Ways Dana Scully Didn't Die
There are many accounts to the death of Dana Scully. Different chapters, different ideas, each with the element of the unknown and unconfirmed. Clyde Bruckman told her she wouldn't die. "How do I die?" She had asked and he had answered wistfully, with a tiny smile, "You don't."
Someone said that Mulder died when he was 68, and the fact was hardly disputed. They said he died peacefully, of old age and physical weakness.
Everything about his death was never confirmed. Nobody knows where he was buried, or even if he was buried. No one knows where Scully was or went.
Sometimes people whisper, stories of the two that could have saved everyone, but saved everyone they could. They say their names in reverence, respect. They know nothing.
A parent of someone in an older settlement told a story; it's the default story, the one most people like to believe.
On a cool autumn day, Fox Mulder stared into space, and had a hunch. He was never wrong, in the end. His hair had become grey, and his face lined with wrinkles, but he still looked very much like the younger man he had been a long time ago.
He said he was going on a hike, and Dana Scully followed him with an apprehensive look on her face. No one could explain it at the time—invaders had not been spotted in almost 3 years then.
Supposedly, they ended in a valley, with a breeze stirring in the gold trees. They say the last thing Mulder must have seen was the blue sky with Scully in the foreground; her auburn hair faded but not grey.
They talked of clouds and precious things, and their voices echoed across the empty world. For hours, Scully and Mulder must have laughed, because they were remembering the good times they'd had. In a cinematic way, their lives had been so beautiful.
People say that he said something, something dignified and cool, loving and adoring and hopeful at the same time. In truth, no one knows. No one was there that admits to it, and no one saw Dana Scully again.
But they say that he said something, and softly closed his eyes to the murmur of mountain passes and distant beauty. Fox Mulder died, and Scully laid her head upon his chest and sobbed until she had rid herself of the weight she had carried since the day she met him.
All she was left with was a feeling of power and passion, of fulfillment. And a singular moment, when Clyde Bruckman responded to her half serious question with a serious answer, "You don't," and gave her a smile.
A/N: X-Files Not mine
This was originally meant to be combined with my other story, "Only One." In the end, that story will probably have a small overlap with this one.
This story sprang from the few random bits of dialogue they planted throughout the series. Clyde Bruckman is one; there is a least one more. This probably won't go more than 4 chapters or less. I wrote this a while back, and thought I'd post it. I hold no illusions that is anything but a quick bit of bedtime writing, which, come to think of it, is how all my stories are. You decide, good or bad.
Let me know what you think, please.
Thanks for reading!