Chapter 9
I wait outside Agent Skinner's office, somehow more nervous than I was my first day. I hope I'm not going to be in any trouble. A few suited men come out of Skinner's office. Surprised, I look at my watch – it's only a little past 8:30. Looks like I wasn't his first meeting of the day. A few seconds later, he opens the door and waves me inside. As we walk over to his desk, I can't help but notice how tired he seems.
"First things first, Agent Simonson," his voice seems deeper, darker, than usual, "I need you to see if you can identify the man in this photo." Skinner picks a photo out of a case file and passes it to me across the desk. It's obviously of a corpse on a medical examiner's slab. My gut clenches as I remember the happenings of the cave in detail.
"That's the second man who tried to assassinate Agent Mulder." I try to keep my voice steady. He nods and accepts the picture back.
"Thank you. Now," he shuffles some papers around on his desk, "we need to talk about your next assignment, what with Agent Scully returning to duty." He pauses and clears his throat. I realize a moment before he delivers the blow that I'm being punished for my lack of complacency. "Since the rest of the available positions have been filled by your Quantico graduated classmates, you are going to be temporarily reassigned to evidence storage." It's worse than I expected, but I manage to stifle every outward reaction other than a sharp inhale.
"I see. I take it that this assignment transfers me out of your jurisdiction." And your protection, I leave unsaid. He nods once sharply.
"I guess you really do see." A silent understanding of the puppet strings passes between us. His eyes hold a sorrow for my fate that is surprising, given our minimal acquaintance. "I'm sorry," he mutters.
"Don't be – I'd rather be punished for doing the right thing than forever blackmailed and controllable for doing the wrong thing."
"On the bright side, I think you can take your reassignment to be the entirety of any wrath directed your way." I cock my head to the side, intrigued.
"How do you figure?" He shrugs, a somewhat awkward rolling of his shoulders.
"I've been here long enough to see certain patterns. I have the feeling you're out of their crosshairs – and you may never have really been in them in the first place."
"Thanks for intel."
"Thank you, Agent Simonson."
"For what?" I ask, perplexed.
"For not being the person they, for whatever reason, thought you were."
"It was my pleasure," I say with a genuine smile. I stand, smoothing my skirt. "Agent Skinner," I say in parting and outstretch my hand, which he firmly shakes. I try my hardest not to notice the calluses on his palm, the way his warm hand completely envelops mine, the strength in his fingers.
I head towards the door. I'm sure I'll see him around sometime – and evidence logging can't be that bad, can it? On my way out of Agent Skinner's office, I hear Mulder call my name. I turn and see him jogging to catch up to me.
"Simonson, where are you off to?"
"My new assignment – the punitive evidence logging." He grimaces.
"Sorry – that's definitely my fault." I laugh.
"It's not your fault. It's mine for not letting you die," I say with a grin.
"Well, if it's any comfort, I'm glad you didn't. Hey, speaking of evidence, I wouldn't expect to get your jacket back. So," he pulls his suit jacket off his arm to reveal a jacket almost identical to the one I was wearing that fateful night, "I thought I owed you a replacement."
"Mulder, you shouldn't have," but I let him set it around my shoulders all the same. It's so thoughtful, how could I refuse?
"It's the least I could do. Keep in touch, Simonson," he says with a wave as he heads into Skinner's office.
"You too, Mulder." At least something decent has come out of today. I make my way to the first floor warehouses after putting the new jacket in my briefcase. There's no way this assignment can be worse than my first day working with Mulder, so walking in, I feel rather confident. It's going to be tedious, no doubt, but that's nothing I can't handle.
I scan my ID to get through the door and approach the chain link fence that goes all the way to the top of the warehouse ceiling – nearly three stories. I head to the glass booth where the sign-in agent sits.
"Hi, my name is Laila Simonson. I was told to report here for my assignment," I tell the overweight, elderly agent.
"Hm. I wasn't told to expect you. Let me radio the manager." Fifteen minutes later, a sour-looking agent makes his way to the cage. Unlike Skinner's gruffness, which I suspect has been born out of a need to be cautious about who he trusts, he just seems angry.
"Yes, Agent Simonson. You're late." My new manager waves to the security guard, who buzzes the gate open. I step through.
"Sorry, I had a debriefing meeting at my previous assignment." He snorts.
"I don't know who your last supervisor was, but I don't tolerate tardiness." Did he even hear me? He looks me over with a sneer. "Name is Agent Woolden. You will refer to me as either 'Agent Woolden' or 'Sir Woolden'. Is that clear?"
"Yes, Sir Woolden." His gaze lingers on my chest. Did I somehow time jump two decades ago?
"Follow me." He leads me back between stacks of pallets to a desk underneath a shelving unit. God, this place is both mustier and darker than Mulder's office.
"You will be logging the serial numbers on these bills." He points to a crate full of hundreds. He logs me on to the computer. "You will be accurate. You will be timely. You will wear gloves. And you will not have any complaints. When you are finished recording a serial number, you will put the bills in plastic bags in these boxes." He points to more manageably-sized boxes that evidence is stored in. "Write the date, case number, and your badge number on each box. Get started," he orders.
But he doesn't leave. I guess it's understandable he wants to supervise me at first to see the quality of my work, but it feels like being babysat. The boss is an asshole, but I won't let that rattle me. I set my things on the floor and, carefully put on two latex gloves from a box on the desktop, select a bill, and input the serial number in the computer. I'm slower than I would like, but I know I need to be accurate right now. I repeat the process a few times with Woolden silent, but I can feel that he is still watching, waiting for me to make a mistake. I breathe a heavy sigh but continue regardless and ignore how sweaty my palms are getting inside the gloves.
I finally hear his footsteps depart thirty minutes later. I would hope he has something more important to do than wait for me to make a mistake – what a waste of taxpayer dollars that would be. I manage to bear the day philosophically, in a sort of meditative state as I punch numbers into the computer, but it is a relief when it's 5 o'clock.
On my commute home, I keep my bearings about me and try to forget that I have to go back to the same mind-numbing task tomorrow. I didn't drag my ass through Quantico to sit at a desk logging evidence all day. I promise myself that tomorrow I'll check the internal job postings. If I'm off the mysterious cigarette man's radar, then I doubt he would concern himself with keeping me punished.
And yet, a month and countless applications to transfer later, I'm still logging evidence. At this point, I'm pretty confident it's not Smokey Man's doing but rather the record of the incident my first case and the stigma of being put into evidence logging. Sure, everything looks good on paper, but agents don't get put into evidence without a reason. Most of the managers are probably assuming I did something wrong on that case.
Perhaps worst of all is that my favorite instructor at Quantico hasn't returned any of my calls. I even called the department office to check that he is still with the department and isn't on a rather lengthy vacation. So, that means for whatever reason, he's involved with this somehow. Every time I think of how he set me up for this, my stomach twists. Why on earth would he think I would do something so despicable as abandon my partner? I shake off the thought, realizing I had made a typo (I am now logging the serial numbers of guns, and have been, for a few weeks now).
Despite weeks of punctual and almost error-free work, my manager is still suspicious of everything I do and will not refrain from referring to me as "sweetheart." I don't know how much longer I can take this. And, as much as I would hate for these criminals who orchestrated Mulder's attempted assassination to win, I cannot stay in evidence logging much longer. I've decided I will have to quit and search for jobs outside the Bureau. However, I know that it will look incredibly odd on my resume to have graduated from Quantico but not have lasted more than two months at the FBI.
Noon has finally crawled its way to the present, so I head to lunch. I have thirty minutes to eat the rather dry sandwich I brought before Agent What-an-Ass comes barreling down the aisle to my desk.
"Simonson, Assistant Director Skinner is requesting your presence in his office." My eyebrows raise.
"Right now?"
"Yes, now move while you still have time on your lunch break, or you will stay after to make up the missed time." I need no further encouragement, and I certainly don't want to keep AD Skinner waiting.
At his office, his secretary waves me in. All the same, I knock briefly before I enter.
"Agent Skinner, how I can I help you?"
"Thanks for coming by, Agent Simonson." He sighs heavily. I approach his desk.
"Has Mulder or Scully kept you updated on the progress with this case?" We get lunch together about once a week, but we try not to talk shop. So I shake my head.
"Only that they've been having difficulty, naturally."
"That's putting it mildly. Neither man has had hits on DNA or prints or dental records. Agent Bradford's weapon didn't match the slug from the second would-be assassin – which was not a good mistake to make, let me tell you. Scully has just finished the last of the three re-autopsies and found they all actually died of a heart attack, most likely caused by an injection of nicotine right before the post-mortem mauling."
"That should give the families some comfort, at least." I think for a moment. "But you didn't call me up here just to complain about a hard case," I say with a smile.
"No, you're right. It's just, you were there, I was hoping you could maybe remember something you forgot before that might give us a break in the case." I think for a moment, unsure if I should reveal my hunch to Skinner, but then I look into his deep brown eyes and know that I can.
"Well…I don't know how much this might help, or if I'm even right." He leans forward, encouraging me to continue. "One of my mentors at Quantico, a man named Jim Moriarty, is no longer returning my calls. We had talked my first day here, when I called to complain about how things were going with Mulder," I say, a little flushed, "and he had encouraged me to take the first opportunity to change the situation. Between the timing of giving me the cold shoulder and his comment, I can't help but suspect he is involved somehow. I know it's silly, but,"
"It's not silly. Thank you for telling me. Can you write down his full name and contact information?" I nod and jot down my former mentor's information. I check the clock on the wall – I still have ten minutes left on break.
"Was there anything else?"
"No," he says gruffly.
"I'm sorry I couldn't be more helpful."
"Don't be – we all figured the investigation would go like this. I'll keep you posted on if we dig up anything on Jim."
"Thank you." I'm halfway out the door before he calls out to me.
"Simonson," I turn back around, "you're a good agent. Don't forget that."
"Thank you, Agent Skinner." He gives me smile that verges on a grimace. There's no way for him to know how much that meant to me, but it managed to lift my spirits considerably. I manage to make it the rest of the day without banging my head on the desk even once.
