Skinner took another look around at the surviving members of the Spilano incident. Agent Marcus had already been taken away by an ambulance, and now both of Spilano's accomplices were being loaded into the second one, surrounded by a legion of FBI agents.
Meanwhile, Agent Dell was being escorted roughly to a squad car. Honestly, Skinner reflected, he would be surprised if the man didn't arrive to the lock-up in worse condition than he was in now leaving the crime scene.
As Dell was walked past where Mulder was getting looked over by an EMT to make sure he didn't also need to be taken to a hospital, Skinner briefly thought he was going to have to break up a fist fight. He was sure that the only reason one didn't break out was that, at that moment, Scully extracted herself from her farewells with the marshals to walk over and begin giving directions to the EMT. This effectively and thoroughly distracted Mulder.
Mulder was being poked, prodded, and had a penlight flashing in his eyes, and yet he was the most relaxed Skinner had seen him in the last couple weeks.
As Skinner approached the partners, he hear Mulder putting up a token protest. "Scully, I don't need a hospital. I just want to go home."
"Mulder, you have a baseball-sized knot on the side of your head."
"I knew I never should have taught you how to play baseball." Scully raised an eyebrow at him and a grin spread across Mulder's face. "Okay, so that might not be completely truthful."
"Uh huh."
"Scully, I got the bump when they tossed my unconscious body around. It's been more than 24 hours and I've shown no signs of a concussion. Smith here'll back me up, won't you?"
Bobby Smith looked back and forth between the pair, clearly afraid of taking a side.
'Poor kid's been in enough stand-offs today,' Skinner thought wryly.
He was about to step in, when Scully conceded. "Fine, but if at any time I decide you belong in a hospital I reserve the right to drag you to one."
"You think you could take me, G-woman?" Mulder leered at her, either forgetting that there were others around or simply not caring.
"I think we both know I can," she replied, in a way that made Skinner feel like a voyeur and Smith look like he didn't know whether to run or rejoice that he didn't have to pay for this kind of entertainment.
"Agents," Skinner said, finally making his presence known, "how are you two holding up?"
Mulder opened his mouth, most likely with a ready-made quip, but Scully cut him off. "We're fine, sir."
"Good. I will need both of you to come back to the Hoover building to give your official statements - "
"Sir!" Mulder immediately interjected. "Can't that wait until tomorrow?"
Skinner shot him a glare that he knew Mulder was pretty much immune to at this point. "As I was saying, I need both of you to come in and give your statements, but then I don't want to see you in the office until Monday."
Skinner watched as they had an entire conversation without words. Scully titled her head at Mulder, who barely suppressed the smirk that was threatening the corner of his mouth.
Not waiting for them to respond, he turned to Smith. "Are they cleared to leave?"
"They can go." Smith handed a bottle of water to Mulder. "Drink all of that."
"Do I need to refill this prescription?"
"Let's go!" Skinner ordered, already walking to his fleet sedan.
"So his gun was actually trained on you, Agent Mulder? There's was no indication that Spilano was his real target?"
Mulder had answered the same question three times now and was getting fairly tired of it. SAC Dixon seemed particularly incredulous about his series of events - which Mulder found ironic, since this case was one of the most straightforward he'd worked on since he left VCS.
"No, sir, his message right before he fired was the only indication."
"Right, that..." Dixon looked at his notes, "his father was 'very disappointed in him'?"
"Right. May I ask why you keep asking me this?"
"Agent Mulder," Skinner intervened, "the only reason we're asking is that I was with Agent Dell the entire time we were interviewing Angelo Spilano. He never said anything about his son other than he wanted us to take the death sentence off the table if he told us how to find him."
Dixon leaned forward intently. "Is it possible he could have said something else and you misunderstood?"
"No."
Dixon and Skinner exchanged a look before Skinner nodded. "All right, Agent Mulder, you're dismissed. Send Agent Scully in."
Scully walked out of Skinner's office 25 minutes later and found Mulder, head resting on the back of the couch he was sitting on and eyes shut, resting. Judging by the dark circles under his eyes, that was something he hadn't done a lot of recently.
She stood there watching him for a moment, tempted to just let him rest. But at any moment now, Skinner and who knew who else would come out of the office, and she knew he wouldn't want anyone else to see him.
"You just going to stare at me all night, Scully, or were we going to get out of here at some point?" Mulder asked, eyes still closed.
"I hadn't really decided yet," she said softly, walking over to stand in front of him.
When she reached him, Mulder squinted up at her. "Hey."
"Hey." A peaceful silence settle between them. "Oh," he said, suddenly remembering, "I have something for you."
Scully immediately adopted her skeptical look. "What?"
Reaching under his collar, he used his thumb to hold up her cross. Scully gazed at it, unable to say anything. Mulder unhooked the clasp, stood up, stepped around her, and brushed her hair to the side, returning her necklace to its rightful place.
"Mulder, I want to go home."
Mulder knew that Scully had yet to fall asleep. Her breathing was even enough that she probably would have fooled anyone else, but as he lay wrapped around her in her bed, Mulder could practically hear her thoughts.
"Scully," he whispered, brushing away a strand of hair that had fallen across her forehead. "It's not a dream anymore. You're really home."
"Those dreams kept me sane."
"Me too. Even if they did tend to end at inopportune moments."
She turned in his arms and looked up at him. "That was unfortunate. We already made up for that once tonight.” Then she paused, looking thoughtful. "How many times did we have those dreams?"
Her lips brushed against his with each word she spoke and he had to force himself to respond verbally. "At least a dozen."
"Well, I guess we have some catch up work to do."
"I guess we do."
They could sleep later.
"Thank you so much, Dr. Speake. Next Thursday is fine. I really do appreciate you squeezing me in. Right. You too."
Scully set down the phone in its cradle and turned, almost running into Mulder. "Mulder! You scared me."
"I thought you got checked out last night and everything was fine."
"I did and everything is."
"Than why are you making a doctor's appointment?"
Of all the ways she'd planned to tell Mulder, this was probably the furthest down on the list - but the terrified expression on his face convinced her that she couldn't put it off.
"Mulder, Mary Speake is a doctor that I went to medical school with. We didn't take a lot of classes together because she was studying to be an OB/GYN, but I trust her."
"I don't understand."
Scully took his right hand in hers, drawing strength from him and trying to give him some reassurance. "Mulder, when I was in witness protection, I started experiencing dizzy spells, and I ended up in the hospital at one point."
He opened his mouth to speak but she continued on. "While I was there the doctor gave me some surprising news." Drawing in a fortifying breath she blurted out, "Mulder, I'm pregnant."
Mulder blinked at her several times. "I'm sorry, what?"
"You want to take a minute?"
Mulder walked over to her couch and collapsed onto it.
"I'm going to go get you some water."
Scully took her time in the kitchen, trying to give Mulder as much time to collect himself as possible. When she walked back into the living room, he hadn't moved, so she simply set the glass on a coaster on the coffee table in front of him, and waited.
"Pregnant?" Mulder asked, as if it was a new vocabulary word he was learning for the first time.
"Yes."
"How?"
She decided to try to keep things light. "Well, when a man and woman decide they love each other, they wait seven years and then - "
That seemed to snap Mulder out of his daze. "But Scully, the in vitro didn't work!"
Mulder's reaction was now starting to worry Scully; it seemed to go beyond simple shock. "Mulder," she started cautiously, attempting to keep her voice steady, "if you don't want - "
He looked honestly bewildered. "Not want? Not want our ba-? Scully, we got our miracle! How can you even..."
Mulder seemed to be unable to finish his sentences, but Scully got the gist of it nonetheless, and felt tears gather in her eyes. She didn't know if it was her tears or if his brain had resumed normal speed, but Mulder reached for her then, tucking her head under his chin as she curled into his embrace.
"We're going to be parents, Scully."
She felt his smile, her own spreading across her face in answer.
"Yeah. Yeah, we are."
"Hello?"
Skinner was surprised that he wasn't surprised when a decidedly male voice answered the phone. "Agent Mulder, do I want to know why you're answering Agent Scully's phone?"
"Probably not, sir." There was no apology in his voice.
Skinner could feel a headache already starting to form. "Fine. I was actually looking for both of you anyway. Dell is willing to talk, but he'll only talk to the two of you."
"Sir, I don't think..." Skinner heard the muffled sounds of a conversation taking place on the other side of the phone. The only words he could clearly make out were a loud protestation from Scully that she was 'not an invalid'. Mulder returned to the line. "We'll be there as soon as possible."
Adam Dell was led into the interrogation room, his cuffs clinking as he moved. He appeared perfectly calm and in control.
Scully stood near the back of the room, arms crossed across her chest. She watched as Mulder leaned back in the chair across from Dell, affecting a cavalier attitude.
"Thanks for coming."
Mulder shrugged. "We were told you were being a tad anti-social."
"How are you doing, Agent Scully?"
"Much better now that I don't have a price on my head. Now, why don't you stop wasting our time and tell us why we're here." The self-assured look on Dell's face made it far too easy to play 'bad cop'.
"Well, since you asked so nicely..."
"You asked to talk to us," Mulder reminded him.
"Yeah, I did." He considered the two of them for a moment and then continued. "Angelo Spilano didn't order the hit on you. You have to make sure it doesn't get added to the charges against him."
"You want us to believe that Spilano wasn't orchestrating the whole thing from inside a jail cell?"
"It was all Tony. I didn't know that though until it was too late."
Mulder shook his head. "Well, it's not like we can ask Tony Spilano for his side of the story, is it?"
Dell leaned forward angrily. "That little runt needed to be taught some respect."
"Respect?" Scully asked in disbelief, walking forward and leaning across the interrogation table. "You killed a man in cold blood, Dell."
"He deserved it."
"I am so sick of hearing you guys talk about what other people 'deserve'! What gives you the right to decide what anyone deserves?"
Dell stared up into Scully's eyes, trying to get his temper back under control. "You have no idea what that neighborhood was like before the Spilanos took over, Scully. Kids getting shot, homes getting broken into-- you never felt safe. The Spilanos created more stability in my neighborhood than the cops ever had!"
"And if a few innocent people have to die in order to keep that peace, so be it?" Mulder asked.
"Sacrifices are sometimes necessary."
"That's an easy position to take when you're not the one making the sacrifices."
Dell held up his handcuffed hands. "Does it look like I'm not making sacrifices, Agent Mulder? I knew as soon as I let you and Jeff live that I would end up here, but I didn't kill you because Spilano didn't want it."
"Then why were you willing to do it in the first place?"
"Tony led me to believe that he was merely acting out his father's wishes; I had no idea he'd gone rogue."
"And when his father found out, he got angry."
"Of course. Who wouldn't?"
"So, he asked you to take care of it for him?"
"He trusts me," Dell replied smugly.
"That'll come in handy for both of you. There are so few people you can trust in prison."
"You just going to sleep all day?" was the first thing Jeff Marcus heard when he woke in his hospital bed.
He struggled briefly to open his eyes and then wished he hadn't as sunlight seared his retinas. Next he felt the all-consuming pain in his abdomen, and wondered how he could have not noticed it before. Just as he was about to scream out in pain, a delicate hand placed a button into his own, which he pushed repeatedly. The pain began to dull.
Eventually, he was able to concentrate on his surroundings, and saw the two faces of Mulder and Scully looking down at him. Marcus tried to sit up, but Scully placed a hand on his shoulder keeping him in place. He winced, as his movement jostled his wound again.
"First gunshot wound?" Mulder asked sympathetically. Turning to Scully, his face took on a faux-reminiscent look. "Ah, I remember my first gunshot wound. It feels like yesterday."
"That's because the last time you were shot was a few months ago," she responded before turning back to Marcus. "How are you feeling?"
"Well, I'm apparently not as experienced with it as Agent Mulder is, but it feels like I've been shot."
"Do you want me to get your doctor? Is the pain medication not working?"
Marcus shook his head. "No, I'll be okay."
"You better be!" Mulder put in. "You owe me a rematch on the poker game."
Marcus smiled, his eyes starting to feel heavy again. "You're on."
"We'll let you get some rest," Scully told him, "but we'll come back later to check on you."
"Okay." The word was barely out of his mouth before he'd fallen back to sleep.
As they walked down the corridor of the hospital, away from Agent Marcus's room, Scully caught Mulder's hand and pulled him into a bone-crushing hug.
"Does it make me a horrible person that I'm so glad that wasn't you?" Scully asked, Marcus's pale visage swimming behind her eyes.
"No, it makes you human."
She tipped her head back, staring up at his face and seeing all of his caring and concern written there. "Let's get out of here, Mulder."
"Scully, I don't know if I mentioned this, but I'm really glad you're back."
"Me too, Mulder."
Next: Epilogue
