The Way Back to You (1/?)
by Pereybere

Email: aria_raj@yahoo.com
Rating: NC-17 / M - This chapter is a T, but it will definitely
become an M rated story in the coming chapters.
Keywords: MSR
Spoilers: Probably loads, so if you haven't watched the whole
series - including the miniseries, avoid!

Disclaimer: It goes without saying that I do not own The X-
Files. No infringement intended.
Author's Notes: It's been a very long time since I sat down to
write an X-Files fanfiction. Looking back on my life (I'm 30
now), I spent almost all of my adolescence writing X-Files
fanfic, which I published on Gossamer. Then as an adult I
found , and started writing here. When I wrote Six Degrees of
Requiem, my most favourited and read X-Files story, I was
only 20 years old. It's remarkable how much time has passed. I
haven't written fic for any fandom in six years. I left the fanfic
world to become a paid writer for a publisher of erotica. For a
long time I thought the fanfiction muse had left me forever.
Turns out, all it took was the promise of a reboot, some sneaky
little clips of Mulder and Scully and suddenly, I was right back
where I used to be. I hope anyone reading this - old fans or new
- will enjoy it. MSR forever!


Chapter One

When she'd left, there'd been no fight; no raised voices, no
volleying of below-the-belt insults. When she'd packed her
belongings, Dana Scully had done so with quiet resignation,
carefully folding her clothes into piles. She hadn't pulled
garments from their shared closet with frantic rage, or smashed
knickknacks in a fit of anger. This was, in reflection, perhaps
the saddest thing of all; even the passion was gone.

Scully found him in his office, surrounded by the remnants of
two decades worth of obsession; files, newspaper clippings,
posters, letters. In contrast to her meticulous order, Mulder was
as haphazard and frenetic as ever. Outside the walls of the
house, time had moved on. Inside, it felt as though they'd spent
almost fifteen years on the event horizon of a black-hole,
forever hovering where time stood still. It surprised her,
sometimes, when she travelled into the city and discovered how
different life was, now. She never quite felt as though she
belonged in civilization anymore.

"Hey..." she said, gently touching her knuckles to the door.

Mulder lifted his head from a file spread across his desk.
"Hey," he replied, his voice quiet with resignation. "Have you
packed?" Dark eyes shifted beyond to where her suitcases sat,
side-by-side, next to the door. She knew she didn't imagine the
momentary flicker of regret that crossed his still-handsome
features. "I'll help you to the car," he said, pushing his chair
back.

Long buried tendencies of independence almost resurfaced, as
she opened her mouth to refuse his help. She could carry her
own bags - she had packed them and lugged them downstairs,
after all. Her stomach clenched in a knot of resentment; would
their parting even be necessary if Mulder had shown the same
chivalry, just once, before now? Would her misery have
become quite so deep rooted, if he'd only noticed?

"Will you call me, when you get settled?" Mulder asked,
hefting her cases with both hands.

"Of course I will," Scully replied, turning up the collar on her
winter coat. The skies overhead were laden with snow; a thick,
threatening colour of pewter. When she exhaled, a deep breath
of knotted anxiousness, the air condensed into an dense white
cloud. Though her leather gloves, Scully's fingers were cold.
Mulder, wearing only an olive-green t-shirt and jeans, appeared
to be immune to the biting chill. "You should go inside," Scully
said, at a loss for anything more significant to say.

It wasn't that there was nothing she wanted to tell him; there
was. Thousands of words, long sentences of explanation, but
face to face with him, she found herself uncharacteristically
inarticulate. The words she'd rehearsed to defend her choices
were pitiful, as she prepared to say them. She was choked with
tears, a pain quite literally spreading across her chest. This was
it. She was leaving him, and their relationship, behind.

Mulder stepped closer. Reaching out, he brushed a tendril of
hair away from her cheek. The intensity of his gaze reminded
her of all the times before; when he'd first attempted to kiss her
in the hallway of his apartment building, all those years ago.
When he had kissed her as they welcomed the dawn of a new
millennium together. When he'd first made love to her, in those
last seconds before he reached a shuddering climax, how he'd
looked into her eyes   how he hadn't needed to say I love you,
because every word, every emotion, every unspoken sentiment
was right there.

"I don't blame you, Scully," he said at last, stroking his thumb
across the arch of her cheekbone, to the outside corner of her
eye where a single tear had formed. "I'm sorry," Mulder told
her. "For all the times my obsessive neuroses have hurt you."
She clutched his hand against her cheek, closing her eyes
against the onslaught of tears threatening to fall. "Please don't
cry. Not anymore." She was in his arms then, clinging to the
familiarity of his body with desperate, soul-crushing yearning.
She sobbed against him, praying that he would ask her to
stay  praying that he wouldn't. The circle was endless,
complicated in its simplicity. She wanted to go. She didn't want
to go. She wanted to stay. She needed to escape. Endless
uncertainty, never knowing what the right choice was.

"I love you," she murmured against the soft, well-worn fabric
of his t-shirt. She breathed in his scent, the familiar woodsy
scent of him. He'd been outside today, meandering through the
woods, reflecting upon some mystery or another; she could
smell the outdoors on him. Any other day, she would have
undressed him, led him to bed, let him work out the frustrations
of his mind upon her body; a momentary respite for them both.

"I know," he replied, his voice muffled against her hair. "I love
you too, Scully. Always." His hand was on her neck then, his
lips touching upon her own for the briefest of seconds - tender,
gentle... goodbye. "Call me," he said.

She withdrew from his embrace, her body aching; the pain of
leaving him mixed with the deep, ever present sexual arousal
that invariably flared inside her when they touched. Scully
fished in her coat pocket for her car keys. Her feet crunched on
the stony gravel, and Mulder stepped back, edging towards the
porch where he stood, watching her - silent.

Over the roof of the car, she looked at him. "Why don't you
want me to stay?" she asked at last, voicing the question she
hadn't been able to vanquish from her mind. What she really
wanted to say was why aren't you begging me not to go? Why
do you want to be alone so fucking badly? She rarely swore at
him, even when they fought. In truth, they rarely fought either -
which was probably why her discontent had festered,
fermenting into this toxic blend of rotten emotions.

"Scully..." Mulder said, shaking his head slowly. He crossed
the space between them again, taking wide, urgent strides. 
"You can't possibly know how much I want you to stay," he 
said, taking both her hands in his.  She wished she wasn't wearing 
the leather gloves, yearned to feel his skin on hers. "But you aren't 
happy here. More than anything else, Scully, I want you to be happy." 
He bent his head, peering into her eyes, imploring upon her to 
understand.  "This is who I am; obsessive, thoughtless, neurotic 
and I know this is my fault." His hands squeezed hers one final 
time.  "That's why I'm not asking you to stay... because you of all
people, deserve to be happy."

She mourned the loss of his touch when he stepped away again,
this time climbing onto the porch - ever further away. "I'll see
you," she said, pulling her eyes away from him. Inside the car,
she fumed in silence. So this was the time he picked to be
selfless? Now? After all the many years of thoughtlessness,
Fox Mulder decided on altruism on the very day she chose to
leave? Her tires spat gravel as she pressed her foot to the gas
and sped away from the house, jittery with anger, pained with
melancholy.

"Fuck you, Mulder," she said out loud, refusing to look in the
rearview mirror. Her stubbornness lasted only two miles along
the deserted road. She never had mastered how to be angry at
him for very long - instead, she felt a profound sense of loss.
The relationship that she'd been a part of for a very long time,
was over. Scully wasn't sure she was ready to be alone, again.
Not just alone... but without Fox Mulder; partner, best friend,
lover.

Scully could pinpoint exactly when things began to fall apart;
January 2010. Mulder became distracted again, holed up inside
his office for entire days, reading files, scouring the internet
and researching paranormal phenomena. His eidetic memory
was a curse, caused him to toss restlessly when he finally did
come to bed - sometimes in the middle of the night. He was
dismissive of her concerns, resentful of her mollycoddling.
Days of this behavior became weeks, then months and before
either of them could comprehend it, there was an almighty
chasm between them. The only constant was the sex, frantic
and passionate, then long and tender. Between the sheets, he
seemed to revere... almost worship her. Then, when she was
sated and exhausted, Mulder would slip from their bed and
return to his cluttered office - as though making love to her
somehow rejuvenated him. Like caffeine, or cocaine.

God, the sex was breathtaking - but it wasn't enough. They
hadn't shared a meal in months, she couldn't remember the last
meaningful conversation they'd had together. It might have
been some kind of midlife crisis, but his inability to express
himself emotionally left Scully feeling cold and a little used.
Yes, been more than willing when his hands wandered over her
body and his rigid cock pressed against her backside, but there
had to be more. There had to be. They just didn't laugh
anymore. Or talk. Nothing but breathless, rampant sex.

The snow began, light and wistful at first, blowing across her
windshield and melting almost immediately. Within ten
minutes a blizzard had descended; sheets of thick, opaque snow
blocked the path of her car and Scully's concentration focused
entirely on navigating her car out of the countryside, and into
the city where she'd temporary rented an apartment.

In hindsight, if it hadn't snowed that night, she might have
returned back to the house, to Mulder, to the familiar warmth
of his embrace. As it happened, the snow came heavier than it
had in years, making any attempt at returning all but
impossible... and by the time the weather thawed, and her
resentment cooled from a fierce boil to a low simmer, their
temporary separation had somehow become permanent - and
just like that, at the command of an untimely snowstorm, their
seventeen year romance had ended.