Author's Notes: The title comes from the song by the Beach Boys. It started playing on iTunes while I was trying to think of a title for this story; a real-life X-File, perhaps.

Yet another story I started when I first began writing fanfic, and picked up eight years later to finish it.

Summary: A/U after all things

For Mimic: You da bomb.

California Dreaming
Rated PG
Suzanne L. Feld

When she stepped out of the jetway at Dulles Dana Scully felt such a strong sense of déjà vu that it was almost dizzying. This, she thought as she pulled her weekender behind her, is really how we travel back in time.

The airport was just as crowded as usual, which was why she had only brought the bag that fit in the overhead and hadn't checked anything. If she ended up staying long enough to need more clothes she planned to buy them. She could afford—and use—a few more outfits anyway, she thought as she made her way to the car rental area. It wasn't like she didn't have plenty of money to burn these days; private practice was just as lucrative as she'd been led to believe. It certainly paid better than the FBI ever dreamed of.

Twenty minutes later she was driving away from the airport through snow flurries in an unremarkable midsize Ford sedan, once again assaulted by déjà vu. Only this time Mulder wasn't in the seat beside her yammering away about some crazy-ass case but instead lying in DC Memorial Hospital, probably engaged in dying.

Her mind shied away from that thought but it could not be ignored, since it was the reason that she was here in D.C. Deep in her chest, her heart ached at the thought of Mulder as it had ever since she'd left. It also beat faster with nervousness at the thought of seeing him again after the acrimonious way they'd parted. The only good thing was that he was likely still unconscious and she'd have time to brace herself for dealing with him. If he ever woke up, that was. From what she'd been told, there was a possibility that he would never regain consciousness. She planned to go over his chart mercilessly and make sure that nothing had been overlooked, no tests skipped, nothing missing.

Dana heaved a sigh as she carefully exited the freeway, the snow beginning to accumulate on the road. She had to stop thinking that he might not make it. People survived this type of head wound, often without permanent damage; he certainly had more than once. Still, the thought of any type of impairment to his stunning mind just about paralyzed her with horror. She knew that Mulder would not want to live as a vegetable and already planned to honor the wishes in his living will no matter what they were. She didn't know if he'd changed them since they'd been partners but since she was still listed as his next of kin and executor it seemed unlikely.

Forcing her mind away from those dire thoughts, she pulled into the hospital's parking area and flashed her medical ID from San Francisco General to gain entrance to the physician's lot. She got directions to the ICU from the security guard at the door and hurried to the fourth floor, dreading and yet anticipating seeing him.

She had no idea how much it would both hurt and elate her.

The ICU was quietly bustling and, after stopping at the nurse's station to pick up his chart and let the doctor on call know that she'd arrived, Dana continued on alone. She stopped at the end of the bed and felt her heart lurch when she saw Mulder lying there. The first thing she noticed was the thick white bandage that covered most of his head. Then she noted that his hair, what showed of it beneath the cotton wrappings, was longer than it had been when she'd left. He was also much thinner and more pale than she remembered him being. Though that might have been due to blood loss, she also had the feeling that he'd been spending a lot more time indoors. He was still unconscious, tubes and wires leading from him to the beeping machines, and even combing over his chart several times didn't tell her any more than the E.R. doctor had over the phone.

So now it was just sit at his bedside and wait.

Holding his limp warm hand, Dana fought back tears as she gazed at his peaceful face. Why did it take something like this to bring them back together? The incident that had driven them apart in the first place seemed much less important when weighed against the fact that he might die without ever really knowing how she felt about him.

Unbidden, her mind drifted back to that last fight, the one that had cemented her decision to leave….

"Look, Mulder, I can't do this. I know you think—"

"I don't think, Scully, I know we can—"

"You may be able to, but I can't. I just can't. If you're not able to give me my space and let me come to terms with this—"

"Terms?" He'd all but shouted, glaring at her from across her living room. "What terms? We're in love, we made love, we're now a couple! What other terms do you need to come to?"

"The fact that I can't handle you smothering me!" she snapped right back at him. "Just because we slept together does not mean we're suddenly joined at the hip, Mulder. I haven't lived by myself for the last ten years for any reason other than I wanted to, you know."

"I didn't say we had to move in together, I just said I wanted to stay the night and you blew up at me." He'd turned to sulking, but that only steeled her resolve.

"You stayed last night, and the one before," she pointed out. "Did it ever occur to you that maybe I need a break?"

"From me?" he said incredulously. "I thought you'd want to spend more time with me now."

Now, she knew, meant since they'd become lovers less than a week ago. It was beginning to seem like a lifetime.

"I need some time to get used to this… to this change in our relationship." She tried to calm down and reason with him. "Not forever, just until I—"

"Until you decide you've had enough of me in your bed!" he snarled. "I'm not stupid, Scully, I get it. You had your itch scratched and now it's hit the road, jack, am I right?"

Her temper, which was hanging on a frayed thread to begin with, snapped. "Think what you want to—you will anyway!" she screamed back. "Get the fuck out, Mulder, I have had enough of you!"

"You'll regret pushing me away, Scully, mark my words." He'd sneered as he stalked to her front door, grabbing his black leather jacket off the end of the couch on his way. "Things'll never be the same for either of us and you keep in mind that this is your fault, not mine."

She clenched her jaw, gritting her teeth, until the door slammed behind him hard enough to rattle the window glass across the room. It was then that she knew what she had to do.

"Dr. Scully?"

Dana was jolted out of her reverie by a deep voice and she looked up to see a tall, thin man in a white lab coat standing near the end of Mulder's bed. "Yes?"

"I'm Dr. Rhodes. I was here when Mr. Mulder was admitted last night and have been monitoring him since his surgery."

She rose and shook his hand. "Good to meet you. Thank you for calling me so quickly."

He nodded and picked up the chart from where it rested on Mulder's lower legs where she'd left it. "You've looked at this?"

She nodded. "He was damned lucky that the bullet bounced off the side of his skull instead of piercing it."

"Then you know that there's not much we can do at this point other than monitor him since he's got the no assistance clause in his living will. He's breathing on his own and he'll either come out of the coma or he won't. Let's at least give him overnight and see how he is tomorrow before we make any further decisions. What do you say?"

"I think that's best."

"Does he have any other family we should contact?"

"No… no, I'm it," she said, feeling a pang of sadness at that admission. "I'll be staying with him if—until—he wakes up, if I can."

"Of course, I'll let the nursing staff know. And you're related… how? Sister?" he said dubiously, clearly eyeing her hair.

"No. We were partners at the FBI before I, ah, I left last year. It appears that he never changed his next of kin even though…" Her voice cracked unexpectedly and she quickly cleared her throat and forced herself to finish. "We, ah, we haven't seen each other in some time."

The tall doctor moved away, nodding. "Well, yes, then. Let the nurses know if you need anything. Have them page me if you need me, and I'll leave his chart at the desk."

He disappeared around the curtain and Dana sank into the hard plastic chair beside the bed, taking Mulder's hand again. She looked over at the steadily beeping monitors, seeing that while his pulse was slow and BP lower than normal, both were within acceptable parameters. He had been lucky indeed, though a CAT scan showed that the impact of the bullet caused a subdural hematoma which had been relieved by surgery, probably what was causing the coma. She was glad that he had only required a Burr hole trephination, which was a small hole drilled in the skull to siphon out the blood, rather than the more dangerous craniotomy or even a craniectomy, where sections of the skull were removed, which was always a possibility with a hematoma of this type.

With any luck, he would come out of it within forty-eight hours… and if he didn't, then there was no telling when—or if—he would.

Later that evening a burly orderly brought her a more comfortable reclining chair which she slept in that night, dozing fitfully and waking often to check Mulder's vitals before falling into an uneasy sleep once again. The lights were down and voices hushed but she remained mostly aware of where she was and why. But near morning she finally laid back in the recliner and drifted into true sleep. She dreamt of her flight across the country behind his back and how she had been unable to help imagining his shocked reaction when he returned from an out-of-town case to find her permanently gone.

Within three months after leaving D.C. it was like the last ten years of her life never happened. Though she had planned to go into full-time pathology, an opening at a private pediatric clinic in San Francisco with ties to the largest hospital in the city had caught her attention and that was where she ended up. Before long she had a full patient load and discovered that though she missed the thrill of the chase as a field agent, she loved healing people—especially children—even more.

She refused to admit to herself how much she missed Mulder, though she thought of him frequently. And it got no easier as time went by.

When she finally broke down and got her apartment by the beach, the move away from her old life finally seemed permanent. It was then that Dana realized she'd been hoping in the back of her mind that Mulder would come swooping out of the east to try and win her back with a big macho bullshit display. It didn't happen; while she did get calls and email from him, she never answered and it tapered off as the months passed. She wasn't sure if she was pissed or relieved when he eventually gave up.

Morning in the ICU woke her with a clatter of equipment and the first thing she did was push the blanket covering her to the floor and jump up to check over Mulder's vitals, even while groggy. His pulse was noticeably weaker than the day before, which immediately concerned her. When a nurse stopped by she noted it as well, and said that she would contact the doctor on duty to have a look at him.

"He does seem to be weaker," the on-call doctor told her when he showed up a short time later. "But there isn't much else we can do, I'm afraid. He is stable, though, so I'll see if we can find a bed for him."

"Make it a private room; if his insurance won't cover it then I'll pay for it," Dana said firmly.

While they were moving him, she went down to her car and through the snowstorm to get clean clothes from her suitcase. Dana planned to change in the physician's locker room but decided to check on Mulder first and, carrying her clean clothes in a patient bag she'd grabbed from the ICU, found his room. To her horror his vitals were even lower than they had been earlier but there was no one in the room monitoring him. While she stood there, he flatlined.

Without even thinking about it Dana took charge. Dropping the bag and kicking it to the side, she leaned out into the hallway and shouted for help, then began issuing orders that the staff scrambled to follow. No one got in her way or tried to halt her as she began CPR, not stopping until Mulder's heartbeat was back and at a safe, steady rhythm. Then she bitched out all and sundry within the sound of her voice for leaving him alone in such a state. One nurse tried to explain that she had been on the way back to check on him after an emergency call, but Dana would have none of it.

Only when he was stable and his vitals stronger than they had been even the day before did Dana dare to relax. She sank into the chair beside his bed, beginning to shake with delayed shock as she realized just how close it had been. Had she not walked into the room when she had, if she'd gone to shower and change first, there was a good chance that he would now be dead.

The rails on his bed were down and she took his big hand in both of hers, then leaned over and rested her forehead on his shoulder. "Jesus, Mulder, that was too close," she told his unconscious form, listening to the heart monitor beeping steadily. "I can't lose you now. Hang on for me, okay? I don't know if you can hear me but I'm right here and I'm not going anywhere until you're back with me."

Heaving a sigh, she finally let herself relax. It was then that she felt Mulder's hand, clasped in both of hers, twitch. She lifted her head and gazed at his face, but he didn't move again for the rest of the time she sat by his bedside, afraid to so much as go to the bathroom without someone else by his side for even those few moments. She did eventually turn on the TV with the remote, though she didn't let go of his hand and barely paid attention to it.

Late in the afternoon one of the nurses came in and, after checking Mulder's vitals, picked up the patient bag from the floor near the wall by the head of the bed. "Dr. Scully, do you know what or whose this is?" he asked, holding it up.

"My clothes—I was going to change earlier but forgot all about it," she said tiredly. "And now I'd rather not leave him."

"I can sit with him while you change," the nurse said, going over to hand her the bag. "Trust me, that won't happen again. You put the fear of God into everyone around here."

She gave him a ghost of a smile as she got up, taking the bag. "Thanks."

Feeling better in clean clothes after taking a quick sink bath in the attached restroom Dana resumed her vigil at Mulder's side. It wasn't too much longer before an orderly in a white jacket entered bearing a food tray and set it on the rolling bed tray. "Mike told me that you haven't eaten since you've been here, and I thought you might appreciate this," the young woman told her.

"That was very nice of you—thank you," Dana said. Her stomach growled to instant attention as the orderly lifted the round metal cover off of the plate to show a grilled chicken breast on a bed of wild rice with steamed carrots on the side. No matter how it might taste, it certainly looked good. "Now that I think about it, I haven't eaten since yesterday afternoon."

"Not good, doctor—you of all people should know that," the other woman gently scolded, pushing the rolling tray over to her chair. Dana scooted back and away from the bed, and just as she let go of Mulder's hand she thought she felt it twitch again. But a close look at his face showed no change.

After dinner, which was actually quite good, she felt better but was just as determined to stay with Mulder until he regained consciousness or it was believed that he was in a coma indefinitely. Though she knew intellectually that she couldn't live in this hospital room if his stay became extended, she also couldn't bring herself to leave him for more than the few minutes it took her to use the restroom.

As she sat and looked at him lying pale and motionless in the bed, Dana made herself a deal. If—when—he woke up, she was going to be nothing less than honest with him. It was a damn shame that it took something so serious to get her to see how much he meant to her, but it had and she was not going to lose him now, be it to death or another misunderstanding.

As afternoon moved into evening Dana began to wonder why no one else from the FBI had bothered to come visit Mulder. Though she hadn't stayed in touch, she assumed that he still worked under Skinner and was baffled as to why the A.D. hadn't showed up. He had always visited either of them in the hospital no matter why they were there. On top of that, Mulder had been wounded in the line of duty which should have at least garnered him a get-well card or two from the other agents, she thought darkly. But nothing arrived and no one else visited on that long, melancholy day.

She slept a little better that night, stretched out in the recliner rather than leaning over Mulder's bed for hours like she had the night before. But she was still aware of the beeping machines monitoring him and woke up twice before three a.m. to check him despite having been aware when the nursing staff stopped in every hour or so.

Then she began dreaming that Mulder was talking to her in that unmistakable tenor voice of his. No matter where they were or what they were doing or if they were in person or on the phone, Dana had always known his voice. She couldn't understand what he was telling her, but it was urgent and she strained to listen. Finally, she opened her eyes to see his face turned towards her in the dimness of the hospital room and realized that it wasn't a dream—he really was trying to talk to her.

"Oh my God, Mulder, you're awake." She got up with a low groan under her breath and turned on the dim light behind the bed, then leaned over him. With one hand, she gently brushed away a lock of hair that had fallen from beneath the bandage onto his cheek. "How do you feel?"

He cleared his throat, wincing, and she reached over to get the lidded cup of water that had been waiting for him since he'd been moved to the room. It was lukewarm, but she doubted he would mind. And he didn't, sucking on the bendy straw and then sighing with relief as she put it back on the bedside table.

"How do you feel?" she asked again.

"Like I'm dreaming," he rasped, his fingers curling around hers as she took his hand. His dark, shadowed eyes gazed up into hers with confusion. "Izzis really you, Scully? What happened to me? Where am I?"

"You were shot," she told him gently. "Do you remember anything?"

His forehead creased and then he winced, slowly lifting his shaking free hand to carefully touch the bandage around his head. "Uh, dunno, last thing I—I recall is Dumars running towards me… yelling… then a bright flash…"

"Don't push yourself, it'll come back," she soothed him, seeing that he was getting agitated. Dumars had been a case they'd assisted on well over a year ago, not long before she'd left. He was clearly confused but she didn't want him to get upset. She was relieved that he apparently didn't remember the past year, and relaxed for the moment. "How does your head feel?"

"Like someone dropped a brick on it," he grumbled. "Got something for that, doc?"

"I don't, but I know someone who does." Dana smiled down at him as she pushed the call button for the nurse. "There are going to be a lot of people around here happy to see you awake."

"How long was I out?" he asked, glancing around the room then wincing again.

"Close to forty-eight hours. Don't move your head too much, Mulder. The bullet glanced off your skull and you had a subdural hematoma relieved by surgery."

"In that case I guess I don't feel too bad," he said, his eyes going back to her. "So is this what it takes to get you to come back to me?"

A jolt to her gut made her realize that he was not confused and thinking he was in the past. "I'm sorry that it is," she admitted, lifting her free hand to brush her fingers along his jaw. "I never should have left you the way—"

"Oh, look who's awake!"

At the sound of a strange voice Dana jerked upright, moving her hands away from him. She stepped back and let the nurse check him over, then turned her back per Mulder's request when the catheter was taken out. It wasn't until they were left alone that she pulled her chair back up to the bed and took Mulder's hand again. He was on a morphine pump through the IV and she was watching to see when he pushed the button, relieved to see that it wasn't as often as it could have been.

"So where were we, Scully, before the interruption?"

She took a deep breath and said, "Discussing the terrible way that I left you a year ago."

"Ah." His fingers tightened around hers. "Are you happy where you are now, Scully?"

She reminded herself that she had decided to be honest with him and now stuck to it. "Mostly," she admitted. "But there's a gaping hole in my life that I don't know will ever be filled again."

Their eyes met, held. "Mine too," he said, then sighed. "And no matter how many partners the FBI throws at me, none of them is you."

"Do you remember what happened yet, when you got shot?"

He raised his eyebrows. "It was Dumars—the same one who evaded us a year and a half ago. We'd tracked him to a house in Columbia Heights and my so-called partner was calling for backup when I went in after him. I don't even know where that twit got to, but Dumars must have heard me come in and rushed me. Like I said, the last thing I remember is a flash. Hasn't anyone from the FBI told you what happened?"

"Haven't you learned to wait for backup when you bother to call for it?" She said with some exasperation. "No one's been here, and I haven't called the FBI. I've been staying with you. You flatlined earlier today and I've been afraid to leave you alone."

"That would explain my sore chest, but it's not as bad as my head," he said. "As for the FBI—don't expect to see anyone. I think I've burned any bridges I might have had there, and after Skinner retired—"

"Skinner retired?" she repeated, aghast. "Seriously?"

"Yeah, it was forced," he said, lifting his head from the pillow, then winced. "Better than getting censured and fired. They tried to get me to—"

"Mulder, why don't you take it easy?" Dana interrupted, rubbing the back of the hand she held with her free one. He was getting agitated, his blood pressure and pulse rising. "You still need to rest, and getting upset won't help."

"Yeah, yeah," he sighed, tossing his head restlessly then wincing again and holding still. "I hate this shit, Scully, I really do."

"What, being in the hospital? Think you'd be used to it by now," she teased gently.

"Not just that. This whole thing—the FBI, the way the assholes treat me, feeling bored and helpless and not knowing what else to do… no one else has given me the time of day since you left, Scully," he said, then yawned. "You won't leave while I'm sleeping if I—I take a nap, will you?"

She started to take umbrage at that, then realized he had every right to think that way. "No, Mulder, I will be right here when you wake up," she promised firmly. "You have my word."

"Good enough." He gave her a half-smile and squeezed her hand, then his eyes closed slowly. "See you on the flipside."

He woke again briefly about four hours later, just long enough for a careful trip to the bathroom with the nurse—he refused to let Dana help him despite the fact that she was a doctor—then it was right back to sleep. But he was sleeping, not in a coma, so her worry had abated quite a bit. Still, she couldn't bring herself to leave his side just yet.

The next morning, he woke shortly after the rattle of breakfast trays began and, though still complaining about the headache, seemed to be more back to his old self. He grumbled about the hospital food and complained about being bored even though Dana brought him a stack of magazines from the waiting room. He was not happy with being made to stay in bed even though every time he got up, he was so dizzy that he could barely stand even with help.

The one good thing, Dana knew, was that it gave them plenty of time to talk and clear the air between them. He insisted she go take a shower and change after breakfast, but once she was back he didn't seem to want to let her out of his sight and she was happy to stay by his side. While out of the room she had made a few phone calls on her cell, discovering that things at the FBI were even worse for him than Mulder had alluded to. He no longer had the basement office, she found out, and the X-Files had been closed months before. Apparently, he was passed around to assist on cases, otherwise ignored or doing background checks. She really felt his pain on that one, remembering the time they had shared in the bullpen under Kersh.

They were sitting quietly and watching TV after lunch when, out of the blue, he turned down the volume and said, "I wish I'd had you watching my back."

"If I had, you certainly wouldn't have gotten shot." Dana replied without thinking. "How many times over the years did we save each other?"

He snorted laughter, then reached over and got his covered plastic cup of water from the nightstand, ice rattling from inside it. After a pull on the straw he said, "I think the only time that either one of us got hurt when we were watching out for each other was in the first year, the Luther Lee Boggs case. After that, it always happened when we were apart. Or to both of us if we were together, such as with the Brown Mountain fungus."

Dana nodded, thinking of the numerous things that had happened to each of them: her abductions by Duane Barry, Donny Pfaster, and Gerry Schnauz; getting shot by her supposed partner in NYC. Not to mention Mulder's mishaps over the years when she wasn't around such as the undercover case with the domestic terrorists; almost drowning in the Bermuda Triangle; and nearly dying in a buried rail car in the Arizona desert for starters. She was sure there were more she wasn't remembering at the moment.

For an instant, she felt sweetly nostalgic for the years they had worked the X-Files, then forced herself to see reality. Though she had loved the job, enjoyed the challenges and adrenaline rush that went with it, somehow she no longer missed it the way she had thought she would while she was a field agent.

"Where'd you go, Scully?" Mulder said softly and she turned to see him smiling slightly at her. "Area 51? Dreamland?"

She gave him a wry grin. "Remembering some of our, ah, more exciting cases," she admitted. "Sometimes I miss it, but then I remember how many times we came close to dying and that changes my mind."

He pinned her with an intense look. "You're being more open than I've ever known you to be, Scully," he said slowly, resting the cup on the white sheet folded back over his flat stomach and wrapping his hands around it. "So, you're happy where you are?"

"Content," she said after a moment of thought, making herself meet his eyes and not looking away or hiding anything although the emotion in his caused an answering jolt in her belly. "I don't want to go back to the FBI if that's what you're asking."

He huffed, glancing away to the TV, where a familiar orange-haired clown was dancing with a life-sized hamburger while confetti fell around them like multicolored rain. "I don't know that I want to either," he said as his eyes met hers again. "But I don't know what else to do with my life."

If she didn't ask, she'd never know.

Taking a deep breath, she said, "Come to San Francisco with me, Mulder. There are so many other things you can do, you can be. You are so much more than what you've become. Go back to school, maybe, or find a job in a different branch of law enforcement. My apartment's plenty big enough for us both. And it's right on the beach."

Though it was a huge chance, after talking to several people at the FBI she knew Mulder had nothing left there—and he seemed to understand that too. He had well and truly burnt all his bridges and would perhaps welcome a new start. She couldn't imagine the Mulder of a year ago leaving the FBI, but clearly things had changed so she decided to take the chance that maybe now he would consider it.

He narrowed his eyes at her, but she could see his hands shaking ever-so-slightly where they were curled around the cup. "After what happened right before you left, are you offering to have me come live with you?" he finally said in a neutral tone, absent of anger or challenge.

She leaned forward and removed the cup from his hands, putting it on the side table, and took both of them in hers, looking down at their intertwined fingers. "Mulder, for the past year I have tried to fool myself into believing that I felt nothing for you, that our week as lovers was just a dalliance that meant nothing to me other than sex. But that's bullshit." She paused, raising her eyes to his. "Seeing you here, knowing you almost died, brought the truth home to me. Unless you don't want me, don't want to try again, I want… us."

"Oh, God, Scully." He moved his hands out from beneath hers and grasped her upper arms, pulling her onto the bed with him and leaning forward at the same time. She noted his grimace of pain but then her eyes fell closed as their lips touched. It felt new yet so familiar; she had missed his smell and touch so much without letting herself realize it. Her arms crept up to rest on his broad shoulders, though she did have the presence of mind not to put too much pressure on him. The magical kiss went on and on, neither wanting to end it and gasping for air around each other's mouths.

"Well this is about the last thing I expected to see," a familiar voice boomed from nearby.

They broke apart, Mulder with another grimace of pain as he fell back against the pillows. Dana wasn't sure if she should be happy or sad to see their old boss and glanced at Mulder, deciding to take her cue from him. He didn't look upset, so when Skinner walked over and put his hand out to her first, she got up and shook it, then found herself pulled into a brief but powerful hug. "Agent—well, now I guess it's just Doctor, Scully," Skinner boomed before turning to the bed. "And Agent Mulder—I just found out what happened, that you were here. How are you feeling?"

"Been better," Mulder said briefly as Dana dragged another chair closer to the bed and waved her ex-boss into it. "How've you been, Walter?"

Hearing his first name startled Dana even though she knew that he was no longer Mulder's boss, and hadn't been for some months. She hadn't been able to find out exactly why he'd been forced to leave the FBI, but knew it had something to do with sticking up for Mulder after a botched assignment. Regardless, there didn't seem to be any animosity between them.

"Not too bad. Got feelers out for a possible job in LA," he said, running a hand absently over his now completely-bald head. "Dana, I thought you'd left for good."

She felt her face grow warm but ignored it. "So did I. But someone didn't change his next of kin so guess who got called when he was admitted."

Skinner nodded sagely, glancing over at Mulder briefly. "What've you been up to?" he asked, settling back in the plastic chair and crossing one ankle over the other knee. Still buff, Dana noticed, the bulging muscles in his chest and arms visible despite the dark blue polo shirt and North Face jacket. If not for Mulder, she knew that she'd have returned Skinner's obvious interest in her when she'd been at the FBI.

Dana talked about her new life openly, not hiding how much she loved working with children, and her new city. Though she didn't mention how much more she made, she suspected that the fact she had an apartment on the beach and drove a brand-new Audi instead of her old Toyota might have given them a clue.

"So, Walter, what are you doing now?" Dana asked, trying out his first name. She almost said "since you left the FBI" but didn't want to dredge up old wounds.

"I've been working with a private security firm, but I've got a job offer from the LAPD," he said. "They're creating a new division, Priority Homicide, and are looking for someone with federal law enforcement experience to head it. I'm flying out next week to see if I might be a fit for the job."

"Then we'll be in the same state," Mulder said, leaning over to take her hand. "I'm quitting the Bureau and moving to San Francisco with Scully."

Both of them stared at him. "That's one hell of a way to say yes," she finally said.

Skinner laughed, shaking his head. "In that case, aren't you two going to start calling each other by your first names?"

Mulder and Scully exchanged a look, then grinned over at him.

"Nah."

finis