Splinter
ALLY112038@AOL.COM 

CLASSIFICATION - MSR, Mythology, character angst. 
RATING - PG 13 for some adult language/situations. 
SPOILERS - "SUZ/Closure
ARCHIVE - Anywhere. Please let me know though so I can visit. 
FEEDBACK - Good, bad or indifferent. I lap it up always. Feed me at Ally112038@aol.com  
DISCLAIMER - The characters contained within remain the sole property of Chris Carter, Fox and 1013 productions. Whether or not they deserve them remains a moot point with me right now!

I'm worried about Mulder.

There I've finally admitted to myself that something isn't right with him recently. I don't base it on anything concrete. Just a vague sense of unease that he isn't telling me everything he should be.

To the casual observer he appears pretty normal - or at least as normal as one might expect after what he's been through lately. The patented Fox Mulder banter is still in evidence. He still grins that goofy grin in all the right places. He still invades my personal space way too much and pounces on every opportunity to throw thinly veiled innuendo in my direction.

And he *almost* had me fooled. I mean let's face it this guy towers over me. I don't get to look in to his eyes too often, but today I finally managed to study him long and hard across the conference desk in Skinner's office.

We were present for a standard departmental meeting. Nothing was said that I haven't heard a hundred times already and so I spent the time in a more constructive way.

I observed my partner.

What I saw shocked me. Literally jolted me to the core. Because I looked in to his eyes and saw absolutely nothing. The eyes of a dead man. Unseeing, unfeeling. No emotion other than a deep and all consuming sadness that seemed to nestle squarely in their chameleon depths.

The voices of my colleagues faded in to nothing around me as the enormity of what I was seeing hit me like a punch to the gut.

I swear I felt a pain that for a second far outweighed any physical injury I have ever received.

My partner is hurting inside. I suspect he's been hurting for a long time. And I never even took the time to notice.

Sure I *suspected* something was wrong, but maybe I was too wrapped up in my own problems to really focus like I should have done.

And I've been torturing myself ever since with the thought that three years ago I wouldn't have missed the tell tale signs.

That's the problem with sharing time and space the way I do with this man. It's easy to become complacent. Our entire partnership has been an emotional roller coaster. We have given a whole new level to the term Love/Hate.

There have been times when all I've wanted to do is calmly draw my weapon and blow his head off his shoulders. Especially when he's given me one of those irritatingly sardonic smirks he does so well.

Other times I've wanted to take him in my arms and protect him from the worst in himself. To keep him safe from a world that seems to relish the challenge of keeping Fox Mulder just one short step away from complete despair.

But mostly, we just jog along, oblivious to the highs and lows. We *know* each other now you see.

He's my partner, my protector, my best friend. He always has been, I think from the very first day I walked in to his office.

I remember looking up at him with a sense of wonderment. This crackpot Agent who lived in the basement. *Spooky Mulder*. My new partner. And I knew somehow that we would be together forever.

Fate has conspired against us more times than I care to remember and yet somehow, we have always prevailed.

Either by good luck or sheer bloody mindedness, I can't be sure. The only thing that matters is that everyday, his is the first face to greet me.

More recently, as we took our complicated relationship to brave new levels it is also the last thing I see at night before I slip in to delicious slumber. Feeling his arms around me as I fall in to sleep.

Now though, I wonder how many nights I have slept through while this man has remained still and silent. How many times has he kissed me awake, feather-light touches dancing on my skin while I have remained cacooned in this new comfort zone and refused to open my eyes enough to really *see*?

It makes me shudder to think that he's hurting and I haven't even taken the time to notice. Maybe it's because subconsciously I am afraid to burst my own bubble. I'm happy. Happier than I have been in years, because I have finally found some peace. When I held Daniel's hand in that Hospital not so long ago, everything I have suppressed for so long burst free from me.

Finally I was able to make some sort of sense out of my own life, to forge a path I should have walked a long time ago.

I hadn't realised back then that somehow Mulder's hand had slipped from mine. That he was making the journey alone.

How could I have been so blind?

Have I really become so self obsessed that I have stopped seeing him? The prospect squeezes at my throat. Icy cold hands stealing my breath away and tugging painfully at my heart as I battle through the remainder of the day. But I watch him often. When he's not looking directly at me, I am able to study him further.

Several times I have caught him staring ahead, eyes far away, in a place I can't reach him.

He looked up once and I wasn't quite quick enough to busy my gaze elsewhere. Our eyes clashed for a second and then he offered me a smile so gentle that my heart almost cracked in two.

I almost asked him outright then. But I have enough in the smarts department to know that it was neither the time nor the place.

So instead I just returned the gesture and bent my head back over my work.

The day passed excruciatingly slowly until finally, out of the corner of my eye I saw him rise from his desk. Checking his watch as he announced the work day, for him at least, was over.

I was still wrestling with unfinished expense reports and urged him to go on ahead. He didn't argue, just dropped a hand on the crown of my head as he passed, letting it linger for just a second as an unspoken promise of things to come.

I waited for the door to click shut behind him, then forced myself to count to five hundred. Slowly and carefully, giving him the time to exit the building, to get in his car and leave.

Then, as soon as I felt safe that he wouldn't be returning, I began to prowl.

I began to look for clues as to what is bothering him. It might seem strange to begin my search in this office, but Mulder's life is here. It is far more personal to him than his apartment will ever be and I have a hunch that I will find answers here.

On first glance, everything looked pretty much as it should. His desk was it's usual muddle of unfinished reports, balled-up paper and seed husks. Mulder seems to work best in the midst of chaos. After seven years I've quit trying to reform this aspect of his character. Besides, I find it kind of endearing now. It's a part of who he is. Just like obsessive tidiness is my particular kick. Yin and Yang. It never ceases to amaze me.

But my initial sweep yielded no results. Gave me no insight whatsoever. I guess I was hoping for a revelation and when none came I collapsed heavily in to his chair. I closed my eyes and breathed in the scent of him that is permanently ingrained in to the leather, battling against tears that for no particular reason, burned beneath my lids.

I'm not sure how much time passed before I gained a measure of control, was able to force my eyes open once again.

And then I *saw* it.

Or rather I didn't.

I could have kicked myself then for not noticing before. But like I said it's all too easy to become complacent. Maybe I would notice an addition to this cluttered space, but when something is taken away it's harder to spot. Plus, I don't find myself behind my partner's desk too often. But now, so many things fall neatly in to place as my eyes rivet on the empty space she used to inhabit.

*Samantha*

The smiling eight year old younger sister balancing precariously atop a metal climbing frame. The picture that has been Mulder's only constant desktop companion during the years I have know him. A picture that is now conspicuous only in it's absence.

I drag my mind back, trying to pin point the time it disappeared. I can't be sure, but I vaguely remember seeing it in it's usual place even *after* the mystery was finally solved.

We attended a memorial service for her. Just the two of us. There was really no one else left. Mulder had travelled to Connecticut alone to say his final goodbye to his Mother. A woman who hadn't always made the right decisions but who, I think he came to understand, was driven by forces beyond her control. He watched as she was lowered in to the unforgiving earth then came home and cried in my arms. I listened as he sobbed - huge painful gasps that almost tore me apart - and then gently covered him with a blanket as he finally fell in to an exhausted sleep.

But after Samantha he didn't cry. He told me he was free. I believed him.

I allowed him to carry on with life, never once questioning how allowing her finally to be put to rest might affect him.

I just took him at his word.

*Complacency*

I found the picture in his bottom desk drawer. Concern over riding any sense of unease that if he could see me now he would be understandably furious.

But if he walked in that door right now, I would find words to justify to him why I am doing what I am doing. Because the picture itself *tells* me I have justification.

The beautiful light wood frame is cracked and splintered, as though it has been thrown with force against a hard surface. The glass, aside from a couple of splinters which cling stubbornly to the broken edges of the wood, is missing.

The photograph itself is scratched. It's glossy surface, so lovingly protected by my partner for so long has turned dull. Scored by the broken glass or by Mulder I can't be sure. But the effects are the same.

And as I stare at it, look at the still smiling face of Samantha Mulder, I feel the tears finally gain release from beneath my lids.

He said he was free.

I *believed* him.

I shake my head in an effort to clear it. To attempt to gain an insight in to where I go from here. Truly I have no idea. But as I ease the battered picture from the shattered remains of the frame I am sure of only one thing.

That I will do everything in my power to make it up to him.

To set him free.