Title: Wait Without Hope
Author: Zubeneschamali
Rating: G
Spoilers: Empedocles, general Season 8
Summary: Missing introspective scene towards the end of "Empedocles," tying up a few loose ends on Doggett's part.

Disclaimer: Everybody here is the property of Chris Carter, 1013, and FOX. Hmph.

Feedback: Please! jlcidell@yahoo.com

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
--T.S. Eliot, East Coker

What the hell am I doing here?

I must have asked myself that question a dozen times already, standing here staring at her. It's not like there aren't other places I should be, like home in bed. Whatever else this . . . case might have done to me, it sure wore me out. And it's not like she'd be alone if I wasn't here. Mulder's gotta be lurking around here somewhere, and if he wasn't, Skinner probably would be. But instead I'm sneaking into her room, again, staring at her like she's gonna tell me all the answers to life, the universe, and everything. Like she's gonna tell me what the hell I'm supposed do about her now.

It's like having a loose tooth that you can't help wiggling with your tongue. Like that scab you can't help but pick at, knowing that it's just gonna start bleeding and you're better off waiting till it dries up and falls off by itself.

I shouldn't want her. I slowly shake my head. I can't want her--but I do.

I'm looking at her lying there pregnant, thinking of what it was like waiting for Luke to be born, watching him grow up. And not get to grow up. I'm thinking about that case a few months ago with the pregnant woman and the "alien" baby. What would it do to her if she never got to have this baby, even now that Mulder's back? I've read the X-Files, I know she's already lost a child, too. That's the one reason I could never talk to her about Luke. That and the fact that we've never exactly been buddies. Losing a child can be a bond between people, or it can be a deep, dark hole that you never want to look into. Somehow I got the feeling pretty early on that Agent Scully's not too good at sharing her feelings, and this was probably not a good place to start.

But she is so damn strong. I'm remembering the last time I stood over her hospital bed, after taking that godawful slug thing out of her neck. She never hesitated, just told me what to do and made me do it through her screams of pain. I think that's the only time she's fully trusted me throughout this whole damn partnership. I didn't realize till later why it really was that I was so mad at her for ditching me. It wasn't just a case of not being able to trust her partner; it was the fact that I almost lost her. Lost her. Hnh. Like she was ever mine to lose, then or now.

So . . . damn . . . strong. My hand almost reaches out towards her sleeping body, as if there were some kind of aura that I could sense. Well, why not? If we can be corrupted with the power of evil, can't we also, maybe, somehow embody the power of good? Is that what I've sensed in this woman, what the *three* of us have sensed in her? Is that why I'm so drawn to her? Is it any wonder, then, that the one who seems to need the power of good the most is the one who has her?

I turn away and softly snort to myself. Yeah, John, like she's some kind of angel or something, sent to save the sinning FBI agents of the world, or at least of the J. Edgar Hoover basement. You know she's not perfect. You know she's seen as much darkness as you, maybe even more. Maybe even been part of it. You've read *all* the files, and you can fill in the blanks when you have to.

But she's come through it. Through what would have destroyed a lesser person. It nearly destroyed me once, after all, and after hearing Mulder's little sharing session out in the hallway, I wouldn't be surprised if it's come close to destroying him as well. Evil, that is.

What the hell it has to do with suddenly seeing a body made of ashes, I don't know. Or what it has to do with me standing here at ten till midnight, with a long drive back to Falls Church, expecting Mulder to come in here any minute and kick my ass, I don't know. What it has to do with Reyes sleeping a few floors below or Scully sleeping here, instead of at home, now, that makes a little more sense.

What it has to do with me trying to keep Mulder's grave from being opened . . . well, that's an interesting question. I shift from one foot to the other, my eyes still glued to her face. No matter how many times I tell myself that I was doing it for her sake, that I didn't want to put her through any more pain, there's this little voice in the back of my head that won't shut up. This little voice that says I wanted her all to myself, that if Mulder had just stayed in the ground, I'd have her. Not today, not this year . . . but someday. I'd like to think I'm not capable of such thoughts. I'd like to think I'm not capable of a lot of things that I am. Maybe that's why Mulder's theory of evil appeals to me. It makes it possible for me to hold a conversation with a man that I tried to keep dead without falling to my knees with guilt, if it's just something that got into me.

Like a lot of things that have gotten into me these past six months.

"It gets hard, you know, Agent Scully?" I say so softly I can barely hear it. "It gets hard to deny things sometimes." I've always been big on speaking my mind, but I also know when to keep my mouth shut, something I've been doing a lot of lately. "I don't know when it happened . . . Dana. I suppose if I thought about it I could come up with a time, a place. But it doesn't matter. Not in this lifetime." A memory flashes into my head, reading about an X-File with some kind of reincarnation crap, Mulder being regressed to find The Truth. Looks kinda like they're the soulmates after all. "You are so far gone . . . " I shake my head. "I can't even _begin_ to hope to love you." And yet I do.

I watch her sleep and realize that this might well be my last chance to do so. She sure isn't going into the field with me anytime soon, and I get the feeling she might not be returning once she goes on leave. Something so simple, watching her sleep, that in another universe might have taken place every day . . . instead, I'm only gonna have a handful of memories, a few times of my arms around her. "You're a lucky man, Fox Mulder," I say aloud.

I wish I dared kiss her cheek, touch her goodbye. I can't risk it, though. Like I haven't been able to risk anything these last six months. Not even a touch, not even a first name. So I close my eyes before I can wiggle that tooth again, open them for one final glimpse of her, and steal out the door. It's a long drive back to Falls Church.

A figure leans forward out of the darkness. Rising from the cot in the corner, hidden in the shadows, he comes forward to stand on her other side, bending down to kiss her cheek, touch her arm. "Yes, I am," he whispers. He sits in the chair beside the bed, taking her hand in his, and watches her as she sleeps. "Yes . . . I am."