Title: What He Knew
Author: Gillian Leigh
Summary: What if Skinner had been abducted instead of Mulder? What would it mean for the X-Files and for Mulder and Scully themselves? Why would he have been abducted in the first place? Post-Requiem.
Disclaimer: They're not mine. If they were, would I be writing this?!
J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building
Agent Doggett met them at the employee entrance to the vacant building, and ushered them inside and down the hallway toward the elevator.
"I'm sorry to call you away from dinner," he apologized, not commenting on the fact that they had been dining together. "But there are a few things I need to speak to you about, and I wanted to do it right away." They stepped into the elevator, and Scully looked at Mulder questioningly. He responded with a shrug of his shoulders. He had no idea what was so urgent.
"Agent Doggett, I understand that you're the Task Force Leader on this one, and that we should all be cooperating, but it seems to me that you're utilizing our research and excluding us from the investigation," Scully stated simply. Doggett turned around and looked at her as the elevator doors opened.
"We should be working together," he began, leading them down the hall to the office. "And I'm not trying to exclude you, but while I was working in my office tonight, someone slipped an envelope under my door, much like what happened with Gibson Praise in Arizona." He unlocked the door to his office and flicked on the lights, ushering them inside. Mulder bit back a smile as he locked the door behind him and turned off all of the lights except the one on his desk. So much for being the only paranoid person in the room, he thought to himself.
Retrieving the envelope in question, Mulder and Scully saw that it was an "Inter-Departmental Correspondence" envelope. Scully's eyebrow went up, remembering the same type of envelope that she had encountered... the one from Diana Fowley. Glancing at Mulder, she knew he was thinking of it too. But Fowley was dead. Who was helping them out this time?
"It's all surveillance documents...photos and transcriptions of phone calls and phone records as well," Doggett said, pulling the described items out of the envelope.
"I'm not trying to be rude, Agent Doggett," Mulder began. "But I don't see what any of this has to do with A.D. Skinner's disappearance..."
"If you would give me a chance, Mulder, I'll explain exactly what I believe the relevance of all of these things is to the case. I believe that they might in fact have a very profound connection to A.D. Skinner's disappearance. But if my theory is correct, we won't be hunting aliens anymore; we'll be looking for some very terrestrial suspects," Doggett concluded, handing Mulder the enlarged black and white photos. Scully gasped in surprise.
In every picture, Skinner was talking to the Cigarette Smoking Man or Alex Krycek.
"Oh my God," she said. The photos were obviously taken by someone other than a casual observer. Some were from inside Skinner's office, others his home, but the last was the most shocking to them. In the last picture, Skinner was bent over Mulder, who was unconscious and strapped to that metal table, covered only from the waist down by a sheet. The picture was from the room where they had done the brain surgery on him.
"He was in on all of it," Mulder said, feeling angry and betrayed. "He's been in on it since the beginning."
Scully's Apartment
"Agent Doggett, would you like some coffee?" Scully called from her kitchen, looking over her shoulder at the two men who sat on her couch, intently reviewing the case information that they had so far.
"If you're makin' it, I'll gladly take a cup..." he said, rising up off the couch.
"No, no, sit," she ordered, waving her hand at him dismissively. "I've already got the pot brewed. Just tell me how you like it."
"Black with a spoonful of sugar," he replied. "Thank you." She poured his coffee and added the sugar, and then placed it on the tray with her mug of decaf tea and Mulder's cup of coffee and brought it into the living room, setting it on the end table. Her coffee table was currently covered in various documents, pictures, and oddly enough, Skinner's medical charts, which she had previously thought had no relevance at all, but the pieces began fitting together with Doggett's new information.
"I want to have these checked tomorrow to make sure they're authentic," Mulder said, taking his coffee mug from Scully. "Thanks Scully." She nodded.
"I can take them down to the photo lab on the fifth floor. My buddy Jerry works there; he'll squeeze us in as a favor first thing in the morning." Mulder shook his head.
"I've got my own sources... a group of men I trust explicitly. I'll take the photos to them if you don't mind." He didn't make the statement a question, daring Doggett to argue with him. He didn't.
"Alright, Mulder," he replied. "But I have to ask... what did you mean when you said that Skinner had been in on 'it' since the beginning? What was he in on?" Mulder looked over at Scully. They didn't know if they could trust Doggett farther than they could throw him.
"Excuse us for a minute," Scully said, nodding toward Mulder. "I just need to have a word with Mulder."
"Sure," Doggett said. He knew what they were going to discuss; his trustworthiness, what exactly to tell him, what to leave out... Mulder followed Scully into her bedroom, and she closed the door.
"What do we tell him?" Scully asked of him, crossing her arms. His brow creased.
"We can explain my type of cancer to him, and how you had the same thing done to you, and the chip in your neck, and its absence in mine..." he said.
"But nothing about the baby. No one can know yet...well not anyone in the FBI at least..." Scully replied, a hand slipping down to cover her stomach. Mulder smiled.
"No, we won't tell him about the baby. Would you be comfortable telling him about your abduction?" he queried, touching her shoulder. She nodded.
"Sure, we can do that. We should tell him about Africa, and the surgery that those doctors performed on you..." she supplemented. He nodded, and after a moment, he laughed. "What?" she asked, looking at him questioningly.
"After we tell him all of this he'll probably send us for a psych referral..." Mulder said. Scully laughed, and squeezed his hand.
"I'd better make more coffee then," she said. "This will probably take the rest of the night..."
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A/N: Mulder and Scully, as you can tell, have started to trust Doggett, and doubt Skinner's integrity. As you can tell this story doesn't exactly follow the Season Eight timeline...but that's why it's an AU story. I'm sorry the chapters are taking so long, and that this one's so short, but I promise some twists and turns down the road, don't you worry. ;o) Whether you liked it or not, review and let me know what you thought!
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