~~~ February 23, 1995 ~~~

Scully was dozing in her chair when she felt Mulder stir.  
She jerked awake, her head snapping up, and she found him 
looking at her with slitted eyes.  "You're still here," he 
said in a hoarse whisper.

She rubbed the back of her stiff neck and gave a rueful 
smile.  "Still here," she agreed.  She had not left his side 
for longer than two hours since she'd arrived at the base.  
They had a cot set up for her in another room, but she hadn't 
used it much.

"You can go off duty now, Dr. Scully," he said.  "The patient 
is going to live."

He sounded so sure of himself.  Maybe that was because he 
hadn't seen his condition when they'd brought him in, 
lifeless and pale with no pulse.  She'd literally had to 
shock the life back into him.

He shivered.

"Cold?" she asked, moving closer.

"I can't seem to get warm."
 
She drew the blankets higher up over him.  "The cold is what 
saved you.  If you hadn't collapsed in the snow you'd 
probably be dead by now."

"In that case..." He made a show of pushing the blankets 
aside.

She smiled and put them back, tucking them more securely 
around his body.  "That part's over."

"What day is it?" he asked suddenly.

"Um, Sunday, I think."  She checked her watch and tried to 
count back from a day she could remember clearly.  "Yeah, 
Sunday."

"No, I mean the date.  How long have I been here?"

"It's the twenty-third.  You've been here five days."

He sank back into the pillows.  "February twenty-third?  It's 
your birthday."

She halted her fussing to look at him.  "I guess it is," she 
said as she resumed her task.  "I wasn't aware that you knew 
my birth date, Mulder."

"Oh, I know."

She looked at him again, and the corners of his mouth 
twitched. 

"I just don't ever remember."

He started to cough and she poured him a glass of water from 
the nearby pitcher.  He sat up with her help long enough to 
take several swallows.  As she laid him back on the pillow, 
he was breathless from the effort.

"I didn't have time to shop," he told her with his eyes 
closed. "'Sides, all there is around here is snow."

He had awakened for the first time that morning, and as far 
as she was concerned, this was present enough.  She sat back 
down in her hard chair and tried again to rub the pain out of 
her neck.  Five days of bedside vigil had taken their toll.  
She was smothering a yawn in her sleeve when Mulder spoke 
again.

"You got a rubber band?"

"A what?"

"You know, a rubber band.  Do you have one?"

She patted her pockets knowing full well she didn't have any 
such thing.  "I can probably get one.  Why?"

He motioned her away on said mission, so she got up and went 
to the medical center office.  They presented her with a 
whole box of rubber bands in different colors and sizes.  
Since she didn't know Mulder's planned purpose for the 
elastic, she selected four or five of them and headed back to 
the room.

"What are you doing?" she said, rushing forward when she saw 
him sitting up with something in his mouth.  

He broke off and coughed heavily, and she could see he had 
pilfered a latex glove from the nearby table.  

"Mulder, you shouldn't be--" She broke off as he wheezed into 
the glove again, blowing it up like a balloon.

He held his hand out for the rubber band.  "Give me one," he 
said, his voice almost gone.  When she didn't immediately 
respond, he made an impatient grabbing motion. 

She set a red one in his palm and he twisted it around the 
base of the glove.  Pleased with his efforts, he smiled at it 
and flicked it back and forth with his fingers.  "Ta da!" he 
said in just the barest whisper.  He handed the glove balloon 
to her.  "Happy birthday, Scully."

Despite herself, she smiled.  "Thank you, Mulder."

He nodded, out of words, and settled back down in the bed.  
"You should get some rest," he said, closing his eyes again.

She tucked the blanket up closer to his body, scooting nearer 
to him in her chair.  "I'm okay," she said.  "You just rest."

His hand closed over her wrist.  "You're so warm," he 
whispered.  "How can you be so warm in here?"

"It's not so cold.  You've lost muscle mass and you haven't 
been out of bed in five days.  I'll get you another blanket."

She tried to get up, but his fingers tightened around her 
wrist.  "No," he said, "stay.  I'm all right."

So she lowered herself into the chair again.  With her free 
hand, she rubbed the sore place on her neck.  Mulder tracked 
the motion with narrowed eyes.  

"Hurt?" he asked.

"Just a little stiff," she said, taking her hand away.

"Let me try."

"Mulder, no..."  But he was already forcing her head down to 
the blankets so he could reach the back of her neck.  When 
his icy fingers touched her, she sucked in a sharp breath and 
her hands curled on the bed.

"Sorry," he muttered.

But then he started rubbing and the pain did begin to fade.  
His fingers absorbed the heat from her skin and soon the 
sensation was actually pleasant.  She made a little humming 
noise into the blankets by his hip and closed her eyes.  

God, she was tired.  Just thirty more seconds, she told 
herself.  Then she would go find her cot and get some real 
sleep.

But she let herself drift under the soothing touch of 
Mulder's fingers, nearly asleep when his hand moved from her 
neck to the top of her head.  Her eyes came open as she felt 
him slip into her hair and find the tender spot on her scalp 
where she'd been thrown up against the wall.  There was still 
a scab there.

She tensed as Mulder touched it lightly with one finger.  He 
had to be thinking of the bridge and the devil's bargain he'd 
made for her life.

Scully took a deep breath and sat up, his hand falling away 
from her as she did so.  She searched his face for any 
indication of anger, but his eyes were soft and thoughtful.  
"Mulder, I'm sorry," she whispered to him.  "I'm sorry about 
your sister."

He gave her the barest hint of a smile and cupped the side of 
her face for a moment.  When he pulled back, he shook his 
head.  "It wasn't her."

"What?"

"A clone, maybe.  I found more of them.  They're all her and 
yet none of them is her."

"Do they know where she is? Do they know what's happened to 
her?"

"If they did, they wouldn't say.  They told me that they're 
proof she's alive somewhere."  His face sobered.  "I don't 
know if I can believe that.  Steven Spielberg and Michael 
Creighton made a whole lot of money on the idea that you can 
bring dinosaurs back to life from centuries old DNA."

"Mulder, that's science fiction."

The pillow rustled as he looked at her.  "And this isn't?  
I'm here -- I nearly died -- because of poisoning from toxic 
alien blood."

For once, she didn't bother to argue with him.  "So you think 
these women were lying to you?" she asked quietly.  "You 
think Samantha is gone?"

"I don't know," he replied, looking suddenly exhausted.  He 
rubbed his eyes.  "But they were right about one thing -- 
they're proof she existed.  Sometimes..."  He shook his head 
slowly and looked at the ceiling.  "She's been gone so long 
that sometimes it seems like she was never here at all."

Her throat closed over, and Scully reached for his hand.  He 
returned her squeeze. "I should go," she said.  "Let you get 
some sleep."

"You too," he reminded her, and she nodded.  She got up to 
go, but he grabbed her arm.  "Scully, wait."

When she looked down, she saw he was holding the glove 
balloon out to her.  She gave a watery laugh and took it from 
him.

"Never let it be said that I won't give you a hand," he said 
solemnly.

She thwacked him once on the knees with it.  "Say good night, 
Mulder."

"Good night, Mulder."

Back in the room with her cot, she pulled the ugly green 
curtain closed across the long window, and the icy landscape 
disappeared from view.

~~~~~~

syn_tax6@yahoo.com