Author: Jadeblueafterglow17

Title: Kaltbluetig (In Cold Blood )

Disclaimer: Owned by Fox, Chris Carter...and the amazing characters are all theirs.

Note: Out of ideas...Maybe when I have new ideas. Maybe I will write a sequel...but for now its done. Please Review!

Chapter 10: Hope Therapy

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Fox Mulder sat in the bleachers of a large empty basketball stadium. He barely noticed the persistent breeze that shrieked through his hospital gown. He glanced down at the basketball team on the court. As his eyes focused he noticed the team jersey. He wiped his tired eyes and wondered where he'd found time to check out a Knicks game. He glanced up at the scoreboard the score was Knicks 121 Celtics 118, with 3 seconds remaining in the last period. He watched as number 13 made a sprint up the court, and shot another bank shot, increasing their lead again. He heard the crowd began to count down the time till the game clock expired,

"3 …2 …1…" he felt his heart began to pound in his ears, his hands start to tremor as he joined in the count with them.

He felt an overwhelming warm sensation come over him, then warmer, and then very hot as, he closed his eyes for a moment he could hear the sound of familiar voices in the distance. His chest started to hurt and burn from the inside out, as he grabbed his chest and fell to his knees. He opened his eyes, to find himself surrounded by fire. He immediately tensed up, feeling the flames within arms reach of him. All that he could see was a wall of fire as he turned in every direction. In the instance the fire had seemed to appear, it was as quick that an opening appeared a cool refreshing wave of light chilled his skin, as he went towards it. His chest didn't burn anymore, he did not feel the flames at his feet, but he could now hear voices, familiar voice. As the cool light embraced him, it enveloped him in an ember of blue flame.

"Fox, you must fight, you must survive; so much depends on you." the male voice said.

"Who's there?" Mulder mouthed, but his voice was silent, as he stared in the direction of the voice, unable to see the figure through the bright lights. "…wait please don't leave me, who are you?" Mulder closed his eyes and could hear the sound of his heart beating slowly and then more steadily in his ears.

"Charging to 350!"

"Wait, we've got a rhythm." Mulder heard clearly as he felt his body give into exhaustion and his mind going completely blank.

"Heart rate steadying 70bpm, 75 … I think we got him back."

"Good work Dr. Scully" Another physician exclaimed, as Dana wiped the sweat from her brow.

"What happened?" Dana exclaimed " He was fine a minute ago."

"I'm not sure. I've seen it happen that quickly before, but usually in older patients who've been sick a long time. Looks like his body was just giving up."

"Put the monitors back on his temple; let's see if we shocked some life back into him" The nurse rolled up the sleeve on her lavender scrub jacket. She re-attached four small electrode wires to the open patches on his temples. Nurse flipped the switch and stood back watching as Dr. Griggs, Ferrel & Scully.

The hope drained from their faces, turning to frustration as they stared at the flat teal blue line on the charcoal gray screen. The nurse looked at the screen and hit it with her fist momentarily knocking it off line. Like magic, three separate lines came back.

Back from the brink of death again. It'd been three days of this. Mulder's tortured body unable to sustain itself. Scully going against his wishes keeping him alive even though he had made no attempt to join the world of the living as his body struggled to heal. When he'd given her power of attorney over his life he knew she could make the decision when he was suffereing and knew he would not want to be kept alive with machines. But here she was doing exactly what he'd had not wanted. Prolonging his suffering, his attachment to this hellinsh nightmare because Dana Scully loved this man and could not let him go.
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Hours later Dana Scully had been lulled into a light dose as the beeping and wooshing of the machines that kept Fox Mulder alive gave her some comfort. She clung desperately to his battered fingers cool to the touch but still evidence that life in him still existed.

Footsteps fell in the room but when unnoticed a shadow briefly loomed over Scully's sleeping frame before slowly making their way over towards the patient in the bed.

An audible gasp was heard as the person apprached the bed. A hand gently touched the bandages over his head, the tape covering his eyes to keep them closed. That same hand placed a gentle kiss from her finge tips on each wound on each scar and bandage and dried a tear drop that fell from their face onto his his chest.

"Mom?" a raspy voice whispered. Margaret Scully quickly wiped at tears as she turned to see her daughte sitting in the chair.

"Dana, sweetheart...I'm so sorry...I can't believe this happened, poor Fox..." Scully fell into her mother's arms unable to stop the gut wrenching sobs that consumed her small frame as her mother held her tight.

1 week later

Dana closed the door to his ICU suite and turned off the overhead lighting. She let down the shades, trying to ignore the stares of pity from the hospital personnel out in the hall. All that remained was the small clear white light from the lamp above, and the lights from the EKG, monitor and respirators reflecting blue on his pale body. She glanced over at the machine steadied heart rhythms and insignificant lines of brain activity, and climbed up onto his hospital bed curled up beside him laid her head on his chest and sighed.

"I stayed up all night thinking of what words I could fathom saying to you knowing it would be the last time I would ever see your face. I know you've been with me through this all. I could feel you sitting beside me . . . your arms wrapped around me; the feel of your warm breath on my neck as your head lay on my shoulder. I knew you were there, comforting my guilty conscience. I continue my prayer for a miracle, one that is not destined to happen. I'm afraid you were saying your goodbye, or wanting me to let you go, after you've suffered all this time. I know I've been selfish and I've failed you Mulder." Scully wiped the tears from her cheek.

"If you've taught me anything it was to trust my instincts. My instincts told me not to leave you, they begged me for compassion when all I could give you was sarcasm, when inside I wanted so deeply to take you with me. You were so sick, vulnerable and exhausted. I might as well have killed you myself - I left you to die, in a horrible way, tortured, beaten, and alone. If the roles were reversed you would have stopped at nothing to assure my well being. No apology could make up for that, but I'm so sorry Mulder. I should have been here; I should have taken care of you. I made a promise to myself that I would never let you suffer or die alone, no family no friends by your side, and although I'm here now with your body, I feel as though your spirit, your soul was freed of this suffering before I ever found you, perhaps the only comfort I've found in feeling you so close to me when you are so far away. I wonder thoughtlessly what words escaped your lips as your life was taken from you. Did you call out for me, did your hope that I would somehow find you falter, did you hear my thoughts as I searched for you, hoping for the chance to be your hero?"

"As I lay there thinking of you, seeing your face, staring into your eyes, so concerned and so honest you told me you loved me, as if knowing those would be the last words you'd ever speak to me and I dismissed you. You don't deserve this. I deserve to lose you because those words I could never utter to you, albeit I felt the same and could think of no man I have loved more sovereignly, deeply and silently than you. I was always so worried about what loving you would mean . . . whether it would further de-bunk what discoveries we'd made, when all the while it was so clear to me. Blindly I followed you around case to case, not lured by the motivating chance to prove you wrong, but because I couldn't imagine my life without you being in it anymore, I just didn't want to."

"You are a part of my life, and it's (her voice broken by momentary loss of composure) killing me that you left your life in my hands, after you suffered . . . the loss of your entire family, admonishment of your life's work, and the only way I can stop the hurt for you is to let you go." She looked up at his face, stroking his hair, seeing his face as she last remembered despite the bruises and bandages that stared back at her. Gently she kissed his forehead, her tears landing on his cheek.

"They say you can't really love somebody, till you love them enough to let them go. It seems these clichés had a reason to be made, I'm sorry my love came too late, but I had to let you know. I love you Fox Mulder, I love you so much, and I wish I had time, just more time to make things right."

After a few moments of disheveling silence she said sitting up and reaching to turn off his heart monitors button by button, and taking the monitor pads off his temple. Her hands shook as she glanced at his face, and turned the respirator off. She watched as the air being pumped in and out of his lungs stopped. Gently she pulled the tube out of his throat, removing the tape from his mouth. She took the bandages off of his eyes, still swollen she had to see the hazel depths one last time. Dana kissed him softly on the lips. His motionless body, pale and thin, felt warm to the touch.

Dana laid her head down on his chest tears flowing down her cheek, she listened to his soft heartbeat. For moments there was nothing but the echo of the beat in her ears. She kept waiting for that beat to speed up with the loss of oxygen.

She covered him up to his neck and turned off the light above him. She sat down in the chair next to his bed, and grasped his hand. No sound in the room except her shallow breathing and the hum of the electricity running through the a/c.

After a few minutes had passed, and his heart beat was still steady, she raised her head to look at his face, her face donned a look of unbridled awe, for in less than a blink of an eye, a ghostly sound pierced the air. Mulder's body gasped for air, once, and then again, coughing between breaths. Scully leapt up to turn the light on above him. She sat on the bed beside him and watched his lips as air struggled to pass between them.

"Yes Mulder that's it, breathe, please breathe, God please, breathe." she begged smiling through her tears. She reached up and turned on the oxygen on behind his head. Gently placing the cup over his mouth. She pushed the button for the nurse.

"Yes?"

"Get Dr. Ferrel in here right now."

"Yes, ma'am"
Scully frantically scurried about the room reconnecting the equipment to his chest and temple. With a flip of the switch his vitals returned to the screen.

"Dr. what's wrong, I see you hooked him back up to the life support.:

"No, no I didn't…I took it off and he started gasping for air."

"That's normal, it will stop once his heart stops.

"The heart pacer is gone, and the vent is off. Shhhhsh….do you hear that, his heart is steady, look at his chest, he's breathing, he's breathing, he's fighting."

Skeptically, the nurse walked up and removed the oxygen cup from his face. Mulder continued to breathe shallowly. She grabbed a stethoscope from a kit in the drawer beside his monitor computers and listened to his chest, in three places. Scully continued to hold his hand in hers, a deathgrip which in an instant was let go.

Mulder's hand had a spasm, as his hand twitched. His hand jumped and the monitors on his brain waves were no longer solid signal beeps, they were pacing in multiple varied lines.

Dr. Ferrel arrrived in time to see the lines on the EKG machine change and hear the shuddering breaths being pulled in by his patient. Scully stared at him warily with baited breath praying that this was not just a phase of death, she couldn't take watching Mulder draw his last breath when he seemed so alive. Dr. Ferrel removed the oxygen mask and looked into his eyes as his pupils shrank in size.

He looked at agent Scully, removed his glasses and his face was filled with an unusual mix of emotions; the doctor replaced the oxygen mask and requested a CT scan, and the veil of emotions was lifted as he turned to Agent Scully and put his hand on her shoulder and smiled.
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The End -

Hope you enjoyed It. I will be working on Part II over the next month or so. Your feedback decides if the story continues. So Please light me up with some reviews or flames...I don't care just tell me what you think.