Chapter Ten

Mulder/Scully Apartment, New York, New York

April 8th, 2000, 8:01 p.m.

"Scully, could you do me a favor?" Mulder questioned his partner as he carried the boxed pizza into the kitchen after her. He set it down onto the island countertop and watched Scully fill up the refrigerator with the six pack of Michelob.

"What's that?" she asked with her back turned to him.

"Could you please take one of those and smash me over the head with one?" That earned him a slight delay in her current actions, but she then continued her chores.

"Why would I want to waste a perfectly good bottle of beer over something so trivial?"

"Ha ha. This is the most unhealthy dinner I've ever partaken of with you so far. I just wanted to make sure that I didn't step into one of my parallel universes. Or better yet, Scully, pinch me."

"Maybe you're hallucinating, Mulder, because there's no way on God's green earth that I'd pinch you."

"But perhaps, just perhaps, I'm stuck in the middle of one where there are 1,000 Scullys all around me. And the first one is quite gentle. The second gets playful. The third gets feisty. And the next is-"

"Mulder, the pizza's going to get cold. And I for one am not going to eat cold pizza that I've paid for out of my own pocket."

"Point taken." Mulder practically jumped into the recliner and switched on the big screened TV. "Hey, Scully's there's a Knicks' game on tonight! They're playing the Pacers. Have we got a dinner date on the couch?"

"Not a chance. Remember how expensive this furniture is? I'm not going to leave its fate up to the stars or any other deity that one streak of grease won't end up somewhere on it. We're going to eat at the table properly for once."

After she had the table set, she called Mulder over to her. He begrudgingly left the TV on at a low decibel level, but she flicked the power off after he sat down to concentrate on the pizza.

"Sorry to do that to you, Mulder, but I promise, I won't let you burn up the sports section tomorrow before you get your due satisfaction. I have a good reason--I want your undivided attention."

"Me? Burn up the sports section? You were the one that threw it into the fireplace in the first place!"

"Before there was a fire, yes I did. All that aside, Mulder, it's time for a game of truth with Scully."

"I think I'm going to need that beer now," he started to get up, but she gave him a sharp frown. "What if I don't want to play? What if I just want to watch?"

"Unfortunately, it's your turn to pitch, and nobody else is there to relieve you. I have a slim premonition that's been hanging like a monkey on my back ever since you showed me that 'reliable tip' from the Gunmen, and it's telling me that you're hiding something from me...again," she muttered the last two syllables.

"I do have to admit that the last few times I've been to see the Gunmen that I had an ulterior motive to playing Dungeons and Dragons. We've been gradually piecing back all of the recovered but mostly damaged X-Files through a trial piece of software they're prototyping."

"Oh, brother. Which company did they rip that from?"

"Don't know. They won't even tell me, Scully. And that hurts me right here," he pointed to his gut and rammed the last part of his crust into his mouth.

"Join the club. It's time to come clean, Mulder. How old is this case?"

"Almost ten years old."

"Don't stop now, Spooky. You were just getting warmed up."

And don't you dare think for a minute that that sly grin is going to distract me from getting the whole nine yards out of you.

"Okay. This was one of the first babies I ever pulled after I founded the X-Files Division. To tell you the truth, Diana and I spent the first month cleaning out the storage room next door first. But it didn't stop there. We kept getting these mysterious deliveries from all the other departments, too--euphemisms for 'junk cases too weird for us'. So those eventually got added to the other piles. They were just as dusty as all the others, in case you were wondering. Scully? Hello?" He snapped his fingers back and forth a few inches from her face, and she blinked hard twice.

"Sorry. For a minute there, Mulder, I was beginning to wonder if I'd been sucked into your butterfly paradoxical universe--two words caught me off guard: "I" and "clean"."

"I'll go into details about how I scrub my toilet if you tell me that it turns you on."

"I think Martha Stewart would probably get a thrill out of it. Go on--you were cleaning with Diana."

"Doesn't that make you a wee bit jealous? I was getting dirty with another woman."

"Tell you what. When we get back to our office, we'll have a cleaning session of our own, and we'll get as dusty and dirty as you want...provided it's a day we both agree upon. I'm not getting another one of my Oxford Brooks Brothers suits dry cleaned because you suddenly decide that it's time for spring cleaning." His nose wrinkled with mild distaste, but he continued his tale.

"As we sorted and read through some of these cases, we categorized them into three different boxes: 'subtly strange but interesting', 'not worth even our time', and 'ancient history'."

"I was wondering what those acronyms stood for two months ago. Prey tell, which one did this case fit?"

"Not worth even our time. But somehow, it was one of those files that managed to survive the fire."

"Wait a second. N.W.E.T. is a box that we reserve for the garbage, right? How did that case file get back into the cabinet if it was supposed to be incinerated?"

"Uh...well...I changed my mind at the last minute because it looked 'subtly strange but interesting'. So I kind of shoved it into the back of the cabinet when Diana wasn't looking." This time he arose and came back with two opened beer bottles. "So I looked into it later that night at my apartment. I thought it was a joke at first. The file had nothing but tabloid reports and exterior photographs of the restaurant. Then beneath those, there was a report. But the only thing that wasn't blacked out with permanent marker were the words 'New York' and 'Drew and Angela Robinson'. Kind of made me wonder if it came from the fraud department. But I'll never know because of the cruel invention of the Sharpie."

Assistant Director Walter Skinner's Office, FBI Headquarters, Washington, D.C.

April 14th, 2000, 9:35 a.m.

"I'm sorry to interrupt you, Scully, but I see an issue here that needs to be addressed," Skinner broke into her narrative and motioned his finger to the expense list that was lying on his desk.

"Go ahead, sir."

"There was a charge here made to Saks' Fifth Avenue for two brand new silk ties--at sixty dollars a piece, I might add. Now please be so kind as to inform me why the FBI is paying for an addition to Agent Mulder's wardrobe."

"I'm just as surprised as you, sir. I had no idea he did that." Her innocence seemed austere, so he returned his gaze to the list and flipped the sheet over.

"Any theories as to why that would happen?"

"I have a somewhat plausible conclusion."

"Let's hear it."

"Well, there was a certain incident that occurred that night in the apartment."