Undercover Chapter 7
She was getting frustrated with the lack of progress in the investigation. She was reminding herself that it takes a while to gain the rapport and trust of the inmates to get insight from them but that doesn't mean she isn't frustrated by the amount of time it is taking to close this case and be able to move on with her life outside these prison walls, to resume her life as Agent Dana Scully, MD. She sometimes has to remind herself who she is when she feels herself losing sight of herself. She is surprised at how quickly her sense of self and identity was diminishing. At times she got so into the character of O'Hanna that she almost forgets who she really is. She has only been in for about 10 days and while she is keeping her eyes on the mission she has had times she gets a little too sucked in and has to remind herself who she is.
"O'Hanna, I'm gonna kill you," Marge yelled, making a quick beeline toward the undercover agent from across the room.
"What are you going on about?" she asked, hoping that she didn't show any fear on her face.
"You stole my KitKat!" Marge yelled, throwing the empty wrapper towards her and looking at her challengingly.
"No, I didn't," she insisted, not moving from her position sitting on her bed.
"Well, it's gone, and I certainly didn't eat it," Marge said.
"You sure?" she asked before thinking better of it.
"Oh, you need to remember your place, new girl!" Marge yelled and 'O'Hanna' stood up, showing that she's not just going to back down.
"Or what?" she challenged, not wanting to back down and look weak, which can be dangerous too. Before she knew it, she felt a sharp blow to her face, and it took her a second to realize that she had punched her.
"Fuck you!" O'Hanna said, dodging another punch and in response, punched her back.
"Fight, fight, fight!" she heard some other inmates yell and then felt her get pulled back and thrown on the ground.
"Break it up!" he heard Davis, one of the prison guards, yell. She looked up to see Jack push Marge away from her and Riggs running up to the exchange.
"What happened?" Riggs asked, seemingly having missed the whole scene.
"Catfight," Davis said before gesturing towards O'Hanna. "Get her out of here."
He leaned down and yanked her to her feet in what was supposed to look rough but was a relatively gentle way to help her to her feet.
"Come on," he said sternly while leading her out of the main bed area.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"Medical to get you checked out," he said. "What happened?"
"She hit me, so I hit her back!" she said, holding pressure to her now busted lip, hoping to dull the ache.
"Why?"
"Because she hit me first, I'm not just gonna let her hit me and do nothing," she said incredulously while walking through the hallway towards the medical wing.
"No. Why did she hit you?"
"She's convinced I stole her KitKat," she said.
"Are you okay?"
"Oh yeah, it's fine," she said, removing her hand from her lip so he could see. While she will definitely have a fat lip, there was no major injury.. "I don't need medical."
He stopped outside the medical wing. While he wanted to insist on her seeing medical he knew that she could decide when she needed medical attention and that this was at least something she had power over.
"Another fight like that inmate, and you are heading straight to the hole," he said in a performative rough voice for the sake of passing guards and inmates.
"Yes, sir," she said quietly.
"Speak up, inmate," Mulder said, and she glared at him, annoyed. It was an unnecessary power move to annoy her.
"Yes, sir," she said louder, and he could hear the annoyance in her voice.
"Alright, get out of here, inmate," he said, and she turned around, walking a few paces back before he heard her say "yes sir" in a mocking voice under her breath, and he stifled a laugh.
It was Mulder's day off, but he hates his days off. He has been told that he can't work around the clock without arousing suspicion. He re-reviewed Jack's file for likely the 100th time, hoping that maybe something would stick out. His phone rang which captured his attention.
"Mulder," he said. For a split second, he imagined what it would be like to hear her signature, 'Mulder, it's me, ' on the other side of the phone. While she does get phone calls they decided it was best to avoid her using his name just in case somehow it got back that she is talking with an FBI agent.
"Hey, Mulder," Maggie said. While he would prefer it to be his Scully on the phone, he didn't mind talking with the Scully matriarch. He genuinely likes his future mother-in-law.
"Hey, Maggie."
"Do you know why Dana isn't calling me?" Maggie asked, worry edging in her words.
"I didn't realize she wasn't. How long has she been not calling?" he asked. This concerns him too. While he was there yesterday, and saw for himself that she was okay as of 10:00 pm yesterday, the idea of her not calling was concerning to him. He knows that she was calling as often as she could when she first went in, so why did that change?
"The last I got a call from her was last Tuesday," she said. That was 5 days ago.
"Did something happen the last time you talked?"
"No, it was normal. She seemed a little spacy, but I chopped it up to stress or something going on in the prison, but other than that I mean nothing really special," she said. "Have you had a lot of calls with her?"
"If I'm off, then she calls, but if I'm working, I'm there during phone hours," he said.
"Has anything seemed odd?" she asked.
"Her and Marge are at odds with each other, there was a bit of a fight yesterday where she hit Dana because she thought she ate her Kit Kat, and then Dana hit her back and then after that they have just been avoiding each other but other than that she's been fine" he said.
"Oh, I hate that. I know she can take care of herself; I just…" she trailed off.
"I know. I hate it too."
"Marge is big, I saw her the other day when I was there to visit; she's like three times her size. I don't know how she's not scared."
"She is, but she can't show it-" he said before stopping when he realized he was getting another call and saw it was from the prison.
"Oh, can I call you back? It's Dana. I'll tell her to call you," he said.
"Hey," he said. "You okay?"
"Yeah," she said. "My lovely new friend is telling people that I'm sleeping with Jack, and now Teagan is mad at me because she's all I told you to leave him alone, so yeah there something going on between Jack and Teagan" Scully said. While it was relevant to the case, he couldn't help but notice that how she was telling this was more like gossip than facts of the case. Scully has never been one to gossip but she does have more free time on her hands.
"So, make nice with Teagan again because more information from her is needed," Mulder said.
"For what?" Scully asked.
"The investigation," he said.
"What investigation?" she asked genuinely seeming to not know what he was talking about.
"What do you mean 'what investigation'? Scully, the whole reason we are in this situation," he said, confused that she didn't know what he was talking about as if there could be any other investigation he was talking about.
"Oh right, yeah," she said.
"Are you feeling alright?" he asked.
"Yeah, sorry."
"Hey, your mom called. She's worried, said you haven't called her in 5 days. Is everything okay?" he asked.
"What? I just called her yesterday," she said.
"She said you haven't called since Tuesday."
"Yeah, which was yesterday," she said simply as if he was wrong.
"Scully, today is Sunday, are you okay? I'm getting worried," he said.
She laughed awkwardly, seemingly embarrassed. "Oh, I just… honestly, without work, the days blur," she said. While that makes sense to an extent, being 5 days off and insisting that she called her mother yesterday seemed a little more worrisome than the run-of-the-mill I forgot what day it is, especially when you combine it with her not seeming to remember the investigation.
"Okay, well, if you're sure you are okay…"
"I am… oh hey, sorry I got to go," she said. He was expecting an explanation as to why she had to get off a call they rarely get to have, but it didn't come. He was expecting a love you or at least a bye but instead was just greeted by the click of the call ending.
'Something is really wrong' he thought, dread setting into his stomach.
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I'm so sorry that I haven't posted in, like forever. I had bad writer's block, and well, life happened. I know this is a shorter update but I will try and get another update out soon. if anyone is still interested, let me know your thoughts.