Title: Red Earth
Author: Kudra (kudra_x@yahoo.com)
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer:  These characters aren't mine.  They belong 
to Chris Carter, 1013 & Fox, but they sure are fun to 
play with.
Timeline: "Anasazi" missing scenes
Author's Note: Written for Fandomonium's Virtual Season 
of Smut: Season 2 Challenge
Summary: She wonders why it is that in times of anguish 
we give into the flesh, why we reach for pleasure in the 
midst of pain.

Beta thanks to Elizabeth!



Red Earth

by

Kudra


Farmington, NM
April 16

Blue sky against red, red earth.  There are secrets 
buried here, deep beneath the clay, deep within the 
lines of text that have stared up at her for days, 
mocking, taunting; secrets that only an adept could hope 
to unlock, leaps of faith and logic she fears she is 
incapable of making.  

Her name is in these files, the only three words she can 
decode.  "Dana Katherine Scully" surrounded by mysteries 
and incomprehensible symbols.  She cannot imagine a more 
fitting metaphor for what her life has become.

She parts the curtains and glances out the motel window 
at the red hills in the distance.  They have fled to 
another world here, one of sage smoke and desert heat.  
He is wounded and sedated by her hand, while she is a 
refugee from a disciplinary hearing.  They are surely 
not who they once were---not here---and as she watches 
his breath rise and fall, part of her wishes they could 
forget about coded documents and conspiracies and 
threats to their lives... 

But she's forgotten too much already.

She cannot forget that she made a choice three days ago 
that has tied her fate irrevocably with his. She has 
nothing left to gamble on but hope, and a man whose path 
of thorns has become her own.

****

Georgetown
April 13

He collapses in her arms when she opens the door, his 
full weight jolting her, and the fresh wound on her 
forehead throbs in response.  Her narrow brush with 
death this evening has left her hyper-sensitized, awash 
with nerves and adrenaline, strangely disconnected with 
her usual reality.

She's utterly relieved to see him, and her entire body 
aches for him.  Watching his erratic and confusing 
behavior over the past few days, she's tried hopelessly 
to make sense of it, to fix things for him.  Instead of 
her usual clinical detachment, she feels an instinctive 
urge to nurture, to heal his pain.  

"Fox, my God...you're sick," she says, and she knows 
something must be wrong, because he's allowed her to use 
his first name without protest.

His legs are unsteady, so she urges him to lie down.  He 
looks enormous sprawled on her bed; hot, feverish, and 
covered in the blood of his father, shaking from the 
aftershocks of a mythological tragedy.  

"We gotta find out who killed my father," he mutters.

"Rest.  It's okay," she whispers, stroking his heated 
brow.
"Mulder, I've got to clean you up a little.  If you 
think you can help me get your shirt off, I'll wash it 
for you."

"Need a shower...bath..."

She puts a hand to his warm forehead, and considers that 
cool water might be a good thing to temper his fever.  
"I'm not sure this is a good idea in your condition, but 
do you think you can stand for a little while in the 
shower, Mulder?" she asks.  "I'm not sure you'll fit in 
my bathtub."

"I can handle a shower, Scully," he protests.

She helps him off the bed and to the nearby bathroom.  
"I'll be right outside if you need me."  She hears the 
swish of a shirt being pulled off, a zipper undone, the 
rush of water.  She's not sure why her heart is 
pounding.

A few minutes later, she hears an agonized cry of 
*Scully!* from the bathroom, and she's certain he's 
collapsed.  Thrusting open the door, she doesn't stop to 
think before she parts the shower curtain and steps in.

"Mulder?"

He's crying, head resting on the shower wall.  Water 
drips from his body in pale crimson streams as his 
father's blood washes away.  He turns, reaching for her, 
his face tinged with grief.  The intimacy is 
overwhelming, and she tries to avert her eyes, tries not 
to notice his powerful swimmer's shoulders, his toned 
chest and arms, his...his...exceptional...endowment.  

She's being absurd, irrational.  He's grieving.  This is 
not the time---she should know better---does know 
better.  She forces herself to focus on his pain.

"Are you okay?  Do you need to get out?" she asks.

"He's dead, Scully.  My father's gone.  And I was 
standing over him and all I could think of was you.  
That you could make sense of this, that you could help 
me.  That you were the only one who could."

She's conscious of her racing pulse; her every breath 
seems to grow louder and more rapid.  Is this 
adrenaline?  Empathic grief?  Inappropriate attraction?  
All primal forces that she can't seem to separate right 
now.  

She lost her father last year, and she understands the 
need for physical connection, the need to embrace 
someone, to feel something.  She wonders why it is that 
in times of anguish we give into the flesh, why we reach 
for pleasure in the midst of pain.  

Yet, at the same time, she feels there is something even 
deeper here, something pulsating between them, and its 
intensity frightens her.

"Maybe we should talk about this when you dry off..."

"Just me?" he asks, noting her wet clothes.  "You're 
wet, Agent Scully."

Suddenly aware of her wet attire, she feels ridiculous 
for recklessly jumping into the shower, clothes and all.

"I need to get out, and you need to lie down."

"No, I think you should stay," he says.  "I *need* you 
to stay."  He pulls her to him, covering her mouth with 
his.  "I need contact, Scully, and I think you do, too."

They kiss for an unfathomably long time, splashed by the 
spray of the shower.  Is this comfort or passion?  Right 
now she really doesn't care.  He tugs at her shirt, and 
she peels it off, the wet fabric sticking to her skin.  
His lips wind a moist path down her neck, until he finds 
her breasts, nuzzling and sucking at the tender flesh.  
She moans, a sound as misty as the shower, and her mind 
flickers a warning.

**You're taking advantage of a sick man.**

A sick man with a hard-on.

He pushes her slacks and panties down with one swift 
movement.  His hand quickly slips between her thighs, 
making her jolt.  "You're wet, Agent Scully," he 
whispers in her ear, and her neck erupts in gooseflesh.

He grabs her ass, caressing it and pulling her even 
closer.  He bends his knees, and thrusts gently forward, 
his cock brushing against her opening.  She rises a 
little and guides him, trying to make it a little 
easier.  He shifts downward, trying desperately to find 
the right angle.  She sighs.

"This isn't going to work," she whispers.  "I'm too 
short."

"Or I'm too tall," he says.  "Bed."

A soundless dance to her bed, just steps away.  Not 
bothering with towels, they fall on the quilt, entangled 
in a damp embrace.  He moves above her, his mouth 
teasing her nipples.  She can feel his temperature 
rising again, the cool water having held it at bay only 
so long.  

He's sick, she cautions herself.  He's wracked with 
loss.  He's been erratic and angry and intensely 
paranoid.  

But he's alive.  

He's alive and she is alive, and this is a moment.  Most 
connections we choose to either accept or deny, and 
there's been too much denial in her life of late.  She 
chooses life tonight, and whether adrenaline or lust 
fuels that choice, she'd rather not consider right now.  
Not when he is warm beneath her, blazing like the sun.  
Not when his hands are burning their way down her body, 
searing her flesh.  "God, you're beautiful, Scully," he 
whispers, his words like flames.  When he finally enters 
her, she feels consumed by fire.

He sleeps soundly after this, reduced to a feverish 
haze.  She gets up and wets a cloth for him, and gently 
places it on his forehead.  She watches him sleep for a 
long time before picking up his jeans and reaching into 
the pockets to find his weapon.  

She will find a way to help him, whether or not he 
understands.

****

Farmington, NM
April 16

He wakes, finally, shoulder stiff and aching, sore from 
prolonged sleep.  She's almost giddy to see him whole 
and lucid again.  Still, in the back of her mind, his 
harsh words from two mornings ago echo. *"Don't ask me 
for my trust."*  

She hopes she's done the right thing, hopes he can 
understand.

He stares her up and down.  "You've taken a big risk." 

She returns his gaze.  "I was certain they would have 
killed you, Mulder."

"Thank you for taking care of me," he says, and they 
linger for a moment, eyes locked.  "We've got a lot to 
talk about, Scully."

She looks away, feeling open, exposed.  "Not yet," she 
says softly.  "Listen, my name is in those files.  It's 
not clear, but it has something to do with a test. I 
want you to find out, Mulder. I need you to."

****

She's packed, ready to go east and face the music when 
he calls, a distant voice on a patchy connection.

"...a smallpox vaccination scar... Oh my God, Scully, 
what have they done---"

The call ends abruptly and she swears she can feel a 
burst of heat, yet at the same moment, her blood runs 
cold.  She grabs a scrap of paper from the desk before 
rushing to her car and racing to Albert Hosteen's 
address.

She finds no one in the smoking boxcar.  Her heart 
pounding, she calls his name to the wind. 

Albert Hosteen is holding a cloth to his wounded head 
when she bursts into his home.

"Mr. Hosteen," she pleads, "can you tell me where Mulder 
is?  I have to find him."

She waits for what seems an eternity before the old man 
replies.  "Miss Scully, if you do not return home now, 
you will be of no use to the F.B.I. man," he says.  "We 
will find him, my grandson and I, and we will make sure 
he returns to you."

She walks outside, takes a deep breath, and gazes one 
last time at the red hills.  She can almost feel his 
arms around her, his warm breath in her ear.  Again she 
is left with hope, a lone totem.  Another gamble, 
another leap of faith.  She can only pray that it will 
be enough.

**end**

Feedback welcomed at kudra_x@yahoo.com