Title: Surprises 
Author: jawsoxz3 
Classification: MSR, babyfic, ??? 
Spoilers: Requiem 
Category: Set after Mulder's return 
Rating: PG? 
Distribution: Anywhere, just let me know. 
Feedback: Much appreciated. Send it to
jawsoxz3@prodigy.net
Disclaimer: I don't own any of them. Hell, if I did, I would 
have put them on HBO where some adult nudity is allowed. 


Summary: Mulder learns of Scully's pregnancy, but not the way 
Scully had planned. 


It's been almost two weeks, she thought idly as she watched him. He
had been gone for close to three and a half months and then,
miraculously, almost two weeks ago he had been returned. The Gunmen
had called her in the middle of the night with yet another John Doe
sighting at a local hospital. She had berated herself for not wanting
to go...It wouldn't be him. It hadn't been any of the other times.
But she couldn't let herself give up on him. So she had gotten
dressed and headed to the hospital.

When she arrived, she had been greeted by the beaming eyes and
lopsided grin of Melvin Frohike.

"It's him...I saw him. He's okay."

"What? Where is he? I want to see him."

She had entered his room cautiously, not sure what to think or
believe. It had indeed been Mulder. An unconscious, but otherwise
normal, Mulder. After conversing with his doctor, she had learned
that all of the tests they had run had resulted negatively. There
appeared to be nothing wrong with him - mild dehydration and perhaps
exhaustion - but nothing wrong.

When Mulder awoke the following morning, Scully was greeted with a
loving kiss and a surprising inquiry into the nature of his hospital
visit.

"You don't remember anything? Mulder...You... You were abducted. Just
like I was. You've been gone for about three and a half months."

They had spent the remainder of the day discussing the events
surrounding his abduction and the aftermath. She told him of Doggett
and Kersh, of the Gunmen and Skinner's unrelenting search and faith,
everything she could think of. Everything except her pregnancy.

	**

How do I tell him? I can't tell him now? He needs to recover, her
needs time to rest and get back into the swing of things. He wasn't
expecting this - not that I was. How will he react? I will tell him.
Not yet, though. The right time will present itself.**

She had continually answered Skinner's and her mother's probing
questions with the same answer.

"I will tell him soon. Not now. He needs time to recuperate."

If only Skinner and her mother didn't give her that disapproving look
every time she disclosed that she *still* had not informed Mulder of
her pregnancy.

 * * * * * * * * * *

	They had just made love for the first time since his return. It had
been slow and tender, but filled with the emotion and passion that
they had remembered. Now, Scully lay facing Mulder watching his chest
rise and fall as his eyes closed in rest.

**I have to tell him.**

"Mulder, there's something...Mulder?"

He had already fallen asleep. **Oh, well** she thought to herself,
**I'll just have to tell him later. No. Not later - tomorrow.**

 * * * * * * * * * 

He was already up - she could hear him in the kitchen. 

"Mulder, I don't want any breakfast this morning...don't make
anything for me."

"Are you sure?" was the response from the other room.

"Yeah, I'm sure. I have a budget meeting in a little over an hour. I
need to shower and then go."

She had been in the shower for just a few moments when he sat down on
the sofa, TV remote perched in one hand, breakfast plate in the
other. He juggled the contents in his arms as he heard the phone
ring. He glanced around but didn't see the phone anywhere. Soon he
realized that the ringing was from Scully's cell phone. He clumsily
made his way to her computer bag on the desk to retrieve and answer
the phone for her. As he pulled the phone out of her bag and checked
the caller ID, he noticed a small slip of paper flutter to the
ground. As he stooped to pick it up, he froze. The image on the paper
couldn't be, could it? Mulder palmed the paper and examined it
closely, the phone call long forgotten...

Scully, BabyDana..................14 wks...............21.2 cm
approx.



**This just can't be. Scully's not pregnant. She can't have children.
But what if she is? If she's 14 weeks, that means she got pregnant
while I was missing, or around that time. But, wait...the date on the
sonogram picture is from like, I don't know, 5 or 6 weeks ago...that
would mean... Oh My God. She was pregnant when I left for Oregon. Oh
My God.

 * * * * * * * *

Scully mapped out her plan in her mind as the hot water poured over
her. She would take the rest of the day off after the budget meeting,
come home, make love to Mulder, make him his favorite dinner and then
tell him about the baby. As she went over her mental checklist of
items she would need from the grocery store, she was jolted by the
blast of cold air as the shower curtain flew back, revealing an
extremely upset looking Mulder.

"Mulder? What..." And then she saw it. In his hand, at his side, was
the sonogram photo.

"You're pregnant." 

It wasn't a question, or an accusation, merely a statement.

"Mulder, I..."

"Save it, Scully. You're pregnant, presumably with *my* child, and
you decided not to tell me??? I had to find out on my own? Were you
planning on *ever* telling me?"

"Mulder, it's not like that. I..."

"You what? Hadn't gotten around to it? Or were you just going to keep
it from me entirely? Let me down easy? Don't want that wacko Mulder
in my kid's life...is that it? Am I not good enough?"

"Mulder, no..."

She quickly turned the water off and replaced the chill on her skin
with the warmth of her robe, tying it as she chased him from the
bathroom to the bedroom. He spun around quickly, to face her, as she
neared him.

"I just, I don't understand this. I love you. I thought you loved me,
but what do you do? You find out that we are going to have a baby,
something neither of us even considered possible, and you don't tell
me. I know that I may have extreme beliefs, and maddening faith and
methods at times, Scully, and I have lead a rather dangerous life for
the past few years, but would I be a horrible father? So horrible
that you would want to hide our child from me?"

Tears streamed steadily down her face at the harsh words pouring from
Mulder's mouth.

"Mulder, stop it. Just STOP!"

He stood looking at her, fuming and obviously hurt. She had not meant
for it to happen this way. She could not remember the last time she
had seen him this angry...if ever this angry with her.

"This should be one of the happiest days of my life... of *our*
lives, but instead, I find out like this."

"Mulder, don't, please. I was going to tell you. I swear to you, I
was. I tried to tell you last night, but you had already fallen
asleep. I was going to tell you tonight over dinner. I just... I
wanted to wait until you were ready. You haven't 	 been back that
long, and I didn't want to overwhelm you with everything as soon as
you returned. You needed to rest and heal, and just be loved.
And...well, I didn't want..."

"Didn't want what, Scully?"

"I didn't want to burden you. Mulder, we had no idea that conceiving
this child was even possible. How unfair would it be of me to just
assume that this is something you want? I did not want to force you
into a situation or circumstance that you might later regret. Our
relationship was so new when this happened...I couldn't be that
presumptuous."

At her words, Mulder's expression visibly changed from one of anger
to one of confusion and hurt. "You didn't want to force me into a
situation I might regret??? Is that what you think? That I wouldn't
want to have a baby with you? That I would feel trapped into a
relationship with you? You think that these are things I don't want?
I don't understand that, Scully. Look, I...wait. Where is my father's
cigar box? The old one that used to be in my desk? What did you do
with it?"

"It's, it's still in your desk, I think. It's in my the living
room...Mulder, what are you doing?"

As she followed him into the living room, her mind reeled at what he
could possibly be looking for in the middle of such a critical
discussion. He turned back to face her, a small blue box tied with a
white ribbon in his hand. As he extended it to her, her mouth opened
slightly, in disbelief.

"Open it."

"Mulder, what?..."

"Just open it, Scully."

As she untied the silken ribbon and removed the lid from the box, she
stared down at the dark velvet box it revealed. Her hands were
shaking as though she were freezing or she hadn't eaten in days.

"Mulder..."

"Open it."

She followed his instruction, as she pulled the velvet box from its
container, opening the lid. Her immediate gasp was met with a smug
smirk and arrogant glance from Mulder.

"Is this the action of a man who doesn't want to be trapped? Who
would regret the 'situation?' Do men who don't want to be tied down
buy engagement rings for the women they love?"

"Mulder, it's...it's...Beautiful." 

The tears started anew as she continued to stare at the beautiful
platinum band and its large perfect diamonds.

He went to her then, held her and told her he loved her. All of her
fears and doubts were washed away by the flow of his words and
feelings. "I love you so much. I always want to be with you...I
thought you knew that. I bought that ring a week before the two of us
left for Oregon. I was just waiting for the perfect time to give it
to you...to ask you to marry me. Here. Try it on."

After he slipped the ring onto her finger, he fell to his knees in
front of her and pleaded with her, asking that she marry him, that
she become, not just the mother of his child, but his wife. Her
tear-strangled affirmative was soon muffled even further by his lips
as he kissed her passionately.

 * * * * * * * *

After making love, Scully had drifted off to sleep. He lay with her,
his hand protectively over the mound of her stomach, over their baby.
The thought of becoming a father frightened him, but the prospect of
having to protect their child from danger frightened him even
further. He made his way out to the living room as Scully slept on.
When she finally awakened an hour later, she found him perched on the
couch, papers strewn all around him. He was pouring over the lab
results from her amnio and various other tests.

"You're right...everything appears normal. We're going to have a
happy, healthy baby."

He smiled as he patted the seat next to him, urging her to join him.
As she did so, he turned to her questioningly.

"The only thing that looked odd was this. What is this blacked out
section?"

As he produced a page of results from her amnio, she looked at it and
quickly understood his question.

"I had Dr. Williams do that. It's the baby's sex. I didn't want to
know...not without you."

"Scully, I...thank you. It would have been okay for you to find out.
I mean, I would have understood. Actually, I kind of wish you had. I
want to know what it is."

"Mulder! Don't you want it to be a surprise?"

"Just the fact that there's a baby on the way is enough surprise for
me. No more surprises, just nice and normal. That's all I want." She
looked at him knowingly and lovingly, taking his hand.

"So, if you're going to be a mother, you have maternal instincts,
right? What are they telling you? Is it a boy or a girl?"

"They are telling me that if this baby - boy or girl - doesn't eat
soon, there's going to be some trouble. Come on let's go make
dinner."

"You can't dodge the question that easily, Scully. I mean, you have
to be leaning more toward one sex than the other...what do you think
it is?"

As they made their way to the kitchen, his persistence was finally
getting to her.
"Okay, I'll tell you what I think, but you have to do the dishes."

"Deal."

"Well, I'm not sure, but I have a feeling that it's a boy."

And they continued on that way all through dinner and on through the
night, as Mulder explored the details of his surprise baby and
pregnant fiancée.



end.

Let me know what you thought. jawsoxz3@prodigy.net