Character: Dana Scully
Fandom: The X-Files
Rating: PG-13
Prompt:
Carry On My Wayward Son (Kansas) Vol 3. Week.25 on scifi_muses on LiveJournal
Setting: Season Five Episode: Chinga

Scully decided it was best just to announce it first off, to get it out of the way. "So, I'm going to Maine this weekend?"

Mulder paused, coffee still at his lips, briefcase hanging halfway between him and his desk, and it occurred to Scully she probably could have allowed him a chance to put his things down first.

"You mean you are going to Maine on purpose?" He chocked on his coffee, frowning at the effort as he continued with setting himself up for the morning.

"Well, yeah. What's wrong with it?"

"Nothing, if you like lobster as big as your head and creepy, Stephen King movies."

Scully rolled her eyes and wondered how much of this was a Vineyard raised boy's disdain for the often forgotten New England state. "How many times have you been to Maine in your life?"

"Precisely twice. Once because my father forced me in a fit of father/son bonding time, and the other on a serial killer case when I first got out of the Academy. I would like to note that both experiences left me wanting to stab someone in the eye."

"Mulder," Scully snorted as he settled behind his desk. "I've always wanted to visit. There is this little fishing village I'm going to. It's nice, it's quaint…"

"All the fishing villages in Maine are quaint, that's how they breed serial killers."

"Maine doesn't breed serial killers." Outside of the one Mulder just mentioned, Scully couldn't honestly think of one from Maine.

"No, then where does Stephen King get his inspiration?"

"You are impossible." She threw her hands up, admitting defeat. Mulder was in a truculent mood and determined to rain on her parade. "I take my first vacation that didn't involve sickness or death in how long and you want to bring up serial killers?"

"Of course, cause you know how vacations work, Scully. You go there, planning on relaxation and fun, and next thing you know the man with a hook for a hand is knocking on your door."

"This coming from a man whose highest form of cultural experience is going to find Elvis' ghost at Graceland?"

Mulder shrugged, flipping on his computer. "Scully, I'm all for you taking some time off, God knows you need it. But why Maine? I mean…your mother is nearby."

Scully rolled her eyes heavenward, as it occurred to her finally that it wasn't necessarily her going to Maine that was Mulder's problem. "So what, you can have me close by in case you dig up Bigfoot in the middle of the woods somewhere?"

"Stranger things have happened."

"Mulder," she snapped, looking for something to toss across the room at him. "It has been months since I've been away from DC, from work, from you! I haven't had a vacation alone in…look, I don't know if I've ever had a vacation alone, certainly not since working with you. In the last year I've had cancer, I've nearly been shot at by you, and I lost a daughter I didn't know I had and discovered that I can't have children. And let's not forget the list of other crap that's occurred just in the time I've known you. I've had one weekend in five years where I was out of town without a family member or you in tow, and all I got out of it was an embarrassing tattoo and a one night stand I'd rather forget."

"You know you still haven't let me see that tattoo?" Up went the suggestive eye waggle. Scully's gaze narrowed.

"And at this rate, Mulder, you never will." An acid sweet smile graced her mouth as he laughed at her.

"I didn't say you shouldn't go on a vacation, Scully. I agree with you on all of those counts."

"But you don't want me going to Maine?"

"I'm just saying…you know…."

He waved a hand pathetically as Scully realized that no, she didn't know what in the world he was talking about. "You are saying I can't go now?"

"Well I wouldn't say that."

'What are we doing right now, Mulder? Are there any cases that demand my immediate attention? Am I needed to dissect something strange and potentially gross because the secrets of a global conspiracy ride on it?"

"No," he admitted slowly, guiltily staring down at his coffee cup. One of his long fingers tapped idyll against it as if he were stalling for a reason, any reason to say no to this idea.

"You really don't like the idea of me going on vacation alone, do you?"

"I didn't say I was against the idea."

"But you what? Wants me to stay here and play in the basement with you?"

"What, you don't have fun here?" He glanced around the office as if confused by the idea that anyone wouldn't want to live down there twenty-four seven. Scully bit her tongue and counted to ten before answering.

"Mulder, don't take this personally when I say it. But you drive me crazy, and I'm sick of looking at you."

"I don't know how a man's not supposed to take that seriously, Scully."

"You are my friend, I think the world of you, I can't imagine my life without you in it, yadda, yadda, yadda, but I really need to not look at your face for about four days, maybe five. And Maine is about as far away from that as I can imagine, and I will eat clam chowder, and take bubble baths, and read a book that has nothing to do with anything vaguely paranormal. And I will sleep in as long as I want, and so help me God, Mulder, if I have to see a pair of latex gloves of another form in that time I will take my gun out and shoot someone."

"You'd seriously take your weapon on vacation with you?"

Scully glared at Mulder's bemused expression. "No. I'm trying to make a point, Mulder. I don't want to have to take my weapon, I don't want to look at a case file, a dead body, anything. I just want to relax."

"I think you made your point five minutes ago, actually, when you announced you were going on vacation."

His cheeky grin only made her annoyance more profound. "And so you what, annoyed me into yelling at you, baited me into carrying on for your own personal amusement?"

"So you know how easy you are to wind up. I get you going and you can just run for hours."

Scully bit her tongue so hard she nearly saw stars. "I hate you sometimes, I really do."

"I know." He didn't sound particularly sorry about any of it.

If the man's only source of amusement in his day was keying her up to argue at him, Mulder had serious issues. Scully watched him as he nonchalantly flipped through a paper, sipping at his coffee. Did he plan on doing this all weekend while she was gone, hang out in this office, doing nothing while she went up and enjoyed some time away?

"Mulder, you should take a vacation as well."

"A what?" He didn't look up from the sport section as he busied himself with the daily baseball box scores. Perhaps "vacation" was a foreign word to Mulder, but Scully was determined to remind him of it.

"You know, it's that thing you do when you get away from the office, get away from the city, and do nothing that remotely looks like an X-file for a few days."

"I had a vacation recently."

"Two years ago, when you were forced to take time off, and you spent a day in Graceland."

"See, I know how to live, Scully."

He really was quite hopeless about all of this. "Mulder, at least promise me you'll take the weekend off and stay out of the office. Bum around your apartment if you must, shoot some hoops somewhere, go up to a Yankee game."

"They are on a road trip to Cleveland this week."

"All the better, check out Cleveland and buy a hot dog."

"The only thing to check out in Cleveland as you remember, Scully, was a crappy city and a fat-sucking vampire."

"I don't care if you are checking out three-headed fish, Mulder, get out. You live in this place, you never see the light of day, and after the year we've had…you need to live a little."

Mulder looked as if he was living just fine the way he was, thank you. "Fine, fine, I'll do something. Will you stop harping?"

Triumphant, Scully grinned. "Yes."

With a snap and a rustle of newsprint he put up a barrier between the two of them, clearly done with this conversation. "Leave a man in peace to his sports page."

His disgruntlement earned a soft snort from Scully, but she gave in, allowing him to hide behind his paper while she turned to her own computer. It would be good getting away from each other, to enjoy some time not in each other's company. No X-files, not strangeness, just a normal vacation, doing things normal people did when they were on their own. This would be good for them both. Really…it would be.

Just how many Stephen King serial killer novels were set in Maine again?