TITLE: Swevyn AUTHOR: Rosetta Stone EMAIL ADDRESS: rosetta_s@hotmail.com DISTRIBUTION STATEMENT: Gossamer, okay. Everyone else, please ask. SPOILER STATEMENT: No actual spoilers. But in my mind, at least, it takes place after the events of "Trevor." RATING: PG CONTENT STATEMENT: UST CLASSIFICATION: VRA SUMMARY: Asleep in a hot, humid Mississippi hotel room sans air-conditioning, Scully contemplates the physical properties of matter and her relationship with Mulder. DISCLAIMER: Well, I don't use any character names. So, take that, 1013. NOTES: This is my first story, and what's more, I'm experimenting with tone a bit. Which means that I'd love to hear if what I've done actually works. * * * * * * * * * Dark and heavy. Black and oppressive. There is no color, no light. Only the air as it surrounds, presses down, pushes away. Hot and thick, heavy, unbearable. Not even air. Not light, breathy free. There is no space, no freedom, no movement. Neither liquid nor gas nor solid. It is none of them and all three. Liquids. Damp, heavy. Thick like liquid. Weighting me down at the bottom of the sea. *One of the primary properties of liquids is viscosity.* Molecules bond together, flow together. The tide ripples in and out. Moves, stirs. There is no movement here. Gases. *Gases expand to fit their container.* Their container, this room. Four walls. Small, square box. Me, the irregularity. Air all around, every corner, every curve. Full. Inescapable. Solids. *Characterized by a definite mass.* Mass, weight. Pressure upon my shoulders, on my lower back, slick with sweat, the backs of my thighs. My face. Pressure heavy but soft. Thick, dense, resilient. There but not within my grasp. Building blocks are solid. The mass, the matter, all those molecules, all pressed together. Jammed into one little square. Like the room. Little wooden squares, somehow so concise. Numbers, letters, colors. Painted little squares. This room, black. No shadows, no depth. Heavy, black darkness. Not an absence, a inescapable presence. Here and everywhere. Black, inescapable, heavy. All of the night in this one room. In this room, there is no difference, no space, no boundaries. Within this box, all is one - dark, heavy, hot, thick. A perfect ninety-eight point six degrees inside and out. Uniformity gives way to unity. My body. There, still. Like the room, heavy, thick. There is no movement. No boundaries. I am here and everywhere. My thoughts, inside my head. Inside my chest. Outside myself, next to the bed. No words, only awareness. Only awareness and a breath. On my cheekbone. Right there. Only a fluttering. Was it? Too light even to believe, to comprehend. There. A disturbance in the room. Unity shattered. But the appearance of uniformity remains. They come with regularity now, light breaths, a breeze upon my cheek. I doubt no more. Cooler, lighter. A difference I can feel, sense, on which thought can focus. A breath on my cheek. Another. And another. Soft, again. Not violent. No wintry gust. Not sharp and piercing. A light feather breath. There on my cheek. Different. Terrifying. Without a doubt, I know. He is there. Beside my bed. Kneeling, leaning over. *Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.* An unlikely portrait of prayer. His face, so close to mine. Breathing. Outside my body, still, I know. I picture. I see. His presence, tangible, radiating. He is unshaven, sweaty, tired. Contemplative. His focus on me. I know he smiles. He smiles silently as he breathes. I do not breathe. One with the room, I have reached an equilibrium. No movement is necessary, possible. Was necessary, is possible. His is an invasion about which I can do nothing, about which I must do something. Instantly, I know I must move. I must turn, confront, engage. Now. I do not. I cannot. I remain, motionless, still - heavy, hot, thick - in my unasked for equilibrium with the room. The air does not fight back. Rather, it shifts to accommodate this alien presence. New curves for the air molecules. He breathes, taunting. He does not shake me. That would be too sudden, to harsh, too demanding. So he breathes. Lightly. On my cheekbone. He knows I know. And he knows I fear. But he knows I expect. Expect him. I should move, should turn, should reach for him. I lie still, my consciousness everywhere, in my head and across the room. Behind him next to him. My body is on the bed. I should move. Paralysis, born, strangely, not of fear but of complete relaxation. A power discounted, unexpected, till now. I want to move, but I am trapped. Inside my body and outside my body. It lies there, warm, heavy, unmoving. Layers of self, of flesh, of inertia. Layers through which I must struggle. Out of which I cannot escape. My thoughts fight upwards, towards the air that is a part of me. Away from the breath, the wind which threatens me. I am trapped inside a body that is no longer mine. I know that I must fight. With release comes pain and fear, passion and connection. He is there. He breathes, he smiles, he waits. He waits for my escape. He hopes for it. Is this what abject terror feels like? I know. I accept. I want. But I cannot have. I will but cannot enact. I observe but cannot do. Sinking into this warm, heavy, thick, stagnated bliss, I fight. I fight, knowing that I must. That I need. That I fight only to fight again, to fight terror, to face him. I struggle upwards, through myself. Pushing through walls, through flesh, through air. He breathes. I cannot even whisper. Reach out for him. I struggle. There is no reply. My body does not, cannot, will not listen. And suddenly, I am free. Sitting, reaching out, flicking the lamp switch. Nothing. He is not there. I am here, huddled, one solid mass with defined boundaries, compact molecules. I am finite. The lamp glows, casting irregular shadows. The fan hums, wafting out a breeze, heavier here, lighter there. Reaching my pillow. The air moves, is different, is separate. He is not there. He was never. I could not. And so I will my body to obey. And it cries. The End. Give a first-time fanfic writer some feedback. Please? rosetta_s@hotmail.com * * * * * * * * * * * * In between freezing and melting. In between love and despair. In between fear and sex, passion is." --Jeanette Winterson, _The Passion_