Soldier and Friend

Inspired by Kevin Fagan's article in the San Francisco Chronicle, "Belated Taps for MIAs," which I wouldn't even have noticed if it weren't for Manik's "Shocking Blue" stories, which reminded me (in wonderfully written scenes) that Skinner's Vietnam experience is part of who he is.

Dedicated with love and admiration and awe to Red Valerian, without whose encouragement I wouldn't even have written my first Skinner story, much less tried a story like this. For you, Red. Hope you like it.

"Agent Scully, I'd like a word with you," AD Skinner said as he put away her and Agent Mulder's report.

The two agents traded quick looks—

?
Busted!
Shut up, Mulder.

—and Mulder left as Scully reseated herself. When the door closed behind Mulder, Skinner folded his hands and asked without preamble, "Agent Scully, are you familiar with mitochondrial DNA testing?"

Clearly puzzled, she nevertheless answered, "Yes, sir. mt-DNA tests are used to determine the identity of human remains. It's become the standard in the field of identification because of its incredibly high accuracy rate."

"Have you performed this test before?"

"Twice."

"How qualified would you consider yourself to judge someone else's determination of identity using this test?"

"I'd consider myself highly competent, sir."

Skinner fell silent, thinking briefly about what he was about to ask, not sure how pure his motives were. That he'd been rocked by an unexpected phone call that morning, he couldn't deny. That he'd tried to think logically about his options, he wasn't as certain. The last person he wanted to ask for help was Agent Scully, she'd been pushing herself hard enough as it was. But she was one of the few people he knew who could do what he needed to have done. And, although he knew he was rationalizing, if she accepted it would be the perfect excuse for her to take some time off, maybe even a short, well-deserved vacation.

Scully shifted in her chair, and finally prodded, "Sir, may I ask why—"

"I received a phone call today from a Mr. James Kilcrease," he said abruptly. "He received word from the Department of Defense's MIA/POW Office that the remains of his son, Corporal James Kilcrease, Jr., were recovered from a crash site in Vietnam and are now being held at the Army's Central Identification Laboratory."

She intuited what he didn't say. "You and James Kilcrease, Jr. were friends."

He nodded and continued, "There have been several instances where the CIL has made mistaken determinations of identity. Mr. Kilcrease is unable to follow up on the positive identification of his son's remains, and he asked for my help. I'd like to assure Mr. Kilcrease that the remains are indeed those of his son." He drew a breath. "I have a…personal favor to ask of you, Agent Scully. Please feel free to decline if you wish."

Even with his face shadowed by the light from the window behind him, Scully saw he was clearly uncomfortable asking her for her help. She knew he never would have said anything—would have gone to the lab and come back with no one the wiser, he was that private a person—except this was so important to him. And that made her want to accept.

She had been trying to find a way, ever since he'd come to her hospital room after her cancer had gone into remission, to tell him she knew Mulder had been right to trust him, that she knew how badly she'd misjudged him. There'd been no words then; she couldn't manage any for the lump in her throat, and then the moment to say what she could only say right then was gone. They'd gone back to work, where people didn't talk about feelings, about gratitude. But here was a way to make up to him for her mistrust, her suspicions, to prove he'd been right to fight for her and Mulder, right to care enough about them to put his career, his life, on the line for them.

"You'd like me to verify the mt-DNA test on those remains, sir?"

"I don't trust the CIL," he said frankly. "I do trust you, Agent Scully."

She straightened. "I appreciate your confidence in me, sir. I can do the testing as soon as possible."

"I can get you on a direct military flight tonight, if you think you could be ready by then."

"Certainly." Not sure if she'd have to pack for an overnight or not, she asked, "The CIL is located—?"

"In Hawaii." He added, as if in afterthought, "At Agent Mulder's request, I scheduled a week's down time before your next assignment to catch up on paperwork before Internal Audit starts in on our division."

Both he and Scully knew her paperwork was already in order.

"I've…never been to Hawaii," she said slowly.

After he'd maneuvered her into requesting leave time and had signed the proper forms, Skinner pushed away from his desk, arose and paced to the conference table, folding his arms across his chest and staring down at the polished wood.

"James Kilcrease, line one," his secretary had said over the intercom that morning, and it still amazed him that after all this time hope could rise in his heart like a small bird at that name. Years should have inured him to it, taught him indifference, or at least how to move on. But they never had.

He took the call and said, "Dad. Hi."

James Kilcrease, Sr. More his father than his own father was, in the strange way that kindred souls found each other sometimes. They exchanged pleasantries, found out how each other was, and then, "Walter, I'm sorry to call you at work, but I've had some news about Jimmy." And hope, although it struggled in Skinner's heart, started then to die.

Scully checked her watch and added six hours. Skinner would still be awake. "May I use your phone?" she asked the lab technician on duty, and when she nodded Scully dialed his number.

He picked up on the second ring. "Hello."

"Sir, it's Ag—Dr. Scully," she corrected herself, remembering that, although her FBI credentials had gotten her in, she was here in a personal capacity. "I've just finished verifying the results of the original mt-DNA test. With 99% accuracy, I can state that the remains tested were those of Corporal James Kilcrease, Jr."

A brief silence on his end. Then, his voice edged with something she couldn't quite define, he said, "I can accept that number. Thank you, Dr. Scully."

"You're welcome, sir." She hesitated ending the conversation there. "Is there anything else I can do for you here?"

"No. I appreciate all your help, very much. I'll see you in a week."

He hung up, and Scully slowly did the same on her end. She wasn't sure why, but she felt like she could have said something more to him, although she didn't know what.

The young officer who had been assigned to escort her while she was at the Lab, and had done a wonderfully discrete job of shadowing her every move, saw her out to her car. "Is there anyone who should be informed that I'm done here?" she asked him as they walked down the hall.

"I can take care of that, ma'am," he answered, holding a door open for her politely.

Out of curiosity, she asked as she walked past him, "What happens to the remains now?"

"Each set of remains will be sealed and placed in its own aluminum box and flown tonight to Travis Air Force Base in California, where they'll be presented to each family tomorrow with a full honor guard in attendance."

She nodded. "It's only fitting, after so long," she said, more to herself than him.

But he heard her, and answered, "It still doesn't seem like enough, ma'am."

Later, Scully sat on the hotel terrace for dinner, watching the sunset over the ocean as she picked at her food. She knew she should be reveling in the colors and sounds and smells of nature around her, but her mind kept returning to the image of a flag-draped box with only a few yellowed teeth and bits of bone inside.

She crumpled her napkin in frustration. The young officer had been right—it wasn't enough. There'd been seven other sets of remains besides those of Corporal Kilcrease at the lab, and out of professional courtesy she'd verified the mt-DNA tests on them as well. Eight people whom their families hadn't known whether to mourn or hope for. How did you deal with finality after all these years? What could commemorate that kind of loss? What could possibly be enough now?

Was there anything she could do?

She went back to her room, thoughtful. And as she rummaged through her suitcase for the things she needed to get ready for bed, she realized she hadn't packed her sandals, or sunblock, or even her swimsuit.

So. Even back in D.C., she'd subconsciously known what she was going to do.

She called the lab. "This is Dr. Dana Scully from the FBI. How can I find out if there's room for one more on the flight to Travis tonight?"

"Please precede us, Dr. Scully."

She nodded to the captain and moved stiffly to the exit. She'd managed a few hours of sleep on the flight despite the cramped quarters in the cockpit and hoped she didn't look too rumpled now. It was gray and windy outside, and she buttoned her coat before she stepped out, pausing briefly on the top step to get her bearings.

Seven clusters of people on the tarmac, huddled together against the cold. Over a hundred airmen and veterans ranged behind them. And one tall man in Marines dress blues at attention and alone.

As soon as she saw him she realized she'd made a horrible mistake in coming, hadn't thought it through, shouldn't be here now. She'd never seen Skinner in uniform, and knew it was something she hadn't been meant to see. She'd thought she had come for two good reasons, to honor the dead as the last person who had examined their remains, and for Skinner's sake, the man she owed so much. But she didn't belong here at all.

Scully made her way slowly down the stairs, trying not to feel self-conscious as she walked deliberately towards Walter Skinner. The Assistant Director. The soldier. The man she didn't really know at all.

She considered simply standing beside him and not meeting his eyes, but knew she had to face him, had to apologize somehow for intruding on what should have been separate from her life and the person he chose to show her every day. She stopped in front of him and threw her head back as the wind lashed her hair around her face.

He looked down at her from an impossible height, his eyes unreadable behind his glasses.

"Sir—"

She half-expected a reprimand from him, and knew she deserved it. Instead, he surprised her by saying, "Thank you for bringing them home, Dr. Scully."

She nodded in acknowledgment, her cheeks flushing red in gratitude despite the cold, and fell in beside him.

As a bugler's Taps faded into the breeze, she felt Skinner snap a salute beside her. She held herself straight and still, head high, face betraying no emotion, as she'd learned to at her share of military funerals, as eight boxes, each carried by four Navy seamen, were solemnly walked across the wind-whipped tarmac to waiting hearses.

The groups of mourners followed slowly on foot to the base mortuary, and Skinner said, finally breaking the silence between him and Scully, "I didn't expect to see you."

"I didn't know I was coming, not until the last minute," she answered, not looking at him. "I—didn't want Corporal Kilcrease to be alone."

He nodded, and said again, "Thank you." The edge was back in his voice, the one she'd heard on the phone. She thought she knew what it was now, and kept her eyes resolutely ahead—she didn't need to know what he looked like when he grieved.

He didn't ask her to wait outside, so she stood silently by as he made arrangements for Corporal Kilcrease's remains to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Around them she could hear an occasional soft sob, the strange silences that descended in the middle of sentences, a heaviness of time and memory and patient hope at an end. But Skinner was emotionless, efficient, as if performing a business transaction, and Scully wondered if her presence was shoring up his granite facade, or making it impossible for it to come down.

When he finally picked up the folded flag that had draped the box of Corporal Kilcrease's remains and turned to go, his eyes met hers for a long moment. She saw a weight in his eyes, the heaviness she'd sensed from everyone else, plain and undisguised even though not a muscle in his face betrayed him.

Unaware of what he was projecting, he saw in her eyes what he'd felt as she'd stood beside him—acceptance. He knew beyond a doubt that she was there to give him whatever support she could, and for the briefest moment he wanted nothing more than to receive that gift from her. But instead his hand went to her shoulder, resting there briefly before he guided her out of the building.

He knew she always finished what she started, which was why he hadn't been completely surprised to see her step off the plane. But in the harsh sunlight breaking through the clouds overhead he saw that her face was wan now, too pale, and if the day was taking its toll on him, how much more was it taking from her?

He said as they reached his car, "I'm driving over to see Mr. Kilcrease. Is there anywhere I can take you, Dr. Scully?"

She looked at him, her hands in her coat pockets and her shoulders squared, and said simply, "Wherever you're going, sir."

Skinner took off his hat and tucked it under his arm before he entered the room at the nursing home. Scully followed a few steps behind. James Kilcrease, Sr. was sitting in an armchair staring out the window, but he turned as they came in. He was thin, with sunken cheeks and prominent age spots on his face, his yellowing white hair combed straight back from a high forehead, his eyes a watery gray. A smile of recognition transformed him, though, making his eyes bright and revealing deep laugh lines around those eyes and his generous mouth.

"Walter." His voice was soft, but there was genuine affection in it as he held out his hand. "How are you?"

Skinner took the frail hand, held it firmly between his own. "Fine. It's good to see you, Dad."

Scully stopped where she was, surprised at how close Skinner's relationship was to this man. More parts of his life she hadn't even suspected before. But Skinner gestured her forward. "I'd like you to meet Dr. Dana Scully, she's the one who determined the positive identification of Jimmy's remains."

She stepped closer, took the hand he offered. "I'm very pleased to meet you, Mr. Kilcrease," she said.

"The pleasure is mine, Dr. Scully," he answered. "Thank you for helping Walter, and me. It means so much."

"You're welcome." The words felt so inadequate as she said them. She added awkwardly, "I'm…sorry for your loss, Mr. Kilcrease."

His gaze left hers briefly as he nodded. "It was so long ago," he said, his voice low, "so long ago." He looked back at her. "But I'm glad Jimmy's back, finally. All these years…" His eyes grew distant. "At least I can set my mind at some kind of ease now."

She nodded, and moved away from the two men, tried to leave them a little space to themselves by examining the framed pictures on the dresser. A wedding photo, candid family shots—a picture of a young man in uniform with dark blond hair, the same eyes and mouth as Mr. Kilcrease but with a crooked nose, saluting for the camera. She lingered over it, trying to reconcile the remains she'd handled with the human being they'd belonged to. Jimmy Kilcrease. Beloved son and friend.

And then she saw a faded photo of Jimmy in his teens—nose straight now—with a dark-haired boy his own age, arms around each other's necks and clutching a football between them, grinning fiercely. The dark eyes, the strong chin—the other boy was Walter Skinner.

There was too much here that was none of her business, that she had no right seeing or knowing. She turned back around, wanting to leave, and caught sight of a face she never could have imagined on Skinner. Here, with no need to scrutinize, the tightness around his eyes was gone; with no anger to keep in check, the tense jaw was relaxed; there was none of the wariness or suspicion she had thought characterized him, not here. Not in this place where she didn't belong.

She went back to Skinner's side, and he bent slightly so she could say in an undertone, "I'm going to go check with his supervising physician, see how everything's going."

Skinner watched her leave, and then turned back to Mr. Kilcrease. The older man was looking absently at the far wall, and there was silence in the room. Finally he said, his voice small, "It hurts, Walter." He exhaled unsteadily. "No man should ever outlive his son. No man."

Skinner handed the other man the folded flag and crouched down by the chair, looking into the pained gray eyes. Mr. Kilcrease took Skinner's hand, placed it on the triangle of blue cloth and white stars, and covered it with his own. "I look at you and see Jimmy, too," he said. "See everything he could have become. You were both so…" He took a deep breath, pulled himself back from memory with an effort, concentrated on the face in front of him. "Do you know, Walter," he said slowly, squeezing his hand for emphasis, "how very proud I am of you?"

He nodded. "I know." He looked down at their joined hands, and said what was on both their minds. "I know, Dad. I miss Jimmy, too."

Freed by Skinner's words to reminisce with the one man who'd known Jimmy as he had, he said, "I still remember when Jimmy first brought you by. Your family had just moved in down the street, we took—oh, Dorothy had made some sort of casserole or something, we met your folks, but you were nowhere to be found. Dorothy and I went back home and a little while later you and Jimmy were at the front door and he was yelling, 'Look what I got!' like you were some stray dog he'd found and wanted to keep." He chuckled. "You were so thin, and half a head shorter than Jimmy, I wasn't even sure you were the same age." He pretended to look at Skinner critically. "You've filled out a little since then."

"Since second grade? I hope so!"

Mr. Kilcrease's smile widened, as Skinner had intended. "Do you remember—" The older man started to laugh. "Do you remember that day you and Jimmy became 'blood brothers'?" Skinner nodded, strangely silent, and Mr. Kilcrease, not noticing, went on, "I walked into the kitchen and there was blood all over your shirts and I thought you'd been in a fight, Dorothy was bandaging your thumbs because you'd both slit them and pressed them together with some mumbo-jumbo or other pledging undying loyalty—"

"'Only each other, till the end,'" Skinner said, his voice low and his eyes unfocused.

"That's right!" he exclaimed. "That's right. And then there was no separating you two, you did everything together, you even…"

These memories were safe, the ones they both shared, and if it made Mr. Kilcrease happy to relive them, it did no harm to Skinner, either. And the two men kept the emptiness back a little longer.

Scully looked in the doorway at them a while later, saw they were still talking and found her way to the chapel. When the doors closed behind her she took what felt like her first breath in hours. It was blessedly quiet. Empty. And, even devoid of any religious symbolism, comfortingly familiar. She sat down and rested folded hands on the back of the pew in front of her.

It was easy enough to trace the path that had brought her here, but she couldn't understand how wanting to do a favor had turned into feeling like an intruder on a life not hers to understand. She didn't even want to sort through the glimpses she'd gotten of Skinner beyond the boundaries of the man she knew as her Assistant Director. She didn't need uncertainties, conjectures, she needed to know something, to be certain without a doubt of even just one thing—

James Kilcrease, Jr. was dead. She'd proved that herself.

And she leaned her forehead on her hands, suddenly reminded of Mulder and his sister Samantha. Although Skinner and Mr. Kilcrease had undoubtedly hoped Jimmy was still alive, they had also known there was an equal possibility that he was dead. As far as she knew, Mulder had never, for one moment, entertained the notion that Samantha could be dead. What would ever happen if there was proof she was indeed dead? All his searching, his obsession, his belief, for nothing?

She felt like crying, but was too tired to muster the energy. "Oh, God," she sighed. She felt weighted with certainty, with finality. And the sigh turned into a prayer. "Oh, God..."

Long moments passed, but her mind refused to clear. And then she heard the doors open behind her and she felt the strain in her shoulders and arms as she straightened, resting her hands in her lap and closing her eyes, trying one last time to center herself before she checked on Mr. Kilcrease and Skinner again. She took a deep breath and turned to exit the pew when she saw who was sitting across the aisle—Skinner, with his head bowed.

She didn't know whether to go or stay, and indecision froze her in place until he looked up, first straight ahead, and then turning to her. "Dr. Scully," he said, his voice muted in the chapel. "What did Mr. Kilcrease's doctor say?" She answered in the same hushed tone, assuring him Mr. Kilcrease was doing well.

He nodded, grateful, and then said, "Mr. Kilcrease can't come to Arlington for the burial next week, so he wanted to have a short memorial service here, and he'd be pleased if you were present."

"Of course I'll stay," she answered.

The nursing home's chaplain came in, and gestured that they should move forward. Skinner and Scully arose and went to the front pew, Skinner leading the way and Scully slipping in next to him. A nurse wheeled Mr. Kilcrease into the chapel, the flag Skinner had given him and the picture of Jimmy in uniform on his lap. The nurse handed the flag and picture to the chaplain, then parked Mr. Kilcrease in the aisle next to Scully and took a seat in the pew behind them.

Scully glanced at Mr. Kilcrease's unsteady hands resting in his lap, and found herself thinking of her own father's funeral. Startled, she looked up at the chaplain, who began to speak. As it became clear that he knew no more about Jimmy Kilcrease than she did, her gaze dropped, and she found herself looking at Skinner's hands, which were holding his hat. Large, capable hands, calm and still.

Too still, she realized.

She remembered going to the funeral of Captain Timothy Barendrick, a man who'd served with her father and had visited the family so regularly they'd called him "Uncle Rick." And although at all previous funerals Captain Scully had stood with his family, stoic and silent, this time he'd stepped forward and walked to the graveside. She'd watched him, stunned, as he'd stood over the coffin, facing the mourners, unable to let the moment pass without commemorating what Rick had meant to him. In a strong, clear voice he'd recited Tennyson's "Break, break, break" and then, when he'd finished, bowed his head and said softly, "Goodbye, old friend." And in that moment, despite his rigid posture and steady voice, for the first time she knew she was seeing her father grieve, and knew what it was to ache so deeply for someone else you thought your heart would burst.

And as she heard the chaplain murmur the 23rd Psalm now, and sat next to a too-still Skinner, she felt the ache again, for a man who, because she was present—one person who knew him and would see him again after this was over—couldn't, wouldn't let down his guard, show a single break in his control. The stillness was only on the surface, she knew; she could feel the tension like a live thing all around him. Had she come all this way for this? To make it impossible for him to mourn for his friend? What more could she do to wrong the man she'd so desperately wanted to repay?

Made impulsive by anger at herself and her own half-acknowledged grief, when the chaplain paused she stood. He looked at her, startled, but gestured for her to speak. And as she stared at the white stars of the flag resting on the podium, at the picture of Jimmy Kilcrease so many years gone, the poem that had been etched on her brain ever since she'd heard it from her father so long ago came tumbling out of her:

"Break, break, break
On thy cold gray stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.

"O, well for the fisherman's boy,
That he shouts with his sister at play!
O, well for the sailor lad,
That he sings in his boat on the bay!

"And the stately ships go on
To their haven under the hill;
But O for the touch of a vanish'd hand,
And the sound of a voice that is still!

"Break, break, break
At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me."

Scully moved a hand as if to touch the picture. "I'm so sorry, Corporal," she breathed. "You died much too young." As she said it, sorrow in the abstract with blinding swiftness became grief so deep she felt it as physical pain.

Her sister Melissa had died too young.

Then Skinner was standing beside her, holding her hand tight before everything came apart. She gulped air, closing her eyes briefly against memory, as she heard Skinner say, his voice low,

"'Only each other, till the end.' Goodbye, Jimmy."

She heard what was in his voice and squeezed his hand. Mr. Kilcrease had reached for her other hand, and she could feel the tremor of his sobs in his faltering grip. "Goodbye," she whispered to Jimmy, to Missy.

Skinner saw Mr. Kilcrease back to his room, and Scully made the phone calls that ensured she would be on the plane that had brought her to Travis, which was returning to Hawaii in the morning. She needed time before she returned to the Bureau, to Mulder with a new sadness in her heart at the thought of Samantha, to stern and implacable Skinner behind his desk with the disjointed images she had of him now.

She met Skinner in the dining hall. His appetite had deserted him, and there was a lump in Scully's throat that wouldn't go away, but neither had had any food for hours and they forced themselves to eat before they left. Yes, he could drive her to Travis before his own flight to Washington. No, it shouldn't be a problem to find a motel with two vacancies between here and the airfield. They drove until they found a motel, checked in, got their luggage out of the trunk, walked to their rooms, and stood in front of their doors awkwardly.

There were no words for what had happened in the chapel, for either of them. At the very moment Scully had needed someone, anyone, to give her strength, to keep her from falling headlong into a chasm of grief and guilt she was still slowly crossing, it had been Skinner who had given it. And when Skinner hadn't been sure if he could hold his emotions in check one moment longer, Scully had made the gesture that showed how intensely she felt what was happening, how deeply she understood what he was going through. She had given him the strength, had freed him, to say goodbye.

"Good night, Dr. Scully," he said finally.

She nodded. "Good night, sir."

He watched her go inside, and then went into his own room. Mechanically he set his suitcase down near the door, placed his hat on the shelf in the closet and removed an envelope from his jacket pocket before he hung it up. He looked around, noting the locks on the door, where the smoke detector was, the absence of a table and chair. He placed the envelope carefully on the pillow, put his gun and badge on the nightstand and sat down on the edge of the bed, letting his lightly-clasped hands dangle between his knees as he stared at the floor.

That he was exhausted, he didn't need anyone to tell him. It seemed like years since he'd gotten the call from Mr. Kilcrease at work, and about that long since he'd been able to sleep. He wanted a drink, but he couldn't run away this time, couldn't blindly act as he sometimes did. Somehow, it mattered that if he went anywhere, Scully was right next door and would know—

Scully. Guiltily, he remembered that, after all, he'd sent her to have a vacation.

Worrying about her and Mulder had become second nature to him, and yet in some ways Scully was the last person he needed to worry about. Time and again she'd faced danger, even faced her own death, and she'd proved she was pure steel.

It took its toll, though. He knew that first hand, and if anyone had to see the moment when the tiniest rent in that steel ever showed itself, it had to be him. Not Mulder; he knew what Mulder needed from Scully as well as she did. But Skinner had no illusions about what it meant to feel control slipping away. He'd tried to protect her with the trip to Hawaii, but now she was here, he had to be the one with her because he understood, and he felt that somehow she knew that.

It didn't occur to him that that understanding could go both ways.

She'd offered to go all the way to the CIL as a favor to him, and then on her own come to meet him at Travis, proof to him they were starting to come to an understanding, that the uneasy trust Mulder had simply offered him, he had finally earned from her. Her trust meant a lot to him. But he had no right to ask her for anything else.

Abruptly he turned and emptied the envelope, looking again at the things Mr. Kilcrease had kept of Jimmy's and thought he might like to have.

Like Jimmy's penknife, its bone handle yellowing with age. The great equalizer, he remembered, cutting candy bars and everything else in half their pooled allowances could only afford one of. It had pried reluctant insects out of the mud, carved pumpkins and—in a misguided attempt at creativity—bars of soap, carefully cut out pictures from National Geographic, stood in for screwdriver and hammer when they knocked together one invention or another, torn up old t-shirts into rags so they could polish their bikes… Skinner opened it and ran the blade along the pad of his thumb. It needed sharpening, he thought absently, and then realized what he was doing and glanced quickly at his thumb, as if a wound long healed could simply reappear. He clicked the blade closed again and laid it aside.

A white name badge had fallen out of the envelope onto its face. Skinner turned it over and read, "My name is SCORCHY. May I help you?" From a summer at the bakery, when Jimmy had proved less than adept at frying donuts and had earned the nickname from their shift manager, who'd put him in charge of busing tables instead. Jimmy had somehow turned the name badge, as he did most everything, to his own advantage, making up improbable stories about "Scorchy" that delighted the regulars and set the girls from school giggling. He'd always end by pointing in the back and saying, "You think that's something? You know what they say about my buddy Walter…!" And more than half the time he had no idea why he got the huge grins he did when people poked their heads in the back and waved on their way out of the bakery. Skinner spelled the name on the badge with a forefinger, almost smiling. God, that summer—!

That summer was a long, long time ago. Skinner picked up a puzzle piece, from one of the map puzzles Mr. Kilcrease had bought for Jimmy in an attempt to "make learning fun." The two boys had put them together over and over while recovering from chicken pox (when they weren't memorizing WWII fighter planes until they could tell each one just from its silhouette), not really paying attention to what they were doing, until they'd discovered the night before a big geography test when they'd been prepared to study all night, popcorn popped and kool-aid ready, that they already knew where everything was. The popcorn bowl had been upended in their relief, leading to a food fight Mrs. Kilcrease had sworn looked like a blizzard across the Dakotas when she'd walked in on them. Skinner traced the edges of the state of Mississippi, capital: Jackson, state bird: mockingbird, state flower: magnolia, principal crop: cotton. And set it down, as if the pillow on his bed had been a map of the United States, between Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Alabama.

The book of matches puzzled him; he slowly turned it over and over, trying to put together with the name and the drawing of an ivied trellis a memory of a restaurant on that street, but couldn't. He finally opened the cover and to his surprise saw the names "Walter," "Sarah," "James," and "Christina" written in four different hands. How could he have forgotten Jimmy's cousin, little Sarah Guidry from down the street, and her moon-eyed crush on him? Her attention caught by no one her age, both he and Jimmy had known she would ask him to go to her first high school dance with her. That part, accepting with a good grace, had been easy. Jimmy's had been the harder one, and typical of him, to befriend Sarah's too-shy best friend, Christina, so she'd have someone to ask to the dance, too. He and Jimmy had stood in the living room at Sarah's house, huge corsages in hand, and watched as the two girls in all the trembling glamour of their first pairs of high heels and dangling earrings made their way downstairs.

Jimmy had cracked, 'Jeez, Sarah, you cleaned up halfway pretty!' and in reflex she'd slugged him, and what could have been an uncomfortable evening conducted with the immense dignity only a fourteen year old could summon turned instead into laughter and gentle teasing and dinner at the new Italian restaurant, where four matchbooks had made the rounds of the table so they could all sign their names and have a souvenir of the night. And later he'd hauled a classmate with wandering hands off a shocked Christina, and Jimmy, charging back from the refreshments table, had floored that too-enterprising young man with a right cross before the chaperons stepped in…

God almighty. Even here, in the middle of nowhere in a motel Skinner had never stayed at before, there were too many ghosts. He closed his burning eyes.

Scully undressed and got in the shower, hoping the water would relax her. She made it as hot as she could stand, but she still had to wrap her arms around herself, feeling chilled, tense, almost sick as the water beat down on her. Shivering, she gave up and toweled off, then changed into her pajamas and robe. She went back to the room and found something to wear the next day and hung it carefully in the closet, tucked her dirty clothes into the bottom corner of her suitcase, found her toothbrush and floss. Her eyes burned and she couldn't swallow the lump in her throat away, and still she couldn't cry.

Skinner had accepted her presence, her need for closure to what she'd started. But instead of closure it had all spiraled out of control. Meeting Mr. Kilcrease, seeing what Jimmy meant to him and Skinner, everything reminded her of people she'd loved and lost, her father and her sister both taken too soon from her, without a chance to—no words to—

Her arm suddenly whipped out, clearing the top of the dresser in a destructive clatter. "I wish I could cry!" she ground out through clenched teeth.

She shouldn't have been surprised to hear a knock at the door. She smoothed her hair back from her face as she went to open it.

Skinner had his gun drawn, but he immediately dropped it to his side. He peered into the room. "I thought I heard something."

"I'm sorry if I disturbed you. I didn't mean to."

His gaze went to her. "Are you all right?"

She felt the full force of concern behind the simple question, and wondered if lying would do any good. "I will be. Eventually."

He seemed to relax at her honesty. "You need to get some sleep."

"I know." She turned away and picked up the brochure rack from the floor. "I just feel restless."

"So throwing stationery around helps?"

She looked at him. Humor was always so unexpected from him that despite the lump in her throat, she managed a harsh laugh. "If you can't sleep either, come in," she offered on a sudden impulse. "We can keep each other company for a while, if you like."

He went to close the door to his room and, to her surprise, came back. She gestured for him to take the head of the bed, and she perched at the foot. She ventured a question, hoping it was innocent enough for him to answer, and for her to feel more like herself.

"I saw the pictures in Mr. Kilcrease's room." He nodded. "Did you break Jimmy's nose?"

Startled by the question, he gave a sudden snort of laughter. "No, that wasn't me. Although with some of the fights we had… That was a hockey puck that got away."

"You played football together, too?"

He nodded again, his gaze suddenly abstract. "We did just about everything together."

She leaned forward and asked carefully, hoping she wasn't prying, "What was it like, being Jimmy's friend?"

He frowned as he considered her question. After all, she'd never known Jimmy; she deserved that much. "What was it like," he repeated. "It was like…being one step behind total disaster every second of every day. Jimmy was the ringleader, equal parts good will and absolute disregard for physical safety. I was the cautious one, always trying to head trouble off at the pass." He quirked an eyebrow. "It usually didn't work."

A tiny smile curved the corners of Scully's mouth as she imagined two young boys wreaking havoc on a long-suffering neighborhood. Seeing her expression and wanting it to remain, Skinner told her what he and Mr. Kilcrease had reminisced about earlier that day, things it didn't hurt to tell.

Caution needed a spur to action, a way out of sameness and safety, just as a ringleader needed brakes, someone who could take an idea and figure out how to make it reality, and Jimmy and Walter had grown up two sides of a coin. As they'd gotten older, they'd discovered elements of each other in themselves — Jimmy adding method and thoughtfulness to his headlong plunge through life, Walter an ability to take the lead under adversity to his pragmatism and reserve.

And Scully sensed something that had drawn the two boys to each other in the first place as Skinner talked—probably never articulated to each other, certainly not now to her: Jimmy and Walter had shared a strong sense of what was right in the world, and the ardent desire to act on it. Through Skinner's stories she saw the beginnings of the man who joined the Marines on his eighteenth birthday. Who kept the line for his field agents who couldn't (or wouldn't) keep it themselves. Who had tried so hard to shield his wife from what his work had become (because no matter how disillusioned he grew, he would never give up) that his shelter for her turned into a wall she couldn't breach and he'd lost her. Who had gambled everything that meant anything to him for her and Mulder. She felt a familiar ache building inside her as she looked at him, at his expression changing as he remembered more and more.

Skinner finally took a deep breath, bewildered at where memory had left him. Then he said slowly, as if trying to make sense of it all, "All these years I've felt Jimmy…in the back of my mind, and I thought that meant somewhere he was still alive—if I could remember him like that, then he couldn't be dead. And no matter what, no matter how bad things got, I was never alone, Jimmy was there. Even when Sharon and I separated, I thought Jimmy was with me." His Adam's apple worked briefly before he said, "It turns out, I was alone all the time." In a lower voice, "And I don't know how to be alone like this."

Neither do I, she thought as she looked at him. The emptiness she'd been living with since she'd lost Missy was brand-new to him, and she gave him the only thing she had. "You're not alone," she whispered fiercely. "I'm here." And suddenly her vision blurred, and with a small sob she realized she was finally crying. But despite the relief, she realized who she was crying in front of, and what the hell would he think of her, weak enough to—

Through her tears she saw him move towards her, and suddenly found herself in his crushing embrace. She felt something tightly wound inside her give way as he rocked her in his strong arms, and in that moment realized how much she'd needed solace. She threw her arms around him and held tight; he needed this at least as much as she did. "You're not alone," she insisted over and over against the front of his shoulder, "I'm here."

He pressed his cheek against her damp hair, his tangled emotions somehow finding relief as he and Scully held each other. She was safe with him; he'd never betray this moment to anyone. At the same time, even as her tears soaked his shirt her words were a consolation to him, a truth she wouldn't let him ignore. No, he wasn't alone.

And neither was she.

Skinner continued to rock her back and forth until she'd calmed. She rubbed her face against his shirt to dry it and looked up at him from the circle of his arms, her eyes red and swollen, her mouth unsteady and her cheeks splotchy with crying. She hid nothing from him, and her trust in him was a precious, fragile thing that made her all the stronger in his eyes. And he couldn't think of a moment when she'd looked more beautiful.

There was almost nothing of the Assistant Director about Skinner; his face was still the face she'd seen in Mr. Kilcrease's room but there was something compelling about it now. She suddenly saw Mr. Kilcrease in Skinner, something not only kind, but a gentleness life had taught him not to reveal. Her hand went to his face, fingers tracing the new contours revealed by grief and compassion—and came away wet. Scully's eyes widened with surprise, and he caught her hand in his to forestall anything she might say. A nod of her head comprehended everything: her acceptance and sadness, her understanding and silence. She wouldn't ask, and she wouldn't betray this moment, either.

He carefully moved away, his stern voice contrasting with his troubled expression as he said, "It's late. We've…been through a lot. I should leave."

The voice of reason. He was always the voice of reason, and he was always right. But it was late, and they had been through a lot, and that was exactly why—

"Please, don't be noble," she begged. "Stay with me tonight. When…when Melissa died, I stayed in her empty room all night and Mulder stayed with me. And it meant so much just to have him there, to be able to hold him if I needed to. Don't be alone tonight. You don't have to be."

Her hands went to his arms as if to hold him there. "Please." So blunt it didn't seem in the least selfish, she said simply, her blue eyes refusing to let him go, "I need you. And you need me."

He met her gaze squarely, hearing a plea for nothing more than human companionship. If she could admit her need to comfort him, to be comforted, why couldn't he do the same?

She sniffled and turned away, not wanting to push any harder, and pulled off her bathrobe and draped it across the corner of the bed. As she turned down the covers and slipped between the sheets with her back to him, she heard his shoes come off, his clothes folded and placed on the table, his glasses and gun set on the nightstand. He turned out the lamp and a sliver of moonlight came through a break in the curtains as she felt the weight of him as he got into bed on the other side.

Between them they had enough self-control for at least three people; they both knew nothing would happen unless they wanted it to. All either of them wanted was comfort, and they wouldn't use sex to get it. And neither needed a lover more than they needed a friend.

Skinner moved closer to her, his front to her back, and instead of tensing as she'd expected to, Scully felt herself relax instead, utterly and completely. She could never relax like that with Mulder; she was always too aware that, Mulder being who he was, she had to be responsible for the both of them. But she knew, with deep down surety, she didn't need to worry about Skinner, that here, and now, she was safe where she was. She pulled his arm around her and laced her fingers through his.

He tucked her head beneath his chin and squeezed her hand. It felt like the most natural thing in the world, to hold Scully close and feel the warm weight of her snuggled against him. How long had it been since he'd held Sharon like that? How long since he'd taken simple trust for granted?

He would have tried to puzzle it out but, filled with a quiet peace that hadn't been his for years, he was soon asleep.

The clock radio, set by the previous guest to go off at 3:30 a.m., suddenly gave them Aretha Franklin loud and clear:

"…think! (Think! Think!) Let your mind go, let yourself be free! Let's go back, let's go back, let's go way on way back when…"

Scully sat bolt upright at the sudden assault of sound, and gasped for breath as she tried to remember where she was. Skinner, whose first instinct was to go for his gun, regained his presence of mind first and fumbled with the radio until it was silent again. He exhaled heavily and rolled onto his back. Scully looked down at him, her mind only now starting to clear, and as their gazes met, adrenaline still running high and pulses beating fast, they both burst into laughter, tried to stifle it, and then gave in, laughing helplessly for no better reason than it felt like blessed relief to laugh.

"Oh, my God," she managed finally, leaning her head against her knees and hiccuping in wonder. "I don't think I've ever heard you laugh before!"

"You haven't," he admitted, wiping his eyes weakly. "Didn't think I could, did you?"

"No, I never—I mean—" Another giggle escaped her. "I'm sorry…!" She turned her head to look at him. "This is so stupid!" she exclaimed. "I don't even know what's so funny about Aretha Franklin—!"

Scully was blurry to Skinner's eyes, and in the dark even more so, and something about the shadow she made, what she said, stopped the breath in his lungs as he remembered another place, and another time altogether.

Scully suddenly sobered at the expression on Skinner's face. "What is it?" she asked.

"Just…remembering something…the song…"

She slipped back down beside him and touched his arm. "I'm here," she said, her voice soft. She felt his stillness under her hand, and waited.

Finally, not looking at her, he said slowly, "We'd just come from somewhere near Phu Bai, narrowly missed an encounter with the Viet Cong, and were going to one of Bob Hope's road shows." He shrugged minutely. "There'd been a rumor that Aretha Franklin was going to be there and we were all pretty excited, she and Jimi Hendrix were our soundtrack to the war, pretty much. When word reached us that it was Lola Falana, Miss America and some rock and roll band no one had ever heard of, and no Aretha, it was enough to turn my men almost mutinous, they were looking at the stage and me as if a well-placed shot, or grenade, would take care of everything.

"I thought it was the end of my fledgling military career right there, I was too new at being an authority figure to think I could change a group of men back into a fighting unit that trusted me not to get their asses killed, that I could bring them back from something like this. They kept muttering, 'Man, they said Aretha was gonna be here!' and the tone was getting angrier and angrier. And then—I don't know how to describe it, but in that moment, I acquired The Stare, and The Voice."

Scully heard the capital letters, and knew exactly what he was talking about. And so did every other agent at the Bureau.

"When I looked at them, they went silent. And then I told them what sons of bitches they were if they didn't look at Miss America and like it, because she was what we were fighting for. Something like that, I don't remember the rest." He snorted. "I'd never cowed a bunch of men before, but let me tell you, it felt damned good."

He fell silent, and Scully thought he was reveling in that moment of power and absolute authority, until he went on in a very different voice, "And then I turned around and, in that whole sea of soldiers, hundreds, thousands of us, I saw Jimmy Kilcrease not thirty feet from me. We…made it over to each other, pounded each other on the back, traded news of where we'd been, what action we'd seen, swore over the same generals—all the stuff that doesn't matter, looking back on it. He showed me a letter he'd gotten from his father, read part of it to me. And then the show was starting, and we went back to sit with our units."

He paused, and then went on deliberately, "It was the last time I saw him. I wish I'd known that then, I would have paid more attention, said something— But I had no premonition, not like they say you do. I think back, and I remember thinking he was getting sunburned, losing some weight, and that was all. I was so sure we'd see each other again, that we'd have time later to catch up with each other, but it was pure chance we'd seen each other that day at all.

"Strange, isn't it, that after I find out Jimmy's really dead, it'd be that song on the radio like that."

She knew he wasn't looking for sympathy or pity, and hoped she was saying the right thing in the right way. "I never would have guessed your guardian angel was Aretha Franklin."

He looked up at her, one eyebrow on the rise, and then his mouth softened into a small smile. "I never thought about it that way." And he remembered another woman, with tears in her dark eyes, begging him, "Walter, please, let me in!" But, he realized, there'd never been a distance between him and Jimmy, never a need to ask to know something. Just—acceptance, and when the time came it would all come tumbling out. Just as it had with Scully. She already knew the worst of it, was in the thick of it with him, knew what his life had become because hers had been transformed in the same way. He didn't need to protect her from anything. She was already right by his side.

Scully also considered the person beside her, and remembered someone else. Yes, Mulder had been with her after Missy died. But she'd discovered that even in grief, she was stronger than he was. He'd needed comfort and absolution even more than she did, and she'd held him and given it to him. The most she could ever expect from Mulder was that they'd be able to keep each other from falling but they'd always teeter on the side of the abyss. She couldn't rest, ever, with Mulder. But Skinner was different. When she'd started to fall, he'd caught her and not demanded anything in return. He was strong enough to offer himself without need or condition. And that had bolstered her own strength, her desire to be for him what he was for her. Acceptance of her as she was, weaknesses as well as strengths. A place where, even for a little while, she could let down her guard.

She felt no tension in his arm still under her hand, and she suddenly realized all the pieces she'd seen of him earlier that day and hadn't understood were coming together. He was little boy and grown man, son and AD, soldier and friend, stern and principled and deeply caring and fiercely private—and yet, even while he was grieving, he could still reach out to her and, shared, the grief in her heart was no longer a burden.

She touched his face as she had when it had been wet with tears and looked at him, really looked at him. He regarded her intently, her face close enough to him that he could see in her eyes a thankfulness and dawning wonder, heard it in her voice as she said softly,

"Walter." The man before her, whole and entire. She knew she was only beginning to understand him, but it was what she wanted to do, for herself and for him, without any thought of what she owed him or what she might get from him in return for the effort.

To draw any closer would mean they could no longer look at each other, and it almost seemed less intimate to kiss than to break their gaze. Tentatively, almost shyly, they leaned towards each other. "Dana," he breathed, and he felt her smile before they kissed.

Skinner went back to his own room to shower and change, and they drove to Travis AFB, stopping for coffee at a roadside diner on the way. Conversation between them was random and brief, more said with their eyes, their shy, lingering gazes, than any words.

As Scully got ready to walk across the tarmac, she turned and looked up at him.

She couldn't bring herself to say anything out loud, but she asked him a question from her heart, from an empty place he had filled too briefly and she couldn't stand to feel again, not yet.

His answer wasn't rejection, but there was sadness there, behind the warmth of his dark eyes. What happened in the night had no connection to the light of day. She knew that. She didn't want to let go of what they'd shared, but she had to be grateful for what had been. She nodded, and turned away.

He watched her walk, small and alone, to the waiting transport, and suddenly thought of Jimmy, of another goodbye that hadn't been a goodbye. Always tomorrow, always all the time in the world…

Only when the transport had taken off did Skinner get back in his car and drive away.

Determined to make a fresh start and enjoy herself if it killed her, Scully hit the hotel boutique. She couldn't find a sundress that didn't need altering so she settled for an aloha shirt and matching shorts, a pair of Keds, a swimsuit, and a large straw hat to shield her face from the sun. She got the directions from the concierge to a beach where, he confided to her, sea turtles were sometimes known to congregate, slathered on sunblock, grabbed a hotel towel and was on her way.

After an afternoon chasing the surf, finding shells, climbing rocks, exploring caves and watching the clouds float by, she returned, exhilarated and oddly at peace, to the hotel.

"So did you find the sea turtles?" the concierge asked her.

"No, but I hope to tomorrow."

As she walked towards the elevator, she heard a voice behind her. "Maybe I can help you find them."

A voice that made her heart stop. She turned.

Walter Skinner stood in the lobby behind her. In his business suit he looked incongruous framed by the potted palms and koi-filled fountain, and then she realized she looked like an idiot in her floppy straw hat and too-loud clothes and muddy shoes, that despite her precautions she was freckled all over—but he was still walking towards her.

Not wanting to hope, she blurted out, "What brings you here?"

He closed the distance between them, and she saw the answer before he said, "You," and bent to kiss her.

FIN

Acknowledgements: "Think," written by Aretha Franklin and Ted White.