From: Andrea Barrett <pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk>
Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2007 19:37:46 +0000 (GMT)
Subject: Six Degrees of Requiem 1
Source: direct

Title:  Six Degrees of Requiem - Part 1

~*~ all roads, all things ~*~

Author:  Andrea Barrett

Disclaimer:  Still not mine.  I've lost hope.

Keywords:  Mulder/Scully Romance

Category:  SRA

Rating:  NC-17 throughout.

Spoilers:  This is the chapter that corresponds with 
all things.  However, there are spoilers all over the place.  
I just can't help myself.

Summary:  From all things to Requiem, the story of an 
ever evolving relationship.

Feedback:  Send all your feedback - lots please - to 
pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

At just after two the rain started.  

It was the thunder that woke her, rumbling through the 
sky.  She was startled at first, not only because it had 
been a nice afternoon earlier, with no signs of an 
impending storm, but also because she was disorientated, 
not quite sure where she was, or why she was sleeping 
while sitting upright.

When the initial confusion disappeared, she became aware 
of the open window, teasing the storm into the apartment, 
scented like spring.  She was not at home, yet she felt as 
though she were, and there's a small amount of comfort 
in the scent of him, permeating from the afghan.  Running 
her fingers over the dark colours of the fabric she 
wondered if he sometimes slept with the blanket, or if 
he'd continued to retreat to his bedroom since acquiring a 
bed.

Pushing the prickly blanket aside, she stood, pulling his 
arm chair across the floor, careful not to make any sound, 
and left it as close to the open window as the furniture in 
the room would allow.  Then, reaching across his cluttered 
desk she pushed the glass panel as far as it would go, 
coaxing more of the still, moist air into his living room.  

The leather creaked beneath her light weight when she sat, 
snagging the blanket with her hand, draping it across her 
knees.  Outside, the thunder rumbled again, making her 
smile.  She had loved storms, especially thunderous ones, 
since she was a child.  Her mother said it was God's way 
of cleansing - since then, she'd always thought the world 
was clean, after a storm.

A new start.  A fresh beginning.

It felt fitting, in a strange sort of way.  Earlier, she'd 
finally been able to relinquish the demons that had 
privately haunted her since medical school.  When she'd 
taken the plunge and admitted the secrets of her past, her 
partner, who she thought would harbour some kind of 
quiet disgust, embraced the truth with open arms and 
accepted that she was young, naïve and attracted, as the 
Smoking Man had once said, to power men.

Drawing her knees to her chest, she thought of how, after 
all their years together, she had predicted his reaction so 
wrong.  Instead of wondering how she could have so 
willing destroyed someone else marriage, he had merely 
shrugged and put it down to her vulnerable age.  

His acceptance endeared her, and encouraged her to 
move on.  A few months earlier, he'd been freed of the 
one thing had held him firmly in his past; Samantha.  Now, 
she too was freed of the one piece of her past that had 
always refused to let go.  

"Penny for them?" she lifted her head, catching just the 
silhouette of him in the bedroom doorway, the walls 
beyond splashed blue from the muted television.  
Narrowing her eyes, hoping to determine his state of 
wakefulness, she turned in the chair, swinging her legs 
over the arm.  "Daniel?" he guessed, pushing himself off 
the doorframe.  She shrugged.  

"Just musing over the past ten years of my life.  And then 
some."  The minutes ticked by, becoming hours.  It wasn't 
such a great big leap between hours and years, she 
decided.  Looking back, it was as if everything went by in 
a blur.  "You're forty next year," she said, meeting his 
gaze when he came close enough to be lit by slanting 
beam of the street lamp outside his open window.  

"Jeez," he hissed as though she'd spoken something 
forbidden, "don't remind me."  Standing at the front of her, 
sandwiched between the desk and the chair, her eye level 
with his thighs, he sighed.  "Thinking about becoming 
forty is something I've been avoiding."  Lifting her eyes 
from the plaid pyjamas he wore, she raked her eyes over 
the contours of his face, the lines of his jaw, the darkened, 
world-weary depths of his eyes, still illuminated by the 
merest glimmer of the outside light.  He looked like a 
black and white portrait - half of his face lit, half shaded 
in dark.  

"You're not old," she soothed, "well, compared to me, 
yes..." his laughter silenced her and she let the sound 
wash over her, sweeping away the sad troubles that had 
bombarded her for the past few days.  She'd been alone, 
while he'd been in England.  But then, she supposed, fate 
wanted it that way.  

"You're catching up, Scully," he replied, folding his arms, 
crossing his legs at the ankles, staring down at her.  
"What are you?  Thirty eight?"  She cleared her throat.

"You know well that I'm only thirty five.  Nice try, though.  
If it soothes your ego..."  Mulder chuckled, reaching out, 
touching her hair.  The slightest gesture made her tremble 
and she pulled an unsteady breath into her lungs, meeting 
his brooding gaze with the same trepidation that she had 
so many times before - for he had the ability to look 
through her, into her soul, and stir her senses unlike 
anyone else ever had before.

"Getting old isn't so bad," he said at last.

"I resent that statement.  I'm not getting old."  His 
fingertips dropped to her chin, stroking along the edge of 
her jaw, his skin calloused from work.  

"We're all getting old, Scully," Mulder replied, his voice a 
whisper.  "It's whether we're happy getting old, or not."  
Scully clutched the blanket with tight fists, wondering over 
his words.

"No one is happy about getting old," she decided, and a 
rumble overhead kept him silent until the clashing 
dispersed completely.

"But we can be happy with everything else, right?"  It 
sounded so simple, when he said it.  As if sadness and 
happiness was a switch.  If only she could trip all the 
switches of unhappiness in her life, and make everything 
alright.  "I'm not unhappy," Mulder added, dropping his 
hand, folding his arms again.  "For the first time in 
perhaps... my living memory... I can say I'm not unhappy."  

"But are you happy?" Scully pressed, leaning back just 
enough to see his lips purse in reflection.  "I didn't think 
so," she added, when he didn't reply.  "Men like you just 
aren't happy.  It's part of your nature to be..."

"You're wrong," he said, pushing back on the desk, sitting 
atop what she supposed was a half finished file.  "I am 
happy.  As happy as I can be.  We're all as happy as we 
can be, aren't we?  Everyone wants something more.  The 
Hindus discourage it, you know," she frowned.

"Happiness?" 

"No, wanting more.  They believe that you'll be forever 
reincarnated, never getting to Heaven unless you learn to 
appreciate what you have.  Karma.  'He who desires 
desirable things and broods upon them will be born 
again'."  Scully blinked.

"A lesson in religion?  Just what I need at half two in the 
morning."  He smiled, the pearly whites of his teeth 
shimmering.  "I also don't want to imagine that I face 
persecution in death just because I wished for more 
money in life."  She sounded huffy, and he laughed.

"Don't worry," he said as a stroke of lightening flashed 
through the sky, illuminating the room in a blast of 
brilliant white.  "I'll put a good word in with God.  Since 
I'm older and I'll be dying first and all that..."  Turning her 
gaze to his fish tank, luminous and blue in the darkness, 
she thought of how unpredictable life was, really.  If 
people died in numerical order, he'd be gone before her.  
But, a cancer that lived beneath the surface of her body, 
in remission and always ready to attack, there was no way 
to be sure she wouldn't be the person putting in a good 
word with God.  "Christ," Mulder whispered, slipping off 
the desk, "I'm sorry, Scully... I never thought..."  She 
waved her hand, silencing his pleading apology.  

"It's fine," she whispered, "if we didn't laugh about death, 
we'd cry, right?"  He nodded, hands clasped between his 
legs, his eyes watching her as the memories of her illness 
settled between them like a blanket of doom.  The rain 
lashed against the glass, just barely missing the window 
sill.  A breeze teased her skin, and she sighed.  
"Happiness is a fickle thing, isn't it?" she decided.  "Here 
one moment and gone the next."  Mulder straightened.

"We're a fucked up pair, really, aren't we?" he said. 

"Yes," Scully agreed, "but a pair, none the less."

"The most fucked up pair in the bureau," he added and 
they both nodded together, silent whilst they 
contemplated this point.  "Yet, as fucked up as you are, 
Scully, I wouldn't trust anyone more."  She smirked, 
watching the UFO at the bottom of his fish-tank as it 
dropped, rose, dropped and rose again.  

"Back at you," she said at last.  "You've never betrayed 
me."

"I never will," he told her, "because you and your 
friendship mean too much.  Even if you wouldn't come 
check out crop circles in England."  In the muted light, she 
saw him push out his lower lip.  

"If you keep wasting money," Scully said, "they'll shut us 
down.  We're due another financial audit, soon."  He 
shrugged, unconcerned with the threat of impending 
auditor-wrath.  It was the same every year, anyway.  
Once a year, each department and their staff went under 
financial review, searching for ways to cut unnecessary 
cost.  The X-Files department and its staff of two would be 
summoned shortly.  "It'll take more than some supersonic 
kids or zombies to convince them to let us work."  Mulder 
blinked, the mention of the zombies automatically 
reminding him of their New Year's kiss.

"Even if they do shut us down, it's only a matter of time 
before someone gets abducted by aliens-"

"Or claims to," she chimed in.

"And then we'll be back in business.  Every year I panic 
that we'll be kicked out of the FBI and every year, it's a 
big waste of time."  He stretched, his bones popping, 
followed by a satisfied groan.  "This year, I'm taking a leaf 
out of the Buddhist book.  Tranquillity, Scully."  Her earlier 
experience in the Buddhist temple came screaming back, 
and she sighed.

"It was the Hindu book a moment ago," she reminded him, 
"what next?"  He rolled his shoulders.

"Variety is the spice of life, Scully.  Do you want some 
tea?"  She shook her head, and outside the storm seemed 
to have settled - aside from the rain and blustery wind, 
the thunder had subsided and the living room was 
ominously quiet.  "Coffee?  Water?  Juice?"  Chuckling, 
Scully stood, stretching too.

"Good night, Mulder," she said.

"You're leaving?" he sounded surprised and maybe even a 
little disappointed.  She shrugged, folding the blanket into 
a neat half and then a quarter, holding the bundle in her 
arms.

"It's late," she said, "and I'm tired.  I should go home... go 
to bed."  Mulder nodded, as if musing.  

"Or you could stay...?"

He could have said so many things in response to that 
statement.  'Alright, see you tomorrow, Scully' or even 
one of his harmless sexual innuendos.  But he didn't.  He 
asked her to stay - and it was the closest thing to a 
physical relationship that they'd ever got, because he 
wouldn't ask her to sleep on the sofa, so the implication 
was perfectly clear.  No innuendo this time.  

"I could..." she replied, dropping the blanket to the chair.  
The only sound for a moment was the wind, the rain and 
the trickling bubbles in his fish tank.  

"Only if you want to," Mulder hurried to add, pushing 
himself away from the desk.  "I'll... I'm... just going to the 
bathroom."  His way of permitting her a moment's privacy 
to gather her thoughts.  

When his bedroom eased shut, she inhaled deeply, the 
scent of the passing storm filling her lungs, fresh and 
clean.  A new beginning, she reminded herself.  Goodbye 
to Daniel and her past guilt.  Goodbye to the naïve woman 
she was.  Nowadays, she was contented with who she was 
and who Mulder was.  So, he'd asked her to stay.  He was 
inviting her to be just a woman.  

She was just a woman and he was just a man.  

In their late thirties, seeking something more than the 
professional maelstrom that had sucked them in, kept 
them bound for the past decade - not all of which was 
together, but still, a decade in total.  It was time to let go, 
she supposed.  There was no need to panic, as Mulder had 
explained. 

Padding, bare foot, she pushed the chair back to its 
original place, smoothing her hands over her skirt before 
trailing her slightly trembling fingers through her hair, 
pressing against her scalp and wondering at how each 
moment had brought her to the exact spot she stood, 
hesitating by his bedroom door, wondering if it was 
enough to be just a woman.  

Hearing the toilet flush, she straightened her spine and 
pushed the door open.  The television was off now, and 
the glow of his bedside lamp cast long dark shadows 
across the room, slanting towards her.  Hearing him turn 
on the faucet, she quickly removed her pantyhose, tossing 
them into the waste paper bin at the bottom of his bed. 

Willing her heart to be still was futile, for standing in 
Mulder's bed room, with the intention of sharing his bed 
was the most paramount event to have happened in her 
personal life in years.  She had imagined how this 
inevitable moment might happen but, when she was on 
the brink, it was impossible to fathom how it had 
happened at all.  

The bathroom door creaked open and he stepped out, his 
hair standing in unruly tufts, a sure sign that he stood had 
been nervously raking his finger through his hair.  It was 
as though there were virginal adolescents, preparing to 
take the plunge into adulthood.  

"You stayed," he whispered as if awed by it.  Scully smiled 
tightly.

"Yeah..." she said, shifting at the bottom of his bed, 
turning her eyes to the ivory walls, the blank television 
screen, the branch that banged against the glass pane 
outside, anything, except looking at him.  "I stayed..." her 
voice dropped, barely audible.

He heard it, though.  "I'm glad.  Do you want a t-shirt?"  
Without waiting on a response, he pulled an old cotton 
shirt from his drawer, pushing the garment into her hands.  
She took a step towards the bathroom door, seeking the 
privacy sanctuary offered to her by the four walls - yet, 
after the first initial step, she paused, turning to face him.  
 
"Thank you," she said, draping the t-shirt over the edge of 
the bed, her fists tightening at the bottom of her sweater.  
She hesitated, her heart pounding inside her throat and 
she was certain the sound of her raucous heartbeat was 
audible, especially when he stood so close, she could feel 
the heat of his body radiate towards her in pulsating 
waves.  

With arms that felt like spaghetti, she pulled the sweater 
over her head, the still air teasing her bared skin, making 
her hair stand on end, prickled with anticipation.  Before 
her, his eyes struggled to remain on her face, drawn 
downward by the teasing glimpse of her breasts, hidden 
from his ravenous gaze by the wispy lace bra she wore.  

"Scully..." he whispered and she supposed he was going to 
say something else.  He didn't however, rendered 
speechless by the voluntary state of nakedness she was in.  

Stepping forward, eradicating the small distance between 
their bodies, she touched him.  A tentative touch that was 
stiff and hardly erotic.  Yet it was more than she'd ever 
given him - speaking volumes, telling a story of greedy 
desire.  

"I was meant to be here," she said, the words raspy and 
breathless.  "All roads, Mulder, all things..."

His arm snaked around her waist, touching the silken skin 
that was exposed to him.  "Yes," he agreed, sinking his 
fingers into her hair, his thumb grazing her jaw and he 
watched as her lips parted in eager response.  She looked 
flawlessly beautiful, her cheeks flushed in the muted lamp 
light.  He admired her bravery in removing her clothes 
before him, encouraging this moment between them - for 
accepting his subtle request for her to stay.  She'd 
embraced his haphazard proposal with the sort of grace 
he'd come to love about her.  No dramatics.  She wasn't 
melodramatic in any form.  And it was for this reason that 
their bodies, joined at the hips, felt so right.

Her hands danced across his arms, over his shoulders and 
down his back, as if mapping the contours of his body.  He 
closed his eyes against her ministrations, willing himself to 
remember every touch she offered him.  His photographic 
memory, he decided, would be a gift, not a curse, in this 
instance.  

Their first kiss as would be lovers was hesitant at first, a 
whispering touch that teased and made her eye lashes 
flutter against her cheeks as she yielded her body to him, 
fighting the urge to ravish him.

"Are you sure about this, Scully?" he asked her, his hands 
pausing over the clasp of her bra.  Her legs felt unsteady, 
his solid length the only thing holding her straight.

"More than anything," she replied with a soft nod, tilting 
her head and pressing her mouth to him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


Title:  Six Degrees of Requiem - Part 2

~*~ The Addiction ~*~

Author:  Andrea Barrett

Disclaimer:  Still not mine.  I've lost hope.

Rating:  NC-17 throughout.

Spoilers:  This is the chapter that corresponds with 
Brand X.  However, there are spoilers all over the place.  
I just can't help myself.

Summary:  From all things to Requiem, the story of an 
ever evolving relationship.

Feedback:  Send all your feedback - lots please - to 
pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

She was a woman, indeed and sometimes, usually on 
Sundays when there was nothing on the television except 
old movies, and she'd slip into the oldest and most 
comfortable pair of pyjamas she owned, eat ice cream and 
imagine herself as the love-struck heroine of the fifties, 
wrapped in a passionate embrace.

Women did those things, when they weren't struggling to 
maintain a professional façade in order to climb the ladder 
of power.  She was no different, and, in recent years, 
she'd come to learn that reality fell far short of the 
fictional kisses.  But now, it was delicate and delicious - 
she barely recognised the sound of her own murmured 
voice as she whispered her approval as his tongue, 
dexterous from years of sunflower seed manoeuvring, 
slipped between her teeth and explored the hot crevices of 
her mouth.

Her spine arched, brushing their hips together like 
magnets, drawn by invisible, powerful force.  She snaked 
her arms around his shoulders, winding her fingers into 
his hair, realising that in this case, her fantasies fell far 
short, because he felt leaner than her mind had predicted, 
his skin smooth and warm.  Her hands curled in his hair, 
tight, grasping fists.  After so many years of wondering 
she was satisfied that he was the perfect specimen of 
masculinity.  

Stiffening her tongue, she stroked along his lips, tasting 
something that she couldn't distinguish - and what she 
would forever catalogue in her mind as 'just Mulder'.  
Uniquely him, she was already addicted to the fleeting 
taste she experienced.  Worse than cocaine, it left her 
greedy for more.  Tilting her head, she urged him closer, 
their mouths pressed together with bruising force.  She 
supposed her lips would hurt in the morning, but it hardly 
mattered.  Like all true addicts, all that she was concerned 
with was getting her next gratifying fix. 

Massaging his tongue with her own, Scully released his 
hair, drawing circles on his on his aching scalp, although 
he didn't complain about the pain she had inflicted upon 
him.  Tracing her fingertips across his spine, still teasingly 
covered by the t-shirt he wore.  She decided to even the 
scales of their nudity, tugging at the worn fabric with 
fingers that were curled like claws.  Taking her initiative 
he broke their kiss long enough to rid himself of the 
cumbersome garment, before sealing their mouths 
together again, breathless and ravenous.  She took the 
opportunity to map the lines of his body, as a sculptress 
might when creating a masterpiece.  He was a 
masterpiece, she thought, rippling muscles that were tight 
beneath her exploration, yet teased and aroused enough 
to flex, his flat, dark nipples hardened, much the same 
way as they were when he showered in tepid water.  She 
remembered, from too many decontamination showers, 
just how his body reacted - he had sensitive skin and she 
intended to find as many ways as she could to arouse it.  

Recalling with striking clarity how she'd caught a glimpse 
of his arousal during their last quarantine.  The image of 
him, like an Adonis, would be forever ingrained in her 
memory.  Perhaps to other women, he wasn't such a 
specimen of perfection.  She knew that he was popular 
among the secretaries, but no one, she guessed, would 
have held his body in such high esteem.  After seven 
years of admiring every line, every muscle, every ridge, 
she knew his body almost as well as her own.  

Stroking his sides, she smothered his soft moans with her 
mouth, pleased that finally, after to-ing and fro-ing, they'd 
made their way out of the gloom of hesitation, and the 
taste of their bravery was intoxicating.  She felt liberated, 
with his flesh moulding itself to the touches of her palms.  

Flicking her earlobe with his tongue, she shuddered, 
fumbling with the tie that held his pyjamas tight.  Her 
wrist brushed his arousal and anticipation raged through 
her veins, like pulses of electricity, she could barely 
contain her excitement and catching a glimpse of her own 
reflection in the mirror, her eyes clearly conveyed this.  
Her pupils, dilated in the soft light, glittered with arousal, 
and her lips, naturally red, were plump and coloured 
similar to rubies, shimmering the same way, too. The 
sight of herself, flustered and excited, aroused her more, 
and she stroked him through his pyjamas.  

His fingers curled around her wrist with a vice-like grip.  
"Don't," he growled, pulling her hand away.  "It's been a 
long damn time, Scully," he warned her, "and right now, I 
don't have much resolve left."  She stepped back, popping 
the button of her skirt and pulling the zipper downward 
with trembling fingers, aware that with each creak of the 
zip, his eyes widened a little more and her heart rate most 
certainly doubled each time she met his lingering gaze.

Her skirt dropped to her ankles, pooling at her feet, 
exposing the flat plane of her stomach, kept firm from 
regular swimming exercises and crunches, the smooth 
skin of her thighs and her legs, slim and shapely - 
complimenting her tiny frame.  The contrast of their 
bodies was vast, yet somehow fitting.  He looked lost, 
mesmerised by her and she realised then that it wasn't 
just she who had spent hours idly fantasising.  The 
attraction had always been mutual.  At least, for a long 
time it had.  

She was so unlike Dana Scully the Federal Agent, now.  
She was a woman entirely, dressed only in her underwear, 
her hands passing over her thighs shyly as he examined 
the curves of her in much the same way she had done 
moments earlier.  She wondered if the reality of her was 
better than his fantasies, or if his penchant for 
pornography had filled his head with unrealistic ideals.

"You're perfect," he whispered, taking her hands in his, 
drawing invisible circles on her skin.  The two words put 
her mind at rest, wiping away any lingering doubts she 
had about what kind of woman she was.  He looked 
enchanted and his expression filled her with confidence.

"Thank you," she replied, meaning it completely.  "Should 
we...?" she asked, her voice trailing off with unspoken 
suggestion.  He blinked, no doubt stunned that she, his 
partner, was standing in front of him, proposing with such 
eloquence that they 'get down to business'.  

"What's the hurry?" he asked, and she opened her mouth 
to reply that her raging desire was the hurry, when the 
branches outside his window clacked nosily against the 
glass, making them both jump.  Heads spinning, the 
watched it scrape against the frame for a long, silent 
moment, their hearts beating with almost audible force.  
"Scully?" Mulder said, shattering her reverie and drawing 
her gaze back to him. "As fucked up as I am, I'd be worse 
if it weren't for you.  You..." she nodded, reaching out to 
stroke the bronzed skin of his forearm.

"Keep you honest?  Yes, I know," she said, her tone filled 
with an odd kind of mirth.  

"Honest, sane, happy... all those things..."  She thought of 
their past and realised that their relationship was 
cemented as if by unspoken agreement.  "This... it's just 
icing on an already wonderful cake."  Their relationship, 
she recalled, was one that had been handled as if it were 
fragile china - he'd been hesitant to accept her equally 
hesitant request to father her baby, simply because he'd 
been afraid that their working partnership and friendship 
would be shattered as a result of such personal 
interaction.  But that was over a year ago, now, and a lot 
changed during those precious seconds, minutes and 
hours.  Somehow, they'd awoken to realise love and sex 
would never work, unless it were together.  A complete 
partnership in everything. 

"It is pretty wonderful," she agreed, no longer self 
conscious about standing before him so exposed.  How 
long had it been since she'd had sex?  Too long, she 
decided, and as a woman, she had unquenched desires 
that ravaged beneath her cool exterior.  She wasn't 
beyond self-gratification and, during the bleakest, most 
depraved times in her life, she had resorted to it.  As a 
young woman, back in medical school and the academy, 
she wasn't short of dates, or sex, if she wanted it.  But 
since Mulder...

Since Mulder everything else became history and she 
didn't want anyone else.  

His fingertips brushed her jaw line, stroking along the 
creamy skin there, over the cheeks that were flushed the 
colour of spring roses - and not from embarrassment 
now, but brazen want.  "I'd like to see you, Mulder," she 
whispered, her raspy request hanging with such respect in 
the air between them, vague, yet painfully clear at the 
same time.  He sucked a breath into his lungs, pulling on 
the drawstring of his pyjamas, loosening the tie and 
urging her gaze downward to the line of dusty dark hair 
that snaked from his belly-button, disappearing beneath 
the line of plaid.

Hooking his thumbs inside, he dropped them, kicking the 
pyjama bottoms aside, his eyes never leaving hers.  It 
was she who broke their lingering gaze, watching as his 
penis stiffened harder in response to her hot stare.  Her 
lips curled, her finger twitched as she wondered how good 
it would feel when he slipped inside her, filling her body 
with his great width.  

"Well?" he asked, his tone filled with laughter.  "Do I pass 
muster?"  Her gaze flickered, faltering on his lips, which 
pouted with a suppressed smile.

"Visually, yes," she said, "but I want to know what this old 
man's body is capable of, physically."  He stepped closer, 
slipping his arms around her waist, passing his fingertips 
over her spine, counting the ridges of her vertebrae with 
each stroke.  Her nipples tightened, her lips parting as she 
prepared herself for the taste of him - a taste she was 
already craving.

"Enough of the old man stuff," he warned, touching his 
lips to her nose, coaxing a sigh from her lungs.  
Unclipping her bra, he freed her of the garment, testing 
the weight of her flesh in his palms.  Scully, seeking 
support, reached behind and held tight to the bottom of 
the bed, thrusting her body nearer to his exploring touch.  
Inside her pelvis, her flesh burned, desperate for release.  

Reaching between her thighs, he stroked the soft inner 
flesh, dipping just the tip of his finger into the wet nectar 
that had gathered.  She sighed, hooking her legs behind 
his thighs, dropping her weight to the mattress.  He 
looked down at her, nipples hard and pointed, her breasts 
shadowed and enticing in the lamp light.  Dropping to his 
knees, he brushed his cheek along her thigh, scratching 
the silken skin with his stubble, watching as she winced, 
her teeth clenched and her fingers insinuating themselves 
in his hair, again.  

Pressing his lips to the creased skin behind her knee, he 
tasted the hidden spot with his tongue and she whimpered 
his name like a plea, the sound lingering on her lips and 
she drawled the word.  Her leg, slipping over his shoulder, 
exposed her plump moist flesh to him.  He looked up at 
her, delirious with want, his tongue snaking out just 
barely touching the hardened nub of her clitoris.  She 
pressed her lips together, clenching her thighs around his 
head, urging his tongue into her body.  He flicked her clit, 
relishing the feel of her nails as they dug into his scalp, 
encouraging him.  The taste of her, saccharine like honey 
yet smoky and mysterious, would remain on his taste 
buds for all eternity.  Stiffening his tongue, he pushed his 
flesh into hers, the sound of his name on her lips bringing 
his painful arousal to almost excruciating levels.

Grasping his penis in his hand, he stroked his own flesh 
with a certain familiarity, except this time, he wasn't 
imagining having his mouth on her.  Now, it was perfect 
reality and his balls tightened in response to this 
knowledge.  Alternating between harried and slow strokes 
that matched the pace of his roving tongue, he felt his 
body change, so close to an explosive orgasm.  Passing 
his palm across her flat belly, he cupped her breast, the 
pointed nubbin of her nipple pressing against his work 
calloused skin.  Circling the puckered flesh with his thumb, 
pulling her clit between his lips, Mulder wondered if he'd 
ever been on the brink of such immaculate euphoria 
before.  He was certain beyond a doubt that he had not.  

"Please..." she whispered when her legs had begun to 
tremble.  "Please come inside me, Mulder... please..."  
Standing, positioning himself at her entrance, he watched 
how her lips parted when his penis slipped between the 
wet folds of her, into her body.  Her muscles were tighter 
than he could ever have imagined, and they felt like liquid 
molten around him, milking his penis.  

It took only a few moments of fierce strokes before her 
walls began to ripple around him, her hips jerking as she 
murmured his name over and over again, thrusting, until 
he was buried as far inside her as he could be.  When she 
came, he followed, spilling white-hot semen into her 
womb, drenching her walls in his essence.  She cried out, 
her voice drowning the sound of the wind, rattling against 
the windows.  

Falling at her side, slipping from her body, he pressed his 
cheek to the duvet, breathless and spent.  "I can't ever 
give you up, Scully," he said, dropping his arm over her 
body, as if claiming her.  

"I know," she replied, stroking his arm, "you don't have 
do."  

"In this job, we can't ever say that."  She let the words 
wash over her, never realising just how accurate his 
statement was, or just how much they stood to lose.          

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

A few weeks later, she almost lost him, and the reality of 
what they were doing became all too clear.  As satisfying 
and fulfilling as the frequent sex was, looking at him 
through the glass, she had to admit that sex was just a 
small part of a bigger package.  He wasn't just her lover, 
no strings attached.  

Having pumped nicotine into his body, effectively killing 
the tobacco beetle in the process, they'd poisoned him 
and his heart had almost stopped, twice.  But it was the 
lesser of two evils - the nicotine might have killed him, as 
opposed to the beetle undoubtedly doing so.  

"Hey," he whispered when he saw her, his voice still 
hoarse.  "I hear you want to make an addict out of me."  
She took his hand, the feel of him, still alive, washed all 
the tension out of her body.  "The doc reckons I'm already 
a forty a day smoker, and I'm not even finished my 
treatment."  Scully looked at her feet.

"It was the only way, Mulder... you'd have died..." his 
fingers tightened around hers, pulling her eyes from her 
shoes to meet his, twinkling with his usual good humour.

"I know," he rasped, "I trust you."  The door breezed open 
and Skinner, who had been feeling increasingly guilty, 
stood coyly between his room and the corridor.  "Come 
in," Mulder said, spluttering and coughing from the effort 
of too much talk.  His lungs, still weak, were barely strong 
enough to maintain breathing let alone talk.  

"How are you feeling?" their boss asked, hovering at the 
bottom of his bed.  Mulder shrugged, lifting his eyes 
skyward.  "I can't help but feel personally responsible 
for..."  Scully shook her head, releasing Mulder's hand.

"You can't blame yourself," she said, and her partner 
nodded.  "The most important thing is he's okay.  Or he 
will be.  And the experiments are going to stop.  No more 
genetic alternations."  Skinner half shrugged.

"I think it's best if you take some time off work," he said, 
"and recuperate."  The objection on Mulder's tongue was 
never spoken, for Scully hurried to agree, detailing that 
his lungs needed to strengthen before being exposed to a 
dusty atmosphere.  "For now, I think you should rest," 
Skinner added, "I'll take you back to the motel, Scully."  
She hadn't slept in what felt like forever.  Her clothes 
permeated the scent that was unique to hospitals and she 
thought nothing would feel as nice as a hot shower and a 
change of clothes.

"I'll come back later," she told him, stroking the back of 
her hand across his forehead, bending to press a feathery 
kiss to his cheek.  "The doctor knows where we reach me 
if..." she didn't dare finish her sentence, for her greatest 
fear was his lungs collapsing or the bugs returning.  "Will 
you..." be okay? She wondered what she wanted to say.

"I'll be fine," he replied, as if reading her mind, "just rest."  
She wasn't sure if he meant her or himself.  

"Okay, see you soon..."  Following Skinner through the 
corridors of the hospital to the parking lot, she saw the 
questions in his eyes, behind his glasses.  He'd witnessed 
a certain degree of intimacy between them - not that of 
lovers, exactly, but far beyond mere professional concern.

"When?" he asked, clipping his seatbelt in place.  She 
followed suit, folding her hands atop her lap, turning her 
eyes to the rain-soaked tarmac outside the car window.  
When, indeed.  How many times had they had sex since 
that night, in his apartment?  Ten?  Fifteen?  Each time 
the boundaries faded a little more.  

"About three weeks ago," she said, a blush tingeing her 
cheeks, "but it has no effect on our professional work, 
whatsoever, sir," Scully hurried to add.  Skinner reversed 
the car, silent and slightly intimidating - he was still their 
superior after all.  

"Be careful, Scully," he said and with those three words, 
he signalled the end of his inquiry.  He didn't want to 
know any more.

"That's it?" she asked, surprised.  Skinner shrugged.

"It doesn't concern me, agent," he said.  "Just... be 
careful. You've been through a lot, and I wouldn't want 
one of those bastards to use this new piece of information 
to grind you down."  Scully mulled this over in her mind, 
wondering who the shadow government would take the 
information to - and what effect such a revelation would 
have on The X-Files.  

"Do you think they'd shut us down?" she asked.

"I think they'd try," Skinner replied.  "But I trust you'll be 
discreet."  She nodded in the affirmative.  "Good.  I have 
to head back to DC tonight, but when Mulder gets better, 
will you see he gets this?" he pulled an envelope from his 
pocket, with Agents Mulder and Scully written on the 
front.  

"What is it?" Scully asked.

"The Lazarus Bowl is finished," Skinner said, "and you're 
both invited to the premiere."  So much had happened in 
the past eighteen months that she had almost forgotten 
about Wayne Federman and his movie.  Almost.  If his 
eccentricity wasn't ingrained in her brain for all eternity - 
along with their stay in LA.  "I trust you'll both be in 
attendance."  Skinner said and her silence was filled only 
by the swish of the window-wipers.  

"I'll... try..." Scully said, slipping her thumb nail into the 
envelope, slicing the paper before removing the eloquent 
invite.  "I wish I could say convincing him will be easy..."  
Skinner glanced sideways at her, a smirk toying at his 
usually impassive expression.

"When is anything ever easy with Fox Mulder?" he asked 
and she turned her head towards the window, smiling to 
herself.

"Never sir," she said, "never."  

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Title:  Six Degrees of Requiem - Part 3
~*~ Le Valses De Vienne ~*~
Author:  Andrea Barrett

Disclaimer:  Still not mine.  I've lost hope.

Rating:  NC-17 throughout.

Spoilers:  This is the chapter that corresponds with Hollywood, A.D.  
However, there are spoilers all over the place.  I just can't help myself.

Summary:  From all things to Requiem, the story of an ever evolving 
relationship.

Feedback:  Send all your feedback -- lots please -- to 
pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"Still pissed?" she asked as their driver, Maurice, negotiated the 
limousine through the darkened streets of Los Angeles. Mulder 
leaned forward, staring into the golden depths of his 
champagne, and she knew he wasn't questioning why Skinner 
offered them his FBI credit card.

"We were portrayed as a joke, Scully," he said, draining the 
glass in one long gulp. She crossed her legs, luring his attention, 
momentarily, away from his own dark musing.

"It's never bothered you before," she said, her hip brushing his 
when he sat back in his seat, lacing their fingers together.

"We've worked so hard, lost so much, and I don't want to 
immortalised as some crack pot..." he sighed, "and I don't want 
you being condemned as Mrs Spooky for your part in my 
crusade." Scully blinked slowly.

"It's my crusade, too," she whispered. "Besides, as I've already 
said, it's just a stupid movie. In a few years, maximum, people 
will be asking 'what's The Lazarus Bowl?' It doesn't matter, 
Mulder." The limousine turned, breezing along the street, 
through the balmy night. "What would you like to do with the 
credit card then?" Freeing himself of the bowtie he'd been 
hassled into wearing, Mulder tucking the silk into his pocket, 
lifting his shoulders.

"A Bureau credit card? We could get a private lap-dance. 
Skinner's accountant might get a kick out of it." Scully chuckled, 
swatting his arm.

"I don't imagine Skinner would get a kick out of it, though. 
Dinner?" she asked and he shook his head.

"I'm not hungry. Too much popcorn, I think." She rolled her 
eyes, unsurprised that Mulder had given himself a belly ache. "I 
can't think of anything I want that costs money," he admitted. 
"Except maybe a Lamborghini, and again, I'm sure Skinner 
wouldn't be overly tickled by that kind of purchase." Scully 
pressed her lips together.

"Do you think his card has that kind of credit limit?" Mulder 
shook his head, reaching over to roll the window down, coaxing 
warm hair into their car. "Do you want to have a drink?" 
Gesturing to the empty champagne glass, Mulder vetoed her 
second idea. "You're not making this easy," she complained. "All 
that's left is dancing and making love." With their conversation 
kept consciously private from their chauffer, Mulder had no 
reason to fear that he might have heard -- yet he did. Casting a 
cautious glance towards the darkened partition screen, their 
driver's eyes remained on the road. "Don't worry," Scully 
soothed, passing her hand along his thigh, "Skinner knows."

"How?" Mulder asked, turning towards her, their bodies angled.

"He knew from Virginia. It wasn't really a long shot," she 
reminded him, "he's known us for almost eight years, Mulder. 
You longer..." Shrugging her shoulders, she poured herself 
another glass of champagne, "he's fine with it. Don't let paranoia 
take over... please?" she pleaded, pleasantly surprised when he 
merely nodded, once. "Thank you." Reaching over, she pressed 
the intercom. "You can let us off here, we'd like to talk a bit." 
She took two quick sips of champagne, before slipping the glass 
into the holder at her side.

Maurice slowed the Lincoln to a breezing stop, hurrying to exit 
the vehicle and open the rear door for them. Mulder allowed 
Scully to get out first, pausing to admire the smooth length of 
her legs, as she turned, holding her hand to him. "Good evening 
sir, ma'am," the chauffeur said, tipping his cap. "Shall I wait?" 
Mulder passed him fifty dollars, shaking his head.

"We'll be alright," he said, "why don't you take the car back and 
call it a night? No one should be working on a night like this." 
Maurice smiled, tucking the notes into his pocket.

"Much obliged, sir," he said, "a lovely evening to you both."

Arm in arm, they strode along the shore-front, the warm breeze 
ruffling her hair, teasing her neck as she enjoyed his silent 
presence beside her. Flanked by palm trees, Washington, D.C. 
and their job seemed a million miles away. Even if they were 
being constantly observed, she lost interest in trying to worry. 
Only their footsteps, passing cars and the whispering leaves 
above her head, made any sound.

"It is a lovely evening," Mulder said at last, unlacing their arms 
and tangling his fingers in hers, instead. "I suppose this whole... 
thing... with the movie is foolish," he conceded. Scully nodded, 
slipping a tress of hair behind her ear, descending the ten 
narrow steps to the golden beach, whose true beauty was hidden 
in darkness, lit only by the silver moonlight, that cast white 
beams of stark luminosity across the grains. Her shoes sank into 
the sand and she clicked her tongue.

Mulder held her as she removed the highest shoes she'd worn in 
months, and dropped them at the bottom of the steps. "I'll get 
them later," she decided aloud, pausing when the waves brushed 
against the surf, making her sigh. "Lets walk, Mulder," she said, 
when he'd removed his dress shoes and black socks. "With no 
food, we need to compensate with something, don't we? We're 
alive." Slipping his hands into his pockets, lifted his shoulders in 
a soft shrug.

"We'll be alive tomorrow, too, won't we?" he said and she 
chuckled.

"I certainly hope so," Scully replied, her eyes the colour of 
polished sapphires in the moonlight. "But then, who knows?" His 
own eyes twinkled with the kind of unspoken mischief she'd 
grown to adore -- especially when it was directed at her.

"Who knows indeed," he agreed, bumping her shoulder, "we 
could be gone in an instant, if God dealt us such a fate." 
Pressing her lips together, she smothered a chuckle.

"I thought you didn't believe in God," she said, "or are we being 
figurative this evening?" He didn't respond, his features 
impassive as he turned his eyes to the rippling waters of the 
Pacific Ocean, placid and glassy. The view held his attention for a 
long moment, before he exhaled deeply, removing his hand from 
his pocket, slipping his arm around her shoulder, his fingertips 
brushing her clavicle in a spontaneous technique meant to 
arouse her.

"If you were alive for one night only, and you had to pick a 
single drink, which would it be?" he asked, their toes sinking into 
the sofa natural sand. Scully felt his fingertips on her throat, and 
hummed.

"A glass of vintage white wine," she mused, "Something special, 
for my last night of being undead." Mulder smiled at the stars 
overhead, his fingers slipping beneath the high neck of her chic 
black dress.

"And food? Your last meal?" She wondered at all the tasteless 
meals they'd shared together in cheap diners in rural towns, and 
decided that there were far more bad culinary experiences than 
good ones.

"I don't know about food," she admitted, "so much as company. 
I'd undoubtedly share my last meal with you. And I'd ask you all 
the things I've been too afraid to ask." He glanced sideways at 
her, his roaming hand skimming the top of her breast. "I think 
we'd eat Chinese takeaway on your sofa, with beers... or does 
that violate my last drink rule?" He shook his head.

"You can have your last drink after the meal. The wine's in the 
fridge, chilling." She chuckled, the sound lost in the whispering 
ocean.

"Okay," she agreed, "we'd drink some of that Shiner you have in 
your fridge, then. I like that." Removing his hand, he slid his 
fingers into her hair, curling the auburn tresses, pulling out the 
band that held the silken strands in place.

"What about your last dance?" She tilted her head, leaning into 
his touch, her need to jump to the next, final question, rising.

"Something ancient and classical," she whispered, turning to 
face him, leaning close enough that he could press his lips to the 
column of her throat, tasting just the essence of the perfume 
she'd squirted there earlier. "Like a waltz. I always liked 
watching couples dance the waltz." He hummed against her 
throat, dipping his tongue into her clavicle.

"Les valses de Vienne, Scully?" he asked, changing his accent, 
sounding deliciously foreign. "Maintenant que deviennent, Que 
deviennent les valses de Vienne..." he sang and she sighed 
against his lips, wrapping her arms around his neck, leaning into 
his kiss.

"I don't know what you're saying," she whispered, "but I'd like it 
very much if you'd continue..." He tasted her lips with his tongue, 
which apparently could not only tackle little seeds, but long 
foreign words, too.

"I would," he replied, "but that's all I can remember. In my 
defence," he continued, "the last time I heard this was in 1990, 
when I was working in Behavioural Sciences with Francois 
Molyneux." There were so many pieces of information that she 
didn't yet know about him, and so many she wanted to learn. 
"He played the song on repeat one afternoon while we did a 
profile together. In ten years, I think I'm doing well to remember 
even a few lines." She nodded, toying with the soft hairs at the 
base of his neck.

"Indeed you are," she said. "It sounds wonderful, nonetheless." 
Mulder tightened his arms around her waist, teasingly flicking 
the cool zipper of her dress and she inhaled salty air into her 
lungs, mixed with the scent of him. The familiarity of him eased 
her trembling nerves -- the same nerves that never failed to be 
whipped into a frenzy by his proximity. He was her illness and 
her cure.

"So we've established your last drink, last meal and last dance... 
what," he asked, "pray tell, would be your last location for some 
love making?" Such a naughty question, she thought, spoken to 
her by the man she'd considered to be only her partner for the 
past seven years. The sound of his voice, filled with lusty need, 
sent a quiver down her spine.

"There's nowhere else I'd rather be," she replied. "If it weren't 
indecent to do it on a public beach, I'd have no hesitation. 
There's something classically romantic, tantalisingly naughty 
about it. He kissed the spot between her brows, barely brushing 
his lips across her skin.

"Psychologists believe there's an exhibitionist in all of us, Scully," 
he said, "even the reserved ones." She blinked at him through 
the dark, catching a glimpse of his perfect teeth, and she was 
pulled through time and space, transported to his apartment that 
rainy night when they'd reflected on age, death and expenditure. 
Her sexual appetite was far from appeased and she'd since 
acquired something of a taste for him. More than what Wayne 
Federman might call 'A residual flavour'.

"Do you think I'm reserved? Or more importantly, do you think I 
am an exhibitionist?" He laughed, the sound of his delight mixing 
with the temperate evening breeze, carried out to sea where she 
hoped it lasted forever, carried for all eternity in the wind. It was 
illogical and impossible, of course.

"Yes," he said, "Both." She scowled.

"Reserved? It shall be my quest to prove you wrong." He kissed 
her lips, coaxing her tongue from her mouth into his and she 
complied, losing herself in the feel of his hands roaming over her 
clothes, across her spine, touching her buttocks with the kind of 
exploration he normally reserved for bedroom activity only. He 
tasted of champagne and popcorn.

"I accept this challenge to be proved wrong, fair maiden," he 
said, "and I sincerely hope I am." She slipped her hand beneath 
his jacket, raking her nails over his back, watching his face 
contort with a mixture of pleasure and pain. "For now, Scully, 
lets dance... we've all night, after all..."

"One night in Hollywood?" she asked.

"Let's live it like it's our last." He said.

How true, she would reflect later, that statement was -- for they 
would never return to Hollywood again.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Title:  Six Degrees of Requiem -- Part 4

~*~ A Fighting Chance ~*~

Author:  Andrea Barrett

Disclaimer:  Still not mine.  I've lost hope.

Rating:  NC-17 throughout.

Spoilers:  This is the chapter that corresponds with Fight 
Club.  However, there are spoilers all over the place.  I 
just can't help myself.

Summary:  From all things to Requiem, the story of an 
ever evolving relationship.

Feedback:  Send all your feedback -- lots please -- to 
pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk 


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"I'm sorry," he sighed, pulling the blanket from her naked body, 
tracing his fingertips across the yellowing bruises that he'd 
inflicted upon her. Last week, they'd been vibrant and purple, 
and he hated that it was his hand that had marked her beautiful 
skin.

"For the thousandth time," she replied patiently, "it wasn't your 
fault. The arena was a bloodbath, Mulder, and everyone was 
beaten to a pulp. Besides," she lifted her arm, displaying the 
round bruise that spanned most of her left side, "this one was 
courtesy of a lady called Joanne Ivan. And this one," she lifted 

her leg, "was a man twice your size who's name I didn't catch 
because I was too busy elbowing him in the head." Mulder 
chuckled. "Sorry about your teeth..." He winced, having only had 
the corrective braces removed two days earlier.

"It's alright," he said. "I just hope we never get caught in such a 
violent vortex again... I'm not sure these aging bones could 
handle-" she pressed her mouth to his, smothering his piteous 
ramblings with a hard kiss. "Fine..." he said with a shrug, "brush 
off my concerns... it's..."

"Oh be quiet," she said, her hands snaking under the duvet to 
test his level of arousal. "It's Sunday, Mulder, and I'd like to..."

"I know what you'd like to do. Point proven, by the way," she 
frowned, and his lips parted with a cheeky smile. "You've 
established yourself as having no reservations whatsoever." She 
giggled, recalling their late-night dance in LA, and her promise to 
erase his opinion of her as the straight-laced FBI agent. And she 

had. Outside of work, anyway. "Don't..." he hissed when her 
fingers curled around him. "You're a religious woman, Scully, 
isn't Sunday supposed to be a day of rest?" She shook her head, 
wavy strands of still un-brushed auburn hair tumbling about her 
cheeks. She looked ethereal - angelic, almost.

"Shush," she whispered, peppering kisses to his chest, along the 
hard line of his sternum, as far as the blanket would allow her to 
go, "I'm worshipping." Tracing his fingers over her spine, he 
sighed, wondering at how her skin felt like liquid satin, 
impossibly soft beneath his touch. When she slid up his body, 

tonguing his Adam's apple and left a moist trail over his jaw, he 
felt his body harden painfully in response to her. Her lips 
touched his, and she was like oxygen to his lungs.

I had been a hard week, he mused, sharing painkillers and being 
confined to the office. Made worse only by his desire for her, he 
sighed each time she reprimanded him for a lingering stare in 
the basement, because according to her, they never knew who 
was watching and secondly, work was after all, work.

He'd more than made up for their 'no sex at work' ban, but the 
long office hours seemed to drag by, especially with the v-
necked blouses she kept wearing recently.

Her tongue slipped between his lips, stroking his inner mouth, 
waking, not only his own tongue, but all other sensitive parts of 
him, too. When her fingers danced over his torso, between the 
duvet again, his fingers coiled around her wrist, hard and tight. 
She whimpered against his lips, thrusting her hips against him, 
their bodies grinding with the kind of rampant need that he'd 
only ever experienced with her. He'd never wanted to be inside 
another woman as much as he did her.

"Be slow," he whispered, "I don't like when we have to rush..." 
There had been a few moments when their frenzied hormones 
demanded a quick fix. Once, she had almost given in to him in 
the stationary closet. Almost. Languid sex, however, was 
reserved for the weekend.

"Me neither," she replied, gazing up at him when he rolled, 
looming over her with tight, firm arms. Glancing down, she saw 
his penis, hard against his abdomen, and she shivered with 
anticipation. Meeting his lustrous gaze, she ran her tongue 
across her dried lips, pulling a tight breath into her lungs. He 
was spectacular -- she never got tired of his body. Or what effect 
it had on her. "Tell me a secret, Mulder," she said, passing her 
flat of her hand over his abdomen, relishing the feel of his hard, 
taut muscles beneath his rippling, warm skin.

"A secret?" He dropped his head, taking a semi-hard nipple into 
his mouth, coaxing the flesh into a tight point. "I like this..." he 
sighed, passing the flat of his tongue across the puckered skin, 
and she winced, grasping his hair into tight fists.
"That's not a secret," she hissed, "you've practically been 
attached there since..." He smiled against her breast, releasing 
her, leaving her skin shiny. Scully realised a sigh of what he 
could only interpret as relief. She had admitted once that his 
mouth had the ability to lure her dangerously close to orgasm 
every time. "A proper secret," she said, parting her legs, 
welcoming his hips to rest against her.

"I watched porn for years," he said, prompting her to roll her 
eyes.

"I know that too," she said, drawing patterns on his shoulder 

with the tip of her nail.

"I wasn't finished," he reprimanded her with a hard, bruising kiss 
before clearing his throat. "I watched it quite a lot, actually. So 
I've seen good sex before. But I never experienced it until you." 
She didn't gush, and he didn't expect her to, either. Their 
relationship was based on more than a gooey slush of romance. 
He knew she was touched by the way her absent roving stopped, 
her hand stilling over his shoulder, her eyes boring into his own, 

searching the depths of his soul.

When he shifted, the tip of his penis grazed her thigh and her 
body trembled. "And correct me if I am being egotistical, but I 
think the same can be said for you?" he asked, brushing his lips 
across her jaw, pulling her earlobe into his mouth and passing 
his tongue along the back. Her breathless sigh brushed his 
temple.

"That would probably be an... astute... assumption..." she replied, 
hooking her legs around his waist, positioning her entrance at 
his tip. One thrust, and he'd be inside her. Sweet anticipation 
made her body tingle, as he drew back, claiming her lips with his 
own. He tortured her for a long moment, barely grazing her 
sensitive skin with his penis.

"Probably?" he queried, easing himself inside her. She stiffened, 
never quite accustomed to his width. When her muscles relaxed 
around him, so did she.

"Fine," she sighed, "you're the best." He laughed, the sound 
gruff and raw. Drawing back, he pulled out of her almost the 
whole way, watching her face with the interest of a art 
aficionado, studying a painting in the Louvre. She held her 
breath, waiting on the delicious intrusion. His eyes swirled, a 
myriad of colours -- all of which made her think of autumn. From 
warm, unfathomable brown, to twinkling gold. When he kissed 
her again, he dispelled a breath and she inhaled, drawing the 
essence of him into her lungs.

Tightening around him, she felt the steady staccato of his 
heartbeat against her breast, and felt an enormous amount of 
pride in knowing that it was her, her body, that could evoke such 
powerful emotions in his. "Scully..." he whispered and he 
sounded as though he were having an epiphany. She have come 
to love this side of her partner, of their mutual love-making that 
was so powerful, it left the tips of her toes tingling.

Taking his face in her hands, she passed her thumbs over his 
lips, watching how his mouth opened, as if he wanted to speak, 
but the sensations of their love-making rendered him 
speechless. She didn't mind. There was nothing he needed to 
say and nothing she needed to hear. The shape of his lips, still 
moist from their kisses, would be recorded in her memory 
forever -- in the event of something awful transpiring, she never 
wanted to forget how he felt, beneath her hands, around her 
body, inside of her.

He was still bruised from their encounter with the 
doppelgangers, and his bronzed skin looked battered, as did her 
own. Her lips had just barely healed, but her spine, arched now 
as she leaned into him, still ached. It didn't help, she supposed, 
that they were in bed together at every opportunity. But the 
feeling of him, aroused and filling her, joining them together in a 
sort of heavenly union, was too powerful to resist. It was as if 
they were supposed to be there -- that all the trails in their lives 
was merely a test to see how strong they would be when forged 
together in a meaningful relationship. And they worked. They 
really worked.


Reaching between them, he stroked the sensitive bud between 
her thighs, listening as she spoke his name as if he were a God. 
Her God. Pressing the tip of his finger against her, she thrust her 
hips twice and they were one. The need and desire rose in her 
chest, and she whimpered, her orgasm rushing through her body 
like an out-of-control torrent, crashing through her womb, her 
legs, her belly, to her chest and down her arms. She convulsed, 
her fingers curling and her nails digging into his shoulder. He 
winced when she broke the skin, adding another injury to the 
already growing list of bumps and bruises, cuts and grazes.

He stiffened, his arms shaking from the effort of holding his body 
over her, and his eyes fell closed as a guttural moan rose in his 
chest, spilling forth in the form of her name, drawn out as 
though he were afraid to let go of it. She felt herself loosen, 
sagging to the bed with quiet exhaustion as he came within her, 
lost in the emotion of it.

Afraid of crushing her, he withdrew from her body and she 
whimpered at the loss of him, feeling somehow empty. He 
gathered her into his arms, smoothing her hair and pressing a 
kiss to her forehead. "You smell like sex, Scully," he said, 
inhaling deeply. She hummed against him. She smelt like sex a 
lot these days. The air in her bedroom often carried a heady 
spiciness and she's been hesitant to wash her sheets, after 
catching the scent of him.

"So do you," she said, draping her arm across him, nestled into 
the nook of his arm. After a long moment, he spoke.

"Still happy, Scully?" he asked. It had becoming something of a 
ritual, to ask about happiness because, for the majority of their 
partnership, personal happiness was overshadowed by personal 
grief. Recently, there'd been a strange absence of sadness and 
he felt obliged to ask, to be reassured, that the woman he'd 
grown used to worshipping, was still happy.

"Do I look like an unhappy woman?" she asked -- and with her 
flushed cheeks and full lips, he had to admit, she looked 
anything but unhappy. Yet, he always craved the verbal 
reassurance.

"Scully..." he pleaded, drawing his fingertip across her 
cheekbone. Her eyes fell closed, her lashes brushing his skin.

"I'm happier than I've ever been," she sighed at last. "And 
happier than I'm ever likely to be again." His arms folded around 
her again, holding their bodies together.

"Not if you're happier tomorrow," he said and she nodded.


"Do you think we'll be happy forever, Mulder?" she asked, and 
he shrugged.

"We're in with a fighting chance, I guess," he said, and it was 
probably the most optimistic thing she'd ever heard him say. It 
filled her with a kind of warmth that she wasn't used to, and she 
tucked her head under his chin.


"Happiness has to end sometime," she reminded him. 
"Unfortunately, it's inevitable." His chest rose in a heavy sigh, 
his hand passing over her forearm in a gentle caress and she 
was awed by how she felt when she was with him.

"I suppose you're right," he said at last, "but for now..." she 
nodded in understanding.

"For now, we are."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Title:  Six Degrees of Requiem - Part 5

~*~ Insatiable ~*~


Author:  Andrea Barrett

Disclaimer:  Still not mine.  I've lost hope.

Keywords:  Mulder/Scully Romance

Category:  SRA

Rating:  NC-17 throughout.

Spoilers:  This is the chapter that corresponds with 
Je Souhaite.  However, there are spoilers all over the place.  
I just can't help myself.

Summary:  From all things to Requiem, the story of an 
ever evolving relationship.

Feedback:  Send all your feedback - lots please - to 
pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
We build our church above these streets
We practice love between these sheets...
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


"You ready?" Jen asked.  

"Yeah, I'm ready."  

Was he?  There were a million things in life that he 
wanted to wish for - if he had an infinite number of 
wishes.  How nice it would have been, to have all of life's 
desires with a single request. 

"Where will you go, after I make my finish wish?  Will you 
just... disappear?"  Jen rolled her head back, apparently 
bored with the conversation.  He supposed she had been 
asked the same questions many times from the sixteenth 
century until now.

"I go wherever my rug is.  Where is that, by the way?  Is 
it some smelly evidence room?  I've been there before 
and boy, it isn't fun."  Mulder stood, pacing the floor of his 
office in ways he had done so many times before.  Jen 
crossed her arms again, touching her upper lip with the tip 
of her tongue.  "Any chance?" she asked, gesturing to the 
clock on the wall.  Mulder stopped.  

"Okay," he said at last.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Mulder hated evidence rooms.  It took forever to find what 
you were looking for and when you did, it was sealed in so 
much plastic that it took another twenty minutes just to 
get into it.  

Today though, luck must have been on his side, for he 
found Jenn's rug without any difficulties, and it was 
wrapped in only one rug bag propped against the wall.  

Unwrapping her, Jenn lay on the floor, her silvery eyes 
watching him with unmasked contempt.  "You've had your 
three wishes," she snapped, getting to her feet.  "You 
can't have anymore."  

"Yes I can.  I unwrapped you again.  It's not m fault I'm 
just incredibly lucky, is it?  Besides," he said softly, "I only 
want one more."  Jenn strode towards the door, and he 
knew he would inevitably get what he wanted.  If he had 
been wrong, Jenn would never have been allowed to leave 
her rug.  "You'll like this one," he promised.  

"I doubt it," she retorted and he sighed.  "One more 
always becomes two, and then three..."  

"I have to meet Scully in an hour... please...?"  He hadn't 
touched her in over a week, and as the hours ticked by, 
his need for her deepened.  Not even a genie would deter 
him tonight.  "Okay, I'm going to make a wish now.  I 
have plans for tonight.  I wish that, subsequent to this 
wish being granted that you will never have to grant 
another wish again.  That you will be released from the 
spell cast upon you and that you should become human 
again.  I mean twenty first century human, too, not some 
decrepit sixteenth century French woman."  Jen stood still 
for a long time, her silver eyes glittering like liquid 
aluminium.  Mulder held his breath, wondering if he forgot 
to mention something that would allow Jen to read 
between the lines.  Somehow though, he imagined she'd 
be happy enough to take this wish at face value.  

"Really?" she asked her voice not altogether strong.  "Four 
and a half centuries and no one has ever wished for this..."  
Mulder shrugged.  

"I told you that you'd like it.  Now would you just grant it 
so I can go home?"  Nodding softly, with less 
determination than usual, Jen smiled.  

"This is the last wish I will ever grant."  After a long 
pause, she grinned.  "Done."  As if, in an instant, 
something changed around her, Jen looked altogether 
human.  Her eyes shifted to an artic clear blue and when 
she pressed her fingertip to the corner of her eye the Mark 
of the Jinn was gone and her skin was smooth.  "You freed 
me."  Rubbing his hands together, Mulder grinned.  

"Excellent!  Now I can go." Striding across the room to the 
door, he paused.  "Actually, I'd better escort you out of 
the building.  Don't want you getting arrested on your first 
day of being human."  Jen pulled her lip between her 
teeth, her cocky arrogance gone.  Now, she was just a 
woman.  "Follow me."  

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

All week, he had watched her and cursed his lack of 
professionalism.  Each time she tapped her pencil against 
her lips, he imagined kissing her, imagined her kisses all 
over his body.  It had been a living hell, not having her.  
Not showing her how much he loved her.  

Now, as those lips drank from a bottle of beer, he was no 
longer interested in watching Caddyshack.  Not that he 
ever really was.  Watching movies, he knew, was their 
new code for sex.  When he glanced sideways at her, 
studying her lovely features in profile, he thought about 
Jen and what she had said.  

'I'd wish that I could live my life, moment by moment, 
enjoying it for what it is instead of worrying about what it 
isn't.'  

Reaching out, he took Scully's hand, stroking her 
knuckles.  His gesture drew her gaze away from the 
television towards him, her brow furrowed in an endearing 
frown.  "I'm not going to worry about this ending," he 
said, drawing her hand to his lips, tracing an almost non-
existent kiss along her silken skin.  "Life is what it is, 
right?"  Her eyebrows arched, her eyes widened, but she 
didn't reply.  "I have missed you so much this week..." 
Mulder added, his fingers moving over her wrist.  

"Yeah..." Scully whispered, turning her body towards him, 
encouraging his tentative touch.  "Me too."  Leaning into 
her, he slid his fingers into her hair, stroking her scalp, 
their mouths inches apart.  He could smell the beer on her 
breath and it intoxicated him more than if he had been 
drinking it himself.  Warm love radiated from her body in 
pulsing waves and when he cupped the back of her neck, 
urging her close, she came willingly, their lips meeting as 
if of their own accord.  

How many times had they made love on this sofa? he 
wondered.  How often had she cried out his name in the 
heat of pleasure?

Lying back against the weathered black leather, her hair a 
vibrant russet fan against the darkness, she was ethereal 
in her beauty and each time he looked into the liquid blue 
depths of her eyes, he remembered why he loved her.  He 
saw his past, each moment of terror they had shared 
together and he saw themselves cemented together.  

Her fingers touched his cheek, her lips moist and parted.  
Leaning down to kiss her, his heart surged when she 
arched her back and met him half way, apparently as 
greedy as he.  For tonight, he knew, his apartment would 
be a place of divine worship and Dana Scully would be the 
goddess he intended to spend hours adoring. 

Slipping his fingers beneath the white blouse she wore, he 
found her breast and urged her nipple into a turgid point.  
Her lips parted, welcoming his tongue and as he stroked 
the recesses of her mouth, she moaned deeply, her hips 
brushing his erection as he knelt over her.  Scully parted 
her thighs, cradling him against her apex, her nails 
digging, almost painfully, into his neck.  

His thumb drew erratic circles over her nipple as he pulled 
the lacy cup away from her breast, her flesh moulding into 
the curvature of his hand.  She seemed to fit.  In every 
way possible, Dana Scully fit.  He wanted to tell her that 
he loved her.  But it seemed almost trivial.  Surely she 
knew.  He touched her in ways he had never touched 
another woman.  In ways he had never wanted to touch 
another.

Slipping her blouse over her head, he watched the rapid 
rise and fall of her chest as she watched him beneath 
lidded eyes.  Her cheeks, dusky with raging desire, were 
soft when he pressed a soft kiss there.  A delicate sigh 
escaped her lips and her palms moved over his back, his 
muscles seemingly manipulated by her touch.  

"Tell me what you wished for," she breathed in his ear, a 
tremble coursing through his body when she did.  

"You'll find out," he promised, hoping that she really 
would.  For if Jen had not granted his third wish, he would 
have no way of rectifying the hurt it would cause - 
especially since Scully was so sceptical. 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"There is a racing inside my heart
And I am barely touching you..."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Willing away the demons of his own doubt, he dropped his 
mouth to hers again, and any lingering questions she 
might have had, were erased with the intensity of his kiss.  
He knew it was his ultimate weapon, and tonight, he 
intended to use it to his full advantage.  He wanted her to 
forget that she'd ever felt hurt before.  

His fingers slid beneath the waist of her pants, finding her 
moist core quickly - he was an expert at touching her 
now.  She whispered his name, and he smiled against her 
lips, his thumb stroking her, urging her desire into a tight, 
coiling spring.  Her arousal was his, and as his circles 
intensified, he wanted nothing more than to be inside her.  
Where he'd wanted to be all week.  Work was their lent, 
so to speak, and when their professional lives took 
precedence, sex was off the menu.  

Touching the tip of his tongue to her pulse, he felt her 
inhale, a rattling breath that he'd come to associate with 
her excitement.  Her hands helped him to undress, her 
dexterous little doctor fingers unzipping his jeans in record 
time.  With each breath she took, her breasts rose and 
touched his chest, her little nipples hard.  Remembering 
how they tasted to his tongue, he pressed his lips 
together around the bud, the tip of his tongue touching 
her pebbled nipple, her puckered flesh easily manipulated 
by him.  

Naked now, he spread her legs further, nudging her 
entrance with the tip of his penis.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
We move together up and down
We levitate, our bodies soar
Our feet don't even touch the floor
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

She met him, stroke for stroke, her lips murmuring her 
approval, breathless and coarse; the sounds she made 
brought his arousal to a dizzying height.  He felt her cool 
hands move over his back, stroking the muscles of his 
body.  He had never wanted anyone in his life as much as 
he wanted her.  Nor had he ever loved so much.  

Being inside her wasn't just sex.  It could not ever be.  
She had been his sanity, the voice of reason, friend and 
kindness for so many years.  Looking into the maelstrom 
of blue that were her eyes, he saw a reflection of his own 
feelings and it was this, not her naked body that brought 
him to climax.  Around his penis, she shuddered, her walls 
turning to liquid molten.  

Sated and tired, he fell over her, breathless.  Her fingers 
laced through the damp strands of his dark hair, shorter 
now than in earlier years.  His breath fanned over the 
swell of her breast, tightening her nipple again.  He could 
feel her breath on his forehead and the sensation was 
oddly arousing, even though he could not possibly had 
needed sex again.  Despite this, his penis stirred against 
her thigh and he felt, rather than saw, a smile grace her 
lovely lips.

"Scully I-" he had never voiced it.  Except once, in a drug-
induced haze.  

"Shush," she whispered back, her fingers stilling 
momentarily in his hair.  "I know."  Closing his eyes, 
listening to heart beat, he suspected that she did know.  
That she had always known.  Silent understanding was the 
epitome of their relationship - a bond that was as unique 
as it was bizarre.  Pressing a soft kiss to the top of her 
breast, he held her closer.  Everything was perfect.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
There are no words,
There's only truth...
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Title:  Six Degrees of Requiem - Part 6

~*~ Everything Changes ~*~



Author:  Andrea Barrett

Disclaimer:  Still not mine.  I've lost hope.

Rating:  NC-17 throughout.

Spoilers:  This is the chapter that corresponds with Requiem.  
However, there are spoilers all over the place.  I just can't help 
myself.

Summary:  From all things to Requiem, the story of an ever 
evolving relationship.

Feedback:  Send all your feedback - lots please - to 
pereybereparadise@yahoo.co.uk 

Author's Note:  I have enjoyed writing this story more than I 
can ever say.  The X-Files was my obsession and in so many 
ways it still is.  I'd like to dedicate this last chapter to the show, 
and to my best friend, Sharon who, if she ever reads this, will 
understand exactly why I picked the chapter title that I did.  

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

She had held the baby with so much tenderness that, had he 
believed in God, he would have cursed the man for making her 
life so damn miserable.  In that moment, if he had the power to 
turn back time, he would have ensured she was never assigned 
to him.  Perhaps she would have led a normal life.  Maybe she 
would have had a husband, some kids, and a dog.  A white 
picket fence, who knew?  

He knew for sure, if Scully could read his mind, she'd have 
castrated him for his thoughts.  She did not want protected.  
She had made her choices knowing that they were dangerous.  
Scully chose love and friendship over comfort. 

Stroking her hair, he listened to her breathing and his touch 
roused her from her fitful sleep.  Her blue eyes fluttered around 
the car, settling on his face after a moment.  He witnessed the 
anxiety melt from her body and she smiled.  "I'm sorry," she 
apologised, straightening in her seat.  "I've just been so damn 
tired lately."  Pinching the top of her nose, she widened her 
eyes.  "And this headache, I just can't shift it."  He took her 
hand, lacing his fingers with hers.  It was a pleasure he 
shouldn't have allowed himself.  Lover's touches were strictly 
off limits out on the field.  

"I'm going to check out some photographs in my room," he told 
her, gesturing to his cabin.  The Oregon motel would have been 
quaint, had it not been for the bizarre goings on that always 
seemed centred around the town.  "Get into bed and rest.  
Don't get sick," he warned her, pressing his palm to her 
forehead.  Her skin was hot to touch, but hardly feverish.  "Do 
you think this car is bugged?" he asked and her brow furrowed.  

"I doubt it," she replied, a hint of mirth evident in her tone.  

"If we were anywhere else right now, Scully, I'd want to kiss 
you," she opened her mouth to protest and he cupped his palm 
over her lips.  "However bad that is for me to say, you're more 
important to me than any of this.  You must know that..." He 
could only see her eyes now, but through her irises he saw 
everything.  She wasn't mad at him.  

Her fingers curled around his wrist, pulling his hand from her 
mouth.  "I do," she replied.  "But you have to stop talking like 
you're going to lose me, Mulder.  We cannot continue like this."  
He dropped his eyes to his lip, fiddling with the car keys.  

"We've been through so much," he whispered at last.  "It's 
difficult not to imagine the worst.  Being back here, in this 
place, it's like going back in time.  It's like... your abduction 
never happened, your cancer..." a sideways glance at her 
revealed that his words had affected her.  She kept her eyes 
downcast, as though mulling over what he had said.  Ever the 
voice of reason, however, she glanced up, forcing a smile to her 
lovely lips.

"All that has happened," she said.  "And it cannot be reversed.  
Yesterday is gone and we can't get it back.  Tomorrow we will 
be looking back on today and I'd rather not reflect on my life 
and know I was always worried about the worst.  I'm here now.  
You are here now."  She leaned across the car, closing the gap 
of their bodies.  It was the closest she had ever gotten on an 
assignment.  "We are here now, Mulder.  Do you understand?"  
He took her hand, revelling in the satin feel of her skin.

"I'm trying," he promised.  "I've lost so many things in my life, 
Scully.  I can't lose you."

He replayed these words over and over in his mind as he got 
undressed, showered and changed.  Losing Scully, especially 
now, was the one thing that would bring his world to a 
shuddering halt.  He was yin and she was yang and there was 
simply no other way to explain it.  He was not being overly 
romantic, or poetic.  The truth could not be denied.  Without 
her, he was not whole.  

He wasn't fully concentrating on the photos when she knocked 
his door.  Her dizziness, regardless of how much she wanted to 
underplay it, was serious.  She wouldn't have come to him, 
otherwise.  Her skin felt cool now, her eyes wide with unspoken 
fear.  Their earlier conversation came blaring back, and his 
usual fears resurfaced.  

Covering her with the blanket, he held her, almost begging her 
to quit.  After awhile, she fell into a reflective silence and he 
suspected that she might finally agree.  She would leave the X-
Files, become an ordinary field agent.  She held his hand and 
he fell asleep behind her, vaguely aware of her shampoo and 
how wonderful she smelt.  She was his, now, and protest as 
she might, he was going to protect her.  

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Scully woke first, wrapped in his embrace, she felt safe.  Her 
dizzy spell had passed and she felt better now than she had in 
days.  Looking in the mirror, her skin was dewy and her eyes 
bright.  Looking down at herself, she realised that during the 
night, Mulder must have woken and undressed them both, for 
she wore only her underwear.

Rummaging on the floor for her clothes, she was surprised to 
find that Mulder had neatly folded her pants and blouse and 
draped them over the chair.  Glancing at his still-sleeping form, 
she thought it might have been him, not her, who was sick.  
Smiling fondly, she watched his eyes flicker beneath his eyelids.  
He would wake soon, and whatever he dreamt of would be a 
memory.  

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Scully was struck by how much 
she felt for him.  However foolish his choices sometimes were, 
he loved her more than she could ever wish to be.  Even in his 
sleep, his hands searched the sheets for her, and his lovely 
features twisted with worry when he didn't encounter her body.  
Inhaling sharply, his eyes opened, wide with panic.  

"Hey," she soothed, kneeling over him, clothes in hand.  His 
fingers touched her waist, encouraging her not to leave.  It was 
already seven thirty, and their day loomed ahead.  With much 
to do, there was no time for Mulder's arousal techniques - 
which were strictly forbidden.  Yet she found herself melting 
into his embrace, her thigh covering his as he leant into her.  

"This sucks," Mulder sighed, his breath hot against her ear.  

"What does?" Scully asked, turning in his arms.  Beneath the 
covers, she felt his arousal, hard against her inner thigh.  

"Not being allowed to touch you."  A consist source of 
annoyance between them, their mutual rule that sex on 
assignment was forbidden was sometimes the worst agreement 
they'd ever come to.  "Seeing you like this..." he stroked her 
rosy cheek, watching her lashes flutter.  

"You undressed me," she reminded him, "so it's your own 
fault."  His lips brushed her bare shoulder and curved into a 
smile.  They were on a downward spiral into dangerous 
territory, yet neither of them seemed particularly wilful, today.  
"What if someone sees us?" she asked, her voice a hushed 
whisper.  She knew the drapes were drawn and if someone 
could see them now, they would see them at home, too.  Then 
she realised she was trying to rationalise their actions.  

"Let them," Mulder whispered, his fingers caressing her breast.  
"I don't care."  His tone told her he didn't.  His body told her 
the same.  

His lips stroked her jaw and her lips parted, eagerly awaiting 
the moment in which he would kiss her, and she would feel all 
her inhibitions come crashing down.  It was inevitably the same 
as always.  Sexually, Mulder could turn her into another 
woman.  She was wild, in his arms.  Stoic and sensible when 
she was not.  Now that he was touching her, she was at the 
point of no return.  Until he was inside her, she would not see 
reason.  

His thumbs hooked into the waistband of her panties, drawing 
the silk and lace over her thighs and ankles.  She was already 
wet, the effect of his caresses, and the prospect of him 
invading her body.  Medically, she knew this was simply her 
body's way of preparing her for penetration, as a woman, she 
knew it was what he did to her.  

His lips found hers, his touch tentative and hesitant at first, as 
though he wasn't certain he had permission.  When her fingers 
found his penis, curling around his width, he took her action as 
acceptance that they were past the point of return.  His mouth 
pressed hard against hers, her thumb stroking the tip of his 
penis, luring a pearly drop of arousal from within his body.  She 
was always amazed at how her touch affected him.

As her heart raced, her head felt light again but she remained 
silent, ignoring the prickle of worry that persisted - the part of 
her mind that told her something was physically wrong with 
her.  To tell herself that she was getting the flu was just foolish 
and she wondered if her cancer was coming back.  Pushing the 
thought aside, she stroked his flesh and listened to his 
murmurs of approval instead.  

His fingers laced within her hair and his touch made her 
breathless with eager anticipation.  Closing her eyes, she tried 
to lose herself in the sensations her body experienced, telling 
herself that it was useless to worry about illness when she 
could throw herself into the euphoria she knew would come 
with his ministrations.  

"Whatever is making you frown," he whispered against her lips, 
"stop."  Her eyes flew open, but his were closed, and she 
wondered how he had known.  She suspected it was a lot to do 
with their mutual abilities to read one and other.  As if to 
soothe away the worries in her mind, he took her face in his 
hands, his thumbs drawing circles on her cheekbones, and after 
a long moment, he opened his eyes.  "I have to tell you, 
Scully," he sighed, leaning over her now.  She released his 
penis, her lips parting as she opened her mouth to protest.  
Telling her, she thought, would trivialise it.  "I am so in love 
with you," he whispered, "and you might think it is a cliché to 
say it, but I can feel the winds of change here, Scully, and I 
don't want either of us to regret not saying it."

However great it was having sex with him, this time her 
pleasure was tarnished by the force of his words.  In the 
recesses of her mind, she wanted to return the sentiment, yet 
she was almost afraid because then it he would have to admit 
that something was changing.  That her sudden sickness was 
related to the events occurring around them.  Seven years ago, 
they had been in this same place, when they had only just met.  

So much had changed.  Yet so much was still the same.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Krycek was promising the forbidden fruit, a space ship, and she 
knew Mulder was going to go.  She knew, looking at him across 
the conference table, that his need to find the truth had won 
over.  After fainting in the woods, he probably reasoned that he 
was doing it all for her.

Shaking her head, Scully strode from Skinner's office, into the 
hallway, breathless and dizzy.  It took only a few moments 
before he was behind her, telling her that she wasn't going.  
Indignant that he was trying to protect her, to shut her out, she 
dropped her hands to her hips.  Through his talk about 
abductees and begging her to forget about it, she could only 
think of how annoyed she was that he thought her to be weak.  
Then his tone changed, and he wasn't her protector.  He was 
the man who loved her more than life. 

"I'm not going to risk... losing you..." he whispered, keeping his 
voice low enough that the people in the office, those they 
trusted and those they did not, would not hear him.  Falling into 
his arms, not caring any longer about the risks, she sensed the 
change in their relationship at once.  Things would never be the 
same.  For the first time, he was shutting her out.  When they 
had taken the leap from partnership to lovers, an irreversible 
shift had taken place and she was more important to him that 
his work.  More important to him than his own life.

"I won't let you go alone," she replied at last.  "Skinner can go 
with you.  There's no one we can trust more."  Mulder nodded, 
turning back towards the office.  Her fingers curled around his 
wrist, and his eyes widened when he turned back to her.  
"Mulder," she sighed, seeking warmth in his touch.  Since 
they'd become lovers, they'd each dreaded the moment in 
which the dream, their dream, would end.  She couldn't help 
but imagine that this was it.  "I love you, too."  His features 
softened, his hand reaching out to tilt her chin towards him.  

"How about you tell me that again, when I get back?  And you 
can tell me if my third wish came true."  She smiled weakly, a 
frown furrowing her brow. 

"Sure," she promised, letting him go."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

She knew he was gone.  Skinner didn't need to tell her, the 
look on his face, the silent devastation, and she knew she had 
lost him.  Swallowing, she shifted in her hospital bed, her 
thoughts spinning crazily in her mind.  Why now?  

"I already heard," she whispered when Skinner tried to speak.  

"I lost him," his voice broke and it was the first time she'd ever 
seen her boss cry.  Knowing how much he had let her down, he 
was broken by the weight of his failure.  "I don't know what 
else I can say.  I lost him.  I'll be asked... what I saw... and 
what I saw I can't deny.  I won't."  Later she would learn the 
details of exactly what Skinner saw that night, when Mulder 
walked into the light and was taken from her.  For now, the 
vague information she had been fed was enough to break her 
heart.  

"We will find him," she insisted, her voice watery to her own 
ears.  "I have to."  Aside from herself and her doctors, no one 
knew just how much she had to get him back.  

Skinner turned to leave, his shoulders heavy with anxiousness.  
"Sir," she spoke, reaching out for comfort, understanding.  
"There's something that I need to tell you.  Something that I 
need for you to keep to yourself."  As he returned to her 
bedside, she saw the questions in his eyes, and swallowed 
hard, her own joy shattered by her broken heart.  "I'm having a 
hard time explaining it.  Or believing it but..." her eyes met his, 
"I'm pregnant."  

She thought it was impossible for him to look any more broken, 
but at these words, his whole body seemed to shudder.  
"Mulder's?" he asked, and her trembling lips were all the 
clarification he needed.  "Dana," he whispered, sinking to the 
chair behind him, "I'm so sorry."  She straightened in the bed.

"You did everything possible," she told him.  "I know you did."  
Her boss kept his eye averted, unable to look at the woman 
Mulder had gotten pregnant, the woman who loved him enough 
to sacrifice a normal life.  "It's alright," she whispered, knowing 
that the truth of what had happened had not yet registered in 
her mind.  "Mulder will understand."  

"Mulder might be dead!" Skinner snapped, raising his voice.  
Her look was stricken, her eyes wide.  "Because of me."  

"He's not," she insisted.  "He cannot be."  Perhaps she was 
being irrational.  Foolish, even, but she could not accept that 
she would never hold him again.  "I refuse to accept that."  
Skinner dropped his head into his hands, his voice muffled.

"You have to, Scully," he insisted.  She shook her head.

"No.  No I won't."

He stood, leaving her alone, his eyes downcast with shame and 
sadness.  She listened to the door close and felt herself break.  
A sob welled in her chest and she released it, pressing her 
fingers to her lips.  How cruel was life, that she could finally be 
pregnant, after all the heartache, and Mulder was gone.  

Sobbing until she was too tired to move, Scully pressed her 
cheek to the pillow, touching her smooth flat stomach with her 
palm.  She remembered LA, dancing on the sand, and thinking 
that Mulder's voice was carried out to sea.  

Falling into a sleep that was fuelled by exhaustion rather than 
comfort, her last waking thought was that she hoped, one day, 
his voice would be carried in the wind, back to her again.  

END

Thanks for reading everyone.  I hope I was able to accurately 
portray the extraordinary relationship of Mulder and Scully to a 
certain degree.  Review, please!