TITLE:  To Sleep? Perchance to Dream?

(Part 1 of 1 part)

NAME: frogdoggie

E-MAIL: frogdoggie@hotmail.com

CATEGORY: VRA

RATING: NC-17. M/SK. This story contains SLASH. Graphic sexual activity between two men. So, if you don’t like that type of thing - STOP NOW! Forewarned is forearmed. Proceed with caution.

SUMMARY: Skinner contemplates a variation on the idea that the sleep of reason produces monsters. Angst ahead - so beware.

FEEDBACK - YES PLEASE, AND THANK YOU SIR, MAY I HAVE ANOTHER? Comments, suggestions and healthy debate are always welcome. Flames? Thanks! I need to build a bonfire so I can roast a few weenies!

TIMESPAN/SPOILER WARNING: This season. SR819. Slight foreshadowing for Biogenesis.

KEYWORDS: vignette angst slash Skinner Mulder NC-17

DISCLAIMER: Fox Mulder, Walter Skinner, Dana Scully and all other X-Files characters belong to Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen Productions and 20th Century FOX Broadcasting. No copyright infringement is intended and no profit is being made from their use.

*Author's Note: Seriously, this is an angst fest folks. I promise something lighter next time. Promise. Really.

To Sleep? Perchance to Dream? by frogdoggie

It's 3 AM. I watch Mulder's fitful tossing and turning. I watch his eyes rolling around in their sockets in troubled REM sleep. I see his eyes open slightly showing hazel filled, unseeing slits. I watch his eyes roll up in his head and then back down. I watch his lids slip shut again. I watch his breathing pick up a little. I watch his lips part, his mouth open ever so slightly. I hear his whimper.

He made a similar sound at 10 PM, under me, when I was in him. He whimpered and we both moaned loud as I drove against his ass, fucking him. He laughed with enjoyment too, as I cranked his hard cock in time with my grunting thrusts. I bent and kissed him, told him I loved him. He shut his eyes and arched up, begging me to do him hard.

He looked very much as he does now when he came. His hazel eyes rolled back in his skull, looking inward during his orgasm. But I know he was whimpering with satisfaction, and a hell of a lot more aware of this world at 10 PM. He gasped 'I love you' after that whimper. Gripped my arms tight and thrust his hips against mine calling out "Walter! God!" as we rocked together in pleasure. I felt so alive, coming inside him with a roaring, joyous shout of "FOX!" that was ripped right out of my chest. So alive afterwards, smiling into his eyes as we held each other, and I basked in his satiated grin and languid kisses.

Now I feel...I'm not sure what I feel...except a deep chill somewhere in my guts as I watch him and ask myself...

What does he dream?

I mean, what does he really see? I can make some educated guesses. I've heard him call for his sister, his mother, his father. I've heard him curse his parents, his father more than once - both of his fathers actually - because he's still not sure who really fathered him even now. I've heard him call for Dana Scully many times, over and over. Sometimes the Scully dreams rival those he has about Samantha in their sound and fury.

There's something rather nightmarish in seeing a fine, brilliant mind like Mulder's reduced to gibbering mindlessness. There's something infinitely sad about seeing the body I so lovingly touch in ecstasy...the body I feel privileged that he shares with me so readily, writhing in extremis. It's agonizing for me. All I can do is hold him until he comes back to himself and then watch him roll over in shame when he realizes he acted out in front of me yet again. As if his actions were shameful to me? That idea hurts. It's not like I wouldn't understand. I have my own nightmares. The idea he thinks I won't understand hurts as well.

Mulder's cries are pitiful. I cringe every time I hear the utter terror, longing and guilt that those shrieks contain. I know he doesn't want my pity. He'd hate it if I showed pity towards him as a matter of fact. But I can't help it. I do pity him. I can only swallow my sympathy and hide it from him. But...it's hard to listen to his shouting.

I've heard men, myself among them, scream horribly in battle, the screams of the wounded and dying. But none of those long ago screams compares with Fox Mulder in the throes of a nightmare. None of them comes close to the depth of suffering that must be contained in Mulder's soul. They don't come close because...I didn't love those other men...not even myself...as much as I love this man. So, I love him and his screams wound me, adding invisible scars to the visible ones I've accumulated over the years.

We don't talk about the nightmares. He either can't or won't, and I have to respect his wishes to remain mute about them...for the time being. There isn't much I can do about his closed mouth attitude at the moment. He's much too stubborn to let me in completely, even now. It's a trait I admire but truly despise in this instance. He won't unburden and I can't make him. I'd be a hypocrite if I did. After all, how much haven't I told him yet, I ask myself? That question's too painful to answer.

Besides, we're manly men anyway - right? We don't...unburden to our partners as a rule, do we? Well, fuck that idea. I already had one marriage ruined over that piece of gender stereotyping. I'm pretty much determined not to let this one go down the tubes the same way. I just have to be patient and hope Mulder feels he can trust me enough to talk. Or trust himself enough is more to the point perhaps. I know he feels that by telling me about the dreams he'll endanger me in some way - or add to my stress or burden or some other bullshit. We have to talk about that too - his guilt is something I can more than understand. I think I can help him with that issue as well. And Christ all mighty, I have to tell him the truth too. Soon. How can I expect him to trust in me if I won't trust in him?

But in the meantime, I watch. I watch and wait. I watch and wonder what he'll dream about tonight to make the screaming start.

I see his breath pick up again. I can't help but observe, strangely fascinated despite my revulsion, as his body marshals the fight or flight response. His actions are almost hypnotic. His eyes roll faster, his legs jerk and then move spastically. He starts to pant and his arms, and then his graceful hands, twitch. His hands ball into fists.

I can't stand it for long however. Not this time. I just can't take it tonight, not after our earlier lovemaking. I lean close to shake him so that he'll wake up before the worst terrors begin. When I touch him he speaks and the words rush out, rising towards that keening cry I know will come at the end.

"You prick. Krycek....oh...Jesus..."

"Mulder?" I whisper, trying to grab his arm. He plunges on.

"I'll kill you mutherfucker. If you touch him again you're dead meat you SON OF A BITCH!" he wails.

"Mulder?" I shake him and he bats my hand away.

"BASTARD!" he screams, hitting me in the jaw. It's only a glancing blow but it hurts all the way down to my heart.

"Hey, wake, up. Mulder, come on. It's ok....it's ok babe," I croon to him, moving his arm aside.

"You're a dead man if you touch Sk..Sk...Walter again," he cries out, flailing his arms against my chest.

I let out a shuddering breath and finally get hold of him. I pull him into my embrace as I've done so many nights in the past. Tonight tears are starting to dribble down his face and his cries die out into quiet pleas and threats. He curses a man I certainly think of as a low life, fucking, son of a whore. A snake I'd like to throttle with my bare hands. He needs to be brought to some kind of justice for what he did to Mulder and Scully. That I hate what he did to me goes without saying. What he did? God...I live in...I dread what he may yet make me do. Mulder's next words echo my thoughts as I gather him close.

"You hear me, Alex? I could kill you for what you've done. Kill you....you fucker."

I rock him and he whispers into my chest.

"Please, don't hurt him...don't make him...ddddon't...please...."

"Mulder, I'm here, come on man, wake up...please..." I beg him now too...just like he begs Alex Krycek for my life, for...my integrity. I stroke his hair. Tears spring into my eyes as well. My vision blurs as I bend and kiss the top of his head.

I feel reason overtake him at last. I sigh as his next whispered words tell me he's once again, for better or worse, in the land of the living.

"Oh, God. Walter...I...I thought you'd...Walter don't go. Be...be here...please don't leave me."

"I'm here lover, I'm here. I love you. I won't go. I'm here for you...always, Fox. Always."

Even as I murmur those words in utmost sincerity...I curse myself as a liar. Mulder's words should bring me the relief of knowledge. The knowledge that, instead of turning away, he might be willing to share his fears with me at last. The relief that at last I've found my opening to unburden to him as well. But instead of relief...I'm dying inside. I'm dying because, as tonight's nightmare only serves to show...Fox Mulder can never be sure about 'Always'.

And neither can I.

-THE END-