower with the hot water turned all the way up, shivering.
GRREEEEAAAAT.
Things only went downhill from there. The man was so pigheaded. He thought he
could drive when he might have been suffering from an aneurysm. Mulder also
thought he was remembering things. Things from his somewhat cloudy childhood
that might shed some light on the shadowy men that both of them were working so
hard to expose. He wanted to go to the town his parents used to spend their
summers in. They went to a house he claimed to have been in previously. In
spite of its overgrown state, inside the agents found two corpses, and inside
those corpses they found slugs from Mulder's gun.
So Mulder spent the night in jail keeping his fellow inmates awake most of the
night yelling for Scully. Scully, on the other hand, spent the night working to
get her partner out of jail. She found enough traces of a hallucinogenic drug
in Mulder's blood samples from the previous morning to have him released. He left
her at the police station, but she followed him back to the overgrown
summerhouse.
In the gloomy interior, Mulder was besieged by his memories. Memories so
terrible as to have been buried since childhood. Scully tried to talk to him.
"Scully, go AWAY!"
Mulder groaned, drawing his glock. She tried again.
"GO AWAY!" Mulder bellowed, leveling the pistol.
"Are you going to kill me too?" She watched her pain crazed partner
wrestling with his subconscious. Teach me how to kill her Xena, teach me how
to kill her.... kill her..... Scully's eyes widened.
"Its you." She whispered, as her eternal partner pulled the trigger.
THE END. Sort of.