Title: The Truth May Hurt Author: spookycc Rating: Possibly PG, nothing more than the ep. Classification: Fill-in-the-blanks for DeadAlive, Doggett POV. Scully!Angst, Doggett!Angst. DF -- *Doggett Friendly* Character Death. Character Life. Summary: Doggett finds what he was looking for. And loses what matters most. Spoilers: Specifically, for "DeadAlive". To be safe, for S8 so far. Disclaimer: No characters, human or canine, are mine. And no dogs were harmed in the making of this fanfic. :)~ Feedback welcomed at spookycc@earthlink.net Dedication: As ever, to Doggett's Bitch (f/k/a "Fox's Vixen" :). My soulmate, always. And for girlassassin, most loyal fan, and great friend. No beta-reader was used. All typos are my own. **** Raleigh, North Carolina I stand, marking a silent vigil well behind my partner, as a priest intones his final words. Everything within me pushes me toward her, yet I do not move. She stands with Skinner, and her mother, whom I've just met. I stand near Kersh. How much does *that* say? The service ended, the small group of mourners disbands. Waiting in line with the rest to speak to Scully, I want to be the one who stands *by* her in this moment - in every moment. Instead, I wait my turn like the rest of the people on the outside of her life, looking in. Skinner steps away, and Scully spends a few moments in quiet conversation with her mother. Mrs. Scully seems deeply affected by Mulder's death. She must have known him well. Or maybe she just knows what his passing has done to her daughter... Scully allows me an all-too-brief hug, and then motions toward her mom. "Can you make sure she gets back to my apartment ok?" I nod. "Sure. No problem." I escort Mrs. Scully to my car, and open the passenger door for her. While she numbly buckles her seatbelt, I stand at the open door. I look over the top of the car to the gravesite, where Scully and Skinner still stand. I see Scully bend down toward the grave for a moment, and then she leans into Skinner, her head against his chest. I know she is crying. I've felt the strength of her emotions myself. And this emotion she feels now is beyond words. "Agent Doggett?" Mrs. Scully's voice brings me back to reality. She follows my gaze with her own, and lowers her head as I close her door. We drive mostly in silence, making small talk, avoiding the painful issues we both have on our minds right now... *** Some Hours Later We stand at the door of Agent Scully's apartment. Once more I look over at the woman beside me. I see the same strength I see in her daughter. And I can't help myself, I *have* to ask the question. "Mrs. Scully - were your daughter and Fox Mulder..." She smiles a bit. "Lovers?" I nod. "I don't know," she answers honestly. "They might have been. But it's more than that. They "touched" each other somehow. They were - connected. I can't explain it, except to say that they shared a bond that was stronger than marriage - stronger than mere love for one's lover." My head is lowered, until Mrs. Scully lightly touches me on the sleeve. I raise my eyes to meet hers. I'm sure they betray the sadness that overwhelms me, at Mulder's passing, and at the knowledge of what he truly meant to Scully. Her hand still resting on my arm, Mrs. Scully smiles. The same smile I see so rarely grace her daughter's face. "Dana has spoken of you, Agent Doggett. I know you care about her. She cares for you, as well." I lower my gaze once more, uncomfortable, yet wanting more than anything for her to continue talking. She does. "No one else could ever be what Fox was to Dana," she chooses her words carefully, it seems to me. "A relationship like that - we're lucky to have *one* of those in a lifetime. Many people won't ever even have *one*." I fight the tears that well behind my eyelids. I *thought* that Scully had special feelings for Mulder. But this goes even beyond what I feared. "Agent Doggett-" Her voice pulls my attention upward, and I look at her, as she wishes. "Whatever she and Fox had will be with her always. But that doesn't mean she doesn't need someone. Here, and now." I nod, just a bit. "Please. Take care of her?" She wipes a single tear from her cheek. "Always." **** Three months later I walk into Kersh's office with more than a little worry. My dealings with him have never been very positive. He surprises me, then, by handing me a copy of a letter of commendation, and a recommendation for a promotion. I defer any congratulations to Skinner, who sits with me on the business side of Kersh's desk. Skinner interrupts. "Deputy Director Kersh spoke to me at length before you came up. He thanked me and asked me to write you a letter, too. Officially transferring you off the X-Files to a division more suited to your talents." Well, that would be, like, *any* division, right? I am instantly wary, and I flash a glance toward Kersh. "Man of my word, Agent Doggett," Kersh says. How dumb does he think I am? Does he think I can't see what he's *really* trying to do? "Thank you for your support, sir." I can't keep the smile from my face. "But, all things being equal, I'd like to give any transfer some thought." "Fish while they're bitin', John." Kersh's voice is my cue to exit the room. I head down to our office. Agent Scully is pulling files from one of the cabinets. I pause to look at her, as I often have recently. Impending motherhood seems to suit her. She looks more contented than I've ever seen her before. I decide I won't bring up the meeting I just came from. "Hey, good mornin', Agent Scully. How're you feelin' today?" Scully turns to face me. "I'm fine. How are you feeling?" "Me? Good. But then, I don't have a little J. Edgar to lug around." She graces me with the smallest of smiles. Then she brings up my meeting with Kersh. Skinner told her about it. "Well, whatever he told you, I'm still gonna be here, to drive you crazy with questions, and nagging doubt." I smile a bit myself. "You'd be crazy to stay, Agent Doggett." Then call me crazy. I've been called worse, for less reason. She continues. "This is a huge career opportunity for you." Agent Scully is a bright woman. Surely she knows why this is comin' down. "It's not my career he's got in mind," I assure her. "What do you mean?" So she *hasn't* reasoned it out, then. I'm a bit surprised. I nod again to her ever-expanding belly. "In six weeks, you go on maternity leave. Kersh transfers me out, guess what? He gets to lock that door over there for good." Scully regards me seriously. "You don't owe me anything, Agent Doggett." She couldn't be more wrong. I owe her my life at least twice over. But more than that, I owe her for helping me to see that my career need not be the defining thing *in* my life. Scully taught me to care again. I'd been afraid to do that ever since... Ever since I lost Luke. And his mother. She's re-awakened that need to care - to *be* cared for - and I won't throw thatt away. "They put me down here to find Mulder," I insist. "I found him. So what? We still got an open file on this case. I got big questions." She smiles again, as if at a private joke. "What?" I ask. "I heard the same speech come out of my mouth seven years ago," she informs me. Then she turns serious once more. "Get out while you can, Agent Doggett. Or you may never get out at all." **** The phone rings on my nightstand, jarring me once again from sleep in the middle of the night. What is it about the X-Files and sleep deprivation? It's Skinner. I hope this is better news than the last thing he woke me for. Hell, it *couldn't* be worse. He fills me in about what he's found out, tells me about Billy Miles. I don't know the name right off, but, well, it *is* like 2 o'clock in the morning. When Skinner mentions that Billy Miles is from Oregon, I remember the name from Mulder and Scully's last case together. Skinner fills me in on the rest of what has happened. Billy was dead. Now he's not. I meet Skinner at the Bureau - I park my truck and he picks me up in his fleet sedan. I voice my main concern immediately. "Have you told Agent Scully any of what you told me?" He shakes his head. "No." "My strong recommendation, Sir. Don't." I watch his face for any reaction one way or the other. I see none. "This thing pans out or not, you're gonna re-open wounds that still need a lotta healin'. Not to mention the fact that she's had a difficult pregnancy. You know that as well as anybody." "I appreciate your concern, Agent Doggett, but I wouldn't have told her anyway," he assures me. "Certainly not where we're going," he adds, uncomfortably. "Where *are* we going?" I ask. He gives me a worried look and doesn't answer for a moment. When he does speak, I wish to hell he hadn't. We drive to Raleigh, North Carolina. To Mulder's grave. I can't hide my disgust as I slam the car door shut. "I'll say it again - we're openin' up more than a grave here." "I respect that, Agent Doggett. But, under the circumstances, I think *not* digging it up would be far more regrettable, don't you?" "No! I think this is insanity!" How can I make Skinner see how *wrong* this is? Scully is *finally* almost able to look toward the future instead of the past, just a bit, and now we're digging up Mulder. What does he hope to accomplish? "Yeah, well, personally, I couldn't live with the doubt," Skinner asserts. "That what? That we buried a man alive?" My voice is louder. I don't give a damn. "We *found* Mulder, you and me together! We saw the same body. Mulder wasn't just "dead" - he'd been dead for days! We had to have a closed casket. Fer cryin' out loud, the body was too far gone, and that was three months ago." Skinner takes my verbal abuse in stride. "The kid they pulled from the ocean - Billy Miles. From the extensive tissue neccrosis, they think he could have been in the water for *months*." He goes on to explain that even having the doctor notice the sudden life signs was a fluke. I stand by the backhoe, shaking my head. "I don't believe it. I don't believe I'm even standin' here." When we arrive at the morgue, there is a media circus waiting for us. I send them all outside. Damned ambulance-chasers. This is a private matter. I lean over to Skinner as we stand by the coffin. "I'll say it again - insanity." The coroner and his assistant open the top of the casket. Mulder looks - three months more dead than when we buried him. **** Hours later, I stand beside a doctor in a hospital room. *Mulder's* hospital room. He tries to explain that Mulder is both alive and dead. I walk out into the hall - and see Agent Scully trying to push her way past AD Skinner. She sees me immediately, and walks slowly toward me. She looks - anxious, eager, worried... "What did they say?" I sigh sadly. That gives her my answer. She moves closer. "I *need* to see him." My eyes meet hers, lock there. "I know. But I wish you wouldn't." She walks past me, of course, toward his room. I shoot AD Skinner an angry look. He had no right to bring her here, expose her to this, until we know for sure what will happen. **** Kersh summons me to his office again. It's just a little over an hour before sunrise. I don't know when I last slept. He wants to be sure I'm seriously considering his offer. I'm not, but I tell him I'm still thinking about it. Then he gets to the reason he brought me here. The "Mulder" case. He wants me to drop it. "Drop it," I repeat in disbelief. He recites the Bureau stance - if it looks bad, it's bad for the FBI. I don't tell him I have no intention of dropping the case. He lowers his tone, a little menacingly. "I'm throwing you a rope. Don't go and hang yourself with it, now." I keep my look direct, serious. I'd like to laugh in his face. If he thinks all that crap still matters to me anymore... **** I head back to the hospital, and find Scully at Mulder's bedside. She looks like she belongs there, somehow. But she looks lost... "You can't do this to yourself." I tell her. "You asked me not to come in here, Agent Doggett. I hope you're not asking me to leave." I lower my gaze, then meet her eyes. "My concern's for your well-being, Agent Scully. That's all it's ever for." She looks a bit surprised at my statement. That hurts, more than a little. I continue anyway. "I felt this was a bad idea from the start. I told the Assistant Director so. Worrying about the affect it might have on you." "You mean finding Mulder alive?" "I know you came in here with the doctors. I'm sure you must've asked them what his chances are." Scully stands and faces me. "Agent Doggett, however I felt about you when we first met, you changed my opinion. With the quality of your character and of your work. Now I am thankful to know you and I am thankful for your concern. But no matter what Mulder's chances are, the choice not to open up that grave was wrong. And not because of me personally, but as my partner on the X-Files." I feel chastised, yet at the same time hurt by her reaction to what I did. I only did it to prevent *her* pain. I wasn't lying. That's what it's about. "Now the truth may hurt, but it's all that matters," she continues. "What truth?" "About what caused this." We're interupted by the call nurse, who says, simply, "You've gotta come quickly. It's Billy Miles." It is Billy Miles. In the hallway, naked. And he looks... normal again. Scully bundles him in a blanket, and sits him in a chair in his room. She asks if he remembers anything. "I remember water. And I remember being on the ship." "You were found by a fishing boat," I interject. Billy looks at me with a strange expression on his face. "That's not what you mean, is it, Billy?" Scully asks him. "You mean - a space craft." I can't even hide my disbelief. I don't even try. Billy says he understands now. The aliens are here to save us. Jeezus... "Well that's great news," the sarcasm drips from my voice. "I'll let you two talk." Of course Scully follows me out into the hall. How can she believe this shit? "Agent Doggett, where are you going?" "Back to the real world, why?" I turn to face her. She closes the distance between us. Well, the *physical* distance, anyway. "You just won't believe it, will you? Not even for a minute. Not even with it staring you right in the face." "Is that so important to you? What I believe or don't believe?" Scully's face has an unreadable look. If I had to guess, I'd say she's surprised, but yes, it *is* important to her. I continue. "I'm really not up to this assignment anyway. As you so gently put it." I can understand that it *is* a mystery. But I *can't* see why she keeps deluding herself with all this alien nonsense. Her voice hardens. "I underestimated you, Agent Doggett. I thought this was just simple resistance to extreme possibilities. When in fact you're just downright bullheaded." I push her further. "Do *you* believe it, Agent Scully? I mean that stuff he said about aliens comin' to save the world." She has no answer. How can she expect me to believe it when *she* really doesn't? I wish I could erase the self-satisfied smile I wear as I leave her. I didn't mean to make this any harder for her than it already is. I have to help somehow. I know I'm grasping at straws, but I find my car headed for the penitentiary where the man who calls himself "Absalom" now lives. Even if I don't believe *how* he does what he does, the people he says he healed *were* healed. I ask for his help... Back at the hospital. Heading for Mulder's room, I pass a man in the hallway. As he leaves, I turn and gaze after him. I should know him. I know his face. From the X-Files? I see Scully coming out of another door, and meet her in the hallway. She thinks I want to argue, but I only want to share what I've learned with her. As it turns out, we kinda argue anyway. She thinks Billy Miles is an alien. I tell her what Absalom said, that if he hadn't healed the people that were returned, they would have become aliens themselves. I don't believe that for a minute. But this could be *some* sort of virus, I guess... Scully sets off to arrange for an operating room. When I ask why, she tells me about a vaccine for the virus that Skinner is supposed to be getting for her. I head back to Mulder's room, where I saw Skinner before. Just before I get there, the door is shut, and locked from the inside. I bang on the door, let him know who it is, but there is no response. Then I hear the alarms. The alarms that mean the monitoring equipment is disconnected. I kick the door in and stop dead in my tracks. Skinner is unhooking Mulder's life support equipment. "What the hell are you doin'?" "You don't understand-" Skinner starts. "You're killin' him!" I grab him by the shoulders and pin him against the wall. He doesn't even resist. "I had no choice," he states simply. "He wanted me to kill Scully's baby." "Who?" I'm in way over my head now. "Alex Krycek. For the vaccine." Alarm bells sound within me - *that's* who I saw in the hallway. I've seen his photo in Mulder's files. Hell, I've seen his photo in the FBI former staff database. Skinner continues. "It's the only way he'd give it to me. I couldn't trust him. And I couldn't do that to her." "Where is he?" **** I enter the hospital's enclosed parking garage slowly, gun drawn. As I walk through the first level, a car somewhere ahead of me starts - I aim my gun at it, but it's floored in reverse, and I have to jump out of the way to avoid being crushed between vehicles. I land hard, and my gun skitters harmlessly, at least ten feet away. Krycek throws the car into a forward gear and takes off. No time to get the gun - I catch up with the vehicle, and force my way into the driver's side window. "Stop the car!" Krycek and I battle for control, both landing a few punches, the car careening wildly all over the damn place. He connects with a pretty solid left and I'm almost thrown all the way back out. I see cars in my peripheral vision, and he aims straight for them - he's gonna try to knock me off the car. I hang on as long as I can, and then bail right before he hits the first car. I roll over as I hear his car screech around the corner, and just catch a glimpse as it heads off. I roll over onto my back, trying to catch my breath. Damn. My ribs hurt, my head hurts. Hell, my whole body hurts. And then I hear the car coming back. Krycek gets out of the car. He holds up a vial, and tells me what it is. He doesn't even need to do that. I *know* what it is. I pull myself to my feet and walk toward him steadily. Before I can get within forty feet, he drops the vial. It shatters on the pavement, spilling the vaccine. I run as best I can, trying to stop him. Maybe there's more - maybe he has another vial. Maybe I'm just kidding myself - but I have to try. Krycek jumps back in the car and is gone before I can get there. I'm left standing in the shards of glass, and the liquid that could have saved Mulder's life... I storm back into the hospital, and my look tells Skinner that I didn't get the vaccine. I don't think Skinner was wrong. Krycek wasn't to be trusted. I meet Scully in the doorway of the operating room. It looks like she might be able to treat Mulder without the vaccine, with some anti-virals. She speaks like she's had experience in that area before. Skinner saved Mulder by pulling him from life support. If I'd gotten there soon enough to stop him... My cell phone pulls me away from Scully, and I find myself in Kersh's office again. Not for any commendation this time, I'm pretty sure. Kersh looks straight at me. "It's gonna be awful crowded down in that X-Files office." I almost smile. He thinks he's punishing me. He slips his glasses on. "Maybe you didn't hear me. I said you're on the wrong floor." "Yes *Sir*." I leave him there, thinking he's won. I head back to the hospital. I should have just stayed there. I stop off at the O.R. unit, and the ward clerk lets me know Mulder's back in his room. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but I hurry there... I open the door, just a bit. Scully's head lays on Mulder's chest. Tears trace her cheeks, but her expression is happy. She looks up as I hesitate in the doorway... Mulder is awake. Alive and awake. And she is there with him. Suddenly I feel it. This is where *they* belong. Not where *I* belong. I close the door and leave them together. Biting hard on my lip, I force back the tears that threaten to spill from my tired eyes. Finding Mulder was her sole reason for existence. I was willing to move heaven and earth trying to make that happen. I found Mulder. But it means I have lost forever what I never really had... ~fini~ Author's notes: The last few lines are really from Doggett's Bitch, simply with tense changed to make them fit. poor Jawn...