A profile in caring - (31 Parts)

[krazykat]

A walk on the dark side... no thanks!!! Closest I could get to enjoying Mulder's cold whilst writing this was the UST filled vaporub scenes...

[krazykat]

Pure Scully fluff.....

PART 17

Scully sat cross legged on the other bed in the dormitory room, her reading glasses perched on her nose, listening to the soft snoring emenating from the sleeping form

of her partner as she reviewed his copies of the casefiles. If she was honest, this was the part of her chosen career that she hated the most, this slow and almost endless wading through crime scene data, forensic reports, witness statements and the notes from the interviews with the grieving families, and although she prided

herself on her intelligence, there were times that she wished she had Mulder's photographic memory and ability to speed read. She smiled gently as the memory of Mulder trying to teach her how to speed read during their first year of partnership popped into her mind, laughing gently as she remembered Mulder's amused exasperation at her inability to grasp a skill that came completely naturally to him.

She sighed, pulling her glasses off and bringing her right hand up to massage her temples, as her left hand closed the file she had been reading. *Coffee* she thought to herself, the sudden craving for caffeine consuming her. She uncurled her legs and twisted, pushing herself up off the bed and stretching, the muscles in her lower back and shoulders complaining after several hours spent sitting in the same position. She yawned, looking at her watch and inwardly groaning when she realised that it was 8pm and she had now been up for nearly fifteen hours. She took a couple of steps towards the other bed, her right hand gently coming to rest, palmside up on Mulder's forehead, feeling the heat rising off of his flushed skin, his temperature rising as the antipyretic effect of the acetaminophen in the nyquil started to wear off.

*Let him sleep* she told herself, loathe to wake him up just to give him another dose of medication that would put him back to sleep, knowing that sleep was the best

thing for him at the moment. She gently removed her hand from his forehead, allowing it to trail backwards through the hair that had only recently started to grow back

after the latest of his 'weed whacker' haircuts, smiling softly as her partner contentedly snuggled against her outstretched arm. She loved watching this man sleep, the slight worry lines and the haunted look in his eyes disappearing, his face, unlined despite the fact that he was pushing forty, relaxed, making him look so much younger and carefree. She bent her head down towards his, her lips coming to rest on his forehead in a gentle kiss, confessing to herself that despite her best efforts not to, somewhere in the course of the last six years she had fallen in love with this brilliant, infuriating, sensitive and passionate man.

She stood up, slowly, taking a deep breath, pushing down the feelings that she had for this man, composing herself before she headed back to the BAU offices in search

of coffee.

[krazykat]

Moving back in the direction of a plot.... do not flame me about the lack of sneezing

PART 18

Scully turned away from the coffee percolator, her eyes quickly scanning the office, searching for the source of the "Agent Scully" that she had just heard, silently groaning as her eyes came to rest on the solemn face of SAC Huthcins as he walked towards her. "Sir?" she asked, her dread building as he quickly informed her that another body had been discovered and instructed her to wake her partner and to be ready to leave Quantico for Lake Fairfax Park within the next fifteen minutes.

*Another body? Shit he's escalating* she thought to herself as she nodded tersely, all thoughts of coffee now forgotten. "Yes, sir" she replied, turning away from him and quickly exiting the office and heading in the direction of the dormitories. She pushed open the door to the stairwell, quickly jogging up the five flights of stairs, dreading trying to wake the sleeping Mulder, knowing that between the sedating properties of the nyquil and her insomniac partner's tendency to sleep like the dead when he actually managed to fall asleep, that she had her work cut out for her.

Reaching the floor on which the dormitory that they had acquired was located, she pushed through the door, quickly turning to the right and jogging along the corridor, vaguely aware of the looks that the cadets in the multicoloured tops of varying agencies threw in her direction as she negotiated her way past them. As the end of the corridor neared, she slowed to a walk, quickly regulating her breathing as one hand came up to smooth the locks of red hair that had fallen out of place as she ran. She paused outside the dormitory room, one hand coming up to gently knock on the door, a public gesture of affording the slumbering occupant some privacy despite the fact that she would have signed an afidavit atesting to the fact that Mulder was dead to the world without even having to open the door.

Getting no response from her knock, she pushed the door forward gently, her head peeking around the corner of the doorframe prior to entering, her heart melting as she took in the sight of her gorgeous partner lying on his back, gently snoring, his face turned towards the door, his left arm curled across his stomach and his right arm lying by his side. He looked so peaceful and she hated the fact that she was going to have to pull him out of a restful slumber to go visit the body of a butchered young woman. She slipped into the room fully, closing the door gently behind her before crossing the short distance to where her partner lay, gently perching on the side of the bed facing him.

"Come on G-man, time to wake up", she said as her right hand came to rest on his shoulder, gently shaking it. She watched as he mumbled something that sounded like "'nother ten minutes honey", before he rolled over and cuddled up to her, sighing contentedly in his sleep. She took a deep breath and tried to ignore the little devil in her mind that suggested that she just crawl into bed with this man and cuddle. "No, not another ten minutes, now, Mulder" she replied, shaking his shoulder more forcibly than before, smiling when sleep-filled eyes stared up at her with confusion. "Morning, or should I say goodnight, Mulder" she said, her hand moving to his forehead to brush the stray lick of hair away from his forehead, noting with a sigh of relief that for now at least, the pills were having an effect and his temperature was down.

Mulder looked at her, his expression blank, his eyes showing his confusion. He didn't seem to be able to form a coherent thought, his mind sleep addled, the remnants of the nyquil in his system leaving his eyes heavy. His eyes started to close over again, only to open wide as he felt Scully gently slapping at his cheeks, her voice firmly telling him that he had to get up. He yawned, his back arching off the bed in a feline-esque stretch, his arms and legs extending outwards as he tried to shake off the last vestiges of sleep. He sat up and Scully inwardly winced as the man who had looked so relaxed two minutes ago looked up at her, the exhaustion that he was feeling clearly evident in the dark circles under his eyes, the slightly dazed and drugged look in his eyes, and if that was not enough, she could hear the congestion in the shallow breaths that he was taking.

"Wha' timmizit?" he asked her as he brought his hands up to his face, his hands violently rubbing at his eyes in an attempt to force himself awake.

"About half past eight" she replied as she leant behind him to grab his glasses off the bedside table. She leaned back and handed them to him as she continued. "Hutchins got a call from Virginia state police about a woman's body they found dumped in Lake Fairfax Park. The body was sliced to pieces, massive blood loss, hands and feet intricately bound. A velvet hood was placed over the woman's face. Hutchins wants us on the road in the next ten minutes".

"Shit" Mulder replied, his tired features registering his surprise and worry. He slid forward to the edge of the bed and pushed himself upwards, swaying slightly as he stood up to quickly. He took a deep breath, regaining his equilibrium before turning towards Scully. "He's escalating after three victims? I have to say that that frightens me Scully, because my gut instinct is that we are missing victims, that the UNSUB started killing prior to Jennifer Reid".

"You think he changed his ritual?" she asked as Mulder stepped towards the chair in the corner of the room, yawning as he reached down to pick up his clothes and then turned and walked into the small bathroom in order to get changed, listening as she heard the water running in the sink. A minute passed before the bathroom door reopened and Mulder reappeared, his hair slightly damp from where he had run his fingers through it, trying to tame the 'bed head'.

"No, I wouldn't say that he's changed the ritual, more that it has evolved as his fantasy grew and he became more confident. I'd bet that if we run a search through VICAP of unsolved murders involving knife wounds and ligatures that we would be able to identify a list of unsolved homicides that could be linked to this offender" he replied as he sat down on the bed and slipped on his shoes, tying the laces before standing up, reaching over to the bedside table and grabbing his holster, attaching it to his belt.

Whilst Mulder continued to get ready, Scully sat on the bed, considering his theory, her stomach churning at the thought that this monster might have been responsible for the deaths of over women and that nobody had managed to connect the dots until his practices became completely barbaric. She took a deep breath and stood up, a tight smile on her face as she looked at her partner as he lifted the box of tissues off of the bedside table and straightened up. "You ready?" she asked.

"Ready when you are G-woman" he replied, smiling at her tiredly.

[krazykat]

PART 19

Mulder groaned as he spotted the gaggle of news crews that were already set up and filming the flurry of activity at the crime scene boundary, watching as virginia state police effectively patrolled the perimeter, ensuring that only authorised personnel gained access to the scene. He hated fucking reporters, hated the way in which they managed to fuel mass panic on the one hand whilst portraying themselves as self righteous defenders of the people on the other hand. Oh sure they were useful when it came to warning certain populations that they might be targeted, he himself had manipulated the press to his advantage on previous cases, but the rest of the time they were just a fucking nuisance. He chuckled softly as he watched Scully turn to Hutchins and say "looks like the vultures are here".

The black FBI issued SUV slowed to a halt, the four agents unbuckling their seatbelts, doors opening in an almost synchronised concerto of movement, three doors

slamming shut in a cacophany of sound. Mulder paused, one hand gripping the door as the cold air assauged his sinuses, his nose starting to run. He audibly groaned as

he felt the need to sneeze building. He hated feeling like this, his head fuzzy, his muscles aching, unable to take a deep breath for fear of triggering a coughing fit, and victim to his rebellious sinuses. His eyes closed, his breath hitching slightly, his nostrils flaring as his hands desperately routed through the pockets of his leather jacket in search of a crumpled up tissue, pulling one clear and up to his face just in time to catch the three sneezes that escaped, his body thrusting forward with the force of each sneeze, the SUV door supporting him. He blew his nose, silently groaning as he contemplated just asking Scully to shoot him and put him out of his misery. He jumped as he felt Scully's hand coming to rest on his arm, his mind wondering how she had managed to sneak up on him.

"How are you holding up partner?" she asked, her eyes quickly scanning his features, noting that with the exception of the flush across his cheeks, he looked deathly

pale against the bright floodlights that had already been set up to aid the investigative teams to safely negotiate the terrain.

"I'b not really, buhhhh HUUUUHHHTSCHEEEEEEEEW, but I'll lib" he replied, his hand releasing his death grip on the door of the SUV, stepping back and slamming the door closed. "Cub ohd, let's run the gauntlet" he told her, his hand coming to rest on the small of her back as he turned in the direction of the crime scene tape, gently

guiding her ahead of him as they walked towards the yellow tape that delineated the boundaries of the crime scene.

Scully smiled inwardly, her conscious mind not allowing her professional persona to be caught on film smiling at a crime scene. It was strange, if anyone other than

Mulder were to invade her personal space she would be furious, but with Mulder, things were different. She knew that he couldn't help his gentlemanly behaviour, the

old european manners having been drummed into him from a young age by his american-dutch mother and vineyard high society, and the fact that he treated her like a true equal, never disparaging her for being a woman, or considering her to be inferior to him in anyway was the main reason that she didn't object to this gentle

shepherding.

They walked past the reporters, their heads turning away from the cameras, "no comment's" falling from their lips as they negotiated the path to the crime scene tape,

their bodies folding at the waist in order to duck under the yellow tape. "Who's in charge" Hutchens asked the young trooper who stood nearest to them.

"That'd be the Captain. The CSI's arrived 'bout ten minutes ago, he took them down to the scene. If you follow the markers down to the scene, ask for Morelli, someone

will point him out to you" he replied before continuing, "watch your step though, there's quite a sharp incline and it's slippy as hell down there, we've already had a few guys fall tonight".

"Thanks" Scully said to the young trooper, Hutchins and Mulder having already turned away from the younger man in order to follow the trail down to where the body lay. As she turned she noticed a group of teenagers stood huddled together on the perimeter, their faces etched with shock and horror. "The kids the ones who found the

body?" she asked.

"Yeah, it looks like they came out to the woods in order to get blasted, we found a bag of pot abandoned at the scene, but given what they've been through I'll doubt

that the captain'll make anything of it".

Scully nodded, acknowledging the information, her anger at the pain and suffering that this UNSUB was causing increasing further as she thought of the innocence that

had now been lost forever. She took a deep breath, stealing her emotions and anger in preparation of the horror that would be evident at the crime scene and headed off in the same direction as her partner and Hutchins, quickly catching them up despite her smaller stature. They walked along the trail in silence, each of them lost in

thought, stepping carefully through the wet, slippy foliage and mud, gradually walking deeper into the forest, negotiating their way across the small streams that

meandered their way through the forest towards the larger lake.

After several minutes of walking, the silence punctuated by coughing and sneezing from Mulder, they paused at the edge of a flurry of activity, the CSI's who had

arrived before them having already started documenting the scene, camera flashes going off, numbered markers being placed next to all of the paraphenalia littered

around the crime scene, the majority of it probably having nothing to do with the crime at all but still needing to be catalogued and processed. A tall man, in the brown uniform of the state troopers turned towards them, his hand rising to wave them over.

"You the feds?" he asked.

"Yeah, SAC Hutchins, SSAs Mulder and Scully" Hutchins replied, quickly carrying out the introductions. "You Morelli?" he asked.

"Yeah. One of the kids who discovered the body flagged down a patrol car about two hours ago, after we managed to secure the scene and got a proper look at the victim we ran a check on active cases in the area to see if there were any red flags and well, the rest is history really. This the work of the guy responsible for the other

three murders in the area?"

Mulder sighed, "Frob your initial description, it sounds like it. We deliberately ohbitted the hood and ligature details from the bedia, so it's unlikely that this is the work of ahhhh ahhhh HARTSCHOOOOOOOOOO, excuse be, a copy-cat, although I don't like the fact that this dump site differs so much frobh the previous ones. They were all urban areas, so why has he switched to woodlands?"

"Maybe it was an opportunistic kill" Hutchins replied, turning to look at Mulder.

"Well if that is the case, it's quite disturbing as it beans the UNSUBS ability to control his blood lust is slipping, but then again that bight work in our favour as he could start to make bistakes" Mulder said before turning away from the others and starting to walk the perimeter of the scene, his mind already working to try and assimilate the information he knew about this most recent kill with his profile of the killer.

"Some useable forensic data would certainly be nice" Hutchens said, quickly explaining to Morelli that they had failed to find any fingerprints or DNA at the previous crime scenes.

"Has the coroner had a chance to look at the body?", Scully asked as she watched Mulder visibly shiver as he stood at the edges of the forensic activity, his eyes expertly cataloguing the information in the crime scene. *He really shouldn't be out here* she thought to herself, as she listened to Morelli point out who the coroner was and explain that he had only arrived a few minutes ahead of them and was waiting for the CSIs to finish photographing the scene before he carried out a cursory

examination of the body in situ.

"Okay, if you could excuse me sir, I'm going to go talk with the coronor" she said to Hutchins, before turning and heading in the same direction that Mulder had headed

a minute earlier.

Morelli sighed, the look on his face grim. "You know I've been a cop for twenty years, but I've never seen this level of violence at a crime scene before and I've seen

some pretty horrendous crime scenes in my time. I can't imagine what those poor kids who found her are thinking. I've got some officers who are going to take them down to the station, let the police surgeon check them out so that we can see about getting initial statements from them so we can try to work out what they touched if

anything. We'll also fingerprint them whilst they're down at the station in order to eliminate any prints that don't belong to the bastard that did this".

"Thanks" Hutchins replied, one hand coming up to scrub at tired eyes.

"You're agent ok?" Morelli asked, his head nodding in the direction of Mulder, the agent currently consumed by a fit of sneezes, his head violently snapping forwards with the force of each one as he stifled them into the tissues he held in his hand.

"Not really, he's absolutely loaded with the cold and probably shouldn't even be out here if I'm honest, but he's the best profiler I've got at the moment and with the heat that we're getting from the brass to solve this one, well, you know. Anyway, knowing Mulder, if I'd let him catch up on the sleep he desperately needs, then come tomorrow morning I would be catching all kinds of hell from him for not waking him. He's one of those profilers who prefers to work from his own impressions of the crime scene rather than just the crime scene photos".

[krazykat]

PART 20

Mulder was crouched down next to the body, a pair of purple neoprene gloves on his hands, gently sniffing as he felt his nose running. After two hours, the CSI's had finished their initial cataloguing of the scene and before the body was removed in order to transport it to Quantico as per Scully's request, he wanted this opportunity to view the UNSUB's handiwork up close. His hands reached down to the body, lifting up the hands one by one, squinting at the fingernails, hoping to see any evidence that this young woman had fought for her life and that in the process of doing so had managed to break the skin of her attacker. He gently tilted the palms, the resistance of rigor mortis evident as he did so, noting the defensive wounds.

He lowered the victims arm back to the floor gently, trying through this gentle act of reverence to afford this broken shell of a woman the dignity that she deserved in death. He stood up quickly, immediately regretting it as his vision started to turn gray around the edges, he took several deep breaths trying to ride out the dizzy spell, stubbornly fighting against the desire to faint, refusing to allow the local cops to have the satisfaction of seeing a seasoned FBI agent pass out at a murder scene. *Shit* he thought to himself as the dizziness refused to pass and he felt his knees start to give way, his body refusing to cooperate.

Morelli watched as the profiler gently swayed, what little colour there had been in his cheeks draining. *Shit* he thought to himself, quickly stepping forward, his arms extending forward to catch the agent as he fainted. "Johnson, get over here will you" he shouted to one of the young officers near to him, noting that near enough

everyone present at the crime scene turned to look at the commotion that he was causing, almost sighing with relief when Johnson slipped Mulder's left arm under his

shoulder and supported his weight enough for Morelli to do the same with Mulder's right arm. Quickly, they gently dragged the agent over to one of the equipment boxes,

settling him down on top of it, supporting the younger man as he started to regain consciousness.

"What happened?" Scully demanded as she crouched down in front of her partner, one hand coming up to feel his forehead, gentle moans emitting from her partner as he returned to consciousness.

"I'm not sure" Morelli replied. "One minute he was examining the body, then the next minute he stood up and then, well that's pretty obvious I'd say".

"He's burning up" she muttered as she turned to look at Morelli. "Can you get one of your men to go back up to the clearing and get a hot tea with four sugars in it from the catering van? He's not really eaten anything all day and his blood sugar must be through the floor by now". She turned back to her partner, gently rubbing his legs as he came round.

"Hey" Mulder said weakly, embarrassment evident in his eyes

"Hey yourself" she replied, the gentle smile on her face barely masking the concern in her eyes. "How are you feeling?"

"Honestly?" he asked, his eyes slipping shut as the exhaustion that he was feeling washed over him. "I feel like crap and eben worse, I cab't believe that I just fainted at a cribe scene".

Scully chuckled, "I'm sure that nobody will hold it against you Mulder, given the amount of coughing and sneezing that you've done since we got here, I think they might just have managed to work out that you're not exactly at the top of your game right now and if they haven't, well, they really shouldn't be in law enforcement".

Mulder shivered as he gently laughed, his laughter giving way to harsh, wracking coughs. He really did feel lousy and at this particular moment in time he just wanted the ground to open up and swallow him whole. He was so embarrassed. He couldn't believe that he had actually fainted at a crime scene. In twelve years as an FBI agent he had never fainted or vomited at a scene of crime, sure he got a little bit squeamish around autopsies but even then it was more of a mental revulsion against the very necessary act of further desecrating the bodies of victims who had already suffered so much. He took a shaky breath, as the coughing fit ended.

"When are you doing the autopsy?" he asked as he removed the purple gloves, dropping them onto his lap before reaching into his pocket to retrieve the crumbling

tissues that he had been sneezing into for the last two hours. As he listened to Scully tell him that she would autopsy the body the next morning, not willing to start the procedure when she had already been awake for nearly eighteen hours, he brought the tissues upto his face, his eyes squinting up at one of the floodlights that served to light the crimescene, trying to coax out the sneeze that he could feel building. His breath hitched, his nostrils flared, his eyes slipping closed as the need to sneeze finally reached fruition, HATCHUUUMH HETSCHUMPH HARTSCHUMPH HUHETSCHT HEHTSCHHT.

As he continued to sneeze he heard Scully and Hutchins discussing heading back to Quantico, his partner insisting that since they were only about twenty minutes from

Alexandria that instead of dragging an already exhausted Mulder back to Quantico that she would really appreciate it if Hutchins would drop them off at Mulder's

apartment, pointing out that she could borrow Mulder's car to head back to her own apartment, get some sleep and grab a change of clothes before driving back to the

academy the next morning in order to conduct the autopsy.

"Here" he heard somebody say, the only indication that it was directed at him coming in the form of a hand resting on his shoulder. He opened his eyes, noting Morelli

standing in front of him, a styrofome cup in hand. He nodded his thanks, stifling another sneeze into the tissues, before reaching out a hand to grab the hot cup of tea being offered to him. "Thanks" he said, a weak smile gracing his face.

"No offence Agent Mulder, but you look like shit" Morelli said, chuckling as the expression on the younger man's face changed, the unvoiced 'no shit sherlock' completely evident in his eyes as he took a sip of the hot tea, the expression turning to a grimace in response to the sweet taste.

"Euggghhh, how many sugars did she tell you to put in this?" he asked Morelli.

"I take it you're not a fan of sugar in your tea?" he replied at the same time that Scully appeared and said "stop whining Mulder and just drink it, and don't even think that you are getting up until all of that tea is gone".

"But Scull'" he started to protest, his voice trailing off as he took in the raised eyebrows and the pursed lips.

"Mulder, all you have had to eat in the last twenty four hours is a couple of spoonfuls of soup, a glass of orange juice and god knows how many cups of coffee, it's no

wonder you just passed out, so shut up and drink your tea or I will personally drive you to GWU and demand that they hook you up to a drip until your blood glucose

levels return to normal levels".

"Yuhhhh, you're suhhh HARTSCHEEEEEEEW HATSCHOOOOOOOOO, such a bully when you're in doctor bode Scull', whateber hahhh haaaah HARTSCHEEEEEW HETSCHOOOOOO happened to bedside bahder" he sniffed, before repeating, "bedside manner?".

"Well for starters, my patients don't normally answer back" she replied, Morelli chuckling in response to the pathologists dark reply. "The coronor and his team are going to organise the removal of the body and arrange for it to be transported to Quantico, the CSIs are co-ordinating the finger tip search with the locals, and whilst that is going on, Hutchins is going to drop us back at yours so that you can get a good nights sleep".

[krazykat]

PART 21

Mulder sat sipping the last of the tea, listening as Hutchins, Scully and Morelli discussed the fact that the CSIs had failed to find any identification on the victim's body and that a search of missing person's reports might provide no further clue as to the victim's identity at this stage as both the local coronor and Scully concurred that the time of death had occurred within the last six to ten hours and as such the victim may not even have been reported missing yet. He stood up slowly, taking slow, even breaths in order to combat the dizziness that immediately washed over him. He closed his eyes, raising his right hand to his face, scrubbing at it gently, releasing a small sigh of relief as the world stopped tilting on it's axis. As he opened his eyes, he felt Scully's hands lightly gripping his arms, her worried eyes assessing his condition. "I'b fihd Scull', just got dizzy for a bidute".

"Sir, if it's okay with you, I would really like to get Agent Mulder home" Scully said, her hands dropping back to her sides as she turned to look at Hutchins and Morelli.

"No problem Agent Scully, why don't you and Mulder head back to the SUV, I'll catch you up in a few minutes" Hutchins replied, turning to Morelli and explaining that they were all exhausted having started the day with a briefing at 7am".

"It's no problem Agent Hutchins, your boy is obviously dead on his feet" Morelli said, watching the two agents as they started the walk back to the car park, one of Scully's hands coming up to catch her partner as he slipped on a patch of wet grass.

As Hutchins and Morelli turned to discussing how they would co-ordinate varying aspects of the case, Scully was surreptitiously watching her partner out of the corner of her eye. He was absolutely exhausted, his eyes at half mast, his ghostly complexion only broken by the angry flush of fever across his cheeks. He stumbled again, slipping on wet leaves and Scully's hand came out to steady him, her concern rising at her usually graceful partner's seeming inability to put one foot in front of the other. "Just another few minutes Mulder and then you can crawl into the SUV, turn on the heat and close your eyes" she told him gently.

"I'll be fuuhhhhh HETSCHT HARTSCHHT HETSCHEEEEEEEW, be fine Scull'" he replied, stumbling slightly as the sneezes threw him off balance, his right hand coming out to grip the trunk of the nearest tree as he sneezed again. "Juhhhhhst gihhhHAIIITTSCHEEEEEEW HATSCHEEEEEEEW HASCHOOOOOOOOO, gib be a bidhute".

Scully watched as he sneezed a further three times and then released his grip on the tree trunk, his hands moving to search his pockets for the tissues he had been sneezing into for over two and a half hours, his left hand eventually pulling a clump of sodden and disintegrating tissues up to his nose in order to wipe away the dampness she could see glistening on his nostrils and upper lip.

"Come on partner, the sooner we get moving again, the sooner you can get warm" she told him, as she noticed him start to shiver.

He looked up at her and nodded, the tissues being stuffed back into his jacket pocket as he took a deep breath and started walking again, his hands pulling his jacket closer around him in an attempt to combat the cold. Several minutes passed as they walked in silence, carefully picking their way back along the trail, the silence intermittently punctuated by Mulder's sneezes. As they neared the beginning of the trail, Mulder was gripped by another sneezing fit, the force of the sneezes causing him to stumble, his right foot slipping on the wet foliage underfoot and he felt himself falling forwards. Scully, who was about a metre behind her partner sprang forward to try and steady him, but she was not quick enough and instead, she could only watch in horror as he fell into one of the many small streams that they had been carefully negotiating their way across.

[silentdreamer789]

she could only watch in horror as he fell into one of the many small streams that they had been carefully negotiating their way across.

Oooh, will this mean even MORE sneezing? I hope so! Loving this, absolutely excellent.

[krazykat]

Oooh, will this mean even MORE sneezing? I hope so! Loving this, absolutely excellent.

I have no idea what you mean?

*acts all innocent *

Am glad you are enjoying it... I am feeling a bit mean for treating poor Mulder in this way, but I think that there will be lots of opportunities for Scully to play doctor in the next few parts.

Mod Note: Fixed tags ~Mute

[krazykat]

PART 22

Mulder sat in the back of the SUV shivering, his wet jumper and t-shirt having been replaced by a flimsy FBI windbreaker, a blanket that Scully had stolen from one of the state troopers wrapped around his upper body in a futile attempt to provide some extra warmth, futile because his wet jeans were still plastered against his legs, no alternative having been available for him to change into. His body snapped forward as he sneezed, groaning slightly as the slight headache that had been building over the last hour increased. He was miserable and wanted nothing more than to finally get back to his apartment, get out of his wet jeans and stand under a scalding hot shower in an attempt to get warm.

"Not much longer now Mulder" he heard Scully say as Hutchins turned the SUV they were travelling in onto the Capitol Beltway.

"I know ScuhhhHARTSCHOOOOOH, Scuwwy".

She smiled as the congestion in his voice caused him to mangle her name. "Maybe you should try calling me Dana just for tonight".

"I suhhh, suhhhhh huuuhhhh HETSCHOOOOOO HETSCHEEEEEEEEW, subhow dob't think that will help, Dayduh" he replied, laughing quietly as she visibly blanched at his

mangling of her christian name.

"Euugghh, I'm not sure which is worse" she told him, jumping slightly as Hutchins stifled a laugh, having completely forgotten for a minute that they were not alone in the vehicle.

"You know it's no wonder that Agent Scully gets referred to around the Bureau as 'Mrs Spooky'" Hutchins said, looking at them through the rearview mirror. "Do you two

have any idea what an old married couple you are?"

Mulder laughed, his laughter trailing off into another fit of sneezes. Scully rolled her eyes and took a deep breath before she answered the senior agent. "Sir, you as

well as anyone should know that most partners develop a relationship that rivals most marriages", inwardly adding *without the added benefits of having a warm body to

cuddle up to at night that is*.

"I'm well aware of that Agent Scully, but even now mixed gender partnerships are relatively rare and are often fraught with tension. You and Agent Mulder however are a natural partnership, it shows in your solve rating, the way that you instinctually know what the other one is thinking, and that alone has probably saved your lives a

number of times, but other people who watch you together just see the two of you bickering like an old married couple. I'd bet a years salary that the two of you are

constantly having to explain to complete strangers that you are not married".

"Ahhhh, he's got us thuhhhhh thehhhhh HETSCHUUUUUM HETSCHEEEEEW, there Scuw'".

Scully smiled. "Well, I suppose that 'Mrs Spooky' is a hell of a lot nicer than 'the ice queen'. Sir, do you know where you're headed to from here?"

"Erm, I assume I take 177B" he replied.

"No, cuhbing frob this direction it's easier to take 176B and take Telegraph until you reach Duke Street, turn left onto Duke, I cahb direct you frob there" Mulder told him, his eyes slipping shut as he heard Scully tell Hutchins that it would take about another ten minutes from here. The next thing he was aware of was Scully gently shaking him on the shoulder and telling him that they were 'here', whether here actually was. He opened his eyes, noticing that the vehicle was parked opposite his apartment building, before his eyes slid shut again.

Scully unbuckled her seatbelt and leaned across to repeat the action with Mulder's belt. He was completely out of it, both sleep and fever clouding his usually precise

mind. "Sir, I might need some help getting him up the stairs" she said, smiling wryly as she tried to persuade Mulder to wake up long enough to get him out of the car

and up the stairs to his apartment.

"No problem Scully" Hutchins said as he unbuckled his own seatbelt, removed the keys from the ignition, opened the car door and exited the car. Ten seconds later the

passenger door closest to Mulder opened and Hutchins leaned in.

"Mulder", Scully half shouted as she forcefully shook his shoulder, "wake up!", almost sighing when he opened his eyes and bitterly muttered "ok I'm up, you don't need

to shout" and swung his legs out of the car, only pausing as he became light headed once more upon exiting the car.

Several minutes later, a half asleep Mulder stood propped against the wall outside his department as Scully grappled with her keys to open the door, softly telling him

that whilst he was taking a nice warm shower to try and warm up, she would run down to the all night grocers and pick up some more drugs for him. She finally pushed

open the door, turning back to her wayward partner to guide him into his apartment, pushing him down onto his desk chair and bending down to untie his laces. "Come on Mulder, let's get you out of those wet clothes and into the shower" she said, offering him the perfect opportunity to gently tease her back, her concern rising slightly as he failed to respond, her medical training telling her that between the hypoglycemia, the immersion in cold water, that it was likely that her partner was mildy hypothermic.

She pulled off one shoe and then started working on the other, her hands quickly untying the laces and removing his dress shoes. "Mulder we need to get you out of

those wet jeans, do you think you can manage?" she asked, sighing inwardly as he looked at her with a slightly confused expression on his face, her decision being made immediately as she noted that he was no longer shivering. Somehow she managed to wrestle him back to his feet, supporting his tall, lanky frame with her diminuitive one as her right hand wrestled with his belt, the buttons and zipper on his jeans, her mind desperately wishing that she could hear a smart assed comment from the man in front of her as she tried to undress him. She pushed his body backwards so that he was propped up against the desk, her left arm holding him firmly in place as her right hand tugged at the wet denim, wrestling it off of his legs slowly as the material refused to co-operate. As she managed to get the material down to his thighs, she stood up, gently pushing him back into the chair so that she could use both hands to pull the material free from his legs, grimacing as her hands registered the icy feeling of the skin on his legs.

As she finally managed to remove the jeans from his legs, she dropped them onto the floor and pulled her partner up to a standing position, half dragging him in the direction of his bedroom, firmly pushing him down into the unmade bed and tucking the covers firmly around him before quickly stripping down to nothing but her underwear and crawling into the bed with him, her arms coming up to encircle his body, her arms gently rubbing his back, trying to transfer her own body heat to his.

[krazykat]

PART 23

Scully was concerned, it had been about forty minutes since Mulder had taken a nose dive into the icy stream and although she was doing her best to warm his body, the fact that he had already been feeling the effects of hypoglycemia, had such a low proportion of body fat and even worse, had two previous and very serious experiences

with hypothermia from his escapades in Alaska and Antarticta left him extremely vulnerable to the effects of the cold. Several minutes passed before Scully felt Mulder

begin to shiver gently, his body finally starting to generate heat on it's own as it absorbed the heat from her own body. Mulder groaned gently, a stuttered "cold" falling from his lips. "I know partner, I know" Scully replied, pulling him closer to him, her hands continuing to gently rub against his back in soothing circles as she felt the temperature of his skin start to rise.

Several more minutes passed before Mulder's shivering started to cease, this time, the lack of shivering indicating that his body temperature was returning to normal

levels rather than dropping dangerously low. Scully sighed wth relief, then bit her lip to prevent bursting into laughter as she felt Mulder stiffen against her as he became fully aware of their situation.

*What the fuck?* he thought to himself, swallowing reflexively as he felt her naked skin against his, her hard nipples poking throught the cotton bra he could feel against his skin. He was confused, the last thing he remembered he had been sitting in the back of a bureau SUV, his clothes wet through from the unexpected dive into the icy cold water of one of the many streams that fed into Lake Fairfax. "Errr, Scully?" he asked, hoping that she would answer the unspoken question, his mind racing as he tried to work out what the hell was going on, inwardly groaning as he felt himself reacting to the feel of her skin against his and the gentle caresses of her hands against his skin.

Scully ducked her head downwards, the opportunity to mess with her partner's mind proving to great a temptation. She inhaled shakily, her hands stilling their movement as she adopted a shaky tone to her voice and said "You said you would never forget last night, Mulder". She desperately tried not to laugh as she heard his slight gasp of breath, her mind picturing his 'panic face', but as much as she tried to contain it she couldn't stop the giggling fit from emerging.

Mulder let out the breath that he hadn't realised that he had been holding, shakily laughing as he considered murdering the petite red head lying next to him. "You're a wicked wuhban Scully" he told her.

"I'm sorry Mulder", Scully gasped out in between laughs. "I couldn't help it. How are you feeling?" she asked him.

"Honestly?" he asked, feeling her head nod gently against his chest. "I'b confused, why are you lying ihb by bed with next to nothing on, ahd why ahb I naked Scuwwy?".

"You remember falling into the stream?" she asked.

"Yeah".

"Well, by the time we got back here you were showing mild symptoms of hypothermia. I managed to get you up the stairs, fully intent on forcing your sorry ass into a warm shower, but by then you were fairly non-responsive, the hypothermia getting worse, so I stripped you down, got you into bed and then, well it didn't exactly rain sleeping bags, but you finally got your wish" she told him, smiling gently.

"Pity I was tuhhhh, tuhhhh HETSCHT HETSCHEEEEEEW HUUTSCHOOOOOO, to out ob it to notice".

"Bless you" she said, listening as he sniffed, the congestion in his sinuses evident. "I'b going to get up and make a pot of tea. You want some?" she asked him as she removed her arms from around him, sliding out of the bed and padding over to Mulder's closet, pulling his beloved Knicks t-shirt off of it's hanger and slipping it on.

"I wouldn't say no, but do be a fahbour SCull'? Don't put four sugars in it".

[krazykat]

PART 24

Mulder sat up in bed wearing a ratty old FBI sweatshirt, the covers pulled up around him, a blanket wrapped around his shoulders as he sipped the tea that Scully had

handed to him ten minutes previously, listening as he heard his partner order a chicken supreme pizza with no mushrooms, telling the person on the other end of the

phone that she would collect it in twenty minutes. He was still cold, but the warmth of the tea and the memory of Scully's warm lithe body pressed up against his were

helping to wash away the last vestiges of the icy chill that had gripped his body in the last hour.

He smiled at Scully as she popped her head around the doorframe, her hair scooped back into a ponytail, her face clear of make up, the small smattering of freckles and

the mole on her upper lip clearly visible. He watched as she walked over to his bed, a slight twinge of arousal washing over him as he took in the fact that she was

wearing a pair of his running shorts along with his knicks shirt, the spare pair of glasses she kept at his having replaced her contact lenses, which now sat in her spare contact lens case the two of them long ago adopting the practice of leaving spare toiletries and glasses at each other's places in order to cope with late nights such as these.

"You feeling any better?" Scully asked him, trying not to blush as his eyes roved appreciatively up and down her body, amazed at the way in which this man could affect

her with just a look or a smile.

"Yeah, I still feel like crap, buhhhhh HARTSCHUUUUUUMP HARSTSCHEEEEEEW HATSCHOOOOOO, eugggh, but at least I'b warmb" he replied, smiling weakly at her. "Why didb't you just gedh theb to delihber?" he asked her, one hand coming up to rub at his nose, trying to quell the tickling feeling in his sinuses.

"Because I'm going to head down to the all night pharmacy on Duke Street and grab you some more drugs, then I'm going to pick up the pizza, we are going to grab a bite to eat and then I'm going to head back to mine" Scully answered before yawning, her own exhaustion finally catching up to her.

"No you're doht. Scull' you're as shattered as I ab, why don't you just crash here todight? I bean, you've got a spare suit in by closet, you have toiletries and it really doesn't bake sense to dribe back to yours tonight just so that you hab to leab earlier toborrow borning to head back to Quantico. I'll eben let you hab the bed".

"You will do no such thing" Scully told him, her right eyebrow arching skyward as she glared at him in disbelief. "If anyone is sleeping in your bed it is you Mulder. You are ill and you need all of the rest that you can get. If I stay, and I haven't decided whether or not I will yet, then I will take your couch. For now though, I'm going to get changed and head out to grab the pizza".

Mulder placed his cup down on his bedside table, opened the top drawer and removed a handkerchief, suddenly desperate to blow his nose. He brought the soft material up to his face, listening to the sounds of Scully slipping into her own clothes as his head snapped forward with the force of four harsh sounding sneezes, each of which

were caught in the white cotton. He groaned as he felt the sinus headache he had intensify, blowing his nose as he heard the sound of her heels clacking across his

wooden floors, his car keys being lifted from the hook in the hallway, front door of his apartment opening and closing seconds later.

A minute passed, the wet, honking sounds the only noise in the now quiet apartment. He groaned, dropping the handkerchief down onto the bed as he sank back against the pillows, his eyes closing over as sleep over took him, his breathing shallow as he breathed through his mouth, his nose, although having just been blown already

filling with more mucus.

Twenty minutes later Scully slipped back into Mulder's apartment, a bag of groceries balanced under her left arm, her left hand gripping the pizza box as she fumbled

with Mulder's keys. She quickly moved to the kitchen, dropping the keys onto the countertop, sliding the pizza box onto the counter before placing the grocery bag down. She quickly unpacked the groceries, placing the orange juice and water into the fridge, putting the bagels into the breadbin and the tinned soup into the cupboards, before slipping the rocky road ice cream she had picked up into the fridge. She opened the cupboard on the right hand side of the stove, standing on tiptoes to reach the plates on the top shelf, her six foot two partner having not organised his kitchen with little people like her in mind.

She put the plates onto the counter, opened the pizza box and placed two slices on each plate, closed the box back over and lifted the plates and the grocery bag and

headed in the direction of Mulder's room, entering it quietly and smiling as she realised that he was fast asleep. She walked back into the living room, dropped the plates down onto the coffee table and pulled two bottles of iced tea, a pack of nyquil, a pack of dayquil and two boxes of tissues, scooping all of them into her arms and heading back to the bedroom, placing each of the items on the bedside table, before heading back to the living room to eat her pizza, curl up on the couch and get some much needed sleep.

[chui]

oh wow... im glad i finally made it back to the stories board... this is wonderful!!! poor, poor Mulder....

[krazykat]

oh wow... im glad i finally made it back to the stories board... this is wonderful!!! poor, poor Mulder....

Am glad you are enjoying it

[krazykat]

Just a mini-drabble that was inspired by my real life sneezing muse

PART 25

Scully stood outside Mulder's apartment, trying to balance the takeaway bag from Katz's deli in the old town and her briefcase as she slipped the key into the lock. She was tired, her shoulders aching from the five hours that she had spent in the autopsy suite at Quantico, the first three and a half hours spent 'slicin and dicin' and the last hour and a half spent tagging evidence and compiling her findings. She pushed open the door and walked inside, nudging the door closed with her hip as she heard the sound of a shower running, it's occupant sneezing up a storm. She dropped her briefcase onto the floor and walked into the kitchen, placed the brown bag onto the counter and proceeded to hunt out the 'good coffee' that she knew Mulder kept hidden in his apartment for those days when instant just wouldn't do.

Whilst Scully boiled water and measured out the finely ground columbian coffee into a cafetiere, Mulder was stood under the shower, his head tilted forward, the hot

water raining down on the back of his neck, gently soothing his aching muscles. He felt like shit, his throat was sore, his muscles aching and if that wasn't bad enough, the steam driving his already tortured sinuses crazy. He groaned, a low husky sounding moan as he felt the need to sneeze increasing once more. He breathed in

shakily as he felt his nostrils start to flare, his right hand coming up to rest against the wall in an attempt to steady himself, his eyes fluttering closed as he sneezed, WARTSCHUUUUUUUH WAHHHHSCHEEEEEEEW WASCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HARTSCHEEEEEEEW HARTSCHEEEEEEW HASCHEEEEEEEW HARRRRTSCHHUUUUUUUH.

He sniffed, a harsh wet sounding sniff that did nothing to relieve the irritation in his sinuses, reaching for the bottle of shower gel as he did so, squeezing a generous amount of it into his left hand. He placed the bottle back onto the shower rack and tilted his head back slightly, groaning as the tension in his head increased and moving his hands across his hair, gently lathering the gel into soapy bubbles. He paused as he felt the congestion in his sinuses start to run, and lowered one hand down to his nose to wipe it clear, regretting doing so the minute his soap scented hand brushed against his nose, the perfumed scent, one of the few that he had discovered that did not bother his allergies, proving to be too much for his red and irritated nose this morning.

He gasped wildly, his sinuses itching unbearably, his nostrils flaring and chest heaving as the sneezing fit built. He placed his right hand back against the wall in order to brace himself against the monsterous sneezes that he could feel building, took several hitching breaths before succumbing to the sneezes: haaaaaahhh haaaahhhhh uhhhhhhhh wuhhhhhhhhh WAHHHHSCHEEEEEEEW HARTSCHEEEEEEEW WASCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HARTSCHEEEEEEW HASCHEEEEEEEW WARTSCHUUUUUUUH WAHHHHSCHEEEEEEEW WASCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HARTSCHEEEEEEEW HARTSCHEEEEEEW HASCHEEEEEEEW HARRRRTSCHHUUUUUUUH HASCHEEW HASSCHOOO HARRCHOOOOOOO HAAARTSCHUUUUUUUH.

[krazykat]

PART 26

Mulder walked into the living room, a pair of ratty old sweatpants riding low on his hips, a tight fitting Oxford university t-shirt clinging to his upper body, revealing the athletic form of his chest. He hated being sick, but at the same time, the sound of Scully pottering around in his kitchen, the slight scent of freshly brewed columbian coffee and chicken soup evident in the air, warmed his heart, the bizarre domesticity of the situation re-emphasising just how much he loved this woman. Oh sure, it was no house with the white picket fencing that she had alluded to wanting, but they were here, together, her taking care of him, and although he had yet to work up the courage to tell her that he loved her, times like this offered him a degree of hope that she wouldn't run screaming from him when he finally did manage to tell her.

He smiled and took the last few steps over to the couch, his hands vigorously rubbing the towel through his wet hair, the thick hair standing up on end as it started to dry. He paused, feeling the need to sneeze building again, his breath hitching slightly as he looked up at the window, the sunlight hitting his eyes causing his body to snap forwards with the force of two harsh, wet and completely uncovered sneezes, the wet mist spraying in the air, dancing with the dust particles in the beams of light that fell across the room. He sighed, turning his body as he did so and flopping down on the couch, the towel dropping to the floor as he leaned forward and grabbed a handful of tissues out of the box that sat on his coffee table. He sneezed as he brought the tissues up to his nose, getting the tissues to his nose in time to stifle the next four sneezes, blowing his nose as the fit passed, the wet congested sounds echoing in the quiet room.

Mulder lowered the tissues from his nose, tilting his head backwards against the back of the couch and groaning slightly as he felt the congestion returning. He turned his head to the left as he heard Scully's heels clacking on the wooden floor, smiling as he saw Scully entering the living room, a tea tray that he couldn't for the life of him remember having purchased in her hands, two glasses of orange juice, two steaming bowls of soup and the freshly brewed coffee balanced on it. Scully smiled at hims as she crossed the distance to the coffee table and lowered the tray onto it, her right hand coming up to rest on his forehead as she turned towards him, the doctor in her trying to assess his temperature before he had the chance to complain, or wriggle away from her.

"How are you feeling?" she asked him, her hand dropping back to her side as she realised that for now his temperature was not elevated. She sat down on the couch beside him, toeing off her shoes and bringing her bare feet up to curl underneath her.

"Ober dhan dhe fact that I cab't stop sneezing, I dohb't feel dhat bad. I woke up about an hour ago, took suhb pills ahd then dozed. I swear I habn't slept this buch since the last tibe I was in a cobah" he replied, coughing slightly as he reached forward to grab one of the glasses of orange juice. "Hab to say though , I'b starving".

"It's no wonder Mulder, it's been two days since you last ate a proper meal" she told him, smiling as he finished the juice in one long series of gulps, nodding her head towards her own glass in response to his unasked question with a "yes, you can have it, just don't think that I'm sharing my coffee".

Mulder laughed, putting his glass down on the table and lifting the other glass of orange juice, bringing it to his lips and sipping the cool liquid before continuing "I wouldn't dreab of getting between you and dhat cup ob coffee. You'd probably scratch by eyes out if I tried. So, what's with dha soup? I bean, if it wasn't for dhe fact dhat dhere's no matzoh ball in it, I'd swear you were channelling by Jewish grandmother. You go to Katz's?"

"Yeah, I stopped in on my way back from Quantico" she replied, before asking "You're Jewish? How did I not know that?"

"Technically. My mom was Jewish and by Dad was episcopalian, Sam and I were both raised Jewish, but I dohb't practice, haven't in a long tibe, it's hardly surprising that you don't know" he replied, turning away from her to stifle four harsh, wet sounding sneezes. He took a deep breath as he placed the empty glass onto the table and lifted up the soup, blowing on it gently to cool the hot liquid, the scent evoking happy childhood memories of visiting his mother's parents in New York. "So, how was the autopsy?" Mulder asked, directing the conversation back to the murder investigation.

"Long" Scully said, her arms stretching upwards as she yawned. "My shoulders are killing me, but given what that poor woman went through, it seems pretty selfish of me to complain about something so trivial. Mulder I couldn't actually tell how many individual stab wounds there were due to the amount of violence, but I would estimate that it was somewhere between fifty and seventy, all made with a smooth blade approximately one inch in width, perhaps four to five inches in length".

"Cause of death?"

"Massive blood loss. As with the previous victims, the last wound received was a violent slash across the neck that severed both the carotid and jugular. We may have some decent forensics to go on this time around though" she told him, watching as his eyes widened almost imperceptibly as he swallowed a spoonful of the clear broth. "I managed to lift a couple of partial prints off of the victims skin and there was also fragmens of skin and blood under her nails. Given the number of defensive wounds on the palms of her hands, I woud imagine that it will belong to our killer".

"Nice work Scully. Any idea as to who dhe victib is yet?"

"No, or at least up until I left Quantico an hour ago there had been no progress made on identifying her. Nobody has reported her missing as of yet and her prints aren't in any of our databases. Hutchins has issued the victim's description to all of the police departments in the tri-states areas and her description has been flagged in the VICAP database. Hopefully she had someone in her life to notice that their sister, daughter, wife or girlfriend has not come home". She leaned forward, lifting her own bowl of soup up off of the table and the next five minutes passed in comfortable silence as the two agents ate their soup and sipped their coffee. Scully smiled as Mulder put down his bowl and surreptitiously looked at her out of the corner of his eye, almost as if he was trying to decide whether or not she would nag him for not finishing the contents.

"Don't worry Mulder, I'm not going to bite your head off if you don't eat it all, the main thing is that you are eating something" she told him, her right hand coming to rest on his forearm. He smiled at her, the smile suddenly fading as he remembered that he had not seen a note at the previous crime scene. "Scull', was dhere a note with dhe body?" he asked.

"No, I didn't find one and the CSIs failed to turn one up at the crime scene. What do you think it means?"

"I'm nor sure" he replied, "I really don't know what it beans right now, but then again I was pretty sure that the notes didn't mean anything to begin with. Dhese cribe was bore opportunistic dhan his previous ones, the escalation suggests dhat he cab't help himself, dhe compulsion to kill consuming him in a way it hasn't before now, if he's getting sloppy, bahking bistakes dhen bhaybe the lack of a note justs tells us dhat he, uhhhhh excuse be, HARTSCHHUUUUUUH HATSCHEEEEEEW HASCHOOOOOOOOO, dhat he is uhhhh HETSCHEEEEEEEW HESCHEEEEEEW ETSCHUUUUUUUUH, eugghh, I wish I could stop fucking sneezing for just fibe bidhutes, what I was trying to say is dhat maybe dhe lack of a note just signifies that loss of control, I bean I thouhhhhhHARTSCHUUUUUUUH HASCHEEEEEEW thought that the notes were beant as an attempt to control us".

"Well, all we can do right now is wait I guess. Hutchins was having someone enter the search parameters you suggested into the VICAP computers in order to compile a list of all unsolved crimes involving stab wounds and ligatures and the partial prints that we have are being run through all of the databases, so right now all we can do is wait for the results of the forensic tests to come back". She reached forward, putting her now empty bowl of soup onto the table before reaching back and stretching, her hands coming down to gently massage the back of her neck and shoulders in an attempt to alleviate the tension that had built from hours in the morgue.

"Here, let me do that" Mulder said, chuckling as Scully quickly stood up and moved to sit in front of him, her blue eyes sparkling as she smiled. *I never should have given her that first neck rub* he thought to himself as he remembered the gruelling day she had spent in a morgue in Dudley, Arkansas piecing together bodies from the scores of bones dredged from the river running through the town and the tiny sounds of pleasure she had made as his strong hands had worked to unknot the tension in her neck and shoulders. He slowly pushed her hair to the sides, his hands coming to rest against her shoulders, the thumbs of both hands pressing gently into twin knots of tension, the other fingers gently beginning to knead at her skin.

Mulder swallowed his breath as he listened to the soft keening noises emitting from Scully's throat, his body reacting to the almost sexual sighs of pleasure and muttered 'hmmmmm, just there's Mulder'. He shifted his hips slightly, his fingers moving across the soft creamy alabaster skin, his inner demon telling him to just lean forward and taste it, imagining how it would taste. *Why the hell do I do this to myself* he thought as he felt himself harden further in response to a long drawn out moan falling from Scully's lips, his arms aching to just pick her up and carry her through to his bedroom so that he could run his hands all over her body. He sneezed, twice, his head turning to the side in order to prevent covering her neck with the spray from the sneezes, his hands stiliing for a moment until he felt Scully tilt her neck back impatiently into his hands.

She moaned softly, the pleasure and pain of Mulder's touch a heady mix of torture that caused her to squirm away from the initial pressure of his fingers against bunched muscles and then sink into the gentle caresses as the muscle fibres began to loosen. As annoying and frustrating as her brilliant partner could be, she had learnt early on in their partnership that one thing that he was very good at was giving massages and this small moment of intimacy was but a small price to pay for two a.m. phonecalls and weekend flights to investigate the wonderful and bizarre cases that crossed their desks. She heard him sneeze, twice, his hands stopping their kneading movement as he was consumed by the force of the sneezes. Before she realised what she was doing she had tilted her neck backwards into his hands, her actions causing her to blush as she realised that she was acting like a spoilt cat desperate for it's owners tough.

As Mulder's hands began to move again, he felt the need to sneeze building again, the torturous tickling sensation that had been plaguing his sinuses all morning turning into an all consuming itching deep within his nostrils. He sniffed, a wet drawn out sniff that caused him to cough gently, but did nothing to alleviate the itching. His breath hitched, the slight gasping sounds clearly audible as his eyes started to close over, his jaw slackened, his hands slowing their motion as he sat on the precipice of the huge sneezing fit that he could feel building.

"You ok Mulder?" he heard Scully ask as she shifted beneath his hands, her head turning around to look at him, her eyes widening in astonishment as she noticed his features contorted by the need to sneeze.

"Ihhhhhm fuhhhhh huuuhhhh fine Scull', just neeeeeeeh ehhhhh neeehhhhhd tuhhhhhh huhhhhhh snuuuuuhhhETHSCHOOOOOOHeeze" he replied before he surrendered to the sneezing fit, WAHHHHSCHEEEEEEEW HARTSCHEEEEEEEW WASCHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HARTSCHEEEEEEW HASCHEEEEEEEW HUPTCHOO HACHUMMH HATCHUMPH HETCHOO HCHMMPH HATCHUMMM HATCHUMPH HATCHMM HICHUMP HATCUHMMPH HATCHUMMM HATCHUMPH HACHUUMPH HASCHEEW HASSCHOOO HARRCHOOOOOOO HARTSCHUUUUH.

Scully watched, her eyes widening in astonishment as Mulder showed no signs of being able to bring the sneezing fit under control, his eyes closed, completely unaware of anything at the moment over than the need to sneeze. She leaned forward and grabbed a handful of tissues from the box, standing up and moving to sit beside him on the couch, her right hand gently rubbing his back in soothing motions as her left hand slid the tissues in front of his hands, feeling the slight dampness of the sneeze as he sneezed forcefully into the waiting tissues, his hands coming up to take them from her as he became aware of their presence. "ThahhhhhASCHEEEEEEEEW HATSCHEEEEEW HAIIITSCHOOOOOOO, thuuhahhnnks ScuhhhHETSCHEEEEEEEEEW HURTSCHOOOOOOH" he gasped out in between sneezes.

Several minutes passed before finally the fit, which if Scully, in her boredom, had counted correctly, consisted of fifty-two sneezes, finally started to taper off long enough for Mulder to lean forward and snag some more tissues and blow his nose with loud, wet and honking blows. He dropped the tissues and collapsed backwards against the couch, suddenly exhausted, his eyes closing. He sighed as he felt Scully's hand come to rest on his forehead, her fingers gently massaging his temples.

"You ok now?" she asked, the concern evident in her voice as she listened to Mulder moan softly.

"Doht really" he said, his eyes opening, the exhaustion that he was feeling clearly evident within them. "If I'b honest, I think I need to crawl back into bed ahd just stay there. I feel lousy Scull'".

"Then go crawl into bed Mulder, I'll call Hutchins and let him know that I'm going to be based from here today. I can't really see it being much of a problem given the fact that I've filed the autopsy report and can't do anything else from a forensics point of view until the test results come back. Do you have anything to amend to the profile?"

"No. Can you get Hutchins to call us once they badhage to ID the girl?" he asked her as he stood up, swaying softly as he felt himself becoming light headed.

"Yeah I will do, come on let's get you into bed" she replied as she stood up next to him and gently guided him in the direction of his bedroom. "There's a briefing at six, you think you'll be up to it?" she asked as they entered the room and walked across to the bed, her hands coming down to pull back the covers as he sat down and swung his legs onto the bed, his head collapsing against the pillows.

"Doesn't matter. If Ihb not up by three, wake me soh dhat we can get on dhe road by four. Hitting the I95 at rush hour has neber been by ihdea ob fuhn".

Scully smiled at him as her hands gently lifted the covers up and settled them around him, feeling him pulling them tighter to him as he shivered gently. "I will do partner, but for now, get some rest k?".

"Okay Scull', why doh't you do the sahb? If I probise not to jump you, you cahd eben halb half of dhe bed".

"It's ok Mulder, I can sleep on the couch. You just rest" she said, jumping slightly as his hand encircled her wrist.

"No you wohd't, you'll be in adh out of here ebery five bihdutes checking on be. Why dohd't you just get chadged into wohd ob by shirts and get suhb sleep Scuww'. Ihb to tired to be adything but a perfect gentleben".

Scully closed her eyes, sighing as she debated whether or not to just crawl into bed with her partner or to retreat to the safety of his couch. They had shared a bed once before on a case after the hotel had screwed up their reservations and they had been unable to find alternative accommodations. She blushed, her red headed complexion failing to hide the flush as it rose across her necks and cheeks, as she remembered awaking to the feel of Mulder's hard erection against her ass cheeks and his hand protectively clutching one of her breasts. *Oh fuck it* she thought, rationalising to herself that they were both adults and perfectly capable of acting as such. She took a deep breath before saying, "fine. I'll call Hutchins and let him know what's happening and then I promise to join you and get some rest".

Mulder smiled, his eyes closing, breath evening out as he drifted off to sleep, his body beginning to succumb to sleep.

[silentdreamer789]

Fifty-two sneezes?!?!?!!?!?!?!?!? Wow. Though I can't believe that Scully hasn't caught this. Or someone else. Mind you, he's sneezing more than enough to satisfy me...

[krazykat]

Warning: references to physical arousal but nothing explicit enough to consider 18+

PART 27

Scully awoke to the sound of her cell phone vibrating on the bed next to her, the alarm that she had set beckoning her from her slumber. She was warm, the temperature in the bed stifling as a result of the body heat coming from her feverish partner, the situation made worse by the fact that her body was completely ensconced by his strong muscular arms. She smiled as she listened to him gently snuffling in his sleep, the congestion in his sinuses evident in the occassional snore that emitted from him, the feel of his arousal against her hip causing her temperature to rise further.

*Down girl* she thought to herself, trying to rationalise the reaction of his body as being merely biological and not a symptom of the inherent attraction that existed between them. She knew that she was fooling herself, that the man who lay next to her in this bed was as hopelessly in love with her as she was with him. All she had to do was think about their near kiss in his hallway and the reactions of his body to hers other the course of the last twenty-four hours to know that this reaction was not merely biological, but for the sake of their partnership she could not afford to act upon her feelings towards this man. She sighed, grabbing the cell phone and killing the alarm before wiggling her body down the bed, slowly freeing herself from Mulder's grasp, her heart leaping as he automatically tried to tighten his grip on her, a slight sigh of loss uttering from his lips as he lost his grip on her.

She stood up, shivering slightly as the sudden change of temperature caused the small hairs on her arms to stand on end and goosebumps to rise across her skin. Despite having been asleep for the last three hours she was absolutely exhausted, a bone weary level of exhaustion that reminded her of the seventy plus hour shifts that she had pulled during her residency. She sighed, wincing slightly as she realised that her throat hurt, her right hand coming up to feel her skin, noting that it was slightly warmer than usual. *Great* she thought to herself as she realised that in all likelihood she was coming down with Mulder's cold. She walked into the living room, leaning down to lift up the open bottle of tylenol that sat on the coffee table and tapping two pills into her hand, noting with alarm that it was already five past three and she still had to wake Mulder and both of them had to shower and get on the road before the worst of the traffic kicked in.

She dry swallowed the pills and dropped the bottle back onto the coffee table before turning and walking back into the bedroom, stifling a sneeze as she did so. Quietly, she walked across the bedroom floor, avoiding the creaking floorboard next to Mulder's closet as she moved towards his bed, before gently lowering herself to perch on the side of the bed her left hand coming up to gently shake his shoulder. "Time to wake up cinderella" she told him, shaking his shoulder a bit more forcefully as he tried to roll away from her, snuggling deeper under the covers. She sighed. "Come on Mulder, WAKE UP!" she tried again, shaking him harder, smiling when he pushed her hand away and started bitching at her to leave him alone. "Sorry partner, I can't do that. It's time to get up, take some more meds, grab a shower and then head into Quantico for the six o'clock briefing, you awake?".

"Yeah, IhhhhhHARTSCHUUUUUUUH HARSCHOOOOOOOO, I'm up" Mulder replied, groaning as he forced his body up into a sitting position, squinting at her in the dim light of his bedroom, his left hand blindly searching the bedside table for his glasses, finally turning his head towards the table when he couldn't find them.

"What you looking for?" Scully asked.

"My glasses" he replied as his mind started trying to work out where he had last had them.

"Can't help you out there partner, you weren't wearing them when I came back earlier. Anyway, your the one with eidetic memory, not me, surely you can remember where you put them".

"Wish that were the case Scully, my memory always fails me when it comes to the location of my glasses and car keys, both of which get dropped in random places all over this goddamned apartment. I swear I once found my keys in the fridge having absolutely no recollection of having put them there".

Scully laughed as she stood up. "I'm going tuhhhHIISCHOOO huh-ITSCHEEW, oh, excuse me, I'm going to hop in the shower whilst you hunt for your specs. Oh and Mulder, seeing that you've managed to infect me I expect a nice hot steaming cup of coffee to be sat on your coffee table by the time I'm washed and dressed".

[silentdreamer789]

Hehehe. Now they've both got it. Lots more yummy sneezes to come, methinks...

[krazykat]

Apologies to one and all for the lack of posting over the last week or so as work has been crazily busy and will remain that way until the end of next week!

Tonight was the first oportunity that I had to sit down and write something so here it is...

PART 28

Scully stood in Mulder's bedroom, listening to the sounds of her partner pottering around in his kitchen, making a late afternoon snack for the two of them. She smiled at the thought of Mulder, a man that had the telephone numbers of local chinese and pizza deliveries programmed into his speed dial, making her scrambled eggs and bacon, her stomach growling as the scent of the food permeated the apartment. *He must be feeling better if he's voluntarily making himself something to eat* she thought to herself, chuckling as three loud and masculine sneezes echoed through the apartment in complete contradiction to the notion that her partner might be feeling better.

She sneezed, a feminine sounding hiihTCHOO that sent her body tumbling forward at the waist, her wet, untamed hair falling forward, her nipples hardening as her naked cleavage gently danced with the force of the sneeze. She shivered, the cool air in the apartment reminding her of the fact that she was stood naked in Mulder's bedroom, small droplets of water still clinging to her skin. *I'm going to kill him for infecting me* she thought to herself as she became aware of the congestion building in her sinuses, the slight pinched feeling behind her eyes a sign that without the tylenol that she had already taken that she would have been dealing with a sinus headache on top of the general feeling of lethargy that she could feel within her body.

She groaned as she pulled the egyptian cotton bath sheet across her body, firmly rubbing it against her alabaster skin, drying her lithe, petite body with practiced motions, her mind registering the occassional masculine sneeze and the sound of cupboards being opened and closed. She dropped the towel to the floor, her body now dry and reached into the travel bag that Mulder had left lying on the bed for her, pulling out a pair of plain white cotton panties and a matching white bra, the in her groaning at the thought of wearing such unappealing underwear, but the rationale part of her mind reminding her that she had left boring underwear in the bag to prevent her partner from snooping through her stuff and finding out that her taste in undergarments had moved from the bland and comfortable to the more sexy and daring ranges of Agent Provocateur. She chuckled as the image of her partner sitting in his apartment holding her favourite lacy black and red thong and matching bra popped into her head, her mind immediately cursing her own imagination as she felt herself becoming aroused by the image and the subsequent memory of Mulder's body wrapped around hers as he slept.

"Hey Scull' hurry up will ya" she heard Mulder shout from his living room, jumping slightly as she was startled out of her reverie.

"Yeah, just give me two minutes and then the shower's all yours" she yelled in reply as she continued to dress, her hands buttoning closed the emerald green blouse that had been laid out on the bed , a small smile gracing her features as she thought about just how many times Mulder had nagged at her to get ready over the years. She quickly stepped into a pencil black skirt, zipped it closed and ran her hands down across the material to soothe out the few creases that had formed in the material. *That's better* she thought to herself as she reached into her small wash kit and retrieved the miniature version of the chanel perfume that Mulder had bought her last year out of guilt after he had developed an allergy to the scent that she had worn around him for years.

She lightly spritzed the perfume over her wrists, the light flowery scent that she loved lingering in the air, but this morning, the normally sweet and flowery scent was overbearing, harsh and acrid, the slight irritation that was settling into her sinuses from the cold that Mulder had managed to pass on to her being irritated further. She dropped the perfume bottle onto the bed, her hands coming up to her face, fanning backwards and forwards as she felt the need to sneeze increasing. She inhaled, her breath hitching reflexively as her body stood poised on the precipice of a sneeze. She wanted to sneeze, needed to sneeze, was desperate to clear the horrendous tickling sensation in her sinuses and yet it refused to come. Slowly, she brought her right wrist up to her nose and inhaled gently, the scent of the perfume filling her nostrils, the tickling feeling increasing tenfold, her eyes falling shut as her lips parted, her breath hitched and she finally succumbed to the sneezing fit, hiiihhtCHOOO CHOOOO SCHEEWWW hitscHEEEW huhhiitSHOOOOO SCHEEEEEW HihhhhTCHOOOOO.

[silentdreamer789]

Oh, more yummyness! Hope we still get plenty of Mulder sneezing as well!

[krazykat]

PART 29

"So do I get to smear your chest with vaporub?" Mulder whispered into Scully's ear as she brought another tissue to her nose and blew gently, chuckling softly as he watched her tilt her head up towards his, her right eyebrow arching as she glared at him over the tissues.

"Will you pay attention" she ordered, her face clearly transmitting her lack of amusement at his statement at the same time that her mind raced with images of those strong, lean hands firmly massaging their way across her breasts. She felt her nipples harden slightly with arousal and she had to use every modicum of self control to contain the shudder that threatened to run through her body in response to the huskily whispered suggestion in her ear. She turned away from him, refocusing her attention on the briefing, listening as Agent Donovan revealed that the final victim had been identified as one Sheryl Carraghan, a poli-sci student from Georgetown University who had been reported missing by her friends after failing to turn up to a weekly seminar after having not returned home from a week spent visiting her boyfriend in New York, nodding as the younger agent told them that both the parents and the boyfriend had been informed of the victims death and that Mr Callaghan had formerly identified the body that afternoon.

"Has the boyfriend been interviewed yet?" Mulder asked.

"Agents from the New York office conducted a preliminary questioning on our behalf. Apparently Ms Callaghan caught the two hour bullet from New York to DC at 8.16am on Tuesday morning, CCTV footage shows her arriving at Union Station and we can trace her movements onto the DC metro, next picking her up at the Dupont Circle Metro station. DC police and Virginia state troopers are trying to track her movements through CCTV footage along the route out to Lake Fairfax, the boyfriend stated that she liked to hike out on the trails there and if she headed out there upon her return to DC then it would certainly fit with the estimated time of death that Agent Scully and the coroner both agreed upon" Hutchins answered, consulting his notes as he spoke.

"The boyfriend have a solid alibi?" Scully asked, her right hand brining the tissues up to her nose to stifle two feminine sounding sneezes as she finished speaking.

"Yeah, after dropping Sheryl off at the station he started a twelve hour shift at the marriot hotel where he is currently employed as a receptionist. There is no way that he could possibly be the perpetrator" Donovan replied before continuing to relay the findings of the interview.

Mulder sat and listened as the conversation ebbed and flowed around him, his right hand gently massaging the bridge of his nose as he heard the team reporting that interviews were scheduled to be conducted with Sheryl Callaghan's parents and friends the next day and that a detailed profile of the victim's life was being compiled in order for a comparison with the other victims lifes to look for any commonalities between them. He smiled wryly as he heard Agent Monroe mutter "not that we'll find anything" under his breath.

"What about fuhhhHURTSCHUUUUH HARTSCHEEEEEEW, sorry, what about forensics Scull? Anything come back in from the samples you sent off to the lab?" Mulder asked as he routed through his pockets for a tissue.

"Well, the initial forensic tests showed that the blood found under the fingernails was AB negative, which in forensic terms is a complete blessing as less than 1% of the population have that blood type. I've placed a rush on the PCR results, but it's going to be another five-seven days before the results come in. Unfortunately with the UNSUB being a non-secretor we will not be able to confirm a DNA match against the semen found on the third victims body, but at least we will be able to run DNA matching against the centralised database and as a means of eliminating any suspects" she replied. "Agent Donovan, what about the prints that I pulled from the body, were there any matches?"

"Yes and no. We ran the prints that you pulled against all those on file for known convictions and against the VICAP database. There was one hit relating to prints that were found on the murder weapon of a 23 year old woman in the tri-states area from about five years ago. It fit the parameters that Mulder had asked us to run through VICAP and we also identified a further eight murders with a similar MO and victim type that spanned a four year period".

"When was the last of those murders committed?" Mulder asked, his mind already working to process the information in relation to the profile of the UNSUB as it stood.

"Two years ago" Donovan replied.

"So if our UNSUB was responsible for all of those crimes then what happened to him between the last murder and the first one of these crimes?" Hutchins asked, looking directly at Mulder as he asked the question.

"Prison? A class one misdemeanour for sexual battery in the state of Virginia would have bought a years imprisonment, with release on bond, the court time, then the need to plan and refine his MO, that could account for the two year lag in crimes. Just because there's no match to prints in the system doesn't really mean anything, if he was arrested in a county still computerising their records then the print card could still be sitting in a pile of records that are still to be computerised. I'd like to review the files and case reports from the nine crimes that have been identified as potentially committed by our UNSUB see if I can identify any similarities other than the stab wounds and the ligatures".

"Was there any sign of DNA evidence in the files?" Scully asked before stifling a sneeze into the crumpled up tissues in her hand.

"I'm not sure Agent Scully, the files are still being collated at present. Not all of the information was available in the database so we've had to contact the original investigative officers to try and get hold of the casenotes and evidence. We should have everything we need by the end of the night" Donovan replied, gesturing with this head towards a stack of brown cardboard boxes in the middle of the office floor. "What we have so far is in those boxes if you and Mulder want to share the task of going through them".

Scully nodded in reply, her tired mind groaning at the thought of sifting through the files and accompanying evidence of nine murders, a weak smile gracing her lips as Mulder whispered "I'll get the coffee if you get the tissues" as Hutchins told the rest of the team that until they had the rest of the crime scene data and the results of the forensic tests that there was nothing that they could do for now and that they should take this opportunity to have a night off, spend some time with their loved ones before reporting back to the office at 7am the next morning in order to receive their assignments for the day.

As the agents filed out of the conference room, Hutchins turned to Scully. "How are you feeling? I couldn't help but notice that Mulder isn't the only one sniffling and sneezing his way through my briefings now".

She laughed softly, her laughter quickly turning into a harsh, ticklish sounding cough that left her gasping for breath. She felt a glass of water being placed into her hand, a rich, baritone voice telling her to drink. Several minutes passed before she was able to bring the coughing fit back under control and as she sat stood there, sipping the cool liquid, she heard Mulder tell Hutchins that he was going to start going through the crime scene files that the team had managed to pull from VICAP whilst Scully got some rest.

"Mulder, I'b fide" she told him, wincing slightly as she heard the congestion in her voice replacing her m's and n's with b's and d's. She opened her mouth to speak again, to tell him that she was perfectly capable of continuing to work, but before she could speak her breath hitched and she succumbed to a rapid fire series of sneezes: hiiihhtCHOOO CHOOOO SCHEEWWW hitscHEEEW huhhiitSHOOOOO SCHEEEEEW hiiTCHOOOOO SCHOOO hehTSCHEEEEW.

"Oh really?" Mulder replied, chuckling softly as he reached behind him and pulled a couple of tissues out of the box that sat on the desk behind them, handing them to her as she continued to sneeze. "Look. if you are feeling up to it then I'm not going to say no tuhhhhh huuhhhh HARTSCHUUUUUH HATSCHEEEEEEEEW, to the company, but if you need to get some rest then get some".

"That applies to you to Agent Mulder, you're not exactly a glowing picture of health" Hutchins told the younger agent as he lifted his files off the table. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to head home and see if my wife and daughter still recognise me. Good night Agents, I'll see you at seven am".

[silentdreamer789]

Heh heh. BOTH sneezing beautifully!

[Zuki]

Aweome! Love this story!

I'm super glad to be back to read this... Moulder

[Vetinari]

PART 29

"So do I get to smear your chest with vaporub?" Mulder whispered into Scully's ear

[krazykat]

PART 30

Apologies for the long delay in posting a new part to this story. Let's just say that it's been that long since the last post that I had to go back and reread the whole thing just to remember what I was actually writing about!. Just to explain, I have been incredibly busy at work in the last few months... between training, conferences, grant proposals and meeting my writing targets for work, writing for pleasure has just been too far an exhausting prospect to deal with. I have now stopped work for a relaxing break and intend to use some of the time for writing so for now a brief, albeit sneeze free, interlude....

Mulder leaned back in his chair, his arms reaching upwards, stretching, trying desperately to work out the kinks that had taken up residence in his back and neck after

four hours hunched over the files from the nine murders that had been identifed as potentially being committed by their UNSUB. He yawned, exhaustion working it's way

into every inch of his body, the combination of too many early mornings, too many late nights, far too little sleep and the energy sapping cold that he had been battling for several days.

Lowering his arms back down to the table, he pushed his chair back, slowly standing up, his hands coming to clutch at the table as a wave of exhaustion ran through his

body, the conference room slowly tilting on it's axis. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and cautiously opened them again, a relieved sigh working it's way past his lips as the conference room remained stationary this time. Pulling his glasses off his face and tossing them onto the conference room table, he chuckled softly as he took in the image of Special Agent Dr. Dana Katherine Scully, slumped over a stack of autopsy reports, gently snoring, a small puddle of drool pooling on the top form.

He smiled, revelling in this quiet moment, observing the vulnerability of the strong, independant woman that he trusted to keep him alive and safe on a regular basis, the intensity of the feelings that he felt for his partner temporarily blind siding him as he watched her sleep. He loved her, and if he was completely honest with himself, he couldn't imagine spending the rest of his life with any other woman. Sure, there had been others in his past, Phoebe, Diana, but this diminutive red head had worked her way under his skin until he wasn't sure where she ended and he began, and the extent to which he depended upon her scared him at times.

However, now was not the time to dwell on how much he needed her support, friendship and love, but rather it was the time to extend the same support backwards to his

plainly exhausted and ill partner. Decision made, he walked around the conference table, a quiet cough escaping from his lips as he reached Scully, his knees bending as he slipped into a crouch next to her slumbering form and extended a hand out to gently scrape an errant lock of hair from where it rested across her forehead. He truly hated himself for having to wake her, but he knew that if he left her sleeping like this that she would be stiff and sore the next morning and hating to see her suffer in any shape or form, he dropped his hand to her shoulder.

"Scull', time to wake up" he gently said, chuckling as she moved away from him, muttering in her sleep about not wanting to go to school. He gently shook her shoulder

again, inwardly sighing as she burrowed her head more firmly into her crossed arms, knowing from experience that once Scully was deeply ensconced in sleep he had two

options when it came to getting her to bed. The first, which would be intolerably cruel given her exhaustion would be to firmly shout at her, tapping into the part of her mind that had trained to be constantly on alert as both a doctor and a field agent. The second, which he would surely catch hell for in the morning, would be to just gather her lithe body into his arms and carry her up to the dormitory room that had been assigned to him for use over the last couple of days. *Oh well, it's not like you haven't carried her sleeping form into motel rooms before* he thought to himself.

Decision made, he gently wrestled her into a seated position, slipping her left arm over his shoulder, his left arm under her knees and his right arm around her before

rising to a standing position. As he did so, Scully turned towards him in her sleep, her right hand grasping his shirt tightly as she snuggled in against him. He smiled, taking a moment to just watch her sleep in his arms before negotiating his way across the conference room floor, wrestling with the door and out into the hallway.