TITLE:          You're Not Supposed to Be Here
AUTHOR:     nikki, 11/00
ARCHIVE:        Yes to auto-archives, others, please ask
RATING:     PG-13
SPOILERS:       A hell of a lot of them, but especially Requiem, all things, 
T2
KEYWORDS:   crossover, Scully, Mulder, Doggett
SUMMARY:    When two worlds that weren't meant to meet collide.  Or guess    
                        who's in the shower with Bobby Ewing.
NOTES:      I couldn't help myself.  This is for anyone who's ever had some 
noise 
                        from real life invade your dreamscape and make it 
weirder than it 
                        already was.
DISCLAIMER: If I owned them, Doggett would be nothing more than a toddler's 
                       attempt to explain the game of fetch.
THANKS:     Extra special thanks to M.Sebasky for the super-sharp blade she 
                       wielded with ease and expertise.  Gerry and Suzi, as always, your 
                       help was more appreciated that you'll ever know.  All remaining 
                       inconsistencies, awkward phrasing and weirdness is my fault.
FEEDBACK:   You betcha.  nikoleaw@aol.com
                     Want more weirdness?  
http://members.aol.com/nikoleaw2/index.html


It had been a long day, even by her pre-pregnancy standards.  But now, with 
her new and seemingly never-ending desire to sleep, such a day left her 
exhausted beyond anything she'd ever known.  She wanted nothing more than to 
go home to a warm bath, then the comfort of her cool sheets.  

She was closing up her briefcase when the phone rang.  She was tempted to 
simply ignore it and leave, but she knew that she couldn't afford to.  Not 
now.  Not when any call, any piece of mail, any lingering glance at her face 
by a stranger-any one of those things or a thousand others could be the one 
clue she needed to find Mulder.  And with every passing day, her need to find 
him increased while the time available for her to look decreased.

"Scully."  Her voice was leaden with the fatigue that she was finding more 
and more difficult to ignore. 

A woman responded quickly, her tension vibrating through the phone lines like 
an overstrung guitar.  "Special Agent Dana Scully?"

Scully unconsciously straightened her posture in anticipation as she 
answered, "Yes.  Who is this?"

Rather than answer the question, the woman went on.  "I'm trying to find 
Agent Mulder.  I've been trying to get in touch with him for the last two 
days.  Somebody told me to try you, that you'd know where he is and how I can 
reach him."

For a split second, Scully's grip loosened and the phone began to slide from 
her suddenly nerveless fingers.  It wasn't the first time she'd received such 
a call.  It was usually someone wanting him to come investigate an eerie glow 
near their home or a rash of livestock mutilations or something equally 
uniquely Mulder-like in nature.  The commonness of the calls didn't make them 
any less painful.  And this time, like all the others before, she was left 
momentarily stunned and breathless as the impact of Mulder's disappearance 
washed over her anew.

She recovered immediately, as years of being a woman in the boys' club had 
trained her to do, tightening her hold on the phone and smoothing out her 
voice.  "I'm sorry.  Agent Mulder is on extended leave at the moment.  Is 
there something I can do for you, or..."  Scully trailed off, in the hopes that 
this would be the call where the mysterious voice on the other end of the 
line would give her the answers needed to find Mulder.

Instead, she was met with continued silence.  She began to feel the 
embarrassment that always came when she allowed her emotions to lead her into 
making incorrect assumptions, something that she seemed to be do doing more 
and more often lately, as she continuously pushed her body's new limits.  She 
fell back on her basic FBI training regarding all contact with potential 
suspects, witnesses or clients, regardless of how odd their content might be: 
 Maintain the conversation long enough to get all of the information that 
you'll need to complete your Record of Contact.  

"Hello?  I didn't, um, didn't get your name.  Are you still -"

The woman tersely cut her off.  "You've worked with Agent Mulder for like 
seven or eight years right?  You've been on a lot of the same cases with him, 
right?"

Scully was mildly surprised by the turn the conversation had suddenly taken.  
"Yes.  What is -"

"Look, maybe you can help.  I'm calling about my son."  The woman's voice 
dropped in volume as it rose in intensity.  "They're trying to take him and 
kill him.  
A friend of a friend gave me Agent Mulder's name.  Said that he's got some 
experience in cases like mine."

Scully's instinctive need to protect the vulnerable, increased ten-fold when 
she heard that a child could be at risk.

"Do you have any proof that your son has been or is currently in any 
immediate danger?"

"Goddamnit!  I just told you that they're trying to *kill* him.  How much 
more danger do you need?"

"I understand that but -"

"Look, can you help us or not?  We can't stay here, or anywhere else for 
long.  If you know how to kill this...this...thing,...then I need to know.  
Otherwise, we need to keep going until we find someone who can."

Scully tried to make her voice sound strong and soothing as she answered, "I 
need to know what you believe the threat is before I can know whether or not 
I can help you."

The answer was barely above a whisper.  "A man that can change his face.  
Who's stronger and faster than most people.  Who can survive being shot full 
of holes  Who's trying to kill my son."

Scully's response was swift and sure.  "Tell me a place that I can meet you."

The caller's voice seemed to calm just a bit as she answered, "I'm at the 
No-Name diner just past the Gaithersburg turnoff on Route 42."

"I can be there in half an hour.  How will I recognize you when I get there 
and what should I call you?"

The woman emitted a mirthless sound that might have been a laugh under other 
circumstances.  "I don't suppose that I need to tell you to come alone.  Look 
for a blonde in a ponytail wearing jeans and a blue jacket with a grey 
t-shirt."  She was quiet for a moment but before she broke the connection, 
she uttered a terse, "You can call me Sarah."

******

The No-Name Diner was just the kind of small, hometown place that Scully had 
been in countless times with Mulder over the years.  Nearly 9 o'clock at 
night and the place was populated with only a few guests, mainly lingering 
over their desserts of freshly baked pie.  Her mind quickly ran through some 
of the various towns where they'd eaten in just such establishments.  
Gibsontown, Bellefleur, Heuvelman's Lake, J.J.'s Country Diner in a town 
whose name she could never remember, the Flying Saucer just outside Ellens 
Air Base, all these places came flooding back to her as she stood just inside 
the doorway.  She could almost feel him standing behind her, anxious to get 
inside and sample the local fare while he spun out his latest theory in a 
voice hushed enough to prevent others from hearing, but intense enough to let 
her know that he once again believed in an unbelievable scenario.  

After a few seconds of standing there motionless, Scully realized that she 
had once again allowed her mind to drift.  It was something she found herself 
guilty of doing more and more often, especially when she was overly tired, 
which seemed to be all of the time now.  She had read that such lapses in 
concentration, particularly daydreams about an uncertain future and an 
idealized past weren't uncommon for pregnant women--it was simply the human 
mind's way of accepting that a significant change was coming.  Nonetheless, 
it disturbed her.  In her work, a momentary lack of focus could mean the 
difference between life and death.  Pushing the nostalgic thoughts of shared 
meals with Mulder to the back of her mind, she looked around for a woman 
fitting the description she'd been given.

Even before her mind had fully registered that the clothing and hair matched 
those that she was looking for, she'd seen the woman's eyes and had known.  
They had that extreme alertness, an almost unnatural brightness to them, 
coupled with an intensity that bordered on manic.  Scully herself had been on 
the run for her life with Mulder enough times to recognize the look.

Scully walked over to the table where the woman was tightly gripping a glass 
of water.  With the barest hint of a question in her voice she said, "Sarah?"

Sarah acknowledged her with a slight lift of the head.  "Agent Scully."

With that confirmation, Scully slid into the booth.  She was too tired and 
anxious to spend time on pleasantries she normally would have engaged in to 
set a potential witness at ease.  And sensing that Sarah was far too wound up 
to appreciate such reassurances anyway, she wasted no time getting to the 
main point of their meeting.

"Sarah, what exactly can you tell me about the man who you believe is trying 
to harm your son?  Can you describe him?"

Sarah sounded exasperated as she replied, "I told you on the phone, he can 
change what he looks like."

Scully nodded before answering.  "I know that.  But, is there one face that 
you've seen more than once?  Something that you saw repeatedly which has 
caused you to believe that this one man has the ability to make himself look 
like someone else?"

Sarah's nostrils flared with her sudden intake of breath as she grasped 
Scully's question.  Her eyes took on a look of deep concentration as she 
slowly answered, "Head's kind of like a triangle on its point, but his chin 
is kinda funny.  Too weak or something.  Dark hair, but a really big 
forehead.  That's what comes to mind.  But I was always running like hell 
when I saw it, so I never really noticed much more than that."

Scully's breathing sped up as she remembered a man who had appeared to her as 
Mulder and then, transformed before her eyes.  At the time, she'd explained 
it away as a hallucination brought on by stress and fear, never quite able to 
accept Mulder's early insistence that it had been an alien shapeshifter.  
Despite her inability to explain it, she'd never forgotten what, or who she 
had seen that night.  The wide forehead, the strong angular facial planes, 
the jutting chin.  She idly wondered how anyone could call that chin 'weak', 
but if, as Sarah had just said, she was always running for her life when she 
saw him, fear could have a tremendous impact on how one saw and remembered 
things.

Taking a deep breath in an effort to suppress her rising sense of urgency, 
she continued to question Sarah.  "Do you have any evidence to support your 
theory that someone is trying to kill your son?"

Sarah spat the answer out at her.  "Evidence?!  What the fuck do you want?  
Bullets that missed us that we ran back to pick up as souvenirs?  You want 
evidence, go look at the dead bodies of the folks my son was staying with.  
That oughta be evidence of something."

Scully looked and sounded nonplussed as she probed.  "Your son was staying 
with someone else?"

"He was.  But then I found out he was in danger.  And so were they.  I got 
him out of there and we've been on the move ever since."

"Why was your son staying elsewhere?"

Sarah's eyes regained their intensity as she hissed, "What the fuck does it 
matter?  Maybe I was too broke to take care of a kid.  Maybe people thought I 
was insane and had me locked up and gave my kid to the state.  Maybe I 
thought he'd be safe if he wasn't with me.  Maybe I had some kind of scam 
going to make money by putting my kid in foster care.  Who gives a shit?  Do 
you know about the guy that's after us and how to stop him?"

"Sarah, please, I know that you must feel like these questions are a waste of 
time, but knowing the answers to them will help me know how to help you."

Sarah sat back in her seat and looked at Scully warily.  "I'm not crazy."

"I wasn't about to say you were.  I was going to ask if you know why this 
man, or anyone else would want to hurt your son."

For a split second, Sarah's eyes skittered away, but quickly refocused on 
Scully.  She gave Scully a long assessing look, and seeming to reach a 
conclusion, she quietly answered, "Because they believe that he'll be 
important in the future.  That he's somehow going to save mankind or 
something like that, but they don't want it to happen, so they're trying to 
take him and kill him now."

Scully fought to keep her breathing and her voice steady as she asked, "Is 
there any reason that someone would think this about your son?  Does he have 
any special talents?  Has he had some unexplained illness, or taken part in 
any kind of medical trials?  Anything at all?"

"No.  Not that I know about.  He's just a normal kid."

Scully had no proof, but she had a feeling.  A feeling that this woman might 
unknowingly have the answers to the questions that Scully had been asking for 
three long months.  She leaned in and said, "Sarah, I may be able to help 
you.  I think that I have some idea of...what's happening to you and your son.  
I'd need to see his complete medical records to be certain, especially since 
you're unsure of his exact medical history."

Sarah sat up as she angrily replied, "Look, I may not have been there, but I 
knew how he was.  I'd have known if he'd been really sick or something."

Scully swallowed the tears that threatened at the words she was about to 
utter and again spoke in a reassuring tone.  "I'm sure you would.  But 
sometimes...it's possible that he could have been, or maybe still is, very sick 
but not showing any symptoms.  That you might think everything is fine, when 
it isn't."

Holding up her hand to forestall a reply from Sarah, Scully went on.  "That's 
not the most important issue right now.  We need to get you and your son 
somewhere safe.  And then we need to develop a plan to make sure you stay 
that way."

Sarah was already shaking her head.  "Oh no.  You can't protect us from 
this...thing.  There's nowhere we can hide.  It will find us.  That's why I 
need to know how to kill it."

"Sarah, I'm sorry but I can't just tell you how to kill someone.  I'm -"

Sarah stood up to leave.  Scully reached out and grabbed her arm, and was 
surprised by the highly developed muscles she felt underneath Sarah's sleeve.

"Sarah, please, wait.  I know someone that I think might be able to help."

Sarah turned her eyes towards Scully and lifted her chin in a gesture meant 
to show her continued willingness to listen, although she remained standing 
and poised for a rapid exit.

Scully, sensing that this was her last chance, spoke rapidly, "You said that 
they're trying to take your son.  There's an agent I work with, he's had some 
experience with missing children's cases.  He's got a good success rate.  
And, and, it seems to me that what we need to do, is come up with a plan to 
keep your son from becoming a missing child.  I think he can help.  If the 
man you believe is after you and your son is unusually strong, and if this 
actually is...similar to cases that I've had past experience with, then, having 
two of us there if he does manage to find you, well, that just gives you and 
your son a better chance of getting to safety."  

Scully sensed that Sarah was teetering on the edge of belief.   It was 
obvious to her that Sarah was being pulled in one direction by her fierce 
need to believe that Scully truly would help her, and being pulled with equal 
force in the other direction by her extreme paranoia that everyone was out to 
get her and her son.  Scully fractionally loosened her grasp on Sarah's arm, 
her eyes issuing a silent plea of their own as she softly said, "Sarah, 
please, I can help you.  Let me help you."

No sooner had Sarah closed her eyes and given a small nod of agreement, 
Scully pulled out her phone and started dialing.  Having no success with the 
third number she tried, she was forced to leave the same message on this 
machine as she had on the previous two.  

"Sir, this is Agent Scully.  I'm with a woman who is in a situation that may 
be related to one of our current cases.  Please call me on my cell as soon as 
you receive this message."

Seeing Sarah's questioning look, Scully made a snap decision.  Despite the 
adrenaline that this newly forming case had infused her with, she was still 
exhausted.  The exhaustion was making it more and more difficult to keep her 
mind focused on the situation at hand, and having gone for several hours 
without eating, she was now feeling somewhat nauseated.  She knew that 
regardless of what she might want, she was in no condition to face the 
so-called Alien Bounty Hunter on her own.  She needed backup, and at this 
point, if it was going to help her find Mulder, she'd take that backup in any 
form she could get it.  Knowing that she could tell Sarah none of this, she 
tamped down her disappointment and rushed to try and maintain Sarah's 
confidence. 

"There's someone else.  Another colleague of mine.  Also highly experienced 
in missing persons cases.  And, while he doesn't have...the firsthand 
experience that I've had with cases like yours, he is very familiar with the 
literature.  Let me call him.  Like I said, having two of us there increases 
the odds in your favor."
 
Sarah's compliance was longer in coming this time, but when Scully got it, 
she made the call immediately.  

"Agent Doggett?  It's Dana Scully.  I'm at the No-Name Diner outside of 
Gaithersburg on Route 42 and I need you to come out here now.  I have a woman 
and her son who need to get to a safe house, and I may have some additional 
information regarding another case similar to this one."

*******

Though the wait had been less than 20 minutes, Sarah had been fidgety and 
tense throughout.  Despite several attempts by Scully, Sarah had refused to 
divulge many additional details about herself, her son, or their situation as 
they waited, saying that she only wanted to tell the whole story once, and 
that she may as well wait until Doggett arrived before starting.

The restaurant's aromas of rich, homey foods had become sickening to Scully.  
She'd spent the last 10 minutes keeping a close eye on Sarah as she limited 
herself to shallow breaths in an attempt to keep her nausea under control.  
As a result, she didn't hear the door open, nor did she see Sarah's eyes 
widen in terror.  But she did feel the small formica-topped table wobble as 
Sarah leapt out of her seat and ran towards the exit at the back of the 
diner.  Whipping her head to peer around the side of the booth to see what 
had so disturbed Sarah, she saw Agent Doggett rushing into the diner drawing 
his weapon as he yelled, "FBI!!  Sarah Connor, stop!!"

Scully was barely out of the booth when Doggett rushed past her in pursuit of 
Sarah.  Drawing her own gun and repeating Doggett's announcement of "FBI!", 
Scully took off after them.  As she burst through the back door, she saw 
Doggett standing just a short distance away, his posture rigid, only his head 
moving as he seemed to be methodically cataloguing everything around them, to 
the point of almost sniffing the very air.  Scully called out to him, "Agent 
Doggett!"  Getting no response, she called again.

This time, he jerked, as if being suddenly woken, and then strode quickly 
over to her.  

Scully pointed her gun directly at him and started shouting questions at him 
before he reached her.  "What the hell was that all about?  How did you know 
what her name was?  Who are you?"

As he approached her, he ignored the gun pointed at him and reached out to 
place his hand on her shoulder.  "I'm sorry.  But, you're not supposed to be 
here."  She felt a mild pressure on her shoulder and suddenly, she was being 
shaken back and forth.

"Scully.  Scully, come on.  It's too late for you to try and drive back home. 
 Come take the bed so you don't end up with a stiff neck."

She sat up so quickly that she experienced a moment of lightheadedness.  When 
her vision cleared, she reached out impulsively and cupped Mulder's cheek in 
her hand.  She stared into his eyes for a moment before allowing herself to 
look around the rest of the room.  Everything was intact.  His computer was 
sitting where it had always sat, his fish were swimming in lazy circles 
around the UFO that kept landing and taking off in its watery world.  

She turned and looked wide-eyed at Mulder for another moment before tearfully 
asking, "Mulder?"

Alarmed by her sudden and seemingly inexplicable show of emotion, Mulder 
wrapped his arms around her and rumbled near her ear, "I'm right here, 
Scully."

Feeling embarrassed by her actions, Scully pulled away and gave a small 
watery laugh as she said, "You wouldn't believe the dream I just had."

He smiled and said, "Well, we've both said that dreams are just answers to 
questions we haven't figured out how to ask."

Chuffing softly, she answered, "Well, I don't know if I want to know what 
that question was."

He gave her a slow, lazy smile as he pulled her up off of the couch and said, 
"Come on and use the bed.  Like I said, you shouldn't be out driving now, and 
you don't want a stiff neck in the morning.  The bed's more than big enough 
for both of us."

Scully looked at him and felt butterflies in her stomach.  She wanted to toss 
him back a glib reply, but she couldn't.  The mention of the two of them 
sharing a bed was too much.  It harkened back too closely to the already 
fading memories of her dream, and it touched too closely on a question that 
she had desperately wanted to ask him for more than a week.  Her recent 
encounter with Daniel and the reflections she had been forced to make about 
her life and the decisions she had made were too close to the surface for her 
to try and hide them under late-night innuendo.

Sensing her serious mood, Mulder simply took her hand.  Quietly, she allowed 
him to lead her into his bedroom.  As she settled herself into a sitting 
position at the head of his bed, she noticed that he had his bedroom 
television on.  Trying to lighten the mood and gather her thoughts, she 
looked at him and asked, "Couldn't sleep, so you figured you'd wake me up 
too?"

"Actually, you sounded like you were having a bad dream.  You were moving 
around and mumbling, so I went to go check on you.  You were drooling on my 
favorite blanket so I figured I'd better wake you up."  His eyes quickly lost 
their mirth as he continued, "You know, if you want to talk about it..."

She looked past him at the tv and her eyes widened in shock.  "Mulder, how 
long have you been watching this movie?"

"Huh?"  Looking at the screen, he saw Arnold Schwarzenegger attempting to 
outmanuever an enemy cyborg.  "Oh, since it started.  I love this movie.  I 
mean, it's not "Plan 9 From Outer Space", but it's still a classic in its own 
right.  Why?  Do you want to see it?  I think I've got the tape around here 
somewhere..."

She shook her head and laughed.  "No.  No.  I just think I may have figured 
out what my dream was about though."

"What?"

Though her face was calm, her fingers restlessly twined themselves in his 
blanket as she asked, "Mulder, have you ever thought of yourself as a father?"

The End

Feedback helps keep the nightmares at bay.  nikoleaw@aol.com