Disclaimer, classification and rating in part I.
Background: In part I ("Spiro the Frog Croaks Again"), Mulder is visited in a dream by the spirit of his dead childhood pet frog, who informs him that Mulder's favorite fish, Pooky, is the latest of Mulder's animal victims to join the choir invisible. In part II ("Pooky the Fish Gets the Big Flush"), Scully realizes how much the loss of Pooky has affected Mulder, and she plots to get him into therapy.
Summary of part III ("The Sessions"):
Dealing with Pooky's passing, Mulder finds himself at an emotional breaking point. Scully pressures him into seeking professional help, but the only counselor who will take him is...
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Susan Kosseff began straightening her therapy room in preparation for her new client. Cleaning up after her treatment sessions always took a long time; even though Mulder was late for his appointment, she would have liked to have a few more minutes to put away all the chewy toys and dolls strewn around the floor, and to wipe up all the little messes she invariably found after a session.
After all, she was a pet therapist; she wasn't used to working with humans, who usually don't like sitting in a puddle of puppy pee.
Susan had heard of Mulder's reputation for emotional instability -- everyone in the psychological community within 20 miles of the D.C. area knew about "Spooky" Mulder, even pet therapists. But she also knew him from her sister, Karen's, work on the Holvey case. Agent Mulder had seemed pretty normal, Karen had told her, but he also had some strange ideas. Either Mulder was mentally disturbed or weird things seemed to happen when he was around. "Just read his report on that case, Sue," Karen had advised her sister.
"Dead chickens coming back to life to peck the old grandmother into a fatal heart attack?" she had said aloud as she read the report. "An FBI agent participating in an exorcism, claiming he saw ectoplasmic goo drip down the walls? Theorizing that the ghost of Charlie's dead twin caused the Holvey baby to get run over by a kiddie train?"
The office door opened and the lanky form of Fox Mulder came silently into her domain. Kosseff was slightly shaken at seeing him after she had just been thinking about some of the strange things Mulder had come up with on that case. Then she noticed how fatigued Mulder looked; she had heard he had been having difficulty sleeping since his loss.
"Agent Mulder!" Kosseff cheerfully greeted him. "I've heard so much about you from Karen. I just wish we could have met under happier circumstances."
Mulder stared at her, a blank expression on his face.
"Well, why don't you come in and make yourself comfortable," Kosseff said, not showing surprise at Mulder's lack of response. His partner had warned her that Mulder would likely be resistant to treatment. Dana Scully had said the only reason he had agreed to come was because she had finally reported her concern for her partner to their direct supervisor.
The problem was, due to Mulder's reputation among the D.C.-area
psychological community, no other therapist within striking
distance would take him, and he refused to see a "staff shrink". Skinner had finally tried to arrange for her sister's services, hoping Mulder would warm up to someone he already knew professionally -- that is, someone he had worked with before and had not managed to alienate.
However, Karen had declined, presumably due to a sudden case of influenza (but Karen had seemed perfectly healthy to Susan), and referred Skinner to Susan, who could certainly use the business. Pet therapy was a service not in huge demand by the conservative populace of Arlington. She had been considering branching out to child psychology, but it took time to build up a clientele. And it took a license.
A.D. Skinner had said the F.B.I. would look the other way about
her lack of appropriate credentials if she would just try to do something to help Mulder. Apparently, they were getting desperate. Since her professional experience had only been with animals and their owners, she was not sure exactly what approach she would take with Mulder. Apparently, Mulder's current problem was grief over the loss of a pet. She knew about dealing with that. But both A.D. Skinner and Agent Scully had made it clear that the problem likely ran much deeper than his current state of grief.
She could try some of the techniques she knew her sister had used with children, to get practice for her hoped-for career change. Her sister had even loaned her some therapeutic tools of the child psychology trade -- some dolls, action figures, and teddy bears, mostly. Both Karen and Agent Scully had assured her that the age-appropriateness, or species-appropriateness, of her approach should be the least of her worries.
"You're dealing with Mulder here," Agent Scully had mysteriously tried to explain when she had talked with her over the phone. "Try anything...anything!"
Well, that's what she would do, she vowed.
Mulder still stood in the doorway, looking like he'd rather be facing a human-sized flukeworm than here, being made to talk with her about his feelings. Or whatever it was she had planned for him.
"Agent Mulder, you know that your cooperation with this therapy has been ordered by A.D. Skinner. You are aware, I'm sure, that it is conditional to your continued assignment to field duty."
Mulder still stared at her, a blank expression on his face.
Kosseff tried again with her standard, cheerful approach. "Usually when I see my anim...uh, clients, we sit on the floor here and just get to know each other in our first session."
Mulder continued to stare at her, a blank expression on his face.
"Come here, Mulder," she ordered, patting the side of her leg, then suddenly catching herself in her old habits.
"Mr. Mulder, please," Kosseff corrected herself, motioning to the open area of linoleum, which still smelled of Lysol after her quick clean-up effort.
Mulder eyed the clown punching bag that stood in one corner, wishing he could attack it, wanting to punch that smiley face until it would burst as he imagined it was...he couldn't think of who. /Maybe this nosey Kosseff dame/, Mulder thought. /Scully, why are you making me do this?!/
"I'm sure you wouldn't want me to report that you have been uncooperative on our first meeting," Kosseff said.
Mulder said nothing as he looked again at Kosseff, then went silently to a corner of the therapy room and sat down, cross-legged.
"You're showing progress, Fox," Kosseff said encouragingly as she mirrored his posture three feet in front of him.
"Don't call me Fox. Call me Mulder," Mulder said, a blank expression on his face.
Kosseff sighed inwardly. This was not going to be easy.
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FBI Headquarters -- basement office
Washington, D.C.
One week later
/Dammit, I hate taking on this case without Mulder around to leer at...uh, look at...uh,
lust after...uh, uh, banter with!/
Agent Dana Scully tried to put her partner out of her mind as she searched the FBI database for information on fan club members who met on the Internet to discuss their favorite TV actor -- and to trash each and every female he was ever seen with, on screen or off. His latest romantic interest was alleged to be the unfortunate missing actress.
"There has to be a connection here somewhere!" Scully informed her computer screen. Mulder would have seen it by now, she knew.
Mulder's theory was that a Satanic cult had formed from within one of these groups, or possibly a conglomerate of all of them, and that the young actress might have fallen prey to them in some way.
As usual, Scully had thought Mulder's theory was far-fetched and without rational basis. After checking out some of the various fan clubs' members, however, she was becoming more open to the possibility that Mulder's theory had a vestige of truth.
/Well, I don't go for Mulder's "Satanic cult" idea, but there are plenty of cuckoo people out there who are upset about this chick./ If only she could find some way to narrow down the list of possible suspects from the thousands of fans, they would have someplace to begin.
"It can't be all of them," Scully hypothesized under her breath, peering at her computer screen. /But they're all pretty obsessed; how can we tell who might go over the edge and do something -- something rash about it?/ If only Mulder weren't so on the edge about his fish right now. She had learned not to put any excess pressure on him when he was in a state like this.
"Hi, Scully," Mulder called as he entered the office, his voice bringing her back from her contemplation of the case. Her mental concern for Mulder, however, remained as she looked up at him. "Mulder. How was your meeting with Susan?" Mulder had been to several sessions a day with her for the past week, and Kosseff had informed her that Mulder was still barely talking to her.
"Susan? You mean that dog shrink you're making me go to? How do you *think* it's going, Scully?" Mulder replied hostily. "Mulder, why won't you *speak* to me about this?"
"ROWF!" Mulder barked reflexively in an impressive imitation of a well-trained canine.
"Good boy, Mulder," Scully praised, tossing Mulder a handful of sunflower seeds as she scratched behind his ear. "But I had asked Susan to teach you how to heel."
"Yeah; it goes to show you how effective her treatment methods are," Mulder replied sarcastically, shaking his left leg when Scully's scratching fingers hit just the right spot.
"Anyhow, Mulder, Susan's not a shrink. Shrinks are the ones that prescribe drugs, remember? You know how well you've taken to that idea in the past," Scully said, returning Mulder's sarcasm as she ceased her scratching.
Mulder's psychiatric background was possibly a cruel point for Scully to bring up, but she was tired of Mulder's refusal to deal with his problem. He had been reticent towards his partner ever since the morning Pooky died.
Scully's efforts to console him whenever he had suddenly become tearful and withdrawn had each time been met with anger, and usually ended up with him storming off to the bathroom, returning hours later with reddened eyes. He also refused to give up the empty sunflower seed bag; many times she had arrived at the office in the morning to find Mulder already wearing it. She knew that those days would be particularly difficult for both of them.
The bag was hard to explain to other agents -- the Halloween excuse never worked, since it was already December. Mulder's tearful outbursts, however, had proved to be even more embarrassing the time they had passed by the fountain outside the Hoover Building. Someone had cruelly stocked with hundreds of small fish, obviously meant as a jab at "Spooky" Mulder.
"Come on, Mulder, why won't you talk to me about this? I'm your partner. I'm your friend. What did you and Susan talk about?" /Or *did* he talk today?/, Scully added to herself.
Mulder fell into his chair with a resigned sigh. The nightmares and guilt of what he had done to Pooky had made it impossible for him to sleep for days at a time. He wanted this pain to go away; maybe, he thought, it was time to give in to Scully.
"I...I talked about Pooky today," Mulder whispered, his voice almost inaudible. Scully, not believing it was possible, saw Mulder's face take on even more of that "lost puppy dog" look she found so attractive...but which engendered in her such concern.
"You did?" Scully asked carefully, not wanting to scare him away with her relief that he was at last opening up about his loss. "What...what did you say?"
Mulder still refused to look at his partner, keeping his eyes downcast at his hands, which he held clenched in his lap.
"I realized something today. I told Susan all about her...about Pooky," Mulder said at last. "You know, Pooky was orange, and Samantha..."
"Yes, Mulder?" Scully quietly prompted, leaning forward in her chair, hoping she would say just the right thing to help her partner get through this. "Mulder...what about Samantha?"
"Well...Samantha wasn't. She wasn't orange...I mean, her hair was brown." Mulder's eyes filled with tears as he finally looked up at Scully.
Scully had seen Samantha's picture enough to know that her hair had been brown. She didn't look much like a fish, either...not really. At least he was talking about it, Scully told herself. Visibly, he seemed to be gradually relaxing now that he had finally broken the spell of silence.
"Mulder...I was wondering about that. You told me that Pooky was so special to you because she reminded you of Samantha," Scully said. "What...what was it about Pooky that made you think of Samantha?"
Mulder took a deep breath, which came through a small sob. "It wasn't Samantha, Scully," he said, tears flowing now. "It wasn't Samantha, I know that now.
"It was...it was you!"
Scully gasped, raising herself up in her seat from her inclined position. "What do you mean, Mulder?" she asked, trying to keep the sudden hopefulness she felt hidden from her voice. "What...do you mean that I...that I..." she could not finish saying what she thought he might mean. /What if I'm wrong? What if he doesn't feel the same way I do? Our professional relationship could be ruined if.../
"Yes, Scully, it was you I thought of whenever I saw Pooky. That's why she was so important to me. Why her death has nearly ripped me apart. Losing her, it was just like...like I had lost you again!"
Mulder quickly reached forward to embrace Scully, burying his damp face into her neck. Scully, in shock from this unexpected revelation, hugged him back, not knowing what to say.
"Mulder..."
Mulder stopped her from saying more when he whispered quietly into her ear, "Scully, I love you."
They both hugged each other harder.
"Mulder, I love you, too."
The hug turned into a passionate kiss, until the government-issue chair they were suddenly sharing broke under their combined weight. Landing on the hard floor, tangled together, only hastened the progress of this new facet of their relationship.
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Next -- the saga concludes:
"The Ex-Pet Files IV: Love Among the Files"
Disclaimer and classification in part I.
Addition to the disclaimer: For the last installment of this story, I have borrowed the name and description of a certain toy made wonderfully by the wonderful Mattel, I'm almost certain, or by whatever wonderful company it's made by (the toy stores were closed the last two days when I added this part, being Sunday and then Martin Luther King day, so I couldn't find out who makes it for sure, but I did try), based on a wonderfully popular character on the wonderful PBS' "Sesame Street", a truly wonderful show. No trademark or copyright or any other kind of infringement is intended.
And please, folks, the following scene does not depict or describe the intended use of this toy (that is, I assume it doesn't) -- so don't try this at home.
This last part, also, has to go up to PG-13, for "mature situations" (not graphic, though; just a lot of talk about sex). I can't believe I've actually written an MSR! So kiddies, and any particularly devoted "Sesame Street" fans, please go no further; otherwise, you may become emotionally scarred for life.
Background: In part I ("Spiro the Frog Croaks Again"), Mulder is visited in a dream by the spirit of his dead childhood pet frog, who informs him that Mulder's favorite fish, Pooky, is the latest of Mulder's animal victims to join the choir invisible.
In part II ("Pooky the Fish Gets the Big Flush"), Scully realizes how much the loss of Pooky has affected Mulder, and she plots to get him into therapy.
In part III ("The Sessions"), Mulder is at an emotional breaking point while he gets treatment from a pet therapist. Although he doesn't get far in his treatment, through it he does discover that he loves Scully. Luckily, Scully feels the same way.
Summary of "Love Among the Files":
Mulder and Scully bask in their new-found love and, of course, Maggie Scully puts in her
two cents.
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Dec. 18, 1996
11:17 a.m.
Hoover Building
Basement office
"Tee hee hee! That tickles!"
"Mulder, you should just use that thing for your therapy."
"Hey, what we're doing *is* therapeutic. I'm supposed to be working on my emotional abandonment issues, right?" Mulder questioned in mock seriousness. "Making love to you is just another way for me to finally resolve my Oedipal complex. Involving Elmo, here, is part of the treatment. He represents my wounded child."
"Mulder, you're mixing Freudian theory with Bradshaw's inner child work. That's a little unconventional, don't you think?"
"But I'm an unconventional kind of guy, Scully. I thought you'd realized that about me. Now, how about I throw in some Dr. Ruth?"
"Mul-der!"
"C'mon, Scully, aren't you having fun? Are you getting tired of our little game?"
"Mulder, having a Sesame Street character staring at me while we're about to have sex on top of your desk doesn't exactly turn me on. I prefer more...more mature forms of foreplay."
"But you sure liked my Elmo doll a few weeks ago, when Susan first gave him to me. He kept on disappearing from my desk, and you were always the one to 'find' him. What have you been doing...loaning him out to your nieces and nephews? I know these things are hard to get ahold of these days, but...he's mine, Scully, and you're going to have to deal with that!"
"Mulder, really, I don't want one. I may have liked him once, but now he's just getting on my nerves!"
Mulder held the doll up to his partner's face as she lay under him atop the back-breakingly uncomfortable desk, doing his now-famous impression of Elmo's childish voice as he used the doll like a puppet. "Why don't you wike Elmo no more, A-gent Scuw-wy? I wike you! Won't you be my fwiend?"
"Sure, I liked you, Elmo. That is, before I had Agent Mulder to be my 'special friend.' "
Mulder looked at her in surprise. "What you mean, A-gent Scuw- wy?" he continued, a bit tentatively, still in Elmo's baby voice, shaking the doll in front of her.
"Well, Elmo," she said, becoming annoyed -- after all, this Elmo foreplay was getting old, and she *was* a doctor; she could think of more sophisticated ways to get randy -- "I liked you so much *before* I became extra-good friends with Agent Mulder because, my dear, your giggling makes you an excellent vibrator."
Mulder got off of her, looking shocked that the Ice Queen would do such a thing with an innocent stuffed toy.
"So *that's* what you were up to with him," Mulder said indignantly. "I thought you were just jealous that I spent more time with Elmo than I did with you!" Mulder hoped Scully had washed the doll before she returned Elmo to him each time. But then, they were going to be married soon. Something like that shouldn't bother him now.
"Well, I was jealous of him, Mulder," Scully admitted. "I still am. You've been carrying him everywhere. To the F.B.I. lunchroom, on stakeouts, into meetings with Skinner. People are beginning to talk, Mulder!"
"And what is it they're saying, Scully?" Mulder asked, trying to become playful again, having recovered from his initial surprise at Scully's frank admission. He didn't like how this discussion was spoiling their stolen moment. After all, Skinner might walk in on them again. Or, God forbid, Pendrell. That had been an immediate turn-off to both of them; probably, all three of them. But he really doubted Pendrell had much of a sex life in the first place. The poor boy had run away, crying, never to be seen outside of his lab again.
"They're saying you must have a thing for redheads, Mulder."
Mulder grinned devilishly, climbing back onto the desk with Scully. "Well, they're very right about that. Especially redheads who wield a scalpel as well as you do."
Mulder carelessly tossed his wounded inner child aside, letting Elmo land next to the desk with a thud.
"Tee hee hee! That tickles!" Elmo giggled, over and over again, as it lay broken on the basement floor.
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Three days later
Margaret Scully's house
Maggie Scully sat at the kitchen table with her younger daughter, both busily addressing envelopes that would soon be filled with cards inviting friends, family, and Lone Gunmen to the wedding of Dana Katherine Scully and Fox William Mulder.
"Honey, I'm so glad that you and Fox finally got some sense into your heads and saw that you were meant for each other," Maggie said, her vaguely Irish lilt creeping into her voice as it did when she was happy and at home with her family. The members of her family that were still alive, that is.
"Mom, that's the third time you've said that in the last hour," Dana replied, a happy, girlish smile gracing her usually serious face.
"That may be, but third time's a charm," Maggie said, getting more Irish as each moment passed.
"Mom, why don't you use the sponge to seal those envelopes? You don't have to lick them, you know. The glue is beginning to affect your..."
"Oh, hush, now, girl, there's nothin' wrong with doin' things the old-fashioned way, me old grandmother always said, Lord rest her soul," Maggie advised her daughter as she did the "spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch" routine, crossing herself reverently at the mention of her deceased matriarch.
Dana decided she would have to get her mother a try-out for the next production of "Finnian's Rainbow" at the Community Center. Either that, or if they ever needed a female spokesvoice for Lucky Charms commercials...
Maggie took up the next envelope from the pile, then quickly put it down again.
"Oh, Dana, honey, I almost forgot. I wanted to get you and Fox a special wedding present, but I thought I should check with you first. I wasn't sure what Fox would think of it." "Oh, Mom, you've already given us the house," Dana said, wishing her mother weren't quite so enthusiastic about this wedding, but relieved she had set aside her Irish for the time being.
"Oh, the house, that's nothing. I'll have a nice place to stay up there in the attic," Maggie brushed off the concern she could see in her daughter's eyes. "No, I wanted to give you something more personal. A gift that might give you two something to practice with so you're ready for all those beautiful, red-headed, large-nosed grandchildren you're going to give me."
Dana was immensely curious now, as her mother got up to retrieve a photograph that had been laying on the kitchen counter. Maggie came back quickly and placed the photograph on the table, in front of her daughter.
"Oh, Mom, you didn't..." Dana said, looking up in disbelief at her mother. "Well, I have paid for him, but you don't have to take him if youdon't want him. I know how much you miss Queequeg, honey; that's what made me think he would be the perfect present for you.
"Now, tell me, dear, how is Fox with pets?"
THE END
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