Disclaimer: The X files belongs to Chris Carter and Fox...I just decided to borrow the characters for my story...No agents were harmed in the writing of this fic.
Note: This is meant to follow that episode...oh, drat. Where Scully found Daniel (?) in the hospital, and Mulder was at Stonehenge chasing crop circles. A Moby song was played..;) That's all I know.
The light turned red, and her thoughts drifted.
Red is to evil, as blue is to neutral...cold. An aura, a feeling unexplained by her beloved science, nor her partners own beloved paranormal.
And the watch ticked.
Startled, her azure eyes turned upward, hands gripping the steering wheel with a ferocity which so caused them to ghastly whiten. Her truth, her lies, her choices were for so many things she couldn't have.
And yet, she imagined the sounds of a family, her voice calling above the strain of music; her sun-filled living room awash with the empty, serene air of a cool New England morning--and her lover, husband...partner. As the word 'partner' symbolized togetherness, so she then realized its signifigance. They were together often, and always, and sometimes, but never...never were either one without the other.
Today her lungs expanded fully as she drew another deep breath. Today, beneath the front she held high in front of her, she knew all of what she was looking for and none of what she'd thought she'd once found.
"How many lives could we be leading if we made different choices?" She murmured through drowsy lips, unable to hear the words, yet able to speak them forth. Mulder had spoken this, as he spoke through her on many occasions, with strength, sense, and a calm which was unfamiliar to her personal feelings and thoughts.
Did she think as he did? Sometimes, perhaps. In those fleeting moments when yearning and dispair allowed the release of self---her self-image, self-conciousness. She became like he was...but only in mind's eye.
"What if...there was only one choice?" She asked aloud, a question posed to Mulder, answered by her own voice, in rhetorical format. "And all the other ones were wrong?"
They could be wrong. But paths were blazed throughout one's fate--any path free to be chosen, and each leading to a life of infinite possibility. Infinite possibility, infinite success, and infinite failures.
Where second chances were few, and far between.
But what of the path she saw before her now? As easily as choosing a salad, a car, a new suit- this particular path needed tailoring. Snip a thread, lay a stepping stone...plant a signpost. "TO YOUR DIRECTED CHOICE".
At that particular moment, as her watch ticked, stubborn in it's frozen time, the faintest thought began to tickle the edge of her tortured mind. A snatch...a tendril of poetry, from activist years at Berkley, striking her enough to make her recall the words.
"Do you know why the caged bird sings?"
"Yes," She whispered. "I think I know why. He was calling out for a companion."
The light changed.
Her pedal touched the floor.
And Dana Scully flew.