Character: Dana Scully
Fandom: The X-Files
Rating: PG-13
Prompt: Picture of President Obama staring at ceiling with caption: Pencils? On the Ceiling: OK, who let Fox Mulder in here? (Fox Mulder-X-files) 42 on scifi_muses on LiveJournal
Setting: Season Six Episode: Drive
AN: Not that I'm changing my rating, but there is a warning for gratuitous uses of swear words.
Despite the fact that Scully carried a weapon everyday, she wouldn't necessarily call herself a violent woman. But there were days…and there were people that decidedly made her rethink her policy on randomly discharging her handgun whenever the mood struck her. Right now, Assistant Director Kersh's smug face fairly screamed that it was a perfect target. Skinner never made her respond this way, and yet look at the self-satisfied expression as Mulder stalked out of the man's office made the holster just under her suit coat tails itch, the leather rub against her skin.
Not that Mulder hadn't provoked him…Mulder was good at that.
"Sir, Agent Mulder has been through a lot," she stated, reminding her new boss that her partner hadn't exactly had the easiest of weeks. After all he had been put on manure duty, followed by an abduction at the hands of a bigoted racist who forced him to drive hundreds of miles at gunpoint, only to nearly reach his destination and have the man die on him, his head exploding in a rain of blood, bone, and gore. It hadn't really been one of Mulder's prime days…or one of his prime years for that matter.
Kersh obviously was in no mood to show empathy towards her erstwhile partner. "And you apologize for him a lot. I've noticed that about you."
"I'm not apologizing for this. Because of his work, the DOD is shutting down their antenna array in northeast Nevada. Our participation in this case saved lives."
Her arguments obviously were not going to be particularly persuasive to him. "I don't see you proving that. The Department of Defense admits to culpability whatsoever. Furthermore, they say that the closing of the antenna was in fact coincidental."
"Right," she drawled, snorting at the typical, "cover our ass" response. Of course they would say that, she seethed. Would the Defense Department really admit to having a antenna array that had caused the death of several, innocent civilians? Anyone with half a brain in the FBI knew this, and knew the politics involved once the Justice Department started calling out the Defense Department on anything. And yet Kersh swallowed it. Of course he would it was the safe answer, the reasonable answer, it meant he wouldn't have to admit that Spooky Mulder was right, that he had done any good in this, that he could keep him under his thumb. Because ultimately, as Scully was quickly realizing, that was what Kersh's job was. He was supposed to be the hard ass here, he was to do what Scully could not as Mulder's partner, undermine his work, doubt his theories, and keep Mulder out of the X-files.
A stern frown settled on Kersh's dark face, and Scully had a feeling she wasn't going to like what she was about to hear. "Don't misunderstand me, Agent. I don't care if you and your partner saved a school bus full of doe-eyed urchins on their way to Sunday Bible camp. You are no longer investigating X-files. You are done, and the sooner you and Mulder come to recognize that, the better for both of you."
Perhaps he had meant it as a reminder and warning to Scully, but did he really have to take such superior joy in the telling? At least he was honest, he didn't care for the truth, or who got hurt, or what wrongs were being committed, only that Mulder stayed choked on his leash. Sadistic, conceited, over-blown…
Her gun itched against her skin.
Without a word or even the pretense of waiting for a dismissal, Scully turned on her heel, reaching for the door, muttering loudly enough for Kersh to hear plainly, "Big piles of manure."
The door slammed on his mildly outraged "excuse me", but she didn't bother to respond to it.
She should have been surprised to see Mulder waiting quietly outside Kersh's office for her, but she wasn't. Uncaring that the assistant directors prim but pretty looking secretary was sitting right there, Scully took one look at her partner and felt all the adjectives rumbling in her brain spew forth in a torrent of angry bile.
"The pompous, smarmy, conceited, supercilious, self-righteous, egotistical, sadistic, idiotic, self-deluded, brown-nosing fuck!"
Her voice was loud enough and ringing enough to carry through the office, down the hallway, even through Kersh's closed, oak door. But Scully hardly cared as Kersh's secretary stopped cold, her pen clattering from her frozen fingers as her eyes attempted to swallow her face. Scully turned on her, eyes flashing as she whipped a finger up to pin the woman in her place.
"And don't you even think about starting in on me on protocol and proper behavior, because your boss wouldn't know the proper way to respond to a crises if it came and bit him in the ass. People were dying, and he couldn't care less, because we weren't checking the licenses of farmers to make sure they could have a shit pile in their back yard?" Yes, a shit pile, this was what it all was. "And I know he can hear me in there, and good. The hell he's going to say anything because that would mean he would have to face up to the truth like a man."
"Glurp?" It was about the only noise the secretary could mange as she found someway to speak, but no way to form coherent thought under the violent fury of the agent standing in front of her.
Scully whipped around, away from the idiotic woman and towards her equally awe-struck partner, who seemed transfixed suddenly by the tableau in front of him, hazel green eyes shining as she fumed. "He wants us working shit work, then, I can think of some shit work I'd like to do to him right about now."
Perhaps it was the swearing that finally broke through the reverential state Mulder found himself in. He shook himself, fingers reaching across to grasp Scully's elbow firmly and steer her away from the very terrified looking secretary at her desk. "Scully, perhaps we should take this outside."
"Outside, then he wouldn't be able to hear what I really think of him," she snapped, glaring at the thick, varnished door that stood between herself and the real object of her ire.
"Believe me, the way your voice carries, I think he can hear you just fine. But I think you've scared his secretary enough, and she thinking about calling security. After all, you have a gun and she doesn't." He tried to shoot the woman a reassuring smile, but it only seemed to make her worse. Scully thought she could see the woman's fingers inch towards the phone.
"You're right," she acquiesced, the fury dimming somewhat, now simmering low beneath the surface. "She can't help that her employer has his head so far up his ass he's got shit for brains."
"All right, Sailor Scully, that is quite enough," Mulder drug her out of the office doors and down the hallway, earning the mild and curious stares of passers by who wondered what in the world the ruckus in AD Kersh's office was about. Scully glared at them all stormily as Mulder pulled her firmly to the elevators, refusing to let her go even as she pulled against his tight grasp.
"Nope, I'm not letting you loose again, not with the sort of language you are spewing. Good Catholic girl my eye, does your mother know you speak like that?"
"She was married to my father, who do you think taught me?" Scully yanked again, but he refused to budge, fairly throwing her into the open elevator before following suit, turning on her in part shock, part awe, and part amusement.
"Dana Katherine Scully, I don't believe I've ever seen you lose your head like that once in the five years I have known you." Not cool, calm, controlled Scully, not the woman who stood before OPR boards and Skinner interrogations. As reason seeped in slowly to Scully's overwrought brain, she realized that no, perhaps he hadn't. God, that part of her she thought was long gone, washed away with her childhood. She thought she had grown into her temper, had tamed it. But the smug look on that man's face when he said he didn't care who they saved. Innocents died…and that didn't matter to him?
"Mulder, I'm not sorry I said what I did."
"You may be sorry when you get slapped with a protocol violation for speaking that way about a superior." Mulder fretted as the doors opened and waited for Scully to walk out into the marble lined lobby, following close at her elbow. "Your record has enough docks on it because of me, Scully, you don't need to add to it."
"Well let me add to it honestly, then, and say what I think," she snapped, rubbing at the bruising his fingers left on the tender flesh inside her arm. "Mulder, this isn't about keeping the X-files from you, you heard him. He wants you to quit, he's daring you to. He's nothing better than a schoolyard bully, a drill sergeant in a suit with a badge. He wants to break you, humiliate you, and he doesn't care who gets hurt doing it."
"I know," Mulder replied simply.
"You know," she whipped up to look at him as he shrugged, a hand at the small of her back resting gently there as he propelled her through the office doors. Her skin tingled at the pressure, so near where her holster resided, and she felt herself relax physically at the contact.
"You know, you are awfully cute when you are mad," Mulder grinned broadly, eyes shining. "It's even better when it's on my behalf."
"Mulder, I am serious."
"I know. And that's what makes it so wonderful."
What in the hell was he talking about? "Mulder, this isn't simply about keeping the X-files away from you. And I can't abide that, it's wrong, it just simply is. This isn't what I came to do at the FBI, I came to help people, not to avoid my duty because of politics."
"Did you realize you said "fuck" and "shit" repeatedly in that tirade. I mean, I know you swear from time to time, Scully, but I think that's the most extended use of cursing I've ever heard from you in one sitting." Mulder seemed fixated on her course language as he wended through the light, afternoon crowds on the street, his feet making their way to the local coffee shop haunt that many in the Hoover Building wandered to for occasional breaks in the day. Scully followed, in no mood for coffee, but certain that if she didn't go, Mulder would flip her over his shoulder and carry her there.
"Mulder, I'm a Navy officers daughter, it wasn't like I didn't hear it from Dad, or Bill, or even Melissa growing up." Melissa had taught her some of the more colorful ones, as a matter-of-fact, and had also taught her to swear in Spanish. "If I'm pushed to a point, Mulder, I can and will break and this…you didn't see the look in his eyes when you left."
"No, but I saw the look in his eyes when he dared me to quit." Mulder ran rough fingers through his dark hair, shrugging against the light, cool late September breeze. "I know what he's trying to do, Scully. And I know he got to you. It's another tactic. If he gets you mad enough, perhaps you will get enough of him, or me, or whatever that you will quit too."
"If I wanted to, Mulder, I could have done it months ago." A part of her wondered still if she shouldn't have after all.
"The point is he wants to win. If he wins, then I lose credibility, and whatever work I've done is truly lost."
The plan was insidious and yet effective. Scully's temper dampened somewhat at the cold-heartedness of it. "Do you think that Agent Fowley would…"
"Diana has her own agenda," Mulder cut in quickly, brushing Scully's suggestion aside. "She'll keep the work going, protect it, but that's not what they want to destroy. They want to destroy any pretext of questioning I've ever thrown out there, any validity to my arguments and theories. They want to make me out into the crank who couldn't hack the real, everyday work of the FBI anymore, and so he went to go chase his flying saucers." His words tumbled out as if they left a bitter taste as they left his tongue.
"Are you going to let them?" Scully's question seemed so little and quiet now compared to the force of her anger earlier.
"What, and leave you all alone there? I go away and you might take to potshots at random passers by, I don't think you can be trusted by yourself," he teased, stopping in front of the coffee shop, holding open the door for her. "Besides, I wouldn't give Kersh the satisfaction, the sleazy bastard."
"See, you swear," she pointed out cheekily as she passed by him.
"Yes, well I sort of do it all the time, for you it was rather like the Blessed Virgin cracking out a bitch-slap."
"I'm hardly blessed or a virgin," Scully snorted, staring up at the drink menu. "And you are buying."
"Me," Mulder yipped unhappily.
"Yes, because you left me in there alone to be castigated, and made me lose my temper. And besides, I covered for your ass when you were the one who talked me into this mess."
He sighed rather guiltily, he knew she had him dead to rights. "So what, black and dripping acid like your tongue right now?"
"How about whatever pumpkin spice, sugared, froofy thing they have for fall. I'll take that, and you get yours, and let's go to the Mall to walk and laugh at tourists."
"If that's what turns you on, sure," he teased, getting in line to place an order. Scully sighed, watching him. They were out to break him, she knew that now. They wanted to destroy him, not just keep him from the X-files, and not just discredit his work. How callous Kersh had been about it, how cavalier. Peoples' lives were at stake, she had tried so hard to do something good. And he brushed it off as mere coincidence?
Mulder turned to her, as if sensing where her thoughts were returning and simply smiled. It wasn't a special or secret smile, nothing knowing or romantic about it. But it was his lopsided grin, that cheeky smirk that laughed at their entire situations. And perhaps he was right, this was the situation. They weathered it as best they couldn't, and wouldn't give Kersh the satisfaction.
His smile should be outlawed, she mused, as her stomach churned in ways she didn't find quite comfortable in the given circumstances. She was reminded painfully that she stuck by him through this idiocy not just for her own need for closer, but out of loyalty and love for him….love for him. And it was from that love that her outrage grew, her sense of frustration. She hated this, hated seeing him like this, hated seeing this done to him. How could they not see he was right? How could they not see he wasn't making this up?
One person at least believed him…Diana Fowley. That thought quickly quelled the others, leaving Scully cold and feeling rather empty suddenly. She believed Mulder completely, and he didn't question that loyalty about her…unlike how he questioned Scully. Damn it all…
"Here's your coffee, hot and spiced, and everything nice," he shoved the paper cup under her nose, and Scully found that it didn't sound nearly as appetizing anymore.
"Thank you," she accepted it anyway, since she had forced him to buy it. "You know, rather than walk around the Mall, I think I'll just call it a day, head home, take a bath. I think all of this…I'm tired."
He looked disappointed on her sudden flakiness. "And here I had my heart set on making fun of people walking by."
"I know, I'm sorry just…maybe it's everything, I think I just need some rest."
He deflated somewhat, but nodded, understanding. "Sure. Let me walk you back to the office, make sure you don't attempt to insight a riot in the building before you get out of there."
Scully smiled wanly at his jest. "Sure, though I don't think I'll whip out another can of invectives on anyone, even Kersh, today."
"Good, because I don't think the green newbie's need to hear such things coming out of a respectable, seasoned agent, like you." Mulder fell in companionably beside her as she wandered back out onto the street and towards the Hoover Building once again. "By the way, in case I didn't say it, thanks."
"For," Scully frowned, drinking deeply of her coffee and losing her train of thought.
"For being enough of a partner and friend to care about what Kersh said. And for losing your temper in such a spectacular fashion over the likes of me."
Scully flushed. If only he knew half of it, she thought sadly. "Mulder, I don't lose my composure and toss about insults for just anybody."
"I know, and I feel honored you did it for me."
"Right," she chuckles, her cheeks burning. "Just, don't expect it again."
"I won't, frankly that terrified me."
"Right, I'll keep that in mind for future reference," she teased lightly, feeling her equilibrium returning somewhat. Tomorrow would be a new day, without manure piles or exploding skulls. And maybe, just maybe she could get through the next day without feeling insulted by Kersh's very presence. But somehow she doubted that.
"You know, I wish I had a video camera for when you went off like that, I think Frohike would be so turned on by it."
"Fox Mulder, you are an evil, dirty, despicable man," she snorted, sending spiced pumpkin latte up her nose.
"I didn't even earn a 'fuck' in that description, I'm so disappointed."
Scully had a feeling she was not ever going to live this down.