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anjouficThis is one for the X-Filers on my list. I've been going through my bits and pieces of writing that's related to the Speechless series as I'm trying to make sure that I pick up all of the dangling threads in Justice. Occasionally, I find things that surprise me, things I barely remember having written.
This is a fully-written, but un-betaed scene from Respite, the fourth story in the Speechless series. Originally, it was supposed to be the penultimate scene in the story, taking place after Scully is almost taken again. I decided that it was best to leave the story as a kind of cliffhanger. It was never my intention to leave it this long, certainly, but ... there it is. What was supposed to be the ultimate scene has actually been reabsorbed into the working draft of Justice, but for this little scene, there will be no place so I thought I might as well give it a home here.
If you read it, you'll see why I left it out -- the tone is totally wrong for the ending of the story. In the first draft of the story, I was going to spend a little more on establishing the character of Caleb Lester, who is Mulder's childhood friend and lawyer. However, I ended up using Caleb (and his great-grandfather Jacob) in Aquinnah, so I dropped them in Respite, other than to mention them. In the original draft, Caleb is married to a woman named Elizabeth and they have three children. Mulder, Caleb and Elizabeth all grew up together on Martha's Vineyard, where Caleb and Elizabeth still live, and where Mulder and Scully have gone for their bit of Respite.
EDIT: In the bright light of morning, I've decided that I'm wrong. This was supposed to have been an alternative opening for the story, not the penultimate scene. Still, I see why I discarded it.
*~* *~*
Aquinnah
June 28, 1999
The peaceful hum of nature around her -- the buzzing of the insects, the ubiquitous bird song, the murmur of the afternoon breeze as it ran its invisible hands over the rustling trees above her -- all of these things were momentarily obscured by the shrieking joy of the children running after Mulder. She could hear their urgent instructions to each other as they tried to trap him, his soft chuckle just barely discernible above their excited chatter. She was smiling before she turned her head on the hammock pillow, raising a hand to shield her sleepy eyes from the sunlight streaming through the leaves.
Mulder was disheveled and flushed from the exertion. His comically loud Hawaiian shirt was unbuttoned nearly to the waist and wrenched to the side by his activity, showing off the tan he had effortlessly acquired over the past few days. Christopher, the youngest son of his childhood friend Caleb Lester, was riding him with the simian grace of toddlerhood, astride Mulder's back with his arms around Mulder's neck in a choking embrace. He was laughing at his sisters' vain attempts to unseat him from his throne, cackling whenever Mulder would evade them. For his part, Mulder was doing what he did best -- teasing -- although this time it was not her, but Christopher's sisters Hannah and Elaine that were his targets. He would drop a shoulder so the girls could almost touch their brother, then scuttle sideways like a crab, out of the reach of their grasping hands.
"Get him! Get him!" Elaine was breathlessly ordering her bigger sister, leaping from the lawn in kinetic bursts. She was only tall enough to reach Mulder's hip and whenever he lowered Chris near her she leapt ineffectively to capture her brother. Hannah, older and wiser at six, understood that half of the fun in the game was the pursuit. She feinted at Christopher, tickling his soft belly whenever she could.
In retaliation, Mulder launched a tickle attack on Hannah and she fell into a curled-up, giggling ball on the lawn. While she was distracted, he swept her shrieking sister up under his arm like a football and ran across the green expanse of lawn toward Scully, dramatically moaning "Sanctuary, sanctuary."
Scully braced herself for the impact. "Don't tip me over, Mulder," she ordered in her mock-stern voice.
"Wouldn't dream of it," Mulder choked out as he tripped over a trailing lace from the ancient pair of moccasins that he'd insisted on wearing all week. He pulled himself away from the brink of disaster, managing to drop to his knees just short of her shady perch as he plopped an upside down Elaine upside next to her in the hammock. He tipped forward so she could loosen Christopher's death grip from his neck. When she peeled the toddler's hands away, they left tiny white impressions on the tanned skin of Mulder's neck.
Mulder settled onto his knees next to the hammock, resting his head on Scully's stomach as the children wiggled and giggled. From behind him, he could hear Hannah's mock irate shriek as her father crept up on her and continued Mulder's tickle attack.
"Boys against the girls?" Scully asked affectionately. She smoothed the damp hair away from Mulder's brow and looked at him with amusement.
"What else?" He reached up and traced the line of Scully's nose with the tip of his finger. It was pink at the end and he tapped it.
"Again?" she asked.
He nodded. He was smiling at her softly, his eyes full of love and the promise of what would come when they were alone later.
She struggled to keep her eyebrow in a straight line at the implication but failed. She touched the corner of his mouth as his smile grew from it, curving from one side to the other, her own small smile an acknowledgment of their silent conversation.
Elaine was watching them curiously.
"I'm glad we did this," Mulder said softly. "We needed this so much."
His words burst the small bubble of contentment that she had been floating in. She nodded, but couldn't stop the involuntary response. Her hand rose from his face and began to travel to the back of her neck.
Mulder shook his head and pulled her hand away from its goal.
"No," he said, firmly. "Don't do that. It's going to be fine, Scully." His hazel eyes were grimly determined and he held her gaze until she nodded, seeming to assent. He kissed her hand, nodding back to acknowledge that they were dropping the subject. Neither of them was willing to discuss that topic in front of their audience.
"What's wrong?" Elaine asked in a worried tone. Her face was wrinkled in concern.
"My nose is sunburned," Scully lied, breaking Mulder's intense gaze to look at the little girl. She pulled the scrunchy out of Elaine's messy black hair and smoothed it efficiently back into a ponytail.
Elaine was staring at Scully suspiciously. "Your nose is always sunburned," she announced with the casual bluntness of three-year-olds everywhere. She had not been distracted in the least by Scully's attempt to change the subject.
Scully snorted and then turned her head. "Mulder," she purred.
At her sugar-filled tone, he picked his head up warily from where he had lain it back down on her belly.
"If this is boys against the girls, what makes you think you can claim my hammock as sanctuary?"
His eyes fell on the sweating, lime-green water pistol that she had hidden underneath The Journal of Forensic Science just before she leveled it and shot him right between them.
Elaine squealed in delighted shock at this unexpected turn of events; Mulder picked up her babbling brother and shoved the hammock hard. As the hammock rocked, Scully snatched Elaine up just before they were both dumped onto the ground unceremoniously. However, she still managed to get off another shot and hit Mulder in the seat, wetting the right cheek of his khaki shorts. He made a satisfyingly high-pitched yipping sound as he disappeared into the trees at the edge of the lawn, protecting Christopher from the stream of water.
"Now, you're going to get it!" Elaine announced triumphantly to her father just before Scully shot him in the back.
"Did you put ice cubes in that thing?" Caleb asked, clutching at his sodden shirt. Hannah used the opportunity to escape her father and scrambled over to hide behind Scully.
Scully waggled her eyebrows at him. "I don't have to tell," she said sweetly. "You're not on my side." She shot him mercilessly as Caleb fled for the cover of trees.
"Get them!" Elaine shrieked imperiously from her hip. "Get Daddy!"
"All right, girls," Scully said in her most professional tone, placing Elaine on the ground. "Just let me re-load." She unearthed her bottle of water from underneath the upended pile of journals. Enough of the ice had melted in the hot sun for her to be able to fill her pistol up to the brim. She stood up straight and blew the hair out of her eyes. "Follow me," she said, and the girls marched fearlessly into the green woods to take their prisoners.
~*~
So. You see. Very silly. But enjoyable, at least to me.
Thanks for reading!
This is a fully-written, but un-betaed scene from Respite, the fourth story in the Speechless series. Originally, it was supposed to be the penultimate scene in the story, taking place after Scully is almost taken again. I decided that it was best to leave the story as a kind of cliffhanger. It was never my intention to leave it this long, certainly, but ... there it is. What was supposed to be the ultimate scene has actually been reabsorbed into the working draft of Justice, but for this little scene, there will be no place so I thought I might as well give it a home here.
If you read it, you'll see why I left it out -- the tone is totally wrong for the ending of the story. In the first draft of the story, I was going to spend a little more on establishing the character of Caleb Lester, who is Mulder's childhood friend and lawyer. However, I ended up using Caleb (and his great-grandfather Jacob) in Aquinnah, so I dropped them in Respite, other than to mention them. In the original draft, Caleb is married to a woman named Elizabeth and they have three children. Mulder, Caleb and Elizabeth all grew up together on Martha's Vineyard, where Caleb and Elizabeth still live, and where Mulder and Scully have gone for their bit of Respite.
EDIT: In the bright light of morning, I've decided that I'm wrong. This was supposed to have been an alternative opening for the story, not the penultimate scene. Still, I see why I discarded it.
*~* *~*
Aquinnah
June 28, 1999
The peaceful hum of nature around her -- the buzzing of the insects, the ubiquitous bird song, the murmur of the afternoon breeze as it ran its invisible hands over the rustling trees above her -- all of these things were momentarily obscured by the shrieking joy of the children running after Mulder. She could hear their urgent instructions to each other as they tried to trap him, his soft chuckle just barely discernible above their excited chatter. She was smiling before she turned her head on the hammock pillow, raising a hand to shield her sleepy eyes from the sunlight streaming through the leaves.
Mulder was disheveled and flushed from the exertion. His comically loud Hawaiian shirt was unbuttoned nearly to the waist and wrenched to the side by his activity, showing off the tan he had effortlessly acquired over the past few days. Christopher, the youngest son of his childhood friend Caleb Lester, was riding him with the simian grace of toddlerhood, astride Mulder's back with his arms around Mulder's neck in a choking embrace. He was laughing at his sisters' vain attempts to unseat him from his throne, cackling whenever Mulder would evade them. For his part, Mulder was doing what he did best -- teasing -- although this time it was not her, but Christopher's sisters Hannah and Elaine that were his targets. He would drop a shoulder so the girls could almost touch their brother, then scuttle sideways like a crab, out of the reach of their grasping hands.
"Get him! Get him!" Elaine was breathlessly ordering her bigger sister, leaping from the lawn in kinetic bursts. She was only tall enough to reach Mulder's hip and whenever he lowered Chris near her she leapt ineffectively to capture her brother. Hannah, older and wiser at six, understood that half of the fun in the game was the pursuit. She feinted at Christopher, tickling his soft belly whenever she could.
In retaliation, Mulder launched a tickle attack on Hannah and she fell into a curled-up, giggling ball on the lawn. While she was distracted, he swept her shrieking sister up under his arm like a football and ran across the green expanse of lawn toward Scully, dramatically moaning "Sanctuary, sanctuary."
Scully braced herself for the impact. "Don't tip me over, Mulder," she ordered in her mock-stern voice.
"Wouldn't dream of it," Mulder choked out as he tripped over a trailing lace from the ancient pair of moccasins that he'd insisted on wearing all week. He pulled himself away from the brink of disaster, managing to drop to his knees just short of her shady perch as he plopped an upside down Elaine upside next to her in the hammock. He tipped forward so she could loosen Christopher's death grip from his neck. When she peeled the toddler's hands away, they left tiny white impressions on the tanned skin of Mulder's neck.
Mulder settled onto his knees next to the hammock, resting his head on Scully's stomach as the children wiggled and giggled. From behind him, he could hear Hannah's mock irate shriek as her father crept up on her and continued Mulder's tickle attack.
"Boys against the girls?" Scully asked affectionately. She smoothed the damp hair away from Mulder's brow and looked at him with amusement.
"What else?" He reached up and traced the line of Scully's nose with the tip of his finger. It was pink at the end and he tapped it.
"Again?" she asked.
He nodded. He was smiling at her softly, his eyes full of love and the promise of what would come when they were alone later.
She struggled to keep her eyebrow in a straight line at the implication but failed. She touched the corner of his mouth as his smile grew from it, curving from one side to the other, her own small smile an acknowledgment of their silent conversation.
Elaine was watching them curiously.
"I'm glad we did this," Mulder said softly. "We needed this so much."
His words burst the small bubble of contentment that she had been floating in. She nodded, but couldn't stop the involuntary response. Her hand rose from his face and began to travel to the back of her neck.
Mulder shook his head and pulled her hand away from its goal.
"No," he said, firmly. "Don't do that. It's going to be fine, Scully." His hazel eyes were grimly determined and he held her gaze until she nodded, seeming to assent. He kissed her hand, nodding back to acknowledge that they were dropping the subject. Neither of them was willing to discuss that topic in front of their audience.
"What's wrong?" Elaine asked in a worried tone. Her face was wrinkled in concern.
"My nose is sunburned," Scully lied, breaking Mulder's intense gaze to look at the little girl. She pulled the scrunchy out of Elaine's messy black hair and smoothed it efficiently back into a ponytail.
Elaine was staring at Scully suspiciously. "Your nose is always sunburned," she announced with the casual bluntness of three-year-olds everywhere. She had not been distracted in the least by Scully's attempt to change the subject.
Scully snorted and then turned her head. "Mulder," she purred.
At her sugar-filled tone, he picked his head up warily from where he had lain it back down on her belly.
"If this is boys against the girls, what makes you think you can claim my hammock as sanctuary?"
His eyes fell on the sweating, lime-green water pistol that she had hidden underneath The Journal of Forensic Science just before she leveled it and shot him right between them.
Elaine squealed in delighted shock at this unexpected turn of events; Mulder picked up her babbling brother and shoved the hammock hard. As the hammock rocked, Scully snatched Elaine up just before they were both dumped onto the ground unceremoniously. However, she still managed to get off another shot and hit Mulder in the seat, wetting the right cheek of his khaki shorts. He made a satisfyingly high-pitched yipping sound as he disappeared into the trees at the edge of the lawn, protecting Christopher from the stream of water.
"Now, you're going to get it!" Elaine announced triumphantly to her father just before Scully shot him in the back.
"Did you put ice cubes in that thing?" Caleb asked, clutching at his sodden shirt. Hannah used the opportunity to escape her father and scrambled over to hide behind Scully.
Scully waggled her eyebrows at him. "I don't have to tell," she said sweetly. "You're not on my side." She shot him mercilessly as Caleb fled for the cover of trees.
"Get them!" Elaine shrieked imperiously from her hip. "Get Daddy!"
"All right, girls," Scully said in her most professional tone, placing Elaine on the ground. "Just let me re-load." She unearthed her bottle of water from underneath the upended pile of journals. Enough of the ice had melted in the hot sun for her to be able to fill her pistol up to the brim. She stood up straight and blew the hair out of her eyes. "Follow me," she said, and the girls marched fearlessly into the green woods to take their prisoners.
~*~
So. You see. Very silly. But enjoyable, at least to me.
Thanks for reading!
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no subject
Date: 2006-03-15 05:09 am (UTC)Mulder's right, they really did need this. Everyone deserves a respite now and again and Mulder and Scully more so than virtually anyone. It's so rare that they get to be normal that in some ironic twist it becomes extraordinary when they are normal people. Plus, the image of Scully with her sunburt nose, green water pistol, and fearless female sidekicks off to win the gender wars was delightful.
Thanks for giving a peek and I'll be checking in to make sure that I don't miss the much anticipated Justice.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-19 08:35 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-15 04:22 pm (UTC):: blows kisses ::
Date: 2006-03-19 08:36 pm (UTC)Hee!
no subject
Date: 2006-03-15 06:53 pm (UTC)I'm also charmed thinking of Scully's deadly accuracy with any sort of pistol, and how very doomed Mulder is. *g*
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Date: 2006-03-19 08:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-19 08:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-19 08:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-17 03:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-19 08:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-17 04:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-03-19 08:38 pm (UTC)