The X-Files and its characters do not belong to me.  They belong to Fox,
Ten Thirteen, Chris Carter and others.  I am just borrowing them to have
some fun.  I am not making any money from them and no copyright
infringement is intended here.

Spoilers: Christmas Story/Emily

MS friendship with lots of Mulder angst and introspection.  Shipper
friendly but non-shippers don't have to run.

Thanks to Vickie, Gerry and Nancy for beta reading for me.

Summary: Mulder thinks a lot about his relationship with Scully and with a
special little girl on their flight home from San Diego together.

Completed January 17, 1998

I can be reached as macspooky@earthlink.net

"The Love of a Child"

        by

  Macspooky

Fox was glad they had gotten seats on the side of the plane where there
were only two passengers. He had tried to get the their flight upgraded to
first class, but it had been full.  He had helped to settle his partner by
the window for the trip back to Washington.  He knew Dana was exhausted.
She had been pushed beyond limits of human endurance these past few days
and she was barely out of the hospital from her cancer treatments.  Her
trip to San Diego with her mother to visit her family had been to help her
to relax and recover, to regain her strength, but it hadn't worked out that
way.

"I'm so tired," she said softly as they became airborne.  It was the first
admission that she had made that she was not fine throughout her ordeal in
California, an ordeal that she had undergone for the most part alone.

"I know," was his quiet reply.  He slipped an arm around her.  For a
moment she stiffened.  "Shh..." he whispered, "Close your eyes and try to
get a little sleep.  I'll be right here." To his surprise, she nestled
down a little closer.  He wrapped his other arm around her and held her
close aware of the scent of her hair and the warmth of her body.

There were so many things he had never said to Dana Scully, things he had
never said because he wasn't certain she would want to hear them.  He had
never told her how his heart had broken when they had discovered that she
would never be able to have children.  At first he told himself he felt
bad because she was his friend and it was agonizing news for her, but
eventually he had to acknowledge to himself that his heart had broken for
himself as well because when he pictured having children, he pictured no
other mother for them but her.

He had never told her when she had cancer that he had wanted to marry
her.  She wouldn't have. She was too fiercely independent.  He wanted to
marry her because he loved her, but he also wanted it because he wanted
some control over treatment options when she reached the point where she
could no longer make those decisions herself.  He would never forget the
day that Margaret Scully had turned off Dana's life support during that
horrible time she had been in a coma.  If he had been married to her, he
would have been the one making the decision.  He wouldn't have had to feel
so helpless.  Still, he had said nothing because it was the wrong reason
for marriage and she never would have agreed.  It would also have made it
sound as though he were criticizing her mother, and he didn't want to do
that.  He had understood Margaret's reasoning perfectly at the time.  She
had done what she did out of love and respect for Dana and the need for
closure.  So, he had remained silent.

He had never told her how much he loved her, or how he didn't want her to
go away for Christmas because he would be all alone.  He was used to it,
of course, but it was growing harder now that there was someone he wanted
to be with.

Then he had gotten that phone call asking him to come to San Diego and
Dana Scully had told him that she had a child, a little girl named
Emily.  He had listened impassively as the pain went through his body. 
Even the name hurt.  Emily had been the name of Samantha's favorite
doll.  After she had been taken, he had found Emily and hidden her, afraid
that someone would throw her away and she wouldn't be there when Samantha
came back.  His mother had gone in search of the doll when he had been out
one day and had gotten hysterical when she hadn't been able to find it. 
When his dad had found out what he had done, he had endured a beating and
his father's drunken verbal diatribe about what a good for nothing boy he
was, failing to protect his sister, upsetting his mother.

And, as Dana told her story, a part of him started to hate the child he
had never even seen because Emily meant danger to his partner and he had
only just gotten her back from the brink of death, from her cancer.  He
had expressed his concerns to her about her safety quietly and gently, but
he could see she was determined and that there was no changing her mind.
Dana was in her stubborn mode.  Dana was Emily's mother after all. Inside
he hated Emily even more.

Then he had seen Emily sitting on the floor of the children's center
coloring and his heart had stopped.  She looked exactly like the children
he dreamed of having, tiny with red hair and big blue eyes....Dana's
hair....Dana's eyes.....and he didn't hate her anymore.  He made that
silly face at her....Mr. Potato Head.  He wasn't used to being around kids
and he didn't even know where he had gotten it from, but Emily had looked
at him and smiled....Dana's smile, and he realized then that he didn't
hate her.  He loved her because she was her mother's daughter and the
child of his fantasies.  He had wanted to hug her, and make her giggle,
but she was a shy little girl and besides it wasn't his place.

So he had sat before the judge and pleaded Dana's case for custody inspite
of the danger and the pain it would bring his partner.  He would have
married her then and there in the judges chambers if having a husband..a
two parent home...would have helped, but that was another thing he kept to
himself.  Marriage to him would not have helped her case.  There was his
reputation.  He was Spooky Mulder, you see, with one or two cards short of
a full deck.

He had been miserable sitting in Bill's living room.  He hadn't even
wanted to go into the house knowing how Dana's brother felt about him, but
Scully had insisted.  Her-sister-in law was as big as a house and as he sat
and waited for Dana he looked around.  It was a pretty house, a normal
house occupied by normal people.  No wonder they hated him.  He had stolen
Dana's normalcy. It was a relief to him when Dana had finally come back
downstairs and joked about Tara being due two weeks ago.  It had to be
difficult for Scully to see her sister-in-law knowing that she would never
get pregnant.  And, he had been surprised to find that her family was not
being all that supportive.  Even Maggie seemed tired, as though dealing
with Dana and her problems had worn her out and she couldn't take much
more.  She hadn't seemed to be reacting as a grandmother either.  This had
surprised Fox.

The phone rang and Dana had answered it after looking at him.  No one was
on the other end but he had gotten a trace.  They had rushed to the
Children's Home and found Emily burning up with fever.  He didn't know
where it came from, but he had not been able to leave that child lying in
her bed.  He had picked her up and cradled her next to him feeling the
heat radiating from her body and smelling her unique child smell, and he
had never wanted to let her go.  If things had been different, she might
have been his little girl.  Then he had felt the lump on the back of her
neck and he had known what he would have to do.  Dana was....no, they
were, going to lose Emily and there was probably nothing anyone could do
about it.  He had held the child in the ambulance all the way to the
hospital and then let her mother take over. He hadn't had a choice.

When the ER doctor asked if they were her parents he had wanted to say
yes...he was her father, but he wasn't and lying wouldn't help.  In the
end, it was best, he had decided to leave Dana to handle the medical
decisions and devote himself to doing what he did best, investigating,
especially after the technician had punctured the child's skin and nearly
died and he had realized that they were dealing with a hybrid or a
clone.  It made him sick knowing that there were other fetuses out there,
but he had had no chance to destroy what he had found.

Then, the bastards had even stolen the little girl's body so that there
would be no evidence left of her existence, replacing it with sand.  If
Scully hadn't opened the coffin, they never would have known.  He was
willing to bet that all of the autopsy data was false too.  The
authorities had not let her do it since she was the child's mother.  They
had buried the sand filled coffin in silence not telling her family, and
then he had put her cross around her neck once again before the trip home.

Silently, like a defeated creature, Dana followed him off the plane and to
his waiting car.  She was glad that he was with her and that she didn't
have to deal with any details.  The drive back to her house was silent.

"Do you want me to come in?" he asked softly.

"Yes....just for a moment...please...." He followed her inside and sat on
her couch while she turned up the heat and hung up her coat.

Dana Scully sat near him, close but not touching.  She seemed to be
weighing a decision.

"Mulder," she said softly, "There is something I need to tell you and I
don't know how.  I'm not even sure if I should.  A part of me doesn't want
to but a part of me believes you need to know, have a right to know. I
would have told you sooner, but...well I didn't want to make it any harder
for you during that time when Emily was dying....I knew...I knew you cared
you see."

"What?  What, Scully?" he asked.  He was suddenly terrified.  Did she have
cancer again?  Was she going to leave the X-Files?  Had this finally broken
her spirit?

"I know....I know there have been times when you've doubted that your
quest was also mine and I know there have been plenty of time when I have
told you you were crazy...."

"Yes...." he said.  She took his hand in hers and rubbed the back of it
gently with her thumb.  "Emily's tests indicated that she had a father. 
She may have been hybridized or genetically altered somehow, but she did
have a father.  She was not strictly a clone. I don't know why...I just
had this feeling....so I called in some favors and had a genetic test run
against a piece of hair I removed from your jacket...."

His heart froze in his chest.

"Emily was...somehow...your daughter too...." she managed to choke out.
"Whatever they did...she was your daughter too....and the quest to find
out who did this is going to be ours forever...."

She broke down then...broke down and wept for her lost eggs and her dead
daughter.  He pulled her into his arms and held her carefully hiding the
anger that was growing inside of him.  It wouldn't help at this
time....not him...not her, and she needed him now, needed him to be
strong.  A single tear ran down his cheek but he didn't let her go.  He
knew he should tell her there were others out there, but somehow the words
wouldn't come. Could they be his too?

"We'll find them," he whispered finally.  "We'll find the bastards that
did this to your.....our little girl...together....you and I."

She looked up at him.  "I know," she said softly.  "I'm sorry.  I thought
you had a right to know." She wiped at her eyes.  "I...I think I'd like to
be alone now...will you be okay?"

"Yeah...yeah....I could use some time to think too." Fox Mulder got to his
feet and went to the door.  Leaving his partner alone, he drove home to his
empty apartment.  Strangely, he found he wasn't surprised at all by her
revelation.  There had been something about Emily.  She had only been his
for a very short time, but during that time, he had loved her very much,
and maybe that was a good thing for him as well as Dana.  His only regret
was that she had never known to call him daddy and he had not known to
call her daughter when she was alive.

The End.