randomfoggytiger

[randomfoggytiger]

This is for @medicatedmaniac who asked for a Ficlet set in the Proof of Life Universe: “Proof of Life my beloved - maybe the leadup to the Pulitzer prize being awarded? Maybe the night of and their in their hotel room getting ready to go to the ceremony? Or they get a letter about being nominated in the mail and maybe have mixed feelings on the nomination?”

1. She gets caught as she stands on the threshold of the hotel room, déjà vu suddenly overlaying her vision like a slide into a projector. The window is in the same place. The desk. The carpet is the same, though cleaner. If she closed her eyes she would hear a spat of gunfire. She does not close her eyes.

“Scully?” says Mulder from behind her with a gentle hand on her upper back.

She has stayed in hotel rooms since being held hostage in Africa, but this one…this one has a layout so similar to the one in which she was held that her amygdala takes over her higher functions. For a moment. One moment. Then she swallows and forces herself to breathe again. Forces herself to calm.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Mulder whispers. He has come up more closely behind her, is looking over her shoulder into the room.

He is the only other person in the world who would get it, and does.

In a moment, the bags he was holding hit the floor and he brushes past her, marches into the room with purpose, directly to the desk, where he picks up the telephone receiver.

“I’m getting us a different room,” he says.

Scully swallows thickly and finally does close her eyes, breathing deeply through her nose. She does not hear gunfire. They are an ocean away from that place.

“Wait,” she says, then moves into the room herself. Stands in the center and takes a slow turn. Mulder, still standing at the desk, still holding the phone receiver in his hand, watches her.

She turns to him calmly, and, she thinks, with dignity.

“Before you call,” she says, “take my picture.”

“Take your-”

“Take my picture,” she says. “In front of the window.”

Mulder slowly lowers the phone. Glances at her. Glances at the window. She doesn’t have to explain what she means. He understands immediately.

“A journey of a thousand days,” he husks.

Scully nods. “The light,” she goes on, “is perfect.”

2. Africa again, but far east of the jungle mountains and lowlands besieged by war, they are now in the shadows of Kilimanjaro, the savannah stretching before them as paper unfurls from a scroll.

Scully is here for six months, the resident doctor in a rural hospital built and supplied by a Canadian charity. She treats diseases long dead in the First World west, urges the women to collect water from the new well six miles away rather than the river that is only two.

She has a local guide and contact who works for the charity, a lanky Maasai man who goes by the Christian name of James. He wears ropes of delicate and colorful beads and a lion's tooth on a cord around his neck. Under his red tunic he wears a white Hanes wifebeater and sandals made of old tires. He is missing a tooth on the side of his smile, which he is also always wearing.

“Good morning, Doctor,” he says in his friendly accent when she emerges from the clinic door to see if there is anyone waiting for treatment.

“Jambo!” Scully says at a volume and enthusiasm which makes her uncomfortable. She would rather a quiet hello and nod, but the culture she is living in necessitates jovial greetings at all times.

James is leaning against a post just beyond clinic porch and holding a spear which means he was likely out in the bush.

“Have you seen Mulder?” she asks.

“Yes,” he says. “He got a call. He asked me to come and get you.”

At this, Scully raises her eyes. Cell phone reception is spotty here at best. She hasn’t bothered to carry her phone with her in weeks. Mulder always has his out in the field, but the clinic is in a dead zone and there’s really no point.

James pulls his own cell phone out of a pouch that’s looped around his waist. He presses a button and hands it to her.

“Scully?” says a tinny voice punctuated by static. She puts the phone to her ear.

“Mulder?”

“Scully,” Mulder says. “Call Benjamin and Savato, tell them we have to leave early.” He explains his statement in a rush and Scully is dumbfounded when she silently hands the phone back to James.

He nods at her and steps back respectfully. When she’s halfway through the door of the clinic, she comes back to herself and spins around.

“James!” She calls out. “How does your phone work here?”

James smiles widely, showing the gap in his mouth.

“Magic,” he says.

3. The day is sullen; gray and without cheer. Outside the window, the rain comes down in a defenestrating assault.

In the bright doorway of the bathroom — they have a top floor suite — Mulder stands, struggling with the knot of a bow tie.

“Monkey suit,” he says, a little whiny.

Scully smiles and walks up to him, the silk sheath dress she’s wearing whispering as she moves. She’s not wearing heels yet and has to tilt her head back to look up at him.

“It’s only for an evening,” she says, reaching up and taking over the knotting. “And if the big mucks at Columbia hear you complaining, they might take back your award.”

Mulder lifts his chin to give her more room to work. After a moment she feels his warm hands settle on her waist.

“There,” she says, straightening his bow tie. His hands stay where they are.

“Does it feel weird?” He asks her quietly. “To be here? For this?”

She pulls a stray hair — hers — from his white sleeve.

“A little,” she says.

4. “…for fairly obvious reasons, the areas of arts of scholarly arenas live close to my heart and lived experience. Over these two decades, so much has changed in our world. And we all know those changes have had huge impacts on journalism, the arts and scholarship. But three things have remained true. One, is that we value these roles of journalism, the arts and scholarship, and that has remained central to a good life. Personally, socially and politically. The second is that good and talented people continue to join these professions. And the third is that the Pulitzer Prizes annually provide the world with the occasion like tonight, to honor and celebrate these critically important areas of human endeavor, and the people who perform at the highest levels in them…”

The speaker continues to drone on. Scully pushes the remainder of her short rib around on her plate. Mulder has barely touched his fish.

The picture of Scully standing in the window of room 1055 at the Hilton has been projected on a giant screen behind the podium for the last several minutes, and Scully can feel the eyes of the gathered assemblage flitting to her on a near constant basis.

They’re probably thinking of her trauma, of her experience, and they have most certainly read the stories that were breathlessly published about her and Mulder. Most of them have seen up close and personal the ravages of war and upheaval. There are several journalists she knows here, acquaintances she left behind when she resigned from CNN. Most of them approached before the ceremony and politely inquired about her, her health, what she was up to now. Many with a sad, pitying look on their faces.

She sets down her fork and turns the wedding ring around in circles on her finger. She doesn’t feel pity when she looks at that picture. The look on that woman’s face displays nothing but courage, and the eye behind the camera nothing but love.

When Mulder heads up to the stage a moment later to be handed the certificate he won, the applause that spreads through the room is thunderous. His eyes never once leave hers.

5. The lobby of the auditorium is thick with people and humidity, joyous voices rising up over the static of tires sloshing over rainy streets just beyond the front doors. They’ve been back in the States for a week, but Scully still isn’t used to the crowds. The noise.

From behind her, Mulder touches the bare skin of her shoulder. He’s just returned from the coat check and holds up the red wool coat she’d had to buy at Nordstrom two days before. She puts her arms through the silken sleeves.

All around them winners and colleagues and friends are making plans to go out and celebrate their accomplishments. One man in a charcoal suit has a bottle of Veuve in his hand that he swiped off of one of the tables. Several people have invited them to join them.

Mulder tips his head to whisper in her ear.

“We can slip out right now when no one’s looking,” he says.

She doesn’t even wait to answer, using her small stature to slip in between several people and out into the cold damp.

They’ve been provided a town car and driver for the evening, but it’s too hard to find him in the chaos outside the auditorium, so they hail a cab instead. Once they’re on their way back to their hotel, Mulder pulls the certificate out from under his coat where it was sheltered from the rain and looks at it.

“I’m starving,” he says to the piece of paper.

“You barely ate,” Scully points out.

“I was nervous,” he explains.

Scully takes the certificate gently from his hands and looks at it. The gold foil. The calligraphy.

“If we call in a room service order now, it should be to our room by the time we get out of the shower,” she says.

“God I love you,” Mulder says reverently.

They gorge themsevles on cheeseburgers and truffle fries, and, on a whim, a bottle of champagne (Mumm’s rather than Veuve, as, Mulder points out, he isn’t about to spend his prize money on booze) as they sit around in fluffy white robes with HBO on mute on the big TV in the corner.

On the desktop, under their room key, sits the Pulitzer certificate.

“That’s as much yours as it is mine,” Mulder finally says to her, nodding towards it.

“Yes,” she agrees, and sets a half full glass of bubbles on the bedside table. She reaches for the terry cloth tie of his robe.

Later, it’s all soft sighs on soft sheets and Mulder fills her with himself until they become each other.

#txf #fic #slippinmickeys #what a read #I always eat up epilogues #and this was a great one

[randomfoggytiger]

Meteor

She remembers the space he’d carved around himself, and the moment she realized the distance was too great to cross.

Rating: PG Word count: 1k

Notes: X-Files revival era fic.

Originally posted at ao3 01/19/2016

~*~

She makes her way up the long drive, the old farmhouse looming like a specter from her past. There are no lights in the windows, just a cold, hulking shadow against a darkening sky; an apt metaphor if she thinks about it too much, which she won’t.

“Where are you, Mulder?” Scully whispers to herself. His car is parked next to the porch. It’s evening, too early for sleep.

The air is damp as she leaves the warmth of the car, carrying a folder of papers. Spring has turned the ground to mud beneath her feet, and she, in her most expensive pair of heels, frowns. Her good boots are at the bottom of a box at the back of her closet along with the rest of the things she never unpacked.

The porch creaks in the same places, the screen door still protests on its hinge. She knocks once before trying the handle, finding it open.

“Mulder?”

The house is dusty and silent. She curses under her breath, gooseflesh rising along the back of her neck, wishing she had her holster. Three months on the job after so long away and she’s still not used to carrying.

She’s debating whether to check upstairs or leave the file on the kitchen table when a voice calls her name from outside.

“Scully?”

She steps onto the porch, squinting into the darkness. “Mulder? Is that you?”

“I’m out back,” he calls. “Watch your step.”

She turns on her phone’s flashlight and makes her way to the back yard. A shadow sits on the frame of the old pickup they haven’t used in years.

“I’d have left the porch light on if I’d known you were coming,” it says.

She points the phone in that direction, eliciting a wince from her partner as the beam hits his eyes.

“Ow, Scully.”

“Sorry,” she mutters, shutting off the light. “What are you doing out here, Mulder?”

There’s the distinct sound of liquid sloshing, the kiss of a bottle at his lips.

“Just sittin’ and thinkin’.”

“In the dark? It’s chilly,” she says, rubbing her shoulders for emphasis.

His face resolves as her eyes slowly adjust. He’s sitting on the tailgate, legs dangling off the end, a beer nestled between his thighs.

“I thought you’d be working.”

“Guy can’t take a break once in a while?”

She smirks. “Who are you and what have you done with my partner?”

“Hah-hah, funny. Have a seat, Scully.”

She does after a pause, easing herself onto the tailgate to join him.

“This’ll warm you up,” he says, offering her a beer.

“How many of these have you had?” she asks, accepting the bottle with a raised eyebrow.

“Just the one, doc. Don’t worry,” he says. “It’s not that kind of party.”

The cap twists off; the taste of malt fizzes on her tongue, goes down smooth.

“I take it you’re here for business and not pleasure,” he says, nodding to the folder in her lap.

“Mm. It’s the autopsy results for Lisa Baylor. Scrapings from her fingernails revealed traces of skin; they’re processing the DNA and I asked the lab to run it through NICS. We’ll have the full results in the morning, but I thought you’d want to get an early start.”

“You ever heard of email, Scully?”

“You mean the thing that keeps you tethered to your computer at all hours? Yeah, I’ve heard of it,” she mutters.

He offers a wry smile. “You didn’t have to drive all the way out here for that.”

“Maybe I wanted to talk about the case in person.”

His voice grows soft. “You don’t need an excuse to visit, you know. You always have a place here.”

“I wasn’t looking for an excuse.”

“Checking up on me, huh?”

“Mulder,” she sighs. “Don’t start.”

A cricket chirps in the grass at their feet, filling the stillness that hovers like a black mist. She remembers the space he’d carved around himself, and the moment she realized the distance was too great to cross.

“You’re right. I’m sorry,” he says finally, nudging her shoulder in apology. “Been a rough year. Sometimes I forget we’re on the same side now.”

“I’ve always been on your side, Mulder,” she murmurs, feeling their history like a lead weight in her chest. “I’ve only ever wanted what was best for you.”

“I know,” he nods, then holds out his bottle. “Truce?”

“Truce,” she agrees, letting the glass clink softly. For a moment, the silence is comfortable, familiar, and she closes her eyes.

When she opens them, she’s looking at his profile in the dusky light. With his beard shaved and his hair trimmed, she can almost see the man she met twenty odd years ago. Without thinking, she reaches out to touch his cheek, the stubble rough against her fingers.

He looks over, bemused, and she pulls her hand away, still feeling the ghost of his skin against her palm.

“You clean up good, G-man,” she says.

He chuckles, his gaze turned upward. “Hey, it’s starting.”

He points to the sky and her eyes follow, trying to see what he sees. A pinprick of light flicks across the sky, followed by another, and then another; the beginnings of a meteor shower.

Mulder reaches behind them and pulls out two rolled sleeping bags, settling back against one in the bed of the truck. She doesn’t ask why he brought two instead of one, for the same reason she knows the extra beer in her hand was never intended for him.

She pulls the rolled blanket behind her and lies back to watch the show. Her eyes flit from one corner of the heavens to the other as more of the blue-white streaks make their way across the night, and she marvels at how the stars can still stun her with their beauty, how the universe in all its endless mystery can be so breathtaking, even after bringing such grief.

His voice is rich and vulnerable, spoken to the open air. “It wasn’t all bad, was it, Scully?”

She doesn’t have to think. Her response is as immediate and as involuntary as a heartbeat. “No…it wasn’t.”

She finds his hand without trying and listens to the sound of their mingled breathing as the sky falls around them.

cc @today-in-fic

#txf #fic #sixhours #I remember this one!

[randomfoggytiger]

The Căluşari//2x21

#txf #S2 #The Calusari #Scully #the infamous #“wind in kindergarten” #gifs #great set

[randomfoggytiger]

The Căluşari//2x21

#txf #gifs #great set #S2 #The Calusari #an underrated Mulder joke #I've forgotten about #because no one watches this ep. (including me)

[randomfoggytiger]

finally finished this wip that has taken my soul from me 🫡

but here is my beautiful wife if anyone looks at her i will blow this whole place up

#art #stellagibs0ns #txf #finally finished this wip #Scully #her face #beautiful #absolutely gorgeous #her face! #the colors!

[randomfoggytiger]

Rob Bowman, The X-Files: Fight the Future (1999 DVD audio commentary) // The X-Files: Fight the Future (1998)

#txf #FTF #Rob Bowman #quotes #“they were going to” #yeppity yep yep #xf meta #meta

[randomfoggytiger]

How about some middle-aged reflections on the early days of their (romantic/sexual) relationship?

They’re spreading mulch around the trees, tucking flowerbeds in for winter. The air is crisp and dry, sharpened by the pungent smell of the mulch.

“Got the Stanford alumni newsletter yesterday,” Scully says. “Guess who their new entomology professor is.”

He frowns back, puzzled. Her tone indicates that the answer is one he should get. Does he know any entomologists?

Mulder starts to shake his head. “I have no-“

He sees her face, the smirk she’s trying hide, and then he remembers. “Nooooo,” he says, drawing the word out with a laugh. “Bambi?”

“Bambi,” she confirms, grinning now. “Did you sleep with her? I honestly can’t remember.”

“No!” He’s a bit shocked that she thought this. He’d kind of wanted to though, he recalls. Little khaki shorts.

Scully rolls her eyes. “Oh, sorry to impugn your virtue.”

Mulder offers her a petulant look. “You make it sound like I was Wilt Chamberlain-ing my way through every case.”

She leans against the big sycamore, scoffs. “You’re mighty defensive there, Marty.”

He grins back. “Judge away. You weren’t putting out yet. Not to me, anyway.”

Scully laughs. “We were so young.”

“We were so young.”

She rolls her palms around the rake handle, her beautiful slim fingers with oval nails like the inside of a seashell. She’d been pretty back then, he thinks. Lovely. But now she’s ethereal, refined to some radiant essence.

“I think….hmm. I think some part of me really felt that if you and I followed the rules then everyone else had to as well, you know?” Her expression is a little wistful. A little sad.

He does know. “I like to think it made it that much sweeter in the end.”

“It did. I loved you so…so….purely. I remember when you made it to that Congressional hearing. I think I was done then. The rest was just waiting to happen.” She laughs, a little shy even now.

“You were like Beatrice,” he says to her, adoringly, in the honeyed light. “Come to lead me into Paradise.”

Scully drops the rake, walks over to take his hands in hers. “Is this heaven?” she asks, gazing up.

Mulder smiles back, squeezes her cool little fingers. The wind chimes on the deck ripple like harp strings. The sun makes a halo on her tawny head.

#txf #fic #aloysiavirgata #enjoyed this #a Bambi mention? on my weekend? #these two #you write their banter like two perpendicular streams: going the same direction #and always connecting at unexpected little intersections #very engaging

[randomfoggytiger]

After Modell, Scully and Mulder leave the hospital and are forced to acknowledge the reality of what happened—in their own, incredibly emotionally repressed way, of course.

Aka the post-Pusher fic I have been writing for the last week. If you haven't noticed yet, I am incapable of not using extended, flowery metaphors to describe some lovely pain, and this one is a prime example.

stay close, listen (~2.6k, T)

Mulder turns away from Modell with a sigh, and when he finally steps outside, Scully is waiting for him, watching him with an expression he cannot quite place. There is a version of this story that ends with three dead bodies on the floor, all bullets fired from the same gun, the same hand. Scully still reached out with that knowledge perforating her lungs, still took the hand capable of soul-numbing violence, and touched him like she had no reason to be afraid of him. ——— (This picks up right as the episode ends and they're leaving Modell's hospital room. A study of devotion, death, and the fact that above everything else, you need a hand to hold.)

#txf #fic #actual-changeling #I will most definitely read this #later~ #veeeeeeeeeeeeeery interested

[randomfoggytiger]

#txf #S1 #Tooms #gifs #great set #Mulder #Scully #the first love confession

[randomfoggytiger]

Gazing

'I do not gaze at Scully' Mulder.

TXF Fanart ☆ MSR Fanart

#art #tennant-the-tigger #txf #Gazing #“so you say with your mouth” #Mulder #Scully

[randomfoggytiger]

#txf #S4 #Terma #I think? #gifs #great set #The Red and the Black #maybe? #...wow I can't remember

[randomfoggytiger]

Tithonus

How can you have too much life? There's too much to learn, to experience.

#art #carrie11 #txf #S6 #Tithonus #beautiful #love that ep #love this edit #gorgeous

[randomfoggytiger]

my season 9 experience so far

#txf #S9 #memes #Mulder #can't agree more

[randomfoggytiger]

Krycek is such a good antagonist because we never quite learn what exactly his real motivation is. I will accept any and all explanations ranging from "wants to advance to Big Bad Crime Boss" over "trying to assert his masculinity through aggression (for fear of not conforming to the standards of normative heterosexuality)" to "praise kink (good boy! such a good job with that murder!)"

#txf #xf meta #Krycek #nobody knows #every aspect of this show is an x-file isn't it? #took me a few years ;))))

[randomfoggytiger]

Mulder grinning like an idiot whenever scully starts a monologue about the gory details of a death is just sooooo. The fact that theyre not throwing themselves at each other in any given scene is astounding to me

#txf #xf meta #Mulder #Scully #autopsies #100% true

[randomfoggytiger]

Happy Birthday to one of my favorite writers!! I hope it was a good one. If you’re still doing drabbles my one word prompt to you is “funfetti” because that is synonymous with birthday imo 🥳

Thank you so much!

Between them, William sleeps fitfully, his scrawny colt-like leg poking out of the covers and twitching into Scully’s ankle. He is almost as tall as she is. Mulder had moved a nightlight into the bedroom when the boy had come in at 2 am, complaining of a sore throat. In the weak light, Scully can see a sheen of fever-sweat over his brow. It’s almost time for Ibuprofen.

He’d shown no tell-tale signs of impending illness earlier in the day, was full of the boundless energy of 9, and had spent the morning holed up with Mulder in the garage tinkering with the old lawnmower. He’d asked for a triple-decker PB&J for lunch and then begged Scully to help him make funfetti cupcakes even though he still had grease under his fingernails. He’d somehow convinced Mulder to let him eat four. If anything she’d have guessed an upset stomach, but here they are with what is likely strep.

From William’s other side Mulder sighs in his sleep, shifting on the narrow bit of mattress not taken over by his son. A moment later, Scully hears the same gentle sigh from William. Then it’s a sniff, then a cough, and then a feeble “Mom?”

“Shh, it’s okay.” She reaches out to feel his forehead, then the soft, taut skin of his back. The fever is still there, but low grade. “It’s time for Ibuprofen,” she says softly, unable to keep herself from sliding her hand up his back to finger the ducktail of hair at the base of his skull.

“Okay,” the boy says. He’s old enough to take pills but still prefers the cherry stuff.

“I’ll get it,” Mulder rumbles, and slides out of bed, coming back a minute later holding the little cup. He clicks on his bedside light then throws a tee shirt over the top of it when Will squints uncomfortably at the brightness.

In the hazy, muted light, the boy sits up and throws back the medicine.

“I have Little League tomorrow.”

Scully glances at the clock. 5:45. He has Little League today.

“I’ll call your coach,” she says, already cataloging the other things she needs to do: schedule an appointment with the pediatrician, call the school, see if Barr can take her 9:00 am autopsy.

“But we’re playing the Blue Jays,” the boy whines. “They need my bat.” His last word is cut off by a short burst of coughing.

“It’s still spring ball, bud,” Mulder says gently. “You guys aren’t going to miss the playoffs if you miss one game.”

“They'll lose without me,” he says sullenly.

The boy is probably right, but arguing the statistical probability of a win or loss of the Farr’s Corner U-10 Tigers without William Mulder’s bat is not something she’s willing to get into before 6:00 am.

“You need to try to get some more sleep,” she says.

The boy settles back into the pillows unhappily.

Mulder turns off the light and pulls on the tee shirt that was covering it and Scully thinks about the bulb-warmed fabric sliding over his skin.

He comes around to her side of the bed and squeezes her elbow with a smile and then shuffles down the dusty hallway toward the kitchen.

Beside her, William turns over and sighs into her arm, his body going gradually limp with sleep. The clock beside her flicks another minute higher, then another.

She smells the warm tang of coffee and the boy beside her shifts and the sky turns the barest pink and the Earth spins, spins, spins.

#txf #fic #slippinmickeys #I. adore. it. #always feel so fortunate to read your family dynamic fics

[randomfoggytiger]

when the

I feel these words as if their meaning were weight being lifted from me. Knowing that you will read them and share my burden as I have come to trust no other. That you should know my heart, look into it; finding there the memory and experience that belong to you -- that are you -- is a comfort to me now as I feel the tethers loose and the prospects darken for the continuance of a journey that began not so long ago and which began again with a faith shaken and strengthened by your convictions. If not for which I might never have been so strong now as I cross to face you and look at you, in complete. Hoping that you will forgive me for not making the rest of the journey with you/...

.../I have not written to you in the last 24 hours because the treatment has weakened my spirit as well as my body. Mulder, it is difficult to describe to you the fear of facing an enemy which I can neither conquer, nor escape. Penny Northern has taken a downturn. I now look at her with the respect that can only come from one who is about to walk the same dark path. Seeing her, I can't help but see myself in a month, or a year. I pray that I have her courage to face this journey. Mulder, I feel you close. Though I know you are now pursuing your own path. For that I am grateful. More than I can ever express. I need to know that you're out there if I am ever to see through this.

hits

#txf #quotes #S4 #Memento Mori #I feel that a good ol' fashioned “Ma'am.” fits here