#i still don’t like krycek

[plumdonutsv]

mulder: krycek needs a safe house

skinner: ok. he’s safe here

skinner: *punches him and locks him out in the cold*

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s5 episode 2 thoughts

i wrote the following episode writeup two days ago, and still, there is so much to process. but let past me take over as we begin our adventure into some DELICIOUS angst with a happy ending content:

i wasn’t going to watch this episode tonight because i am feeling tired and sick, but then i scrolled down a little bit and read some of the next episode’s descriptions, and boy. i want answers. which i will not receive if i do not watch the episodes prior to them. so. here we are.

i’ve also heard that this episode is really good, so i’m excited to dive in, even if i have a headache while watching it. usually i try to preserve my watching experiences for when i don’t feel ill, but sometimes you just have to push through it.

(it WAS really really REAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLY GOOD. my sickness was not fixed but some other part of me was)

okay. the description... mulder is looking for a cure and the FBI snitch. and he receives help from an unlikely source…. is it krycek??? let us see

(it was not krycek)

we begin with the recap, and again, the combination of skinner’s gruff “call a doctor” while holding scully's limp body and mulder’s defeated face at hearing the vial just has water in it is crazy 

mulder is at the hospital at 5 am!!! he’s looking for scully :( no one is helping him!! he is getting maaaaad omg

“i’ll calm down when i have a REASON TO CALM DOWN!!”<- OHHHH he is always going to cause a scene in a hospital. someone please pair up this scene with one breath to make a nice matching gifset thank you <3

the doctor wants to know who tf he is when skinner comes out of the room!!! OH FUCK, I FORGOT SKINNER THOUGHT HE WAS DEAD LMAOOOO “you move pretty good for a dead man” <- well yes he does! 

“i’m only half dead” now what do you mean by that… is he saying that without scully he is only half alive.......

oh skinner is PISSED! he is following him into scully’s room… please save the fighting for when she is not trying to get rest, thank you very much

oh my GOD, mulder sees her in the room and he literally has to put his hands on his knees and breath, and he cannot do it… holy fuck… he asks skinner what happened, and when he doesn’t answer right away he asks “DUE TO WHAT?” again, and skinner has to say she’s dying

(i immediately hit replay to watch him collapsing in on himself and gasping for air again. pain. pain and angst. feels good. like pressing into a bruise)

SKINNER AND MULDER START FIGHTING???? throwing hands. “don’t make me put you under arrest. DON’T” <- this is escalating. very quickly. we haven’t even had the intro yet. holy fuck.

(my skinner and mulder angst heart is deeply satisfied)

oh my god… how he’s watching her through the window……………..

the intro was cut short, but i expected this 

ohhhh no, mulder is here before section chief blevins… he’s in troooOOooOouble!!!

“the fact of you being here alive, it gives the effect of shaping this investigation into something altogether different” <- well yeah. that is very much the case. let's all state the obvious together.

blevins and the squad seem to be surprisingly patient with him as they explain they need to know who the real dead guy found in his apartment was. they say, well, you know, this is going to be a murder charge. so please say something to help yourself out here. and he says idgaf bye <- LEGENDARY!!!

ohhh skinner is following him out… skinner says he has been withholding evidence. he knows mulder shot the guy, killed him, then shot him again to hide his identity!!!! woahhhh!!! this is huge!!!!

skinner tells him to admit why scully lied on his behalf, and he says that her disease was given to her by someone at the FBI. he takes a moment to process that, then asks who, and there is a whole lotta guilt in mulder’s reply: “i failed to find that out, sir” <- NOOOOOOO i’m sad :(

oh mulder, and your intrinsic, ancient guilt.......

“you don’t want to forget who your friends are, agent mulder- to remember who you can trust” <- oh my god oh my gooooood. you KNOW i am a SUCKER for the whole mulder/scully and skinner dynamic, and he knows that skinner made the deal with the devil for him but scully doesn’t know that and she doesn’t trust skinner and oh my goooosh

mulder nods, while skinner watches him leave. i hope he has taken this talk to heart.

section chief blevins is at the racetrack again with CSM?? and he’s watching senator kennedy speak about human cloning. which seems random. how is he even watching that while at the racetrack? they didn't have ipads

CSM points out he said mulder’s not to be underestimated <- haha yeah THAT’S my boy!! 

ohhhh, but blevins knows CSM let him escape…. and CSM isn’t alarmed by this! he’s all smirky, even as blevins says their FBI man has been exposed.

“mulder’s in trouble. he needs help. we can give it to him” “in exchange for?” “his new loyalty. to us” <- WOAHHHH

some dude was behind blevins the whole time and he says “you can proceed now” so is he off to go get mulder???!?!?!

scully is waking up!! OHHHH look at his smile when he sees her…. oh somebody kill me. he loves her SO much

(author's note: tearing up just thinking about this as i make these notes readable. goddddddddd)

she’s so worried that someone is going to see him, but OH MY GOD he grabs her hand, sits on the bed, tells her it’s okay, and kisses her cheek “i’m officially among the undead” <- WAAAAAAAAAH I LOVE HIM

(and while in the moment this only inspired the deepest of affection, i now find myself thinking of a vampire au, and who would be the vampire... but let's get back on track)

she asks what happened, and he says he didn’t come there to talk about that <- YEAH THAT IS WHAT I WANTED TO HEAR!!! you tell her not to worry sweet girl

but she won’t take it, says he doesn’t need to protect her!!! and that is just like her, to die arguing. so he fesses up that he will have to testify everything that he knows 

he does NOT want her to worry oh my god “it doesn’t matter” “yes it does” (gently) “hey scully, how about those yankees?”<- OHHHH MY GOD i cannot stop saying oh my god, but what even is there else to say?

i just. he loves her so much. he wants her to relax and be calm and be okay even when she would never let that happen in a million years. and the fact that she is worried about HIM while she is literally dying… bro. i’m emo.

scully is trying to warn him that skinner is the mole, and he’s touching her face, saying no, it’s not him, and oh, i’m melting. my heart is melting. 

WOAH WHAT??? she is saying to tell the committe he has to testify before that SHE KILLED THAT GUY??? to keep him safe???

he smiles and shakes his head, saying he can’t do that, but she responds with “mulder, if i can save you, let me” oh my god???

“let me give at least some meaning to what’s happened to me” <- OH MY GOD??????? no no no no no no no. 

(the implications here... trying to find meaning... nobility in sacrifice... the religious imagery it inspires....... we need to unpack this at length someday)

OH enter maggie and bill scully, watching as mulder sits on her bed holding her hand, smiling like the dutiful son-in-law he appears to be, which is especially crazy, when you consider the whole “and where has this mulder guy been” thing bill had going on when we last saw him. but mulder says he was just on his way out. 

AND he kisses her hands as he leaves… the tenderness which i feel towards this man is so sensitive and indescribable

and oh my god, mulder introduces himself to bill. he says he’s sorry about his sister… but bill has something else to say- WHAT IS IT??

“mr. mulder… i know something about you, about what dana’s been through with you, so… let’s leave the work away from here, okay? let her die with dignity” <- OH MY GOD????? WHAT THE FUCK???????

bill you literally SUCK what the HELL?? you don’t know ANYTHING about what they have been through!!! 

he looks like he was just slapped :( and bill goes in and holds her hand while mulder is there just standing opened mouthed, unable to believe what he just heard :(

what the fuck.

bill count ur days.

so now the guy from the racetrack that was with blevins seems to be on the loose with a sniper gun!!

ohhhh, mulder is leaving the hospital when he sees CSM!!!! “please tell me you’re here with severe chest pains” <- JHDJSJDJ okay yes i laughed.

OHHHH he says that the water he got in the facility is essential to scully’s survival???? and that he’s here tonight as a friend?? so they go outside to talk about it… but the sniper, isn’t he loose????

cutscene to the lone gunmen’s headquarters, where mulder is emptying the water vial into a little dish, saying CSM promised him something would be in there. and there is some… thing?? a microchip??

OH! he says that maybe it has to do with when the chip was removed from her neck!! because she got very sick shortly after it was removed!!! woah... that is wild to think about. so maybe if it had stayed in there this wouldn't have happened??? but she would have kept getting abducted because they would have known her location? but earlier someone said it was the procedure that takes their eggs that makes them sick. but how does that involve the alien? who knows. probably not chris carter.

kritschgau is here now; he’s been summoned before the committee

he confesses to giving classified information because he knows what the government is hiding from the people!!!! developing a moral compass late in life

but he denies knowing who killed the guy found dead in mulder's apartment, whose name is scott…

“i’m aware of one connected death, though” <- is he going to say scully???

NO!!! his son, who died that morning!!!!! oh no :( i feel bad now 

he says that part of his work comes from a congressional lobbying firm?? called “roush”. blevins and some other guy exchange looks but skinner asks what it means. and kritschgau says idk. well. me neither 

back in scully’s room, mulder is being yelled at by bill as he tries to explain the microchip from the tube might make her better. maggie seems to want bill to settle down, while scully is staring hard at it.

she says that everyone has their heart in the right place, but it needs to be her call… oh, so diplomatic… and she decides to try it

bill looks like he wants to kill mulder, and mulder tries to dodge his eye contact. it was very emotionally charged.... but also a little bit funny 

so now the sniper guy is back. he’s setting up the rifle, but where???? and to shoot which of our characters???

bill comes out of the hospital room and mulder is working overtime to try and avoid his gaze until he realizes it is impossible.

“see, she’s your big defender, but i think the truth is, she just doesn’t want to disappoint you” <- bro WHAT?? how fucking infantilizing can you be??? just because she’s your little sister doesn’t mean she can’t make her own informed decisions about living and dying??

bill, we are GOING to throw hands at some point 

OHHHHHHHH bill blames MULDER for all of this AND for missy’s death……… again…. not very fair…. scully made her own decisions… but if i were bill, i might feel the same if it were my family….

ohhh my god this whole exchange needs to be on my blog:

“has it been worth it? to you, i mean, have you found what you’ve been looking for?”

(mulder pauses, before answering in a whisper) “no”

“you know how that makes me feel?”

“in a way, i think i do. i lost someone very close to me- i lost a sister, i lost my father- all because of this thing i’m looking for”

“this what? little green aliens?”

(mulder looks down, before smiling) “yeah. little green aliens”

“you’re one sorry son of a bitch. not a whole lot more to say”

holy FUCK

1. i love a man who loves so unabashedly and so unapologetically. i love a man with his heart on his sleeve, and i love mulder for this reason, even if he is terribly stubborn and often infuriating. look at him. look how dedicated to the truth he is. look at how much he loves her.

and 2. for their own sake, i hope they elope when they get married, but for the sake of pissing bill off, i hope they get married in a traditional fashion, and he has to sit there and watch and regret everything he said when this inevitably saves her life and they get to grow very old and happy together because of his quest for aliens. and then they say their vows and kiss and bill writhes in the knowledge that he is a mean person. that is all. for now. because i will probably have more to say later.

fuck you bill. all my friends hate bill. 

mulder's phone rings… he answers it, saying “one sorry son of a bitch speaking” and it’s CSM??? asking how’s our patient? well. i guess he can take some credit here for the potential recovery, but “our” feels strong.

he says he’s arranged a meeting he will want to attend??? hmm. hmmmmm. hmmmmm. much to ponder here. mulder do NOT make any deals, CSM is a NASTY FUGLY SLUT!!

so mulder’s sitting in a diner, sipping coffee, when someone pulls into the parking lot??? it’s CSM himself. 

WITH THE CLONE SAMANTHA FROM BEFORE???

“you know 'em or something?” “i think that’s my sister”, he says to the waitress <- WHAT??

obviously though, he realizes it’s the fake samantha, right? like this trick won’t work on him twice... right?

she looks at CSM and says “my father” <- HUH??

nah, i do not believe it’s her at all. she says she was frightened, and she tried to forget everything from that night. she was told she was going to see her father. and CSM said basically that she was an affair baby and he's the bio dad. and he took her in and was so kind.

nah. i’m not buying it at all….

but mulder is crying……….. he’s had a rough go of it though these past few days, okay?!?!?! so don't be mean to him for believing what HAS to be an obvious lie

he tries to explain that CSM is probably lying to her about many, many things, because he has obviously known mulder’s whereabouts for a very long time, and has never told her

he says that she should come see their mom… but she says she can’t do it, she needs time, she has children of their own, and she won’t tell him where to find her. I DON’T BUY IT i’m glad she left before her mom could see her, because she doesn’t deserve that heartbreak AGAIN.

he assures her they will reunite on her time and he lets her go. even though he very much does not want to. which is a lot for his character. how he lets go of the iron grip he had on her arm...

i wonder if he doesn't believe it, deep down.

she says she’ll think about it, and she leaves, getting into the car with CSM. mulder is utterly gagged. 

hmm. HMMM. CSM is trying HARD to get him to pledge to the dark side. but will the same tricks work again???

meanwhile, scully is being injected with something. but she looks so sad as her doctor doesn’t seem hopeful. 

she asks if he’s ever seen a miracle, and he says he’s seen recovery from the brink, but he won’t dare call them that

sniper guy?????? has his rife aimed at CSM??? or mulder??? or both???? because they are standing next to each other

they’re meeting up. “you give me these things- the only things i’ve ever wanted- and i can’t think of any reason for you to do so” <- HE’S LYING ABOUT THE SAMANTHA STUFF, HE HAS TO BE. WE SAW A WHOLE CLONE ARMY OF PEOPLE WITH THAT FACE. IT CANNOT REALLY BE YOUR SAMANTHA, MULDER.

but he says he will offer him the truth, about the project. mulder says he knows the truth. CSM fires back that kritschgau was the one lying!!! 

“in exchange for what?” “quit the FBI, come work for me” <- WOAH he was shockingly forward there. i can kind of admire that. now please say no, mr. mulder. 

AND HE DOES SAY NO!!!!

“what have you given me? a claim of a cure for scully? is she cured?” (oh the way he said that was SO sassy, it felt like a read)

“you show me my sister, only to take her right back” <- again. DID he do that, though?

“you murdered my father. you killed scully’s sister, and if scully dies, i will kill you” TELL HIM BABY!!

“i don’t care whose father you are, i will put you down” OUGHHH GET HIM 

sniper guy puts his gun away when mulder leaves!!! so must be it’s mulder he’s after!!!

cut to scully cam… it’s her mom!! she called to see her and gives her a big hug.

“i fight, and i fight and i fight… but i’ve been so stupid” hey what do you mean. hey sweetheart what do you MEAN by that.

OH she is having a crisis of faith…. she feels guilty for being closed off to father mccue. ohhhh....... is the blaming herself for being too scared to turn to god??

she tells maggie she has no improvement, and they hug and they cry; “i know you’re afraid', maggie says, "i know you’re afraid to tell me, but you have to tell someone”

blevins is watching more press about human cloning. is that why they do these experiments with the women? for cloning purposes? is that what i am supposed to believe from this?

blevins calls someone, and sees skinner in the background of the hearings on cloning… now what is he doing there. blevins says their colleague was supposed to fix the FBI problem, and then he will fix it for good… is he talking about the sniper?????

back to scully’s room, where she is sleeping, and mulder is entering. he’s watching her sleep, then laying his head next to her and SOBBING. WHYYYYY???? OHHHHH....... he couldn't bear to wake her up. someone please hit me with a hammer.

then he is here at a meeting with blevins, who says something urgent has arrived. it’s the analysis that shows he fired the shot into the dead guy!!! from an undisclosed source!!! and unless he offers someone else up, all evidence points to him being the killer!!

is he bluffing??? did skinner sell him out?? no, that cannot be it...

blevins claims that scully was going to name skinner as the mole, and that they have found substantial evidence against him, which mulder refuses to believe. well… he is A mole, but not THE or THIS mole!!!

he’s basically saying name skinner and you walk free????? mulder doesn’t answer, just says he’ll see blevins at the hearing. verrrrry shady

he goes back to scully, who asks why he’s here, he has a hearing!! this has never stopped him in the past. and he confesses to having stopped by last night, but not having the heart to wake her up :( she’s asking why…

he says he was going to take the deal with CSM, but changed his mind after blevins tried to get him to implicate skinner!!!

(skinner being his grounding force to returning to his sense of morality... no no no it's fine i'm definitely super cool about that)

scully offers again to take the blame, but he refuses, saying he couldn’t do that to her family or live that lie (the truth motif)

“we all have our faith… and mine is in the truth” <- YESSSSS the comparison to religion in his dedication… everyone has been saying and observing it for the past 4 seasons, but now HE has!!! 

“then why’d you come here if you’d already made up your mind?” (laughing) “because i knew you’d talk me out of it if i was making a mistake” <- OHHHH to be known is to be loved…. <3

and father mccue walks in right then!! she says “you’ll be in my prayers” and he kisses her cheek, saying “have the father say a few hail mulders for me, okay?” <- LMAOOO AWWWWW BABY

she’s crying as father mccue walks in and mulder walks out…

and her honesty in telling him that she will pray for him, after running from her own belief for so long; it was as if she thought praying would be a declaration of weakness, and maybe it is, to submit yourself to something higher, to ask for a mercy you cannot earn... but she is going to, and not only for herself on the brink of death, but for her best friend who is going through his own turmoil..... oh scully........

now for the hearing. he's late! fashionably so!

they’re setting the stage- we know that man was killed with your weapon- and mulder says he wants to set the record straight.

skinner asks for a break??? but mulder says he’s ready to proceed….. oooo what are they each getting at…. skinner looks stressed af

he says he was assigned to work with scully, who he thinks was to spy on him…

“that agent scully did not follow these orders is a testament to her integrity as an investigator, a scientist, and a human being” <- YESSS 🔥that is my girl who is motivated by the eternal burden of doing the Morally Correct Thing :,)

he’s explaining that she lied about his death because he asked her to, because she was a victim of the grand conspiracy that is killing her (this is cut with footage of the sniper looking at CSM through the scope of his rifle, and scully praying with father mccue)

he’s saying he will name the people responsible for this tonight!!! but they just want to know if he shot scott!!!! it's getting more and more tense and loud, before we boil over to a yell:

“i can’t do that sir, because the section chief is the man i’m about to name!” (murmuring) <- OHHHHHHHHHH HE DROPPED A BOMBSHELL ON THE VILLA

(we enter slo mo) (sniper fires at CSM) (blevins is shot by some other guy, who puts the pistol in his dead hand) (CSM lays on the floor, bloody, holding the picture of baby mulder and samantha)

DID CSM JUST DIE????? i refuse to believe it. that bitch can’t be killed……. nope nope no way. unless i see his corpse (NOT his headstone or his funeral, his actual CORPSE) i shan’t buy it.

so much just happened????

the next morning, skinner is with mulder at the hospital. who, as if just hearing me, tells mulder that CSM is dead, shot holding the photo of him and samantha

NO BODY WAS FOUND??? but it was too much blood loss for anyone to have survived. so someone took the body?? OR someone brought extra blood to dump on the ground and fake a death!!! makes you think!!

mulder claims he just guessed it was blevins behind it all- do i believe it? or do you think it was his years of solving crimes that allowed him to pick up on it subconsciously? i'm going with that interpretation

and blevins had been on roush’s payroll for four years!!! a biotechnology company!!! for cloning??? for aliens?? and of course all connections are now being erased.

BUT NOT EVERYTHING…. SCULLY’S IN REMISSION!!! skinner is shocked and mulder says it’s the best news he’s ever heard 😭🥺 my BABY

when skinner asks what turned it around, he says he doesn’t know, and they’ll never know…

oh my god, i love that their beliefs combined to cure her… his obsession with the Truth and her literal coming to God, and which of them was actually responsible is entirely impossible to tell. oh i actually LOVE THAT SO FUCKING MUCH. RAHHHHHH THAT IS SO POETIC. their guiding forces in life, and we have no way of knowing which is responsible for her life being saved. but it happened.

and skinner wants to see her!!!! leaving mulder to hold the bloody photograph of his baby self… and he’s crying… it’s been a very long few days for him 

oh my god… i need some time to think on this all….

so, 2 days have passed since i watched this episode, and i still have SO many emotions. in no particular order, some things i am dwelling on: bill's cruelty to mulder; mulder smiling as he held scully's hand, trying to distract her; him unable to hold himself up as he sees her in the hospital room; skinner telling mulder to know who his friends are; skinner trying to pause the meeting before it even began so he could offer some sort of advice to mulder; scully crying into her mom's arms, surrendering to god; scully, who knows that mulder is not a believer, and has ridiculed her for being so in the past, telling him that she will pray for him; scully worrying about him when she is the one who is dying; scully reclaiming her agency when she decides that she wants to use the microchip; mulder saying that her remission is the best news he could ever have possibly heard; and skinner going in to see her while she was still surrounded by her family

WAAHHHHHHHHHH

so. a lot on my mind. a very, very, very good episode. i thought the blevins reveal kinda came out of nowhere since he has mostly been a set piece rather than a real character, but honestly, that wasn't the heart of the matter here, so we can disregard it.

i'm not sure how i feel about the potential samantha reintroduction. actually, i do know how i feel: i just didn't much care for it. frankly, i just don't buy it at all, and it felt like a lot to cram into one episode, especially since they've used the whole "is it really her?" plot point before. so it felt like a bit much on top of the already incredibly high emotional stakes.

but other than these thoughts, the episode was fantastic. finally, we get something happy! the potential end of scully's illness! mulder and skinner basking in her presence as she recovers!! her surrender to the omnipotent! his surrender to the truth, but not at the extent of his morals!!! everyone is so happy and the wedding is tomorrow!! i will see you there!!!

(what did you think?? did you like this one as much as i did?? did any moments make you tear up?? anything you noticed that i missed? please tell me!!! i'm really excited and want to chat on the subject :D)

[leiascully]

Fic: It's Not That Deep (Mulder/Scully/Krycek, M)

1500 words; M for sexual situations; even ratboys have rich fantasy lives

In Alex’s fantasies, Scully is wearing leather.

Just leather.

There’s a harness around her hips with a dildo jutting out from the soft mound of curls between her thighs, and she’s slung on his oldest, dirtiest, softest leather jacket. She leaves it undone. The skin of her belly is milk-white against the black leather. The shadows between her breasts draw his eye and dry his mouth.

What Mulder is wearing varies. Sometimes suit trousers and a button-up shirt, the sleeves rolled taut around his muscled forearms. Alex was always jealous of how effortless Mulder made it look. Sometimes jeans and a black turtleneck. Sometimes that fucking red Speedo. God, that Speedo. Alex almost got on his knees on the wet tile and blew him right fucking there. But usually, in the fantasies, it’s a suit.

In Alex’s fantasies, he isn’t wearing anything. Maybe a pair of handcuffs or a gag, but that hardly counts. He’s bent over a table, or a couch, or the desk in the basement office. This time it’s the desk and his hands are cuffed behind his back. Scully, behind him, snaps on a latex glove.

“Don’t move,” she says in an ice-cold voice that makes Alex shiver.

“You’ve been a bad, bad boy,” Mulder says. He’s always watching, at the beginning, lounging with his pants undone. His dick pushes through the fly of his black silk boxers, already mostly hard. He strokes it idly. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

“Fuck you,” Alex snarls.

“Wait your turn,” Mulder tells him, sounding so smug that Alex wants to shut him up by putting something in his mouth. He can’t help licking his lips.

Fucking Mulder. He has everything Alex wants. He could walk into any of the Syndicate’s clubhouses tomorrow, sit his ass in one of those overstuffed chairs, and be offered the world. They’d put a drink in his hand and a crown on his head. He wouldn’t have to crawl the way Alex has. Alex immediately adds those chairs to his fantasy rotation. Imagining riding Mulder’s dick in the Syndicate’s sanctum sanctorum makes his dick twitch.

He can feel Scully behind him. She isn’t touching him, but her presence is palpable. He can feel her eyes drag over his skin, judging him unworthy. He squirms.

“I told you not to move.” Her words are frosty, but the hand she lays on his hip is hot. She drips lube down his ass crack. Her fingers trail lower and lower, the latex catching at his skin but the lube slippery. Alex tries not to whimper. He knows from experience that will only encourage her to take her time. As it is, it feels like an eternity before her fingertips are pushing into him. She works him open with slow thrusts. Alex lays his cheek flat on the desk so he can watch Mulder watching with half-lidded eyes.

“You shouldn’t have pissed her off,” Mulder says. He’s still stroking himself with two fingers. “She’s going to take you apart.”

Alex can’t think of anything he wants more. Maybe the keen edge of Scully’s attention can dissect his life into parts that make sense. Maybe she can peel him down to just desire, all the layers of shame and guilt and resentment cut away. She’s got two fingers in him now, and then three. He wants more. He wants her to fuck him until he forgets English.

“Ask politely,” she tells him, and he gasps, “Please,” and then he can feel her cock nudging against him. Her foot taps his and he spreads his legs wider, lowering his hips. The chilly shock of more lube makes him tense up and he has to purposely relax as she pushes into him.

“Alex,” she says, her voice a caress. She holds his hips, not moving, letting him adjust to the girth of her dildo. God, she feels so fucking good. Her fingers dig lightly into his skin and he grinds back against her. The hem of the jacket brushes his back.

“Please,” he says again, and she shoves deeper. The way she fills him up is incredible. He’s panting already. The way Scully fucks him is precise. Every thrust feels calculated. She never kisses him. Even in his dreams, he can’t go that far. If he’s lucky, she’ll drag her nails down his back or haul him up and play with his nipples. She fucks him like she’s listening to his confession. He’s scum, but she isn’t afraid to get dirty.

Mulder, on the other hand, fucks like it’s personal. He likes to see Alex’s face. He likes to put his hand around Alex’s throat - not choking, just holding Alex’s jaw so he can’t move. No amount of deep dicking can redeem the hurt they’ve caused each other, but God knows they try, in Alex’s fantasies. As he watches Alex get fucked, the rolled cuff of his shirt strains against the way his forearm flexes.

Alex grits his teeth and braces himself against Scully’s thrusts. She’s powerful, despite her small size. Her gloved hand slips from his hip to his dick, latex catching his sensitive skin until he hisses. She fucks him right up to the edge. The muscles in his legs are shaking. His balls are tight as she strokes them.

“Good, Alex,” she says, and he almost comes just from that. But then she pulls out, leaving him slumped over the desk. He feels so empty and bereft without her moving inside him.

“What do you think?” she asks Mulder.

“I’m gonna fuck him up the ass,” Mulder says. There’s a pearl of liquid quivering on the head of his dick. Alex wants to lick it off. Mulder stands up, lanky and graceful. He’s not wearing the suit anymore. It’s easy to disrobe in a fantasy. His skin is smooth and golden.

Scully peels the condom off her dildo and hitches her hip onto the desk. Mulder hauls Alex up by the wrists so that she can situate herself in front of him. Alex opens his mouth as Mulder lowers him again, lapping at Scully’s silicone cock. He loves it when they fill him up from both ends. He deserves to be punished and he takes it gladly.

Mulder isn’t patient or clinical. He shoves roughly into Alex and Alex moans around Scully’s cock. Mulder fucks him like he can shake Alex’s bones loose. Alex chokes on silicone and begs for more. He licks up and down the smooth sides of the dildo. Scully scrapes her nails through his hair and down his neck. His jacket has fallen open to frame her tits and fuck, she’s beautiful. She unbuckles the harness and lets the dildo slide under Alex’s chin. He plunges face first into the wet heat of her cunt. His tongue has gotten him in trouble over and over; this is the one thing it does well. Scully sighs, her thighs tensing around his face.

For a few minutes, Alex’s life is simple: friction, pressure, slickness, pleasure sparking along his nerves. He licks frantically at Scully’s clit as if it will relieve the overwhelming sensation. Mulder pounds into him and Alex is going to come. He’s inches away, hovering on that edge. Suddenly Mulder pulls out and Alex almost sobs.

“Flip him,” Mulder says, and then Alex is on his back with Scully straddling his face and his ankles over Mulder’s shoulders. His arms are pinned under his back, but he relishes the ache in his shoulders. Mulder thrusts into him again and again and again until every thought is gone from Alex’s head. He’s all instinct, all urge. Scully trembles over him, crying out as she comes, and Mulder growls in his throat. And just like that, Alex is coming, hot spatter all over his stomach. Mulder slides out of him, rolling off the condom, and lifts Scully off Alex’s face. She wraps her legs around his waist and he presses her up against a filing cabinet. The leather jacket squeaks. Alex rolls to his side, panting, watching the two of them. Scully flings a hand out to steady herself against the rattling cabinet. Mulder lips at her tits, sucks at her pale skin. Scully leans down and kisses him, mouth open like she’s breathing life into him.

Watching the two of them is like trying to read Braille - he’s missing so much of the subtle communication between them, the unspoken connection. Scully doesn’t have to ask for what she wants. Mulder gives it to her, already knowing. Scully keens, her voice rising higher and higher, and Alex can see the muscles in Mulder’s ass tense as he pounds up into her. They come together, their voices twining in harmony, and goddamn, it’s a gorgeous sight. Alex’s dick twitches like he could come again watching them fuck.

Yeah, maybe it’s fucking pathetic that the people having the most fun in his fantasy aren’t him, but that’s the way it works. He blinks himself back into the real world, sticky and spent.

[agent-troi]

Eight Nights of Mulder, Night 5: Miracles

Summary: Scully finds out she’s pregnant… but this time, Mulder is there to share her joy.

@eightnightsofmulder @today-in-fic

ao3 link

“Scully, they’re taking abductees. You’re an abductee.”

She put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Do you want to become one yourself, Mulder? Because that’s what could happen if you go back out there.”

“I can’t let it happen to you again. I won’t. I’m not gonna risk…” he paused to swallow around the lump in his throat. “...losing you.”

Her eyes welled up with tears, and he could feel his doing the same. In unison, they moved into one another’s embrace.

“Don’t go back,” she whispered. “Please.”

Before Mulder could respond, he felt her suddenly go slack against him. He stumbled as he caught her limp body in his arms. “Scully? Scully!”

He saw her eyes twitch beneath half-closed lids. “M’ld’r…” she murmured sluggishly.

“I’m here, Scully. I’m here, and I’m not leaving. You hear me?”

“Mmmm…” There was a light sheen of sweat on her forehead. His panic escalated, and he bent at the knees to scoop her up in his arms and cradle her against his chest. She’s so small…

“Agent Mulder?” Skinner had emerged from the conference room, followed closely by the three Gunmen. Their eyes widened when they saw Scully. “What happened?” Skinner asked.

“I don’t know, I think she fainted.” Mulder could barely hear his own voice over the sound of his heart hammering in his chest. “I’m taking her to the hospital. You guys stay here with Krycek and Marita and see what else you can find out.”

He made it to the hospital in record time, Scully regaining consciousness along the way but still weak enough not to raise more than the faintest objections when Mulder told her where he was taking her. When he told the admitting nurse that he was her boyfriend, Scully raised her eyebrows at him but didn’t say anything. Thankfully, the nurse believed them, so he was allowed to wait with her while they ran a series of tests.

“I know it’s technically true, since we’re together now,” she remarked as she sat on the examination table, her legs swinging back and forth as they were too short to reach the ground. “But ‘boyfriend’ just sounds so… juvenile. No, that’s not the right word. It’s just not… enough… to describe what you are to me.”

Mulder sat in a chair which he’d pulled up right next to the table, squeezing her hand gently as he looked up at her. “If I’d said I was only your ‘partner’, they wouldn’t have let me in here.”

Scully chuckled. “Half the time people assume we mean that in a romantic sense anyway. I think it’s fitting. It describes every aspect of our relationship, personal and professional.” She paused to let out an adorably enormous yawn, and Mulder couldn’t help but smile despite his lingering concern. “And it would’ve described…” 

Her voice faltered as she suddenly looked away from him, down at her feet. “If we’d gotten our miracle, we would’ve been partners in that too.”

Regret and agonized longing pierced his heart, just like it had back in Oregon when he’d watched Scully hold Teresa Hoese’s baby. He’d wanted that for her– with her– so much, but whatever cruel God was in charge of dispensing miracles had decided it wasn’t meant to be.

The door to the exam room opened, and in walked the doctor, who looked like she was trying not to smile. “Miss Scully?”

She handed her a manila envelope, which Scully immediately opened. Mulder looked at the doctor anxiously, too afraid to read it himself. “What is it? Is she okay?”

A gasp caused him to turn his attention back to Scully, who was pressing one hand to her mouth as if she were trying to hold in laughter or tears, or both. “Scully?”

His partner looked up at him with an unreadable expression. “I’m… I’m pregnant.”

She laughed softly as tears of joy slid down her cheeks. “I’m having a—”

“We’re having a—”

“A miracle,” they finished in unison. Mulder pulled Scully into his arms and spun her around, laughing and crying with her. 

“I told you not to give up, Scully.”

“You did,” she murmured into his shoulder. “I’ll never doubt you again.”

He snorted. “Liar.”

Scully laughed again. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

“I thought you believed in miracles?”

“I thought you didn’t?”

Mulder smiled and kissed her forehead, cradling her face as she gazed up at him with wide-eyed joy and wonder. “Well, maybe now I do.”

[azure-firecracker]

the x files of course!! AND a fandom you want to do and/or think I would enjoy 🫶🏽

Aah thank you💚💚💚

TXF

Favorite female character: Scully the absolute love of my life! An icon. She will murder you with wit and science and a glare. She’s also the most protective person you’ll ever meet. She’s loyal to a fault and rational to an even greater fault, but also both of these save her (and Mulder) over and over. She’s nuanced. She’s sassy. She’s hilarious. She’s a badass. She breaks my heart. Character of all time.

Favorite male character: Mulder the absolute puppy of a man that he is. He has trauma. His self preservation skills are nonexistent. He would die for the truth but he will live for Scully. No one carries more love in their heart than this man. He almost dies every episode. He’s a genius. And an idiot. And a lover. And a fighter. But really mostly a lover if he didn’t have *trauma* I adore him!

Favorite Season: Season 5 could theoretically take this but for now still Season 2! In all its raw soap opera love story type glory. This is the season of desperate hand holding, of racing through the dark after one another and screaming into the night, of pulling each other back from Hell and undying loyalty in the face of unspeakable horrors. It’s desperate embraces and collapsing into each others arms and gloom and new love and every emotion is at level 100. Season 2 you will always be special to me.

Favorite Episode: I have two! One is Irresistible (which I have talked about extensively on here), and the other is Demons (which I will talk about extensively on here). You can see my love for angst and hurt/comfort and rescues lol (and you can find my thoughts on both episodes in my masterpost!) In many ways I think these episodes mirror each other, and they sort of form an episode quartet along with Unruhe and Anasazi. But that’s a topic for another post.

Favorite Cast Member: Gillian Anderson!

My favorite ship: “Mulder, I wouldn’t put myself on the line for anybody but you” “Scully, you are the only one I trust” MSR my beloved.

A Character I’d Die Defending: Fun fact Dana Scully has done nothing wrong ever actually all of her skepticism is valid and she’s a perfect human being.

A Character I Just Can’t Sympathize With: I don’t care if he’s a failed writer or whatever CSM is just an asshole and (hot take) not that entertaining to watch.

A Character I Grew to Love: Skinner! He started out lowkey boring, but I quickly was like “ooh he’s cool I like him” and then he got really interesting and nuanced (much more so than I anticipated).

My Anti OTP: I once saw a Scully/Krycek fic. That man had a hand in her abduction. No.

I think you’d probably like Buffy the Vampire Slayer if you haven’t seen it already (I’ve only seen 4 seasons but it’s always a fun rewatch for me)

Favorite female character: I have two! First is Faith who follows my trend of evil girls who are really just misunderstood and have never been loved. She was also my first real character crush! Second is Willow, who I just relate to a lot as a witchy lesbian nerd, and I want to give her a hug whenever she’s on screen and she’s so lovable and so layered and I love her very much.

Favorite male character: Probably Giles. I have a soft spot for parental figures and his relationship with Buffy is so sweet and layered and complex. Also he’s just an awkward British librarian who’s way too attached to a group of teenagers and I love that about him.

Favorite Season: Season 3! As dark as Season 2 but less melodramatic, plus Faith is there being hot and gay and evil! It’s not a perfect season but over half of these episodes are excellent.

Favorite Episode: Oh I’m not sure since it’s been a hot sec since I watched the show. I LOVED This Year’s Girl/Who Are You from Season 4, even though the season isn’t that great. I also love Five by Five from the spin-off Angel, if only for the ending scene.

Favorite Cast Member: Charisma Carpenter! I won’t get too into it here and I don’t know everything but she did some very brave things by speaking out against the show’s creators and I admire that.

Favorite Ship: Willow and Tara have my heart, but Faith and Buffy are SO fun! It’s a tie.

A Character I’d Die Defending: I won’t say Faith since I’ve already talked about her a lot. Instead I’ll go with Cordelia, who went through a lot of growth (especially if you watch her on Angel), and her growth was often unacknowledged by the show itself. Justice for my girl!

A Character I Just Can’t Sympathize With: This is ONLY about Buffy and not Angel, but I got SO sick of Angel by the time season 3 ended. He just sat there and was emo. I ran out of patience for him. He was great on Angel though (they let him do things besides mope and brood).

A Character I Grew to Love: Buffy! At first I thought she was sort of just a generic protagonist with some teen girl fun sprinkled in, but she’s got so many layers to her character and her fun is sprinkled with a real gravity that’s sort of a heartbreaking back and forth when you realize how young she is. I’ve also come to relate to her a lot more as I’ve gotten older, and the more I do, the more I like her.

My Anti OTP: Remember that time they tried to make Xander and Willow a thing? No? Me neither.

Ty for the ask:)

[lesbianmarrow]

txf but mulder is a woman is really good #lesbian mulder and scully forever however I still think that in a scenario where both mulder and scully were men mulder would say some deeply unhinged “I wish I were a woman so that I could marry you” stuff with varying degrees of sincerity all of the time

i don’t disagree and i think the mulder/krycek stuff makes a persuasive case for giving mulder weird compelling homoeroticism but i just can’t get too invested in the idea of gay guy msr because like well we already have bashir and o’brien don’t we. it occurs to me that mulder’s rocky dating history and scully’s jealousy would come off extremely misogynistic with gay guy msr and that would be really really funny. but then i guess that just circles around to channeling kirk/spock

[all-eyes-lead-to-the-truth]

All Eyes Lead to the Truth | Tunguska (4x08)

Rats are survivors. Natural born killers who do the work of destructors; by no means impervious, but they’ll attack the weak, anything that stands in their way. They adapt and survive.

Alex Krycek respects that. Maybe it’s why Mulder’s “insult” had felt like a compliment. 

Yeah, he’s learned to live like the rats. 

And yeah, Mulder. He’s had little trouble adapting. 

The relentless agent sits across from him now in this miserable cell, picking at the underside of his boot. Conversation doesn’t really work for them. They’ve been through enough shit together; you’d think he’s earned an iota of trust.

“So,” Alex ventures. “We gonna die here?”

Mulder glowers. “If we ever do get out, I’m gonna kill you myself, Krycek.”

Alex smirks. “I don’t think that’s true.”

“Oh, no?”

“You’ve had a hundred opportunities. You haven’t taken any of them.”

Mulder’s eyes narrow. He says nothing. Spooky Mulder would never deny the truth.

They sit, the faint scratching of roaches and vermin echoing around the cell. Perhaps silence is preferable, but Alex can’t help himself. He wants the upper hand. He needs the upper hand. 

And he knows exactly how to get it.

“Whaddya think Scully’s up to?” he asks. Mulder’s eyes dart towards him, then away again. Here we go. As expected, Agent Scully is his trigger. Adapt, Alex. 

“Scully, Scully, Scully,” he purrs. “I remember when I met her. She could barely look at me. Like our partnership personally offended her.” He looks at Mulder, trying to make eye contact. “Most agents get a partner or two in their career. Maybe it works out, maybe it doesn’t. They move on. Not you two, though.”

His cellmate remains silent, but now wears  a searing glare. 

“We’re gonna die here anyway, Mulder, so you may as well confess. What’s she like, you know… in the sack? Carpet match the drapes?”

If looks could kill, Alex would be a dead man. He thrives off this, off making Mulder squirm. It’s just so fucking easy.

Sometimes he wonders how things would be if he’d just join forces with Mulder. He’s the obvious choice for an ally, morality-wise. But morality isn’t the medium with which Alex paints. He isn’t like Mulder. And anyway, there’s something he relishes more than his admiration of the man: the power Alex wields over him. 

Like right now.

Mulder clenches his jaw and looks away, unable to meet Alex’s eye. Once again, his honesty betrays him.

“Are you serious?” Alex’s eyes go wide. He was absolutely certain they were sleeping together. Talk about an X-File. “Shit. You two really had me fooled.”

His incredulity aside, this approach isn’t working. He needs to take a different route to get a rise out of Mulder. Something worse. 

“You know,” Alex says, lowering his voice. “Back when she was abducted, I suggested just… killing her.” Mulder bristles. “They underestimated your determination, but I never did. I warned them you’d never stop. They didn’t listen.”

A loud clang comes from somewhere in the gulag. A horrific scream. 

“Guess there’s still time,” Alex shrugs. “They don’t make the same mistake twice.”

That does it. Mulder lurches across the cell and wraps his hands around Alex’s neck for the second time today. There’s rage in his eyes, a primal savagery. And Alex likes it. He isn’t even sure why he does this, why he wants it. Maybe it’s the kind of thing he needs to feel alive. To feel like he isn't alone in the dark.

Like he does on occasion, he thinks of the missile silo. Mulder would probably like that story. But he doesn’t seem to be in the mood for talk. His arm is jammed beneath Alex’s chin, pinning him against the wall. He can feel his airway closing, but he knows it won’t last. Mulder will let him go. 

“Don’t ever say her name to me again,” Mulder seethes. For a wild moment it feels like they might kiss, and it’s not the first time he’s felt that way. There's an undeniable energy between them. Maybe it’s the knowledge there’s no one on the planet he hates more. Maybe Mulder’s passion is contagious. 

Maybe they’re both just animals.

As expected, Mulder lets him go with a ceaseless penetrating glare. Their little game is over for now; at least, until they play another one. 

They sit on opposite sides of the cell for hours until dinner is served. He and Mulder spit out the roach-infested soup in temporary camaraderie, but then a guard makes his way inside, and Alex takes his shot. He’s got one play left and he’s going to use it, no matter the cost.

The guard hesitates. Mulder asks for a translation, understandably concerned. Alex replies honestly: “That I want to see his supervisor.”

If he doesn’t want to see you, you’ll be accountable, the guard replies in Russian. He appears taken aback, unaccustomed to a prisoner's authoritative tone. 

I’ll be accountable, Alex insists. Mulder dumbly looks back and forth between them. 

The guard acquiesces, and opens the door. Freedom lies ahead if he can play this correctly, if he can just find one more dark pipeline to squeeze through. Maybe he’ll get out of this shithole alive after all. 

He’s brought before the head honcho and sings like a canary. The Americans are working on their own vaccine; he’s even got the name of the head doctor. He mentions an old comrade, Vasily Peskow. That gets their attention. 

Alex Krycek has been no stranger to loyalty. But as he betrays the country he genuinely loves, he realizes the truth: his loyalty is only to himself. 

As he’s escorted from the gulag, he’s taken past Mulder’s cell again. He peers inside where his adversary awaits whatever fate Alex’s defection has unleashed. There’s a slight twinge of regret inside him, but it quickly passes. 

He steps outside as the chilled air of Tunguska slaps him in the face. Beneath him, a rat scampers by, disappearing into the woodwork.

Read the rest of All Eyes Lead to the Truth on Archive of Our Own

@admiralty-xfd

[deathsbestgirl]

the difference between when scully is kidnapped in lazarus vs by duane barry early in season two is wild.

you can see his worry & how he’s a bit withdrawn, and his determination to find her. he shows his skills in handling these kinds of cases. but i also think it’s clear he doesn’t carry real guilt about her being taken.

where with duane barry, he’s desperate. the lengths he went to, with krycek screwing up his ascent to the mountain, is insane! like impressive & crazy & amazing. he was just barely too late. but he has her necklace & her faith and he’s grasping at his own belief which is harder to keep without her there now.

they were already dedicated partners, but it’s clear how much closer they became in the span of a few months between these incidents. they lose the x files but still find ways to work together. they have clandestine meetings. they don’t lose their partnership. scully doesn’t give up on him when his depression is so palpable. she knows because he didn’t even see her in the hall that time. and he always sees her.

duane barry threatened everything they had. their partnership, their friendship, scully’s life — mulder’s life by extension. he had no one to help him through this, because she was the one who started getting him through everything. even his past grief. and that’s when mrs. scully became a lifeline. someone to share in his desperation & grief. and magically (to him), she didn’t blame him for her daughter’s abduction. at the same time, he was a lifeline for her. but it was difficult to keep maggie’s faith that she would come back. i think her giving up felt like a nail in the coffin to him. but having someone else’s belief to push against bolstered him. and then she comes back. battered, bruised, near death. and he falls back on the only thing he can hold onto. avenging her. until melissa tears him to shreds. because that isn’t what scully needs, and he takes the chance on melissa’s beliefs. because scully loves her so much (idolizes her) and melissa loves dana so much and these scully women know how to bring out the best in him with their blunt forceful honesty & seeing right through him. they know the good, sweet, caring man he is whether he purposely showed them or not.

anyway. all that to say, i love the evolution of their relationship. even so early on, the other’s safety is paramount to their own peace of mind and holding onto their beliefs and fighting the fight & the truth they pursue for such similar yet still different reasons.

[carefulfears]

I saw you tagged that photo of Mulder, Krycek and Scully as “I’m so fascinated by them”; can you talk about that? I don’t know if I’ve given too much thought to their dynamic before and I’m curious as to why you like them as a trio

anon, i want to walk you through a scenario. you’re a 29 year old medical doctor teaching classes at quantico after having been separated from your first assignment at the fbi. you miss your partner. you’re giving morbid lectures and nearly crying when a student says you sound “spooky” and arranging covert meetings at the watergate hotel.

one day, your ex-partner reaches out to ask for your help on a case! you’ve been waiting for this for months! you practically begged to autopsy a body covered in sewage waste and mutant worms for this!

he comes to see you about the case, and your face falls as you realize that he’s brought with him a new partner. “this is alex krycek, we’re working the case together,” he says. standing next to this barbie doll looking motherfucker (whose hand you pointedly refuse to shake).

your wary “trust no one” friend, who accused you of being a spy when it was your first day on his assignment, has seemingly taken to this new ally. they’re carpooling and saving each other’s lives in train stations and venturing into hostage situations without telling you. (“sounds like your new partner is working out…must be nice not having someone question your every move,” you tell him cheekily over the phone).

in a split second, a broken window, a mountaintop- your life changes forever. three months of missing time, and you come back to find a reopened office and an FBI agent without a partner; that hand you refused to shake participated in your violation, then disappeared without a trace.

it isn’t long before he’s back: one, two, three gunshots fired. a father. an apartment wall. a sister.

(though i don’t know if scully ever found out that krycek was there when her sister was killed)

in a moment of quick thinking and sweaty desperation, you break up a fight and trade a bullet in the deceiver for a bullet in your partner’s shoulder; less than a year after introduction in your autopsy bay, you save both lives.

over the years, he’s the shadow you can’t quite shake. when your partner makes his way to hong kong or russia, it’s not you that goes trailing after.

you do follow his tracks into a dark apartment, ask him, what are you thinking about? listen to him tell you about destiny. fate. the “inextricable relationships” of our lives.

when he changes his tune, suddenly willing to follow leads he had admonished you for suggesting, you could swear you heard russian translation.

(i know scully doesn’t know that krycek kissed him)

office fires, nanobots, and air force base abductions later, you strategize over chinese takeout and pizza. you stand at the head of the table, your partner two people removed, the russian to his immediate left.

perhaps it would be too much to ask, after the funeral, to grieve free of threat. nonetheless, there’s leather around hospital corners, broken vials in the garage, a seat taken at the bureau when you still don’t have one to share.

three more gunshots, the spy dies and you give birth on the same day. it’s colder without a shadow, though you can’t say you miss it.

you stand in a court of law and can’t help but notice, your partner looking over his shoulder.

[scullysexual]

previous fic | e | prompt 3 | this list | ao3 | @today-in-fic

“Scully…what are your thoughts on double penetration?” She licks her lips before she answers, thinking. It could be hot but it could also be painful, there wasn’t exactly a lot of her. But Mulder would never hurt her, not intentionally. And while she has no experience with this he seemed to have some. He’d look after her. She can trust him. “Okay…” she says, still sounding unsure. “Just okay?” He wants her to be sure. She is sure. “We’ll do it.” [Mulder and Scully try double penetration]

iii. Double Penetration.

A You got mail! sign pops up on his screen while he attempts to finish this report. Anything for a distraction, Mulder drags his cursor over to it and clicks on it. The email is simple, the email address non-descript, it could almost be mistaken as a scam email or even an email sent to the wrong person if Mulder wasn’t so familiar with this address or these types of emails.

I’m staying in town for a few months, it reads. In a few weeks I’ll have some time off. Meet me then- A.

One could go back through his emails and find countless messages that are similar to this one and each one ended the same way. The fact that Alex Krycek could click his fingers and Mulder would always be there despite his protests made him hate himself.

But that was before. That dark time between ending it with Phoebe and meeting someone else, someone who showed him he didn’t need to chase a carrot on a stick anymore. Mulder’s answer is simple.

I have a girlfriend now.

And Alex’s response is quick.

Okay. Bring her along too.

Mulder doesn’t reply.

He is quieter than usual. No less attentive to her but whatever is distracting him is now distracting her, and she can’t come if she’s distracted.

“Mulder, what’s wrong?” she asks, gently pulling on his hair to lift him up from where his face lays between her legs.

“It’s nothing...” he begins then seems to think better of it. He sighs, laying his head against her thigh and doesn’t look at her. “Scully…what are your thoughts on double penetration?”

She doesn’t class herself as a prude, she is fine to explore and try new things when it comes to sex but his question has a hot flush spreading quickly down her body, her voice suddenly stuck in her throat.

“I…I don’t know. I’ve…I’ve never tried it,” she chokes out. “Um…Have you?”

Sudden images of Mulder in different positions, with different people, and different objects floods her mind. Her pussy pulses slightly at the thought and she shifts her hips.

He smiles, squeezing her other thigh. “A couple times, yeah. She, uh…she liked it so, you know…”

Scully nods. “Why- why do you ask?”

Mulder’s eyes widen as if searching for an answer.

“I don’t know…I guess, curiosity?” He shrugs, beginning to sit up but stays kneeling between her legs. She can see his dick now, hard. He laces his fingers through hers. “Would you…would you like to try it sometime? We can take it slow and- and if it’s done right it can be good for you.”

She thinks it over.

“How good?”

Mulder smiles, as if recalling a good memory.

“Really, really good.”

Her eyes fall to his cock again. Sometimes she struggles to take one Mulder let alone two…And then a panic grips her and her eyes dart up suddenly.

“We can keep it just me and you, right? We don’t need to find a third person, do we?”

He shakes his head. “We don’t need to involve anyone else- not yet anyway. But if we do this, we do it at yours. You have the tools.”

Scully wonders just what he could be going on about. Then it dawns on her.

“Oh.”

Mulder chuckles. “So...” he says. “What’s your answer?”

She licks her lips before she answers, thinking. It could be hot but it could also be painful, there wasn’t exactly a lot of her.

But Mulder would never hurt her, not intentionally. And while she has no experience with this he seemed to have some. He’d look after her. She can trust him.

“Okay…” she says, still sounding unsure.

“Just okay?”

He wants her to be sure. She is sure.

“We’ll do it.”

She feels his cock grow harder as he leans down to kiss her.

Sex at Scully’s was a rarity. Mulder’s was closer, more convenient, this whole thing had started at Mulder’s. Besides, Scully liked being surrounded by Mulder things, Mulder’s scent. With him at hers, all she could focus on was things she forgot to do- like wash that mug this morning or move the pile of laundry that had started piling up.

“You good?” Mulder asks, drawing her attention away from said laundry pile. He knows she’s distracted.

She smiles. “Yeah,” she says and brushes that annoying lock of hair away from his face. “I’m just nervous, I think.”

He smiles back and kisses her sweetly. “Don’t be.” He starts trailing more kisses down her naked body. “It’s just me.”

Scully nods, remembering that. Her finger stroke through his hair, grounding herself as he makes a path downwards.

“I’m gonna make sure you’re ready, okay.”

Scully nods again.

“You’re allowed to come so don’t hold back.”

The first touch of his mouth on her as her back arching slightly and a sigh escaping her lips.

“I didn’t know I needed your permission,” she says as her eyes close and she lets herself feel, anticipating what was to come.

His chuckle sends a vibration up through her body, her inner muscles throbbing as his tongue strokes its way around, gently building her up.

She does wonder, briefly, if this is what he would do to Her. Was he as gentle and caring with Phoebe as he is to Scully? And if so, how could Phoebe never return the favour. Not for the first time does Scully find herself burning up with anger at Phoebe’s past actions.

All that fades, however, when Mulder begins gently sucking on her clit, his fingers now joining his mouth as he pries her open. The pressure starts to build and her hips start to move, matching his fingers that thrust in and out of her. She can hear him talking, encouraging her, but it all becomes white noise as she falls over the edge, fireworks exploding behind her eyes.

Mulder’s pace slows as she rides it out. When she’s finished he sucks his fingers clean and rejoins her at the top of the bed. Scully feels drowsy, the afterglow of orgasm drifting over her like a blanket.

“You okay?” Mulder whispers.

Scully nods. “I just need a minute.”

He kisses her gently. “Take your time.”

She fights to keep her eyes open, her hand reaching over to grasp Mulder’s dick. If she can focus on him for a bit she might just stay awake.

But Mulder has other ideas. He pulls away before she can properly touch him and Scully looks up in confusion.

“I need to be hard-hard if this is gonna work,” he says, his finger beginning to play with her hair and now he’s done it. Her eyes droop, his ministrations threatening to send her to sleep.

“We don’t need to carry on if you’re tired,” he says, his hand still in her hair. “You can sleep.”

As tempting as that was the night still wasn’t over. They had come to do one thing and they were doing it.

She playfully wracks his hand out of his hair and shakes her head.

“No, it’s okay,” she says, opening her eyes (though with difficulty) again. “I’m ready.”

“Only you can be sure,” he says more to himself. He leans over to plant another kiss against her lips before moving off her bed. She follows him, watching as he confidently makes his way to her chest of drawers, pulling open the top drawer like he’s done this countless of times. Just how did he know where to look, she didn’t remember telling him.

Awakened now, Scully leans up on her elbow and asks that question.

“Uh...” Mulder stumbles. “That night you asked me to grab you some pyjamas- I opened this drawer first and well…”

Scully rolls her eyes, unoffended, and flops back down onto the bed. She sees him pull out something blue and her eyes widen in panic.

“Not that one!” she pretty much shouts.

“Uh…okay?” Mulder says uncertain, dropping the offending item back into the drawer.

They had three weeks away from each other and as a leaving present, Mulder bought her a dildo. Blue- his size and girth- it was fantastic but the idea of having two Mulder sized dicks in there at once terrified her, not to mention, she didn’t think she could do it. There was another, however.

“There should be a pink one,” she says and Mulder instantly starts looking. “Towards the back,” she guides. “I don’t really use it anymore…” she adds shyly. And why should she? She has a better, more accurate one now.

Mulder finds the prize and brings it- and the bottle of lube- back over to the bed.

“This is tiny,” he says, sitting down and looking at it. “Do you use this?”

“Not anymore, that’s why it was at the back.”

Mulder chuckles but it dies when he sees the look on Scully’s face. Nerves. She was feeling nervous; her eyes darting from the dildo to his cock and back again.

“Hey,” he says, drawing her attention back to him. “We’re still taking it slow.”

Scully nods. Of course they are and it’s Mulder, she has nothing to be worried about.

She lays back down, the activities starting again once more. Mulder drags his fingers between her legs, her wetness from earlier still present. Removing his hand, he squirts the lube into it then, with what could come with practice, gives her little pink dildo an impressive handjob. Scully’s eyebrow shoots up and he laughs self-consciously.

“I’ll tell you later,” he says.

Satisfied the silicon isn’t going to hurt her, he pushes it up into her.

“We’ll start with this okay,” he says.

She nods, biting her lip as he begins to move it in and out of her.

“Can I come again?” she quickly asks.

“Of course you can. You can come as many times as you like.”

“Thank you,” she says though why she’s thanking him she has no idea.

Between the lube and her own wetness there is little resistance. Mulder keeps up a steady pace and Scully’s mind starts to wander about what will happen next, when he and the dildo are both inside her. The thought makes her brain so fuzzy and when he touches her clit as he pumps in and out she feels the telltale signs that she’s about to come- the drop in her stomach and her muscles clamping around the silicon. She feels herself come impossibly more wet as the slippiness causes Mulder to lose control and the dildo slips out of her.

“Fuck, Scully…” Mulder cries, unable to restrain himself watching her come. He sucks in a breath, moving to straddle her. “I thought I was going to come just by watching you.” He leans over her, kissing her again, much harder than he has done all night. “I can’t wait for this.”

Scully can only half hum/half moan her response as her body shakes with little tremors. She’s so wet, so turned-on, that she’s 100% sure she’s leaking onto her sheets.

More laundry to add to the pile, she thinks deliriously.

“Um, Scully?”

“Hmm?”

“I think I’m gonna need you to do the dildo part.”

“Mm’kay…”

Her arm is like lead as she moves it between her legs, grabbing hold of the silicon and pushing it against her. She lets out a loud moan, her over-sensitised muscles protesting but she ignores it.

“Scully?” Mulder’s voice sounds again.

“Mm’yeah?”

“I think your arm is in the way.” Scully let’s out another moan. “Um…I’m gonna move you, okay?”

“Yeah…”

She’s too far gone to be of much help but he manages to get her turned around and on her knees eventually. He moulds her into the position he wants, her hand now underneath her body, just holding onto the base of the dildo. He pushes her down onto and she moans again.

He holds her hips and leans above her, his mouth in line with her ear.

“It’s my turn now, okay,” he says and she nods against him.

Her hand clenches around the headpost, moaning loudly as the head of Mulder’s cock pushes into her. She feels the stretch and the slight ounce of pain, it wakes her up, eyes snapping open as his name falls out of her mouth. She felt insanely full.

“Mulder…” she cries.

“I’m here.” His hand clenches around her hip. “Just breathe, Scully.” She does so. “I’m going to move in a minute. If you want this to feel good I’d recommend when I thrust in you pull the dildo out.”

“Yeah?” she asks with a shaky breath.

“Yeah, trust me.”

He pulls back and Scully sighs. Just before he thrusts back in, he speaks again.

“Remember to pull it out, Scully.”

He pushes into her and Scully only just pulls the dildo out of her. She comes immediately, moaning non-stop as her muscles clench around him, pulling him in deeper.

“Shit, Scully!” he cries out as spurts into her.

Her brain has turned to mush again as she falls against the mattress, the dildo forgotten somewhere beneath her. Distantly, she can still feel Mulder rutting against her before her world goes black and there’s nothing else.

He spends the next 10 minutes in what feels like a haze. Scully has gone, wiped out beside him, and Mulder lays next to her, breathing heavily.

Something digs into his back and he reaches underneath him, grasping something warm and wet.

Scully’s dildo.

The stickiness beneath his hand reminds him of the mess that is no doubt accumulating beneath her. He picks himself up from the bed and heads to her bathroom. He starts the clean-up routine; washes his dick of their combined messes, sanitises the dildo with some unscented soap, and brings it and a washcloth back into the bedroom. He puts the dildo (and lube) back into the top drawer and pries Scully’s legs open, gently touching the cloth to the space between.

She startles at the contact but relaxes once more when she realises who it is and what he’s doing.

“That was amazing,” he hears Scully say as he goes to dispose of the cloth. He smiles then disappears only to return not a moment later and rejoin her on the bed.

He pulls her onto his chest, throws the sheets over them both. He is surrounded by everything Scully and it makes his heart feel full.

“I hate Phoebe,” she says and his chest drops at the mention of her name. He looks at Scully, sees the little frown on her face as she looks up at you. “How could she treat you like she did? You’re too good.”

Mulder chuckles, relaxing, letting his hand play with her hair. If he was with Phoebe now and they were at hers she’d have told him to leave. But not Scully. Scully closes her eyes and snuggles in closer. Scully doesn’t just take.

Towards the end, he treated Phoebe the way she treated him and even though she had no problem doing it to him, he still felt guilty about it.

“Well, maybe I wasn’t good to her,” he says quietly.

“No, you were too good.”

If only you knew the whole story, Scully, he thinks to himself.

Wanting to get away from conversations of Phoebe he changes the subject back to their most recent escapade.

“So…Would you do that again?” he asks.

Scully doesn’t answer but her knowing smile answers for him.

They snuggle in for the night. When he gets home tomorrow he’ll respond to Alex’s email. For now, he lets himself exist in this wonderful Scully bubble.

[starbuck09256]

Hot date?

Tagging @today-in-fic and @xffictober2023

Mulder POV

Set in season 2 during Sleepless

Scully doesn’t shake Kryceks hand. I feel a little smug about it. Scully and I went through a lot last year. While we didn’t always have the easiest of partnerships, the large amount of respect and admiration for her has only grown in recent months. As much as I tried to step away after The X-files were closed it didn’t work. She is still here by my side helping me when she can. I know she misses the fieldwork, she loves the challenge of the unexplained almost as much as I do. I lean back after she explains how a man can think they were being burned alive yet not have a single burn on his body. Her expertise and knowledge continue to amaze me as I smile as Kryceks asks his follow-up questions. I pick up a recent article she has lying on the side of the desk. It’s one that I sent her yesterday. I grin at the notes and highlights she has already jotted down. The one at the bottom, stating “There is not nearly enough room on this page or any of the others to describe how wrong and incredibly fabricated this is”. Given all that she has done for me in recent weeks, I know I need to take her to dinner. Then I hear Krycek saying something to her about dinner as well. Confused I lift my head up in curiosity. 

“I am wondering if you would have dinner with me, sometime this week Agent Scully,” she looks up at him in confusion. “I’m sorry, you mean to discuss the case?” I can see the shadow of her face and know that Krycek has made her uneasy. While I would like nothing more than to go up and wrap my arm around her and explain clearly that she is not on the market. She is on the market. I know she isn’t seeing anyone socially. There are days I wonder if I could get a refund on my Oxford education because, until this exact moment, I didn’t realize I should be dating Scully. Krycek chuckles and shakes his head reaching his hand out towards. Scully's eyes flicker to me quickly but I know she can handle this on her own, and my own interest in her makes it imperative to hear her answer. “I would want to know if you would like to go on a date with me?” Krycek asks, he pulls his hand away since Scully put some distance between them. “I don’t think so, Agent Krycek? Was it?” Ooh well played Scully, well played. Not only did you brush off his question you also illustrated quite clearly his unimportance. I can’t help but grin just slightly. Krycek seems a bit confused at being denied. “Why? Are you seeing someone? It's just dinner,” Scully takes a step towards him. My former partner will not be pushed around by anyone, ever. I can’t say that I’m not a tiny bit thrilled to have her unleash on him. Krycek is an annoying little yes man who makes me want to question any personnel who thought he was Agent material. “Actually, Agent Krycek, I’m interested in someone else, though I’m sure you would be an adequate dinner companion.” Scully's eyes now land directly on mine right at the moment she said she was interested in someone else. I have to resist the urge to point at myself. A man can dream, that this spitfire woman, whose brilliance and tenacity have certainly captured my heart, would be interested. “Well, alright Agent Scully,” Krycek leaves it alone.

 Part of me is surprised he seems like the kind of creep who wouldn’t take no for an answer. Krycek reaches into his pocket and pulls out his cell phone dialing as he gestures that he will be right outside when I’m done. 

I walk over to Scully. She looks up at me with a small smile. I bite my lip. “I didn’t know, he wanted to ask you out,” I say because really I didn’t. While of course, I have thought about Scully in not-so-professional ways. It wasn’t until minutes ago that I realized I could ask her out. I could spend my evenings with her in that cozy apartment of hers, arguing about cryptoids and the validity of space crafts that have crashed into the sea. She shrugs. “Well, he certainly isn’t the person I was hoping to ask me out when you two walked through the door.” My brave woman. She has played her hand, and I am grinning wildly at her. “I might have come to the conclusion just a few minutes ago that now that we aren’t partners in a professional sense, we could in fact be partners in a more personal manner.” I step close to her, invading her small space, which doesn’t make sense to me as she takes up so much of my mind some days it’s hard to think of her as tiny or small. She looks up at me with those beautiful blue eyes, “You just now thought of that? I thought you went to Oxford?” she teases and I am already moving my hand up and down her arm. “Tonight dinner?” I ask. Please say yes Scully. Because it’s Friday and I want the entire weekend to make up for the fact that you and I could have been enjoying each other for months in non-platonic ways. “Pick me up at 7?” She says, her soft smile is the one she gives me when she figures out the small clues I leave for her to uncover. I reach up tucking an errant strand of her hair behind her ear. “Absolutely,” I say. She nods softly. 

Her voice takes on a soft undertone “I’ll email this over to you when I’m done. We can talk about that article you sent yesterday.” She is all of a sudden a little shy and I adore it. “Oh, I don’t know Scully I have other things I think we need to talk about tonight. Like if I should bring my go-bag and what your favorite breakfast foods that I can make you are?” She shakes her head laughing and hits me with the file folder. “Get out of here Mulder, I need to leave soon to get ready for my hot date.” I chuckle heading to the door. “You mean I need to leave and get ready for my hot date,” I say to her.  We grin at one another and as I turn to grab the handle for the door. Her shy voice is back. “Maybe pack for an extended weekend, since we have Monday off, after all.” The shit-eating grin I have when I walk out of the morgue drives Krycek a bit nuts as he sulks back to the bullpen. 

[wittyno]

Glad you stuck with the X files, s3 is much better than s1 and s2 (even though those have Ice, Beyond the Sea, Ascension, One Breath) cause two of the shows best writers Darin Morgan and obviously Vince Gilligan really bring their A game here and also Scullys hairstyle gets much better

Season one definitely drags. I think it’s partially my fault. It’s been a while since I’ve seen stuff from this era. It’s something you need to get used to again. The way it‘s shot, the way the plot moves, even the lighting is different than the way we do it today.

I do appreciate the better lighting. If this show was made today you wouldn’t be able to see a thing most of the time.

As for the quality of individual episodes I think the biggest problem is the run time of the whole season. Even if you have some amazing writers on your team it can’t be a banger every time. Especially on an order of 25 episodes.

While I was annoyed at the Phineas Gage issue those episodes were great. It also was the first of like 3-4 times she was kidnapped in the season so that hadn’t worn yet. Dwane Barry was some good TV. I do hope Krycek comes back. He seemed fun.

Most of my gripes are small. Do I love that the kid in DPO was in rudimentary reading and essentially fits every Hollywood stereotype of the r-slur creep? No, but the episode is well acted, well-shot, and not half bad.

Part of it is also that a show like this is made for me. I love Delta Green and all the themes and types of story beats that it brings. So even the episodes that don’t hit 100% are still enough in my wheelhouse to make me like them at least a bit.

The beginning of season three was fire. So good. It twists and turns and you feel just as on edge as Mulder and Scully. Ok, maybe a little less because you know how many seasons there are. But it really captures that hunted / us against the world vibe that i love so much. The „holy shit the world has gone to shit but we are still here and we are fighting together and for each other“. The world has actually gone to shit. It’s not just „oh a suspect was mean to me“. No, the government/aliens is out to get you. The „just because he’s paranoid does not mean they’re not after you“. It sets this show apart from your regular fair cop show.

It also makes Mulder and Scully the weird ones whenever they talk to the normals. Whenever they propose a theory of the unnatural or the occult , everyone gets to go „you’re crazy“. On the flip side whenever some innocent person is experiencing crazy shit Mulder and Scully can come in and be like „hey this is insane but we believe you“ and there is something truly powerful in that.

I also love that when rightfully called out on their previous inaccurate portrayal of indigenous cultures that the writer for the first two episodes of season 3 went and spent some time with indigenous peoples and got to observe their rituals and cultures, which he then heavily incorporated into those episodes. I can’t speak to the accuracy but I think it’s great that they did that. This was in the days pre-internet call outs. Nothing would have happened had they ignored this.

I also love a show that loves its fans in the way the x-files did. Nowadays, social media marketing is part of most creatives contracts. Not in those days. Those were the days of the forums. Again, no one was paying them to interact with fans and most people weren’t even on the internet back then. From what I understand it’s a lot like being a Patreon member for a podcast with less than 500 patrons. Even more so if it’s not on Patreon but just in general a smaller listener base. I love small podcasts by the way. It’s way more about the love of the thing that you’re making than about money. Not that I don’t want people to make money. I don’t begrudge most podcasts their success. If you can be creative and get paid for it, absolutely do it but at some point it becomes a business. That’s fine but it’s just a different feel.

As for the hair. I feel bad making fun of her but… it’s bad. It’s that thing where you see someone wearing an outfit or a hairstyle where you have to ask yourself: is the look actually good or are they just conventionally attractive? And in this case it‘s very much the latter.

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s3 episode 16 thoughts

(giggling and kicking my feet) it’s mulder and scully time <3

and it was a GOOD episode!!! i was sad, but damn was i compelled! back to the very beginning of the episode to begin the note-taking journey, with a tiny recap of where we left off beneath the “keep reading” bar…

hehehehe i am excited!! i love to spend the evening with the ultimate duo. and we have so much to cover!

so many twists and turns to walk down! krycek is back! skinner is hurt! scully is sleuthing! mulder is in hong kong! we had best begin!

YAAAS we got another “previously on the x files” <- i loathed these at first for throwing me off my typical groove, but now that i know we only bust them out on special occasions (multiple part episodes) i look forward to them

ugh scully is so pretty. “you say that every time” and it’s true every time??? 

we get a recap: flash bang alien, inky eyes, skinner on a hunt for answers before being interrupted, scully’s dad’s friend johansen, the rat bastard 

timeskip to 1953. a man from johansen’s squad who is covered in burns is telling his story, and it is being recorded. he is being visited by those who claim to want to bring him to justice, but he says he won’t tell. 

so after johansen started a mutiny and locked the rest of the sailors in the sub, those trapped on the lower levels knocked the dude with the inky eyes on the head with a wrench. so he is knocked tf out. and liquid started pouring from his eyes (BLEAUGH) and into a drain. the survivor who has all the burns and who is recounting this calls the liquid “the enemy”

a guy that looks a lot like matty healy (but much cleaner) is asking him what he means by calling liquid “the enemy”. so the interviewee says that the thing went back to where it came from. 

GASP!!!!!! HE ADDRESSES THE MATTY HEALY LOOKING FELLOW AS “MR. MULDER”!!!!!! oh this is JUICY!!! and the camera pans over to another man putting in a cigarette!! GASP!!! WE KNOW WHO THAT IS!!!!

baby cig man says “you can trust all of us” (<- LIES, LYING, SAID BY A GUY WHO IS LYING)

(you can tell the actor playing baby cig man had just one line but he worked SO hard to get cig man's voice right... it made me giggle)

why does young mr mulder look kinda cute. aww. so little. almost wanna squish his cheeks.

they changed the intro again. smh! messing with my rhythm.

anyway, back to main plot. scully’s rolling up to the hospital to find skinner, where she is met by agent fuller and agent caleca, two names i do not think i have heard before. scully asks for hair and fiber from the crime scene and these two are like “we don’t have that yet” so she says “um get it?” (not really but basically) (and they claim it was some random guy that shot him… not buying it)

oh! skinner is being wheeled out! she’s off to go investigate. now if it were ME being rolled about with my shirt off after a gunshot wound and emergency surgery, i would not want people seeing that. but hey, she’s a doctor so maybe she’s chill like that. still! i’d be soooo embarrassed omg

SHE GRABS HIS HAND OMG!!!!! he opens his eyes a tiny tiny bit and tells her that he has seen the man who shot him before!!!

man, i thought just the hand grabbing was gonna be all tender, and it was! but getting a clue at who did it was a bonus too

back to the rat bastard and mulder. at least krycek seems aware that mulder can and will kick his ass and is deferential to him. 

scully is looking over skinner’s chart. OH! she asked for guards. and she wants them NOW. she does not CARE about your excuses. WOO!!! she says idgaf if you two agents stand out there YOURSELVES, get GUARDS ON him!!! YAAAAS!

back to krycek and mulder cam. mulder notices that they are being followed and tells him to speed up. at gunpoint! and this mystery vehicle runs them off the road!!!!!!

noooo, their faces are all smushed in. someone pulls rat bastard out and asks where the tape is, but the fellow who attacked him gets flash banged, because again, krycek has alien flash banging powers.

but poor mulder still has his bloody heady on the dash :( he sees some odd flashing 

scully gets called into the lab and this guy has some info on the dude that shot skinner. she says it will take too much time to run the hair sequence, but to do it anyway.

(also, i can’t tell if this is the same guy from the lab as before that clearly had a crush on her or if this is a different one but idk i guess it doesn’t really matter... he doesn’t seem like her type)

so the two men that krycek flash banged last night are now in treatment for radiation, and who is visiting them but cancer man!!! he is once again lighting up as they are dying. he bends down and moves a bandage, and sees the eyes of a patient meet his. but he says to HAVE THE BODIES DESTROYED OMFG HE DOES NOT GIVE A FUUUUCK THIS GUY IS EVIL!!!!

mulder at da hospital. bandage on his head. awwwwww :( it’s so sad and pathetic... he’s baby.

AND SCULLY IS THERE!!!! WITH A SMILE!!!!!! WOOHOO I WISH I COULD LIVE IN THIS MOMENT FOREVER!!! YES YES THOSE ARE MY FAVORITE CHARACTERS!!

the police found him and he mentioned “we” so she says “who’s we” and he has to say KRYCEK… she is (very gently) confused

an excellent person to have by your bedside whilst recovering. 

she tells him that she is sorry for the bad news, but skinner has been shot as well. but the doctors seem to think he’ll be okay. and she has an idea on who it is that pulled the trigger!

GASP!!! she pulls out the scans on the hair. two of them, in fact. the first being from the man who shot skinner, and the second being from the man who shot melissa. and they’re a PERFECT MATCH!!!! CONSPIRACY!!! CONSPIRACY, I CRY!!!

(shrill violins, fade to black)

oh! it’s the united nations alien council. um i realize now i don’t know their actual name. but you know who i’m referring to, right? the guys. the gang. the squad. just a couple of dudes.

they’re discussing the site “WHERE THEY RECOVERED THE UFO” well! there you have it! word of god confirmation! it’s indeed a ufo that the french sailors came across in the last episode!

“it seems we have an information leak, gentlemen”, one of them announces, which makes me say, okaaaay ominous <3

and they say cig man has responded in a way no one could have predicted… omg was he behind the skinner thing…?

scully visiting skinner <3 asking how he is feeling <3 he doesn’t seem surprised about the news his shooter was the same as melissa’s, especially because those three men had warned him before about pursuing her case. he says she should be careful about saying that the case was shut down because people don’t want it to be caught but. it’s looking them right in the face.

OH! the man that shot him was one of the ones who attacked him a few months back on the stairwell! well i didn’t even catch this. some detail noticer i am. AND KRYCEK was the other one!!!! yes, and they stole the tape yes yes i’m recalling!

ohhh it’s serious. he tells her that she cannot afford anger, that if she’s angry she’ll make a mistake. “i’ll be okay”, she says (voice breaking) (<- said by a woman who is lying)

he says that if she can’t keep her head, it’s okay to step away… this feels very chekov’s gun… but she says that’s exactly what they want. OH! i love that she knows she can get to the bottom of this. i love that she believes in herself.

scully is furiously typing on her laptop. asking to devote full bureau resources to finding krycek. got her glasses on n everything. terribly beautiful whilst angry. she is saying he can explain everything that is going on, but i don’t think anyone is gonna listen to herrrr because the fbi does not give a fuck!!!

scully is now entering their office to see the giant yellow scuba suit. “it looked great on me in the store” says mulder, who needs to make a joke or people will die. perhaps he needs to make a joke even more when people really ARE dying.

so, why is it here? great question. it was covered in oil, the french guy was covered in oil, his wife was covered in oil, and it’s all diesel oil from world war two submarines. a new meaning to the term “oiled up”.

theory time with mulder: it’s a medium for an alien creature for body-jumping. he laughs when she laughs, aware of how ridiculous it sounds, but also aware of her thinly veiled fury; what else could he do? he does know how it sounds, he does know what she needs, but the truth. the truth.

so what does this thing living in the oil want with krycek? a great question. 

omg guy from the lone gunmen is ice skating! and so is another one. wow a team bonding mission <3 AND THE OTHER ONE!!! FROHIKE!!! 

is this something they do often... no, this must be a sleuthing mission.

frohike goes in a locker and opens something. GIVES IT TO MULDER!!! YAAAS THE TAPE!!! they say he should “call upon their services more often” YAAAS they want that sweet sweet agent time <3 

but noooo! the tape is gone!!!! mulder gets mad and throws the empty case. still, a reunion with his pals <3

cig man is watching tv. sipping some sort of liquor.

(whenever i see someone drinking a beverage with ice in it on a tv show, i think of that one tiktok of a prop master explaining how they make prop ice and the many different kinds they can do. i think this looks like glass ice to me. shoutout to people who make videos about props; you make my heart very happy)

BRO... THE TAPE JUST APPEARS. KRYCEK HAS ENTERED????? but the guy who shot skinner is there too!!! and is holding krycek at gunpoint!!!!

cig man watches krycek's eyes go all inky (correction: OILY) and black. omg……

cancer man is rolling up 15 minutes late for the UN alien meeting. lmao it's funny in a way. he moved the ufo to a new location! he promises it will be absolutely inaccessible.

someone asks why he won’t bring it to nevada like the others. probs because even the normies know about nevada as the alien place. dweeb.

GASP! they want answers for what happened to skinner. cig man says for all he knows, it's just random. even though they have a drawing of the guy who did it, who is “one of his”, he’s denying it. AND THEY’RE ALL GROANING BECAUSE NO ONE BELIEVES HIM FOR A SECOND LMAOOOOOOO

(so funny to me that despite being on the super secret alien council, cig man still manages to be unprofessional and lie through his teeth to people who seem far more competent, even when secrecy effects the entire planet. something very funny about him lowkey sucking at his job)

so he needs to get the shooter out of the country NOW or else skinner can make an ID and no one can stop the arrest!

back to the agents trying to piece things together. the lone gunmen are babbling on about how to best find what was written on the case but mulder has the secret: rubbing a lil pencil over top LMAOOO. he finds a phone number!!

and who picks it up when he calls but… the un alien club!!!

it’s the well groomed man!!! mulder says krycek gave him the number. and he asks to meet with mulder. allegedly in central park? is this a trap...

so, the dude who did the shooting is named luis. the other agents are saying to scully they can’t look any further than they already have, but she says keep looking, she’s seen stranger. and the lab guy says “i believe she has” when she leaves lmaoooo GET UP. he's down bad fr. pathetic. get up.

i mean i am too but i'd like to think i'd have more dignity about it

mulder in da park. is he alone… are they gonna get him??? the well-groomed man meets him. they’re playing some mental chess with who can ask each other what. so he tells mulder there WAS a ufo at the bottom of the ocean that was shot down during ww2, and a salvage attempt had been made, but there were complications.

so it looks like they’re both looking for krycek. but the well groomed man leaves by saying “anyone can be gotten to”. very very ominous. and mulder calls scully and says check on skinner RIGHT NOW.

she gets down there and he’s NOT THERE??? apparently he was moved to a different hospital. WHO TOOK HIM?????

scully slaps her badge on the door of a ambulance on the side of the road and asks if he’s got a skinner in there. this dude says yeah and he must be freaked tf out, but she’s coming along for the ride now.

skinner wants to know what she’s doing here, and she says she just wanted him to be safe. she pulls her gun out and opens the door and WHO IS IT BUT LUIS!!! WHO FIRES AT SKINNER!

TRAFFIC GUNFIGHT CHASE!!! luis just got hit by a CAR!!! she got him!!!

and she’s SCREAMING at him. screaming like we have never heard before, are you the man that killed my sister??? he’s begging for his life.  he says he can tell her where krycek is…

the police roll up, telling her to put the gun down. and she sadly holds up her badge and explains that she’s basically the police but actually better so y’all are kinda late to the situation. they take him into custody. and she’s tearing up. i do not trust that he doesn’t have a poison tooth in there. 

she calls mulder, who is rummaging through his car, and tells him that he was right, someone was going to kill skinner. and it IS the man who shot her sister. and allegedly krycek is going to north dakota. mulder says please meet me in new york with two tickets to north dakota asap. 

what’s in north dakota, she asks? the salvaged ufo!!!

cut to north dakota cam. agents are rolling up, and how terribly i wish i could see what happened on the flight and ride up to there. how tense the silence was, how valiant the attempts at breaking it were. UGH. someone pls write the fic someday i’m already emotional.

she’s got a vest thing on and it’s cute. i get that we have bigger things at hand but i can still appreciate a vest moment!!

they go into a silo... but the door locks behind them!!! they go 8 stories down!! that is a lot!!!! 

now they’re opening a door to what looks like a nuclear waste thing. idk i don't know much about nukes. but it’s just a big empty silo. so they have to check 199 more. 

except they hear a thunk in the tunnels!!!

scully finds one of the (barely alive?) burn victims that had been flash banged by krycek just as mulder announces “he’s here”, and a large group of soldiers runs in

OH! they go to start running from the soldiers and he grabs her. it was so subtle but so sweet. i’m gonna gnaw at something. 

NOOO! they’re surrounded!!! and cancer man is coming up. she yells that they saw bodies in there and he says “you saw nothing” <- wow absolutely garbage fellow has sunken further than even before by adding gaslighting to his resume

so they’re getting taken into custody but cancer man is going deeper, and he tells the soldiers to take the bodies away. he goes down to the nuclear thingy, and lights up, which i feel would be a bad choice in a circumstance where things were actually nuclear, but okay. 

we see something very dark and oily? and hear people throwing up. OH! it’s krycek, with the black stuff pouring from his eyes and mouth. on top of a triangular looking ufo. the oil is pouring into a spiral thingy? and it gets sucked up. 

MULDER AT HIS DESK WITH HIS GLASSES ON!!!! AND A HEALING CUT ON HIS FOREHEAD!!! could a man be any more attractive? it’s debatable.

knock knock. who is it? it’s skinner!!!! limping, and not supposed to be back in the office for a few more weeks!

mulder gets up to shake his hand and help him across the room. a right gentleman, he can be. OHHH so this is why i have seen those bloopers of skinner with a cane LMAOOOO

he’s looking for scully though lmao. yeah not interested in YOU, mulder. 

mulder thanks him for getting shot because he stood up to the evil. he’s saying no, no, i wasn’t doing that, at all. i don’t know what you’re talking about. but not in a humble brag way, in a denying allegations sort of way. it's interesting. my brain is still stuck on this moment.

he says that he “mistakenly” believed he could bring melissa’s murder to justice. mulder says hey, what do you mean by that? so that is why skinner needs to go see her.

she's out and about, though. she’s bringing flowers to melissa’s grave NOOOOO :((((((( she doesn’t even say anything, she just sits there. 

UNTIL MULDER COMES AND BRINGS FLOWERS TOO??? and she has to brace herself to see him. 

he touches her shoulder gently before he sets them down. oh my GOSH

she tells him about how someone told her the dead speak to you from beyond the grave, and that is what a conscience is. he says that’s interesting, that he’s never thought of it that way. a man who sees her suffering and doesn't know what to say to make it better.

and she thought that finding the man who killed her would bring closure but it didn’t. 

he grabs her by the arm at this point, and says he needs to talk to her. tells her that they found luis dead. whoever was behind it all tried to cover it up. 

“i think the dead are speaking to us, mulder. demanding justice” <-stop. stop i’ll cry. you think i won’t cry? you think, for some reason, i won’t sob? i won’t collapse into a heap? you’d be incorrect. you’d be naive and mistaken. you’d be an utter fool, even in a world of fools.

(muffled screaming of me trying to keep it together)

but funny i should type that, because we also hear some muffled screaming on camera, that of krycek trapped in the ufo?? or in the room with it, deep in the nuclear silo?

episode ends with his screams.

WHAT!!!

so much has happened. and really one thing is on my mind: who is gonna hug scully? who is gonna tell her that the anger is okay, even if it’s futile? who is gonna hold the baddest woman alive close and listen? even if all she has to say is silence? 

RAAAAAAAAH i’m gonna CRY.

i feel like i could write another thinkpiece here but i also feel like i need to let this one sit for a bit. 

scully holding skinner’s hand, scully waiting by mulder’s bedside, scully saving skinner’s life, scully screaming, so guttural, at the man that killed her sister. scully in glasses and scully in vests and scully in coats. furious and devastating and calculating and guilty. 

i have some major questions re: krycek and cancer man and why don’t they just deal with him already??? like for real. i know the answer is gonna be that someone from higher up would just replace him, but i do think it is funny how he goes about blatantly committing all those crimes and then clocks into work the next day like nothing happened. and no one can act like anything happened because they’ll tear the fbi down if they do. we all have a coworker like that, don’t we? that sucks terribly but you can’t do anything about it because the inside supports how terrible they suck? sigh. many such cases.

krycek, if i’m supposed to feel bad for you, i don’t. starve in that ufo and see if i give a damn. 

skinner denying any concept of heroism… i think he’s doing it to keep himself safe. like he said to scully, any sort of accusations are risky. i don’t think he wants anyone to get the idea that he is a hero, even if he is in reality. i also think he has a complex and a great fear of being PERCEIVED as a hero after the things he did during war, and who knows what else he did but hasn't spoken about. but interesting still that he would deny a gesture as simple as being thanked. 

there are many dots in my head. i would like to think they are connecting, but honestly i’ve got matty healy dupe mr. mulder on my mind still just because it was so funny. and then also scully angst. and a deep deep desire to get into that car on the drive from the airport to north dakota, to just listen in on whatever went down. maybe i’ll have to write it if no one else does! isn’t that terrible? when no one else will write the exact thing you want to read, so you have to do it?

(i’ve actually never written fic before so that would be a major commitment. but a one shot here or there sounds interesting)

anyway. lots on my mind. it was a good episode, but kept a lot of things unsolved. which is the point, i know, but they dangle the answers in front of you!! then snatch them away!! i wanted a tiny bit more of the tea. 

but i guess, on the other hand, we know what the tea is, don’t we? we know cancer man and the UN alien squad are hiding this, they’re aware that this alien creature can cause radiation, they’re aware of ufos and they’re covering them up. they might not be aware of the exact nature of the creature, but they ARE aware of it, and that it’s a weapon of mass destruction. what isn’t clear is how tf krycek got roped into this. but again i really dgaf about his loser ass. 

i’m plotting. i’m pinning things on boards and tying them together with string. and then making predictions from there.

(actually, think it’s cool we see a bunch of different kinds of aliens on this show. there were the poison blood clones, standard alien 👽 fellow, and now the oil creature. fun that we get multiple perspectives and takes on what could be. perhaps scarier than just plain old little 👽, but!!! interesting for worldbuilding purposes)

back to plotting….

[mollybecameanengineer]

The Home Front

Summary: Mulder, Scully, and William have been kidnaped and their deaths faked. How do their friends and family react?

word count: 6,138 | Teen | MSR | @today-in-fic

Read on AO3 or check out the first chapter below the break

This is part of an episodic series called A Second Chance. All the episodes are collected, in order, using AO3’s series feature. The concept of the series is to rewrite seasons 8 and 9. It deals with Mulder’s return from the dead, the birth of William, and Mulder and Scully trying to juggle family life with impending doom.

If you don’t want to read the whole thing, but want to read this story, here is what you need to know…

Previously on A Second Chance: After Mulder returned from the dead, he moved in with Scully. (Reentry). Scully, while pregnant, was infected with the black oil and somehow neutralized it (Immunidad). The Cigarette Smoking Man (and a new syndicate) learned of this, and became interested in Scully’s baby. After William was born, Mulder and Scully were determined to keep him safe (Sinister). However, after they learned that not only can William neutralize the black oil if infected, but he was also immune to the Super Soldier virus, Mulder planned to go on the run with William, leaving Scully behind due to the chip in her neck (and therefore her ability to be tracked). However, the Smoking Man got to them first. Mulder and Scully agreed to go with the Cigarette Smoking Man because he promised that he would keep them together and protect them from the alien colonists (who want to kill Mulder, Scully, and William) in exchange for letting him make a vaccine from William’s blood. (In the Space of a Day) When Maggie discovers that her daughter and family are missing, Skinner and the rest of the crew start a search, only to find evidence that Mulder and Scully ran, but died in a car accident. This evidence was planted by the Smoking Man and his associates, but no one knows that, and Mulder and Scully don’t know that everyone thinks they’re dead. Meanwhile, Mulder, Scully, and William leave with the Smoking Man, (Loss) who takes them to a remote military installation in Oregon. There, they are given base housing, and William is examined by the medical team. After exploring the facilities, Mulder and Scully decide that Scully will work with the team to develop the vaccine, while secretly trying to find a way to make William no longer immune, and thus no longer special. (The Gilded Cage) In their prison, Scully discovers why William is immune to the virus: he has defective white blood cells. This means that it’s unlikely that anyone could acquire an immunity like he has. In addition, he is immunodeficient. Just when Mulder and Scully start to plan their escape, Krycek appears. (Milestones)

June, 2001

“I’m not going.”

Frohike sat, with his arms crossed, glaring at Byers and Langly. The former was dressed in his usual suit, though one of his darkest colored ones, while the latter was wearing his dress t-shirt: which was still a shirt bought at a concert, it just didn’t have any holes in it.

In response to Frohike’s declaration, Langly threw up his hands. “Whatever, dude,” he said, before walking away.

“Melvin.” Byers walked over, and placed a hand on Frohike’s shoulder. Frohike had to suppress the urge to shrug him off. “I know you don’t believe that it was Mulder, Scully, and William in that car. I understand your doubts, and I promise we won’t stop looking until you’re satisfied. But,” Byers took a breath. “You should go to support Mrs. Scully. I know you don’t agree with having a funeral, but she’s grieving, and we are the closest thing Mulder has to family at this point. If we don’t go…” Byers trailed off. 

Frohike sighed. He understood what Byers was saying: if they didn’t go, it looked like they didn’t care. And Frohike cared. Since they’d gone missing last month, Frohike had tried to come up with any angle that might shed light on what happened. And while the dental records of the body in the burned up car matched his friends, they could be faked. It was all too convenient. He hated that Mrs. Scully had the bodies cremated before he could do a thorough examination. 

It all seemed like a show to make them stop looking.

Byers was still looking at him, a stern expression on his face. “Alright,” Frohike relented. “I’ll go.”

Byers smiled. “Good. We leave in ten minutes.”

***

It was a sunny day. 

Skinner stood next to a folding table that had been placed on the dock. It held pictures mostly of Scully, from childhood on. There were a couple pictures of Mulder, always with Scully, obviously snapped when he participated in some Scully family function. There was only one picture of William. He was in Scully’s arms, Mulder was sitting next to her on their couch. They were both smiling for the camera, which Skinner assumed Mrs. Scully had been wielding.

There was also a large flower arrangement and before that an urn. 

“I know Dana buried him the first time,” Mrs. Scully’s voice came from behind him. “But she wanted to be cremated and put to rest like her father. And I thought he’d want to be with her.”

Skinner nodded. Not to mention there wasn’t much left of them after the car fire. Skinner pushed the gruesome image out of his head. “I think you’re right. Mulder loved your daughter very much.”

“I know. And she loved him. And William –” Mrs. Scully’s voice caught. “Excuse me,” she said, walking away, wiping at her face. 

Skinner sighed, turning his attention back to the pictures. What a loss. Skinner had hoped, before Krycek had brought them the news that the Smoking Man was after William, that the birth of their child might bring Mulder and Scully peace. That their relentless searching would come to a close, and maybe they would be able to rest. To enjoy being a family.

But less than two weeks later they were dead. He supposed there might be a kind of peace in that, just not what he’d hoped for them. 

Skinner could feel tears welling in his eyes, and he blinked them away. He needed to be strong today for Scully’s family – they didn’t need his blubbering. 

“Good afternoon all, if you’ll take a seat, we will get started,” the priest said from the front of the gathering. Skinner recognized him as the same priest that had visited Scully when she was in the hospital. At least that meant he knew her – Skinner hated funerals where it was clear the officiant had no knowledge of the deceased. 

Turning his back on the pictures, walked over to the cluster of chairs where the funeral would take place. 

***

Charlie thanked God that Tara had gotten Bill out of the apartment.

The funeral was two days ago, and their mom had asked them all to help pack up Dana’s apartment. The landlord had asked if they could be out by the end of the month, which gave them a couple weeks. However, Charlie was leaving in a couple days, as was Bill and his family, and it felt wrong to leave his mother to this alone. 

So they’d all come over, but Bill just won’t shut the fuck up about how Mulder had been the cause of so much despair for their family. Charlie got it – if Dana had never joined the FBI, if she’d never gotten involved with Mulder, she and Melissa would likely be alive. But, right now, it really wasn’t helping. 

Thankfully, Matthew needed to run off some energy, so Tara convinced Bill to take him to a nearby park. Charlie didn’t know how she put up with his older brother, but thankfully he listened to her. That left Charlie with his mother and Tara, trying to sort out his sister’s life. 

“Are you going to take the fish home?” Charlie asked. 

His mom sighed. “I think so. They were Fox’s. Dana brought them from his apartment after…” No one liked to talk about the fact that his sister's partner had been dead twice, so his mom didn’t finish the sentence. “Anyway, Dana said they were important to Fox, it seems like I should take them and try to keep them alive.” 

Charlie nodded. He looked around the tank, trying to figure out how they were going to get it and the fish (still alive) to his mom’s place. 

“Anyway,” Mom said. “You should look through Fox’s clothes and see if there is anything you want. He was shorter than Bill, but I think his clothes might fit you.”

Charlie wasn’t too sure about that, nor was he thrilled about taking a dead man’s clothes, but it was an excuse to get things packed up and off to Goodwill. 

In the bedroom, Charlie started pulling Mulder’s things out of the closet. He had a lot of nice suits, but, as Charlie suspected, Mulder had longer arms and legs, and a smaller waist. Well, someone would get use out of them, he thought as he boxed them up.

Moving to the dresser, Charlie opened up the first drawer, and then slammed it back shut. Shit, he thought, then slowly opened it again. Sitting there, on top of his sister’s underwear, was a bright pink vibrator. The kind that’s shaped like a penis. Jesus Dana, this is more than I needed to know, Charlie thought, as he wondered how to dispose of this. 

“Hey, Charlie, I was thinking –” Tara’s voice stopped short as she saw what was in the drawer. 

They both stared at each other a moment, then at the vibrator. “Well, at least it’s not your mom finding this,” she said in a low voice. 

Thank god for small miracles. “Yeah, should we, like, look for more sex stuff?” Charlie whispered back. “So Mom doesn’t find it?”

Tara nodded. “I know I’d prefer if my siblings found this kind of stuff, rather than my parents.”

Charlie grabbed one of the big black trash bags, and gingerly threw the vibrator into it. “I’m guessing no one at Goodwill wants a used one of these.”

Tara laughed. 

After a careful search, they’d disposed lube and expired condoms (which explained William), two smutty novels, five vintage issues of Playboy (which Charlie felt a little bad about throwing away, but with Tara standing right there, he didn’t want to leaf through them to see why Mulder had kept these issues from twenty years ago), and VHS with the title Hand Solo, which was clearly a Star Wars porn parody. 

Charlie kind of wanted to keep the tape. Maybe he’d fish it out of the trash when no one was looking. 

“Well, hopefully that’s all of it,” Tara said, tossing some non-sex related trash on top to hide the contents. 

“Yeah,” Charlie said, going back to what he had been doing, going through Mulder’s clothes. He found Mulder’s drawers, and started pulling out ratty sweats, boxers, and socks, and dumping them in the trash. As he worked, a wave of grief hit him. He’d only met Mulder once, at Christmas in 1998. He had shown up with Dana, late. The combination had riled Bill up, and generally made things a bit uncomfortable. But he seemed like a nice guy, and his sister seemed happy with him. 

And now they were both dead, along with a nephew he’d never met. He’d never met to become distant from Dana, but he lived in Seattle and she was here. And neither of them were good at calling. So they’d grown apart, if not on purpose. So now he got to learn about her by clearing out her apartment. 

Charlie sighed and stuffed more of his sister’s life into the trash. 

Continue Reading on AO3

[lambourngb]

fanfic origin story

I was tagged by @ravens-words - thank you! 💖 [Quick aside: Everyone should go read EJ’s new hangster kidfic right now!!! If you like Top Gun Maverick at all ]

What was your first fandom (reading and/or writing)? Reading: X-Files was my first fandom. I was actually a Mulder/Scully shipper in season 1 - Paula Graves “12 Degrees of Separation” that I found on a USENET server, before getting into Mulder/Krycek on a mailing list.

Writing: I posted Smallville Clark/Lex as my first posted stories… but I wrote a ton of unposted, cringy self-insert Mercedes Lackey fanfic when I was 12 and 13. I was a horse-girl, so obviously I had to write about an OC with lavender eyes and their own talking horse.  I was on a Mercedes Lackey fan page for a while, but obvious she was very anti-fanfic so I thought I was a weirdo for a very long time, breaking the law and writing my own stories of Valdemar

What was the first story you ever wrote?

Finished and posted? “Lessons in Compassion” set after the pilot of Smallville.

Ever? When I was 10 I started writing a novel called “Kentucky Bound” where a girl goes to a horse auction and picks out a yearling that ends up winning the Kentucky Derby. I wrote out OC horses, characters, margins of victory in my outline and probably hand wrote about 25 pages before I got blocked, lol.

What's a piece of advice you would give your younger fic writing self?

You can finish a story. It takes focus and discipline but it’s possible.

What's an early fandom interaction that stuck with you (be it a nice comment, a friend you made, a fic that got a lot of feedback)?

@ninswhimsy : It’s all her fault, lol. We bonded over the show during season 1 hiatus and had a lot of fun chatting and sending each other snippets. I’m enormously thankful our friendship survived past the show.

The other early fandom joy was writing and publishing “Last Years Wishes” - It still gets a lot of love and hits, and I’m very touched by that.

Post a sentence or two from an older fic and a sentence or two from a newer one (if you want)

I’m still trying to get back into a writing frame of mind - real life is extremely busy and stressful. I’ve played with the idea of being “retired” for a lot of reasons, but right now that feels like giving up, and I don’t really want to do that.

Newer: - from the next story in my “Trying” universe:

Michael didn’t bother with browsing the old People magazine in the waiting room, his nerves were wound far too tight to engage with the props provided by the clinic to fight against the boredom of waiting that came hand-in-hand with every medical appointment. Alex, having had more than his fair share of doctor visits, had warned him that “appointments” were closer to “approximations”, and that they should expect to wait long past their time. Case in point, Alex was idly scrolling through his phone completely accustomed to the routine. Michael did his best not to fidget in place, while keeping his eyes trained on the closed door of the doctor’s office in anticipation of their name being called. An hour had already gone by, along with the hour drive to the clinic from Roswell; it was shaping up to be an expensive afternoon of lost work time for Michael. Only the importance of why they were there had kept him from walking out in annoyance.

It was time for their state-mandated physicals, required by law, for their fostering license.

Their caseworker, Ms. Patel, or Aimee as she had allowed them once it had become clear how serious they were in becoming foster parents, had maintained that the medical report was merely a formality for men of their age. It was designed to weed out applicants with particular health issues that would impede their ability to keep up with an active child. Despite Alex’s prompting for specifics, she did not provide any concrete examples of what was considered disqualifying on a health exam. Probably out of a worry that her speculation could be considered discriminatory.

The exam was promised to be thorough but not invasive, a general physical of vital signs without any accompanying blood work. That was meant to be comforting to them, but Michael, had barely slept during the last week out of worry.

Liz and Kyle had both reassured him that a basic physical would not reveal him to be an alien to anyone, his biological differences were mainly clear in his blood work or through an ultrasound of his organs. Not even the fact he had managed to pass through the foster system as a child without detection was enough to calm his anxieties, mainly because he had suspicions about Jim Valenti’s intervention. It was a risk to have a doctor study him, and for the first time since Michael realized he would be the subject of a federal background check, he worried over if the prospect of being a parent was worth it.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I wish Kyle was here,” Michael murmured to Alex with a ghost of humor. They had both listed Kyle as a character reference in their application, not realizing at the time it would disqualify him from being the physician who performed the medical evaluation on Michael.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I wish Isobel was here,” Alex whispered back, before reaching to hold Michael’s hand.

Michael rolled his eyes at Alex, having long figured out that his sister and his husband enjoyed playing up their animosity for each other, out of some childish tug of war over who loved Michael the most. They seemed to get a particular enjoyment out of sniping at each other, a contest over who managed the best quip or blistering observation, Alex and Maria often teaming up against Isobel and Liz at gatherings, while Michael, Max, and Kyle quietly placed bets on who won.

“I can do the same things she can,” he reminded Alex, tapping his forehead in emphasis. If a doctor did happen to do a double-take on their readings of Michael, he was prepared to slip inside their mind to block or erase that knowledge. As badly as he wanted a child, revealing himself as an alien was not part of the plan.

“I know you can, but I also know you don’t like to.” ***

OLDER: And from these hands (let you go free) - my ringmaker fic:

“That was why you changed that summer,” Alex said, mostly to himself with a quiet devastation. His gaze was faraway, sitting only a few feet from Michael and yet fifteen years away from him all at the same time. “I thought it was me. My dad attacked you because of me, and suddenly you weren’t going to college anymore. I did that to you, I thought I had ruined your life-”

“Never.” He squeezed Alex’s hand hard, horrified at the very thought. “You were the one good thing I had back then. You made me believe there was a place for me here. I probably leaned too much on that, too much on you, when we were teenagers. And that wasn’t fair to you.”

“I wish I had known what you were going through.”

“I couldn’t tell you.”  

“Couldn’t or wouldn’t?” Alex asked him wryly, still laser sharp in his observations. “We didn’t exactly talk much back then.”

Michael acknowledged the point with a wince. In so many ways he was still the kid with the trash bag suitcases, he had moved from one place to another, never able to claim anything as his own, but once he was an adult and finally free to make his own home, he held onto everything. People, when they let him, and the memories, when they didn’t. Most importantly, he kept the truth about what was behind his feelings, guarded jealously behind his lips. Those truths, the pain he had experienced, the hardships of never feeling like he had a home; those were his. There was a question that had haunted him, what if he gave them up, what if he shared them, and it was for nothing? What if no one cared? That was a worse prospect to him than moving from house to house with a black garbage bag as his luggage.

***

That was fun, and a much better reason to log back onto tumblr, lol.

[dinnaberry]

Why is Alex krycek still here…,I don’t wanna see him like