"Zero Out the Variable"

Name: Branwell

E-Mail: COMBS-BACHMANN@WORLDNET.ATT.NET

Date Finished: February 20, 1999

Rating: PG-13, Language

Category: Story with Angst

Archiving permission: Anyone may feel free to archive this.
Just keep my name with it.

Time: Set immediately after "One Son"

Disclaimer: Chris Carter, David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, and Ten
Thirteen productions created and own these characters. My writing
is for fun, not profit.

Thanks: I would like thank the people who participated in
the ATXC thread concerning MSR fanfic started on Feb. 16 by
Ambress. I participated mostly to vent, but some people gave
me some really good ideas about the "Two Fathers," "One
Son," episodes. I had to write this before I even thought I
could enjoy watching "Agua Mala." Maybe reading it will add
to someone else's enjoyment after the rather disturbing take
on Mulder's and Scully's relationship that we got from the
previous episodes. I also owe thanks, as always, to
Pellinor's incomparable "Deep Background."

Spoilers: "Two Fathers," One Son"

Summary: Mulder and Scully regain the X-Files, but have lost
the understanding that enabled them to work together and
help each other. It takes a painful experience to mend the
rift.

***************************

Kersh's mouth moved but the sounds no longer made
sense to Mulder. He had listened long enough to understand
that Spender was returning the X-Files to him. Then he
allowed foggy shadows to descend once again between himself
and his thoughts. He let Skinner and Scully field the
questions.

There was so much new information to process, and he
hadn't yet been able to integrate it. Time would take care
of that. It was the formless dread he sensed lurking
somewhere in the misty recesses of his brain that had him
worried. That sense of impending doom---he couldn't
attribute it to a definite source. Scully would help him
sort it out. They would shape a theory, working together
like a hammer and flame on a tough piece of iron, bending
and twisting it into a useful pattern. After AD "Nobody
tells me anything" Kersh finished his interminable rant they
could go back to the basement.

Finally they exited into the hallway. Scully was
speeding away from him toward the elevator, so Mulder
reached out and put his hand on her shoulder. She stopped
immediately and turned to look at him. Her expression made
him forget what he was going to say.

He saw that look with some frequency these days.
Janice Wilson was the administrative assistant who tracked
all the documents in background checking. Whenever she had
new pictures of her grandchildren she shared them generously
with the office, taking special care that Scully didn't miss
one. He almost walked into the coffee room once, when Janice
was holding forth about it with her good buddies.

"I've heard the stories too, but she's really normal.
Not like him. She enjoys my pictures more than anything. I
swear she had a tear in her eye when I showed her that
precious one of Emily---that's Brad's oldest---with her
Mulan lunchbox on the first day of school. A woman her
age . . . ," here Janice shook her head sadly, "her
biological clock must be giving her fits. I'm doing her a
favor by nudging her in a direction she'll be glad she took
some day."

Scully was supposed to save this look for Janice
Wilson, not him. Polite interest veiled a weary marshalling
of defenses against another innocently inflicted blow. He
looked up at the nameplate outside of Kersh's office and
remembered his original intention.

"Shall we go downstairs and take his name off the
door?"

He couldn't manage the smirk he had planned.

"What about her name?" Scully asked simply.

The anger and frustration he had gotten used to
hearing in her voice when she spoke of Diana were missing.
In fact, there didn't seem to be any emotion at all. He
probably looked as though he were doing an impression of one
of his fish. She just stood there waiting for his answer.

Now, what was that answer going to be? Spender had
specifically mentioned both of them in his recommendation.
But he hadn't said anything about Diana leaving the X-Files.
Spender and Diana never had acted like a team. What if Diana
wanted to stay and work with him and Scully? There was a
solution to this problem just beyond the clouds that
presently obscured his vision. Scully turned and walked away
while he tried to identify it.

"Scully, wait. Diana isn't going to want to stay on
the X-Files. Even if she did I don't think they'd approve
the appointment of three agents."

"It's OK, Mulder. My offer to get out of your way is
still good. You don't think very clearly when Diana and I
are both around. Maybe I don't either. You can't have Diana
and me too, but if she doesn't want to stay on the X-Files,
I will. The work matters. I do insist on my own office this
time. Even if it's small, I'll need my own office."

She stood there without moving, but it struck Mulder
that she was receding from him like a simulation of the Big
Bang run backwards. Her energy, her emotional ties to him,
her intellectual engagement---he sensed everything being
withdrawn at a dizzying pace. Gathered up into a
concentrated point which allowed no light to escape, it was
then shielded behind a smooth, invisible wall of courteous
behavior. This was nothing like that moment in his hallway
last summer. Then she stood as vulnerable as a child, and
told him with trembling lips that she had to leave the
bureau to avoid being used against him. He wouldn't dare
touch her now.

"Sure, whatever I can get for you Scully," he almost
stammered in his hurry to get the words out.

What difference would it make? His mind picked away at
the puzzle without reaching its usual successful resolution.

"I won't be available on the phone tonight. Leave a
message and I'll call back if there's an emergency," she
instructed him temperately.

That was that. The elevator door closed between them.

When he stumbled over Spender's alleged body five
minutes later he couldn't honestly declare it an emergency.
It wasn't their investigation and the corpse wasn't going
anywhere. They wouldn't let Scully do the post mortem
anyway.

As it turned out, Mulder didn't have to make the hard
choice. The next morning they were informed together that
Diana was reassigned and they were being put back on the X-
Files. No one had to call security to suppress an unseemly
outbreak of uncontrolled glee.

While Facilities dawdled over moving a desk into an
adjacent storage room for Scully, they worked together again
in the big office. Mulder searched out the cases Spender
statused, or held pending outside action. Scully organized
and prioritized them. They reviewed the cases together. Some
were closed after they called local law enforcement and made
suggestions and recommendations. Others had been overtaken
by events and rendered moot. The remainder became their
workload.

Mulder couldn't complain that Scully made the job
personal. Even the glimpses of her individuality afforded by
her "Janice" look, as he thought of it, slowly disappeared.
She exhibited a cheerful or neutral professional mask on all
occasions. Only when the question of an out of town trip
came up did he see anything of the stubborn, opinionated
woman he used to know. He tried to fan the flame.

"We both have to go, Scully. There are three bodies
with no diagnosed cause of death."

"Mulder there are plenty of local resources. There's a
university hospital sixty miles away . . . ."

Her anger dwindled almost visibly as he watched. She
delivered the rest of her reply in reasonable, almost kindly
tones.

"I don't want to argue. Put a note in my file that I
refused to make the trip on the grounds that it was poor use
of the available travel funds. You can, of course, report me
to the AD and I'll answer to him."

"You realize that this will go on your permanent
record, Dana Scully," he replied with mock sternness.

He could almost feel the floor vibrate with the impact
of his joke falling flat. From that point on Scully always
made a recommendation on which of them should travel out of
town on a case. He rarely challenged her, never
successfully. There were no shared trips.

For a while he thought she'd get over it, whatever it
was. It went on and on until he believed something had to be
done. The problem was that his mind no longer served him
very well. Somehow he couldn't step back and view a problem
as a whole anymore. Putting things in perspective had no
meaning outside the abstract concept. It was like seeing the
world from the bottom of a well, or through a cardboard
tube. One little disk at a time. Then he finally had a good
enough day to work his way through an interior monologue
that led to a depressing conclusion.

Was all of this about his choosing to trust Diana?
Surely Scully wouldn't ignore all of their shared years of
hope and disappointment and suffering to focus on this one
disagreement. Before Cassandra turned up again he was
nerving himself to take their relationship farther toward
intimacy---toward becoming lovers. Now he couldn't remember
how he had the guts to even fantasize about it.

Scully had turned her back on him and he didn't
understand it. You didn't act as if six years of commitment,
putting your life on the line for each other, placing
absolute, exclusive trust in each other, just didn't count.
Not without an explanation. Not without discussing it.

Not unless you were prepared to sacrifice the
relationship. When you were that close to someone you owed
them a key to interpret actions that appeared unjustifiable
in normal terms. Otherwise they would feel mocked, used,
rejected.

The truth had been on hold in his unreliable brain for
a long time, but now he took the call.

He had fucked up so badly this time that it couldn't
be fixed.

After that realization, one gray, savorless day
blended into the next. Mulder had never slept so much in his
life. Some nights he went home and slept from seven to
seven. Still he dragged himself through each day, dully
waiting for the release of falling into dreamless sleep
again when his duties were completed.

Then, as he shaved one morning, the answer was
revealed to him. Subsequent days looked much brighter. If he
had been able to think better he would have seen the light
much sooner.

********************************************

Scully supposed he thought she was punishing him.
Maybe she was. It felt more like she had simply run out of
resilience. Her elastic had failed to snap back after the
last titanic stretch.

If she didn't take it personally, it didn't matter on
any given day whether she was working with a human being or
a crude approximation of one. It was cruel to think of him
that way, but it seemed to fit the facts. This way she
didn't have to re-calibrate her sensitivity to him on a
minute-by-minute basis. Bland and impersonal was so much
less painful and exhausting.

His sudden rejection of her world view in favor of
Diana's had hurt and shocked her more than she would have
predicted. On giving it some thought she realized that the
fault had been her own. Not long before the return of
Cassandra she had seriously considered that she and Mulder
might become lovers. She had believed in the possibility
that he had changed---grown as a person. He was bigger than
his obsession, aware of the needs and feelings of others,
willing to put some effort into getting closer to her. It
had all been an illusion built on her own hopes and dreams.

Diana walked in the door and he reverted to the
credulous fanatic, unwilling to listen to reason, and
positively resentful at being asked to explain or justify
his actions. He expected her to trust Diana in life or death
situations based on nothing more than his nostalgia for
their past relationship. Scully had no trouble believing it
was nothing more than memories. His and Diana's exchanges
had about as much warmth as Dead Horse, Alaska in January.
In spite of that Mulder showed a praiseworthy fidelity to
the memory of their bond. Unfortunately Scully was quite
sure that Diana was no longer on his side, if she ever had
been.

The real Mulder had come crashing through Scully's
fantasy when a crisis occurred. Never again would she let
herself be so self-deceived.

Really he didn't seem to much notice or mind the
change in her. At first she caught him giving her puzzled
looks. She didn't react. Then she moved into the glorified
closet that was designated as her office. The pattern she
set served both of them well as a means of reducing contact,
and therefore stress.

She always called before she went over to his office
with paperwork or questions to discuss. Whenever possible
she sent documents for his review electronically rather than
delivering them in person. His own informal drop-in sessions
became even less frequent. Their solve rate fell, but it was
still higher than most teams could boast.

Sometimes whole days passed without their exchanging
more than a few words.

Mulder focused on the mundane aspects of the work,
apparently abandoning his wilder flights of imagination and
theory. He set the recovery of the burned files as a high
personal priority. When she glanced in his door she often
saw him hunched over the computer trying to make out the
contents of computer images of blackened documents.

Maybe he was glad to be relieved of the burden of
trying to measure up in an area where he was pathetically
ill-equipped. Scully had never been able to decide if she
hated Bill or Teena Mulder more for the wreck they had made
of the wonderful child born to them. Every so often that
child peeked out at her from amid the debris of severe
emotional neglect. He could take her breath away with some
act of natural kindness or powerful insight. A cruel
desertion or cutting remark would follow to remind her that
chaos held sway in Mulder's soul.

He was adjusting to the new arrangement. Last week he
was livelier than she had seen him for a long time. When one
of the administrative interns flirted with him, as she
usually did, he flirted back. Scully wondered if she should
warn the girl.

You'll be the third, she would tell her. He'll
energize you with his passion, take over every part of your
life, even hint at romance and sexual attraction. When his
mother lies near death he'll cry in your arms. It'll be up
to you to save him from the consequences of his lunatic,
risk-taking behavior. Then he'll twit you publicly with
making the work personal when it doesn't suit him to be
accountable to you. No matter how much of yourself you
invest in his quest, your input will be nulled out at his
whim. And in the end, he'll never grasp the terrible extent
of the damage he's done to you, because he just can't.

Early Friday morning Scully looked up when she heard a
knocking on the frame of her open door. Mulder was there,
attired in casual clothes. He wore a sweater that looked too
big over loose-fitting jeans. That wasn't his style at all.
His jeans were usually distractingly snug.

"I just wanted to let you know, Scully. I have to go
to Martha's Vineyard this weekend. Mom's thinking of selling
her place at Chilmark. I offered to go see if it needs any
work before she puts it on the market. I'll have my cell
phone if you need me."

He stumbled a little over the last sentence, but
continued firmly.

"I'll probably drive back on Monday. Take care of
yourself."

"You too, Mulder. I'll handle the weekly status report
to the AD on Monday."

Then he turned away quickly and left. She heard his
rapid, determined footsteps going down the hall. He hadn't
demonstrated so much energy since before he learned about
his father's conflicted role in the Consortium conspiracy.
She wondered briefly why he hadn't just phoned her and saved
himself the trip through the D.C. traffic.

At the end of the day Scully checked the "IN" basket
on Mulder's desk. Its surface was almost as clear as the day
he moved back in. In fact, the entire office had an air of
neat organization she thought was foreign to Mulder's
nature. He must have gotten tired of living in the clutter.

----------------------------------------

Mulder thought of nothing but the traffic as he
maneuvered through the beltways out of D.C. When he finally
reached the interstate he considered his destination.

Had his father kept Chilmark against the day Samantha
was returned by the alien colonists? What a homecoming that
would have been. Might still be.

"Welcome home, Honey. Do you remember the room you
were abducted from? We've kept it just the way it was."

Mulder wished someone would smack him for every
contemptuous thought he ever had about his father. Plenty of
people screwed up in less difficult situations than his
father faced. Like, for example, his son, Fox. Maybe if he
hadn't estranged himself from his father all those years
Mulder could have learned some of the Consortium story from
him. He might have been less confused and insecure about the
facts. He might have learned to be more of a man. Then maybe
he would have had the balls to face the mess with Diana
straight on instead of tiptoeing up to it with oblique
glances.

When he met Diana there was nothing good in his life
except professional recognition. The cost of achieving that
was killing him. She offered belief, admiration, positive
feedback and warm, comforting sex. He thought they were
close. Was it all a lie? Couldn't he trust his own instincts
at all?

Because if she was against him now, it was a sure bet
that it all started back then. Someone planted her and used
her from the beginning to control him. And if they fooled
him once they could fool him again. If he had to question
Diana's loyalty now, how could he trust himself to assess
Scully's genuineness in the present?

So he took his usual uniquely destructive approach to
problem-solving. He trashed the one marvelous thing in his
life rather than acknowledge that he was emotionally
incapable of doubting Diana. No only did he lay waste to his
friendship with Scully, he left her with wounds to her
psyche that she might not live long enough to heal. He had a
pretty good idea of how much hurt she concealed under that
bright, competent faade.

"I killed the relationship to save it, Sir," he
reported to AD Skinner in his imagination.

"Congratulations Agent Mulder. Prepare to receive the
FBI's highest recognition for Idiocy Above and Beyond the
Call of Duty. Bend over and assume the awards position."

And big deal if he could trust Diana. What positive
thing had she accomplished for the X-Files since she
returned? Gibson was abducted from her custody. She fixed it
so Mulder could get his chops busted in that nuclear power
plant. In all the time she had access to the files she never
passed any leads or information to him. Her status reports
were things of beauty. They should have been, because they
appeared to be all the work that got done. Cases were
received, categorized, filed and forgotten. Spender had
suspended him and Scully with no interference from Diana.
Then she put Cassandra Spender into a place whence she was
handily removed by the Consortium.

Could even a trusted person that ineffectual be
properly described as an ally?

Not that he had any right to be critical of
incompetence. It didn't matter. He wouldn't be seeing her
again.

Mulder picked up a list from the seat beside him. In
the past he didn't have to use lists, but nowadays his
memory wasn't one hundred percent reliable. He had checked
everything off as he put it into the trunk. Antique Ivory
paint, brushes, plastic drop cloth. Caulking and caulking
gun. Weather stripping and draft guards. His mother would be
pleased with the value added to the house.

He stopped at a ratty little motel called the Shut-eye
just outside of Woods Hole. Places like this reminded him of
more good times than bad. Maybe that was why he found it
harder to sleep here than he did in his apartment. Dawn
found him awake and ready to continue his journey. Mulder
took in the beautiful sight of the rising sun with more
appreciation than he ever felt before. Today would be a good
day.

********************************************

Early that evening Scully received a call from
Frohike. Never shy about expressing his curiosity, tonight
Frohike was nosy to the point of being obnoxious.

"Dana, it's Frohike. We haven't seen you since the
unfortunate events of two months ago. How are you?"

"I've been all right. I suppose Mulder told you we're
back in the basement. We've been pretty busy getting things
in shape."

"Actually I'm calling about Mulder. I thought they put
you on the X-Files, so I wondered. Is he working on a
profiling assignment right now?"

"No, no. There's been plenty of work, but it's routine
investigation. Routine for us, anyway," she amended.

"Well he's acting like he's in the middle of a heavy
profile. Last night he couldn't even follow me when I was
explaining how they may be using alien technology in
producing a certain TV series which shall remain nameless."

Scully often had trouble herself with following
Frohike's reasoning through its more Byzantine complexities.

"Maybe he was just tired," she offered.

"Maybe," Frohike replied skeptically, "But Dana why is
he so Godawful skinny?"

There was an awkward moment of silence while Scully
tried to remember when she last looked at Mulder closely.
She gave up.

"How skinny is he?"

"He's using old belts to hold his pants up. Haven't
you noticed? Are you two still fighting?" he asked
critically.

"We're not fighting Frohike. We're just not very close
anymore," she said tiredly.

"He didn't say anything bad about you."

Why should she have to explain herself to him? Scully
stayed silent.

"So, are you telling me I should call somebody who
gives a damn?" Frohike returned with unexpected venom.

"No. I'll check into it first thing Monday. Thanks for
calling. I'll let you know what I find out."

And she would, too. Probably he was going out on UFO
stakeouts somewhere at night and forgetting to eat. It would
pass.

She didn't really start to worry until Tara called.

They performed the ritual exchange of facts concerning
everyone's health and employment, and then Tara got to the
real reason for her call.

"I called you because I had a rather strange
conversation with Mulder today."

The world seemed determined to make the care and
feeding of Mulder her job.

"Tara, you've probably noticed there aren't any other
kind," Scully tried to joke.

"Seriously, Dana. He hadn't called me since last fall,
when you were both recovering from that field trip to
Antarctica. He asked me all about how Matt was doing and how
I was doing. He told me how wonderful I was for overcoming
my problems. 'Not everyone can be as strong as that, Tara,'
he kept saying. Then he told me that helping to find Matt
was one of the high points in his life. You know what
bothered me Dana? It was that he used the past tense.
Instead of saying that it would always be one of the high
points, he said 'was,' like there wouldn't be any more in
the future. He doesn't have cancer or something, does he?"

"Tara, I think you're overreacting. Mulder doesn't
always express his feelings very clearly. I told you we got
our old positions back. That's what always meant the most to
Mulder."

"Well, you see him every day, so you would know. I
just knew I'd never forgive myself if I didn't say anything
and something happened."

"What could happen?"

"Nothing could happen, I guess, if you say so. When you
see your mother, give her my best."

This was just great. Right before going to bed she
gets two phone calls implying that she's the last line of
defense between Mulder and some terrible but nebulous fate.
Tomorrow she'd call him, as much as she hated to do anything
that might upset the new equilibrium they'd achieved as
partners. There must be some work-related question she could
ask him.

Scully conscientiously set her alarm for seven o'clock
and rose immediately to carry out her plan. He didn't answer
repeated calls to his cell phone. Her next step was to visit his
apartment in search of clues that would indicate anything
questionable about his plans. He'd never asked for the return of
his key, and she hadn't wanted to bring the subject up.

It all felt miserably familiar---the knot of anxiety in
her stomach, the stifled resentment at having to do another
search and rescue, the nagging worry at the back of her mind
about how she would hold it together if she failed this time.
If this exasperating, arrogant, exciting and loving, yes,
loving-in-his-own-way person were actually forever extinguished.

She was astonished to find a cleaning crew hard at
work at his place when she arrived. How could she find an
excuse for being there that wouldn't give Mulder the wrong
idea if it was recounted to him later? Put on the spot, she
couldn't think of anything better than a work file she
needed.

"If you show me some ID you can look around, dear,"
the motherly leader of the crew told her. "I don't think
it's here, though. This place was tidied up real well before
we got here. There are a few boxes sealed up in the bedroom,
but there aren't any loose files, or even any newspapers or
magazines sitting around."

Scully didn't much like the sound of that. She made
the most of her opportunity to snoop. When she reached the
bedroom and saw the four boxes labeled 'Scully,' 'Skinner,'
'Frohike' and 'Mother,' her insides informed her that she
had better do something fast.

She tried to call one more time and then got directory
services. In spite of feeling like a fool, she called the
police department in Chilmark and asked them to check on the
well-being of the man staying at 2790 Vine Street. He might be
suffering from exhaustion, she explained. It was a widely used
code for describing the condition of a celebrity who had
overdosed on an illegal substance. She was tempted to come right
out and ask that they cover up the reason for their inquiry if
things were all right. She contented herself with asking them to
be discreet. The officer assured her that he would look into it.
She could call again in a couple hours and he would let her know
if there was a problem. He acted as though he were used to
performing this type of delicate mission.

Two hours. It was nine o'clock now. If she waited to
call, and then had to make the drive after all, she wouldn't
arrive there until long after dark. There would be no inner
peace for her until she had done everything she could. She
got in the car and headed for north I-95. Luckily everyone
else on the highway felt the same urgency she did.Ten miles
over the speed limit didn't stand out at all. At the New
Jersey state line she stopped and filled the gas tank, and
made her call to the Chilmark police.

The same officer told her in down home accents that
the person at 2790 Vine Street was in fine condition and she
shouldn't worry herself. Scully could imagine how the
conversation might have gone.

"You better watch out Mr. Mulder. Your girlfriend is
checking up on you. Better not try sneaking any bountiful
babes into the family mansion. I won't say a word, but some
old lady here will make it her business to cook your
gander."

Mulder stood there and grinned, his assumption that
she was jealous proven to his satisfaction.

"Yeah, she's got a bad case of the green-eyed monster,
hasn't she."

What would he say when she showed up in person? She
almost turned around and headed back right then. Instead she
went with her instincts and continued up the coast.

As the sun started its downward track on her left, she
was glad she hadn't let herself be discouraged. With nothing
but driving to think about she was reviewing her experience
of the last eight weeks. Her memories were turning up the
volume on her internal alarm system. Mulder hadn't been
nearly as sharp recently at their investigative work. Scully
frequently found things he had overlooked. She attributed it
to an attitude problem on his part. Their case load wasn't
as novel and exciting as it used to be. Spender had probably
dumped leads that seemed too outrageous straight into a
wastebasket. But what if Mulder were doing the best he could?
Nobody noticed because even half of his usual talent was
more than anyone else around there had.

He showed incredible restraint these days in his
reactions when things went badly for him. Sometimes she
wondered if he noticed. Perhaps he was accepting it as what
he deserved. There had been a few occasions when she caught
him looking at her with what she could only describe as a
haunted expression. As soon as he was aware of her scrutiny
the look lost that quality and became blank. He could have
been staring at the same document every time she saw him
seemingly engrossed in recovering lost texts.

There was a possibility of significant personality
change here, which could signal a depressed state. Such a
state could put a person's life in danger.

By the time she was on the ferry she was cursing at
the time consumed by moving cars on and off the boat. She
grudged that extra hour of travel time. Wasn't she going to
feel stupid when she arrived, breathless and urgent? He'd be
fixing a leaky faucet while he listened to a basketball
game on the radio. What the hell was her cover story going
to be, anyway? A ten hour drive to fetch a missing file that
didn't exist? I was just passing by Massachusetts on my way
to Maine, and decided to drop in? She was going to lose all
credibility with him. And yet, like Tara, she'd never
forgive herself if she didn't act and something happened.

Christ, what if he did have a girl there? What if it
was Diana? Well, then she'd just have to kill herself. It
was impossible to imagine a graceful retreat from that
situation.

Then there were so few roads in Chilmark that she
almost felt she got there too soon. How could she prepare
herself psychologically for the all the possible scenarios
that might go down on her arrival? She couldn't. All she
could do was lower her head a little and prepare to bull her
way through whatever personal hell awaited her.

The sky still held the last glow of the setting sun.
Mulder's car was parked outside the house, but no lights were
visible from outside. It was only seven o'clock in the
evening. There was no way that the insomniac Mulder was
already asleep. Although he and a honey could be doing
something else in a bed. She pounded on the door anyway.
If he knew it was her, would he be more or less ready to open
it? She didn't know. There was a peephole. If the identity of
the visitor made any difference he could already know it was
her.

When repeated knocking got no results, Scully tried
the knob. The door was locked. She determined that the lock
was a deadbolt, so there was no question of using a
credit card to enter. After circling the house, and trying
the back door, she returned to the front stoop. OK, was that a
scream for help she heard from inside? That was her story.

Her light driving gloves wouldn't give much protection,
but they would help. She broke the big window to the right of
the door. It wasn't until she tried too hurriedly to knock
out the shards that projected from the frame that she cut
herself. The shocking thrill of nerves and tissue being
dissected jolted up her arm from the side of her hand and
wrist. She ignored it and climbed in the window. Damn. She knew
when she turned on the light that she would need stitches. She
ringed the cut arm above the wrist with her other hand and
squeezed while holding it higher than her heart. The bleeding
slowed to almost nothing, but it had already soaked her sleeve.

She started calling Mulder's name, her heart speeding up to
a panicky rhythm when she still received no answering call, and
heard no sounds but her own. All of the doors she could see were
closed. One by one she opened them, turned on lights, and kept
calling his name. When she located the bathroom she grabbed a
small towel and tied it tightly around her lower arm. There were
still a few more rooms toward the back of the house.

********************************************

The ferry ride was cold and windy in spite of the
sunny day. Mulder shared smiles of commiseration with the
few travelers going to the island from the mainland at this
time of year. When he landed he reflected that his body
didn't demand feeding, so he didn't need to stop and buy
food. Wait a minute, how could he know he wouldn't need food
tomorrow? It was tougher to keep this straight than it
should have been.

He drove to the West Tisbury Market and picked up a
reasonable assortment of canned goods, milk and instant
coffee. When the clerk rang up his purchase Mulder went out
of his way to comment on the brisk weather and his hopes
that the wind wouldn't make outdoor chores difficult. With
a little prompting she'd remember how relaxed and jovial he
was that morning.

When he pulled up at 2790 Vine Street he found that
Bert's Hauling had come through for him. The half cord of
wood he ordered last week was stacked neatly at the back of
the lot. He wouldn't use nearly that much, but the neighbors
were thrifty-minded. They wouldn't let it go to waste.

There was a lot of daylight left and he needed all of
it. He carried his food, overnight bag and supplies into the
house and put everything away neatly. The ladder was in the
shed as he expected. He cleaned leaves out of the gutters,
putting them into the cardboard box from the market. The
birds' nests from the corners of the porch roof went in
there also.

Then he was ready to start on the indoor work. He was
startled by a knock on the door just as he got out his paint
brushes. The peephole in the door revealed the unworried
face of one of the few people who made up the island's
police presence.

"Good morning, officer. What can I do for you?" he
asked cheerily.

"Good morning, sir. We had a call from a lady who
thought she saw a prowler at the Mulder place. Just checking
up."

"No problem. I'm one of the Mulders. I'm Teena's son, if
you know her. I'm glad to hear that the neighbors look out
for the property."

"Do you have some ID I can see?" the officer persisted
politely.

"Sure."

Mulder felt in his back pocket and found he'd left his
wallet in the car.

"Why don't you come out to the car with me while I get
my wallet?" he suggested.

As he removed the jacket containing his ID, he
realized he'd left his cell phone in the car too. It didn't
matter. He knew Scully wasn't going to need him. She hadn't
needed him for some time past, and there was nothing to
indicate that she ever would again.

"So long. Have a nice day," Mulder called with a smile,
as the man got into his patrol car.

That was a piece of luck. With his testimony the whole
inquiry would be wrapped up in nothing flat.

He touched up the woodwork and baseboards with the
matching paint. All the old windows needed caulking around
the glass, and he replaced the worn out weather stripping on
the outside doors. The draft guards he installed on the inside
doors would cut down a lot on the cold gusts of air that
bothered his mother when she tried to sit and do needlework. Of
course she never came up here anymore.

The sun was getting low and he was starting to feel
the chill in the house. He had one last chore to complete
before the sun went down. It wasn't hard to locate the
outside vent from the wood-burning stove. It had a little
screen over it. Probably there was a screwdriver in the shed.
When he located one he tucked it into his back pocket. He
placed the ladder up next to the vent, and fetched the
cardboard box from the porch. Three of the screws holding the
screen he removed and dropped to the ground. The fourth he
left, so the screen hung by it below the opening. He pushed
double handfuls of leaves into the vent until it wouldn't
easily hold more. One of the bird's nests went in front of
the leaves. The rest of the box's contents he scattered on
the lot across the road. Everything else was returned to the
shed.

It occurred to him that they would expect to find food
in his stomach. He heated up a can of spaghetti on the stove
and ate it with more enjoyment than he expected. A glass of
milk finished the meal. The sun had set and it was quite
cold enough to light a cozy fire in the stove. He arranged
the wood and kindling as his father had taught him many
years ago.

The drop cloth on the sofa would prevent him from
ruining it before they found him. After the fire exhausted
the fuel in the stove, the temperature inside would drop
enough to keep him fairly fresh. Sandi Berg, the realtor he
dealt with, had receipted delivery of the key a week ago. She
was scheduled to inspect the property on Tuesday.

Carbon monoxide was notorious for making its victims
sleepy. Everyone would assume he had forgotten to check the
vent, lit the fire, and been overcome by the fumes before he
realized what was happening. Anyway, whatever they
suspected, they couldn't be sure.

Just as he knelt to light the kindling he heard
knocking at the door again. This was not a good time to be
interrupted. There were no lights on. Let the policeman, or
whoever it was, assume he was tired out and already asleep.
The visitor might suffer a little self-recrimination later
on, but it wouldn't be serious. After all, there was no way
to know what was happening inside.

He stayed on his knees quietly in the dark while the
person tried the doorknob and then circled the house. For
some reason tears were running down his cheeks. He didn't
try to stop them. They were a foretaste of the release he
anticipated from this act.

Then, to his disbelief, he heard the sound of glass
breaking and a voice calling his name. Quick, light footsteps
came from the front of the house. There was a sudden glare
as the overhead light was flipped on. He knew who it was, of
course. He stayed on the floor with his head bowed.

"Could you turn the light back off, Scully. Please.
It's hurting my eyes."

--------------------------------------------

She found him in the next room, crouched in front of a
cold stove with matches in his hand and tears streaming down
his face. He bent his head under the assault of the overhead
light, but made no move to get up. All he did was ask her to
turn off the light for the sake of his eyes. She did. There
was enough light from the hall to allow her to move around
the room.

When she reached his side she didn't hesitate. It
wasn't clear what was going on here, but Mulder was in
distress and she had to make some attempt to ease the
anguish she had seen during that brief flash of light. She
put her good hand on his shoulder and spoke his name once
more with gentleness. He startled her by rising up on his
knees and putting both arms around her, pressing his face
against her body at the waist. Mulder was strong. He was
squeezing her hard.

The action reminded Scully irresistibly of times in
childhood when she had grabbed her own mother this way,
hiding her face against her mother's soft blouse, squeezing
as hard as her skinny little arms would permit.

Her hands went naturally to his thick brown hair. It
was longer than usual---too long really. He must have been
skipping haircuts. When she gave him a reassuring pat on the
back she felt the too-prominent bones of his shoulder. And
he was cold. She could feel him shivering with it. How long
had he been sitting on the floor in a cold, dark house?

Mulder knew he shouldn't do this. Scully had set clear
boundaries for their partnership. If he violated them she
might leave the X-Files. Now that his plan was ruined he
would have to go back to work for a while. It would be
impossible for him to survive even one day of her total
abandonment. Besides, the X-Files needed her. She had to
stay so she'd be in a position to carry on the work when he
was gone.

It was wrong of him to plan to leave her alone to cope
with the future. He knew that too. He just couldn't take the
pain anymore. But this embrace mitigated the pain, and he
couldn't seem to resist the moment of ease it afforded. Even
though it didn't mean she really cared anymore. The physical
sensation of contact with her warm body evoked memories of
hugs that did mean something. He found they were better than
nothing at all.

Why didn't he understand what he was doing when he was
in the process of throwing everything important away? He had
dug himself deeper every day into a black pit where the sun
couldn't reach, and every shovelful made feeble sense at the
time.

This was doable, though. Allowing himself another half
minute of silent comfort, he then removed his arms from
around her. Thank heavens she was letting him stay hidden
in the darkness. OK, so you didn't think you'd have to deal
with tomorrow. You can do it. There's always next week, next
month. You can make it to the next opportunity. She's not
looking very closely these days. It doesn't have to be a
great performance---only one credible enough to convey what
she wants to see.

He looked up at her gamely where she was silhouetted
against the dim light of the hall.

"I'm sorry Scully. That was out of line. I came up
here to be alone. I thought I needed the solitude to get
over some of the awful things the Cigarette Smoker told me
about my family. Maybe solitude wasn't the answer, right?"

His rueful smile wasn't one of the best he'd ever
produced, but in the shadows it would pass. He got to his
feet with difficulty. The cold, hard floor and kneeling
position left his joints stiff and achey. Sitting down on the
sofa, he gestured politely to Scully to take a seat at the
other end. His eyes were used to the dim light again. He could
just make out her features.

"Mulder, I don't know what to say."

"You don't need to say anything. Thanks for putting up
with the unprofessional behavior. I appreciate your
concern."

Viewed from the perspective of their history those
words struck Scully as so sad she could hardly bear it.
During the trip up she had ricocheted between fearing his
scornful amusement at her apparent possessiveness and
worrying that she would discover him dead of a self-
inflicted gunshot wound. The possibility of finding him
absorbed in an exercise of self-discovery didn't occur to
her. That she would receive a respectful, appreciative
welcome from him had never crossed her mind. Had she been
misreading him completely?

"Have you been feeling all right recently?" she asked.

"Not great," he answered. "It was good to get the X-
Files back. I just can't seem to come to terms with what
happened before, you know? My father---I think I misjudged
him and now I can't ever tell him. But even worse, I can't
seem to get things straight in my head. I can't figure out
what to do next. You don't want to talk about it."

He heard her draw a breath to speak and hurried to
prevent it.

"No, no. Don't say anything. I know I gave up the
right to hear your thoughts when I wouldn't listen to you
about Diana. I never apologized for not listening, or
explaining, so I'll do that now. My thinking wasn't clear at
the time, but I know that didn't make any difference to how
you felt. I told myself she deserved to be considered
innocent until proven guilty. Like I apply those standards
consistently. I know I don't apply any standards
consistently. I go with my instincts. She was close to me
once. How could I have been so wrong? How could I have been
so gullible? Who can you trust when you can't trust
yourself?"

"Thank you for explaining. That helps," Scully
answered.

"It doesn't fix it, though, does it?"

"Actually, Mulder, explaining and apologizing can fix
things. None of us is perfect. It's only when we think we're
perfect that we can't even try to make things right."

"I know I hurt you, Scully. And the only thing I
accomplished was to destroy myself. I rejected everything I
value when I tried to ignore you. Your honesty, your clear
thinking, your commitment to doing what's right. I threw
away the best part of myself."

"You make me sound like a Boy Scout. But you can't
really throw part of yourself away. It might get lost
temporarily. You can recover it if you want to."

"Listen to this conversation. 'I,I,I,' comes
out of my mouth and 'you, you, you' comes out of yours.
What's wrong with that picture?"

"Maybe that I haven't apologized to you."

"What the hell for, Scully?" he said roughly.

"For not explaining how I felt. How utterly rejected
and left out I felt, displaced by someone who was a complete
stranger to me, but who had prior claims on you and the X-
Files. I've gotten used to considering them my crusade too,"
she added. "I've gotten used to you caring more about what I
think than what anyone else thinks. I depended on you to
give me hope when things looked blackest. We haven't ever
talked about it, but I feel like we've gotten close to each
other over the years. The way you acted made me think our
friendship wasn't real, that I deluded myself into thinking
you cared about me."

She looked over and saw him bite his lip and turn his
head away.

"I'm not saying those things to make you feel bad.
Maybe it would have helped you do the right thing if I'd let
you see more of my feelings than just the anger. I apologize
for withholding that when you were trying to make decisions.
But I don't know, I'm not sure you were able to make valid
decisions with the stress you were under."

"No, I'm not going to take the mental health escape
clause on this. I thought I was a better person than before
I knew you. It was unforgivable what I did to you," he said
decisively.

"You're wrong again, Mulder," she answered with a
crooked smile. "I forgive you."

After two months of hell it couldn't be that simple,
he told himself.

"I know it's not that simple, of course," she
continued. "I'll still be angry about it sometimes, but I
understand it better now, and maybe we can talk about it.
Eventually it will be history, if we let it."

Absorbed in the sudden change in their relations,
Mulder had almost forgotten the misery that hovered at the
edges of his consciousness, ready to pounce on him when
given an opening. He suddenly remembered why they were in the
dark, sitting in front of a cold stove on a drop-clothed sofa.
Should he say anything about that to Scully? She'd probably
get all grim and professional and want to put him on a
suicide watch in some unspeakably institutional institution.
He'd manage to talk her out of that. But maybe she had a
right to know what a screwed up person he was.

He turned toward her with determined look on his face.
Moving closer to her on the couch he took both of her hands
in his.

"Scully, you've been through so much. I can hardly
stand to think of what you've had to suffer. Have you ever
felt like you just couldn't . . . ."

He trailed off when he registered that there was
something wet on his fingers. As he lifted her hand to
examine it more closely he detected an unpleasantly familiar
odor. It smelled like fresh blood. He jumped up and headed
over to the light switch.

"Scully, what's that?" he asked, coming back over to
the couch and pointing wide-eyed at the now blood-saturated
towel around her arm.

During their emotionally draining conversation she'd
forgotten to apply pressure and keep it elevated. She was
glad she hadn't made a fuss over it. It would have
distracted them from getting to the bottom of their
misunderstanding.

"I cut myself when I broke your window. It's
superficial," she said dismissively.

"It's bleeding a lot. Don't you think you should take
care of it?" he asked urgently.

"I can't do anything here. It's going to need
stitches. It can wait a little longer. What did you want to
ask me?"

"Nothing that can't wait longer than that. Come on,
get in the car. There's a little hospital on the island."

When they pulled up at the emergency entrance it
almost looked as though the place had closed for the night.
At their ring a security guard opened the glass door and
summoned the nurse on duty from her Cosmo. She looked at the
bloody towel and asked the guard to get Dr. Singh. The
extremely youthful Dr. Singh emerged sleepily from a room
down the hall a few minutes later.

Nurse Cindy sat Scully in a treatment room with her
arm extended on a table. Cindy then requested that Mulder
leave, explaining that she didn't want to have to revive him
when things got a little bloody. Mulder assured her that he
didn't faint at the sight of blood. Then he remembered with
a guilty start that this was Scully's decision.

"Do you want me to leave?" he asked, turning towards
her.

"No, I wish you would stay," she answered.

Cindy wrote Scully's description of the accident on
her chart and prepared gauze and antiseptics for cleaning
the wound.

Dr. Singh whistled a little through his teeth when he
unwrapped the towel and started wiping blood away at the
edges of the wound.

"You came awfully close to an artery here, Miss
Scully."

She heard Mulder exhale forcefully behind her. Scully
shrugged mentally. She had known it was close, but she also
knew it had missed, and a miss was golden in a case like
this.

Dr. Singh looked at her thoughtfully.

"This was an accident you say? Have you been feeling
all right recently. Not especially low-spirited or blue?"

"It was really an accident. I'm not depressed," she
assured him with a smile.

Scully was surprised when Mulder broke in with a
smart-aleck remark. She hadn't heard him talk that way in
quite a while.

"We couldn't possibly be depressed. We're at the
pinnacle of our careers, we've participated successfully in
weight loss programs, and we get the kind of respect that
only comes with having a government job."

Dr. Singh gave him a strange look as he left the room
to get a suture tray. Mulder took the opportunity to
question Scully.

"Are you sure he'll be up to doing the best
needlework? Maybe you should go to a plastic surgeon so the
scar won't be so bad."

"Mulder, with the way my life has been going, I fully
expect to play the Bride of Frankenstein with no makeup
someday. I'm sure Dr. Singh will do fine."

"If you ever play that role, don't even think of
casting anyone but me as the Groom," Mulder replied.

Scully turned around to show him her grin, and was
surprised to find him looking at her seriously.

"You don't have enough scars yet," she answered.

Then she reached her good hand back for one of his. He
leaned forward and let her squeeze his fingers while the
doctor numbed the area of the cut and took what seemed like
a million little stitches.

On the drive back to Vine Street, Scully questioned
Mulder hesitantly.

"Do you ever think about talking to someone about your
feelings instead of going off alone like this?"

"What advice would they give me? 'Stick with therapy
and you can get rid of those paranoid delusions?' Anyway,
I've got you to talk to. If you don't mind
sometimes . . . ."

He trailed off, realizing he was already
being presumptuous again.

"Yes, you've got me," she replied firmly, "But maybe
there are things you don't want to talk to me about, like
Diana, because you'd be afraid of hurting my feelings."

"Yes, my concern for your feelings is legendary, isn't
it," he said with a short laugh.

He did a quick review of his mental condition and
realized that his depression had receded to its usual
manageable level of a dull background pain. If he were lucky
it would stay there. It looked as though he would be OK, at
least until something new happened to disturb the balance of
power in his on-going battle for sanity.

When they arrived at the house it was getting close to
dawn. They could get a ferry to the mainland soon. When
business hours began he would call and make arrangements to
have the broken window replaced.

In the meantime, they shared a can of corned beef hash
and drank large mugs of coffee. There was one more job he
didn't want to forget before he left the island. Scully went
to the bathroom and awkwardly tried to tidy up while keeping
her bandages dry. As soon as she was out of sight Mulder
took the ladder and screwdriver out of the shed once more.
He pulled all the dried leaves and grass out of the vent and
replaced the screen with new screws. It would be too sad if
some poor bum, or kids on a lark, suffocated themselves to
death in this house.

"Are you sure you'll be able to drive?" Mulder asked
her, when she finally emerged.

"That's the beauty of power steering," she said,
moving her bandaged wrist slightly and wincing just a
little.

Scully gestured at his armload of paintbrushes and
tubes of caulking.

"Did you get everything done that you wanted to do?"
she asked him.

"No. Maybe I'll get to it later. Did you ever notice how,
sometimes, if you put a job off long enough, it turns out you
don't have to do it all?"

"Yeah," Scully replied. "You can end up moving out
before you ever get the basement painted."

"Something like that."

End of "Zero out the Variable"