I rewatched the episode 'Pusher' and this sort of wrote itself. This is show has ruined me lol.
Mulder was silent for the duration of their drive back to D.C. Scully, for once the driver, cast concerned glances his way throughout the journey, but never once did he meet her eyes. He had been doing that, she noticed, ever since he handed her Modell's gun at the hospital, when he held it behind himself so he wouldn't have to look at her. The set of his shoulders had been so tense that the contours of his shoulder blades cut sharp, angled shadows against the white of his t-shirt, and his hands were clenched so tight that the tendons were taut against the surface of his skin.
She could still hear the empty clicking of the gun as he fired shot after empty shot at Modell's fallen, wounded body.
When they pulled up in front of his apartment building, Mulder opened the door without a word. But before he could exit the car, Scully stopped him with a hand on his arm.
"Mulder, talk to me."
He turned his head slightly over his shoulder but didn't meet her eyes. "About what?"
"Today. What's going through your head. Anything, Mulder, I don't care what; but you haven't talked to me in hours. I'm worried about you."
"I'm fine, Scully." He began to turn away, but she closed her fingers more firmly around his arm.
"No, Mulder, you're not fine. I know you. You're blaming yourself for something that was beyond your control." When he still said nothing, she sighed. "You're in shock. Come on, I'm getting you upstairs."
"Scully—"
"No arguing, Mulder." Scully swept out of the car and stood at the passenger's side door until Mulder heaved a quiet breath and stood from his seat, closing the door behind him. He still refused to look her in the face as he followed her inside the building and up to his apartment.
"Go shower," Scully instructed as she shut the door behind them. "The hot water and steam will help clear your head. I'll find something for you to eat."
"I'm not hungry—"
At her stern blue gaze, he fell silent with a sigh and made his way to the bedroom to follow her orders.
After his shower (she's right, the water helped relieve some of the tension from his shoulders), he ventured into his kitchen in the clean sweats and t-shirt she had pulled from his drawer. Scully was wiping her hands on a dish towel, two plates holding sandwiches on the tabletop evidence of her kitchen foraging. At his entrance, Scully wordlessly pointed to one of the chairs, where he sat and watched her fill two glasses with water before joining him.
"Sorry, the sandwiches are a little plain," she apologized as she handed him one of the glasses. She sat in the seat beside his and wrapped her fingers loosely around her glass. "I'm afraid the homeowner of this apartment doesn't believe in groceries." There was an upturn at one corner of her mouth and a raised eyebrow as she spoke the teasing words.
Mulder managed a dry chuckle and gave his shoulders a small shrug. "I'll need to have a word with him, I guess." The joke, and his pained smile, didn't reach his eyes. He reached out and picked absently at the sandwich.
Scully returned her own sandwich to her plate and looked at him. Those hazel eyes of his—always such a comfort to her in times of stress—were still nowhere in her line of sight. They hadn't been for hours now, and, though she was loathe to admit it, that frightened her.
"Mulder," she said, the tumble of his name laced with worry in her mouth.
He raised his head so that he wasn't staring at his plate, but he still wasn't looking at her. His head was slightly turned so that she could see the tightness of his clenched jaw.
"Mulder, look at me." But her pleading voice was to no avail; he didn't look at her. With a shuddering breath, Scully reached out to carefully cup one side of his face to turn him towards her. He jumped at the touch, and his eyes flicked to hers as if he had been electrocuted.
As soon as their eyes connected, a wave of emotions passed in a violent storm over his face. What a contrast, Scully thought absently, to the blank slate Modell had made him in that hospital room, when the only emotion that had passed across his features was anger as he fought to keep himself from pulling the trigger on her. Even in the swirl of emotions in his eyes, his entire face, she felt a small sigh of relief escape her as he finally seemed to snap to the present. That wordless bond of theirs seemed to recalibrate, and Mulder's hand reached up to cover hers on his face, which had settled into an expression of pain and shame.
"Scully," he said, voice coming out hoarse. She felt his fingers trembling against her hand. "I'm so sorry."
Her eyebrows knit in confusion and she stroked his cheek with her thumb. "You have nothing to apologize for, Mulder."
He shook his head, hand frozen to hers at his cheek. "No, Scully. What I almost did—" His eyes widened in something like shock, or fear (or maybe both), and suddenly he leaped to his feet, moving into the bathroom that was still warm from his shower. Bracing his hands against the countertop, he retched violently into the sink, his entire body convulsing. While there was nothing in his stomach to come up, bile burned in his throat as cold sweat swept down his spine.
He felt her hands on his back and his arms, murmuring something that he either couldn't understand or couldn't hear through the roaring in his ears. After a couple of minutes, his shuddering eased and his stomach seemed, for the most part, to have settled. He ducked his head to wash the sour taste from his mouth before facing his reflection in the mirror. When he caught sight of Scully next him, he sank to his knees on the tiled floor with a tear-garbled breath.
Scully followed him to the floor and brushed his hair away from his forehead. "Deep breaths, Mulder," she murmured. "Just keep taking deep breaths."
"I nearly killed you, Scully. Me. I nearly pulled the trigger on you. If you had been any slower—"
"But I wasn't. And that wasn't you, Mulder. It was Modell. All of it was Modell. You are not to blame."
"But I was the one holding the gun. I studied psychology, I should have been better prepared to resist his powers of suggestion. But I failed, and he took over, and I almost—" He dropped his face into his hands and gave a muffled sob. Hot tears filled his eyes as the idea of almost-happened filled him with nausea once more. "I'm so angry, Scully. I'm so angry that I almost let him make me hurt you."
"You didn't 'let' him do anything, Mulder." Her voice held an angry conviction of its own that made him look up. She took his face between her hands and stared intently into his eyes. "If there is one thing I will take from this, Mulder, it is the fact that you will fight your damnedest to keep me safe." Sounds of his protest were cut off with a sharp shake of her head. "No, listen to me, Mulder. You fought to keep yourself from pulling the trigger when he had it pointed at him. You fought to keep yourself from pulling the trigger when he directed it at you. But the hardest you fought against his will was when he made you point it at me."
Mulder searched her eyes wordlessly for what felt like hours as the words sank in. Seeing the doubt that still lingered in his hazel eyes, she stroked his cheekbones softly with her thumbs. At long last, he took a ragged breath and folded his fingers around her hands. Drawing them away from his face, he placed a kiss to her knuckles before folding them to his chest, right above his heart. In the wake of his raw emotions laid bare, he spoke plainly in a way that he typically didn't with his partner for fear of crossing a line. "You're the most important person in my life, Scully. You're my best friend, my…everything that's been missing in my life for I don't know how long. I was lost for so long before I met you. You changed everything, changed me. And the thought of me hurting you like that, even if unintentional, is unbearable. That it almost happened today is…beyond my realm of sanity." He closed his eyes and another tear escaped to track its way down to his chin.
Her heart squeezed painfully in her chest at his words. That she meant so much to him, played such an important role in his life, was a staggering and daunting thought. The guarded part of her screamed to handle this confession at arm's length, to detach herself from the possibility of further attachment and the possibility of pain. But the other part of her—the part that felt a rush of relief and elation because, truthfully, his sentiments mirrored hers—roared with the need to comfort him. So instead of deflecting his words, she brought her other knee down so they both rested on the floor and moved to put her arms around him, tucking her head perfectly beneath his chin. He immediately folded her into his arms, burying his face in her hair and wrapping his arms around her body to pull her more soundly to him. She heard the erratic beat of his heart slowly ease beneath her ear and closed her eyes as she let herself revel in the intimate sound.
After an unknown amount of time, when both of their knees began to ache from the hard contact with the tile, Mulder spoke. "This might be a bad time to mention this, but we probably shouldn't eat whatever you found in the fridge."
Scully smiled and gave a chuckle that shook his chest. "I'll call the Chinese place."