Title:  The Denial  (1/1)
Author:  Cookie
Rating:   PG 
Classification:  SA
Summary: Scully debates on whether to tell Mulder the Truth she learned 
from Mrs. Mulder.

Disclaimer: These are not my characters. I have borrowed them to return 
them to Chris Carter and Fox, undamaged after a little use.  I've tried 
to be true to the original characterization of the players and 
mythology, drawing some conclusions with the clues Chris Carter has 
given so far. I do appreciate feedback, BTW.


The Denial

Prologue: In the previous story (The Confession), Scully learns from 
Mrs. Mulder's deathbed confession that Samantha is Mulder's half-sister 
and that there was a deep, conspiratorial reason for her disappearance.


(11 a.m., Connecticut)

She watched as his eyes misted over for the third time. Some part of her 
wondered if his tears would freeze on his cheeks as she stood beside him 
by the silent grave. 

It had been an abnormally quiet ceremony for Mrs. Mulder. Most people 
could not make it to the cemetery through the snow covered roads. Her 
friends, being of long years, were willing, but choose not to brave the 
subzero temperatures of a grave-side service, opting for sending their 
condolences by messenger or florist. Even the priest had been late, 
stuck in snow, and brought by four-wheel drive. So, there the three of 
them were. 

"She loved you, Fox. Your mother was very proud of you." The priest 
patted Mulder's shoulder comfortingly as he left.

Mulder didn't even move. His black wool coat hung as long as his 
countenance. 

Scully stood by him on the snow covered grounds, her feet freezing, her 
nose beginning to run, but determined to be there for him. She gave him 
a few more moments before urging him to leave. "Mulder, how about a hot 
chocolate when we get back?"

He nodded slightly, then had taken her arm to return to the car. His 
thoughts drowning any conversation from his lips. Scully tried to remain 
upbeat for him, but his mother's words were haunting her. She just 
couldn't even broach the subject yet. She just couldn't bring up 
Samantha while he was so distraught.

She was still thinking about what she would tell him late that night 
after they both had gone to bed. Unable to sleep, she had found a copy 
of Breakfast at Tiffany's to read, hoping that it would keep thoughts of 
Samantha's abduction off her mind. It wasn't helping. Her mind kept 
wandering back to the dilemma that Mrs. Mulder's confession had put her 
in. 

At a small sound, she glanced over the rim of her glasses at the 
slightly open bedroom door to see someone slowly pacing up and down the 
hallway. "Mulder?" Her slippers made no sound as she went to find out 
what was wrong. 

He was standing there, head bent. His flannel robe was open slightly, 
the sash dragging on the floor to one side. His hair was sticking up in 
various directions. His bare chest peeked through the folds of the robe, 
and she noticed he had only the bottoms of his pajamas on, hanging low 
on his hips. "I have no one left. All of my family is gone, Scully."

Her heart ached for him. "That's not true. You have friends. You will 
always have friends, Mulder." She took his arm and directed him back to 
his own bedroom. She noticed how cold his skin felt as if he had been 
wandering all through the dark house. "Look, everything will seem better 
in the morning, It has been a long day...no, a long week for you." No, 
even that wasn't entirely true, she thought. He had had a long life 
since the disappearance of his sister. 

Once tucked back between the covers, Scully stood by the bed, wanting  
that slight twinkle back in his hazel eyes as she smoothed the blanket 
up under his chin. "I'll stay to help you get arrangements done for the 
house and its contents if you want. I think Skinner would understand 
under the circumstances." 

He nodded reaching out from the covers to grab her hand. "I still have 
you, right?"

Scully sat on the side of the bed. He was clinging to her. Her mind 
raced through her secret, that damned confession. Maybe, she should tell 
Mulder some of it. Yes, that seemed the best thing. Then the words died 
on her lips. That lonely puppy dog look told her that he couldn't take 
anymore pain. At least, no yet. "Of course, I'm not going anywhere, 
Mulder." She smoothed his riot of hair. It was softer than she thought 
as she noticed his tired eyes closing.

"You left before." He whispered.

Her hand stilled momentarily. "I won't leave again. I promise. Get some 
sleep, Mulder." She sat back against the headboard, staying with his 
until he dropped off. 

Her abduction, her disappearance. She shivered. Was it the same people? 
That was a time of her life that she had put behind her with fierce 
determination, but there were still questions. Mulder had not pressed 
her, but she knew he had wanted to know. Then that thing in her neck, 
those MUFON people...she just didn't want to think about it. There were 
some chapters of her life that she wasn't ready to explore, but Mrs. 
Mulder's story had brought up all those old fears and haunts, then 
compounded them. That was why she couldn't sleep at night. She sighed 
looking down at Mulder's resting face. Maybe, she did need to tell him. 
Maybe both of them knowing could heal deep wounds. Then again, maybe 
not. She just didn't know what to do.




(9 a.m., Alexandria)

The doorbell was one of those that went on forever.

"Dana!" Mrs. Scully opened the door slightly surprised that her daughter 
was back so soon.

Scully didn't even get in the door before the urge to hug her mother 
tightly had overwhelmed her. "Mom."

Mrs. Scully, in that maternal instinct, understood her daughter's slight 
desperate outburst. "And it's good to see you too, dear." She patted her 
back gently until the tight embrace was over. "Would you like a cup of 
tea or something?"

The redhead unbuttoned her coat and hung it by the door. "That would be 
nice."

In the kitchen, Mrs. Scully got right to the point. That was one of the 
traits Scully had inherited from her side of the family. "And so, how is 
Fox? Is he coping?"

Better than I am in some things, Scully thought. "No...well, yes...well, 
I guess as well as can be expected." Scully sat across from the kitchen 
table holding her empty mug in her hands not knowing how she was going 
to start the discussion, but realizing she just had to tell someone if 
only to get a decent night's sleep.

"He is such a good man. It is just such a shame that he must go through 
so much grief in his lifetime. I was glad you stayed to help him in 
Connecticut. He was such a help to me while..." Mrs. Scully's face 
always paled when she thought back to those horrible months that she 
thought her daughter was quite possibly gone forever. "While you were 
missing." She poured the hot water with a slight shake to her hand. "I 
think that he suppressed some of his own worry about you to be 
supportive for me."

Scully looked at her mother through the small line of steam. "You two 
have never discussed those months with me."

"I saw no point. You were back. It was over. Why dredge up the past? It 
comes to no good." Mrs. Scully spooned sugar into her mug, watching her 
daughter struggle with her thoughts. "Live in the present, Dana. You 
should know that."

Scully wondered. Was her mother right? Why dredge up old memories, old, 
painful memories for Mulder? Maybe she should keep what his mother said 
to her a secret. Maybe should she let sleeping dogs lie, wasn't that the 
phrase? But what if those dogs wake up as you are stepping across them? 
"Mom, I've got something to talk to you about. I have a problem. I just 
don't know who to go to about this."

"Does it concern your job? Fox?"

Scully sipped her tea. Well, she had started down this road, she would 
just have to keep going. "When I got up there, Mrs. Mulder talked to me 
while Mulder was out of the room. She told me some things that have 
really disturbed me."

"Did you tell Fox?"

Scully frowned. "That's the problem. I am not sure I should. She was 
rambling about Samantha's disappearance."

Mrs. Mulder put her mug down, her attention centering on her daughter. 
"You must tell Fox."

"No, Mom. I just can't do that so easily. The story she told is so 
incredible...I thought about telling  Skinner, then I knew that I just 
couldn't ask him to help." Scully thought for the moment she would cry 
from the frustration.  "Oh, Mom, I don't know what to do."

"Dana, honey." Mrs. Scully reached across the table, laying a comforting 
hand on her daughter's. "I knew when you showed up at the door that 
something was wrong. You know that you can tell me anything. I'm here 
for you."

Scully thought about Mulder and his state of mind. He was so fragile 
right now. He had clung to her. When they had gone to the lawyer's 
office for the reading of the will, he had insisted that she be beside 
him. It had been subtle, but he wouldn't relinquish her hand the entire 
time. Although he had not talked to her directly, it was that body 
language, his over-courteous need to do things for her. He had never 
been the kind of person to touch, but lately he had taken her arm to 
help her into the car or held her chair at the restaurant. He had 
questioned where she was going when she had stood to go to the restroom. 

She had been little help in his moment of grief. Every time she began to 
tell him about his mother, she would chicken out, seeing his full bottom 
lip quiver as he held in his feelings.  She had either stopped talking, 
leaving a gap of silence, or had talked too much about mundane things. 
It was awkward for her and him.

Yes, she had to discuss this with someone to find out what to do before 
real damage was done. "Mom, Mrs. Mulder told me that Samantha was 
Mulder's half-sister for beginners."

"Dear God." She uttered, nearly dropping her cup of tea.

"That wasn't all. She told me that she knew ahead of time that one of 
her children was going to be taken. It had something to do with Bill 
Mulder's job for the government." Once the first words were out, Scully 
couldn't stop the flow. They spilled like water over the Niagara Falls, 
and she couldn't dam the flood. Even when her mother gasped, shocked to 
the core, she still didn't quit until all of it was out of her system. 
Belatently, in the short hush that had followed her words, Scully 
thought if the story was true, she just endangered her own mother. But 
it just couldn't be true!

"Mom, she said she changed the names on a folder. Mulder was supposed to 
be the one who was taken."

Her mother tried to make sense of it, but her incredulity was too great. 
"But Fox believes his sister was abducted by aliens. Dana, do you think 
that, too?"

Scully shrugged. Did she? She hadn't thought about that. "Mrs. Mulder 
didn't act like ET was coming to get one of her children. I got the 
impression it was the government or someone in power. Mulder began to 
believe about the aliens after a hypnotic regression session with a 
psychotherapist or psychiatrist many years after Samantha's 
disappearance. I've never...well, I think maybe...it's not important 
what I think about that. Mom, she sounded so convinced, so sure of all 
the events. She described everything in such detail. It was eerie"

The other woman was not startled about her daughter's revelation about 
Mulder's theory of his sister's abduction. She knew about it from a 
loose-lipped FBI agent when Scully had been missing. The agent mentioned 
it when she observed Mulder's obsessive search for Dana. At the time, 
she had not cared what the agent said or where Mulder was looking for 
Scully, only that he was looking everywhere. If that  included Heaven 
AND Earth, then so be it. However, in the light of day and after all 
this time, she couldn't see Fox seriously believing in little green men. 
"Dana, are you telling me that she kept insisting she needed to tell Fox 
this?!? Was she insane?"

Scully sighed. "I don't know, Mom. The doctor said the stroke affected 
the left side of her brain. If so, then she could have been experiencing 
some form of aphasia.  Her language could have been affected by the 
stroke, and she could have been saying things out loud that she knew in 
her mind were not true but was unable stop. The first stroke before this 
one could have affected her memory as well. It's just that she was so 
careful what she told me and what she described was so detailed. It 
sounded so plausible...so real.  She wanted to tell Mulder all of it 
before she died. She was so insistent."

Mrs. Scully leaned back in her chair, a strange calmness settling over 
her. "Dana, you will have to do what you think is best."

"But that's why I'm talking to you,. I don't know what is best." Scully 
took her empty tea cup to the sink, confused, bewildered, and in less 
possession of a decision than when she arrived on her mom's doorstep. 

"Whether or not Fox believes aliens abducted his sister, you have a 
dying woman's last request to fulfill. Unless you are sure she was out 
of her mind, then you should never mention any of this again."

Scully stared out the kitchen window watching the small wrens eat at the 
bird feeder. "His mother had suffered a severe stroke. It was the left 
side of the brain. She already complained of memory loss to Mulder 
before this." She slowly ticked off each excuse, each reason  for not 
telling him. "A mother couldn't keep this kind of secret from her son 
for this many years, could she?" Dana looked back at her mother. "Could 
you have done that? Would you have held that secret in for twenty years? 
Especially when your son began to believe that aliens abducted his 
sister? Wouldn't you tell him that you knew differently?"

"I couldn't let you believe a lie, but you said Mrs. Mulder was 
frightened for his safety. So, who knows? After this many years, I might 
have begun to deny it really happened myself." Mrs. Scully sat there, 
watching her daughter's logical and rational mind sort out the problem 
and not come to any true conclusion. "Honey, why don't you talk to Fox. 
Let him tell you what he remembers from Samantha's disappearance. If the 
stories fit, then tell him. If you think he can't handle what his mother 
said, then use your judgment. You know him better than anyone. You will 
make the right decision. I have faith in you."

Faith. That was something of hers that had been tested and tested over 
the years with Mulder as a partner, but Scully knew she still believed. 

Both women jumped as Scully's cellular phone rang. "Scully." She 
answered, wondering if that was a sign from Him.

Mulder's voice was on the other end. "Hey, do you think you could drop 
by? I found something of my mother's that I thought you might like to 
see."

"Sure, Mulder, I'll be there shortly." She rang off., noting he sounded 
better, but not back to normal yet. Her mind went back to the problem. 
Maybe his mother had been suffering from aphasia caused by the stroke. 
It was the plausible solution. She put the phone back in her pocket. "I 
guess you know where I'll be." She told her mother who stood to see her 
to the door.

"As I said, Dana, you know him very well. He has been through so much in 
his life. You will know the right thing to do." She kissed her cheek. 
"OK?"

Scully's mind screamed, NO!, but she nodded anyway, setting off for 
Mulder's apartment.     

Next and Final Installment - Explication.