Overweighted
Chapter Twelve
By RocketMan

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NOTE: Inspiration for this came from a Gillian Anderson interview on Leno.

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"For God speaks in one way,
and in two, though people do not perceive it.
In a dream, in a vision of the night,
when deep sleep falls on mortals,
while they slumber in their beds,
then he opens their ears,
and terrifies them with warnings . . ."
-- Job 33:14-16
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Her white Keds squeaked down the super clean, sterile halls. White
bounced off white and Margaret Scully wished more than anything that she
did not know this hospital so well.

ICU was one way and she knew this way all to much. All too much.

She'd had a dream of this.

Walking and walking and waiting for news. She had been happy and sad at
the same time, fearful and excited.

Now she understood her dream.

Somewhere down this hall was her baby girl, shot and bleeding, and in
this room was her baby's baby, cradled in the arms of its father -- Fox
Mulder.

The room was suddenly on front of her -- 221. A good number for hospitals
to use, a number that indicated old high school memories and talking
with friends after English class.

She didn't want to have such associations here now.

Mrs. Scully opened the door without looking through the window, knowing
that all courage came from ignorance. If she did not know how bad her
own girl was, then she did not have to be afraid. If she did not see her
granddaughter's blindness and deaf ears, then she would not have to be
nervous.

The room was dormant, yet precariously alive.

The machines monitering her little girl hummed and beeped and kept
constant movement, while the three figures that were supposed to be
alive and vibrant, were asleep and pale.

She took a good long look at her daughter's vitals, at the numbers that
indicated good things this day, then turned her attention to the
sleeping two in the chair.

Fox was slack-jawed with his feet propped up on Dana's bed and his head
tucked on top of a child's curly blonde hair.

His hands were gently around her, love emanating from his every line and
every limb.

Margaret didn't want to look at the little girl.

But she made herself.

Her granddaughter. A little thing with fair Scully skin and blonde hair
that made her lashes stand out from her face. Freckles that lined her
chin and nose and cheeks like scattered seed, and pouty Mulder lips that
asked to have their way.

Her hair was pulled back in a pony tail, in the same fashion that
Margaret had done Dana and Melissa's hair when they were little.
Tendrils curled around her face where the hair had escaped the rubber
band and for one instant, the little girl look so much like Dana that
Mrs. Scully had to turn to the bed to make sure her own daughter was
still there.

It made her hurt to see this.

They were a little family: Fox and Dana and this girl -- Helen.

It made her hurt because Dana hadn't wanted her to see Helen until
everything was final, until she knew for sure that this was indeed her
child, and that they would be able to keep her.

And then she had never called. Never asked if Margaret wanted to see
her. Maybe she had thought she didn't want to, after her emphatic
denial that little Emily had been Melissa's.

Mrs. Scully had never gotten to see Emily, but she had wanted to.
She loved her Dana, and she loved anything that was created from her
children.

Helen.

It was amazing to see how wonderful the girl was, how wonderful a
mixture of Scully and Mulder had been.

Despite the unseeing eyes and deaf ears, Helen was beautiful.

She wanted to be a part of this.

Even if Dana didn't think she had a family -- she did.

Mulder stirred then and sighed.

Mrs. Scully slipped her daughter a kiss and then planted a soft one on
Helen's cheek.

After a hesitation, she gave Fox a kiss too.

Then she pulled up a chair and began the wait.

~~~~~
end chapter twelve
adios
RM