The Gossamer Project Author - Title - Date - Spoilers - Crossovers - X-Files - Adventures - Stories - Vignettes Other stories by Lilith From: Lilith Date: Mon, 18 Oct 1999 19:41:44 -0500 Subject: NEW: Portrait of a Family...by Lilith (1/2) Source: xff Title: Portrait of a Family Author: Lilith Spoilers: Everything mytharc related Rating: R for mild sexual situations and some disturbing imagery. Keywords: SAR M/S Myth-arc Feedback: I beg of you. ladylilith@geocities.com Summary: Colonization has been thwarted, Samantha has been found. But the story is only beginning. Disclaimer: Would that I could have concocted something so fabulous as the X-Files. However, Mulder and Scully and many other characters herein belong to CC, 1013, etc. The kids, however, are mine all mine. No Foxes were harmed in the making of this story. ********************************************* Basement, Hoover Building. I knock on the door, feeling a sense of dramatic irony. Scully looks up from her desk as I walk in and smiles at me for a moment. Tipping the leather chair back, she pulls her glasses from her face and watches me shuffle my feet for a moment. "You finally got a desk," I offer as a lame attempt at humor. She's gracious enough to chuckle. "Yeah, I knew if I waited long enough, I'd see my name on the door." She crosses and uncrosses her legs. "You're sure this is the best thing, Mulder?" "My time is up, Scully. I leave you my kingdom." We smile at each other for a long time and I drink in the simple comfort of her presence and her happiness. The phone rings, shattering the reverie. "Dana Scully. Please hold," she answers, putting down the receiver. "I'll be out of touch for a while, Scully." Coward. "How long is a while?" "I don't know yet...I should go," I tell her. I look around one last time. "Ten years Scully. What did I accomplish?" "We found Samantha," she points out. We did, and it was the end of the line for me. My little engine ran out of fuel on a steep incline and I went sliding back down the side of the mountain. Yeah, we found Samantha, living out her days as a happy Kansas school teacher with no memories of me or her abduction. And with absolutely no desire to get to know her old family. Gee, glad to know it wasn't all in vain, Scully. Scully continues, shaking me out of my funk a little, "We uncovered a massive plot to deceive the public, we discovered strange new species..." she trails off. "We had a good time, didn't we Mulder?" "Yeah." God, I want to touch her so much, but I just can't. "We had a good time." Her phone makes a frantic noise, reminding us that some poor slob is on hold. "You gotta go?" she asks, like she didn't hear it. I shrug and hand her a manila envelope. "Someone asked me to bring this to you on my way down," I lie. She takes it from me and lets her hand caress mine. I have to leave. "Good-bye Scully," I say. She looks startled and I realize I've never said that too her, not like this. The phone screams again and she answers hurriedly. As I exit, I can hear her voice, so calm and cool. "Yes, I am sorry to keep you waiting...very important...the most important...I'm sorry, sir, go on." Goodbye Scully. It's after six before I get a chance to open the envelope Mulder brought down for me. Things are so strange without him here. I've had a week to get used to him being gone, but now that it's official, I feel the unfamiliarity more intensely. On top of everything else, I've been offered a promotion, but if I become an Assistant Director and leave the X-Files, the future of the this project is extremely questionable. I tear the flap off and a singular sheet of paper falls out. I grab my glasses in order to make out Mulder's wild scribbling. "Scully- There were so many things that I wanted to say before I left, but I couldn't find the words. So I found someone else's words instead. I cannot live with you, That would be life, And life is over there Behind the shelf The sexton keeps the key to, Putting up Our life, his porcelain, Like a cup Discarded of the housewife, Quaint or broken; A newer Sevres pleases, Old ones crack. I could not die with you, For one must wait To shut the other's gaze down, -- You could not. And I, could I stand by And see you freeze, Without my right of frost, Death's privilege? Nor could I rise with you, Because your face Would put out Jesus', That new grace Glow plain and foreign On my homesick eye, Except that you, than he Shone closer by. They'd judge us -- how? For you served Heaven, you know, Or sought to; I could not, Because you saturated sight, And I had no more eyes For sordid excellence As Paradise. And were you lost, I would be, Though my name Rang loudest On the heavenly fame. And were you saved, And I condemned to be Where you were not, That self were hell to me. So we must keep apart, You there, I here, With just the door ajar That oceans are, And prayer, And that pale sustenance, Despair! Be happy, Scully. -Mulder." Oh Mulder. I fold the letter into my jacket pocket and grab my briefcase. Rush hour has died down a little, and I know a few short cuts. Even so, it's after seven when I pull into a spot in front of Mulder's apartment complex. He doesn't answer when I knock, so I use my key. I should have seen this coming. He's been so distant, almost shy the past few weeks, ever since he turned in his official notice. Even before I open the door, I have a good idea of what I will find. Not that it dulls the pain. The apartment is empty, completely and utterly vacant. I feel tears stinging my eyes and I bite my lip. Oh my God. Out of touch, out of touch. This isn't out of touch Mulder. This is out of my life. Goodbye Mulder. Goodbye. *********************************************** Seven years later A sturdy looking older woman leaning lightly on a cane answers the door. It only takes me a moment to recognize her. She smiles at me and reaches one arm up to hug me tightly. I return the embrace carefully, staring at her grey-streaked hair and her tired fingers. "Hi Maggie." "Fox, I'm so glad you could come. This will mean so much to Dana." I smile as expected and circulate through the living room, greeting the Scullies I know. Bill gives me a terse nod and then introduces me to the three new children who have appeared since Matthew. Matthew has grown a lot in seven years. Around the room are settled various people I've never met. I find myself watching two preadolescent girls, a redhead and a brunette, looking solemn in their black dresses and holding hands tightly. They whisper to each other and occasionally look my way. I am beginning to wonder if Scully is even here when I hear a door open down the hallway. She emerges in an exceptionally plain black dress, with a small child riding her hip. I see his face first since she is turned to close the door. The boy can't be more than three. He is clinging to her with one hand, sucking the thumb of the other. In his little dark suit, his dark hair falling over his face, and his big wet black eyes, I can't help but feel a surge of sympathy with this boy. Scully turns and blinks at me. Unsurprisingly, she doesn't seem to have been crying at all. I suppose some things never change, do they. The boy grips her tighter and buries his face in her shoulder as she approaches me. "I'm glad you could make it," she says in a tired voice. What her expression lacks in sorrow, it makes up for in exhaustion. My hand meets hers in the middle and I give her fingers a brief clasp. I feel a thick jolt and I grit my teeth. She's newly widowed for god's sake. "I'm so sorry, Scully." "Yes, thank you, Mulder," she acknowledges tiredly, slowly dropping her hand. She gives me a tight smile, but the one in her eyes is real. "It is good to see you." "You look so tired, Scully. Would you like me to take the boy?" The boy jerks his head back and shakes it vehemently. "Yes honey. Be good now Ian and show Mommy's friend around the garden. The fresh air will do you good." He sniffles a bit, but lets Scully put him down. His mother and I exchange glances for a long moment, and then I feel his warm little hand clutching at mine. Scully's house has a lovely little English Garden behind it. Ian plods along steadily beside me, quiet and sad. In September there are no roses in the rose garden, but there is a little wrought iron bench. "Are your legs tired, Ian?" He nods and we sit, staring at the brittle twigs on the bushes. "What's your name?" he asks, swinging his legs in the crisp air. "Mulder." "He was my 'doptive dad," Ian announces. "I lost my real Dad too. I don't know what happened to him." Well, that explains one thing. I was starting to think Scully had step-children. "I'm sorry, Ian." "Everybody is," he says sullenly. "If you're Mommy's friend, how come I never saw you before?" Observant little fellow. "Your mother and I worked together for a long time, ten years. But I haven't seen her since well before you were born, Ian," I offer as explanation. "Oh." He fidgets slightly in his seat. "Uncle Bill says my Daddy's death was honor...honorabale?" "Honorable?" "Yeah, that. What's that mean?" "Was your Daddy in the Navy?" "All daddies are in the Navy." I have to smile at that. Adopted or not, he's a true Scully. "Mine wasn't," I tell him, "and he died an honorable death too." "Were you sad when you're daddy died?" "Yes I was, very sad, Ian." He seems to think about this for a little while. "Being sad makes people tired," he says with a yawn. "Mummy is so tired, she says she can't sleep. I can't sleep when Mummy doesn't sleep." "Do you want to take a nap right here?" I offer, patting my leg. He takes the offer and rests his head on my thigh. A gold circle falls out of his jacket. "Pocket watch?" I ask. He nods, his head brushing against my leg. "It was Daddy's. Mummy gave it to me. There's a picture of my daddy inside," he tells me. "You're nice, Mulder, but you have a funny name," he tells me. I smile and stroke his hair. As he nods off, I open the watch to get a look at Scully's husband for the first time. With a jolt, I realize I recognize him...in a manner of speaking. I'm looking at a picture of Kurt Crawford. After I have said my words, there is a long silence before people begin to shuffle toward the door. I wander the room, saying the appropriate 'thank you's and 'so glad you could come's that I practiced the night before to my family and Dennis's sailing buddies. They shake my hand or hug me and then file out. I glance back at the urn on the mantle, knowing that it's empty. Dennis's true remains, his alien essence, were hidden somewhere by Isobel. When I went to recover his body, the officer showed me the small pocket watch they'd found on him, the inside apparently coated in spilled ink. She was given instructions by Dennis himself on what to do when he passed on. She won't explain, but I trust her. Mom stands solid against a window sill watching me. She's known for a long time that something wasn't quite right about Dennis or my marriage, but she's never asked. Poor Mom, long ago she got used to a lack of explanations. Oh, the children. The girls know of course, but someday I will have to explain to poor Ian, my beautiful baby boy. I saw his birth, heard him speak his first word, saw him take his first step. Yet, it is the girls who are my true daughters, who carry my genes. Mom motions to me from where she's standing watching the window. I move to stand beside her and for a few minutes we sit in silence watching Mulder and Ian on the rose garden bench together. My son appears to be sleeping on Mulder's leg while Mulder pets his head. The wind is picking up and Mulder lifts the boy into his lap and wraps his suit coat tightly about the two of them. Absently, I find myself tracing their image on the windowpane. My mother puts a hand on my shoulder and says, "Aren't they precious, Dana?" I nod and relax against the cool glass. "I'm glad you called him, Mom. It's good to see him again." "You let so much time pass, Dana." "So did he. I can't argue about this, Mom. I just gave my husband's eulogy." "Yes," she says with a scowl. "Mom," I sigh. "Dana, you've told me that you can't explain a few dozen times. But my intuition is that you will have to do so soon, my dear." "True." I stare at the back of my son's head. 'Dennis' needed a place to hide. I wanted to adopt those children. It was an equitable business arrangement for all involved. Ian and Mulder, they'll never understand. It begins to sprinkle lightly. The withered branches of the rosebushes begin to sway and bend in the wind. Mulder nudges Ian who only snuggles back into Mulder's embrace. Mulder rises slowly from the bench and holds Ian to his shoulder. He passes Bill and his family on the way out. Bill manages to keep his face entirely expressionless as they pass each other. Tara leans over to kiss Ian's forehead as she says good-bye. "Fox, why don't you put Ian down in his bed?" suggests my mother. "No," I speak up. "Put him in my room. He's been so upset lately. He'll wander in eventually, and I don't want him having nightmares tonight." Outside, it begins to storm in earnest, complete with breathtaking lightening. I lead Mulder down the hallway. I can hear Mom following slowly behind us. She stands in the doorway as Mulder stares at the two double beds, one neatly made up with a light layer of dust. I gesture to the other and Mulder lays the boy down and starts to slip off his shoes. Mom watches me watching Mulder for a while before heading toward the kitchen. I hear the coffee maker starting, light conversation, and the front door closing. Thank you, Mom. Mulder slips off Ian's little suit pants and jacket and folds them neatly. I take them from the bed and put them on my dresser. I pick up Brown Bear from where he's fallen between the bed and the dresser and put him next to my son. "He's beautiful, Scully." "How long will you be in town, Mulder?" He shrugs and smoothes the covers around Ian's shoulders. "I drove. I can stay indefinitely. Do you want me to stay, Scully?" "We have a lot to talk about, Mulder." "Do we?" he asks with a huff. "Cut the crap, Mulder," I say tonelessly. His head snaps up. "You want to know everything, and there is much to tell you." "Like what?" I drop my tone to its absolute lowest and most resonant. "They are all dead, Mulder." She's right. I'm aching to know what's happened in the seven years since I left. Everything indicated that the faceless aliens had defeated the more aggressive species that my father and his cronies, whichever one was my father, made their deal with. It was about that time that we found my sister. And I was too concerned about my own fallout to worry about theirs. Looks like once again, I left Scully to pick up the pieces. I follow her toward the aroma of freshly brewed coffee. The two girls I noticed earlier are still sitting cuddled on the couch. "Moira, Isabel, to bed," orders Scully, signing as she speaks. The brunette answers with her hands, and the other speaks aloud. "Goodnight Mother." They kiss Scully's cheek and give me a sidewise glance as they head toward the hall. "Grandmother left you and Mr. Mulder some coffee," says the redhead. "Thank you, Moira. You behaved very well today. I thank you." "We will miss him. He was a good caretaker." Scully grants the girl a genuine smile and then turns her attention back to me. She pours two cups of coffee and takes a seat at her kitchen table. Scully pushes her own mug away and leans back in her chair. "A good caretaker," she repeats under her breath. "So, how long were you married to a clone, Scully?" I start off boldly. "Four years last May. And he wasn't a clone. He was a Rebel working undercover." I blink at her blindly for a while. "He learned how to blend in with his surroundings in order to infiltrate them. It was a much more pleasant alternative to the facial mutilation most of his people participated in." Well, that would explain the resemblance to the Crawford boys. "But the rebel aliens won." "Right, the resistance won, and they began wiping out the Consortium, its members, its employees, its experiments..." "The girls," I realize. "Control experiments," she elaborates. "The limited number of successful hybrids were killed by the Consortium so that the Aliens couldn't get their hands on them." My head is beginning to hurt, and I drink down some coffee in a frantic attempt to clear my mind. "So 'Dennis' rescued the girls, from his own people?" "Well, he had some help, but he brought them to me, yes. They weren't be too selective when they ran through the laboratories. They were a little miffed at the Consortium's unwillingness to share the vaccine. Unfortunately for Dennis, he had made his distaste for his people's tactics known, and he was himself in danger." She stirs her coffee, but still doesn't drink it. "You still haven't explained ..." "I haven't explained why I married Dennis. Yes, I know. That's more complicated." She lips the coffee cup to her lips and blows at the steam but still doesn't drink. "The Consortium knew their death was coming, and they made an heir of Dennis. He was given a new identity, along with the children. But Dennis still needed a place to hide." "And that's where you came in?" She nods and finally takes a small sip of her coffee. "They told him to seek me out. They told him I would know what to do." "And your answer was marriage?" I ask much too loudly. I hear a noise down the hall. Scully speaks very quietly. "Moira and Isabel are mine," she says very slowly, enunciating every syllable. "He needed a place to hide, I needed my children." I sit very still, half listening to the sounds of stirring in the bedrooms. Most of my attention is focused on trying to categorize what Scully has just told me. Everyone dead, Consortium wiped out, her children, her marriage, her heroic alien husband. "Mommy?" "Oh sweetheart," she whispers, opening up her arms to the staggering boy. Her voice and face soften dramatically. Like changing the channel on a television set, I am now watching a different woman. Or perhaps the same actress in different roles. Ian. She said the girls were hers. She hasn't explained Ian. I stare at my empty coffee mug and sigh. There is a soft hand stroking mine. "Mulder, I think we've talked enough for tonight. You look tired." I squeeze her hand and drink in the site of her smile. Under the barrage of information and sensation today, I had forgotten to really look at Scully. Her hair is darker now, a brown hue like her mother's turned before going grey. Her face is slightly wrinkled, less than one would expect at her age, just a touch of crow's feet and laugh lines. Beyond that tiredness I noticed immediately, I realize that she seems content, wiser. The expression on her face as she pulls her son closer is beatific. My fingers kiss hers for a moment longer. Then I push my chair back and place a hand on Ian's forehead. He smiles at me and then drops his head onto his mother's shoulder. Slowly, giving her time to move away, I lean down and drop my lips to Scully's forehead. She reaches up to briefly caress my cheek. "Good night, Mulder." "Good night, Scully." Title: Portrait of a Family Author: Lilith (The rest in part one) Two days later, I find myself standing awkwardly on Scully's doorstep. I had wanted to give her a day with her children before I came around bothering her again. I take a deep breath and knock loudly on the door. Isobel opens the door and raises an eyebrow. I raise my hand in greeting not knowing what to say to her. I can hear, Mr. Mulder, she signs to me. Once again, I am grateful for some of my FBI training that seemed so extraneous at the time. "Is Scully here?" "Mother is at church," responds a tired voice. Moira comes into view. "Ian is with her." "She didn't take you two?" Isobel snorts and backs away from the door. "We don't go to church, Mr. Mulder. God is foreign concept to us, considering where we grew up." My curiosity gets the better of me. "And where was that, Moira?" "I was in a laboratory. I worked for Dennis. But Isobel," she glances at her sister and signs something first. Isobel nods. "Isobel worked on a bee farm." I open my mouth, but I can't quite form the question. My memory is flooded with the picture of dozens of little brunette girls on porches. Isobel shakes her head. I am not a clone. I am a human girl, Mr. Mulder. And Scully's daughter, I think to myself. "Who was your father." "Isobel doesn't have a father," says a voice behind me. I jump. Scully and Ian have come in through the door I had left open. "She's the product of a special experiment in ova combination." "Two mothers?" I ask incredulously. I had read years ago that such unnatural conception was possible, with the help of modern medicine. "Who was the other mother?" "Mulder, maybe you should sit down," Scully suggests coolly. I can feel heat prickling at my neck. My hands tighten into little fists. Samantha, I think with absolute certainty. Why else would she be so elusive about it? She's had my sister's daughter for four years and she never bothered to tell me. Jesus Scully, what the fuck? What the fucking fuck? "Jesus Scully, when the fuck did you plan on telling me?" I shout, like a complete dumbass. Moira and Isobel look like someone just slapped them. Ian looks like he might cry. Scully, on the other hand, is a statue with a flush rising up her cheeks. "Isobel, take your brother and sister out for a walk," she says quietly. As soon as the door closes, she turns on me in s rage. God, I'd forgotten what Scully looks like in full wrath. "Don't you ever speak to me in front of the children in that tone again, Mulder. Do you understand me?" she demands, biting out each word. I take a deep breath and nod my head. "Then sit down," she instructs softly. "I'll get you some lemonade." Leaning against the sink, I give the ice a few minutes to chill the lemonade. My head is pounding, so I open the drawer of vice and rummage among the anti-depressants, antibiotics, Maalox, and bottle-openers for the bottle of Motrin. I pop four into my mouth and gulp down some lemonade. I can hear Mulder shifting on the couch. I can feel my fingers tingling slightly. In the back of my head, I am reliving all the missed opportunities when I made the same decision again and again while Mulder sat on my couch. None of them will stop me from making that decision again. I don't know if I still love him, or if I love who he is now. He abandoned my seven years ago, left me to survive it all on my own. Granted, I knew he was getting out of the river, but I had expected him to be there on the shore to throw me a life preserver. Mulder doesn't drink his lemonade; he sets it on the table and waits for me to explain. I take a deep breath and explain the biology of Isobel in as much biological depth as I think he can handle. Ian was much easier to explain. A Navy buddy of Dennis had a daughter in trouble. Open adoption made life easier for everyone, and I was glad to have a child that I could truly raise as my own from day one. Mulder is absorbing this all quietly, a little too quietly. I know he has other questions, about my children, about this house. But I just can't discuss it right now, the memories are like little pine needles prickling at my brain and the Motrin has yet to kick in. "Scully, I shouldn't have yelled at you in front of your kids." "Apology accepted." "Where did this house come from?" Well, that was abrupt. So he noticed that the house was a bit nice for a retired AD and a Navy petty officer. "When I said they made an heir of Dennis, Mulder, that wasn't quite true." He bites his lower lip and the tingle surges up through my shoulders. "They left the money to you, Scully?" "Mulder," I sigh, trying to work up my nerve, "There is something else you should know, Mulder." I can see him tensing from across the room. I find myself involuntarily moving to sit next to him on the couch and taking his hand in mine. "That woman in Kansas, Mulder," I begin. His hands are shaking now, and I hold them both in mine, stroking the insides of his palms, knowing that this is going to hurt him so much. I close my eyes tightly and tell him the rest. "She wasn't Samantha." "The tests!" "Fakes," I whisper. "Oh, Mulder," The tears have started already, but he's struggling to keep them trapped behind his eyelashes. "What else, Scully, what else?" "Samantha was supposed to be your father's collateral," I explain as gently as I can. "But some of his actions were interpreted as...rebellious." "They killed her?" I don't bother to respond. He knows. He needed to know. His hands are clenched in mine now. It's actually starting to hurt a little. I run my thumbs against his wrists and he loosens his grip and leans back into the cushions. "Mulder," I whisper as I reach up to wipe his face. He whimpers and turns his cheek into my palm. "Why didn't you tell me, Scully? Why didn't you tell me?" "Mulder, for years I didn't even know where you were, and then when I finally wrangled your whereabouts out of Byers, I had a new baby to take care of. For all I knew, you had a family of your own. I couldn't ask you to come to me, and I was in no position to come to you." He nods and turns away slightly. I move my body slightly closer to his and he takes the invitation to drop his head onto my shoulder. I hold him closer and feel one arm come to loop around my neck. After he cries himself out, we still sit like that, clinging to each other and breathing heavily. "I didn't have a family, Scully," he talks against my neck. "I couldn't have a family, Scully, not without...Scully." The motion feels like a dozen little kisses and I realize I have to get out of this embrace quickly. But dammit, I don't want to. I haven't been held like this for years, not since those brief few months after Dennis first went to sea. Of course, it will come out eventually. The girls still have pictures of her on the wall. Yet another great mystery surrounding Isobel was that instead of appearing at my door with Dennis, was her arrival in the arms of Marita Covorubius. Jesus, stupid Russian bitch, going off and getting herself killed just when the girls and I needed her most. Dammit, now I'm crying and Mulder is rubbing my back. "Scully, you okay?" "I'm fine, Mulder, I'm fine." He laughs weakly. "It shouldn't have been like this. I let you carry this all for me. I should have been there to help you." Mulder, don't you understand? They led you to that faux Samantha so you'd leave the X-Files. "You had your own problems, Mulder. You weren't obligated to me." "Yes, I was, Scully, you know I was," he insists. He lifts his head from my shoulder and I stare into his eyes. Suddenly his eyes are closed and too too close to my own. He's kissing me, pulling me into his lap, and I am kissing him back. I promised myself I wouldn't let this happen, that I would stay in control of my emotions. But it feels so incredible to be kissed. With the exception of one dim memory in Philadelphia, I haven't been properly kissed in about seventeen years. Suddenly, I feel like I am swimming up from a very deep undertow. And I can't decide whether I think Mulder is throwing me a rope or if he pushed me in. Either way, I find myself pulling away just in time to hear footsteps on the porch. "Scully, I...maybe that..." I press my index finger against his lips. "I've missed you, Mulder, but it's been seven years. And that was wonderful, but I have three children that are about walk through that door and I cannot discuss this right now." God, I'm rambling like a complete idiot. For God's sake, say something Mulder before my children walk in and find me on your lap. "Maybe I should go?" We're standing now, so I reach up on my toes and press my lips against his briefly, feeling the shiver race through my muscles. A goofy, confused smile is spreading over his face. "Maybe you should," I reply as the door opens. Mulder grabs his jacket and starts for the door. Ian immediately starts pouting. "Do you have to go, Mr. Mulder?" "Just Mulder, and yeah Sport, I've got to go." "Aw, can't you stay for lunch, Mulder. Mom, can he, please?" Mulder shrugs at me and I smile over my sigh. "Why don't I take us all out for lunch, Scully?" I lick my lips and look at Ian's pleading face. The girls look enticed by the idea too. I don't take them out very often, even now that I'm practically floating in money. "Okay!" I pronounce. Ian and the girls and Mulder too all grin like idiots. "Go change into your jeans, Ian. Quick now." I don't change my clothes much. After all, I am still in mourning. I just throw a robin's egg blue cardigan on over my black dress and grab my purse. Then I follow the others out the door. Ian, trotting alongside Mulder, gripping his hand tightly, flanked by my daughters. Mother, signs Isobel, is this what a family looks like? Moira grabs my waist as I sway slightly, my hands covering my face for a minute. "Yes, darling," I whisper. "This is what a family looks like." So, this is what a family looks like, a real functional family. An adult female primary and an adult male primary with a mix of male and female secondaries. Mother reminds me always 'children' not secondaries. The other children at our education complex have families like this, or so Moira tells me. This is the fifth meal we have eaten with Mr. Mulder. He has been here more than two weeks. Mother spends more and more time with him. She wears less and less black. Tonight she is wearing a navy dress with a long slit up the thigh. Moira is dressed up too, and she's wearing lip gloss because Mother won't let her wear lipstick. Ian keeps asking Mulder questions about being an FBI Agent, or a writer like he is now. Everyone is in love with Mulder. At night, Mulder talks to my mother while we get ready for bed. He tells her he knows what she's thinking, but that this time he promises he won't let her down. That he will do anything and everything to make this work, if she wants it to work. He loves her too. Maybe he also loves us. Mother loves him. It's like a nebula expanding in her eyes when she looks at him. I didn't know human beings could luminese when they touched. They put Ian to bed together and Mulder teases Mother about her lullabies. When I was rescued, Aunt Mari used to sing to me at night, just as tunelessly and quietly as Mother sings. Moira talks to me for hours after Mother and Mulder tell us goodnight. I am so tired, and the more tired I am, the more I can hear them. Their thoughts are nicely meshed and along with Ian's dreams and Moira's droning, they make pretty thought music. My sister finally falls asleep and I feel silence seeping through the house. Mulder must have gone back to his hotel and Mother to sleep. I put on the robe Aunt Mari bought me and grab my sewing basket. I turn on the lamp and pick up the mending. Ian has been very rough on his school shirts and Moira tore a seam in her favorite skirt. I wet the thread and slide it through the eye. Just as I start to trust the needle in to the cloth, my senses are overwhelmed by a vivid image of my Mother's face, her teeth clenched but her eyes smiling as a large hand smoothes over her cheek. I drop my sewing. Mother and Mulder are having sex. I try very hard to be unaware, but I still catch glimpses. Mother's face looks younger, softer in Mulder's eyes. I get brief flashes of intense happiness flooding through both of them. Mother is looking down at Mulder who throws his arm over his face and closes his eyes. I feel a strange comfort sinking through my Mother's limbs and a sense of sinking. Mulder is ecstatic, eyes still closed, but he catches her. Mother is whispering to him, something I can quite make out, but Mulder sees her face happy, tired, and tells her he wants to stay, that he'll leave before the children wake up. I laugh, and pierce the grey cotton of Moira's skirt. Bright, blinding light is pulsing through the blinds over my bedroom window. Still sleepy, I reach across the space between our beds for Isobel and find nothing but air. I leap from the bed and stare at the intense, strobing redness outside. The lawn is bathed in it, the waves scattering on the roof tiles. I slide on my shoes and force the window open. On the lawn, Ian is standing under the bluish cylinder of light spreading on the grass. Above him hovers the stuff of memory and nightmares, a Rebel craft. Mother and Mulder are on the lawn too, screaming to Ian, but they can't seem to move. I don't think I can either. A heavy sensation leaves my arms slack at my sides, and I slump against the window sill. Mesmerized, Ian stares up into the abyss. From the corner of my eye, I see that one of us can still move. Isobel turns on her heel and rushes back to the house. Ian begins to levitate as she comes barreling out of the house with a small mason jar in her hands. "I-AN!" she screams in a shrill, bleating voice, coming to a stop just outside the light cylinder. "I-AN!" Ian turns to face her, and begins to struggle in the beam. "NO!" screams Isobel, and then she begins to speak in the Ancient Language. I think she says, "I give what you want. He wants to go home." I only know a little Dennis's language, just what I picked up in his lab. She hurls the jar into the beam of light and throws herself over Ian as the glass breaks and shards drop down. In the air, there is suspended a mass of black goop. Dennis. She's is sending Dennis home for a proper burial, in the soil he longed to return to. I didn't cry at the funeral, but I am sobbing now. The mass floats upward, the cylinder shrinking around my brother and sister. Mother and Mulder tumble forward, carefully swiping the large chunks of glass off Isobel's back. Ian clings to Mulder, sobbing frantically. Mother is stroking Isobel's face, afraid to hug her because of the glass. Slowly, unsure of myself and of what exactly just happened, I wander toward my sister. "Moira," she whispers hoarsely. I take her hand and Mother's, and Isobel smiles widely. She laughs silently, and I question her with my eyes. We are frightened and hurt, touching each other like we're afraid one of us is going to disappear any minute. What is so funny? I didn't realize I had been signing. "Yes," she says in the Ancient Language, "Moira, this is what a family looks like." It's early but I know they won't mind; they never do. It just seemed to make my sense to drive all night instead of stopping. Martha will complain about her back all day, but the kids love it, especially Lara. Despite the fact that we left before lunch yesterday and the sun is now rising, she is still wide awake, her head resting against the sill, letting the wing whip her hair. She's so excited about seeing her aunt and her grandparents. Not to mention, she never has been able to sleep when she thinks she might miss something. I pull in the gravel drive, listening contentedly to that satisfying crunch. When I was a kid, I used to sit on my mother's giant couch and listen to that crunch and know that Mom was home. The lights in the house next door come up, and I stand on the front porch, waiting. My sister, in her usual uniform of jeans and t-shirt jumps down from the porch and races toward me, nearly knocking the breath out of me with the force of her hug. Not that I mind. "Isobel! It's November. You shouldn't be running in bare feet out of doors." "I-an," she sighs, then lifts her hands. My feet do not feel the cold so much. They are around back, watching the sunrise. "Should we go around?" Isobel shakes her head, and signs her response. My name seems to be the only English Isobel learned to speak. But that never bothered me. Nor did it bother the millions of people who read her books. No, let them watch their sunset. They will come in soon. Get your wife and children. Taking her advice, I rouse Martha and juggle little Dennis and three suitcases up the stairs to the guest room Martha likes. Lara helps me out, telling her mother to just lie down and rest, that Isobel will make us breakfast. I smile at my daughter, daddy's little girl. With a burst of energy, I lift her up and carry her down the stair case, making her giggle. I plop her down on Isobel's old bed. She immediately says what she always says. "Tell me a story, Dad." "Later, sweetie. Grandma and Grandpa will want to see you." But I stay and stare at the pictures with her. It's a gigantic multiple photo frame, full of photos that Moira put together before she went to CERN to study. Isobel put it up in the room they had shared until they went to school. Isobel in the park with Marita Covorubius, a shriveled husk of a woman who my father says was once beautiful. Mom and Dad, or the only father I can really remember, rummaging through a crime scene with their FBI jackets on. Moira and Isobel in their prom gowns. Grandma and Dennis holding me for the first time. Mom and Dad's wedding, all five of us. Isobel and Dad on her Larry King Live interview. Moira's doctorate graduation from Oxford. Dad and his sister, when they were very young. My children in their christening gowns. "Grandma! Grandpa!" Mom shakes her head, but Dad picks Lara up anyway, just for a minute. I hug my parents and kiss my mother's cheek. "Oh sweetheart. It's so good to see you." "Is Moira going to make it in this year?" "Isobel's going to pick her up at noon." "Just in time for dinner then," Lara adds happily. "That's right, baby," says Dad, offering her his hand. "Let's go get some breakfast, princess." Mom pats my shoulder. "So early. You didn't stop last night?" "No, I wanted to get home and see you." She smiles and scratches my back. I've always adored these quiet moments alone with my mother. "Mom, that writing on the picture frame, what language is that in? Isobel would never tell me." Mom seems to consider this for a moment. "She doesn't like to talk about that night, but I know you remember." Oh yes, vividly. "That is Dennis's native language. Moira used it as a joke, something about that night between your sisters. I'm not sure that it is really that funny, but Isobel liked it." I smile at her. Isobel and Moira had many the private joke when I was a child. Then it made me jealous, but as I learned more about how they spend the first decade or so of their lives, I began to understand. My mother traces my infant face in a picture, and sighs. I run my fingers along the English translation at the bottom of the frame. 'This is what our family looks like.' ********************************************** Notes: Okay, I would love some honest feedback on this one. Even after I finished it, I took two weeks to post it. I hope it made sense. ladylilith@geocities.com This started out as a Mulder/Scully Romance and somehow ended up being about the children. Acknowledgments: Big thanks as always to Suzanna, my editor extrordinaire and to the Consortium email list and the Intelligence Board members for inspiration. http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Dreamworld/1947 The Gossamer Project Author - Title - Date - Spoilers - Crossovers - X-Files - Adventures - Stories - Vignettes Other stories by Lilith / Please let us know if the site is not working properly. Set story display preferences . Do not archive stories elsewhere without permission from the author(s). See the Gossamer policies for more information. /