Title: 'Unsettled'
Author: Jori
E-Mail: damienma@adelphia.net
Summary: Mulder feels as if he's failing.
Category: SA
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Per Manum, DeadAlive, Three Words
Disclaimers: Not mine. They belong to 1013 and FOX.
Archive: Yes
Author's Notes: Flitting on the edge of depression myself, I thought I'd
write something depressing. But it's not that depressing. Just a short
something I felt like writing before heading back into my little bubble
where I can pretend most of this is not happening. The title says
exactly how I felt after watching Three Words.

My Fan Fic: http://www.netroenterprises.com/stories/

***************

Words.

And more words.

They pass before my eyes in my desperate attempt to catch up but it's a
losing battle. I should have known that I wouldn't be able to do it.

Those months are something I can never reclaim, no matter how many
newspapers and files I read.

These words aren't going to fill the damn void, anyway. They just tell
part of the story. Just what people want me to know. There's so much
I'll never know. I wasn't here and I'll never know.

So I stare at the words a little longer, hoping to make some sense of it
all. Hoping to find the answers to all these questions.

Hoping.

And failing.

**************

"Why did you keep paying for my apartment after I was dead?" I ask and
Scully doesn't answer right away. She just sighs and looks out the
passenger side window. The seat belt is pulled tight around her
expanding belly and her hands rest right on top, tucked there at the
uppermost curve of baby and right beneath her rounded breasts.

"I don't know."

That's her answer? She wrote the check out to my landlord for all those
months without ever thinking about why she was doing it? I don't believe
that.

"I would've have gotten rid of it. It was an unnecessary expense.
Instead, you kept the utilities all turned on and paid the rent . . ."

"I liked to sleep there, okay?" she blurts out without turning towards
me. Her hand moves from her belly up to her forehead and she rubs her
temples.

"Okay."

"That's all."

"Okay."

"Besides, it was easier to pay for it than to clean out all your crap,"
she says and I almost smile.

But I fail at that, too.

***************

"What did you do with the fish?" I ask and Scully squints at me.

"Huh?"

"The fish that died. What did you do with it?" I ask and now she shakes
her head, puzzled as to why I would even ask.

"I flushed it."

"Oh."

"Why?" she asks.

"What if it wasn't really dead?" I ask, staring at her. She looks away,
towards my windows, before looking back at me.

"Then I'm sure it's swimming around happily somewhere," she lies. I know
when she's lying. I remember that much at least. She's bad at lying.

"You don't think that at all."

"No, I don't. But I'm sure the fish was dead, Mulder. The other fish had
started to do unspeakable things to it," she says, looking from me to
the bubbling fish tank.

"Are you saying my fish are cannibals?"

"I'm merely suggesting your fish are unkind to the dead."

"If it even was dead . . ."

"Mulder," she says, sounding agitated. She does this thing now, when she
gets upset. She tries to cross her arms only to discover there's no
place for them to go so she ends up kind of flapping like a bird for a
few seconds.

"I know. You're sure it was dead. But you were sure I was dead, too." My
voice is a little cold, a little unsettled. I can't help it. I lost
something and I'm not ready to deal with it yet.

"Sometimes . . ." she says, blinking quickly. Is she going to cry? I
haven't even cried much over all this. What point is there in tears?
Some things are just too big for tears.

"What?"

"Sometimes I'm not sure you're alive yet."

Is she trying to make me feel guilty for something?

If so, she's failing.

***************

"I never thought I'd be paying for my own funeral," I say, going through
the bills that were supposed to be covered by my life insurance. Since
I'm not exactly dead, I now have to pay for them. I find one from a the
cemetery for something else. Heavy equipment and labor fees. "Or my
un-funeral."

"Aren't you still paying off that thing you rented in Antarctica?"
Scully asks, leaning over my shoulder to look at what I'm doing.
Something round and firm brushes against me and I jerk away. That
doesn't escape her notice.

"You never asked to. . ." she says but I don't turn around to look at
her. I'm sure her hand is resting on it right now, like it usually is.

"I didn't think women liked that."

"Like with most things, it depends on who asks," she says.

I just can't bring myself to do it. To ask or to touch. I know she wants
me to, but I can't. She sighs and walks away.

One more failure on my part.

***************

"You aren't going to find it," she says and I look up from the file I
was poring over.

"Find what?"

"The answers. I still haven't found them. Why. How. Who. I asked for
years and still, I have no answers," she says, leaning back funny to sit
in the chair across from me. Her hands hold onto the arms of the chair
as she settle back into it, sighing when she's finally down.

I stare at her, and she stares right back at me. As round as her belly
is, one would think her face would show some sign of this pregnancy. It
doesn't. Not even in the slightest. Her fingers are not swollen. Neither
are her ankles or feet. From the backside, no one would ever suspect
that she's carrying a child. Her child. Someone's child.

"The answers have to be here. Somewhere," I say, motioning to the pile
of paper in front of me.

"Who says?"

"Excuse me?"

"Who says the answers are going to be there? Who says there are any
answers at all?" she asks, her voice sharp.

"Scully . . . you've always looked for the answers . . ."

"I got my answer the day I got you back."

We both continue to stare at each other.

"I didn't get any answers."

"Then maybe there aren't any," she says, pushing her body out of the
chair. She waddles out the office door, closing it behind her.

I put my head down on my desk and cry for the first time in weeks.

I'm failing her when she needs me most.

***************

"Mulder, what do you need?" Scully asks. With a nod of my head, I motion
for her to open the door and she does, stepping back and allowing me to
pass.

It's late and she's in a bathrobe, only it doesn't quite fit completely
around her stomach. She is self conscience of this and tries to pull it
closed. It won't go, so she just crosses her arms over herself, tucking
them neatly under her breasts.

"I don't know what I need."

She sits down on her couch, doing that pregnant bending backwards thing
again, and her pajamas ride up her belly and her robe falls open. She
sighs, resting her hands on that baby ledge.

"I thought . . . I don't know what I thought. All I know is I wanted to
find you alive so badly so I could tell you about this," she says,
rubbing her hand down the front of her.

"What about it?" I ask and she looks taken aback. "You've been waiting
all this time for me to ask. What about it? What am I supposed to ask?"

"I  . . . I don't . . ."

"When is your due date?"

"I . . .  the end of next month."

I count backwards in my head. How could I not? I might have lost some
time, but I didn't lose my understanding of it. "Oh."

"What did you think?" she asks, narrowing her eyes at me.

"You said it didn't work."

"You said 'never give up on a miracle.' I never did. On two accounts.
This," she says, placing both hands firmly on her stomach. "And you."

"I gave up on me," I say and she shakes her head slowly.

"Give yourself time. You hardly gave yourself any time."

"I'm afraid."

She pats the cushion next to her but I hesitate. Touch has been hard.
Uncomfortable. After being someplace so dark and cold for so long, I'm
not sure I'm ready for it.

"Afraid of what?" she asks.

"That it will happen again."

"I will find you again," she says, matter-of-factly.

"You'll have other things to worry about," I say, nodding at her
midsection.

"Then *we* will find you."

I finally sit next to her, both of us still. Words aren't exactly
necessary at this point. Maybe they haven't been for a while. The
answers cannot be found in mere words. And they probably won't come with
time.

"Can I?" I ask, and the emotions that cross her face can't be described
by any word I can think of.

"Yes, you can," she says, taking my hand and placing it on her stomach,
up high, near her breasts. Something moves across it and I jerk it away
but she pulls my hand back, smiling. "Mulder, meet your son. Or your
daughter."

I laugh. And cry. Both emotions bubble up at the same time and she does
the same. My hand feels the gentle kick of little feet, the slide of
baby parts moving in quarters quickly growing too small.

At least I didn't fail at this. I didn't fail at what was most
important.

************

The End