Title:  An Unnatural Mother
Author: Agent L
Classification: S, Teena-angst, MT
Rating: Probably PG
Spoilers: Demons
Distribution: Archive anywhere, but keep my name and 
e-mail attached please! 
Disclaimer: To Chris Carter, David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, and Fox:
I know they're not mine, and no money, gifts or even chocolate would be
expected or accepted for this. 
Summary: Teena Mulder's thoughts at her son's bedside shortly after 
the events of Demons. 
Author Notes: This one's for the great Vickie Moseley, who not only 
asked for it, but critiqued it and told me to post it. 
Feedback: Yes, please! LHoward388@aol.com. 


An Unnatural Mother

I haven't seen him sleep like this for many years. Not since he was 
a little boy who would exhaust himself with studies and play, and 
curl up on the couch next to Bill to watch TV. After only a few minutes, 
Fox would be out like the proverbial light, and no amount of jostling 
would wake him. Bill would carry him to his room and we would both 
tuck him in, and he wouldn't stir until morning.

So long ago. Before she was taken, and nightmares and insomnia 
became a way of life in the Mulder household. Before the accusatory 
glances carefully hidden behind polite smiles. Before I could hear the 
whispers of abuse behind the kind words and gentle inquiries. 

An unnatural mother. 

I know that's what his partner thinks. She was civil enough earlier, 
when I arrived at the hospital, determined to see my son. 
But she has already judged and condemned me for his old wounds. 
Wounds that still bleed, like the thin crimson trickle that seeped from his 
head as he stood there in my foyer, accusing me of the most heinous 
things -- lies, deception, adultery -- unable to look me in the eye, 
struggling to control his anger and hurt. And shame.

I calmly informed him that he was bleeding and walked away. 

Maybe his partner is right. 

Fox makes a small sound in the back of his throat and I watch for 
signs of returning consciousness, ready to go find Agent Scully, as she 
instructed me to do. He stirs restlessly, tugging at the restraints around 
his wrists, then gives a soft sigh and lies still once more. I put my 
hand on his arm in an instinctive gesture of comfort, feeling the strong, 
solid muscles of his forearm. Not so much different from another hospital 
vigil, more than twenty years ago....

Fox had turned 12 less than a month before, but he'd always been a 
responsible, dependable boy. Nevertheless, Bill usually insisted on 
getting a babysitter when we went out. That night, we were only going 
next door for a few hours, so I convinced Bill to let Fox watch his 
little sister. The boy was so proud when Bill agreed. He listened earnestly 
to Bill's cautions about locking doors and windows, and carefully wrote 
down all my instructions regarding baths and bedtimes. 

Fox and Samantha stood at the window and waved goodbye. Feeling 
rather foolish, since we were only going a few feet away, I waved 
back, then hurried after Bill. I had no flash of intuition, no cold chill, 
nothing to warn me that my children might be in danger. Instead, Bill
and I went to the Galbreaths, where he and Tom played poker and 
smoked cigars, while Peggy and I gossiped about our neighbors and 
looked at their plans for a new addition to the house. I never once 
thought to call and check on my son and daughter. 

Three hours later, we returned home to find the house shrouded in 
darkness. Living in a new suburb, the electricity and phone 
service was notoriously erratic, vanishing at the first strong wind. 
I was perturbed at this latest inconvenience, but not frightened. The 
children knew where the candles and flashlights were, and more 
often than not, they enjoyed the adventure.

Bill yelled for Fox, an edge to his voice that never failed to bring 
the boy running.

No answer. I called for Fox, then for Samantha.

No reply. 

Suddenly the lights and TV came on, and I realized that up until
that moment, the house had been perfectly still.

"Bill?" I turned to him for reassurance, for his calmness, as the 
first stirrings of fear made my legs tremble, but he had already 
stalked off to look in the kitchen. My heart began to pound as I 
ran upstairs. Neither of the children were in their rooms. The 
rational part of my mind told me they were simply hiding, playing 
a childish joke, not realizing how frightened I was -- but Samantha 
found it impossible to be quiet for more than a minute or two. 

Then I heard Bill's voice from downstairs. I stumbled down the 
steps to see him staring at something on the floor in the corner of 
the living room.

"What did you see?" he demanded, over and over. "What happened?"

"Bill?"

As he turned to face me, I saw Fox curled up in the 
corner, as if he were trying to shrink into the wall. His knees were 
drawn up to his chest and he had wrapped his arms around himself. 
His eyes were open, but he stared blindly ahead, unblinking. Every 
few seconds a tremor wracked his body, but other than that, he sat 
motionless. His face was white except for a vivid red mark on one 
cheek in the shape of Bill's hand. 

As I stared, frozen, Bill knelt down and shook the boy violently, 
shouting in his face. The noise finally galvanized me into action, and 
I moved forward and grabbed Bill's arms, tugging at him with all my 
strength. He moved out of the way grudgingly, and I fell to my knees 
and reached out to Fox. Up close I could see he was shivering -- 
his skin was clammy and cold, his breathing shallow. A fine sheen 
of sweat glistened on his face, and his pulse raced under my trembling 
fingers. Bill had dropped his coat on the floor and I dragged it over 
Fox's body, murmuring nonsensical words in an attempt to calm him -- 
or more accurately, to calm myself, to take some kind of control over 
this unthinkable situation. 

I called for an ambulance while Bill searched the house for Samantha. 
When he found no trace of her, he insisted on calling the police, then 
stayed behind to wait for them while I rode with Fox in the ambulance. 
Fox was nearly catatonic until we arrived at the hospital, when he 
suddenly became hysterical, clawing at the doctors as they tried to 
move him, screaming for his sister. They strapped him down and 
pumped him full of drugs....My precious boy who was never sick, 
who never needed so much as an aspirin.

He slept for 24 hours. While Bill and the police anxiously questioned 
the doctors about his physical and mental state, I remained by his bed, 
constantly talking to him, touching him, trying to guide him back from 
wherever he'd gone. 

When he finally woke up, the first thing he did was ask where 
Samantha was. He had no memory of anything that had happened 
after Bill and I had left the house. I was the one who told him she was 
gone. He accepted the news calmly enough, and in my exhaustion and 
terror, I just felt relieved to have at least one of my children back again.

The police arrived shortly afterward, and Bill insisted on taking me to 
the hospital cafeteria for a quick bite to eat while they interviewed the 
boy. He assured me that Fox was in no way suspected of any wrongdoing, 
that he was simply a witness -- the only witness -- to what had happened. 
And besides, I would be of no use if I let myself get sick. My family, my 
husband needed me to be strong right now. So I had a sandwich and a 
glass of iced tea while strangers interrogated my son.

He seemed fine when we returned to the room, so after a while 
Bill took me home to get some rest. That night, Fox got out of bed 
and broke the mirror in the tiny hospital bathroom. When they found 
him, he had dozens of cuts on his arms. 

The psychiatrist at the hospital put him on suicide watch. But I knew 
that if my son had been trying to kill himself, he would have succeeded. 
He simply knew he needed to be punished, even if he didn't know why.

I don't think any of us have had a good night's sleep since then.

Fox mumbles something incoherent and turns his face toward me. 
No longer a confused, guilt-ridden boy of 12, but a troubled, reckless 
man, relentless in his search to know what happened all those 
years ago. Desperate to the point of self-destruction, he has now 
submitted himself to experimental treatments with drugs, electric shock 
and medical drills. Only slightly more sophisticated than self-mutilation 
with a broken mirror. 

His lips move slightly, and his eyelids flutter as he struggles toward 
consciousness. He tosses his head as if trying to escape the darkness, 
looking for some way back. 

But there's no way back, Fox. Not for you. Not for me. 

His hand strains against the soft cloth restraint, the fingers stretching, 
searching. I put my hand over his and squeeze gently. 

"Scully..." he whispers. 

His partner's name. Twenty years ago in the hospital, he had asked 
for Samantha. Now it's this other woman. Has he ever called for me 
in the darkness? Did he call for me that night, as I sat sipping a martini 
with Peggy Galbreath, discussing kitchen curtains?

When his eyes open, he doesn't seem to see me at first, halfway 
between waking and sleeping. He blinks slowly a few times and 
starts to focus, turning his head toward me as he becomes 
aware of another presence in the room. Unconsciously, his fingers 
curl around mine.

"Mom..?" A tiny frown appears on his brow. "Wh - what are you 
doing here?" 

He looks around again, and I can sense his groggy mind is hard at 
work, trying to figure where he is and what has happened to him. 
He always loved puzzles and mysteries. But at the moment, the effort 
is too much. His eyes drift closed. "Where am I?" he murmurs.

"You're in the hospital." I hesitate, not sure how much more to tell him....
How much he remembers.

He forces himself back to wakefulness. "What happened?"

A feeling of deja vu creeps over me, and I see a terrified 12 year 
old boy looking at me from a grown man's eyes. I consider carefully 
what to tell him, and wish his partner were here with her capable, 
calm demeanor. 

Fox's hand tightens on mine during the silence. "Mom...What 
happened?"

"You were at the summer house." I keep my voice quiet and even, 
even as I remember the terror I felt when Agent Scully called me and 
told me what had occurred there. "You were drugged, and your 
partner came and got you." 

He doesn't need to know the rest for now -- the gun he held to his 
own head, then aimed at his partner. The hallucinations, the seizures 
in the ambulance. I wish *I* didn't know.

He shakes his head with a small moan, his eyes tightly closed as if to 
hide from my words. "I...I remember ... Samantha..." he whispers, 
then opens his eyes again. The lost expression changes to something 
ugly, something that I saw earlier that day in my house, that I had 
seen years ago, in Bill. "You were there. With them. With *him.*" 
Fox's whole body becomes tense. "I saw you. I remembered."

"Fox, you don't know what you're talking about. Your partner said - "

"Where is she?" He raises his head and sees that he is tied down to 
the bed. Panic surges through him and he begins to fight the restraints. 
"Scully. Where is she?"

"Fox. Lie still. You're going to hurt yourself."

"I want to go home!"

The harsh cry pierces my heart, just as it did more than 20 years ago.
He's spent too much of his life wanting to go home, like Dorothy wandering 
through Oz. But there are no miracles here, no helpful guides to show him 
the way.

At that moment, his partner enters the room. In the shadows near 
the door, I see the fear and concern on her face -- but only for a 
moment, before she walks over with a gentle smile, just for him. 

"Hey, the guy next door complained that he can't hear Letterman." 

"Scully, I saw them. She was there. They argued about Samantha." 

Her expression turns solemn.  "Mulder, you still have a very powerful 
drug in your system. You need to try to rest." She stares over at me 
as if I'm somehow responsible for his agitation. "Perhaps you should 
leave," she says quietly.

"No..." Fox moans. "No. Mom, I'm sorry..." His eyes plead with me 
to stay. To understand. To forgive.

Everything I should be begging of him.

She sits beside him and pours a glass of water, holding the straw 
to his lips, but he refuses it. 

"I'm so tired..." he whispers. 

"I know," she says, smoothing the hair back from his forehead in a 
gesture that is both sensual and maternal. "Just rest. It's okay."  

He sighs and his body relaxes. Not from the drugs, but from his 
complete trust in this woman. The same trust he once had in his father 
and me -- the naive belief that his parents could take care of all the 
monsters in his small world, and that a kiss from Mother would magically 
heal any wound. But when his childhood was shattered that night, 
Mother couldn't even help herself, much less make it all better for him. 

I did my best, moving through those first few weeks in a fog of grief 
and confusion. I tried to placate Bill, who drank and raged at fate and 
his family. I attempted to care for Fox, but every time I looked at him, 
I expected to see Samantha by his side, and the agony was unbearable. 

There were times when I hated him for losing her.

So how can I resent this woman for taking my place at his side,
a place that's been as vacant as Samantha's bedroom for the 
past twenty years?  There's a fierceness about this small woman,
as if she can physically chase his demons away, almost daring 
them to approach. So much strength and courage, all of it focused 
on him.

Perhaps *I* am the stranger here. 

I move quietly toward the door, only to hear her voice as I 
reach for the handle.

"Mrs. Mulder." She stands and approaches me, obviously 
uncomfortable at coming between a mother and her son in 
this time of crisis. "You're welcome to stay."

I glance at the man in the bed, now sleeping peacefully. I fondly 
remember the small boy curled up on the couch beside his father... 
teasing his sister... laughing in the sunlight. I see him wave goodbye 
to me from the window in the front room.

"No, dear," I reply, "But *you* are."

The End