From: Jenn

Website: www.geocities.com/muldersmamma

Title: Away

Summary: Some of Mulder’s thoughts/adventure during his absence in S9

Rating: PG

Spoilers: General S8 and early S9 plotlines.

Disclaimer: All characters/spoilers/etc belong to Chris Carter, 1013, and FOX…I don’t own these characters, or any part of The X-Files at all. Which is too bad, because if I did, I would be watching X-Files this Sunday night, rather than the other mindless drivel that is on television these days.

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A dark figure walks down the dimly lit street keeping his head bent, and eyes his to the ground. No one seems to know who he is. No one really cares. This is just one more nameless city he has ventured to, in hope of losing whomever may trace him along the way.

This secret man stays in no one place for very long. A week at most, before he leaves. He has a solitary suitcase and not much else. At this point, he has no name…just a different alias with each person he comes in contact with. New names…a new past, a new future…merely to break any path one may attempt to uncover.

The hardest part for Fox Mulder has become the personal battles within, thinking about what he has done to the woman he loves, and now her child.

As he begins to feel these rush of reflections again, he reaches his hotel, and discretely makes his way up to his room. He glances over at the adjoining door, and is suddenly flooded with memories of hotels just like this one he had spent many nights within. He longs for it to go back to the way it was. He knows this door is locked…there is no one on the other side. He closes his eyes and tries to picture her, to see her. He can still see her face when he really concentrates, but with each passing day, it is harder and harder to see her.

On a fragile moment a few weeks back, he had risked everything and had contacted her through e-mail. He never meant to bare his obvious pain to her…how he is so tired of hiding. It had almost worked…he had been on a late night train, seconds away from a reunion he had dreamed about for months. He had heard the distress over the radio when the train was ordered to continue. His face plastered to the window, he caught a glimpse of her fire red hair, and then her pained face as the vessel sped forward. He wishes so badly that for once, it could work out. That all the running, all the hiding, all the pain and sorry, everything…it would just go away.

Suddenly, his phone rang, startling him out of his thoughts. He never answers his phone anymore…there is no one who knows it’s him, and how to contact him. The hollow tones sound until the person who dialed the wrong number chose to hang up. Tempted, he wants to pick up that phone. He wants to call Scully, he craves to hear her voice. His better judgment reaches him, and he falls asleep once again, alone.

*~*~*~*~*~

The next morning, Mulder realizes that it’s time to move on…he has been in the same hotel for three days. Someone may recognize or become suspicious of his presence. This is the worst part. Knowing he is just going to get up and run farther and farther away. Soon, he will run out of places to go.

He packs his lone bag, and checks out. As he leaves behind the umpteenth trashy motel, he ponders where his next stop would be…should be. He hails a cab and travels to the airport…not yet sure of where exactly he is going.

He waits around the terminals for a while, before he notices yet another one of the Internet cafes. He sees a red-haired woman at one of the workspaces. His heart jumps in his chest, until the woman turns around. Her face is starkly unfamiliar. He realizes yet again, he is manifesting his wishes into reality.

Everywhere he journeys recently, he sees infants. He begins to long for his son. He wants so bad to get back with her and to just be a family. That’s all he wants.

He tears himself from the urge to e-mail her again, and looks up towards the departing flights. His eyes glance down the list as he crosses off each destination in his mind. Places he’s already been, towns too close to DC, residences where the people who wanted him dead live. Near the end of the list, a New Mexico flight catches his eye. He sighs as he stands in line the ticket line, and keeps his eyes averted once again to the floor, so not to catch the attention of any one of the vast numbers of people that circulate around him.

He boards the plane uneasily, and takes his place at the window seat. A middle-aged woman sits down beside him before long. He pulls down the bill of his cap and crosses his arms, as if to sleep, so the woman would not attempt to engage in any conversation with him. Minutes into the trip, he drifts off, into a dreamland that seemed to lack from his unconscious lately.

*~*~*~*~*

The plane abruptly landed, and Mulder looks out the window, seeing not what he expects to see. They are not in New Mexico. He recognizes the DC airport like none other. How many times had he flown in like this? There is no mistake.

"Why have we landed here? We should be in Albuquerque. What’s going on?" Mulder looks around to all of the passengers around him. No one answers, they sit like frozen stones.

"There was re-routing. Bad weather. Please take your seat." A crimson-haired flight attendant suddenly stands before him.

"Why here? When there are so many other places to land?"

"Take your seat. It makes sense in its own way."

He looks at her strangely, knowing her response doesn’t make any sense. He tries to decipher her words. She turns abruptly and walks away from him. Suddenly, the door beside him releases, and he proceeds to push it open.

He walks from the plane, through the airport, forgetting about his luggage. He ventures into the streets, where instead of hailing a cab, he walks. He doesn’t turn his head away as he walks this time. Around him, people are faceless. He shakes his head, trying to get these blurred visions to disappear from his head. When he looks around again to the individuals around him, they have no eyes, no lips, and no noses. Featureless beings walk all around him, carrying about their lives like there is nothing wrong.

Miles away from Georgetown, he trudges on, unsure if he should be here, if he should go and do what he wanted more than anything else in the world. Scully would take him in, protect him, and they could hide together. Nine years since they had met each other, and Mulder now understood his purpose for living.

The miles disappear behind Mulder as he finds himself at her door before he has a chance to think about what he is about to do. He knocks twice and waits.

His heart is beating in his throat, his breath is short and tight. He suddenly wishes he was somewhere else. There is still time for him to turn back.

He hears the locks turn from the other side, and suddenly Scully is standing there before him. As beautiful as ever. Her soft red hair, piercing blue eyes, and milky skin are now mere inches from him. Overwhelming joy and comfort rush within Mulder and he realizes how much he truly has needed her.

"Oh my god…" Scully’s tear-stained face tells him that she has longed for him as much as he has for her. "I can’t believe it’s really you…" There is no hesitation as she reaches her arms out for him.

His arms touch nothingness as he tries to embrace her. She slowly disappears from view. He faintly hears her voice as she fades away –

"I love you."

*~*~*~*~*

His eyes open slowly. He is confused as he finds his head tilted towards the round airplane window. Outside he sees the desert as the world suddenly comes into focus.

"Ladies and Gentleman, we are within minutes of the New Mexico airport, the air is clear and the temperature is currently…."

Mulder shakes his head and closes his eyes again. He can see her face clearly again. A fresh image of her imprinted into his memory, his reason for running comes back into perspective. To protect her. He must run now, so he can be with her in the future. So they can have a future.

A solitary tear escapes his eye as he relives the moment of seeing her again in his dream.

"I love you too," he whispers to the empty air.

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I actually haven’t written a fanfic in almost a year…so that was a somewhat rusty attempt. I had written the bare bones right after S8, to give you an idea on how I was feeling. Please send feedback, good or bad to [email protected]. Thank-you! And keep the X-Files fanfic coming…we can’t let it die! The X-Files will never die if we keep it alive.

--Jenn