Title: Beltane Fire Author: prufrock's love Keywords: Hum... Well, maybe MSR, maybe Mulder/Other and DAL. Always sexual tension. A little Angst, maybe RST. Nobody dies or gets hurt, but one little kid pees his pants. Not a post-ep, or even really a missing scene. Maybe a pre-ep for Requiem? Maybe? Summary: Mulder has a very, very good dream. Or does he? Rating: NC-17. Spoilers: Through all things. Interesting background for Requiem, but doesn't spoil it. Distribution: link to: http://www.geocities.com/prufrocks_love/beltane.txt Disclaimer: Not mine; don't sue. Author's notes: Find the references game: Lovecraft, Jung, & a sprinkle of Wordsworth. "Mad Arab" is a Lovecraft reference and not intended as a cultural stereotype. Beltane Fire by prufrock's love "The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far." -H. P. Lovecraft ******* A heartbeat ago, I was standing innocently, fully dressed, in the huge circle of Neolithic stones thinking about my grad school days and the long flight home and all of a sudden I'm totally naked in front of my partner. I knew I should have stopped with Stonehenge. Scully is sitting with her feet tucked underneath her and her eyes closed, as though she were worshiping at the altar of some false god. She's also nude, the grass brushing against her bare lower legs as she gently sways, the sunlight playing off her hair. We're still in the circle of stones, but all the neo- pagans tourists searching for Arthur and Camelot have vanished. It's just Scully, bare skin, perfect breasts, and soft grass in the warm sunshine. It's very clear where this dream is going to go. It's this kind of thing that plants highly inappropriate thoughts about my best friend in my subconscious, especially when her shirt is a little thin and the Hoover building air conditioner is working overtime. Or when we're alone in my dim office late at night and she hasn't showered since early morning and I can smell her... It doesn't take much to get me started and it usually just sneaks up on me, like this morning. I can't spend almost every single day in close proximity to a beautiful woman and not expect her to invade my dreams, however embarrassing it may be. However firmly I file her as "friend -" mostly because I've gotten nowhere in my pitiful pursuit of anything else - she's still breathtaking. Especially because she doesn't know it. And since my sex dream apparently features the Avebury circles, Spring fertility rites, and my unattainable partner, instead of the top of my desk and a bimbo or two, I guess I should officially declare myself an intellectual. That's a nice way of saying a socially dysfunctional misfit that someone gave an FBI badge and a degree from Oxford. Maybe that's why it's always Dream-Scully instead of Real-Scully. The innkeeper and his wife had indulged me with one last tour of the Red Lion Pub before I checked out, since I was still hoping to catch a glimpse of Florrie or Beth, their resident ghosts, emerging from the well. No Florrie, no Beth, but good coffee, stories, and company. Instead of getting into my rental car and driving directly to Heathrow, where I needed to be at half-past eleven, I decided to make one more round among the stones of Avebury as the sun rose for old time's sake. The history of this area had fascinated me when I was in grad school and I wanted to be able to say I'd accomplished something on this trip down memory lane besides buying an ugly hat and not seeing a ghost. No crop circles, Scully. No Phoebe, either, in case anyone was wondering. Just lots of British damp and Oxford reminiscence and watching the seconds tick by until I could get on the plane to go home. I was marveling at how many couples must have lain here in the last six thousand years – among the triangular female and conical male stones stretching south, and the few remaining giants forming sacred circles around me - when my clothes and the other early-bird tourists vanished, and Goddess-Scully appeared on her knees, inviting me into the lower world of the instincts. I always imagined joining those Beltane rituals. Scully and I may not get any spring babies, but we'll have a damn good time trying. And she makes one hell of a white lady. Whoooh-hah. I wonder where I am right now - where I fell asleep. I just hope I made my flight and I'm currently drooling on the little pillow they give you in coach class. I'm sure I did - I'll just relax and enjoy my dream and hope I don't make any noises that disturb the flight attendants. Please, please do not let me wake up and be jerking off in the middle of a historical landmark in front of a bunch of unshaven women wearing hemp, clogs, and braids. Anyway - I'm naked, she's naked... What -is that- in my head? It's like someone turned the bass way up on a car stereo and put the speakers inside my brain. "Make love to her. Make love to her. Make love to her." Not even telling me in words - it's like it's a primordial instinct gibbering at me. I am man, she is woman; inside her now. Make babies! Yes, that's kinda what I had in mind, except for the babies part. Someone should tell my midbrain that I don't need directions at this point in my life - not unless they're really graphic. Turn the volume the hell down! The non-explicit commentary fades to background noise and I resume my sex dream. Say it with me: whoooh-hah. What - no head? Scully is on her knees in front of me and she's just going to sit there? Okay, so it's a -romantic- dream. Fine. Maybe romance is better - smut is always a little embarrassing when Scully walks into the office the next morning, totally unaware of what Dream- Scully was doing to me with chocolate sauce the night before. I kneel facing her and take her hand, feeling her skin soft and smooth under my palm. How bizarre that I'm having a dream about making love to an infertile woman where ancient couples used to hold fertility rituals. It makes me feel a part of the infinite reservoir of mysteries, part of the vestigial myths. And it makes me horny as hell. Scully moves toward me as I guide her, but she doesn't react in any other way. I pull her against me and her head falls back, inviting a kiss. Or more. As I taste test a neck, two freckled shoulders, a face, and two sweet earlobes, I'm amazed at how real she feels to me. I can taste her makeup, I can smell her shampoo. There's a small mole on her right shoulder and on her upper lip and I can feel the fine, transparent hair on her neck brushing my lips. Her heart is beating fast - I can feel the pulse in her neck. She had coffee with just cream recently - there is still the hint of Starbuck's Arabica on her tongue. Romantic dream or no, I'm ready. Pretty much, Scully needs to show up, be breathing, willing, and reasonably clean and I'm ready. In the live action version, I know better than to spend thirty seconds kissing on a woman and expect her to hop into bed, but this isn't live action. My Dream-Scully is always ready. It's my Real-Scully that gives me pause. I'm thinking too much. Scully. Naked. Breasts. Sex. Scully follows my lead, silent and compliant. My alter-ego, an insecure sixteen-year-old boy, finds Silent, Compliant-Scully very nice. Panting, Moaning-Scully is nicer. Let's see - what shall it be? What shall it be? I love it when she doesn't second guess me. Since I have Compliant-Scully this morning, let's start out with doggie-style in a nod to the ceremonial surroundings my imagination has conjured up. If we're supposed to be the two virgins sacrificed to the fertility gods, it's about twenty-three years too late, at least on my part. Scully stays still as I move behind her, gently stroking her hips as I push her down on her hands. This dream features her tattoo, although that shows up in most of my dreams of her. I linger behind her for a second, enjoying the view and anticipating. I can imagine making love to Scully in real life - in a big bed with soft sheets and candlelight, but I could never ask her to do this. It's just not... her. Yea - like you'll ever work up the nerve to have sex with Scully in real life, Mulder. Only took you seven years to kiss her. Maybe in another seven, you can make it to second base and really screw up your friendship. I am still thinking entirely too much for a dream. Fast or slow? Penetrate fast or slow, I debate as I guide her legs apart, barely having to touch her to get her to move. Slow. Very slow so I can savor that tightness. Make the pleasure-pain of that first thrust last as long as possible. Scully doesn't pull away as I try to penetrate, but I stop, disappointed. As good as the pressure feels, it's not the damp, inviting depths I'd imagined. She's not ready - not even a little wet. I want ready - I want wanted. Christ, my father always told me I could fuck up a wet dream. Never had it happen before, but there's always a first. It would, or course, happen with Scully. Not a problem - I don't mind a little prep time. I roll her easily onto her back and move down on her, my knees popping in protest at the hard earth. I dimly register that old age is invading my dreams before I'm lost in the taste of her. All women taste slightly different, but Scully tastes exactly like I thought she would. I must have penetrated further and harder than I thought, because there's also a tiny tinge of coppery blood on my tongue, which I find inexplicably arousing in an embarrassing, caveman way. She's a taste I want more of. The rhythm of her breathing quickens along with the throbbing in my groin and the accompanying radio in my head ordering me inside her. Her body softens, readies, and I move one hand up to her abdomen, letting her accustom herself to my touch, while my other hand moves down to pacify myself for a moment. I'm about half a step from losing all rational thought when my left hand finds an irregularity in its journey to her right breast. I raise my head, lips still parted, to examine. Maybe it's a new spot to kiss. A scar. A slightly raised, faded scar. A gunshot wound. Scully never has scars in my dreams. Even with my memory, that just doesn't happen. Could this be real? With that radio blaring a porno soundtrack in my head, I can't think straight. Scully is just laying back, eyes closed, waiting for me, and being no help at all. Where would her other scars be? I check the back of her neck and find the small, straight scar where the chip was reimplanted. Looking down, I find the scar on my own thigh and the one on my chest where she shot me. This is real. This isn't a dream. Of course it's a dream, Mulder. I'm three thousand miles away from Scully right now, probably dozing in my rental car and about to miss my flight. I'm seeing reality because I'm looking for the reality. If I thought Scully painted her toenails red, I'd see that too. I check - no red toenails. Clear polish; very Scullyish. Maybe it's like my dream about Diana when Cancerman decided to play Frankenstein with my head. Those dreams were almost this vivid, and I didn't hesitate to have sex with Diana then. No more brain surgery, please. Being psychic isn't all it's cracked up to be. Maybe it had something to do with the ley lines and the stones. This is an ancient religious site - maybe I've slipped into the space between the space the rest of the world knows. Maybe the white noises in my head are echoes from every other couple that laid here before us. Before me. Scully's in DC. At this point in my life, I don't really question perception versus reality. As long as my dry cleaning doesn't get lost and McDonald's doesn't change their numbering on their valu-meals, I assume I'm still in the correct dimension. Anyway, this is a dream. Scully would laugh until she peed her pants if she knew I not only had dirty dreams about her, but that I stopped to analyze them. But what if it's not? What if this really is Scully laying in the grass in front of me, serene and primal? Waiting. But not consenting. The bass is still blasting inside my head, telling me how wonderful making love to her would feel. How our bodies are made to fit together perfectly, which I doubt. Her breasts rise and fall as she breathes, inviting my hands and lips. Beckoning. What if we'd been abducted? But why do this? Scully couldn't get pregnant. If all They wanted was semen from me, They didn't need Scully to get it. Why not another woman that I wouldn't question? Was she just here to pacify me? Was she some sort of clone created as a sick playmate for their new specimen? I feel like Conan the fuckin Barbarian. Did I step on any mushrooms? I don't want to get digested again. Maybe the plan was to get me to rape her. Nothing else has succeeded in coming between us, but I think rape would do it. Maybe Scully is completely conscious and just not able to indicate that she doesn't want this. I remember how awful that felt - laying there while people spoke to me, touched me, and prodded me, assuming I was an unfeeling veggie. She looks so small in front of me, a few pieces of grass clinging to her hair and her head turned to one side as she waits. One of her legs is still bent up and I see dark red, damp curls between her legs. "Ready," the stereo inside my brain wails. Ready. Now. No way in hell I'm doing this; you can stop with your not-so- subliminal messages, whoever you are. One glance at Scully's narrow hips and my engorged and very impatient dick cements my decision. No way I'm hurting her - and I would. I probably already did when I tried to penetrate the first time. I roll away from her and the mental radio goes from blasting to insane, echoing off the rocks like a boomerang so no matter which way I turn my head, there's no escape. I can't stand this! God - get out of MY HEAD! YOU'RE DRIVING ME CRAZY! I face away from Scully, just in case she's aware of what's happening, and begin to take matters into my own hands - literally. After that, They can mutter all they want underneath their little psychic breaths and get nothing for about the next five to fifteen minutes - depending. No amount of Alien mental phone sex is going to override the biology of an almost-forty year-old human male. I'm lost in the ritual I perfected out of necessity almost three decades ago when I feel a small, cool hand on my arm and hear a low voice - outside my ear, this time. "Make love to me." "Is this a dream, Scully?" I ask as I turn back to her, noticing bonfires around us. I get a seductive smile and an affirmative nod as she pulls me to her, eyes closing again as I lower her back into the soft grass. There are other couples now in the fields around us, each man and woman only one tiny cell in the human soul running through us. Dream. Good dream. Once I surrender - to the voices and to the Old Ones and the ley lines - past, present, and future merge. I feel fingers in my hair and the smoothness of her thighs, then warm immersion spreading throughout my body. The voices are right - we're perfect together as long as I go slow. Wonderfully, agonizingly, maddingly, slow. Her lips against the base of my neck don't speak their usual dream-dialogue, saying things I can't imagine ever coming from Scully's mouth when I'm awake; they only breathe, faster and faster as I move. No acrobatics, just delicate arms around me, fingernails lightly grazing my back and buttocks, and legs around my waist, opening and inviting. Nothing men and women haven't been sharing inside this ring of stones and the shadows of the bonfires since the beginning of time. Or before. I feel her orgasm gather, hear gasps, and I lose any half- formulated poetic thoughts. The precious release courses over me, out of me, and I say her name - just once before the stars come crashing down on us, pushing us beyond good and evil and into ecstasy and freedom. "Scully." I doubt that was intelligible - more of a breath than a word. When the heavens recede, I roll us over, still joined, so I can wrap myself around her the way she accepted me. "My Scully," I say again, trying to tell her how much I care for her, the grass cool under my back. "Scully, I -" "Sir?" I feel a hand with fingernails like talons digging into my shoulders. "Sir, are you okay? You're having a bad dream." Trust me, whoever you are, it's not a bad dream. It's a very, very good dream - now go away so I can enjoy it. The creative mind plays with the object it loves. Loves? "Sir!" Too late. I'm awake. I can feel my heart slowing to a normal rhythm. Shit. I unwillingly peek through a layer of eye boogers and discover I made my flight. I just had a wet dream somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean while sitting beside a squally preschooler with a runny nose. I bet his name is "Jeffrey." They're all named "Jeffrey." All obnoxious kids sitting near me on planes are destined to be named "Jeffrey." If parents would just choose another name, coach class would be a lot quieter. Shit. At least someone covered me with the little blue blanket, so the entire eighth row didn't just get a clear view of me coming in my pants. I did, to - I feel my penis shrinking and the damp stickiness I'm going to have to live with until we land. Shit. Maybe not - I have a change of boxers in my carry-on bag, providing I didn't check it. Once my legs stop shaking, I start searching the overhead compartments and get lucky on the second try. Throwing one final glare at "Jeffrey," I escape to the miniature bathroom for a contortion act. Six feet of me was not meant to get off boots and jeans in an airplane washroom, but I'd rather not have doughnut glaze dried all over me - including on my face. How did I manage to get it on my face? Yuck. I smell pussy. I smell Scully, to be more specific. My clothes are inside out. My boxers, my t-shirt, my socks. Only my jacket and jeans are on right-side-out, and my boots are laced oddly. I have to remind myself to breathe as I lean against the little sink. It really happened. I somehow just managed to have sex with Scully. I can smell her on my skin. It really did happen. Breathe. I splash water on my face and check to see if I look like an abductee - however one would look. I can see myself from above, standing alone again in the rolling fields as a single dark point within my soul forms a shadow to devour my body. The bonfires are still burning and I can hear the archaic voices bouncing off the sarsen stones. I can't make out the words, only the primal intent. Scully is laying in the grass where I left her, her face and chest still sweaty and flushed from orgasm. Scully raises her head and a hand to me, inviting me to cover her again. When I blink, I'm staring at my own flushed face again in the mirror of the Virgin Airlines lavatory. It really happened. I finally force my body into motion again after eons pass. I start not to wash, in case Scully wants to press rape charges, then laugh at myself in the warped mirror. How do you press rape charges against a man that was an ocean away? Besides, she consented. I may not have a best friend when I get home, but she consented. I don't think I'm entirely rational right this second. My mind is a little clouded by postcoital bliss and post-abduction terror. I wipe off and change clothes as best as I can, noticing I still have light red scratch marks on my back from her fingernails. Not actual breaks in the skin, just slightly raised lines as though someone drew her nails across my back as she came only a few minutes ago, leaving marks that will fade within the hour. I pull my shirt down hurriedly when my self-examination is interrupted by "Jeffery's" father, telling me it's a potty emergency. Making my way through the cramped aisle to my assigned seat, another thought occurs to me, making me want to turn and head back to the bathroom to puke. Maybe Scully didn't really consent. Maybe it was mind control or the chip in her neck or Avebury or some sort of black magic or - God - something. Mulder, get a grip. Just for once, use Occum's Razor. Be rational. And BREATHE!. I'm on a plane, thousands of feet in the air - I obviously did not just rape my partner. I must have had sex with some woman, because I can smell her on me. I probably picked up a woman with pheromones or perfume similar to Scully's. Afterwards, I got dressed in a hurry in the dark, returned my rental car, made my flight - probably still drunk, and sobered up in my assigned seat, safely buckled in, to an erotic dream about Scully. Chill out and hope you didn't catch any interesting diseases, idiot. I remember the innkeeper urging me to sample the specialty beers late last night - all five of them - and then I thought I went to my room and crawled into bed. Alone. Obviously, I did not. Shit. I can't believe I did that. I must have had sex with a total stranger. Unless I met up with Phoebe. Oh, God, please don't let it have been Phoebe. Anyone but her. A vampire, a sheep, even an effeminate man, but not Phoebe. I'm going to have to go wash again. Actually, maybe Phoebe would be better than a man. I think I'm pretty safe, though - it takes a woman to produce the taste in my mouth and what's in the stubble on my face. I only had a few beers at the pub last night - actually, early this morning, and that was just to be polite. That's not nearly enough to make me black out unless they were laced with something or I drank more and don't remember. Maybe a fugue state? I've certainly had enough blows to the head. How am I going to get Scully to run a CT scan and a tox screen without telling her I just screwed a stranger? I feel a wet play-doh clump of guilt swelling in my stomach. The last woman, in real life, was that vampire years ago and Scully doesn't know about her. I don't know why I feel the need to be faithful to Scully, but I do. And I just cheated. And I don't even know with whom or why. I'm fighting the urge to call Scully on the air-phone when "Jeffery" and his daddy reappear from the bathroom, minus Jeffery's pants. You too, huh, kid? Please, whoever the woman was, don't let her get pregnant. There are condoms in my carry-on bag which I dutifully replace yearly, just like Men's Health says, since I never actually use them. I can't smell the spermicide on my hands, so I pull the bag out from under my feet and check the inside compartment - all three are still there. Jeffery looks with me and nods knowingly. Sex- ed must start young. IDIOT! IDIOT! IDIOT! I could have just caught HIV, or herpes, or syphilis, or whatever - it's quite a list. There are diseaseees they don't even have names for yet. I could end up sending half my salary to some woman I don't even remember for the next eighteen years. I don't want kids with a stranger, I want them with Scully. Where the hell did that thought come from? "Never force a man into his feeling when he is an intellectual. He controls it with an iron fist because it is very dangerous," a British accent says blandly in the base of my skull. Stop thinking, Mulder. Just shut your brain down for a while. "There is no birth of consciousness without pain," the old professor drones, oblivious that his lecture had ended fifteen years ago. SHUT the FUCK UP and let me THINK! I'm going to give Oxford their damn diploma back and take up reading Weird Tales comic books instead. I could do without Jungian enlightenment right now, thank you. Sometimes, I wish my memory came with an off switch. Or a rewind and do-over button. I actually sit on my hands to keep from grabbing that phone to confess and I am surprised when the pilot announces we're about to land in DC. I can't have been awake for more than ten minutes. I glance at my watch, but it's stopped. Breathe, Mulder. Oh well, one more trip overseas without being bombed by some mad Arab with a death wish for mankind or both engines falling off the plane courtesy of a mechanic poking coke up his nose while he's supposed to be checking the plane. I either just had ritualistic sex with the specter of my partner or cheap, unprotected sex with a stranger, but at least I didn't die in a fiery ball. Things were looking up. Shit. The man in customs sniffs me closely and grins knowingly, which sends me into the Dulles men's room to scrub again. Digging out my tickets in my search for my car keys, I notice the one for the return trip isn't torn - it's like I never used it and just appeared on the plane. No, I can't even think that. Occum's Razor, Mulder. It's just an oversight. By the time I get to my apartment, I've formulated a plan: lie. "That is not dead which can eternal lie." That doesn't fit, exactly, but it's close enough and suits my I-think-I-just-stood- on-the-bridge-between-two-worlds mood. I believe my favorite boyhood author's father died of syphilis, which makes it even more appropriate. I still can't convince myself it was all a dream, but unless Scully brings it up or I can tell something has changed between us, I'm not telling her my tale. If some woman shows up in nine months with a little bundle of obligation and paternity papers, we'll talk then. If I have any more blackouts or it starts to burn when I pee, I'll go to my regular doctor like I'm supposed to instead of showing up at Scully's door. I can't face telling Scully about this. I seem to always be failing her. After I shower and scrub off a few layers of skin, I have the overwhelming urge to see Scully in the waking world - just in case. She actually finds me outside the hospital and she's absolutely glowing, like someone lit her internal flame. She's going on and on about having an affair with a married man and healing him psychically. And Buddha - she's big on Buddha. Maybe I'm not the only one that needs to have my head checked out. Scully doesn't say a word about any astro-projectile, Neolithic, fertility god sex - consenting or otherwise, although she tells me something about kneeling in a Buddhist temple at about the same time I was in Avebury. I feel the play-doh drying in my belly. It was just a vivid dream - Scully's memory is entirely different from mine and she doesn't say anything about splendor in the grass or my sexual prowess. I just stumbled into her dream and somehow stumbled back out without anyone getting hurt. Weird, but harmless unless I've contracted a social disease or gotten myself a new tax deduction. I'm not sure if I'm glad or not. That it didn't happen, I mean. With Scully, I mean. Late in the night, we're having a deep conversation on my couch about fate and choices. About what leads us down our path in life. That man is neither the oldest nor the last of the Earth's masters - at least not as far as I'm concerned. I'm pontificating when I realize Scully is sound asleep, looking as serene and primal as she did in my dream. I want to kiss her, to feel my lips on hers again, but the Old Ones have other plans. I just cover her with a throw and let her sleep, wondering if she dreams of me. I seem to be in love with you, Scully. That's what my anima floated to the surface to tell me this morning. Not that panting, schoolboy crush I had for so long, but something I've never quite felt before. It's forever, I think. The Earth mutters it into my consciousness as I look at you - this is the woman I should be with. Is and always will be, like the Ones that built that circle of stones. I peel off my clothes and slip nude under my blankets, hoping I'll have another dream about her or that her dreams will send her to me and we'll meet again in the space in between. I bet I can find Scully in the collective unconscious with my eyes closed. I check for the condoms in the top drawer of my nightstand - like fairies might have stolen them while I was away - and leave the drawer slightly open fooor easy access. Always the optimist, Mulder. As Morpheus takes me, I'm sure I feel a small woman crawling into bed beside me, serene and primal. But maybe it's just a dream. Man does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. -Carl Jung End: Beltane Fires