Early the next morning, Scully awakens; with an internal warmth that has nothing to do with the tropical climate, she looks up at her sleeping boss. "Holding me…" the half-formed thought drifts lazily through her mind, causing a sharp pang. She lays her head back against him and closes her eyes again with a soft sigh. It had been so long since anyone had held her while she slept, it touches her lonely heart. Knowing full well that the illusion would vanish as soon as Skinner wakes up—from then on out it would be about survival and rescue, as it should be—she lets herself enjoy this for now. Mentally hitting the 'snooze' button, she drifts back to sleep for a while longer, as Skinner begins awakening. Cautiously, he runs his fingers through her hair, laying his arm across her back. Until now, he had been content to look at her from a safe distance. Despite their repeated denials, he remains certain that she and Agent Mulder are romantically involved. Whatever they wanted to call it doesn't matter; he didn't want to get in the middle of that. He also knows all too well that if he did somehow pursue a relationship with Scully, there are those that would use it against them. Use her as ransom or bait, or vice versa, he imagines with a shudder. He couldn't endanger her by making his feelings known. It was dangerous enough for him, the wrong people might already suspect that despite his hard-assed exterior he genuinely cared about both her and Mulder, and was on their side. Skinner watches the woman in his arms, glad of the opportunity to be this close to her. He looks down at her with a bittersweet smile, idly wishing that this was real.

A few minutes pass, and Skinner figures they should be getting up to start the day. He looks at the woman sleeping next to him, this time with a different motive. Carefully, so as not to disturb her, he slips out of their nest. He finds her purse nearby and sifts through it until he finds her cell phone. Placing it close to her hand, he sneaks off behind a tree about a foot away and imitates the ringer.

"Drrrrrrring!" he trills.

Scully snaps up, flips the phone open and mumbles groggily, "H-hello?"

"Why the hell aren't you here, yet, Agent? The meeting started an hour ago!"

"S-sorry, sir, I'm on my way, I'm…" she trails off, as she wakes up more fully, looking around, then down at the useless phone in her hand. She shoots Skinner a look that she normally reserves for Mulder, as he cracks up. The sound of him laughing is enough to get a smile out of her. She snaps the phone shut, stands, and brushes herself off. "Cute, sir, very funny."

"Sorry, Scully, I couldn't resist."

Without warning, she suddenly starts peeling off layers. They'd slept late in the day and it's already 90 degrees in the shade. Skinner watches, unsure how to react to her impromptu strip-tease, while she seems as though it's perfectly natural. Following her lead, as though she'd given him permission, he starts casting off any extra clothing.

"And to anyone else, this would be a strange start to the day," Scully quips ironically, acknowledging the awkwardness of the situation. "Where's my purse? My eyes are killing me." Skinner hands it to her as she stumbles groggily to the lagoon for a morning dip. When she comes back, although she seems brighter and more alert, he's curious to see her feeling her way back, as though she can't see.

"You all right, Scully?"

"I had to pitch my contacts, I packed my glasses in my purse," she explains as she digs through her bag. "Here they are," she sighs in relief, slipping them on.

Skinner studies her, trying to be subtly casual, "I've never seen you wear glasses before."

"They're old. I hardly ever wear them, usually just for nighttime."

"They suit you."

Scully pauses, his open compliment taking her by surprise. "Thanks, I try. Gotta look pretty for the boss, you know." God, I sound like Mulder, she inwardly groans, I've been hanging around him too long. She sees Skinner look at her as though he's thinking the same thing. "All right, all right, he's rubbed off on me. You don't have to stare like it's something that strange!"

Skinner shakes his head, "It's not that, I'm just thinking…we could use our glasses to start a fire. It's a bright day; we have plenty of dry wood and grass. If we go back out to the beach and get more direct light, it should work."

"I thought you said we should stay in the shade. I mean, neither of us is exactly accustomed to being out in the light of day."

"We are a pasty bunch," he agrees. "I don't think our Russian or Irish ancestors expected us to end up in the subtropics. What are you doing now?"

Scully is kneeling down on the ground, fiddling with a few banana leaves from their nest from the previous night, twisting them together. "I am making a hat. It's not meant to be a fashion statement, just a preventative measure against sunstroke." Ripping off some fabric from her skirt, she ties it onto her head. Skinner picks a red hibiscus flower and tucks it into the band with a grin. "Well, I'd like to see you do any better," she huffs defensively.

"No, you look…you look beautiful." It sounds as though the words came out of his mouth of their own accord. He looks as surprised as she does. "I…I, uh…" he stammers ineloquently. "It's fine, Agent Scully," he gruffly mutters, pushing his way through the trail they blazed yesterday.

As they make their way out to the beach, Skinner squints into the sun. Scully smirks at him in an "I told you so" way. They each drop their load of dead wood and grass and separated them into piles according to weight. Arranging a ring of stones around the grass and leaves, Skinner removes his glasses and starts trying to catch the sunlight. In a few minutes, they both see a wisp of smoke and a few glowing embers. Scully blows gently and adds some more grass as flames start to grow. Both of them laugh with excitement, piling on more wood.

"We made fire!" Skinner exclaims, "Scully, look, we have fire! We can survive!"

"And hopefully get out of here," she adds, looking back in at the island, the center of which is the mountain of a seemingly dead volcano. Higher ground is evident below its peak, showing where they'd camped the night before, giving the island a tiered look. She points at this structure, suggesting, "Now we should get a fire going higher up, like we talked about last night. Possibly use green wood and fresh leaves rather than this dead dry stuff. People would be more likely to see smoke from a distance."

"Good idea. Which episode did you see that one on, 'Mary Ann'?"

"Laugh it up, 'Skipper', you know I'm right." She picks up a burning stick of wood and heads back inland. Skinner does likewise and follows her closely.

Since they're using the same trail, it doesn't take them nearly as long to reach their campsite as it did yesterday. Skinner clears some ground for the fire while they figure out how to climb the rock face. The precipice is several yards in diameter, and live greenery is evident a few levels up, probably helped by the excellent water supply and ample sunlight. "Now, what it comes down to is, are you better at this than climbing trees?" Skinner asks, shouting over the sound of the waterfall.

Scowling from his light jab, Scully doesn't answer. Instead, she walks around the area, and without further comment, pulls herself up onto a ledge. Unencumbered by her heavy work clothes, she moves with surprising agility, now up onto the next level, leaving her superior dumbfounded at the ease with which she's gotten up. She reaches down to him and he pulls himself up with her help.

"Time to get out from behind that desk job."

"Yeah," he pants, "I think you're right. You field agents have all the fun."

Struggling up the next level and helping him along, she smiles, "Oh, what Mulder and I wouldn't give to have you down in the basement with us sometime."

"I don't know if I'm up for that. Chasing after psychopaths and UFOs, that kind of thing is for the young." She suppresses a laugh at his remark, bringing a smile to his face. Together, they make short work of tackling the edifice, and are now on a plain thick with green foliage. "This looks like what we're looking for, this should smolder for a while."

"Yeah, now one of us just has to go down and get the fire to light this up," Scully remarks, looking over the edge. Meanwhile, Skinner is gathering up bunches of leaves into a big pile.

"Why don't you go down? I don't think I could climb back up one-handed."

"Sounds good. I'll be right back."

It takes her a bit longer getting back with the fire, but she makes it. She throws the branch down into the heap of leaves, soon gray clouds of smoke start rising up from it, reaching up into the sky.

"How's that for team-building exercise?" Scully quips, sharing a high five with her boss. Satisfied with their work, and tired out from the workout, they sit down and watch their smoke signal for a several minutes. Both of them are breathing heavily from the effort of getting up there, and they soon slowly acquire very relaxed smiles.

"You know, this stuff smells familiar…" Skinner muses, as Scully bursts into giggles. "What's so funny?"

"I…don't…know…" she gasps, falling on the ground in hysterics. "Say, Skin-man…sir…you know wh—what I think?" Pointing at the smoldering heap and mouthing wordlessly for a moment amid demented laughter, she manages to say, "I think that's…we're burning a whole smoking pile of…Say, have you ever really listened to Pink Floyd?" She blinks up at him slowly with an idiotic grin on her face. "Mulder's, like, got all their records and thinks they're so the best. I didn't at first but I can, like, totally see what he means."

By now, Skinner is trying hard not to be as high as his companion. "Man, now she's a stoned Valley girl. That's just wrong…" He pulls her to her feet and she slouches into his body. "First time?" He feels her nod. "Okay, okay, Scully? Listen up."

"Yes, Mister Skin-man, dude sir?"

"Look, we…" he trails off, getting the giggles himself, "we gotta get down from here."

Scully groans, "Oh, God, am I stoned??"

"You're baked," he confirms and they both laugh.

"I like you, I'm glad we're friends," she sighs. "I mean you're…you're not one of them, are you? You wouldn't give us to them, would you?"

"No way," he answers, sitting back down with her by their fire.

Scully stares up at the sky and starts singing…badly, "How I wish…how I wish you were here. We're just two lost souls swimmin' in a fish bowl…year after year….I wish Mulder was here." She blinks, shaking her drug-addled head, looking around her. "Say, Skin-man. We…we need to get out of this. It's like the freakin' poppy field in Wizard of Oz for crying out loud." They both laugh at this and stand back up. "Just follow me, I can do this. Whoa…I don't know why people do this on purpose, my brain feels all fuzzy."

"Careful, Scully, the rocks look kinda swimmy."

"Yeah, yeah, just…slow and steady, right? Here we go."

As they get lower and lower, the air gradually clears, shaking off the worst of their stupor.

"Man, whoever flies into that's gonna be wasted," Skinner says. "Birds, too." And they laugh uproariously at that thought.

As their heads clear they make a silent agreement never to mention this again. Scully scopes out the area for more fruit trees and soon returns with two large breadfruits. Dumping them into the fire they left going at the bottom of the rock wall, they both go to the lagoon to wash up.

"I wonder how long it'll be before someone finds us?" Scully asks.

"I wonder if they're even looking for us. That was a pretty bad storm we flew into. They might have written us off as dead."

"Not Mulder. He'll try to find us," Scully believes firmly.