Scarlet

*Author* Jamie Greco

jgreco217@aol.com 

Rating: PG-13

Classification: S, MSR

Spoilers: No

Summary: Mulder attempts to describe his inner feelings and confusing
revelations to Scully after being drugged, despite her reluctance to hear
them.  Skinner also makes a small appearance.

Disclaimer: No infringement is intended.

Archive: Sure, if you let me know where to visit.

Author's notes:  It's a twist on the Mulder is drugged theme, with some
humor and romantic notions thrown in.

I hope if you liked it, you'll let me know or it's quite possible I'll
develop a complex.  Okay, I've already developed one, but still ....
 
 

(I don't know how I've missed this up until this time.  Have I been so
preoccupied, so completely absorbed in my inner world, that this has simply
passed me by?  Or is this a new development that has inexplicably asserted
itself to add a new wrinkle to the mental fitness trial forever taking
place in my mind?  I plead insanity, your honor, I beseech it, I crave it, I
implore it.  Calgon, take me away.)

"Did his tox screen come back yet?"

"We expect it any minute."

"I asked for a rush."

"Agent Scully, we have a great many patients here.  Your partner is simply
one of them."

"My partner has been given a drug of unknown origin and--"

"You are assuming that he was given something.  He might very well have
administered it himself."

"Agent Mulder has been injected with a drug of unknown origin.  We have no
idea what to expect until the tox screen comes back.  He is an FBI
agent..."

(The colors are deeper, more richly painted when she is angry, but they
retain the same hue.  It seems to be an aura, not in the allegorical
sense or even as an analogy.  She has simply attained a halo, and it 
matches her hair.

But they don't just hand out halos.  She must have had it but kept it
concealed.  If she has been an angel this whole time, why hasn't she
attempted to convey this to me?  And do you go to hell for thinking unclean
thoughts about angels?  Maybe I can fall back on the insanity thing.)

"Have someone bring it to me as soon as it comes up from the lab."

"Why don't I just grow another arm so I can make your every wish a
reality?"

(When she sighs, I can see the colors of her mind escaping.  They're
beautiful, as I would have expected if I knew the colors of your mind
transformed into a prism like entities that swirl around and mix with your
aura.  It's breathtaking!  I wonder what colors mine might be.  Probably
ink black and blue.)

"Is something wrong, Mulder?"

"Wrong?"

"Are you having trouble breathing?"

"No.  Do you see anything?"

"I see you...with a fresh set of bruises."

"What color are they?"

"Uhh, kind of red with bluish black overtones."

"Are they beautiful or do they clash?"

"Clash with what?"

(The closer she gets, the more I realize that she has kept a secret from me
all these years; I can see it.  I can see the nuances of shading that
she is hiding from me.  I wonder if I could touch it.)

"What are you doing, Mulder?"

"I'm trying to...I'm just trying to--"

"Just try to stay calm.  Here, hold my hands."

(Oh my god, when she touches me, I can see her colors co-mingling with
my own without being muddied or diluted in any way.  No, her colors are
becoming my colors; they are feeding me.  My fingers are taking on her hues 
like a chameleon, and now my wrists and my elbows.  It's like a miracle.  
Maybe it is a miracle.  If she's an angel, maybe this is her way of showing me. 
Maybe I will simply absorb her truth and her faith and her loyalty.  I know now
that those are her colors.  But still, there's more.)

"Remember, Mulder, before when we talked, I told you that you had been
given some kind of a hallucinogenic?  Do you remember?"

"Scully, do you remember the first time you came into my office?"

"Yes, Mulder, I do."

"Did you have it then?"

"Have what, Mulder?"

"You don't have to hide it any more; I can see it.  It's all around you,
and now I know.  I know the truth, Scully."

"You know the truth."

"Yes."

"Mulder, what are you looking for?"

"Has it reached my chest yet?  My heart?"

"Mulder, I'm sorry, you're not making any sense."

(Her hand on my forehead propels her colors straight into my mind.  When I
close my eyes, it's like a kaleidoscope of everything good and true--wave
after wave of magenta and violet all the way to the palest of yellow, the
almost white.  Each color a feeling; each feeling a hurricane force wave,
taking me under in a delightful drowning.  With my last breaths, I know;
everything I ever wondered about her, I know.  I can't help but wish she
wasn't an angel.  Maybe she's a fallen angel or maybe she'd be willing to
fall...for me.)

"Are angels allowed to date, Scully?"

"I'm sorry, Mulder, I was on the phone.  What did you say?"

"I said...I forgot what I said."

"It's okay, Mulder."

"What's okay?"

"That you forgot."

"Forgot what?"

(I have the feeling when her colors travel through my brain and my muscles
and my oxygen and my blood, I have a feeling when they mix in my heart,
I'll know her secret.  A secret is simply a nuance, something yet unseen but
still there, under the surface of the pools of truths.  When it washes over my
heart, I'll know what it is in her aura that I can't identify.  I'll
just--I'll just...)

"Mulder...you fell asleep."

"What?"

"You fell asleep.  Are you feeling any better?"

"Any better than what?"

"Do you remember where you are?"

"N-no. Am I dead?"

"Mulder, if you're dead, so am I."

"No, Scully, you're an angel."

"An angel, huh?"

"Yeah, I can tell now.  I can see clearly.  It's all falling into place."

"Mulder, do you remember when we talked about the drugs you were given?"

"No. Yes. A little."

"It was kind of a cocktail--sedative, hallucinogen.  Can you tell me who
gave it to you?"

(I like when she sings.  I know she doesn't think she has much of a voice;
but when you add the visuals, it's really quite impressive.)

"Mulder?"

"Hmm?"

"Assistant Director Skinner is here and-- Mulder? He's out again.  He's
been in and out all evening."

"Any ideas on who might have done this and why?"

"Well, sir--"

(If I close my eyes, I can see it better.  I can hear the colors, the
nuances.  Even though she has moved from me physically, I can feel her
surround me, encircling, turning as though to make out union tighter.  I
can feel her pounding through me, vibrating my bones and sinew, and I can 
feel her heat.  She radiates as surely as if she were giving off ashes and
sparks.

Does he know?  Can he feel it?  I can feel his heat.  Skinner. 
Skinner.  I should have known.  She should have told me.)

"I know."

"Pardon me, Agent Mulder?"

"I know what you feel."

"I'm sorry; I'm not--"

"I can see it.  There's scarlet all around you.  I know what you feel for
Scully."

"Agent Mulder, you're not well."

"I can see it all over you.  Scarlet coming out from the top of your head,
splashing around at your feet."

"That's very poetic, Mulder.  What the hell are you talking about?"

"You...and Scully.  I know you want her, love her. I can see it coming
out of your eyes and through your pores, deep scarlet."

"Settle down, Mulder."

"Why didn't you say something?  Why did I have to come here to know? 
Are you in love with him, Scully?  With him?"

"Lay down, Mulder."

"No, Scully!  No!  I need you to say it.  I need to hear it!"

"I wouldn't have thought it possible, Agent Mulder, but you're an even
bigger pain in the ass when you're stoned. Agent Scully, let me know when 
he gets back to normal. Or whatever passes for that with him."

"Yes, sir.  I'm sorry."

"And Agent Scully?  Do me a favor.  If he forgets this incident, please
describe it to him in painful detail."

"Yes, sir."

"What? You're just going to leave now?  You can't face me with the
truth?  Is that it?"

"Shut up and lay back, Mulder."

"He wants you, Scully."

"Okay.  Take a deep breath and lay back."

"Have you been seeing him this whole time?"

"Mulder, I'm not having this discussion with you.  Not now."

"I can take it, Scully."

"Well, I can't."

"So, that's it?  That's what you haven't told me?"

"Mulder, Skinner's right.  You are a bigger pain in the ass when you're
stoned."

"You should have told me."

"Oh, Mulder.  Come on.  When would I have found time to see Skinner? In
bathrooms between flights?  In the middle of the night when I'm not talking
to you on the phone or even sitting next to you in the car?"

"I know you would make time.  I know if you were in love you'd make time."

"That goes to show how wrong you are, Mulder.  Can you just take a few deep
breaths for me?  There. There you go."

(I wonder if she can hear the music her hand makes when it goes over the
hairs on my arm: each and every follicle a new and unbelievably sweet note,
clear and impossibly stirring.  Oh, the colors are back.  If she touched
the hair on my head, I might hear a symphony.  Add the visual, it would be
fucking Fantasia.)

"There, see?  You feel better?"

"Scully?"

"Hmm?"

"Can you hear it?"

"Hear what?"

"Touch...touch my hair.  Maybe you can hear it then."

"Mulder."

"Just...just put your hand on my head."

"There."

"See?"

"Sorry, Mulder."

"Nothing?"

"Sorry."

(I guess I was wrong about the angel scenario. Maybe the idea was a little
far fetched, at least as I define the term.  If she can't hear what sounds
like a symphony of wind chimes, just from the touch of her hand...)

"Scully?"

"Yeah."

"If you were in love with Skinner--"

"Mulder, will you knock it off?"

"---You'd tell me though, right?"

"Yes, Mulder.  You'd be the first to know."

"Because I want to tell you how I feel and I couldn't do that if I knew
that you wanted him like he wants you."

"Oh, brother.  Mulder, this is shaping up to be a lampshade moment."

"A what?"

"You know, you're completely wasted at the office party and you think to
yourself, 'You know what would be really funny?  If I took off all of my
clothes, put this lampshade on my head and danced on top of the Director's
desk.'"

"Was I at this party?"

"Mulder, there was no party."

"But you said---"

"What I'm trying to get across to you is that you have to go back and look
these people in the eye on Monday. You have to work with them.  But
you'd be so mortified it would be nearly impossible to do."

"Where did you even find a lampshade at the bureau?"

"Mulder!  Concentrate on what I'm trying to say to you."

"I'm trying, Scully."

"I'm sorry.  I know you're doing your best you can under the circumstances.
I'm just trying to save you from yourself."

"By dancing naked while I'm not around?  Save me from that kind of
salvation."

"Mulder, I didn't--Okay, let me try a different tact.  If you have feelings
you want to express to me about how you feel about me--"

"Scarlet."

"What?"

"I feel scarlet."

"Okay.  You feel scarlet.  Now you've told me."

"Do you feel scarlet about me?"

"Mulder..."

"Just tell me, Scully."

"Can't we just have this talk when you're not...chemically enhanced?"

"But there won't be a soundtrack then, Scully.  Or colors."

"We could put on a CD and then we could both hear it."

"Would that be better for you?"

"Yes, Mulder."

"What about the colors though?"

"I'll provide colors, Mulder."

"Like...like a kaleidoscope?"

"Like fireworks."

"Promise?"

"Have I ever lied to you, Mulder?"

"Only about the halo."

"What?  Mulder?"

"Is that your secret?"

"Oh, Mulder.  I thought you were asleep."

"Is your secret that you can make fireworks?"

"Yeah, Mulder.  That's my secret."

"And you'll show them to me?"

"If you're sure you want to see them when you're feeling more like
yourself."

"I want to see them."

"Okay."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

"Scarlet."

"Good night, Mulder."
 
 

Thanks for reading.
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Jgreco217@aol.com