Corrigenda (15/15)
by charvill

Email: charityharvill@yahoo.com 
Category: MSR, A, Post-IWTB

Summary:  Dana Scully was treating more patients than just
Christian during the winter of 2008.  This is the story about the
father of one of those patients who is awed by the miracles our
favorite former-forensics-dabbling-FBI-agent-turned-pediatric-
surgeon performs.  Drama ensues, of course :-)

Author's Note: Corrigenda is a Latin phrase meaning
"things to be corrected"
Archiving: Please ask permission. 


Thursday, April 17, 2008 

3:21pm 

"Who were you talking to?" Scully asked as Mulder slunk
through the door frame, closing the door to the bedroom and
facing her with an expression that struck her as too-blank. The
heavy sigh, affirmed her suspicions. "Skinner?" 

"Yeah," he answered, hesitant on how much he should add. 

"You asked him to put the house back in order--" 

He did a double-take as he sat across the room from her in the
easy chair. "How did you--" 

"Sixteen years together. And, I'm not mad." Mulder's eyebrows
wrinkled together. "That you weren't going to tell me." 

"Scully--" 

"I told you I'm not mad. You were just..." Her words caught in
her throat, and she swallowed painfully in an attempt to clear it.
All that time over the last week to think about Mulder and what
he went through was replaying at four times normal speed.
What was his reaction to the letter? Did he, for a second,
believe the lie? Had he shown it to anyone else? Did he find the
necklace first? How did he track her down? Even with the
German clue she had given...*why* did he come back after she
told him to go? 

She suddenly had trouble breathing. 

"How did you do it?" 

"How did I do what?" Mulder's voice was barely a whisper, his
face so close that it blew the wisps of hairs that had fallen in
front of her eyes. So overcome by her thoughts, she had not
even noticed his panicked reaction to her own anxiety.  

Scully forced herself to stare into his eyes and the emotions that
overwhelmed her as she did were many years old. She could
feel the tears burning as she looked at the man who had gone,
literally, to the ends of the world for her. And she for him: this
man who had given her life purpose and direction. This man
who had given her a child. This man who had shown her the
true meaning of forgiveness and everlasting love. 

Her voice squeaked as she ignored his question, trying instead
to convey everything she felt in one statement, "I love you...a
lot." Scully's lower lip trembled, her chin quivered. She huffed a
laugh. "Can you understand how much?" 

Mulder's lips curled into a half-smile. "Can you?" 

She nodded. "I think I'm beginning to, yeah." 

"Good. Because...Jesus, we've been through a lot, but..." The
psychologist in him screamed at him to stop realizing he was
about to release his anxieties on her. *That's the last thing she
needs right now,* he told himself. 

"But this feels worse somehow," she finished for him. 

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to--" 

"No...don't." Her hand moved without conscious thought to his
knee, and her eyes followed. Even through the layer of denim
she could feel the warmth that radiated from his body, the
muscles taught from surprise or just overall tension from the last
few days. "I know that I'm not usually so verbose when it
comes to what you mean to me, Mulder, but...but after..." 

His stare moved from the fingers grasping his leg to Scully's
face, seeing the pain and remembrance in her eyes even as she
avoided his. He could see her fighting to come to terms with her
attack, and it took everything he had not to run from the room
back to Virginia and find a way to get to Patterson. Adrenaline
coursed through his body at the idea of vengeance. 

"When I thought I might die with you thinking that I was in love
with someone else..." The tears that built at the thought choked
the rest of her words and, knowing there were no words to
convey the sheer agony that one thought had given her during
her time away from him, she locked eyes with his. 

His silence was a blessing, a jolt of strength that she needed to
continue the purging of her demons. Her hands did not shake as
she brought them up to take his face between them. The slight
stubble of his cheeks was a comfort grown of immeasurable
touches over the past fifteen years -- both platonic...and not.
Mulder's lips parted just slightly, her name forming there in
silence, and she leaned forward just enough to press hers
against their heat.  

And the kiss deepened. What her tongue couldn't produce in
words it did in caresses, moving slowly, deliberately. His air
was hers, and hers was his. Several long seconds later, she
gently withdrew from his mouth to rest her forehead against his,
relishing in the radiance of his breath against her face and the
feel of his nose on her cheeks as he raked it back and forth in a
hypnotic manner. 

"You've known me a long time, Scully," he whispered and then
leaned back just enough to look into her eyes. "And in all that
time, when have you ever seen me give up on the truth?" 

His comeback effectively stripped her of all arguments, as only
Mulder had ever been able to do, and her shoulders shook
slightly, the tiniest of smiles appearing on her lips. 

"I, uh, I didn't know exactly how to bring this up, but..." 

She raised an eyebrow at his sudden loss of confidence. "But
what, Mulder?" 

"When I was on the phone to Skinner...we were also talking
about some of the legal actions that need to be taken." 

Her head nodded. "We have to go back tonight." 

"The house will be ready by tomorrow morning, so we can stay
here and then drive back in the mor--" 

"No." 

"Scully, I don't think you want to see..." He stopped before he
let out the truth of what he had done to the house himself. She
had already put herself through enough torture. 

"It's not that." Upon seeing his confusion, she continued, "I'm
not going back to that house." 

Illogical fear gripped him and her name came out in a gasp of
confusion. *Hadn't she just...?* 

Securing his hand in hers, she quickly amended, "That's one of
the things I wanted to talk to you about. Do you remember
when you told me the darkness finds us?" He nodded for her to
continue. "Those words have haunted me since the morning you
spoke them," she sighed, her eyes closing briefly as she shook
her head. "And, I think I'm finally tired of trying to escape it." 

"And the house...?" 

"While I was gone," she continued, seemingly avoiding Mulder's
question. "I thought a lot about that. And it seems, no matter
what we try to do to keep ourselves 'safe', there's no way to
escape the past. I've been kidding myself for a long time that I
was  independently working towards finding the truth. Because
the one truth I know is the one I've been foolishly and
obsessively denying for a long time." 

"Scully, listen, I'm not sure what you are referring to but I know
I don't need to remind you what the amount of psychological
turmoil you've been under can do to a person and--"

"I want to find William, Mulder."  

 

THE END