Summary: Deslea's rec: "In this Existence missing scene, Marita forms a new alliance. I love the latent strength of the unidentified protagonist. Sequel to Good Intentions."

EMAIL: texgoddess@yahoo.com or
maidenjedi@hotmail.com
RATING: R
CATEGORY/KEYWORDS:
ARCHIVE: Yes. I'll submit to Gossamer directly.
SPOILERS: Existence, and you should have read
"Good Intentions"
DISCLAIMER: They just aren't mine. I leave
the hard stuff to the big boys.
SUMMARY: The inauspicious beginnings of a brave new
world.

AUTHORS NOTES: Adding to the mystery is all. I
miss the conspiracy, don't you?! You'll have to
excuse me if this ends up particularly moody; I
have Poe's "If You Were Here" stuck in my head.




*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*


His cigarette hit the ground, and in my mind I
couldn't tell for sure that it really was a
cigarette. It seemed to me it was a rose, a
white rose, falling on a coffin lid, and that he
and I were the only ones at some joke of a funeral.

I think I might've sobbed, and I think the bastard
just walked away without a word. No matter. The
dead man on the ground needed no eulogy tinted with
the scent of Morleys.

It was the last thing I saw, the embers of his Morley
smoldering in the blood that was not yet cold, that
poured from a body not yet stiff. I curled up fetally
on the floor, something sticky soaking my hair, and
the
revulsion I felt at realizing it was blood just made
the sobs come faster and harder, choking off my air
supply and leaving me gasping and dry-heaving.

I don't know how long I lied there. Maybe minutes,
maybe hours. I was hallucinating. I heard his voice,
felt him move and breathe next to me, blaming me,
cursing me. Sure this was my fault. Sure it was!
Who fetched him from Tunisia? Who brought him back to
the smoking bastard?

Me.

And didn't that all lead to this point? Did that not
take him back into Fox Mulder's world, back into the
deceit and the conspiracy and give him a hobby-horse
about saving the world?

But I didn't dwell on that long before the sweeping
sound of a black leather trenchcoat brushing the
concrete made me open my eyes. Black patent leather
shoes stood before me, Florsheims I'd bet, and I could
see my face reflected in the flawless shine. A
whisper told me that the shoes were not alone, though
part of me believed it was the devil come to collect
Alex.

Warm hands wrapped around my upper arms, and I heard a

vaguely familiar voice, feminine, urge me to get up.

"Let them take of this. Alex would understand."

My sobs resumed, harder and wetter this time. Would
he? Would he understand? I thought maniacally of the
phone call that had brought me here to the Hoover
building garage. *he's dead, Ms. Covarubbias* How, I
had thought, and why? But it was what entered my mind
next, as I hung up the phone, that sent me convulsing
into the arms of the woman. I had thought, what about
me? Am I next? Was that a threat? Grief was not
causing these tears, but fear. What would I do
without Alex in my life?

"Shh, Marita. Come with me. I know what its like to
lose the man you love to obsession."

For the first time, I looked up into her eyes. I knew
I recognized the voice.

She crookedly smiled, tears making her pinch her eyes
into a pouty squint, the wrinkles standing out. All
this time I had thought her dead, as we all did. And
I nodded, thinking of what she said. She knew better
than anyone what obsession would do, where it would
lead. The dark depths of self-loathing still lurking
in the corners of her eyes spoke volumes. Here was a
woman that undoubtedly wondered if she had pushed him
to it, and wondered why she should suffer for his
mistakes and his passion. I wondered that too, and
when I took her hand and leaned into her for support,
it was as a sister in the crisis of self-discovery.

Blood still on my forehead and in my hair, I turned
away from Alex's body and closed my eyes in real grief
for the first time since I'd heard the shadowy voice
on the phone. The sounds of cleaning up came from
behind me, and the zipping of the body bag was like a
suture for a deep wound. I wasn't through, I still
had so long to go, but I could and would get over
this, over him. I squeezed her hand a little tighter
as she led me away from that battlefield. She had
done it and come out the other side. I would too.

She stopped and I looked at her face, questioning.
She let me go, and turned back toward the blood
puddles and the still-warm corpse. Three steps, maybe
four, and she stood outside the blood. In front of
her lay the cigarette. In one more step, she
unceremoniously crushed it, grunting a little as she
did.

She looked up at me and her eyes were bright with
triumph.

And we walked away from that scene to go on with our
lives, alone and brave in a world without them.

----------

The end. feedback always accepted at
texgoddess@yahoo.com
I went back and read Good Intentions after I posted it
and realized there was another POV for it. Ok, sort
of. If you guessed who the other woman was, kudos to
you, because even I didn't know who she was for most
of this!


=====
"How do you explain the things you love?
You can't. You just do." -- Dawson's Creek
----------------------
enigmatic office monkey
http://envy.nu/officemonkey