Title: Beyond Invisible Author: Lauryn Tucker (Lauryn137@aol.com) Date: 2/7/99 Category: VAR, post-colonization Rated: PG Disclaimer: I own Chris. Er, Chris owns me. Uh ... never mind. Archive: Okay for Gossamer; others, please let me know. Feedback: I adore it -- Lauryn137@aol.com Summary: What happens after the end? ******* Beyond Invisible By Lauryn Tucker 2/7/99 ******* The Apartment I see her sitting in a chair by the window, gazing out into the street. It is only late afternoon, but the dark clouds that have hung over the city all day give off the impression that it is much, much later. The streets are dirty and gray, and of course, empty. They've been empty for many days now. Empty and dark, like the apartment. Like our souls. Her head rests against the back of the chair, red caressing white. She wears nothing but a giant tee shirt -- probably one of mine. My arms ache to reach out and hold her, but I do not move. She needs this time alone. We both do. Even from behind, I know what her face looks like: pale and drawn, tired of the fight. Devoid of any emotion, except for within the depths of her haunted blue eyes. They are such beautiful eyes, even now. The end has come and gone, and it has taken its toll on both of us. But we are alive. We have been lucky. Others have not fared as well. I am not sure who exactly escaped the holocaust, and who did not. But the phone lines are down, irreparable, and we have seen no one from our window. And neither of us will leave the apartment. We are too afraid. Not so afraid of who we won't find, but of who we will. And who -- or what -- will find us. XXXXX I'm afraid. Not of monsters, mutants, or alien abductions. I am afraid of an empty street. It sounds silly, but at the moment nothing terrifies me more than the wet, dirty, colorless street just outside my window. Am I afraid that at any given moment it will fill with nondescript cars and men in dark suits intent upon killing my partner and myself for the greater good of the Project? Or am I afraid that they will remain empty? I reach up to touch the tiny gold cross at my neck. After all these years, after all we have been through, it is still here. I still wear it. Must be an X-File. It has been so long since I last went to church. It has been days since I even left the apartment. I know that we will have to, soon, or we will starve. The food is almost gone, and it is a small miracle that it has even lasted as long as it has. We have been lucky. I wonder how my mother is, where she is, if she is even alive. I wonder about my brothers and their families. But I try not to think about my family too much -- I am almost certain that they are dead. I thought about them a lot in the first few days, but I have since stopped. I am numbing myself to pain -- and that means I cannot grieve for the unknown. I can not weep for the ones I have loved and lost. The apartment is cold, and I know I am shivering visibly. The shirt I am wearing -- Mulder's shirt -- is thin. Mulder. Mulder. I have only just learned to open up to him, to allow myself to love him freely and without fear. Why must it end now? Why *now*, of all times? The end has come and gone, and neither of us will ever be the same. XXXXX The Beginning of the End It came suddenly, a swift, quiet invader to the fortress of our souls. We dropped like flies, so to speak, like rocks to the bottom of the pond. The Black Cancer. The plague to end all plagues. One by one, great cities fell. Lives were lost; dreams were destroyed. And the men who stood silently watching in the shadows were thrust suddenly deeper into the darkness than ever before. My vengeance. They were the first to die. With the stealth of a tiger and the force of a thousand atomic bombs, the silent killer ravaged our beautiful planet, leaving nothing in its wake but death and destruction. Wastelands that were once fields and valleys, brimming with life, now black and cold. It is so very cold. In the aftermath of the attacks, there was chaos. Sheer terror from every corner of the earth turned the most gentle, rational men into cold-blooded killers, guilty as the invader they ran from. The overriding perpetrator of their own demise. Earthquakes came; the world shuddered. People panicked and ran, with no place to run to. Volcanoes erupted, soaking the hillsides in hot, molten death. Floods swept away the countrysides, washing away lives. There were fires, thousands upon thousands of fires. In the horror of the destruction, in the sudden cold that blanketed the planet, people turned to their first and most unfaithful tool: fire. They burned everything -- homes, fields, forests ... Bodies. The next ice age loomed. And as the jungles burned to the ground and the oceans froze over and the smoke obscured the stars, they stayed, together, in her apartment. There were no tears, just silent, seething rage at the injustice of it all. For what comfort can be offered in light of an inevitable doom? What can you say to the one you love when the world is at its end? Sweet nothings. Because nothing was all they had. Bittersweet nothings. Neither one cried. They had been strong before, all their lives, and they were strong now. Crying would not help. So they remained in the shattered apartment, in the ruins of what was once a home, a haven, and waited. In the cold darkness, they preserved. They stayed strong for one another, each putting up his or her own shield against the end for the other one's sake. There would be no weakness and pain. Only numbness and immunity. That was what frightened Dana Scully more than anything else. Immunity. They had both been exposed to the virus, been given a vaccine. And the vaccination had worked. But for how long? And at what price? How much pressure could they withstand before one of them was lost? The virus was near. Too close. The risk of infection was high -- even for them, in their *altered* conditions. If one were to die and the other live ... But that was not an option now. It never had been and it never would be. Scully knew that they were in it together, until the end -- whenever it came. She had sworn to herself, when it all began, that she would not let him die without her. That he would not die. She had promised to remain by his side, no matter what it meant for her. Because there was no life without Mulder. Not in this world. ~END~ Notes: I've read the spoilers, but I wrote this long before they came about. I wanted to post this now, before all the post-eps for Two fathers/One Son start pouring in, so it might stand out a little :) Should there be more? I can't decide. Wanna help me choose? Lauryn137@aol.com -- Feedback will make you the artist of the week!