Silences -- The X-Files Lyric Wheel

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Date Posted: Thu August 24, 2006 03:49:51
Author: Alysswolf
Subject: Silences

Silences
by Alyswolf

Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. Chris Carter and Fox own them; I'm just taking them out for a brief spin.

Author's Note: This story splits off from the official XF canon after Kitsunegari then reconnects briefly at the end of Season 5 before veering off again.

===============
January 1998

If you had asked me two weeks ago whether Scully and I communicated, I'd have given a confident 'of course' and been surprised by the question. Now, sitting at my desk listening to the silence, I have to admit that the real question should have been were we listening to each other?

In hindsight, I suppose that we had fallen into the habit of hearing what we expected to hear. I always believed that Scully knew how much I valued her input even when we disagreed. Despite knowing that she was assigned to bring about my downfall, I found her worthy of my trust. Sure, we had our differences. A list of our differences could fill a notebook, but that never bothered me. Having someone constantly agree with me, now that would bother me. I grew to enjoy the debating game we played. At least I thought it was a game.

I'll be the first to admit that I'm no prize as a partner. I tend to run off after tangents on cases without following departmental policies on keeping my partner fully informed. I can see where this could be interpreted as a vote of no-confidence, but honestly, I'd never really thought about it that way. Scully was a capable, determined investigator who had her own way of pursuing a case while I had mine. Our disparate styles should have clashed, but instead they meshed to create a nearly unbeatable team. It was so obvious to me; when did Scully stop believing, or had she never believed to begin with?

I'm faced with the depressing possibility that my brilliant profiling skills missed the obvious erosion of Scully's faith in our work. It's hard not to feel that her request for a leave of absence also reflects her loss of faith in me, personally. Perhaps this was the only way she could tell me that something has gone wrong.

Follow the evidence, I tell myself. Find the first broken link in the chain and then trace the gradual disintegration of the chain itself. The Modell case revealed the fissures in our relationship. Her complicity in Skinner's abrupt dismissal of my judgment in the case hurt. Skinner's doubts I could understand, but I had thought Scully had more faith in me. There were never any words spoken, but I'll admit that the atmosphere in the office was frigid for several days. I could just as easily point to Scully's grief over the death of her hybrid daughter as the straw that sent the camel to its knees. There are so many candidates for the honor of being the last straw. No matter, the end result is sitting on my desk in the form of a terse letter informing Skinner, not me, that she was taking a six months leave of absence. Two sentences devoid of recriminations, yet reeking with unspoken accusations, were all it took to shake our partnership.

Skinner handed me the letter without a word. His expression was professionally neutral, but I could feel the unasked questions hovering between us. He seemed to expect me to know why my partner, my friend, needed time off. I wonder if Scully had been more forthcoming with Skinner or whether this letter was all that she intended to say on the subject.

Did Scully try to contact me, to explain? Had she been the one to call me and remain silent when I answered the phone? Had she tried to tell me that she wouldn't be there to catch me the next time I fell? I want to believe that she had attempted to find the words to tell me that we were through.

As always in the strange duet that defines our partnership, I echoed her attempt. I had spent the day Skinner handed me the letter raging in my office, hurt, confused, and bereft. When I realized that I was acting out the emotional reaction of a jilted lover, my anger collapsed. I had no such claim on Scully. If I had misread her, if we had depended too much on communicating in silences, then perhaps we never understood each other at all. My questing beast was never her rival; it might pull me from her side on occasion, but I always knew I could fight my way back.

When I heard her voice answer the phone that night, I knew then why she had fallen silent when she tried to call me. There are no words to express the pain, the loss, and the slow decay of hope. Two nights I tried, then I let her go in peace. I'm still working, but I can't feel much hope for anything right now. The silence lies between us like a wall. Whether we can breach that wall when, not if, she comes back is the question I don't have any answer for. I cannot allow myself to think that she might never return.

===============
February 1998

A forest of pencils is sprouting from the ceiling in my office. Files have been cataloged, sorted, and updated until they would probably pass muster by the Librarian of Congress. I'm bored. Skinner has vetoed every one of my attempts to take cases that might require me to go into the field. A week ago I stormed into his office demanding answers. I might just as well have stayed down here in the basement and sent up a memo for all the answers I got. No partner. No field work. Apparently Skinner is indulging in willful ignorance or else he is simply ignoring the fact that I worked alone for nearly a year before Scully was assigned to the X-Files. I managed OK. Not great, I'll admit after knowing what I can accomplish with a good partner, but enough to earn a nice record of cases solved.

It has occurred to me that Skinner might be conducting an illicit psychology experiment to discover if it is possible to kill another human being from boredom. So far this month I've attended four workshops and had requests for official statistical reports on cases that have been in my files longer than I've been down here in the basement. Any doubt I had that Skinner actually reads my reports was laid to rest when he sent back one of the statistical reports with a blistering reminder that I was an FBI agent, not Nostradamus. The statistics were there, but I'll admit that the conclusions I drew from them were a bit over the top. At least I know that someone out there knows I'm still alive.

I saw Scully the other day; I'm fairly certain she saw me despite the lunchtime crowds on the streets. This makes the third time in six weeks we've crossed paths. Coincidences or is fate nudging us to sit down and talk through our problems. Other than the first week when I prowled through her neighborhood hoping for a chance for a casual encounter, I had been careful to stay away from places she might be. Not because of any chivalry, mind you, but because I didn't trust myself not to go right up to her in public and ask her what the hell happened.

The first chance meeting I put down to Mulder's luck. I had finally decided that I had been alone before and that it was time I remembered how to function without Scully at my side. Then I see her and I'm back at square one; missing her and floundering around like a fish out of water. For several days I saw Scullys everywhere until I convinced myself that the first sighting had been a delusion; a fantasy wish come true.

The second time I saw her, I nearly bolted across traffic and accosted her, but she disappeared into the crowd before I made it halfway across the street. The hysterical honking and shouted death threats from assorted drivers was probably her first clue that I was coming. Third time was the charm, however. She was right there in my path, then gone again before I could move, but this time we made eye contact. Short women with red hair are not uncommon, but none of them have Scully's distinctive eyes. I've seen those eyes staring back at me in surprise, concern, anger, and even over the barrel of a gun; they are unforgettable and unmistakable.

I'm paranoid for a reason; there actually are people out to get me. Losing Scully has stopped me dead in the water as effectively as a bullet and with far fewer lingering questions. Lacking anything else to occupy my mind, I began to study the chances that our near-brushes were less than coincidental. There were too few to establish a statistical pattern, but one common element stood out. All our close encounters occurred within a five block radius of the Hoover Building. I think I'm beginning to smell a rat; a really big rat.

===============
March 1998

If I end up resigning as an FBI agent, I may take up rat catching. With the help of the Gunmen, I've been doing some very funky poaching with some very disconcerting results. Right now, I'm holding onto my faith in Scully by my fingernails. For six weeks I fretted and worried that my obtuse obsession with finding out the truth behind the government's lies had driven her away. I stood accused by myself and by most of my co-workers of gross negligence in the care of a good partner. My slow descent into hell was proceeding right on schedule. Was that the plan? Was I supposed to simply wither away until I gave up all hope and resigned?

There's no one I can confide in. The Gunmen have gone deep underground after laying down a maze of confusing trails to hide their activities. I've burned every single photo and audio tape they gave me. I just wish I could burn the memory of them out of my head. My gut reaction is that I've been betrayed, but my instinct tells me not to trust the evidence. It's too convenient. Last year, Scully had looked at solid forensic evidence that said I had murdered two people. Operating only on her faith in me, she defied logic and fought to prove my innocence.

According to information the Gunmen's hacking operation turned up, Dana Scully has been employed by a civilian intelligence service with ties to the Pentagon as well as to the National Security Agency. The records show that she has been an agent in good standing with this service since 1993; the year she appeared in my office as my new partner. Everything checked out in cross-references and back trails much to Byers' and Langley's fury. They refuse to believe that Scully has betrayed us, but they're having a hard time arguing against the evidence their electronic sleuthing has unearthed. Only Frohike remains cheerfully certain that the evidence lied. He bluntly pointed out that the information was ferreted out way too easily. The records were buried deep enough that a cursory search would not have found them, Frohike insists that the complex protections weren't as impenetrable as they should have been. Nothing like using a negative to prove a positive; Sherlock Holmes would be proud. Frohike has a nice, healthy sense of paranoia where government secrets are concerned.

I've been suspicious of Scully before. Hell, I've come right out and accused her of spying, although I was under the influence of some damn good psychedelic drugs at the time. At least I didn't shoot her. From the beginning, her relationship with the X-Files, and with me, has been ambiguous. She doesn't believe in the paranormal, except where it's approved by the Catholic Church. Her reports contradict, even debunk, my theories, yet somehow those same reports have never manage to supply the ammunition my enemies need to shut me down. Friend, spy, ally: Dana Scully carries enigmatic to new heights.

After spending a week scrutinizing all the information retrieved by the Gunmen over three weeks of diligent hacking of seven different government agencies, I find myself agreeing with him. It's just too pat. Taken as a whole, the evidence is very convincing. It was a perfect portfolio of betrayal calculated to trigger every single one of my paranoid nightmares. The only question is one of timing. Had Scully had been deliberately sent out to be seen, or did she arrange our accidental encounters as a way of kicking me in the ass? If the latter then she was running a very big risk.

I've never doubted her courage, just her ability to play the role of traitor. Whoever is behind this draconian game must have had a powerful lever to use on her and I bet I know what it was. Play along and let Mulder self-destruct, or we'll do it for him. To save my life, Scully had to be willing to destroy our partnership. I wonder if they told her that my resignation would be sufficient and if she believed them? Perhaps, even fearing that my death was the ultimate goal, she had to play along and hope the game masters would be satisfied with my departure from the FBI. I can't say I wouldn't do the same thing in her place.

Taking the long odds is more in my department than hers, but she can be a gambler if the stakes are high enough. I wish there was a way I could let her know that I still believe in her, in us. It's too dangerous to even try, to even whisper my faith aloud in the darkness. No doubt I am under surveillance. If I deviate from the script, I'll condemn us both. She's played her role. Now I have to play mine and hope that against all odds we'll come out of this damn game alive.

We'll meet in the spaces in between the lies and talk in the silences where we have always spoken without words and trusted beyond reason.

===============
April 1998

It's been six weeks since I began this game of cat and mouse with an unseen enemy. I'm not sleeping and I've lost enough weight to provoke a comment or two from Skinner. I've still having trouble figuring out what he knows and if he's aware that he's being used by master puppeteers. He drags me into his office at least once a week for a scathing review of my non-activity while at the same time refusing to sign off on requests to travel to investigate cases. It's a perfect bureaucratic Catch-22, but something about the last few meetings feels off. Skinner has no equal in verbally flaying me and his words certainly haven't lost their sting, but lately they've seemed to be delivered by rote. Skinner has always been a good soldier, but he also knows how deep the conspiracy runs and to what lengths the men behind it will go to keep their secrets. How much does he know, or suspect, about the situation? How far is he willing to go to keep being their good soldier?

If my enemies are looking for signs of my eventual disintegration, I've given them plenty to see. If this keeps up, there's only one logical conclusion and I'm not about to carry the charade to my death. There has to be another way; a way between Charybdis and Scylla.

My mood swings from trust to betrayal and back again daily. I'm beginning to understand my father's fascination with using alcohol to forget. Unfortunately, alcohol merely enhances my memories until I'm crushed under the weight of remembering.

If this is a setup, why has no one from the other side bothered to contact me, to offer me a deal I can't refuse? Are they so certain that removing Scully will bring my downfall? If Scully has betrayed me, then why haven't they simply taken me out by the stroke of a pen or a sniper's bullet? What in hell are they waiting for?

Scully once told me that if I quit, they'd win; the 'they' being our ever-present enemies hiding in the shadows. As matters stand at the moment, if I quit they win, if I stay they win; I'm playing against the house and the house has fixed the dice. I've played the game according to their rules and so far I'm no nearer to a solution that will bring Scully out of the shadows and leave me alive. If the only way to save her was for me to die, I might just be willing to oblige, but there's no guarantee they won't use my death to break her. Dying isn't an option. Charging the mouth of Hell to rescue her isn't an option, either. Hell would just laugh and close its gates around Scully forever.

Hacking got me the information I needed to perceive the maze our enemies built around us; maybe it's time to do some funky profiling to find a way out. I used to be pretty damn good at seeing patterns no one else could see. Every trap has an exit; an obvious one and one that the creators never thought of. What would be an appropriate substitute for my death? I'm only going to get one chance to choose so it better be the right one.

I'm remembering why I hate profiling. It's not the gruesome murders, although profiling a child killer is a living nightmare. It's the fact that once I start trying to assemble the puzzle, I don't stop. I endlessly re-arrange the pieces without a break. The evidence haunts my every waking and sleeping moment until I live the puzzle; I become the puzzle. Patterson used to enjoy watching me twist myself into the shape of the murderer and basked in my ability to emerge shaking and an emotional wreck with the answer. Now I'm profiling against greater odds than any murderer ever presented and with little to no evidence to give me the border pieces. The only way I'm going to succeed is by profiling myself. Distance myself from the entity known as Fox Mulder and consider what price I could demand in exchange for his life and his partner.

I'm fighting the Hydra and the Hydra's winning. My appearance is becoming the water-cooler bet of the month in the Bureau. Despite my exile to the basement and my overt ostracism for the sin of exasperating a partner to the point of needing R&R to recover, I still have my contacts on the gossip circuit. The current odds seem to favor Skinner kicking me out of the Bureau although my collapse and institutionalization is coming up fast on the outside. If I don't come up with an answer soon, the latter may well be my personal favorite. It certainly wouldn't surprise anyone if I went mad, least of all myself at this point.

===============
May 1998

'Iacta alea est'

Did Caesar feel sick to his stomach when his horse planted its hoof in the Rubicon? I doubt it. Julius Caesar had a ferocious sense of his own invincibility. I wish I had a tenth of his confidence. Every fear I have felt up to this moment pales in comparison to the terror I feel as the dice fall from my hand. Fate will have no pity if I've chosen the wrong sacrifice. Even if God exists, I can't pray. Samantha took all my prayers with her when she vanished. Only now do I feel the lack of an ability to pray, to cast everything into a divine being's lap and believe.

The Gunmen are alert and waiting for a sign that my sacrifice is acceptable in the sight of my enemies. They didn't try to dissuade me from my decision, but they didn't try to hide their doubts that I had chosen the right course of action. Loyalty such as theirs is something I'll always remember with pride. If I've chosen unwisely, at least I'll know that I tried and that I had friends willing to help me right up to the end. They promised me that if everything went to Hell, they'd dive so deep that no one would find them.

Scully's been in my thoughts a lot, lately. There are moments when I can almost hear her voice chiding me for being taking a blind leap into the unknown without a parachute. Damn it, she was my parachute. If freefalling is the only way I can get her back, then I have to try it. Doesn't make my stomach any less queasy or help me to sleep, but if I'm wrong, sleep-deprivation will be the least of my worries.

One week from today I'll know if my gamble paid off. It's going to be a very long week dodging Skinner. Whatever caution has kept him from expressing his concern has vanished. I must look like walking death. My excuses are wearing thin even as Skinner is becoming more persistent in demanding answers. I never realized just how small the Hoover Building can be when you're trying to avoid running into someone. Skinner is prowling the halls like a demented cat looking for a mouse, and I'm that mouse.

====================
May 18, 1998

It's done. My life's work has been consigned to the flames hoping that Scully, like the mythic Phoenix, will rise from their ashes. Despite my fear of fire, I have the makings of a decent arsonist. It helps that I didn't have to concern myself with hiding the accelerants. Too many people are known to dislike the evidence I keep, no, kept, in those filing cabinets. The list of possible suspects is long, but the last one Skinner would ever suspect is me. The phone call informing me that my office had been reduced to ashes was a little later than I anticipated. I spent an hour fretting over whether I had somehow fumbled the whole thing and would have it to do all over again, tomorrow.

Intellectually conceptualizing the destruction of my office and actually standing here in the ruins inhaling the smoke and feeling the drip, drip, drip of the sprinklers on my guilty hands are two very different things. The charred remains of evidence shout my guilt. I was their guardian, their spokesman to a skeptical world. I was the only one who could bring to light the conspiracy that had destroyed so many lives. All of this I have sacrificed in the hope that it would be enough to free me and allow Scully to come home.

Very slowly, painfully, I turn away from the destruction I have wrought and walk towards the elevator. It's hard not to think that in offering up this sacrifice to save Scully, I might have sacrificed my chances of finding Samantha.

I will find you. No matter if it takes the rest of my life, or at the cost of my life, I'll find you. I just couldn't let Scully pay the price that's mine to pay. For a moment, I seem to see Samantha, as I last remember her, standing at the edge of my vision smiling sadly. I want to believe she would understand. I need to believe.

=====================
May 19, 1998

Under Kim's curious, watchful eyes, I manage not to pace nervously in Skinner's waiting room. After two nights with no sleep, I'm running on caffeine and nerves and the caffeine is beginning to wear off. Skinner's call said be in his office at 10 a.m. and he's running a few minutes late. I've been here since 9:30, jumping slightly every time the hall door opens. Still no sign of Scully.

Finally, the intercom buzzes and Kim waves me in with a look of profound relief. I manage a wry smile and a shrug as I plunge towards the door. To my dismay, Skinner is alone. Throwing dignity to the winds, I quickly look around, hoping against hope to see Scully in a corner. I've lost. I sacrificed everything and I lost.

Gradually, I realize that Skinner is talking. When I focus on him, he waves me to my accustomed chair and waits until I sit down. His concern is obvious, but his tone is calm and official. Amid the roar of my self-recriminations, I can barely hear him. After a moment, he pauses and waits, giving me a chance to pull myself together. We've been here before and I can see from the slight bracing of his body that Skinner is half-prepared for a violent reaction. Does he understand what I've done? Aside from the criminal act of arson and destruction of government property, does he sense that I sacrificed everything for a desperate hope?

Numbly, I listen as Skinner talks of re-assignment to Violent Crimes and the closure of the X-Files. I want to refuse; to tell him to take this job and shove it. I can't quit sitting down. Creaking with exhaustion and despair, I rise to my feet, preparing to end my career with a few well-chosen words. In case certain people are listening, I plan to make those words very well-chosen and pointed. Freedom is having nothing left to lose.

"Sir, I assume this offer applies to the entire X-Files team, not just to Agent Mulder."

Skinner's face nearly cracks as he breaks out in a smile. I spin around so hard I stumble. In an instant, I feel her hands bracing me. If I've gone mad, I'll take this over reality any day. By the time I turn back to Skinner, he's managed to get his expression under control.

"Of course, Agent Scully. I see no reason to break up a partnership that has acquired an impressive solve rate. Take the rest of the day off to retrieve any personal items that might have survived the fire, then report to Adderson in Violent Crimes first thing tomorrow morning. Welcome back, Agent Scully."

Skinner plays the bureaucrat well, but I know him well enough by now to know that Scully's appearance was a surprise and a very welcome relief. Hopefully, he'll never know how close I came to giving up just now. He might guess, but I doubt if he'll ever bring up the subject.

"Well, Mulder, let's go see what's left of our office," Scully says with a sad smile, laying a hand on my arm in sympathy.

Speechless with the sudden release of tension and fear, I let her lead the way. Then, almost hesitantly lest she turn out to be an illusion of a desperate man, I place my hand in the small of her back. She's real. My knees wobble a little, then steady. I'll collapse later, probably after Scully chides me about eating something and getting some sleep.

I'll probably never know what really happened during the last five months. There's really no need. We have said all we need to say about trust and sacrifice in a single touch. We walk in silence that speaks louder than words. Maybe one day we'll figure out how to communicate in words, but until then, we will meet in the spaces between the words as we've always done.

The End

8=8=8=8=8=8=8=8=8=8=8=8

Author's Notes: Charybdis was a massive whirlpool that destroyed Odysseus's ship. Scylla was a many-headed monster that plucked up members of his crew and ate them.

I realize the tenses are all over the map, but Mulder seemed to pass between past and present and back again without skipping a beat. Muses.

==========================
Lyrics sent by Raine Wynd
(lyrics used marked by *)

Something's Always Wrong by Toad the Wet Sprocket

Another day I call and never speak
And you would say nothing's changed at all
And I can't feel much hope for anything *
If I won't be there to catch you if you fall*

Again
It seems we meet *
In the spaces *
In between *
We always say
It won't be long
But something's always wrong

Another game of putting things aside
As if we'll come back to them some time
A brace of hope a pride of innocence
And you would say something has gone wrong

Again
It seems we meet
In the spaces
In between
We always say
It won't be long
But something's always wrong

[1]
Again we fail to meet and mend
The spaces safe between intents
We say too much and long been gone,
Oh but something's always wrong.

[2]
Again we fail to make amends
And wend our way between intents
And looking back, not moving on
Oh but something's always wrong.

[3]
Again we fail to meet and mend
The spaces safe between intents
We say too much, too long been gone
Oh but something's always wrong.

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Replies:

Re: Silences -- Dryad, Fri August 25, 2006 00:43:50
Re: Silences -- Rhi, Mon September 11, 2006 01:44:30