Alteration of Policy

Note: This one-shot is assuming that, prior to Agent Scully's collapse in the meeting room after finding the Chimera cells in her body ( which caused her cancer), Assistant Director Skinner was semi-reluctantly covering up certain cases (X-files). I haven't seen the whole series in ages, so he might have been unwitting..though another episode he mentions he knew about some things. Takes place during the end of Redux pt 1.

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I didn't become an Agent to be used.

I took my first job here, fresh out of college, in order to serve my country. And I did, for a number of years, until the day I first sat in my executive level office and realized how tangled the chain of command was, and how powerless success had made me.

I followed, though. I willingly, if reluctantly, followed through with orders to cover up Mulder and Scully's investigations from time to time.

My unease grew with each lie, for as time went on I found myself growing closer and closer to them as a friend. It was inevitable, I suppose. When one had over a hundred agents under his command, its inevitable that a sense of duty to protect them will arise, especially when one sees certain people on an almost daily basis.

I was going to walk into that room and uncover Scully's lie about Agent Mulder's faked suicide, because I didn't want to see her shut up in a federal prison with her cancer and without the ability to at least talk to her family before…her death. Had she gotten too far in with the lie, Mulder would of never recovered from her dying somewhere he couldn't comfort her. And then I'd have one dead agent and another lost in a far more frightening way.

Then she'd stood, eyes holding that look that usually meant someone was going to have a gun pointed at their temple, and thrown down solid evidence that she'd been purposefully been exposed to chimera cells containing a virus that gave the cancer's it's base. The files in my hand suddenly became heavy like lead.

I didn't think anything I'd done had led to her slow decay, in fact I'm sure of it. But she was right, and the men I followed had done it, had begun the process of killing a great agent and a good woman just to control and hurt the one man who relied on her being there for four years.

I thought of my wife, Peggy, and instantly realized I had allowed my worst fear to happen to someone under my command: the loss of the one he loved. Now, I know it seems like I never saw it, but Mulder's face after she'd told him of her cancer had cemented years of suspicion.

I locked eyes with Scully, willing my own to show my remorse and my support for her. Then the blood droplets landed on the DNA tests and she looked back up at me again, this time with fear and no small amount of pain.

I'd run forward to catch her even before her knees gave out under her. One hand to her cheek confirmed a change in her temperature from either the shock or the actual sickness. Her eyes were focused, but dull with tears.

"Someone get a doctor!" I'd all but screamed. Someone ran out the door while dialing 911 as I turned back to the woman in my arms, now pale and shaking. Something changed as I maneuvered her into a more comfortable position and leveled my gaze at my superior.

I hadn't become an agent to be used, but I had led myself through the hoops in the end.

Well, I'm done playing the marionette, boys.