SPOILER WARNING FOR SAVING HOPE SEASON FIVE FINALE!
Major spoilers for episodes 17 and 18 - don't read if you don't want to be spoiled!


Fox Mulder roamed the halls of the Omega nursing home feeling utterly bored. The in-between existence of his was such a major drawback. He didn't understand why, but in this existence he always wore a G-Man suit including a tie and his FBI badge. Whenever he tried to remove the tie and badge, they miraculously reappeared with a blink of an eye; literally. He was doomed to feeling constantly choked within his clothes for eternity it seemed and he wondered if Skinner was somehow behind this cruel joke of an almost-afterlife.

He hopped by the nurses' station to check the time. It seemed that limbo-attire did not include a watch, maybe because it would be overly depressing to check the time in this condition or maybe because there was no meaning for such a measurement when you were in this parallel plane. He didn't really know since there were no guide books to such an existence. He wished he could go back to his previous state so he could write about his experience but first thing, he had no idea if he'd retain any memories of this period of his life and second, it appeared to be more and more unlikely he'd ever recover from his coma.

At least it seemed so until the day before…

[The day before]

It was late in the evening and he was avoiding his room. It was the time when the nurses were changing his PJs and well… other stuff. They were connecting his feeding tube to his 'dinner', i.e., a bag filled with some form of creamy fluid that was serving as a filler for a pizza. As a final touch a PT would come by to make sure his muscles kept getting some form of stimulation. The worst part about it all was having to stare at his pale, worn out body. The many months of lying in bed doing almost nothing had taken their toll and he realized that if he did wake up some day, he'd need an extremely long rehabilitation.

It was too depressing, so he stayed away. His favorite romping place was the dining hall where residents who were able, sat for dinner. At least he'd get to listen to conversations, even if he wasn't able to participate.

"You know, it's really not polite to eavesdrop on people," a male voice spoke.

The speaker was extremely close to him, but being as nobody had spoken directly to him for the passing two years, Mulder just continued with his regular surveillance.

"I guess manners don't apply to government agents," the voice continued.

Mulder's brows furrowed. This was odd. Was this actually meant for him? When he came to think of it, the voice had a familiar lilt to it.

"You're not imagining things, Agent Mulder, I am, in fact, talking to you."

Mulder turned around abruptly and found himself face to face with a pair of light blue eyes that belonged to a blond-haired man wearing a tux with an undone bow-tie.

He swallowed hard before he blurted, "Ch… Charlie Harris?!"

"The one and only," Charlie smiled.

"B… But… you're supposed to be in…"

"…Canada?" Charlie picked up the conversation. "Well, to tell you the truth, I'm supposed to be nowhere, at least my spirit's not supposed to be around the living anymore."

"Spirit?!" Mulder was feeling overwhelmed. He'd not had so much excitement in a long time and he was too shocked to comprehend. "What do you mean - spirit?"

"You know; apparition, ghost, phantom, specter, spook—"

"OK, OK, I get it," Mulder shot at him, "So, you're just like me, then?"

"Not really," Charlie replied, sounding bemused.

"Not really? What's that supposed to mean?!" Mulder felt as if he were about to flip.

"I'm a little worse off than you," Charlie explained.

"Worse than me? How can anybody be worse than me?!" Mulder yelled at the top of his voice, his arms rising with exasperation, then they fell back to his sides as realization dawned on him. "No… you can't be…"

Charlie smacked his lips. "Yup, I can and I am."

Mulder shook his head in disbelief. "I'm sorry, man…. That sucks big time."

"Not really."

Mulder looked up at the blond man. "Huh?"

"When it's your time to go, you'll know. It's hard to explain when you're not there yet and I'm actually here to make sure you won't get there any time soon."

"What's that supposed to mean? Am I going to die?" Mulder shot Charlie a worried look and if he had had a beating heart he was certain it would have been beating like mad at that very moment.

"Dunno." Charlie responded matter-of-factly.

"You know, for a doctor you sure need to work on that bed-side-manner of yours," Mulder told him. "Right now I am not very sure I'd cast a vote of confidence in you."

Once again Charlie Harris offered Mulder a glimpse of his pearly whites. "Why don't we find ourselves a quiet place to sit and I'll explain everything?"

Mulder shot Charlie a sideways glare. "Are you going to deliver some bad news or something? I mean, you doctors, you always take people to quiet rooms for that after all."

"Geez, Mulder. For a spirit you are just too uptight. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, i.e., when I say I want a quiet location, I want it cause it's quiet and nothing more. Why don't you just indulge me. I have a feeling you'd feel a lot better after I'd explained everything."

Mulder pouted, but then he grudgingly relented. "I know a good place, just follow me."

"You know," Charlie said as he walked beside Mulder, "You can just think of the location and you'd get there in a blink of an eye."

"I know that," Mulder shot back, "But how will you know where to go?"

"Oh, I've got my own little tricks," Charlie grinned mischievously.

Mulder felt irritated but he blinked and next he was standing in an empty bedroom that had recently been vacated. A millisecond passed and suddenly Charlie Harris appeared beside him.

The room's furniture was minimal – a cupboard, a bed and a comfortable sofa chair. Mulder quickly moved towards the chair and plopped right into it. He had no idea how he was able to sit and stand on things while he wasn't able to pick things up or move them. There was some form of strange physics to this weird plane and despite having lived as a ghost for two years now, he was still intrigued by the whole concept.

Mulder looked up at Charlie. "I hope you don't mind, but I have developed a serious allergy to hospital beds as of late…"

Charlie nodded his understanding. "Not at all. I quite get where you're coming from." With that, he hopped and sat on the bed.

"So, what did you want to talk to me about?" Mulder prodded once they were both settled.

Charlie let out an awkward chuckle. "Let's see now… how do I begin… OK… So let's start from my situation first, I guess. I am dead; died in a car accident on my way to mine and Alex's honeymoon."

Mulder winced. "Talk about a crappy death… that really takes the cake…"

But Charlie seemed very much at peace with what he'd just told Mulder as if it didn't really matter much anymore. He wasn't angry or upset. He was his usual cynical self, almost as if he wasn't talking about his own life… or death. "Yeah, me and Alex, we just don't do weddings very well, I guess. Alex believed at the time that she was cursed and it was all her fault, but now we both know better—"

"What do you mean 'we'? Can Alex see you in this state? Does she also have your ability?" Mulder was baffled.

"Here's how I see it," Charlie tried to answer Mulder's confusion. "A few years ago Alex was stabbed by a patient and nearly died. During her time between life and death I saw her as a ghost and at some point after she'd recovered, I sort of told her about my 'condition'… and at first she didn't believe but slowly she began remembering moments from the time she was in between and she came to realize I was telling the truth. I don't know how this happened. My experience taught me that hardly anybody remembered that experience but a few do. One particular such person wanted to kill me for not keeping a promise that I made to him as a ghost."

Mulder listened intently as Charlie unfolded his unbelievable tale. "You definitely seem to have come close to death a little too often. If I recall, you were about to have surgery on your brain to remove a tumor when we had last seen you."

"And I almost died during that operation as well… but that's beside the point," Charlie continued. "Or maybe it isn't… cause after I survived the operation and then afterwards was held at gun point and shot and almost lost my arm in the process…"

"Geez!" Mulder exclaimed.

"Well, after all of that Alex decided she was bad for me and we separated… and for a while we weren't together and my ghosts became more twisty and creepy and I thought I was going mad. When things got too much I quit my job, but Alex was extremely concerned for me. She believed me about the ghosts but she'd never really seen it the way I had. At some point a friend overheard her preparing for a speech she was about to give in front of a panel in order to prevent the board from firing me. That was just before I quit. As she was preparing for that speech she mentioned my ability to see ghosts and later on she confided in that friend that she wished she could understand me better. The friend who was in to all sorts of spiritual shit sent her on some sort of guided affected imagery trip so she would be able to see what I saw and I don't know how, but Alex actually did."

Mulder was fascinated. "I've read of such things during my work on the X-Files. The fact that you were basically able to communicate with the dead is given proof that a spirit world exists—"

"That fact is given proof? What exactly would you call your current state of existence then?" Charlie laughed.

"Touche'," Mulder smirked.

Charlie continued with his endless saga. "I have my theories and they mostly revolve around the fact that Alex Reid had been around death before, first her dad, then her brother and she was far more open-minded than a lot of people that I knew. She tried so many experimental methods on me when I was in a coma and she constantly felt my presence during that time. I don't know if it was our bond or if there was more to it, but the fact remains that she had slowly found a way into my shadow world."

"Well, all of this is very nice, but I don't see how this relates to me and to you being here." Mulder was beginning to feel impatient.

"I'm almost there. Bear with me," Charlie demanded.

Mulder's shoulders slackened, but he gestured for Charlie to continue.

"So I died in that car crash, but at the very last moment, just before I left Alex saw me. She saw my spirit. She was able to make the leap herself from her plane to mine. And I knew everything would be alright and I moved on and I'd been lazing on an amazing sandy beach ever since until William came."