TITLE:  Physics 101
AUTHOR:  Lysandra
E-MAIL:  Lysandra31@aol.com or Lysandra@mediaone.net
WEBPAGE:  http://www.angelfire.com/ms/lysandlys/fanfic.html
CATEGORY: SRA; Scully/Other; MSR (Shippers won't be disappointed,
though, so don't be put off by that Scully/Other!  <g>) 
RATING:  NC-17 (for sexual situations & strong language)
SUMMARY:  Mulder wonders what Scully did last night with her new
boyfriend. 
ARCHIVE:  With prior permission, please.
SPOILERS: Through US Season 5 to be safe!  
TIMESPAN:  Ummm, pre-FTF & forget about Small Potatoes.  Kind of a 5th
season netherworld where M&S haven't ever kissed at all, and they
still work on the X-Files from their basement office. NOTE:  Things
aren't always as they seem.  ;-)  THANKS: At the end of Part 8!


PHYSICS 101 - PART 1 of 8 (NC-17)
by Lysandra


F.B.I HEADQUARTERS 
MAY 31 - 9:05 A.M.

Mulder barely looked up as Scully walked into the office, just as she
did every day, although she wasn't usually five minutes late.  Crisp
suit, gold cross, heels clicking on the linoleum.  It was Scully, all
right, but something about her made him take a second look.  Something
about Scully was different this morning.

"Hey, Scully."

"Morning, Mulder."

What was it, exactly?  Her hair was the same as yesterday.  No new
cut, no new color.  She smelled of sweet vanilla, as always.  Same
makeup as usual.  Mulder had seen this particular suit plenty of times
before, so it wasn't her clothing either, although he could have sworn
she usually wore a different blouse with this Liz Claiborne.  No new
jewelry, no new shoes, no new accessories of any kind.  

Maybe she's wearing new lingerie, he considered with a sly smile.  

Well, his x-ray vision was on the blink so he doubted he'd be finding
out if he was right about *that* any time soon.  

No, Scully wouldn't like that much, and neither would Robert McMahon. 
Scully had gone out and gotten herself a regular Friday night date, an
actual boyfriend.  Mulder had to admit he was a bit jealous that he
didn't have Scully all to himself these days.  Not that she'd
abandoned him, or the X-Files, not by a long shot; but she just wasn't
at his beck and call anymore.  

Monday to Friday, nine to six, or anytime they were working on a case,
Scully was all business, and all his.  But lately, she'd rebuffed him
a few times when he'd called her after hours to ask a question.  She'd
sigh, "Mulder, I'm busy right now.  Can we please talk about this in
the morning?"  And then he'd hear soft male laughter in the background
as Scully hung up without even saying 'goodbye.'

Scully had met Robert McMahon at a wedding five weeks ago, and Mulder
could tell she liked him.  He seemed very nice - not too suave, not
too boring, good sense of humor.  He was a physics professor at
Georgetown, obviously intelligent, and like she once said, "Smart is
Sexy."  The physics thing couldn't have hurt his chances with Scully
either.  

Robert was good-looking in an everyday way, Mulder supposed, one of
those guys who at first seems unremarkable, but then after you got to
know him, you couldn't help but like him.  Well, Mulder *didn't* like
him, actually, but it was nothing he could put his finger on.  Robert
just annoyed him.  But he seemed trustworthy and all...  Mulder had
even had the Lone Gunmen check Robert out on the sly, and the man was
clean.  He'd done it to be cautious, nothing more.  Just making sure
his partner was safe and secure.

Mulder didn't begrudge Scully any happiness, really; he just wished
she wasn't the only one who had a social life.  It made him feel a
little lonely.  He and Scully had been in the same boat, dating-wise,
for almost the entire time they'd known each other, and frankly, he'd
found it comforting.  They were both chained inexorably to the
X-Files, both celibate - well, practically celibate, anyway - and both
pretty disinterested in the dating scene.  After all the things they
had seen and done, normal First Date conversation just seemed
impossible.  How do you tell someone you've just met that you are
trying to expose a global conspiracy that just might ruin the world as
we know it?  Or that you've been searching for your missing sister for
25 years?  Polite dinner conversation rarely revolved around alien
viruses, flukemen, or liver-eating mutants.  

He wondered what Scully and Robert had talked about on their first
date.  Mulder had heard her talk to Robert on the phone from the
office, but, always the professional, she never discussed anything too
personal, at least not while Mulder was in the room.  He'd listened in
as she made dinner plans, discussed whether to rent a video or go out,
and asked what she should wear to Robert's faculty dinner.  Mulder
wondered if Robert could ever know Scully as well as he did.

He and Scully had been on a case in Florida for a seven long days -
hot, sticky Florida.  Scully had called Robert every day while they
were there, except that night they'd slept on a barge and her cell
phone battery had run out.  Mulder's cell phone, of course, was lost
forever to the Everglades, probably lunch for a gator by now.  Victor
in the FBI Communications Department had just laughed when Mulder
called from the hotel to requisition yet another new phone.  

One of those humid nights in Florida, Scully had put Mulder on the
phone with Robert. 

"Talk to Mulder for a second, I've got something in my eye," she'd
said, handing Mulder the phone as she headed for the bathroom. 
Hearing laughter on the other end, Mulder asked Robert what was so
funny.  Robert told him, "I just think it's odd that you and Dana call
each other by your last names," adding, "it seems so formal."

Formal?  This guy's an idiot, Mulder thought.  "I guess it might look
that way to an outsider," he answered.

"I mean, it's kind of nice, I suppose, like using a nickname," Robert
said.

Mulder couldn't bear to talk to Robert for another second.  "Hold on,
I'll see if Scully's okay in there," he said, not waiting for a reply
as he set the phone on the night table and walked away...

Mulder's mind snapped back to the present as Scully shuffled some
papers.

There was definitely something unusual about her this morning.  Mulder
couldn't quite put his finger on it, but he could absolutely feel
something crackling in the air.  She'd been her normal self in
Florida, other than having nightly conversations with Robert, but now,
without her even saying a word, he knew she was a different Scully. 
And whatever it was, the change in her had occurred since he'd dropped
her by her apartment last night on the way home from the airport.  

Hmm, Scully, Mulder thought, what's happened since eight o'clock last
night? 

He cleared his throat.  No response.

She had her back to him, so he knew he'd have to work at this.  He
didn't want her to think he was profiling her, even if he was.  Scully
was no dummy.  

Slow and steady wins the race, Mulder, he told himself.  Patience is a
virtue.  But he needed to see her face.

"Hey, Scully."

"Hmmm?" she asked, seemingly intent on her laptop as it booted up.  

"Scully."

This time she spun her chair to face him.  "I hope you're not going to
tell me we have another case already, Mulder, because this report is
going to take at least a few hours, and I'm *not* getting on another
airplane until I've done my laundry."

He had to laugh.  "Nope, nothing like that."

Mulder saw something just then, something new... What the hell was
that *look* in her eyes?  Not an angry look, but a new look
completely.  It had been a long time since Scully had shot him a look
that surprised him.  Now we're getting somewhere, he mused.  

Scully's left eyebrow rose just a touch.  "Mulder."

"What?"

"Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Like what, Scully?" he replied as innocently as he could.

"Mulder, you're staring."  Scully's lips hinted at a smile, just
slightly, but it was there.

An imaginary light bulb blinked on just over Mulder's head.  He had a
pretty good idea as to what was different about Scully this morning. 
And he was going to enjoy this.

"Oh, was I staring?  I'm sorry, Scully.  But you looked happy there
for a second."

"Happy?"

"Yeah, happy.  Glad, joyous, blissful."  He paused for dramatic
effect.  "Satisfied."

"Mulder..."  Scully dropped her gaze to the floor, apparently very
interested in the heel of her left shoe.

Oh my God, Mulder thought.  I'm *right.*  "Scully...?"  His voice was
wrapped around a tease.

He knew, and she *knew* he knew, but he could tell she wasn't ready to
give in that easily.

He had never seen her this flustered before, and he actually thought
it was cute.  She looked like a little girl, making circles on the
floor with the toe of her shoe.  A few freckles peeked out through her
foundation; Scully was actually *blushing.*  Mulder felt it as much as
he saw it.  

Then she looked up at him defiantly, her eyes a vivid blue against her
flushed cheeks.  "*What,* Mulder?"

"Since we've seen each other last, is there any chance that you..." 

Scully was caught in the headlights.  Mulder could barely detect the
fear behind her eyes, and he'd give her one thing - she put up a
valiant fight.

"Mulder, what is it?" she challenged.  "Would you just spit it out
already?"

"I was just wondering, Agent Scully ... if you got laid last night."


**END PART 1/8 **

Feedback would be swell - spit it out already, to: Lysandra31@aol.com
or Lysandra@mediaone.net

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

PHYSICS 101 - PART 2 of 8  (NC-17) 
by Lysandra

FBI HEADQUARTERS
MAY 31 - 9:02 A.M.

Scully lingered in the elevator for a moment, reluctant to step out
into the basement.  Her fingers itched to press the button that would
return her back to the safety of the parking garage.  She had
considered calling in sick, but settled for dawdling at home for five
extra minutes, changing her blouse at the last second.  She had an
almost overwhelming urge to run back home while she still had the
chance. 

He'll know, she thought.  Mulder will take one look at me and know
something's different.  She studied her reflection in the mirrored
wall of the elevator, then silently chastised herself.  You look fine;
stop worrying.  
She mustered up her courage, stepped out into the hallway, and strode
purposefully toward their office.

He scarcely noticed when she walked in.  That was good.  They greeted
each other as always, and she immediately sat down and turned her back
on him, contenting herself with the busywork of pulling her laptop out
of its case and setting it up for the day.  Power cord, printer cord,
modem...

Avoidance was a good tactic for now, Scully supposed; if she could get
through an hour or so without Mulder picking up on her mood, she might
be able to calm her nerves enough to survive the rest of the day.  She
hoped he wasn't alert enough to sense a change in her.  With any luck,
he'd be too tired to notice.  The case in Florida had been draining,
and she suspected that if Mulder was in the office before her, he
hadn't gotten enough sleep.  

*She* definitely hadn't gotten any sleep at all last night.... 

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

Arlington, VA
May 30

Mulder had dropped her off around eight, and she went straight for the
shower, not even bothering to move her suitcase from its spot by the
door.  After cleansing herself of all things Floridian, she slipped
into her favorite sweats and a big Redskins T-shirt that she suspected
she had inherited from Mulder.  

Laundry, then bed; that was the extent of her agenda for the evening.

But at eight-thirty, Robert arrived unexpectedly with flowers, food,
wine, and a smile.

"I missed you," he said, kissing her on the cheek as he set the things
on her dining room table.  His bounty included fresh fruit, cheese and
bread from a local French bakery, complete with plastic plates and
utensils.  "I know," he sighed, "it's bad for the environment, but so
are dishpan hands, Dana.  You've worked hard all week; tonight leave
everything to me." 

"You're on," she smiled, giving Robert a quick kiss before settling on
the couch and tucking her bare feet beneath her.  Her hair wasn't even
close to dry, her face was devoid of makeup, and God only knew *what*
she was wearing, but Robert looked at her like he was ravenous, and
not just for bread and cheese.  

What if I'm Robert's 'thou,' she mused.  As in 'a loaf of bread, a jug
of wine, and ... me.'

As Robert spread out a picnic dinner on her coffee table, she
reflected on how long it had been since she had attended any sort of
picnic.  Especially not with service like this.  Robert kept her wine
glass full, and fed her grapes.  If she'd been a little less tired,
she might have insisted on feeding herself - but independence wasn't
all it was cracked up to be, she thought.  It was actually a nice
change to be waited on hand and foot.  

Speaking of feet, he gave hers a lovely massage after dinner.  Dana
watched him, thinking he had pretty strong hands for a professor, and
that she'd never have graduated if any of her teachers had his ready
smile and golden-brown eyes.

"Mmmm, 's nice," she murmured, feeling slightly woozy from the wine. 
And it *was* nice, she thought.  Why haven't I had my feet rubbed like
this in so long?

Robert was easy to be with - no stress, not a lot of shop talk.  On
their first date, she'd told him about the X-Files, as impartially as
she could, as if she were talking about someone else's life.  As if it
were just a *job.*  He took her at face value, and told her he wasn't
as interested in what she did as in who she was.  He was so sweet.  He
had no idea, of course, of what she had been through because of the
X-Files, and how much further they were likely to take her.  She had
dropped the subject after that, and was thankful that he had never
picked it back up.

She happily noted that the moment she tilted her head from side to
side to stretch her neck, Robert caught on at once.

"Here, c'mere," he whispered, grabbing a pillow off the sofa.  He sat
her on the floor between his legs, while he remained behind her on the
couch.  He moved his hands to her shoulders, ministering to her sore
muscles with great care.  "Have I told you that I used to date a
physical therapist?" he asked.  "She taught me all the tricks of the
trade."

"Mmmm, I'll bet she did," she replied quietly, grinning.  

Robert's fingers lightly kneaded her neck, tangling delightfully in
her damp hair as he massaged her scalp.  "Relax, Dana," he whispered. 
"You're so tense... God, you smell good."  

As his hands lowered onto her back, she relaxed, leaning forward
slightly.  Now working on her shoulder blades and spine, he draped
soft kisses just above the neckline of her T-shirt, and murmured,
"Mmm, when did you get this little scar?" 

Ignoring the question, she hoped she hadn't tensed up.  She wasn't
ready to discuss her implant with Robert, not yet.  It would only lead
to a discussion of life, death, cancer, conspiracy, and infertility,
and she was having too pleasant an evening to broach any of those
subjects.  Relieved that he didn't push for an answer, she let her
muscles loosen up at his touch. 

She silently thanked Robert's ex-girlfriend for whatever massage
techniques she'd imparted to him, and she thanked Robert's parents for
giving him such nice hands, and she thanked her lucky stars that she
was on the receiving end of all this tenderness.

"This ex of yours was a good teacher," she mumbled into her chest.

"Pardon?"

"Your ex-girlfriend, thank her for the lessons, this feels ... oh,
that's good, right there..."

Robert chuckled.  "I'll send her your regards, Dana."

She fleetingly considered sending Robert's former flame some flowers,
or a bottle of wine, or ... mmm, that felt great ... maybe a new car.

His touch was so gentle, yet firm, and his voice was so soothing, and
for a moment, she barely registered that Robert had moved from the
couch and was now seated behind her, his legs wrapped around hers. 
She lost the power of speech as he gently snaked his right hand in
front of her, pulling her into him, surrounding her with his
comforting warmth.  

His left hand crept back up to her neck, but his right ... oh, his
right hand was sneaking under the hem of her T-shirt and whispering
feather-soft caresses on her stomach.  Dana leaned back into him,
resting her head on his shoulder.

She wasn't surprised when Robert twisted her body slightly so his
mouth could find hers.  She managed to drape one relaxed arm around
his neck, opening herself up to his now-roving right hand.  

"Not in full uniform tonight?" Robert teased into her mouth as his
thumb grazed the underside of her bare breasts.

"No," she whispered, "I wasn't expecting a gentleman caller this
evening."

"Should I go?" Robert asked, knowing her answer already.

"You should stay," she said, turning toward him to fully participate
in the activity at hand.  She kissed him hungrily, pushing her body
against his.  He tasted of the wine they'd been drinking, and, oh yes,
it was a very good year.

His hand explored her left breast, ohhh, that felt *very* good... She
absently wondered how long had it been since anyone but a doctor had
touched her there.

Robert's tongue found the same rhythm as his hands, very circular, she
noticed.  How did he manage to be methodical and sexy at the same
time?  She pondered the question for a moment, decided she was
thinking too much, and returned her attentions to the very nice man in
her living room.

"Dana..." he whispered.  Robert always called her 'Dana,' never
'Scully.'  It had been so long since she'd been just Dana to anyone
outside her family.... The X-Files had dragged Dana away and buried
her under layers of mud and muck and mucous, dragging Scully into a
world of corpses, cancer, and conspiracies. No wonder it had been
forever since she'd felt feminine and pretty and all those silly
girlie things that she was feeling tonight.  

Her hands moved up his chest, and as her fingers worked to unbutton
his shirt, she felt Robert go a bit tense.  

"What is it?" she asked, looking into his warm brown eyes.

"Nothing... It's just," Robert shifted a bit uncomfortably, "...It's
just that if our clothes start coming off... I don't think I'm going
to want to go home tonight."

She pondered this for all of a millisecond.  Scully might have been
practical and sent him home; after all, it was getting late and she
had laundry to do.  Tonight, however, Dana was in charge, and Dana was
about to have sex for the first time in ages.  Decision made.

"You're not going home tonight, Robert."  

And that was that.  Her hands flew back to his shirt buttons, pausing
only to let Robert pull her T-shirt over her head.  In a moment his
bare chest was against hers, and a moment after that he was pulling
her up off the floor, kissing her like she hadn't been kissed in
years, and a moment after that, he quite literally swept her off her
feet and carried her into her bedroom.

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

FBI HEADQUARTERS
MAY 31

And now, Scully was trying like hell to ignore Mulder, who was trying
like hell to get her attention.  

Mulder, being Mulder, wasn't giving up, so she finally turned around
and tried to divert his attention, saying she couldn't go on a new
case until she'd done her laundry.

Nope, *that* didn't work.  Mulder's eyes were suddenly as big as
saucers.  This really wasn't good.   He must have seen her blushing;
she felt very flushed all of a sudden.  Maybe she could get out of
this if she went on the offensive, she hoped.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" she queried.

"Like what, Scully?"  Mulder's face was innocence personified, but she
didn't buy it for a second.

Like what, indeed, she silently snorted.  "Mulder, you're staring."

"Oh, was I staring?"  She hated him at that moment, him and his little
knowing smile.  "I'm sorry, Scully.  But you looked happy there for a
second."

Shit.  "Happy?" she replied, hoping her voice didn't betray the legion
of butterflies that had set up residence in her stomach.

"Yeah, happy.  Glad, joyous, blissful."  Shit.  "Satisfied," he
smirked.

Scully couldn't bear to look at him right now, but she managed to
slide a warning into her voice.  "Mulder..."

His reply was mocking.  "Scully...?"

Shitshitshit.  Scully could feel colorful heat rising through layers
of skin, burning its way to the surface, and fought the urge to fan
her face like a Southern belle on a scorching Atlanta day. 
Thankfully, that impulse passed before she acted on it.

"Yeah, what, Mulder?"

Scully tore her stare from the spot on the floor to look straight at
Mulder.

"Since we've seen each other last, is there any chance..."  His voice
trailed off.

Let's just get this over with, Scully decided.  "Mulder, what is it? 
Would you spit it out already?"

Mulder dove right in.  "I was just wondering, Agent Scully, if you got
laid last night."

Without a moment's hesitation, Scully looked him right in the eye as
she replied.  

"No." 


** END PART 2/8 **

Confused yet?  Feedback *might* get you a hint!  Lysandra31@aol.com or
Lysandra@mediaone.net   
 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * *  
PHYSICS 101 - PART 3 of 8  (NC-17) 
By Lysandra
Disclaimer, etc. in Part 1 


No??  Did she just say 'no?'  Mulder knew that his partner didn't lie
to him; she had occasionally lied *for* him, but never *to* him, other
than her tendency to say she was fine when she wasn't.  But how could
he have been so wrong about this?  Immediately, ideas raced through
his mind, and all the signs pointed toward the validity of his
ScullyGotLaid theory...  

First, she was trying to avoid looking at him.  Scully never had a
problem meeting his eyes before.  

Secondly, she had a boyfriend.  She'd been seeing Robert for just
about the right amount of time that she'd consider getting intimate
with him.   And they had just been apart for a whole week, the first
time they'd been separated since they started dating.

Then there was the blush!  Scully was not a woman who normally
blushed.

What was with the different blouse? It had a higher neckline than
usual, probably to hide something - a hickey?  A rash caused by
Robert's razor stubble, maybe?

And that look in her eyes -- Mulder thought he recognized it now... It
was a sex look, an 'I've had sex' look.  Not that he'd really seen it
on *Scully* before.  And it'd been a few years since he'd seen it in
the mirror, but that was beside the point...

Something had changed since he had last seen her.  Something internal
and fundamental.

More than anything, Mulder had a hunch.  A ScullyGotLaid hunch that
wouldn't go away.

Ergo, therefore, consequently, Scully *had* had sex!  That's all there
was to it.

He decided to challenge her.  "I'm sorry, Scully, did you say 'no?' 
As in, you *didn't* get laid?"

Scully was regaining her composure now.  Her eyes didn't waver, her
skin seemed to be thinking of returning to its normal hue, and her
voice was even and controlled as she replied.  
"Not that it's any of your business, Mulder, but no, I didn't *get
laid,* as you so delicately put it.  Now can I get back to the
report?"  She spun back to face her computer without waiting for a
reply.

"Sure, Scully, report away."  He studied the back of her head,
wondering how he could have been so wrong.  There must be something he
was missing.   An important clue was somehow being obscured, lurking
within the shadows of Scully's soul.  And hell if he wasn't going to
figure this out.  

Scully was typing onto her laptop, but the clicking had a different
rhythm than her usual report-typing cadence.  Her face was hidden, but
he wanted to believe he knew what she was doing: he supposed she was
staring at the screen, praying he wasn't profiling her, and typing
gibberish.  Mulder felt like a lion on the hunt; he was prowling,
while she was hoping he'd find something else to devour.  Now this was
personal for some reason.  He had to know What Was Going On With
Scully.

Caught up in his own thoughts, it took a moment for him to realize
that she had risen from her chair and was walking out of the office. 
"Hey Scully," he casually asked, "Where're you going?"

"Well, Mulder," she said, not an ounce of humor in her voice, "after I
sneak off for a quickie in the stairwell with James from the mailroom,
I'm going to a discount warehouse to buy a gross of condoms, some
whipped cream, and five pounds of strawberries.  Do you want me to
pick anything up for you?"  

Mulder sagged in defeat.  "Jesus, Scully, forget it."

"Forget it??  Mulder, since when has *my* sex life had anything at all
to do with *you?*"  The color was creeping back into Scully's cheeks,
but now, Mulder knew, it was born of anger.  "What would make you
think that I'd come running in here after having sex and discuss it
with my partner?  We're only partners at *work,* Mulder.  Now if you
don't mind, I'm going to the ladies' room.  Is that okay with you?"

Ouch.  Don't hold back on account of *my* feelings, Scully, Mulder
thought, but the phrase that actually escaped his lips was, "Sure. 
Fine.  Whatever."

Scully was already out the door, heels clicking on the linoleum
again.

Okay, maybe it was childish, but Mulder wanted to know what she'd been
typing.  Her computer's screen displayed no word processing, he saw as
he rose to get a closer look.  She'd obviously hit Alt+Tab, so he hit
it again, and, bingo, her document came into view: 	FUCK YOU MULDER,
FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK YOU Hmmm.  So it was like that, was it?

A thumping sound in the hallway jarred Mulder from his musings.  He
listened for a moment, heard nothing more, returned Scully's computer
screen to its previous incarnation, and sat back down at his desk.  

Oh yeah, *this* was going to be a fun day in Scullyland.  Mulder knew
he'd angered her, but some of her little speech was a tad harsh, even
for Scully.  Yeah, they were partners at work, but they were friends,
too ... weren't they?  

Outside of work, *weren't* they friends?  After all they'd seen, all
they'd been through, was this still just a *job* to her?  Of course
we're friends, he reassured himself.  They called each other at all
hours.  She drove him to to pick up his car when it was in the shop. 
They occasionally had dinner together, even when they were in town. 
He had a key to her apartment. And on a particularly bad day in a
particularly bad motel when Scully had been suffering from a
particularly bad case of PMS, she had sent him to the drugstore to buy
her some Natural Instincts Cinnaberry hair dye, which she applied in
the bathroom.  He noticed that she seemed to feel much better
afterward.  For heaven's sake, Mulder knew Scully's menstrual cycle,
and even which brand of tampon she preferred.  This is silly, he
thought.  We've saved each other's lives more times than we can count.
 Scully's not just a job, she's an adventure.

Back on track, Mulder, he chastised himself.  Whether they were
friends wasn't the issue here.  What *was* at issue was Scully and
What Was Wrong With Her.  Why had she gotten so bent out of shape when
he'd asked if she'd had sex?  The comment wasn't any more lewd or
lascivious than countless others he'd made in the past, and she'd
never reacted this way before.  He'd hit a nerve; he could feel it in
his bones.  He was definitely on to something, but ... what?  

Okay, let's say she she *hadn't* gotten laid.  Then where was this sex
vibe coming from?  All her signals pointed to sex.  Her not wanting to
look him in the eye was the most glaring for some reason.  She'd
avoided eye contact after she'd gotten that tattoo in Philadelphia,
and sex had been involved there, hadn't it?  Mulder had never found
out whether Scully had actually slept with Ed Jerse, but the way her
eyes didn't meet his had told him more anyway.  Whether she'd had
intercourse with the guy or not, something sexual had happened between
them, Mulder knew that for sure.  And he had gotten the same feeling
from her this morning.  

Christ, he didn't expect Scully to come running in like he was her
best girlfriend and give him all the juicy details, but he had hoped
that at this point they were above keeping secrets.  She hadn't
exactly kept Robert away from him; Scully had made a point of
introducing them the first time Robert had come to pick her up at
work.  She spoke to Robert on the phone every day and didn't bother to
keep those conversations private.  She'd gone so far as to offer up
the information that she felt normal dating Robert.  "Like a regular
girl," she had said a few weeks ago.  Mulder had wondered at the time
why she would want to be regular, but he had let it go.  Well, he
wasn't going to let *anything* go now.

Scully's heels again graced the hallway tiles, and he caught her gaze
as she walked right in front of his desk to her own area, neither of
them daring to speak.  She turned her attention back to her computer,
and again Mulder was left pondering the back of her head.

"Scully?" he ventured, suddenly feeling a bit ashamed at the fact that
he was profiling her.

Her voice dropped like an anvil.  "What?" 

"I'm sorry."

A moment passed.  Then another.

Scully turned to look at him now, and her face held something sad,
something troubling to Mulder.  Although her eyes were currently dry,
she looked as though she could burst into tears at any moment.  Her
bottom lip jutted out slightly, as if she were concentrating on
something important.  

"Mulder, I...."  She paused, looking away from him for a moment. 
Dammit, why wouldn't she look at him?  Was she *trying* to frustrate
him?

"Look," he interrupted, "It's possible I'm being a jerk; I know that's
nothing out of the ordinary.  But something's obviously bothering you.
 And maybe it's not my place, as your *partner,* to ask you to tell me
what it is.  But if you want to, Scully, I'll be right here."

At this, a solitary tear trickled silently down Scully's cheek.  She
made no move to wipe it away, just held his gaze and whispered,
"You're always right there, Mulder."

He started to feel scared.  Terrified.  Her voice hadn't held much of
a clue as to what that cryptic statement meant, but what had started
as mere teasing had suddenly turned into something much more serious. 
Why was his being *right there* making her cry?  Was she glad, sad, or
mad that he was *right there?*  Was this about *him*?

For once Mulder's profiling finesse flew completely out the window. 
He didn't have the slightest idea what was the matter with her, but he
knew one thing.

He didn't want to make Scully cry ever again.  

She sat very still as another tear fell, sliding off her cheek in slow
motion to hit the ground with what Mulder heard as a crash.  

He rose swiftly, and in a moment Scully was in his arms, sobbing.  Her
face was at his chest, and she shivered as though she were freezing,
the tremors heaving her whole body against his in grief, or fear, or
some horrible emotion he still couldn't place.  The last time they'd
been in this position, with her emotions swirling this close to the
surface, was the night she'd nearly been killed by Donnie Pfaster.  

Mulder held her close, not daring to speak.  What would he say at this
point, anyway?  He knew that when her tears subsided she'd give him an
explanation.  So he held her, and stroked her hair, and let her lean
against him for who knew how long.  Maybe five minutes passed before
she made an effort to pull away.

She gazed up at him, and there it was again, through her tears, that
look she'd given him earlier, the look that still perplexed him.

Mulder suddenly felt very protective of Scully, a different sort of
protective than usual.  He wasn't trying to keep her out of harm's way
here, nobody was holding a gun to her head; but he felt like she
needed saving somehow, from her own feelings, the feelings that had
propelled her into his embrace.  Something close to her heart was
torturing her, and he wanted to make it all go away.

He studied her tear-marked face, looking again for a clue.  He decided
to just come out and ask her.

"Scully?"

She held his gaze, but didn't answer, and simply kept looking at him
that way.

This wasn't just curiosity on Mulder's part now; he was seriously
worried about her.  He decided to try a different tack.

"...Dana?"

She opened her eyes fully, then took a giant step back, breaking
contact with him.  Her eyes were wide and wild now, feral and blazing
like an animal's.  Jesus, what just happened?  

Finally, she spoke.  "*What* did you just call me?"   

"Dana... I called you Dana."  It *was* her name, after all.  He just
didn't use it very often.  He could count on one hand the instances
when he had.  Usually someone had just died, he realized belatedly.

"What's wrong?" he asked, needing, no, *aching* to know what was going
on here.  A brand-new sensation of butterflies and adrenaline and pure
pain churned his stomach, making him feel as if he'd like to sit down
and put his head between his knees, but he didn't think he should move
at this point, not when he was so close to Scully's secret.

Her eyes never wavered now; she was staring at him with such intensity
he almost looked away.  And when she spoke, her voice now clear and
strong, her words rocked him to his foundation:

"Mulder, the next time you call me 'Dana,' it had better come from
deep in your soul, and you'd better be prepared to deal with who I am,
and all that I am, and what you mean to me."  She pointed one
manicured index finger at him in a stabbing motion, emphasizing her
warning.  "Don't you *ever* call me 'Dana' unless you can do that."

Mulder couldn't stay upright now.  What was she saying?  He was dizzy
again, and this time didn't he fight the feeling.  He sat down
abruptly and lowered his spinning head between his knees.  

Her words swam in his head.  <<"...You'd better be prepared to deal
with who I am ... and what you mean to me." .... "Don't you ever call
me 'Dana' unless you can do that...">>  This was like watching a
foreign film with bad subtitles; he heard the words, but their meaning
was unclear.  And Scully usually wasn't vague; she must be telling him
something.  But what?  What, exactly, did he mean to Dana Scully??

After a minute he felt stable again, and dragged his head out of his
lap, looking up to see ... his very empty office.  Scully was long
gone.


** END PART 3/8 **
  
Are you needing, no, *aching* to know what was going on here?  Part 4
will clear up a lot... Send feedback to: Lysandra31@aol.com or
Lysandra@mediaone.net

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * * *  
PHYSICS 101 - PART 4 of 8   (NC-17) 
By Lysandra
Disclaimers, etc. in Part 1
(except for this note:  Shippers, hang in there...you'll make it.)

FBI HEADQUARTERS
MAY 31 - 9:18 A.M.

Scully wished she'd never gotten out of bed this morning.  The
elevator wasn't taking her away from Mulder fast enough for her taste;
she could still feel his arms warming her, and the sweet smell of him
lingered on her clothes.  She had just run out of the office like an
idiot, after making a fool of herself.  She'd told him he'd better not
call her 'Dana' again until he knew what it meant to her....  He
probably thought she *was* an idiot, but she didn't want his little
guessing game to get too far, lest she say something she'd regret
later.  She'd already said too damn much.

Mulder thought that she'd had sex last night, and God knows that was
dangerously close to the truth, but at the same time, it wasn't the
point at all.  The reason she *hadn't* had sex, that was what she was
trying to avoid telling him.  And she'd almost blurted out too much. 

She hadn't done a great job of fending off Mulder's questions, so she
had escaped to the Ladies Room for a few minutes in an attempt to pull
herself together; but being alone with her thoughts wasn't any easier
than being in a room with Mulder.  She had literally banged her head
against the wall in the restroom, hoping to clear it of all this
doubt, indecision, and fear.  All she'd managed to do was give herself
a headache.

So she'd returned to the office, resolved that she wasn't going to
lose her cool, and then ... she'd just lost it *all* in front of
Mulder.  Hell, she'd latched onto him and cried a thousand tears,
feeling safe and warm in his embrace as long as she didn't have to
look at him.  She thanked God for small mercies, grateful that she
hadn't divulged even more than she had.

The day was only beginning, and what a mess she'd made of it already. 
Calm down, be rational, she told herself as she willed the elevator to
quickly deposit her in the parking garage.  God, I can't believe I
cried.  

Her thoughts drifted back to last night, when all this began.  Things
had been progressing nicely with Robert; they drank good wine, ate
good food, and he gave her a great back rub, and when the situation
started getting sexual, they had adjourned to her bedroom to get more
comfortable...

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

MAY 30 - 9:42 P.M.

Robert gently laid her down on her bed, and paused to look at her. 
The hungry look in his eyes said she was the most beautiful thing he'd
ever seen, and then he said it out loud: "Dana, you're... you're
gorgeous."  

Nobody had ever called her gorgeous before.  Where had she found this
man again?  Oh yes, it was Michelle's wedding, she remembered, and
he'd looked very handsome.  

"You looked gorgeous yourself in that tuxedo the night we met," she
replied.

He almost blushed, and then reclined on the bed beside her, stroking
her face and hair, kissing her cheek and neck oh so gently.  

She went on, "Who has a formal evening wedding in this day and age? 
Who has time to plan that sort of thing?"  

Lapping at her skin, Robert agreed.  "Practically all the people I
know who've waited this long..." he nibbled her earlobe, "...end up
flying off somewhere tropical like Aruba..." he suckled, hard, just
above her collarbone, "...and getting married on the beach with a few
friends, barefoot and happy."  

That's going to leave a mark, she thought, not caring.

"You're barefoot," he added with a smile.  "Now let's see about making
you happy."  He turned his full attentions to Dana's body, kissing her
more ferociously than he ever had before, one hand tangling in her
hair, the other twisting her left nipple between his fingers in a
torturous dance of pleasure and pain which made her moan with
delight.

This feels really, *really* nice, was her only thought.  God, had she
really been so *very* celibate for all this time?  What had she been
thinking?

He pried his lips away from hers slightly, to ask, "Getting close to
happy?"

"Mmmm, happy..." she sighed, not really giving it a thought one way or
the other.

His tongue dove back into her mouth, seeking answers from her own,
which responded of its own volition.  Robert was a good kisser, not
that she'd had much to go by recently, but she was pretty sure she was
right about this.  Like riding a bike, she supposed.  His lips were
gentle yet daring, his tongue soft yet insistent, and he tasted like
the zest of the cheese and the earthiness of the wine.  

Dana's hands finally decided to do some exploring of their own, quite
separate from any conscious decision on her part.  They stroked him,
up and down his back, wrapping around his strong arms and caressing
his face, finding a hint of five o'clock shadow.  She ran her fingers
through his wavy hair, and again fleetingly thought she'd never had a
Physics professor anything like Robert. 

His lips, his hands, his chest -- all the parts of him that were
touching all the parts of her felt so nice; the soft noises coming
from deep in his throat serving to remind her he was really here with
her, not a fantasy, not a dream.  A real man, here in her bed,
half-naked and filled with desire for her.  Mmm, this was turning out
to be a very pleasant evening.  This is *much* better than doing
laundry, she thought, making a mental note to get up early in the
morning to do just that.

His mouth moved to her right breast, licking and kissing and sucking
and nibbling so very nicely that she barely noticed when his hands
slipped inside the waistband of her sweats, gently pushing them down
over her stomach, her hips... 

Dana didn't even realize she was wriggling her legs to rid herself of
the sweats, didn't realize when she stopped caressing his upper body
to fiddle with the button of his jeans, didn't realize when she pushed
his jeans and boxers over his hips; she just knew that she wanted his
skin against hers from head to toe.

Robert lightly chuckled as he helped things along, and moments later
they were both naked, the last of their clothes crumpled in a heap
somewhere at the foot of her bed.  She luxuriated in the feel of his
legs tangled with hers and his hands trailing lower on her body as he
continued kissing her with abandon.

There was no talking now, only soft moans echoing throughout her
bedroom, vague shadows dancing on the wall as cars passed in front of
a street lamp outside.  

She was mesmerized by it all: she felt as if the logical part of her
had taken a much-needed vacation and the only part that mattered at
this moment was the part that was being stroked and fondled and
caressed.  Dana was feeling warm and cherished and safe here in her
sanctuary.  Robert wasn't a dangerous unknown like Ed Jerse had been;
this wasn't rough, not a one-night stand, and Robert certainly didn't
have psychotic tendencies that would make her question her judgment in
the morning.  He was reliable, and tender, and here with her now,
making her feel wanted and sexy and adored.

Ohhhh--!!  Nobody had touched her *there* in quite awhile, and God, it
felt good.  A hand had slipped between her legs, and she unconsciously
spread them wider to give the hand better access.  One finger slipped
inside her, *wow* that was nice, oh, right *there,* yessss....

Always adept at multitasking, she didn't have to think about anything
in particular as she reached for his penis, and began stroking him,
mimicking the rhythm of his finger, or now fingers, inside her.  He
was already hard, and getting harder by the second as she trailed her
hand over his length, noticing he was as hot on the outside as she
felt on the inside.  

His moans became stronger and more insistent, and she felt him edging
closer to her on the bed, and his voice was ragged as he spoke:

"Mmmm, Scully..."

SCULLY??

Her eyes flew open, her hands stopped moving, and her whole body
tensed up as her surname hung in the thick air of her bedroom.

No, this is all wrong.  This man does *not* call me 'Scully,' she
thought.  Mulder calls me 'Scully.'  Only Mulder.

Robert, jarred by her sudden stiffness, stilled his hands as well,
then retrieved his fingers from her depths and leaned back to look at
her, apparently frightened by her expression.

"Dana?  Did I do something wrong?  Did I hurt you?"  His face held
concern, and worry, and a question as to what just happened.

Oh. My. God.  This is Robert, here in my bed, she remembered.  We're
in bed, on the verge of something really intimate, and ... Mulder. 
Nobody in my bed should be calling me 'Scully' except Mulder.

Fuck!  Mulder's not *in* your bed, Scully!  Mulder's probably doing
his own laundry right now, or else he's already asleep on his couch,
or maybe he's fiddling around on the internet looking for conspiracy
theories, but Fox Mulder is definitely *not* part of this scenario. 
Nor should he be.

"Dana?"  

Shit.  Robert.  How could she explain this to him?  "Why did you call
me that?" she asked.

"'Scully?'  I don't know, I..."

Hearing him say 'Scully' again only made it worse, and she didn't want
to hear any more.  "I'm sorry, this--" she managed a vague gesture at
him, then at herself, "This ... isn't going to happen, Robert."

His gaze retreated behind his eyelids for a moment before he looked at
her again.  She didn't know him well enough to read his expression,
but disappointment, concern, and anger were all possibilities at this
point.  

Robert pulled completely away, leaving her feeling cold and alone as
he rose from the bed, grabbed his clothes and silently walked into the
bathroom, shutting the door behind him.

"I'm sorry," she repeated, her voice a bit more committed now that she
was talking to a closed door.

Shit.  Where had *Mulder* come from, anyway?  She hadn't given him a
thought all night; she'd never even considered that she should be in
bed with him instead of with Robert.  Damn Mulder for invading her
brain at the most inopportune moment possible - it's not bad enough
that he invades my personal space, she thought, he's got to come into
my head when I'm in bed with someone *else?*  

Thoughts raced through Scully's mind, molecules whizzing around atoms
swirling around protons.  Why had the mere mention of her last name
deposited Mulder into her conscience?  Why couldn't she just go with
the flow, for once, and not analyze things to death?  Why, why, *why*
did someone else's fingers need to be stroking her inside and out when
these feelings for Mulder hit her like a Mack truck??

Robert opened the bathroom door, now fully clothed, clearly
uncomfortable with the situation but unwilling to give up completely. 
He sat down on the edge of the bed, remaining silent for a moment. 
"I'm not sure what happened here tonight, Dana," he finally uttered.

She wrapped the sheet around her front as she sat up to face him. 
"Robert, I think... I think I wasn't quite ready to make love with you
tonight, and I'm sorry that things got so far before I realized it."

"Look, I thought we wanted each other," Robert said, his voice
betraying a hint of anger.

"I did... I did want you, Robert," she answered.  "But..." she paused,
taking a deep breath, "When you called me 'Scully,' it just set
something off in me that I didn't even know existed.  All of a sudden,
I realized..."  She trailed off, unwilling to finish her thought
aloud.

Robert seemed to need her to finish it, though.  "Realized what,
Dana?"

Her own eyes welled with tears now, her heart thumping madly as hidden
feelings jumped from her subconscious into the realm of her real life.
 "I realized, when you called me 'Scully,' that nobody calls me that
except Mulder."

He kept looking at her, waiting for more.  "So ... this is about
Mulder, isn't it?"

That's the understatement of the year, she thought.  "Yes, it is."  

"Jesus, I should have known... I thought it was sweet, his calling you
by your last name, but I guess it's not, is it?"  Robert rose from the
bed, unable to hide his annoyance.  "We'll talk about this when we're
both a little less emotional, okay?"

Scully tried to imagine feeling less emotional.  Her mind swam,
passions mixing with thoughts mixing with memories, until her brain
was overloaded and simply wouldn't process anything more.

"Robert?"

"Yeah, Dana?"

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah."  

He turned to go, and she realized she couldn't leave it like this.  

"Robert, wait."

"What?"

"I don't need to talk about it."

Robert studied her face for a moment before she saw it dawn on him
that she was breaking up with him, and he didn't have any say in the
matter.  Scully felt a little sorry for him, but not much.  He hadn't
invested any more than she had, she thought.

Finally, he muttered, "So that's it."

Quick and clean, she thought.  "Yes.  That's it."

"Fine, *Dana.*  Goodbye," he sneered.

With that, Robert walked out of her bedroom, and Scully felt an
embarrassing twinge of relief when she heard her front door click shut
behind him as he left her alone in her apartment.

She grabbed Mulder's T-shirt from the floor and put it back on,
slipping into a clean pair of panties before heading into the
bathroom.

The face in the mirror looked strange to Scully.  She'd seen her own
reflection a million times before, but now there was something
different, something in her eyes.

She stretched the neck of the T-shirt to look at the mark Robert had
left behind on her collarbone.  Didn't hurt much, she realized as she
touched it.  

Although she'd been about to make love with Robert, she didn't *love*
him.  It was only going to be sex with Robert, just sex.  Not like it
would be with...

Shit.

She was in love with Mulder.  


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

FBI HEADQUARTERS
MAY 31 - 9:20 A.M.

So here she was, in the parking garage of the Hoover building, sitting
in her car wondering where she should go now.  Home didn't seem safe. 
Not only did it feel like the scene of a crime, but worse, Mulder
would surely find her there.  She fumbled around in her purse for a
moment, found her cell phone and turned it off.  She knew he'd call
her eventually, and she couldn't bear to talk to him right now, not
even over the phone.  She'd check her messages later.   
It was 9:20 a.m. on a Tuesday.  Where would someone who didn't have a
job *go* at 9:20 on a Tuesday?  Were stores open yet?  Maybe she could
go to the library, but that seemed too much like work.  She hadn't had
her morning coffee and this life-altering realization was seriously
taxing her overwrought psyche.  

Coffee.  That was it.  She'd find a nice, relaxed coffeehouse, sit and
sip a vanilla latte, think about her life, and work through this.  She
couldn't be in love with Mulder.  She shouldn't.

Scully drove all the way to Bethesda, passing three or four
coffeehouses before she saw one that fit her mood, though she couldn't
actually identify the mood.  She couldn't even decide if this mood
belonged to Dana or Scully, and cursed the fact that she was so
confused.  The place wasn't crowded, and wasn't populated with
yuppies.  This was more of a neighborhood place, she sensed.  It
wasn't in *her* neighborhood, wasn't in Mulder's either, and wasn't
anywhere near the Hoover building, and this comforted her.  She wasn't
likely to run into anyone she knew here.  She'd sit here for an hour
or so, let the classical music flow over her, think logically where
she should go from here, and get on with her life.  

Yeah, right.  

Well, she thought, I won't go wrong with caffeine, so let's start
there.  She placed her order with the college student behind the
counter and found an almost-secluded spot behind a bookshelf, folding
her legs under her in a big overstuffed chair.  Heaven.  

Or Hell.  The idea that she was in love with Fox Mulder, of all
people, was nearly too much for her to even imagine.  Mulder?  My
partner, Mulder?  How could I have let this happen?  

Sure, she had feelings for him, but it had always been camaraderie,
trust, friendship.  Not love.  Not love like this.  Not 'I need him I
want him I must have him' love.  Not 'what does he taste like feel
like kiss like' love.  This was unthinkable.

Oh God, had she really given up a night of perfectly good sex because
of Mulder?  She wasn't likely to have another chance very soon, this
she knew.  Not with Robert, anyway.  

Scully shifted in her chair to idly grab a book off the shelf, and
came to the conclusion that she didn't really want to have sex with
anyone but Mulder anyway.  Not now.  Now it would be a betrayal - not
of Mulder, but of herself.  Dammit, why did she have to be so
introspective, so logical?  Who cares if it's a betrayal?  Mulder had
no claims to her, and she doubted he'd even want to.  This was all her
doing, all in her own mind.  

Mulder was probably wondering where she'd gone.  Screw him.  He'd
ditched her so many times that payback was only fair.  See what it's
like to be left high and dry, Mulder.  Of course, he'd have no idea
what she was paying him back for, and he was no doubt pacing the
floors already.

She managed an insincere smile of thanks at the waitress when her
coffee arrived, in a big blue mug with a mismatched saucer.  What had
she said to him again?  <<"...The next time you call me 'Dana,' it had
better come from deep in your soul...">>  God, she was psychotic.  As
if they both didn't have enough problems...   

Deep in his soul...  If Mulder felt anything for her, deep in his
soul, it was respect, gratitude, friendship.  She scowled even while
taking a sip of her latte.  Mulder's soul was filled to the brim with
the darkness of guilt and obsessions long held, and she wasn't sure
she wanted to be thrown into that mix.  

This is ridiculous, she thought.  I'm already *in* Mulder's mix.  And
he is most definitely in mine.  

She wasn't getting anywhere.  But this coffee was good, so she'd sit
and think some more.  

Where the hell was Dana?  She'd been let out of her cage for an
evening with Robert, but that wasn't the real Dana, not all of her. 
She hadn't given him her heart.  Her heart was still buried beneath
the muck and mud, beating away just like always.  Thu-thump,
thu-thump, thu-thump.  How could Mulder have been the one to bury her
heart and also the one to make it want to jump out of her chest? 

<<"...You'd better be prepared to deal with who I am, and all that I
am, and what you mean to me....">>  Did she actually threaten him? 
And with what, exactly?  Herself?  Big deal - she didn't even know who
she was these days.  This split personality business wasn't funny. 
How had she let her job rob her of her identity this way?  When
exactly had the X-Files taken over her life?  When had Mulder?  


** END PART 4/8 **

Feedback?  Yum!  Send it to: Lysandra31@aol.com or Lysandra@mediaone.n
et, who wonders when, exactly, X-Files fanfic had taken over her
life.

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

PHYSICS 101 - PART 5 of 8  (NC-17) 
By Lysandra
Disclaimers, etc. in Part 1


FBI HEADQUARTERS
MAY 31 - 9:20 A.M.

Mulder surveyed the wreckage of his office.  There wasn't any actual
physical damage, but devastation hung in the air, thick and misty. 
Scully's raw emotions had burst onto the scene when he called her by
her first name, and now his confusion over her reaction added to the
dank feeling of unrest that surrounded him.  He and Scully had worked,
bantered and argued in this room for years, but their basement
hideaway had never taken on an atmosphere quite like this.

Think, Mulder, think.  

Had Scully been on the edge when she walked in this morning, or had
she been set off by the sound of her name from his lips?  He tried to
recall exactly what had taken place over the last fifteen minutes. 
Fifteen minutes.  Such a short time for something so momentously
mysterious to have happened... 

Yes, something was different about her, from the moment she'd arrived
in the office.  He mentally kicked himself for assuming that Scully
had had sex; apparently his instincts had failed him.  Anyway, she was
right; it was none of his business.  But that didn't stop him from
being curious.  He'd had thoughts of Scully from time to time, sexual
thoughts.  He had chalked those thoughts up to the fact that, well, he
was a man, and she was an attractive woman, and they were in close
proximity.  He'd tamped them down where they belonged, deep in his
subconscious.  Scully wasn't some girl he'd picked up in a bar; he had
to look at her across his desk every day.  He had to sit in cars with
her for hours upon hours.  He had a pretty good thing going with
Scully for all these years, and he was proud of himself for hanging on
to the one sane relationship he'd built.

Then a horrific thought came into his mind, unbidden, unwanted. 
Unimaginable.  Was it possible she had been raped?  That would account
for her embarrassment, her reluctance to make eye contact, and for the
high neckline on her blouse; what if she were hiding bruises?  Shit. 

Think, Mulder, think...  That might just be it, he reasoned.  Someone
could have been waiting for her inside her apartment last night, could
have ambushed her the second she walked in the door.  She'd had her
suitcase in one hand, her coat in the other along with her keys, when
he'd dropped her off in front of her building.  Fuck!  Of all the
times to be in a hurry.  Why couldn't he have walked her to her
door??

Mulder was feeling pain, physical pain in his chest.  He took a deep
breath.  Okay, think about this logically.  Was there anything about
Scully that would *discount* the rape theory?  Anything at all?  

She'd smiled a little smile that seemed, well, a tad devious, like she
was keeping something from him, and at the time he'd assumed she was
hiding some delicious secret, not something horrible like this. 

And she'd made a joke about going to buy condoms, but when he replayed
the comment in his head, she didn't actually sound amused.  

And when she flung herself at him and started crying, the tears had
come from someplace deep inside her, someplace she didn't want to go. 
She didn't seem to be in any physical pain, he realized; he had held
her tight and she hadn't flinched - that, at least, was something. 
She at least felt safe in his arms.  And, he realized, he felt safe
too, holding her in his arms.  It had been the right place for both of
them to be at the time.

But nothing that she had said or done would completely erase this
disturbing theory from his mind.  Dana, he'd called her Dana, and it
had set her off on a rampage.  If someone *had* raped Scully, maybe it
was someone who knew her, knew her name.  Could it have been Robert? 
Date rape is still rape.  Fuck fuck fuck.  

Mulder paced furiously in the small office, unable to sit still. 
She'd obviously showered this morning; he could still smell that
vanilla shower gel she always used.  If she had been raped, the
evidence would be washed away - unless she'd been to a hospital
already.  She had looked a little tired; what if she'd been up all
night dealing with this?  And why hadn't she called him?  Surely she
would have called him, wouldn't she?  God, it would be just *so*
Scully to go through something horrible like this and only be five
minutes late for work.

Mulder considered calling Mrs. Scully to see if she knew anything, and
went so far as to pick up the phone before deciding against it.  With
his mind so muddled, he thought he'd better calm down a bit before
worrying her; what if he was completely wrong, and he scared her to
death?  She'd been through enough; he'd wait.

He had to find Scully.  Right now.  He grabbed his jacket and keys and
slammed the door behind him as he left.


ARLINGTON, VA
10:02 A.M.

Mulder didn't find Scully at her apartment.  He also found no sign of
forced entry, which made him feel slightly better, but didn't erase
his concern.  Maybe she'd given Robert a key.  *Robert.*  If Robert
had been the one to hurt her, Mulder would kill him.  It was that
simple.  Christ, if *any* man had laid a finger on her without her
permission... Mulder couldn't stomach the thought.

He saw that her suitcase was still sitting by her front door.  So she
really *hadn't* done laundry.  He hesitated a moment before heading
into the bedroom.  It smelled like Scully, and he took a deep breath
before looking around.  Nothing out of the ordinary as far as he could
see.  Her bed was made, and everything looked to be in its place.  Not
that he knew where everything's place *was* in Scully's bedroom, but
it looked fine to him.  

He wondered if the place was a tad *too* neat.  Often, he knew, rape
victims not only shower, but clean up the scene of the crime to erase
any memory of the attack.  He checked the wastebaskets, and the
laundry basket in her bathroom; no sheets, no blood; again, everything
looked okay.

For a moment he considered waiting for her, but he felt like he was
invading her privacy, and he resisted the urge to linger.  

He drove by Mrs. Scully's house; Scully's car wasn't anywhere to be
seen, and he didn't stop.

On a whim he drove to his own apartment.  Nope.  No Scully.  No
surprise there; she had obviously wanted to get away from him.

He dialed her cell phone.  "The mobile unit you've called is not
responding..."  Shit.  She *never* turned off her phone.  She *really*
didn't want to talk to him, did she?

This is useless, he thought.  She could be anywhere.  Frantic thoughts
twisted in his head, images of Scully crying, her eyes brimming with
liquid pain.  Concentrate, Mulder, he told himself, even as his own
eyes stung with unshed tears of frustration.  She's hurting, and she
needs you to be the sane one for once.  

He headed back toward the Hoover building, reasoning that if Scully
*did* need him, that's where she'd look first.  He also thought that
at least one of them should get some work done today.  He'd finish the
report himself, maybe.  Anything that would clear his head at this
point would be an improvement over his present state of panic.

No.  *No!*  He couldn't just sit and wait when she might be in serious
pain.  He had to DO something.

He made an illegal U-turn, heading back toward Georgetown University.

All the way up four flights of stairs to the Physics Department,
Mulder silently repeated his mantra with each step: 'Scully, Scully,
Scully,' willing her to be okay.  

He didn't have too much trouble locating Professor Robert McMahon, and
waited outside his classroom.  Keep your cool, Mulder, he told
himself, pacing the hallway like a caged animal.  He could see Robert
writing equations on the Dry-Erase board as he spoke.  There were only
six or seven students, and just one female among them.  Mulder
imagined Scully in college, in the same situation.

As Mulder paced, he silently raged with unspoken questions: 
Why is she unhappy today? 
Tell me, Robert, what did you do to her?   
Robert, did you hurt her?  
Did you *rape* her?

When the students had filed out, Mulder entered the room, trying
valiantly to keep his cool.  He spun one word into a threat. 
"Robert."

Robert turned and stared at Mulder, trying to place him.  Mulder
didn't notice, and dove right into his inquisition, grabbing Robert
roughly by the shoulders.  "What *happened* to her?"

Robert looked terrified as he broke free of Mulder's hold.  "Who *are*
you?" he yelled, walking quickly toward a phone on the wall.

Mulder realized then that Robert didn't recognize him, and was
probably about to call security.  He beat Robert to the phone,
blocking Robert's path.  "Fox Mulder," he hissed.  "Scully's
partner."

Robert studied him for a moment.  "Jesus, Mulder, I didn't recognize
you.  What the hell's *wrong* with you?"

Mulder took a step backwards, trying in vain not to sound accusatory. 
"Scully's ... upset about something... And she was fine when I dropped
her off last night."  He spoke through clenched teeth.  "So I was
hoping you could shed a little light on the situation."  

Robert suddenly looked very uncomfortable.  *Very* uncomfortable, and
very silent.  The profiler in Mulder didn't like this one bit.

He took a step toward Robert, who had turned to look out the window. 

"Have you seen Scully since we've gotten back from Florida?"

Robert paused a moment before answering.  "Yes.  I saw her last night;
why?"

Mulder lunged, whipping Robert around by the shoulders, until they
were again face to face.  His voice now crackling with anger, Mulder
challenged Robert, invading his personal space.  "What did you *do* to
her, dammit??"

"...Christ!" Robert managed, again freeing himself from Mulder's
grasp, "...Calm down. I didn't do anything to her."

Mulder saw truth in Robert's face and almost sighed with relief as the
realization sunk in.  Robert didn't rape her.  But he also saw
something in Robert's eyes that told him there was more.  Robert knew
what was wrong with Scully.

Mulder took a deep breath as he considered his next words.

"Look, I'm sorry.  I didn't mean -- Shit..." he sighed, frustration
evident in his voice.  He moved to sit down, but never made it to a
chair, pacing restlessly instead.  He continued, "I'm well aware that
this is none of my business, but..."  

Robert looked at Mulder strangely, staring into his eyes, apparently
searching for something.  Mulder started to worry again when he saw
the disturbing expression on Robert's face.

Robert snapped at Mulder.  "No. This *is* your business.  But not
here."  Robert looked angry now.  "Not with me."

Had someone *else* hurt her?  Had Scully turned to Robert last night,
instead of him?  What the hell was going on?  

No time like the present to find out, he thought, so he said it out
loud: "What the hell are you talking about?"

Robert shook his head, derisively clicking his tongue against his
teeth.  "Do you *always* call her 'Scully?'"

Mulder was suddenly uncomfortable with this conversation.  Robert
seemed to be almost toying with him now, but Mulder couldn't walk
away, not if there was a chance he'd get the answers he'd come here
for.  

Answer a question with a question, he thought.  "Why is that
important?" 

"Do you ever call her 'Dana?'" Robert volleyed back.   

This guy was really pissing Mulder off.  "Rarely.  Why?"

"I was just wondering."

"Where is this going?  I call her 'Scully,' okay?  What's that got to
do with anything?"

Robert laughed quietly.  "You'll have to ask *her* that, I think."

Mulder's anger was on the verge of spiraling out of control.  "What if
I did call her 'Dana,' what difference would that make to you?"

"Hell, you can call her anything you want, and it won't make a
difference to me," Robert said.  "It's not like I..." he trailed off. 
"Never mind."

What the fuck was this guy talking about?  Mulder realized that Robert
and Scully had broken up last night, or at the least had a fight.  But
what was it about her *name* that was making Robert steer this
conversation in circles?  

Think, Mulder, think.  Slowly, his mind started to make the connection
- still tenuous, but better than nothing.  When he'd called her 'Dana'
earlier she'd lost it completely.  And Robert knew something about
this, apparently.

"It's too late for 'never mind,' you know that," Mulder said, giving
up the struggle to keep his voice down.  "Why don't you just tell me
what made her so *fucking* upset?  Something about her name?"  

"This conversation is over."  Robert grabbed his briefcase and his
coat.

"I'm not through with you," Mulder managed through gritted teeth.

Robert wasn't biting.  "Whatever you say from now on, you'll have to
say it to Dana."  He closed his eyes for a moment, shaking his head
before continuing, his voice taking on a distinctly bitter tone. 
"Sorry.  You'll have to say it to *Scully.*"  Robert choked out her
surname as if it were an epithet.  

And then he stalked out of the classroom, leaving Mulder alone.

Mulder tried to wrap his brain around what just happened. Unable to
stand still, he kicked the rubber wastebasket, but didn't get any
satisfaction from the act, and, looking for something more substantial
to wreck, he picked up Robert's chair and flung it against a wall,
listening to the clattering echo as he headed out of the building,
fists clenched.  

He had to find Scully before his head exploded from the twin burdens
of worry and curiosity.  

On the drive back to the Bureau, Mulder could think of nothing but
Scully.  

Think, Mulder, think.  Robert had given him clues, and now it was up
to him to decipher them and find her.  He felt slightly better, now
that he was relatively sure that no sexual assault had taken place
last night.  But there was still a mystery to by solved.  Talking to
Robert, Mulder had gotten the distinct feeling that he himself was
part of the problem with Scully.  But what had *he* done?  He'd
dropped her home last night, and now, this morning, she was apparently
in a state of extreme anxiety over the difference between being called
'Dana' and being called 'Scully.'

This was like an X-File, but he wasn't lucid enough to put the pieces
together yet.  His mind once again spun with snippets of the day's
conversations replaying on a tired loop: "...We're only partners at
*work,* Mulder..." "...Do you *always* call her 'Scully?...'"
"...You'd better be prepared to deal with who I am, and all that I
am..."

Scully.  Robert knew what was wrong with her and Mulder hadn't gotten
it out of him.  Not all of it.  Robert had probably hurt her, and now
Mulder suspected she'd hurt Robert too.  Mulder thought about it for
another moment, then realized he didn't care if Scully had hurt Robert
at all.  That was of no consequence to him.  He only cared about
Scully and whether she was all right.  Scully, and Dana, and whoever
else was inside her head today.  As for Robert, that prick could drop
off the face of the earth and Mulder wouldn't mind a bit.  Anyone who
could swear her name, the way Robert just had, didn't deserve Scully.

She hadn't been back to the office, he discovered upon his return.  He
realized that he didn't know her hangouts, didn't know where she might
go on a Tuesday morning when she was upset.  

Mulder did know some things about Scully -- some important, some not
so important.  

He knew she had a sweet tooth.   
He knew that she hated being interrupted when she was taking a bath. 
He knew she missed her father.   
He knew that she taped "Ally McBeal," although he also knew she would
never admit it.    He knew she blamed herself for Melissa's death.  
He knew she wore glasses when her eyes got tired.  
He knew that she grieved for Emily every single day.
He knew that her eyes were the bluest he'd ever seen, and that her
heart was the purest he'd ever known.  

And in a flash of clarity, he knew without a doubt that he was in
very, *very* big trouble here.  

He realized that whatever he knew about Scully, it wasn't enough.  He
wanted to know her hangouts, and her secrets, and her favorite song. 
He wanted to know her most embarrassing moment, and her most treasured
childhood memory.  He wanted to know it *all.*  

And he knew that he loved her.


** END PART 5/8 **

Please send feedback, before my head explodes from the twin burdens of
worry and curiosity! Lysandra31@aol.com or Lysandra@mediaone.net

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


PHYSICS 101 - PART 6 OF 8  (NC-17) 
by Lysandra
(disclaimers, etc. in Part 1)


The Big Cup Coffeehouse
Bethesda, MD
11:41 A.M.

Scully leafed through the book in her hand as she sipped her vanilla
latte.  Despite lounging in what must have been the most comfortable
old chair in the world, she shifted and squirmed miserably, finding it
hard to make herself sit still.  

The book she had grabbed was a well-worn copy of "Bartlett's Familiar
Quotations."  Great.  All the advice in the world in one book, and
thousands more opinions than she could handle right now.  She already
felt like she had two people inside her head, and that was one too
many as it was.

Still, she absently thumbed through the pages, not really looking at
the quotes, occasionally spotting a familiar name flying by. 
Shakespeare, Milton, Jane Austen.  

God, Scully hated Jane Austen; completely useless dreck.  Full of
unlikely romance and silly twittering girls with no sense at all.  She
scowled as she read an Austen quote:  	"A lady's imagination is very
rapid; it jumps  	from admiration to love, from love to matrimony 
	in a moment."
As if Scully didn't feel bad enough having come to the conclusion that
she was in love with her partner, Jane Austen assumed she wanted to
*marry* him, too?  Jesus.  She daydreamed that Jane Austen was alive,
walking into the coffeehouse wearing one of those long dresses with a
high waistline.  Scully imagined kickboxing Jane back into the 19th
century where she belonged.

Unable to concentrate, Scully dropped Bartlett's in her chair to mark
her territory as she got up to peruse the shelves for another book. 
She wasn't sure why she was bothering; her eyes could barely focus on
the titles, she was so scattered.  The books were in no order at all. 
Paperbacks mixed with hardcovers and a few magazines; Karl Marx sat
next to Bret Easton Ellis; both shared a shelf with Norman
Schwarzkopf, Dorothy Parker, and Stephen King.  If she'd been looking
for something specific, she thought, it would take forever to find
it.

Scully heard some scuffling nearby and peered around the shelf to see
what was going on.  On a couch opposite her chair, a young couple,
maybe in their late teens or early twenties, was making out so
voraciously she thought they might choke on each others' tongues. 
Thank you very much, she thought.  I really needed to be reminded of
what I missed out on last night.  I was where you are.  Only unlike
you, you little punks, I wasn't in a public place.  She imagined
shooting them dead, right there on the spot, if only to put them out
of her misery.  They were only about ten feet away.  They'd never feel
a thing.  Hell, they were so intertwined, one bullet might suffice for
both, if she caught just the right angle.  She fingered her gun.

No, she decided, she'd let them live.  Her sexual frustration wasn't
their fault.  It was her own damn fault.  She was so close, so close
to having sex.  With the wrong guy. 

She padded over to her big chair, moved Bartlett's Quotations onto the
little table, plopped down, and sighed.  Her latte had turned tepid. 
She signaled the waitress for another, as if she were in a bar.  "Can
I get another over here, the same, please," she called out.  The
waitress smiled, giving the ever-annoying 'thumbs up' sign. 
Everyone's happy in here but me, Scully thought.  People going about
their lives, working, kissing, and I'm drinking coffee in a strange
part of the city where I don't know anyone, just so I can avoid
Mulder.  Pathetic.

She closed her eyes for a moment, and pictured him.  His lips first
and foremost, of course.  Those lips were his best feature by far, she
thought.  His lips always looked like they wanted to kiss and be
kissed.  She'd imagined kissing them a thousand times, and that was
when he was just her partner.  Now that she was in love with him, she
suspected they'd pull on her like a magnet.  Best not to think of his
lips.  No, they were dangerous.  

Stop this, Dana, think of something else.  His hair.  That should be
safe.  Mulder had pretty good hair most of the time, although he
tended to go through goofy spiky phases now and again, making Scully
wonder if he was really aware of what decade it was.  But it always
teetered between being cute hair and good hair.  Sometimes she was
jealous of his hair.  It somehow fit his face better than hers fit her
own face.  It was always the right color, always perfect Mulderhair. 

Oh, now she was going off the deep end.  

Screw it.  She was in a coffeehouse where she knew nobody, and she
could think about Mulder if she wanted.  What else?  Mulder had
gorgeous eyes, though for the life of her she couldn't name the color.
 Murky, she thought.  But that was fine; murky suited Mulder most of
the time.  If eyes are the window to the soul, then Mulder's eyes were
perfect for him.  His soul was confused, and beautiful, and shadowy,
and pure.

Thank God the waitress brought her another latte just then, or she
would have started thinking about parts of Mulder that weren't
attached to his head.

Ahhh, this was more like it.  Good latte.  Hot and frothy, just the
way she liked it.  But those damn kids were still on the verge of
orgasm within spitting distance.  She narrowed her eyes, again
imagining their untimely deaths, before chastising herself.  Hell, she
was just jealous and she knew it.  But they really should come up for
air, she thought, if they don't want oxygen deprivation to permanently
damage their brains.   
Again, Mulder popped into her mind, unwanted and annoying.  Who is
this person I love? she thought.  What made me fall in love with
*Mulder,* of all people?  Certainly he was good looking, in a goofy
sexy sort of way, she supposed, what with his lips and eyes and all. 
She'd seen him at his worst - bruised and battered, drugged,
frustrated, disrespectful, cocky, argumentative ... she could go on
and on, listing and categorizing the many faults of Fox Mulder. 

She'd seen the best of Mulder, too - caring, intelligent, sweet,
protective, funny, awestruck, loyal, interesting.  He was all those
things, and his good points balanced out his faults quite nicely.  

And yes, he was more than a little attractive.  Scully's mind drifted
back to her picture of him.  No, make that pictures, plural, like one
of his infamous slide shows.  Mulder laughing in the rain on their
first case.  Mulder wearing his glasses, lifting a sunflower seed to
his lips.  Mulder in his boxers after that hotel fire.  Mulder covered
in dung... 

No.  This wasn't helping.  When Scully still thought Mulder was sexy
covered in shit, she realized just how hopeless this situation was.

She grudgingly went back to looking at Bartlett's Quotations.  Again,
she idly turned pages and watched the authors' names fly by at an
alarming rate.  

Until something caught her eye.  Thomas Henry Huxley.  She thought he
was Aldous Huxley's father, if she remembered correctly from college. 
He had been a biologist, a scientist.  Good.  "Science," she murmured
out loud.  

What science had to do with love, she had no idea.  *This* Huxley had
written essays on Darwinism, and Education, and Nature.  But two
quotes caught her eye.  Quotes that had little to do with biology, she
realized.  They were both from something called "Technical Education"
- she hadn't read it, whatever it was.  These words, this advice from
a man long dead who she'd never known, sounded like something her own
father might have told her.

The first was short and sweet: "The great end of life is not knowledge
but action."  True, she thought.  She spent her whole life trying to
avoid acting on her feelings.  Trying to keep it together as things
around her fell apart.  She knew that the time for this was over. 
Time to face the music, Scully.  You love Mulder.  You can't keep this
knowledge locked away or it will kill you.  You've got to tell him.  

The next quote seconded the thought: "Perhaps the most valuable result
of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have
to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not."  Jesus. 
There it was.  A bolt of lightning she couldn't ignore, printed on a
page in black and white, from Aldous Huxley's dad.

She'd always been practical.  She'd never avoided tasks she found
distasteful, due to her sense of duty, or maybe her strong Catholic
upbringing.  The Scully household wasn't a place for lollygaggers. 
Everyone did what they had to do, be it chores, homework, or church
activities.  There was no putting off 'til tomorrow what you could do
today.  Well, there.  That was something that 'Dana' and 'Scully' had
in common.  

As a girl, Dana Scully was a contradiction: the little tomboy with her
nose in a book.  She spent half her time trying to outdo her brothers
athletically, and the other half inside studying diligently so she
could be a doctor someday.  She'd had a temper that rarely came out,
and a thoughtfulness that both charmed and annoyed her family.  She'd
been too intellectual for the bunch of them, and sometimes she wished
she were normal, just a regular girl like Missy, out on dates and not
worrying about getting into a good college and medical school. 

As Dana grew up, she'd unconsciously avoided having a personal life;
it would interfere with her goals.  She'd dated, but always kept a
part of herself hidden.  She hadn't given herself fully to either of
her two college boyfriends, and then not to Jack, and not to Ethan. 
Always, always, she'd give a little and pull back before things got
too serious.  Too serious emotionally.  She'd been doing the same
thing with Robert, she realized.  She and Robert had nice safe
discussions - physics, politics, films, favorite books - but she'd
never shown him even a sliver of who she really was.  He hadn't met
Dana *or* Scully.  Both had been safely hidden away inside her in a
secret place unknown even to her.  

Robert didn't know about her abduction, or Emily, or Melissa, or any
of it.  She'd been relieved that he never asked her much, but now she
wondered why.  Why *didn't* he ask about her family, or her work?  She
spent so many hours working on the X-Files, and yet Robert knew only
the barest sketchy outline of what she did with her time.  "My partner
and I investigate cases with a paranormal bent; he tends toward the
outrageous explanation, while I try to validate or invalidate his
theories with scientific fact."  Sounded logical.  As if the X-Files
had anything at all to do with logic.  She laughed out loud at the
thought, sitting here in this coffeehouse with a mug of vanilla latte
warming her from the inside out.

No, Scully, science won't help you now.   She vaguely wished that she
had a best friend to bounce this off of, but Missy was gone, and
*Mulder* was her best friend.  She was on her own here, and Huxley was
taunting her.  "Make yourself do the thing you have to do...whether
you like it or not."  

*No.*  Fuck Thomas Henry Huxley.  The last thing in the world she
could do right now was tell Mulder she was in love with him.  It would
surely ruin everything she'd worked so hard for; five years of
hard-earned trust would fly away in a flash of lightning if she dared
step over that line.  There was simply no reason to lay this on
Mulder.  She'd just had a bad experience, and made a mistake, and she
would get over it, in time.  

They didn't have any cases lined up, and that was good.  Maybe she
would take a few days off.  Get her head together.  She couldn't
concentrate on an investigation right now anyway, not with these
feelings taking over her life the way they were; being in close
proximity to Mulder might just make her spontaneously combust.  She
just needed a few days: a few days to think, and settle her stomach,
and make sense of this strange new feeling.  

She'd never told a man she loved him, and she wasn't going to start
with her partner.  So unprofessional.  She would, however, go talk to
Mulder, and try to explain away her behavior this morning.  She owed
him that.  

She could tell Mulder she was upset about the breakup with Robert. 
Which wasn't really a lie.  Well, yes, it was.  But it would have to
do.   She couldn't bring herself to tell him the truth, and she
couldn't very well avoid him, so she would lie to him, just this
once.

Scully deposited the book back on the shelf, left a tip for the
waitress, threw one last scowl at the oblivious couple on the sofa,
and headed out the door.  She was going to get this over with, whether
she liked it or not.


** END PART 6/8 **


Feedback just might make me spontaneously combust - bring it on! 
(Whether you liked it or not!)  Lysandra31@aol.com or Lysandra@mediaon
e.net

Author's note: Jane Austen quote taken from "Pride and Prejudice." 
With apologies to Ms. Austen, whose work I actually like very much. 
Some of it, anyway.

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

PHYSICS 101 - PART 7 of 8  (NC-17)
by Lysandra

FBI HEADQUARTERS - X-FILES OFFICE
MAY 31 - 12:14 P.M.

Mulder would probably look the same as usual to anyone walking by his
office door, but he imagined that his head was ricocheting off every
wall, every corner, every nook and cranny in his messy office.

He loved her.

"I love her," he said, aloud, nearly scaring himself to death.

He tried it out again.  "I love Scully."  At least he didn't jump this
time.

"I'm in love with Scully."  This was getting easier, he thought. 
Although if she walked in right now, he wasn't sure he'd even be able
to speak, let alone declare his undying devotion to her face.  

But he *did* want her to walk in.  He needed to see that she was okay.
 And yes, he *would* tell her.  There was no getting around it.  Now
that he knew he was in love with her, she had to know it too.

Mulder was strangely elated.  He'd never felt this way before, never,
and it would take some getting used to.  His head was still swimming,
but now it was unexpectedly filled with possibilities instead of
worries, hopes instead of fears.  

Scully was okay, he just knew it.  He suspected she'd stopped off for
some coffee to get herself together.  She wasn't worth a damn until
that first cup of coffee, and she needed time to think.  Hey, he
thought, I'm profiling her again, and this time it's working.  She'll
be coming back soon, and I'll tell her I love her.  

He was both excited and terrified at the prospect.  She was in the
middle of some unknown personal trauma, and he was about to spring
something very unusual on her.  More unusual than any X-File.  How
would she react?

She might hit him.  That would be bad.  Scully could really hit.

There was also a big possibility that if he didn't say it just right,
she'd think he was joking.  What if she laughed at him?  No, Scully
wouldn't laugh.  She might walk out of the office and never come back.
 

She could misunderstand and think he was talking about brotherly love.
 He'd have to make sure to tell her he was *in* love with her.  

She might say something like, "Mulder, I don't have time for this," or
"You can't be serious," or "Very funny, Mulder, now get out of my way
so I can finish that report."  

He thought about this for a second.  Why wasn't a *positive* reaction
popping into his head?  Why couldn't she say something like, "Mulder,
I love you too; I always have..." and then wrap herself around him and
give him a big juicy kiss with her perfect mouth?  He smiled at the
thought, unlikely as it was to actually happen.  A kiss from Scully
was too much to hope for, he realized.  He knew that if he ever had
the chance to kiss those lips, he'd never be able to stop.  

This was getting ridiculous.  Here he was, daydreaming about kissing
his partner, when he was probably about to get shut down entirely. 
This day had certainly taken some unusual turns, and it wasn't even
lunchtime yet.


FBI HEADQUARTERS - PARKING GARAGE
12:14 P.M.

Scully found herself pulling into the parking garage of the Hoover
Building for the second time today, without knowing how she got there.
 Suddenly the knot she'd had in her stomach since last night twisted
just a little tighter.  Every step she took brought her closer to
Mulder, and closer to tears.  Scully wasn't usually a sentimental
person, but today she didn't think she could keep from crying if she
saw one of those sappy telephone commercials.  

Today, her emotions were raw and jagged and too close to the surface. 
All this fresh love, and nowhere to put it.  Certainly, she couldn't
put it where it belonged, in Mulder's care.  Mulder was so focused on
his quest for justice, and his search for his sister, and his passion
for the X-Files, he wouldn't know what to do with love if he found it.
 He would surely discard her gift, shattering Dana's heart and ruining
Scully's career in one fell swoop.   

No, Thomas Huxley be damned; she was *not* going to tell Mulder she
was in love with him.  And she wouldn't think about how right it felt
to be folded in his arms.  She reminded herself of The Plan:  March
in, tell him she needed some personal time effective immediately,
march out, and start driving.  In and out.  She knew it was now or
never as the elevator doors slid open. 

Ding!  

Mulder's heart leapt into his throat and down to his stomach and
settled in his groin when he heard the ding! of the elevator.  The
hydraulic whirring of the doors sliding open.  The click-clack of
Scully's shoes in the hallway.  Click-clack, click-clack.  Closer. 
Jesus....

His heart skipped a beat.  Literally.  There she was, in the doorway,
walking toward his desk.  He sat, mouth agape, just staring at her for
a moment.  This was the first time he'd seen her since he'd been *in
love with her.*  She was a vision, an absolute angel to his soul.  She
was the only woman in the world.  The only woman that mattered.  And
he finally realized, in his lovestruck haze, that yes, she *was* all
right.  No harm had come to her.  A wave of emotion slid off her and
slinked toward him, but it wasn't pain or fear anymore.  He didn't
quite know what it was; he thought it might be the echo of his own
feelings, hitting her and reverberating back to him.

And maybe it was.  Scully was staring too, giving him that *look.* 
That strange and wonderful look she'd given him earlier.  She was
silent too, as she studied him as he studied her.  

Mulder wasn't aware of it, but a huge grin had laid claim to his face
as a lightning bolt hit him full force.  She was in love with him too.
 It was so clear to him now.  How had he missed that before?  It
wasn't an "I've Had Sex" look; this look said something along the
lines of, "I *Want* To Have Sex...With You, Mulder."  God, it was the
best look he'd ever seen.  The very, very best Scully look she had
ever directed at him.  

His grin reached the back of his head, and Scully kept looking at him
that way, and they just stayed there for a few more moments, and he
realized that he would call her Scully, or Dana, or Honey, or Baby, or
Sweetness, or whatever she wanted him to call her.  There wasn't a
name big enough for what he felt inside.  He couldn't believe he had
never had this feeling before.  All those years were just a warm-up. 
His life started now.  Nobody should have to go through life without
feeling like this.  He loved her and she loved him.  He closed his
eyes to remember this moment forever, but the grin stayed put.

"Mulder."  Oh, Jesus, had she always said his name that way?  His name
on her lips was sweet as honey, and dripping just as messily into his
psyche.  And then she said it again.

"Mulder."

Scully's mouth was working, but she couldn't take her eyes off of
Mulder's face.  His mouth hung open as he studied her as if he'd never
seen her before.  He stared at her as if she were a porn star, an EBE
and his sister Samantha all rolled up in one.  She felt so hot, ablaze
from his gaze.  She imagined herself bursting into flames on the spot.
 

And then he smiled.  No, strike that.  A smile is an upturned mouth,
maybe a few teeth.  This was much more than a smile.  Mulder's face
lit up completely, a goofy grin overtaking all his features.  God,
he's gorgeous, she thought.  I'm in big, *big* trouble here.  She
watched him close his eyes, as if he were remembering the world's best
dream.  God, Mulder, what the hell are you thinking about?  Because it
can't possibly be me.

"Mulder," she said, trying to stir him from his trance.   And still he
grinned.  He was obviously trying to drive her insane.

She had to get out of here, that was for sure.  In and out, quick and
clean.  

"Mulder," she repeated, and this time he responded.

"Scully?  You okay now?" he asked.  

In and out.  "I'm fine."  Just do it.  "Look, Mulder, I'm sorry about
earlier--"

Mulder couldn't help himself.  "No problem, Scully.  Anytime I get
full body contact it's okay with me."  This was working out, he
thought.  He still sounded like himself.  And he would bide his time,
because he was *not* going to fuck this up.   He only had one chance
to tell her he loved her for the very first time, and he was going to
make it perfect.

"Mulder..."

"I'm sorry.  Go ahead, Scully."

"I need to get away for a few days, maybe the rest of the week..."  He
could see she was scared.  He had forgotten for a moment that she
didn't know yet that he loved her.  But still, he had to wait.  

Wait, Mulder, wait.  He felt like Hank Aaron, waiting for the right
pitch for his 715th home run.  Can't swing too early, it'll
happen....

No way was he letting her leave town.  She wasn't even leaving this
office until she knew how he felt.  

He tried out a casual tone and said, "Scully, it might not be a good
time for that."  

Frustration crossed his partner's beautiful face, telling Mulder that
she didn't want to be in this office a second longer than she had to;
she wanted to get away from him because she was scared.  Scared of
him, and scared of herself.  He knew all of this in an instant, and he
wasn't falling for it.

"Mulder, I've got some personal things to work through, and I can do
the report while I'm away--"

She's winding up, Mulder, choke up on the bat.  Personal things,
indeed.  This was as personal as it got.

"Personal things, Scully?  Care to share with the class?"

Mulder apparently wanted to play.  She was in no shape to play.  In
and out, Scully.  She opted for acting annoyed with him, though it
felt like another lie.

"No, Mulder, 'personal' means I do *not* want to share with the class
right now."

"Not right now?  Why not, Scully?..."  He went on, but she couldn't
listen any more.  His eyes were on fire, the way they would get when
he was finally making his way inside a suspect's brain.  Sirens blared
in her mind.  Red Alert, Scully!  With his beautiful eyes fixed on
her, and his voice wrapping around her like a pretty bow, she was
unable to flee.  She was caught in the Mulder Tractor Beam.

"Mulder, I just..."  

She was faltering.  He knew it.  She knew it.  Big, big trouble.

"You just what, Scully?"  He was still smiling.  Was this fun for him?
 "You just need a spur-of-the-moment vacation?  You were crying a few 
hours ago - did you just need some comfort?  Did you have a fight with
your boyfriend?"  He twisted the word 'boyfriend,' as if he knew it
was a lie.  

She couldn't take much more of this.  She'd been here two minutes and
she was already so worn out she thought she may need to sit down,
maybe put her head between her knees like she'd seen Mulder do earlier
as she was running out the door.

No.  In and out.  Throw him a bone, let him think he's right, and get
out.

"Look, Mulder, if you must know, I completely blew it on the boyfriend
count, okay?  Is that personal enough for a Tuesday morning?"

He looked like he wanted to play with the bone a bit, gnaw on it and
bat it around.  

God, Mulder, I'm burning up over here.  Stop, please.  Don't play with
me.

He didn't stop.  "Oh, really?  Professor Wonderful giving you
problems, Scully?"

"No, it's not him, it's me... I..."  Dammit, she'd said too much now. 
She spun away from him.  If she had to look at his eyes for another
second she'd fall apart again, and that was unacceptable.  One crying
fit in front of Mulder today was plenty.

Mulder watched as she turned her back on him, and he knew she was not
able to talk about this while they were face to face.  Okay, Scully,
he thought, but you'd better spill the beans or else my face will be
so close to yours you won't be able to ignore it.  Wait, Mulder. 
Wait.  

"Go on," he said quietly, not wanting to spook her.

"He ... he said something..."

What had Robert said to get her so upset?  Mulder thought back to his
conversation with Robert.  He'd asked if Mulder ever called her
'Dana...' and then Robert had said 'Scully' like he hated her.  Oh
God.  Robert couldn't have called her 'Scully,' could he?  No.  Surely
he hadn't.  

Jesus.  Mulder could feel a wave of heat coming off of Scully, and she
was ten feet away.  He had that feeling, the feeling he got when he
had just figured out what made some monster do the horrible things he
did.  That feeling that he was right; he knew; he was inside her head
now.  Quite a place to be.  So Robert had called her 'Scully,' and she
hadn't liked it.  She hadn't reacted well, apparently.  Mulder would
have to tread very carefully here.

He rose, and walked slowly around his desk, coming up behind her and
lightly, so lightly, placed his hand on her shoulder.  He didn't spin
her to look at him; he just stood behind her, touching the woman he
loved to let her know he was close.  "Scully, tell me."

Mulder felt Scully shiver slightly at his touch, but was glad that she
didn't try to get away.  Her head was bowed a bit, as if she was
looking at the floor, but he suspected her eyes were closed.  His left
hand remained on her left shoulder, and without realizing it, his
right had come up to gently stroke her hair.  He'd done this before,
when she was in the hospital; he'd done it this morning when she had
cried.  But now, now that he knew he was in love with her, she felt so
different to him.  He never wanted to let her go.

"Mulder..." she started hesitantly, then continued, her voice a bit
stronger: "Mulder, what I have to tell you is very personal, more
intimate than it should be between partners..."  Her voice caught a
bit.  "So if you don't want to hear something really personal about
me, now's the time to bail out... I won't hold it against you..."

Oh, God.  This was it.  Mulder wished he could see her face right now.
 Hang on, slugger, hang on, she's going to lob a fastball straight
down the middle.  Wait for the pitch, Mulder.  

He waited.  "Scully, nobody's bailing here. Tell me."

His heart sang a song of joy as she turned to face him again.  Thank
you, Scully.  Thank you.  Her eyes welled up with tears.  God, she was
gorgeous.  He wanted to kiss each tear hello then swallow it goodbye. 

He wasn't touching her at all now, and was devastated by the loss.  

"Tell me," he said.

Scully's plan was shot to hell.  This was hopeless.  It was all going
to come spilling out of her any minute anyway.  Buck up, Scully, she
told herself.  He's not letting you go.  Thomas Henry Huxley was
right.  Do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done.

She couldn't quite place all the emotions in Mulder's eyes, but they
held satisfaction and happiness.  Probably satisfaction at wearing her
down, she thought.  He probably thought this was some little game, and
he probably thought he was about to win.  Well, partner, you're about
to get more than you bargained for.  You're about to get Scully, and
Dana, and Starbuck, and it's going to be too much for you to handle.

And still he gently persisted.  "Tell me, Scully."

Scully felt like she was the bone, and Mulder was the dog, intent on
burying her.  

God, he smelled so good, and she didn't know if she could even speak. 
She needed a piece of him, something to steady her and tell her she
could get through this, and she unknowingly grabbed his hand and held
on for dear life.

"...Last night, Robert and I... we were in bed, and..."  She looked up
at Mulder shyly, as if this were just too mortifying for her to say
out loud.  "Do you want me to go on?"

Mulder didn't especially want to picture her in bed with Robert, but
yes, he wanted her to go on.  He needed her to go on.  

"Keep going, FBI woman," he said, smelling the sweet latte on her
breath.  God, I was even right about the coffee, he thought. 

She let loose a small smile before she continued.  "I hadn't slept
with him, not yet...but we were getting really close..."

Mulder knew in his heart that she hadn't slept with Robert; he could
accept the rest.  But he could feel her tension, and he thought it
might snap her in two if he didn't say something quick.

"How close, Agent Scully?" he coaxed, giving her a sly smile.

"Jesus, Mulder, *close,* all right?"  This was good.  She was almost
laughing.

His hand went back to Scully's hair, just touching the ends, near her
neck, his touch as quiet as his voice.  "Okay, you were close.  And
then what?"  

"And then ... and then... Mulder, he...he called me 'Scully.'"

Mulder could barely believe it.  Am I *good,* or what?  He couldn't
hide his smile of satisfaction.

"You think this is funny, Mulder?  Do you?"

"No, Scully, he's an idiot, and I'm just glad that you're not still in
bed with him letting him call you 'Scully,' when he doesn't know you,
doesn't know anything about you.  He doesn't love you, Scully."

Oops.  Maybe he'd just swung at a bad pitch, but he couldn't keep that
inside.

Scully took a step back.  "How do you know what Robert does and
doesn't know about me, Mulder?"

"Scully, after this morning, I thought -- Shit...  I thought it was
possible that he'd ... that he'd raped you.  So I went over to
Georgetown, and had a little chat with him."

Scully was stunned.   So this is how Mulder had spent his time while I
was off drinking a latte, she thought.  He thought he was protecting
me, and he was pumping Robert for information...  Robert wouldn't have
told him anything...  She didn't think he would have, anyway.  Oh,
God, she prayed he hadn't.

"Mulder, I can't believe you."  And she couldn't.  "How could you do
that?" she asked, trying to sound angry instead of mortified.

Mulder lost his cool then, and stopped playing.  "Scully, you wouldn't
talk to me; I couldn't find you anywhere..."  Jesus, she'd scared him
good this morning, hadn't she?  "...And you had that 'I've Had Sex'
look, and you're wearing a different blouse, and you were crying like
something horrible had happened..."

"First of all, I haven't--"  No, that was too much information.  He
didn't need to know that she hadn't had sex since she'd met him.  She
chose curtain number two instead.  "I'm wearing a different *blouse*?"

More truths came tumbling out of the man she loved.

"Yeah, that's not what you usually wear with that suit, you wear that
green thing, and I thought at first you were hiding a hickey, but then
after you were so upset I thought it could be bruises or something..."
 Oh yeah, she'd scared him all right.  "...Jesus, Scully, from the way
you reacted when I called you 'Dana,' I figured that if someone *had*
raped you, it was someone you knew, someone who called you 'Dana,' and
Robert...I thought it was Robert."

Scully was hit by a strangely pleasant wave of nausea then, as Mulder
ranted about her behavior.  How could she have missed this?  He was
worried about her, and jealous... Oh my God, he was in love with her
too!  She somehow stayed still even as the nausea subsided and her
knees buckled and her insides danced.  She felt a smile overtake her,
and couldn't for the life of her wipe it off her face.   Mulder loves
me.  He *loves* me.

She wanted to look into his eyes and savor this moment forever. 
"Mulder, look at me."

And he gazed at her as if she were the woman of his dreams, and this 
*was* a moment she'd savor forever.

"It was a hickey, okay?  Look."  She pushed her lapel aside, revealing
the bruise Robert had given her last night, eons ago, in a galaxy far,
far away.

Mulder's eyes lit up like she'd just shown him the Holy Grail.  He
hesitantly reached out and touched it, his fingers feather-soft on her
purple skin, and she shivered at the sensation of his fingertips on
her sensitive flesh.  She needed him to touch her everywhere, and all
her secret bruises and hurts and soft spots would be his for the
taking.  

Even though he had already figured out that she hadn't been raped,
Mulder felt such relief just then, not only at her saying it out loud,
but at her willingness to show him.  He gently stroked the dark spot
on her collarbone, put there by another man, and couldn't help but
want to kiss it.  Kiss it away, kiss Robert's mark off of her.  But
Mulder hadn't seen his pitch.  Not yet.  

Scully's eyes fluttered closed, and Mulder knew it was because of the
way he was touching her.  Suddenly the air in the office was sexually
charged, and Mulder was as aroused as if Scully were naked beneath
him.  He was going to have to tell her soon, he thought.  Come on,
Scully, lob it in, I need that pitch.  No curve balls, Scully,
please...

"Scully, you didn't sleep with Robert."  Not a question, a statement.

"No."

"Why?"

Scully looked up at him, her fingers again intertwined with his.  Her
tears weren't so close to the surface now, but Mulder felt her pulse
racing at her neck where his other hand lingered.  This is it, Scully,
he thought.  Say it.  Say it.

"You're right, Mulder, he doesn't know me."  She seemed to be
measuring out her admissions in small doses, but Mulder would wait. 
He was desperate for her to tell him the whole truth, but if she had
to waste a few pitches, that was fine.  He realized he'd been waiting
five years for this day, and he could wait another minute or two.

*I* know you, Scully, Mulder said silently.  I know you.  His thumb
grazed her collarbone, so delicately.

She continued, "And I don't love him."

No, Scully, you love *me*.  His grip on her hand tightened.

Scully, you're so close.  Come on.  Tell me.

"I..." she closed her eyes again, unable to continue.

"Tell me," he said, softly. 

He said so much in two words, she thought.  His voice, so soft, told
her all she needed to hear in those two little words.  Tell me,
Scully.  Tell me you love me.  Don't put it off.  I love you too. 
Give up your fears.  Jump, Scully, I'll catch you.

"Mulder..." she barely breathed his name.  She opened her determined
blue eyes, and looked into his.  This was more than The Look.  This
was a Scully Look he wanted to put in a box and carry around with him
forever.

Mulder loved her, and she loved him; they both knew it now.  It was
just a matter of saying it out loud, making it real.  They both knew
it was coming; both knew what she would say next.  When she  exhaled,
he breathed in her air, hoping the words would be carried by the
current.  But still she held on to them, like a secret, hers for a
moment more.


** END PART 7/8 **

Don't keep your feedback a secret!  I might put it in a box and carry
it around with me forever.  - Lysandra31@aol.com or Lysandra@mediaone.
net

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

PHYSICS 101 - PART 8 of 8   (NC-17)
by Lysandra
Disclaimer, etc. in Part 1
Please see author notes at the end of this chapter!  <g>



Scully felt electricity flying through the air between them.  This was
normal, she knew: just electromagnetic fields, static electricity,
ions and atoms.  Usually, the electricity wasn't visible.  Today, on
the other hand, she could swear she was seeing sparks, fireworks, the
whole shebang.  

So this is what it's like, she thought.  This is what it's like to be
face to face with Fox Mulder, a mere moment away from telling him I
love him.  

Time really did stand still, or maybe it was just hanging there in the
charged air, waiting for her to catch up.  The time between now and "I
love you" was an eternity in a moment, and Scully didn't know if she
was ready to let the moment go.  But let it go she did, and there
would be no turning back.

"I love you, Mulder," she said, quietly, almost more for her benefit
than his.  

Her secret now out, Scully smiled as a near overpowering sense of
relief washed over her.  "I love you," she repeated, as if the first
time had been a rehearsal.  She sighed a contented sigh, a sound she'd
never heard herself make before, and she had to swallow the urge to
shed blissful tears.  

Mulder's grin returned, pure joy dancing in his eyes, his heart
beating like a jackhammer.  It was the ninth inning of Game 7 of the
World Series, the bases were loaded, and the pitch was right down the
middle.  

Mulder swung for the fences.

"I love you, too," he almost yelled, unable to keep the words inside
for another second.  "I love you, Scully," he repeated, absently
tightening his grip on her hand.  

Mulder's grin had apparently traveled all the way to Scully's face,
because now she was wearing it, too.

And the two of them stood there, grinning like idiots.  Just stood
there, so close, both unwilling to move for fear of ruining the
moment.

Mulder finally broke the silence.  "Uh... Scully?"

Scully was still reeling from Mulder's declaration, and it took her a
moment to answer.  She didn't rush, wetting her lips in slow motion
before she spoke.  "Yeah?" 

Mulder was so taken with the sight of her tongue he nearly forgot what
he was going to say.  He knew he was treading on dangerous ground, but
for some inexplicable reason, curiosity won out over logic.  "Uh... If
you love me," he blurted, still grinning, "and I love you ... What
were you doing in bed with Robert last night?"  

Her expression changed to one he *had* seen before: an eye-roll which
was usually accompanied by a tirade about his unscientific approach on
a case.  But he continued anyway.  "I mean, it's all right, but...?"

Scully sighed, wondering how it was possible that she had fallen in
love with someone so infuriating.  "How could I let some other guy
give me a hickey when I'm in love with you?  Is that what you mean,
Mulder?"

He laughed, his warm fingers playfully twisting her hand like a
teenager on a first date.  "Well, Scully, I wasn't gonna put it in
such a high school way, but yeah, I guess so."

"I just ... everything was fine last night," she told him.  "I hadn't
even *thought* about you..."  She looked up at him, hesitating
slightly before continuing.  "Things were moving along, and I was
honest-to-God on the verge of ... having sex with him."

Mulder slid his hand into her hair, studying each Cinnaberry strand as
he spoke.  "And is this when he said the 'S' word?"

"Mm-hmm," she managed, shivering as Mulder's fingers grazed her neck. 
"And that's when it hit me."

"What hit you?"

"That he -- he wasn't *you.*"  Scully peered up at him, feeling a bit
silly to be admitting such a thing; but she continued, her words
picking up speed as she went on.  "He wasn't you -- and all of a
sudden it just seemed so wrong to be even *thinking* of having sex
with someone who wasn't you, and... I just realized at that moment
that I was in love with you."  She stopped, worried that she was
saying too much.  "This is completely crazy, I know..."

"Scully," he said, giving her shoulder a little squeeze, "How do you
think *I* feel?"

"What do you mean?"  Scully looked into his eyes, more than a little
apprehensive at what he might say.

"Well, I came to work this morning like any other day over the past
five years, expecting a little banter, a little arguing."  He flashed
a loopy grin, and she immediately fell in love with him all over
again.  

He continued, "But you came in with this *look* on your face, a look
*I've* never seen before, and ten minutes later you're crying, and
*that's* never happened before.  And hell if I wasn't going to find
out what was wrong, and then when I saw What'sHisName, God, I *hate*
that guy..."  

This made Scully laugh again.  "Wait, Mulder, are you saying--" 
Scully wanted to hear it out loud for some reason.  "Are you telling
me you were *jealous?*"

"Hell, *yes!*  Granted, it took me a little while to figure out what
it was, because I've never really experienced it before, but yeah,
jealous would be the word.  After I got over being scared for you, I
was jealous."

Scully struggled not to smile at this, though she couldn't have been
more pleased.  Yes, it was a little petty, but she was glad that
Mulder had been jealous of Robert.  Glad in retrospect, anyway.  She
mused that maybe she was a regular girl after all.  Going out with
someone else to make the love of her life jealous.  Of course, she
hadn't even known that was what she was doing at the time, but, she
thought Missy would be proud of her just the same.  She giggled at the
thought.

"What?" Mulder asked.  "That's funny?"

Scully laughed, "It's crazy that after all these years I would even
*subconsciously* try to make you jealous, that's all."  

Mulder pulled her close, wrapping his arms fully around her.  "And
crazier that it would work," he added.  Her hair smelled lightly of
something flowery, and it was so soft against his skin; all of her was
so soft against him.  "Jesus, Scully, it was a normal morning, and now
I'm in love with you."  God, he loved the way those words felt in his
mouth.

Scully's suit was made of a silky material that slipped and slid
against his palm, and he sent his hand on a journey across her back,
finally feeling the hidden curves he had only imagined over the years.

Scully's elation gave way to rational thought for a moment.  "Mulder,"
she said, nuzzling her head into the crook of his neck, seeking
sanctuary from the words she was about to say, "...what are we going
to do with all this?" 

"All this *what,* Scully?  All *this?*"  He gave her another
affectionate squeeze.

God, his hands felt so right on her, and she again regretted letting
Robert touch her at all.  "All this love," she returned, feeling more
confident now.

She felt him shiver slightly at her words, the muscles in his back
flexing beneath her touch.  She'd never imagined his spine to be so
absolutely straight and strong, or his back to be so very smooth. 
Even through his shirt, she felt as though his skin was sizzling into
her palms, her fingertips, branding her hands as though she were his
property.  

And maybe she was.  And maybe Mulder's mine, she thought.  All mine.

He smelled like he always smelled -- clean and salty and a little like
some cologne Scully couldn't place, but for some reason, now she
couldn't get enough of his essence.  She felt like an animal,
ascertaining if he was friend or foe from his scent, although she knew
now that he was more than a friend.  Now he was her mate.  Like swans,
she thought, mated for life.  Mulder was her dark swan.    

Mulder almost couldn't believe she was real.  He'd dreamt about her,
to be sure -- but even his wildest dreams didn't do justice to
Scully's delicate strength.  In his dreams, yes, he'd have sex with
her, but he'd never imagined feeling anything like he felt right now. 

This real life moment, just holding her in his arms after they had
both declared their love, was better than any fantasy he'd ever had. 
Although right now, his living, breathing dreamgirl was feeling very
sexy indeed, warm and inviting and wrapped up in his arms, her small
soft hands drawing circles on his back, unbroken and unending.  

And, if he wasn't mistaken, Scully's softest parts were rubbing
against him quite pleasurably.  Scully's breasts, against his stomach,
for example.  How had he not noticed *those* when he comforted her
earlier?  He knew that his hardest component was pushing into her
stomach as well, and marveled at the contrast.  He ground into her
slightly as Sexual Fantasy Scully merged with Real Life Scully in his
mind.

She pulled away, but dragged him with her as she headed for the door.

"Where are we going?" he wondered aloud.

"Nowhere, Mulder," she replied with a mischievous smile, as she closed
the door to the office.  "I just don't think I need anyone walking by
right now, that's all."  She pressed herself into him, trapping him
against the door.  

"And why is that, Agent Scully?" Mulder asked, perfectly content to be
caught between a Scully and a hard place.

Suddenly hesitant, she pushed away from him slightly, ducking her head
before looking up at him through her lashes.  "Well, Mulder, for two
people who've just said 'I love you,' I think we've forgotten
something."

"And that would be...?" he whispered.

"We haven't..."  She felt her face flush again.  "Mulder, we haven't
even kissed yet." 

Mulder didn't need to be asked twice. 

He leaned toward her, and slowly, deliberately, kissed her forehead,
"That..." and her cheek, "can be..." and her chin, "arranged."  

Scully fought to keep her eyes open as Mulder's lips touched hers for
the first time, not wanting to miss any of this.  She half-expected an
awkward moment that never materialized; this was as natural as
breathing, for both of them.  So softly, his mouth covered hers,
lingering lightly for a moment before he increased the pressure
slightly.  Scully realized in a flash that this was already the best
kiss she'd ever received.  This chaste kiss reached into her heart,
and her mind, and her soul.  

What a difference the right man makes, she thought, as she slipped her
eyes closed and happily allowed his tongue to slide between her lips. 
It was the first part of Mulder to ever be inside her, and it
immediately became a cherished part of her, and she wanted to swallow
him whole right then and there.  She'd never forget this moment as
long as she lived.  Trite, but true, she thought, as she joined her
tongue with his, tasting love and light along with toothpaste and
sunflower seeds.

As for Mulder, he was just astonished that he was kissing the love of
his life.  This was the perfect kiss, he thought, and it had only just
begun.  Scully's lips were softer and more impossibly lush than he'd
ever hoped, and she was making such a sweet noise, a half-hum-half-moa
n which caused him to involuntarily thrust his hips against her.  He
sighed with relief when he realized that Scully not only didn't mind,
but as a matter of fact was herself grinding him into the door with
increasing force.  And her tongue, that tongue that had aroused him a
hundred times when it had ventured forth to lick her lips, was now
licking his own lips, his own tongue.

He simply couldn't get enough of her, and tangled one hand in her hair
as the other gathered her to him just a bit closer, if that was even
possible at this point.  He wondered how anything could be better than
kissing Scully, even as his mind wandered to other things that would,
indeed, be better.  She tasted bittersweet, like the coffee she had
drunk, and he could stay here forever kissing her, and tasting her
coffee, and kissing her some more.  

With a sudden burst of insight, he knew that for once in his life, he
was in the right place at the right time.  With the right woman.

As Mulder's tongue probed her mouth mercilessly, Scully responded
eagerly.  She stood on tiptoe, increasing her body's contact with his,
twining her fingers through his hair, shivering in anticipation of
More Mulder.  She needed all of him; she wanted him to climb inside
her and make a nest.  

For just a moment, Scully's thoughts returned to last night, and she
inwardly screamed at herself for letting things go so far with Robert,
when it should have been Mulder all along.  Only Mulder could kiss her
like this, flinging all her cares away, making all the pieces of her
universe fall into place; he'd been holding the missing pieces to her
puzzle, and she had been holding his.  Suddenly all her doubts and
fears were cast aside, and all her mysteries were his for the solving.
 

Abruptly, the Man She Loved halted the World's Most Perfect Kiss, and,
breathless, Scully looked into his eyes again, noticing that they
weren't murky, at least not today.  Mulder's eyes were green, like
Spring.  Like a fresh start.  

She gasped for something to say, something to mark the moment. 
"Mulder, your eyes, they're green," she blurted.  Yeah, that was
brilliant.

"Yeah, Scully," Mulder whispered, his thumb tracing the cheekbone
beneath her left eye, "and yours are blue.  And now that I'm able to
look at them for any length of time," he smiled, "I see they've got
little greenish-gold starbursts in the middle.  Does that make us
incompatible?"

"No, but it's probably the only thing that doesn't."

"You've *got* to be kidding," he said incredulously, pulling back to
focus on her more fully.  "Who's more compatible than we are?"  He
planted his hands around her waist, anchoring her to him.  "How many
husbands and wives spend as much time together as we do?"

"Is someone in this scenario a *wife,* Mulder?" she asked, aiming for
sarcastic sweetness but ending up with straight sarcasm.

Mulder looked slightly hurt, but gave as good as he got.  "No, Scully,
after one kiss, no matter how incredible, I'm not proposing."  As his
mouth returned to the grin he'd sported earlier, the glint in his eyes
was unmistakable.  "Yet."

Scully was about to make a witty comeback, but all her thoughts flew
south for the winter when Mulder's hands skimmed up her sides until
they were at the outer edges of her breasts, his thumbs teasing her
suddenly erect nipples through her suit jacket.  Her witty comeback
turned into a breathy moan, to his obvious delight.

Mulder's gentle caress sizzled through the layers of her jacket, her
blouse, and her bra, and her heartbeat quickened along with his touch.
 Looking into Mulder's eyes as he increased the pleasant pressure on
her breasts, she was stunned with the realization this was already so
much more erotic than anything she'd felt last night with Robert, more
erotic than anything she had ever felt in her life, period.

As he felt her body respond to his touch, and watched her eyes flutter
closed, and listened to the sweet kitten sounds she didn't seem to
know she was making, Mulder silently questioned how someone so very
strong could possibly be so delicate.  He increased his ministrations,
trying to ignore the ecstatically babbling voice in the back of his
head that kept saying that these were Scully's breasts, her *breasts*,
he had his hands on Scully's BREASTS.  

Go slow, Mulder, you made it through I Love You, now don't blow it. 
But God, he really wanted to see those breasts, to feel just how soft
she was under her blouse, how they'd feel against his fingers, his
mouth.  He'd settle for a nibble on her neck right now, however. 

Scully had always known Mulder's lips were sexy, but she had never in
her most specific fantasies imagined the salty smoothness that was his
tongue ... which was wet on her neck, just beneath her right ear,
ohhhhh.... and his hands, the hands she'd watched throwing pencils,
and flicking sunflower seeds, and drumming on steering wheels, those
amazing palms and fingers and thumbs were now covering her breasts
with warm and loving caresses, and she knew that if Mulder was as
aroused as she was, they were either going to make love here in the
office, or they were going to have to stop this.  Very soon.  But not
yet.  Please, don't stop, Mulder, she thought.  Not yet.

"Mulder," she purred, her mouth at his ear, "if Robert had made me
feel *anything* like this when he touched me, I'd still be with him
right now; I would have called in sick and made love all day."

Mulder gently chuckled at Scully's admission.  Who would have imagined
Special Agent Dana Scully playing hooky for nookie??

Mulder did remove his hands from her breasts, but only to turn his
attentions to unbuttoning her suit jacket.  He released buttons from
holes, bottom to top, and when he nudged her to free her arms from
around him, she complied with a shy smile.  The loss of bodily contact
again nearly made Mulder weep, so he wasted no time pushing the jacket
off her shoulders and flinging it onto her chair as neatly as he
could.  "Scully?" he murmured, as he released the top button of her
blouse from its hole with a surprising gentleness.

"Mulder," she teased, "I don't want to talk right now," and she
reached for his tie, dragging him to her, and kissed him so forcefully
he almost lost his breath.  He pulled away for a moment, spinning
around so it was now Scully trapped against the door, making a muffled
thud he hoped nobody heard in the hallway.  

The kiss resumed - Jesus, could she kiss or *what?* - and Mulder lost
his train of thought for long moments and all he knew was Scully's
tongue, dueling with his, licking the roof of his mouth, her teeth
against his, overbite meeting overbite.  He inwardly cursed every day
over the past five years he had gone without knowing what it was like
to kiss her. 

"Mmm, Mulder..." she murmured against his lips, thinking of protests
even as she worked to rid him of his dress shirt.  First the tie,
unceremoniously flung across the room.  After unbuttoning his shirt,
Scully pulled the shirttails from his trousers.  What a welcome sight
Mulder's finely muscled chest was, already starting to glisten with
the sweat of his arousal.  Her objections were muted by passion as she
was finally able to glide her hands over his bared abdominal muscles,
shedding her customary professional detachment.  No, she was
definitely attached today, *very* attached to her partner.  

"Oh my," she said, unashamedly taking a good look at him.  He looked
like a GQ model, shirt hanging open like that, hair mussed, bedroom
eyes, lips lips lips...  She leaned in and took his nipple in her
mouth as she pushed the shirt off his shoulders, and the feral gasp
that escaped from Mulder only served to arouse her even more.  

Mulder, stunned that he was getting away with *any* of this with his
usually straight-laced partner, silently thanked her for playing
along, and for playing along so very enthusiastically.  It had been
far too many years since he'd felt anything even remotely close to
what he was feeling now.  He wrapped his hand in Scully's hair as she
nibbled on his chest, and he thought that he could die happy just
tangling himself with her forever.  

Tangled, he thought; I've been tangled with Scully for so long
already, and I never want to be untangled.  Her fingernails lightly
scratched up and down his back, sending shivers south as he slipped
one of his legs between hers, and the moan he elicited with that move
was a rich reward.  "God, Scully," he mumbled, unable to form a full
sentence, he was so caught up in listening to the sexy sounds coming
out of her.

Scully felt nearly complete already, practically fused with Mulder's
soul, but when his thigh hit her crotch, it was nearly too much for
her to handle.  Robert had touched her much more intimately the night
before, but she had been disconnected then, only partly there to enjoy
it.  This, *this* was more like it.  Her mouth was now traveling over
her partner's chest, and she was happy to take her time and taste
every delicious inch of him.  She spent a long moment kissing the scar
she'd given him a couple of years ago, noting it had healed fairly
well considering she'd had to stitch him up herself.

And then someone knocked on the door.  

Scully felt the door quake at her back, and jumped, landing more
securely than ever in Mulder's arms.  She froze, looking up at him
with panic in her eyes, as if to say, "I knew this was a bad idea." 
The look he shot back said, "Don't even think it."

Mulder cleared his throat twice before managing to speak.  "Who is
it?" he finally asked through the closed door.

"Skinner."

Oh, shit.

"Just a second, Sir," Mulder called out.  "We're just...just a
second."

"Oh, *that* was smooth," Scully quietly hissed, as she pulled Mulder's
shirt back over his chest and started to button it up.

And he had the audacity to kiss her again, just a peck, but even that
was enough for her to narrow her eyes at him.  Does nothing faze him?
she thought.  Jesus.

He reached over, grinning, and combed through Scully's hair with his
fingers, and though she knew he was trying to help, his touch felt far
too sensual with AD Skinner standing on the other side of the door. 
She pushed Mulder away and made a dash for her purse, knowing that her
lipstick had been kissed away.

Mulder finished buttoning his shirt and tucked it in quickly while he
made his way behind his desk, sitting down and popping a sunflower
seed in his mouth.  He struggled to control his still-ragged breathing
by inhaling deeply and exhaling some stress.  He hoped he looked like
it was business as usual.

Skinner's voice resonated through the wood of the office door. 
"Everything okay in there, agents?"  He sounded impatient as always.

Mulder looked at his partner, who was desperately searching for her
lipstick.  He sent her a look telling her she was out of time.  She
plopped down in front of her computer, purse in her lap, and gave him
a little nod.  Now or never.  Another thirty seconds would arouse far
too much suspicion.

Standing outside the office door, Walter Skinner was rapidly running
out of patience.  He was about to raise his hand to knock again when
he heard Mulder's voice saying, "Yeah, Sir, come on in, it's open."  

Skinner opened the door and walked in, taking in the scene in front of
him.  Something was definitely different with Scully, he thought. 
Though she had her back to him, he immediately sensed that she was
nervous, agitated.  "Are you all right, Agent Scully?" he asked.

She didn't face him as she answered. "Yes, sir, I've just got
something in my eye."  She fumbled for something in her purse, and
Skinner turned his attention to Mulder.  Something was different about
him, too.  He looked too calm, too happy, too something.  Mulder just
didn't quite look like Mulder.  It was like one of those pictures in a
kids puzzle book, where there are ten things wrong and you have to
find them.  There was something wrong with the picture these two
presented today.  Scully was hiding, and Mulder... 

Aha!  Mulder's tie was missing!  "Agent Mulder, I wasn't aware this
was Casual Friday," Skinner said, a tinge of amusement coloring his
words.   

Scully swung her chair around then, and the look on her face... Oh
God.  She was flushed, and heat practically oozed out of her.  She was
absolutely pink from her hairline down to her chest, which Skinner was
seeing more of than ever before.  Besides her obvious blush, she
sported a hickey on her collarbone.  This was *Scully*?  Skinner mused
that if *he* had made her look like that, like she'd just been
thoroughly kissed, he'd never have let anyone see it.  He would have
barricaded the door. 

He had a pretty good idea what was going on here, and he could feel a
headache coming on at the thought of all the problems this would to
cause him.  Jesus, this was going to be complicated. 

"What, my tie?  Sir, I was hot, so I took it off," Mulder offered.

A likely story, Skinner thought, scanning the room quickly.  He walked
over to the file cabinets and gingerly picked up Mulder's tie off the
floor in front of them.  Silently, he walked the three steps to
Mulder's desk and laid the tie on the blotter.  Mulder had the
audacity to shrug like Alfred E. Neumann, giving Skinner his best
"What, me worry?" look.

Scully shot Mulder an unamused stare.  Skinner almost laughed, but
thought if they could pretend they hadn't been fooling around in the
office, he could pretend he hadn't noticed.  Don't ask, don't tell. 
They'd saved his life in the past, more than once.  Fair is fair.  But
now it was time to get down to business.

"Agents, this isn't a social visit," he said.  "I need you to
investigate some deaths in Scottsdale."

Mulder hated Arizona.  Too hot.  Although now that he thought of it, a
wet-with-sweat Scully sounded quite appealing.

"Arizona?" he asked, hoping that talk of the case would make Skinner
forget about the missing tie, and Scully's gorgeous bee-stung lips,
and the pheromone-enhanced air in the office.

"Yes, Arizona," Skinner sighed.  "It seems that the members of a
certain country club are dying.  Alphabetically."

"Sir?" Scully asked, all business now.  "Alphabetically?"

"Yeah.  And it doesn't look like your run-of-the-mill serial killer,
either.  The victims have all died differently.  The first was a heart
attack; the second was a car accident.  The third drowned.  And so on;
there have been six deaths so far, and it finally dawned on the club's
social secretary that the dead were the first six on the membership
list, in order."  Skinner looked at Scully for a moment.  "So far it
looks like a series of unfortunate coincidences, but we'll need full
autopsies on the latest two victims."

"Should I shine my golf shoes, sir?" Mulder asked, smiling.

"I'm afraid so, Agent Mulder," Skinner replied, thinking he should say
something to these two, but not quite sure what.  He gave each of them
a knowing look.  "And agents, if you could try to stay out of trouble,
I'd appreciate it."

With that, he dropped the case file and plane tickets on Mulder's desk
and walked out, shutting the door behind him - only to have it pop
open again a few seconds later.  He turned to see Scully standing
before him, a nervous look on her face. 

"Sir, may I speak with you for a moment?"

"Of course, Agent Scully," Skinner said, wondering what she would say
in the way of an explanation.

"Sir, I know you saw this," she stated, pulling her collar aside to
reveal the mark on her collarbone.  Skinner nodded, raising his
eyebrows in a silent question.

Mulder couldn't hear the conversation in the hall, but figured Scully
knew what she was doing.  He lifted his collar and shook out his tie
before bringing it around his neck, leaving it hanging loosely.  God,
he'd love a job where he didn't have to wear a tie, he thought.  He'd
love it if Scully didn't have to wear *anything,* but that was beside
the point.  He absently bit his bottom lip, relishing the memory of
her tongue sliding over it, and wondered when he'd feel the real thing
again.  He already knew that Skinner had smashed the window of
opportunity for any real action here in the office.

He perused the plane tickets; their flight wasn't until 10:45 the
following morning.  Mulder grinned.

Scully returned, a smug smile playing on her face, and Mulder had to
ask.  "What was that all about, Agent Scully?"

"Well, Agent Mulder," she grinned, extremely happy with herself, "I
simply told him that no matter what it looked like, that this hickey
isn't your handiwork, and that you and I are *not* lovers, and never
have been. The look on his face was priceless."

Mulder smiled as he shook his head in awe.  Scully had deflected
Skinner's suspicion off their new relationship, and hadn't even had to
lie.  Oh, this woman was smart.  

Of course, Mulder hoped that by tomorrow the part about not being
lovers *would* be a lie.  

"Have I mentioned that I love you, Scully?"

"I believe you have, but I'm glad to hear you haven't changed your
mind already.  And now I really have to get my laundry done before we
leave."  She bent to power down her computer and gather her things,
rising just as Mulder stepped into her space.

She felt the heat rising in her again as Mulder stood a foot away. 
"Mulder," she said, looking at him through an errant lock of hair,
"You can't stand this close to me in the office.  I can't handle it." 
She silently congratulated herself at her truthful assessment of the
situation.  There was no reason to be coy.  This was, after all,
Mulder.

He knew he shouldn't push his luck, but he just wanted to be near her,
to catch another whiff of her before she left him for a few hours. 
And then she blew her hair out of her eyes so sensually he thought he
might die from the sheer heat of the moment.  

Scully was stunned at the look Mulder bestowed upon her.  He was
gazing at her as if she'd just handed him a pair of courtside tickets
for a Knicks-Bulls playoff game.  He looked at her as if she *were*
the tickets.

"When do we leave?" she asked, wondering what brought on that look, a
look she wouldn't mind seeing again if she had the chance.

"Scully," he said, fiddling with the lock of hair she'd just blown out
of her sightline, "Don't *ever* grow this piece of hair.  I love this
piece.  You can do whatever you want with the rest of it, but just
leave this alone."  He let go of her hair, leaving it dangling in her
eyes again.  

"Mulder, you're crazy," she whispered, blowing the hair out of her
face again.  She was rewarded with that look.  Ohh... *now* she got
it.   

"Besides, I could say the same for you," she added, catching him
slightly off guard.

"Scully?"

"Well, there's this lock of hair, right here..."  She reached up and
threaded her fingers through the hair on his brow.  "And when it gets
just a little too long, just before you get a haircut, there's about a
week's worth of you combing it back with your fingers... I love that. 
That's always a good week, Mulder."

"Jesus, Scully, if I'd  known that, my hair would be down to my waist
by now."

They both laughed, and Scully took a small step backward.  "Seriously,
Mulder, the first time we..." and she was overtaken with sudden
shyness at saying the words again; somehow now it seemed all real, and
not a game.  She cleared her throat.  "The first time we make love,
Mulder, it's going to be just you and me.  Not Robert.  I don't want
*either* of us to be thinking about anyone else touching me."  She
looked around the office before adding, "And definitely no X-Files."

Mulder leaned over and kissed her temple, leaving a whisper of wetness
behind.  "This might be a first, Scully, but I agree with you.... As
much as I'd love to ravish you right here and now, this isn't the
place." 

"Mulder," she asked, "what time is our flight?"

"Tomorrow morning; we're on the 10:45 out of National."

"Tomorrow?" she smiled.   Good.  This meant she had time.  Time to buy
new lingerie.  Time to have her bikini line professionally waxed.  
Time to change her sheets.  "Then I'll see you at seven, Mulder?"

"Yeah, I guess that gives us enough time," he sighed, back in work
mode.  "I'll pick you up at your place?"

"Yes, seven o'clock.  *Tonight.*  And make sure you're packed, because
I'm not driving to your place in the morning."

Oh, yes, he loved this woman.  "I will definitely be there,"  he
laughed, and he had a sudden thought.  "Scully, can I ask you a
question?"

Why not, she thought.  She was an open book for Mulder at this point. 
"Sure, Mulder.  Shoot."

"Tonight, when I'm ... ravishing you..." he said provocatively,
leaning closer, "...what do you want me to call you?"

You're practically ravishing me already with that voice, she thought. 
"Mulder," she answered, breathless again, "*you* can call me anything
you want.  Within reason."

His eyes held a smile, but his intent was serious.  "And ... is 'Dana'
within reason, Scully?"  He knew what he meant to her now, and he was
prepared to deal with all of her, if only she'd let him.  Don't change
your mind, Scully, don't back out of this, he thought.  Let me in.

She pondered his question for a moment, and knew her answer.  Yes. 
Yes.  Yes.  She was shocked at how quickly she'd made the decision to
let go of herself and let Mulder in.  But now the thought of *not*
letting him in was inconceivable.  She'd done what she'd had to do,
and now, well, now, she was going to like it.  A lot.  

"Hmm ... I don't think I'd actually *mind* it..."  She flashed him a
sly smile.  "But I just might be tempted to call you 'Fox' in
retaliation."

She saw his eyes widen slightly as his mouth curved into a knowing
smile.  "'Scully' it is."  

She leaned over and gave him a sweet, soft kiss which held a promise
for tonight and forever.   She walked out the door, calling back, "See
you later, Mulder."  


END 8/8

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

AUTHOR NOTES: 
== I sincerely thank *anyone* who's read this far!  (If you haven't
pressed "delete" by now, you're my friend for life, and I send you
virtual chocolate in thanks.) == I'd love feedback, in case you
couldn't tell from the desperate pleas at the end of each chapter, and
if you've waited until now, well, there's no more story left, so send
it on out, to: Lysandra31@aol.com or Lysandra@mediaone.net  -- Liked
it? Hated it?  Tell me about it! == My most heartfelt, mushy, sappy
thanks to the best BetaGirls in the world: Magdeleine, my Wonder Twin;
and Pebbles, the queen of well-written sap; and to our den mother
Erlybird, who encourages me in the twinight.  Great big thanks also to
Jill Selby and the not-so-enigmatic Heather, who both gave me some
excellent beta advice early on for this story!  Last but by no means
least, thanks to shannono and Brandon Ray, who both stepped up to the
plate in the bottom of the ninth.  <g>  
Visit my fanfic -- it won't bite unless you want it to...
http://www.angelfire.com/ms/lysandlys/fanfic.html