InsaneJournal

Truth be told, Mulder had honestly given up on the possibility of Samantha ever arriving via Tesseract. After three years with very little in the way of traffic from his world outside of himself and Scully, he was just grateful to have Scully and William here and the option to build a life with the two of them that mostly didn't involve aliens or government conspiracies. Not that they didn't exist at all here, mind you, in fact this reality had confirmed extraterrestrials and Mulder had spoken to them before, but rather that they weren't a significant part of his daily life - so much so that it kept him from all other things.

But he never stopped thinking about his younger sister, or about the possibility that she could show up on the network one day. Right now he could only think that he ought to have been at SWORD when she arrived. This would all be incredibly confusing for her. It would only grow more so when he tried to explain time travel and things that had happened - she'd been older than when she was abducted though… so what had happened? Where had she been?

Outside of her apartment door he raised his hand and knocked firmly. He held a bottle of chocolate milk in one hand, and there was a chocolate bar in his pocket,he really hoped she still liked mars bars. At one time they had been her favorite. She was here. Samantha was actually here.

Samantha had had no idea what was going on when the blue light suddenly appeared all around her. She’d gotten away, she was trying to find help but she barely remembered anything other than her name. She had a brother, she knew that but she had no idea where to find him and now she was in New York and he was here and grown up. It was confusing and scary and part of her kept thinking someone would show up to take her away for more tests but so far they hadn’t.

When she heard the knock, her first instinct was to hide but she knew it had to be Fox. He’d said he was coming and she went to the door and opened it just enough to make sure and she saw him and what he was holding and she smiled. “It’s really you,” she said, feeling tears come to her eyes. “nobody else would have remembered a Mars bar.” She opened the door so he could come in.

"Samantha," Mulder said softly and for an instant he couldn't really see to make out her face. But it was definitely Samantha. Definitely his younger sister. At least probably. There had been so many times in the show where he'd found clones, or had dreams, or something had been wrong - but this, so far as he could tell, was actually his younger sister. "I bought - well, I bought milk and the Mars bar… and it's - really good to see you here," he finally settled on this statement being unable to think how to put everything else.

"Can I - can I give you a hug?" He asked finally. "I know I look older. There's explanations, but I don't know how much sense they'll make for you."

She wiped her tears off her cheeks. Part of her was afraid to let him touch her but she knew, somehow she just knew that it was okay. This was Fox, she had no doubt in her mind. “Yeah, you can. I’d like that,” she said and stepped forward and put her arms around him. Yes, this was him. Even if she couldn’t remember details, her heart knew the truth. This was who she’d been searching for, why she’d run away. Although clearly he had grown up. “I know I’m in the future,” she said when she finally let go. “They told me the year. It was 1979 when I saw the blue light so this is all really….strange.”

Mulder slid his arms around her and held on tight. He had questions, so many questions about what had happened to her and where she had been, and whether or not the television show had given him an answer or just a possible closure without any real answers, but right now all he wanted to do was to hug her and the conversation would come in a little bit, after he managed to get slightly drier eyes, and she'd had a proper opportunity to look at the chocolate milk.

When he finally pulled back, it was only enough to look at her, and he draped his arm across her shoulders. "Let's get some of that chocolate milk. Did they tell you about the varied timelines? When I was from it was in the 90s. But that when I was brought here, which was - nearly three years ago now. I've been here - in this reality - for nearly three years. Three coming up on December. I keep thinking maybe you'll come someday and here you are."

Samantha went into the kitchen and got out two glasses. “They did explain all that but it didn’t make a lot of sense. They also said that the people here don’t think we’re real? That we exist on TV and in books,” she shook her head. “I thought that where I was was strange but at least I was real.” She still wondered if all of it was connected but it couldn’t be because if it was, Fox wouldn’t be here. They’d gone to a great deal of trouble to make sure she didn’t remember anything about her family.

“I wasn’t taken by aliens,” she said, taking a glass of milk and handing one to him. “Some men took me, they did all kinds of experiments on me. I don’t even remember some of them. They wiped my memories and I tried to get away.” Samantha shuddered at the thought. “All I could remember was my name and I had memories of having a brother but I couldn’t remember your name. I just knew you were out there somewhere and that was where I was trying to go when the light got me. Then I remembered, it started to come back to me but you’re grown up and I’m fourteen which is funny because I’m supposed to be older.”

Mulder followed her to the kitchen and sat the milk bottle down on the cabinet as he watched her. Part of him just wanted to reach out and hold her hand and not let her go. She was here, but for how long? The Tesseract was fitful sometimes, and people had come and gone within months of arriving. But usually it was months, so he should get at least a few weeks at the very worst case scenario. He breathed out, trying to relax and to not overwhelm her with everything.

"I work at the FBI - at home I mean - and I work with unexplained cases, and things that don't make sense. And it has nothing on this place at times, although there was, or will be apparently, this one case where this man is writing a book, and things that are in the book are happening in real life too. It seems to have some bearing on what happens here - a bit." He looked over at his sister and reached out one hand to take the extra glass of milk, and the other he reached out to drop over Samantha's hand. "I'm glad you're here. I'm glad - because I've -" he didn't want to say he hadn't seen her since she she'd been taken, so he diverted. "I've been here in this reality for three years. It's been awhile since I've seen you."

Samantha took a drink of milk as she listened to him. It didn’t surprise her that he ended up working on unexplained things, he’d always liked puzzles and mysteries just as she had. She had no idea that she’d been one herself. “The men who had me, they did a lot of things, tests, experiments, I don’t even know what they were for,” she said slowly. “I was so scared, it was awful, I never knew what was going to happen next. They tried to tell me that our parents weren’t my parents. I ended up believing them because they said it over and over,” her voice grew a little shaky. “there was a man who smoked all the time, they told me that he was my father and I thought it was true because he was there nearly every day. Part of me though, part of me didn’t want to believe it. The one thing that never went away though was me knowing I had a brother. I couldn’t remember your name until I saw you here but I remembered you.” It had been hazy but the knowledge had been there and now that they were face to face, Samantha was beginning to remember a little bit more.

“Will I have to go back?” she finally asked. “I don’t want to...I was running away, I don’t know where I was trying to go but I want to stay here.” Now that she was with Fox, she felt safe. Samantha couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt safe.

Mulder nodded. He'd watched the episode where he thought he had figured it out - it seemed that perhaps he had, and it didn't make his heart hurt any less with the knowing of it. The time had been so difficult with everything that had happened with his mother - their mother - and trying to figure out whether Samantha had been a part of it, and with Scully doubting him - no not doubting him, just questioning him and keeping him honest as she always did. He squeezed her hand gently his question tearing at his heart.

"Not tonight," he said, hoping fervently that it was true. Nobody ever came and went that quickly, did they? "The Tesseract, the box that brought you here, does work both ways and nobody seems to understand why or how it brings who it brings - just that it does. And eventually we all go back to our homes, but some of us stay for a very long time. I've been here for three years - Scully, that's my partner, she's been here for multiple years as well. And you'll get to meet her, and also my son, your nephew - his name is William."

“I have a nephew?” Samantha couldn’t believe that and she couldn’t stop the grin that lit her face. “That’s cool, how old is he?” it was so much easier to talk about stuff like this than to try and think about where she’d been and the things that had happened to her. “I hope I get to stay for a while. I don’t understand all of this but I haven’t understood a lot of what’s happened to me in last couple of years. At least I’m not by myself anymore.”

"Well, he came through the Tesseract separately from Scully and I - so we're not sure is the short answer, but around two - give or take a few months," Mulder gave his sister a grin. He wanted to give her plenty of opportunity to talk about what she needed to and he wanted to tell her that she would never have to go back, that she could just stay, and maybe- maybe she could. Stranger things than being here for years of your life had most certainly happened, and if anyone was deserving of the chance to live a life away from everything in their home reality - it was Samantha.

"You're not by yourself, Samantha. If you'd like, I'll talk to Scully and we could possibly see about making room for you in our apartment for a while so you don't have to be alone or with strangers. I don't think she would mind, and we can talk to the Stark Charity folks about it."

“I’d like that a lot,” she said. “I hope those people don’t mind.” Samantha had spent too much time alone and the idea of being with her brother and Scully, whoever that was, and her nephew, it sounded great. “I’m glad you’re here. When I saw the blue light and I woke up in that strange room, I didn’t know what was going on. At least it turned out to be something good, I’m not used to good things happening.

Mulder reached for her hand again and squeezed it. He didn't want to make her relive everything that had happened even as he wanted to know - what types of experiments, what time of information had they taken from her? Who had been in charge? He could guess at pieces and fill in ideas from the television show, but he didn't know much more from there than he had at home. Not truly. But it seemed that Samantha did not remember details right now.

"Perhaps we can have you talk to someone," he suggested. "Not right now, but help you remember what has happened and where you've been, and I'll be right here with you through that process. But right now, Samantha, you're safe. Right now you're - you're here, and it's safe here." Yes, occasionally there were government organizations gone bad, or killer robots, or crazy things in the Tower - but generally speaking - it was safe here. There wasn't anyone that was going to take her away like the smoking bastard would have done. "And I'm here too. We'll get everything sorted out. Get you some pancakes tomorrow morning maybe, if you'd like? I'll talk to Scully and see if we can get you a place to stay that's closer to us. Get you started in some of the classes they've got here. It'll be good. You'll have a good life here."

Samantha moved closer and hugged him again. For the first time in a long time, she wasn’t scared to touch someone or to let someone touch her. She knew this was her brother, she knew that she was safe and she knew that no matter what, he would take care of her. Everything was going to be all right.

Finally.