"Xena," Gabrielle crooned, "Xena, shh." Gabrielle, roused by the sound of her friend's distress had moved to comfort the warrioress who, in her sleep, was laid vulnerable. The sleeping form in Gabrielle's arms whimpered.
"Oh Xena." She sighed, a tear running down her cheek. She wanted to wake her warrior, but knew better. Xena was as likely as not to hurt her before she had fully wakened, her well-honed reflexes causing her to reach for her sword unconsciously.
Xena sobbed once and jerked awake, pulling away from Gabrielle's grasp. Her face was pale. Gabrielle squeezed her hand gently, then let Xena withdraw back into her dark musings. It was useless to do anything else. Xena would do all she could to keep from exposing her past to the bard, even though it seemed inescapable. Gabrielle looked up from her hands to see that Xena had pulled her knees up to her chest, unable to control her emotions; the nightmare spilled over into reality.
Feeling Gabrielle's gaze, she choked out, "Go back to sleep, Gabrielle."
"Xena, I won't sleep with you like this." The red head frowned sternly. "What was it this time?" she asked again, as she did every time Xena woke herself like this. Ice blue eyes met light green. "Please Xena." She begged, not for the first time.
"Gabrielle..." Xena ran her fingers through her dark hair, her elbows resting on her knees.
"Yes?"
The warrior forced herself to rise, to leave the campsite before she could say more. She left the warmth of the dying fire; she ran but did not feel it. She wanted to exhaust herself in order to fall into the dreamless sleep of the weary. She wanted to make a small escape from her thoughts and from the nightmares.
Gabrielle watched Xena's back as she left. Sighing, the bard fought the urge to chase her down and force her to let it out, but she knew better. Callisto had forced the Warrior Princess to confess to her crimes in front of a crowd of people once, and despite its privacy, Gabrielle's prying would be no less heinous than that. She did the only thing she could do, she lay on her back, and started counting the stars.
Scully woke sweating and breathing hard as if she'd been running. She looked around, momentarily disoriented. Flinging aside the blankets, Scully wanted to look for her sword but instead shook off the remaining wisps of the dreamscape. The bathroom light was on. She must have forgotten to switch it off in her need to get to bed the previous night. Mulder was driving her crazy. Even though they weren't allowed to work together any longer, he was really getting in over his head.
Wearily, Scully flicked the light off, glanced at her clock and realized she'd neglected to call Mulder about the implant that had been taken from Duane Barry's neck. It was either very late or very early. Considering that Mulder had never hesitated to wake her from much needed rest, she picked up the phone. She reached his answering machine and was in the process of leaving a message when she realized that she was not alone. The window behind her shattered. Scully went for her gun, but an arm wrapped around her legs, sending her to her knees.
"Mulder, I NEED YOUR HELP!" she screamed into the phone before it was wrenched from her grasp.
"Xena? Xena? I need your help. Is Mount Nestos north or south of the Sibar River?" Gabrielle gently shook the warrior's bluish face.
"North of the Sibar River..." Xena gasped out, feeling numb and exhausted. The bard sighed as the warrior's eyes slid shut again. The knife wound in Gabrielle's leg was beginning to show signs of infection, but she would go on. She gazed sadly down at the fallen warrior on the litter, wishing that she could go back in time and stop the trap that had so severely wounded her lover. She looked around for a few more moments, resting, before urging Argo forward. Xena bounced about excruciatingly in her fur-lined bed, trying to ignore the cold and the throbbing pain that seemed to engulf her entire body. The litter hit a stone and the warrior mercifully passed out of consciousness.
"I have nothin to hide." Duane cooly replied.
Scully pounded furiously on the roof of the trunk with her bound hands, squealing through the rag that gagged her lips. The trunk popped open, and she made eye contact with the police officer, and then it was over. The uniformed man fell, blood gushing from a fist sized wound in his chest. Duane Barry hefted the still warm shotgun in his hand and frowned at his captive. Scully stuck her head out over the rim of the trunk, hoping that the tantalizingly near patrol car had a camera in it, and that the camera was running, and aimed in her general direction. She cast a piteous glance at the car before the trunk lid closed over her head once again.
In the dark, Scully was left to contemplate her situation while the car screeched down the road. At the absolute best, that patrol vehicle contained a camera that had gotten both a look at Barry and herself as well as the license number of the car. Scully clenched her jaw to keep from sobbing. All she could do was try to sleep, to let the dreams come.
She approached the box carefully and was about to reach for it when she was foiled by the sudden appearance of a richly dressed man, King Gregor. There was some fuss, and in the end, the King left the room with the box. Pandora's Box. Xena turned panicked eyes to the man still sitting at the head of the table. He smiled at her, and with a gesture, commanded that she be taken up to his quarters for "later."
"Ohhh, you smell soo goood." He sighed.
"Have no fear, I wish no pain, only pleasure." Nemos added, taking her stiffness for nervousness.
"I wish only to take your responsibilities from you, if only for a little while." Xena smirked behind her veil.
"Where is the king?" she added coyly.
"Just a few doors down."
"Am I really on the same floor as the king??" she tried to sound awed.
"Enough about the king. You spoke of pleasure." He leaned forward to nibble at Xena's neck. Her fist met his forehead instead, and he fell back onto the bed.
"And you spoke of pain," she growled and ambled off to find the King's chambers. Gregor was easily immobilized, but as Xena was about to beat a hasty retreat with the Box Nemos stormed into the room.
"Ohhoh. Xena. I'm sure you won't get away this time." His palace guards fanned out behind him.
"There are few things in life that I'm sure of." Xena fluttered her lashes at him. "But I'll betcha this'll surprise ya." She dove headlong out the window. Her hair brushed the dirt, and Xena twisted up to untie the curtain pull she'd secured around her ankles to break her fall.
Scully fell into the grip of a dream, but this time it was different, this time, she seemed to be looking through someone else's eyes. She was balanced on a tree limb, moving with the silent grace of a cat. Just below her, a red haired girl sat staring at the ashes of a fire. Argo stood saddled and ready to go nearby. Xena/Scully grinned ferally as she leaped quietly from her perch, landing a bare meter from Gabrielle. The bard stumbled to her feet, reaching belatedly for her staff. Xena/Scully scowled at her.
"You're lucky that was me." The warrior rose to her full height.
"Xena!" Gabrielle twirled her staff teasingly, a challenge in her eyes. "I've been practicing." Xena laughed affectionately and flexed her knees, inviting the bard to attack. The anger washed from her features. Gabrielle stepped forward, preparing to attack. Xena suppressed the amusement that threatened the rise to her face. Her bard was getting cocky. She sidestepped a blow easily, then caught the end of the staff on its follow through.
"Maybe a little too showy, huh?" the red head asked, suddenly finding herself lying on her back in the dust.
"Oh just a little." Xena grinned. She leaned down to help the bard to her feet. Gabrielle tried to use the leverage of her position to tug the warrior down onto the ground with her, but Xena refused to join her friend and instead straddled the smaller woman.
"Oh? Really?" she demanded. Xena pinned Gabrielle's arms over her head with one hand, and with the other she proceeded to tickle Gabrielle's most sensitive area, her exposed stomach. Gabrielle screamed and thrashed under the larger woman, trying to wriggle free and escape this torture. When Xena finally decided that the bard could take no more, she stood up, leaving Gabrielle to pull herself to her feet.
Argo bumped the warrior impatiently. Xena still had a hint of a smirk on her face.
"I owe you for that." Gabrielle did her best "menacing" voice. Xena just smiled. They walked in uncharacteristic silence for a few moments. Gabrielle was too busy plotting her revenge to chatter.
"Gabrielle? I can hear you thinking, don't even bother." The warrioress glanced at Gabrielle through the corner of her eye.
"So what am I thinking then?" The bard jumped in front of her friend, holding her staff out to block Xena's path.
"GabriELLe!" Xena simply knocked the staff aside and pulled Argo onward.
"Nurse! She smiled!" The haggard woman looked hopefully at the RN that rushed towards her. A glance at the comatose woman's face revealed nothing out of the ordinary.
"Maybe you should get some rest, ma'am," the nurse patronizingly suggested. Mrs. Scully frowned. She hadn't imagined it, her daughter had just grinned.
"Dinar for your thoughts?" Gab broke the silence.
"Not now, Gabrielle." Xena firmly replied, trying not to look at her bard.
"Xena, it helps to ta-"
"I KNOW, I know, we've been down that road before. Go to bed." Xena returned her attention to the flames. The subtle (and not so subtle) signals the bard had been sending over the past few weeks weren't lost on the warrior. Far from it. Despite her desire to reciprocate, she feared unleashing any more of herself before the little bard than she already had. Xena knew the strength of her passions and the power of her body to carry through on them. She dared not approach Gabrielle as anything other than a friend; it simply wasn't safe for the smaller woman. Xena's thoughts roamed back, over the many lovers she'd had in the past. Willing and unwilling, not that they weren't all won over in the end.
Gabrielle roused several hours later. "Xena?" she demanded. "Get some sleep."
Xena shot her a look. The bard clambered out of her bedroll and circled around the warrior. She stopped to rest her small hands on Xena's shoulders. "Please?" She whispered. Xena rubbed her eyes with her calloused hands.
"All right." She ignored the heat that rose to the spots on her skin that the bard had touched and followed her obediently to bed.
The man and woman on the shore were abruptly replaced by a cheerful looking woman wearing white. She called out, beckoning to the boat and its precious cargo. Scully felt herself being pulled back towards to the dock, to safety.
After a hug that was slightly longer than necessary, she and Mulder settled easily into their old partnership. Almost immediately, he tossed a manilla folder in her direction and began to brief her on his current case. Scully focused on him for the first few minutes, but seemed to lose him after that.
She was running in the dark, her booted feet not making a sound. Dodging around trees and leaping growths of underbrush, she dashed in pursuit of something.... something just out of reach, and only slightly visible as an occasional rustling of the leaves. "Gabrielle?" she called hopefully.
".....so I think we...." Mulder took the pencil from behind his ear. "Scully."
A tall man with a sleepy voice and hazel eyes peered at her as though waiting for her to say something. Xena stared right back.
"Who are you!" She demanded.
"What are you talking about, Scully?" His face filled with concern. "Are you all right?" He placed a hand on her shoulder. Xena glanced at the offending hand, and before the man could react, she had him pressed to the wall by his throat, his feet dangling several inches off the floor.
"Who ARE YOU." she spat.
"I'm Mulder, Scully... lemme down.." He clawed at her fingers, choking. Xena dropped him like a bag of rocks. She turned away from him and got a glimpse of her own reflection in a pane of glass. She touched her face with her fingertips. It wasn't her face. She saw a short redhead wearing strange, flimsy clothing.
"Scully??? What is it?"
"Who is this..Scully?"
"She's you..."
Xena shook her head as everything flooded back.
"Mulder... I'm sorry, are you ok?" Scully knelt in front of her partner, prying his fingers away from his throat to examine him closely.
"Scully? What happened?" Mulder coughed.
"It don't know."
"What do you mean you don't know? Scully... you tried to strangle me. Not to mention you were able to lift me clean off my feet." He stood up, towering over the diminutive red head.
"I'm sorry Mulder," she stammered.
"Sorry? What's going on with you Scully? Are you sure you're fully recovered?"
"I don't KNOW Mulder," she snapped, then glanced up at her partner apologetically. "I've been having these dreams...."
"Ya wanna tell me about it?" Mulder gingerly took a sip from a conical paper cup.
"Well...."
"Scully. Come on...."
"I'm having these dreams in which I am.. I'm a warrior woman, always with a little red haired woman named Gabrielle... I don't think they're... er... adhering to a linear timeline. Things change..." Scully's face flushed bright red.
"What things?" Mulder demanded from his seat on a corner of his desktop.
"Well, Mulder, sometimes, the little redhead and I, we're lovers, sometimes we aren't yet, sometimes.... sometimes things are just different. But they're all so vivid, and I don't forget them like ordinary dreams. Just now..." Scully said, watching her partner swallow, "I was dreaming again."
"Could it be a result of your abduction?" Mulder asked over the rim of his paper cup.
"I suppose it could, but-"
" Scully, I want you to see a hypnotist."
"WHAT? Mulder, you know how I feel about hypnotism."
"I don't know about you, but I have no desire to meet up with your ‘dream warrior' again." He teased, rubbing his throat conspicuously. Dana Scully quirked an eyebrow at her partner.
"I don't think that hypnotism is going to help anything. I won't let it happen again."
Seeing the determination etched into her face, Mulder refrained from arguing any further. He loosened his unimaginative tie a bit to check his neck for bruises in the monitor of his computer. He glared significantly at his partner before he continued to brief her.
It wasn't until they were well on their way to the scene of the disappearance of a prominent vulcanologist that Mulder noticed she wasn't wearing her little gold cross.
"Did the chain break?" he asked.
"Did what chain break?" she irritably replied.
"On your cross. I've never seen you without it on before."
A strange, wild look passed briefly over the red head's face. The gods have never done much for me, she thought, but said aloud, "It was a relic from a dead faith, Mulder." Scully watched the scenery through the car window.
"Why now?"
"What does it matter Mulder? Maybe I just decided I didn't like it with this jacket!" I can't explain it. She pondered, but Xena wouldn't have worn it. Scully turned her attention to her partner's profile. And such a lovely profile it is too. She smiled unconsciously at him. He caught the look, if only for a second, before she turned away.
"What was that for?" He asked playfully.
"Just thinking."
"About what?"
"Shut up and drive." Scully flashed her partner a look of anger that said ‘You talk too much' more clearly than mere words ever could have.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Xena asked.
"Yes. I trust you, Xena." Gabrielle assuaged her warrior's fears before the taller woman voiced them.
"Suit yourself." Xena shrugged and waved her hand in front of the bard's face to check the blindfold. "All set then, let's go." Xena started forward at her normal pace, tugging Argo along behind. Gabrielle listened to her lover walk away, then started tremulously forward. Her feet managed to find almost every uneven spot in the dusty road, and she stumbled along for a while before Xena returned to her side.
"How DID you manage this? This is really scary." Gabrielle grabbed Xena's shoulder as though it were a lifeline. The warrior said nothing.
"It was my idea, I know," the bard sighed, "I know." They continued to make slow, painstaking process, the bard chattering only when she wasn't tripping.
Around midday, Gabrielle tripped over her own left foot and tumbled headlong to the ground. Frustrated, she wrenched the cloth from her eyes and squinted into the noontime sun. Xena peered down at the young woman sitting in the dirt with her hazel eyes half closed and laughed aloud.
"Tired of this game already?" the warrior teased.
"Tired?"
"Yes, are you tired? Do you need me to stop?"
"No... Mulder, I'm fine." Mulder continued to stare at her for a moment, she glared back at her partner.
"Pull over," Scully abruptly demanded.
"What for?"
"Pull over... please." Mulder glanced in her direction, puzzled. Gravel crunched under the sedan's tires as it came to a halt in the emergency lane. Scully climbed out and circled around to the driver's side door. She opened it and ordered Mulder out. He seemed irritated , but something in her expression kept him from protesting. There was a fire in her eyes that he'd seen only once before.
Scully jerked the seat forward to accommodate her shorter legs, and after making all the other necessary adjustments, glanced in the rearview mirror and floored the gas. Mulder's head was jerked painfully backwards. The tires produced an agonized scream. The grey sedan squealed out into the stream of heavy interstate traffic, leaving a trail of rubber behind it. Mulder bit his tongue to keep from saying anything that might upset his suddenly touchy partner. She turned on the radio and flicked through the stations, only stopping when she found one that played vaguely Celtic new-age music. Mulder shrugged helplessly.