Early the next morning, the Avengers were called again away to the Sokovian border where tensions were building once more. With his medical clearance still not through, Mulder was resigned to letting Scully leave with the team once again without him and hanging out with Bruce. By now he knew better than to watch live news from the area and so, when he needed a break from Bruce's endless technobabble, he went to find Skinner who had set up a room close to the bridge which was serving as an FBI/S.H.I.E.L.D. liaison office.
"Figured you'd be back on solid ground by now," Mulder said, dropping himself into a spare chair, "doesn't the FBI need its Deputy Director anymore?"
"Fury asked me to stay on in an official capacity until this whole Wellspring situation is resolved," Skinner replied, "in case access to additional FBI files is required. Easier to have me here in person for instant authorization."
Mulder nodded, picking up a paperweight and fiddling with it absent-mindedly.
"You know, it's funny," Skinner told him, putting his pen down to take a break, "before you reappeared, I barely saw Scully anymore. I've seen her more in the last few weeks than I have in the last five years."
"When did you last see her before that?" Muder asked.
Three years earlier
Skinner exited the elevator at his floor and walked to his door while flicking through his mail. It was Friday night and the end of a long week punctuated only by a series of dull meetings so he was looking forward to throwing his suit into the laundry hamper, opening one of the craft beers he had received for his birthday, and maybe watching a movie with his feet up.
He reached his apartment and stopped. Light was streaming out from under the door and he could hear music inside. Silently he slipped the mail he was carrying into his briefcase and unclipped his gun, resting his hand on the butt. He carefully tried the door but it didn't move, whomever was inside his apartment hadn't broken the locks. He found his key and inserted it, turning it as quietly as he could. Hand gripping the gun, he levered the handle and opened the door. The living room light was on and someone had switched on his CD player which was quietly playing one of his Howlin' Wolf albums. The rest of the room was immaculate, ruling out a burglary. He pushed the door closed behind him and moved into the centre of the room, ears straining for any noise. Hearing something behind him he spun on the spot toward the kitchen. Scully was standing in the doorway, leaning casually against the frame. She was wrapped in one of his towels & drying her hair with another. The shock of seeing her again after so many years hit him like a punch to the gut.
"Most people ask before invading their friends' homes," he remarked with a wry smile, clipping his gun holster closed again.
"Sorry. My safe house was compromised. I needed somewhere to lay low for a while."
He nodded, not asking her to elaborate. In all likelihood she couldn't anyway.
"Do you need anything?"
"Some clean, dry clothes would be nice. Food?"
He moved to his bedroom, discarding his coat on the back of a chair as he passed, and looked through the chest of drawers at the foot of his bed. A minute later he returned to the living room with a t-shirt, pyjama pants, a pair of boxers and a hoodie folded in his arms.
"I don't exactly keep anything in your size here but I shrunk this stuff in the wash and never got around to throwing them out. The hoodie was mine in my freshman year of college when I was considerably skinnier. It's the smallest clothing I have."
He handed her the items and she smiled.
"Thank you Sir." She appeared to be about to drop the towel & change on the spot but something in his face must have told her to stop.
"I'll call for a pizza," he told her. "What do you want on it?"
"Anything as long as there's mushrooms."
Skinner pulled a face.
"I'll order two."
An hour later Skinner found himself on his couch watching a repeat of Fargo, a pair of empty pizza boxes on the floor by his feet and Scully's head resting on his shoulder. She was wrapped in his old hoodie which swamped her tiny frame. He'd pulled a blanket down from the back of the seat and draped it over them a little while earlier. To all the world it would look like a typical domestic evening, until they looked under the blanket and saw the way his hand rested on his weapon, ready to attack at a moment's notice. Scully was drifting off, he could feel her gradually slipping further and further down his side.
"When did you last get a full night's sleep?" he asked.
"June 9th 2000," she replied, her eyes briefly meeting his. For a second he saw the pain she masked so well now, but then it was gone. He didn't need to ask what date she was referring to.
She laughed quietly. "I don't know, maybe a week ago?"
"Get some rest Scully."
"Can't. Too risky."
"I'm here."
She laughed again but he shot her a serious look. "I'm not kidding. You can take my bed, I'll stay awake just in case."
"I can't ask you to stay awake all night just so I can catch up on my beauty sleep."
"You're not asking, I'm volunteering. And it's not beauty sleep, it's essential rest. You needed a safe house and a 'safe' house is what I'm going to provide. Now please, get some sleep."
She gave him a funny look, one which seemed to encompass gratitude, exhaustion, and several other expressions he couldn't place, before standing up and walking silently to his bedroom. She left the door slightly ajar and he instinctively dropped the volume on the television several notches.
Shifting positions he spotted her combat gear, scrubbed clean of blood he hadn't questioned while they waited for pizza and now drying over the back of a dining chair. Comfortable again he considered his evening. Staying awake all night hadn't been part of his Friday night plans, in fact he'd rather been looking forward to a gloriously long stint in his bed. However as he looked over at the partially open bedroom door and let the pad of one finger run over the smooth surface of the gun still clutched in his hand, he knew that he much preferred spending his night protecting an old friend than doing anything else he could imagine.
"You protected her," Mulder stated, "when I couldn't."
"Always," Skinner agreed. "As much as she would ever let me. When you disappeared.. She was broken for a long time. I worried a lot. But then S.H.I.E.L.D came along. As much as it scared me, her leaving and becoming a part of this thing I didn't understand and couldn't control, it changed her for the better. I can't say she put everything behind her and moved on, but she grew around it. On the rare occasions I saw her, she was a little stronger every time. It felt… reassuring."
The team returned from Sokovia late that afternoon, Scully nursing gunshot wounds to the shoulder and the right of her stomach. Mulder winced at the sight of her but swallowed his anger and helped her strip out of her combat gear, clean the wounds, and get comfortable in their shared quarters once the medical team arrived with a shot of morphine. Mulder was grateful that Bruce had told him about the S.H.I.E.L.D. research team developing a completely non-addictive version of the drug because he had recently begun to wonder if it was safe for Scully to keep being so heavily dosed with the substance.
Not long after, Mulder received a notification that Fury had scheduled a meeting with him and Scully for the following morning.
"You gonna be Ok with that?" he asked.
"I've sat through meetings in much worse condition," she assured him. Mulder wasn't sure whether to be relieved or frustrated by that statement.
The next morning, he helped Scully clean and re-dress her injuries which already looked much better, and the two made their way to Fury's office.
"Feels like old times," Mulder quipped as they took their seats opposite him
"Sir?" Scully asked, her eyes on Fury who produced a pair of reports and placed them side by side on his desk. They both fell silent waiting for him to speak.
"Agents. These are the results from your recent medical examinations," he explained, flipping open two reports. "An interesting fact was discovered by our team upon evaluating them." He pushed one of the files forward. "This is Agent Scully's latest assessment. Here you'll see her rate of cellular decay." Fury then pushed the second file forward. "And here is Agent Mulder's assessment, note his rate in comparison."
Scully leaned forward to look at the number. A second later, her head jerked up and she locked eyes with Fury.
"They're almost exactly the same!"
"So I saw."
"But what does that mean?"
Fury raised an eyebrow at Scully.
"I thought you were the scientist?"
"Can someone please explain what we're looking at here?" Mulder asked.
Scully pointed at the number in her report. "This number here represents the rate at which my cells are breaking down, it's effectively the speed at which I'm aging. My number is slightly more than one-fiftieth that of the average human being so I'm effectively aging at a rate of one day for every 50 or 60 for an average person. Your cellular decay rate," she pointed out a similar number in his own file, "is almost exactly the same. I've only ever seen that once before and that was in Thor's bloodwork."
"You're saying I'm aging at the same speed as you?"
"Yes, roughly one-fiftieth as slow as you should be."
"So that would put my lifespan at..?"
"Approximately 5000 years if you were to die of old age," Scully said, "give or take a few decades."
Mulder felt all the air leave his lungs. He sat back forcefully, stunned by what he had just heard. He heard Scully and Fury continuing to talk around him.
"I don't understand this," Scully was saying, "how can both Agent Mulder and I have such similar cellular decay rates? That can't be a coincidence?"
"I don't believe it is. Reading through your report again in light of this new information, you were both exposed to the Purity virus, am I correct?"
"Yes Sir, I was exposed in 1998 and Agent Mulder in 1996."
"Hmmm," Fury leaned back in his chair.
"Thor once told me that his people didn't always lead such long lives. Many eons ago the Asgardians learned of objects called Infinity began to gather knowledge about these objects and soon learned enough to seek them out. Over time, at least three Infinity Stones passed through Asgard. Thor believes that the power of the stones residing on Asgard for hundreds of years imbued all the Asgardian people with their exceptionally long lifespans. Thor also believes that the aether is one of those stones in a different form."
"If Purity is actually a part of the aether, then both of us had part of one of these Infinity Stones in our blood for a short time," Scully continued.
"A part not strong enough to kill us, but enough to supercharge our cells just like the Asgardians," Mulder finished.
"It would appear so,"
Silence fell for a few moments as both Mulder and Scully absorbed what they had just learned.
"Was that the only abnormality on my report, Sir?" Mulder asked eventually.
"Yes."
"Does that mean I'll be cleared to join S.H.I.E.L.D. in full?"
Fury fixed him with a steely gaze.
"Given that Agent Scully has been a part of this organization for well over a decade living with the same 'condition', I see no reason to prevent your joining. This information will remain classified however."
"Yes Sir"
"Sir?" Scully asked in a voice Mulder knew well, "was a full blood analysis performed as part of Agent Mulder's medical?"
"Of course."
"Could I request that the results of that and my own results be copied to my personal records?"
"What are you thinking?" Mulder asked.
"It's just a theory, but I might have an idea about how to eliminate the Purity virus."
"I'll have those files with you ASAP Agent Scully," Fury told them, standing up from behind his desk which Mulder took to mean that they were dismissed. They all walked to the door and Scully strode away without a backward look, a distant look on her face. Mulder knew her brain was currently working at a mile a minute analysing whatever idea she had just thought up
"Welcome aboard Agent Mulder," Fury said from beside him as they entered the bridge. "Now figure out how to destroy this damn Purity virus for me."
Despite his desperation to discuss the results of his medical, Mulder knew better than to disturb Scully for the rest of the day. She had locked herself into a lab and requested to be taken off her usual Intelligence assignments, something Fury had agreed to without hesitation. The only time she got in touch was to request permission to access Mulder's full medical history into childhood which he authorized immediately. If Scully had an idea, it was probably a good one.
Instead, Mulder found Thor in the Avengers lounge and asked his permission to read through the ancient Asgardian texts regarding the aether. Mulder then spent his day engaged in his own research, not even taking a break to eat and instead requesting food be brought up to him in his quarters. If he was honest with himself, it was the perfect distraction from the realisation that he was destined to outlive nearly everyone he had ever known by several thousand years, something his brain was staunchly refusing to accept.
After the better part of a full day with little sleep, going back and forth between multiple translations of the Asgardian texts produced by JARVIS, he felt like he might possibly be on to something. Just as he was considering calling the team together to discuss his findings, Scully did exactly that. Mulder gathered up his notes from where they had spread across most of the room and made his way to the Avengers Lounge to see what his partner had found.
Scully was pacing at the front of the room when he entered and he was grateful to note that he wasn't the last to arrive. Finding a seat, he placed his own notes on the floor below his chair and awaited the rest of the team. When they finally arrived, Scully started talking.
"You've all read our report so you all know that both Agent Mulder and myself were infected by the Purity virus during our years with the FBI," she began, "and both of us were given a vaccine. Mulder's vaccine was developed by a team led by the Russians, whereas my vaccine was developed by the American team. The two vaccines were therefore slightly different, but they both worked effectively to save us from conversion into the host creatures we witnessed in Arizona. If we could recreate the vaccine we were given, it might give us a way to attack the Purity virus now, but with no samples to work from I thought up another idea." Leaning forward, Scully flicked a switch to lower the lights.
"I started out by comparing mine and Agent Mulder's blood." She brought up two images onto virtual screens one beside the other. The pictures showed thousands of dots in highly complex patterns. "These dots represent the antibodies present in both. Theoretically, what you're seeing here is a database of all the viruses and diseases both Mulder and I are immune to."
"I think I see where this is going," Tony said, leaning forward and looking impressed.
"Next, I used the medical records from the entire helicarrier crew to identify other known antibodies. These," a set of matching dots lit up on both screens, "are the antibodies for chicken pox and these," a different set lit up, "are the antibodies for measles. By comparing our records to those of the crew I was able to identify and then eliminate the antibodies from over three hundred known viruses and bacteria strains from Anthrax to Zika. If I remove all of them…" Scully pressed a button and nearly all the dots vanished, "it leaves behind these. These antibodies belong to something that both Agent Mulder and I have been exposed to, but not a single other member of S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel."
"You think these are the antibodies that relate to the Purity virus?" Mulder asked, although he knew it was mostly a rhetorical question.
"Yes. And in theory, we can use them to reproduce the vaccine you and I were given."
"We need to get this straight down to the labs," Steve said, "the faster we can get this in motion, the better."
"The problem is that even with a vaccine, Purity is currently too widespread. Even S.H.I.E.L.D. can't inoculate the entire population in the few days we have left. Once it activates we're looking at mass conversion into colonist hosts faster than we can deploy."
"I might have something to help prevent that," Mulder answered and every eye in the room shifted to look his way. He grabbed his own notes from the floor and turned to face the room. "I've been reading through the old Asgardian legends about the aether and have a listen to this." He read aloud from his notes.
"As the Nine Worlds converged above him, Malekith could at last unleash the Aether, but Asgard ripped the weapon from his grasp. Without it, the Dark Elves fell. With the battle all but lost, Malekith sacrificed his own people in a desperate attempt to lay waste to Asgard's army. Malekith was vanquished and the Aether was no more."
"That was written by my grandfather Bor, the once king of Asgard," Thor said, "it is written in his own hand."
"Right. But there was more. I had JARVIS scan the pages and he found extra text, a hidden note in a different hand, signed by someone named Einherjar."
Thor furrowed his brow.
"Einherjar was a close friend of my grandfather, one of his most trusted advisors. What does this note say?"
"He tells us that Bor ordered him to bury the Aether deep on Svartalfheim where no-one would ever find it. He also says that, because of its sentience, the Aether is in effect attracted to itself. It desires power and will immediately try to regroup in order to gain strength. If the source is released, any Purity that's out in the world will immediately flow toward it."
"What are you thinking, Mulder?" Scully asked.
"Two things. First we need to free the aether/Purity, whatever you want to call it, from the Wellspring, then we need to contain it the way Thor's grandfather and Einherjar did. If we free the part that remains inside the Wellspring, the rest of it should come flowing back from across the planet to join it, and then we trap it for good."
"Sounds simple enough," Tony scoffed, "what did you have planned for after lunch?"
"I'm seeing a big hole in this plan," Steve continued, ignoring Tony, "how exactly do we trap something this powerful?"
"I may be able to help with that," Thor replied, "we have a number of ancient relics from Svartalfheim in our vaults on Asgard. If I consult with our historians, we may be able to identify something strong enough, just as my grandfather once did."
"My biggest concern is what happens when we release this thing," Scully said, "how do we control it?"
"The Aether is attracted to life. To power," Thor replied. "It will immediately seek out the strongest among us. We must make sure we release it in an unpopulated area and allow it to gather to its full power within one of us, then we contain it."
Everyone started looking between Thor, Tony, and Steve, obviously trying to figure out who was the strongest among them. Thor, noticing, intervened.
"Neither myself nor Stark or Rogers are strong enough to contain the Aether. It is a substance of immense and eternal power. None of us could hold it." He stopped talking and looked across the room. Everyone's eyes followed him until they all found themselves looking directly at Bruce.