Ahah! Yet another chapter me'lads! I just wanted to point out that 1. this story is slightly marysue 2. It's half not meant to be serious 3. If your thinking that it's kinda stupid and immature that I tryed to squeeze as many x-files regulars into it...your right.
Yep! So now that thats out of the way...ENJOY! And dont forget to R&R (haha rest and relax...nope)
She continued to ponder that one question as she entered the head quarters and went through security, waving momentarily at the friendly bag-scan-man, Ted.
Who was her new partner?
She pushed the button marked B for the basement on the lift's panel and the doors had begun to close, when a woman across the foyer called out for her to hold the lift. The woman continued to run towards her, Kate doubted that she would make it in time – plus she was in a hurry, so she didn't make a move to prevent the lift doors from closing.
The woman reached the lift just before they closed completely; she put her foot in the door and threw Lewis a spiteful glare.
The woman was tall, thicker set than usual but still lean and muscular. She had sawn off blonde hair that rested just above her shoulders and a side swept fringe.
In an attempt to avoid eye contact Lewis looked towards the ground.
The woman was wearing pointed black heels, which pumped up her already muscular calves. Kate's eyes followed the woman's outline up to her figure hugging A-line pencil-waist skirt and up again to her sleeveless turtleneck.
This woman was quite attractive, in a new age kind of way – she had delicate facial features, and her liberal amounts of black eyeliner complemented her deep brooding green eyes.
Kate stole a glance back up at the woman's face; the green eyes were fixed right on Kate. It appeared that she too was sussing Kate out. Then the thought occurred to her – was it possible that this woman could be Kate's new partner? She hoped not, they hadn't exactly got off to a good start.
A wave of relive spread over Lewis when the woman exited the lift on the second floor, as the doors closed she watched as the woman disappeared down a corridor and out of sight. She leant against the lift's cold metal wall for the remaining seconds of her journey down to the basement. The bell dinged dully and Kate made her way along the dark, silent hall.
She could hear distant chatter coming from an office three quarters of the way along the corridor. The door was ajar and a thin crack of light escaped from the room, along with the apparent squabbling of several male voices.
Lewis glanced up at the name on the door – 'Special Agent Fox Mulder'. This was the place – but who was inside? Did Mulder feel the need to assign her two or three partners? What a ridiculous gesture…
She paused for a second before entering to try and pick up what the men inside were arguing about. The first voice sounded out, "I dunno! He wouldn't tell me – that punk! Said that if we'd done my research we should know already!"
Apparently she had arrived mid way through the conversation. They must have been discussing the two new officers assigned to the X-Files for the week.
A second, higher voice - "I'm putting ten bucks on Jorden Pacy-Currand…"
Jorden – a man? She worked better with men.
And a third, better spoken voice then followed, "I'm not so sure. They had quite a fight last year. You never know – he could have called Fowley." FOWLEY? Alarm bells sounded in her head – she might be working with Diana Fowley?
The second man spoke again "I hope not – I mean she is really Foul-ly"
Juvenile, muffled laughter followed. Kate couldn't help but to have a silent giggle at the extremely lame joke. She quietly pushed the door open and stepped inside the room, without disturbing the three men inside.
As she stood, her back pressed up against the wall she observed the three men that were rummaging through the only desk in the room, their backs turned to her. The first was very small, he had what was left of his slightly greyed hair pulled back into a short pony tail, the second was tall and had long, blonde hair – not a dissimilar colour to the woman from the lift, and the third was taller still and had clean cropped brown hair and was wearing a grey suit – she supposed he was the well spoken voice she had heard just before.
Her mind was already a cacophony of unanswered questions, but another was added to the mix at this precise moment – What on earth were these three extremely odd looking men doing in this office – rummaging through Mulder's desk?
The suited man looked up at the opposite wall and caught Kate's reflection in a large glossy poster that Mulder had tacked up.
He swung around unceremoniously; accidentally delivering a hard slap to the back to the blonde mans head.
"Ow – Byers, what the hell man" said the blonde man moodily as he rubbed the back of his head, then he too noticed Kate. He knocked the remaining, short man on the arm and they both turned to face Kate.
As bemusing and odd this situation seemed to her, Kate couldn't help but to be quite amused. They all just stood there, staring at one another – the three men standing awkwardly, like the three stooges and Kate, backed up against the wall, as though she was trying to evade school-yard 'cooties'. She wasn't sure what to say, or even who these men were. She was about to ask when the short man stepped forward slightly and spoke first.
"She-is-hot!" he proclaimed loudly to his comrades.
"Shut up Melvin!" said the blonde man, pushing his friend out of the way, walking closer to Lewis and holding out his hand, "I'm – you can call me Langly", he said eagerly in rather smitten tone.
"No, you shut up Richard" said the original, short man as he stepped forward again, nudging 'Langly' out of his path. Kate was completely dumbstruck, she had no idea what was going on. Who were these men? What did they want?
"I'm Frohike, but you can call me whatever you like baby", he put a particular suave emphasis on the word baby.
"Um…" muttered Kate.
"Shut up both of you, you're acting like a pair of schoolgirls." He pushed past both of them and walked up to Lewis. She could sense that he was the most level-headed of the bunch, perhaps even their leader, so to speak.
"I'm Byers and we - are the Lone Gunmen", he announced regally – as though she had the slightest clue what he was talking about. She raised an eyebrow timidly.
"She hasn't read us!" said Langley. Frohike gave him a sharp look and he quietened down.
"We're friends of Mulder's" continued Byers with a smile.
"Yeah, we do all the dangerous, macho stuff" said Frohike puffing out his chest,
"We're his nerds…" concluded Langly. Kate laughed. She kind of liked these guys, as weird as they were – she liked them.
"I, uh, don't mean to be rude or anything but, uh – what exactly are you – 'Lone Gunmen', doing here?" she asked politely.
Byers smiled again, "sometimes we help Mulder and Scully out on their cases. Mulder called us last night and said that an old friend of his would be taking care of the files for a few days. Due to the 'peculiar' nature of the X-Files he thought it would be best if we came down to give you and your partner a bit of a briefing.
We're fairly certain your partner will be paired with Special Agent Jorden Pacy-Currand, if you were wondering." Good, she thought – she was with a man.
"We thought for a second we would be stuck helping Diana Fowley", Frohike continued on from him. "Do you know her?"
Lewis grimaced defiantly, "do-not-get-me-started-on-Diana-Fowley!"
"One for the brigade!" cheered Langly as he and Frohike high fived and patted Byers on the back. Kate allowed a laugh to escape her delicate lips as she watched the men celebrate their small triumph.
To be perfectly honest she was rather happy that they too disliked the woman – the thing with Diana Fowley was that you either liked her, or you hated her. Apparently everybody in this particular room fell into the latter category. Kate felt more at ease now, she leaned up against the desk as Frohike, Byers and Langly began to rant about all their individual hates about Fowley.
After a minute or two of the extremely unprofessional chattering a thought occurred to Langly.
"Sorry, we didn't quite catch your name there Agent…"
"Lewis" twittered Kate stupidly, "Kate Lewis." She smiled, but their faces had all gone blank.
Frohike spoke first – "the-Kate-Lewis?"
She nodded, newly unsure, "the only Kate Lewis I know."
"The F.B.I. Academy - Kate Lewis?"
Oh god! She thought – what had Mulder told them about her?! She nodded again apprehensively.
"We've heard so much about you!" said Byers
"He said you were hot – but not this hot!" exclaimed Frohike again.
"Uh - Thank you?"
"Kate. I mean – we've been hearing stories about you for yea-", Langly was cut off by the sound of footsteps approaching down the hall.
At first they were distant and echoed off the walls, but then they drew closer, and closer still – until Kate could hear the clear, harsh footfall's of a pair of heels.
This certainly was no man about to walk through the door. They all held their breath, hoping that the ill-reputed Diana Fowley didn't walk in.
A dark figure turned the corner and stood in the doorway.
To Kate's horror, framed by the dark wood stood – the woman from the lift. Her curvy figure, outlined by the light shining in from the hall seemed to hang there in the air – her toned shoulders now covered by a black, tailored jacket, her face set in stone, looking as obnoxious as ever. The room was silent as the two women stared at each other in disbelief, the Lone Gunmen sussing out the obvious tension – or so it seemed.
Suddenly, to Kate's surprise Langly spoke up, "AH-HA! Ten bucks to Langly! I was right! It's Pacy-Currand!" he rushed forwards to hug the woman, who obliged and spread her arms warmly.
What was going on? Kate had thought that Pacy-Currand was a male – Jorden?! Thought… presumed more like. That was something she would have to work on – apart from the inability to be organised and the clumsiness, Lewis had a habit of being far too presumptuous. It was obvious now – Jorden - Jorden could be a female name too. Clumsy, unorganised, presumptuous – sometimes she wondered how she had even passed through the academy.
Without getting too caught up in realising her own vices, Kate watched the scene unfolding in front of her. Langly had moved aside and Special Agent Jorden Pacy-Currand was currently hugging Byers, she gave him a peck on the cheek and stepped up to face Frohike, who was a considerable number of feet shorter than she was.
"The silver-tongue himself!" she said charismatically.
He opened his arms and walked towards her, she smiled appealingly as she followed in suite.
When he was mere inches away from hugging her, she over-zealously swung her whole arm around behind him and comically slapped him on the behind.
Kate smiled, because for the first time that morning it did appear that Melvin Frohike was lost for words. Perhaps this woman, Jorden, wasn't who Lewis had first assumed her to be.
Pacy-Currand winked at Frohike and her laugh rang out across the room, "just joking Melvin!" she said affectionately as she finally pulled him into a tight hug.
"Anyhow – it's Byers who has the cute butt…"
Everyone sniggered slightly, even Kate - everyone except Byers that is. Langly, Frohike, Kate and Pacy-Currand all turned to face him with serious looks plastered to their faces; Byers turned a pleasant shade of pink.
He cleared his throat loudly. "Right, well now – erm – that's out of the way…" he said awkwardly in a high pitched voice, laughing as though he too found it funny.
"Kate, this is your partner – meet Special Agent Jorden Pacy-Currand, I'm sure she wont mind you calling her Jorden though", Kate smiled but the woman's face had returned to its original set; cold and empty. Apparently Byers hadn't noticed the sudden chill in the room, so he continued, "Jorden this is Agent Ka -",
"We've met" said Pacy-Currand glancing at Lewis's name on her security pass, "and Currand or Pacy-Currand will do just fine."
Kate smiled again meekly, for a millisecond or so she had begun to think that perhaps this Currand woman had a little more depth to her character than first met the eye – apparently not.
She decided that perhaps Currand was like Fowley – you either liked her, as the Gunmen appeared to - or you didn't, as Lewis had begun to. She really didn't even care to know people like that - yes, that was probably the case, shame really… for a second there –
"So boys what's the case file say? - Why exactly are you here actually?" Currand asked the two questions in quick succession. Then before anyone had answered she turned to Lewis and raised an eyebrow.
"Oh – I see, we have a rookie on our hands?"
"No! I've been working for the Bureau as long as Mulder" said Kate defensively, adding - "we studied at the academy together you see" in an attempt to show a personal side to her new partner.
Currand nodded her head, her eyes opening wide as she made a humming noise in the back of her throat, showing her agreement with what Lewis had said. She was treating Kate like a child!? Kate was extremely annoyed, but tried not to let her emotions show on her face. What did this woman have against her? She had merely forgotten to hold the door of the elevator open. Why did Jorden have some kind of pre-disposed notion that she was so much better than Kate? It was driving her insane.
"Isn't that interesting? Well Fox and I did quite a lot of work together back when he was a profiler for the VCU, in the earlier days of the X-Files I helped him out a little bit. That's why he's asked me to come back now, you see."
Fox? Mulder allowed this woman to call him Fox? He told Kate that he had never allowed anyone to call him that – not even his parents!
She gave, what she thought was a subtle glare in Pacy-Currand's direction; Pacy-Currand mirrored her look.