Value & Honor
by Forte
(Forte1354@aol.com)

Please see Chapter 1 for rating, summary, disclaimer, etc.


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- Chapter 9b -

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Along the Potomac River
Washington, DC
Saturday, 1:01 p.m.


"Emily, I know that there are lots of interesting things in the
grass, but Daddy is waiting, the baby is kicking, and Mommy is
losing her patience.  For the last time, let's go!"

Mulder glanced away from Scully at the sound of the now-impatient
mother.  The woman's back was to him, one hand holding her
daughter's.  The other, he guessed by her comment and from the way
her arm was crooked, rested on her six-months-pregnant belly.

Mulder turned his attention back to his partner, watching Scully
slow her pace as she approached the mother and daughter.  A tiny,
melancholy smile crossed her face as she looked at the other woman. 
But as her gaze turned down to the little girl the smile
disappeared, replaced by flashes of fear, anger, and embarrassment
as she left the pair behind.  Guilt stabbed at Mulder's gut as he
saw Scully move her hand across her own stomach, mimicking Emily's
mother.  Their conversation at lunch the previous day rang in his
head.

<"And you think I don't understand loss, Scully?  Don't you know
I've =felt= loss every fucking day since Samantha was taken?">

<"I know that, Mulder, and I'm sorry.  But you have something that I
will =never= have.  You have hope, Mulder, and I don't have a damned
thing.  I will =never= have a damned thing, and there is nothing
that you or I or anybody else can do about that.">

Oh, Jesus.  What the hell was wrong with him?  How did he think he
could ever understand what she had gone through -- what she was
going through now?  Would he ever learn to just shut the hell up?

Mulder watched his partner close the distance to the bench. 
Scully's eyes were downcast and her lower lip quavered in her
struggle to maintain control.  As she approached she looked up to
meet his eyes; he knew that his expression must have been screaming
anguish.  He almost looked away, torn between giving her privacy and
giving her support, but choosing the latter.  He forced his face
into a neutral mask.  < Give her compassion, but no pity.  You know
she hates pity.>  She clenched her jaw, returning her gaze to the
path, but the tremble remained as she continued her approach.

"Hey, Scully."  Mulder greeted her with the most even tone he could
manage, his voice pitched low, his heart in his throat.  Scully had
stopped at the opposite end of the bench, staring at the seat.  For
a moment Mulder was confused, then he followed her gaze to the bag
with their lunches, which he'd placed in the middle of the bench. 
< Pay attention!> he chastised himself.  He reached over and slid the
bag towards himself.  Scully sat where the bag had been, her hand
leading the way as though she were afraid something sharp would be
there.  She kept her back ramrod straight, not resting against the
back of the bench, and she stared out over the Potomac without a
word or a glance in his direction.  Mulder had already been sitting
forward on the seat, anxious as he watched Scully approach.  Now he
scooted closer to the front edge of the bench so he could better see
her face.  Her expression was blank, and her lower lip was still,
but her eyes looked haunted.

< Okay, Mulder, she's obviously not gonna start talking anytime soon.
Say something to her.>  He realized that he was still clutching the
bag.  Food.  Yeah, that would be a safe topic.

He cleared his throat, then lifted the bag, holding it in mid-air. 
"I brought lunch for both of us.  I know you said you weren't
hungry, but I thought you might be by now."  Scully gave an almost
imperceptible nod, continuing to stare out over the water.  Mulder
started to lower the bag back on the bench.

< No, don't put it there.  There can't be any boundaries.  No walls
between us.>

He was sitting too close to the end of the bench to place the bag on
his other side, away from Scully, so he moved closer toward her and
then set the bag down in the space he'd made at the end of the
bench.  He was now only about a foot away from her.

Scully remained quiet and still, looking out over the water with
unseeing eyes.  Mulder cleared his throat again.  "Umm... I finished
the search on matches for names of the MUFON women.  No luck.  But I
printed out hard copies of the passenger lists and started going
through it by hand to look for anything that jumps out at me."  He
patted his jacket where he'd stuffed the papers.  "Haven't found
anything yet, but I still have a lot to look through."

Another tiny nod.  More silence.

< Try again, Mulder. >

"The Gunmen are still working on the encrypted e-mails.  Frohike had
a feeling that they were getting close.  He thought they might break
the encryption this afternoon."  Scully nodded a third time, but
otherwise made no movement.

Well, at least she was there with him on some level... but maybe she
was just nodding whenever he stopped talking...

< This is getting ridiculous.  Say something that requires a
response, some kind of a reaction other than a nod.> he told
himself.  < Yeah, but what?  'Gee, Scully, you seem pretty upset
about seeing that really pregnant woman with the little girl named
Emily.  Want to talk about it?'  Uh huh.  That'll go over well.>

Scully took a long, slow breath.

< Okay, there's your opening. >

"Scully?"  His voice was low, cautious, concerned.

She took another deep breath and looked toward the ground before
turning her gaze to him.  She looked like she was going to speak,
and he braced himself for "I'm fine, Mulder."  But whatever she was
going to say was interrupted when she glanced up and saw a couple
strolling hand in hand down the path in their direction.  She
stopped, bit her bottom lip, and looked back out over the water.

Mulder waited until the pair had passed and were out of earshot.  He
tried again, her name coming out like a gentle caress.  "Scully." 
He waited, hoping that she'd be ready to say something, and then
thanking the angels he didn't believe in when she was.

"I wonder if her parents know how lucky they are."

Mulder could hear the slight tremor in her voice, the effort she put
into sounding matter-of-fact.  He knew Scully didn't expect him to
answer, but he considered asking her what =she= thought the answer
was, if only to keep her talking.  He didn't have the chance before
she spoke again.

"Most of the time I don't even think about it."  She sighed,
clasping her hands and dropping her head to stare at the path in
front of them.  "I can forget it.  Then..."  She shifted her body
and turned her head in Mulder's direction to look down the path
where the mother and daughter had gone.  Her expression was wistful,
yet pained.  "Then I see something like that... and I'm reminded of
it all over again."

Mulder nodded, knowing she could see him out of the corner of her
eye, but said nothing.  He waited, wanting her to say everything
that was on her mind, and afraid to ruin the moment.

"Before..."  Scully paused, returning her gaze to the ground, her
body still turned slightly toward her partner.  "I never thought
much about having children.  It was always... something that other
people did.  But something that I assumed I would do someday, even
though I couldn't imagine actually going through the process."

Mulder continued to wait, fixated on Scully's words.

"But at the same time I couldn't see myself getting old and =not=
having a family."

She paused again.  Still Mulder waited.

"Kids.  Grandchildren."  Scully bit her lower lip again and cleared
her throat.  "I didn't realize how much I would miss that until it
wasn't an option anymore."

Mulder swallowed hard and nodded again, but still said nothing.  He
fought the urge to pull her over to him, to take her in his arms and
give her the comfort he knew she needed.  But he also knew it wasn't
time for that yet.  He could tell she still wasn't done.

"I think I could have been a good mother to Emily," she blurted,
pain obvious in her barely audible voice.  She suddenly looked much
smaller to Mulder.  He couldn't stop himself from moving closer to
her and covering her clasped hands with one of his own.

"Scully."  A "look at me" came out in the tone of his voice.  After
a moment's hesitation, she turned her head towards him.  He felt a
stab again, this time in his heart, at the anguish on her face and
the glitter of unshed tears in her eyes.  He swallowed again to ease
the shaking of his jaw before he spoke.

"I know you would have been a good mother, Scully.  No one else
could have loved Emily or taken care of her like you would have." 
The words felt to him like the greatest truth he had ever spoken. 
He desperately wanted to say more, to add encouragement about the
possibility of future children for her.  But he couldn't find any
other truthful words, so he said nothing.

Her lower lip trembled again; Mulder watched her bite the inside of
her mouth to steady it before she lowered her head, looking at their
hands.  She pulled one of her hands away and brushed her now-free
fingers over his.  One tear spilled from her eye and trailed down
her cheek.

Scully stiffened, then pulled in another deep breath and let it out
slowly.  She leaned over and picked up a small stone from the ground
with her free hand.  As she sat back up Mulder released her other
hand, moving his to her back.

Mulder watched Scully roll the stone between her fingers, pressing
so hard that her fingertips turned white.  He tried to think of
something, anything, to say, then pulled his hand away from her back
in reflex when she suddenly moved.  She jerked her arm backward and
threw the stone into the river with a strength that surprised him.

"It's not fair, Mulder.  It's just not fair."  Scully's low voice
shook with rage, her expression a mixture of anguish and hatred. 
She stared back over the water again, her jaw clenched tight.  "I
usually..."  She swallowed before starting again, as though willing
herself to calm.  "I usually don't begrudge anyone the ability to
have children.  It didn't bother me to be around Tara when she was
pregnant with Matthew.  But sometimes I see..." she gestured down
the path with her hand, "and I get... jealous, I guess."

Mulder shifted on the bench, uncomfortable.  <"You have hope,
Mulder, and I don't have a damned thing.  I will =never= have a
damned thing, and there is nothing that you or I or anybody else can
do about that.">  He hung his head, guilt-ridden, then forced
himself to look at her again.  She deserved no less, and she
deserved some reassurance.

"No, it's not fair.  And it's natural that you'd be jealous,
Scully."  He played his own words back in his head.  It's not fair? 
How about you, Mulder?  What haven't you been fair about?  He
swallowed hard.  "Scully, about yesterday... about what I
said....about Samantha...."   He stumbled over the words, searching
for an apology that could never be sufficient.  "I'm sorry... I
didn't realize..."  Scully turned her head to look at him; he sucked
in a quick breath.  "I never should have compared Samantha to Emily.
 What happened... to both of them... they were tragedies.  I had no
right trying to measure which of us has been hurt more."

He waited, trying to squelch the panic he felt as she stared at him.
 Finally she nodded and looked away again, toward the Jefferson
Memorial.  "Thank you."

Without taking her eyes from the horizon, Scully repeated his
earlier action, covering one of his hands with her own.  Mulder
relaxed, both at her touch and at the sense that she had said what
she'd needed to about her encounter with the little girl and her
mother.  He looked down at their hands, then turned his gaze up when
her hand shifted a fraction.  She was straightening her posture,
squaring her shoulders.  He studied her face.  She looked...
confident.  Resolved.  Ready to take on the world again.  He
followed Scully's gaze over the water, allowing her her
contemplation.

After a few minutes of now-comfortable silence, Scully took another
long, slow breath.  "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal
hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."

Mulder turned to look at her.  "Hmm?"

She removed her hand from his and gestured across the water. 
"Jefferson wrote that.  It's one of the quotes engraved in the
Memorial."  Mulder turned back to look over the water at the
columned structure, struggling to pay attention to her words rather
than to the loss of her hand's warmth.  "It seems fitting," she
continued.  "It's what we've done."

Mulder nodded.  "I suppose it is, in a way.  I never looked at it
that way before."

Scully was silent for another moment.  "Mulder, I thought about
something while I was finishing the report for Kersh.  Have you ever
heard the phrase 'Man plans, and God laughs'?"

"Yeah, I have."  He made a small snorting sound.  "But in our case I
think sometimes =we= plan, and Cancer Man laughs."

"I wouldn't be so certain about that, Mulder.  Maybe in the end, it
will be Cancer Man's plans that God laughs at.  Maybe that's why
we're here.  Maybe that's led to everything that's happened to me. 
To the women in Allentown.  To Emily."

Mulder paled, his head snapping around to face her.  "Scully, I
refuse to accept that you were destined to suffer."

She met his eyes.  "I didn't say that I was =destined= to suffer. 
It's just... I don't know if I can explain it.  I don't know that
I've made sense of it myself.  I can't believe that our entire lives
are mapped out for us from the moment we're born.  I think we're...
usually free to make our own decisions.  To exercise our free will,
to direct our own lives.  To react to the influences of those around
us.  To try to influence the lives of others, for good or for ill --
like Cancer Man does."  Mulder nodded his acknowledgment.  "But then
there are occasions when things happen that just seem to... fall
into place, somehow.  So maybe there are times when people and
circumstances come together in such a way that only one outcome is
possible.  And we become... fated... destined... =meant=  to do what
we do.  When there becomes only one path we can take."

Pause.  "Like your experience with Kevin Kryder?" Mulder asked,
cautious.  He watched Scully as she turned to look back out at the
Jefferson Memorial.  Was it his imagination, or had she flushed a
pale shade of pink?

Scully sat up straighter.  "I know you don't believe that what
happened with Kevin involved any kind of intervention, Mulder,
divine or otherwise.  But yes, that's essentially what I mean.  I'm
certainly not going to go so far as to say that I was born to save
Kevin, but I think I was the right person in the right place at the
right time, and in that respect I was meant to...."  She faltered,
looking like she was choosing her words with care, before
concluding, "I was the one who was supposed to help him."  She
paused again.  "Did you ever think that we became partners because
of... something more than powers at the FBI wanting me to de-bunk
your work?  That this was something that would have happened
regardless of their influence?"

Was it only twenty minutes earlier that he'd been thinking that
being with her just felt right somehow?  That he was where he was
supposed to be?  "Yeah.  As a matter of fact, I was thinking
something like that just before you got here."

Scully turned to look at him again.  "Do you remember telling me
once that what happens to us might not have to do with personal
choice, that it might be fate?"

God, how could he ever forget being in Melissa's hospital room
after... ?  He wondered if he was tinged pink himself, from guilt. 
"Of course."

"That's similar to what I'm saying.  Maybe, under some conditions,
under a particular set of circumstances, there is only one possible
outcome.  And at some point, because of whatever choices you and I
made in our lives, it became inevitable that we'd be doing what we
do together."

"Searching for answers that other people are determined to hide from
us."

Scully nodded.  "I guess what I'm trying to say... with all the
unanswered questions we have, Mulder, I'm sure of one thing.  Those
men who are responsible for Emily... for the women in Allentown...
they haven't yet reached that point where there will be only one
outcome.  They haven't won yet."  She glanced down the path where
the other Emily and her mother had gone.  "For all the horrible
things those men have done, Mulder... there are billions of people
who haven't had to experience the... the horrors that you and I have
lived through and witnessed.  I think if I can keep those horrors
from them, I'll be giving the MUFON women, and Emily, the justice
that I owe them."

"=We=, Scully."  Mulder's reminder was gentle.  "Remember, I said I
owe them, too."

"We."  She flashed a small appreciative smile.  "Yes, we certainly
do have that 'eternal hostility' that Jefferson wrote about, don't
we?"  Mulder recognized the determination in the set of her jaw. 
"And I'm not letting go of it."

Mulder tilted his head toward her.  God, she was incredible.  For
the second time in less than twenty-four hours, he found himself in
awe of her strength.  Her determination to keep going no matter
what.  He reached up and rubbed her back a few times as he had the
previous night.  "Scully, have I told you lately that you're
amazing?"

She gave him another small smile, this one of recognition.  It was
replaced after a moment by a more serious look.  "Mulder, I know I
said yesterday that I don't have hope.  Maybe I don't have hope of
ever having children, but I do have hope about other things.  We
have Kurt's messages, and that's a place to start.  That's where my
hope starts."

Mulder felt a tiny smile curl his lips.  He remembered Scully's
similar words in a Providence hospital after his mother's stroke. 
"Yeah, we do, Scully.  We have a place to start."

Scully straightened her back further, still looking at him.  "They
took away a part of my life, of my future, Mulder -- a significant
part, but not all of it.  I refuse to crawl in a corner and die
because of what they've taken away from me.  If I do that, they
win."  She glanced at the ground and breathed deeply again, as
though storing extra strength, then looked up at him again.  "We can
beat them, Mulder.  I'm sure of it."

His eyes were as earnest as his tone.  "I want to believe that,
Scully.  You know that."

Scully placed her hand over his again, looking him in the eye.  Her
lips narrowed into a thin, determined smile.  "Mulder, I decided a
long time ago that I couldn't stop doing this.  Couldn't stop
fighting.  Like I told you this morning, my strength gets run down
sometimes.  But I've been re-energized, and I'm ready to keep going.
 As long as I -- we -- need to.  I can think of far worse ways to
spend a lifetime, Mulder."

Mulder blinked.  Twice.

< Lifetime? >
 
But before he could process that thought, Scully stood up and
brushed her fingers against his shoulder.  "Let's go.  There's
something I need to show you."


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- end Chapter 9b -

Coming soon:  Chapter 9c!

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