Lips touch (1/1)
Classification: VRA
Rating: PG 
Spoilers: "Tunguska", X-Files Movie, and CC's confirmation on E!
Keywords: black cancer/oilen, Shipper/Noromos safe, character dies
Summary: Mulder lies dying, Scully remembers
Note: Based on a dream I had, and speculations on "lips touch"
on the alt.tv.x-files.
Post: Anywhere

Lips Touch
by Diane Elizabeth Thio

	Mulder lies dying, and I have no words left for him.
	He is lying on a table, wrapped in wired fencing. He rasps and
struggles, his lean body stripped naked. They claim that the fencing is to
protect him and others from the oil-like substance that has harnessed
itself inside him. Black cancer, "oilen". 
	My mind, though able to see the evidence, is unable to accept it.
I know, biologically, he will die. The vaccination was ineffective.
However, I cannot accept his twitching, spasm-racked state.
	"Scully..." I look at him. His green eyes, changing with his
moods, are clear. No blackness has slid over them. 
	"Have you...ever wanted to...have our lips touch..."
	Black oil slides over his eyes, and his body buckles into another
spasm. His arms and legs frail about, and the barbs of the wire slice into
his skin, snag against his flesh, rip through the epidermis like a scalpel
through tissue paper. Instead of blood running, there is black ooze.
	He lays still. I know he wants to hear my reply. But his eyes are
full of opaque darkness. He is blinded, blinded by the truth that he did
not intend to find, but caught in him. 
	He knows, I know, that our lips touch.
	When our words come from our mouth, our lips touch.
	I know when his lips touch mine, even if he was unaware of my
knowledge.
	I remember the pain in my body <how could something so small hurt
so much?>, the world and Mulder blurring into one, and the descent into
unconsciousness. Before , our lips would touch, but he touched mine to
restore my breath. As desperately and as passionately as he would have
before.
	Now, our lips touch.
	This time, there is no restoring of life, only an acknowledge of
trust, and a final goodbye. When the black oil slides away from his eyes,
they remain open. I reach under the wire netting and close them.
	Mulder is dead,and I need to say nothing more.

All responses are welcome.