Title: Another Life

Author: Angel LeeAnn

Rating: PG-13 (just to be safe)

Summary:  Strangers at first then, a case draws them together.

Disclaimer:  I don't own them.  Damn.

AUTHOR'S NOTES:  I am sorry if this has been done before.  I swear I am not stealing your idea.  It was purely accidental.

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Chapter One

March 31

Take-off strip at D.C. International Airport

2:35PM

Sighing, Dana Scully wiggled in her seat in the failed attempt to awaken her derrière that had gotten tingly for the third time.  Her shoulder rubbed against the passenger beside her and she flashed him a small smile as an apology.  It was the fifth time she had bumped him, but he had yet to complain or send her a venomous glare.  He had just kept typing away on his laptop.

This time, instead, to her surprise, he returned her smile with a charming grin.  "I understand your frustration."  He nodded pointedly down at his long, cramped legs, then back at her.  "Maybe it would help if you just stood up for a couple minutes and shook it out."  He beamed a boyish smile.  "Then again, it may be a ruse just to see you shake your cute little behind."

Under normal circumstances, she would have been outraged and offended.  Yet, there was something about the uniquely handsome man that caused her to smile despite herself.  "I wouldn't want to give Dirty Harry behind me an eyeful."

His grin widened.  "No, we wouldn't want that."  He glanced down at the laptop perched precariously on his knees then, snapped it shut.  He slipped off his silver wire-rimmed glasses and slipped them inside his trench coat pocket.

A few minutes of comfortable silence spread out between them before the man himself began to squirm.  He cursed under his breath, slanting so he was sitting sideways in the hopes of gaining a bit more legroom.  Dana watched him from the corner of her eye before inquiring, "Would you like my seat?"

His hazel eyes shot up and a look of awe fluttered across his face before he masked it with amusement.  "Now, ma'am, I cou'n't take the seat of a lady.  My mama taught me better than that."

She rolled her eyes at his slurred, fake Southern drawl.  "You'll have more room if you take my aisle seat.  Please, I insist.  We've been on this runway now for an hour.  Who knows how much longer it'll take."

He looked torn about taking the blissful offer, but he eventually relented.  "If you really don't mind."

"I wouldn't have asked if I minded."

They both stood simultaneously.  Dana moved out into the aisle and so did he.  She slipped in first, taking the window seat and he followed right behind her.  Once settled, he gazed somewhat bashfully at her, his eyes not quite meeting hers.  "Thanks," he muttered, reopening his laptop.

Dana's eyebrows knitted together at his sudden aura of shyness.  "You're welcome," she murmured in return, glancing down at his computer.  She caught the words "X-files", "woods", "marks", and "implant" before the lid was slammed shut.  She jumped, startled by the abrupt violent movement.  Her eyes snapped up to be confronted with intense hazel orbs.  "I'm sorry," she said hastily.  "I wasn't reading it."

He glanced around the compartment before returning his attention to her.  "It's not personal.  It's just confidential.  I can't have anyone reading my case notes during an on-going investigation."

"Investigation?  Are you law enforcement?"

"FBI," he grumbled.  Then instantly changing gears, he asked brightly: "How about you?  What agency snatched you up?"

"I'm a medical doctor.  Actually, I'm a pathologist."

"You ever get a live one sent down, doctor?"

"Not yet."  She smoothed her hand down her slacks, but was unsuccessful at getting any of the wrinkles out.

"Ladies and gentlemen," the pilot announced over the speaker.  "We apologize for the delay.  If you have missed a connecting flight, you will be accommodated at either a hotel or on another flight.  Now, if you would all fasten your seatbelts then we could – finally – be headed off."

Dana gripped the armrests of her seat, gritting her teeth as she plane taxied down the runway.  She was tempted to squeeze her eyes shut, but refused to give that far into cowardice.

The intriguing man beside her leaned closer and whispered: "You don't like flying?"

"No."

Without missing a beat, he stated casually: "Did you know that dolphins are the only other species to have sex just for the hell of it?"

She whipped her head around to gape at him in shock.  "What?"

"Yeah, amazing isn't it?  We humans aren't the only ones to do it for pleasure."  He shrugged his shoulders.  "Yet, that's nothing compared to the pig.  Their orgasms last up to thirty minutes.  We can't even fathom that."

"I…how…what?"  Dana stared at him incredulously.  "I can't believe you know this stuff.  How do you spend your weekends?  Watching the Discovery channel and reading encyclopedias?"

"I have a photographic memory.  I've got so many strange facts up here," he tapped the side of his head, "that I wonder at times if I'm ever going to overload."  He chuckled softly.  "Then again, at times I wonder if I've already overloaded and am spinning aimlessly out in orbit."

"Should I approach that one?"

"No."  He slipped his long fingers into his pocket and withdrew a handful of sunflower seeds.  He kindly offered her some, but she politely refused.  "Your loss."  He popped one into his mouth.  "Anyway, I'm not that educated about insects and animals.  I can, however, tell you that Ulysses S. Grant, who smoked cigars, died on the twenty-third of July eighteen eighty-five of throat cancer.  His last word was 'water'.  Now isn't that tragic?"

"Very."

He gave her a sideways grin.  "You want to hear something really ironic?  A forty-seven year-old lawyer co-signed a contract with a ninety year-old woman.  It was agreed that he would pay her five hundred dollars a month for life as long as he got her house when she died.  Ten years past…then twenty…then thirty…the woman celebrated her one hundred twenty-first birthday.  Yet, ten months later, the lawyer died at the age of seventy-seven.  He ended up paying more than one hundred eighty thousand dollars for a house worth no more than sixty thousand.  And he never even got to own the house."

"It is now safe to remove your seatbelts," the pilot announced.

Dana smiled sweetly at her companion.  He had purposefully distracted her.  "You're a very smart man, Mister er…"

"Mulder.  You can just call me Mulder."

"Do you have a first name, Agent Mulder?"

"Nope.  I guess my parents forgot to give me one."

"Well, then, I don't have a name at all."  Dana peered out the tiny window, amazed at her behavior.  Sure she flirted, but never so openly with strangers.

"Fox."

She swiveled around.  "You're going to tell me something about a fox now?"

"Yes I am.  I'm going to tell you something very important about 'a fox'.  He hates his name just about as much as he hates the infomercial selling the 'must buy' dust pan."

Her eyebrow quirked before her mouth formed an 'O'.  "Are you joking?"  Her eyes widened and she hastily added: "I don't mean that cruelly.  It's just that…it is…well…"

"Bizarre?  Yeah, I've yet to live it down."  A pained expression passed over his features before he wiped it off with an easy grin.  "Anyway, did you know that Eleanor Roosevelt was such a lousy cook that she served the King of England hot dogs for dinner?"

End Chapter One