Spoilers: X-Cops, Arcadia
Cops and Chicken Noodle Soup
Crinkle.
Green grass. Rolling, lush hills. Tall fir trees and clean-cut hedges. The sun shining brightly, warming her skin and glowing her hair.
Mulder's head on Marvin the Martian's body.
Crinkle.
"What the—" Dana Scully sat up in bed, her hair sticking to her face and neck while she tried to calm her pounding heart. At least it hadn't been a nightmare.
Though, she mused, The Jetsons had always creeped her out a little.
Her fingers brushed the hair away from her face as she fell back against the pillows. Her sinuses were congested. There was a rough pain in the back of her throat and her ears were ringing. Great, Scully thought, throwing an arm across her eyes, a cold.
Scully rarely fell sick. As a doctor, she kept herself in good shape, tried to eat right, and avoided any sort of contagious virus at all costs. Usually, this worked. Her and her partner's office was in an out-of-the-way corner of the Hoover Building (out of the way? We're stuck in the frigging basement), and so they easily missed any bug spreading amongst their co-workers.
But she hadn't taken precaution for the last little while. She'd followed her partner to Los Angeles, followed him just as she always did when he got some hair-brained idea in his head that monsters or ghosts, or even aliens were running around loose in their country.
God, what in the hell was that crinkling noise?
Groggily, Scully reached over and tugged her bedside lamp on. The box of Kleenex she'd left by her bed the night before was spilled onto her bed sheets.
"Perfect," she grumbled. Once glance at the digital clock told her it was twenty to seven; her phone would be ringing any minute.
5, Scully thought, gathering up a few Kleenexes, 4-she blew her nose loudly-3, 2-where the hell was her cough medicine?-1...
Sure enough, Scully's phone rang shrilly from next to her bed. She clicked it on.
"Not today, Mulder." Her voice was a good octave deeper than usual.
"Good morning to you too, sunshine." Fox Mulder's tenor floated over the receiver. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say a man answered the phone."
Scully managed a chuckle that quickly turned into a hacking cough.
"I'm sick, Mulder. And it's all your fault." She blew her nose again.
"My fault? How do you figure that?"
"You dragged me through those dirty streets, looking for a werewolf of all things, at the latest hours of the night. And we were in that disgusting crack house—"
"Scully?" Mulder interrupted.
"Yes?"
She heard him take a deep breath as though preparing himself for his next comment.
"Do you have the Hanta Virus?"
Scully laughed so hard she dropped the phone.
"Mulder!" She coughed, picking up phone. "I'm sick and the only thing you can do is crack jokes?"
"Sorry, Scully," he said, though she knew by the amused one in his voice that he wasn't at all. "Oh, hang on—that's my other line."
"Mul—" Scully heard the click of the dial tone and took the opportunity to blow her nose again.
Men, she thought.
"Hey, G-Woman," Mulder came back over the line. "That was Skinner. He says that under no conditions are you to come into work today."
Scully's eyebrows rose.
"Mulder, is that a hint of glee I hear in your voice?"
She could hear him laughing.
"He says he has a 'special surprise' for me."
Scully dabbed at her running nose with a handful of Kleenexes.
"A surprise? Sounds exciting."
"Tell me about it. Anyway, I'm going to go and check out what he wants, and then I'll swing by to see you. Chicken noodle soup sound good?"
She nodded before realizing her partner couldn't see her.
"Yes. And Mulder?"
"Yes?"
Scully theatrically drew in a deep breath.
"Bring Kleenexes."
His laughter was the last thing she heard before clicking the phone off and snuggling back under the covers.
Knock.
A hummingbird. Brown, furry squirrels. Bright blue jay birds and galloping deer.
Mulder's head on Marvin the Martian's body.
Knock.
"Huh?" Scully say straight up in bed. Her head and vision spun momentarily and she had to steady herself with a hand on her forehead.
"Whoa, there, partner." A warm pair of arms gently eased her back down into the pillows. Scully blinked as Mulder's concerned face swam into view.
"Mulder?"
"Yours truly," he smiled. "You okay? You scared me for a minute there."
"What? Oh, I'm fine. Just sat up too fast." Scully reassured him with a smile. She glanced over at her bedroom door, where a bag full of groceries sat next to her partner's bag. "What'd you bring?"
Mulder left her bedside to gather up his things.
"It's a surprise. Hang tight for a minute while I get everything ready."
He left, presumably to enter the kitchen. Scully propped herself up against the headboard to wait for Mulder.
Minutes later, he re-emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray laden with a bowl of chicken noodle soup, some bread, a mug of hot tea, and a box of Kleenexes decorated with cartoon UFOs.
"Aren't you just Mr. Mom," Scully rasped. Her voice now sounded like a frog was lodged in her throat.
"This isn't all." Mulder carefully placed the tray's legs on either side of Scully's before retreating back out of the bedroom. He returned a moment later holding a videotape.
"Please tell me that's not one of the tapes you claim not to own," she said, spooning some of the soup into her mouth.
"It's not," Mulder smirked, "this, partner, is Skinner's 'special surprise' for me."
Scully cocked an eyebrow.
"Mulder, as much as I love to indulge your every whim, I have to draw the line at things involving Skinner, a videotape, and a 'special surprise'."
Mulder merely smiled and popped the video into the VCR attached to her television.
"Scully, you ever seen 'Cops'?"
A groan eminated from her already raspy throat as Scully sank defeatedly back into the pillows.
"They can't have it edited and cut already," she protested.
"Sorry, G-Woman, no luck there. Skinner did say that you 'well-represented the position of the FBI in relation to the paranormal', if that makes you feel any better." Mulder added, pressing 'play' on the machine.
"And you?" Scully took another spoonful of soup. She noted, with some flattered bewilderment, that he had taken care to cool down the scalding hot liquid with a few well-placed ice cubes.
"The biggest embarrassment the FBI has ever seen." He grinned in a self-satisfied sort of way and started toward the bedroom door.
"Where are you going?" Scully asked, setting her spoon back down.
"To get a chair from the kitchen."
She rolled her eyes. Mulder always played their relationship to the extremes—either overly affectionate, with their undercover mission last year, or completely hands-off, giving her the space she less frequently wanted.
That, or he didn't want to catch her cold.
"Mulder," Scully sighed, lifting the tray off of the bed and placing it on the floor, "get over here. I won't get you sick."
Mulder smiled at her. There they were, once again toeing that ever-thinning line. There were times when he felt absolutely sure that it was finally time to add that final element to their relationship. Then there were times that he would look at that line and see a wall erected in front of him.
Plus, he didn't want to get sick.
Ah, well.
"You promise, Scully?" He grinned at her.
"Cross my heart."
She watched him loosed his tie as he crossed over to the other side of the bed. He crawled silently onto the sheets, tossing the piece of cloth to the foot of the bed.
"I never wear a tie to bed," Mulder said, at Scully's puzzled look.
She laughed.
"Whatever floats your boat."
They turned to the flickering screen across from them. It was surreal to watch themselves on the TV, bickering over Mulder's belief that the Sheriff's Deputy should have been hospitalized for werewolf bites.
For the next half hour, both Mulder and Scully were silent as the event of the other night unfolded in front of them, occasionally breaking the quiet of the room with a laugh (or, in Scully's case, a cough).
"So, apparently, we're on the lookout for someone whose hair matches her fingernails-- bubblegum pink. That'd be a good color for you, Scully." TV-Mulder said.
Silently, Scully pulled the pillow out from the behind her head and smacked Mulder full on in the face with it.
"OW!" Mulder cried, jumping. "What was that for?"
"For suggesting the ludicrous idea that I would ever wear the color pink." Scully said matter-of-factly, smirking.
"Uh huh." Mulder said. He quickly pulled the other supporting pillow out from under her and she fell, rather gracelessly, into him.
"Mulder!" Scully rasped as loudly and as offended as she could. He smirked.
"Geez, Scully, if you wanted to get this close to me, all you had to do was ask."
She glared daggers at him.
"Fine, Mulder." Scully pushed herself away from him to grab the pillow she'd hit him with. It landed softly into his lap, her head following it a moment later. "Consider yourself my own personal pillow."
Mulder looked down at the bright auburn hair cascading over the pillow, at the perfectly shaped lips and petite nose, and decided he really didn't mind.
"Whatever you want, partner."
She grinned and turned her head toward the television set.
An hour later found both Mulder and Scully fast asleep, Mulder's long body wrapped around Scully's small one, one hand tucked over her side, the other coming across her stomach. His face was buried in her soft, cropped hair.
Scully's breath came in small puffs from her parted lips. Her mind was millions of miles away, in a bright, open field with Mulder by her side as the walked, hand in hand, through the long grass. The sun warmed their skin and shined softly on their heads. She wore a yellow sundress and bare feet.
The time, Marvin the Martian had the good grace not to intrude.
Ring.
A beach. Warm sand. Lapping waves and an orange sunset. Scully in a pink sundress.
Skinner's head on Fred Flinstone's body.
Ring.
"What the—" Fox Mulder sat up on his couch. The phone sitting on the table in front him was ringing shrilly, turning the sinus headache he had into a full-blown migraine.
The troublesome piece of plastic made it into his hand and to his ear before Mulder realized he'd done it.
"You lied, Scully," he rasped into the phone, wrapping himself into his blanket and standing in search of Kleenexes.
"I lied? About what?" Scully's voice, he noted, was back to normal.
"You said you wouldn't get me sick. And guess what?" Mulder snatched the box of Kleenexes off of the kitchen counter and made his way back to the couch. "I'm congested, I have a headache the size of a spaceship, and my ears are ringing. And my throat feels like raw beef."
He fell back onto the couch and blew his nose loudly.
"Mulder?"
"Yes, Scully?" He heard her draw in a breath, as though preparing herself for her next comment.
"Do you have the Hanta Virus?"
Fox Mulder laughed so hard he coughed, thinking that later that day, he would invite his partner over for chicken noodle soup and a little daytime entertainment.
Of the video kind, of course.
A/N: This is my second foray into XF fanfiction. My first was a CSI/XF crossover that can be found in my profile. Read and Review!