TITLE: A Tour of Muted Interests
AUTHOR: Stephen Greenwood
RATING: PG-13
CATEGORY: VRA
FEEDBACK: nothingbutnet@hotmail.co.uk
SETTING/SPOILERS: Set post-The Truth and bleeds into IWTB. Other
spoilers for Squeeze/Tooms, Detour, Emily, The Pine Bluff Varient,
Dreamland, Arcadia, Je Souhaite, DeadAlive, William.
WORD COUNT: 3,166
DISCLAIMER: I take no responsibility for what happens to Chris
Carter's characters from here on out.
SUMMARY: While on the run, Scully worries about Mulder's obsession 
with the paranormal.

With thanks to Beth and Kim.

* * * * *

It starts with a magazine in New Mexico.

After three days spent sleeping, making love, and surviving off
produce scavenged from the vending machine at the end of the block of
rooms, Mulder decides that newly-crowned fugitives need more
sustenance and a change of clothes. Calling the funk coming off his
grey t-shirt 'manly' is only endearing for so long; it's simply a
matter of time before his jeans walk of their own accord.

They head out just before dawn. He wishes he had a ball cap to hide
his face. Not for the first time, she wishes her hair wasn't red.

The ten-minute walk to the store is the most fresh air either has
had in far too long but their enjoyment is wrought with paranoia, as
if those four flimsy walls they're renting back at the motel is a
panic room in disguise. (Plenty of panicking has occurred since Tom
Hensley signed his name in the guest register and paid with small
bills, but it's nothing a warm embrace can't handle.) His palm is
sweaty and Scully grips his hand too tightly; both the roads and the
sidewalks are quiet and reassuring, but she doesn't let go.

The fluorescent lighting inside the store reminds her of morgues and
hospitals, of death, of a life she no longer leads. Her world now
consists of flea-ridden bedspreads, worry lines, and the man
squeezing her fingers, but she is grateful. Mulder picks up a basket
and tosses in bread and fruit, cheese and a tin of SPAM. ("Poor man's
steak, Scully. Frontline on-the-run rationing at its finest.") Over
in the meagre clothing section, they grab non-descript jeans, t-
shirts and underwear that come in packs of three and five, a couple
of pairs of socks. New shoes would be nice but are not necessary, not
yet, and they are left on the shelf.

Scully settles on dark brown hair dye while Mulder watches quietly.
He doesn't comment when she tosses a box of condoms in with the
toothpaste. There is a time and a place to bring up dead daughters
and abandoned sons. This isn't it.

It's as they're standing in line at the checkout that he picks up a
copy of the Weekly World News, conveniently stacked next to rows of
candy and gum and other cheap items that nobody really needs but buys
on impulse; 'a marketing conspiracy', he called it once. The cover of
the paper - 'DEAD MCVEIGH ON MORGUE SLAB!' - is less ludicrous than
most but Mulder devours it all and reads out headlines from the
inside articles in the same delighted tone he used to reserve for
slideshow presentations in a basement office some eighteen hundred
miles away. Only he could make 'astronomer rebuked for endlessly
staring into space' as interesting as a flesh-eating disease
manufactured by a militia group.

For a second she thinks he's going to toss the magazine into the
basket as the cashier starts ringing up their things but he puts it
back without protest. It is fleeting but she sees the look in his
eyes, the hesitancy and the longing.

This, she thinks with no small amount of dread, is how it begins.

* * * * *

Fifty miles outside of Tucson, Arizona, there is a gas station off
Interstate 10, just past Benson. Scully, driving for this shift,
pulls in next to a pump and jumps out of the car, eager to stretch
her legs. Mulder almost falls out of the passenger side and lets out
a relieved groan as his vertebrae pop back into place. He never was
good at sitting still for prolonged periods.

It's dusk and they're going to keep driving through the night,
taking comfort in the shadows most fear. The cover of darkness is a
precarious one and they both know it offers little more safety than
daylight, but all good fugitives sneak around once the sun goes down.
There's less traffic on the roads in the evenings, too, and they zip
across state lines without scrutiny. They're both watchful of suits
and SUVs.

Scully siphons gas into the car they took before entering Arizona as
Mulder wanders the small lot, working the kinks out of his neck. She
squeezes his shoulder when she moves past him to pay and he follows
her inside obediently, protectively.

The attendant is a middle-aged man with greying hair, tied back in a
ponytail, and a salt-and-pepper goatee. He chews tobacco lazily while
squinting at a portable television behind the counter, raising a hand
in acknowledgement while never tearing his eyes away from the screen.
Mulder meanders down the centre aisle and, fairly certain he won't be
pulled away from her in the next two minutes, be it by Government
officials, Super Soldiers, or little grey men, Scully heads to the
counter.

She is about to hand over the notes when a thump alerts her to his
presence. A packet of sunflower seeds sits on the countertop
expectantly. When she looks at him, Mulder merely shrugs and gives
her a tentative smile, as though a reminder of who they used to be
might break her. She rolls her eyes because that's what he expects
her to do.

"Where you folks headed?" the attendant, 'Mike' written in scrawling
spider-writing on his nametag, asks as he rings up the gas and the
seeds.

"Vegas," Mulder quickly supplies, wrapping his arm around her
shoulders like they're Rob and Laura Petrie again. "We're gonna get
married by Elvis."

Mike, eyebrows raised, glances at Scully, who smiles indulgently.
"It's always been our dream," she offers, fighting back a grin. She
has to pinch Mulder's hip to quell his silent laughter.

"All the best to ya," he says, and takes their money. "Might be
headin' that way myself in a coupla months, check out this Area 
Fifty-One they're harpin' on 'bout on the TV." He gestures 
haphazardly with one hand. "You know anythin' 'bout it?"

*Too much.*

Scully holds her breath. She's sure the temptation will be too
strong and he'll give in, open his mouth and engage in a debate over
the Government's best - or worse - kept secret. You can take the man
out of the basement but Scully knows he keeps a copy of those files
with him at all times. She thinks it will be his memories that will
lead to him pining for the days when they chased monsters with
flashlights and wild abandon. Mulder surprises her by shaking his
head and saying, "Not my kind of thing. I prefer to keep my feet on
terra firma." Faint scars can attest to that.

Back in the car he commandeers control of the wheel. They've been
driving again for ten minutes when he reaches over and rests his hand
on her thigh. "I would marry you, you know," he murmurs, taking his
eyes off the road for a brief moment to look at her.

"I know," she replies. 'If I could' is left unsaid.

* * * * *

In Lewiston, Idaho, they eat at a restaurant called Zany's because
Mulder likes the name. The food is fresh and plentiful, and while
neither is sure how their stomachs will react to the sudden reduction
in grease, they waste no time mourning its loss. 

"I never thought I'd be so glad to see greens on my plate," Mulder
confesses between forkfuls of peas and sprouts.

"Your arteries are similarly thankful," she replies with a smile,
the first real one in a week. Being properly fed does wonders for
Scully's disposition.

Conversation between the two is light as they focus on their meals,
basking in meat and vegetables that haven't been deep fat-fried
before landing on their plates. In this new life of theirs, it's the
little things that mean the most.

She should be appreciative of Mark Wight's and Jenny Appleby's good
health and cash reserves, the fact they have (relatively) clean
clothes and food in their bellies, but truth be told she feels out of
place in a proper restaurant wearing her thrift-store purchases, more
at home alongside the long-haul truckers they make small-talk with in
roadside diners. Those men are used to creased clothes, bleary eyes
and initial shyness; mile after mile of interstate does that to a
person, they say over bacon and scrambled eggs, nodding wisely like
they've just divulged the meaning of life. She feels like she reeks
of transience.

Seeing America from the passenger seat of stolen cars was never high
on Scully's to-do list but the travel doesn't bother her as much as
she first thought it would. What's worse is the awareness of Mulder's
growing restlessness. He is a lost soul, wandering aimlessly from one
Podunk town to the next with no end in sight, condemned to purgatory,
and sometimes she feels the ridiculous urge to apologise to him, as
though it's all her fault. She knows his capacity for guilt rivals
his martyr complex and in the end she says nothing.

They treat themselves to dessert and try to ignore the party of
eight recently seated next to them. The table is loud and raucous,
the alcohol flows freely, and the conversation makes Scully's stomach
churn.

"I'm tellin' you, it was real! At least seven feet tall, broad
shoulders, covered in fur-"

"You're fulla shit, Gary," was followed by murmurs of agreement,
cries of protest.

"Naw, man. You wasn't there. It was Bigfoot isself skulkin' at the
bottom of that hill. You jus' ask Pete Taylor; he saw 'im, too."

Scully almost can't do it, can't raise her eyes to meet Mulder's
because she's afraid of what she might see, but she glances at him
with her features delicately masked. A bemused smile plays across his
lips and as he turns she thinks he's going to interrupt, to launch
into a lecture on Sasquatch complete with case reference numbers from
files long since destroyed, but he merely signals to the waitress for
the cheque before resting his elbows on the table.

"Well," he muses, not noticing the relief on her face, "Bigfoot is
native to the Pacific Northwest." 

* * * * *

They avoid Wyoming entirely.

* * * * *

She is a blonde when they reach Custer, South Dakota, and Mulder has
grown a goatee that can't be fooling anyone who is seriously looking
for them; she thinks he likes this cloak-and-dagger lifestyle a
little too much. His hair is longer, too, and several times a day
Scully finds her fingers itching to brush back the persistent lock
that threatens to fall over his forehead. He's taken to wearing
flannel shirts and sturdy boots for reasons she can't quite fathom,
but she must admit she likes him scruffy, not that there's an Armani
suit at hand if she suddenly changes her mind.

It's raining as they hike through the woods and the steady drizzle
seeps through the gaps in the trees, landing on the muddy forest
floor and making it dangerous underfoot; wet leaves are notoriously
difficult to walk on even with suitable shoes. The only sounds are
the squelching of mud around their boots and the rainfall hitting the
canopy above. Mulder and Scully don't talk.

After five miles they stop for a quick breather. She notices the
mischievous look in his eyes seconds before he presses her back
against a tree trunk and kisses her senseless. Later, when they pitch
their tent in a small clearing, he makes love to her so slowly it's
almost maddening, and she envies his self-control at a time when all
she can think about is clawing at him ferociously, letting him seep
through her skin and into her blood so she can feel him racing
through her veins, keeping her alive. 

She leaves crescent moons on his shoulders and back.

When they climb into their sleeping bags she finds he has zipped
them together. "It's raining," he points out helpfully. "You didn't
think I'd forget, did you?"

*Of course not.*

"Watch out for Moth Men," he mumbles as he falls asleep, his head
pillowed on her breast, her fingers idly running through his sweaty
hair.

* * * * *

They indulge in a movie in Chicago, Illinois. He's Anthony now, the
saint of lost things, and Scully finds it painfully appropriate. Her
name is Mary, as in miraculous-conception-sacrificed-her-son-to-the-
greater-cause-Mary. There is a cruel irony in the connotations of
four letters that most of the time she chooses to ignore. (Mary too
fled her home to escape persecution. At least she didn't bear the
weight of the end of the world on her shoulders; Revelations came too
late for her to worry about.)

The movie theatre only offers a cheesy rom-com or a B-grade sci-fi
film even Mulder has never heard of; he leaves the choice to Scully.
She debates the chick flick just to surprise him but can't do it to
herself, and they settle in to watch terrible special effects and
dialogue. The theatre is pretty empty but it is the middle of the
day, and they are joined only by an elderly couple and two boys who
look like they should be in school. Mulder buys unbuttered popcorn
and slips his arm around her shoulders like they're teenagers again. 

She loses nine minutes when he leans over to kiss her halfway
through the feature.

Luckily the plot isn't hard to follow: it's a typical battle against
alien invasion with incompetent officials and heroic civilians, and
Scully is sure they could draw more parallels if they chose. She
leans against Mulder's chest and smiles at the low rumblings of his
laughter as so-bad-it's-good lines spew from the actors' mouths.

They hold hands as they leave the darkened theatre, blinking as the
sunlight accosts their eyes and the crowds bustle on the sidewalks.

"When will Hollywood learn the inaccuracies of little green men?"
Mulder sighs.

"That's your biggest problem with that movie? Next you'll be
complaining that the only thing wrong with Armageddon is the
soundtrack."

"That's a classic," he argues. "Besides, physics is your speciality,
Mary, not mine."

"Unless it's in disregarding it, Anthony," she replies pointedly.

He kisses the side of her head and loops his arm around her waist.
"Touche."

* * * * *

The house in Virginia looks like it belongs in a horror movie,
although Mulder is quick to reassure her that it's not haunted and,
as far as he's aware, nobody has ever died there. The overgrown weeds
and the tiles falling off the roof do little to assuage Scully's
initial discomfort but somehow, if she had to choose a place for
Mulder to live, this would be it. It screams 'paranoid paranormal
researcher lives here!' It's his self-chosen job title these days; it
sits easier with him than 'total nutjob' or 'government puppet'.

He picks a room on the ground floor to be his office. It's not quite
the basement he's used to but there's enough space for a desk and
pencils stick in the ceiling tiles. He is relatively easy to please
in those respects.

They shift furniture and scrub floors and order flat-pack bookcases
from IKEA. He cuts the grass and never ventures beyond the front
gate. She buys cheap artwork and displays it in frames to make up for
their lack of photographs. Mulder quietly watches her nesting.

When Scully returns from a grocery run one Thursday she presents him
with a battered cardboard tube, a red bow tied around the middle. 

"It's not ticking..." he muses as he holds it to his ear, rattling it
suspiciously.

"Just open it, Mulder." 

He decides the gleam in her eye is more anticipatory than dangerous -
and he can't think of anything he's done recently to piss her off -
so he pops the lid off the tube and pulls out the contents. His eyes
grow suspiciously wet but he laughs in delight.

"Scully, this... how did you find one of these?" he asks, admiring
the familiar poster.

She shrugs, smiling, pleased at his reaction. "I used to work for
the FBI," she says offhandedly. "I might be rusty but I can still get
results."

It is the first thing to decorate the walls of his office. It
doesn't stay that way for long.

She finds him spending more and more time behind that closed door.
He grows pale - like the dead, her mind helpfully supplies - and he
gains weight, putting on the pounds he had lost as they dashed from
state to state. He still runs occasionally, darting through the woods
at the back of the property, and he often shuffles from the chair in
front of the computer to the fridge or the bathroom, but he doesn't
exercise like he used to. 

He haunts online forums using nonsensical usernames and has
magazines and newspapers sent to a PO Box in the nearest town. Twice-
weekly trips are made to check for new bounty; the office walls
become gilded with clippings torn from journals. Scully worries that
one morning she'll wake up to find her liver missing, or - worse -
him.

When they were on the run - *really* on the run, moving from car to
car, motel to motel, town to town - he had been able to suppress his
fascination with the weird and wonderful, more intent on keeping
moving and staying alive. But now they have a place of their own, a
house if not a home, his guard is dropping more with each tick of the
clock. Despite his office looking like a Tooms-nest, he is awakening
from hibernation, and Scully fears he will soon leave. Not forever,
but for just long enough to make her bite her nails and contemplate
wearing black again.

Mulder remains squirreled away while her name is cleared and she
takes an internship at Our Lady of Sorrows. She isn't sure what he
does all day but his muscles keep their definition and the laundry is
done when she gets home, although she walks through the door to find
him hunched over the computer screen five nights out of six. He has
books and scrolls and maps, and yet he never goes anywhere, instead
conversing with the world via the Internet like a misguided prophet.

He is there every time she comes home. Scully starts to relax.

And then the FBI stick their noses in and six years unravels in a
heartbeat. Mulder likes a challenge, feels the need to prove himself
after being in almost-solitary confinement for so long, and he delves
into the fore eagerly, immersing himself in the world of priests and
psychics and paedophiles, in someone who is all three. She can feel
him slipping away like a dream upon waking.

Mulder makes it home in one piece, albeit showing a little more wear
than when he left. She scolds him for scaring her and, as he takes
her in his arms, he vows not to do it again.

Scully knows there will be a next time. There always is. 

*Four years.*