From: Janine100@aol.com Date sent: Thu, 16 Oct 1997 20:27:32 -0400 (EDT) Subject: Glance Across the Great Divide Title - Glance Across the Great Divide Author - Mina Green E-Mail address - Janine100@aol.com Rating - G Category - Story/Vignette Spoilers - Momento Mori Keywords - Mulder/Scully Friendship (Well, okay, maybe some romantic feelings) Summary - "Birthday Girl! I have something for you." Agent Pendrell, Tempus Fugit. What Pendrell had, and how he got it. GLANCE ACROSS THE GREAT DIVIDE I closed the door behind me, and my key ring fell from my hand. I picked it up, cursed it, and threw it across the room. It flew noisily until it smacked against the far wall of my apartment and clattered with a satisfying thud to the floor. In the dark, I couldn't tell where they landed. I would have to search for them tomorrow. I leaned back into the door and slid to the floor as well. God, I was exhausted - not from going without sleep for two days, but from the cheerful, supportive facade I had been keeping up on the way back from Allentown. I did it for Scully. I held on for her. Kept giving her reassuring glances, squeezing her hand comfortingly. I had tried to communicate without words, that everything would be all right. Even though I felt like screaming and cursing, even though I was more afraid now than I had ever been. If she was taken away by this enemy, there was no chance that she would return. And I would never see her again. I couldn't hold it in any longer. I couldn't even get up to walk to the couch. I took a deep breath, and heard her voice. "If the darkness should have swallowed me." Strange, how her voice came, saying words which I had only read. I sobbed. I don't know how long I sat there, crying for my partner, for Samantha, for my father, again for Scully, and finally for myself. I tried to compose myself when I heard the phone ring. She might need me, and I couldn't reveal my distress. The telephone rang once, and the machine picked up immediately. At the beep, Skinner's voice came through the speaker. "Agent Mulder, I just wanted to reiterate how important it is that you DO NOT pursue the option that we discussed earlier this week. I understand your desire to resolve the current problem, but your most important task right now is to inform me if Agent Scully seems to be working too hard, or ignoring any symptoms which occur. The health of my agents is of the utmost importance to me. This is a direct order, Agent Mulder." Click. I pulled out the small vial that was in my jacket pocket. I hadn't told Scully about the Kurts, or the file in which I found the vial. Even if she would have believed the story, she couldn't be burdened with it now. Not when she was sick. As I looked at the tiny container, the thought struck me that I was holding Scully. That she was between my fingers. And then another thought, a terrible, dark thought. This is all I have of her. This thing filled with stolen Scully. No, that wasn't true. That wasn't true. I had memories. Memory is subjective, the psychologist sitting in my brain said. Where is the truth of Scully? If she ceases to exist, where will be the proof? I knew that I had evidence of Scully, of our partnership. All of our work was detailed in reports. But none of that would help me to remember her if she leaves. I got up in search of undeniable evidence. I opened the file drawer of my desk. I keep hard copies of some X-files at home, just in case. There were two that involved Scully, but only one had what I needed to see. I pulled the folder from the drawer, and paged through. There it was. A picture of Scully. I placed it on the desk and remembered another file. I found the second picture just as quickly, and added it to the collection. Then I looked at them, and realized that they were not the precious items I thought they were. A grainy close-up from a state police cruiser camera. Her eyes were huge with fear. Her mouth was gagged, and her hair tousled. I couldn't use this to remember her. The other one was worse. An instant photo, Scully's face distorted, screaming. A madman's representation of her. Two pictures, and a test tube of ova, that would only remind me of the times I failed to protect my partner. Other than that, there was nothing. How could that be? My partner, my best friend, whom I trusted more than myself. And yet, there was no concrete representation of that. I needed to have something of her. Something positive. How? But I couldn't ask her, she would think that I had given up on her. And I didn't want her to be discouraged. When the idea finally came, it was brilliant. And I knew exactly who could help me with it. The next day at work, I picked up the phone and dialed the extension. He answered immediately. "This is Agent Mulder. I need your assistance with something." "Yes? What can I do for you two, Mulder?" "First of all, I need you to swear your silence on this matter. It is very confidential." "Done. Of course, anything you need." "What I need is for you to meet me in my office after hours. I will call you when it's time." "Okay, is there anything I can prepare ahead of time for you and Agent Scully? "Agent Scully is to know NOTHING about this. Do you understand, Pendrell?" "Sure, whatever you want, Mulder." "I'll call you." I hung up. God, I hoped that he was capable of this. A few hours later, I had explained to Pendrell, in most official terms, why I needed his help. He looked a little suspicious, but seemed eager to accomplish a task that didn't involve sitting behind a desk. Two days later, there was a knock on our office door. "Come on in, we're not busy. Just trying to solve the mysteries of the universe." I grinned at Scully. Pendrell stuck his head in the door. "I hope I'm not, um, disturbing you two, am I?" Scully took her reading glasses off and raised an eyebrow at our guest. "This is unusual, Agent Pendrell. To what do we owe the pleasure?" He blushed and fumbled in his pocket, just like I suspected. Like I had counted upon. "I uh, have this new technology that I thought you might be interested in." "Don't tell me. You guys have finally built that ectoplasm trap. We're official Ghostbusters now, right?" He was a little thrown by my adlib - it wasn't in the "script". "Well, uh, no, but, anyway, this could be really useful in the field, and maybe you would like me to show you how to use it?" He produced a tiny silver camera, and held it up in the palm of his hand. I walked over and inspected it. "It's an itty-bitty camera. Very nice. But we know how to use cameras already. That was in Evidence 101, wasn't it, Scully?" "Mulder, Agent Pendrell came all the way to the basement to show us this. I am sure that it must be out of the ordinary - isn't it?" She turned to Pendrell, and moved close enough to look at the camera as well. He smiled at Scully, the kind of smile that little boys reserve for their prettiest, sweetest teachers. I wondered for a moment if I had ever smiled at her like that. "Well, you see, Agent Scully, this is a digital camera. You can take up to twenty pictures with it. It doesn't use film, and all you have to do to see the photograph is hook it up to a computer - with the right software, of course." "So we could save pictures as a computer file instead of having to wait for them to be developed?" Scully looked over her shoulder at me. Her mind was working on the possibilities, I could tell. The accidental or purposeful loss of film had caused us problems before. I said, "And we could send these files to other computers, right?" "Yeah. Let me show you how it works. This cable hooks up to the camera, and then." Pendrell looked at the back of the camera. "Oh." His face was perfectly crestfallen. "What?" I had already moved to my computer. "The last pictures must have been transferred already. There isn't anything in here to show you. I'm sorry. Another time, maybe." I cleared my throat. "Pendrell, it is a camera, can't you just take a picture? I would like to know how to use it." "Uh, sure. Of what should I take a picture?" He looked around the room, searching for a subject. "Pendrell, I know that Agent Mulder is planning on taking pictures of paranormal phenomena, but you're not going to find any in here. Not even the ghost of J Edgar." Scully put her hand on Pendrell's arm and winked at me. "How about you just take one of Mulder, and then you can hook it up to the computer." "Oh, no. I'm not going to be the guinea pig here. Who knows what those guys up in the lab would do to a picture of me? I'm not taking that chance alone. Come on, Scully." I gestured for her to come stand beside me. "Mulder, someone has to learn how to use the camera." She walked over to me, arms folded. "Well, then it should be me. Because you're always too busy explaining away my theories. You'd miss the opportunity to take a picture of a UFO because your brain would be trying to justify how the swamp gas floated that high." "You've got to be kidding, Mulder. I should be the one taking pictures, exactly because I can justify them. You would use up all of the camera's memory on god knows what." "Hey, it's my pictures those Men in Black keep seizing and destroying." "It's the x-rays that I took of those corpses in Oregon that were incinerated." That was the chance I needed. "Oh, Oregon? Do you want to talk about that, Agent Scully?" I drawled. "I can think of something that we should have taken a picture of on that case." I paused long enough for her to remember. Agent Pendrell was on the hook. "Oh? What's that?" Scully turned her back to me. "Mulder, you are impossible! And to mention that in front of Agent Pendrell!" She muttered under her breath. "What will he think?" And then she made a strange sound, trying to stifle the giggle that I knew was rupturing in her throat. I took a step closer to her, and slid my arm across the back of her shoulders. Scully's eyes traveled surreptitiously to my face, warning me, but I was already whispering in her ear. "An extreme possibility on your very person?" And then we were consumed by laughter. I had been waiting to hear her laugh, to see her smile again - it seemed as if it had been weeks. We had both forgotten about Pendrell. I don't even know when he snapped the picture. I think we would have laughed until we collapsed if the phone hadn't rung. Scully fell back into her chair and picked up the receiver. "Scully." She was still grinning. "Okay, I'll tell him." She hung up. "Agent Pendrell, they need you up in the lab. Something about an email bomb?" "Oh, gosh, well, I have to go then. I'll show you this another time." He backed into the door, found the doorknob with his hand, and awkwardly opened it. "Bye." As soon as the door shut, Scully began to giggle again. "Extreme mosquitoes, anyway." I went to see Pendrell a few days later, with a package under my arm. "Agent Mulder, here is your envelope with the - uh, results you needed." Pendrell handed me a cardboard envelope. I put my package on his desk. "I need you to do one more thing, Pendrell." He looked at the package. "Open it." He did, and pulled out a silver scrolled frame. "What's this for?" "Scully's birthday is February 23rd. You're giving her a copy of this," I held up the envelope, "in that." I pointed to the frame. Pendrell reddened. "Mulder, I can't do that. Why aren't you giving it to her?" "Simple. I already bought her a present." "Oh. But -" "Pendrell, she will think it is so sweet that you thought of her." I knew I was playing on a weakness here. "Really?" he wasn't convinced. "I guess I could - but I'm warning you, Mulder, if she starts asking a whole bunch of questions about this." "Hey, don't worry. She really doesn't believe in conspiracies." The picture stays in its envelope, underneath the files which hang in the bottom desk drawer. I don't think of it as evidence of her existence anymore. It shows the truth of two partners, of our friendship. When I look at it, find myself even more convinced that we can find a cure, a reason, for this enemy. I hope that when she has the chance to look at the same picture, she will feel the same conviction. Our eyes are filled with trust and joy, frozen in time. END Feedback to Janine100@aol.com Bonus points for anyone who can tell me the source of the title allusion...