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randomfoggytiger · 1 year

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All IVF Roads Lead Away from The Unnatural and to Millennium

After spending too much time batting back and forth various IVF theories (post here for the hall-of-fame-ers), I'd settled on early Season Six because of the factored-in procedure requirements.

And then a discussion with @welsharcher and @agent-troi made me reevaluate everything... and I realized, with dawning horror, that the facts concluded upon not only upended what I believed about Per Manum's time crunch but also pushed back Mulder and Scully's dating timeline from The Unnatural to Millennium.

What Canon Presents as Facts

Per Manum was a patch-on episode; and there are a few restrictions it imposes on the flashbacks with Mulder and Scully.

The IVF arc must take place after the episode Emily because that is when Scully learns her infertility was caused by medical experiments robbing her of her ova.

In Per Manum, Scully is awkward about asking Mulder for her request.

When the IVF fails, both are not stingy with their hugs-- never have been-- but Scully stops herself from fully kissing Mulder, instead placing it tentatively on his cheek.

The greater implications of points #2 and #3

Point 2: Scully's awkwardness in these flashbacks is absent from her behavior all through S7, especially after Millennium. From then on out, she flirts and pulls Mulder's tie (Rush), makes cracks about going home and making all things right with the world (The Goldberg Variation), shares a personal, traumatic story from her childhood and is unfazed that Mulder collects her and her things to go (Orison), takes it for granted that Mulder would want her to spend the night and advocate for him (Sein und Zeit), is openly jealous of his attention (Rush, First Person Shooter), keeps him guessing (Theef), denies CSM's pop psychology but not his claims about her love (En Ami), and pouts openly while calling Mulder (Chimera.) (See post here for flirty gifs (collected from @settle-down-frohike.)

Point 3: Scully's miss-kiss is how we know this precedes Amor Fati: then, she passionately and unhesitatingly gives Mulder's bandaged head a kiss after his dream recitation; but in Per Manum, though both are tender and grieving, there is still a hesitancy in her behavior. That hesitancy is born from Scully's insecurity in Mulder's life post The Beginning, after her hallway forehead blessing was replaced by his frustration at her refusal to believe. She and Mulder were in sync in S6, and she knew he loved her... but where was she in the order of importance? Still under the Truth? (It's a question she is still asking in S8's Essence.) Amor Fati was the turning point in their relationship: Mulder finally showed his partner that any better life, any better ending paled in comparison to the chaotic and brutal and beautiful one they shared together.

The Requirements for IVF (specifically the FET Timeline)

There would have had to have been a lot of downtime for Mulder and Scully to attempt IVF and continue a pregnancy.

Flying while pregnant, in the 90s and now, is not unsafe; but frequent flyers are heavily discouraged from taking as many trips because of possible health concerns (blood pressure, early risks, radiation, etc.) with mother and fetus-- particularly in the first and third trimester-- and even more so if the mother has a preexisting condition or previously challenging medical concern. Not only that, but the demands required for the IVF process would have put a further strain on travel.

Scully's ova were collected and stored (and recovered) frozen, meaning she would have had to use the FET method for her IVF cycles. Frozen Embryo Transfer takes up to 32 days from start to finish (starting the count from Day 3 of a woman's period up to the day she takes a pregnancy test); and Scully would likely have had to use the medicated FET method rather than the natural one, which is not a difference in timeline so much as convenience. Not only does the medicated FET method require additional supplementation, but the changes from estrogen and progesterone to embryo transfer-- in other words, forward progress-- hinge on how successfully the lining of the uterus thickens: if it's slow, the process drags on longer; if it's unsuccessful, the process starts from scratch. And despite all these measures, the "success rate of an untested frozen embryo transfer can go as low as 20-30%, decreasing with increasing maternal age." Hence, its failure.

The only times The X-Files had enough downtime to meet these stringent requirements were twice, and both in S6: the grounding under Kersh's disciplinary thumb and the unaccounted-for months between The Unnatural (April) and Biogenesis (September.)

The Clincher: A Purposefully Placed Family Planning Book

While the mind melding events of Biogenesis-Amor Fati are unfolding, Scully scours the office before jet-setting off to Africa. In the background is a clear glimpse of a blue family planning book amidst Mulder's various piles that he uses to feather the nest (grabbed from @dreamingofscully's post here~.)

Chris Carter, Frank Spotnitz, the writing team, and the actors knew David Duchovny was leaving the show after the finale of S7; and they planned for the miracle baby early on in the season. (For any lingering doubts about William's paternity, see here for Frank's own words on the subject.) Because of that, the gang split up and left some clues: not just the family planning book mentioned above, but also David and Gillian's decision to act as if Mulder and Scully were dating off-screen post Millennium and the writers request to incorporate William's conception into All Things. Because of those decisions, fertile (heh) ground was sown for anyone willing to look back and fill in the gaps... which they did in Per Manum; and which I do now.

The family planning book serves as the definitive timeline marker for Scully and Mulder's IVF journey. If they had attempted IVF early S6, then the book would have shown up with Mulder's things when he "feathered the nest" post One Son. If he and Scully had attempted IVF after Millennium or any time S7, it would have made an appearance then. But it doesn't: it only appears on the end of season six after Mulder and Scully have grown closer, when an IVF success or failure makes him clarify that it won't "come between us." When there is more that is between them but not technically enough for them to do this journey as a couple (yet.)

It also bookends the conclusion of the IVF arc: by joining Mulder's stash, the book has become another totem of his life in the vein of Samantha's picture, the cloth hearts, and Karin Berquist's "I Want to Believe" poster (and even Queequeg's collar and Scully's keychain.) It'll be packed away out of sight once he gets the cleaning bug or Scully asks him to; but, until then, it haunts the basement with the ghost of its lost potential.

Why IVF, Why Now, Why The Unnatural?

As mentioned above, there is a pocket of downtime post The Unnatural's April and Biogenesis-Amor Fati's September (thank you to @dreamingofscully for pointing that out in this post), with only one legitimate case in-between.

(With that in mind, The Lone Gunmen's ask of Scully is doubly stupid since they asked her to fly out to Las Vegas in Mulder's name sometime during her IVF process and triply stupid because Scully-- who likely went against medical precautions-- was drugged.)

But why did Scully seek a second opinion after The Unnatural?

Because Mulder's baseball date and uplifted banter reawakened that dream in her: "What you may find as you're concentrating on hitting that little ball, the rest of the world just fades away. All your nagging concerns, the ticking of your biological clock, how you probably couldn't afford that nice new coat on a g-woman's salary, how you threw away a promising career in medicine to hunt aliens with a... crackpot, albeit brilliant, partner." Because Mulder signaled that he was noticing her, her new suede coat, her ticking biological clock... and that those were important to him.

So, Scully went in for another checkup, to seek hope for both of them.

The Timeline: A Culmination

The Unnatural-- Mulder, for the first time in their partnership, turns away from the heart of the mystery to gaze at the mystery of his heart; and Scully is giggly and hopeful (having pressed hints about "a normal life" over and over since early S6.) For the first time he mentions something between them that is personal beyond near kisses and love confessions: he brings up her habits, her coats, and her fertility, showing her that he sees her. And after that night, Scully gets another checkup with her doctor and kicks off Per Manum.

Per Manum, the elevator-- Scully runs into Mulder after her appointment, depressed and down with more negative results. Seeing how devastated this fresh reminder is (despite the episode's very clunky reiteration of her infertility-- which both she and Mulder already know about and know each other knows about), he admits to having her ova on ice. Scully is both hurt he'd kept this information from her for over two years and desperately hopeful-- again-- that there is another last chance.

Per Manum, the clinic-- Doctor Parenti tells Scully there is a "good chance" that she can get pregnant if they get started right away. She's barreling onward, not thinking two steps ahead of her (noted here in some deleted lines-- thanks to @dunhamhairograpy) except for the fact that she has to ask Mulder for his participation.

Per Manum, "The answer is yes"-- "I don't want this to come between us" is pivotal. Yes, it could refer to their recent peace over Mulder's noncommunication; but that seems to have been swept aside by both of them in their heady anticipation. So, it has to refer to their personal relationship, one which just blossomed beyond loving partners into partners focused more on each other than the Truth. Mulder can't let go completely until his Closure; but he'll explore living a variation of normal with Scully post The Unnatural's moral lesson and Amor Fati's revelation and Millennium's permanent shift.

Three of a Kind-- Scully hops on the rare plane to join "Mulder" in Las Vegas, being pulled into The Lone Gunmen shenanigans and ending up getting drugged, flirting up a storm, and planning her revenge. Luckily, it seems Scully isn't too worried about what happened, meaning she was either between rounds or hadn't begun her first (or only?) cycle yet.

Field Trip-- A more personal episode for Mulder and Scully: he is unusually hurt and angered by her normal level of skepticism, which hurts her in turn as he's devalued herself as well as her abilities for the work. The two of them dance around these feelings until they fall right into hallucinogenic mushrooms. (An interesting note: @iconicscullyoutfits noticed here that Scully does not drink at Mulder's wake, slotting in perfectly both with her denial of this reality and her on-going carefulness with the IVF tries.)

Per Manum, "It was my last chance"-- Regardless if it's their first and only or last of many tries, Scully is unflinchingly scooped up by Mulder, though diffidently shy about crossing too many lines herself in grief (shying away from her impulsive smooch to instead hesitatingly place a kiss on her partner's cheek.) "Never give up on a miracle", Mulder intones; and holds onto the family planning book for a while more.

Biogenesis-- Mulder may have the book in his office; but Scully has lost hope, asking him "Look, after all you've done, after all you've uncovered... I mean, you've won. What more could you possibly hope to do or to find?" Her question is more in-character with another fruitless endeavor behind them, a wish to see this journey, too, to its end; and this informs her arc in this three parter: rebuilding herself and her identity in Africa, at the military base, in her apartment, and outside his.

Amor Fati-- Mulder dreams "another life, another world" where Scully can live safer and freer from him while he gets a built-in idyllic life, wife, and children: "Don't give up on a miracle" echoing around in his head. (An interesting note: @cecilysass's post here about the meaning behind Mulder's Temptation is amazing.)

But that miracle is a false illusion; and Scully saves him from himself ("You were my constant, my touchstone") just as he saves her from her self-distrust ("And you are mine.") It's now that Scully brands Mulder's forehead as her own just as she had in Fight the Future: diffidence gone, courage and confirmation found.

From Brain Surgery to New Years Celebrations

Mulder would have been too weak for much while recovering from invasive brain surgery, as evidenced by his and Scully's (mostly) hands-off approach in the next episode Hungry.

However, Mulder joined Scully in California for Christmas-- on a case, of course-- and got himself from one mess to another. They avoided death, saved the world from the Apocalypse, and, most importantly, patched a family back together. There might never be a child to welcome them home from a dangerous case; but they have each other.

And Mulder seals that realization as the ball drops.

And that concludes the IVF arc~!

Thank you for reading~

Enjoy!

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cecilysass · 2 years

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The Caller You Are Trying To Reach (1/1)

Read on AO3 | Rated Mature | Tagging @today-in-fic

He hasn’t been able to reach Scully all day, and it’s making him behave badly. She’s free to do what she wants on a weekend, obviously. She doesn’t have to tell him, even if she usually does.

He calls her cell. He gets a message saying the caller is unavailable. He tries again. He decides he’s going to stop calling for a while and do his laundry or go work out, but then fifteen minutes later he can’t help it, he’s trying again.

On the twenty sixth time, she picks up on the third ring.

“Hey,” he says, keeping his voice casual, but it sounds unconvincing even to him. “Where are you?”

“No,” she says. “Where are you?” There is a repetitive dinging sound behind her he can’t place.

“I’m at home. I have been all day. I’ve been calling you,” he says, trying not to sound annoyed. “Listen, Scully, I had an idea I thought we should look into about the Ganz case— the brother’s bank account? Maybe we should see if there are any other examples of—”

“Shhhhhhhhhhhhh.”

“What?” He frowns, trying now to hear better. “Are you okay?”

“I said shhhhhhhhhhh. No more talking. Talk, talk, talk…” She pauses dramatically. “…talk.”

His face goes slack. “Scully.” Alarmed, he stands up from his couch. “What’s going on?”

“Too. Much. Talking. Mulder. Fox.” Her voice drops into a syrupy lower pitch. “You can do other things besides talk, you know.”

At the sound of her words his mouth has slowly fallen wide open. He’s hit with a number of strong reactions that he can’t quite get a handle on. Part of him wants to burst out laughing, but he’s not sure this is funny. “Where… are you right now?”

“I’m at the hotel. Waiting for you. Where are you? I’ve been looking and looking—” She is interrupted by the sound of someone’s voice, someone’s low post-adolescent masculine voice. “Thanks, cutie.” She giggles in a breathy, throaty way Mulder is certain he has never, ever heard from her, in all the six years he has known her.

“Mulder, somebody just told me I was a beautiful woman,” she whispers loudly. “He walked all the way across the casino to tell me. He has a shaved head, and I sorta want to go over there and rub it.”

“The … casino?” Mulder’s mouth is completely dry. Fear has started to ramp up. He begins to pace back and forth across his living room. “What casino? What city are you in? Have you been drinking?”

“Las Vegas,” she says. “You told me to come to Las Vegas, you goof.” Her voice goes sing-song. “I always do what you tell me, don’t I, Agent Mulder?”

“I didn’t tell you to—”

“Everybody keeps asking me if I’ve been drinking,” she says petulantly. “The bartender. The man at the bar. The other man at the bar. The … other man at the bar. But I haven’t had a single drink, not even one! Just an autopsy.”

“An autopsy? Why? Who did you—”

“I want a drink,” she announces. “Gin and tonic. Wait, what happened to the bar, Mulder? It was here a second ago.” Her voice goes distant. “I might need to set you down and look for the bar.”

“Stay on the phone,” he begs. “Scully, is it possible you’ve been drugged?”

“I’m going to tell you something you don’t know about me. It’s an important secret. Shhh.” She lowers her voice. “I’m really, really good at getting men to buy me drinks at bars. Did you know that?“

“Uh, no.”

“Are you surprised?”

It seems more than remotely plausible that men would want to buy Scully drinks at bars. “Not exactly, no.”

“Do you know my trick?”

He hesitates. “No.”

“I’m a flirt.” She laughs in that ridiculously breathy way again, and it seems to be aimed directly in his ear. “Melissa said I was a tease. But no, no, no! Not a tease. Just a flirt. I used to be the best flirt.”

“Scully,” Mulder says, keeping his voice level, but starting to feel decidedly frantic. “What I really need you to tell me is the name of the hotel you are in.”

There is a pause. “When a man buys you a drink at a bar, sometimes he thinks it means you’ll go home with him. Have sex with him …” A stage whisper. “Fuck him. Of course it doesn’t always mean you want to fuck him.” Her voice shifts to that low, dark molasses quality again. “Sometimes you want to, Mulder.”

Mulder smacks his head into the palm of his hand. Too, too many reactions, not all virtuous. “Jesus, please tell me, what’s the name of your hotel?”

“I could go home with someone if I wanted to,” she sounds almost defiant. “Any time I want to. I could right now.”

“Scully.” Mulder’s voice is as steady and firm as he can make it. “I know you could. Jesus Christ, I know you could. But you’re definitely incapacitated. Please don’t do anything—just stay on the phone with me, okay?”

She groans in apparent frustration. “Why don’t you ever let me have sex, Mulder?”

He wills himself not to analyze that statement too carefully. “You’re not yourself. Let’s try to figure out what’s happening here. Do you see a sign saying what hotel you’re in?”

“How do you know I’m not myself?” she whines.

“A sign on the wall, maybe?”

“You don’t know what I’m like.”

“I know you, don’t I?” he says in exasperation. “You don’t normally act like this. Is there a sign—”

“That’s a lie. I do normally act like this. What am I doing? Talking on the phone with you. I talk on the phone with you alllllllll the time. Constantly. I am acting like myself.”

“You don’t normally want to have sex with strangers in bars, Scully.”

“That’s a lie, too,” she says. “I do. Want to. Sometimes. Sometimes I might sit in a bar and think, maybe I will let that man buy me a drink. He’s tall and good-looking, and he could take me home and throw me on the bed and fuck me until I can’t see straight.” She laughs again, full on.

“Oh,” Mulder manages, his voice strangled.

“But do you want to know a secret, though?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. Another stage whisper. “That’s not what I think about the most.”

“No…?”

“That’s not what I think about at night. And in the bathtub. And … lots of times. Do you want to know what I think about?”

He really, really does. He one hundred percent does. But fuck it all to hell, he knows he needs to change the subject. He can’t be the guy digging for titillating information when she’s like this. And Jesus Christ, he can’t lose sight that her safety is possibly at risk. He’s got to get his head out of his dick here.

“Scully,” he says, clenching his jaw in frustration, “please forget about that, please, and help me figure out where you are. I just really need to know the name of your hotel.”

“I don’t remember the name,” she huffs. “Stop asking. Why aren’t you even curious about what I think about? Don’t you even care?” She sounds disconsolate.

“Can you find someone to ask? A concierge desk maybe?”

“Why don’t you even want to know my secrets?”

He sighs. “I just think you’re going to find it embarrassing later,” he says quietly.

“Will I?” She giggles again, and although he prefers Scully with her faculties intact, he does appreciate how much this version of Scully laughs. “Why would I be embarrassed?”

“Because, well.” He gulps. “Your sexual fantasies are just usually something that you keep private. I think it would bother you that I knew what they were.”

She whispers. “But you’re curious?”

Yes. Yes. Very curious. He chooses his words carefully. “Not enough to make you uncomfortable later.”

She groans again, and the sound is so prolonged and low, right in his ear, that it adds to the growing problem of Mulder’s inappropriate and shame-provoking arousal during this emergency phone call.

“Scully, scan the room,” Mulder says. “Look for someone wearing a uniform that might have a hotel name on it.”

“I’m walking to see better. There are so many people here,” she says. He can hear the murmur of crowd sounds around her. “Oopsy—I didn’t mean to bump into you, cutie. You have the cutest little cowboy mustache, you know that? What did you say?” There’s a pause and some muffled talking. “Noooo, I can’t do that right now, I’m on the phone with Mulder.”

Mulder freezes mid-pace. “What did he ask you to do?”

“He was having a little private party he invited me to,” she whispers. “But I’m doing your thing now, Fox, so I can’t go.”

Mulder feels sweat beading on his forehead. “This is very, very important. Listen to me. Don’t go anywhere with anyone,” Mulder says, gesturing emphatically with his hand, although she can’t see him. “No private parties. Stay in public, stay on the phone here.”

She yelps. “Ouch, stop.”

Mulder jumps. “What? What happened, Scully?”

“That lady bumped into me,” Scully complains. “Too many people.”

“I don’t like this,” Mulder mutters. “I don’t like the crowd. Go to the perimeter of the room. Avoid other people.”

“I can’t talk to people?”

“Are you walking out of the crowd?”

“I always do what you tell me to, Mulder,” she says in a husky voice again. Her tone changes. “But Mulder, you never let me do anything fun, not like I used to do. You are such a … what’s the word Bill’s friends used to say? You’re such a cockblock.”

“W-What?”

“It’s so unfair,” she says, another whine. “I never go out. I can’t date anyone.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says. “I have no authority over you. You can date whoever you want, Scully, when you aren’t incapacitated.”

“Ohhhh, that’s not true,” she says, a low laugh. For a moment she almost sounds like herself. “Nooooo.”

“Scully—”

“Can you imagine what you would do?” She starts giggling. “You would make a face like this…” She pauses, still giggling, presumably demonstrating his face, a demonstration Mulder can’t see. “You would throw a temper tantrum.” She giggles again, even snorting a little.

“Okay, okay,” he tries, “that’s not—”

“But it wouldn’t be funny,” she interrupts. “It’d be sad. Because I don’t like to see you upset. You’re my Mulder.”

Mulder touches the phone lightly. “Hey,” he says softly, stupidly moved by her childish statement. “You’re my … Scully, too.”

“So no sex, Mr. Cockblock,” she exclaims loudly. “No sex with anyone. Not with men from bars, and not with you either.” A deep sigh. “Never, ever, ever with you. Even when it seems like it might happen, it doesn’t.”

He’s shocked into complete silence.

“Mulder,” she whispers. “I see someone dressed like Elvis in a what-do-you-call-it-suit. The people in space. Who travel in a ship? Pointy ears?”

“Star Trek,” Mulder says automatically, still numb from the previous statement.

“I knew you would know,” she says triumphantly. “Elvis in a Star thing suit. He’s dancing.”

“Scully… when you said…” he starts.

“When I said what?” she says. “When I called you a cockblock?” She giggles.

“No,” he says. “Never mind.”

“Can I ask you a question, Mulder?”

“I guess.”

“Do you have any sexual fantasies?”

Mulder paces back and forth a little faster, shaking his head. This is a nightmare. “Of course, Scully. You know about the videos that aren’t mine.”

“Ohhhhh, I get it, yeah,” she says knowingly. “Big tits, big hair, fakey fake orgasms. Like those girls in the group shower one? Who all scream in the exact same way every time? Why the exact same way?”

He pauses. “You’ve watched the group shower one, Scully?”

“But noooo. Not what I mean. I mean real fantasies. About real life.”

“I think most people have real life sexual fantasies,” Mulder dodges.

“He doesn’t want to say,” Scully announces conversationally to someone, presumably an innocent bystander. “He thinks they’re private.”

“Well, yeah,” Mulder says, flustered. “I think most people would say they’re private.”

“Mulder,” she says, her voice again some sexy, dark-hued parody of her normal argumentative work voice, “I’m not talking about most people. I’m talking about you.”

“Scully,” he protests pathetically.

“Maybe you need an example,” she suggests.

“No, no,” he says hastily. “No examples.”

“What about one … where you stop the car? And you get out of the car to flash your flashlight in the dark trees, but it’s nothing, and you’re very frustrated. So we come back to the car but instead of getting in, you keep talking and you …. press me up against the side of the car and you’re speaking to me, close, and you have me pinned hard. And ohhhhh, there’s your breath on my neck.”

“You’re talking about … me and you?”

“Yes, silly,” she says. Her voice turns breathier. “And then your mouth is on my neck, moving down, and it’s everywhere, and I’m gasping, and you pull off the buttons of that white silk work blouse—”

“Oh my god,” Mulder says. His mind is way too quickly following her scattered thought process, filling in details easily where she has left them out.

“Do you like that one? Because I have others.”

“Uhhhh,” he says. “That one is just fine.”

“I like the getting fucked against the car idea,” she whispers confidentially. “Skirt pulled up, panties down, shirt wiiiide open, bra hitched up, back against the metal, you’re kind of grunting, those lips crushed in my ear.” She sighs luxuriously. “Is that everyone’s fantasy, or just people who spend lots of time in cars with you, Mulder?”

He’s now got his palm on his stiff crotch, unwisely running it back and forth. It’s not the time, he really shouldn’t, but he has always had a weakness for phone sex, and this is Scully, it’s Scully. He can’t think straight any more.

“Mulder?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he says, tightly. He’s trying to get it back together.

“What do you think?”

“I think— I think it sounds…”

“Oh Mulder, yours probably are in the office all the time, aren’t they? You love the office sooooo much. With all the files.”

“You’re not … entirely wrong,” he says in a miserable voice.

“The desk?” she says huskily. “Is that it? Bent over?”

“Among others, sure.” He’s whispering, and he knows his cheeks are burning.

“You see, I guessed,” she says. “Not very imaginative, Agent Mulder.” She giggles again.

“Trust me,” he mutters. “I’m plenty imaginative. Imagination is not the problem.”

“You know,” she says in a low, liquid tone, “I wish you were here right now.”

His heart is thumping. The sultry sound of her voice sends blood rushing straight to his cock. He runs a finger down the side of the phone.

“I do, too,” he says, keeping his voice even with great effort. “Because… I think you need my back-up. And these things you’re saying, well, obviously they’re affecting me, I can’t hide that, but I don’t know if I’m really talking to you or whatever drug is in your system.”

There’s a pause. “You know, you’re just plain … sweet, Fox Mulder.”

He rolls his eyes and shifts weight between his feet, feeling like a teenager getting a compliment. “Come on, Scully. Give me a break here.”

She gasps into the phone, and he practically jumps to the ceiling.

“Mulder! Look! Look! Do you see who it is?”

“No.” He’s trying to readjust his pants. “I’m on the phone, Scully. I can’t see.”

“It’s Frohike,” she says excitedly. “He’s looking for someone. Maybe he’s looking for me, Mulder. Melvin! Yoo-hoo. I’m over here.”

“Frohike,” Mulder repeats. He narrows his eyes. “Frohike.”

“Yes. Is that Byers with him? Nooo, I don’t think so. Where did Byers go?” she says. “I think Hickey sees me, Mulder! I can’t wait to talk to him.”

“The Gunmen are with you,” he says grimly. And their days are numbered, he thinks.

“Of course they are, silly,” she says. “They’re the ones who brought me up to speed. That’s a funny phrase, isn’t it? Up to speed. Whoosh!”

Mulder hears Frohike’s urgent voice in the background. “...looking for you everywhere, Scully. Where have you been? Who are you talking to?”

“Hickey!” There’s a shuffling sound, and Mulder imagines that her arms have probably gone around the little man, no doubt giving him the thrill of his life. “Frohike, it’s Mulder. Want to talk to him?”

There’s a pause. “That’s Mulder on the phone? Right now?”

“Get on the phone, Frohike,” Mulder bellows into his phone, so loudly the window panes in his apartment vibrate.

“You don’t have to yell,” admonishes Scully.

“I’ll talk to him later, Scully,” Frohike’s voice says in the background.

“Frohike, what the fuck are you guys doing–” Mulder shouts into the phone receiver.

“Shhhhhhh,” Scully says. “Shhhhhh, you need to calm down, Mr. Crankypants.”

“Okay, okay,” he says to Scully, modulating his tone. “Just ask him if—”

“Listen, I’m going somewhere with Frohike now, okay, Mulder? He says it’s important.”

Mulder lets out a frustrated exhale. At very least he’s certain the Gunmen will prioritize her safety, although apparently he can’t be sure they won’t put her at risk for stupid reasons.

“Fine,” he says. “But give Frohike this message for me: I expect a full and a detailed explanation from him within twenty minutes…or I’m reporting the abduction of a federal agent, and every available member of law enforcement in metropolitan Las Vegas will be out searching for the Three Stooges, including every two-bit traffic cop and park ranger.”

“Waaaaaay too long of a message,” Scully complains.

“Uh, I heard,” comes Frohike’s voice nervously in the background.

“I mean it, Frohike,” Mulder says, raising his voice again so Frohike can hear.

“Hickey, do you know what Mulder said? He said—”

The call clicks off abruptly. Dial tone.

Mulder stands in the middle of his living room floor, phone in hand, unable to do a single thing.

***

The following day

Mulder leans against his kitchen table, phone cradled under his chin, scowling, listening closely to Scully’s explanation.

“It doesn’t take much to imagine the potential uses of the anoetic histamine,” Scully is saying. “Suggestibility, mind control. It’s troubling, to say the least. I’m going to write a full report when I get back.”

“That’s a good idea,” he says neutrally. “And you yourself were injected with it?”

“I was, yes,” she says. “I don’t remember very much of those hours, but evidently I presented as though I had been drinking a lot. I’m sure it was… humiliating. The whole experience has been unpleasant, to say the least.”

“And you’re okay? It sounds potentially unsafe, to be drugged up, suggestible, wandering around a Las Vegas hotel.”

She huffs a sigh into the phone. “The Gunmen claim I was safe the whole time. Trust me, Mulder, I was ready to throw all three of them out the penthouse window when I figured this whole thing out.”

“What time is your flight back, g-woman? You need a ride from the airport?”

“Sure, thank you – it’s around seven.” She pauses. “So Mulder … you and I didn’t speak on the phone yesterday at all?”

He bites his lip, hard. “Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know,” she says. “I just felt like I might have remembered something about that. It’s a little fuzzy.”

“Hmm,” he says. “The memory effects sound interesting. Something for your report, I guess. So what’s your flight number?”

A heavy sigh. “We did speak, didn’t we?”

He rubs his forehead wearily. “Yeah.”

“It was … bad, wasn’t it?”

“Come on, Scully,” he says lightly, “we’re all friends here. Who among us hasn’t acted badly while drugged?”

“I can’t decide if I want you to tell me about it or not.”

“You don’t,” he says with finality. “Please trust me on this. You don’t.”

“Tell me just one thing I said, just to set my mind at ease,” she begs. “One thing so I can feel like I have some idea.”

He squeezes his eyes shut. “All right.” He can hear her taking a breath in anticipation on the other end of the line. “You’re apparently very good at getting men to buy you drinks at bars. Not because you’re a tease, but because you’re a flirt.”

“Ah.” She exhales. “Okay. That’s not so bad. A little embarrassing. Not horrific.”

“No. Not so bad. See?”

“My flight number is 4543. I’ll meet you at the downstairs entrance like usual,” she says. He thinks she’s about to hang up, but there’s another pause and he can hear her inhale. “Mulder?”

“Yeah?”

“You held back, didn’t you?”

“Please just drop it, Scully.”

“Something else,” she says. “Please.”

“I really wish you wouldn’t–”

“Loss of memory makes me nervous.”

“Okay,” he relents. “Okay. I know. I get it.” He considers for a moment. “Here’s another. Let me think about how to put this. Here goes: I thought Frohike was the only friend I had who was borrowing my videos that aren’t mine, but apparently I was wrong, because you were able to describe choice details from a scene.”

“Oh,” she says. “Oh.”

“There you go.”

“That’s more embarrassing.”

“They’re my videos, so not especially embarrassing to me.”

A pause. “The neighborhood cheaters one?”

“Nooooo,” he answers. “The group shower one, but holy shit, Scully. Just ask before borrowing next time, okay?”

“Mulder,” she says, “did I say other inappropriate things… things that…?”

“Nothing to be embarrassed about,” he says, and means it. “Nothing. Really.”

“The very fact you know what kinds of things I mean,” she says, her voice small, “makes me think that I did, and that I should be embarrassed.”

He considers how to put this. “You didn’t say anything that I couldn’t have said to you.”

She doesn’t say anything for a moment. “You’ve flirted in bars to get drinks?”

“No comment,” Mulder says primly.

“You’ve practically taken your shirt off in a diner to get the last piece of pie from a waitress,” she says, “so I guess I can see it.”

“You’ve got nothing to be embarrassed about, Scully.”

“Okay,” she says. “Thank you, Mulder.”

“So that’s that,” he says, a businesslike tone. “And I’ll see you at the downstairs entrance of the airport tonight.”

“All right,” she agrees. “And on the drive home, maybe you can tell me about all those imaginative office sex fantasies you have.”

She hangs up the phone.

#the x files #x files fanfic #xfiles fanfic #my fic #3 of a Kind #three of a kind #The Caller You Are Trying To Reach

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