"So, maybe you'll finally tell us what part you played in the upcoming blessed event?" those words Langley said earlier this evening keep echoing in my head. Gee, Langley old buddy, why didn't you simply drive a stake through my heart? The pain would have probably been easier to bear.

***

I remember focusing in on Scully in the hospital room, blinking, then focusing again. "You're pregnant," I'd said, stating the obvious.

"Yes," she'd nodded, practically beaming with
happiness.

"How did that happen?" I asked. Because I distinctly
remember her telling me that the IVF procedure didn't
work. Anyway, that was over a year ago - at least, I
thought it was; I wasn't sure how long I've been out - so if it had worked she would have already given
birth.

Scully laughed then and said, "Geez, Mulder! You, of
all people, should know how I got pregnant."

I nodded slowly. Yeah, of course. Another IVF
procedure. This time - whether because the other guy
provided a more potent donation or just through the
luck of the draw - it obviously succeeded. Wonder if
she asked Skinner to help her out this time around.
Okay, no reason to get ridiculous! Since I wasn't
available, I'm sure she just used an anonymous sperm
bank donation.

***

The thing is, I know I should be happy for her, but I
can't help feeling cheated. That should be my baby
growing in her womb and it hurts like hell that it's
not. When we attempted the IVF procedure, I happened
to read some of the literature intended for infertile
men whose wives were considering IVF or artificial
insemination with sperm bank donations. Counseling is
mandatory in those cases, because so often the husband - even if, in theory, he agreed with his wife's decision - comes to regard the baby as some kind of interloper; views his wife - despite the fact that everything was done medically - as having committed adultery.

That's how I feel. Complicating the issue is the fact
that we weren't lovers when we attempted the IVF
conception, but became lovers a few months later. I
don't know where I stand now. Do we continue as
lovers? Do we go back to being just friends? Does she
want me to marry her, in order to provide a stable
family life for the baby? 

I also can't wondering help wondering if this is
payback - either on a personal level or a cosmic one - for my own act of infidelity during *her* abduction. That's how I've always viewed my little interlude with Kirsten Killar - infidelity. Despite the fact that it all occurred years before Scully and I became lovers, I've always felt guilty about it. Should a miracle ever occur and Scully convert me to Catholicism, that would probably be the first sin I'd confess to the priest: "Bless me father, for I once cheated on the woman I love". I felt so bad about it, in fact, that from the moment Scully was returned to me until the night we became lovers nearly five years later, I lived a life of complete celibacy, my only sexual release coming from phone sex, dirty magazines,  porn flicks. . .and fantasies of Scully.

So maybe Scully reasoned that if I could fuck vampires while she was being tortured by aliens, she could go to a fertility clinic and conceive a child while I was the one experiencing an extra-terrestrial brand of hospitality. Even as these words cross my mind, I realize how unfair I'm being to her. Scully may not even know about that night in Los Angeles all those years ago. If she does know, it either didn't bother her or she forgave me for it long ago. Everybody - Skinner, the Gunmen, hell even Agent Doggett - have told me how much Scully missed me, how much time and energy she devoted to searching for me.

In a weird way, in fact, attempting another IVF
procedure was probably her way of dealing with the
pain of my absence. Just as, in my own warped way, I
was trying to drown *my* sorrow by having sex with a
stranger.

Scully doesn't really seem to make any connection
between sex for the purpose of making babies and sex
for the purpose of expressing emotional closeness, the way the she and I shared during those last few months before I was abducted. I wonder if those will always stand out as the best few months of my life; if she'll be too busy with the baby, now, to ever want me in her bed again?

I'm well versed enough in Catholic beliefs to realize
the irony of this situation. Scully, despite being
pretty devout in most other areas, simply didn't seem
fazed by the official church teaching against
medically assisted conception. On the other hand I,
agnostic though I am, want to run around screaming and quoting the Pope: damn it, there *should* be a link between the baby-creating and soul-uniting aspects of sex! You shouldn't have one without the other.

***

I've just about decided to try to get some sleep when
I hear a knock on the door. I know who it is even
before I hear the familiar, "Mulder, it's me," and see the doorknob turn as she inserts her key.

"Hey, Scully, what's up?"

"Mulder, I think we need to talk," she says seriously.

"Okay," I agree.  We settle down next to each other on the couch.

"Mulder, I've been trying to be patient with you, I
really have. I know you just recovered from a terrible ordeal and I'm nearly beside myself with happiness to have you back again. And I know you've been hit with a lot - both on the personal and professional levels - since you returned. But I just can't understand your attitude and it's hurting me."

"Look, Scully, I know I probably shouldn't have broken into that facility. I probably shouldn't have shoved Agent Doggett, either, it's just that,"

"I'm not talking about that," she interrupts me. "This is not about our jobs or the X-Files. This is about *us*!"

Her face softens but, at the same time, her eyes mist
up as she takes my hand and lays it gently on her
rounded belly. "About *this*, Mulder! The baby. You
seemed so eager - well, if not exactly eager at least
accepting - about having a baby when we discussed it
over a year ago. I realize the circumstances are
somewhat different than what they would have been if
that procedure had suceeded, but I still thought you'd be happy about it."

"Scully, I am happy for you. Really I am. It's just. . ."

"See, that's what I mean. You keep saying you're happy for *me*! Before, you really sounded like you wanted it, too. You'd said you wanted to be involved, to be able to see the baby. . ."

"I do," I say, breathing a silent sigh of relief.
Okay, she still wants me to be involved in her life on a personal level. I'll get to see the baby, probably Scully and I can continue to be lovers, maybe even - if I'm really lucky - I can eventually persuade her to marry me and let me adopt the baby. We can form a perfect little family unit - Mommy, Daddy and Baby. Hell, I feel an almost-uncontrollabe urge to go out and buy a minivan! "I'll be happy and. . .honored. . .to be your baby's father figure."

Suddenly, Scully's hitting me with a sofa pillow. Or
maybe she's trying to smother me, I'm not sure which.
All I know is, she seems really angry; this isn't
play-fighting, like we used to do occasionally before
my abduction. She's also screaming, "What do you mean
father *FIGURE*??" Her emphasis on that last word
gives me my first clue of the evening and starts a
small flicker of hope burning in my heart.

"Scully, calm down," I say. Crap, she's really hurting me now, pounding the pillow with all her might into my ear. Scully's both a doctor and and F.B.I. agent, which means she knows a lot of good ways to hurt people without causing lasting damage. I could subdue her, of course, but I don't want to hurt her or the baby, so I just sit there and take it until she quits.

"Scully, I think we're both operating under some sort
of major-league misunderstandings," I finally get out. "Can I a question - just one - without you starting to beat the shit out of me again?"

"Ask," she snaps, but I notice she doesn't make any
promises about not whaling into me again.

"Is it my baby?"

This time, she doesn't hit me. I should be so lucky as to just get beat up. This time, she starts crying. Not dainty little tears sliding silently down her cheeks, like I've seen a few times before, but absolutely *bawling*! Between her sobs, she manages to get out, "Of course it's your baby, Mulder! What kind of girl do you think I am?" At any other time, the idea of my independent, mature Scully referring to herself as a "girl" would bring a smile to my face, but this is not the night to debate semantics.

"Scully, stop crying," I whisper gently, moving so
that I'm kneeling in front of her. "I assumed that
after I was abducted you made another IVF attempt, but that this time around you had to make use of an
anonymous donation from a sperm bank. Are you saying
that the clinic had some of my semen left from the
time we tried before? That they were able to implant
an embryo within you that contains both our DNA?"

Okay, this evening is getting weird - and for me to
call something weird is really saying something! Now
Scully is laughing. Again, it's not a dainty little
chuckle, but a full-blown belly laugh that seems
capable of sending her into premature labor. I find
myself smiling, too, even if I don't quite understand
the joke. "What is it?" I ask.

"Mulder," she finally says. Then she leans in and
gives me a long, deep kiss. Then she draws back and
laughs again, but not so uncontrollably as before.
"Mulder, you poor thing," she says with a smile,
touching my face gently with her fingertips. "No
wonder you were acting like such a jerk! I guess I
didn't exactly explain things in a coherent fashion,
did I?"

"Scully, I'm still confused," I confess.

"Let me start at the beginning," she replies. "Do you
know how long you've been gone?"

"Almost six months. Skinner and I went to Oregon in
early October and this is the first week in April."

She nods, then says, "How far along do you think I am
in my pregnancy?"

"About five months?" I suggest hesitantly. She
actually looks bigger than that to me, but I'm not
exactly an expert on pregnancy.

She shakes her head and smiles. "I'm seven months
pregnant, Mulder. When we were in Oregon together -
when we saw that baby and you talked about all I had
'lost' due to my association with you - I had already
conceived. I just wasn't aware of it yet."

"Scully, why didn't you tell me you'd made another
attempt at IVF?"

"I didn't, Mulder."

"I know you didn't. Why not?"

She smiles and shakes her head again. "It's not that I made an attempt at IVF without telling you, Mulder. I didn't make another attempt at medically assisted
conception."

"Then how. . .?" I ask mystified, touching her stomach gently. It seems to me we're back where we started from. This conversation is going in circles.

"Mulder, you *DO* remember the, um, change in our
relationship that had occurred about three months
before your abduction, don't you?" she asks quietly.

"We'd become lovers," I reply. "But what does that
have to do with you being pregnant?"

Scully doesn't answer, just holds my face in her hands and looks into my eyes, smiling, until the light bulb finally clicks on in my brain. "Y-you mean," I stammer, "we just. . .it just happened, naturally?"

"Mmmhmm," she purrs. Yeah, purrs. *THAT* sound
certainly brings back happy memories. "We made a baby
while we were making love, Mulder."

"But I thought you couldn't!" I say. "Scully, I sat
there in the doctor's office with you and heard him
*say* that an in vitro fertlizaton was your only
chance for motherhood."

"I was there, too, Mulder," she points out dryly.
"What can I say? The doctor made mistake. Whoever or
whatever harvested my ova obviously missed a few.
Believe me, when I first found out, I was just as
astounded as you are, but I've had several months to
adjust to the news."

I breathe a huge sigh of relief. I send up a silent
prayer of thanksgiving before I remember that I don't
believe in God. Or maybe I just changed my mind on
that subject. "I'm going to be a Daddy?" I whisper,
wanting to hear her say it.

"You're going to be a Daddy," she whispers back. Then
asks, hesitantly, "You're not. . .upset, are you?"

"Upset?" I echo, confused. "Scully, I was upset when I thought the baby *wasn't* mine. Now that I know it is, I'm thrilled!"

"I  thought maybe - since you were more of an, er,
active participant in the conception than we had
orginally planned - that you might feel more of an
obligation than you would have the other way. Like
that I'd expect you to marry me or something."

Uh-oh. Oh, the hell with it! It seems like dancing
around issues always causes more problems for us than
confronting them head on. "As a matter of fact,
Scully, I *would* like us to get married," I say,
placing my fingers gently on her lips before she can
object. "Just think about it, okay? We don't have to,
but I'd like us to. If you're not ready for marriage
yet, let's at least consider living together. I know
I'm a slob, and I promise I won't make extra work for
you, but I want to be with you and the baby as much as possible."

"Mulder,  she says, removing my fingers from her lips, "you just made two women very happy."

"*TWO* women?" I ask.

"Me," she says, kissing me quickly on the forehead,
"and my mother."