Ten
Scully glanced instinctively at her wrist for the millionth time since arriving at Antarctica. She no longer had a watch. Nobody kept time. There was not much point. It was either dark all day outside or light all day outside, and they stayed inside for much of the time. Time inside was up to their own individual body clocks and a lot of people chose to sleep while others worked or played. There were no rules.
Still, she missed the security of having a watch on her wrist. Even when she had been underground after the invasion she had been in the possession of clocks and calendars. She had been alone underground for five weeks but she never lost track of more than one or two days. Those days were long behind her.
The only real measurement Scully had of how long they had been there was based upon the length of her hair. When she had been knocked out at the processing centre her thick, orange hair had touched her shoulders. It had since grown to halfway down her upper arm.
To Scully that equated to approximately six months of time, but it was not reliable. She no longer trusted her body, which was confused by the climate and the inability to tell day from night. Her menstrual cycle was a lost cause, though she was comforted by the fact the only two other women in the complex had confessed they had the same problem.
She tapped her fingernails against the workbench she was leaning over and decided not to continue with her research. She felt tired. Her day was nearly over and she wanted to find Mulder and discover what he had been doing all day. They kept the same time, thankfully. For a man who had rarely slept during their working partnership he had certainly improved over the years since. Sleep had sometimes been a struggle in Virginia but his sleeplessness then had more to do with boredom than his sister or his nightmares. She had woken up so many nights to find him reading beside her, or downstairs in his office looking over apparent X Files.
In Antarctica, however, when they thought it was night they slept. They had made a promise not to lose touch in the expansive complex so made an effort to find one another before going to bed, so that they still slept and woke together. Scully thought that was important for their sanity and to help with the adjustment of living in such a strange place, and luckily Mulder had agreed. She was tired, so as part of their routine she should find him.
Luckily she knew what his schedule for the day had been like. They had chatted over a breakfast of fresh fruit and bread. Scully's plans had involved her research; she had no appointments scheduled with the other residents. Mulder had been 'open to session' all day, which generally meant he had been bludging in his office. Scully had been at the complex long enough to know how those days ended, and they ended there often.
Still, she was never quite sure what she would find.
She packed up her things and made sure the many doors that led to storage rooms around her office and the research lab in which she had spent her day were locked tightly. She checked the examination rooms on the lower floor to make sure it was clean for the next day. She walked around the operating theatres looking for anomalies that could indicate a breach of her secure premises. The exam rooms and theatres on the lower floor were easier to get into but she kept nothing confidential there. Her patients could get in and see her though; that was the main priority. Upon inspection she found there was nothing to cause her displeasure and the whole space was neat and very clean.
Scully smiled as she returned upstairs to her office and hung her white coat up in the rack by the door before leaving. As she walked out of the doors that sealed her 'wing' of Tower One of the complex off from everyone else, she placed her hand on the blank side of the door. It slid shut so completely it was hard to distinguish the door from the wall, but for the tiny green-red light that was there purely for her benefit. The scanner read her palm and she no longer flinched at the tiny pinprick against the tip of her fifth finger.
She worked at the largest and most secure part of the complex in the primary tower. It took a lot to get in and out, and Scully was patient as her eyes were then scanned.
"Sealing up now," she stated, aware her voice was being analysed in addition to her iris, her palm print and her blood. Satisfied, Scully heard locks click on the doors as though a jail had gone into lock down, and her hand tingled in a sign that she was free to go.
Scully's flat shoes squeaked softly on the shiny, cream floors. She took the stairs. Escalators and elevators were available in the centre of the cylindrical towers, but she liked the stairs. They kept her fit and she liked to keep some energy in a day that was mostly spent sitting.
There were no directions on any of the walls and Scully knew her way by practice and instinct. She and Mulder had been blessed with very helpful guides upon their arrival. It had taken Scully a long time to be able to get from her room in Tower Two to her offices, and then from her offices to anywhere else without any help. Mulder had caught on only slightly quicker; there was not much a photographic memory could do when every door looked the same.
Mulder had offices on the level below the level her patients could access at Tower One. All the medical offices were in the one section, and when Scully and Mulder had arrived the entire top three floors of the first tower had been abandoned. Not even the nurse in residence had bothered to open it up. Scully hadn't minded. She had gotten everything fresh. And boy, what she had gotten, she thought with an overwhelmed sigh.
Scully unlocked and entered Mulder's office without having to pass any special clearance points. She knew her fingerprints were scanned against the door handle and the complex knew that she and Mulder shared each other's space. He had even been granted emergency access to areas like her office, and if she accompanied him and scanned herself in he could go anywhere on her floor. He was the only person she would ever consider sharing her space with. There were secrets in those rooms that he was meant to know.
Mulder's office looked like a typical psychologist's office with a desk, plants and comfortable chairs arranged on a soft carpet. A row of books lined a shelf behind a generous, black chair which Mulder sat in daily. His large, wooden desk was not the mess she had come to expect from working on the X Files with him. He did not take notes because he remembered what people told him. At most, he would scribble a few sentences down in his diary against the appointments.
Scully approached the black book on the desk and flipped it open. There were no actual dates or times. Blank pages had been broken up into sections by horizontal pencil lines and Scully automatically looked to the most recent. Sometimes Mulder left her notes if he was going to be with the guys at the end of the day, and even though she thought she knew where she was it was best to check first. If she was wrong, she could spend hours looking for him.
Or what seemed like hours, she corrected. It was hard to stop thinking in terms of time. Mostly Scully let herself think about hours and days and months. It just made living easier, and she knew Mulder did it too, otherwise he would not bother dividing the pages of his diary. It was helpful to them, but Scully had to wonder whether it would become less important as time continued to pass.
After all, she would have to cut her hair eventually, and then what would she do? Mulder had drawn a doodle on the bottom corner of the most recent division, and Scully smiled at the picture of a stick figure holding a baseball bat. She suddenly knew exactly where he was.
Her shoes again squeaked as she left his office, making sure the door locked behind her. The hallway was circular just like all the rooms, and elevators and escalators in the centre remained still; only operating when people requested their use. They were fast and silent, but Scully still preferred the stairs. She did not like the weightless feeling of zooming up and down at such fast speeds.
She knew the door she was searching for but Mulder always made it obvious. Stuck to the wall just outside it was a piece of paper with a note scribbled in his familiar handwriting, the words formed by black ink and all in capitals.
'AFTERNOON OPEN SESSION: BALLROOM DANCING'
The 'open sessions' had been Scully's idea. She had thought it would be a good idea if he had group meetings, where people could socialise with one another. They all saw each other so rarely, and all were busy on various projects, but mostly everyone 'existed' in the complex. It was not living. Scully was happy to be doing her part and she did feel as though she was living, but if she had been there alone it would have been harder.
Mulder kept her grounded, and that thought sounded strange to her because she had always believed she kept him grounded, and she supposed she still did. But she panicked too, she woke up in cold sweats more often than him, and when she gave into those weaknesses that plagued her thoughts on darker days he made her feel alive. He kept it real.
The door was unlocked and Scully entered. She had never expected there to be actual ballroom dancing and was used to Mulder's cheeky code. Though she was surprised to see, not a baseball field stretched out before her, but a basketball court. She grinned.
The room had become Mulder's escape. Scully had not been able to figure out how he had done it. The first time they had taken the tour around their offices it had been introduced as Mulder's 'open' space. Inside it had been plain and unfurnished and very, very cream. Nothing in the complex was white, which was something Scully had expected. To her white spoke of sterility and detachment, but the floors and walls were cream and in many places decorated with art. Their private quarters were carpeted just as their consultation offices, and though they survived underneath the surface of the icesheet in a structure built by aliens, nothing was white and everything was homey and comfortable.
As though they had been looking through Architectural Digest for ideas, she thought.
But none of that explained why, upon standing in the empty, open room for the first time it had transformed into their bedroom in Virginia. One second she had been standing beside Mulder and staring at all the cream, and then she had been in her bedroom. The bed had been turned down, ready for them, the lamp was on. Mulder had grinned, walked over and jumped onto the bed as though it had been 'real'. Scully had gasped, expecting him to fall straight through whatever type of joint hallucination they were both experiencing. But he hadn't fallen, the bed had creaked a little under his weight and he had bounced on the mattress, resting back on the pillow and inhaling deeply.
'I like this room,' he had declared, patting the bed. 'Come on Scully, live a little.'
Scully had been beyond stunned. Mulder had been 'going with the flow', as he put it, but later on when they were discussing it he confessed his ignorance as to how or why the room had become what he wanted, rather than what anybody else wanted. He had not been aware of consciously wishing to see the room, but he had told her the image had been in his mind. She knew whenever one of them had been having difficulties sleeping side by side in the sand for all those months the other had often whispered a little domestic fantasy about how comfortable their bed was; the picture had helped them pretend that was where they were, and sleep had sometimes come easier.
"DOCTOR SCULLY!"
Scully realised she had been leaning against the open doorway with a gentle smile on her face and she allowed her smile to widen to a grin when Eddie called to her. She stepped into the room and the door slid shut behind her, and she crossed her arms, looking around. She had seen the room become a lot of things, but Mulder liked to unwind with a game of baseball or basketball at the end of a boring day. She had expected the baseball because of his drawing, but she could plainly see that he had chosen the alternative. Sometimes on basketball days she would step into an arena as big as Madison Square Garden, but she was currently standing in what appeared to be any high school or gym basketball court.
"Eddie, you back for therapy again?" she called out in jest. She kicked off her shoes before she stepped onto the court. She knew from experience they made a horrible creaking noise that gave her the shivers. Eddie was already walking towards her, his hand outstretched for a high five. She had not seen her nurse all day. He was nothing like she had pictured. She was only one of four Americans on the base, and they were the only ones in the room with her.
Eddie was a tall, muscular African American from Boston with wise, dark brown eyes that were flecked with an amazing amber colour Scully always found hypnotic. His smile was wide and friendly and though she stood barely taller than his hip he never made her feel like she was looking up at him. He was also an extremely competent and compassionate nurse, and he liked her and respected her as a doctor. So overall, she was happy.
He held his palm low for her to hit and he grinned, doing a bit of a jig and pulling her further onto the court.
"Mulder told us you'd make it, but we were startin' to think you lost track of time, girl."
"I did not!" she scoffed playfully, grinning over at Mulder who was leaning against the back wall with a wide grin on his face. Scully felt herself grinning back. It felt like forever since she had seen him, even though it had just been that morning. The absence of real time always made the time seen infinite.
"So are you gonna join us?" Eddie asked hopefully.
"I don't think I need any therapy right now," she taunted, cocking her head to the side and pretending to think.
"Got some therapy of your own last night, did ya?" he teased. She laughed, shaking her head even though his statement was partly true. "Ah!" Eddie exclaimed, reaching out with his large hands and brushing a thumb over her jaw. "Made the little doctor blush." Scully smiled but took a careful step back. She liked Eddie, but he did tend to get into her space sometimes. The good thing was he knew about his problem and he responded to her silent messages without taking offence or retaliating in any way. He just grinned at her and removed his hand, gesturing to where Mulder had been joined by the only other American at the complex.
Michael also stood nearly a head above Mulder, but he was leaner than Eddie. Eddie wore his afro proudly, in a mop of black frizzy hair, but Michael shaved his head. At least Scully assumed he shaved it. He surely was too young to be bald. They were both younger than Mulder and Scully. Eddie said he was about thirty-four and Michael claimed to be twenty-five. Scully knew she and Mulder had to seem ancient to them; both in the vicinity of their early forties. Not that Mulder acted like his last birthday had been his forty-third.
"Evenin' Dana," Michael greeted in his delightfully southern accent when she looked his way and smiled. She liked that they were on similar clocks, though Eddie and Michael went to bed later and slept later. They were always free for a game with Mulder and Eddie was always on time for her work schedule. Michael worked as a cleaner so could keep whatever hours he wanted. Neither of them had wives or partners at the complex, so they never had anybody coming by to drag them to bed. Not like Mulder, she realised. She often walked in on their down time.
Anybody was free to come, they were called 'open' sessions for a reason, but most of the time it was Mulder and his buddies. Scully did not mind. She hadn't made friends outside their little group. To the residents, she was 'the doctor', the woman who worked in the restricted area, the woman who must have inside information about the complex, and the redhead with those icy eyes they had brought in with her partner at the last minute just to 'keep an eye on them', on their health, on their progress, or whatever.
Scully had heard all the rumours and had chosen to ignore them. After all, working with Mulder on the X Files had taught her a lot about standing up for herself. She had always been headstrong and stubborn and confident in her academic abilities, but until she had worked with Mulder she had never experienced the sort of demoralising teasing that he had lived with for most of his life. She had been a navy brat and moved around a lot, sure, but that had insulated her from a lot of negative energy. She had never really ventured past 'that new smart girl' to 'that nerd'.
Mulder had been 'Spooky' and she had become 'Mrs Spooky', or the 'Ice Queen', and she had been proud of those names because they were a reflection of everybody's assumptions that firstly, she and Mulder were close and that they trusted one another with their lives, and secondly that she could handle the pressure. Mulder had tried to apologise to her one day after they had overheard something particularly nasty about her from a passing agent having a bad day, but she had explained to him her theory and it had seemed to settle him. It would have been unfair for him to bear the brunt of the jokes. She hadn't minded sharing.
"Uh, hellooo," Eddie drawled, waving his large hand through her line of vision and interrupting her thoughts. She jerked back to full alert and looked over at him, her blue eyes wide. "You still with us? Long day."
"The longest," she groaned, walking up to Mulder. Michael was spinning a basketball on his long, bony, brown finger and Scully leaned into Mulder's side as he wrapped an arm low around her hips. Against Michael and Eddie, he never seemed so tall. "So what are you doing? I thought I would be walking in on a proper game. I'm disappointed."
"These two couldn't decide who wanted to lose first," Mulder teased, nodding his head in the direction of their friends. "Do you feel like playing or are you tired?" he asked gently, squeezing her hip and causing a brief shiver to flit up her spine.
"You know I don't like playing basketball with you all," she groaned. "I'm barely over five feet tall. You're all giants."
"We'll let you make a shot," Michael promised. "Come on, Mulder's been all moping about losin' to US since we got here. Apparently he really had his heart set on baseball today."
"Yeah, what happened?" she asked. "I saw the drawing you left in your office."
"I dunno," he hummed. "Guess I changed my mind, or maybe it's been raining on the field or its being mowed or something. Out for maintenance, you know?" Scully laughed softly. "Come on, let's shoot a few hoops. If you like I'll make the LA Lakers over here sit out while we warm up."
"Hey man, don't call me names," Eddie chuckled. "I aint no LA Laker. Please."
"I didn't go up to get changed first because I thought you were playing baseball," she explained, aware the slacks and long-sleeved sweater she was wearing was unsuitable for the court, but Mulder was a step ahead and pointed to the bleachers and the pile of clothes sitting beside his bat and glove. Scully approached straight away. It was an unspoken agreement that Mulder kept an eye on Eddie and Michael to make sure they didn't watch her as she changed, for Mulder regularly went over to their quarters and got her clothes.
Once she was dressed as they all were, in shorts, a t-shirt and sports shoes, she returned, tucking her long hair behind her ears and catching the ball as Mulder threw it to her.
"One on one?" she challenged. Mulder grinned mischievously, nodding. "All right, sit down boys," she ordered the others. "You're about to see the doctor get her butt kicked. Don't tell."
xxx
"Augh, I am so full," Mulder groaned as he lay back on their expansive bed that 'night'.
The mess hall consisted of round-the-clock availability of all sorts of fresh food, cultivated and processed in Tower Three. As far as Scully knew, all the seeds or the genetic blueprints of those seeds had been provided by the aliens and the complex itself provided variable, controlled temperatures at different levels to allow a wide variety of fruits, vegetables and grains to grow. They didn't just grow either. Untainted by pests, pesticides or unseasonable weather, their fresh food flourished.
They had fish available, although it had to be requested because the fish whose flesh they wished to consume had to be killed on demand. It sounded horrible but whenever Scully wanted fish she didn't hesitate. An entire level of Tower Three was an aquarium. The carbohydrates were bread or rice, and every now and then the cooks went to the effort to make pizza or pasta. There were other things there Scully had missed. Michael had a habit of leaving chocolate mints in the delivery space outside their quarters. They had toiletries, shampoo and deodorants; they had been provided with clothes and furniture.
They even had red meat, which after long periods without Scully always craved. Thankfully the provision of such meat did not require the slaughter of any cows housed underground at the South Pole. Instead the meat was 'grown' by way of genetic engineering. Scully had hesitated only the first time; it was the best damn beef she had ever had, and she and Mulder had steak regularly. The chicken was also very popular.
They in fact ate an extremely healthy diet, and Scully knew that everybody else who lived in the complex also ate well and as a result were all in good health. That made her job a lot easier. There was no alcohol in the complex, no tobacco, and no deep fryer. Residents could order something at the mess hall and have it prepared there by the chef to eat in or take back to their quarters, or they could go to the kitchen and choose their own supplies to cook in their quarters privately.
Most days people filtered in and out of the mess hall and the chef was always busy, but Scully enjoyed going 'grocery shopping' and picking her own food. She could toss up a salad at home and she and Mulder could take it to their offices for lunches. The mess hall was right at the bottom of Tower Two and they worked at the very top of Tower One, so to have to leave the office for lunch took a long time. Shopping and cooking helped them both feel normal, too, and they only ate at the mess hall a couple of times a week.
Just as they had that night. It HAD been pizza night, and word had spread quickly. Mulder had polished off an entire thin-crust pizza loaded with fresh toppings and Scully had only managed half of hers. She was not surprised he felt full. His stomach looked huge as he lay on the bed with his hands over his tired eyes. Their quarters were on the top floor of Tower Two, and they had taken the escalator up. The stairs would have left them both with indigestion and the elevator's speed probably would have caused her to vomit. She still felt sick from overeating, and joined Mulder on the bed. He turned his head until his forehead touched her shoulder and sighed.
"So how was your day?" he mumbled. She was still wearing her t-shirt but they had gone upstairs after basketball to change for dinner and they had both put jeans on instead of their sweaty running shorts. She hummed, fingering the denim over her hipbone.
"Interesting," she answered honestly. It was never uninteresting, that was for sure. "I spent most of the day looking over the science of the antidotes again."
"Do you think you would use them?"
"If I was out of options, yes," she answered cautiously. 'The antidotes' was a term she had given what was contained in one of her offices' storage rooms. Mulder had seen the drawers, stacked floor to ceiling and filled with millions of vials of cultures and liquids. Upon their arrival, they had both been told that contained in that room was all of the drugs necessary to treat any illness which should occur, but they were only to be handled expertly and manuals had been provided for Scully. She still did not know why.
The aliens had given her their technology. She had almost had something similar given to her once by a man who later betrayed her, who had led her around on nothing but hope and a sliver of trust. In the end, all he had given her was a blank disc. Yet in Antarctica she had been given volumes of science that was nothing like the science she had learned, and yet so much was similar. She found that upon closer inspection she did understand it in parts.
She still did not know why she had it though. Why did she have the cure for cancer sitting in her storage room? Was it really the cure for cancer? Was there really a cure for Alzheimer's and Muscular Dystrophy and Parkinson's? Was there really a vaccine for SIDS, for HIV? Everything pointed towards the fact that what was in her storage room was real, and that it would work, but she had no way to test it, and nobody to ask for more information.
And if the aliens cared so much about the human race, why keep those cures hidden until most of humanity had been wiped out? That fact always left her feeling suspicious about the so-called cures. Were they antidotes, or just more false hope?
"I wish I could ask them," she whispered. "Why this was given to us. I could spend years testing their technology with human equipments, but I don't think it will ever be enough, and if one day you have a heart attack, I am going to have to fill a syringe with the antidote and put it straight into your heart. I don't know how I can do that, not knowing whether it would cause you more pain."
"Do you believe in it?" he asked seriously.
"Yes," she replied. "I am living in an underground silo that has no electrical wiring and yet somehow stays heated and ventilated and lit, and the lights go off when we decide to sleep. How could I not believe that the cure for cancer sits upstairs when I had the cure given to me ten years ago? Surely it exists still, but in a more refined form."
"Dana, have you done a complete inventory of what's in that room?" Mulder asked, rolling properly onto his side and staring across at her face. She nodded.
"I know what's there. I haven't completed an examination of the science behind each."
"Is there an antidote for infertility?" he asked. She winced, biting her bottom lip. She had been waiting for the question for a long time, unwilling to bring it up on her own because of the answer.
"Not mine," she admitted in a shamed whisper. "Mulder there's an antidote for health problems which lead to infertility, like cystic ovarian syndrome and endometriosis and even STDs, but there is nothing that can be done for a barren womb. I'm sorry."
"It's not your fault," he assured her, shaking his head firmly and fighting against the tears that built in his eyes when he heard the guilt in her voice. "I just had been thinking."
"I know," she assured him. "I did check. I had been thinking too." She reached for his hand and squeezed tightly, managing an emotional smile. "I'm sorry Fox," she repeated.
"Shh," he hushed, leaning his head down and resting it against her breast as her other hand threaded through his hair and held him against her. "Guess we'll have to survive with the fish," he mumbled after taking a few deep breaths with her. Scully smiled, glancing out of the open bedroom door into their living room. She could see Mulder's pride and joy spanning the length of one whole wall. Scully had to admit she was pretty proud of it as well.
Their own tropical aquarium was soothing and beautiful and teeming with life. It was set deep into the wall and they hadn't even put it there; it had always been in their home and it had always been filled. As far as they knew, none of the fish had ever died. When they took days away from their office they were happy to sit on their couch with books or work they had brought home. The fish relaxed them. Scully had never had trouble adjusting and the tank was no bother; it cleaned itself and there was no audible filtering system. She did not know how it worked or sustained itself but it did.
"You know what else I did today?" she asked, raking her fingers soothingly through his hair as his head continued to rest on her chest.
"What?" he asked, the hum of his voice against her soft breast relaxing. She shut her eyes.
"I had another look through the genetic database. You know for a race so intent on stripping half the world's resources away, they went to an awful lot of trouble to catalogue every living thing. There's not just the human genome there, there's everything. Every animal, every plant, small micro-organisms to complex beings, mammalian, reptilian, you name it."
"Is that because they created us or because they were studying us?" Mulder asked.
"I'm not sure," she replied honestly. "On the one hand, evolution has been proven by fossils, but if we are a product of their creation it still could have been done over those hundreds of millions of years. Presumably as they advanced their own creationist technologies the earth would have advanced, and then when they realised they had achieved an equilibrium they could have pulled away."
"That is a pretty cool theory comin' from a good Catholic girl," Mulder teased, holding her hand tightly and brushing his thumb over the tops of her fingers. He raised his head from her chest and rested his chin on her sternum, watching her. She was teasing him with a smug smirk and his eyes flickered to the gold crucifix around her neck, a present from her mother when she had been a girl. That and a few photos were all she had left of the woman who had given her life and raised her, who had always believed in her and in him; Mulder felt blessed to have known Maggie Scully. The woman had always exuded love for her family. It was something that awed him because it was something he could not remember in his own house, and he had always wanted more. Only Maggie had ever dared bridge the gap to give it to him.
"I have to admit it's a possibility," Scully mumbled, unaware of Mulder's grief-laden nostalgia for her mother. "Mulder I saw our science on alien spacecraft years ago. I think I've seen too much to deny that our science may have come from another realm. That being said, I believe that our souls are still entwined with life in a way no science can explain. No human or alien science can explain personality, love, or the way we form relationships or use our brain to expand our own knowledge. That will to achieve is something that has to come from something else. I still believe that."
"Do you believe there is a soul in all things?" he asked curiously.
"Yes," Scully replied definitely. "To a certain extent. I think in complex organisms very much so, but I'm not about to start believing that you could be reincarnated into an ant. I think you're too complex for that, Mulder." He chuckled. "Who knows, maybe the soul is something that is produced as a result of the science of our creation, but it is not something that is ruled by that science. Once it exists, it takes its own form. And maybe that's where your theory comes in about souls choosing their bodies, their lives. Who knows Mulder, maybe that is true? All I know for sure is that our science exists to us in our lives. Everything else is changed for me."
Mulder hummed thoughtfully. For once, they were on the same page. They had been since arriving. Both their beliefs and everything they had thought about the world and the aliens had been put aside upon entering the complex and experiencing first-hand what had been created for them. The unknowns were the same, the information available was the same, and the possibilities were the same. For once, neither knew which possibility they favoured, which one they wanted to prove. They were not at opposing ends of the spectrum; they were stuck in the middle. All they could do was investigate.
"Are you still writing all your notes?" he asked. She nodded.
"I've already filled up two notebooks." As far as Scully was aware, she and Mulder were the only ones who used paper. There were computers that networked but neither had felt comfortable using the touch-screens and turning their information over to some sort of online storage database. Stationery was easy to come by and they had shelves of empty books waiting to be filled with Scully's analysis.
"Do you think it's weird that everyone else has pretty...secondary roles here?"
"Secondary how?" she asked curiously. Mulder shifted himself away from her and slid up the bed so they were eye to eye and propped himself up on his elbow, wiggling to get comfortable on the thick, supportive mattress.
"Well maybe that's the wrong term. A lot of them are agricultural and work on preserving the farm and the aquarium and you've got the genetic engineers working as well, but all of that is food-related. Everything here seems to be concerned with preservation. Then you've got that group of four who are the main mediators, the lawyers or whatever, who don't have any real purpose other than to sit and wait for a signal. And then there's the chef and some cleaners and then...there's us. This 'medical' team. You, me and Eddie. Nobody here is sick, Scully."
"I did notice," she mumbled, frowning in deep thought. "It doesn't mean there shouldn't be a doctor here, or a psychologist. Those are skills that have been needed throughout time in all situations and this is nothing if not extreme. But um...nobody seems to 'want' to socialise with us Mulder. We're as rejected by the majority here as we were in the FBI. I think they think we're spies, like if they come to me with a problem I'm going to pass it on. Besides checking everyone over when I got here, there have been no problems."
"I sometimes get the feeling," he began, trailing off for a few seconds to gather his thoughts. He trailed a finger along her shoulder as he spoke, unsure of whether or not he wanted to say what he was about to, uncertain about how it was going to sound. "Sometimes I feel like it's all here for us," he mumbled. "But that doesn't make sense because nobody could know we would survive, and if Shannon hadn't had Gibson with her that day she would never have had to try to get us into the only other alternative, but doesn't it feel 'right' somehow that it 'is' us here? I mean with everything we worked on, with what we know...And you've been handed all of this amazing data, and it feels like it was 'meant' to happen this way."
"I know how you feel," Scully hissed, her heart beating painfully in her chest as she watched him struggle to admit something which from anyone else would have sounded egotistical, and yet Mulder made it sound like it was simply a humble fact. "I don't know what to do with this science," she continued. "I want to share it with everyone but I'm bound by my ethics. I can't talk about it to anyone here but you and I know that binds you as well... Mostly I just want to know what it's for, what I'm meant to do with it. Is it to help save us, or is it to help write their history books?"
Mulder shrugged, unable to answer. He wanted to believe it was to save them, to somehow save their friends. He wanted to believe they possessed a way to restore the earth; to resurrect all that had been lost. He just was not sure he believed in fairytales.
"Fox," Scully whispered seriously, reaching for his face and settling her fingers against the five o'clock shadow on his jaw. "Sometimes I feel like the presence of God is in this place."
Mulder did not know what to say. He felt it too. A spirit in the way the complex operated, a force enclosing them, preserving them, but for what and for whom? A selfish part of Mulder did not care about those answers because Scully was alive and with him and safe, but the rest of him wanted answers. The only problem was, God had a historically annoying habit of not talking back and no aliens were there to answer their questions.
Scully held the creation of the planet in her hands. It was locked in her office. She studied it daily. How could she not feel the presence of God in those words, in the symbols? It was as though everything combined had led them there, and yet it was as though their arrival had been pre-arranged. Who could do that but a God? The information they possessed equalled power, and they were awed and alone. Mulder stared down at Scully as tears filled her eyes.
"Mulder, it scares me," she admitted. He shut his eyes and nodded. He too was afraid.