Edge of Field
By lisby@earthlink.net
Category: Story, Angst, Post-Colonization, MulderTorture
Rating: PG with an edge (no graphic sex); Threesome 
(Sk/Sc/M.)
Spoilers: Season eight AU. Spins off after Within/Without, 
but before TINH. Per Manum happened, just slightly 
differently.
Summary: "I was...curious about my Secret Admirer. 
Someone was taking fine care of me and I needed to know 
who and why."
Archive: Permission granted.
Feedback: Pretty please, to lisby@earthlink.net.
Disclaimer: Scully, Skinner, Doggett, etc., belong to 1013 
productions and Fox. No offense intended; no money made.

Author's note: Tina Hill is an original character from my 
WIP, 'Lessons'. It just felt right to include her in this story, 
so I suppose it's a progression of the same universe. All you 
really need to know is that she was Scully's roommate at 
the FBI Academy and a close friend. You can read 
'Lessons' and all my X- Files fiction, at Lisby's Limited 
Oeuvre, http://home.earthlink.net/~iwonder/lisby.htm.

If you'd like to read 'Edge of Field' online and see a picture 
of the obelisk, please go to 
http://home.earthlink.net/~iwonder/edge.htm.

Thank you to my volunteer betas: Ann Vanderlaan, Kelly 
Keil, Vyper, MaybeAmanda, and Jessabelle.

For Marlene and Xanthe. Better friends there cannot be.



Edge of Field
by Lisby
-----------------


My name is Dana Katherine Scully. I was born thirty-six 
years before the Da'an came, so you do the math. I never 
adopted the new-style calendar, and I really don't care what 
year it is. I've stopped quantifying time in ways other than 
days and nights, and warm and cold seasons. 

I'm writing this because Becky Spangler from Mobyville 
drove out here today through autumn rain and wind. As she 
warmed her hands around a mug of tea, Becky explained 
that she's heading up the Canton's History Project. I'm the 
original human resident; my daughter, conceived in the Old 
World, was the first child born in this new human 
freeplace. Becky said no history would be complete 
without my input. I'm flattered, but my memories won't 
lend the citizens any great insight. I wasn't a city founder, 
or a hero, or a politico. I've stayed in the Outlands, on my 
farm, growing fruit, wheat, and corn. I can count the 
number of times that I've been away from Ollie Hill on my 
fingers and toes.

Before the Da'an invasion, I was an agent with the Federal 
Bureau of Investigation, a resident of the city of 
Washington, and a barren woman who'd endured four 
rounds of hormone therapy and embryo transplantation. My 
closest female friend, Tina Hill, had donated her eggs. My 
FBI partner, Fox Mulder, had provided his sperm. We'd run 
through the whole batch of Tina's surgically harvested 
eggs, so that was that, I thought. But Tina offered me more.

She, Mulder, and I were sitting on the couch in my 
apartment. "Take many as you need to make this work, 
Dana. I mean, they're just going to go to waste if you don't 
use them. And I don't mind the extraction procedure," Tina 
assured me earnestly.

I was tearing up with gratitude when I felt my partner's 
hand on my shoulder. "Scully," Mulder said deadpan, 
"Don't worry, I don't really mind the extraction procedure, 
either."


I finally caught on the sixth attempt, finally became an 
Irish-American redhead gestating a Native-American Jew. 
And, after years of resolute verticality, the father of my 
child and I were enjoying a sweet, gentle romance. We 
were talking about moving in together, about him leaving 
the Bureau so that he could focus on being a real parent, 
not just a workaholic progenitor.

It was then that the Da'an took Mulder-- he was theirs to 
begin with, but that's another story. For several months I 
mourned, blind to indications that the invasion was at hand. 
When the Da'an arrived, I stopped grieving and got pissed. 
They'd taken Mulder and now they were stealing my 
unborn baby's planet. I became a rebel and was captured 
shortly thereafter, during an attack on our hideaway.

Coughing and choking, I'd escaped the burning building, 
staggered outside into smoke-dimmed daylight as a small 
killer saucer drew up overhead. I'd seen them dispatch their 
victims in one quick and probably almost painless shot. I 
remember wanting to laugh in relief because now it was my 
turn to die, and my child's. Thank God we wouldnąt suffer.
The saucer's hum trembled the ground beneath me, made my
ears and eyeballs ache. I saw a bright white flash and....


I returned to awareness slowly, lying under a cotton-ball 
clouded sky in the tall grass at the edge of a field. The long 
fronds were mature green and the stalks heavy with seed. 
Their rustle was the only sound I heard. Drugged, I 
thought. I'm drugged. I was also nude and sticky with 
congealed bioplasm. Dead blades of grass and dirt stuck to 
my shoulders, bottom, and calves when I finally got to my 
feet. Inside my womb, "Number Six" kicked. Wherever we 
were, thank God we were both alive.

Downhill, I spied a narrow gray-blue river with scrub along 
its bank. I stumbled there to wash then sat awhile, staring at 
the water until my head fully cleared. I turned from the 
river, shielded my eyes from the sun to look back up the 
hill. Atop it stood a weathered clapboard house set in a 
landscape like a Wyeth painting. When I reached it, I found 
the house empty. I also found a chicken shed with no flock, 
a barn with no cows or horses, trees without wild birds, and 
rich brown soil lacking bugs, grubs, or worms.

When darkness came, I took refuge in the vacant house and 
slept huddled on the wooden parlor floor. I awoke to pale 
sun, the sound of songbirds, and a cheerful blaze in the 
hearth. Fire, domestic and wild animals, fish and insects-- 
all of these had arrived during the night.

The growling of my stomach was ridiculously loud and 
probably insured that spear fishing gained me nada. I threw 
my sharp-ended stick down and combed the area for wild 
berries and nuts instead. I felt like a Homo Erectus, naked 
and ranging. Back at the farm, I found my new hens had 
laid three eggs. I swallowed the innards raw while 
dreaming of a frying pan. I even managed to shoot milk 
straight from the udder into my mouth. "A bucket or a cup 
would have been nice," I told the air.

The frying pan, a milk pail, cups, and a whole range of 
household goods appeared while I slept. In the kitchen I 
found a cast-iron stove, a sink with a hand pump, and a 
pantry full of food. The coal shed was stocked and cords of 
wood were stacked outside the back door. Apparel of a 
warm but old-fashioned design filled a wardrobe in a 
bedroom where a four-poster bed was piled with pillows 
and quilts. Stylistically, nothing looked newer than 1920. It 
seemed my unseen benefactor had a thing for the "good old 
days."

Warmly dressed and my stomach full, I went to milk my 
two cows while a black and white cat followed me through 
the dewy grass, stropping my shins. I named her Milk Puss. 
She's sitting on my lap as I write.


****


The days cooled and the leaves began to turn. I worked to 
put up winter supplies, fished every day and dried what I 
caught, made simple soft cheese the way I'd learned in Girl 
Scouts, and collected hickory nuts and chestnuts. I picked 
apples and berries and dried them on trays over the dim 
embers of my fireplace. In the evenings, I kept the fire 
stoked and talked to the cat and unborn Number Six, 
reassuring them that we'd be fine. I slept by the hearth, 
wrapped in blankets and seated in a rocker, rather than 
sleep alone in the cold bedroom.

One morning, when I hurried out to milk, then fish, I found 
several boxes of supplies waiting in the side yard. A few 
more crates arrived every day thereafter, yielding me quite 
a reserve. No longer afraid of starving, I stopped waddling 
around in a rush and watched the land instead, getting to 
know the subtleties of this place, now mine.

I named the farm Ollie Hill. See, I sewed a little doll for the 
baby that came out looking something like that old TV 
show puppet. Ollie had been a safe sweet thing. My new 
home seemed that way, too. Eventually, areas of the farm 
earned their own names: Tree Stump Meadow, Marigold 
Patch, Muddy Wash, Old Oak Field, Half-a-Field, Edge-of-
Field....


I was quiescent about winter's arrival, but increasingly 
curious about my benefactor. Someone was taking fine care 
of me and I wanted to know who and why. I couldn't 
believe it was the Da'an.

One morning, as I carried the bedpan to the outhouse, I saw 
my secret admirer hovering about ten feet off the ground 
near an old oak, standing in dark contrast to the orange 
leaves and aqua sky. It was a huge, sleek, ebony diamond--
about the size of an automobile-- long on one end and 
stunted on the other. Of course, it was a guardian obelisk, 
but I had never seen one before and fear made me drop the 
bedpan, stumble backwards, and reach for a gun that I no 
longer owned. The black thing drew away from me, too, 
bobbling when it halted like a boat on water. I watched it, 
and felt as if it watched me, too. Then I took a few steps 
toward it, but it zipped across the field and into the woods.

It came back the next day. When I walked out onto my 
porch, I found it hovering in the front yard above a stack of 
boxes. The point of its diamond nose dipped to me as if 
bowing. Once again, when I tried to draw closer, it flew off 
into the forest.

The boxes held my photo albums, my books, my jewelry-- 
even my makeup and a sea-shell southern belle that 
Mulder'd bought me in Ocean City just a few weeks before 
his abduction. I stared at the tacky pink tchotchke, awed. I'd 
believed everything of mine was gone, burned or blown to 
bits. But here were many of my possessions, returned to me 
by this strange black thing. How the hell had it done it?


I named my benefactor Zippy. It visited me daily. One 
afternoon, it followed me down to the river. After I'd 
settled myself on a flat rock and cast my fishing line, Zippy 
came up behind me and-- whoosh-- shot out over the river. 
The obelisk hung low to the surface, it and its reflected 
image looking like a huge Rorschach blot. "Hey! You're 
scaring the fish," I hollered. "But thanks for the pole and 
for everything else." It skittered and took off.

Zippy returned that night. I could see it above the big tree, 
partially blocking the moon. "I'm going to need help," I 
called to it. "You seem to give a shit...whatever you are. I'm 
about to have a baby. I'm feeling Braxton-Hicks 
contractions. That means I'm not too far from delivering-- 
maybe a few weeks or even less. I don't want to do this 
alone. I'm afraid I'll die and so will the baby, and I don't 
think you brought us here for that. So, if you care, do 
something."

Afterward, I didn't see my guardian for a few days. I 
watched for its black shape amid the golds and reds of the 
trees and in the windswept gray and blue of the autumn 
sky. I carved a pumpkin and put the seeds away for 
springtime. Gave it a ghoulish grin and triangle eyes. When 
the dark came, it guarded my front porch and acted as a 
beacon for Zippy.


I found him lying in the place I call Edge-of-Field, where 
I'd first awoken to my new life. His skin was slippery with 
green goop and he was shivering violently. I took off my 
coat and wrapped it around him, then guided him up the hill 
to my home.

After I'd bathed him, I examined his body for marks of 
abuse. He was heavily doped, but otherwise the same as 
when we'd parted: big-muscled with ropy tendons, brown-
eyed, broad-shouldered, and nearly bald. I dragged the 
mattress down from the bedroom and yanked it close to the 
parlor fireplace, put him to bed, then lay down beside him. 
My belly kept me from getting as close as I wanted.

Zippy had brought me Walter Skinner. In the old world, 
he'd been my boss, then my friend, then, in the months after 
Mulder was taken, something more. It was a "something" 
we'd been trying to define when the Da'an sacked the base 
and snared me. His own capture had followed by just a few 
weeks, he later told me, during another Da'an strike on the 
rebels.


Zippy brought warm clothes, a shaving kit, an old-
fashioned nightshirt, boots, Walter's glasses, and a few of 
his favorite possessions. It looked like the obelisk intended 
for Walter to stay. I led him by the hand around the 
picturesque farm and showed him everything about our 
home. We had no idea where Ollie Hill was or what had 
happened to everyone else on Earth, and honestly, we didn't 
give a fuck. We'd known so much grief in so short a time 
that Walt and I wanted to drink down our joy and slam our 
mugs on the bar, demanding more.

Walter squinted and frowned when I told him about Zippy. 
He did so again when our guardian returned and hung in 
the twilight sky, whirring. Before that night, I'd never heard 
the obelisk produce a sound.


Appropriately, on the day that my water broke it poured 
down rain. Walter kept a kettle boiling on the stove, and 
laid out a knife, cloths, and a basin. He'd helped to deliver a 
few babies in Viet Nam, he told me as we walked the long 
hall to the kitchen then turned around to come back. I 
wasn't comforted by his ancient experience (I was about 
five when he was in 'Nam) and almost said so, then I 
realized the obelisk had brought me just who I'd asked for: 
a companion who could help me. I hadn't specified a Mayo 
Clinic obstetrician, had I?

Labor hurts. It progresses to a level of pain that's literally 
indescribable. This lack of vocabulary must result from a 
primitive superstition: to name the pain makes it real.

Walt and I paced the length of the hall back and forth, 
again and again and again while I supported my belly and 
felt it harden with every contraction. Finally, I couldn't 
walk any more, had to lie on the mattress by the fireplace 
and pray. My distress frightened Walter. I can still hear him 
calling my name above the din of the rain and my agony, 
above the sound of my cries for Mulder.

Finally, I pushed out a baby girl into Walter's hands. She 
was bloody, blue, and limp, but in a moment her eyes 
snapped open, she threw her arms out and squealed, then 
her body turned pink with the in-rush of oxygen. My baby 
had a shock of black hair and Tina's long, narrow, humped 
nose. Her mouth was Mulder's, as was the shape of her 
eyes. But her pupils were infant blue, so for a while I could 
pretend to see my own genetic influence.

Once the afterbirth was delivered and the baby and I were 
cleaned up and beneath warm blankets, Walt went out on 
the porch to bring in more wood. "That goddamned thing is 
outside," he told me as he tossed a log onto the fire. "It's 
right at the foot of the steps."

I looked at my sleeping child and kissed the top of her dark 
head. "Maybe it wants to know we're all right."

"If Da'an are so smart, it should know that already."

Walter stripped down to his long underwear and slipped 
into bed. We drifted off, listening to rain and thunder and 
my new daughter's steady little breaths.


A loud banging woke us, made the baby howl. Something 
was ramming up against the door trying to get in. Walter 
grabbed the fire poker as he scrambled to his feet. He flung 
the door open, admitting a gust of rain and wind and the 
obelisk's pointed proboscis. I saw Walt lift the poker to 
strike its hull, but I screamed for him to stop. "No! I told 
you it wants to see the baby!"

He backed away, lowered the poker, then let it drop. I 
threw off the covers, scooped up my child, and staggered 
across the room. The deep red blood that had pooled in my 
uterus ran down my legs. "Dana, god, get back in bed!" 
Walter cried.

I held my daughter out to the obelisk like an offering. 
"See...see? She's okay. I'm okay. Everything is fine." Zippy 
made a whir and a few clicks then withdrew into the night.


****


I called the baby Calla Lilly. It seemed like a name both 
Tina and Mulder would like-- Tina because it sounded 
somewhat Native American and New Age-y, and Mulder 
because it carried no baggage. He was in that mental space 
just before he disappeared, ready to let go of his frequently 
tragic past.... As I said earlier, Mulder's is another story 
entirely.

Lilly wasn't an easy infant. During her early life, our world 
narrowed to the parlor, the kitchen, the coal shed, the 
outhouse, and the woodpile. Lilly, and the heavy snows that 
fell just after her birth, left us no chance to move beyond. 
Walt wanted to ride out in search of others and of clues as 
to our whereabouts. Instead, he stayed with me and a 
shrieking infant who seemed dismayed to be alive. When 
her big trembling lower lip stuck out and her eyes squinted 
into abutting scalene triangles, she looked amazingly like 
Mulder.

I always could block out someone else's screaming child, 
but my own baby's cries pierced the center of my brain. 
Day and night of her miserable wails, of her frantic nursing 
that left my nipples cracked and bleeding, of her scorning 
my love and comfort...it finally snapped me. "What the hell 
is wrong with you?" I shouted, shook her, then I dumped 
her in her cradle. I marched out onto the porch, slammed 
the door against her squalling, pounded down the steps, and 
kicked my way into the snow drift, heading I don't know 
where.

There were hobnails in the soles of my leather lace-up 
boots, but it was inevitable that I'd slip. Zippy was hovering 
out by the big bare oak. It drew closer when I fell, then 
hesitated. "What's with this Gibson Girl crap anyway?" I 
yelled at the obelisk as I tried to stand, but caught my heel 
in the hem of my long woolen skirt and landed on my ass in 
the snow again. "And what's the matter with gortex?"

Walt had been watching from the window. He walked out 
and offered his assistance. "Dana, sweetheart--"

"Don't call me sweetheart," I hissed, knocked away his 
proffered hand, and got back to my feet on my own. "I just 
tried to hurt my baby."

"She's fine. You didn't hurt her. It's okay."

"It's not okay," I shouted at him. A hot tear ran down my 
cheek. I wiped it away angrily. "I read books while I was 
pregnant-- I thought I knew what to do but I don't. God 
damn it, I can't do this alone!"

Walt looked off toward the obelisk. His jaw slid side to side 
before he finally spoke. "You're not alone."

I shrugged, unable to say I was sorry without letting loose a 
flood of tears.

"Listen," Walt said quietly, "tomorrow, I'm going to take 
the horse and go out on reconnaissance. The snow's not too 
deep since that last warm day. I could go a few miles in 
each direction, at least.... Who knows? Maybe Dr. Spock's 
living just over the ridge."

"Yeah," I muttered, finally in control. "In the town of 
Babyville. Wouldn't that be the luck."


Walt prepared to leave at first light. I wiped my hands on 
my apron, stood on tiptoe to kiss him goodbye, and made 
him promise to be back by dark. I spent the day tending to 
Lilly and fighting with the stove, which wasn't drafting 
properly, so that I could boil diapers, wash dishes, and cook 
stew. "And once I wanted to be Laura Ingalls Wilder," I 
told Lilly, who lay bundled in a basket on the floor with a 
copper-skinned fist crammed into her mouth.

In the late afternoon, I started watching for Walter. At 
dusk, I set lanterns in the windows and paced back and 
forth before the crackling fireplace with Lilly in my arms. 
She wept and flailed, struck me on the chin with her head, 
then reared back to look at me with impassioned eyes so 
like her father's.

I didn't hear Walt above Lilly's crying until he was right 
outside the door, shouting for me. As I tucked the baby into 
her crib, Walt burst in, his arms supporting a hunched 
figure who was wearing his coat. Long salt-and-pepper hair 
hung over her face. He brought her to the fire and sat her in 
my rocker. The bare skin of her legs, feet, and hands was 
slimy and cold. Beneath her fallen hair, her teeth chattered.

"Where did you find her?" I asked, grabbing the blankets 
off our pallet to drape around her. 

"Edge-of-Field." Walt rubbed the woman brusquely 
through the blanket. "I watched the obelisk drop her off."

"What?"

"Just help me get her warm.... Maggie? Maggie, do you 
hear me?"

Adrenaline made my heartbeat pound in my ears and clog 
up my throat. No. It wasn't possible. But Walter brushed 
the hair from the woman's face and I saw that it was indeed 
my mother. "G-god. M-mom." I choked, sinking to her feet 
with a buzzing head. "Oh my god."

I looked up into her face. She seemed much older than 
when we'd parted a year and a half ago on the first of July. 
I'd driven her to BWI to catch a flight to San Diego so that 
she could visit my brother and his family. While she was 
there, the Da'an one-upped the Independence Day 
fireworks. After the massive electromagnetic pulse, there 
was no way for me to learn if my family had survived. 
Stories told by the refugees who straggled into our 
stronghold made me assume the worst. Now my mother's 
deep wrinkles and heavily grayed hair spoke of a harsh 
survival.

We kept Mom warm by the fire. Eventually, when Walt 
offered her hot tea, she took the cup and sipped from it 
while staring into the flames. Beside her, I lay on our pallet, 
propped up on an elbow, teasing cranky Lilly with a nipple. 
Mom suddenly looked at me and spoke for the first time, 
her voice wondering. "You're so young, Dana." She 
reached out to stroke my cheek. "You don't look a day over 
thirty-five." I leaned into her caress. "I always said special 
prayers for your father and you children on your birthdays-- 
prayers for your souls. I thought you were dead, too, 
sweetheart."

"I'm fine, Mom." I reassured and winced. Lilly had latched 
on.

My mother sighed. "On his last birthday, your brother Bill 
would have been fifty-six; Melissa would have been fifty-
four; you would have been fifty; and Charlie, forty-eight. 
And, can you believe it? I'm seventy-five.... The tribe 
turned me out then. They have to do that with old people."

I opened my mouth and closed it. "Mom," I finally spoke 
evenly, "you're not seventy-five. You're sixty, or maybe 
sixty-one if it's later in the year than I think it is. And I'm 
thirty-eight, not fifty."

"Oh no, you've been dead for fifteen years," she replied, 
gazing at the fire with pupils that reflected hot orange. 
"You, Bill, Charlie, my daughters-in-law and my 
grandbabies-- all gone when the end came so long ago."

"But it's 2001, Mom," I almost whimpered...whispered 
instead.

My mother looked at me again, grinning. I noticed that 
she'd lost two of her lower front teeth. The rest looked 
worn and yellow. "Don't be silly, Dana. It's 2015."


I bundled up and made my way down to Edge-of-Field. 
The sun was pale and far away; the air was charged with 
cold. Walt said the obelisk's underside had dilated and my 
mother was expelled in a flush of viscous liquid, then 
Zippy settled on the ground, whirring like an asthmatic 
while Walt buttoned Mom into his coat and carried her up 
the hill. The physical evidence confirmed his statement and 
told me more. Zippy had lain in the snow, leaking ooze, 
long after Walt had gone.

I stared at the huge green stain, seeing it for what it was: 
afterbirth. I imagined myself inside the obelisk, and Walter, 
too. Both of us had made a journey in that thing, with no 
more memory of it than our fetal gestation.... Mulder once 
confided in me that he had prebirth memories. In return, I'd 
given him a patronizing half-smile that conveyed he was 
nuts and that I stayed with him only on sufferance. As my 
unblinking eyes burned from the cold, I suddenly felt sure 
that Mulder really did remember the womb, that every 
crazy thing he'd ever said was true, including his last words 
to me: "Scully, I will see you again soon."


****


My mother's eyes sparkled when she looked at Lilly. It was 
wonderful to watch her coo at and cuddle my cranky little 
freakazoid. Lilly was calmer, too, her angst displaced into 
motion, especially rubbing her feet together ("cricket feet," 
Mom called it), and exploration-- grabbing anything in 
range for a quick trip into her mouth. My hair and collars 
were perpetually wet with slobber.

While she doted on her grandchild, Walt and I could more 
easily perform the constant, necessary work of the farm. 
The tensions between us eased, and our roots twisted 
together more tightly. Walter was such a good man. Each 
morning, I awoke beside him happy.... No...almost happy. I 
wanted Mulder on my opposite side. I needed, craved, all-
but-tasted something that society did not yet forebear. Then 
again, society no longer existed.


The obelisk had disappeared after it brought my mother. 
When we finally did see Zippy, it dawdled near the tree 
line, across the snowy fields, unwilling to come closer or to 
be approached.

The bitter cold lasted far, far longer than I'd expected. Just 
when I wondered if we were living in a nuclear winter, 
spring and all its verdure arrived in the course of forty-eight 
hours.

"This is bizarre," said Walt, as he stood outside in his 
shirtsleeves, starring down at wild flowers and new green 
grass that had sprouted as the snow rapidly withdrew. The 
warm air smelled of fertile earth. I could hear the river, fat 
with run-off, rushing along its banks. "I swear I can see 
these plants growing."

"I can, too. I think you'd better skip any more 
reconnaissances until we get the crops and a garden 
planted." I leaned against the one of porch roof's vertical 
supports and crossed my arms on my chest. The light, 
sweet wind flapped my long skirt against my legs and 
rustled my hair.

Walter looked up at the sunny sky and hoisted a suspender 
that had slipped off his shoulder. He frowned. "I grew up in 
the Midwest, but I really don't know much about 
agriculture. I never meant to be a farmer and I had older 
brothers to help, so nobody forced me into it."

"Well," I said cheerfully, "we've got a horse and a plow. 
We hook up the horse behind the plow and make a furrow, 
then drop in some seeds, right? Nothing to it."

He smiled at me and I looked down, suddenly embarrassed 
at my hopefulness. "Those fields are steep and rocky. It's 
going to be backbreaking work for just the two of us."
 
When I looked up again, Walt shrugged, resigned. "Well, 
we'll just do whatever we have to do."

"Yeah."

"Parents always say that one day their kids'll regret not 
listening to them-- I guess this is my day. Do you think 
Lilly will ever feel this way?" He was really asking me if I 
thought Lilly would live to see that day, but I wasn't going 
there.

"If she does, wild horses won't drag an admission from 
her."

"You're right. She's as stubborn as Mulder."

"Lilly looks even more like him now, since her eyes have 
turned black. I know Mulder had hazel eyes, but I 
remember them as dark. His eyes were always so dilated, 
so-- I don't know-- hungry." Impelled by the memory, I 
expressed to Walt what had been a forbidden hope. "I want 
to see Mulder's eyes when he holds Lilly for the first time."

There was a long pause as Walt's squint widened into the 
openness of surprised understanding. "Dana, Mulder is 
dead."

"We don't know that."

He walked to the porch steps, but didn't climb to my level. 
"All right. _In all probability_ Mulder is dead, and has been 
dead for a while."

I shook my head. "No. We never knew for sure."

"We found all the other abductees. You know that I think 
we would have eventually found his body if the Da'an 
hadn't come." Walt stopped and sighed. "So let me guess: 
you're going to ask the obelisk to bring him here. Is that 
it?"

Until then I'd just played with the thought, but.... 
"Well...yeah, I'm going to," I told Walt, lifting my chin, 
daring him to piss on my decision.

He gave me a long look then shrugged like he was twisting 
inside his skin. "You know that I loved Mulder, too. I-- I 
just don't want trouble with-- with the powers that be, 
whatever the fuck they are. And I don't want you hurt. 
Jesus, Dana, what if the obelisk dumps Mulder's body in 
Edge-of-Field? Have you thought of that?"

My breath caught. God. I hadn't. Seeing Mulder dead was 
my Room 101. I'd told Walt so through choking tears when 
we'd found the first male abductee dumped in the lush 
northwestern woods. The man was partly decomposed, 
with ivory bones showing through tears in his mummified 
flesh. I'd sobbed that I couldn't take finding Mulder like 
that. He was so handsome. I loved his body so. Just screw 
the natural order: it would be an abomination for beauty 
like Mulder's to corrupt. 

But if I did see Mulder dead-- either in decay or as a 
sleeping beauty-- I'd have to finally let him go. I could love 
Walter completely, without longing for more. "If the 
obelisk brings Mulder's body," I finally answered, "we can 
give him a loving burial. We can keep his spirit in our 
hearts and move on."

Walt gave me another searching look and finally nodded. 
"All right. Just ask Zippy for some field hands while you're 
at it."

I smiled and bent to kiss his smooth scalp. "Okay, Walt. I 
will."


Walter and I stuffed a hay tick to replace the feather bed 
that Mom now slept on in the parlor and moved into the 
upstairs bedroom. Lilly sojourned at night with whomever 
she felt fondest. At night, with fresh breezes wafting 
through open windows, Walt and I kissed and snuggled our 
child. When she preferred my mother's company, he and I 
made love to the sound of frogs who lived along the river 
and the whistling mating calls of ground hogs whose 
burrows pitted our fields.

It was during one of these delirious, delicious poundings-- 
Walt inside me, hammering my sweet spot until everything 
turned blue and I saw flashes of light-- when Zippy passed 
by our window, its form momentarily blocking the light-
giving moon.

Walter groaned as I scrambled off him and fumbled for my 
nightgown, then pounded down the narrow, twisting 
staircase with his semen and my own fluids slicking my 
inner thighs. I caught Zippy ovipositing in the side yard 
under the big tree. The obelisk came down low and birthed 
a load of odd-shaped objects. While they were gently 
thumping onto the ground, I heard a marked increase in 
Zippy's respiration-- although I'm not entirely sure that's 
what the "wheezing" really was. There was no 
accompanying discharge. Apparently, only humans needed 
to be transported in a fluid-filled ovisack.

When the obelisk was finished, it hung there, many shades 
darker than the bright moonlit night, seeming to recoup its 
strength. "Thank you for what you've brought," I told it 
softly. The obelisk jerked in apparent surprise and rotated 
so that its long proboscis faced me. "Thank you for 
everything," I continued. "For Walter, my mom, the farm. 
You've given us all a new life. I don't understand why 
you've done it, but I do thank you."

Zippy made a little trill, like Milk Puss when she was sated 
with kneading and ready to sleep. Don't get complacent yet, 
I mentally told it as I moved closer, creeping beneath the 
branches of the oak. The damp moss that grew there 
squished under my feet. I was so close that if I reached out 
I could touch the obelisk. "I need you to help me again," I 
said. "We need more help to run this farm. There's one 
person who could help a lot. You knew about Walt and my 
mom, so you must know about him, too. His name is Fox 
Mulder. If you bring him here, we'll be okay."

Zippy's wheeze transmuted into a rattle. "We need him. Fox 
Mulder," I stressed the name as the obelisk backed out from 
under the tree. Momentarily, it floated, the silver moonlight 
glinting off its hull like two slanted-triangle eyes. When it 
rose straight up and sped away, I prayed it had gone in 
search of the friend and lover I longed for.


It wasn't long afterward that Walt and I paused in our labor 
to watch a flock of obelisks flying in V-formation like 
geese, high up, and heading east. "I'll bet they're bringing 
more people," Walt said quietly.

"Yeah," I agreed.

"When we finish planting the corn, I'll ride out."

"Okay."

Would Mulder be one of the newcomers? Neither of us 
wondered it aloud, but the hope was in our bellies. Mine 
tingled 'til I shook. 


I burped Lilly and laid her on a folded blanket at my feet, 
then sat back in the rocking chair. Walt had been gone two 
days. As I fumbled with the small shell buttons on my shirt 
I told myself that it wasn't as if he was searching by air or 
in a four-wheel drive. There were forests to wend through 
and perhaps streams or a river to cross. Walt's socks were 
doubtlessly wet; he was saddle sore, branch whipped, and 
only a few dozen miles from home.

The cat rubbed against my shins and Lilly pushed herself 
up on her elbows, cooing. Her eyes glittered with her 
father's intense curiosity and milky saliva glistened on her 
chin as she reached out to capture Milk Puss's tail. But the 
cat merely twitched it away and Lilly, unable to support 
herself with one arm, sank forward on her face. I was 
laughing when my mother called to me from the front 
porch. I picked up the baby and went outside, found Mom 
sitting on the steps in the velvet balm of night below a 
panorama of stars.

"Dana, where is the Big Dipper?"

I passed Lilly to her and then scanned the sky, feeling a 
coldness creep through my veins. "I don't see it, but there's 
so many more stars out here without any city lights." My 
eyes strained while my brain tried to find the familiar shape 
in the cold, pinpricked blackness. "I-- I can't find it right 
now."

"Have you seen it before?" my mother asked.

"Before...since I've been here?... No, but I-- stargazing 
hasn't really been a priority." In truth, I hadn't looked up 
since the spacecraft came. I was afraid of the night sky.

Mom made a fretting cluck, kissed the top of Lilly's head. 
"Where's Orion's Belt?"

I searched the wide expanse. "I don't see it."

"How about Cassiopeia?"

I couldn't find it, either. "Oh my god," I whispered as I 
suddenly understood.

"Dana, I'm frightened," My mother's voice cracked. "Where 
are we?"

I sank down beside her, close against her warmth. I couldn't 
answer. I didn't know. The more I studied the heavens, the 
more anomalies I saw-- clusters and configurations not only 
foreign to Ohio or Illinois, where I'd thought we might be, 
but to the southern hemisphere of Earth as well.


****


Walt returned to Ollie Hill in an old army jeep. It pulled up 
slowly, circumnavigating ruts and sheds and vegetable 
gardens, with our horse trotting along behind, tied to the 
bumper by a long lead.

Walter wasn't alone. A stranger was behind the wheel. The 
man was dressed in worn fatigues, the brim of a slouch hat 
shielding his eyes. Both his hair and his beard were long. 
The two of them climbed from the jeep and came toward 
me, burbling, "...The damnedest thing. There's a road that 
wasn't there before. It starts just over the hill--"

"It leads straight to Mobyville."

"There's hundreds of people there!"

"God, can't believe I'm seeing you again!"

"Can you believe it's him?"

"...Look good. Lucky you got picked up early. Hey, can I 
give you a hug, Agent Scully?"

My eyes narrowed as I studied the ragged man with the 
warm smile and outstretched arms. My heart pounded when 
I recognized him. "Agent Doggett."

"It's me all right," Doggett laughed. "But will you please 
just call me John?"

Doggett and I were made partners by the FBI after the 
Da'an took Mulder. Bureau partnerships weren't supposed 
to be arranged marriages, but I was "Agent Scully," a 
euphemism for "The Widow Mulder," and he was "Agent 
Doggett," the suitor whom I'd locked out of my confidence 
and refused to befriend to protect my battered heart. My 
lower lip trembled as I acknowledged my sin. 

Doggett clucked and hurried to embrace me, to try to 
connect with me on this new world, just as he had done 
when we were partnered on the old. "Agent Scully, don't 
cry.... I'm sorry I'm not Mulder. Walter said you were 
hoping for him."

"Have you seen him?" I hated myself for asking, for 
sounding fucking desperate. 

Doggett said no, but added quickly, "The guardians-- those 
flying black things-- they're bringing more people all the 
time."

I looked into Doggett's cold blue eyes that were nonetheless 
gentle and tried to smile. I managed a thin stretch of my 
lips. "I'm glad you're here."

"Walter says you need some help on the farm."

"We do."

I felt Walt's big hand on my shoulder, his warmth against 
my back. "If we're going to get any work out of him, John 
needs a few good meals."

"Yeah. I do," Doggett agreed. "Things got lean before I was 
captured.... Hey, where's this miracle who ought to be 
about two but was just born last winter?"

"John says that he was captured in 2003," Walt explained.

"Oh." I nodded as if that made sense. None of it did. I'd 
given up trying to understand it. "You want to see Calla 
Lilly?" 

"God yes." Doggett chuckled. "Walt never shut up about 
her and your mom. I'd like to meet her, too."


Within a few hours, and with the aid of hot water, soap, 
scissors, and a razor, Doggett was transformed. As he sat 
on the porch steps dangling Lilly from his knee, the 
afternoon sun revealed the deep lines at the corners of his 
mouth and eyes and the gray at his temples. But Walt had 
given him a clean muslin shirt, and if I squinted, pretending 
it was of starched and pressed cotton, Doggett again 
appeared the G-man I'd known.

"Ya liketa bounce on Uncle Johnny's knee? Huh? Do ya?" 
He jiggled his leg. Lilly hiccuped a laugh. My mother sat 
behind them, smiling at the glee of her glittery-eyed, wild-
haired, toothless granddaughter. Her rocker glided back and 
forth, making comfortable-sounding squeaks. Walt and I 
watched our newly expanded family from the emerald 
green yard. Exuding content, he gathered me in tight. I 
rested my cheek against his broad, hard chest. He smelled 
like sweat and leather and mildewed clothes and something 
else-- something quintessentially him. It seemed right-- was 
it all real?

"This shouldn't be happening."

"Hmmm...what?"

"You, me, mom, Doggett.... It was the end of humanity and 
we all happen to survive and end up here? What are the 
odds?"

Walt caressed my cheek with a work-roughened palm. "If 
you're setting yourself up for a big angstfest, don't. This is 
not too good to be true." His tone was a familiar mix of 
sternness and love. "I'm real. John is real. Your mom is 
real. Maybe we're in the Twilight Zone; maybe we're in 
Heaven, but wherever we are, this is happening to all of 
us."

"Who do you think will turn up next-- Alex Krycek? Tina?"

'You're not going to say Mulder's name and neither am I,' I 
read in Walt's eyes. "I'm waiting for Alvin Kersh," he said 
dryly. "I love him."

I sneered and pushed away, walked toward Doggett, who 
was holding Lilly out with a bewildered expression. She 
had started to cry. "It's okay, John," I reassured with a 
smile. "She's just yelling for the boob.... C'mere, poor old 
Number Six."


Later, as Walt, Doggett, and I sat on the porch in the 
twilight, I learned that the new "town" was a tent city, 
supplied with only the essentials. By comparison, Ollie Hill 
was swank. "I don't get this old-fashioned bit," Doggett 
commented, then paused to sip beer from a thick old 
brown-glass bottle. "Down at Mobyville it's all army 
surplus. This-- this is like some wacked-out period piece. 
Good brew, though."

"We call it 'Zippyweiser.'" Walt admired his own bottle. 
"Sounds like we may have a rogue obelisk," he opined. 

"Yeah. One who's seen too many reruns of 'The Waltons' 
and 'Little House on the Prairie,'" Doggett replied. 
"Mobyville's guardians must have been watching 'MASH.'"

The men laughed, but John's comment made me wonder. 
"Do you think the obelisks literally have seen the reruns, or 
do you think they're providing what those people are used 
to? The rebels were paramilitary; the people in the town are 
mostly captured rebels. Maybe the obelisks think a 
paramilitary environment is what those humans want."

Walt took a hit off his beer, swallowed loudly. "You know, 
Dana," he said, "that begs the question of whether Zippy 
thinks this is what you want."

"What _I_ want? I didn't ask for this." I looked toward the 
tree line-- an unfurled dark purple ribbon in the growing 
night. Was the obelisk hiding in those murky woods? 
Zippy'd done everything by stealth since I'd requested 
Mulder. "I've told the obelisk exactly what I want."


I laid in wait for Zippy, finally, catching it during a 
predawn drop-off. I spoke to the obelisk quietly, baiting it 
with a request for materials to build an addition on the 
house and another fireplace stack so that we could heat the 
upstairs. I sandwiched my demand for Mulder between 
requests for antibiotics-- even though they weren't 'period'-- 
and more clothes for Doggett. Zippy tossed its proboscis 
and departed.

The next morning, we awoke to find that all the rooms in 
the house had fireplaces. There were also two more 
bedrooms, an attic, a cellar, and a second parlor decked out 
in mahogany and crimson upholstered furniture, 
antimacassars, and potted plants. Mom and I stood barefoot 
on the Turkish carpet and gaped at the ornately framed 
charcoal portrait of my father above the mantel. Drawings 
of my sister Melissa and of Tina Hill hung from a picture 
rail on the opposing wall. In the portraits, these twentieth-
century sitters were dressed as though it was the 1860s.

The front yard was an altar to our possible needs. Walter, 
Doggett, Mom, and I went outside in our nightclothes, 
sipping coffee, to inspect the offerings.

"God damn," Doggett proclaimed, "I'm asking Zippy for a 
Porsche!"

Walt grinned and shook his head. "Don't bother. You'll just 
end up with a Model T."


John, Walter, and I watched from an upstairs window as 
Zippy labored in the moonlit yard. It was leaving us seeds 
or whiskey or cloth or a goat, maybe. Whatever the gifts, 
they would be unrequested. I'd told it repeatedly that we 
only needed Mulder.

Zippy's wheezing had changed during the past week into a 
loud arrhythmic vibration punctuated by clinks and pings. 
"I'm waiting for its curly springs to pop out," Doggett 
smirked.

Walt provided a deadpan "boing."

"I just don't get why it's stressing itself so bad."

I crossed my arms on my chest and dropped my chin. Walt slipped
an arm around my shoulders. "Oh, there's a reason."
he told Doggett.

John turned toward us, became backlit with a moonlight 
halo. I frowned and bit on my lip, shrugged under the 
weight of Walter's arm and of his unspoken accusation. 
"One of you mind letting me in on it?"

"It's personal," I scantly refrained from snapping. The same 
slim margin allowed me not to finish with "Agent 
Doggett."

John heard me use the 'A word' anyway. His voice was 
stone covering hurt when he said it was too fucking late to 
go back to the Bureau. "I thought you said I was part of this 
family now."

Walt assured him, "You are."

"You are." I echoed quietly, looking down at the silver-
touched floorboards. 

"So?" Doggett demanded.

I confessed after a squirmish pause. "I asked Zippy to bring 
Mulder."

"And the obelisk can't do it," Walt appended with too much 
implied I-told-you-so.

I shrugged out of his embrace. "We don't know that," I 
contradicted him. I had to. "We don't know that at all. And 
there's evidence to the contrary."

Walter raised an eyebrow. "There is?"

"Yes. There's no portrait of Mulder in the new parlor, only 
of people we know are dead, so I still have hope, even if 
you don't. I'm going to bed now. Goodnight."

As I walked away, I heard Walt murmur, "She's denial in 
action."


****


Zippy hung low in Edge-of-Field. I cocked my head as I 
listened to the strange aeolian tones drifting up the hill. My 
mother stood beside me on the porch. "What's it doing, 
Dana?"

"I don't know." I shook my head.

Curiosity finally drove my legs beneath swishing skirts that 
sent crickets leaping from the tall grass stalks. Birds chased 
after me then soared ahead like the obelisk's kin. Their 
screams made me shiver as I gathered pace.

As I drew closer, I saw that the obelisk wasn't hovering. It 
lay on its underside with its nose pointed toward the 
afternoon sun like a compass seeking true west-- perhaps 
the west of my ancestors who identified the direction with 
the land of the dead. "Oh god, oh god," I prayed aloud as 
dread possessed me.

Despite the bright light, the top of the obelisk's obsidian 
hull was clouded by condensation that trickled down its 
sides to drip upon the ground. The odor was putrid. I 
covered my nose and mouth with my hand as tears welled 
in my eyes. The obelisk's perspiration stung, but in truth I was 
about to weep for a sudden surprised recognition of 
attachment and impending loss. My benefactor was dying.

For the first time, I wondered if we could survive without 
the obelisk. If Zippy died, would Ollie Hill vanish, leaving 
us on a dust-bowl planet, light years from Earth? Or what if 
Lilly and I were left alone in such a place-- if Walt, John, 
and Mom were gifts also reclaimed by the obelisk's 
demise?

"Don't die." The tears ran down my face. Zippy seemed to 
answer with an ear-splitting A-minor that made me wince. 
When the note faded, I reached out to touch Zippy's hull, 
saying, "I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry. I should never have 
asked for Muld--uh!" I jumped back without making 
contact as the obelisk's proboscis lifted a foot or so, then 
sharply dropped. I felt the impact reverberate deep in my 
chest. "God!"

When Zippy had lain still for a moment, I hooked a tousled 
lock of my hair behind one ear, took a trembling breath, 
and began my apology again. I owed it to my caretaker and 
to my immortal soul to speak my sins and my sorrow aloud. 
I told Zippy I didn't know why it had chosen to provide for 
me out of all the humans once of the Earth, but no matter 
the reason, I'd always been grateful, even if my exterior 
seemed cold. "You gave me so much and I-- I've taken 
advantage of you and I don't know how to save you," I 
wept. "Just know that it's okay that you couldn't bring me 
Mulder--"

It lifted its nose and brought it down again,
assaulting me with another ear-splitting note that made my 
eyes roll up and my inner ears pulse.

Mulder...twice...I said his name and it jumped, I thought 
through the dizziness. "Mulder," I said aloud and was 
rewarded by another ground-shaking thud.

"Mulder!" I shouted the name this time. I was shivering 
with adrenaline. Zippy's proboscis rose up and slammed 
down, then it sang again, making me clutch at my aching 
ears. "Wh-what are you trying to tell me?"

It lay still on ground that was saturated with its foul 
secretions. At last, I placed an unsteady hand on the 
obelisk. I'd expected the feel of steel, not the springy 
wetsuit texture of the dolphins I'd touched once at Sea 
World. And not the heat of fever. My mouth gaped in 
astonishment. Epidermis, not hull. I'd known the obelisk 
was biomechanical, but now I discerned that it was actually 
more biological than mechanical. The subtle implications 
mixed with heat of the obelisk's febrile skin. The full 
conscious comprehension seemed to hang like haze in my 
brain's periphery, then in an eternal moment congealed 
front and center. 

I whipped around and ran uphill, screaming for Walter and 
John. My skirts tripped me but I hauled them up above my 
knees and kept running.

"Walt! Doggett!"

When the men appeared from the direction of the barn, I 
shouted for them to get knives and axes. They looked at 
other in confusion. My mother hurried out on the porch and 
I yelled at her to get out the medicines-- everything we had 
because I didn't know I'd need-- and blankets and bandages. 
"And boil hot water!"

"Dana, what they hell is going on?" John tried to take my 
arm, but I snatched it away.

"We don't have time! It's Mulder! Goddamn it-- Zippy is 
Mulder!"


It was gruesome work, like butchering a whale. We broke 
apart bioplastic cartilage and metallic bones, carved 
through white, stinking meat, severed rubbery tubing, and 
tore out strange hematite organs to reach the heart of the 
carcass. There we discovered a thick-walled sack perhaps 
five feet tall and four feet across. When we slashed it open, 
a flood of pale green slush spilled out onto us. Stunned and 
shivering, Walt, John, and I watched as the sack deflated, 
settling around an inner object. As the skin further 
contracted, the tip of a nose and chin, sunken hollows of 
eyes, the curve of shoulders, and the points of bent knees 
and knuckles became apparent.

We tore away the membrane to finally reach my partner. 
His bare skin was cold blue. He sat in a chair that seemed 
hewn from dark gray stone, metal spikes laterally piercing 
his ankles and wrists-- their purpose, apparently, was to 
serve as restraints. Tubes perforated his side, chest, and 
stomach, and what looked like an alien chastity belt 
imprisoned his hips. Mulder's head was locked in a metal 
clamp from which six huge syringes, three on each side, 
had punctured his cheeks then pulled back, stretching his 
skin out like sails. He was a fish caught on a party line, a 
crucified Christ, Dr. Frankenstein's weirdest experiment.

Horrified though I was, I had to smile at my partner's 
expression. It was pure Mulder. His lips were compressed 
into a flat line that signaled ornery acceptance. "All right, 
you've got me," I imaged him telling his captors, "but you 
just fucking wait 'til I get off this lounge chair." I wanted to 
kiss that chilled, petulant mouth, but instead I reached 
down and ripped out his stomach tube, leaving behind a 
purple hole that slowly dribbled deep red.

"Dana, do you know what you're doing?" Doggett asked. I 
could feel him behind me, shivering.

Did I? No. I wasn't thinking; I was action, like a dervish or 
a drill, or Kali Ma who strikes down obstacles with 
relentless forward thrusts. I grabbed the tube that ran into 
Mulder's side and yanked. It didn't budge. I dug in my heels 
and used my weight against it, staggering backward when it 
gave, holding the blood-sticky pipe up like Excalibur. 
"John, tell Mom to build a fire and make a pallet by the 
hearth and to prepare and sterilize everything I'll need for 
suturing. Come back with blankets."

"Dana--"

"Go!" I screamed at him.

He went.

I wiped fallen hair back from my face and ordered Walt to 
pull out the crucifying spikes while I extracted the chest 
tube. Walt struggled, unable to dislodge the skewers from 
their anchor points. He looked to me questioningly. 
"Whack them with the axe," I said. 

Behind the flesh-and fluid-flecked lenses of his wire rims, 
Walter's eyes grew big. "But I could miss. And even if I 
don't, I could break his limbs."

"You won't miss. We can set broken bones."

"But--"

"Just do it or he won't survive! He's not breathing!"

Walt picked up the axe John had left, hefted its weight as 
he gauged distance and force, then brought it down where 
the spike joined the chair on the outside of Mulder's right 
wrist. The impact snapped the metal and bent the spike, 
twisting Mulder's arm down and rotating his palm outward. 
"God, I'm so sorry, buddy." Walter's forehead was deeply 
furrowed as he studied Mulder's unchanged expression.

"He didn't feel it. Now slide the spike out and do the rest."

Walter glared, no doubt wishing me my own moment of 
hell. It came when I realized that the syringes piercing 
Mulder's cheeks ended in a large barb. There was no way to 
quickly remove them without adding to the scars he'd bear. 
I had no choice but to rip the needles out, to wince and 
want to weep at the little pieces of flesh that adhered to the 
hooks.

When we unlocked the gray metal girdle, we found 
Mulder's genitals pale and shriveled, and another hose 
that ran from the chair's seat was pushed through his anus into 
his rectum. Walt slipped his arms beneath Mulder's armpits 
and lifted him. He must have expected that after a short 
length the end would appear. When it didn't happen, Walt 
snarled, 'Dana, get that thing out of him!' He viewed the 
tube as a rape object, not a waste removal spout. I eased the 
pipe from Mulder's digestive tract and out of his rectum as 
Walt looked away. "Is it done?" he demanded through 
clenched teeth.

"Yeah." I let the tube fall.

Walt took a deep breath and hoisted Mulder fully into his 
arms. When Doggett sprinted down to us just seconds later 
we quickly spread out the quilts he'd brought. Walter laid 
Mulder down upon them carefully, but I wasn't gentle as I 
pried open my partner's stiff jaw, forced his head back, 
pinched his nose, and placed my mouth on his. 

Wake up, Sleeping Beauty, I thought as I tried to inflate his 
lungs with my breath. His chest didn't rise. I retilted his 
head and tried again. I still couldn't get air down his 
windpipe. "Blocked airway...blocked airway," I muttered as 
I plunged my fingers past ice-cube teeth and an ice-block 
tongue, down below his cold-lump tonsils. When I touched 
the obstruction, a line of electricity shot straight up my arm. 
My muscles jerked. "God!" 

"What is it?" Walt demanded.

"I don't know...I...." Now I had my fingers around the 
foreign thing's edges despite the current it emitted. I had it 
now; the thing keeping Mulder from breathing was in my 
grasp.

The object I withdrew was shaped like a river pebble, 
absolutely black save for little lights, glimmers.... An odor 
like a doused fire arose from Mulder's open mouth. The tips 
of my fingers and my palm had turned red; white blisters 
formed as I watched, but I felt no pain. My head cocked as 
my eyes and mind were drawn by the twinkle of the silver 
dots in velvet darkness. 

The universe tilted when the thing was slapped from my 
hand. For a moment I was flying, too, then I was back in 
my body, my gut twisting. I turned away from Mulder to 
retch on the grass. Walt's hands gripped my shoulders, his 
voice said something ... something.... 


When a person loses consciousness, hearing is the last 
sense to go, so it should be the first to resurrect. But it's not. 
Pain returns before anything else, along with the hazy 
rebirth of identity.

Finally, I could hear my moans and the footsteps they'd 
summoned. Walter's scent reignited my sense of smell. His 
weight dipped the mattress, tipping me against him. I 
opened my eyes and winced into a beam of sunshine falling 
through the window. Walt cupped my chin, turned my gaze 
toward the shade and his weary face.

I tried to swallow the dustball in my throat. "Mulder?" It 
didn't actually sound like Mulder, but Walt understood me. 

"He's downstairs."

"Heesokay?"

"Mulder's getting better. Here, drink some water." They'd 
almost lost me, Walt explained as the liquid filled my 
mouth and my swallow threatened to turn into a spasm. He 
lightly touched my arm, drawing my attention from internal 
sensations to pale skin marred by red scabs, and to my 
mittened -- no-- my bandaged hand.

"Radiation burns." Walt frowned, looked down at the 
counterpane as he told me they'd had to amputate the tip of 
my forefinger. "I- we're so sorry, Dana. John and I--we...." 
he trailed off.

"S'okay," I whispered.

"Dana--"

"Nuh. S'okay." I stared at the white wrappings, feeling 
nothing at my loss. I'd done what was needed to save 
Mulder. In my mind I saw his blue skin and purple lips, his 
mouth gaping. Again, I smelled the odor of ashes. "The 
burned-out vacuum of space," I murmured.

Walter raised his head. "What?"

"An astronaut...on the radio."

"An astronaut?"

"Yeah." I shivered on exhale. "Heard'im interviewed long 
time'go. He said space smelled like that."

"Like a burned-out void?"

"Uh-huh."

Walter waited out a reasonable pause. When I added 
nothing, he lifted an eyebrow to prompt me. Tears had risen 
in my eyes, were barely retained by my lower lids. I could 
see light refractions shimmering like stars. "God Walt, I 
held a whole universe in my hand."


When I was well enough be carried downstairs in the wiry 
arms of Doggett, I found Mulder lying in my mother's bed 
with our daughter sitting on his chest.

Mulder was wan; each cheek was marked with blood-black 
scabs, but he was alert and focused on Lilly. His hands 
hovered, ready to catch her if she toppled. To my relief, I 
saw the dressings on his crucified wrists were stained with 
exudate, but no suppuration. I itched to examine the rest of 
him.

Mulder paid no attention as John settled me on the bedside 
chair, then without looking away from the baby said, 
"Scully, I'd like you to meet my daughter. Her name is 
Calla Lilly. Nice name, but she can't fly."

"He's crazier than a Jay Bird," Doggett leaned down to 
whisper. When I tensed, he quickly amended, "But don't 
worry, he's getting better. Skinner says he's more like his 
old self every day."

"Oh. Okay." I managed a weak smile. "Good."

Doggett straightened and said in a loud bemused voice 
reminiscent of a nursing home attendant, "I told you babies 
don't fly, Mulder. Only pigs do that." Then he spoke softly 
to me again, "Your ma and I are in the kitchen if you need 
us."

Mulder scowled as John retreated. "He's not part of your 
happy ending."

My eyebrows lifted. "My what...? Mulder...?" He stared 
resolutely at Lilly, who'd jammed her fist in her mouth like 
a cork. "Mulder?"

"You said I'd go into hypovolemic shock if I lost my 
cellphone."

"What?"

His full lips unexpectedly pulled back into a toothy grin 
and he cooed to Lilly, "And she lived happily ever after."

I leaned forward to stroke Mulder's cheek. The scabs felt 
nubbly and hard but his undamaged skin was supple. "You 
did this for me? So that I'd have the life you wanted for 
me?"

His pupils slid left to peer at me stealthily. "Yes. But I did 
not shift that person."

"But I thought-- the farm work...."

"The transmission was delayed."

When he offered me nothing further, I sighed. "How in the 
world did you do this? I mean, could you actually prioritize 
my welfare? Didn't the Da'an control you?"
 
"I already don't remember." Mulder's lips trembled. He 
pinched them together and finally looked at me full on and 
with remorse. "I'm sorry, Scully."

"Oh, Mulder." I petted his dark brown hair.

"I can't help like that anymore."

"It's okay, sweetie. We can help ourselves now. I think 
we'll be just fine."



As Mulder adjusted to the loss of his superpowers, I 
learned to live with my handicap. I'd suffered second- and 
third-degree burns. The radiation not only irrevocably 
charred one fingertip and left most of the others numb from 
nerve damage, but also caused scars that greatly reduced 
my range of motion. As the nobility of self-sacrifice faded, 
I bawled on Walt, on Mom, even on Doggett, who treated 
the moment like a miracle, rubbing my back as we stood, 
slowly swaying in the yard.

When I had cried myself out, John thanked me for privilege 
of snotting up his shirt. "I always wanted to be your friend. 
I know-- I know I'm not Mulder or Skinner, but--"

"You don't need to be. And you are my friend."

He gave me a wry grin. "Even though I cut your finger 
off?" 

I shrugged. "Call it Karma for cutting you out of my 
confidence when we were partners."

"Karma, huh? And I thought you were Catholic."

I smiled wistfully. "I am...or I was. Do you think people 
will resurrect the Catholic Church here?"

"Wherever here is."

"Well, wherever we are, and old religion or new, it's 
home."


****

To catch up with the present, Walter, Mulder, and I became 
life partners. In the past, during our Bureau days, Mulder 
often didn't tell me things-- important things like he was 
bisexual and had been in love with Walt for years. In fact, 
back on Earth, he'd wanted what we now have, but was 
afraid it would never work. On the old planet, before the 
invasion, it probably couldn't have, but here we've bonded 
and thrived.

My two husbands and I have lived together at Ollie Hill for 
many years; exactly how many I cannot say, because-- as I 
wrote earlier-- it no longer matters.

Our new planet's drawn-out orbit, or exposure to proximate 
Venusian gamma rays or whatever the voodoo is, extends 
the human lifetime perhaps indefinitely. We adults did not 
age while Lilly grew into a broad-shouldered, six-foot 
Amazon like her biological mother. With her thigh-length 
sheet of black hair, from behind she looks so much like 
Tina Hill that my heart often aches. But when Lilly turns, 
she's Mulder's child. She has his eyes, lips, and smile. She 
has his wiles and reckless determination, too. Her teenage 
years were the first circle of hell.

Lilly aged normally until her mid-twenties then suffered a 
near-fatal fever. Afterward, she was in stasis like the rest of 
us. Just as Lilly was the first child born here, she was also 
the first to experience Fixative Fever, or Regenerative 
Fever, as John says it's called in other Cantons.

John frequently travels, visiting the major settlements of all 
the Cantons. He's our liaison with the rest of transplanted 
humanity, and our broker, trading Ollie Hill's crops for 
everything else we need and recruiting field hands for the 
planting and harvest seasons.

Walt, Mulder, Mom, and Lilly usually accompany John to 
local market days. When the bartering is done, the men and 
Lilly drink beer in a public house or take in a football 
game. My mother shops and eats a meal with an older lady 
she met up with who used to be in her tribe.

Occasionally, Mulder and Doggett join the Mobyville 
Martians baseball team for a season. When they do, the 
games take them all around the region. They've even 
played in the New World Series where the Martians took 
home the pennant. For her part, Lilly excels at basketball. 
She used to let her father coach her, but now says she'd 
rather be strangled than let Mulder sit anywhere closer than 
the top row of bleachers during a game. I hear about all 
their victories and defeats when they return home, for as I 
said, I seldom leave. 

On one of his trips to the neighboring Canton's capital, 
Doggett met a woman named Manjushri. After his third 
visit, she returned to Ollie Hill with him. We built them a 
house of their own next to ours in which they have thus far 
raised three children to adults and are now in the early 
years of their second set of two.

Walter, once one of the United States' chief law 
enforcement officers, later a farmer, began yet another 
career as a master carpenter. His furniture is highly prized 
and commissions are nearly constant. During one lull, Walt 
built us a big, comfortable swing and hung it from a strong 
limb of the big oak. In good weather, when the day's labors 
are done, we lounge against the smooth wood and each 
other to take in the sunset.

On one of the last temperate days of autumn, not long after 
I began these reminiscences, Mulder and I sat in the swing 
under the nearly denuded oak, discussing what I had 
planned to include and exclude. I'm a very private person, 
and Mulder, with characteristic over-earnestness, was 
pushing me to write about events and emotions I felt 
uncomfortable revealing. I told him he should go write his 
own memoirs for public consumption.

"What exactly would I write about, Scully? The fat hairy 
nothing that I remember? I can't explain why these people were 
chosen over others, or how they were brought here. I can't 
tell them if the Da'an are evil or good. I don't even 
remember being abducted." Mulder smiled wistfully and 
twisted my heart.

I stroked his cheek, let my fingers trail down over the white 
faded scars to trace his full lips. He caught my hand and 
kissed my palm. I didn't feel it. The scars there are too 
thick. Mulder laid my hand on his thigh and contemplated 
the abrupt stub of my forefinger. "If I was still Zippy, I 
might have been able to heal this."

"Mulder," I said gently, "every time something goes 
wrong, you say you could have made it all better if you 
were an obelisk. But that's not true."

"It's true that you don't have a guardian any longer because 
I'm not it."

"I'd rather have your help as a free human than magical 
help from the slave they made you."

Mulder's brow furrowed. "I don't know that I was a slave, 
Scully. I wish I knew for sure how I ended up an obelisk. 
Maybe I wasn't forced to become one-- maybe I volunteered."

I wondered how long it would be until Mulder forgot about 
his missing time, the way that an immortal man I once 
investigated forgot his wife's name after a hundred 
years...what was that man's name? Huh, I thought, I've 
forgotten. If I hadn't found Mulder, would his name be lost 
to me now, too?

"Help! Help meeeeee!"

We both turned toward the cry. John's daughter Mishali ran 
toward us, sobbing. Mulder met her three-quarters of the 
way, bending to catch the little girl in his embrace. 
"Mishali, what's wrong?"

"A monster! Uncle Fox, a monster!"

I reached them smirking, but Mulder frowned at me and asked 
her softly, "Where?"

"In Edge-of-Field. He's naked and yucky!"

He and I looked at each other for a long empty beat and 
then we took off. When we were partners at the FBI, out on 
cases, it seemed like we were always chasing something. 
Mulder: the tall lean man sprinting ahead, and me: the 
small, short-legged woman determined to keep up.

Mulder was ahead of me now with his arms and legs 
pumping, while I held up my skirts and barreled forward, 
trying to cut the distance. It felt good race after him again. 
It was exhilarating. I shouted his name, not from concern, 
but from the certainty that he would answer.

I saw that Mulder was already on his knees beside the 
prone form in the field. "Scully!" he called over his 
shoulder, responding as expected, making me smile. I was 
breathing hard when I reached them. Mulder had stripped 
off his coat to cover the shivering, groggy man. When he 
turned to me again, he was grinning. "Scully, I think this is 
your long-delayed field hand."

My mouth fell open as I sank down into the dead grass, 
looking at slime-smeared face of Melvin Frohicke, one of 
our oldest friends.

"Better late than never, huh?" Mulder asked in obvious 
delight. "I guess I am still taking care of you, Scully." 
Frohike was trying to focus. Mulder used his shirt cuff to 
wipe some of the goop away from his eyes.

"M-mulder?"

"Hey, Melvin. I'm here."

"Where are we?"

"The Happy Ending, man. You're in Scully's Happy 
Ending."


FINIS

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