F.B.I. Headquarters - J. Edgar Hoover Building, Washington D.C.
August 20
9:12 AM
"Good morning, sunshine."
Scully glanced over at the doorway where Mulder stood grinning lopsidedly, and raised an eyebrow.
"Would I be right in guessing that we have a new case, Mulder?" she asked, noting how his grin momentarily widened at the question.
"Maybe," he shrugged, as he closed the door behind him then walked over to the single large desk which they shared.
She had seen when she arrived 45 minutes ago that the office door was already open and that Mulder's suit jacket was on the back of his chair, so she assumed he had been in a meeting with Skinner. It wasn't unusual for Skinner to call Mulder first and invite him in for an initial briefing, and Mulder would then brief Scully himself. She occasionally found the arrangement irritating, but she also understood why Mulder had never tried to change it.
Because I'm the sceptic, she thought. Because he doesn't want me to debunk the cases before we even get started.
She frowned slightly at this uncomfortable thought. She knew how much Mulder valued her; that wasn't the issue. She also knew that she'd seen many things in the past few years which defied rational, scientific explanation, and which fit Mulder's theories far better than her own. However unconventional his views could be, he had a keen insight into almost any situation they'd ever found themselves in, and she deeply respected him for it.
I guess I just sometimes feel less like his partner and more like an obstacle he has to keep overcoming, she thought. And I worry that he might feel that way too.
"Any chance of some coffee?"
His voice brought her back from her thoughts, and she glanced up and gave him a small smile. She was already holding the coffee jug, and had finished filling her own mug before she'd become lost in thought.
"Sure," she said, taking his mug from the draining rack and filling it before walking over to the desk with both mugs.
"You alright, Scully? You seem preoccupied today," he said, and she could see the single, small vertical crease in the centre of his forehead which told her that he was curious and slightly concerned.
"I'm fine," she replied, and he continued to look at her for a long moment before nodding, satisfied, and picking up his coffee.
She sat down, continuing to watch him as she started drinking her own coffee. Mulder was oblivious to her gaze, and was already engrossed in the case-file binder he'd been carrying under his arm when he arrived.
I wonder what it'll be this time, she wondered.
She saw his mouth curl into a small grin at something he'd read in the file, and she immediately mirrored the expression without even being aware of it. He was a mass of contradictions and contrasts. His life had been shattered so early, and he carried the burden of the loss of his sister Samantha everywhere he went. He was careful to keep his emotions under close guard, but she always knew when he was thinking about it, which was often.
A loss like that could destroy a person; not just the loss itself, but the circumstances surrounding it. It was the not knowing which did the damage, and the effects on Mulder were plain enough to see, including his life-long quest for "The Truth", as he called it. His had not been an easy life, by any means.
And yet, for all his burdens, he could also be infuriatingly, wilfully immature - he actually seemed to gleefully delight in doing so, particularly when he knew it was infuriating her. There was almost no situation in which he wouldn't offer a wisecrack, almost no corner of the office without sunflower seed casings on the floor, and almost no square inch of the roof tiles above their desk which wasn't speckled with holes from thrown pencils. He also had a rather magnificent bad-little-boy expression which he used mercilessly and with tactical precision.
She felt a blush rising in her cheeks, and quickly took another drink of her coffee. Those thoughts were fairly frequent these days, but they were also inappropriate here.
She waited a moment before glancing back up at her partner, but he was still engrossed in the case file. She gave a small sigh, and he finally looked up.
"You sure you're OK?" he asked, and she smiled and nodded.
"So when are you going to tell me what the case is?" she asked, and Mulder immediately stood up, quickly crossing the room to the overhead projector.
He lifted a series of transparencies from the case folder, laying them on the projector's glass bed, and then quickly turned out the room's main light. There was a moment of near-darkness before the powerful bulb of the projector came on, causing Scully to squint briefly as her vision adjusted. When it did, she frowned in distaste.
"I guess they were tired of fighting over the remote," Mulder quipped, but his tone of voice didn't match the levity of his words.
The image projected onto the blank area of the opposite wall showed two people, a man and a woman. They were lying near each other on the floor of what appeared to be a tastefully-decorated study or home-office, and they were both dead. Even upon the briefest initial inspection, it was clear that the man had died from multiple stab wounds to the torso, and that the woman had died from a single wide wound to the neck.
After the initial wave of revulsion had passed, the doctor within Scully took over.
Male; cause of death: blood loss and catastrophic multiple organ failure due to approximately ten to fifteen large blade wounds, appearing to intersect with the heart, left and possibly right lung, and large intestine. Female; cause of death: fatal blood loss due to seemingly single slashing wound to the neck from left side to right, severing the carotid artery.
Mulder's mind also automatically analysed the scene, dispassionately reporting its observations and deductions.
Blood spatter patterns indicate that only the male struggled, and the entire conflict occurred in the area immediately in front of the desk. Blood pooling indicates the male was driven back against the desk, probably by an initial surprise blow from the murder weapon, and then was quickly struck multiple times. He attempted to escape to the left but was blocked by the leather armchair. He then moved to the right, but fell. Blood spray indicates that a small number of final wounds were administered where he lay. Blood and shoe print patterns indicate the female was killed less than one meter from the male, likely immediately afterwards.
"My god, Mulder," Scully breathed, in a small voice, and Mulder gave the barest nod.
"James and Angela Ingles of Akron, Ohio," he said. "Husband and wife."
"She killed him, then herself," Scully said. It was not a question, but Mulder nodded anyway.
"Kitchen knife," he said. "Only fingerprints on it were hers. Found underneath her body."
There was silence in the room for several seconds before Scully spoke again.
"Motive?"
"The local P.D. have no idea," Mulder replied. "By all accounts they were living the dream. He was a successful architect running his own company, she worked in public relations. No enemies, no affairs. They just moved into the house two weeks before."
Scully raised one eyebrow slightly, and Mulder understood her meaning perfectly: What aren't you telling me? He pulled the transparency from the projector bed, and Scully was relieved that the gruesome image was no longer spread across one entire side of the room.
After shuffling through the contents of the case file for a moment, Mulder slid another transparency onto the projector and a new image appeared. It was a sheet of paper, with several lines of typing. Scully felt a chill run up her spine as she read the words.
TOMORROW I WILL WAKE UP AND FIND MY LEXUS REPLACED WITH A FERRARI.
I WILL RETURN TO THE WRITING ROOM, BUT THE MACHINE WILL BE GONE.
I WILL HEAR A NOISE AND BEGIN TO TURN, BUT IT WILL BE TOO LATE. ANGELA WILL KILL ME, AND THEN KILL HERSELF.
THE MACHINE IS FOUND AT A GARAGE SALE THREE HOURS LATER.
"So it was a suicide pact," Scully said at last, and Mulder frowned.
"That's what the police are saying," Mulder replied, and Scully noted that his tone made it clear that he didn't accept the explanation.
"So what's 'the machine'?" she asked, and he raised a finger in the air - clearly feeling that she had reached the heart of the matter.
"It's the typewriter used to type that note," he said, a small smile beginning to play upon his lips. "The husband bought it the previous afternoon, as confirmed by his employees. Went out and just picked it up in his lunch hour, then took it back to the office before taking it home at the end of the day."
Scully digested his words for a moment, and then shrugged.
"A little strange to go to the trouble of picking up a typewriter for a suicide note, but no stranger than making the decision to die in the first place," she said, and Mulder shook his head.
"That's why we got this case, Scully," he said triumphantly, drawing a puzzled frown from her before he continued. "There were three computers in the house, and two printers - all working perfectly. He was an architect so there were literally reams of drafting paper and boxes of notepads, and a whole office supply store worth of pens, mechanical pencils and markers. Yet he went out and bought a typewriter specifically."
Scully sighed. She knew that her partner saw significance in this admittedly bizarre detail, but in her view it was abundantly clear that the typewriter was only another piece of proof of the evidently disturbed mental state of both husband and wife.
"So how do you explain it, Mulder?" she asked, with a note of weariness in her voice which did not go unnoticed. Mulder paused for a moment before replying.
"I can't. Not yet. The Akron P.D. aren't investigating because forensics turned up no suspicious circumstances and the note is 'evidence of frame of mind', whatever that means," he said, disdain evident in his voice.
Scully's frown deepened.
"I've got to agree with them, Mulder," she said, noticing that her partner rolled his eyes. "But that still doesn't explain why the F.B.I. were even notified of this case. It's tragic, but it's hardly a federal crime or of interest to the Bureau. Where did it come from?"
Mulder suddenly grinned widely, a sparkle evident in his eyes, and she felt both warmth and a shiver chase through her.
"Customs fraud task force," he replied, as if that explained everything. He was now beaming. He waited a long moment for dramatic effect before going on, and a very small grin crept onto Scully lips despite her best efforts to contain it.
"No sales record, service history, dealer record, license plates, or even a Vehicle Identification Number," he said. "For the brand new Ferrari Maranello sitting in their driveway with zero miles on the clock."
Scully's eyebrows shot upward and she opened her mouth to speak, but Mulder continued before she could say anything.
"The only vehicles registered to them are her light-blue Honda, which was found in the garage, and his silver Lexus, which he drove home from work the previous night as usual, and parked it in the driveway. And which is now nowhere to be found."
"And get this, Scully," he said, pointing at her with his characteristic exuberance, "According to a neighbour who gets up early to go jogging, the Lexus was still in the driveway at 6:30 AM that day."