The ride back from the Air Force hangar passed in tension-laden silence,
none of the passengers in the car ready to discuss what they had seen,
or the carnage they had witnessed. Despite her inner turmoil, Scully
half-dozed for much of the ride, the physical and mental exhaustion of
the past 24 hours finally catching up with her. She was looking forward
to a long hot bath and then a good night's sleep, but when Skinner pulled
up in front of Scully's apartment building, Mulder got out of the car too.

"What are you doing?" she asked, slamming the car door shut.

"I'm going in with you, so we can talk."

"Mulder, we have nothing to say to each other right now."

"Why don't you let me be the judge of that," he said coolly.

She shot daggers at him with her eyes, then realized that Skinner was still
sitting there, letting the car idle, serving as an uneasy witness to their discord.
"Fine," she muttered. Skinner let out a relieved sigh and pulled away,
the wheels of his car screeching on the roughened asphalt before he
disappeared into the night.

The two of them stood on the curb - partners, friends, whatever the hell they
were to each other at the moment - and sized each other up uneasily. Taking
each other in, evaluating their options. Feeling out their territory.

"Well, I'm not going to stand out here all night," Scully said finally, and
turned to go into her building. Mulder followed without a word.

Her apartment was cold and dark and it suited Scully's mood immeasurably.
She was tempted to leave the lights off just so she wouldn't have to look at
him, but settled for switching on one table lamp. The golden light diffused
throughout the room, casting eerie misshapen shadows and leaving the
farthest corners in complete darkness. She threw her keys on the coffee table,
and then went into the bedroom, putting away her jacket and her gun before
returning to the living room. Mulder was standing in front of the couch,
looking down at the cushions, as if unsure whether or not he would be
allowed to sit.

She decided to keep him wondering, standing opposite him and folding
her arms across her chest. "So we can assume that Diana wasn't among
the burned, since her car was nowhere in sight. Why wasn't she at your
appointed rendezvous, Mulder?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe she got there too late, just like us."

"Then why didn't she stick around and call the authorities like we did?"

"I don't know. I'm sure she had her reasons."

"As always," Scully muttered under her breath.

"Scully -"

She clenched her fists in frustration. "I just don't understand what I'm
supposed to do, Mulder. I don't know what I can do at this point, to
measure up to whatever it is you're expecting of me. Do I trust no one
or do I trust everyone? Do I only trust or distrust the people you tell me
to? Are you suddenly the arbiter of who is trustworthy and who is not? Are
the only people who can be trusted the ones you've had sex with?"

He flinched at her final sentence, then his face settled back into the patronizing
mask he had been wearing for the past couple of days. "You don't know -"

"That's right, Mulder, I don't know," she said, cutting him off again. "I don't
know what's going on because you won't tell me. Instead you treat me like...
like...like some greenhorn rookie who doesn't know the score, or a pretty
little thing who shouldn't worry her head about the big picture, or a weasel
who's going to stab you in the back, or some shrew-like harpy bent only on
personal vendettas. Is that what you really think of me, Mulder?"

"You know it's not. I've only been reacting to your own behavior," he said
defensively.

"My behavior?" she said, eyes widening, her voice practically cracking on the
words. "My behavior? Well fuck me in the ass and call me Betsy. Exactly what kind of behavior are you referring to? What kind of behavior would you like it to be? I'm sick of this shit, Mulder. I don't need to have the one person I trust more than anyone, the one person who is supposed to trust me the same way, suddenly treating me like a five-year old and questioning my motives. My God, who rescued you from the middle of the Sargasso Sea just a few months ago? Who was there for you when your mother was in a coma? Or when your father was murdered? Or when you were digging in the earth with your bare fingers, afraid that you were uncovering Samantha's body? Who has saved your ass time and time again? Who ---" she took a deep breath, "who was that man who rescued me in Antarctica, Mulder? Because I'd sure like to have him back."

The bulk of her venom spent, she subsided, breathing hard, glad that she had
left her gun in the other room or who knew what she'd do next.

He looked down at his shoes for a while, then finally back up at her, and she was
astonished to see a small grin on his face. "Call you Betsy?"

She let out a sharp laugh without thinking, then stifled herself. "Don't change
the subject!"

"I'm not," he said swiftly, raising his hands in an appeasing gesture. "Christ,
Scully, you can't possibly think that I don't trust you anymore, or even that
I trust Diana more than I trust you. It's just that you don't -"

"I don't know her, right. I've heard that before," she said sullenly. "How can
I, when you won't tell me anything about her or your relationship with her?"

His face darkened. "You don't need to know the details. All you need
to know is that she has never betrayed me," he said firmly, stabbing the air
with his finger to punctuate the statement.

"And I have?" she countered, placing her hand on her chest. "When have I
ever given you cause to mistrust me? And to such a point that my efforts and
my beliefs no longer carry weight? I may not always agree with you, Mulder,
but to the best of my knowledge, I have never betrayed you either."

He looked uncomfortable at that, and she pressed her advantage. "Mulder,
stop and think for a moment. Why wasn't Diana at the hangar, where she
was supposed to meet you? Why wasn't her car there? Why didn't she stay
until the ambulances arrived, if she really was on the level? Why isn't she
trying to contact you right now to tell you what happened?"

A half-hearted shrug was his only response.

Right. She sank down onto the couch and rubbed her face with her hands.
She was so, so tired. Bone-weary. "I don't know what else to say, Mulder.
And I don't have the strength or the inclination to figure out what it is that
you want to hear."

He sat down in the armchair next to the couch and scratched his stomach
through the gray t-shirt he wore. "I -- I don't want you to tell me what you
think I want to hear, Scully. I never have."

She didn't bother to respond, just looked at him, waiting for more.

"Maybe you're right," he said quietly, and she started in surprise. "Maybe she
does have an agenda of her own, maybe she has the same agenda as old
C.G.B. Spender, maybe she doesn't have the best interest of the X-Files at
heart. But maybe she does. Maybe she has been on our side all along.

"And in light of what happened earlier, considering that she wasn't there
tonight, where I thought she would be..." He trailed off and chewed on his
lower lip for a minute before continuing. "I'm glad she wasn't there, because
if she had been, she'd be dead. But yes, like you, I can't help but wonder
why she wasn't there in the first place."

"If she doesn't come back, we may never know," Scully said neutrally.

"She'll come back," he said stubbornly. "One way or another."

Quiet descended upon them then, and there didn't seem to be much of
anything else left to say. "I'm going to bed, Mulder," she said, getting up
from the couch. "I'll see you in the morning."

He nodded, not looking at her, and rose from his chair. She walked him
to the door. He turned back to look at her before stepping into the hallway.
"I do trust you, Scully. I don't want you to ever doubt that."

She met his gaze steadily. "Then don't ever give me a reason to," she said,
surprised at the naked emotion she heard in her own voice.

He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but only nodded
again, and left.

She closed the door behind him and went to bed. But despite her weariness
and earlier fatigue, it was a long time before she finally fell asleep.

End.