FICTION: Two Steps Back

It's hard to move forward when demons from the past keep haunting...

The Rain King episode was a bit of a strange one timewise, in that the teaser begins on a Valentine's Day and then the main events of the case fast forward six months to mid-August. Then in what appears to be an epilogue, the events move forward yet again... to what? A year down the road? [I choose to disregard the events of the epilogue because who really gives a hoot that these two have a kid who quite likely also has the power to affect the weather?]

Anyway, the point is that in my fiction timeline, TWO STEPS BACK is a direct continuation of the Rain King ep, but it is the sixth story in my Crossing Lines series. So if you are also reading my fic in conjunction with catching up on these episode reviews, you may want to continue past S6's Field Trip before you read this one.

Several years before my own personal family history with cancer went very bad, I had a thought that Scully seemed too normal for someone's whose cancer was merely "in remission". I was positive that there would be periods when it would smack her in the face, even if merely on the possibility that it could be back. After all, at the beginning of S5, the cancer had been identified as having metastasized... where did it go?

I wanted to explore all of these things in a story and for some reason, it seemed to fit well into the subpar episode that the Rain King turned out to be. I think I felt the need to explain some of the things that Mulder and Scully said/did within this hour. (And perhaps this belongs in the review of said ep, but Mulder was quite right when he said that "I do not gaze at Agent Scully." At least, I saw no evidence of him having done that in Holman's presence.)

As I've mentioned in my original notes, TWO STEPS BACK was a tough one to end. And it was the first story that I really struggled with, to the point of wanting to scrap it altogether at one point. But I really did believe that the realism that I was attempting to put back into Scully's life was worthwhile. In the end, that's what made me continue and I did get several feedbacks thanking me for having completed it, on that very basis.

On that note, have a Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, what have you - I will be taking a bit of a break and will be back in ten days...