Title: Struggling
Category: X-Files XRA
Author: Singing Violin (Pearl on Ephemeral/Gossamer)
Rating: K+
Disclaimer: The X-Files characters and universe are not mine.
Summary: What happens after the screen goes black in "My Struggle II"?
Archiving: Anywhere, just let me know.
Chapter Note: I am so sorry this update took so long! RL has been full of surprises...mostly good ones, but all demanding of my time and energy. Big thank you to anyone who is still following!

"I have to go," she managed to mutter sleepily, although the warmth of the covers enveloped her and threatened to pull her back into the land of nod. She wanted desperately to stay right here, like this, indefinitely, in the comfort of a soft bed and under the watchful gaze of her attentive erstwhile partner, regardless of whether or not any or all of it was an illusion. But, she reminded herself, this is exactly why I have to leave; I must escape the allure of temptation. I must escape this reality before it pulls me in.

The ex-partner's face became stricken; a tear slid down his cheek as he vaguely nodded his head. "I understand. I just...it's totally selfish, but I want you to stay."

Her own eyes began to water; his grief seemed so palpable even though she had accepted that he was but an apparition. "I know, and I'm sorry." Then, hopefully, she added, "I'll see you again soon?"

Though it didn't seem possible, his face became even sadder than before, as if he wanted very much to believe something he knew for certain was untrue...which, for Fox Mulder, was quite a rarity. "Yeah," he choked out. "Soon."

He took her hand, and she gave it a gentle squeeze. "We'll be together again," she squeaked out, mostly in order to reassure herself.

He responded only with a sob - the painful sound of one who has lost everything he knew he had, and then something more.

She closed her eyes, and repeated the ridiculous words in her head, embarrassed to speak them aloud. "There's no place like home, there's no place like home, there's no place like home." It occurred to her that she was no longer sure what "home" even meant anymore. The saying was that home was where the heart was, but she'd just left two different "homes," each populated by at least one person who loved her dearly and was completely devoted to her. Yet somehow her heart wasn't in either place, and therefore she couldn't call either home. Was it just a knowledge that they weren't real? Or was it more than that, an inability to accept happiness after all she'd been through? A need for conflict, for pain?

At the thought of pain, she was suddenly in the thick of it: not just any pain, but the nearly unbearable pain she'd almost forgotten.

She felt the sting of needles over her entire body, and the burning of unknown substances being injected under her skin. Hammers pounded inside her skull, acid was eating her from the inside out, cramping her internal organs, and she was simultaneously freezing and on fire. And once more, she was paralyzed, unable to move away from any part of the assault. Tears escaped from under her closed lids, and for a moment, she wished for death.

And then she remembered her mission, her purpose. She needed to live so she could save Mulder.

A Mulder she could hardly remember. One with whom she'd fought, split, and to whom she'd returned reluctantly, hesitantly, and uncertainly. She realized with considerable distress that she had no clue where they stood with each other. Images of the Mulder who painstakingly tended to her every need and cried at the thought of losing her were fresh in her memory. She reminded herself that this was not the real thing; that this Mulder existed only inside her head.

But he'd felt so real.

And so wrong.

And there it was.

She struggled to open her eyes, and a figure swam into her field of view...

For a moment, all she could see was a blur, with an appendage moving rapidly towards her.

Dread bubbled in her chest, but still she could not move, so instead she attempted valiantly just to focus her vision.

Sad eyes. Drawn cheeks. Thin-pressed lips. And a far-too-familiar countenance. Déjà vu as she realized, once more, that it was a familiar hand which held a similar syringe to that which had been used to inject her before, in what she now no longer could reliably identify as dream, reality, or something in between.

She wanted to scream, to refuse, but was completely unable to react, save for the few tears that escaped her eyes and ran down her cheeks into her ears.

She braced herself for impact, but barely felt the needle amidst the sensation of all the others. She thought she saw him mouth the words, "I'm sorry."

She closed her eyes. She couldn't see this, not again.

And then, suddenly, the pain was gone.

She opened her eyes once more.

He was still there, but this time, he spoke aloud to her. "Can you move?"

She tried. First, she wiggled her fingers. They obeyed. Her toes too. With relief, she nodded her head.

"Good," he told her. "We have to get out of here."

Fear overtook her now. Was this really Mulder, or another apparition? She'd had this vision before...and it didn't have a happy ending.

"Now," he added sternly. "I can carry you if..."

"No," she managed to blurt out, then, with difficulty, sat up and swung her legs over the side of the table on which she lay. She slid down to the floor, then gripped the table, her knuckles turning white as her shaky legs threatened to give out on her.

He held out his hand, and she looked askance at it.

"You'll never make it on your own," he assessed. "Let me help."

"Why are you here?" she asked, not yet willing to take his hand. She half expected him to be an alien shape-shifter, though why one of those would be rescuing her, she couldn't fathom. He couldn't possibly be trying to take her somewhere worse than she had just been, for such a place could not possibly exist.

Or could it? She reminded herself that even imagination has its limits.

On the other hand, she didn't seem to have much of a choice. The prospect of staying here, of being reattached to the equipment, tested on, violated...if she had an opportunity to escape, she should. Shouldn't she?

She needed something more. Some piece of evidence that she was doing the right thing, or at least moving in the right direction.

"Who are you?" she asked directly, trying to keep her voice steady.

His face became a mask of utter pain, but just for a moment, as he seemed to realize that it wasn't that she didn't remember her partner, but that she didn't actually believe he was here.

"It's me, Scully," he insisted, his voice cracking slightly as he dropped his hand to his side. Then he reiterated, "We have to go."

"Why?" she asked, standing firm, even though she felt as if she could collapse at any moment.

"You want to stay here, Scully? They'll kill you. He'll kill you." He looked at her: helpless, pleading.

She still didn't buy it. "Why? And who?"

"You know who," Mulder answered quickly. "And you can probably guess why."

"If you're Mulder, then how are you alive?" she asked the man. "Last I saw you, you were dying, and I didn't have the means to save you."

He looked as if he were about to cry. "He did," Mulder explained. "He had a cure, and he offered it to me, and I didn't take it...until he changed the game. Said he was a hopeless romantic, and couldn't let one of us live and the other die. So he took you...and I agreed to take the cure if he wouldn't kill you. I'm sorry. I couldn't let you die."

She almost believed him.

"Please," he begged again. "Come with me. I did this for you."

"You made a deal with the devil," she observed. "You just injected me with God knows what; you probably don't even know what it is, and I'm pretty sure it's not the first time." Then, even though she knew her words would hurt, she enunciated her question clearly so there would be no mistake, "Why should I trust you?"

Though it didn't seem possible, his face contorted with even more pain and regret. "Because you always have, Scully. You told me once that I was the only one you trust."

"Things change," she pointed out, bitterness infusing her speech. "I left you." More than once, she added internally.

She held her breath for a moment, waiting for him to tell her she was out of her mind, that their split had never happened. To reveal once more that what she thought was real was just another illusion.

But he didn't.

"I shouldn't have let you go," he admitted. "I gave up on you, and I'm not going to make that mistake again."

"All right," she conceded, as much because she felt she had no alternatives as because she wanted to believe this Mulder was the real deal, after all the hallucinations that she'd been interacting with of late. "I'll go."

He held out his hand once more, and she took it.