*RE-POST* "The Road Not Taken", by deejay (NC-17) 2/5
deejay
Assorted warnings, disclaimers, and other bits of frippery:
TITLE: "The Road Not Taken"
AUTHOR: deejay
RATING: NC17, for adult language, violence, and sexual situations (some
of them graphic). If you're offended by any of that, go somewhere else.
If you're under 18, you probably shouldn't be reading this anyway, so go
somewhere else whether you like it or not!:)
CLASSIFICATIONS:
T, R/A (Adventure, Romance/Angst)
SPOILERS: References to "Quagmire", "GenderBender", "End Game",
"Anasazi"
TIMELINE: Pre-Diagnosis Season 4. Takes place in Mid-October 1996.
KEYWORDS: Slash story, Scully/other
SUMMARY: Scully takes a long-overdue vacation, and gets a LOT more than
she bargains for, including revelations about herself.
ARCHIVE: Submitted to Gossamer USA and AEA. All others, please ask me
first (unless I submit it to you), and include my penname when you do
it.
FEEDBACK: Questions, comments, flames and fanmail may be sent to
drj...@wizvax.net.
'SHIPPERS: Fasten your seat belts. It's gonna be a bumpy ride.
"The X Files", Dana Scully (and all Scully relations and ex-boyfriends
appearing herein), Fox Mulder, and Walter Skinner are all properties of
Chris Carter, 10-13, and FoxTV. I do not wish to infringe on their
copyright, nor do I seek monetary gain from this story in any way; if I
did, I'd do it in book form and go through the proper channels! The
other characters in this story, the story idea itself, and all dialogue
belongs to Night Tripper Productions and the author (That's me, by the
way!). All rights are reserved, and will be defended to the death! Any
resemblance to real-life people, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
"Possession", by Sara McLachlan (Tyde Music, 1993) is also excerpted
without permission; however, if I can promote Sara's music even a little
bit, it's a small price to pay! For those who want to hear the whole
song, go get a copy of _Fumbling Towards Ecstacy_, available at fine CD
stores everywhere! Four stars! Joe Bob sez, "Check it out!"
This story appears in slightly different form on Bobbi's Auto-Erotic
Asphyxiation Page. If you like your fanfic extra-spicy, check out
Bobbi's little slice of erotica heaven at:
http://nycmetro.com/Bobbi/index.htm
* * * *
THE ROAD NOT TAKEN (2/5)
by deejay
<<<THREE>>>
Scully found herself holding her breath. It was as if the scene before
her would crumble if she made the slightest movement.
A small sailboat fought with the current as it made its way up the
Seine. The clouds were puffy white on a dark blue background, and the
wind made the high grass wave and the branches sway as the girl with the
flowers walked by the riverbank. The flowers in the trees seemed
incredibly vivid, white with pink edges, and the thought of France in
early Summer made everything else seem so far away...
"Amazing, isn't it?"
Renoir's "The Seine River at Chatou" turned back into the impressionist
masterpiece it was, and Scully snapped back into the quiet reality of
the old wing of Boston's Museum Of Fine Arts.
"Oh, shit, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to startle you..."
Scully turned to look at the interloper of her imagination. She tended
to size up people initially the way she sized up suspects -- a
by-product of her job she did not like at all. Female, a shade shorter
than Scully. Light brown hair, shoulder-length, combed behind the ears,
bangs feathered over the brow. Fair complexion, no makeup to speak of.
Brown herringbone jacket over grey turtleneck, blue jeans, black boots,
and brown eyes. Very brown. Very lively...
Scully tried to smile, embarassed that she had been so engrossed in the
painting. "It's all right. Not your fault. Whenever I see this work, I
tend to..." She searched for words.
Obviously relieved, the interloper said, "Space out?"
Scully looked back at the painting. The print on her bedroom wall at
home was comforting in its own way, but was a pale imitation of the real
thing. "That's about right."
The interloper looked at the painting. "This piece does that to me, too.
Same with anything by Monet." Beat. "Did you see the Impressionists
fight the Postcards last year?"
Scully blinked. "The Impressionists..."
The interloper made a dismissive gesture. "Sometimes I forget other
people don't talk like I do. The Museum put on an exhibition last
December comparing Impressionist works with State-sanctioned art of the
same period. The French government of the time would only support art
that put France in a good light -- rolling fields, beautiful sunsets,
Paris as the jewel of Europe, that kind of thing. Basically large-scale
postcards."
Scully nodded, understanding now. "That must have been fascinating."
The interloper nodded. "Put next to the stuff the government -- and,
thereby, the Salon -- supported, you could really see why the
Impressionists were as controversial as they were. They were showing
poverty, suffering, loneliness, while the government wanted all of that
to disappear. Sort of 'Morning In France'."
Scully smiled. "So who won the war?"
"The Impressionists, in a walk. For one thing, their names are universal
while the Postcard painters are all long gone. For another, the end of
the exhibit showed how the Postcard painters started incorporating
Impressionist themes and styles into their work. After all, you can't
deny the truth."
Scully refrained from commenting on that last statement. Instead, she
said, "So how long have you studied art?" It was a fishing trip, but
this woman could be one of the eternal graduate students that made up a
good portion of Boston's population. They came in all ages, sizes and
sexes. And with her unlined features, she could have been anywhere from
18 to plastic surgery.
The interloper laughed. "Formally, not at all. Informally, ever since my
dad brought me here when I was five. He didn't know anything about art,
either, but he wanted to expose me to..." She made quotation marks with
her fingers. "...'the finer things.' We'd come here, like, four or five
times a year. When I was old enough to ride the T myself, I'd come
whenever I could. Still do, usually whenever I want to lower my stress
level."
Scully looked round the high-ceilinged gallery, the grey walls covered
with Impressionist works she'd only seen in books. "I can understand.
It's a beautiful place."
The interloper gave Scully a speculative look. "They don't have
something like this where you live?"
Scully was surprised. "Do I look that much like a tourist?"
The interloper shrugged. "Just a hunch."
Scully had to break eye contact with her, and she couldn't figure out
why. "Well, the National Gallery's got the artwork, alright."
The interloper nodded to herself. "Farthest south I've ever been was
Baltimore. Always wanted to visit D.C..."
"It's an interesting city," Scully said neutrally. *Provided you don't
work there,* she didn't add. She held out her hand. "Dana Scully."
The interloper smiled and shook her head. "My manners truly suck. Becca
Maxfield. My friends call me Max." They shook hands. Max' eyes twinkled
when she smiled. Scully thought it was... What _did_ she think it was?
She didn't know, and it was starting to annoy her.
But instead of getting away from this feeling, she did her best to
ignore it as they walked around the museum. Max hadn't asked if she
could join her and Scully hadn't invited her, but they spent the next
two hours together, their conversation primarily about art, as they
immersed themselves in the works of Renoir and Van Gogh, Monet and
Matisse. Scully didn't tell Max what she did and Max didn't ask, and
when Scully asked Max what she did, she simply said, "I work for the
city."
They were in the new wing of the museum, near the entrance to the
restaurant, when Scully realized how hungry she was. "You know
everything else about this place," she said lightly. "How's the food
here?"
Max wrinkled her nose. "Mediocre and expensive. It's the coffee shop at
Logan Airport without the ambient noise. Tell you what. There's a pub
near Northeastern's campus. Not much for atmosphere, but it's got the
best sandwiches in the area, if you're up for a little walking."
Scully felt herself doing the Mulder Smirk. "I've just spent three hours
traversing the Museum of Fine Arts. A little more walking isn't going to
make much difference."
"I left my coat in the Old Wing." Max smiled with very bright white
teeth. *Non-smoker,* Scully noted. *Good.*
*Damnit, WHY is it good?*
<<<FOUR>>>
The cloakroom in the Old Wing was in a corridor just off the entrance
foyer. Being a rainy day, the line was fairly long. Max and Scully
agreed one of them would retrieve the coats while the other one used the
ladies room. If the line hadn't moved much, they'd switch. Scully's need
was less than Max' -- surprising, considering Scully had more coffee
than food on the USAir shuttle flight, plus two cups before she'd left
the house that morning -- so Scully got in line while Max went off in
the opposite direction. The line did move fairly quickly after the
harried clerk finally found the right coat for a tremendously fat woman
who seemed convinced he'd stolen it.
Vacationing in Boston had been a whim, pure and simple. She'd never been
there before, but Scully had heard Mulder wax poetic about its general
wonderfulness too many times during dull moments in the basement. A
well-respected pathologist was going to be a guest lecturer at Harvard
Med the following Monday, and Scully was looking forward to attending.
Plus she had always wondered about the museum that housed the original
source of the print above her bed. So after checking into a high-rise
Hilton next to the Prudential Center, Scully stowed her bags in the
non-descript hotel room and got directions from the concierge on the
best way to reach the MFA. It was surprisingly easy; a branch of the
subway ("The T", as they called it here) went right by it.
When Scully entered the original Museum entrance and got a Visitor
button from a mousy woman wearing an MFA Volunteer badge, all she
planned to do was find the original of the Renoir, then spend the rest
of the afternoon wandering around the gallery. She had not expected to
meet anyone, let alone spend two hours wandering the galleries
discussing art with... well, with anyone.
Scully's frown depened as she came up to the cloakroom counter and
handed the clerk her ticket and Max'. What was the problem here? Max
seemed perfectly nice. Friendly. Funny. Easy to talk to. It had been
perfectly pleasant. Scully shouldn't have been hearing alarm bells.
*Okay, not alarm bells, exactly,* but the sensation she got the first
time she looked in Max' eyes... Scully shook her head as the clerk
brought the coats. *Maybe it's just this is the first person I've had a
prolonged conversation with that hasn't witnessed an alien abduction, or
a vampire attack, or been possessed by demons...* She put a dollar in
the tip jar and started back towards the main entrance...
"...and _I_ said I don't give a FUCK what that judge said!"
Scully's stopped short. Adult male, obviously distressed, and with the
surrounding marble his voice echoed quite well. Arguing with a woman,
though Scully couldn't make out her end of the conversation. The crowd
around her murmured to each other while two other male voices joined the
argument coming from the foyer. A middle-aged man in a green sweater
said, "I guess someone else thinks the service around here needs
work..."
BANG! BANG!
All conversation promptly ended as screams started coming from the
foyer. Most were just unfocused screams of terror, while one was
obviously the distressed male, telling whoever was around him to "GET
BACK! GET BACK! GET THE FUCK BACK!" Confusion erupted behind Scully as
the cloakroom line realized life had just gotten dangerous.
Scully simply reacted. Suddenly the coats were in a pile by the wall and
her Sig Sauer was in her hands. She had no idea why she had put it in
her suitcase, and even less of an idea why she strapped it on before
leaving the hotel. Scully had chalked it up to habit and left it at
that. If she'd had time, she might amend that conclusion to read "divine
intervention." But from the sound of the man in the foyer, and the woman
who was now pleading for her life, Scully did not have time.
The appearance of another gun on the scene elicited a fresh batch of
screams from the cloakroom line. "GET DOWN," she barked in the Voice Of
Authority she'd learned at Quantico. "STAY DOWN!" Whether it was the
voice or the weapon it was attached to, the cloakroom line dropped to
the marble floor with no argument. Weapon pointed towards the floor,
Scully put her back to the wall and edged towards the entrance. Her mind
was in Warp Speed Mode. *Small-caliber weapon, maybe a .32 or a .38. Two
shots fired. Only four left if it's a revolver, and I've got a full clip
and more stopping power. But no backup and no time to get any from the
sound of it. And the woman sounds too close to him. If he uses her as a
hostage or a shield...*
Footsteps from the other end of the corridor snapped Scully out of her
mental sit-rep. Max had appeared at the other side of the entrance to
the foyer, leaning around a wide grey column to peep out the developing
scene. Scully was about to tell her to get back, but the warning died in
her throat. One reason was Max' expression -- total concentration
without a trace of fear. Another was the gold badge now clipped to Max'
breast pocket. The third was the Colt Python with the 4-inch barrel that
she held in her left hand.
Scully hissed at Max. Max looked over, annoyance quickly replaced by
surprise as she focused on Scully's Sig. Max was trying to adapt as fast
as she could. It went without saying that finding herself in a hostage
situation in the MFA -- on her day off, yet -- was unexpected. But now
she was staring across a marble doorway at an attractive, well-spoken,
well-dressed woman she'd just met two hours before... who apparently
felt the need to pack heavy artillery on her vacation! Max looked up at
Scully. "What the fuck are you," she mouthed to her. Scully started to
answer, then reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out a slim black
wallet and held it open. It was a photo I.D. with three blue letters on
a white background: FBI. Max goggled at the letters for a moment, then
nearly laughed out loud. *Good one, Maxie. For the last two hours,
you've been trying to...*
"Joel, please," the woman blubbered. "Please don't . Listen..."
"PLEASE?! LISTEN?!? That's all I've SAID for SIX WEEKS!! 'Listen,
Louise, PLEASE listen...' Well, it's a LITTLE LATE, YA KNOW?..."
*Party time.* Max looked back at Scully. "On 'three'" she mouthed,
holding up three fingers as she flattened her back against the wall and
locked the Python in a two-handed grip.
Scully nodded, her grip tightening on the Sig as she blew air out her
nose. Scully had never done anything like this with anyone but Mulder. A
flash of uncertainty ran through her, but it was quelled with a quick
look at Max. *She's a professional,* Scully told herself, *And thank God
she's with me now.* Together they mouthed, "One... Two... THREE!" And
they swung into the entranceway.
"FBI," Scully barked in the Voice. "DROP YOUR WEAPON!"
"POLICE OFFICER," Max shouted in a Voice of her own. "FREEZE!"
With his red checked lumberjack jacket and faded brown workboots, Joel
wouldn't have looked out of place at a Redskins tailgate party. He was
standing in the center of the foyer, left arm wrapped round the neck of
the mousy volunteer, the right hand pressing the barrel of a .38 Special
hard into her right temple. He'd broken her nose at some point, and she
was making small keening sounds as the flow made a pretty large stain on
her white buttondown shirt. Scully pegged Joel in his early 40's,
balding but not grey, average height but big all around -- arms, legs,
gut. His eyes worried her more than his weapon. They were wide and wild,
and made it clear he'd have no more problem shooting Louise -- or
Scully, or Max, or anyone else who got in his way -- than he had
shooting the two security guards who lay dying by the cashier's desk.
Joel was breathing through his nose, adrenaline and the extra weight of
the woman making him breath heavily, but if Scully and Max' weaponry
gave the man pause, he didn't show it. If anything, the stare he threw
at their demands would have made most people slink away. Joel just
stared at the two women for a count of five, and then he started
laughing -- softly to start, then quite loudly.
*Fabulous,* Scully thought furiously. *Two high-powered handguns staring
him in the face and he's yukking it up.*
Max kept her T-sight right on the bridge of Joel's nose. *Oh, this is
gonna be big fun,* she told herself. *Where the fuck is the cavalry?*
Joel was in the middle of a long guffaw when he wrenched the volunteer's
neck just a little tighter. She stopped keening and started choking.
"You hear THAT, Louise," he screamed down at his captive. "Your SISTERS
are here! And they got guns AND badges!!"
"Put the weapon down NOW," Scully ordered, sounding a lot more sure of
herself than she felt.
"Come on, guy," Max said, trying to sound a note of reason. "This isn't
gonna solve anything..."
Joel's head snapped up. Max tried not to feel like a jack-lighted deer.
"REALLY?! You're telling me blowing this BITCH back to HELL... which is
where she BELONGS after what she did to ME... to my LIFE... to my
FAMILY... You say that won't SOLVE ANYTHING?!? It sounds like the
PERFECT solution to ME..."
"It's not a solution if you've got a family," Scully called out. "You
have kids, sir? You want to make them orphans? Is this how you want them
to remember you?"
"What I HAD..." Joel snarled, "WAS A GOOD LIFE! A HOUSE! A BUSINESS! And
this..." He looked down at Louise with withering hatred. "...this BITCH
TOOK IT ALL AWAY! She raised a wanton little TEASE who gave it up to any
boy with a CAMARO AND A LETTER JACKET!" A trickle of drool came out the
side of his mouth as he looked up at Max and Scully. "I DID MY BEST! I
TRIED to put her right! MAKE her see what was right! But I guess it
wasn't GOOD ENOUGH, HUH, LOUISE?!"
Dimly, Max could hear the sounds of sirens coming up Huntington Avenue.
*About fucking time. Gotta keep him talking...* "The cavalry's almost
here, Joel. Now, you're outnumbered already. You think you're gonna get
out of here alive when the TAC Squad gets you in their sights?"
"HAVEN'T YOU BEEN LISTENING?!?" His voice cracked from the strain of
howling. "MY LIFE IS _ALREADY_ OVER! IT GOT TAKEN AWAY FROM ME! BY
LAWYERS! BY JUDGES! BY SOCIAL WORKERS who thought THEY knew more about
what was BEST FOR MY FAMILY then ME!" Joel yanked Louise up off the
ground and spun with her, sending her legs flying as he did it! "AND
THIS VICIOUS LITTLE CUNT MADE IT ALL POSSIBLE!"
Even though she was a head shorter than Joel, Louise made a dandy
shield. Even if he'd given Scully and Max a clear shot at his back, at
this range there was no guarantee a bullet wouldn't go through Joel and
plow into Louise. So if Joel had wanted to hold them off, all he had to
do was keep holding onto Louise. Louder sirens and squealing brakes.
*Just a few seconds more,* Scully pleaded. "Joel, listen to me..."
"YOU WANNA LISTEN TO SOMETHING, BITCH?! LISTEN TO THIS!!"
It all took about five seconds.
Louise went flying face-first into the marble wall, her head cracking
quite loudly on impact. His arm held straight out, Joel pointed the .38
at Louise's head.
"NO!" Scully's shot took a big chunk out of Joel's right shoulder. Max
aimed lower at the last moment, the hollow-pointed round shattering
Joel's right ankle. Joel fired as he went down on his back, the bullet
ricocheting off the wall a foot above Louise's head and flying up into
the rafters.
"It's over, Joel," Max shouted. "Stay down!"
Joel bellowed like an angry grizzly bear. He had dropped the .38 when
Scully blew out his shoulder, but it laid right next to him, and he
grabbed it with his left hand and brought it up. Scully and Max both
fired twice. Joel's body rolled once, twice, and then was still. Four
large red blooms blossomed on his chest.
Max flew across the floor, kicking the .38 away from Joel's body as
Scully got to Louise. It was obviously academic, but Max checked the
pulse out of habit. No sale. Joel's eyes were half-closed, all the rage
drained from his face. *Game over. Drive home safely.* "How is she," Max
wanted to know.
Scully did a quick check of the pupils. Pulse rapid, breathing rapid,
skin clammy, shaking like a leaf, obviously concussed. "She's in shock."
"At least she's alive," Max said, more to herself. She looked over her
shoulder. "SOMEBODY CALL AN AMBULANCE!"
"IN THE MUSEUM," a man's voice called commandingly from outside. "THIS
IS THE POLICE! THROW OUT YOUR WEAPONS AND COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP!"
Max stood up, looking back at Joel's dull eyes as she re-holstered the
Python. "Golly Days," she said dryly. "Why didn't _we_ think of that?"
END OF PART TWO