METAMORPHOSIS (1/4) By: Annie Sewell-Jennings (Auralissa@aol.com) Disclaimer: The characters of Mulder and Scully don't belong to me, but they want to. They've been telling me about your abuse of them, Mr. Carter. Haven't you ever heard of the Geneva Conference? Sheesh. Summary: A photograph of Mulder and Scully together brings Mulder to ask himself a question that he can't answer by himself. Category/Rating: VAHR (Mulder/Scully romance)/NC-17. Spoilers: Yup. Bunches. Right on up through "The End". But not another post-"The End" fic. And just a little spoiler for the movie, but NOT FLICK-FIC. This piece just includes that the X-Files were reopened. So there. :P Keywords: Mulder/Scully Romance. Author's Notes: This is just a little piece of something that I thought was interesting and thought could make an interesting fanfic. Then, it evolved (or perhaps dissolved) into smut. Tell me if I'm right or wrong over at Auralissa@aol.com. Feedback is a precious commodity these days. ;) Don't worry, Slash Junkies. I've still got a few tricks up my dark little sleeve. ;) Also, this story takes place somewhere after "The End". Mulder and Scully are re-opening the X-Files, but the office is long-gone. It be charcoal, kiddos. BTW, I think that I finally figured out what constitutes as both angst and humor. I hope that this is it. ::grins shakily:: And a more personal note -- I had problems with my America Online while writing this piece. I had four pages of smut written which were lost during a glitch with my AOL, and I never was able to retrieve them. I am still mourning those pages, cause I was really proud of it, and Kristin is currently finding ammo to go hunt down Steve Case and blow his brains out because of it. So, tell me what you think. I still yearn for those lost pages... ::sighs, wipes a tear away:: Yet another reason why America Online can really suck the weasel. Dedication: For my fellow hopeful romantic, Kristin Pohaski, who inspired this piece with her own "Ashes and Ourselves". You ARE the best, Kristin. Don't let anyone tell you differently. ;) METAMORPHOSIS In our pop-culture society of post-feminist revolution, they say that you can distinguish a man's worth from his wallet. Looking through mine, I guess that I'm not worth jack shit. If you catch me at the right time of the month, there'll be about fifty bucks or so, the occasional movie ticket stub from either an independent film or, sorry to say, a skin flick, and the singular photograph. That's where I would prefer for my value to be judged. Not by my meager amount of cash that always fluctuates from month to month, but by that one picture. Without that picture, I'm worthless. It's not a studio portrait, nor is it done by a professional photographer with a great eye for detail. I've often thought about what a studio portrait of her would look like, with her best features maximized and her flaws detracted. I guess I always figured that it wouldn't be worth it, because I like her flaws and her lines. Studio shots are made to appease the subject. So my photograph of her is finessed only by the lover's eye, made into perfection only by those that love her imperfections. It was taken in Seattle on a whim. Just because I thought that she looked beautiful. I have the unfortunate predilection towards sap and mush when it comes to a beautiful Scully, and this was one such impulse. We were working a more taxing case, one that was stealing sleep and energy, and we were writing out our profiles and field reports in caffeine-laden blood. She had gone out to Starbuck's for more coffee, and I was left at a crime scene with a witness and the ASAC. I hated the ASAC on that case, which was an unusual occurrence. Contrary to popular belief, I actually interact well with other agents when they don't have the usual bullshit that's passed around the Hoover building. The weather was, as it usually is, disagreeable, and the day was not exactly photogenic, but the subject certainly was. She really was lovely that day, with the wet wind blowing her hair around in a supernova of red. I turned the camera around from the onslaught of bodies and close-ups of bloodied flesh, and took the most incriminating shot of the day. I took a picture of a beautiful woman and I took it with the eye of a person who loved her, and anyone who saw that picture could tell you that. But I just wanted a picture of her. Just something beautiful. I'm not the kind of guy who develops his pictures after he takes them. Scully does our photo development, and she caught that photograph of her walking on a street in downtown Seattle, two lattes in her hands and her hair exploding behind her like an afterthought of crimson. And she saw that photograph, and, in typical fashion, did not say one word as she slid it across to me on the office table. Oops. I hoped for a more violent reaction from her, actually, but was not surprised when I was met with that cool disregard. But I kept that photograph, the secret sap that I can be sometimes. I kept it carefully; not wanting to fray the edges or crease the image, and kept it safely tucked away in my billfold. Other men my age keep photographs of their wives, their children, their loved ones. I just have a shot of a beautiful misted woman with red hair and coffee. That's my family. Perhaps it's a little sad for a thirty-six-year-old man, but she's all that I have. Just the reality of a woman that I don't have. I wasn't struck by the symbolism of that photograph until recently, when I stopped by Scully's apartment to go through the hellish process of taking stock of our old office and setting up a new headquarters. With the X-Files up in smoke and our computer backup sketchy to say the least, work has been transferred to between my apartment and hers. The Bureau has set us up in a new arrangement upstairs, but neither one of us really feels comfortable yet. That's not where we spent five years. That's not where we stored our memories. People can say that it was just an office, but it was something other than that. You see, that was where I lived for the duration of the importance of my life. That was where I met Scully, where I set up operations, where I functioned. It was my place of origin, a place that was, somehow, more essential and vital to me than air, food, or home. It was an archive of six years of work for Dana Scully and I, and it was where our secrets and our truths were. It hurt to realize that her file went up in smoke, and with that file, so did Emily's. So did Samantha's. So did the Allentown file. So did so much, so much that was so important and vital to the continuance of our quest and journey. We took a blow on that day, a blow that set us back for a while. Whoever decided to torch Spooky's office was a damn smart guy. Well, I never said that the old smoking bastard was an idiot. Just a bastard. Scully's apartment always had that warm femininity that she always carried with her, but in the intimacy of her apartment, I had been noticing it even more frequently. She appeared more at home in it, and the sight of her inside of the light that glowed rather than blared was a revelation. Scully was still businesslike and efficient, but there was a gold to her that made her seem more accessible, and it came through in small gestures and signs. Like the fact that she smiled more, or that she would touch me more often and with more familiarity. Our basement office was familiar, but her apartment was more casual. It didn't scream of work. Well, it has of late. I feel guilty about moving half of the X-Files operation into Scully's home, but she was the one who insisted. I knew that she cared about the X-Files greatly, but I never realized the extent of her involvement until they were gone. Guess that Joni Mitchell was right. I always knew it. I was finishing going over a filing system with her when she excused herself to catch a phone call from her brother. Yikes. I was more than willing to let her go take that one in another room. Just between you and me, Bill Scully scares the absolute *shit* out of me. Call me chicken. Call me a wuss. I prefer to be called sane in a situation like this. Pit me against a big, bad-ass Navy guy who happens to have a pre-existing hatred towards me and I shake like a pansy. And I would *never* admit to Dana Scully that I'm afraid of her older brother. Never. So, I stayed put in her living room, walking around with my hands in my pockets, trying to be quiet so not to give away the fact that I was with her. That was when I found her desk, a place that I usually avoided out of sheer heartache. It was one of my great regrets about that office, that sadness that I felt about the loss of our basement haven. I never got Scully a desk and I never got her a nameplate. I always procrastinated before our argument, and then I never knew how she would react if I got her a desk afterwards. Would she consider it an appeasement or an appreciation? Would she like the gesture or would she hate it? Predicting Dana Scully's reaction to anything is not something that's very easy to do. But without her presence for me to feel uncomfortable under, I felt drawn to that mysterious part of her home, and I was curious, itching just to take a quick glance over it. I'd never even looked at the desktop of it; it was so forbidding. I inched toward it slowly, and then heard the door open and saw her exit the bedroom. She looked uncomfortable talking with Bill, and I wished for the courage to say something. "Bill, I've got to go," she said, holding her other hand to her ear as though I were somehow distracting her with my silence. "Yeah, I've got Mulder over..." Dammit. Bill's reaction to that did not sound pleasant, and I watched her flinch, wince, and blanch all in the same facial expression. Wow. That was *pissed*. "No, Bill, I am *not* going to tell him that," she snapped, her voice taking on that "don't sass me you motherfucker" tone. I've been on the wrong side of that conversation too many times not to recognize it. "I'm not starting with you again tonight..." But her heel was turning, and she rolled her head back, frustrated, and walked out of the living room and back to her room. Alone again, I wandered back toward the desk and all of its tantalizing possibilities. Knowing that I was off the hook for a little while, I walked toward it and start scanning the top of the desk for anything that caught my eye. There was an assortment of photographs, and almost every one was familiar to me. There was a section of photos that was designated to those in the Scully family, from a man I didn't recognize but assumed to be Charlie to the aforementioned Bill. It finished off with the gently formidable matriarch and patriarch, Margaret and William. There was no photograph of Dana set in that corner of the desk, but that wasn't particularly surprising. I certainly didn't have a photograph of me set up *anywhere* in my vicinity. Then again, I'm prone to looking goofy and awful in photographs. I always end up feeling like a jackass. And there was another smattering of photos on the other side of her desk, and I picked those to investigate next. It was a collection of two, and I was touched to see both photos. One was of me. Just me. I felt myself flush red at the shot because of the frankness of the shot, the dead-on approach that the photographer had. It was a photograph that didn't leave much to the imagination, and I was embarrassed just to know that such an awful picture existed, let alone staked its place on *her* desk. My nose took up most of the picture. Yup, there it was, this big giant traitor that made me the butt of childhood jokes and high school disdain. Some kids called me Foxy when I was in middle school and high school, but the one that really hurt was the quick description of me. "Do you know Fox Mulder?" "Yeah, he's the one with the nose, right?" They used to call me The Nose. So, add the big nose to the dorky smile on my face and the hair that flopped every which way and I was a big idiot in that photograph. I made a decision to get one of those studio portraits done for her to replace the one of me looking stupid on her desk. Might as well feel good about my appearance *once* in my life. The other photograph was something very monumentally touching. It was a photograph of the two of us in our old hunting ground, that dark basement with the scattered photographs that made it seem like the entire room was a gigantic ransom note. Newspaper clippings were wallpaper, and tabloid magazines were coffee table reading material. There was method to my madness, though, in that Dana Scully was the organized contradiction to my whirlwind of categorized chaos. She was touching my elbow in that picture. I felt rushed just looking at her fingertips circling that joint, and I remember *exactly* when that photograph was taken. I remember all particular moments that include Dana Scully's rare touch for the fact that they are so rare. We were working on a case involving (was I really that awful?) crop circles in Arkansas. Turns out that a well-informed UFO nut made the circles and just sought autographs from Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. I signed his extraterrestrial photograph with the Miranda rights. Chuckling, I put the photograph back down on the desk and headed for the drawers. The sound of her voice, irritated and edged by frustration with her brother, floated toward me from the bedroom. I had time to spare. And then, I was caught by a square, worn-out fold of leather. Scully's old FBI badge. Smiling, I picked it up, and what I saw took my breath away. There was an old photograph of her inside of that badge, discounting her federal ID. This was a Dana Scully that I barely remembered, some faded woman that had gone away shortly after meeting her, and one that I had the brief acquaintance of before she melded into the woodwork and out of my grasp. She was thin-faced as she was now, only this woman's thinness was fresh-faced and defiant, not wracking like Scully's seemed to be now. There was a boldness in her eye that was a little tempered now, and a defiance that was a little less obvious to the observer now. Her hair was too long for her face, something that limped rather than swung, and her wardrobe... It wasn't that polished Scully that was so alluring now. And I realized, looking and analyzing this photograph of a woman that I was in love with, that I did not know that part of her. I never really did. I mistrusted that early version of Scully, with her Clarice Starling knock-off outfit and her "go fuck yourself" snot voice. She was ambitious, straight-laced, stuck-up, and stubborn as hell. She's still stubborn. But she became more cynical and wary, loosened up and accepted the renegade nature of our work, and is more accessible and older than I realized. Some would say that Dana Scully is considerably harder than she was before she joined the X-Files, but I see her softer in many ways. Her face is a little sadder, a little more weary. Her eyes can be cold, but I see them take on a tired affection when she speaks to me. Her lips have that sidelong curl to them when she gives me a mild, half-meter smile. Dana Scully is beautiful, more beautiful than I've ever seen her before, but when things grow intimate with us, her beauty is that of a quiet flower rather than a glorious rose. I need to stop watching that Lifetime channel. But that small, faded photograph of Scully was enough to set my mind spinning through a thousand different thoughts and possibilities, and I stood at her desk, looking at that photograph and seeing it morph and change through the years. There was that woman with softer hair that bounced around her face that gave her hair a more definitive shade of red rather than a slower auburn. She was still reluctant to me, and I was reluctant towards her, but this was the woman that I first fell in love with. Over separation and distances, I let myself become swept away with the few memories of seeing that openness of Scully that made my chest tighten and my groin ache. And when she was gone, I knew that I had broken the cardinal rule of efficiently working with your female partner: I'd fallen in love with her. Somewhere, a feminist weeps. Either that or she's preparing to crack my nuts. And when she came back, she continued to change and go through that stunning metamorphosis of woman and spirit. Lucky for me, I fell in love with each and every one of them. Every last photograph of that woman, I'll tell you that I love her. I fell prey to every incarnation of Scully as she changed and matured, grew and wearied, discovering her with eager eyes and willing mind, and then promptly falling in love with each new manifestation of that indefinable but recognizable essence of Dana Katherine Scully. I have no doubt that I'm still in love with her, more now than ever. If that makes me a sappy S.O.B., go fuck me. But that's just the pure fact of it. My doubt now is whether or not she still loves me. I knew that she loved me from that monumental case that still holds more meaning than just a show-down in a hospital room between my own will and this overriding love for another woman. It was when I put the gun to my own head, praying to God that the bullet struck me dead right there and spared me the hell of killing her, when I knew that she loved me. Because she screamed and she protested, and her eyes welled up with tears that didn't quite spill yet. Through the fog of struggle and Robert Modell, I saw her. I knew. But that man that held a pistol to his temple and hoped for a bullet out of five other empty chambers was not the same man that held a photograph in his partner's apartment. It was not as varied or as early as Dana Scully's, but I underwent my own personal metamorphosis of faith and maturity, when I finally came of age and realized the bitterly harsh realities of life. Perhaps I developed a cynicism that most men my age are accustomed to, or perhaps I simply faced the truth and swallowed it instead of spit it back out. Either way you interpret it, I guess the anal retentive Mulder finally learned an actual life lesson, and it's stuck with me ever since. This new man still loves her. But does she still love me? In my own personal rebirth, did her feelings not transfer over to the new man that I am today? I was so stunned by these new implications that the picture almost slid out of my hand. In the middle of my still adolescent self-absorption, I had failed to notice whether or not she acted any differently toward me. Did Dana Scully still love me? "Mulder?" Startled, I spun around, the picture slipping from my sweaty palms and fluttering to the floor. Jaw dropped, eyes wide... I always paint the picture of guilt. Never have been able to tell the slightest lie to her, and I think that it's one of those qualities that she actually likes. "Uh..." Yeah, that's a smooth line, Mulder. Just utter something unintelligible, and she'll let me *right* off the hook. But she wasn't ticked or upset, just amused. With that almost-smirk on her face, she moved toward me, dropping the phone on the sofa as she came to the desk. "What are you looking at?" she asked, interested, and I bit the bullet. "Uh... This," I stammered, holding up the picture. I will never understand the unfairness of possessing a degree from Oxford and still being reduced to one syllable words and grunts in the presence of my partner when I'm thinking of her not as a partner, but as a very desirable woman. Maybe it's just overworked hormones. Damn this testosterone. Scully took the photograph from my fingers and did not comment on the sweat that certainly slicked it. She just looked at herself and chuckled, a smile barely showing her teeth. "God, was I really that green?" she wondered, a fond smile turning her face. It was one of those smiles that you're supposed to reserve for flipping through old yearbooks and high school photographs, an amiable grin meant for chuckling over yourself when you were a teenager. It was slightly disheartening to see that smile when she was just looking at a picture of herself from six years past. "I wouldn't know," I remarked, finally collecting my wit and my senses again. She nodded, that small smile still painted on her fair face. It was what was generally known as a Mona Lisa smile, something secretive and alluring. Fat shit. The Mona Lisa never made me swallow and gulp back the beginnings of a hard-on. That painting had nothing on the redhead with the lush, enigmatic smile at that moment. "Uh." She put the photograph back down inside of her old badge, folded the badge back up, and tucked it back in the top drawer of the desk again. "It wasn't a flattering picture," she decided, and I shook my head. "I *liked* it," I said, and she arched her eyebrows, surprised. Jesus, did she really have no idea that I thought she was that beautiful? You insensitive prick, Mulder. "I'm flattered," she dryly offhanded. She turned away from the photograph and from me, directing her attention instead to a pile of unsorted files. "What do you want to do about these receipts..." This could have been the end of all of our conversation and our discussion, and I could have given her a grin and a "how-do-you-do" and been off with the night. She could have stayed in her place, and I gone back to mine. But I was still hung up on my indecision and that old picture, and still on this bout of fancy that seemed to be affecting my every gesture. So, I did the usual stupid thing and went ahead with my question. "Scully, do you still love me?" I blurted, and I felt the many invisible hands of regret and guilt start smacking me around immediately. <> But there was only a moment where I sensed surprise, just a flicker of shock, and it flashed over her, parting that previously admired mouth into a soft O, and then letting it fall back into the calm, cool serenity that was her usual domain. "Well, Mulder, that's an interesting question to ask considering that I've never told you I loved you in the first place," she remarked, going back to her filing. <> I crossed over to her, placed my hands over her slightly wavering ones, and fit my abdomen to her back. It was just a slight amount of contact, a mere brush and friction of fabric, but it was enough to distinguish my presence behind her. I briefly blessed her demure height; seeing over her shoulders was an added bonus to this brief moment of observation. "Well, Scully, do you?" I murmured in what I considered to be my most intimate tone of voice. I moved one hand away from her hand when I spoke, rifling lightly through the brushing of red hair near the nape of her neck. It was the most tender area on a woman, accentuated by this woman's shorter hair and fairer skin. She stiffened for a moment when I touched that part of her, and I saw her flush pink there as she blushed. Omigod, Scully blushed. And it sure as hell couldn't have been out of embarrassment, because I hadn't done anything to offend her... It could only mean... Suddenly, she pivoted, managing to stay balanced on those heels, and took my face roughly between her palms, her fingers instantly threading through the edge of my hair, and pressed her firm, lithe figure up against my body. It was an overload of senses, brought on by this sudden barrage of sensations that was being dealt to my body. There was her leg, pushing insistently between my constantly weakening knees, a slide of thigh near my racing cock, oh that thigh, breasts crushed to my chest and nipples abrading through however the hell many layers of clothing that we had, and her fingers sloping through my hair. I spoke about the nape of the neck being a G-spot for women, well, Dana Scully just proved me wrong. "Well," she breathed, and then made the final connection that almost set me off, barely held back by the finest, most tremulous touch of control. She fastened her mouth on mine, coming toward me with passion and force in a kiss so roughly sparking that it was actually private. It was both the most violent and most intimate kiss that I have ever participated in, and this was made more obvious with the forceful entry of her tongue in my mouth, the thick consummation of something that has been lying in wait for six really, really long years. And all the while, the other sensations were exaggerated beyond belief. The nipples were hard and circling, the attrition of the thigh constant and sweet, and there was the beginning massage of her hips onto mine, letting me know that there was something that she was offering that had not ever been offered before on such open, definite terms. And I gave it back to her, oh, God yes, with my hands sliding down to grasp her firm butt in my hands, just washing my palms over the texture of it through her pants, and my hips didn't just grind, they lunged toward her with a desperate attempt to match her. Yeah. Right. Fat chance, Foxy. And by the time that we parted, we were both on the verge of intercourse without having removed one piece of clothing; our bodies were *that* damn close to each other. And she pulled away. She pulled away. Wiping the edge of her mouth with the back of her hand, her hair mussed and her eyes very, very dark, she gave a rattled smile that told me volumes and stumbled away. She tried to pull of elegance, but it was immediately sold out by arousal. "Well, does that answer your question?" she shakily asked. Yeah. Uh-huh. And it gives me a new question to ask. (end part one) METAMORPHOSIS (2/4) ***** Whenever I go into the local Barnes & Nobles, I'm confronted by rows and rows of commercialized romance novels featuring women being dipped by muscular men, their undoubtedly silk blouses slit low enough to show off a considerable amount of cleavage and their impressive, heaving breasts. It's inevitable that they have flowing hair that catches the cheesy colors and cover of the novel, and that it's flaxen and luxurious. The woman always has this starry look in her eye that attests to the fact that she is utterly swept off her feet by her rippling-muscle man. Simpering, actually. That ain't Dana Scully when she's aroused. It was fascinating to stand in front of her, her eyelids just a little droopy so that I caught a more thorough glance of her eye makeup, her cheeks flushed pink, and her lipstick smudged. Her hair wasn't this wonderful trail of curls, but rather a very controlled heap of red. She turned her back to me, starting to fuss with the papers and files. Expense reports and filing systems. Somehow, I think that our finances weren't exactly the foremost issue on her mind. Not to be arrogant, but she seemed pretty flustered after our brief but certainly memorable kiss. I can only speak for myself on this one, but I knew that I was very hot. So, I dared to go a little further, to continue it a little more. Because I'm a guy that likes his answers and his evidence, and I had both of mine from that incredible kiss that she had blessed me with. She loved me and she wanted me, and damn sure I wanted her. Slowly, I smoothed my hand over the more prominent bone of her clavicle, and the skin was so soft and the bone so fine that it was delicate. She sucked in her breath, shuddered, but didn't turn away. I did notice that she had been reading that short receipt too many times for her to really be reading it, and this was encouraging. So I asked my question. "Is that kiss going to satisfy you?" I asked, using the lowest voice that I could so that it purred into her ear. Scully's body leaned far back, so that her head almost dropped against my chest, and I wished that it would. Her hair was something wonderful to witness, and I just knew that it would be wonderful to touch. It was the most beautiful hair that I'd ever seen. "Um..." Scully whispered, and I grinned a little. So I wasn't the only one with verbosity problems. To encourage her further, I swept my hand over her forearm, and she shivered as though she were chilled. And then, I bowed my head to her neck, tugging on her skin with my lips and my teeth, just a little nip and a tight suckle. When I pulled away, I saw the blood vessels rising to break under her skin. Wow, I hadn't given a girl a hickey since high school, and the reddish-purple of the broken vessels were tantalizing. It was brutally blissful, and I wanted to mark more of her with those darker patches that imprinted my mouth onto her skin. "No," she finally said, and I groaned. Suave Mulder wasn't going to last long with four years of celibacy and the love of his life telling him she wanted his body. Suave Mulder was quickly turning into Adolescent Mulder. "Good, cause it ain't gonna satisfy me," I confessed, and she sucked in her breath between her teeth; I heard it hiss and whistle. There were no holds barred now, nothing that couldn't be done or said. We knew where this was going and what was going to happen, and so there was no shyness now. Just startling decisiveness as far as our hands and our lips were concerned, and so I let myself answer her on whims and fancies. "Scully..." "You're not going home tonight," she promised. "Not if I have anything to say about it." Joyous, my hands flew to her stomach, and I pressed her body to mine. I heard her cry when she felt my erection touch the small of her back, that area that I had claimed for years with my hands and now pressed with my cock, and I shuddered against her body at the sound and sense of her. Scully was an explosion of arousing temptation, and my fantasy was finally becoming realization. The imagination is a wonderful thing, but it shallows greatly in comparison to the real woman. When she pressed her hands over mine and started to lower them from her belly to her mound, my voice caught in my throat. I was beginning to realize that Scully might very well eclipse all of my very inventive daydreams. Her hands guided mine to glide over her stomach, to brush her navel, and then to veer through the crease between her thigh and her pelvis, sliding over that rise of her pubic bone and finally to touch the warmth of her, feel the heat that my touch and my lips had inspired. "Thank you," I moaned to no one in particular. Thanks to God, thanks to Scully, thanks to whatever had inspired this sudden revelation that had gotten us to this point. Her head tilted on my breastbone, and she moved one hand away from her mons and toward her breast, so that my palm rested squarely on Scully's firm, warm... Ohhh... "Oh, thank you..." "I assure you that the pleasure is all mine," she dryly said, her voice husked by the arousal that I felt underneath my palms. "And it is, isn't it?" So, her hands left mine, assured that they were in their respective positions and knew what to do, and snaked up to my face, craning her mouth so that she was starting to nip at my neck, sloping her neck to reach my throat. "There..." she whispered, and circled my skin with her tongue as I started to touch her. I busied my hands quickly, assuring myself of my own prowess as I stroked the rise of her, the angle of her, and then petted the warmth of her through her clothes. It was wonderful to feel her humidity and know that this was because of me, and that I was touching her and making her react this way. Her arousal was a great contributor to my own, and with each touch and exploration, I pulsed toward her with a more fervent hardness. And this only made her rock harder, swing more toward me, and we were building off of each other's reactions. No longer satisfied with just a smooth or a caress, I flecked my fingers in between her thighs, finding the center of her wet warmth spreading and staining her dark dress trousers. She shook against me, and I pressed my forefinger into the origin of her heat, and she gasped, throwing herself forward and into my hands. "Ah, Scully," I murmured fondly, and she gave a shuddering moan, something that was softer and more pleasurable than visceral. Her voice sounded lovely when she did that, something rawer than Scully but something somehow more real. And then my other hand started working in synchronization with the hand between her thighs, so that I was thumbing her center as I was working her nipple, flicking fingers in perfect rhythm. "That's it." "Mulder," she murmured, rolling her head back on my shoulder. "Oh, yes, Mulder." "Right," I encouraged, and she grasped my neck with her lips, sliding her mouth down so that she was blowing air on the hollow of my throat. All the while, my cock throbbed and ached for some release, and I took my reprise in the feel of her body. Another well-timed finger circled her nipple, wanting to feel the pebbling of her areola. It was starting to become frustrating, but the entirety of my sexual experience over the past six years has been through frustration. Each restrained tug of my own hand on my cock, wishing that I had something that wasn't real and wasn't there, and then each repressed moan and mutter was without a round, pink mouth to utter it into. Now, there she was, fantasy fleshed out beautifully, and I was in sensory heaven. And her hands went down, wrapping around me, so that she was gripping the small of my back with a predatory prowl, and she chuckled into the curvature of my throat. "I'm saving the best for last," she confessed, and I felt flattered. So, Scully thought that I had a nice ass. It was almost enough to make me blush. "Sorry, I don't have that much patience," I admitted, and she dug down into my hand, pressing herself against my fingertip enough to provide herself with friction. It must have been glorious, judging by the way her body tightened against mine and then splayed against my chest. "Neither do you, apparently." She laughed, an uninhibited sound that was unusual to hear. "Girl's gotta get her kicks," she said. "Ah, and so do you." And so she pushed me away, turned me around, and switched position. This time, it was my back to her, and I was left exposed to her, blind to her sensations, and Scully was the one in control of me yet again. "This is nice." "It's all yours," I donated, and her breath caught. She sounded surprised by this, and I nodded to her. "Anything that you want." I swallowed hard, feeling her gaze settle over my body. It was excruciatingly wild, and I was becoming harder and hotter than I had been earlier, and she touched over every part of me. "Um, Scully..." "Thanks," she whispered, and then there was a hand. Just a splayed palm over my chest, touching my heart and smoothing over my pulse. "It's ours, Mulder. Yours and mine." There were lips, perusing through the bottom fringe of my hair. She curled one longer thread around her fingers, chuckled, and then blew air onto the exposed skin. "You also need a haircut." This set me off into laughter, breaking a little tension of the moment. "Well, I'll be sure to call my hairdresser tomorrow," I joked, and things turned serious again when she nipped at the skin with the edge of her teeth, just grazing the skin with the smoothness of her incisors. Her tongue peeked out and smoothed her brief breath of a love bite. "Don't," she requested, or was it an order? "I like it this way." She emphasized this by turning her hand away from my heart and over to my chest again, swiping over my left nipple. I jerked forward, and she pressed her fingertips over it so that it was flattened to my body. "Yes, ma'am," I squeaked, a little embarrassed by the way my voice cracked. Scully chuckled, and then started work on my neck with her lips. The two most important tools in lovemaking, other than the essential parts, are the hand and the mouth. Anyone who dares to challenge this probably wants to incorporate something sick like kitchen utensils. In any case, I'm a man that prefers the basics in sex, the human components being the most intriguing and, to be frank, the most inaccessible. Any man can go out and buy a tape, and any woman can purchase a vibrator. It's much more difficult to get another person, unless you live in Nevada or are a member of the Senate. Scully's hands and lips are especially skilled, and she used them slowly, lightly, only quickening her pace with extreme care and caution. There was a soft puff of air against the lace of my hair, a tweak of her fingers on the core of my nipple, and then a loop of tongue to accentuate both actions. And then her other hand stroked the muscles of my abdomen, and I shuddered in the same way that she had earlier. We were taking turns, I realized, but our pleasure was derived from it. It was a give-and-take seduction, and it was the way that we had always worked. Together, complementing each other, building off of our strengths and our weaknesses. "I love your body," she murmured against my neck, and she nuzzled her cheek against my shoulder through my cotton jersey. Dressing for work had been considerably easier lately. When she twisted my nipple with the pinch of her fingers, I hoped that undressing would be easier, too. "Thanks," I rasped, that stupid crack in my voice still there. Now Scully knows that I squeak like a teenager when I'm really aroused. Great. "I love yours, um, too." She chuckled; she didn't get chirpy when she was excited. She then thrust her hips against my ass, oh, man that was wonderful, ground her warmth against me so that I knew that she was still hot. And I knew then, oh did I know, and I had known for a while. I loved knowing. I loved her. She meshed her hips to my butt, touched my nipple with care, and slurred her lips onto the exposed skin of my shoulders with wondrous slick heat. She was an artist, and I was dying from her painting. Unable to take this onslaught of touch without her touching that one very hard, very responsive part of me, I attended to it myself, stroking myself through my jeans as she continued her caresses. I thumbed the tip of me, and when combined with her hands, I arched away from her, my hips rising to meet a woman who stood behind me. She sucked in her breath when she saw me do this, and she gave a shaky moan. "Omigod, Mulder..." she rushed, and I almost came when she did said that, when she brushed her breasts against my back and felt the erect nipples scraping along my spine. It was impossible to believe. It was too real and too tangible. My knees gave for a moment and I stumbled, almost falling. Suddenly, "knee-tremblers" were made clear to me. I'm not a very strong man when it comes to sexual pleasure, and I was quaking now on the edge of control. "Mulder..." She hugged me closer, and then let me go. There was no further that we could go, both shedding our resistances and allowing each other to view our vulnerabilities. She knew that I was on the verge, and I knew that she was in need of similar release. And I hadn't seen her face since we had begun, but she had seen mine. I was positive that it was wildly different now. She turned around behind me, leaning against the desk, and gripped it for pure strength. To recollect herself and gather her control. I had no such thoughts. With wobbling legs, I turned and walked between her and the desk, sitting squarely on the surface and looking up at her, thus losing the advantage of my height. But I wanted to see her, feel her, and I wanted to look up at her as though she were some form of goddess. She was, too, with that hair and those eyes, and those lips and hands. Well, I never said that she was a virgin goddess, just a goddess. I wrapped my hands around her slim waist, trailed my eyes up her heaving body, and finally took my look at her face. It was the portrait of rapture, eyes turned navy from our passion. Her lips were full and parted, puffing breath between them, and her were lined pink and glowing. Scully turned her gaze down to me, and her hair fell like a curtain around her face, like this veil of bright red-gold. It was almost strawberry kissed, and I admired how it was highlighted by the light above us. And I had only one reaction to this stunning vision. "Wow," I breathed, and she was actually surprised by this. Not by the simplicity of my word, but by the fact that I had reacted in the first place. I really was an asshole sometimes. "Aw, Scully, didn't you know?" "Know what?" she asked, tilting her head so that her hair faintly shimmered in the lighting. Each layer was caught with red-gold, and the tips curled just a little. "Jeez, Scully, I *love* you," I said, and that was when I was rewarded with so many gifts that it made up for every forgotten birthday and Hanukah from years pass, and filled each holiday for years to come. She would never have to buy me anything ever again; I had won every prize in the luminescence of her smile as she graced me with it there. It was that thrilling, bright, cheekbone-illuminating smile, where the crinkles around her blue eyes showed and her lips were stretched to the limits. It was the smile that I had only seen maybe twice before with her, and it was so stunning that I melted in her grin. Still smiling with all intensity, she climbed up on the desk with me, and started to lower herself into my lap so that she rested on my thighs. "I know," she confessed, twining her fingers in my hair. "But I never thought that I'd actually hear you say it." Oh my. As she settled onto me, her warm, moist center rubbing and caressing the tip of my cock, I started to whisper the words over and over; she gnawed on my ear with her lips. "I love you, Scully, I love you," I whispered, pleading with her for more. She was always the one who had a hold on me, and I was happy enough to let her have that control. Just as long as she never stopped touching me or kissing me. "So kiss me, Mulder," she demanded, and I did. (end part two) METAMORPHOSIS (3/4) Our mouths met, tangled and twisted, sliding over each other until the tip of her tongue breached my mouth first. It swept inside of my mouth, turned and folded within those confines, and smothered me with heat and taste. I pressed my hands to her face, fastening my mouth to hers, and slid my tongue around inside of her mouth. She tasted like hot tea, something herbal and intriguing. Orange peel and cinnamon. It was a lovely taste, and I wanted her to make that tea for me. It was comforting, spicy, sweet like honeyed sugar. Her hands shook down my body, until they clamped down on my hips and she thrust herself against me. Scully was a forcefully accessible lover, as I was swiftly and enjoyably learning. She knew what she wanted and was willing to show me, and I was eager to learn. "You're incredible," she whispered when our mouths paused for air, and I took my hands out of her ruffled hair long enough to wrap them around her back. "You're the incredible one," I complimented, and she finally loosened her grip from my hips to take off my shirt. She was carefully powerful with it, and she dropped it on the floor. Swiftly, she possessed my bared body with her hands, running her palms with great friction down my back and grabbing muscle as she went. "Gorgeous," she murmured as she went, and she slipped her hand into the top of my jeans. "Oh, these are still on." "You wanna remedy that?" I asked, and she paused, mulling it over. "Let's do my shirt first," she decided, and started unbuttoning it herself from the top. Eager to get her naked, I started at the bottom, and we met in the middle under her beige top was undone and hanging on her gently. "Cooperation makes things a little easier, huh?" "It's the one thing that I learned from Sesame Street," I quipped, and she grinned, pleased with my response. She shrugged out of her shirt, and I marveled at the grace with which she discarded her top. She just rolled her shoulders back and slipped it off, and it pooled on top of my white jersey. The bra that she wore was something simple and cotton, trimmed with a little lace at the top. Her breasts were pushed from the cups upward, so that the tops were exposed to me, and her nipples were prominent through the coffee cotton. And then she reached around to the back, and removed the bra, baring herself to me and watching me watch her. They were awe-inspiring. I mean, I've seen a lot of breasts in my day. Granted, most of them are viewed through a TV set or a magazine, but they still count because, well, they're breasts. But Scully's were perfection, creamy gold in the softer lighting and rosy around the tips, heavily firm and fitting to her slender frame. And I couldn't resist a moment more. Taking my hand and fitting it into her right breast, I took her left nipple into my mouth and heard her moan my name. It was me that she wanted, my lips and tongue and teeth, and this was all the encouragement necessary. Just say my name, Scully, and I'm yours for life. Any command that you give, just let me know that you want me to do it, and I'll obey. She arched her back into my mouth, clasped my head to her breast, and said my name again. "Mulder, Mulder..." She was whispering. "Mulder." I licked her areola, that part of her that I had kneaded and whittled into a hard, demanding peak. I loved a woman's breast, and Scully's was superior to all. She was beautiful. She was my goddess. And she was smiling as I suckled, as I teased, as I laughed, and I was happy and not frustrated as I loved her. I loved her. Scully retracted, pulling her breast away from my mouth, and I missed the sensation of her heated skin below my lips. It had was redder and deeper than I remembered it, and I realized that I had made it that way. Greedily, I gravitated toward her other breast, finding this not only arousing, but strangely comforting. It was the intimacy of her and me together, and Scully sweetly touched my collarbone, and then rested her chin on the top of my head, caressing the crown of my hair with the underside of her chin. "Ah," she breathed, and we rocked together, my hands sculpting the pliant skin of her exposed breast with palm and finger. I released her nipple long enough to slide my tongue underneath the rich crevice underneath her breast, that tantalizing area that was hidden from sight. I nudged her nipple with the tip of my nose, and she moaned into my hair. "Don't stop," she asked, and I couldn't refuse a request from *her*. I licked and lapped at her, sighed onto her skin, breathed and tongued and suckled. Scully started rocking her hips now, grinding them into my pelvis and onto my erection, and she sighed when she felt it against her. She pulled away again, and climbed off of the table, and stood there, staring down at the man who was at her beck and call. "Well?" I asked, watching her examining me. I smiled at her, feeling a little dorky, and she broke out into a grin. She shook her head, and then reached down to unfasten her trousers and slide out of them, so that she stood in maroon cotton bikini panties. Scully liked cotton; I just liked Scully. She started to remove her underwear as well, that last thin remnant of decency, and I stood up, stopping her. "I want to do that, please," I requested, and she made a little noise. "What wonderful manners," she complimented. "Such a gentleman." "Gentle?" I asked, and gave what I considered to be my pirate grin. Mischievous, rowdy, and seductive. I hoped that it worked on her, and I judged from her hooded expression that it was. "Yeah. Sure." And with that, I took her hands away from her underwear and placed mine there instead, grinning still and starting to lower her bikinis down. They dropped to the floor and she stepped out of them, into my waiting hands. Eagerly, I trailed my fingers down the V of her thighs, slipping down in the crease of her pelvis and caressing her fine red hairs. They were cinnamon-colored, like I knew that they would be. She arched a similarly colored eyebrow in my direction, tilting her head. "It's the luck of the Scully women," she said. "Always have been a redhead." "I knew," I said simply, focused on other targets. She smiled. "I never thought that you'd seen me naked." "I didn't. You've got a redheaded sister. I never thought that you were such a perv." She laughed and then gasped as I slowly rifled through her pelvic hair, coming ever closer to my target. Rolling her head back, she suddenly stood up very straight, and pulled me up and away. "Not yet," she rasped, and her voice was hoarser than it was honeyed now. Harsh caramel. Unbuttoning my jeans, she pulled them down, and I remembered suddenly what underwear I had thrown on in the morning. Dammit, dammit, dammit... She burst out laughing upon sight. Oh, I'm sure that I was a riot to look at. Blue jeans down around my knees, erection bobbing, and wearing silk boxers with Chihuahuas on them. Chihuahuas with party hats at that. And noisemakers. And confetti. I wished immediate death on the jackass who had given them to me as a gag gift last year. And I immediately cursed myself for not burning these on sight. How the hell was I to know that this would be the Great Night when I finally made love to my partner? "Mulder," she gasped between gales of laughter, and I spread out my hands, a crooked smile on my face, nodding and feeling like the biggest ijit ever to walk the face of the earth. "Yeah, yeah, I know," I sardonically said, my face falling and looking toward the floor. It was hell to feel so aroused and so miserable at the same time, and she finally stopped laughing long enough to take notice of my disappointment and humiliation. Her small fingers cupped my chin, and she brought my face up to meet hers. "You're a trip, Mulder." Scully grinned, "a real trip." I quirked my mouth at her, and she turned serious in spite of my horribly comical appearance. Her eyes were direct, and her tongue licked her chapped lips lazily. "If you don't like the boxers so much, then let's get them off." And so she did. She jerked off those damn ugly doggie shorts, and the rough waistband was scraped over my erection so harshly that it was pleasurably painful. I groaned tightly, tossed my head back, and she caught the length of me in her hands. Oh... Scully. These were the skilled hands that I had been missing during my lonely dreams of her, because my large hands weren't the ones that I had caressed myself with. I had needed hers, and she was there to provide them now. "Mulder," she whispered, stroking me from base to tip, feathery fingers, feathery feathery fingers, and I thrust desperately into her grip. She took me, held me, then slowly started to massage my sac inside of her fist. Oh, she handled me beautifully, perfectly, knowing my rhythm and what I needed and wanted. Every other muscle and bone went limp, but I was extraordinarily hard inside of her soft hand. And she crushed herself to my body, her naked breasts rolling and raking over my bared chest, and she slipped her hands between us, working me with one fist and massaging my balls with her other. And her lips slid over mine; she chewed on my lower lip. "Beautiful mouth," she said aloud. There was no coherent thought then. All of my thinking existed inside of my cock. Yup, it really is true -- Men think with their dicks sometimes. A lot of the time. Like right now. But I had an excuse. My redheaded partner was my living excuse, because she was the one processing thought through my penis. Pumping, thrusting, thrashing, I came to the brink, where there was blinding frustration and soft tongue in my mouth, and she heaved against me, and pushed me back on the desk. "Mulder, wow," she whispered, repeating my words from earlier. "Are we gonna..." "Not on your desk," I muttered, though my hips were lifting toward her in a direct contradiction to my verbal resolve. My cock wanted her, and I wanted her too. Desk? Sure, fine. Floor? Great, you got it. Pincushion filled with poisonous needles? Spamtastic. I would have fucked her anywhere. But I wanted to make love to her in her bed. So I gritted my teeth and reigned in tight control, forcing her hands away from my cock with shaking palms. She was surprised, startled, but I shook my head, a barely controlled grin ravaging my face. "Scully, that doesn't mean that I can sit around and wait very much longer," I warned. She had brought me to the edge, and it was very difficult to descend from it when she was so, so very near. "Oh," she breathed, her hair hanging in her face. It was so lovely in that lighting, redder than rubies and brighter than gold. She was cinnamon and sugar and... Spice. Yeah, that hand that was traversing down my erection with a light, fluttering touch, trailing her fingertips over me and just barely dropping them down on the base. "Come to bed then." She pulled her hand away from my penis and placed it on my face. It was slightly damp from sweat and something slicker. Wetness, either mine or hers. Kissing her palm, I let her cup my cheek, and she linked her hands around my face. "Come on. Now." And so she pulled me away from her desk and toward her room, and it was weirdly wonderful, walking hand in hand, both of us naked as the day we were born, to her bedroom. Locked in grip and tight hands, and we both locked eyes, too. Hers were softer in their passion, still blazing but with a more tempered light. I knew, though she hadn't said it in words yet that evening, that she really was in love with me, flaws and all, and she was going to stay with me. And I grinned back at her, and we walked with her hands linked back to the bedroom. She shut the door behind her. Ha. Like privacy made a real big deal *now*. And then she pushed me, so gently, back on the bed, and I grinned at her. She placed her hands on her hips and swayed a little as she approached me. She didn't *sashay*, but she did smirk as she approached. "I'm not going anywhere," I said, and she nodded. "Come to bed." And so she did. She slipped up next to me, her eyes scanning over me, and she ran her hand down my chest with a careful, steady palm. There was no foreplay left to delay this, our inevitability. It was another change in our lives, another photograph that could rest on her desk, and something that I hoped would stay. "Scully," I whispered as I started to roll toward her, and she stretched out on the bed, waiting for me with eager eyes and hands. "Yeah?" she murmured, and her voice was so low that I groaned before I could speak again. Eyes sparkling with midnight fire, she was a portrait of rose. I loved her so much then. I wanted to love her forever. "If we change after this night, I'm always going to love you," I promised. It wasn't something flowery or something poetic, but it was the best promise that I could give her. And I knew that I *was* always going to love her because I'd been loving her for six years now. It was a good track record, and there was this impulse inside of me that bonded me to her in a manner that had never occurred with me before. I hadn't loved anyone like I loved her in my life, and the happiness that I felt when I *did* love her was unmistakable. She was it. The only one. I felt this certainty wash over me as I rolled on top of her, as I positioned myself against her body, and felt her moan in stride with me. I touched her breast with the back of my hand, reveling in the sense of my knuckles breezing past her nipples. I kissed her softly, sweetly, making sure that she wouldn't move or rustle, and she breathed past me suddenly. Her hands touched my face then, and she swept her eyes over my face. "Mulder, that's the most wonderful thing that any man has ever told me in bed," she said, and I smiled. "How come?" I asked, and her eye twinkled as she pulled me down on her. "Because it's honest," she said. "And I really like that." Her warm, moist center was brushing my cock, and she groaned and wriggled a little as I settled over her, shuddering as I ground my erection into her clit, and she gave a louder cry, something more primitive than I had imagined before. "Oh, God, Mulder, yes," she encouraged, and I circled, ground, touched, turned... It was so painfully close to me, and I wanted to let go on her so bad, that beautiful face and that woman... "Mulder," she whispered. "Mulder, *now*..." "Scully," I gasped, and she kissed me hard, taking me into her mouth and stealing my tongue away from me. Sucking it, teasing it, sweeping it as I lowered myself into her. She hissed in her breath from our kiss, and I knew that it had been so long for the both of us. And it just made it better, really, because there was this incredible surrounding of sensation and touch, so that every pressing fingertip and lip and tongue, so that our bodies were richer and more encompassing than before. She tightened around me as I carefully entered her, and I knew that it was a little painful. It had been achingly agonizing for me earlier, trying to keep control of myself when it had just been so damned *long* since I'd *had* sex. But our caution made us careful and more aware, our senses were blurring pleasantly into one slur of touch and feel, and as I thrust into her, I felt more than I had ever sensed in my life. There was her perfect mouth, her breasts, and her hands stroking the curve of my butt. There was her around my cock, squeezing me and holding onto me... And each thrust, each stroke, each feel of her wetly around me with such utter certainty, was amazing. "Scully, Scully," I moaned, my eyes hazing over into a jumble of foggy color and red. That was so much that I saw, her red and her rose. "Scully, I can't... Can't..." I wasn't holding out, my cock was so hard and my skin so sensitive, and my orgasm was so close that I was seeing my vision double. I was making love to her and felt every wonderful sense of it, and I felt her tense up around me, me tensing within. "Come then," she whispered. "I'm not far behind. I'll..." She moaned as I twisted myself within her, beating into her rhythm. Sweat seeped from my body and dropped onto her breasts. "I'll be here." And there was one final contraction, her back lifting off of the bed to meet my body. With a final cry, one last stroke, I released. I let go, and I came inside of her, within her, knowing that she was there and was going to be there. Spasms consumed me, and she consumed me, and I possessed her body with the knowledge that this was just the beginning of another life. Another self. I was changing again, and so was she, as we lay coupled in her bed. But perhaps this would be the best change, the most promising one, and the beginning that we needed to continue our journey and our search together. It was the final metamorphosis, as I fell upon her, and reached my hand between us to release her, too. Thumbing her clit, touching that bunch of nerves so that she would fall with me, toward me, caressing her as she arched and moaned, the sound deep and rich within her. "Mulder," she tightly groaned, and she collapsed on the bed beneath me. I rode out her orgasm with me, watching a smile slip her face as she came, waves of it sweeping her as it had swept me earlier. "Mulder..." she breathed as her body shuddered and glowed, so beautiful and desirable within every confine of her femininity. "Mulder." "Yeah," I whispered, our breathing heavy but starting to smoothen out, and we sighed as we lay there, spent and pleased, and we rolled together on the sheets and covers of her bed. I picked her up and moved her toward the headboard, onto the pillows, and we gathered together then. Wrapping her inside of my embrace, I kissed her lips and she responded. "It's been so long," she murmured, and I nodded. Sleepily, I closed her eyelids with my fingers and kissed the flared eyelashes that were moist from sweat. "Scully," I murmured in the same lowered, quiet voice that I had used earlier. "Sleep, Scully. You're tired, and so am I." She made a low sound deep in her throat, and I nestled into her, my mind fogging from the exertions of that night. "Yes..." As we started spooning together, her head tucked into my shoulder and her arm draped over my chest, she whispered something to me. It landed directly into my ear, and I turned my head to hear her better. To hear that voice speak anything to me. "You're a good man, Fox Mulder," she murmured. She could say my name, and I would believe any word that she told me. And I believed it then. Maybe I really was a good man. And I could be a better man with her. With this final change, this last step, and this last shift in our relationship. Sleeping in a cocoon with Scully, my partner of six years and the most intriguing, intelligent, and incredible woman that I had ever hoped to know, I could achieve that status of completion and wealth that I had always wanted, but never believed I could possess. That completion slept peacefully in my arms now, and I kissed the ridge of her eyebrow with gentleness. "No I'm not," I whispered. But maybe I can be. I tucked myself into her as best I could, swept the bedspread over our cooling bodies, and let the night take us wherever it may please. After all, we were here. Together. Let the world do whatever the hell it wanted, because I had my Scully. I was completing. (end part three) METAMORPHOSIS (4/4) "They told you life is long Be thankful when it's done Don't ask for more, be grateful But I tell you life is short Be thankful, because before you know it It will be over Because life is sweet Life is all so very short Life is sweet And life is all so very short Life is sweet Life is sweet" --Natalie Merchant I took a picture of him this morning. Sprawled out on the sheets, his hand resting on the pillow as though he were still grasping my breast, nuzzling his cheek into the mattress with that small, pleased smile on his face, the length of his burnished-gold body coppered by afterglow, he made the portrait of the satisfied lover. He begged to be captured by the lens of a skilled photographer, which I am not, but because I was the only one around, I gave my best attempt to capture the image of a sleepy Fox Mulder in my bed. Nude, splashed by white sheets and pillows that barely covered his sculpted ass, and tumble-headed from our lovemaking. Only it wasn't really lovemaking, was it? Making love was something that we'd already done for six years. This was just an extension into the physical, but what a pleasant extension it was. My hand running through his hair, touching each silk-and-velvet tendril, a tap on his nose with my lips... I stretched out my toes, arching my foot, feeling my blood pulse just remembering it. How arousing memory can be. I had seen his attention to that one photograph of me last night; it was what motivated me to touch him in the first place. <> my mental voice congratulated, the little muse much gratified by the previous night. Indeed, I was thoroughly happy, rewarded by a slumbering lover who was still sprawled out over my bedsheets as though he had always belonged there. Mm, perhaps he had. The photo sits on the edge of the kitchen table, waiting to develop under the light. In the meantime, I sit with my legs crossed and propped up on the opposite chair, dressed in nothing but panties and his long-sleeved cotton jersey. It's a fondness of mine, wearing my lover's clothing, and Mulder's always had a wardrobe that I've envied. Wearing his tee-shirts, his sweatshirts, his dress shirts... Oh, the possibilities are endless in that they haven't even begun yet. Shivering a little in anticipation, I think of walking around with that leather jacket slung over my shoulders. Delicious. Admittedly, my mind hasn't stopped to weigh the consequences of what happened last night. We shared in unprotected sex, but I have no concerns in that department. It's impossible for me to get pregnant, and I doubt that Mulder's had sex since the Reagan administration. My monk with the dirty mind... What a treasure. I'm not prepared to fawn over men. It's something that I've never done before. Certainly, I've admired their bodies in morning, complimented their libido and prowess, but I've never been one of those women who sat around and thanked God for giving her such a skilled lover. But today is a little different, because I slept with a man who doesn't know how skilled of a lover he truly is, or how much he's loved. This man needs to be told that he's loved not to stroke his ego, but to stroke his heart. Blowing gently on my coffee, I indulge myself in a little taste of last night; his hands on my breasts, massaging my breasts in the cradles of his palms and the caress of his fingertips. Mulder, that gorgeous man, he knows just how to do it precisely. He knew how to touch me, to tease me, to bring me to the brink and then let me fall from it. He caught me in him when I came. My entire body stretches in the kitchen chair when remembering the way he traveled my body, the wide-eyed beauty of it all. It makes me want to rouse him from his sleep and make love to him again, no, not *make* love... Continue love. Further it. Nurture it. I think that Mulder's the first man that I could safely say I could spend the rest of my life with. Laughing a little, I know that I would never be bored with him. He's a myriad of surprises, predictable in their unpredictability. He's stirring in the bedroom now; I hear him mumbling something into the pillow. One long, lanky leg stretches out, and a matching arm pantomimes the limb. I smile and watch him arch and curl in the bed until he flips over onto his stomach, his sun-kissed hair highlighting a summer gold in the morning light. We're supposed to go into work today and start organizing the new filing system, but I've decided that I want today for us. Tomorrow, we'll have dilemmas to solve and decisions to make regarding this new relationship. We'll probably spoon together tonight on my couch or again in my bed, sadly work on the boundaries of this new facet of our partnership, but now I want this morning for us. I want to touch his face again and rub the finer threads of his soft, dark hair in my fingers, searching for a rebellious strand of gray amidst the rich brown threads. I want to line his entire body with my lips, taking special care around his inner thighs and knees. Every part of him has to be explored with more precision, more seduction... I ache just watching him stir under the blankets. The photograph is slowly gaining color and substance as it develops, and I wave it in front of my face as the vanilla coffee heats my body. It's delicious, but not nearly as delicious as he was last night. I grin to look at the Chihuahua boxers that are casually tossed on the floor, smirking when remembering Mulder's embarrassment when he realized he had worn them that morning. Just another weird thing about Mulder that I want explained one day. Ah, the photograph is finally coming to light... "Scully?" the voice from the bedroom calls, and I turn my head from my picture and cock it toward Mulder. My unwitting model has awoken, and I lay the picture down on the table again, walking into my bedroom to see my partner sleepy-eyed and drowsy. Mulder's sexy when he's dozy, and his bed-head is charming. Disheveled brown locks are tossed in his eyes, and I can't help it. I sink into the bed next to him, wiggling back to lean in his body, and his hands start playing through my hair. "We overslept," he says, and I nod. "Yes, we did," I agree. "But I'm not really planning on going to work today; how about you?" After a moment, he shakes his head. "Nah, I've got you here and in bed. What's work?" Chuckling, I nuzzle deeper into him, resting my head under his chin. When I speak, my lips brush against the hollow of his throat, and I kiss him after each word. "We" kiss "have" kiss "the" kiss "day off". Long kiss, a little swirl of tongue lapping at the early morning sweat. There's a low moan in his throat, and underneath the blanket, I feel him stir against my belly. Mm, Mulder, delicious. His mouth is on my cheek now, and I feel his lips start passing kisses down my face and toward my earlobe, and I close my eyes, relaxing into his slow seduction. Contrary to the beliefs of former lovers, I like to be seduced. Slow, deliberate enticement, performed by mouth and hands, and Mulder executes it with perfection. An embrace of the senses, something surrounding and something that employs all elements of lovemaking. Hands sliding over my body, lips kissing my face and hair, legs touching my thighs... It's Mulder's constant discovery of my body that arouses me more than anything else, and how he dives into this task with complete and utter abandon. Not only do I want to drown in his touch, but I want to reciprocate this affection with my own seduction. This is what will make our relationship as lovers so blissful. "Let's quit work and do this the rest of our lives," he whispers into my ear, his breath tickling my lobe. Chuckling, I nestle deeper into him, running my hand over the soft dabbling of hair on his chest. "Sadly enough, we don't get paid for doing this," I remind. His hand slips up underneath my breast, lining the curve of it with his fingertips, tapping as he goes. "Oh, I don't know, Scully. We could set up a video camera and sell the tapes over the Internet," he comments. My hand squeezes his thigh, then circles it lovingly. He confessed to me once that he thought he had chicken legs. I'm confessing to him with my fingers that I love those lanky limbs. "And that would make us *money*?" I tease, then gasp as I feel Mulder's hand slide around to enter between my thighs, feel his palm wisp around the root of my wetness, and I eagerly rock into his hand. Mulder, yes... His other hand removes my panties, and there's his hand, unrestricted, against me. I welcome it by fastening my mouth to his, kissing him fully and thankfully. "I would buy it," he says, and I feel his finger flicker against my moisture, his thumb against my clitoris... Oh, he knows just how to do it, soft and subtle at first, then with continuing pressure. "Mulder," I gasp, trying to regain some control over my voice. "You... You would buy a video of two antelopes..." I moan at the first press of his fingertip into me, just a press, just a tad of friction, but it's a promise of what is certainly coming. My hands press against his back, touching his shoulders and urging him to continue. "A video of two antelopes, oh God, having sex in a dung heap." It's lame, but it's the best I can do. Thought's fleeing from the gently prying finger between my legs, from his thumb rotating on my nub with patterned circling. With no further tormenting, his index finger slips inside of my, and I eagerly clench and tighten around it, abrading into his palm, and my back arches when his thumb swipes at that sensitive knot of nerves that begs for release, for him. I press my mouth to his again, and I'm stormed by the combined efforts of his tongue, his lips, his thumb, his finger... I respond to all with my mouth and hands, clinging to him and imploring him to continue, his body accepting my inquiries and doing as asked. There's one great, perfect stroke of his thumb, finger, tongue, and I fling against him, my pulse racing overboard until I fall into him, and he holds me as I spasm into a paroxysm of both joy and rapture. Mulder is indeed the most successful seducer, the most tender and involved, and the one that I want to please in gratitude for what he does to me. "About the antelopes, Scully," he murmurs, but I sense the gravelly tone of arousal in his voice; he's in agony beside me, "I already have that tape. Not as good as the critics claim." "You're a sick, sick man," I whisper, my body starting to regain its pace from the strength of my orgasm, and my hand falls against his cheek, stroking the lines of his face. "C'mere." That's all it takes, and I pride myself on it. I roll on my side, and Mulder is there, his knees prying my thighs apart, and I toss my head back as he enters. Slow, gentle prod to begin with, gentle caress of his hot hardness against my clit, and then there's the cock, pressing into my soft wetness with his hard silk. Wrapping my arms around his body, I invite him to go deeper, allow him access to whatever he seeks, wanting to reward him for what he has given me already. Last night and this morning. Five years past. Some would see Mulder as a curse, as a burden. And maybe I'm to be classified as a lovesick fool, but I see him as my gift. Now, especially. A stroke, a gentle stroke, but I see the restrain on his face, the lines that are so prominent when he's frustrated now appearing when he's holding back. One hand leaves the small of his back to brush the hair away from his furrowed and crinkled brow, the sweat gleaning over his features. My hips rise against his, matching him in pace, and I choose to equal his rhythm with my own. "Nothing's gonna rival *this*," I whisper, and my other hand runs through his hair; both my hands ruffle the thick brown strands. "Oh, God, Scully, Scully..." he breathes, his voice low and tight, and I arch into him at the sound of my own name. No one says it like he does. "Yes, Mulder..." With a final thrust, not withheld for the sake of my own pleasure, Mulder's voice rises above me, and I smile at the sound of his voice, deeper and richer than the night before, as he climaxes inside of me. The feel of him coming within me is delicious, pleasing, and I sigh as he does, feeling a release that's not orgasmic, but rather comforting and soft. Holding him tightly to me, I kiss him as he goes through those last convulsions, and I feel his hands smooth through my sweat-dampened hair. We tumble together on the sheets, and he swoops the coverlet over us with a flourish. It falls over us like a cloud, soft and white, and it feels airy against my hot skin. Our breathing slows from this daylight madness; Mulder brushes his lips over mine in what is a chaste kiss after such a passionate coupling. It was a different lovemaking than last night, not so charged with passion, but rather laced with finesse. We'll perfect a million different types of copulation, but the learning process promises to be delightful. "Antelopes, Scully?" he teases, and I smile into his face. Eyes grinning at me with the same twist of his mouth, and I love the way his teeth glisten in the filtered light. His eyes sparkle mischievous green, changed from the usual shade of dark hazel. The passion of his mouth is noted easily in this relaxed spooning, and I smile as his face nestles into my breasts. Benevolently, I skim through the chocolate-colored locks, softly riffling them with my fingertips. "Well, I was currently occupied elsewhere at the time," I admit. Mulder grins at me, and I arch my eyebrow at the tinges of pride in that grin. Ah, the male ego is satisfied. Nuzzling my breasts with his cheek, Mulder burrows close to me, and I accept him with open arms. <> I tell myself, and I don't ever want to abandon this one moment. This merger of arms and bodies, this junction of Mulder and Scully. "Mm, Scully, Scully," he murmurs, and I sigh, feeling a shiver at the way he says it to me. Never has a surname been said with such affection or sensuality. My stomach grumbles, hungry after this early morning encounter, and I remember that I'm always famished after morning sex. He laughs at the rumbling against his hand, and he rubs my tummy affectionately. "Hungry?" he asked, and I nod, smiling as well. "I could use some breakfast," I admit, and he nods. "Yeah, probably not a bad idea," he says. Hand still running circles over my flat belly, Mulder kisses the side of my breast. "I'll fix it." "You? Cook? Now this I have to see." All that I've ever seen of Mulder's kitchen never promised much skill with food. "I'm an excellent cook," he brags. "You just never took the time to find out." "Well, let's continue the discoveries," I say. "You cook." Slowly, we rise, and my hand grasps his. I can't quite get enough of touching him. All these years when propriety and policy kept him physically out of my reach, touching him now is alluring and intoxicating. I always had access to Mulder's heart, and this knowledge is riveting. He's taking my breath away in a joyous fashion, and I'm suddenly grateful that this happened out of happiness rather than sorrow. It'll make a wonderful memory when times, undoubtedly, get tough. I can always remember the first time I made love to Mulder, and things will be better. Mulder must be enjoying this sudden admittance to my body as well, for his hands are everywhere on me, through the jersey that I never shed through our lovemaking, his eyes feasting on me in way that makes me feel more beautiful than I've believed myself to be in years. "I think that you look better in that jersey than I do," he compliments, and I smile up at him, tilting my chin and then chasing my hands down his sides. "That works out nicely considering the fact that you look superb in nothing," I say, dotting my fingertips over the rise of his rear. Mulder sucks in his breath, and then grins at me. "Keep that up and we'll never get out of the bedroom." Flicking my hands lower so that my palms touch the surface of his ass, I smile. "Dying of starvation in bed with you... Mm, tempting. But I want hash browns." "Hash browns it is." Smiling, he leans down to kiss me again, a promising kiss, and his hands sweep through my hair as he ravishes me with his lips and tongue. His hands surround my waist, and as he mesmerizes my mouth, he lowers me to the bed. Eyes twinkling, he stands, and I'm left on my back on the mattress. "Wait here, kay?" "Kay," I lazily comply, and he winks at me, walking out of the bedroom completely naked. I swing my head to watch him go, and admire the sleek lines of his body. I've had a select amount of lovers before, all of the same genre and body-type. Muscular men, football players. Big men. Hard-bodied men. Mulder's a different lover, like a lynx among bears. Smooth muscles, broad shoulders, slim build. He's a beautiful man amidst handsome men. With that unique face, quirky, off-center smile, and brilliant mind, the attraction goes beyond physical, so that he draws me like a magnet. Other women might not see it, but I do. And thank God that he sees me in the same light. Thank God he loves me the same way. The photograph sits next to me on the nightstand, and I turn to pick it up. It's developed completely, colorful and vivid, and Mulder's body is sprawled across the bed. I see his ears in the picture, and smile at them. They're pointed, almost elven, whimsical and charming. I've always had a penchant for Mulder's elfish ears. Hands spread against the pillow, and I love those hands, too. Slender, long, and strong fingers and palms. Gorgeous hands to go with a gorgeous man, elegant and sensuous. This is Mulder the lover. I've seen him change and age over the years, shift from a wide-eyed, innocent boyish man who was fascinated by whatever he saw to a bitter, cynical, older man who was jaded by what he'd seen and saddened by the state of the world. And last night, he made another transition. I saw his youth as he traveled my body, saw the appreciation and awe return to his eyes. I saw the suspicion and dejection fade and be replaced by trust and bliss. I saw Mulder the Agnostic transform into Mulder the Glorious, and perhaps all of my worries about becoming romantic with him were for naught. Instead of becoming sloppy, we will be swifter. Instead of becoming sappy, we will be sharper. And instead of becoming immersed in romance, we will become united by it. It will all change for the better, the best transformation, the most beneficial metamorphosis. The photograph sits beside me on the bed, and I smile as Mulder starts breakfast. From the smell of it, he really is a good cook. What do you know? You get surprised everyday. (end of story) Feedback will be worshipped and praised at Auralissa@aol.com. Tell me if you liked it; I have low self-esteem. :*( Thanks for the read! ::says bye-bye like that little happy face in the Blockbuster commercial:: I really like that commercial. See you next time!