Archive of Our Own ^beta

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AN: Hi there! This story is going to combine elements of “Colony” and “Endgame” with my own elements. It can be read alone, but it also follows in the universe that I’ve been creating with my fic (more on that at the end). It comes after “Devotion,” in my universe.

I don’t own anything from The X-Files, and I completely play fast and loose with canon, cherry picking what suits me and leaving the rest.

I hope that you enjoy! Please let me know what you think!

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This wasn’t supposed to be happening. It couldn’t be happening.

Just yesterday, Fox Mulder would have considered himself the happiest that he’d ever been.

For twenty-two years, he had been searching for his sister, Samantha. He’d refused to believe that she could simply be gone. Even if she’d been abducted—which he’d always believed she had been—she was out there, somewhere. He’d believed that he could find the truth about what had happened to her, and then he could find her. He could bring her back.

After twenty-two years, it wasn’t Mulder that had found Samantha, it was Samantha that had found Mulder.

Although Mulder had wanted Samantha to come back for twenty-two years, now was truly a wonderful time in his life for her to come back. Her return could do nothing except make Mulder’s life more complete.

Mulder was the happiest he’d been within the span of his memory. Less than a week ago, he’d travelled with his work partner, Dana Scully, to visit her family and his own. The purpose of the trip had been to let both families know that their work relationship had expanded to become a partnership that extended to their private lives, as well.

It hadn’t been Mulder’s intention to fall in love with Scully when she’d first been assigned to work with him on the X-Files. The first time she’d walked into his basement office, he certainly didn’t realize she’d be the woman that he would come to consider practically an extension of himself—more important, even, than any appendage. That’s just what had happened, though.

Scully had been kidnapped and she’d disappeared. The whole world—even her family—had been willing to give her up for gone. Dead. Much like Samantha, she’d become someone that they remembered, but they had to move on without her.

And, much like he’d felt with Samantha’s disappearance, Mulder hadn’t been able to believe that Scully could just be gone. She couldn’t just vanish. And he couldn’t just give her up.

The differences, he’d slowly come to realize, between his feelings for Samantha and his feelings for Scully had been the extent and type of love that he held for each woman. Samantha was his kid sister, and he’d love her forever because she was family.

Scully was, however, the love his life. Mulder was certain of that.

When Scully had been returned to them, in a coma, and without anyone knowing how or by whom she’d been returned, her doctors and her family had been ready to give her up for dead. Her brain, they’d said, wouldn’t recover from the trauma she’d suffered. She was a vegetable, and her living will had declared that she didn’t want to live that way. They’d unplugged the machines and decided to let her go.

To this day, she said she had heard Mulder talking to her as he stayed by her bedside and begged her not to go. She had heard his declaration of love, and she loved him. So, she’d come back to be with him.

Mulder had cared for her during her recovery. He’d sworn, to himself, that he’d never forget the way he’d felt when he’d believed that she was gone—disappeared, never to be seen again. He’d never forget, either, the way that he’d felt, sitting by her hospital bed and hearing doctors and family members, alike, declare that the clock was ticking down. He’d never forget that desperate, helpless feeling of admitting to himself how much he loved her, all the while feeling that she was slipping away for good and there was nothing that he could do except watch her go.

He promised himself he’d never forget the way that he’d felt because he never wanted to forget how utterly precious Scully was to him. Since her recovery, if it were possible, she’d become even more precious to him. She was his partner in every sense of the word. She worked with him, but she shared every aspect of her life with him, as well. That was why they’d told their families. They wanted them to know that they were devoted to the idea of spending their lives together.

They also wanted to prepare them for the biggest tiny secret that the two of them shared, at this time, only with each other and anyone in the medical profession that absolutely needed to know. Scully was eight weeks pregnant. Worried about her health so soon after the trauma of her kidnapping, disappearance, and subsequent coma, her doctor had ordered immediate tests for their little one after Scully had suspected its presence. The sonogram picture of their six-week-old fetus had earned the little thing the affectionate nickname “the alien” from Mulder. Though they wanted to wait until Scully’s twelfth week to tell their families about the alien, they were already laying the groundwork of sharing such monumental news by letting them know about the seriousness of their relationship.

Mulder was the happiest that he could imagine being.

He was in love with a wonderful, beautiful, smart, amazing woman. More than that, the woman of his dreams was in love with him, too. Through a miracle—maybe even proof that they were destined to be together—she’d been returned to him against so many odds. And, now, she was carrying his child, and she was happy about such a development.

Mulder slept almost every night with her—at either his place or hers—and he was urging her to discuss what she wanted in a home so that they could buy a house and make it their own before their little one was ready to come home outside of its mother’s womb.

Scully didn’t know it, but Mulder had also visited several nearby jewelry stores during the few times he wasn’t with her, and he was carefully considering just the right ring for her. He had already learned there was so much to consider when it came to clarity, cut, shape, and size. He had to pick the perfect one, because Scully deserved the best, and he had to decide when, where, and, most importantly, how to ask her to publicly declare her intention to remain tied to him forever.

Mulder’s life was barreling toward perfection at a remarkable speed—something entirely unexpected by him, and something that was a little unnerving—and it only sped up when he’d gotten the call from his parents that he needed to come, as soon as possible, back to the house that he’d only just left.

Mulder and Scully had been assigned a case practically the moment they’d gotten back from visiting their families. Like all their cases, this one had been bizarre. They were working toward solving a case that would help them protect a number of clones that had been located, even though they weren’t yet entirely informed about all the details surrounding the creation of the clones. Someone was killing the clones, and Scully and Mulder had been assigned to figure out who was doing it and to protect any remaining clones.

Just as they’d found an address that might provide them with another lead, Mulder had gotten the urgent call from his parents that he needed to return to their home. Scully had understood. Mulder feared that something sudden had happened regarding the health of at least one of his parents, so he’d kissed Scully, made her promise to be careful when she went to follow up on the new lead, and he’d left for his parents’ house.

That’s when Mulder had discovered that Samantha had come back to them.

Mulder had hardly been able to believe it. After twenty-two years of searching, Samantha was back. Mulder had spent the evening, and much of the night in a happy family haze with his parents. They’d given her up for gone. Unlike Mulder, however, his parents had never held onto the idea that she’d come back. They had stopped searching for her. Though they still loved her and missed her, they counted her among the dead and gone. She was a memory—a wonderful memory, but a memory nonetheless. They hadn’t continued to search, determined to find her. Her very unexpected reappearance in their lives had surprised and exhausted both of them. Mulder saw first his mother and then his father off to bed in the early morning hours when they should have been sleeping for some time.

Alone with Samantha, Mulder had thought about how much he’d dreamed of what he would say to her the first time he saw her. None of what he’d thought of, before, seemed relevant now. All his thoughts had turned to wanting to tell her how happy he was. Stepping out onto the porch, and facing her for the first time in twenty-two years, fully accepting that she was back, he’d almost said it all to her at once—“I met a the most incredible woman, and we’re unbelievably in love, and there’s so much more that I can’t tell you just yet, but it’s equally wonderful, and you’re back just in time to share all of that with me; with us.” But Mulder didn’t tell her any of those things. Instead, he asked her about herself. He asked her to tell him the details about where she’d been, what had happened to her, and how she’d gotten back. He’d asked her for everything that he felt, in his gut, she was holding back from telling their parents.

The story that Samantha told him set the wheels in motion, in a way. It was a story involving alien abduction—which Mulder had always believed that his sister had been abducted by aliens—and alien relocation. It was a story that involved alien bounty hunters and their strange shapeshifting abilities that could be used to facilitate the destruction of a specific group of aliens and their wards.

Samantha’s so-called adoptive father was one of the aliens present on the planet. He was one of the aliens that the bounty hunter was set to destroy. Beyond that, he was one of the aliens that fit right into the profile of the people—suspected-clones-now-determined-to-be-aliens—with which Scully and Mulder were working. Samantha wanted Mulder’s help in keeping her father and his other alien companions alive.

Beyond that, in her story, Mulder had heard that Scully might very well be walking into trouble. He’d quickly explained to Samantha what Scully was doing—and how very important she was to him. He’d heard Samantha’s explanation that the bounty hunter that was after the aliens would be after Scully, as well, because of her role in attempting to protect the ones they’d found and to uncover the secrets surrounding everything that was happening.

Scully wouldn’t know him, either. Even if she had answered Mulder’s call, which she hadn’t, she wouldn’t be able to protect herself from the bounty hunter that might very well be after and willing to take her life. He could shapeshift. He could appear to her in any form, armed with intimate knowledge of the person whose form he had taken, and Scully would never know that her attacker was not the person she believed him to be.

Mulder’s training and experience told him that a rational mind was better than a frantic one. He knew that the best thing that he could always do, in any situation, would be to remain calm. But the moment that he’d finally gotten Scully on the phone—after hearing her declare, in a message that she’d left for him, that she believed she was in danger—and she’d hung up the phone abruptly and oddly, Mulder had nearly lost his mind. It had taken everything in his power to keep his emotions under control enough not to get himself and Samantha killed as they drove to the motel in Germantown where Scully had gone to hide and hold up until she felt it was safe.

Mulder hadn’t been there to provide her with the protection that he promised her daily.

When he’d seen the motel room destroyed—blood and a shattered table were clear signs of a struggle—and he’d seen that the door hadn’t been forced, all the air in his body had left his lungs, and Samantha had to help him sit quickly on the bed before he fell to the floor. Scully had been afraid. She’d left the message telling him that she thought she was in danger. She thought she was being followed. Yet, she had opened the door—it hadn’t been forced.

Scully’s attacker had taken the shape of the only person that she would have trusted, at that moment, enough to open the door for them. The only thing that hurt Mulder more than knowing that Scully was somewhere hurt, or worse, was knowing that—even if she’d known it wasn’t him—her eyes had seen him. She had seen him come for her. She’d seen him attack her.

He had hurt her, in some form, and he hadn’t been there to protect her.

Samantha’s promise that the bounty hunter hadn’t killed Scully there and, therefore, likely wouldn’t kill her, was all that had helped Mulder to even feel like he could get air back into his lungs. By now, Samantha explained, the bounty hunter would know where she was. He would know of her connection to Mulder. The bounty hunter would want to make a deal—a trade. He would want Samantha, and he would reach out to Mulder—likely at Mulder’s home. Mulder followed his sister’s lead. He was desperate to know of Scully’s whereabouts. He was desperate to have her back.

Back at his apartment, Mulder had been on eggshells. He’d paced the floors and listened to the rest of Samantha’s story about the aliens, and the bounty hunter, and just how, exactly, they’d all ended up in this particular level of hell. He’d heard the specifics on how to kill the bounty hunter, which was a relatively delicate procedure that involved puncturing just one place at the base of the skull, and he’d filled Skinner in on a few things when he’d come by to offer the information that the last two of the clones that they were meant to protect had disappeared.

Mulder’s heart had nearly exploded when the phone rang. His hands shook when he picked up the receiver.

“Mulder?”

It was her voice. Just hearing her voice nearly made Mulder pass out from relief.

“Scully, are you alright?”

“I’m fine, Mulder,” Scully said. “Listen—I’m not allowed to talk. I have a message. He says he’ll meet you. He says—he’ll return me in exchange for another woman, whom you know.”

Mulder’s stomach lurched.

“Tell him we’ll be there,” Mulder said.

“Who is it, Mulder?” Scully asked. Something happened on the other end of the line. Mulder’s stomach clenched. He worried that Scully was stepping too far beyond the boundaries drawn for her by the bounty hunter. He feared she’d be hurt, badly, for her transgressions.

“Don’t ask any questions, Scully,” Mulder urged. “Just—tell me when and where. We’ll be there to make the exchange.”

Sitting in the car on the bridge, seeing the car pulling toward them, and knowing that Skinner’s men were waiting, Mulder had begun to grow increasingly nervous. The exchange would be faked, to some degree. The sharpshooter would take the man out during the exchange—a shot to the sweet spot that would kill him. Mulder would walk away with both the women he’d lost in his life—both which had been returned to him. Mulder had reminded Samantha of the plan just before he’d gotten out of the car.

They all knew the plan, but Mulder’s training had taught him that things could go very wrong, very quickly. If trouble broke out, there were really too many bodies on the bridge. It was more than likely that someone would be lost. And no matter who was lost, in this scenario, Mulder was going to lose. Still, he’d told himself that this was going to work out. He wasn’t going to lose.

He had to keep his faith and his strength for the good of all of them.

The man had got out of the car once Mulder was out. The bounty hunter held a gun to Scully’s temple. He kept his arm pressed tight around her throat—choking off her air in order to purposefully weaken her, ever so slightly, with each passing second. There was no way she could fight off someone his size, but he’d pull the trigger if she tried. He’d pull the trigger if anyone tried anything and he became aware of it.

If the sharpshooter pulled the trigger at the wrong time, the bounty hunter’s dying reflexes would pull the trigger on his own gun. They would take him out, but he would take Scully with him. That’s why he was holding her the way he was. He knew that, and Scully knew that, too.

Mulder looked at Scully. The blood in the motel room had been hers. She had blood on her face even now—blood that her eyes had seen him put there, even if she’d realized it was all the trick of a shapeshifter. Even at this distance, Mulder could see fear in her eyes, and her fear ripped through him.

Mulder’s stomach threatened to empty of its contents, but he couldn’t even recall the last time he’d eaten something. The man holding Scully demanded Samantha. Samantha had insisted they do this. She got out of the car, and she came over, ready to hand herself over—to give the sharpshooter the opportunity to pull the trigger and take down the bounty hunter.

She’d come ready to turn herself over so that Mulder could have back the love of his life and, suddenly, it all felt very heavy and very overwhelming. It all felt entirely unfair.

This wasn’t supposed to be happening. It couldn’t be happening.

Mulder couldn’t be standing on a bridge, knees shaking, trying to decide if he was doing the right thing by possibly sacrificing his baby sister for the woman that he felt was, somehow, an extension of his soul.

If anything at all went wrong, Mulder could lose both of them. The greatest possibility was that, at the very least, he would lose one of them. It was unspoken knowledge among all of them, that, barring an absolutely perfect execution of the plan, at least one of them was unlikely to walk away from this.

It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. Mulder wasn’t supposed to have to choose who to sacrifice.

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AN: I hope you enjoyed the first part of this!

I’m still fairly new to The X-Files and the fandom, so here’s my customary introduction. I’m only in season 3. I’m watching for the first time. I have a few stories that can all be read separately, or they can be read as all belonging to the same universe. I may, later, write a few stories that go in between the ones I’ve already written, but here are the current ones in their current chronological order.

“A Light in the Darkness,” “Stay, “The Cross,” “Aubrey,” “Irresistible,” “The Lake House,” “The Holinshed Ghost, and "Devotion."

Chapter Text

AN: Here we are, another piece to this one.

As you can probably tell, my primary focus with the events of the episode are around how they affect Mulder and Scully. I’m going to be making some changes to things, and I won’t be recounting everything. I’m going to assume that you can fill in any necessary holes.

I do hope you enjoy! Please let me know what you think!

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Mulder watched Samantha walk closer to the alien bounty hunter. He saw the bounty hunter tighten the hold on Scully’s throat in response, anticipating any kind of trouble that might arise. He wondered when the sharpshooter would take his shot. He saw Scully’s fear and flicked his eyes away from her, unable to handle that much emotion at the moment—unable to deal with the fear that it stirred up within him.

He didn’t know if this was the right decision, but it felt like the only decision that he could make. He just had to hope things worked out. He had to hope that his heart didn’t burst in his chest—especially without Scully nearby to tell him that was medically unlikely.

Mulder heard the man speak to Samantha and demand that she step closer. He saw the moment that the man shoved Scully to the side. She stumbled forward, struggling to orient herself and catch her breath after the man’s rough treatment, and Mulder took a step closer to reach her faster.

Mulder wrapped his arms around her and drew her into him—into the safety that his body could offer her.

“Scully, you alright?” He asked.

“Yeah. I’m fine.” Her voice didn’t quite agree with her words. Mulder held her out at arm’s length. There was blood on her face. Blood came from her nose and her forehead. She was the medical doctor. She would know more about her injuries than Mulder would at a glance. Still, he felt the need to simply be guaranteed that she was safe and well. “You OK?” He asked, pressing her to reassure him.

“I’m OK,” she said. He still didn’t believe her voice, but there was nothing more he could do for her at the moment.

He pulled her back to him, hugged her again, and then gently kissed the side of her forehead that wasn’t bleeding. He normally believed in limiting shows of affection in work environments, but this was different than slipping someone the tongue in the middle of a meeting.

“Get in the car,” he said softly. “Be safe.”

She nodded, offered no argument at all, and slowly made her way to the car, clearly somewhat shaky from the come-down required after running on what had probably been a great deal of adrenaline. Mulder turned back to watch the man that was holding his sister, now, in a very loose chokehold. He wondered when the sharpshooter would take their shot.

He held Samantha’s eyes with his own, wondering what she was thinking.

Strangely enough, the bounty hunter didn’t raise the gun to her temple as he had for Scully. He soon released his choke hold, too, and simply held Samantha. Mulder kept his eyes on his sister, and he waited for what seemed like an eternity for the sharpshooter to take their shot.

Things might have worked out the way they wanted them to work out. They might have gotten Samantha back. Samantha didn’t stick to the plan, though.

She turned to attack the bounty hunter, maybe thinking that she could end all of this and save her adoptive father. With the struggle that ensued, the sharpshooter had no chance to make the remarkably precise shot that was necessary, but he still fired out of instinct, hitting the bounty hunter who, controlling Samantha by the neck at that point, wrestled her backward and went over the side of the bridge with her, into the frigid water below.

Mulder felt, at once, like it was all happening in an instant and like it was happening in slow motion. He ran for the railing, yelling out for his sister, but the dark water had swallowed up both of them. Mulder didn’t have to search out Skinner’s hiding place to know that appropriate calls were being made immediately. Some short distance away, they’d already had several silent units in waiting with at least three ambulances—prepared to come at Skinner’s signal if anything were to go wrong.

Already, Mulder could hear the sirens.

Mulder felt the pressure of a hand on his back, and he knew who it was before he even turned to face her. He could see, in her expression, that she was heartbroken for him.

“Samantha?” Scully asked. “Your sister?”

Mulder’s chest got even tighter, if such a thing were possible. Skinner was close by now. He was yelling orders. Units appeared seemingly out of nowhere. They were starting to spread out to do their best to search with flashlights in the dark while backup was called.

Mulder caught Scully’s shoulders. He felt her arms underneath his palms. He flexed his hands to squeeze them. She was there. For a moment, she’d been gone. For a moment, he’d worried that she’d slipped out of his hands once more—maybe even forever. She was there, though. He could feel the solidity of her body.

“I need you to go with the paramedics, Scully,” Mulder said. “I need you to—be OK.”

“Mulder, I’m fine,” Scully insisted.

“You have blood on your face,” Mulder offered. “And your forehead is still bleeding. I need you to just—listen to me, Scully. I need you to go with the paramedics.” He hugged her against him. “I need you to be fine.”

Scully seemed to recognize that Mulder didn’t want to talk about things right now—couldn’t talk about them. There was too much on his mind, and he wanted to turn his attention to the people now combing the river for Samantha and the bounty hunter—entirely unaware that one of them was an alien. Scully licked her lip and nodded at Mulder.

“OK,” she said. “I’m OK, Mulder. But I’ll go with the paramedics. Be careful, Mulder.”

Mulder simply nodded at her. There was nothing else that he had to offer at the moment. There was an ambulance now parked beside his car. There were paramedics approaching. Skinner would have sent them. He would have told them to come and check Scully out. She walked toward them and turned herself over to them. One of the paramedics led her to the ambulance and helped her inside. Mulder watched when the ambulance pulled off, wondering if he should have gone with her—hating how much, at this moment, he felt absolutely torn in two.

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Scully parked her car where she was sure that it wouldn’t interfere with any of the coming and going of others.

The sun would be up soon. The numbers of people searching had increased. Flashlights and floodlights shined from every direction. The fact that they were still searching—and that the search had expanded in either direction to try to account for drift or swimming—was an immediate indication that they hadn’t found anything.

Mulder was pacing—not able to settle in one spot. He tried to watch everything at once. He wanted to be involved in every action, in every place, at every moment. It was frustration and desperation—and Scully could practically smell it as she approached him.

“Mulder!” She called out as she approached him, hoping to distract him, for a few moments, from his own misery.

He turned to her, and the expression on his face made her chest ache. Even though he was trying to remain professional, and he was trying to act like this entire event didn’t hit far too close to home, he couldn’t hide the worn look of everything he’d been processing. He moved heavily, like he was wearing weights at his wrists and ankles, when he moved toward Scully. He outstretched his arms and caught her. She gave herself over to him, letting him decide what interaction he wanted. He hugged her, quickly, kissed her hard and fast, and then held her at arm’s length.

“Skinner said you’d been admitted,” Mulder said. “You’re supposed to be at the hospital, Scully. I was coming as soon as…”

He broke off like he’d simply run out of words. He was coming as soon as—as soon as he could, as soon as they found Samantha, as soon as he knew what was happening.

Scully smiled at him.

“I was admitted,” she said. “For observation, Mulder. Just—as a precaution.”

“Why aren’t you at the hospital, Scully?” Mulder asked. Scully wondered when the last time had been that he’d slept. She could easily count nearly forty-eight hours, herself, that she knew that Mulder had been awake, and it could have been longer. She didn’t mean the smile that she gave him. She was too tired for it, but he needed it.

“Relax, Mulder,” Scully said. “I was released. I didn’t run away. Everything’s fine. I have a mild concussion. A few cuts and bruises. Everything will heal, and everything’s OK.”

“You’re OK,” Mulder said. It was between a question and statement. One small weight lifted off of Mulder, and he immediately looked a little more exhausted in response—a sign that he would collapse when this was all done and he could let it all go for a while.

“I’m OK,” Scully assured him. She stepped closer to him, though she was certain that they weren’t being watched or listened to by anyone that was there searching for bodies. “The alien’s OK, too, Mulder. It’s just fine.”

She saw the next small weight lift off his shoulders. She heard his sigh as he released some of the tension he was carrying.

“You’re sure?” He asked.

“Positive,” Scully said. “I was thoroughly examined. Carefully observed. The alien’s fine and my body’s showing no signs of that changing any time soon.”

She accepted that the hard, silent embrace from Mulder said everything that he couldn’t say right now about how pleased he was to hear that news. He held her a moment too long, really, for them to technically be actively on a case, but she wasn’t going to tell him that—not right now and not this case. She hugged him back until he released her.

“Mulder—I have to tell you something about that man,” Scully said.

“He wasn’t a man, Scully,” Mulder said blankly. Scully’s stomach twisted.

“So—you know?” Scully asked.

“I just want to know—was it me who came to that motel room, Scully?” Mulder asked. “Was it me who—hurt you?”

“I knew as soon as I heard you on the phone that it wasn’t you, Mulder,” Scully assured him. “I didn’t know who or—what it was, but I knew it wasn’t you. Even if it looked like you, I knew it wasn’t you.”

Mulder nodded his head. He was looking out over the river—out toward the lights that were sweeping back and forth, and out toward the people that would keep searching. The search would be easier once the sun came up. It would be more successful. They could begin trolling.

Of course, part of all that would be accepting that they might continue the search for living people, but they were also accepting that they were looking for bodies. The medical doctor in Scully knew that Samantha wasn’t likely to have survived the fall and the frigid temperatures—especially assuming that they hadn’t already left the river. The part of Scully that was Mulder’s lover, though, needed to believe, right now, for Mulder’s sake.

“You know what it was?” Scully pressed.

Mulder nodded his head.

“You won’t believe me if I tell you,” Mulder said. Scully laughed to herself.

“Try me,” she said. “After what I’ve seen tonight, Mulder? What I saw—in that motel room?”

“He’s an alien bounty hunter,” Mulder said. “Some sort of shapeshifter. See? I knew you wouldn’t believe me.”

“How do you know this, Mulder?”

“Samantha. She told me she was abducted twenty-two years ago. Raised by aliens. Her father—her adoptive father—was an alien that was sent here to form a colony with others like him. He’s one of the men we’ve been trying to protect, Scully. The bounty hunter was sent to kill them. He wanted to kill Samantha, too, because she knows how to get rid of him.” Mulder shook his head. “You don’t believe me. Do you, Scully?”

Scully wasn’t sure, at this moment, what she believed.

“Mulder—I don’t know what to believe. But since I don’t have any other explanation at the moment…”

“You’re willing to accept it as a possibility until we have something else,” Mulder said.

“I just want to know why you didn’t tell me that the woman they wanted was Samantha,” Scully said.

“If I had told you, Scully, that I was essentially trading your life for Samantha’s, would you have wanted me to do it?” Mulder asked. Scully’s stomach clenched, she fought against the wave of nausea she felt, and told herself that it was just her so-called morning sickness—something that could surge up, really, at any time of the day or night.

“No, Mulder,” she admitted.

“I knew that,” Mulder said. “You would have fought against it. You’d have told me not to do it. You might have even tried something, here, that would have had them—searching the water for you right now.”

“You’ve been looking for Samantha for so long, Mulder,” Scully said.

“I’ve been looking for you forever, too, Scully,” Mulder said. “Maybe I just didn’t know it. I don’t know if my—I don’t know what my parents are going to say. But I made the only decision I could make. I made—the only choice that I could. Samantha knew, and she supported it. I couldn’t stand losing you, Scully. I—couldn’t lose you.”

“Mulder—we’re going to keep looking,” Scully said, wishing she could believe that they would actually find Samantha Mulder alive. “You’ve never given up on Samantha before.”

Mulder nodded his head. He looked sick though, like he could feel the nausea, for himself, that boiled in Scully’s gut.

“I have to tell my parents what’s happened,” he said.

Scully nodded.

“Go, Mulder. Be with your parents right now. I’ll stay here. Keep an eye on everything. I’ll let you know the minute we know anything.” He stared at her, visibly hesitating. “I’m serious. I can handle things here. You need to go to your parents. I’m here if you need me, Mulder.”

“Be careful, Scully,” Mulder said.

Scully’s chest ached. She heard so much behind those three words—there was a great deal more meaning there than a simple request that she take care not to fall or end up in harm’s way.

She didn’t care that they were at work, and she didn’t care if, at that moment, someone shined one of those spotlights directly on them. She walked over to Mulder and reached her hand up to catch him behind the neck. She barely had to tug for him to know what she wanted, and he met her for a kiss. She hoped he could feel, in the kiss that she gave him to take with him, everything she’d sensed in his words and the somewhat shaky quality of his voice.

“You be careful, too, Mulder,” she said, when the kiss broke, her fingers still rubbing his neck. His hands rested naturally on her hips for a moment.

“I’ll call you,” he said. “Just—to be sure.” Scully nodded her head. She knew what he wanted to be sure of. He wanted to be sure that she was still there—that he hadn’t lost her, and they hadn’t lost everything that they had between them.

“I’ll answer,” she assured him. “And I’ll call you, Mulder, the moment that I know anything. Leave this to me. You just—focus on yourself and your parents, OK?”

She accepted his nod and his quick kiss. She smiled, too, at the quick declaration of love he tossed at her as he rushed toward his car. She watched him pull off before making her way to the bank where she’d seen Skinner earlier, so that she could ask him how soon they could expect to have a trolling crew at work. The sun, after all, would be rising soon.

Chapter Text

AN: Here we are, the next piece to this one.

As I said before (in previous stories), when it comes to the parents, I’m somewhat making them my own. I hope that doesn’t bother anyone too much when I make changes here and there.

I hope you enjoy! Please let me know what you think!

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“Dad—I’ve got to talk to you,” Mulder said as he mounted the porch steps. His father was standing outside like he was waiting on him—like he had been expecting him.

“It’s Samantha, isn’t it?”

Maybe his father had been waiting on him. There wasn’t really any accusation in his father’s voice, but Mulder still felt accusation in his gut. Maybe he was the one that was causing the feeling. His guilt was gnawing in his stomach like a piranha. He’d eaten half a roll of antacids on the car ride alone. He could barely breathe.

Twenty-two years he’d tried to find her. He’d promised himself that, somehow, he would. Now he’d found her and, almost immediately, he’d lost her again.

“I lost her, Dad,” Mulder said.

“Lost her how?” Bill Mulder asked.

Mulder sucked in air. He was breathing normally. Nothing was actually obstructing his breathing in any way, but it felt like there was a massive weight on his chest. His throat felt like it was tight and closing. The thought of putting what had happened into words was almost unbearable. It was one thing to spout off the necessary words for a report or to request further backup while they were combing the water and the surrounding areas—Mulder knew how to separate himself from his surroundings when it came to his job. He had a certain skill, when necessary, for shutting down the part of his brain that recognized the meaning of the words that he strung together for difficult cases at work. It was something else, entirely, to stand here on the porch and tell his father how it was that Samantha had come to be lost—and to know that one of them, either Mulder or his father, was going to have to go inside and tell Teena Mulder that the daughter she’d just gotten back had been torn away from her again.

“She’s involved with something,” Mulder said, not wanting to share too much in case it might endanger his parents at the moment. “Someone was trying to get to her, Dad. They kidnapped someone else. Used the person as bait to make a trade. Samantha wanted to make the deal. She wanted to get close to the kidnapper. She didn’t follow protocol, and…he got away with her. They’re looking for her. I’m going to keep—I’m going to keep looking for her, Dad. I’m going to find her again.”

“Did this have anything to do with your little partner, Fox?” Bill asked.

Mulder felt something boiling around in his gut that wasn’t there before—something the antacids he’d eaten earlier couldn’t even begin to touch.

“Scully was involved,” Mulder ceded. “She was kidnapped.”

“Exchanged for your sister,” Bill filled in.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Mulder said.

“I don’t think you do, Fox,” Bill said.

“You’re thinking—I chose Scully over Samantha, and you’re angry about that. Listen, Dad, this might not be the time or the place…and I don’t want to say too much without Scully present…but Scully is more than just my partner.”

“I’m aware,” Bill said. “You told us you were—dating.”

“She’s more than just my girlfriend,” Mulder said. “Listen—I know that’s not the point, but it’s not what you think. I didn’t just hand over Samantha as a—as a sacrifice, Dad. We had a plan in place. We had a sniper. We never intended to let him get Samantha.”

“Until your sister broke with protocol to fit her own agenda,” Bill said. “As I told you, Fox, I don’t think you know everything I’m thinking. As for your relationship with Ms. Scully, I’m sure you’ll be informing us of all important information as needed. I presume she is unharmed?”

Mulder swallowed back the unease he felt. His father was calm—more than calm. It was almost as though he’d simply suspected this.

“Scully’s fine, Dad,” Mulder said.

“Samantha must have known something,” Bill said. “Or she suspected some—problem—might arise. I questioned it when she made the request of me, but she refused to explain and I didn’t press. Your mother was too interested in having her time with Samantha to have me taking up too much of it. She left something for you.”

“She left something for me?” Mulder asked, confused.

“Specifically for you,” Bill said. “Wait here. I don’t want to tell your mother what’s happened just yet.”

Mulder nodded his acceptance of this plan. Clearly his father intended to be the one to break the news to his mother. Mulder was happy with that. He could hold things together in front of his father—even if he felt that, piece by piece, he was crumbling inside. He wasn’t sure that he could be so resolute while facing his mother to tell her what had happened.

Bill stepped into the house, quietly, and returned a few moments later. He held an envelope in his hands, which he examined like he hadn’t really seen it before.

“Samantha said to give this to you if you should return without her,” Bill said. “She must have known something—or she must have intended something. I get the feeling that your partner—Scully—just got caught in some crossfire.”

Mulder took the envelope from his father’s hands. Everything inside him was practically spinning. Samantha knew, before they’d even left the house, about the bounty hunter and the presence of aliens like her adoptive parents. She knew that she wanted Mulder to take her to find them. She wanted to face the bounty hunter and get rid of him—to save the colony of aliens. Mulder knew she’d known all of that because she’d told him about all of it before they’d left. Still, was it possible that she’d already known how things would go? The enveloped he held in his hands had to have been given to his father some time before the conversation between Samantha and him even took place.

Samantha had assumed that Fox would return to the house without her—likely to say that she was missing again. She’d expected, then, to go missing, in some way.

Mulder wondered how much else she knew. He wondered, too, how much his father knew that he wasn’t saying, but he knew enough to know that his father would take his secrets—all of them—to the grave. His work had long since taught him how to disclose just enough information, without giving away anything he didn’t intend.

Mulder ripped open the envelope and he read the letter that Samantha had written and sealed within.

His heart beat wildly in his chest, the flutter of hope and excitement mixed oddly with the discomfort of uncertainty that everything happening around him had stirred up.

“I’m going to keep looking for her, Dad,” Mulder offered, without disclosing what was in the letter—he could keep his secrets the same as his father. “I’m going to find her.”

Mulder took quick leave of his father. He didn’t want to waste any more time than he already had.

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Scully had left the investigation area only once, and that had been to take a quick trip to a nearby convenience store for the privacy of their bathroom and the quick purchase of crackers and ginger ale, which she choked down in the car like she was taking medication instead of enjoying a snack.

Scully felt absolutely miserable, and there was only so much that she could blame on the baby she was carrying. Her digestive discomfort was coming from her little alien’s influence as it mixed with the other uneasiness she was feeling.

For as long as she’d known Mulder, he’d had a driving force that kept him believing in everything, against all odds. He’d had one thing that had gotten him through every difficult and complicated situation he’d been in. That one thing had been the belief that his sister, Samantha, was out there, somewhere. He believed she’d been abducted, but he was willing to accept whatever explanation was necessary in order to find her and bring her back.

Mulder’s unwavering belief that he could find Samantha, and his determination to do just that, had helped him keep going no matter how hopeless things seemed. It had kept him going even when nobody believed in him, and when they dubbed him “Spooky Mulder,” and talked about his crazy beliefs and theories.

Mulder’s greatest focus in life had been to find Samantha and bring her home.

He’d had her right there. She’d been in the car with him. They’d probably had time to exchange some conversation about old times and catch up on things since her disappearance. She’d, perhaps, shed a great deal of light on things for Mulder—Scully hadn’t had time to hear everything that he’d heard. Mulder had found Samantha, even if Scully wasn’t exactly sure how everything had taken place.

And, now, Samantha was gone again. She was missing.

If it hadn’t been for Scully, Samantha would be there. She’d be with Mulder. If Scully hadn’t opened the door for Mulder—for who or what she’d believed was Mulder, because she still didn’t know to explain what she’d experienced—then none of this would have ever happened. Somehow, Scully told herself that she should have known better. She should have avoided whatever it was that had happened.

Scully had cost Mulder his sister. She’d cost him Samantha.

Even though he wasn’t actively holding it against her, and even though Scully didn’t doubt at all that Mulder loved her and loved the promise of the child she was carrying, she had to accept that there was a very good chance that his feelings for Samantha, and what had taken place here, may very well affect their relationship—if not now, then somewhere down the line.

The very thought of it gave Scully a sick feeling that no amount of trying to self-medicate could ever remedy. She felt the discomfort in her gut, but she knew it belonged to her heart more than anything.

Her heart—aching as it was—sunk lower in her chest when they found what they’d been looking for. Scully came when the officers called her over. For a moment, she took in the face of Samantha Mulder in death, and then she immediately dialed the number.

“Scully—Samantha had to know that all of this was going to happen,” Mulder said the moment that the phone had made connection. “She left me a letter for when I returned to my parents’ house without her. She told me where to meet her. I’m almost there, Scully.”

“Mulder…” Scully said, breaking in. As soon as Mulder stopped speaking, Scully swallowed against a particularly violent wave of nausea. She told people horrible things all the time. It was part of her job. She’d practically studied, while studying medicine, how to detach herself from bad news enough to save herself from empathetic burnout while dealing with patients and their families. But this was Mulder, and she felt like her chest might explode. Still, someone had to tell him, and some part of her told her that it would be better coming from her than Skinner. “Samantha isn’t going to be there.”

Silence. It was just a second, but it felt like an eternity. If Scully didn’t know what was wrong with her, she might have suspected she was having some kind of cardiac episode.

“You found something?”

“They just pulled her body from the water, Mulder,” Scully said. “I’m so—I’m so sorry.” Silence again. “Mulder—this isn’t your fault. None of this is your fault, Mulder. I just want you to know that. I want you to—I want you to remember that. It isn’t your fault.”

“I have to go, Scully,” Mulder said. “You’ll take care of things?”

Scully nodded, even though she knew that he couldn’t see her on the other end of the line.

“I can handle things here,” Scully said. “Where are you headed?” She listened as Mulder ticked off the name of a clinic in Rockville, Maryland. “Be careful, Mulder.”

“You be careful,” Mulder responded. “I love you.”

Scully smiled to herself. No matter how this might affect them later, they could handle it. The welcomed warm feeling in her stomach—pleasant even as it competed with her ongoing suffering—told her that.

She glanced around, sure that she wasn’t being listened to by anyone, and lowered her voice.

“I love you, too, Mulder,” she assured him. “None of this is your fault.”

“Thanks, Scully,” Mulder said. He hung up without another word. The sound of the phone disconnecting was the end of the conversation. Scully hung up on her end and sucked in a breath of air to calm her nerves. She dabbed her fingertips underneath her eyes to take care of the few drops that had quietly escaped.

None of it was Mulder’s fault, but she couldn’t help but feel like a great deal of it had been her fault.

The least she could do was perform the autopsy on Samantha herself, to be sure that it was handled with care and respect.

Scully made her way over to look at the woman, once more, as her body waited for everything to be finalized so that she could be transported according to Scully’s requests. Scully’s surprise was almost staggering when, while she looked at the body of Samantha Mulder, she saw the corpse begin to deteriorate, rapidly, as though it were being eaten by acid—leaving behind an odd green liquid.

Chapter Text

AN: Here we are, another piece to the story.

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think!

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Scully was thoroughly exhausted when she made it back to the basement office. Clutched in one hand, she carried the paper bag with the bagel she’d purchased. Under her arm, she carried the ginger ale that lacked the caffeine she desperately wanted at that moment. She’d almost convinced herself, making her purchases, that a little caffeine wouldn’t hurt, and one cup of coffee was certainly permissible, but Mulder had really wanted both of them to give it up, and she wasn’t going to go against his wishes just because he wasn’t present.

She’d love to sleep. She’d love to close her eyes for just a few minutes.

For as exhausted as she felt, Scully knew that she wouldn’t sleep even if she gave herself permission to take a nap. She really found it difficult, these days, to sleep without Mulder nearby. She also had a great deal on her mind, and she knew that her thoughts wouldn’t be still long enough for her to really rest. She settled for the energy that food would give her, instead. Mulder would be happy about that.

Scully took a moment to prepare the bagel the way she wanted it, and to spread out the cream cheese so that every bite was almost equally covered. She ate half of the bagel without pausing for much more than the air required to keep eating. She’d forgotten to eat in the face of everything.

“I don’t know if you’re as hungry as I am,” Scully said, daring to speak to the little one that she carried only because there was nobody present to witness her possible foray into insanity, “but if you are—I’m sorry.” Scully sucked the cream cheese off her fingers, reclined a little in her chair, and opened her email for it to begin loading while she ate the other half of the bagel and wished, for a moment, that she’d gotten two. Still chewing through the bagel, Scully picked up her phone and dialed Mulder’s number. The phone rang, but Mulder never answered.

Scully got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She’d been telling herself all day that the thoughts she was having were nothing more than a type of chemical overreaction that was being caused by the hormones in her system. She was naturally going to feel more dramatic about everything. The things she thought weren’t necessarily real or even rational. They were simply feelings—erratic feelings—like the ones that she sometimes got at various points during her regular menstrual cycle.

Except these were ten times worse because they were fueled by everything her little alien was pumping through her system.

The irrational thoughts in her head told her that Mulder wasn’t answering the phone because he was heartbroken over losing Samantha. The irrational thoughts told her that Mulder was regretting, now, the fact that he’d even taken Samantha to the bridge to trade her for Scully. A relationship of such a relatively short amount of time probably seemed entirely incomparable to a sister who had been found after so many years of diligent searching.

Mulder had dedicated his life to finding Samantha. He’d finally found her and, because of Scully, he’d lost her. He probably wanted nothing more to do with Scully—at least that’s what the voice said.

Scully blew out her breath and wiped at the corner of her eyes. There were tears already beginning to run freely there. She laughed at herself as she abandoned the last piece of the bagel that she no longer wanted and got up from her chair to get tissue.

“I know it’s not true,” she said, speaking to the alien, again, since they were alone in the basement office and she didn’t feel entirely ridiculous doing so. “I know Mulder—your Daddy—I know he doesn’t hate me. He might—blame me for this, but…he doesn’t hate me. And he absolutely doesn’t hate you.” She calmed herself with a few purposeful breaths. “This is just—hormonal overreaction. I know it is. It doesn’t even feel real. I know that’s not what’s going on. He might feel bad about losing Samantha, but…I also know that wasn’t Samantha.”

Unknown Origin.

Those two words had played a much larger role in Scully’s day than she’d ever expected they would.

The body that had allegedly belonged to Samantha Mulder had disintegrated, leaving behind a green liquid and, essentially, nothing more. Scully had sent the liquid off to be analyzed by three different labs—maybe because of her hormonal overreaction, and maybe because she simply felt that she owed it to Mulder to find out what had happened to his sister. She’d even dedicated herself to sitting in a lab with a sample of the liquid and breaking it down as much as she was capable of doing.

All the results had come back the same, and what she’d found made her uncertain and uneasy. Scully always liked being able to explain things and, much like the man who had attacked her—appearing to her, first, as Mulder, only to appear to her another way later— this was something she couldn’t explain. At least, not entirely.

The liquid had many of the components of blood, but it had many components that were simply of unknown origin. It was impossible to say exactly what the liquid was, why it behaved that way, or what had made it consume the entire body like acid.

What was certain was that there was absolutely no chance that the body—the one that had appeared to be Samantha Mulder—had ever belonged to Samantha Mulder. Scully didn’t know who—or even what, honestly—had been posing as Samantha, but she knew that Mulder had not found his sister. Not his real sister.

She also knew that there was something in the blood—a retrovirus—that seemed to die when exposed to cold temperatures. It tied back to something that had been found in a previous body she’d examined—that of Agent Weiss. The two were connected, though Scully had no idea how.

Mulder needed to know that he was chasing someone—or something—but it wasn’t Samantha. He needed to know that the Samantha that he thought he’d lost, again, was only someone masquerading as Samantha.

Scully sat down again, picked up her phone, and called Mulder once more. She chewed through the bagel she’d temporarily rejected, determined to eat it for the good of the alien if for no other reason. When Mulder didn’t answer, again, Scully’s brain stopped overreacting. Instead of feeding her the explanation that he’d turned against her, it switched gears to suggest that he was either busy or had bad service.

Scully turned to her email, determined to give Mulder another minute or two, and was surprised to see that she’d missed an email from him.

She was even more surprised when she opened the email and read his words.

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Scully understood what Mulder must have felt in the days when she’d been gone—kidnapped and lost to the world.

She’d wondered if she’d ever find him. He’d told her not to follow him in the email. He’d said he couldn’t jeopardize her life—but he was surely willing to jeopardize his own. She’d gone through Skinner and the mystery man who sometimes informed Mulder about things that nobody seemed to know. She’d been afraid that she’d never get answers, but she finally got enough to get her to Alaska.

She understood what Mulder must have felt in the hours when her family had honored her wishes to remove her life support and let her slip away. She understood what he must have felt practically waiting for machines to tell him that she was going away—this time for good.

At least Scully hadn’t had to simply sit and wait to see what would happen. She hadn’t had to stand back, idly, and wait to see if Mulder would live or die. She had at least been able to fight, in some way, to keep him alive. She wasn’t forced into passivity.

In actuality, Scully had been the reason that Mulder had lived at all. When she’d gotten there, Mulder was dying from hypothermia and hyper viscosity syndrome. If the whole process of finding out where Mulder was, and getting out there to him, had taken her even half an hour longer, she would have arrived only to find him gone. The people there didn’t know about the retrovirus. They didn’t know about the cold. They didn’t know how to treat him or save his life.

But Scully did.

Scully understood what Mulder must have felt in the hours he spent at her bedside, wondering if she would ever wake up or if he would simply be left with nothing but a shell of her former self as a physical reminder of who she had been.

Even though Scully knew very little about everything that was going on, and everything that had affected Mulder, Scully believed he would wake up. Her belief, however, was little more than belief of the type that Mulder had taught her was important. It was all a hunch. Faith. The need to believe.

It wasn’t normally Scully’s chosen way of dealing with things, but she couldn’t choose anything else—to choose anything else would be to give up on Mulder, and she couldn’t bear that.

Between her fingers, Scully rubbed the gold cross that she wore almost all the time. The feeling of touching it kept her grounded. It kept her mind from drifting too far into the darkness that her hormonal overreaction presented to her every time she let her mind wander. She reminded herself that Mulder had kept the cross the whole time that she’d been gone. He’d kept it the whole time she’d been in the coma. He’d returned it to her, while she was recovering, and he’d told her that he’d practically worn the little gold cross away to nothing from touching it so much.

Mulder’s devotion to the cross hadn’t been so much about faith in the religion that the cross represented, but rather it had been faith in the fact that Scully would simply be OK because that’s what he needed.

Scully needed Mulder to be OK more than she could remember needing anything before.

She didn’t know how many hours had passed. She didn’t know exactly how long it had been since everything in their lives had seemed normal—or at least as normal as their lives ever seemed to be. She didn’t know how long she’d spent without sleeping or eating—simply keeping vigil over Mulder’s bed in the small, remote Alaskan hospital.

All she knew was that it had been entirely too long, and she missed Mulder with an ache that burned throughout her body.

She was almost ashamed of herself that she was so lost in her contemplation of how desperately she needed Mulder to return to her, that she didn’t hear him wake. She didn’t hear him quietly turn his head toward her. She didn’t see the subtle movements as she contemplated the little gold cross.

“Scully,” he said, his voice rasping out.

Scully’s heart began to pound in excitement before her mind fully had the opportunity to understand what was going on. She sucked in a breath and gave silent thanks to God if, in fact, her contemplation of the cross and her desperate need had been what had helped Mulder come through this.

“Hey,” she said quietly. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I got a bad case of freezer burn,” Mulder offered. Scully smiled to herself, happy to hear him joking around. “How’d you find me?”

“After that email you sent me?” Scully responded. “Mulder—I…you wouldn’t believe all I had to go through…all Skinner had to go through…to find out where you were. Thanks for just ditching me.”

He smiled at her.

“I had to,” Mulder said. “Scully—I couldn’t let you follow me. It was dangerous. I couldn’t let you risk your life like that. I couldn’t let you risk…” He hesitated, clearly aware that they were still not discussing their little one too openly. “I couldn’t let you risk everything.”

“But you were willing to risk your life,” Scully said. “You were willing to leave me—to leave everything.”

Mulder reached his hand out, and Scully took it. She squeezed his fingers.

“I had to find out what I could,” Mulder said. “I had to find out about Samantha.”

“Then I guess you found out that it wasn’t Samantha,” Scully said.

“No,” he said. “It wasn’t. But everything I did find out restored my faith that she’s out there. It gave me the faith to keep looking for her. Scully—I know she’s out there. I know I’m going to find her.”

Scully squeezed his hand.

“I hope you do,” she said. “But—I don’t want to lose you just to find her.”

Instead of looking bothered by the words, Mulder looked pleased. He smiled softly.

“You found me, didn’t you? Although—we’ve got to talk about the fact that I specifically asked you not to follow me, because it was dangerous, and…here you are.”

“We’ll talk more about it when you’ve eaten something and rested. You need to recover, but…now that I know my treatment plan didn’t go completely awry, you should be able to do that anywhere.”

“You did this?” Mulder asked.

“Someone had to save you,” Scully said with a smile.

“So, when do we leave?” Mulder asked.

“Now that you’re awake—maybe in the morning,” Scully said. “We can fly back home. I can take care of you.”

“Home?” Mulder said with a smile. “Does that mean you still love me?”

Scully leaned and kissed him. He was tired, and she could tell that. He was slow to respond to the kiss, but there was nothing personal there.

“I love you,” she assured him. “But don’t think this means we’re not going to talk about you ditching me and running off.”

“I’m looking forward to it,” Mulder assured her.

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AN: This is the end of this little story/reimagining/piece.

The next little story I do will be a short little domestic piece where Mulder gets some good nurturing.

I hope you enjoyed this little piece! Please don’t forget to let me know what you think! I always appreciate hearing from you and knowing that you’re reading!