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Title: Dawn
Rating: PG A little present for aliali, but who the hell am I kidding? I loved writing this. Thanks for giving me the excuse to do it. . Middle of the night. A little later--occaisional car moving by in still streets, but the movement of beeches in full leaf louder, perhaps distant noise of interstate coming through the hum of the aquarium. Yes, a little earlier, a little closer towards the farthest edge of dawn, whine of alarm clock reads 4: 21, and the slam of front door. Weary thud of shoes hitting hardwood floor, clatter of keys onto Formica, refrigerator opening, whumpfing shut in disgust at empty shelves, then clunk of of briefcase being opened, lid smacking into the coffee table glass. Click of table-top light coming on, rustle of rummaging through drawer for pens, profane cursing when he finds only a dried out ball point, but quietly: He knows you're asleep, after all, and Fox Mulder is the gentleman's soul of courtesy when it comes to chivalry. At least until you disagree with him. Partners, year and a half, ninety seven cases, four effiency plaques, apartment, fourteen fish, two rings, he still calls you Fowley. Still freezes up if you call him Fox, although you only did it once, in the heat of an argument, and now you'll remember the way his entire body hung up over that one word and turned away from you, all jerky and "All hail the conquering hero." The light of the table lamp is blinding after three hours in the blue half-light of the bedroom, and it takes a blink or two to pick out his face. You move over to him, glance at the stacks of 8x10s paper-clipped stacks with blue marker circling half-visible curves of dismembered white flesh. His own mouth twists up, says nothing, so you now it couldn't have gone well, these last hours. You can give the . , probably children, and Mulder said no. Patterson, kept on saying no until Patterson "The NC state ones." He flips through the binder to show you a shot of an Interstate sign, then points to a blue marker "Roadside dumps, strangulation, some really interesting vivisection and genital mutilation, but the really interesting thing is that the victims come from all different parts of society. Prostitutes, Good Samaritans, business executives travelling alone." "Ah." You've read about them in the newspapers, big deal over how everybody was at risk nowadays. Sigh as you glance at a listing of confirmed fatalities. "Thought you said you weren't taking any more serials until the X-Files got re-opened." Idly, Mulder turns to a photo that shows one of the victims in the morgue, and you fight a small surge of nausea over just what a person looks like when you flip them inside out in real life, then attach the body parts in all the wrong places with catgut. He sighs, and you can feel his shoulder moving through the shirt underneath your hand, and then when he turns his head to face you, you see that he's got the beginnings of a fine black eye on the edge of erupting into full technicolor glory. He catches you staring and answers, with just a little bit of laughter in his voice. "We had a little altercation. He refused to open the X-Files after I accepted. I screamed at him, he screamed at me, I punched him, he--" He shrugs again, makes this tired little grin that makes him wince when the muscles pull across the blackening eye. And there's the crux of your whole quarrel with him. It's stupid, this mad-bull charging of his--was it ever going to get him somewhere? Even if he managed to get to the truth, to the heart of the mystery, would he be in the position to influence it? Would he be able to stop the abductions, stop the experimentation, or would he just keep on running into steel walls? Stupid, stupid waste--they had the money, they had the resources, they had the truth, and they could snatch out of your hands just as you got a hold on it. Honey caught more flies than vinegar, the old adage went, and for once, traditional wisdom was true. There was a time and a place to dig in and refuse to budge, but, you had to pick those times, those places, and Mulder. . . Mulder had made it into this personal crusade, a jihad for his lost sister, into an emotional ride and that could only end in misery. Misery and failure, the truth was possible, but only through hard logic and compromise But you don't say anything--not tonight, not now, not right now or not when he's still doing this last serial. You run your hands through his hair, wince when you scrape your knuckle against five-o-clock shadow, trace the edge of the ripening bruise, lay a little kiss on the forehead, right where the plates join together, and he would shift in small appreciation, except he's put his hands, and from the tense line of his shoulders, you realize he's crying. .end Feedback to anasile@aol.com
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