disclaimer: not mine, don't sue
ahhhhh, i am sooooo sorry i have not been updating! things have been crazy, but i finished this story and it's gonna be good.
She had left.
Again.
Back to Salt Lake City.
Back to her life that was not a Life.
He left.
Again.
Back to Washington, D.C..
Back to his life that was not a Life.
They were exactly the same.
"Hi, you've reached Dana Scully. I can't come to the phone right now but please leave a message and I'll get back to you as soon as I can…"
It was her answering machine.
Again.
He called every day, even though he knew she wouldn't pick up.
Maybe she would.
That would be a plus.
But he was just content to listen to her recorded voice for now.
Besides, he wouldn't know what to say.
She had been more distant than usual. She had gotten a taste of her Life, and she had liked it.
Then she ran away from it.
Back to her life.
Again.
It was not lost on anyone. When she got back to the field office, her colleagues noticed her change.
There wasn't much change.
She had never gotten close to any of them. There was just enough change that they would see.
Her dulling eyes and her dulling hair.
Her body complaining.
Her soul dying.
And nobody felt like asking Mark-with-the-broken-nose.
Mark-with-the-broken-nose had woken up in the hospital in Chicago with a severe reality check. His character hadn't changed much since they got back, but his colleagues noticed his change.
There wasn't much change.
He hoped to fix that.
He actually felt terrible about what he did, though he would never tell his partner. He had not wanted to confront her at the beach like he did. He did not want to separate her and her partner.
But he also didn't want to be seen as a fool.
Nobody
Made
Mark
Sloveny
Look
Like
A
Fool.
Even though he himself noticed what a jerk he had acted like.
Mark Sloveny is not like other men at the Salt Lake City field office.
He can go for miles without stopping.
He can go for days without looking back.
But he always looks back.
And sometimes, he doesn't like what he sees.
This was no exception.
And it was eating him up inside.
Who was he to take her Life away from her? He had degraded her in such an unforgivable way.
He had never ditched her but he had called her a bitch and that is worse.
He wanted to talk to her about it but could never really find the appropriate time.
Until one day she walked into the office with the same clothes she had on the day before and the darkest circles he had ever seen under her eyes. That was when he knew it was time for an intervention.
That was when he knew that an apology was in order.
"Dana," he started that morning that would change her life (and her Life). She looked up from her desk, startled, as if she was amazed that somebody had said her name.
He didn't blame her.
They hadn't spoken much since they got back from Chicago.
"Yeah?" she asked, the momentary shock subsiding. She had looked back down at whatever she was working (or pretending to work) on. It was just Mark-with-the-broken-nose. Mark-on-the-ground. Mark-the-glory-hound. Mark-who-was-her-partner-but-not-her-partner. He could tell she still didn't want to speak to him.
"Uh, I like that jacket on you."
She felt like smacking him.
She knew she hadn't changed clothes last night. She didn't care.
"Would you like to elaborate on that?" she asked, not caring who she fought with. He Himself could walk in here and she would have no problem starting an argument.
That
Was
Dana
Scully.
"No. I just hate seeing you like this."
"Like this? Like what, Mark?"
"Like a ghost. Dana, whenever I see you, you're a thousand miles away. You're not here. You're there, with him."
"I'm fine."
She still said that even when she wasn't fine. If He were there, He would have found it nice to know that
Some
Things
Never
Change.
"You're not fine, Dana. Nobody that lives like you could be fine. You go to and from places without making an impact. Without making a sound. You're dead… and I realized that I had never truly seen you happy. Not until we got to Chicago and you found him."
"Well He and I cannot be in the gray, so we came up with a compromise."
He stays in the black.
I stay in the white.
Little did she know that they were both in the black.
As dark a black as you can find.
"What compromise, Dana? You stay away from each other and go your separate ways, shut-off to the world? Suffering the same amount separately?"
Mark had never wanted her to leave as much as he did at that moment. Because, after all, she was still his partner (even if he was not her's), and he still wanted the best for her. In the FBI, partners look out for each other. Partners have each others' backs. And while he could have felt so much contempt for Him, all he wanted his partner to do was find Him and live
Happily
Ever
After.
"It's not that simple, Mark… I can't just leave and run back to D.C."
"Why not? You are not a whole person without that man."
"Because…"
"Why not Dana?"
"I don't know why not!" she started to cry. She didn't want to cry in front of Mark, she never had before. The true truth was, though, that she didn't know why she didn't just leave. Mulder knew she didn't know also.
Mark-with-the-broken-nose kneeled down in front of Scully and let her cry on his shoulder. Her cries made him want to cry. For all the evil in the world. He had never known what Life (or the lack of one) could do to someone so subtly. He had never known what the fates and the gods of love planned when they were not shooting their movie. He had never known that he could care so much for the woman that shut him and everybody else out of her life.
For the first time in their over-one-year partnership, Mark Sloveny scratched the surface of Dana Scully's Life.
And now he was pushing her away.
"You need to go, Dana," he whispered into her hair as he felt her cries start to subside.
"What if he won't take me back?" she asked with all the fear in the world. Why would Mulder take her back? She had left him not once, but twice.
"He'll take you back, Dana. You just have to promise that you won't run away from him again."
"I don't make promises anymore."
"Maybe it's time to start."
"I couldn't just make such a huge promise right away."
She needed practice.
He stood her up and took her over to the mirror that hung on their office door.
"Promise yourself," Mark-with-the-broken-nose told her, gripping her shoulders.
"What am I supposed to promise myself?"
"Promise yourself that you won't run away from him."
She had to promise that she wouldn't run away from Him.
She had to promise herself.
"Mark--"
"Come on Dana, look at yourself and say it. 'I promise I won't run away from Mulder.'"
She looked at herself in the mirror. Her dulling eyes with the bags, her dulling hair, and her complaining body looked back at her. It had been a long time since she'd really looked in a mirror. She didn't like what she saw. She looked dead.
There was only one thing to do.
"I promise," she started, shakily, "that I won't run away from Mulder."
"Louder, Dana."
"I promise I won't run away from Mulder."
"What?"
"I promise I won't run away from Mulder!" she shouted, smiling. Her entire body opened up, and she leapt into Mark's arms.
"Good job," he said, hugging her back.
"Thank you."
It was the only thing she could manage to get out.
"No, Dana, don't thank me. In fact, I've been meaning to tell you how sorry I am. For everything that happened in Chicago. For things that didn't happen in Chicago. I'm sorry I was so distant from you. I never tried to get close, and yet I thought you were the one preventing us from having a good partner-partner relationship. I'm really sorry."
"Me too."
They were exactly the same.
Their division director found them, in their office, still hugging.
"Was one of you shouting?" he asked, taken back by the sight of Dana-the-dead hugging Mark-with-the-broken-nose.
"Sir," Scully started, pulling away from Mark unlike she pulled away from him in the past, "I would like to ask for a transfer. I want to go back to Washington."
