From: Mystic <nalvarez@delphi.com>
Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative
Subject: NEW: Elevator [1/1]
Date: Thu, 9 May 96 19:35:59 -0500


Hi people!  Well, The X-Files and it's characters are the property
of Chris Carter, 1013 and FOX.  Have fun reading and please tell us
what you think about this joint project.  :)
**********
Elevator
by Mystic and Megan
Nalvarez@delphi.com & zzcf89a@prodigy.com
**********
        Scully walked into the open elevator with a sigh of relief.
It had been a hard day with over fifteen files that needed looking
into, ten of which weren't X-files.  She'd left Mulder on the top
floor of the building, in the library, scanning an autopsy report
of what appeared to be a human who'd had her entire skeletal system
removed through the base of her neck.  The only thing that had been
left was the skull.
        It sent a chill down her spine.
        She closed her eyes as the door slowly closed her away from
the rest of the world.  The building would be closing in five
minutes, so it was quiet in the elevator, just as it would be quiet
when she threw herself into her bed and slept in just twenty
minutes.  Suddenly there was a loud slam which startled her into
full consciousness.
        She looked at the hand that had stopped the elevator doors
from closing with disgust.  It meant that she couldn't relax in the
elevator, she had to be 'FBI Special Agent Dana Scully'.  Then the
face followed the hand and she almost smacked it.
        It was Mulder.
        He was grinning like an idiot at her standing there pissed
off.  She sometimes wondered if he knew that he was making her mad
with the things that he did.  He stepped into the elevator and
stood next to her.  He held a briefcase in his hand, probably full
of X-files that he would take home to go over, alone.  She
sometimes wondered why he didn't just ask her to go to his house,
as a friend, just so he wouldn't be so lonely all the time.
        "So, Scully, had a fun day?"  He looked at her exhausted
expression and smiled wider.  He knew he was pissing her off just
by that look on her face.  She always let him know exactlhhhy what
she felt with a look, whether she'd intended to or not.  She looked
at her feet and sighed.
        "Yes Mulder, it's been ecstatic.  I'm overjoyedhh."  She
told him sarcastically.  "It's been such a great day, one of the
best I've had in years."
        "You don't have to take it that far, I was just kidding."
        "I know Mulder, I'm sorry."  She brought her hand up to her
head and rubbed it.
        Another headache, another cold.
        She wondered if she had more Aspirin, Ibuprofen and Sudafed
in her drawers than Mulder did.  It had to be an almost equal
number.
        "You OK?"
        "I'm fine, I just want to go home and throw myself into a
hot tub and soak for hours."
        She looked up at him.  He was off in space.  She wondered
what he was thinking about, but upon remembering what she had just
told him, she thought it better she didn't know what he was
thinking.
        "Well, as soon as this sucker hits the bottom floor you'll
be five minutes closer to doing that."
        "Did you say five minutes?"
        "Yeah, why?"
        "You don't suppose they do a building check before they shut
it down?"  She glanced at her watch.  The building would close in
two minutes.  Mulder saw what she was saying and pressed the button
for the garage floor.  They watched the numbers on the wall light
up one by one.  It was taking forever.  The number 3 lit up and
then the elevator stopped.  The lights all shut off, except one,
the emergency light.
        They stared at the doors.
        She looked at him and said, "You don't supposed one more
person is going to get on, I mean, maybe there's someone else in
the building who forgot about the time and they're going home now."
        "Scully, I don't think so."  He looked down at her.  "I
think we're stuck here."
        Scully pouted and Mulder thought she looked as if she were
going to stomp her foot and throw a tantrum.  She dropped her
suitcase and slammed the button for the garage.  She then picked up
the emergency telephone and listened, then looked up at him with a
face that made him want to cry.
        "It's off."
        "They can't just shut down the whole building!"  He took the
phone from her hand.
        "Mulder, you don't expect someone to be there now, do you?"
        She put her hands on her waist and stared at him staring at
the phone.  He slammed it back into its cradle and the looked up
at the controls of the elevator.  He reached into his pocket and
pulled out lint.
        "Mulder, are you going to make something out of that?"
        "No."  Then he twisted his face with understanding, and it
turned to a silly grin, "Well, if McGuyver was here, he might."
She smiled.  "I was looking for my cell phone.  I left it in the
office, do you have yours with you?"
        "No, the battery ran out yesterday so I bought a new battery
at lunch, but the phone is at home."
        "Isn't this great."  He sat on the floor.
        She sat down next to him, grateful that she'd decided
against wearing a skirt that day.  "When does the building open in
the morning?"
        "I don't know, four, five in the morning?"  He glanced at
his watch.  "At least seven hours away."
        "What are we going to do now?"
        "Wait, I guess."
**********
Ten minutes later

        Mulder stood trying to pry the door open while Scully held
the phone in hear ear hoping that it would spontaneously turn on
and there would be someone on the line.  Mulder slumped to the
floor in defeat.  They were going to be stuck in that damned
elevator for the night.  He looked at Scully with the phone pressed
against her ear and smiled, she never lost hope.  He loved that.
She yawned and her eyes closed.
        "Scully, give it up.  The security guard is probably
sleeping at the front desk, in a pile of doughnuts, having great
dreams about vacationing in Hawaii."
        "Aren't there video camera's in the elevator?"
        "No."
        "We have camera's in people's offices, we have camera's in
the halls, and pointing at every window and door, but we don't have
one in the elevator."
        "I guess when they installed the camera's they didn't figure
on two agents loosing track of time and getting stuck in the
elevator."
        "I want to go home."  She put the phone back.
        "I know, I do too, but we're stuck here."  They sat Indian
style in front of one another, looking at each other's shoes.
"Makes me want to play patty cake."
        Scully laughed.  "Twenty questions?"
        "What?"  He looked up at her.
        "Do you want to play twenty questions?"
        "You mean there are things that I *don't* know about you?"
        "Just like there are things *I* don't know about you."
        "So who goes first?"
        "You go first."  Scully volunteered.
        "OK."  He thought a minute.  "What's your favorite color?"
        "Mulder, that is so lame."  She stopped a second and thought
of all the sick things he might want to ask instead and answered,
"Red.  And yours?"
        "Black."  He thought.  "Do you take a shower, or a bath?"
        "What kind of question is that?"
        "Answer Scully."
        "If I'm tired, I take a bath.  If I'm in a hurry, I usually
a shower, and you?"
        "Same as you.  Is this why you let me go first, so I would
have to think up the questions?"
        "Yes."
        "Well, it's not fair."
        "Next question Mulder."
        He sighed.  "Have you ever had any weird dreams about anyone
in the office?"
        She thought a moment about this question, then decided the
only person who could be embarrassed by this answer was Mulder.
"Well, I had a dream a while back about you."  His eyes went wide,
he figured she wouldn't answer the question.  "You were wearing all
black and it was a leotard.  You were tap dancing, with a little
black hat in your hand, and a wand, on top of a table."
        He face turned red.  He looked at the floor and smiled.
"Your turn Scully."
        "Have you ever had any dreams about anyone in the office?"
        "Scully, I just asked you that, come up with another
question."  He looked up at her, she was smiling.
        "I promise, this is the last time."
        "Scully, I can't..."
        "What, are you chicken?"
        He smiled and inched closer to her.  She inched into a wall
and watched his feet touch hers.  "You want to know the truth?"
She nodded.  "I barely ever have a dream about anything except the
night my sister was taken.  But I do have one reoccurring dream,
about you, you're spanking me and I'm covered in chocolate fudge.
And here's the kicker, we're both naked."
        "Mulder,"  Her voice cracked, "I think you've watched one
too many of those porn videos."
        "And this from the woman who envisions me tap dancing on a
table in black tights."
        "Look, next question, a normal one this time."
        "OK."  He thought, he'd had ten more sickening questions for
her, but he couldn't think of anything clean.  "What's the most
embarrassing thing that's ever happened to you?"
        Her eyebrows creased.  "That would have to be the time that
I got caught on the flag pole."
        "Flag pole?"  He repeated.
        "I was playing with my brothers at the Navy base that my
father was assigned to at the time, I was eight.  We were all
standing around the flag pole.  They wanted to see how high they
could hoist me and I wanted to see the whole base, it was kind of
killing two birds with one stone.  They strapped me to the thing
and they lifted me up ten feet before another naval officer saw
them and screamed.  My brothers hooked me there and left me.  The
officer helped me down and took me home.  We were all punished."
        He laughed and she smacked his arm.  "I'd love to meet your
brothers, Scully."
        "No you wouldn't."  She shook her head thinking of the
things that him and her brothers would do if they ever met, they
were so similar in their playful ways.  "OK, Mulder, what's the
cruelest thing you've ever done to your sister?"
        "I spilled corn flakes on her brand new dress because she
was being a pain in the ass that morning."  He paused a moment.
"This is such a silly game."
        "Would you like to pick a new one?"
        "Truth or dare."
        "I don't think so, we'll stick to safe things."
        "Safe?"
        "I know what'll happen if I play truth or dare with you.
So, I'm not going to play that, I think we'll stick with this
game."
        "Fine."  He rolled his eyes.  "Who's turn is it now?"
        "Um, yours."
        He smiled.  "Have you ever done anything that your parents
didn't approve of?"
        "Actually, me being here, they didn't want me to join the
FBI, I guess they knew about you."  She smiled at him.  "So, what
happened with you and Phoebe?"
        "She and I met each other in England, but while I was really
in love with her, she was only using me for her psycho games.  I
decided I didn't want to play anymore and as soon as I came to the
US I severed all ties."  Then he quickly added, "What happened with
you and Jack Willis?"
        "I met him at the academy and he helped me through all the
really hard times.  I guess I fell in love and after spending a
week up in the mountains I decided that this wasn't the guy that I
wanted to be with.  As soon as we got back *I* severed all ties."
        "I guess neither of us has any luck with our partners."
        "Well, I haven't killed you, yet."
        "But you tried."
        "I did not."  She leaned on one hand behind her.
        "You shot me in the arm."  He held it as if it were still in
pain and gave her The pout.
        "I shot you because you... Jeez, I really don't want to talk
about that anymore.  It's done and over with."  She paused.  "My
turn.  Why didn't you shoot me when we were with Pusher?  I mean,
you had the chance."
        "I couldn't."
        "That's not an answer."
        "I don't know how to explain it.  Somehow your presence,
your voice, it overpowered everything he was saying."  The both
stayed quiet for a moment.
        "What time is it?"  She asked.
        "11:47."
        "Damn, I want to get out of here!"  She looked at the doors
hoping that they would spontaneously open and they could leave this
extremely awkward situation.
        "It's my turn, Scully."
        "You really like this don't you?"
        "What I like is wasting time so that morning comes sooner.
It's my turn to ask a question."  She waved her arms, 'Go ahead.'
He thought a moment.  "When you first saw me, what did you think of
me?"
        "Well, that first time I had seen you the only prior
knowledge I had of you was that you were a maverick agent whose
nickname was Spooky.  I thought you were going to be a kidder,
always making jokes, always spitting out odd theories, I can see I
wasn't to far off.  Except..."
        "Except what?"  He sat up eagerly.
        "No, that's another question."
        "That's cruel!"  He folded his arms.
        "And it's my turn."  She answered sweetly.  "Did you object
to having me assigned to work with you?
        "I don't remember that I did.  I remember having read your
thesis and liking it and I had made a mental note to tell you if I
ever ran into you.  Then they told me that I was going to get a
partner, and it was you.  I think the only thing I objected to was
my mind thinking that you could only be a spy for them, that you
would eventually help them shut me down."
        "Why did you even read my thesis if it had nothing to do
with what you did?"
        "No, Scully, that's another question.  Now, what was the one
thing you thought wrong about me?"
        "I had told a friend of two in Quantico who I was being
paired up with and the advice they gave me was, 'Be careful with
Spooky, he has a knack for getting women to go out with him and
then he breaks their heart.'  But I don't recall you even asking me
out on a date, so I guess I was wrong in assuming what they said
was true."  Scully said carefully and looked at Mulder.  He was
giving her an odd look, one she didn't think she'd seen before, and
she had thought she'd seen his entire repertoire.  "What?" she
asked.  He shook his head.  "What?" she persisted.
        "Nothing," he said, a little too quickly, as though he was
covering something up and she stared at him, trying to figure out
what it was.  "Just thinking."
        "About...?" she prompted.
        "Nothing.  Really."  He looked at her face.  "Aren't you
going to ask me a question, it's your turn."
        What she really wanted to ask was what that look had
meant, but she couldn't.  It perplexed her when he did things like
that.  Hid things from her.  She shrugged.  She ought to be used to
it by now.  "What did you think of me?" she asked, trying to sound
casual.
        "That you were a spy, Scully, didn't we just go over this?"
he asked crossly.
        She frowned at him.  "What's got you so tense?" she asked.
        Mulder shivered slightly, holding back most of it.  Her
voice always affected him deeply when it got all low and concerned
like that.  His head ached from his temples to his teeth, the kind
of sharp ache that he knew wouldn't stop until he got some sleep.
Or stopped fighting what he felt.  "I'm sick of being in this
elevator," he admitted.
        "Well, sorry," Scully said sarcastically, shifting away from
him.
        "I didn't mean it like that," Mulder said, as close to an
apology as she'd ever heard out of him.  He dropped his head to
massage his forehead with one hand.  "Got any aspirin?"
        "Not on me," she replied, though she wished she did.  "Where
the hell's MacGuyver when we need him?"  Mulder cracked an ironic
smile, just the reaction she'd been hoping for.  "Want to try the
phone again?"
        Mulder rolled his eyes as he picked it up.  "Still dead."
        "Figures."  Scully said.  They stared at each other, then
looked away at the same moment, searching opposite corners of the
elevator with their eyes.  "What time is it?" Scully asked.  He
looked pointedly at the watch on her arm and she stifled a yawn as
she looked at it, feeling stupid for getting caught looking for
something to say.  "After midnight," she said.
        He nodded.  "Maybe we should try to get some sleep."
        She raised an eyebrow at him, several interesting images
coming to mind, all of them involving how small the elevator
was.  Then her eyes closed for a moment as she allowed herself
to realize how tired she really was.  "Maybe you're right."  But
she didn't move.
        Neither did he.
        "Maybe we should ask some more questions," she said
finally.
        "Maybe we should just talk."
        "Oh?" she asked, "What about?"
        He hesitated for a long time before he answered.  The
silence went on for eons.  Scully watched him.  "Us," he said
finally.
        "What about us?" she asked.
        "What you really thought of me when we met," he said and
was instantly aware of how badly the words sounded coming out of
his mouth.  Too late now, he thought.
        Her face brightened with an incredulous, teasing smile.
"So what did I think of you when we met?" she asked.
        "That I was brilliant and sexy."
        "Sexy," said Scully as though she couldn't believe it.  She
thought about it for a second.  "Would you settle for tall, dark
and acerbic?"
        "Tall?" Mulder cried.  "That's the best you can do, is
tall?"
        "I didn't notice it till you got up," Scully argued, trying
to defend herself.  "I suppose next I'm supposed to say that
you went home and compared me to Pamela Anderson," she said,
referring to the artificially enhanced actress.
        "More like a summer's day," Mulder muttered.
        "What was that?" Scully cried, sitting up absolutely
straight.
        "I said, what does that make me, David Hasselhoff?"  Mulder
cringed inside; he should have known Scully wouldn't let him get
away with anything.
        "If the shoe fits..." Scully said.
        "Speaking of shoes," began Mulder, and took Scully's foot in
his hand, pulling her leg out from under her so that he could
contemplate her high heeled shoe.  "What is it with you and these?"
        "I don't know what you're talking about," Scully said
quickly, and tried to regain possession of her foot.
        Mulder held fast, tracing the line of her foot in the shoe
with one finger.  Scully felt her stomach tighten and wondered if
he had any idea of the effect he was having on her.  She ground her
teeth together, fighting it.  "Did you know," Mulder began, "Some
old Russian counts actually used to drink Champagne from ladies'
slippers?"
        "What did the young Russian counts do?" Scully retorted.
        "You have quite a mouth on you," Mulder informed her.
        "Yours isn't so bad yourself," she said, thinking it would
sound like something out of an old Bogart film.  She realized a
little too late that it sounded like something Bacall would say,
and they had been in love.  She tore her eyes away from his lips.
        "Really?" Mulder said, the words barely more than a breath.
He explored her anklebone with his fingers as though it was the
most interesting thing he'd ever seen.
        She jumped and tried the phone again, praying it would be
working.  It wasn't.  Help me, she thought.  "Imagine how the
champagne must have tasted," she said, latching on to the first
thing that came into her mind.
        "Imagine," Mulder echoed and met her eyes with a dark,
playful look.  Her heart stopped as she realized what he was going
to do, her eyes going wide.
        "No," she said.
        "What?" he asked, his voice silky as he grinned at her
cockily.  She didn't answer.  "What did you think I was going to
do?" he challenged.
        "I don't know," she lied, "I think being in this elevator
has made you insane."
        "What would you do if you were insane?" Mulder asked her.
        "Are we playing again?"
        "I really want to know," he said, and took his hand off of
her foot.  She didn't move it.  "What would you do if you were
stuck in this elevator-"
        "I am stuck in this elevator," she reminded him.  Ten more
minutes of this, she thought, and I will go insane.
        "And you had my reputation for being crazy -"
        She interrupted his morose words, trying to be clever.
"Crazy like a fox, you're trying to say?" she smirked.
        He drew in a harsh breath and she saw instantly that she'd
hurt him.  He looked down and she searched for the words to
apologize, but there were none that would not make things worse.
"Maybe you're right," he said finally, stiff.  "Maybe we should get
some sleep."  With that, he put his head down on the carpeted
floor, drawing his knees up. He didn't close his eyes right away,
watching her for a long moment with eyes that were innocent and
almost pathetic.  She wanted to touch him but couldn't let herself.
Then he put a hand over his face, blocking out the light.
        Scully watched him, stared at him.  "Mulder," she said, and
he didn't respond.  "Mulder," she said again, louder, climbing up
on her knees, drawing nearer to him.  Darn it, she thought.  "I'm
sorry," she said and put her hand out.
        Before she could touch the hand he was covering his face
with, he moved.  His eyes were dark on hers.  "I don't think you
want to do that," he warned her.
        Her eyebrow went up, rebellious, a little angry that he
didn't care that she'd apologized.  "Why not?" she asked, raising
her chin stubbornly, aloof.  And she deliberately put her hand on
his shoulder.
        "Because I might do this," he said and two seconds later, he
was up on his knees, kissing her, his hands tangled in her hair as
his body pressed hers against the wall.
        The temperature in the elevator seemed to go up a couple
of hundred degrees.
        Scully kissed him back, tilting her head up, asking him for
more, the contact between them pure sexual energy.  The energy
that had flowed between them like electricity from their very first
meeting.
        Mulder forced himself to pull away while he still had some
semblance of control over his raging desires, breathing hard as he
sat back on his heels, watching Scully blink at him, her hair wild
about her face.  She was trying to figure out what was going on.
"Wow," she said and he saw that she was breathing as hard as he
was.
        She didn't say anything else, but she didn't stop looking at
him, either, for so long that he started to feel ashamed.  He knew
he shouldn't have done that.  She was still staring at him, her
mouth hanging open prettily and his head ached worse than ever.
What was he supposed to do now?  Roll over and go to sleep?
        He snickered.  That was a cliche if ever he'd heard one.
        To his surprise, Scully snickered back.  A moment later,
they were both stifling laughter, which soon became loud,
uncontrollable laughter filling the tiny space.  "This is good,"
Scully said between wild giggles, "When was the last time we did
this?"
        "I'm not sure we've ever done that, Scully," Mulder said
and it only made her laugh harder.
        "Are you..."  she was too breathless to speak and her side
ached.  "Are you sure there's no video camera in here?"
        Mulder stopped laughing instantly.  "What are you
suggesting?" he asked.
        "Nuthin'," she said quickly and he swore if this had been a
Western, she would have said, "aw shucks," and traced a line
in the sand with her toe.  "Maybe we should get some sleep," she
said and lay down.
        "You're crazy," Mulder informed her and she only smiled
and squeezed her eyes shut.
        A moment later she bounced back up.  "I'm too hyper
to sleep," she told him.
        "Then don't," Mulder suggested, wishing he'd never put his
hand out to stop the elevator.  There was a couch in the office and
he never would have kissed her.  He might be a lot better off, he
thought.
        She gave him a look like he was no fun and yawned.   A
second later, he yawned in reply.  "If your life were a movie, what
would it be?" she asked, leaning against the wall, more tired than
she cared to admit. She'd realized she should take advantage of
this time to talk to him.  Half the time when they were on a case,
it seemed like they never even spoke to each other.
        "Plan 9 from Outer Space," Mulder replied without a
moment's thought.  "What about you?"
        "I haven't seen that," she said.
        "I meant, what movie."
        She shrugged.  "My life is the same as your life, Mulder.  I
defer to your greater knowledge," she said and then saw the look he
was giving her.  "OK, it was a lame answer," she admitted, but the
look didn't change.  "What?"
        "You really think that your life is the same as my life?" he
asked seriously.
        "How many hours a day do we spend together?" she asked.
"Fifteen?  Twenty?  All the hours we're not sleeping."
        "We could be sleeping now," he said and as they looked at
each other and the silence grew between them, they had to kiss
again. They were powerless not to, moving in to each other like
magnets, drawn together by a strong, unseen force.
        Scully put a hand up to stop it, to push him away, although
at the same time, she was opening her mouth against his.  This is
so right, she thought, then did pull away.  "This is wrong," she
said.
        "It is," Mulder agreed, his eyes never leaving hers.
        "As long as we agree," said Scully and kissed him again.
        "We have to stop," Mulder said a moment later.
        "You're right," Scully said.  A tiny kiss.  "You're
absolutely right."  There was a long pause.  "We'll go to sleep
now, and when we wake up, we'll be out of here."
        "Yes," said Mulder.  "Exactly."  They looked at each other
and separated, each of them pressing as close to opposite walls as
possible, to try to insure that they wouldn't touch accidentally in
the night.
        "I thought you were brilliant and sexy," Scully admitted,
catching him totally off-guard.
        "I didn't think you were anything like Pamela Anderson,"
Mulder said in return, and she laughed.  "I like hearing you laugh.
We should do this more often."
        "What?" asked Scully and there was a long silence.  They
both thought about their kisses and wanted more.  "Get trapped in
an elevator?" she finished.
        "No," said Mulder.  "Laugh."
        "Not a lot to laugh about with the X Files," Scully said,
and remember the case she'd been looking at that afternoon, the
girl with her spine ripped out.  She shivered, suddenly cold.
        "Come over here," Mulder said.
        "Why?"
        Mulder didn't answer, just reached out and pulled her into
his arms, settling her body comfortably against his, one arm draped
around her shoulders.  "Better?" he asked into her hair.  She
nodded.
        It was warm and comfortable, she thought, and not scary at
all, like she'd thought it would be, all the many times she'd
thought of it.   Crazy, she thought, that they had to get trapped
in an elevator to be this close when they spent so much time
together.
        Mulder watched her eyes drift closed and smiled at her
for just a second before closing his own eyes.  Sleep wasn't long
in coming for Mulder that night.

        Manny, the nightwatchman, woke up about two-thirty.  After
he cleared his head from the dream he'd been having about Hawaii,
he realized that the phone in elevator number one was off its hook.
He frowned and went to investigate.  The elevator was stuck between
floors two and three on its way down.  All he had to do was press a
button and a few seconds later, it arrived at the first floor.
        The door slid open.
        "Well, I'll be damned," Manny said, looking into the
elevator.  They both still had all of their clothes on, a fact for
which Manny thanked his lucky star, the mysterious tenth planet,
but they were curled around each other like they were inseparable,
like comfortable lovers, like Chang and Eng the Siamese twins, like
two parts of the same whole.  His arms were around her and her face
was burrowed into his chest, their forms a completed circle.  A
tear came into old Manny's eye.  It was the sweetest thing he'd
ever seen.
        He pressed the door close button on the inside of the
elevator and sent it back up to the space between the second and
third floor. He wouldn't disturb them now, he decided.  Later, when
it was closer to the morning, he'd check on them via the closed
circuit video camera and bring them back down when they were awake.
        He turned around and went back to his little booth, propping
up his feet on the table, cramming a doughnut in his mouth
and picking up his issue of the Midnight Inquisitor,
flipping back to the story about swarms of metal-munching
cockroaches from Mars, a smile still touching his face.  Two
FBI agents falling asleep in a stuck elevator.  Who ever heard of
such a thing?
**********
The end.  Did you like it?  We'd really like to know. :)

Later,
Mystic (Nalvarez@delphi.com) and Megan (zzcf89a@prodigy.com)