Wake Up Call; or Agent Doggett Has Something To Say

Sara B. 01/06

Mulder answered the knock on his door only to find Agent John Doggett standing there. 

“Can we talk, Agent Mulder?”

“Just Mulder, remember?”

“Sorry, but I still want to talk with you.  May I come in?”

Mulder turned and retreated back into his apartment, Doggett followed after closing the door.  Mulder fell onto his couch and put his feet up; his look challenged Doggett to do the same.  John walked to the leather chair on the other side of the room, removed his coat and sat down slowly.  Mulder expected the man to tell him why he was here but Doggett just sat staring at his hands.  Finally Mulder’s patience broke.  “Well this has been real.  You can let yourself out, right?”

Doggett was undaunted by Mulder’s rudeness; he expected nothing less.  In his experience with this man he couldn’t understand how a woman like Dana Scully had attached herself to him.  Mulder was sullen, rude and he never seemed to put Dana’s concerns first.  Hell, he seemed to do his best to ignore that she was pregnant; pregnant with his child. 

Doggett’s eyes rose and pierced Mulder’s.  “I came here to ask you what the hell is wrong with you?  I mean Dana Scully is carrying your child yet you act like it’s nothing; like you don’t care.”

“I don’t think I need to discuss this with you. . .”

“Well you damned well better talk to someone.”  Doggett stopped to reign himself in.  “Mulder, do you have any idea what most of us would do to have a woman like her in our lives?  I know that you have been through something that no one can fully understand but have you thought about what Dana has been through?”

Mulder’s look went from petulance to full blown insolence.  “You seem to want to tell me.”

Doggett sat back in the chair.  “Do you know when Dana found out she was pregnant?”  He didn’t wait for Mulder’s answer.  “Just before she found out you were missing.  Oh, and you may be interested in knowing she was in the hospital at the time.  She passed out and those friends of yours took her in.  She had just figured out that it was you who was in danger and not her.  She begged the guys to contact you but they weren’t able to reach you.”  Doggett paused and looked at his hands.  “Can you imagine?  There she was being taken to the hospital because she’s having fainting spells and her only thought is ‘contact Mulder and warn him.’”  Doggett shook his head and looked at Mulder.  “Then she hears the news she never thought possible,” he heard Mulder’s harsh intake of air.  “Yeah, I know all about it.  Believe it or not, Mulder, I did read through the X-Files,” he sneered. 

“I take my assignment seriously.

“Can you picture it; she’s lying in a hospital bed, waiting to tell you about the pregnancy and the next thing she knows Skinner is telling her that you have gone missing.  Her joy is ripped from her before it even had time to settle in.”

Doggett stood and walked toward the shaded window and lifted a slat to look out.  “The first time I met her she threw a cup of water in my face.”  He heard Mulder chuckle behind him and turned.  There was a gentle far away look on Mulder’s face and a small smile played on his lips.  It was the nicest Doggett had ever seen him, he smiled too.  “Yeah, I was told not to play all my cards so I didn’t tell her who I was.  I engaged her in some conversation and alluded to you telling other women that you didn’t trust her.  She knew right off it was a load and threw her water at me; she was that sure of you.  I never told her anything but the full truth from then on.”

Mulder sat up; he was really interested in hearing how Scully acted while he was gone.  Doggett continued, “We tracked you, or what we thought was you, to the desert southwest.  Somehow she and Skinner got there at the same time as my team.

There was what I now know was a, God I can’t believe I’m saying this, a shape shifter; an alien shape shifter.

“We tracked you; I mean ‘it’ to a school for the deaf.  Gibson Praise was hiding out there.  It tried to snatch the kid but we stopped it.  He attacked a couple agents, long story short, that thing threw Dana across a room and she ended up in the hospital.”

Doggett watched his audience of one and knew Mulder was really interested.  “A few weeks after I was assigned to the X-Files she ditched me and got abducted by some cult that placed their messiah in her back.  I located her and she had me cut the creature out.  Those weren’t her only trips to the hospital either.

“Did she tell you about her amnio procedure?”  Mulder shook his head.  Doggett debated for a moment, “ask her about it; that is one story you need to hear from her.  What I’m trying to make you understand is that she could have lost that baby a number of times.  She never stopped looking for you. 

“When we found your body we were all afraid for her.  She just, I can’t describe it.  She was lost.  That wonderful spirit that she has was gone.  We didn’t know if she was going to make it.  Skinner was afraid that once she gave birth she would just give in.”

Mulder stood up and started pacing and shaking his head.  “She came back to life when you did.”  Doggett walked over to Mulder and placed a hand on his shoulder.  “I can’t understand it but Dana Scully lives for you and she loves you.  Don’t you think it is well past time that you let her know you feel the same?”  Doggett grabbed his coat and started to leave.  He stopped before opening the door.  “Maybe you should ask why even after you were confirmed dead she still kept this apartment and all your things?”

Doggett left and Mulder fell back to his couch trying to take in everything the man had told him.  Suddenly he got up and went into the bedroom and started looking for something.  He found it in a box on the top shelf of his closet.  Mulder held the doll reverently.  It was a family heirloom handed down from generation to generation.  He placed it back in the box and closed the cover.  Now it was his turn to pass it to the next generation.

End