His eyes were wide and frantic and he turned in circles until he felt dizzy, searching, scanning and wishing for any glimpse of her. 

Suddenly his heart beat was in his ears and he blinked back the fierce wave of tears that swirled and grew behind his eyes. 

‘Scully,’ he said loudly, sharply, a demand rather than a question. ‘Scullyyy!’ 

There was a ringing sound in his ears and it was only growing louder as terror took over his entire body, a bolt through him that nearly brought him to his knees. 

He turned in place again and forced his gaze settle on Scully in her bed, still and pale and an amalgamation of all of his biggest fears.

He was alone. Scully was hurt. He couldn’t help her. 

He felt like he was in hell, the one he’d always deserved but she had kept him out of. Shame crept down his spine. Weeks, years of it playing on a loop in his head until he wanted to fall at her side and beg. 

He had married her, taken her away from her family, dropped her into every dangerous situation a person could ever find themselves, and what the fuck did she have to show for it? 

‘Scully,’ he said, voice trembling. He could feel that his face was damp, and he rubbed at it angrily. 

He tripped on the useless pile of books he’d dropped at his feet and felt himself lunge towards her bed, his hands gripping at the scratchy sheets she was wrapped in. 

‘Scully,’ he begged again, waiting for her to return to him. He couldn’t go on without her and they had both known that. 

Where had she gone? Why had she disappeared? Why, at that moment, the moment where he felt close to fixing this? 

His chest heaved and he slid until his palms touched the cold floor, reaching for the books. 

’S-soul retrieval, Scully, I’ll do it. I told you.’ He was muttering, whispering like a fool on the floor by his wife’s hospital bed. 

His hands shook and tore at some of the delicate pages while he searched for the passage he needed, the cold tile biting into his knees. 

‘Scully,’ he said again around a sniff as his eyes dragged over the page, as though the word itself could bring her back if he said it right. ‘The soul detached so it could survive the trauma, Scully, that’s what you did and it was right, Scully, but I’m here to bring you back. It-It’s safe to come back now, Scully. Your soul..’ 

His hands were shaking, too fiercely now to hold anything and the book clattered to the ground. His vision blurred and everything went numb. He wanted nothing more in this life or the next, than to have her back.

So he would wait, standing guard over her like a man who would chain himself to a tree, so convinced of its right to exist, of its precious place in this world. 

That’s what he would do now, for the rest of time, he would be here at her bed, holding her hand so that they could never take her away from him. And if her hand never filled with her own warmth again…

If the machines stopped, if their silence shattered his world, then…

He wondered shamefully what people would think, what would the reports say, what combination of words would make their way to Skinner, or to his mother. 

Would they know the truth, that he had lost his wife and could no longer stumble forward? A widower, a man unmoored after the light of his life left him. His stomach ached as it rippled with the decision he’d unconsciously made years ago. 

He would want the world to know that he hadn’t just lost his work partner, or his colleague, that this wasn’t about guilt or madness. 

He had the rings they’d never worn, the ones he’d bought that night before they even did this whole thing. The store he’d stumbled into with a buzzing in his chest and a credit card in his lucky, trembling hand. 

‘Gold, or silver?’ the helpful salesman had asked. 

‘Gold,’ Mulder had said suddenly, flashes of her crucifix in his mind, a naive hope that she’d actually have cause or inclination to wear it. 

He’d never had the guts to give it to her, not when he’d seen the serious set of her shoulders on that day, the way her body language had warned him off from even touching her. He’d shoved the little velvet box back into his suit pocket and smiled tightly as they rushed out the standard vows, a sinking feeling in his chest as she refused to look him in the eye. 

He had those rings still, buried beneath boxer shorts in a an old wooden drawer and he resolved to slip the gold onto his finger and display it proudly for the rest of their days together on this earth. 

He quickly scrubbed away the tear that had broken free and stained his bruised cheek, pulling his chair closer to her bed until the blankets bunched up between his knees. 

He felt breathless, adrenaline in his veins and desperate bargaining tugging at his soul. 

It would not end this way.

Something fierce and defiant bloomed in him and he tightened his jaw as his fingers clung to her, pressing into her skin. He ached to hear her at his shoulder again, guiding him, reassuring him. He felt less real in a room where she wasn’t conscious, like most of him had disappeared along with her. She’d taken the good parts, the useful ones. 

His wife. Scully. His love and his compass and his star. 

‘It’s… it’s love. It’s all love, Scully, right? That’s what worked every time, in every damn story since the beginning of time, it’s been love. Love of a wife or-or a sister or a father or even of a god. Or- or a husband. Love’s the strongest, right? Stronger than anger or fear, right?’ He sniffed fiercely, trying in vain to keep his voice even. ‘It’s good, ‘cause, if its love then you’ll have to come back to me, ‘cause I’ve got that Scully. I’ve got so much of it that sometimes I can’t even look at it, Scully, it’s… it’s enough, I know it. It will be enough and you’ll have to.’ 

His chest shuddered and he screwed his eyes shut, gripping even tighter around her hand. 

‘I’m begging you, I’m here and I am begging you, Scully, to claw your way back if you can hear me, to come back to me, please.’ The last words were painful pulls from desperate lungs as he clutched at her like a dying man. 

The machines beeped steadily all around, impassive and unimpressed with his ritual, but he couldn’t be stopped. The room could burst into flames, nothing would pull him away from her side now because he knew, he felt it raw and growing in him. He was chained to her. 

If love was the answer, then she would come back to him, she simply had to, because no one had ever loved someone the way he loved Scully. 

Beep.  Beep. 

The last thing he’d thought to allow himself was sleep, but his body betrayed him and he was jostled upright as a nurse entered the room. He shot a look over his shoulder defensively, suddenly alert and furious.

‘I’m sorry, Mr Mulder, I have to check on some of Dana’s vitals.’ She wheeled in a trolley, displaying needles and cuffs and vials. 

He should be used to such a sight by now after years of fighting together against what seemed like the whole world, but it still rolled his stomach. 

’S’ok,’ he muttered, running a hand through his hair and sighing heavily back against the chair. 

His neck ached, and he realised that he had been hunched over her body for some time. 

‘Would you like to step outside? Get some air, I’ll be a little while here.’ 

‘No,’ he said. 

She sighed and nodded, turning from him and lifting up a chart.

He stared at Scully, watching the slow press of air fill her lungs through a network of tubes and listening to the eerie rattle of a machine pretending to be her. 

The bag of fluid hanging underneath her bed swayed as the nurse jostled against the arm rail and Mulder grimaced, turning away. How many things could be stripped from her? How many basic choices and dignities would she lose because of him? 

She quickly unscrewed a tiny plastic cap from the wound inside Scully’s elbow and began to draw things from her body. There were so many wounds now and it seemed she got new ones each day. There was one wrapped in a sticky clear square at the top of her chest, where the borders of the dressing had rubbed grey, and one tangled in wires on top of her hand where the skin was so thin he wanted to cry. Her veins were darker now, brought to the surface by something awful, and he wanted to gather her into his arms and push the nurse away, to beg her to leave her alone. 

‘Mr Mulder, if you are going to take that, you have to step outside. I am trying to work.’ 

It was then that he realised his cell phone was ringing, buzzing insistently in his pocket and he shook his head. He pulled it out quickly and shut it off, staring back at Scully and letting himself drift back into her orbit. 

The nurse exhaled with frustration and got back to drawing Scully’s blood. Taking, taking and taking from her, labelling each little vial and tucking it down into the styrofoam holder, an uneasy creaking sound filling the room each time she did. The blood was so dark, such a rich red and it made him want to demand that she put it back, to not steal anything else from her, but he bit his tongue and continued to watch. 

He watched every movement, studying each pass of skin or touch of tool to her precious, defenceless body. 

‘I’m all done here, another nurse will be in in a few hours to check on her as the shifts change. Visiting hours are over at nine,’ she reminded tightly with a glance at the clock. 

Mulder nodded and waited for the door to click shut behind her before he shuffled forward again and laid his head by Scully’s hip, exhaling heavily. 

‘Oh, Mulder, look at you,’ Scully said in horror as he emerged from the bathroom, his eye swollen and sore looking, his skin pallid and his hair a wet mess. 

‘Y’know, some women find scars sexy,’ he grumbled, pulling on the first t-shirt his fingers brushed from the pile beside his dresser. 

‘Those women aren’t usually doctors. It’s hard to find something sexy that could have caused internal bleeding, concussions, fractures. Plus, it just makes you look sad.’ 

‘That works, I feel sad, Scully.’ 

‘Join the club.’ 

‘Do we get badges? We already have the secret handshake.’ He joined her on the bed again and she turned to face him as his hand stroked her hip. 

‘What are we going to do, Mulder?’ Her tone was suddenly serious, and he swallowed nervously. 

‘Well, Scully, we could head to the Gunmen’s, or we could head to the hospital, or we could jump on a plane and head to the Bahamas. Hey, wouldn’t that be fun? Flying wherever you want without your passport, or needing to buy a ticket?’

The look she gave him told him that, no, that didn’t sound fun. 

‘I meant, what are we going to do?’ 

‘Oh, the big, do.’ He drew in a deep breath and exhaled slowly.

‘I… I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable, but I think I need to start trying something.’ 

‘Something?’ 

‘Some of these rituals, these… solutions we’ve found to getting you back into your body, Scully. They’re trying to bring you around, and I need to stop waiting for this all to magically resolve itself.’

‘Mulder, you cannot be serious.’ 

‘I am, deadly.’ 

‘Mulder, chanting over my body is not going to fix this.’ 

‘So, what is?’ he asked firmly, ‘Sorry, Scully, but we can’t just do nothing.’ 

‘I- We’re not doing nothing, Mulder, the doctors..’

‘The doctors have given up,’ he said, surprised at the harshness of his own words. 

‘If there is a single thing I can do to fix this, Scully, I’m going to do it. I don’t care how ridiculous it all seems. Something is going to work. There has to be a reason that you’re here, that you’re still with me. Because in a normal, run-of-the-mill coma, Scully, this doesn’t happen.’ 

She shook her head and shot him a disapproving look. 

‘Mulder…’ 

‘I love you, Scully. I love you, and I’m not going to give up.’ 

The words washed over her but left her feeling sick. It somehow loosened her grip on the hope they were holding together, like he was gearing up to say goodbye. 

She looked away and pulled free from his grasp, and he rolled onto his back to stare at the ceiling. 

They rode to the hospital in silence, save for the brief call he had with Frohike, putting his cell on speakerphone as the despondent man listed off a few articles they’d found overnight, apologising as they offered little hope. 

‘Is she there?’ Frohike had asked over the crackling line. 

‘She’s right here,’ Mulder answered with his hands tight on the wheel. 

‘Hey, Scully.’ 

She didn’t reply as she stared out of the window, and Mulder quickly ended the call, plunging them back into their silence together. 

They parted ways in the hallway again, and Mulder carried his bag of books guiltily into the room, hoping to find it empty but stopping just inside of the door as he saw Maggie Scully’s tired frame in front of Scully’s bed. 

The room was bursting with bouquets of flowers, and the sight sent another wave of guilt through him. None from him. He hadn’t cared to notice them yesterday as he stared down Bill’s fist, but now shame flickered in his chest as smiled limply at Maggie. 

She turned and quickly assessed him, looking down at the plastic bag that swung near his calf, and he tucked it behind his leg. 

‘Good morning, Maggie. I brought some books, I.. was going to read to her for a bit,’ he said quickly, hoping she wouldn’t ask any further questions. 

‘Fox,’ she said evenly, a calmness to her words that the tension in her face belied. ‘We didn’t expect to see you today.’ 

He tried not to think deeply about that statement and just nodded as he stepped closer. She looked away, fighting the urge to stare at his injured cheek.

He wondered if it made her glad, if some small part of her felt joy when she looked upon his face, the evidence of Bill’s defence of his sister splattered across it. He cleared his throat. 

‘How is she doing today?’ 

‘She’s on life support, Fox. She’s not ‘doing’ anything.’ 

Fuck. His gaze dropped again to his feet and the tiles and the chair legs as they always did when he was in this room. He didn’t know what to say, but as weary words fought to break through his hesitant lips, she cut him off. 

‘I have our family priest visiting today, and If you don’t mind, I’d like the room. I know you don’t believe, as Dana did.’ 

Does, he wanted to scream, Dana does believe. 

He wasn’t welcome when he was here, and he was despised when he left. His stomach twisted and he chewed at his lip, unsure of what to say. He left the room and closed the door so softly behind him that something fractured in his chest. Scully’s body was in that quiet little room, and he had no place in it. 

Why, why was she with him and not her family? Why, why could he see her even now, across the hall with her immaculate suit and her serious expression, yet the nurses flitted past her as though she wasn’t there at all. 

‘Hey,’ he said quietly from the corner of his lips as he pressed against her side.

‘No new bruises, I assume Bill wasn’t in there?’ 

He smirked and shook his head. ‘Just your mom. She asked for some privacy, though. Your priest is coming.’ 

Scully’s expression drew back into one of horror, her lips disappearing as her eyes glistened. 

‘What? What’s wrong?’ 

‘She’s, uh..’ Scully cleared her throat tightly and squeezed her jaw together. ‘She’s saying goodbye.’ 

He stared at her in disbelief. ‘Already?’ 

Scully nodded and stared over his shoulder at the closed door, a pull in her soul that tugged her forward. ‘He’ll be giving me my last rites.’ 

‘Scully..’ 

She was already moving and so he let her go. 

Something felt wrong, Scully turned over and clutched a hand to her hallow chest, feeling a fluttering of unease. She pulled herself free from Mulder’s arm, and he rolled onto his other side with a grunt of displeasure.

She scrambled to her feet and ran her hands firmly down her clothes, as though brushing the sleep from them would right her body. Something fluttered again, then swam in her veins until she felt an icy sensation travel up her arms.

‘Mulder,’ she called out with fear loud in her voice. 

‘Mmmh,’ he huffed, rolling his head back to stare blearily up at her.

Light poured all around her, cracking in through the blinds around her frame but her movements were unsteady, jerky, and the sight pulled him fully awake with a start.

‘Scully?’

‘Something feels… wrong.’ She gasped shakily as her fingers began to tingle and sting. She held them up and studied them as they began to tremble.

‘What?’ He shot up out of bed and rushed to her, grasping her hands and feeling the skin there, uncomfortably cold.

‘I don’t feel.. well.’

He opened his mouth to ask another question, but the shrill sound of his phone ringing halted them both and their eyes widened in panic.

He nearly tripped over his jeans as he rushed into the living room, grabbing the phone frantically and pressing it to his ear.

‘Mulder,’ he barked into the handset. 

‘..Mr Mulder, it’s Sally here from Dana Scully’s care team. The doctor has asked that you come in today for an update on your wife’s condition.’ Her words were clean and polite, but carried an undertone of judgement that twisted in Mulder’s gut.

They didn’t know, they didn’t know that she was right here by his side and they were working together to bring her back.

‘Uhm, of course, thank you. I can be in by.. nine,’ he said and his eyes locked onto Scully’s with an apologetic expression.

‘The doctor will do his best to be with you at nine, but you may have to wait while he finishes up with other patients.’

‘That will be fine, I can wait,’ Mulder said, almost sheepishly. ‘I’ll wait.’

‘Ok. We’ll see you soon, Mr Mulder.’

‘Uh- sorry, is everything ok?’

There was a tense pause where words were bitten down. He could tell that she wanted to say something stern, something true, but she held back. The line crackled between them.

‘The doctor would just like to see you in person.’

She hung up promptly, and he tried not to dwell on the judgement of a stranger, one who could never understand their situation.

‘What is it?’ Scully asked breathlessly.

‘The doctor wants to see me, for an update..’

He studied her expression carefully, watching the twitch of her eyes as she bit her lower lip and nodded.

‘What does that mean?’

‘Well, I don’t know, Mulder,’ she said sternly. ‘We need to go down there and find out.’

Thoughts clouded her mind, ugly, final things she refused to share with him. They could at least drive to the hospital in some state of blissful ignorance. They could have that.

The journey was over too quickly though, and Mulder was leading her out of the parking lot and through the double doors. Scully felt afraid, the dread of having no presence in a busy building, now all-consuming.

She could tell that he was avoiding touching her too much, as they were free to do in private but not here, where eyes would see him grasping at the air.

‘You coming in?’ he asked in a low murmur with a brush of their pinky fingers as they got to her floor.

She shook her head slowly and he nodded in understanding.

She wasn’t ready to see herself, to see her cold and lifeless body again, so they parted ways at the reception desk and she let herself drift down the familiar, comfortable halls of a busy hospital.

She hovered at the nurses station for a few moments, listening to the clacking of computer keys and the squeak of sneakers against a well-worn floor.

Charts were flipped closed and busily shoved into boxes right in front of her eyes and she ached to flip them back open again. To read, to scan the pages and diagnose, to see patterns and clues fall neatly into place. She ached to contribute something to the commotion, but a flare of frustration drowned it all out and she drifted again, passing through a door without a thought about where it might lead.

‘Did you see that piece-of-shit husband showed up finally?’ a nurse muttered with a mug of coffee held up in front of her mouth.

Scully froze and turned to face the pair, leaning against the counter in scrubs, in a cramped little break room. She recognised the scene so well.

‘Oh, that tall guy? He’s finally back?’

‘Yeah, let’s see if he stays for a full hour this time,’ the first nurse said with a roll of her eyes between sips.

‘Her poor mother has been here every single day, but him? Not a peep. And yet he won’t let them honour her DNR order.’

Scully felt a hot pit of anger in her stomach, watching them discuss Mulder as though he wasn’t willing to go to the ends of the earth for her. They didn’t know him, and this moment felt suddenly cruel. She wished her voice would work in rooms like this.

‘If she wakes up, I hope she divorces him.’

‘Oh, hon, she’s not waking up,’ she replied sadly before turning to rinse her mug out.

Scully shut her eyes and blinked back the tears that ached to spill. She turned and fled blindly through the walls, unnoticed.

‘Jeez, did they print out the entire internet?’ Scully whispered, though she wasn’t sure why she’d bothered.

Mulder couldn’t suppress a grin as her shoulder nudged his and the contact sent a thrill through him.

‘Hey, no, no no! You don’t get our free grunt work and get to talk behind our backs. If she’s making jokes, share them with the class!’

Scully rolled her eyes and twisted her fingers at her lips, flinging the imaginary key over her shoulder.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, there’s nobody there,’ Mulder said smugly.

‘Jerk..’ Frohike muttered as he hefted up another ream of paper and dropped it in front of them.

‘So.. not to sound ungrateful, but what exactly am I looking at?’ Mulder asked with wide eyes.

‘This is… everything,’ Langly said seriously, his hands on his hips as they all took a moment to stare at the mammoth task ahead.

‘Everything..?’

‘We ran a programme, it trawled the net and pulled up anything, medical journals, personal blogs, any page that mentioned a specific set of keywords. Then, we just hit print, it was going all night. No stone unturned,’ he said with a shrug.

‘No stone,’ Mulder exhaled slowly, then pushed it into a low whistle.

‘We’re gonna charge you for the paper though,’ Frohike added as he elbowed past.

‘What about Scully?’ Mulder asked, his voice sounding whinier than he would have liked.

‘For her, it’s on the house, you’ve used up more than your share of our free stuff.’

‘You’re just pissed you can’t see her,’ he grumbled in return and Scully shoved him.

‘You can do it the old-fashioned way, too, Mulder, we won’t judge.’ Byers cut in, gesturing towards a pile of dusty old books they’d stacked in the corner.

‘Thanks. I’ll hit the books and you guys start skimming the mountain. You know what you’re looking for?’

‘Coma patient, apparitions, miracles?’

‘What are we waiting for?’ He asked, smacking his hand on his thigh and standing.

‘And what will the lovely lady be doing?’

‘She, uh, can’t touch anything..’ Mulder said, an apology on his lips as he shot her a look.

‘Nothing?’ Frohike asked.

Mulder didn’t feel like explaining that she could touch precisely one thing and it was his body, so he just shook his head tightly.

‘Scully…’ Frohike blindly addressed the room, his voice a little loud.

‘She can hear you, man, she’s in a coma, not deaf,’ Mulder said with a scoff.

‘Tell him I said thanks,’ Scully said.

‘She says thanks,’ Mulder repeated and they all shared a small smile before taking up their own stations.

Stacks of paper shifted between sides of tired bodies and Mulder sifted through a pile of books until some title seemed vaguely helpful.

Scully watched Mulder carefully as she tired of waiting for him to turn pages that he was still studying, his thumb brushing at the corners as he muttered under his breath.

Her head rolled from side to side, trying to clear the frustration and impatience away with a familiar movement.

His lips were moving silently and the plump lower one glistened as his tongue occasionally darted out to run along it. His forehead was pulled taut and she could see tension running in little lines underneath his skin, beneath stubble that she had never observed this closely before. She was sure that she had never stared at anyone’s skin like this before and she felt herself lean even closer under the guise of reading more of the book rested on his bent knees.

‘You never wear your glasses anymore,’ she said softly without thinking, then quickly straightened up when she heard the rasp of her voice.

‘I, uh.. my eyes are pretty tired.’ He went to reach for them self consciously and she stilled him, the tips of her fingers buzzing against his hand.

He tugged away and pulled his glasses off so he could rub at his eyes, as though he had forgotten about the discomfort until she had brought it up. He groaned quietly as his head pressed back against the wall.

‘What are you two whispering about over there?’ A grumble came from across the room behind stacks of research that were still towering stubbornly above all their heads.

Mulder chuckled but ignored the comment and reached across the grab Scully’s hand.

‘Scully are you ok? Do you feel tired?’

She looked at him for a drawn out moment, squinting as she considered his question. It shouldn’t be difficult to answer, it was normally a yes or no question, but all of her insides felt murky, clouded and unsettled.

‘It’s not…’ She shook her head, searching her brain for how she really felt. ‘It’s not a tiredness per say, it’s more of a.. there’s an ache,’ she said, hovering a hand over the centre of her chest and his eyes flicked down with a frown.

‘Y’know, if this situation wasn’t so gut-wrenchingly frightening, it would be fascinating,’ he said with a little awe in his voice, eyes tracking slowly back up to her face.

‘I suppose. And I suppose it happened to the two people who spend their life chasing this sort of thing,’ she said with a weak attempt at a laugh.

‘Who goes there?’ The mocking voice crackled over the speakers.

Mulder tightened his jaw impatiently and he heard the steady sounds of the fortress unlocking itself. He ushered Scully inside, not caring what the security tapes might show as he waved blindly at the air.

The atmosphere was thick with tension as they made their way down the hall, stepping over wires and boxes in the dark. He turned the corner and brushed his fingers across her lower back, cursing himself as a spark of desire shot through him, a lingering effect from their early morning pressed together beneath sheets.

He forced the over-eager thoughts of her skin and the feel of her hips rocking against him for friction from his mind.

There was a bag of donuts torn open with powder spilled out across the main table followed by faded and re-stained rings from coffee cups that made him feel a twinge of guilt. 

‘How is she?’ A voice asked from the doorway as three bedraggled men filed in.

‘The same,’ Mulder said tightly.

‘Sorry, man.’

Mulder shrugged it off, staring intently down at his hands lit up above the table. Hands that just this morning had tickled skin beneath Scully’s pristine blazer, and had felt the prickle of her arousal chase his touch. His brow furrowed. When had those lines at the base of his thumb appeared? Two little creases that spoke of his age, of time pulling forward that he’d never noticed. 

‘Anything?’ he asked to the room, numbly.

His friends sighed collectively, and he kept his eyes on his hands as he waited.

‘..Mulder, we stayed up all night, we’re running on fumes and all we could find were rituals for raising the dead, or old myths about extending lives, eternal life, deals with the devil, real spooky shit, you know?’

‘Well, she’s not dead,’ he replied in frustration.

‘Thanks, captain obvious,’ Frohike muttered. ‘I’m just sayin’, we tried our best, man. There’s nothing about coma patients waking up because you said the right combination of words or.. or bought a fucking amulet.’

‘So what exactly are you saying?’ Mulder snapped.

‘I’m saying,’ Frohike said calmly, looking around and exhaling, ‘..i’m saying that you shouldn’t be here. You’re looking in old books for some magic cure when your girl’s in the hospital. Don’t you think she’d want you there?’

He felt like he’d been slapped and his eyes settled on Scully, she chewed her lip nervously and scanned the room, a row of grieving eyes looking back at her.

‘Tell them,’ she muttered.

‘What?’

‘You have to tell them, or they won’t… they think you’re going off the deep end.’

‘Yeah, maybe I am,’ he hissed, and all three men traded concerned looks as the air tightened between them.

‘Mulder?’ Frohike said carefully, leaning forward. ‘Have you been getting any sleep?’

Mulder sighed and dropped his head into his hands. ‘She’s not… Scully, she’s not exactly, not here.’

‘Good one, Mulder,’ Scully said with a roll of her eyes.

‘Ok, so you explain it, then,’ he said sharply, staring at her and watching as her tongue ran across her lower lip.

Frohike’s hand gently resting on his shoulder made him jump out of his skin and he stumbled back, making his stool clatter noisily to the ground.

‘Mulder, man, you need to calm down. We’re all here for you, and we know how hard this must be. We know what Scully means to you.’

‘I’m not fucking crazy, alright? She’s… here.’ He gestured vaguely to the space around Scully and huffed out a deep, frustrated breath.

Frohike blinked and shot a look back to the other men, who both shrugged. ‘..Mulder?’

He sighed heavily and searched Scully’s face for support. She tilted her head in sympathy but he knew that she couldn’t offer any real help.   

‘Scully is here, or at least, her soul is..’

He could feel instantly that they didn’t believe him, and he couldn’t blame them. The air felt sharp with their worry and disbelief. He had spent a lot of time in rooms that didn’t believe him, but this one really stung.

‘Ask them to ask me something, something I could see,’ she offered.

‘She’s here, guys, I’m telling you. She…’ He shook his head, his stomach twisting as he fought against the gnawing doubts there.

‘Mulder, you’re worrying us,’ Langly said, tension radiating from his stiff posture.

‘Fucking forget it,’ he muttered.

‘No, Mulder, no, stop! We need help, and you know you can trust them.’ Her voice was grounding and he studied her expression, letting the sweet, familiar features ease his fears. Scully. The rest of the room could fade away, melt into oblivion because he would find his reality there.

The three men watched as their close friend of several years held a silent conversation with the empty air, nodding and staring at nothing, as though he had finally been pushed over the edge.

They exchanged a look, and Frohike tucked his chin to his chest in acknowledgement.

‘Mulder..’

‘Ask her anything,’ he said quickly, gesturing to the woman that stood at his side, as real as she’d ever been.

‘Have you been to the hospital today?’

‘That’s… that’s not- ask her something, she’ll prove to you that she’s really here.’

‘Mulder, you look awful.’

‘Thanks,’ he said bitterly.

‘Mulder, I’m so sorry,’ Scully said at his side, pain twisting in her chest as she watched him fight so hard to prove her existence. With a twinge of remorse, she considered that she wouldn’t believe him right now either.

‘You should be with her, in case-’

‘Stop,’ Mulder warned with a finger pointed fiercely towards him. ‘Don’t ever go there, ‘cause she’s right fucking here.’ He reached out and clasped her wrist, just to remind himself that he wasn’t entirely crazy.

‘Tell him… tell him I can see that he missed a belt loop,’ Scully said, stroking his hand with her thumb to soothe him.

‘You missed a belt loop,’ Mulder repeated, not looking up from where their hands were linked.

Frohike’s eyes shot up as his hands traced around his back, feeling the blank space where the leather sat outside of the fabric. ‘Nice guess.’

‘Ask him to hold fingers up behind his back,’ she said quickly. ‘I’ll read them.’

‘Hold your fingers up behind your back, she’ll read them,’ Mulder said with a sigh, letting her go and missing her immediately.

‘Alright,’ Frohike said, rolling his eyes, but complying.

‘Four,’ she called to Mulder from behind Frohike’s back and he repeated it.

The man frowned and then tried again, swapping between fingers quickly.

‘Two,’ she continued. ‘Two, again.’

She gasped and peered over his shoulder. ‘Just one, a really impolite one.’

‘Did you just flip her off?’ Mulder asked with a glare.

The man looked over his shoulder, searching for a mirror or proof of some trick that Mulder could be pulling.

‘Look, Scully is there, I’m not crazy, not about this anyway..’

‘Mulder..’

‘She came to me, the day she was put into the coma, that night, she came to me and she didn’t have any idea about what had happened to her.’

There was a chorus of sighs around the room, concern and frustration radiating from everyone.

‘Look, I know how it sounds, but haven’t I earned the benefit of the doubt? After all this time you guys think I’m making shit up?’

‘We don’t think you’re making anything up. But a brain experiencing high levels of trauma and stress can-’

‘-Do the… the finger thing again,’ he urged in Scully’s direction.

‘No, we get it, Mulder. We… believe you,’ Frohike said solidly.

‘You do?’ he asked with a knot of apprehension in his chest. ‘You really do, not like, you’re gonna call the nice men in the white coats to come and get me when I go to the bathroom?’

‘They stopped taking my calls years ago, Mulder.’ He looked to his side at his two friends and then across the table at Mulder’s hunched, miserable frame. ‘We believe you.’

He pressed his hands to his face firmly and let out a shuddering breath. He felt like he could cry with relief, and he almost did, until he felt the gentle tingle of Scully’s touch on his knee, reassuring and warm.

He wondered why this was the most she had ever touched him in their lives together, when no one could possibly see it. The thought made his shoulders slump further forward.

‘So…’ he began with a tired voice, ‘I need to find anything we can on putting souls back in bodies. Not raising the dead, or-or reanimating corpses, but putting two halves of someone living back together. She’s here, but she needs to be put back into her body.’

Scully was pacing, and though he tried his best to keep his weary gaze ahead, it kept drifting to the sharp snap of her heels. She was making him nervous, and each time his eyes darted to meet Skinner’s, he worried that the man would see it.

‘Agent Mulder, I understand you’re probably anxious to be at the hospital,’ he said evenly, his attention pulled briefly to the twisted fists in his lap.

‘I’m sorry, sir, I’m just feeling a little distracted,’ he shot Scully another look, begging her to stand still.

‘More than understandable, Mulder,' Skinner said with a calm authority. ‘I just wanted to touch base with you, to get any updates on agent Scully’s condition, and on when you may feel ready to return to work.’

‘And to make sure that I haven’t gone after the shit-for-brains agent that did this to her?’ Mulder said, only half-joking.

Skinner huffed, and stared down at the pencil between his thumb and finger. ‘And that,’ he agreed with a nearly-concealed smirk. ‘It wouldn’t help anyone right now.’

‘I know that, sir,’ Mulder said evenly, avoiding Scully’s stare that he could feel burning into his temple. ‘I can be patient.’

‘I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, agent.’

‘Mulder!’ Scully cut in, anger flaring in her veins. ‘Don’t even joke about that.’

‘So.. how is she?’ Skinner asked cautiously, all humour draining from his face.

Mulder wanted to reach out and slide his arm around her hips, pull her flush to his body as proof. Sometimes she felt so real that other people not noticing her made him anxious. He swallowed tightly and looked up to her.

Her expression faltered as she looked down at him, suddenly seeming so small beneath her. His eyes were wide and wore the weight of an unbearable sadness.

‘Not much change,’ he said simply.

‘Give me something here, Mulder,’ Skinner said seriously.

Scully watched, suddenly feeling like she was intruding. She saw the raw emotion on her ex-boss’s face, and she knew it wasn’t meant for her eyes. The whole thing made her feel sick, staring at the expressions of people who thought they were never going to see her again.

Secretly watching the pity, the concern, the pain, the regret, the fear. And she had to watch it all silently, clawing at the universe to let her be real. She sniffled and felt Mulder’s attention snap to her.

Not here, she thought fiercely. Even though skinner couldn’t see or hear her, she still wouldn’t let herself crumble in this office. She hurried from the room, slipping through the door and tightening her jaw as she turned sharply in the hall and headed instinctively down to the safety of their basement office.

*

‘Scully?’ He whispered as he softly pushed the door open, knowing exactly where he’d find her.

It was thankfully empty, and he watched her carefully as he stepped inside. Her arms were crossed tightly in front of her body and her shoulders were so stiff that he could almost feel the waves of stress coming from them across the room.

‘Hey,’ she replied, turning finally to look at him.

‘Are you ok? You ran out of there pretty fast. Well, you kinda ran through a door, Scully, it was badass.’

She scoffed, a tired laugh struggled from her throat. He stepped towards her with a boyish glint in his eye, and here, surrounded by these four familiar walls, it was like stepping back in time.

‘It was not “badass.”’

‘Do you know how hard it was not to say something with Skinner staring right at me? You ran through a door, Scully. I..’ He shook his head, grinning.

‘I… I just can’t stand it, Mulder. It’s like watching people talk about me like I’m already gone.’

‘Scully, I’m sorry. I can’t even imagine-‘

‘-And you! With your childish jokes about going after Ritter. You think that makes me feel any better?’

‘No,’ he admitted. ‘No, I don’t imagine it makes you feel any better at all.’

‘So, just stop it, alright?’

‘Ok, you’ve got enough to worry about right now, I understand.’

‘It’s not even that, Mulder, it’s just.. god, you wouldn’t do something that reckless and… vengeful. It’s not.. I can’t…’ Her voice was climbing, tense with worry and anger.

She looked around at the remnants of the life they’d shared down here, now changed and shifted and claimed, and sighed.

‘While we’re down here, I’m gonna look through the files, just skim them for anything that sounds helpful, alright?’

There was only one place on earth better equipped for this situation than his own apartment, and so here they stood, outside of a heavy, quadruple-locked door in the drizzling rain, staring up at a little red blinking light.

Mulder waved impatiently and listened to the sounds of the speakers crackle and buzz to life as the door gradually unlocked itself.

‘Hey dude, where’s that pretty little partner of yours? You know we prefer speaking to her than you anyway.’

‘Knock it off..’ Mulder said with an apologetic glance to his side as they both stepped inside of the labyrinth and heard the heavy door rattle shut behind them.

‘Oh, Scully..! Why don’t you love me, Scully?!’ A dramatic chant came over the speakers and Scully flushed.

Mulder grunted in frustration, shaking his head to clear the thoughts that threatened to spill out too soon. He trailed through the first hallway and met the three stooges around a large, lit table.

He held his hand out in front of her and then pulled it back to his side when he realised how useless it must look. He pulled up a seat and crashed onto it, feeling the weight of the last few days crash with him. Scully drew in a deep breath and he felt compelled to pull her into his arms, but he just tightened his fists in his lap instead of reaching for her.

‘You look like shit,’ Langly muttered as he watched Mulder push hair back from his tired face.

‘Seriously, Mulder, what’s up? You’re not fighting with the missus again?’ Frohike called out as he came to claim the seat at his left hand side, where Scully had been about to sit.

‘The missus?’ Scully teased quietly in his ear and he swatted her away.

‘No,’ Mulder said tightly, shrugging his shoulder.

‘Then, what?’ Langly asked, his eyebrows dancing with intrigue. ‘To what do we owe this unexpected visit?’

He squeezed his hands together on the table, letting out a harsh breath.

‘Ok, look.. I’m here for some information,’ Mulder said with exasperation, leaning forward. ‘I need help researching-’

‘Uh-uh, nice try. Again, we ask.. why no agent Scully? You know we’re more amenable to her ideas…’ Frohike waggled his eyebrows and Mulder watched as Scully’s eyes widened.

‘Drop it, guys,’ he warned, tensing his jaw, ‘she’s..’

‘-I bet she’s busy tonight, I bet a woman like that has countless offers on a night such as this. Why would she want to waste her time with-?’

‘Frohike, I’m serious.’

‘She probably-’

‘She’s in a fucking coma, knock it off!’ Mulder slammed his hands down onto the metal edge of the table, his anger finally overtaking him.

The three men fell into a shocked silence, swallowing their next jibes regretfully.

‘That’s not funny, man,’ Langly said with a frown.

‘You’re damn right it’s not,’ Mulder replied, his face remaining a stern mask.

Scully stood there, her breath shuddering as she studied their faces, shock and horror registering around the room in a wave of grief she shouldn’t be privy to.

‘A.. coma?’ Frohike repeated the awful word and it rang between them all.

Scully’s skin felt tight, a wave of nausea rippling through her body as the silence stretched into something unbearable. Mulder tapped the seat beside him and scraped the legs towards himself. To the boys, it would appear a nervous pat of a useless hand, but Scully saw his need to have her close and settled wordlessly in the chair. She watched as his body deflated, a tension he’d been holding released through his parted lips.

‘She’s.. she was shot.’ His voice wobbled around the word. She slid her hand around his and felt the cool, numbing tingle of their touch. She squeezed his palm and felt relieved when he squeezed her back.

‘..Shot?’

‘So.. you’re going after the guy? The shooter?’ Byers whispered.

Scully felt her spine stiffen. She’d never heard a single word of violence leave any of their lips, and the sudden sharpness around the table felt dangerous.

‘You know his name? We can-’

‘Unfortunately not. He’s FBI..’ Mulder said with a bitter expression.

‘She was shot by FBI?’

Mulder swallowed, feeling tension in his jaw as his teeth ground together. ‘Yeah.’

‘If she doesn’t pull through…’ Three pairs of eyes shot up to watch Mulder seriously and Scully nearly gasped.

He nodded back at them and she wanted to scoff.

‘Mulder, you cannot be serious,’ she almost laughed. ‘He didn’t mean to..’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ he snapped, interrupting her.

The air was thick with confusion and unspoken words, they all moved their heads and darted their eyes as though they were having conversations without her.

‘Mulder!’ she said sharply, but he wouldn’t look in her direction.

‘We’re… you know we’re here for whatever you need,’ Byers said with his hands folded neatly on the table in front of him.

Mulder gripped the edge of the table and drew in a deep breath. Scully grabbed his hand again and felt the ripple of tension there that only intensified.

‘What do I say?’ he muttered quietly for her with his chin on his shoulder.

The entire room froze, and she pulled her hand away like it burned.

The other men cleared their throats and Mulder dropped his head into his hands. He felt his entire world swimming, his mind tipping and tilting inside his skull.

‘W-what do you need from us?’ Frohike asked quietly, but solidly.

‘A-anything. I need cases, reports, articles, fucking fables, anything on…’ He took a deep breath. ‘Anything on bringing people out of comas…’

‘Mulder,’ Langly said with suspicion.

‘What?!’ he snapped.

‘You’re.. this isn’t going to help, don’t you think you should be.. there?’

‘I’ve been there!’ Mulder exclaimed. ‘For two days, I’ve been there, with the doctors and, and with Scully’s brother telling me I should make real nice with my own gun.’

He was still so handsome even in death. She didn’t have enough photographs of him to last the lifetime she was now condemned to living without him. She wondered if the baby would take after him or after her. She couldn’t decide whether or not the idea that she would spend her rest of her life searching for crumbs of Fox Mulder in the countenance of their child was heaven or hell.

She picked up his hand, heavy, cold and stiff and rested it against the swell of her stomach. The baby kicked and Scully could almost spy on Mulder’s face the ghost of a smile.

Rictus sardonicas, perhaps.

She had wanted for so long— they had wanted for so long— to reach this moment together and here they were, the three of them, one entering the world, one just having left it, and her, the thin frayed living thread joining the two.

She thought briefly of laying down on the slab next to him, like it was the other half of his bed and letting herself die of despair. It wouldn’t even take the drama of a suicide— so great was her despair that it threatened to engulf her if she would only get still enough to allow it.

She nudged him over on his slab and sat next to him, the baby weight threatening to send the three of them sprawling onto the ground. His head lolled to the side and his mouth fell open as though some half formed jape was about to tumble out. Scully adjusted his head and jaw to give him an element of dignity once more. Her fingers lingered on his stubble, which was exactly as she remembered it had been the morning of his abduction. Whatever had happened to him, it had involved a replication of his shave.

She cautiously removed his sheet and made a more thorough study of him. They had forgone the autopsy Montana state authorities had demanded before allowing the body that had once been Fox Mulder across state lines. It paid to know people that could spare his corpse that indignity. She ran her finger down the scar tissue on his chest. It was thick. Evidently he had lived through what must have been vivisection long enough to heal only to die from something else altogether. She wondered how the months had been for him. If death was sudden or if he had known he was going to die. If he had been dreading it or if it was a welcome relief.

The funeral home would be coming for in the morning but tonight he was still hers, so tonight she washed him as tenderly as she would their baby in just a few months, drying him carefully, swaddling him for his final rest.

He sighed heavily as his forefinger traced the ring of coffee on his napkin. He felt sick, and Scully’s soft presence at his side was the only thing stopping him from sprinting home.

‘Mrs Scully, you know that Dana and I have been partners for a very long time. We have a relationship that is entirely unique. We trust each other with-’

‘-I know that you’re in love with my daughter,’ Maggie said firmly. ‘And she knows it, too.. She knew it.’

Her expression was sombre, her eyes and nose were red and it broke Mulder’s heart to watch her in so much pain. He wanted to tell her, to motion to his side where her daughter still lived, but he couldn’t.

Her words finally registered as he finished studying her face.

‘I’m in love with her?’ he asked, though they all knew it wasn’t a question.

‘Yes, Fox, it’s been obvious for years. Dana may have kept her feelings close to the chest, but she knew.’

Mulder shot a glance to his side and Scully quickly shook her head with a teasing frown.

‘I’m not so sure that’s true,’ Mulder said with a small shrug.

‘Well, I know it. And Bill knows it too, that’s why he’s so unsettled by you. You mean too much to Dana. She puts all of her trust in you, and your.. quest. She’s changed quite a bit since meeting you.’

Mulder felt a hand softly stroke his knee under the table and he fought against his emotions. He needed to say some things now that would make all three of them very uncomfortable in very different ways.

‘I do love your daughter, Maggie. Very much. That’s why- that’s why I have to tell you something.’

The faint hand on his knee squeezed tighter, panic seizing them both. His eyes held firm with Scully’s for a fraction of a second before he turned to face his mother-in-law.

‘What is it, Fox? Please..’

‘God, Maggie, I’m really sorry that this is how you find this out.’ His chest shuddered, his hands screwed into tight fists, the idea of hurting this woman in such a huge way was despicable.

‘Fox,’ she urged, getting agitated.

‘Dana and I are.. married,’ he uttered the words as though they were sharp and painful in his mouth. 

Her eyes roamed quickly over him, and he wondered if she’d even heard him, then she burst out with a short, harsh laugh that made him flinch.

He couldn’t even bring himself to use more affection wording, he couldn’t tell her something that wasn’t true. We’re in love. I’m her husband. We honeymooned in Paris.

No, none of that was allowed, so he searched his mind for the simplest version of the truth.

We’re married, it’s legal, there’s paperwork. It was a Thursday. She wore a suit and we got pizza afterwards.

His gaze fell, it crumbled down to the table in shame.

‘You and Dana are married?’ she scoffed, eyeing him with suspicion. She had long known that Fox Mulder was a strange man, but she had loved and accepted him because her daughter did. But now…

‘Yes. We have been for two years.’ He sighed, eyes still held down.

‘Yet you live apart? Yet you still work together on the X-Files? You don’t do anything personal or romantic together? You- You expect me to believe this?’ Her voice was high as though she was sick of him wasting her time.

‘We’re married,’ he replied weakly, no other words left on his tongue.

‘So if you are Dana’s husband, why did she accept a date from a single father from my church, not three months ago?’

Mulder froze and drew in a deep, raw breath and turned to look at Scully instinctively.

Her eyes widened in shock, begging him to turn back at her mother and he thought he saw a flush of heat at her cheeks.

‘It’s not the most conventional marriage, it’s.. regardless of who she wants to date, Maggie..’ He swallowed thickly, jealousy now marring his exhausted face.

‘Dana is legally my wife, and I can therefore make informed medical decisions in her best interest. And I can assure you’- His eyes bore into hers then, serious and steady as he swallowed. -‘her best interest is all that I care about. I won’t let you take her off the life support.’

‘Fox..’ Maggie whispered, her voice broken, ‘Nobody is taking her off the life support yet. But she did sign the DNR. She doesn’t want to live like this. We only want to respect her wishes.’

‘I’m sorry Maggie.’ He forced out. ‘I won’t let you do it.’

‘Fox, Dana is dying.’

‘Not yet,’ he insisted.

‘There’s nothing any of us can do, and if you love her as you’re claiming-’

‘I would gladly die before I let her die.’

Tears burst from Maggie, ugly and wet and loud, making Mulder wince. She sobbed, and he wasn’t sure if he was allowed to comfort her. Would his touch be painful, or repulsive?

He was effectively taking control of her daughter’s life, ripping it from her hands and laying claim to it without warning.

A sudden, numb weight pressing on his shoulder made him jump, and he turned to see Scully burying her face against him. He tried not to react, he tried to show Maggie his full attention, but he ached to pull Scully on to his lap and soothe her, to cry with her through the pain.

‘Maggie, when Dana was taken..’ he began with a low, rough voice filled with fear, 'when Dana was taken you wanted to respect her wishes and, and.. you almost gave up. Bought a headstone and everything, remember?’

Maggie’s sigh was wounded and he hated the need to bring this up. 

‘But she came back. She’ll come back to us..’

‘That’s not fair, Fox. You act as though I’m giving up on her,’ Maggie said sternly, wiping a tear from her cheek, ‘I’m only doing what she’s always wanted. She never wanted to live because of machines. The doctors say that her brain activity isn’t improving.’

‘Mulder..’ Scully whispered, her chest physically aching now. ‘Mulder, I’m so sorry about this.’ Her lips were at his ear and he felt the pull of despair, the hallow ache in his chest, too much. 

The times he’d wished to feel Scully’s lips on his skin weren’t like this.

‘I will fight for her until the last second, Maggie. I promise you, as long as there is air in my lungs..’

Maggie nodded fiercely and held up a hand, letting him stop.

‘I know, Fox. I can see that.’

He let out a sharp sigh, tightening his fingers around his knees.

‘I don’t understand your relationship with my daughter. It doesn’t make any sense to me, at all. But it seems to make sense to the two of you. And if you indeed love her this much, who am I to deny you?’ She stood shakily, tears staining her face.

‘Maggie, when she wakes up, we’ll explain everything, ok?’

Maggie nodded with a brittle smile and turned and walked away, the tap of her shoes against the tiled floor, a farewell.

Mulder fell back heavily against the green plastic chair, his mind spinning.

‘I.. need a minute alone,’ he said softly, looking down at his lap. ‘Please.’

Scully stood up, with a hand on his shoulder, and followed her mother from the room.

He never thought that this would happen, that something would be so far out of the realm of possibility that Scully would have to be convincing him. 

But here she was, ghostly and insistent and nearly tangible. 

No, she wasn’t ghostly, because they would have called. They would have called if anything worse had happened to her, if she had slipped away from him. 

Or perhaps they were calling, right now, and his imagination was too busy conjuring up this little torture scenario and keeping him too distracted to answer his damn phone. 

‘Ok, what is the last thing that you remember?’ Mulder asked, wrapping his hands tighter around the glass of water he couldn’t yet bring himself to sip from.

She was pacing, her posture as proper and intimidating as ever. He sat on his couch, just perched on the edge like he was afraid to touch the leather. 

‘We were on a case.. or, no, I was on a case..’ She shook her head lightly, then looked up. 

The expression on her face forced him to drop his eyes back down to his hands again. 

‘.. In New York,’ she added, quieter. 

‘Mmmh-hmm.’ He waited, afraid of the next moment, the one where she remembered. 

‘And then… I got home from New York, and I came straight here.’ She narrowed her eyes, almost trying to convince herself of the memory. 

‘Straight here? From New York? It’s the middle of the night. You were that desperate to see me, Scully?’

‘I… we would have had case notes to go over. I would..’ 

He blinked, and again, waited. 

‘It’s…’ She looked down at her clothes, neat and pressed, fitted and neutral, not an airplane wrinkle in sight. Exactly how she’d remembered putting them on this morning. In New York. 

‘Scully..’ 

‘Why can’t I touch anything?’ she asked, her tone panicked as she stepped back. 

‘You can touch me.’ 

‘And only you! I can’t hold anything else!’ 

‘How did you get here? Did you drive?’ 

‘Of course I drove! Do you think… what, you think I..?’ She was panting, her vision narrowing like a caught animal, tunnelling around a truth she wouldn’t face. 

Mulder stormed to the window and twitched his curtain with practised hands.

‘Your car’s not here,’ he said slowly. 

‘Maybe I’m parked around the corner,’ she snapped, the anger giving her a glimmer of control over the unraveling sensation in her stomach. 

He turned back to his room, expecting her to be gone. Why wasn’t Scully gone? Was Scully gone? 

He was pacing alongside her then, taking opposite paths around a tattered coffee table, little paranoid laps of united despair. 

‘Scully, you were shot,’ he said finally, exhaling. ‘In New York.’

She ceased her pacing, stopping him abruptly in his own tracks. 

‘Mulder, don’t be ridiculous! You don’t think I’d remember a thing like being shot?!’ 

He ran his hand over his forehead and dragged it up into his hair, pressing everything back with desperation.

With a long, painful sigh, he held out his hand for her without meeting her eyes. 

‘Come on,’ he said, regretfully.