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Disclaimer: They don't belong to me. CC owns 'em. No copyright infringement is intended.
Category: S, I think.
Spoilers: Gesthemane, of course.
Summary: What really happens after Scully tells Blevins et al that Mulder committed suicide.
Author: Vampire69
Please archive. OK to forward to ATXC.
Now, on with the show!
Exposing The Lie
FBI Conference Room
"Last night, Agent Mulder died from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head."
Silence spread across the conference room as the magnitude of that statement, so calmly spoken despite the depth of the emotion displayed on Agent Scully's face, sank into the minds of those gathered around the table. Many had trouble accepting it.
Mulder was a brilliant man, admittedly somewhat eccentric (or a few sandwiches short of a picnic according to others), often arrogant and insubordinate, considered by many as a royal pain in the ass, but no one had ever really considered him suicidal.
The silence stretched for several minutes before being broken, not by someone in the room, but by the sounds of shouts and running feet approaching in the hallway beyond the closed door. The conference room door was flung open and several people gasped at the bruised and battered figure now standing in the opening....Fox Mulder. A very much alive Fox Mulder. And quite obviously livid, too.
Mulder took two steps into the room and, pointing at where Agent Scully was seated, announced loudly: "That woman is an impostor!"
Chief Blevins immediately attempted to regain some measure of control over the situation.
"What makes you make that accusation, Agent Mulder?" he demanded, shelving for the moment the fact that Agent Scully, or as Mulder claimed, her impostor, had just reported that Mulder was dead by his own hand.
"Because I'm right here," asserted an equally bruised and battered Dana Scully that appeared in the doorway at Mulder's shoulder.
Expelling an inarticulate snarl, the impostor launched herself from her chair directly at the two disheveled agents blocking the door. Caught unprepared by the sudden attack, Mulder was sent sprawling into the hallway by a savage kick to his midsection. Scully took advantage of the extra split second afforded her by the impostor's primary focus on Mulder to tackle her as she attempted to force her way out of the conference room.
AD Skinner, summoned by a frantic and unbelievable message from the front security officers, arrived in the hallway outside the room where Scully had been reporting to Chief Blevins and stopped dead in his tracks at the astounding stand-off that greeted him. Three agents had their weapons trained on Agent Scully holding her own gun to the head of a bruised, beaten, but obviously extremely pissed off....Agent Scully. Skinner blinked, unable to believe what his eyes were telling his brain.*Two* Dana Scullys?
But he's supposed to be dead, isn't he? the thought flashed through Skinner's mind as his eyes darted to the familiar face of Fox Mulder, standing a few feet from the pair of Scullys with both hands held up in front of him in a placating gesture.
"You have nowhere to go to," Mulder informed the gun-weilding Scully, his voice calm despite the obvious concern for his hostaged partner etched onto his face, "You know there's no way you're getting out of this building. Give up before someone gets shot."
"Not a chance, Mulder," she replied, voice tight with rage, "I'm dead soon anyway if I get caught, so I really have nothing to lose. You do."
The fake Scully emphasized her point by cocking the hammer of the gun.
"You both should have been dead by now, anyway," she continued.
"Just what the Hell is going on here?" Skinner's voice boomed out.
Scully took immediate advantage of the distraction Skinner's interruption engendered to wrench free of her assailant. Bringing her hand from her jacket pocket where she'd been fishing for the weapon she'd picked up during her and Mulder's escape from the compound where the Consortium had been holding them, she turned quickly and struck, plunging the needle-like point into the base of the impostor's skull.
A few gaping onlookers dove for the floor at the echoing boom when the gun in the impostor's hand fired a bullet into the ceiling as she convulsed briefly before dropping to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. Scully sagged back against the wall, moaning as she raised both hands to her face.
"My eyes!" she groaned, the stinging unbearable as the tissue surrounding her eyes immediately began to swell.
Mulder ignored the stinging in his own eyes as he darted forward and dragged her a few feet away from the corpse. Several spectators wiped at their stinging eyes as they watched in horrified fascination as the corpse began to dissolve, quickly being reduced to a puddle of greenish goo amid the slightly smoking remains of the impostor's clothing.
"What in God's name...?" Blevins asked, wiping at his eyes. He glanced around, observing that only Mulder and Scully, the two people closest to the...remains, seemed to have been strongly affected by whatever it was.
"That, sir," Mulder stated, pointing one hand at the gooey puddle, "Is part of the proof I've been searching for. I believe it was some kind of clone created by hybridizing human and alien DNA. And before you assume I've completely lost my marbles, there are too many witnesses who saw that doppleganger of Scully dissolve. It obviously wasn't human. There's no way this incident can be swept under a rug and forgotten."
Blevins glanced nervously around at the gathered throng of spectators, knowing Mulder had a definite point. He hid a wince when he spotted the older man standing at the edge of the crowd, cigarette in hand and a furious, if somewhat disgusted, look on his face. The only silver lining Blevins could hope this dark cloud had was the fact that the situation was so obviously unbelievable in the first place. And would undoubtably become even more unbelievable as the rumours started circulating, distorting what had just happened into something entirely impossible. But that was a cold comfort compared to the very real fact that enough people had witnessed this 'impossible' incident with their own eyes to make it extremely difficult to bury in a filing cabinet somewhere.
Blevins suddenly had the nightmarish thought that, far from being able to permanently shut down the X-Files as he had hoped, he might find himself faced with requests from a few agents who would actually *want* to transfer and *join* in Mulder and Scully investigations into the paranormal.
Blevins caught Skinner's eyes across the open space around the noxious puddle. The speculative, almost predatory, look on the AD's face suggested that the same thought had occurred to him as well. And that he in fact *welcomed* the idea that there could be people who now might actually *ask* to be assigned to the "Spooky Patrol".
The crowd parted to allow a medic, freshly arrived from the infirmary through to Scully's side. As the medic helped Mulder get Scully to her feet, he glanced at the green goo on the hall floor and muttered: "Ick, what the Hell is that stuff?" before leading the pair towards the infirmary.
Scully clung tightly to Mulder's arm as they navigated the corridors; she couldn't see anything with her eyes swollen shut.
Blevins watched the medic leave with the two agents before turning his attention back to the crowd still transfixed by the puddle of green goo on the hall floor.
"All right, people. I want written reports from each eyewitness individually forwarded to my office by the end of the day. And get a lab team up here on the double to clean this up. I'll be expecting complete forensics analyses of the...er...remains," he said, waving one hand in the general direction on the puddle, "To be sent to my office as soon as possible. For the moment, until the investigation into this incident can be completed, you are not to discuss this. I don't want to be hearing any rumours about this until a statement is released from my office. Enough gawking, you all have work to do, so get to it."
Blevins shouldered his way through the slowly dispersing crowd and headed for his office, wondering how soon the rumours would be flying despite his injunction not to discuss the incident. Damn Mulder for making that point so bluntly, there was no way to keep a tight lid on this. Blevins just hoped that the eyewitness's reports would contain enough conflicting details (it was a law-enforcement truism after all that no two eyewitnesses ever gave precisely the same description of events) that he could instill enough confusion and disbelief that they could put forward the theory that this was all some sort of hoax or mass hallucination.
Not that he expected such an approach to get very far. Mulder and Scully, possibly even Skinner from the look on his face earlier, would undoubtably be unpleasantly vocal in protesting an effort of that sort.
First things first though. All reports from witnesses and forensics regarding this incident would be classified. And an official memorandum from his office adjuring the witnesses and forensics techs from discussing it until an official explanation was handed down from his office to start with. Blevins rubbed his temples, already anticipating the searing migraine that would be shortly making an appearance.
******************************************************************
FBI infirmary
Mulder sat at Scully's side watching the medic swab around her swollen eyes with disinfectant. When the medic left to prepare some ice packs to help reduce the swelling, Mulder took Scully's hand and gave her a reassuring squeeze.
"Don't worry, Scully," Mulder whispered in her ear, "The swelling should start to go down in a couple of hours, I think. It won't do any permanent damage. I've gone through this before once myself."
"Are we alone, now, Mulder?" she asked, turning her head from side to side despite not being able to see.
"For the moment," he replied, "I wonder how long it'll be before Blevins or Skinner shows up with a long list of questions."
"I've got a couple of questions of my own that are more important to me right now than anything they'll probably ask," she sighed.
"Such as?"
"Such as where did that clone of me come from? And do *they* have any more waiting in the wings somewhere? And another thing, why did the guard at the door think you were dead?"
"God, I hope they don't have any more clones of you up their sleeves. The only thing I can think of to explain where she came from is the possibility that they made her from a tissue sample they got from you during those missing three months. I have no idea why the guard would think I was dead."
"Agent...the phony Scully identified a body found in your apartment this morning as *you* Agent Mulder," Skinner announced from the doorway where he'd caught the tail end of their conversation.
"Body, sir?" Mulder asked as Skinner stepped aside to allow the medic back in with a large ice pack for Scully's eyes.
"A man with your general build was discovered, an apparent suicide, in your apartment. Identified by the fake Scully as you to the DC police. Do you have any idea who it actually was?"
"Possibly that...Critchlieu?...Kritchcow? person from the DoD I told you about Scully. The one who tried to convince me that the body in the ice in the Yukon wasn't an actual alien but a hoax they wanted me to think was an alien. And report as such so they could discredit me again."
"Back up a minute," Skinner said, "But first, are you all right Scully?"
"I'll be fine in a few hours, sir," Scully answered.
"You're sure?"
When Scully nodded, Skinner continued, "Save the details for your written reports, just give me the highlights for now."
"Well, sir," Scully began, "They must have taken me while I was asleep...oh, about a week ago I guess. I...oh, God! Mother's Day dinner at my Mom's. That...that...that *thing* impersonated me at my Mom's!"
"You're back now," Mulder reassured her, "You're safe now. Your Mom'll understand, I'm sure."
"They took you? Where?" Skinner asked, more concerned at the moment what they might have done to her than any possible problems the fake might have created at the Scully residence.
"A warehouse near the airport," Mulder answered, "That's where they took me last night. I remember returning to my apartment from the other warehouse where I'd had the alien brought. But they must have drugged me almost as soon as I walked in the door. Then killed Kritchcow or whatever his name was in my place. I don't know why they didn't just kill me outright then."
"If the story the clone was telling is anything to go by, they were trying to make you out to be a suicide after discovering that the driving belief of your life was all a lie, Mulder," Scully added, "If that had worked, they could have then disposed of us both at their convenience and no one would know. Probably after some more of their 'experiments'."
"The guards they had on us were sloppy. We escaped, borrowed one of their cars and came straight here. Scully told me that Blevins had set up a conference and I hoped we could capture the impostor. But I guess that didn't quite work out too well."
"Perhaps some good has come of this though," Skinner informed them, "I've already had three agents approach me with the possibility of transferring to the X-Files. Since your cancer has become common knowledge, Agent Scully, it seems as if they would like to aid in your investigations if your condition means that you have to cut back on your field work."
Both Mulder and Scully were astonished that the incident with the dissolving fake Scully seems to have changed the X-Files from being something to be joked about to something that should be taken seriously.
"Get some rest before you get started on your reports," Skinner ordered, "And make sure you get all the details exact, all t's crossed and i's dotted. It's even more important than usual in this case. Blevins has ordered everything concerning the incident in the hallway to go directly to him, eyewitness accounts and forensics as well."
Skinner paused in the doorway to add, "And think about the offers for more agents working on the X-Files."
"You think maybe we can move out of the basement to an office that has heat in the winter if Skinner can get the X-Files expanded, Mulder?"
"It might actually be worth it if we can avoid getting saddled with another Krycek. But we can worry about that later, how are your eyes?"
"Getting a little better, I can see again, sort of. It's still blurry and they sting a bit, but not as bad."
As the pair walked down to their office in the basement, Scully turned to Mulder and asked hesitantly, "Mulder, how am I going to explain all this to my mother? And Bill? He was supposed to be there, too."
"We'll think of something," he replied with a grin.
THE END
Disclaimer: They don't belong to me. CC owns 'em. No copyright infringement is intended.
Category: S, I think.
Spoilers: Gesthemane, of course.
Summary: What really happens after Scully tells Blevins et al that Mulder committed suicide.
Author: Vampire69
Please archive. OK to forward to ATXC.
Now, on with the show!
Exposing The Lie
FBI Conference Room
"Last night, Agent Mulder died from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head."
Silence spread across the conference room as the magnitude of that statement, so calmly spoken despite the depth of the emotion displayed on Agent Scully's face, sank into the minds of those gathered around the table. Many had trouble accepting it.
Mulder was a brilliant man, admittedly somewhat eccentric (or a few sandwiches short of a picnic according to others), often arrogant and insubordinate, considered by many as a royal pain in the ass, but no one had ever really considered him suicidal.
The silence stretched for several minutes before being broken, not by someone in the room, but by the sounds of shouts and running feet approaching in the hallway beyond the closed door. The conference room door was flung open and several people gasped at the bruised and battered figure now standing in the opening....Fox Mulder. A very much alive Fox Mulder. And quite obviously livid, too.
Mulder took two steps into the room and, pointing at where Agent Scully was seated, announced loudly: "That woman is an impostor!"
Chief Blevins immediately attempted to regain some measure of control over the situation.
"What makes you make that accusation, Agent Mulder?" he demanded, shelving for the moment the fact that Agent Scully, or as Mulder claimed, her impostor, had just reported that Mulder was dead by his own hand.
"Because I'm right here," asserted an equally bruised and battered Dana Scully that appeared in the doorway at Mulder's shoulder.
Expelling an inarticulate snarl, the impostor launched herself from her chair directly at the two disheveled agents blocking the door. Caught unprepared by the sudden attack, Mulder was sent sprawling into the hallway by a savage kick to his midsection. Scully took advantage of the extra split second afforded her by the impostor's primary focus on Mulder to tackle her as she attempted to force her way out of the conference room.
AD Skinner, summoned by a frantic and unbelievable message from the front security officers, arrived in the hallway outside the room where Scully had been reporting to Chief Blevins and stopped dead in his tracks at the astounding stand-off that greeted him. Three agents had their weapons trained on Agent Scully holding her own gun to the head of a bruised, beaten, but obviously extremely pissed off....Agent Scully. Skinner blinked, unable to believe what his eyes were telling his brain.*Two* Dana Scullys?
But he's supposed to be dead, isn't he? the thought flashed through Skinner's mind as his eyes darted to the familiar face of Fox Mulder, standing a few feet from the pair of Scullys with both hands held up in front of him in a placating gesture.
"You have nowhere to go to," Mulder informed the gun-weilding Scully, his voice calm despite the obvious concern for his hostaged partner etched onto his face, "You know there's no way you're getting out of this building. Give up before someone gets shot."
"Not a chance, Mulder," she replied, voice tight with rage, "I'm dead soon anyway if I get caught, so I really have nothing to lose. You do."
The fake Scully emphasized her point by cocking the hammer of the gun.
"You both should have been dead by now, anyway," she continued.
"Just what the Hell is going on here?" Skinner's voice boomed out.
Scully took immediate advantage of the distraction Skinner's interruption engendered to wrench free of her assailant. Bringing her hand from her jacket pocket where she'd been fishing for the weapon she'd picked up during her and Mulder's escape from the compound where the Consortium had been holding them, she turned quickly and struck, plunging the needle-like point into the base of the impostor's skull.
A few gaping onlookers dove for the floor at the echoing boom when the gun in the impostor's hand fired a bullet into the ceiling as she convulsed briefly before dropping to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. Scully sagged back against the wall, moaning as she raised both hands to her face.
"My eyes!" she groaned, the stinging unbearable as the tissue surrounding her eyes immediately began to swell.
Mulder ignored the stinging in his own eyes as he darted forward and dragged her a few feet away from the corpse. Several spectators wiped at their stinging eyes as they watched in horrified fascination as the corpse began to dissolve, quickly being reduced to a puddle of greenish goo amid the slightly smoking remains of the impostor's clothing.
"What in God's name...?" Blevins asked, wiping at his eyes. He glanced around, observing that only Mulder and Scully, the two people closest to the...remains, seemed to have been strongly affected by whatever it was.
"That, sir," Mulder stated, pointing one hand at the gooey puddle, "Is part of the proof I've been searching for. I believe it was some kind of clone created by hybridizing human and alien DNA. And before you assume I've completely lost my marbles, there are too many witnesses who saw that doppleganger of Scully dissolve. It obviously wasn't human. There's no way this incident can be swept under a rug and forgotten."
Blevins glanced nervously around at the gathered throng of spectators, knowing Mulder had a definite point. He hid a wince when he spotted the older man standing at the edge of the crowd, cigarette in hand and a furious, if somewhat disgusted, look on his face. The only silver lining Blevins could hope this dark cloud had was the fact that the situation was so obviously unbelievable in the first place. And would undoubtably become even more unbelievable as the rumours started circulating, distorting what had just happened into something entirely impossible. But that was a cold comfort compared to the very real fact that enough people had witnessed this 'impossible' incident with their own eyes to make it extremely difficult to bury in a filing cabinet somewhere.
Blevins suddenly had the nightmarish thought that, far from being able to permanently shut down the X-Files as he had hoped, he might find himself faced with requests from a few agents who would actually *want* to transfer and *join* in Mulder and Scully investigations into the paranormal.
Blevins caught Skinner's eyes across the open space around the noxious puddle. The speculative, almost predatory, look on the AD's face suggested that the same thought had occurred to him as well. And that he in fact *welcomed* the idea that there could be people who now might actually *ask* to be assigned to the "Spooky Patrol".
The crowd parted to allow a medic, freshly arrived from the infirmary through to Scully's side. As the medic helped Mulder get Scully to her feet, he glanced at the green goo on the hall floor and muttered: "Ick, what the Hell is that stuff?" before leading the pair towards the infirmary.
Scully clung tightly to Mulder's arm as they navigated the corridors; she couldn't see anything with her eyes swollen shut.
Blevins watched the medic leave with the two agents before turning his attention back to the crowd still transfixed by the puddle of green goo on the hall floor.
"All right, people. I want written reports from each eyewitness individually forwarded to my office by the end of the day. And get a lab team up here on the double to clean this up. I'll be expecting complete forensics analyses of the...er...remains," he said, waving one hand in the general direction on the puddle, "To be sent to my office as soon as possible. For the moment, until the investigation into this incident can be completed, you are not to discuss this. I don't want to be hearing any rumours about this until a statement is released from my office. Enough gawking, you all have work to do, so get to it."
Blevins shouldered his way through the slowly dispersing crowd and headed for his office, wondering how soon the rumours would be flying despite his injunction not to discuss the incident. Damn Mulder for making that point so bluntly, there was no way to keep a tight lid on this. Blevins just hoped that the eyewitness's reports would contain enough conflicting details (it was a law-enforcement truism after all that no two eyewitnesses ever gave precisely the same description of events) that he could instill enough confusion and disbelief that they could put forward the theory that this was all some sort of hoax or mass hallucination.
Not that he expected such an approach to get very far. Mulder and Scully, possibly even Skinner from the look on his face earlier, would undoubtably be unpleasantly vocal in protesting an effort of that sort.
First things first though. All reports from witnesses and forensics regarding this incident would be classified. And an official memorandum from his office adjuring the witnesses and forensics techs from discussing it until an official explanation was handed down from his office to start with. Blevins rubbed his temples, already anticipating the searing migraine that would be shortly making an appearance.
******************************************************************
FBI infirmary
Mulder sat at Scully's side watching the medic swab around her swollen eyes with disinfectant. When the medic left to prepare some ice packs to help reduce the swelling, Mulder took Scully's hand and gave her a reassuring squeeze.
"Don't worry, Scully," Mulder whispered in her ear, "The swelling should start to go down in a couple of hours, I think. It won't do any permanent damage. I've gone through this before once myself."
"Are we alone, now, Mulder?" she asked, turning her head from side to side despite not being able to see.
"For the moment," he replied, "I wonder how long it'll be before Blevins or Skinner shows up with a long list of questions."
"I've got a couple of questions of my own that are more important to me right now than anything they'll probably ask," she sighed.
"Such as?"
"Such as where did that clone of me come from? And do *they* have any more waiting in the wings somewhere? And another thing, why did the guard at the door think you were dead?"
"God, I hope they don't have any more clones of you up their sleeves. The only thing I can think of to explain where she came from is the possibility that they made her from a tissue sample they got from you during those missing three months. I have no idea why the guard would think I was dead."
"Agent...the phony Scully identified a body found in your apartment this morning as *you* Agent Mulder," Skinner announced from the doorway where he'd caught the tail end of their conversation.
"Body, sir?" Mulder asked as Skinner stepped aside to allow the medic back in with a large ice pack for Scully's eyes.
"A man with your general build was discovered, an apparent suicide, in your apartment. Identified by the fake Scully as you to the DC police. Do you have any idea who it actually was?"
"Possibly that...Critchlieu?...Kritchcow? person from the DoD I told you about Scully. The one who tried to convince me that the body in the ice in the Yukon wasn't an actual alien but a hoax they wanted me to think was an alien. And report as such so they could discredit me again."
"Back up a minute," Skinner said, "But first, are you all right Scully?"
"I'll be fine in a few hours, sir," Scully answered.
"You're sure?"
When Scully nodded, Skinner continued, "Save the details for your written reports, just give me the highlights for now."
"Well, sir," Scully began, "They must have taken me while I was asleep...oh, about a week ago I guess. I...oh, God! Mother's Day dinner at my Mom's. That...that...that *thing* impersonated me at my Mom's!"
"You're back now," Mulder reassured her, "You're safe now. Your Mom'll understand, I'm sure."
"They took you? Where?" Skinner asked, more concerned at the moment what they might have done to her than any possible problems the fake might have created at the Scully residence.
"A warehouse near the airport," Mulder answered, "That's where they took me last night. I remember returning to my apartment from the other warehouse where I'd had the alien brought. But they must have drugged me almost as soon as I walked in the door. Then killed Kritchcow or whatever his name was in my place. I don't know why they didn't just kill me outright then."
"If the story the clone was telling is anything to go by, they were trying to make you out to be a suicide after discovering that the driving belief of your life was all a lie, Mulder," Scully added, "If that had worked, they could have then disposed of us both at their convenience and no one would know. Probably after some more of their 'experiments'."
"The guards they had on us were sloppy. We escaped, borrowed one of their cars and came straight here. Scully told me that Blevins had set up a conference and I hoped we could capture the impostor. But I guess that didn't quite work out too well."
"Perhaps some good has come of this though," Skinner informed them, "I've already had three agents approach me with the possibility of transferring to the X-Files. Since your cancer has become common knowledge, Agent Scully, it seems as if they would like to aid in your investigations if your condition means that you have to cut back on your field work."
Both Mulder and Scully were astonished that the incident with the dissolving fake Scully seems to have changed the X-Files from being something to be joked about to something that should be taken seriously.
"Get some rest before you get started on your reports," Skinner ordered, "And make sure you get all the details exact, all t's crossed and i's dotted. It's even more important than usual in this case. Blevins has ordered everything concerning the incident in the hallway to go directly to him, eyewitness accounts and forensics as well."
Skinner paused in the doorway to add, "And think about the offers for more agents working on the X-Files."
"You think maybe we can move out of the basement to an office that has heat in the winter if Skinner can get the X-Files expanded, Mulder?"
"It might actually be worth it if we can avoid getting saddled with another Krycek. But we can worry about that later, how are your eyes?"
"Getting a little better, I can see again, sort of. It's still blurry and they sting a bit, but not as bad."
As the pair walked down to their office in the basement, Scully turned to Mulder and asked hesitantly, "Mulder, how am I going to explain all this to my mother? And Bill? He was supposed to be there, too."
"We'll think of something," he replied with a grin.
THE END