Charge
By Lilydale

CONTENT:  A little V, a little MSR, a little UST, a little strange.
TIMELINE:  Hollywood A.D. post-ep
RATING:  PG
FEEDBACK:  Very much appreciated.  Feed me at 
lilydale10@yahoo.com
WEBSITE: http://www.channel1.com/users/lilydale/fic
ARCHIVE:  Sure.  Please let me know so I can visit.
DISCLAIMER:  These characters are not mine.  They belong to 
1013 Productions, Chris Carter, and Fox.
SUMMARY:  After attending their big movie premiere, Mulder 
and Scully spend a night on the town.  But they’re not 
alone.

Many thanks to Alanna, Emma Brightman, and Pteropod for 
being wonderful people and for lending me their excellent 
beta services.

----

These people are nuts.  They are showing me the town, 
though, so I probably shouldn’t complain.  Well, 
technically, they’re just driving me around town and not 
letting me actually look around much, but I’m not going to 
quibble.  I’m happy to finally be out and about and to 
enable something fun.  Or enable the potential for fun, I 
should say.  These people really are nuts.

Here they are in the City of Angels in their fancy formal 
clothes, with unlimited funds at their disposal, with all 
the time in the world, and they end up here.  I’ve heard 
that these two often come at things a little Star Trekky 
and that they’re often attracted to, shall we say, 
oddities, but I would not have expected this.

"See how that hovering cluster of lights just moved 
slightly up and to the right then darted down and to the 
left?"  Mulder talks like he’s teaching elementary science.  
"Spooklights, sometimes called ghost lights or earth 
lights, float in the air like illuminated vapor pools or as 
strings of lighted blurry orbs, like the ones by that hill 
over there.  They can inexplicably dip and dive through the 
air.  Fairies are theorized to travel like that."


"The lights are not fairies, Mulder."

"They could be," he pouts.  I hear what sounds like a loud 
motorcycle zoom by on the winding road about a few hundred 
feet behind our car before he speaks again.  "Or are you 
holding out on me, Scully?  Have you seen fairies before?  
Do you know their fairy ways?"

Her face may have crinkled or her shoulders may have 
shrugged or her arm may have snaked around his bicep and 
given him a teasing little squeeze like she did an hour or 
so ago because he chuckles.

"Actually," Scully says, not giving the sound of his 
laughter time to wave away into silence.  "Actually, earth 
lights are often indicative of faulty geological regions 
such as the one we’re in, fraught with fault lines and 
plagued by earthquakes and other land disturbances.  The 
lights may materialize as electrons slowly discharge from 
the ground and into the air as tectonic plates expand and 
contract in areas of geological faulting."

"Way to burst my bubble, Scully," he mock-whines.

"You didn’t let me finish.  Earth lights are also 
frequently described by purported alien abductees, so 
although we may not be watching a fairy swarm or tectonic 
light, we may be witnessing a close encounter."

Someone pops open a car compartment of some sort, and I 
hear some plastic crumpling.  "Or about to experience one," 
Scully adds with a lilt to her voice.

"I can’t believe you just said that."

"Someone had to.  We were both thinking it, right?"

"Maybe."

"Well then."  The sound of a shell cracking echoes through 
the car’s interior.  Then another.  And another.

The cracking surprises me because these two have been 
chattering non-stop since we left that eerily decked out 
soundstage and drove to wherever it is that we are now.  
I’m used to silence, but it seems like these two are afraid 
of silence.  What’s to be afraid of?  I crave speech.

Also, it’s true, what I’ve heard people say.  When Agents 
Mulder and Scully talk with each other, it’s like no one 
else is around.  Or at least, they don’t seem to take the 
slightest note of who’s around.  Perhaps they should.  I 
mean, they know I’m here, but they’re not giving me 
remotely the amount of attention that I deserve.

Their mouths, on the other hand, are an entirely different 
subject.  They’re getting plenty of attention.  Yak, yak, 
yak.  Crack, crack, crack.

"You never eat these things, Scully."

"Never say never, Mulder.  Tonight’s all about new 
experiences, in a way," she confesses.  "Attending a 
Hollywood premiere.  Wearing a dress somewhere other than 
church.  Looking out over a near-dark city from a parked 
car."

"You’ve never parked before?  Why Agent Scully, surely you 
jest."  Mulder has sounded so smug, so confident, all 
night.  It’s like his whole existence is one giant joke, 
one never-ending pun and innuendo contest.

"Not with you," Scully whispers.  She’s sure enough to say 
it but not with any kind of authority?  Apparently, 
espousing various theories about earth lights is a very 
different thing from recalling late-night parked car 
memories.  Nuts, I tell you.

Mulder matches her whisper.  "No, not with me."  Contest 
over.

Another echoing crack.  It must have been Scully because 
Mulder gently says, "Until now, of course."  I hear plastic 
crumpling again, a latch clicking closed, and a very soft 
sigh.  Then Mulder exclaims, "Geez, Scully!  Your hand is 
like ice!"

"Then give it back," she soundly demands.  "I’ll warm it 
up."

That’s when I feel it.  Her tiny hand slides right over me.  
(Mulder’s right - it is like ice.)  Each one of her fingers 
rubs me back and forth, like she’s playing a miniature 
piano, composing our own private symphony.  It’s exquisite.  
I’m not sure if she’s warming her hand or not, but I really 
don’t care.  Why did Mulder ever let her hand go?

I’m not sure if she’s nervous or if she’s actually trying 
to generate some heat with all this fiddling.  I’m guessing 
that it’s nerves by the erratic speed and prolonged 
duration of her finger ministrations, that she’s trying to 
stall for time by hiding her hands.  By the fact that she’s 
paying me any attention at all.  One finger slides back and 
forth along my long ridge while another toys back and forth 
along my row of raised bumps.

Good lord, why did Mulder ever let her hand go?  Cold be 
damned!

Interrupting my elation is the realization that the car is 
quiet for the first time all night.  I can even hear leaves 
scraping across gravel as the wind blows them outside the 
car.

"Wow, did you see that, Scully?" Mulder says with wonder.  
"Many testimonials exist of earth lights disappearing as 
mysteriously as they arrived, in bursts of unexplainable 
color, but reading about it can’t prepare you for that."

Ah, looking out the window.  I guess Mulder is playing the 
avoidance game too.  Curious, these two agents.

"That was beautiful."  The words float out of her mouth 
like iridescent soap bubbles.  She takes a breath as if 
she’s about to speak again, but Mulder speaks first.

"According to folklore, when fairies manifest as clouds of 
light like that, people are drawn to them."  Mulder sounds 
enchanted, completely smitten with the lights.  Or with 
something.  "They follow the lights, will o’ the wisps, 
oftentimes without thinking, without rationalization.  They 
just become transfixed and follow the lights."

"But Mulder, surely you know that we didn’t get drawn to 
this ridge by fairy light.  Fairies don’t exist," she 
softly laughs, "and clearly we--"

"Yes, Scully, I know," Mulder interrupts, "but hear me 
out."  She huffs an acquiescing huff, and Mulder continues.  
"Fairy lights are often mischievous or malicious, drawing 
people who follow them from the well-known beaten path and 
into dangerous areas, places fraught with uncertainty and 
peril.  The lights can be blinding, blocking all other 
experiences, other people, other lives, becoming the sole 
focus.  Fixation."  He draws in a deep breath and exhales.  
"And usually, when people reach what looks like the source, 
the home, of the lights, the lights abruptly disappear, 
perhaps not resurfacing for days, months, or years, if 
ever.  The people are left with only their lonesome tales 
of the light and cuts along their ankles from where they 
ran through the thrushes on their way to those alluring 
lights."

"We’re not in any danger here, Mulder."

"Maybe, maybe not.  Fairies can be pretty deceptive."  
Scully grunts a frothy "Hmpf!"  Mulder ignores it and goes 
on.  "It’s not limited to danger, Scully.  Mischief, 
remember?  The lights can confuse people, not just to the 
origin and cause of the lights, but to their own 
orientation, misdirecting people in their journeys, 
confusing their sense of right and wrong, or perhaps more 
simply, twisting their spatial orientation, distorting up 
and down, left and right."

"Do you want me to drive back to the hotel, Mulder?  The 
cop who’ll pull us over may not be as gracious as me in 
listening to your fairy spatial displacement theory."

"No."  At Mulder's lazy but serious response to her sly 
quip, Scully grazes her fingers all along the length of me 
again.  I hadn’t noticed that her fingers had ever stilled, 
but maybe fairies bamboozled me.  She feels much warmer 
now.  Mulder continues, "I just mean that even though 
lights look beautiful in the sky, are fascinating to watch, 
and can be enticing to chase, they may be more trouble than 
they’re worth."

I hear leaves rustling again for what feels like an 
interminable time.  Scully interrupts the wind songs.  "You 
really think so?"

"Yeah.  I do.  Now."  His enunciation is clear.  Precise.  
Scully must know what this means.

"You know, Mulder," Scully replies with the lazy pace and 
golden color of honey, "I doubt that those were fairy 
lights, but I won’t deny that mysterious lights were out 
there."  He must look insanely intrigued because Scully 
says in a playfully defensive tone, "Well, there were.  And 
they were quite enticing."  She pauses and says with 
dream-like conviction, "Near-consuming and enticing."  That 
seems to placate him because she continues.  "However, I 
think those lights were more about plates shifting than 
fairies taunting."

"You think the earth moved?"  His question sounds utterly 
sincere.

Scully’s response is equally heartfelt.  "That’s a little 
too dramatic, Mulder, but, yes, in a way, the earth moved.  
Plates shifted."

"Light came out," he says as if finishing her thought.

"Right.  We were in the right spot at the right time, paid 
attention, and were lucky enough to see the lights fly."  
She pauses.  "But the light was from electrons, Mulder, not 
fairies," she emphasizes yet again.  She sure seems to 
enjoy making that distinction.

"All matter includes electrons, Dr. Scully."  He sounds 
quite pleased with himself.

"Moreover, Mulder, once plates shift, they can’t go back to 
their former position.  They’ve relaxed their tension, 
emitted light, and settled into a new position of strength, 
ready to withstand another round of stresses."

"And the world around it continues to operate, business as 
usual.  That all makes a lot of sense," he admits.

"Agent Mulder, does that mean you’re giving up the fairy 
theory?" Scully asks with an amused edge.

"No," he says with feigned annoyance.  "It’s just that I am 
willing to embrace the theory of a tectonic light show, 
especially since you explain it with such rational 
conviction."

"Just like I’m saying it could have been fairies."

"Who are you, and what have you done with Agent Scully?" 
Mulder teasingly insists.

"C’mon, Mulder," Scully whines with what has to be a toothy 
grin.  "You know I’m just laying out the possibilities.  
Not eliminating any options until they’re disproven 
completely and scientifically."  Scully shifts herself 
around on the car seat, turning more to her left, her coat 
grazing softly along the seat’s leather.  "We have no proof 
that the light was fairy light *or* that it was tectonic.  
I’m just saying that tectonic light is the more plausible 
explanation given the circumstances.  And given the fact 
that fairies don’t exist."

"So, Scully, do you want to drive closer to the hill and--"

"No, Mulder," she interrupts, causing Mulder to emit a 
pitiful little protest squeak.  Scully snickers and keeps 
talking.  "Let’s let it go.  Whatever it was, it’s gone and 
done with.  Let’s let the fairies taunt someone else, let 
the seismologists worry about electron diffusion, and let's 
just live our lives."

Mulder is silent.  I don’t think it’s in defeat or 
acquiescence as much as surprise.  In any event, Scully 
isn’t continuing to defend her position, so he must have 
acknowledged her somehow.  Her hand suddenly twitches over 
me, more deliberate this time.

She pulls her hands out of her pockets, drawing me out and 
twirling me in her left hand.  Neither of them says 
anything.  Both she and Mulder just watch me slowly 
spinning between them in the dark, cramped car interior.  
The way they’re intently staring at me with glazed and 
dilated eyes, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say that I’m 
a real life alluring fairy myself.  You’d think they’d 
never seen me before.

Scully interrupts the brief silence, slowly, deliberately 
drawing her eyes up to peer at his face, and says, 
"So...Mulder...have anything insanely expensive you’d like 
to do?  Anywhere you want to go?"

In way of response, Mulder starts the car and turns to look 
out the windshield.  Although the night’s been full of 
sounds, the biting roar of the engine startles me.  
Mulder’s voice ripples over the noise of the engine, "Which 
way to Disneyland?"

"Why, do you want go?"  Scully sounds highly amused, 
playful.  A surprisingly wide grin lights up her face.  "I 
think they’re probably closed at this hour, Mulder."  She 
still has that smile despite that sad revelation.

"It’s just as well, I suppose," Mulder enigmatically 
drawls.  "Our hotel has an arcade.  That's like an 
amusement park."

"We have the bureau credit card and you just want to go 
back to the hotel?"  Scully sounds incredulous.

"You have a better idea?"

Scully pauses, still twirling me in her hand.  If I was 
really a smart card I could pipe up and scream out 
suggestions of where to go, of what to do.  Don’t they 
realize that I might like a little adventure?  Like to see 
something other than a dingy car rental office, a boring 
hotel lobby, and interchangeable gas station pumps?  But, 
alas, all I can do is reflect the dashboard light into 
streaks of red and white lines across their serene faces.

"Actually, no, I can’t think of anywhere else to go," 
Scully confesses as a sneaky little grin creeps across her 
face.  "So I guess we’ll just go back."  She releases a 
loud, exaggerated sigh.

Mulder responds with a simple sly smile.  The edges of his 
lips upturn only slightly, but he's clearly pleased with 
his destination victory.  "Okay, then.  Off we go."

Before I can see their reactions to our departure from the 
fairy light lookout, Scully slides me back into her dark 
and lonely pocket.  I guess her hands are warm now as she 
only drops me inside, her hand not staying to keep me 
company.  The rest of her must also be quite warm since she 
slips off her coat, presumably tossing it a short distance 
to the backseat as I fly through the air.  I guess it’s the 
closest I’m going to get to a ride on Space Mountain.

"Watch where you put that freezing hand of yours, Scully."

Scully must have demonstrated her new warmth because Mulder 
says, "Mmm...toasty.  My other leg is going to start 
feeling neglected, you know."

"Give me time," I hear Scully murmur under her breath.  
Mulder hears something too but didn't quite make it out.  
Rather than 'fess up, Scully teases Mulder's "Hmm?" with an 
ambiguous "I don't know."  Maybe she added a devious smile 
to go along with her retort, though, because neither of 
them speaks, but the air still rings with noise.

Right now the only sounds are the car’s engine and the 
crunching of tire rubber on loose gravel.  After a few 
minutes one of them turns on the radio.  We listen to a 
baseball game for a while, then one of them switches over 
to a jazz station playing a slow, soulful tune.  Sadly, we 
don’t even make it through that one dreamy song before the 
station switches again.  I suppose they're saving the mood 
music for later.

We listen to a call-in show about gardening for the rest of 
the ride to the hotel.  If we run into any slugs, boll 
weevils, or any other of an assortment of pesky creatures 
and fungi in the near future, we’ll be well-prepared.

I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again.  These two are 
very, very strange.  They have a golden ticket to the city 
and yet we spend the night lazily driving through town, 
sitting atop a light-visited ridge discussing fairies and 
faults, and learning about horticulture.  I have no idea 
why these two are considered by some to be on the bureau 
fringe, testing the limits.  Well, except for the fairy 
thing.

Suddenly, in the middle of an explanation of root rot, the 
car shuts off, two doors snap open, and I hear Mulder say 
something about how they’re staying at the hotel and will 
get the car tomorrow, late tomorrow.  And then, they’re 
gone.  Scully didn’t even grab her coat.

And that’s how the night ends.  In darkness and in silence.

----

lilydale10@yahoo.com
November 2001-January 2002