lovely, dark and deep by fox's gal / The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,/ / But I have promises to keep,/ / And miles to go before I sleep,/ / And miles to go before I sleep./ From /Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening/ by Robert Frost There is a sort of hopelessness that comes with silence. It's as though everyone has something to say and none of it is good, so silence becomes the next best option. The air was heavy with it; unspoken words, sentiments left unexpressed, all of them circling around an identical thought. Just let him go. It's not that easy. There's more to ending a life than a simple pulling of a plug. That phrase only degrades the human body to some sort of defunct kitchen appliance. Pull out the plug and throw it away; it doesn't work anymore. In this case, however, the appliance in question hadn't worked for a very long time. The doctor in charge had come to believe that this was the only option left. He'd been optimistic, of course. Patients who had been through worse had often survived. Most of them were able to regain a normal life. All of them, regardless of how normal their lives became, all had that shadowy area in their past to work through, but they managed. The doctor and his colleagues had firmly believed that this man would have followed a path already well-traveled by those others. They hadn't wanted to believe that someone so young could give up on a life barely lived. His frown deepened as he looked back and forth between the people seated in his office. Usually he was an attractive man; however, he'd allowed the weight of one patient to hang on him, and the physical effects of the stress were making themselves evident. He'd been feeling the stress for the better part of ten years. Numerous times he had encouraged the family to seek out another specialist, but they had refused. There had been doctors before him, but apparently there would be none after him. And he, since he had what was by now a vested interest, did not turn them away. The silence was heavy, and he wanted to break it, but he couldn't ­ he wouldn't tell anyone that it was time to end a human life. They knew it, and they were well aware of the fact that they knew it. "There hasn't been any improvement," he said slowly. The woman ­ she might have looked younger once ­ shook her head. "But you said if we talked to him, if we spent time with him..." He nodded. "I know. And on some level he's always been aware of who's in the room with him. His moments of lucidity have all but disappeared." The doctor rubbed a hand over his face. "There is no explanation for why he slid into a coma. There is no medical reason for it." And that fact drove him crazy. Never before had he had a patient who began to show marked improvement to such an extent before spiraling downwards, never to return. It sometimes occurred to a lesser extent; lucidity returned less often while stretches of catatonia lengthened, but never had he seen a patient show such promise before executing a complete one-eighty. "I can't," the woman was saying. "I can't give up on him. I don't want to abandon him when he needs me. You have to understand that." The man sitting next to her covered her hand with his own and she turned to look at him, pleading in her light eyes. The older man maintained eye contact with the woman. "What about brain activity?" "His condition has worsened to such an extent that if he were to regain consciousness..." This was the hard part. How did you tell two people who obviously loved their son that he was a vegetable? Mrs. Mulder's grip on her husband's hand tightened while Bill Mulder looked as though he'd aged thirty years in the short time they'd been speaking. He cleared his throat. "But there were times, like you said, when he was lucid. If he'd been that way before, why not again?" "Lucidity and consciousness are not necessarily the same thing, Mr. Mulder. Your son was able to cultivate an extensive fantasy life for an extended number of years. He re-wrote history and based his fantasy on that re-written history. He interacted daily with the people in his head, and they began to compete with the world he left behind. To him, this world is one in which his sister was murdered. He was able to repress that, and create a world where she had not been killed, but was merely missing. Both existences have a degree of unhappiness ­ he feels too guilty to be happy, really." In actuality, this was a world in which Fox and Samantha Mulder had been kidnapped on a bicycle ride to the beach during what was supposed to have been the halcyon days of childhood. It was a world where a 12 year old boy was forced to watch his sister be brutally tortured and sexually abused before her death. It was a world in which the child was forced to mutilate the body of his sister before he himself was raped, beaten and left for dead. Repression was par for the course. "Fox has come to imagine himself as someone very important. He's someone who is a threat to others, rather than a victim. He has charged himself with finding Samantha, possibly because he feels responsible for her death. In his mind, he has created himself to be a conglomeration of everything American society considers 'heroic'. He's a highly educated FBI agent in a position of authority. The guilt he feels over Samantha's death comes out by way of sacrifice. He imagines himself sacrificing a promising career in order to find out the truth about her absence. It is entirely possible, Mr. Mulder, that your career influenced your son's choice in this matter." He looked across the desk at the elderly couple. They'd been down this road before; this wasn't the first time they had considered euthanasia and it probably wouldn't be the last. Mrs. Mulder inhaled deeply and tilted her chin upwards. "If he were somehow able to regain consciousness, how do you see potential recovery playing out?" The doctor pursed his lips in thought. "It is my opinion that, if he is able to come out of this coma, the shock of reality opposed to the detailed fantasy that he has created would be particularly harmful. Recovery would be a long and arduous process. It would depend solely on whether he wanted to recover. As of right now, recovery is a threat to Fox. It is as though on some level he knows the pain existing on this plane. He has no control over this world. That alone could very well explain why he resists an awakening." "That's why he's created those... people, you mean," Bill Mulder murmured. The doctor nodded. "Exactly. They're... they're defense mechanisms. He's constantly trying to 'save' himself from what's waiting for him on this side. He considers consciousness a threat, and creates more threats to signify the threat of that consciousness. Similarly, he creates individuals ­ 'characters,' if you will, that he attaches himself to in order to make that fantasy world more appealing. By doing so, he also makes it more difficult to leave. This world cannot equate to what he's created." The older woman looked down at her hands, still linked with her husband's. "That 'Scully' person, you mean." "That's one example. We believe that he created 'Scully' as a stand-in for a maternal figure. She validates him while only appearing as a threat to his construction. He created someone to trust, who would believe in him and his fantasy. There are lesser players, of course, but they all play a part. Think of it like a house of cards. A man can create an intricate, if flimsy structure in so many years. The problem is that Scully, fictional though she is, has anchored Fox in his fantasy world, and any attempts to pull him out are considered a threat." The doctor paused. "He even considers me a threat. My efforts to help have been perceived as intent to harm both him and the people in his head. Looking back, we've been able to piece together much of what his subconscious mind has been trying to do." "*Trying* to do?" the patient's mother asked. "That's right." He leaned back in his chair and pressed his palms together. "Fox has transformed the threat that we pose into an amorphous omniscience ­ a different kind of 'threat.' Rather than the real world posing a threat to his sanity, he has created a shadowy evil that poses a threat to all of mankind—" "Which in turn validates the fantasy," the mother cut in. He nodded. "By remaining in this fantasy realm, he thinks he's saving the world. He couldn't save his sister, so he's trying to go above and beyond the call of duty." Bill Mulder was quiet for a long moment. The pain in his face was evident. It was hard enough to have lost one child, but to lose two was a travesty. "I still don't understand. I don't understand how reality is a threat. We're his *parents*. We *love* him. Doesn't he understand that?" "From what we've been able to piece together, Bill, he's trying to protect himself against that too—" Bill Mulder suddenly stood. "Who needs protection from their *parents*?" He walked the length of the room, seeming far older than his years. He had every reason for that ­ his daughter found brutally murdered, his son found curled in the fetal position, not five feet from her body. Fox had been through varying levels of catatonia, peppered with lucidity. Neither parent ever knew the joy of first dates, senior proms, or driving lessons. Neither of them would ever know grandchildren, or watching their children age into productive adults. They were both exhausted and outraged, and he understood that. "If he was able to sever ties and distance himself emotionally from the memory of his parents, it would make his world ever more comfortable. After such a traumatic experience, this is his way of protecting himself against... himself." It was for that reason that Fox Mulder "killed" his parents ­ they were too present in his mind, and with that presence came the reminder of where he failed, and why he was where he was. They were a reminder of the time before. Of the Real World. By getting rid of that presence, he was able to move more freely within his own world. The doctor alone knew how hard Fox Mulder had been fighting them. He alone knew the extent of the man's fictional existence. He also knew the role he played in that world. Though he tried to remain objective, being charged as a murderous threat when his life's work revolved around saving lives was, on some very primal level, insulting. He knew that Fox had tried many different ways to eliminate his presence, and the doctor was well aware of the patient's frustration at his inability to get rid of him. "It's just too much to consider, Dr. Ryce. I'm sure you can understand that. We can't just... we can't kill our own son. He's our *son*." Her husband's eyes were trained on his hands. "He hasn't been our son for almost thirty years." Dr. Alexander K. Ryce nodded. "I can continue to work with him ­ there are a great deal of experimental treatments that are still open to us. But it's only just a matter of time before he stonewalls all of us completely. Before he gives up and backs out the only way someone can who is that desperate for distance and comfort." The older woman's shoulders sagged slightly. "You mean before he simply gives up the will to live." "No," Dr. Ryce said, his voice low, "before he decides to sacrifice his life for the world within his mind. This isn't a matter of 'giving up' for Fox. It is a matter of working for the greater good. A lie is only a lie for as long as you recognize that fact. Fox fully believes his lie. Somewhere in the process, a lie has become the truth, and he's willing to die for that truth." fox's gal