Dreamcatcher 7
Ally

Dreamcatcher 7

Eeazy Sleep Motel. Cleveland Ohio. May 4th 1999 1:32a.m.

They spent the journey back from the hospital in silence and Mulder suspected that their lack of communication had less to do with tiredness and everything to do with the perplexing nature of the case.

Certainly he had spent the drive formulating and dismissing several different theories as to what had happened earlier that evening.

And truthfully, he had no clue. It was rare for him to be completely stumped by a case. He hadn't been christened with the nickname *Spooky* for nothing. Usually he could rely on intuition to guide him through the tangled web that so often made up an X-File. Tonight though, this same intuition had all but deserted him.

A slight movement beside him, caught in the corner of his eye, prompted him to twist his head toward his partner.

{Shit, she looks tired.}

It had been a long day for them both, sure, but aside from when she had been sick, he couldn't remember seeing her look so used up before. Her face was pale, lit by the ghostly glow emanating from the illuminated dashboard, and the carefully applied make-up of the morning had all but disappeared. It leant her a vulnerable, almost childlike air. It also allowed him to see the dark shadows underneath her eyes. Shadows that contrasted sharply against the creamy, white skin.

It worried him more than he would ever admit. This case, horrific as it already was, would be doubly hard for her to deal with in light of the lingering wounds she carried close to her heart. She never told him as such, but it wasn't hard for him to appreciate that she was still grieving for Emily.

They never talked about it. He wasn't sure that she talked with anyone. It wasn't Scully's way to admit need. Not about anything. And certainly not to him.

He had caught her unawares once in the office they shared. He had left for the day, needing to gather some information pertaining to a case they were working on. Mind elsewhere, he had reached his car only to discover that he had left his keys atop the desk where he had casually tossed them earlier in the day.

He had made his way back to the office, only to freeze in the half open doorway when he saw her. Her back was to him, shoulders shaking slightly as she sobbed silently. She was holding a photograph in her hand, tracing her finger over its surface.

Mulder hadn't been able to make out the picture upon it. He hadn't needed to.

*Emily.*

Scully's daughter. Known for such a short time before she was taken from her, but long enough for Scully to love her. Long enough for her to mourn her passing.

Ignoring the need that ached within him to enter the office and take her in his arms, knowing that it wasn't what she wanted, he had pivoted and walked away, out of the building and straight to the nearest bar. He hadn't moved until the bartender had begun to pointedly sweep the floor around his feet, signaling that it was time for Mulder to get the hell out so he could close up for the night.

And now, looking across at her, he prayed that she wasn't reliving past horrors.

"You OK, Scully?

He watched as she rubbed a hand across her face, attempting to bring herself back to alertness.

"I'm fine. I'm just hoping you have some insight into all this, Mulder, because I sure as hell don't."

He didn't answer her. He didn't know what to say.

"Mulder?" she persisted.

He shrugged. "The truth, Scully? I don't have a clue. Three missing girls. One who turns up looking like she's been thrown into a Cuisinart? A school that looks like it fell off the pages of Country Life magazine full of kids who make Stephen Hawking look ignorant? You tell me. Maybe I'm losing my touch."

Scully absorbed his words, struck suddenly by the defeat she heard in them. It wasn't like him. She was accustomed to hearing any number of outlandish theories spill from his lips. And although she saw it as her purpose in life to balance out those same theories with the voice of reason, she also knew that she relied on him to make sense out of the things they encountered.

More than he would ever know.

"What about this? You were going to explain it to me."

Mulder flicked his eyes away from the road and, for a second, settled them on the intricately woven framework of thread, beads and feathers. "It's called a dreamcatcher. There are several Native American legends as to its purpose. I thought maybe it meant something. Now I'm not so sure."

Scully waited for him to continue, but after long seconds had passed uncomfortably between them, she delved a little deeper. "Care to share with me what that might be?"

Mulder sighed, the sound reaching her across the vast distance that seemed to separate them. She'd seen this before, seen her partner withdraw into himself when in the grip of a difficult case. The fact that she understood it, though, didn't necessarily mean she accepted it.

"It's a kind of good luck charm. Meant to protect its owner against bad dreams. Kind of a preventative measure...it's an age-old story. Passed through one generation to another..."

He trailed off as the lights of the motel came into view, and Scully waited until he'd piloted the car to a halt in front of the office before speaking again.

"I'd like to hear it."

Mulder froze, his hand halfway to the door release. "Hear what?"

"The legend."

"Of the Dreamcatcher?"

He sounded so incredulous that Scully almost laughed out loud. "That surprises you? C'mon Mulder, you've spent the last six years filling my head with alien abduction stories, prehistoric lake monsters, all manner of mutants and freaks of nature, and you're *surprised* that I would want to hear a simple Native American folk tale?"

Mulder gazed at her, as though trying to figure out whether she was sincere or not. Her *asking* to hear one of his outlandish tales was such an un-Scully-like thing to do that for a few moments he was literally rocked backwards. Ever conscious, though, that she might just be humoring him, he offered her one last get-out clause.

"It's late. You sure you want to hear it? It could wait till morning."

Scully smiled back at him softly. "Call it a bedtime story then."

Mulder laughed in response as the moment lightened perceptibly for both of them. "Ahhhhh, Agent Scully, if you only knew how many times I've waited for you to say that..."

**********

Thirty minutes later Scully regarded her partner from behind the over-sized Styrofoam cup of steaming hot chocolate, which he had magically produced from behind his back.

He had, he'd informed her, taken a quick side trip across the street to the all- night diner. He proclaimed, solemnly enough to make her laugh, that no bedtime story was complete without chocolate and marshmallows.

It had made Scully feel like she was six years old again, evoking as it did sweet childhood memories of her mother coming into the bedroom she had shared with Melissa and sitting with them in the warmth of the room, as they listened wide-eyed to the stories she had told from *her* own childhood.

It seemed like only yesterday. A thousand childhood memories that she herself had hoped one day to share with her own daughter. Memories now that would remain forever locked in her heart, to wither and die with her when the time came. There would be no one to share them with. Not now.

Mulder had commandeered the ratty sofa across from the bed where she half lay, half slouched against the headboard.

They had both showered and changed for bed. She in comfortable satin pajamas, Mulder in cutoff sweats and an old T- shirt. There had maybe been a time, way back in the beginnings of their partnership, where Scully might have felt self-conscious to be seen by the man before her dressed so casually. Not anymore though. Now, sharing time and space with him before he retreated to his own room for the night had become almost commonplace. A way to allow the tensions of the day to flow from them before succumbing to sleep.

The Dreamcatcher lay at the bottom of the bed. Scully had allowed herself to properly examine it while Mulder had jogged across to the diner to fetch hot chocolate. The intricate patterns had captured her imagination, and she had found herself tracing a finger along its edge, closing her eyes, drifting off.

She had to admit that something about it had piqued her curiosity, aroused a need within her to fully understand what it stood for.

So she waited for Mulder to begin, once again closing her eyes as his words swirled around the small room to settle against her very core. He spoke softly, like a father recounting a fairy tale to a small, sleepy child, and Scully allowed herself to float on their crest.

"Throughout history, nearly every person and culture has placed importance on the meanings of their dreams. Dreams are still a powerful force in many people's lives, particularly because of the meanings that can be found in them. I have a half dozen X-Files that speak of just such phenomena, Scully. How dreams can affect our lives, our relationships, our everyday actions. How by listening to and understanding what our dreams are telling us we can shape our very destiny."

He paused, and Scully was pretty sure he was sipping at his own hot chocolate, maybe getting his thoughts in order so as to tell the story in the way it was meant to be told.

"To the people of the Ojibway tribe, night visions, or *dreams*, were so important that children were not given a name until a person designated as the *namer* of that child had a dream of what name should be given. The *namer* would bestow a gift upon the child, a charm woven to look like a spider's web. Hung from a loop above the baby's cradle, this Dreamcatcher was believed to catch any bad dreams floating in the air, ensnaring them like a spider's web traps an insect. It was believed that only good dreams could pass through the hole in the center of the web, sliding down the feather at the bottom to fall into the baby's head. The bad dreams couldn't navigate the web, and would hang there, suspended until the first rays of morning sunlight burned them away."

Scully opened her eyes and regarded her partner through hooded lids. "Sounds like something you could use. Do you think they work? The Dreamcatchers, I mean?"

Mulder shrugged. "Maybe. If nothing else, you yourself know how powerful the act of suggestion can be. Call it superstition if you will. Good magic. Whatever. I think if the user *believes* it will protect their dreams, then it will. Much like the modern day version of a placebo. Believe in something strongly enough and it becomes a kind of truth."

He was silent then, dropping his eyes from hers, and something inside Scully cracked as she read his expression. Mulder had spent most of his life desperately wanting to believe. Steadfastly refusing to give up the belief, even in the face of ridicule, that he would one day be reunited with his sister. It was a hope he clung to as if for life itself. His own version of a Dreamcatcher and just as elusive.

"Mulder..."

He shook his head wearily and rose to his feet. "It's late. You're tired and we have an early start. I should let you sleep."

{Don't go.}

"What?" He stopped in his tracks as though struck. Had she just said what he thought she'd said? He hadn't heard her exactly, or at least not in any traditional sense. But her words had reached him as surly as if she had whispered them directly in his ear.

"Stay. Please."

She looked as confused as he did, as though she didn't know how to proceed. Sitting up in the oversize bed, she looked suddenly vulnerable, unsure of herself, of what was real. But her expression cleared again, the confusion replaced with a kind of peaceful clarity. The same expression he had seen fleetingly cross her face that night at the park, and without hesitation, he headed toward the bed, waiting as she scooted across to make space for him to join her.

His heart beat painfully as she reached out to him. Allowing him to snake an arm around her so that her body rested against him softly.

"Tell me the rest of the story, Mulder."

And so he began again, losing himself in long-ago tales of Indian women who could transform themselves magically into spiders, spinning webs to protect their fellow clansmen. Of children protected for all eternity beneath the webs, sleeping peacefully beneath their silken strands as women bestowed upon them gifts of peace and tranquility to carry them into dreams.

And long before he was finished, he felt Scully relax even further against him as she, too, was transported into gentle slumber.

Her breathing was deep, peaceful as she rested against him, and for a few minutes he luxuriated in the feel of her. He watched over her as she slept, trying to make the agonizing decision whether to stay or go.

Finally, he carefully planted a kiss on her brow, feeling the heat of her skin against his own lips, before reluctantly disentangling her from him and laying her gently against the pillows.

His movements were such that she didn't stir, not even when he reached down and smoothed a few strands of the rich, titian hair from where it rested against her porcelain skin.

{Sweet dreams, Scully.}

Next