Disclaimer: No infringement intended.
Chapter 16
Mulder strolled around the airport, waiting for his flight to be called. The terminal was fairly small, with only one gate and a makeshift baggage pickup area. He watched the aircraft land on the runway and begin to taxi to the gate. As he stood there waiting for the plane, his cell phone rang. He fished it out of his pocket and flipped it open to answer.
"Mulder."
"Have you boarded yet?"
"No, the plane is just pulling to the gate," Mulder replied to his partner, the sounds of the airport echoing in the background. He thought he heard a strain in her voice. "Are you okay?"
"No, I'm not. I'm …. bored," she retorted.
"Scully, how can you be bored? Dris and I left the office less than 30 minutes ago," Mulder chuckled at the frustration in her voice. The Assistant Director had separated them for the day, pairing Scully with Agent Nester, which Scully was not happy about. Although the four agents shared office space, Nester had some … annoying work habits, to say the least.
"Mulder, in the thirty minutes since you left me here with Mr. Arrogant, he has made or received at least five personal phone calls. I don't know how he gets any work done." She sighed, sounding like she was in agony.
"Well, he gets worse… try being on a stake out with him," Mulder replied, laughing at her impatience.
"Great, that's just … great. What am I supposed to be doing again?"
"You are analyzing the case file on the first victim and writing the profile on the assailant."
"Okay," she replied hesitantly. "And why am I doing that? You're the behavior profiler. I'm a doctor. I cut up things, analyze samples, and form medical conclusions. I should be briefing AD Kirsh and you should be here to play with Nester."
"Scully," he replied sternly as the paging system called the flight. "I'm sure that AD Driscoll had his reasons for our respective assignments. You need to be adaptable. Nester has a lot to contribute to the investigation. He just has some quirky habits. Stop complaining about it and just … deal with it. I'm hanging up. I'll call you later when I'm done with the briefing."
Scully closed the phone and tossed it down on the desk. She stared at her computer screen and glanced at Nester out of the corner of her eye. Quirky habits? That isn't the half of it, she thought. She watched him as he chatted on the phone to the flavor of the minute. Nester was cocky, arrogant, and confident all at the same time. He knew how to turn on the charm, and worked his skill often. She was amazed by how his act drew people in.
Nester reminded her of the class jokester, always clowning around, never serious, and rarely displaying a sensitive side. Those attributes had gotten him far in law enforcement, as it allowed him to be hard core when working a case or interrogating a suspect. He was a fast thinker and could draw sound conclusions about a subject with just a little information. Nester complimented Driscoll well in their partnership, similar to how she and Mulder worked together.
Scully sighed and tapped her keyboard mindlessly. Although she would never admit it, Mulder was right about Nester. She would probably learn a few things today, if she didn't end up killing him first.
xxxxxxx
"Scully okay?" Dris asked Mulder as he settled in his seat.
"Yeah," Mulder replied as he fastened his seatbelt. "I think getting back to work has taken her mind off 'things'…although Nester is already driving her crazy."
"Well, if she can survive the next 24 hours without killing him, she should be cured of any emotional entanglements." The two men shared a laugh as the flight attendants began their safety announcements.
Mulder sat back in his seat and pulled the in flight magazine from the seatback pocket. He flipped through the pages for a moment mindlessly and thought about his assignment in DC.
AD Driscoll had his reasons for sending Mulder and Driscoll to D.C, but briefing Kirsh had nothing to do with it. …they weren't even going to headquarters at all. It was all just a cover story for their real mission … which Skinner had affectionately dubbed "Operation Kill Bill". Mulder, Nester, and Driscoll had conference called Skinner and set up the base plan yesterday. Killing Cramer was just a figure of speech … they were just going to have a little chat with him, put the fear of god into him and make him think twice about talking to, looking at or even just thinking about Scully ever again. Poppa D was completely on their side when Jeff had laid out the scenario to him … in fact, he was a little too gung-ho and wanted to write Cramer up on formal charges of sexual harassment. Skinner was working out the details for the plan and would have an update for them when they landed in DC a little after six pm.
"Hey, after our assignment is complete … wanna go shoot some hoops at the gym? We could stop by the bar afterwards," Driscoll asked, looking across the aisle at Mulder.
"I'll have to see how it goes," Mulder replied as he looked at Driscoll out of the corner of his eye. "I might need to feed my fish." He started laughing and flipped another page in the magazine. "Sounds like you're getting a little too fresh again."
"It's not like we're on a first date, buddy," Driscoll chuckled.
Dubuque Field Office
Monday afternoon, 14:45 hours.
"Any luck?"
Scully lifted her head at the sound of Nester's voice and ran her hand across her forehead. "No.'
"No, what?" he replied, sitting down across from her. He bit into an apple and started chewing on it loudly.
Scully looked up at him with a disgusted glare. She had been studying the case file for the past three hours without so much as a bio-break while Nester and Agent Jasper milled around the office. She was sure that both men suffered from Attention Deficit Disorder. Nester couldn't sit still for more than five minutes at a time and he was constantly eating something … a candy bar, an apple, a hamburger, chips … ughh. Scully shuddered at the thought of it and wondered quietly how Driscoll was able to put up with him.
She dropped the pen she had been holding and sat back on the chair. "No, I'm not having any luck. I'm not good at this … I can't wrap my mind around it."
"You can't?" Nester questioned her. "Or you don't feel like it? There's a difference."
Scully stared at the desk and silently agreed with him. She probably could do it if she just applied herself … if Mulder was here helping her. But right now, she just didn't feel like it. The Cramer thing was eating at her, and despite the fact that Mulder had only been gone a couple of hours, she missed him.
"Are you having any luck?" Scully replied, dodging his question.
Nester sighed and moved some papers around on the desk. "Well, I don't think our guy killed her," he replied, and tossed the apple core out.
"Why do you say that?"
"It doesn't fit anything else that he's done. Some of the injuries are similar, but nothing else matches up. This victim was found here in the city by the police and her age was estimated in the early twenties. The rest were dumped in corn fields, close to where they lived, and were in their late teens."
"She was found here in the city?" Scully asked as she fingered through some pages of the case file. "It doesn't say that in the file."
"Yeah, it does," he stood and walked around the desk then leaned over her shoulder and pulled out a page of the file. "Here… 'body was discovered at Bunker Hill Golf Course on the green of the thirteen hole'."
"Why doesn't it say Dubuque?" she asked quizzically. "How was I supposed to know she was found here?"
"It doesn't say Dubuque because the Dubuque police filed the report. I guess they never accounted for an outside agency reading the file." He looked down at Scully and saw a perplexed expression on her face. "What are you thinking?"
"I don't know," she shook her head as the scenarios started to play out in her mind. "Why would you dump a body on a golf course in the middle of the winter? On the thirteenth hole?"
Nester shrugged and leaned against the desk behind hers. "Maybe the killer hates golf or … thirteen is his lucky number."
"Thirteen …. Thirteen," Scully drummed her fingers on the desk and pondered the significance to the number. "Wait… When was the body discovered?" she asked, moving some papers in the file.
"December 27th," Nester replied.
"The thirteenth month," Scully mumbled under her breath.
"What?" Nester questioned.
Scully turned and looked at him and noticed Agent Jasper walking toward them. "The thirteenth month … In retail, the week after Christmas and before New Years is called the thirteenth month, it's one of the busiest times of the year. The revenue generated in that one week equals a normal calendar month. " She pursed her lips and tilted her head. "Tracy told me this is a huge retail area. What if the victim came here to Christmas shop…."
"And pissed the killer off?" Nester interjected.
"Yeah, what if the killer was a retail manager and the victim had a difficult return or made a scene in the store," Scully remarked. "Or the killer was another shopper and just followed her."
Nester nodded his head and started to ponder the scenario she was painting. "Why the golf course, though?"
"The thirteenth hole runs along the highway," Jasper interjected from behind them. Scully and Nester both turned to look at him.
"What?" they said in unison.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. The golf course is next to one of the major arteries in the city," Jasper replied as he walked over to a large city map hanging on the wall. Scully and Nester followed him and stood next to him as he pointed out the golf course location on the map.
"Grandview Avenue runs the length of the city and connects three of the major retail areas. Some of the holes on the back nine of the golf course run along Grandview," Jasper said as he waved his hand at the map.
"What's over here?" Scully asked pointing to the area across the road from the course.
"Clarke College," replied Jasper matter-of-factly.
"Any students reported missing?" Nester asked crossing his arms at his chest.
"The police didn't have any reports," Jasper replied.
Scully was still staring at the map, and heard Nester's question in the background. "But the victim was found during Christmas. The dorms would have been closed or nearly empty."
Nester picked up on her line of thinking right away. "Right! Somebody could be missing and no one would know it until the end of the school year. Her friends might think she just dropped out and her family thinks she's still at school."
Jasper eyed the two agents in disbelief. "Don't you think that's a stretch? Clarke is a small school, less than 1500 students. Somebody would have noticed something. I mean ... wouldn't her family be wondering where she is?"
Scully turned and looked at Jasper … his inexperience on the job showing through his comments. "Has this office taken any calls from frantic parents looking for their daughter?"
Jasper arched his eyebrows. "Good point," he replied sheepishly.
Scully looked at her watch. "What time is it? Do you think the Registrar Office is still open?"
"It's three thirty. They should be open until five," Jasper answered.
"Agent Jasper, run up to the school and find out if they have had any questionable drop outs from the fall semester," Scully remarked as she walked to her desk to get her coat. "Nester and I will check out the golf course and the surrounding area to see if we can draw any other conclusions."
xxxxxxx
Nester slid into the driver's seat of Scully's Grand Cherokee rental car and adjusted the radio station. Scully stood outside the sport utility for a moment and removed her coat. The temperature was unseasonably warm, in the high fifties, and she was feeling a little hot in her wool pea coat. She laid her jacket in the backseat and climbed into the front, adjusting her seat and fastening her belt.
"Scully, are you hungry?" Nester asked as he waited for her to shut the door. "I'm going to run through the drive through at McDonald's."
Scully looked at him in disbelief. The guy had been snacking all day and wanted to eat again? "Are you serious?"
Nester laughed nervously. "What? I'm hungry!"
"You've been eating all day! You ate a hamburger at noon, a candy bar, a granola bar, a bag of chips and an apple … where do you put it all?"
"Those were snacks, not meals," he replied laughing defensively. "I eat a lot, I have a high metabolism."
Scully rolled her eyes. "You keep eating like that you are going to end up looking like Agent Fritz."
"Hey, easy on my buddy Fritz," Nester replied as he put the car into gear and pulled out of the parking lot. "He's great person. Maybe you need to get to know him a little better."
"I wasn't saying that his weight made him a bad person … I talk to Fritz, I'm friends with his daughter Meg. I was merely saying if you keep eating junk food, high metabolism or not, you're going to get fat," Scully retorted.
"Okay … So do you want something to eat from there or not?" Nester asked her again.
Scully sighed and gave in to his question. "I'll have the yogurt parfait," Scully replied blandly.
"That's it?" Nester exclaimed looking over at her. "Are you sure? I haven't seen you eat anything all day. You need to keep your strength up. "
Scully started laughing and looked out the window. "I'm not hungry right now … I'll get something later."
xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Nester parked the rental in the main lot at the golf course. He and Scully exited the vehicle and starting walking toward the fairway of the thirteenth hole. The hole was situated a good distance from the main clubhouse and the warmer weather was making the walk difficult. The ground was soft and spongy. The snow was melting and causing icy patches on the cart path. Scully slipped a few times and reached for Nester's arm to steady herself. It wasn't long before she could feel sweat forming on her brow and running down her back. I'm glad I didn't bring my coat, she thought to herself as the sun beat down on her face.
Within fifteen minutes, they had made their way to the tee box of the thirteenth hole. As they walked up the middle of the fairway, Scully stopped and took in her surroundings. Grandview Avenue ran right in front of the fairway, and the two were separated by a chain link fence. There were no openings in the fence, so getting to the green from the street would have been difficult.
Nester apparently was thinking the same thing and turned to speak to her. "Did the autopsy indicate any bruising?"
"From being tossed over a fence?" Scully chuckled. "No, not that I remember." She looked around at the street and the fence again. "Let's walk up to the green. Maybe there's an opening in the fence up there."
They trudged through the melting snow to the putting green. The victim had been found in the middle of the green, Nester mumbled to himself as he looked over some notes about the case that he had stuffed in his pocket. Scully looked at the snow covered green and then made her way up the course to the tee box for the fourteenth hole.
When she rounded the corner, she discovered a gate at the side of the tee box that opened to a service area to the side of the course. There was a short gravel drive with access to Grandview Avenue directly behind the gate.
"Nester," she called back to him.
He headed over to join her and walked to the gate. He fingered the padlock securing it. "This looks new," he remarked. "I bet it wasn't here on December 27th."
Scully crossed her arms at her chest and looked from the gate to the direction of the putting green. "Okay, the killer is driving on Grandview Avenue, pulls into the service drive, cuts the lock ... or maybe it wasn't there. Then drags or carries the body over to the green." She looked around again and tilted her head. "Why the green and not the tee box?"
Nester stepped away from the fence and walked back down the cart path toward the thirteenth green. He stopped about halfway down the path and yelled back up at Scully. "Because you can't see the green from the street, it's sheltered by this clump of trees"
Scully ran her tongue over her lips and made a mental note of the distance from the gate to the green. "The victim weighed about 130 pounds," she paused a moment and looked back at the fence again. "Could you carry 130 pounds of dead weight that far?"
Nester looked up at her and over to the green. He stepped off the cart path and walked through the snow up to the tee box. "I could if I cut across the tee box," he replied, pointing to the direct line from the fence down to the green.
Scully stepped across the snow covering the tee box and walked to stand next to Nester. "How far do you think that is?"
Nester looked around again and bit his lip. "I don't know… forty, fifty feet? Why?"
"I'm thinking that's a lot of weight to carry alone. I wonder if the police department took any photos of the area when they discovered the body."
"Well, there wasn't any with the file, but we can call and ask. It's not really that far, Scully. Look, it's flat from the fence to here," he remarked pointing at the ground and then starting walking across the snow toward the green. "Then it's a downhill slope to the green." He looked back and beckoned her to follow him. "It would be an easy carry."
As the two of them headed down the slope toward the green, Scully noticed the ground was clear of snow and very spongy. They stopped on the outer lip of the rough grass and both took in the distance from the fence to their current position.
Scully shook her head. "I don't know Nester, I think it's … far."
"Scully, we are talking about someone who would have been high on natural endorphins, adrenaline and," Nester retorted getting frustrated with her skepticism. "Probably some illegal substances…definitely not just the normal Joe in any sense of the word." As soon as the words left his mouth, he felt guilty. I shouldn't have snapped at her, he thought. She was just playing the devil's advocate.
Nester walked around the side of the green and surveyed the area one last time. As he began to walk back toward Scully, he stepped into a hole and his shoe got stuck in the mud. He pulled it up and scowled about the soggy conditions. He was sweating and the temperature was definitely affecting his mood. "I think we need to go back to the police department and look at the reports… how they came across the body, what the area looked like…. and see what photos they took."
"I agree," she looked at her watch to check the time. "It's almost 4:30, it's going to be dark soon anyway. We can come back out here tomorrow to see if it gives us a different perspective," Scully replied.
"Now you're talking… and to think a couple of hours ago you weren't able to wrap your mind around this," Nester replied, laughing at her. He took a step up the slope and held his hand out to her so she wouldn't fall on the slick grass.
Scully reached out for his hand and stepped up on the grassy slope. As soon as she put her weight on her front foot, the entire slope collapsed. She and Nester fell about 10 feet into a sink hole deep in the earth.
Scully clawed in the air as the security of solid ground gave way, plummeting her body downward. She reached out and grabbed a handful of mud, which did nothing to slow her descent. After what seemed like a slow motion fall, she felt her body slam against the ground below. Seconds later, she felt the thud of Nester landing beside her. Their bodies lay still for less than an instant, then the impact of their collision caused a second cave in. The thunderous roar of the ground collapsing pounded in her ears and thrust the two agents farther into the earth.
TBC
