Title: The Price of Belief Author: Agent L Classification: Post Ep Rating: G, but please don't let that stop you Spoilers: Conduit (if you haven't seen it, this story will probably not make much sense) Distribution: Archive anywhere, but keep my name and e-mail attached please! Disclaimer: To Chris Carter, David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Fox, and now Robert Patrick: I know they're not mine, and no money, gifts or even chocolate would be expected or accepted for this. Summary: Scully's thoughts after the case. Feedback: Yes, please! LHoward388@aol.com. The Price of Belief He was uncharacteristically silent on the way back to Washington. The fact that he let her drive them to the airport would have been reason enough for her to suspect something was wrong. But when he closed his eyes before the plane even took off, effectively shutting off any attempt at conversation, Scully knew the case had affected -- and still affected Agent Mulder deeply. Normally he was energized when they closed a case, engaging her in discussions and recaps, reliving the glory of the capture -- one more gold star on Spooky's record to disprove his detractors at the Bureau. Usually when he slept on the plane, it was on the way *to* a case, and she sometimes got the feeling that was when he worked out all the details, leaving them to simply follow through with the legwork. She was the one more likely to be exhausted on the way home, from not only physically chasing after him, taking two strides for every one of his, but from leaping across those mental chasms after him while he followed his latest theory. From the outset, however, this case had been different. First, Blevins had warned her about Mulder allowing his personal obsessions to interfere with his professional judgment. Then the case had developed eerie parallels to Mulder's own past, and finally Scully had confronted Mulder, sending a rift through their newly formed partnership. She sensed he had forgiven her for that, however. No doubt he had faced dozens of other people over the years telling him the same thing: Stop chasing after your sister. She had been mistaken to try to stop him, she knew that now. His dogged persistence had led them to Ruby long after Scully would have been on a plane back to Washington. His personal involvement had solved this case. In the short months she had known him, Mulder had turned her world upside down -- had mocked her ideas, challenged her complacency, showed her extreme possibilities and dared her to believe. At first she knew he was testing her, perhaps hoping she would run back to Blevins and beg to be reassigned, but the Scullys were made of sterner stuff. This job was her start up the ladder, a way to break through the FBI's glass ceiling. But it would be easier to debunk Agent Mulder's work if he didn't take it so damned personally -- because she was beginning to take it personally as well. Not because she believed in UFOs and alien abduction, but because she believed in Mulder. The tenderness with which he had touched Ruby's photo, thinking he was unobserved -- his gentleness with Kevin, the vulnerability she'd seen in his eyes when he spoke of his sister made her feel like she was kicking a puppy when she wrote her field report. She'd torn up three drafts now, unable to find a happy medium between the crackpot and the wounded hero. He roused himself as the plane descended and she tried not to notice the shadows under his eyes. She could not afford to feel sorry for this man. They spoke as necessary on the way through the airport, mostly monosyllables, until they reached his car, where he stopped and stared at her across the roof with an unnerving intensity. "Scully. Would you mind if I stopped by my apartment before I take you home? I - I've got something I'd like you to have." She nodded and they got in the car. He had driven for about 10 minutes when he began to talk. "I told Kevin she wasn't coming back, Scully. I didn't believe she'd come back." Scully didn't know what to say, or if she was even supposed to respond. *She* certainly had given up on Ruby, and had been as shocked as anyone when the girl had reappeared in the woods. And she still hadn't come up with a rational explanation for what Mulder insisted were symptoms of prolonged weightlessness in Ruby's medical charts. "I was so envious of them in that hospital room." His murmur penetrated her consciousness. "The happy little family, reunited. Why couldn't --" He broke off abruptly and shook his head. "You were right, Scully, I'm still chasing after my sister." She wished she could take back her words, spoken in a moment of frustration and exhaustion from following him around, being confronted with evidence of things she didn't want to believe existed. "Mulder, if one of my brothers or my sister had disappeared, I'd spend the rest of my life trying to find out what happened to them. Your persistence helped solve this case." "Solved? Is that what you're going to write in your report? I suppose you'll use Darlene's statement that Ruby spent the last month on the back of a Harley and conveniently ignore the evidence. Don't you want to look any further? Don't you want to hear Ruby's side?" Her sympathy rapidly faded at his combative tone. "Ruby doesn't remember what happened to her. And Darlene is right. If she starts talking about being abducted by aliens, she'll sound as crazy as --" "Me?" "..as one of those supermarket tabloids." A grunt told her he was not convinced she was being truthful, and in fact, she wasn't. Not that she had been planning to say it out loud, but his rambling about aliens and conspiracies did him no favors at the Bureau, and she was afraid people would see her as guilty by association. She had hoped to rein him in, to provide a scientific counterpoint to his wild theories and convince him to play by the rules, but Mulder had thrown the rulebook out a long time ago. The problem was, she couldn't prove or disprove some of the events they had witnessed. Her reports had gaps the size of the Grand Canyon and Section Chief Blevins was not pleased with her progress -- or lack thereof. They arrived at his apartment and she waited in the car while he went in. She wondered what his home looked like. Probably similar to the office, with bizarre photos and articles posted on the walls. Maybe he even had another "I Want to Believe" poster in his bedroom. No matter. He'd probably never invite her up to the inner sanctum at the rate this partnership was going. He came back to the car with a paper bag. "A bit late for lunch, isn't it?" she joked, rewarded by a faint smile as he pulled away from the curb. "Just a little background for you, Agent Scully." They were tapes of his hypnotic regression session. That Saturday morning, as the birds sang outside and the sun streamed in her window, Scully listened to a man recount the events that had destroyed his childhood and family. His voice at first was detached, almost blandly explaining to the therapist that he couldn't move. Gradually the emotion crept in behind the words -- the boy still trapped inside the man, unable to move past the one moment in time that had changed his life. *If there was an abduction, it's likely that Kevin was touched in some way.* Had Mulder been thinking of his own experience when he'd said that? Scully supposed she should be grateful he wasn't sitting in a padded room somewhere taking alien dictation from the TV. In many ways, his obsession with the supernatural intrigued her, forced her to take a new look at phenomena she would normally dismiss out of hand. But on a deeper level, Mulder made her see things and consider things that left her uncomfortable and sometimes shaken. If his sister's abduction had touched him in some way, it had now touched her as well. Scully felt like a voyeur, a spectator who stops to stare at a gruesome accident, as she listened to the tapes. She didn't want to look at Mulder and see the 12-year-old boy, still searching for his sister, desperate to bring her home, to set things right again. She had to maintain her objectivity, file her field reports, and get the hell away from him as soon as she could. If she lost her perspective and allowed her heart to overrule her head, she'd be stuck in the basement forever. He wanted to believe. She couldn't afford to. The End Did you like an early look back? LHoward388@aol.com