Disclaimer: I do not own the X Files

The Woman from his Dreams

William woke up to the sound of monitors beeping steadily. He turned his head and saw two cots. In the one nearest him lay the man he had come to understand was his father, Fox Mulder. The man looked much better than when William had last seen him. There was color to his face and he appeared to be just resting.

It worked! William thought excitedly.

He was happy till he looked to the bed on the other side of the room. There lay his mother who was hooked up to a variety of machines. She was not breathing by herself and looked to be very sick again. It didn't make sense to him. Last time he saw her she had been doing better but now here she was looking just as sick as before.

William started to look around for his birth mother but she wasn't in the room. He moved slowly to get up. The stiches on his shoulder hurt as he moved to get up but he couldn't just lie there and do nothing. He walked over to his mom and looked at her face. It was pale and covered in legions. Her chest rose and fell with the respirator.
William felt tears coming into his eyes but shook his head to stop them from falling. He needed to find Dr. Scully.

He moved slowly out of the room taking it easy, as he was still pretty light headed. He could hear people talking down the hall and when he entered the large space at the end he saw the crowd that had been there the last time he came through. The one difference was that instead of being a crowd of sick and dying people they were all mostly confused. He could see more of the sick coming through the door as more of the healthy left. He assumed that the healthy ones had gotten the cure. There had to be many more places besides D.C. that had been hit.

His mind drifted to his home town and a bubble of worry lodged itself in his stomach. He stopped those thoughts, though, because he did not have time. He spotted a nurse and asked for Dr. Scully. The man pointed him down the hall to the lab where William had been earlier.

He entered to see his birth mother standing over a counter with many different scientific instruments in front of her. She seemed to be running multiple tests at once and also appeared stressed out by her current task.

"Dr. Scully?" He said softly not wanting to startle her from her focus.

"William." She said turning and smiling. She moved across the room toward him quickly.

She took his face in her hands and began giving him a look over. She examined his stiches and said, "You should not be out of bed. How are you feeling?"
Her hands moved to his shoulders.

His eyes began to fill with tears again before he could answer and he leaned forward into her arms.

At first Scully was stiff and unprepared but she recovered quickly and held on to her son as if for dear life. She repeated the silent prayer she had been praying since she discovered that Leah was getting worse, God don't take her from him.

"Shhhhh. It's ok." She ran her hand over his hair kissing the top of his head. He had light brown hair with a slight red tint, the exact shade of her brother Charlie's hair.

"She looks sick again! But other people seem fine! What is going on?" He asked through sobs. He, like any teenage boy, did not relish the thought of crying in front of anyone but standing with the woman he had seen in his dreams was too much. For months she had seemed real to him but as soon as he was awake she would be gone. Now that everything had slowed down he realized that she was real. She was actually standing there in front of him.

The fact that his mom looked near death plus all of that and the pain he was in made William unable to stop crying.

"I am working on finding out the reason now. William I will do anything possible to save your mom I promise. Right now we just have her on a lot of medicines to keep her going."

"How long does she have?" He looked up into her eyes and Scully was once again struck by how eerily similar his eyes were to Mulder's. She debated on how honest she should be with him but as she looked at him she knew he would want the full truth. Just like his birth parents he expected full honesty, even if it was painful.

"A few hours." She said looking back at him sadly.

"What can I do?"

"You can go sit by her side. Talk to her. When people are trying to hold on to life like that they can hear you and they need to hear you so that they fight to live. I have seen amazing things happen when a person is motivated to live."

William nodded and Scully led him out the door with her arm around his shoulders. She walked him to the room and moved a chair near Leah's bed.

She looked to Mulder who lay sleeping but looking much better.

In the past hours she had grown desperate. She needed to ask him something and he was not going to like it. She went to his bedside and put her hand to his forehead which was no longer covered in sweat. She moved her hand back into his hair and repeated the action a couple more times till he opened his eyes.

He squinted against the light but when his eyes landed on her they lit up.

"Scully." He said softly. He began to try to sit up.

"Whoa, no Mulder don't move you are still healing." Scully said gently pushing him back to lay down.

Mulder took in the room. He looked behind Scully to see William sitting on the other side of Leah's bed. He clutched Scully's hand and looked up into her face with a silent question. The silent question.

She nodded and smiled at him.

"Give him a moment. I'll explain everything but I have some questions." Mulder waited for her to continue but his eyes were continually leaving her face to look at their son who was in his own world talking to his mother.

"Mulder, you went to see the Smoking Man." It was a statement rather than a question. Mulder just nodded to her slightly worried about her wrath.

"Where did you find him?" Her question floored him. He looked up at her puzzled.

"Why?" He asked.

"I need to talk to him."

"No. Absolutely not." Mulder said and began again to try to sit up.

"Mulder stop moving. I need to find him and I can find out where he is from you or I can wait till Agent Miller returns and ask him but then I will just be losing time. I need to ask him how to save William's mother."

Mulder turned and put together the pieces. He had been so distracted by seeing his son that he had hardly noticed the woman in the cot. She was close to death, Mulder could tell, but he was not going to tell Scully where to find the man who had caused all of this.

"Scully you can't go to him. He wouldn't help anyways he is just as twisted as always. If not more so."

"Mulder I do not have a lot of other options here. I have been told he knows how all of this has come about which means he can save her."

"You have been told?"

Scully sighed again picturing her old friend who had turned against them, "That is a long story for another time. Please Mulder you can tell me or not but I am going to find him."

"Then I'm going with you."

"No."

"Then I won't tell you how to find him. If he is even still there. He could be long gone by now. Off to some secret paradise away from all of us mere mortals."

Scully dropped his hand and kissed his forehead and began to leave.

"Scully! No wait!" Mulder started to get out of bed. By this time William was watching the interaction and began to get up as well. Scully turned to see this and sighed.

Like father, like son. Scully thought as she shook her head.

Scully looked exasperated and tired and stormed over to Mulder pulling him back into bed with minimal strength.

"You are not strong enough to go anywhere."

"Then bring Miller with you."

Scully thought for a moment and realized that Mulder would not give up until she said yes.

"Fine."