DISCLAIMER:  We do not own these characters.  We just like to make them jaunty
and happy.

CATEGORY:  VR
RATINGS:  NC-17
KEYWORDS: MSR
ARCHIVAL:  Gossamer, please.  Anyone else, just let us know.
SPOILERS:  None.  But you might not feel so fresh afterwards.
SUMMARY:  The body is a canvas, meant to be painted.

We would like to thank our wonderful, dare we say, goddess-betas, Dasha,
Kirsten, Gwen, and Alanna, who are currently covered in green goo, smoking far
too many Marlboro Lights, and waiting for the Chinese delivery person.  Shame
on them.

Multiple-personality disorder is a nasty, nasty thing.  Tsk, tsk.

Feedback is better than margaritas -- naissance4@hotmail.com

INDIA INK
By Gang of Four.

+++++

Footsteps on floorboards, echoing a measured cadence.

Dim lightbulbs casting a warm glow on tile.

Heartrate quickening, as it so often does when she approaches his door.

Two weeks missed, two weeks of his phantom hands on her skin under the
too-crisp hotel sheets, his remembered sighs ringing in her ears, trying to
conjure the smell of his hands as they touched her.  His scent and sound and
sight existed solely in her memory in those moments, and while the memory was
potent, it could not begin to compare to flesh and bone and soul.

Apartment 42.  Keys clasped between gloved fingers, she pauses, breathing in
anticipation.  Memories will soon be realized.  Yet, before she can put key
into lock, the door swings open, and he stands before her.

Memories fade into the reality of Mulder.

"Hey," he says, the word less a greeting than a sigh.  Right hand moves through
his hair, left hand welcoming her with the touch of fingers on shoulder. 
Dipping her head in an uncharacteristically shy gesture, she smiles in the
direction of her shoes.  He draws her inside with a sure grasp, and shuts the
door behind her.  The sound of wood on wood fills the darkened apartment.  

"Did you get my e-mail from Houston," she asks, but he stills her lips with his
fingers.  

"Not now.  Time for voices later."  Hands tightening on shoulders, Mulder turns
her around so that she is facing his front door.  In one swift instant, silk
slithers over her forehead and all is black.  

Sight leaves and touch begins.  

"What?"  

Her voice trails away as she feels soft breath on her ear.  "Did you miss me?" 
Without waiting for a reply, he continues, "I missed you."  His voice is hot
chocolate spiked with whiskey.  

"I--" 

"I said, don't speak,"  his tone a warning.

She complies, hesitation fighting with arousal.

With a firm grasp, he leads her away.  After a few steps, she feels a rug under
her feet and realizes that she is in his bedroom.  The scent of sandalwood
overpowers the familiar smell of dusty books and past transgressions.  

"Your clothes, Scully."  

Her hands remain at her sides, fingers balling into fists, trying to determine.
 

"What about my clothes?"

His voice is gruff, words demanding.  "Your suit is nice, but it would look
better on the floor."  And then he commands, "Take it off for me."  

With shaking fingers she draws the buttons through the holes and lets the
jacket slip downward, past the silk of her camisole, which is quickly shed. 
She hears his weight settle on the bed with a familiar creak.  Abandoned but
not alone, she shivers in the warm room, goosebumps prickling her skin.  

"The skirt," he reminds her.  As she lowers the skirt, she hears the sound of a
zipper not her own, and a soft sigh.

He is getting ready for her.  

Expectation is a tangible presence in the room.

"Naked, Scully.  You're not finished."  

As her fingers hook around the band of her panties, she can feel wetness and
warmth.  She is aching for his touch, but he remains distant.    Surprised into
obedience, she awaits his next command. 

"You want me to touch you, don't you, Scully?"  She catches her breath.  "Touch
yourself first.  Make yourself ready for me."  

Cool fingers trail across the swell of her breasts, tracing slow circles.  As
she gives herself over to the sensation, his voice follows her fingers over her
body.  

"Did you touch yourself like this while you were in Houston?"  

"Yes," she whispers.

"Did you think of me?"

She tips her head back and moans.  "Oh God, yes."  One hand moves down her
stomach, to a place needy for touch.  As her fingers glide across wetness, she
hears the sough of his breath.  

"Nice," he murmurs. "Scully, do you know what I'm doing right now?"  She
imagines his hands making their own journey, parallel to her own.  "I'm
touching myself, just as I did every night you were gone.  Do you know how hard
I am right now?"  

Her knees buckle slightly, and she takes a step forward to steady herself. 
Fingers insistently circle her clitoris.  She wants to see the image of
herself, and of him watching her -- but the blindfold taunts her.  

"Mulder, I--"

He interrupts, "Take a step forward."  She does, and feels the edge of the
mattress against her knees.   "Lie down on your stomach,"  he guides her.  Cool
sheets against warm skin, she complies.  "Now you're just where I want you."  

The bed shifts under her, and her pulse quickens at his approach.  And then he
finally touches her.  His body covers her, until she can feel nothing but
mattress and Mulder.    Insistent hands press against her wrists, pushing them
down into the mattress.  His hot breath on her neck, the hardness of his cock
brushes along her thigh.  She arches her back, waiting for him to enter her, to
fill her.

His finger forms a slow circle on the flesh of her lower back.  "This," he
gasps into her ear.  "This commemorates a night a long time ago."

My tattoo, she thinks, remembering pain mingled with arousal.

Again, he speaks.  "I want to make my mark on you tonight."

Abruptly, he rolls off of her and she hears him stand up.  Suddenly, her bare
back feels cool without the touch of his skin.

She can hear the squeak of the dresser drawer opening.  She rolls over and sits
up.  "Scully," he warns.  "I have a lot more ties in this drawer.  Do I need to
use them on you?"

Scully shakes her head.

"No," he says firmly.  "You will need them tonight, I can tell."

Blinded, she shivers at the image and once again resumes her submissive
position, her will and body becoming clay for only him to shape.   With quick
fingers, he slips silk around her wrists and binds them to the headboard.

"Why are you doing this to me," she asks in a voice that mingles fear and
desire.

"You need to be still for me, Scully," he rasps.  

With familiar ease, he grasps her hips in her large hands, and she feels two
pillows slide under her.  Her breath stills as she instinctively spreads her
legs for him.  

He feathers his fingers along her newly exposed skin, opening her with his
fingertips.  Two fingers slip inside her, and his breath slides over her
tattoo.  "You've been a good girl.  You're ready for me now."  

Her retort is to thrust her hips back into his hands.  

"I can taste you on my fingertips." 

He's teasing me, she accepts.  

"Give it to me," she moans into the pillow, her legs spreading wider.

His words are bullets on her skin.  "Not yet."

"Please," she whispers, almost but not quite ashamed to be reduced to begging
for him.  She feels his warm, wet fingertips softly trace intricate patterns on
her back, circling her tattoo then venturing upward, along her vertebrae.  

Then sensation stops.

She hears a soft rustling as the mattress shifts from his movement.  Suddenly,
patterns are again traced on her back, but now the warmth is replaced by a
cool, tickling sensation.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

His voice is an afterthought.  "I'm making my mark."

The brush begins at her hips, where the roundness of her ass meets the strength
of her back.  Wetness trails up her vertebrae.  She bites her lip, and eyes
open in surprise against the blindfold, which is slipping lower as his hands
move up.  

"Are you painting me, Mulder?" she asks.

He says nothing, continuing to travel up her back.  Each puff of breath cools
the wetness on her skin.  She shifts her hips, needing him there.  And then he
slips inside her, inching inward with each stroke of the brush.

Stroke for stroke, he paints her inside and out.  "You're my canvas tonight,"
he whispers in her ear in a labored rasp.  She wants to move, to turn around
and face him.  But mystery is powerful and arousing, as potent as the meeting
of their bodies.  

She never would have expected to love this as she does now.  

Scully can feel the absence of the brush, replaced by his chest pressing into
her back.  "My work is done."

And now he's marking himself with me, she imagines. 

He stills within her, his body bound to hers.  Time grinds to a halt as they
breathe in unison.  She holds him inside until her need to be fucked overpowers
him.  

"Hard," she mutters into the sheets.  The one word is enough.

Stillness dissolves into frenzy as he drives into her with fierce need.  She
cries out in greedy tones for him to thrust harder, to bring this to its
conclusion.  

"It's time."  

And it is.  Rough hands brush hair from her neck, and she feels his teeth
scrape along her nape.  His hands move along her arms, finding her hands and
clenching them within his own.  Pleasure begins to wash through her.

can'tstanditcan'tstanditcan'tstandit

ohgod.

As she is pulled over the edge, his teeth clamp down on her skin, marking the
moment she comes.  This moment she comes for him.  The keening in her throat is
matched by his growls and she opens her mouth for him, letting the sound out,
begging him to join her.  

Thrusts lose their measure, a cacophany of sound and movement.

Two lovers coming together.  

They slowly return to themselves.  He slowly rolls off her and she protests at
the loss of sensation, then she realizes he is loosening her bindings.  Mulder
gently pulls her upright, then removes the tie that has served as a blindfold.

Color washes through her vision.  The light of a dozen candles casts dancing
shadows around the room.  

"Come to the mirror," he whispers, exhausted.

They move to stand, but their legs fail them, and they support one another on
the short journey across the bedroom, to the mirror on the back of the closet
door.

And then, seeing her reflection, she catches her breath.

Black lines of india ink trace intricate patterns on the smooth white expanse
of her back.  The contrast of black on white is stunning, almost as beautiful
as he is.

His voice is awed.

"Making love can be art, Scully."

+++++

THE END


The writers are a bit punchy at this point.

Good night.

feedback to naissance4@hotmail.com