Rating: PG
Classification: V/A
Keywords: M/S friendship, Mulder angst
Summary: An argument followed by a car wreck. An apology followed by a promise.
Spoilers/Timeline: One Breath, pre Memento Mori

Archive: Okay for Gossamer, others ask first, thanks! Come on, at least let me know where it's at so I can visit. :-)

Author's Notes: For all I know, this plot has been written before, and a good chance it was better, too. I don't know. All I know, is that this plot got stuck in my head. To the point that while sitting in my anthropology class I was making notes for this story rather than over the evolution of man. :-) I hope that you like it all the same.

Disclaimer: Straight simple and to the point: Mulder, Scully, Mrs. Scully and Skinner are property of FOX Television, 1013 Productions, Chris Carter, and probably a bunch of other people. If I owned them, I wouldn't need student loans. :-)

Scully rubbed her eyes in frustration, when she opened them again it was to see Mulder staring at her from across the small office. She felt a rumble of anger flare up inside when she saw him open his mouth to speak. Before he had the chance, she said, "Mulder, just stop it! Just don't say a word."

She felt a pang of remorse when she saw the hurt look cross fleetingly across his eyes. However, that remorse died when she saw his eyes harden behind the lenses of his glasses. "Mulder, we've gone through this twice already today. Will you please let it drop?"

Pushing his glasses up on his nose, Mulder considered her question. "Let it drop? This could be an important piece of evidence, Scully. And you just want me to let it drop?"

Scully sighed, standing up, she began to gather work to take home. "Mulder, it's not evidence, it's a crank. It's not like it would be the first time someone wanted to yank your chain." She had tried to be open to his arguments the first time she had heard them, but when he refused even to look at it from another angle they had found themselves at odds.

Having finished packing her attache case, Scully walked toward the door. "Where are you going?" She noticed the harsh edge to his question, but didn't turn around.

Letting out a breath slowly, she paused, standing with her hand on the doorknob. "Away from you, away from your stubborn refusal to see something other than what you don't want to see." Scully opened the door and stepped into the hallway. With a glance at Mulder she added, "I just need some space, Mulder."

"Fine, Scully, I don't need you babysitting me anyway," Mulder muttered, mostly to himself. However, the petite agent walking down the hall heard his mumbled retort.

From where he sat behind his desk, Mulder listened to the echo of Scully's heels on the linoleum floor. Once he was sure she was gone, he pulled off his glasses and leaned his forehead down onto his desk. In so doing, he bumped a bag of sunflower seeds that had been precariously balanced on a stack of files onto the floor.

Leaning forward in his chair to pick up the scattered seeds, he cursed when he hit his head on the underside of the desk. "Damn!" Giving up cleaning up the mess, he pulled himself upright in his chair. "Why does she always have to be right, anyway?" Mulder's question was aimed at no one in particular, and he found himself forced to answer it himself. "Probably because she usually is."

He had lost track of how long he sat there, motionless, berating himself for letting everything get out of hand. Finally he shook himself out of his stupor and decided to call Scully. Picking up the telephone, he punched in Scully's home number and listened to the ringing on the other end of the line. Hearing her voice on the machine, he hung up the phone without leaving a message.

"Come on, Scully," he whispered under his breath as he dialed the number for her cell phone.

After two rings he was rewarded with a familiar voice. "Scully."

Taking a deep breath, he replied. "Hey, Scully. It's me . . ."

"Mulder. Listen, I'm in the middle of a bunch of traffic. Can't this wait?" The drive had soothed her anger somewhat, but it had yet to abate completely.

Mulder sighed, beginning to regret his decision to call her so soon. "Actually, I just wanted to say that I'm . . ." He was interrupted when he heard the squeal of tires on wet pavement followed by the sound of crunching metal. "Scully?" An eerie silence came from the phone, and the only sound Mulder could hear was the pounding of his heart. "Scully?!?" His cries were becoming more frantic when she continued not to respond.

He flinched when he heard Scully groan softly. "Scully? Scully talk to me!" He paused, and when she didn't respond he began to yell into the phone. "Scully? Please, answer me! Scully!" Mulder was torn between rushing to her side, and being forced to break the slim connection he still had to her.

He was startled when suddenly the line went dead. Without thinking, he punched redial and hoped that someone would pick up the little phone. Listening to it ring, he began pacing around his desk, nervous energy radiating off him in waves.

"Hello?"

Mulder blinked at the unfamiliar voice. "Yes. I was trying to reach Dana Scully. I think she was in a car wreck." In the background he could hear the chaotic noises of an emergency scene. When the voice on the other end of the line didn't answer right away, he pressed on. "Could you at least tell me what hospital she's being taken to?" "I shouldn't have even answered the phone, we're in something of a hurry. The driver of this car is being taken to Georgetown Medical, mister . . ." The rest of her statement was cut off as Mulder slammed the phone back into the cradle and ran out of the office.

***

Georgetown Medical Center

Mulder ran through the automatic doors into the emergency room waiting area and headed toward the nurse's desk. "I'm here about Dana Scully. She would have been brought in from a car wreck . . ."

The nurse sitting nearest to Mulder looked up at him over her bifocals. Glancing at one of the folders in front of her, she responded. "She's in surgery. Are you a family member?"

"No . . ."

The nurse looked back down. "Then I'm sorry, you'll have to wait until she's moved to a room."

"As I said, I'm not family. I'm her partner with the FBI. No other family member is here, and won't be for some while. I'd appreciate being contacted as soon as she's out of surgery." With that, Mulder turned his back on the nurse and walked over to one of the plastic chairs that filled the room.

For the next fifteen minutes, he divided his time between looking up at where the doctor should come from and the pay phone that hung on the wall. He knew he needed to call Scully's mom. He just couldn't bring himself to call her. When Scully had been abducted, Mrs. Scully had been both his comfort when he was upset and, at the same time, a reminder that he had failed. It still tore at his heart to remember being forced to watch the strong woman in so much pain. A pain for which he still felt responsible.

Rubbing his hands over his eyes, he wearily stood up and walked over to the phone. After punching in both his calling card number and the familiar phone number of Maggie Scully, he listened to the distant ringing. He was shaken out of his daze when Mrs. Scully answered the phone.

"Hello?"

Mulder hesitated for an instant, closing his eyes he leaned against the wall and steeled himself. "Hi, Mrs. Scully."

"Fox! How nice to hear from you." Her voice was warm, until she paused for a moment. "Fox? Wait, is something wrong?"

Concern tinged her words, and filled Mulder with even more guilty feelings. Pushing his own problems aside for the moment, he tried to concentrate on the woman on the other end of the line. His responsibility was to her right then. "It's Scully. She was in a car wreck."

"Is she," Mrs. Scully's voice shook slightly, but then regained her composure. "Is she okay?"

"She's in surgery. I haven't talked to the doctor yet, but I knew you would want to know."

"Thank you, Fox. Are you okay?" Mulder smiled, she was concerned about him. "Which hospital are you at? Where can I find Dana?"

Mulder's smile vanished, and he concentrated on finishing the conversation. "She's at Georgetown Medical. Do you want me to find someone to come and get you? I'm sure AD Skinner would agree to that."

Mrs. Scully sighed softly. "No thank you, Fox. I'll be there as soon as I can. You just stay with Dana, for me, okay?"

"I will." With that, he disconnected the call, and quickly punched in Skinner's phone number. After a short discussion with the AD filling him in on the situation, Mulder returned to his seat.

Shortly afterward, he saw a young doctor walking toward him. Standing up, he moved to meet the doctor halfway. "You're Ms. Scully's partner?" Mulder nodded his head, waiting on the doctor to continue. "She's out of surgery. She appears to be stable, but that is the kind of thing only time will tell."

"What were her injuries?" Mulder's voice was a hoarse whisper, and his gaze remained fixed on the man standing in front of him.

The doctor nodded toward a pair of chairs next to where they were standing and proceeded to sit down. After Mulder sat as well, he replied. "The injuries she sustained were typical of the type of accident in which she was involved. Mild concussion, cuts and abrasions, those are fairly routine. The problem that required surgery was a result of her air bag not firing. When she hit the steering wheel, two ribs were cracked and an additional one was broken. The broken rib punctured her right lung, that was what we operated to correct."

Mulder nodded, his face having paled while listening to the doctor. "When can I see her?"

"She should be moved to low level ICU after she is finished in recovery. This is only until she is off the ventilator and awake. You can see her then. If you'll excuse me, I'll leave word with the nurses to alert you when you can see her." With that, the doctor stood up and walked out of the waiting room.

Sometime later, Mulder was finally allowed to see Scully. He followed the nurse through the winding corridors until they arrived at Scully's room. His gaze fell onto the small form of his partner lying in the hospital bed and without a thought he was back in the time just after she had been returned. Pulling up a hard back chair next to her bed, he sat beside her and carefully took her hand in his own.

He did his best to block out the familiar sounds of the heart monitor, ventilator and other equipment that filled the room. Instead, he concentrated on Scully's face. Memories he would never escape occupied his thoughts. Nothing hurt him more than seeing Scully in pain or in danger. Especially when he believed it was his fault. Which he usually did.

Mulder found himself discovering something he had never realized before. During their partnership, it was he who found himself unconscious or going through emergency surgery. He had never stopped to consider that he had the easy part, simply lying there medicated out the gills. He never gave any credence to the fact that Scully was the one really suffering, being forced to sit and wait.

Silently, he promised never to overlook that sacrifice again.

His thoughts were interrupted when he heard the door open behind him. He knew without turning to look who had walked into the room. "Hi, Mrs. Scully," his voice was almost a sigh.

Mrs. Scully's eyes fell onto her daughter, and she kept reminding herself that the doctor had said Dana would be fine. Moving to stand next to Mulder, she brushed Scully's hair away from her face and replied to Mulder's comment. "How's our girl doing, Fox?"

She turned her gaze on Mulder when he failed to reply. Unbidden, tears had begun to fill his eyes and he bit his lip to keep them from falling. The last thing Mulder wanted to do was place more trouble at Mrs. Scully's feet. Seeing her attention focused on him, he managed to reply. "She's doing better. When she wakes up, they'll take out the vent."

Mrs. Scully nodded. "Thanks for being here with her, Fox."

Mulder lowered his gaze, unwilling to meet her dark caring eyes. "It's my fault she's here in the first place," his voice was so low, she was forced to strain to make out the words.

"Fox, were you the one driving the car that hit her?"

"No, but I was the reason she was driving in the first place."

Mrs. Scully ran her hand through Mulder's hair. "She wouldn't blame you, Fox. Please don't blame yourself." Mulder merely nodded, saying nothing. "Would you like some coffee?"

Mulder looked up startled. "No. You should be here. I'll go get you something if you want it." Mulder's words came out in a rush, one on top of the other.

Mrs. Scully smiled and gently rubbed her hand along Dana's cheek. "It's no trouble. She's going to be fine, I can tell. Besides, if anyone needs to be here when she wakes up, it's you. Now, how do you take your coffee?"

She had only been gone five minutes when Mulder heard the familiar sounds of someone waking up in the hospital. Before Scully could manage to focus on Mulder's face, he was out of the room summoning the doctor. After a quick exam, the ventilator was removed and Mulder and Scully were again alone. The relief that had filled his hazel eyes had been replaced with caution.

Mulder sat in the uncomfortable chair and softly took her hand in his own. Lowering his gaze to where she couldn't see his face, he felt a single tear escaped each eye. "Scully, I . . ." He paused, unsure what to say. "I'm glad you're going to be okay," he finished awkwardly.

Drinking some of the water the doctor had given her to soothe her throat, she replied. "Mulder . . ." She tried, but was still unable to see most of his face. When he finally raised his head, she was surprised to see the tears shimmering in his eyes. "Mulder?"

He blinked, trying to get rid of the offending moisture. "You know what, Scully?" His voice had changed into something of a flippant tone. When she only continued to look at him confused, he continued. "You never told me that I had it easy when I was lying in all of those hospital beds."

Scully could see that he was struggling to maintain his composure, it was a reaction she was quite familiar with. "How do you mean, Mulder?"

Continuing to rub the back of her hand with his thumb gently, he continued in a shaky voice. "It's just so much harder waiting. I'm sorry for always making you wait on me after I do something stupid. Scully, I'm sorry about a lot of things."

"Mulder . . ."

Clearing his throat, he interrupted her. "You know what, I should go get your Mom."

"She's here?" Scully blinked, surprised by his comment.

Mulder nodded in response. "Yeah, I called her. I never want to have to do that again, Scully. I never want to have to be the one to tell her that her daughter is in danger. I don't know if I could do it again, Scully."

Scully squeezed his hand in response. "I'm sorry, Mulder."

"No," he interrupted. "I'm sorry I picked that fight with you. I was stubborn." He started to stand and tried to let go of Scully's hand, however she refused to let go.

"Look at me, Mulder," she said when he began to avoid her eyes. When his gaze finally returned to her own, she continued. "We were both stubborn. It's no different from a hundred times before. If we didn't argue about every point, we wouldn't work as well together. If two people were ever two opposite sides of a coin, Mulder, it's us. But in the end we're better for it." By the end, she was slightly short for breath, and again sought the water that would ease the scratching in her throat caused by the ventilator tube.

Returning to his chair, Mulder concentrated on their intertwined fingers. "But you wouldn't be here if I hadn't . . ."

"Mulder," she interrupted him again. "It's not your fault someone hit me. And being sorry would be one thing, but your personal mantra of guilt is something else entirely."

He looked at her clear blue eyes, and again found himself struck by the fleeting fear of losing her, like he had before. "I know but . . . When I thought I might lose you, just because of some stupid fight."

"It's okay, Mulder." She waited until he looked her in the eye before she continued. "I'm okay, Mulder."

"I was wrong, about what I said before." Scully looked at him, momentarily confused. "Scully, I need you with me. Hell, I probably do need a babysitter, but that's not your job."

"You're my best friend. And you don't need me any more than I need you. Besides, I'll be with you, always, I promise. Just try to get rid of me." Scully laughed softly, and relaxed at seeing Mulder's faint smile in response.

Outside in the hallway, Maggie Scully stood just out of sight listening to the conversation. She smiled at the positive turn, happy that the two partners were together. Always.

fin

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