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Collector's Edition: Never Again and the Endless Line

Got some Never Again angst for the phile populace. Step right up and take a whirl!

Loose chronological order below~

Beshter's Seasons: Fourth Scully watched Mulder whip around the doorway to the office, bag in hand, partly envious of his time off, partly irritated. He wouldn't be taking it if he didn't have to, she knew that, and it was disgusting that he was forced to it. Mulder had no concept of "vacation." She wasn't much better. What was she doing instead of vacationing? Checking up on Moose and Squirrel? Is this what her life had devolved into, back and forth, up and down, her life in a standstill chasing one false lead after another, and all the moments of life passing her by. Her fingers slipped into her coat pocket, pulling out the delicate rose petals she found the night before. They looked even more ephemeral in the wan, florescent light of the dim office. She felt as dry and desiccated as they were, fragile and empty.

Part of Beshter's fill-in series: post-Kaddish Scully begins to examine her life, its choices, and consequences... and (momentarily) runs away from the endless line.

Stephanie Davies's Insufferable Sting It was as she was pulling up behind her brother's Volvo that she felt it: a cold tickle on her upper lip. And her fingers came away bloody.

Pre-Never Again Scully's questions about her desk and that endless line began at her brother's birthday party.

Anne Haynes’s (Gossamer) Ishmael What smacks me in the face is that, no matter how much I tried to distance myself from him and his influence in my life, no matter the uncharacteristic lengths to which I went in my quest for rebellion, I am less free of him than I was before we parted.

Never Again Scully is consumed by her partner.

@scenes-in-between/@scullywolf's (Ao3) Never Again Telling Mulder would make it real. And she wasn’t ready for that, not yet.

Post-Leonard Betts Scully's fear drives her to Philadelphia.

Chibiness87's Transient Following a suspect into a tattoo parlour dressed as she is may appear a little unwise, but she is intrigued despite herself. The design of the ouroboros calls to her; a direct contrast to what she claimed in the office the previous day about life. Here the snake is constantly reborn, life continues on forevermore, a constant loop.

A symbol of infinity.

Of permanence.

She likes it immediately.

Never Again Scully wonders if she has cancer.

Clementinewoolysocks369's The Problem - Chapter 1 Maybe she just wants to take a normal risk for once. Maybe she just wants to reassure herself she’s alive. It’s a side effect of being one of the few people her age who has had the privilege of seeing her own gravestone. “Dana Scully. Loving daughter and friend.” Her life summed up in a few words.

Post-Leonard Betts Scully feels disconnected from life.

@bakedbakermom/lonegunga1's Ouroboros (Ao3) It was the first place Mulder ever really touched her, on that first case in his dark Oregon motel room with rain sheeting down outside, as Scully stood trembling in the candlelight and the tiny flame flickered in the warm cloud of his breath. She had trusted him enough, even then, to bare her body, and he in turn trusted her enough to bare his soul.

It is still the place he touches her the most, the place she has come to think of as “his.”

Never Again Scully inks her rebellion.

@illaisland/manos_de_piedra's Pierce (Ao3) Viper's fang injecting slick scarlet.

She gasps, flinching.

Never Again Scully soaks in her sensations.

MystPhile's

Never-Ever--Again This is a moment of truth. Another, and so soon after the last. My life is crowded with them these days. I stand outside our office, ready to enter for the first time since returning from Philadelphia.

All the delicious heat I'd felt when I was close to Ed Jerse was, it seems, a mere precursor to his nearly incinerating me, then toasting his own arm.

Never Again Scully ruminates on her avenging anger.

After For the tenth time, she wondered what they were doing here. It wasn't as if blood was allegedly pouring from human flesh, and she doubted that Skinner had assigned the case. Where was the *crime*? Had Mulder brought her to Philadelphia to watch her squirm? Had he chosen this bogus- looking religious case purely to poke fun at her faith? Was he really that cruel, and were they that far gone? She tried to shake off the depression this thought spread over her like a pall.

Pre-Never Again Mulder and Scully fell into bed, never talked about it, and are now grappling with her Philadelphia weekend-- in resentful silence, on a case.

@syntax6's (Gossamer, FFN, omniscribe) 20 - Chapter 4 Snow is falling again when he picks her up from the hospital. Tiny little flakes drift from the silent sky, illuminated briefly by the yellow street lamps before settling softly on the cold white world around them. Scully shivers insider her coat as she waits for him to open the locked car. Snow catches on her black shoulders and dull, burnished hair, and he barely recognizes her. The red seems muted to him now in the wake of all those pictures - her body and Jerse's, catalogued as evidence.

Never Again Scully, injured, asks for help.

defnotmeyo's It's My

And it’s the with who that driving you particularly crazy, right? Because you kind of think that maybe if Ed Jerse wasn’t completely off his rocker, he might be a little bit better than you. He was certainly more stable, outwardly, despite the failed marriage. He was certainly suaver, getting her to open up to him. He was certainly at least as good looking as you, a little more ripped, a little bulkier.

That goads you, doesn’t it?

Never Again Mulder can't finish his sentence.

@mldrgrl's (Ao3) Seeing Red “Get out, Mulder,” she mumbles, trying not to move her lips too much. Blood seeps into her mouth anyway and she grimaces at the coppery tang on her tongue.

“Keep your head back,” he answers, as though he didn’t hear her. He turns the faucet on and turns to the paper towel dispenser.

“I said get out!” she says again, and the force of her voice causes the blood on her lips to splatter on the sink and mirror.

Mulder freezes with a paper towel fluttering in his hand.

Post-Never Again Scully has a nosebleed (in front of her partner.)

@thursdayinspace's (Ao3) fic: five times Mulder doesn't ask Scully out on a date (and one time he does) (Ao3) She’s right to be mad at him. He deserves it. He’s mad at himself. He doesn’t know if he’s ever been angrier.

Amongst other opportunities thoroughly fumbled, Mulder misses a glaring one during Never Again.

@incidental-ao3/incidental's

Febuwhump 2023: The Truth is Out There (And the Fic is In Here) - Chapter 8 But eventually, the yawn came, unbidden, and he reached for the remote.

“You don’t have to do that,” she said hurriedly. He had already flipped it off.

“Nah, you need your beauty sleep,” he joked. He turned his lamp off, but she hesitated.

“Uh, Mulder, can I… can I confide something in you?” she asked, setting her book aside. He propped himself up on his elbow, brow crinkled.

Post-Never Again Scully is plagued by night terrors.

Nothing Else Matters “You… are all that I care about, Scully. All. Nothing else matters without you.”

“Oh,” was all she could manage to say in response. It was disarming, how quickly the energy between them had changed.

AU-- Post-Never Again Mulder and Scully yell out their anger (and finally, finally communicate.)

Diana Alexander's The Vain Shadow of the Past He walked over to Scully's desk, and she looked up at him as he spoke softly. "I'm sorry, Scully."

Post-Never Again Mulder reflects on their complicated relationship.

@frogsmulder/Brynstein's Love Me Tender The shadow of Phoebe Green was his ghost. He had collected others since, they always seemed to follow him, stitched to his heel. But Phoebe had been his first. In every sense of the word. When they had been together she had completely and utterly shattered him. In a way that was both exhilarating and terrifying, but now it was just terrifying. Or so he tried to tell himself.

Post-Never Again Scully realizes Mulder is afraid.

@jessahmewren's (Ao3) Mulder & Scully, #15 Scully watched he scenery slide by in green/blue flashes. They’d been driving for ages. Her tattoo itched, but she couldn’t discreetly scratch it without Mulder noticing, and it was still a sore spot for him.

Ed Jerse was a sore spot for him.

Post-Never Again Scully is ready for a fight.

@suitablyaggrieved/ScullyLovesQueequeg's #4 Come Here, Let Me Fix It For You “Thank you,” She said that lowly, as if forbidden, and that’s when Mulder noticed it. Her cross was not on her neck.

“Scully, what happened to your necklace?” He asked.

“It broke. After all these years, and you wearing it some, it finally broke."

Post-Never Again Mulder does his best to fix things (literally.)

@just-a-donut-who-reads/just_a_donut_who_reads's Unnamed Pacing done, she stands on her toes, arms above her head, stretching her shoulders and mid-section and twists at the waist, allowing the tension to seep out of her body. The action makes her cropped sweatshirt ride up, and from the corner of her eye, she can see Mulder's eyes following its hemline. Suddenly, he looks away, and his hands tighten almost imperceptibly on the cushion he's holding. Scully lowers her arms and turns to him.

"What?" She asks, examining her abdomen. He shakes his head but she continues, lifting up the back of the sweatshirt and twisting to look at her back.

Oh.

Post-Never Again Mulder glimpses his partner's tattoo.

@scullysexual/PostApocolypticAlien's

30 Ways To Say "I Love You" (1/30)/How It Was Before. - Chapter 1 You return from the little café down the road and venture over to her area.

“It was two sugars, right?” you ask.

Startled, she glances up at you and the coffee cup in your hand.

Post-Never Again Mulder apologizes.

A Ghost Inbetween It's a tiny dab of red. You could of easily missed it, would of if you were anyone but yourself yet, either way, you wouldn't miss anything when it relates to her, especially recently. Recently something had been very off with her if the last case was anything to go by.

Post-Never Again Mulder sees blood on Scully's shirt.

Michelle Kiefer's The Bar Scene - Race the Wind When she raised her eyes, Mulder's smug look had been replaced with concern and perhaps a little guilt.

Post-Never Again Scully and Mulder aggravate each other on their next case.

@aloysiavirgata's Snow Carefully Everywhere Descending (LJ) Mulder eyes her sidelong; her height requires her to shimmy to the edge of the tall stool and hop down in an undignified fashion. He watches her stride through the room - linoleum the color of old computers, of old bones - and resents the pairs of eyes that follow her dark, trim figure. They have no idea about her, he thinks. They can’t possibly begin to imagine her, the complexity of the brain cloistered behind that bruised and lovely face. They cannot fathom the things her sea-deep eyes have watched unfold.

Post-Never Again Mulder and Scully, prickly still, begin to slowly open up.

@h0ldthiscat's (Ao3) 7 (things you said while we were driving) She shoves the sunshade back up and clears her throat. “Can we go?”

He notices for the first time that her eyes are wet, that her chin is quivering despite her best attempts to control it. Remorse and guilt wash over him as he remembers an offhand comment from earlier in the week that explains her makeup, her nicer-than-usual suit, the set of her jaw."

Post-Never Again Mulder realizes Scully feels used.

AUs

@seepunkrun/Punk/runpunkrun's (site, Gossamer) Across a Desk (Ao3) She waited to see what he would do. It occurred to her that he wasn't going to say anything on his own. She had to decide if it would be worth it to flush him out of his hole.

Foxhole.

Something in her appreciated how much that remark could hurt him. She held that power inside of her: She could hurt Mulder.

AU-- Post-Never Again Scully's tattoo can talk.

@writingwell/RocketMan's (site) I Hurt "Scully, did you hear me?"

I shake my head no. I hurt, I hurt, I hurt, I hurt

"Scully, would you like to have dinner with me tonight?" he asks.

AU-- Post-Never Again Scully, still saddened from the Tunguska-Terma fiasco, is shocked by Mulder's question.

Brandon D. Ray's (Gossamer, xffics) No Place Like Home (Gossamer) "Tell you what, Scully," her partner said as the chuckles finally died down. "You ever decide you DO want a tattoo, give me a holler and we'll go get one together, okay? We need to spend more time social time together relaxing, anyway -- the stress is getting to both of us."

AU-- Never Again was all a dream.

@swinging-stars-from-satellites/bravest_person_in_Wonderland's even more of exactly the same (Ao3) It might hurt too much to acknowledge that she walked away from her best friend of four years over a stupid fight, a pointless desk and the point of a needle dripping ink into her skin. A part of her misses him, the part that wakes up panicking and praying she won't find blood on her pillowcase, but another part is still angry.

He has no claim on her. She has no claim on him. That makes her sad.

AU-- Post-Never Again Scully leaves without a goodbye... and calls again after her diagnosis.

BONUS

@kateyes224's Mulder’s real panic face. Whatever you do, do not think about how Mulder had answered Scully’s phone call early that morning with one of his usual pithy Mulderisms, eager to regain a tenuous balance with her after she had reduced him to ashes and unfinished sentences in the wake of the Ed Jerse case. Don’t think about how Mulder’s face fell as the words “Can you meet me at the oncology ward?” slowly floated into his ears, his smile fading, as it took his brain several long moments to play catch-up before the words actually made sense.

Post-Never Again Mulder is given bad news.

Meredith's Backhand Her life was his as much as his was hers. And she was waiting to tell him until after she was dead.

Two and a half days of nonstop searching and five hours in a variety of uncomfortable chairs had brought him to his knees. He had been moving so fast for so long that the reality of the situation hadn't sunk in; his brain had been processing the facts nonstop since Scully's call back in D.C., but his heart hadn't been able to keep up.

Memento Mori Mulder understands Scully's Philadelphia excursion.

@cecilysass's We’re Not Here To Get Involved in Personal Problems - Chapter 6 “Blood-related sexual activity!” Scully finds herself getting belatedly frightened and angry. “Mulder, did HIV/AIDS cross your mind?”

“I guess I probably forgot to review the pamphlets that night. Hey, maybe you can tell me for the future, Dr. Scully, how safe are kinky contaminated tattoo needles?”

Scully notes by the bright quality in his eyes that he is a little angry, too, and she questions if Mulder’s fear monster theory is right after all.

Post-X-Cops Mulder and Scully walk the neighborhood, eat mangoes, and delicately discuss past trysts.

@leiascully's tattoo He grazed the snake on her back with one fingertip. She could hear the question in his quiet.

Hearts now open to each other, Mulder and Scully discuss her tattoo.

CONCLUSION

Thanks for reading~

Enjoy!