DISCLAIMER: Mulder and Scully and the search for the truth all belong to Chris Carter and Co. I'm just borrowing them. I promise to return them in no worse condition than Chris would. SUMMARY: "He remembered it in flashes... Sitting so close. It was hard not to bury his face in her hair." TITLE: FLASHES AUTHOR: Rowan Darkstar (rowan_d1@yahoo.com) RATING: NC-17 CLASSIFICATIONS: Post-ep, Angst, MSR ARCHIVE: Just let me know. WEBSITE: http://rowan_d.tripod.com/ TIMELINE: Post-episode story to "Endgame". AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story was written for the Virtual Season of Smut, Season Two, Episode "Endgame". Special thanks to Kudra for the speed beta! :) FLASHES by Rowan Darkstar (rowan_d1@yahoo.com) Copyright (c) 2005 He remembered it in flashes. Close together and logical at first, farther apart and jumbled later on. He was never quite sure whether to blame the phenomenon on his weakened health, the drugs he was still downing, or the pure rarity of the sequence of events; his mind could not process a reality so near to dreams. This couldn't be Scully... But he remembered everything that mattered. **FLASH** He found it in the moment she caught her breath. Not in the beautiful smiles that welcomed him back to the land of the living. Not in the soft skin of her hands in the dry arctic air as she twined her fingers through his, hovering at his hospital bedside. Not in the multiple glimpses he caught down the front of her sweater when she lowered herself to the chair by his bed. But in the simple intake of breath when he clasped her wrist and caught her off guard. He had been out of the hospital for 24 hours. Their flight for Washington wasn’t scheduled to leave until the next morning. She had gotten him a room just two doors down from the motel room she'd been staying in for the duration of his convalescence. She'd taken her own leave time. Said it was a nice break for her. A chance to catch up on things. She'd somehow brought her laptop along. He wasn't sure sitting alone in a cheap motel in the snow with a laptop could possibly be a nice break, but he had never pretended to fully understand Scully. He had never pretended he wasn't afraid to ask. **FLASH** The sun had vanished into the cold night long ago. She had lingered in his motel room just a bit longer than usual. Making sure he had everything he needed for the night. Trying to fix the bad reception on his TV. Checking his vitals and taking away the phone when he tried to order a pizza with everything on it. Her own wounds were nearly healed. At least the ones he could see. Even when she brushed back her hair, the cut on her forehead was barely visible. She was doing nothing more extraordinary than tucking a second water bottle into the ice bucket on the motel table when he stepped up beside her (he couldn't stand to be sitting or lying any longer, too much time in that black hole of a hospital) and he stopped her menial task with a hand on her wrist. He was caught off guard when she reacted to his touch with something like fear. And the hoarse gasp for breath was the most intimate sound he had heard from her lips. "I’m sorry." His apology was reflexive. He didn't know what he was sorry for. He only knew she'd been hurt. And it needed to be fixed. **FLASH** He could see her shoulders hitch higher, the tendons in her neck pull taut. She shook her head at his apology. But she side- stepped away. "I just wanted the second bottle right now. Not too cold, ya know? I'm still...a little cold." He was speaking, but his words were asking something wholly different than the surface syntax would imply. She was looking at him, wide blue eyes peering into him like a laser-light gathering information. She nodded distractedly, maybe answering what he had said, maybe hearing what he was asking. **FLASH** Sitting side by side on the motel room bed. Shoulders almost touching. Almost really talking. "I just...I knew it wasn't you, Mulder, before he... But, when I opened the door and I let him in and I thought..." The soft light reflected off the thick coating of tears in her eyes and Mulder held his breath and tried to forget the last time *only time* he had seen Scully cry. Scully sniffed and cradled her hands in her lap. "He threw me through a glass table," she said simply. "Oh, Jesus, Scully. I'm sorry...I had no idea you were--" But she shook her head. Just a single motion--enough to silence him. "No. I'm fine. I mean...I didn't have any serious injuries." "Then...." He hesitated for a long moment, and the dull hum of the muted television seemed to bloom in the silence. He smoothed a cautious hand up and down her upper arm. Her muscles were rigid beneath her soft sweater. "...what is it?" Scully stared down at her hands, interlaced her fingers and slowly stroked one thumb down the length of the other. "I opened the door. I opened my trust to you--and I got assaulted and violated and hurt. And I know that none of that had anything to do with you. I know that. I *know* that. But it feels..." She shook her head and trailed into silence. Scully smelled like herbal shampoo and whatever perfume she wore and the cheap laundry detergent they always bought at vending machines on the road. Sitting so close. It was hard not to bury his face in her hair. "I want to trust you, again," she whispered at last, her words more breath than voice. The tremor in her voice turned his thoughts to action. **FLASH** "Look at me," Mulder said, hands cradling Scully's face as he turned his body to face her. He angled her chin until she was forced to meet his gaze. Her blue eyes were achingly open, looking to him for something he hoped he could give. "I would never hurt you. Do you hear me, Scully? My hands would never hurt you." Emotion hung thick in his voice. Because he was at the far edge of the earth. And Scully was all he had ever had. She couldn't be afraid of him. Scully remained there, inches from him, breathing heavily. And with every moment he grew more aware of how close her body lay. The sound of her breath, the scent of her hair, her skin. The texture of her eyelids, the dusting of freckles across her breastbone. The rise and fall of her breasts, so close they brushed his arms with each breath. And as always, she didn't move away. **FLASH** His lips were on hers. His lips were on Scully's. Scully's. And he didn't want to be taking advantage of her when she was hurting, *aching*. But there was more here than a passing need for comfort; he felt it, and for once he wanted to be the one to give *her* what she needed. She tasted better than he had ever imagined. "Please, Mulder. I want to trust your hands again." *Oh, God. Scully...* **FLASH** His hands on her back. Her skin hot to the touch. He couldn't decide if she was too warm or he was still too cool, but the contrast flared the fire in his groin. Her sweater was gone, and Scully's breasts were displayed before him, encased in nothing but a thin lace bra. There was gooseflesh where the air caressed her skin. "Where did he hurt you?" he whispered. The faulty TV reception flickered shadows across her pale skin and softened the hard edges of the stark motel room. Scully took his hand and smoothed his palm over her bare shoulder. She closed her eyes. She was trusting his touch to heal. No one had asked that of him before. His mouth was back on hers before he could breathe. **FLASH** Beneath the covers. The town was so far north, the only high class item the motel room could not be without was a thick, heavy comforter. He was buried beneath the warmth with Scully. Red hair and moist lips, white skin and freckles, moving above him in the gentle light. Her hair was still tied back, but half of it had fallen like an elegant shawl around her face. He had come to the end of the earth thinking he had lost everything, that he had nothing left to give. And he had found out no matter how far he ran, he was never alone. He pulled his salvation down tight to his chest, and she held on with equal desperation. Her fingers grasped a fistful of his hair, and the heat between her legs burned into his stomach. *Scully...* **FLASH** "Oh, God, Mulder. Please. I can't...wait... Please..." Her voice was hoarse and throaty and pleading and Dana Scully with a sex flush was everything on Earth he ever fantasized it could be. **FLASH** On her stomach beneath him, head to one side and arm across her face, grasping at her own irresistibly disheveled hair, her other hand snaking up to find a finger hold on the edge of the mattress. He pushed the hair off the back of her neck and hunched down to press his lips to the tender flesh. "I'm sorry, Scully. I would never hurt you. We're safe now. We're safe." She held her eyes tight closed and seemed beyond words as his hips pressed into her ass again and again, reaching his length up inside her, finding the place long-neglected that seemed to almost make her cry. **FLASH** She ran her fingers through his hair, massaging his scalp. She moved her hands over the muscles of his shoulders and he could almost believe she had imagined this moment as many times as he. Her legs were twined with his and he was cradled between her thighs. And for the first time in too long, he felt like he was worthy of being with someone so rare. He couldn't remember the reasons this moment might be wrong. He and Scully had existed in a world outside the ordinary rules for so long...they were making their own way through the darkness tonight. **FLASH** Face to face in the first instant of the afterglow, he had fallen beside her and expected her to collapse in the wake of the rush same as he. But there was still an urgency in her eyes and she was clinging to the moment. Fresh tears blurred her clear blue eyes and she reached out a hand to cup his face, holding his gaze tight to her own. "You traded me for Samantha," she breathed. And her voice rose from somewhere too deep to touch. This was it. He had given her his all. There was nothing left to hide. He reached out and pushed her hair from her cheek, freed an errant strand from the corner of her flushed lips. "Yes," he said simply. "Why?" He shrugged, pretended to brush it off. "It might not have been her. Wasn't her." "But you didn't know that. You thought it was your sister. After all these years..." He nodded. "Yes. I did." "Mulder..." He offered her the faintest smile. "It was you, Scully." **FLASH** **** rowan_d1@yahoo.com http://rowan_d.tripod.com/