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randomfoggytiger · 4 months ago

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CHRIS CARTER'S MISCOMMUNICATION: "Platonic", "Cerebral and Sexy", and the Romantic Dynamic of The X-Files

(Credit to: Melissa Walker)

**Disclaimer**: This writeup won't focus on character flaws, only on delving a little bit deeper to understand a perspective.

In this post, I explore Chris Carter's "cerebral" use of the word "platonic", and parcel out his MSR opinions during the first six seasons of The X-Files.

PART I: WILL-THEY-WON'T-THEY OR PLATONIC?

In August 1993, Chris Carter conducted his first promotional interview of The X-Files. Amongst other inspirations for the show, he drew namely from The Avengers's John Steed and Emma Peel as the cornerstones of the "Fox and Dana" partnership. “David and Gillian are very bright,” Carter said. “They truly are the characters. Their relationship is cerebral and subtly sexy. Fox and Dana remind me of John Steed and Emma Peel in ‘The Avengers.’”

To a generation who grew up watching one of the (then) most widely known will-they-won't-they in television, that comparison signaled allure, attraction, and simmering sexual tension. As @observeroftheuniverse's post here highlights, The Avengers often blatantly played with the romantic pull between Mr. Steed and Mrs. Peel. This article particularly articulates how freely the writers and actors discussed the indisputable fact of "something" going on between them: Peel’s verbal interactions with Steed range from witty banter to thinly disguised innuendo. Regarding the constant question of whether they had a sexual relationship at any time, Patrick Macnee [Steed's actor] thought the characters went to bed on a very regular basis (just not in view of the camera). However, Rigg [Peel's actress] thought they were most likely engaging in an enjoyable extended flirtation that ultimately went nowhere. Writer/producer Brian Clemens said he wrote them with the idea that they had an affair before Emma’s first appearance in the series,[6] and they certainly appear to already know each other very well when Emma is first introduced. And my own post here draws descriptions and quotes straight from each characters' Wikipedia page (and notes the similarities between Scully and Peel.)

However, after years of mixed responses, one clever reporter was able to get a clearer answer out of Carter in 1997:

RS: I’ve always wondered if you watched a show called “The Avengers.”

CC: Sure. Loved it. Mulder and Scully come from those characters, Emma Peel and what’s-his-name — Patrick MacNee. He was older than she was, so it was a sort of May-September, whatever you call it, relationship. It lacked sexual tension because of that quality. But I loved that sort of platonic thing.

And now you must be wondering: how? How did he not notice Steed and Peel's dynamic while remaining a big fan of the show, especially when he described their dynamic as "cerebral and sexy"?

Chris Carter, I posit, uses "platonic" when he means to say "sexual tension without decisive follow-through."

A bold claim. I'll prove it, too.

PART II: PLATONIC DOESN'T MEAN WHAT WE THINK IT MEANS

For the longest time, I assumed this double speak of Carter's was a form of outright lying. Don't get me wrong, he has and will lie when ego becomes involved, or when he wants to bait the "mystery" longer but can't think up a cleverer sleight of hand in the moment. But the truth, from the 1990s to the 2020s, is much simpler: he is telling the truth when he refers to Mulder and Scully as platonic.

Because "platonic", to Chris Carter, means "intellectually driven, sexually interested, non-sexually equal" all rolled into one. And, since he can't find a word that means "sexual without involving sex", he settles for one that strays from making a definitive either way.

In his interviews from 1993 to 1997 (which I explore in Part IV, see below~), he insisted that Mulder and Scully were friends, yet also stipulated they wouldn't end up together "on-screen"; and when comparing them to other sexually-charged partnerships, he repeatedly underscored his preferences for relationships that weren't "overtly sexual."

The nail in the coffin was a 1995 interview for Season 3--

AD: When you first explained Scully and Mulder to FOX, was it a point of sale that this was going to be purely working relationship, no love interest.

CC: I wanted it to be that way from the get-go, although I did want there to be sort of an underlying tension between the two of them because my feeling is when you put two smart people, a man and a woman, in a room, I don’t care whether or not they’re passionate about their life and their work, you’re going to get sexual tension out of that naturally.

AD: Yeah, the sort of Harry-met-Sally-with-brains-scenario.

--and its follow-up in January 1996--

Interviewer: How important is the sexual tension between the characters?

CC: I never wanted them to jump in the sack together because it was uninteresting to me. To me, the most sexual relationships are often the ones that are never realized, consummated or even spoken about. So I wanted this to be two smart people who work together, who happen to get along very well. Through their shared passion in their work, there is a natural chemical sexual tension that comes out of that, that doesn’t ever have to be spoken about, but it works.

Well then, why the double-speak and general lack of clarity?

Chris Carter often claimed he quite literally trusted no one, a self-protective measure that sprung from two alcoholic parents. One was sometimes-abusive, the other "ditzy" and detrimentally loose-lipped; and together, they always held rank, never backing down or apologizing for their wrongs. Humor and obfuscation, then, became his primary tool-- one minute he'd proclaim, “We can’t prove that it [abductions or paranormal activity] happened, but we can’t prove it didn’t”, and the next he'd seriously aver, "I’m a natural skeptic...."

The key to the truth lies in the repeatability of his claims: his oft-voiced skepticism in the paranormal far outweighed his infrequent, one-off jokes.

PART III: WHAT CC MEANS WHEN HE SAYS "PLATONIC"

The most telling piece of information-- the dirt on top of the coffin, if you will-- was a surprisingly open interview promoting Millennium.

Chris Carter's sincerest answer to the question of the "platonic" dichotomy was also his most vulnerable; and, upon realizing this blunder, he swiftly abandoned reflection and escaped through the realms of exaggeration-- a sign that his clarity was mixed with a little too much vulnerability.

February 20, 1997:

Interviewer: In both shows, I noticed, the male-female relationship is central and idealized. In “The X-Files,” it’s platonic. In “Millennium,” there’s a sort of idealized marriage between Frank Black and his wife.

CC: My feeling is that the most powerful relationships you have in life are … not sexual. You haven’t seen Lance Henriksen and Megan Gallagher in a sexual situation on Millennium. Between them, love is understood. Love is gesture and feeling and trust, and all those things, and it’s not necessarily a physical thing.

Interviewer: And the relationship between Scully and Mulder?

CC: It’s also like my kind of idealized romantic relationship. It’s two smart people in a room, arguing something when each one has a valid point of view. It’s like good dinner-party conversation. It’s what makes me feel alive — and good about myself. And I think there’s too little of it in most of our lives and particularly in romantic situations.

Here, the interviewer turned his questions from philosophy to possibility, leading Carter to quickly disengage and strike up hyperbole:

Interviewer: You were talking a second ago about gesture, and how Gallagher and Henriksen don’t really hug and kiss. What would happen if Scully and Mulder were to hug and kiss?

CC: They have hugged. They’ve never kissed. They could kiss if it was the right time for it. They could never give big French kisses. People say, “Will Mulder and Scully ever go to bed?” And I say, “You really don’t want them to.” Because the minute they do, then, basically, when they’re in that motel on their assignment, you know, investigating the appearance of extraterrestrial life somewhere, and they decide they’re finally going to get it on, they’re going to lie there sort of googly eyed in the morning, and those aliens are just going to be running amok. They will become more interested in themselves than in the things that they need to be doing.

He wasn't entirely wrong, either: their partnership and relationship would require-- in 1997, at least-- a lot of communication to get anywhere close to romantically stable. Fight the Future's "But you saved me" hadn't been uttered canonically; and neither character had the downtime of Season 6 yet to sort through and shift their priorities. As easy as it would be to slough off his exaggeration as another example of how little he understood the characters, Chris Carter's statement-- in truth-- pointed to how well he knew their dynamic.

Still, there remained a grain of truth to Chris's drama. He viewed (views) Mulder and Scully as two characters whose sexual attraction served to aid their quest, not detract from it; and feared that anything overtly sexual or "changed" between them would inevitably distract them from saving the world.

A challenging dynamic to understand until I realized it was one he shared it with his wife, Dori.

February 13, 1996:

But the demands of his work wear on his private life. “This is the first time Chris has seen me vertical in a few weeks,” said his wife, Dori, an elegant former screenwriter who flew up from Los Angeles to squeeze in a little private time with her husband.

August 2, 1998:

I work until at least 9.30 and I always work weekends. My wife’s staying in Santa Barbara is nothing to do with any kind of marital break-up. We’ve been together 16 years. It’s more that she’d rather be there and not see me than here and not see me. We speak all the time and its actually very romantic: I’d suggest it to anybody as a way of creating connection and desire.

She would like it if I were home more often, but she knows that I tend to feel a little obsessive and understands that I would probably be miserable if I had to live my life any differently right now. I’m not a workaholic, but when something hits and it’s good, you have to obey its demands.

For Chris Carter, obsessive focus-- as confirmed and reiterated by everyone in his life during The X-Files's run-- was lived without distraction.

During another 1997 interview, he doubled down (humorously, then solemnly) on the pathos of Mulder and Scully's situation.

1997:

Question from Dublin, OH (Sunil Karve): Hi Chris. On that terrible day when the series comes to an end, are you planning on having Mulder and Scully finally get to the “truth” (and more importantly, be able to prove it?)

Carter: They’ll be too busy jumping each others’ bones.

Question from Los Angeles, CA (meredith): Recently you likened M & S’s relationship to the one in the movie “Remains of the Day”. For those of us who didn’t see that movie, what did you mean? Thanks.

Carter: I just meant, I thought it was more powerful that those two characters didn’t get together....

Question from North Syracuse, NY (Ellis): Will a romantic relationship develop between Mulder and Scully?

Carter: No romance.

PEOPLE: Ah the QUESTION…Why not?

Carter: More alien stuff is coming soon.

And yet, he took care to hint (blatantly at times) that Mulder and Scully would end up together after the nebulous, victorious conclusion. Not only as a possibility-- an inevitability.

PART IV: DESCRIBING MSR THROUGH CARTER'S EYES

Carter's descriptions of Mulder and Scully's partnership through the years didn't change... in substance, at least. His answers shifted depending on his devilish mood; but the underpinnings remained the same, all pointing to a similar, looming conclusion.

To illustrate this point, I've included as many statements as possible, barring repetition, dating from 1993 to 1997.

WRITING AND CASTING THE PILOT

"The Truth About Season One", post The Truth:

"It was very easy to cut Ethan out because he just slowed down the scenes where you would see Mulder and Scully together, which is where all the heat really was."

September 23, 1994:

I loved both David and Gillian from the start. And, yes, I chose them from hundreds of other actors who auditioned. The chemistry between them is just pure luck.

February 20, 1997:

[On casting Gillian Anderson] "You knew the chemistry was there with Dave and Gillian. That’s something you pray for, because you can’t manufacture it."

June 14, 1998:

“At the original auditions, I saw dozens of people but the moment David and Gillian walked in the room, I knew I’d found my Mulder and Scully. It was as if the skins I’d created fit these two people like gloves.”

SEASON 1

August 18, 1993:

“David and Gillian are very bright,” Carter said. “They truly are the characters. Their relationship is cerebral and subtly sexy. Fox and Dana remind me of John Steed and Emma Peel in ‘The Avengers.’”

November 30, 1993:

The relationship between Mulder and Scully is particularly promising. So far, it’s a low-voltage attraction. If it gets stronger, it won’t be because that’s the standard TV formula.

“It’s a relationship I’m not seeing on television,” says Carter. “It’s based on mutual respect, not something overtly sexual.”

SEASON 2

September 23, 1994:

LANGER: Chris, You brought back Tooms. Are there any plans to bring back the Eves or that guy who starts fires?

CARTER: Again, anything can happen. Except that Mulder and Scully sex scene.

MOONFERRET: Chris, We all know that the Mulder / Scully thing isn’t going to happen. I’m curious though– why exactly are you so opposed to this? You and the rest of the crew are great storytellers- I’m sure you could pull it off exceptionally. Why so opposed? (Do you get the feeling I’m one of the few that would love for it to happen? Call me vicarious…)

CARTER: Oh, Moonferret. If I could only make your dreams come true.

October 28, 1994:

“I had decided sometime after learning that she was pregnant (last winter) to shoot around Gillian’s pregnancy,” Carter said....

Carter considered making Scully a single mother, but he resisted domesticating the show. “I have chosen not to make the show about the characters’ lives,” he said. “The show works best as two FBI agents investigating paranormal or unexplained phenomena, and that’s what drives the show. If the stories don’t drive the show, then we’re working backward.”

December 1994:

Another source of praise for the show has been the unique relationship shared by the two main characters. Though there is chemistry between Anderson and Duchovny, the writers and actors take pains to maintain a tender but nonsexual relationship.

...As far as the sexual tension between the two goes, everyone involved in the series seems to agree that a full-blown romance is out of the question.

December 1994:

How close will Scully and Mulder get to the final truth in the current season of X-Files? Carter’s answer is as nebulous as any of last season’s answers. ‘I don’t think there is a final truth,” he says with a laugh. “There are problem final truths. We’ll just keep pushing."

SEASON 3

1995:

AD: When you first explained Scully and Mulder to FOX, was it a point of sale that this was going to be purely working relationship, no love interest.

AD: Yeah, the sort of Harry-met-Sally-with-brains-scenario.

1995:

Q. Did you always have in mind a two-person cast, male and female?

A. The Mulder-Scully idea was there from the start. And I wanted to flip the gender types, so that Mulder, the male, would be the believer, the intuitive one, and Scully the skeptic, which is the more traditional male role. It was also important that Scully be Mulder’s equal in rank, intelligence, and ability–because in real life the FBI is a boy’s club–and I didn’t want her to take a back seat.

October 1995:

**Note**: Carter teases a lot during this interview, but his last answer is serious enough.

Melissa: The chemistry between Mulder and Scully is great. Will their relationship ever develop into more than just being partners and friends?

Chris Carter: They’ll find out they’re actually third cousins, four times removed.

Naber: With Mulder getting a girl [a topical Season 3 rumor], will we be seeing Scully having more of a personal life or a date?

Chris Carter: Scully will join a nunnery when she learns that Mulder has strayed.

Mary Paster: Rumors about a girlfriend for Agent Mulder have a lot of fans worried that this will ruin the “sexual tension” between him and Agent Scully — can you tell us anything about it to calm our fears?

Chris Carter: ...About Mulder’s girlfriend… don’t worry, I won’t let anything “ruin” Mulder and Scully.

December 24, 1995:

Q: As you know, there has been a lot of speculation that Scully is Samantha. [Agent Mulder’s sister, Samantha, was abducted by aliens when she was a child and never seen again, causing Mulder to become obsessed with UFO’s. If she were alive, she would be the same age as his partner, Dana Scully.]

A: [Chuckles] People with too much time on their hands.

Q: Can you tell fans that is definitely not the case?

A: That is not the case.

Q: There’s also speculation that Scully is a lesbian and that’s why there have been only fleeting mentions of past romance for her. Is Scully gay?

A: That is not the case either. I hate to answer anything definitely. But Scully is heterosexual.

January 1996:

Interviewer: How close to your original vision is what we get?

CC: I have to say that it’s extremely close to what I imagined. Of course, when I was sitting and writing the pilot, I never imagined episode 73, which is where we’ll be this year. Anyone who creates a show, I don’t think, can look that far down the road. But I did, indeed, have an idea about how the Mulder and Scully relationship would progress.

Interviewer: How important is the sexual tension between the characters?

May 13, 1996:

Since the very first episode, the slow-burn chemistry between Mulder and Scully has had fans in a delicious torment, debating the pros and cons of a romantic/sexual relationship, analyzing the details of each gesture, each word spoken by the characters.

On this subject Chris Carter is adamant. In numerous interviews, he has stated that there will be a relationship between the two main characters “when hell freezes over,” as he recently said in USA Today.

May 16, 1996:

Interviewer: Do chat types want romance between Mulder and Scully?

CC: They do and they don’t. They want elements of it without them jumping into the sack. There are these “relationshippers” who kind of dominate the online chats. I’m a little dismayed because I don’t want to do a show about fuzzy warm Mulder and Scully. Never.

SEASON 4 - SEASON 5

1997:

Carter: They’ll be too busy jumping each others’ bones.

Question from North Syracuse, NY (Ellis): Will a romantic relationship develop between Mulder and Scully?

Carter: No romance.

PEOPLE: Ah the QUESTION…Why not?

Carter: More alien stuff is coming soon.

February 20, 1997:

Interviewer: If the show is ever in trouble, don’t you think Fox would push you to have a romance?

CC: Oh, sure.

Interviewer: And how strong do you think you’ll be when that call comes?

CC: As I say, I may not be here by then, so I don’t know. But I would resist it, as I think the characters would. Or the actors that play them. That’s what The X-Files movies are going to be for.

FIGHT THE FUTURE

March 14, 1998:

[John Shiban] "Chris Carter has said that Mulder and Scully, in a way, are having a romance. Even though it’s not a sexual romance, this is a relationship and it is complicated. And sometimes they are at odds, sometimes they don’t agree, sometimes they are concerned for each other, they are worried that one is going to endanger themselves, etc. Sometimes those things aren’t resolved and we like to leave it lie(?) because it makes them more real to us and more interesting people if they have that kind of long-term up and down that you go through in a relationship like this."

May 1998:

TVG: There has also been a lot of buzz in the press about a scene in which Mulder and Scully kiss. You’ve often said you wouldn’t play that card, that they will never really take their professional relationship to an intimate, romantic level.

CC: Nor should they. I’m not saying it would never happen, but I think the characters, if they’re being true to themselves, would be careful about finding themselves in that entanglement.

June 1998:

Y’know, like do Mulder and Scully kiss?

“I think it would ruin the show,” Carter says, then adds, “I think it would wreck the X-Files if they had a relationship.”

Anderson chuckles: “What? Before we spot an alien, what are we going to do? Smooch?”

Reports Duchovny: “There is way too much history to be developed for them to have a carnal meeting.”

Besides, says Duchovny, smirking, “America wouldn’t stand for it.”

SEASON 6

October 1998:

[Talking about FTF's almost-kiss]:

“I think it’s a natural expression of the love these two people obviously have for one another. And that was an expression of that love, it’s not necessarily a perfectly…” Carter drifts off for a moment, stumbling for the right words to describe his thoughts on the matter. “It’s not a sexual expression. That they almost kiss isn’t stepping over a line that I think that neither of them are quite prepared to step over. But it’s a quite believable one,” Carter insists. “That it doesn’t happen, that’s part of the fun.”

Although Carter says Mulder and Scully’s relationship will be dealt with in Season Six, he does stick firm to one of his former proclamations: “I don’t see Mulder and Scully getting in the sack.”

December 1998:

“They are VERY complex characters. We played with Mulder and Scully’s belief systems in the fifth season. They’re both unmarried. They’ve both lost parents, and they’ve both lost them in a tragic way. Mulder and Scully have a lot to learn about life, I think, and they’re things that people have to learn as they move through their 30s and on into their 40s,” CC observes. “So, I really do think we’ve got a lot more to learn about our characters and about the conspiracy. I don’t think we’ll run out of ideas anytime soon.”

CONCLUSION

I started this exercise as a way to understand Chris Carter's thinking. Seeing the early days of his vision-- poking around in the limitations of his verbiage, finding that a deeper relationship was always in the cards (even if kept back from the table)-- was informative and intriguing.

(What really interested me-- which I couldn't include here-- was the revelation that Gillian Anderson was of the same mind concerning Mulder and Scully's partnership. It was actually David Duchovny who later became curious to explore a more personal relationship between the two. Which explains The Unnatural, I'd bet.)

And that's where we leave off on this platonic miscommunication.

Thanks for reading~

Enjoy!

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all-eyes-lead-to-the-truth · 4 months ago

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All Eyes Lead to the Truth | Fight the Future

OPEN LOT

BLACKWOOD COUNTY, NORTH TEXAS

(@gaycrouton)

Stevie had been looking forward to the summer for the entire school year. No more homework, no more tests. Summer was the reward for all those hours wasted at school.

But now he was bored.

So bored, that when Cody Newton suggested they go digging in the open lot next to the cul-de-sac. It sounded like a good idea. And it was fun for a little while, but now he was bored. Again.

“It’s hotter than balls out here,” he sighed, pulling the neck of his shirt up so he could wipe the sweat off his face.

“Have yours even dropped yet?” Blake teased.

Stevie scooped up a pile of dirt into the blade of his shovel and tossed it at the older boy. “Shut up.”

“I feel like those kids in that book we read this year. Ya know, the ones where they have to keep digging all those holes to become better people or whatever?” Cody whined as he tried to catch his breath.

“You mean Holes ?” Chris deadpanned.

Cody nodded as he took a hit from his inhaler. “Yeah, only our treasure’s gonna be so much better.”

Stevie squinted his eyes against the sun as he looked at Blake, who was rolling his eyes. Cody dragged them all out here because his brother claimed to have heard something weird here a few nights ago. He even said the ground vibrated under his feet. While they all knew Cody’s brother was probably stoned when he said that, Cody took him for his word and believed there was something beneath the dirt.

Stevie didn’t have much to do, so even though he thought this was bull, it wasn’t like there were any good movies playing on TV anyway.

He dragged the toe of his shoe against the ground and made a circle against the gritty dirt. “My hole’s the biggest,” he gloated, taking note of the other boys’ shallow attempts.

“I didn’t know you swung that way,” Blake ribbed, throwing a pile of dirt back into Stevie’s area.

“Dumbass,” Stevie grunted. Irritated, he raised the shovel and dug it into the ground with as much force as possible. Only this time, the ground didn’t seem to have as much resistance. “What the—,” he murmured.

When he withdrew the blade, he saw a dark slit in the ground. Using the side of his shoe, he pushed some loose dirt near the indentation and watched as the dirt fell into darkness. “Guys, come look at this!” he yelled, repeating the action so they could see.

Chris made a sound at the back of his throat before taking his own shovel and prodding the edge of the slit, backing up quickly as it widened slightly.

“What if it’s haunted? Like Goatman’s Bridge in Denton?” Cody asked, suddenly nervous.

Stevie raised his hand to his mouth and started chewing the dead skin around his nails. This didn’t feel fun anymore. He wanted to run and grab his dad to get an adult’s opinion, but he wouldn’t be back until six. None of their parents would.

As the others bickered, something in the darkness caught Stevie’s eye. A glimpse of something? He leaned forward to try and—

His stomach dropped straight into his ass as he felt the dirt give out underneath his feet. His hands swung wildly, trying to grab onto something, but all he found was loose debris that fell alongside him.

Stevie felt like the ground sucker punched him when he made impact. A gasp ripped through his chest and he choked against the air filling his empty lungs. Suddenly, he’d gone from looking at the darkness to the blinding light as he took in the other side of the, now gaping, hole in the ground, framed by the faces of his concerned friends.

“Hey, Stevie. You okay?” Blake called out.

Trying to appear unshaken, he stood up and tried not to inhale any of the disrupted dirt. “I got— I got the wind knocked outta me.”

“Looks like a cave or somethin’!” Cody yelled down.

He was illuminated enough to see around him, but he couldn’t see much of anything. When he walked around to try and see if there was a wall anywhere, he felt a crunch under his shoe, and when he looked, he saw a crushed bone. But it wasn’t the only one. In the dim lighting, the stark white bones seemed to shine.

He picked up the biggest one and realized it was a skull. His daddy had a bunch of critter skulls around the house, but nothing like this.

With a smile, he stepped back into the light and held his findings up for them to see. “It’s a human skull!”

“Toss it up here, dude!” Cody exclaimed.

“No way butt-wipe, this is mine. Anyway, there's bones all over the place, man,” he replied with a smirk. There were so many bones down here, that they could all probably take home an entire human’s worth each.

Looking down to examine the skull’s strange translucence, he realized he was stepping in a puddle of oil. His smile faltered as he tried to think of where the nearest oil derrick even was around these parts. But before he could give it any more thought, the puddle expanded around his shoe. It was like the earth was bleeding.

“What the…”

The skull fell from his hands as pain shot through his spine, causing him to bend over and grab his stomach. His blood felt heavy, almost like he could feel the strain of it moving through his body. The puddle kept expanding and Stevie watched in confusion as it began to fill up the base of the skull through the broken part.

He could hear his friends calling out to him, and using as much energy as he could muster, he looked up towards them. He could see they were there, but only because he could see how their bodies contrasted the blindingly bright light.

And then—

FEDERAL BUILDING

DALLAS, TEXAS

(@admiralty-xfd)

Four minutes.

The moment he sees the digital readout on the bomb, Darius Michaud knows he has only four minutes to live. It’s a humbling thought.

“Can you defuse it?” Agent Mulder asks.

Yes, I can , Michaud thinks. “Yes, I can.”

But I won’t.

Agent Mulder appears undeterred, as if he’s actually going to stick around like a fucking hero, when Michaud knows that isn’t going to happen. He’s wasting everyone’s time, including his own, so he gives the younger agent an unearned glare. Unearned because the man hasn’t done anything wrong; in fact, he’s done his job exactly right. He’s done what should have been impossible, what had to be impossible. And now Michaud is going to die because of it.

Agent Scully urges her partner out of the vending room with a look Michaud assumes is the only thing that could have managed it. Then, all too quickly, he is completely alone.

He sits on his useless kit and faces off with the bomb: this inanimate, unknowable antagonist that will end his life in three minutes and thirty-seven seconds. Hello, friend. He can see exactly what to do from here, which wires to cut. This could be over a lot sooner if he wants it to be. But Michaud isn’t here to save lives, unfortunately. He’s here for a greater purpose.

The mission , they call it. It’s always been about the mission. Whenever he hears that phrase from a superior, he knows what it means: to follow orders no matter what. And Michaud is good at that.

Three minutes.

He pictures the chaos happening just outside this room, how everyone around him had sprung into action, and for a brief moment he’s reminded of what it was like back in the war, when everyone had each other’s backs and were all working towards a common goal.

He’s surrounded by people who all want to stop this bomb from exploding. To save lives. And here he is, under strict orders to keep that from happening.

Two minutes.

He clasps his hands in front of him, partly because he doesn’t know what else to do with them but mostly because, if he doesn’t, he worries he might just start defusing this thing. The survival instinct is strong, and he knows that as much as anyone.

One minute.

He hasn’t thought about ‘Nam in a while, but he is now. Viscerally. He smells the rain, hears the explosions, and feels the squelch of mud that crept all the way up his calves. He thinks of his battle buddies, Mike and John, and how neither of them had accepted the deal he’d taken in order to get out. How neither of them had jumped at the opportunity to taste freedom once again, only to pay for that opportunity in sacrifice and loyalty; by subjection to experimentation and tests and uncertainties.

He’s never felt like a coward before. The responsibilities he’s been given and the knowledge that he’s been helping the mission succeed have been enough to avoid feeling regret.

But he feels it now.

Forty seconds.

He’d known when he accepted this assignment that a lot of innocent people would die. He’d been prepared for the inevitable eventuality. Never in a million years had he expected he’d die not knowing the reason why.

Now, at least, a lot of them will be saved , he thinks.

I’m taking their place , he thinks.

Fourteen seconds.

He wonders what happened to Mike. Did John ever get out of the jungle? He’ll never know.

What will his son think of him after he’s gone?

He leans forward, his head in his hands. He thinks of the kids he’d passed in the hallway minutes prior, how he’d been party to their death sentence, and now he’s going to save them.

Michaud closes his eyes. He doesn’t want to watch this happen.

He is the fucking hero. Even if he’s the only one who knows it.

BETHESDA NAVAL HOSPITAL

BETHESDA, MARYLAND

(@fridaysat9)

Kyle was from a military family. His father was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Marines. His mother was Military Police. He’d spent his childhood on bases all across the country, playing with his siblings and the other military brats whose lives were just as transient as his.

Medical school was expensive. Money had always been tight, and Kyle had two older sisters who went to college and put the family in debt without a second thought. He couldn’t do that to his parents, so he enlisted. Uncle Sam would make him a doctor; all he had to do was report and serve… even if that meant spending his nights on an empty hospital floor guarding halls in the middle of the night.

He’d traveled across the country from California to stand here. It had been six months, and he’d done nothing more than go to classes and basic training, and check identification. Admitting clerk was a very long way from doctor in the field , helping soldiers on the front line.

Kyle was trying to keep himself alert by running through the log book in front of him when he saw a man and a small woman walking down the hall. He didn’t recognize them, but lots of different people came through this section of the hospital. At least it was something to do.

“ID and floor you're visiting, please.”

The man flashed his FBI badge and told him they were going to the morgue while his partner revealed her own badge. There weren’t typically a lot of special orders for the night shift, but there was one tonight– and it was about exactly the location that these two agents planned to visit.

“That area is currently off limits to anyone other than authorized medical personnel,” Kyle said, repeating the official message they’d all been given.

“On whose orders?” the agent asked as he reached for the logbook.

“General McAddie.” Kyle had been told of the General's order not once, not twice, but three times at the start of his shift.

“General McAddie is who requested our coming down here,” the agent said as he scribbled something illegible on the pad. “We were awakened at 3am and told to get down here immediately.”

Shit. Kyle felt his composure slip as he tried to remember if there had been any mention of the FBI.

He didn’t. “I don't know anything about that.”

“Well, call General McAddie,” the agent said, already starting to walk past, his partner falling into step at his side.

Shit, shit, shit.

“I don't have the number,” Kyle admitted.

“Well, then call the switchboard,” the agent said, turning to face him. “They'll patch you through.”

Kyle studied the man in front of him, trying to assess the situation, but all that did was make him feel more like an idiot. Did he have a switchboard number? He’d never called it before. He rummaged through the papers in front of him, wondering if it was here somewhere and no one had told him.

“Jesus, you don't know the switchboard number?” the agent asked, and Kyle decided he needed to get help before he got into more trouble.

“I'm calling my C.O.” He picked the phone up off its base, but the agent stopped him from making the call.

“Listen, son, we don't have time to dick around while you demonstrate your ignorance of the chain of command.” Kyle was frozen, holding the phone a few inches from his ear. He glanced at the female agent who offered him nothing as her partner continued his tirade. “The order came directly from General McAddie, you call him. We'll conduct our business while you confirm authorization.”

The agents started down the hall. Kyle didn’t know who these people were, but the last thing he wanted was to prevent them from doing whatever General McAddie had asked them to do in the morgue.

“Why don't you head on down,” Kyle called out as he hung up the phone, “and I'll confirm authorization.”

“Thank you.”

Kyle watched until they reached the end of the hall before picking up the receiver. He looked at the phone list in front of him. He felt inadequate, like he couldn’t do even the simplest task without waking someone up in the middle of the night to ask a question. He decided to start by calling the clerk on the floor above him, but no one there had heard of any FBI involvement on the premises. He called the morgue next, but the phone went unanswered. He was starting to get a sinking feeling in his gut. Something didn’t feel right, and as he made more calls, saving his C.O., he knew he had fucked up.

It was nearly 4:30am when Kyle ran out of options and finally dialed his C.O.’s home number.

“This had better be good,” the senior medical officer said as he answered.

“Sir, it’s Lieutenant Murray,” he said, keeping his tone firm even though his body was filling with dread. “I am calling to get authorization for two FBI agents visiting the morgue.”

“That area is off limits, Lieutenant.” His C.O. said it like a reprimand and all at once, Kyle knew he had been played.

“They said,” he started, feeling like a child. He cleared his throat and tried again. “They said they were here under General McAddie’s orders.”

Kyle heard rustling and an angry grumble across the phone line. “Jesus Christ. Call the MPs and get them down there immediately, and Lieutenant? Do not leave your post until I get there. Is that clear?”

Yep, Kyle had fucked up royally. At this point, all he could hope was that it wouldn’t cost him his M.D.

“Yes, sir.”

NORTH TEXAS

(BLACKWOOD)

(@monikafilefan)

He stares wide-eyed at the gaping hole in the fireman’s abdomen.

No… no, no, no!

“It's left the body!” Bronschweig yells as he sprints back to the ladder leading up to the open hatch in the ceiling. This is bad. This is really fucking bad. “I think it's gestated!”

He freezes as a figure darts through the shadows.

“What's the matter?” his assistant Micah asks.

“Wait... I can see it.” And it is huge. Its long limbs and bulbous head glistens as it inhales the warm Texan air. The freezing temperature it’s been carefully confined in is now meaningless. It has evolved. “Oh Jesus… Lord…”

The black void of its oil-slicked eyes is endless. Evil lives there.

”Ya see it?”

“Yeah, so much for little green men,” Bronschweig mutters, awed. His hands shake as he pulls out a vial and syringe from his bio-hazard suit. If he weren’t shitting his pants right now he’d laugh at the naïvety that a thin plastic suit could protect him from this monster. “I need you down here!”

While he waits for Micah to get off his ass and help, he fills the syringe with the vaccine’s dark liquid. Sheer dread washes over him when he realizes the bone and tissue that the creature has been ingesting during development is exactly what it intends to consume again. This newborn is hungry.

A noise echoing around the chamber douses Bronschweig’s veins with an icy dose of adrenaline. He twists his head from side to side, trying to spot the creature who’s simply vanished.

Goosebumps prickle his skin. As a scientist, he knows what this is: a predator stalking its prey.

Behind him, a loud, animalistic screech pierces the air. Bronschweig startles, shouting in fear when a massive body slams into his chest, brutally knocking him to his back as needle-like nails swipe across his face.

Bronschweig gasps under the searing pain of scalpel-sharp claws slicing ribbons of his flesh from sternum to stomach. This thing will rip him to shreds. Fighting for his life, he clutches the syringe in his fist and stabs it through the slick, olive-colored torso of the entity pinning him down. A battle cry rips through Bronschweig’s lips as he empties the vaccine into the creature’s veins. It shrieks, lurching away.

Pain. Blood. Shock.

“Oh, God…”

Rolling to his knees, Bronschweig looks down at a gnarled wound on his abdomen weeping dark blood into a crimson pool within his palms. Evisceration. Flayed wide open; like being autopsied alive.

Fuck!

His body throbs to the bone as he lunges for the ladder.

“Help!” His chest is so tight he can barely breathe. “I need help!”

He blinks away tears and catches a glimpse of his colleagues closing the airtight lid attached to his only way out. Piles of dirt cover the bulletproof glass, ominously turning day to night.

Panicking, Bronschweig starts climbing the metal rungs.

“What are you doing?” he cries. The deep cut across his face pulls his mouth into a sneer.

Bastards! All of them, selfish fucking bastards.

He gags as metallic-tasting foam bubbles up his throat and slowly seeps into his mouth and nose. A punctured lung. Christ, suffocating on your own bodily fluids is almost as horrific as being torn apart.

He stares up in darkness at the dirt-covered ceiling, resigned. The project’s motto runs through his head: progress requires sacrifice. He’d just never imagined it was his life he’d be sacrificing.

A clawed hand juts out from behind, covering Bronschweig’s entire face in a visceral death grip, yanking him backwards with incredible force and smashing his skull onto the metal floor.

Bronschweig screams. The creature strikes.

And this is the beginning of the end…

LONDON, ENGLAND

(@gaycrouton)

“Then you must take away what he holds most valuable. That with which he can’t live without,” he stated. This group had been dancing around the inevitable for long enough.

“I presume you mean to say whom ,” the British Bastard countered with a weary sigh.

“Dana Scully,” Spender supplemented, punctuating the name with an exhalation of smoke.

“I know you have a fondness for the girl, but we never intended her involvement to last this long,” Strughold replied. “She should have died in that train car. That cancer should’ve killed her, as intended. Yet, somehow , none of our plans have come to fruition.”

A few of the men in the room averted their gaze. Too feeble to look him in the eye and acknowledge they had become weak.

However, Spender, the worst offender of them all, stood tall.

“It wasn’t the time,” the Fat Man replied.

Gesturing towards the monitor, now displaying black and white footage of Dana Scully conspiring with Fox Mulder. “When do you think the right time is? When she finally succeeds in helping Mulder destroy a plan that’s been decades in the making?”

“Killing her would be worse than eliminating Mulder,” the British Bastard seethed. “Never mind a crusade, he would become relentless. Who knows how many of their allies would crawl out of the woodwork to avenge her alongside him.”

“She was a disposable little girl and your cowardice has allowed her to become Mulder’s very own Mary Magdalene,” Strughold seethed to the room.

When Conrad Strughold started this organization, he chose these men because they were ruthless. These were the men who kissed their children on the foreheads before sending them to their deaths and would shake each other’s hands to celebrate a job well done afterward.

Back then, they would sacrifice anything when they had everything to lose, and now, in their old age, they couldn’t handle the responsibilities that came with playing God.

It was pathetic.

Quickly trying to compensate for their inadequacies, the men in the room all began offering lame contributions while Strughold sat back and listened with contempt.

“The man nearly put a bullet in his brain when he found out we gave her cancer because of him, maybe he’d be too far gone for revenge.”

“But I thought we only mentioned the idea of killing Agent Scully to avoid killing Mulder? What’s the point if the result remains the same?”

“Two birds with one stone.”

“Killing them both will raise the concern of that pesky assistant director.”

“He’s far more susceptible to threats than those two. Let me take care of him when the time comes,” Spender shrugged.

“What if, instead of killing her, we merely… put her out of reach, so to speak,” Strughold suggested.

The British one had the audacity to look disgusted. “You can’t mean—”

“He’d want to believe she was alive so badly that his focus would shift to trying to find her.”

“It would be Samantha all over again.”

“Worse.”

Strughold nodded thoughtfully. “That’s good.”

“I’m sure Marita Covarrubias would appreciate having someone else take the brunt of the vaccination experimentations.” The reminder of the blonde’s plight elicited a few chuckles throughout the room.

“No, it’s too close for comfort,” Strughold dissented. “Besides, don’t many scientists dream of going to Antarctica? Let’s allow her to partake in our exciting research experiments there.”

“Are you so naïve as to think Fox Mulder wouldn’t go to the ends of the earth for that woman? He’s besotted with her, for God’s sake,” the Brit proclaimed.

“On the contrary, his fervent loyalty and affection for Miss Scully is what I’m counting on. Pretty euphemisms aside, it would surely take him a long time to find her. Besides, looking at his track record with his sister, we can assume he will dedicate the second half of his life to yet another fruitless endeavor.”

“What does Einstein say about insanity?”

Through a plume of smoke trailing from his lips, Spender spoke up. “Plus, with Scully out of the way, maybe you could ask your colleague to come back and give Mulder some comfort in his time of need.”

Strughold nodded appreciatively, “I believe Diana would be amenable to that. She’s proven valuable to me with our work in Tunisia. It would be useful to have her keep an eye on him.”

“This is ludicrous!” the Brit declared. “I will dispose of Kurtzweil, but I can not stand by and condone this half-cocked plan.”

The room was silent as he stormed out, slamming the door behind him. It wasn’t until they heard the sound of an engine starting that Strughold spoke up. “I presume everyone in this room understands that he only offered to exterminate Kurtzweil to make warning Mulder less conspicuous.”

“Yes, we know,” Spender agreed.

“He’s been working against the interests of the group for a while now.”

“He had to have known we had eyes on Bill Mulder’s funeral, yet he flippantly disparaged the group to earn Dana Scully’s favor.”

“Well, if he wants to be a friend of the family so badly, then I suppose he can follow in Bill Mulder’s footsteps,” Strughold shrugged.

A finality settled over the room as the absent man’s fate was decided. It served as a reminder that length of tenure meant nothing without loyalty.

“We can allow him to be useful one final time,” Strughold mused, staring out the window at the departing vehicle. “Then let his good intentions blow up in his face.”

2630 HEGAL PLACE

ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA

(@monikafilefan)

“Oh, Trish. It’s my fault,” Theo cries. “I should’ve worked harder to get you the best treatment sooner.”

“Theo,” Trish tsks weakly against his cheek. Tears burn twisted lines down his face that soak the bleachy hospice-grade sheets of her pillow. “Don’t you dare blame yourself for one damn thing. Promise me, my love.”

“I promise.”

Something soft as feathers tickles Theo’s face, waking him from his dream.

“Cuddles…” As much as his late wife Trish loved this damn cat when she was still by his side, that’s how much Cuddles is attached to Theo now. Shoving down lingering sadness, Theo scratches the cat’s back. “Whaddya want, furball?”

Cuddles bats the TV remote with his orange paw and the theme song to Theo’s favorite show pops on.

“Bad boys, bad boys

Whatcha gonna do?

Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?”

“ COPS ! Good boy.” The cat nuzzles his head against Theo’s hand. “Well Cuddles, who do ya think they’re gonna bust tonight?”

“…But you saved me! As difficult and as frustrating as it's been sometimes, your goddamned strict rationalism and science have saved me a thousand times over!” a man yells, his strained voice echoing off the hollow walls of the hallway. Cuddles jumps. Theo rolls his eyes. Nothing new ‘round here. “You've kept me honest! You've made me a whole person…”

Theo ignores the noise until he hears someone running down the hall a few minutes later.

“Damn neighbors causin’ a ruckus.” Theo slowly rises from his recliner as the cops on screen sprint down an alleyway after a perp. “Makin’ me miss the best part.”

Theo looks through the peephole — it’s Fox Mulder from number 42. Of course it is. He’s the only neighbor with a revolving door of domestic disturbances. When Theo flings open his door to remind Mulder that Hegal Place isn’t a gymnasium, he sees the FBI agent’s petite partner, Dana, laying still on the floor, her eyes closed.

Shocked, Theo stumbles over to her, instinctively pressing two fingers to her neck to check her pulse. The act reminds him too much of Trish in her final days. But the contrast of Theo’s dark-skinned hand against Dana’s bone-white throat tells him this is not about Trish right now.

“Then hurry, Goddammit!” Mulder screams before sprinting back into the hall. “Theo?”

“You call 911?” Theo asks.

“Yeah,” Mulder nods. “My partner… she’s hurt.”

“What happened? I heard shouting…”

Mulder gapes. “I’d never hurt her. A bee stung her. I—” He runs his hands through his hair. “ Fuck! ”

“Okay, all right, she’s breathing. Pulse is good.” Theo stares as the stunned agent paces back and forth like a caged lion. Pure panic, Theo recognizes. Suddenly he feels a sympathetic wave of fear so painfully familiar it nearly knocks him out of his house shoes. “Look—”

Dana’s breath hitches and Mulder instantly falls to his knees, carefully lifting her upper body over his thighs, wrapping a protective arm around her.

Mulder’s usual tan face is white as snow while his unblinking eyes refuse to leave the woman laying limply across his lap. He’s silent as his trembling fingers gently sweep red strands of hair behind Dana’s ear.

“Scully…” Mulder’s voice cracks, and Theo fears his heart might just do the same.

He approaches slowly, reaching out to place a calming hand to Mulder’s rigid back. “Help’s comin’. I can hear the sirens already.”

Which is weird , Theo thinks. Never in his 68 years has he counted on an ambulance showing up so fast. Not that he’s complaining. Theo only first met Dana face-to-face two years ago and he’d instantly liked her. Pretty little thing. They’d ridden the elevator together, introduced themselves, and she was sweet enough to offer to hold Cuddles’ heavy bag of litter. Theo pretended to fiddle with his keys to watch Mulder welcome Dana into his place with a dopey-lookin’ grin and a hand to her lower back.

Trish would’ve loved to see Mulder cherish Dana the way Theo cherished her.

“My fault, Scully... shouldn’t have dragged you out there… so sorry…”

Mulder’s pleas pull Theo back to the present.

“No, no. Now don’t do that. Placin’ blame isn’t helpin’ anybody. It’ll be okay.” Saying that to someone cradling their sick loved one is a big risk, but Theo knows from experience that simple words of ease can keep the world spinning a little longer. “Ya think Dana would want you blamin’ yourself for one damn thing?”

Mulder tosses him a sad look. “No, Theo. She’d probably shoot me first.”

Then the elevator dings open and a team of paramedics rush through its doors. The medics transfer Dana from Mulder’s lap and onto the gurney in one swoop.

“Help her!” Mulder orders. “Please…”

Theo feels his back hit the wall as he moves to the corner, his gut churning.

“Can you hear me? Can you say your name?” one medic asks Dana.

Another straps an oxygen mask over her face. “She's got constriction in the throat and larynx.”

“Passages are open! Let's get her in the van right away,” the tall medic shouts when Mulder reaches for Dana’s hand. “Coming through! Watch your back!”

“You’ve never held me back,” Mulder whispers to an unconscious Dana. “Never been in my way, Scully. You’ve helped me find it.”

Mulder stands frozen as the elevator doors close. Theo slaps a hand to the young man’s back and swallows down his own heartbreak to offer Mulder support he wished he’d received years ago. “Now go show her that.”

Mulder returns an appreciative slap to Theo’s arm before racing down the stairs to meet the ambulance.

“ Meooow! ”

“Nosy cat, get back in the house.” Theo grabs Cuddles, holds the furball over his heart as he sends up a silent prayer that Dana will be back in Mulder’s arms soon enough. “C’mon Cuddles, let’s go finish COPS .”

WILKES ISLAND

ANTARCTICA

(@admiralty-xfd)

The weeks drag by at the bottom of the earth.

They’ve been on the ice for nine weeks now, nine weeks away from home. Delilah knew it would be tough but the perpetual sunlight has been messing with her circadian rhythms for so long she doesn’t know which way is up.

The penguins, predictable as ever, do their thing. Emperors remain inland in tight family groups, struggling to keep warm against the unforgiving chill in the air. Her crew is only here to observe and document their activities, although around week three she began to realize it was just as tedious for them as it is for the birds. They’ve been stationed at this particular rookery since the beginning of mating season, and she’s ready to get the fuck out of here. Why couldn’t I have gotten the gig in Galapagos? she wonders. It’s warmer there and those penguins mate for life.

Delilah decides to call it a day. She turns to her camera operator. “Shut it down, Will.”

Will, confused, raises a brow. “We still have thirty minutes out here.”

“I’m putting on my producer hat,” Delilah replies. “We’re done. Let’s go get some coffee, preferably with some booze in it.”

With a You don’t have to ask me twice shrug, Will slaps the lens cap onto the camera and stands, wiping the snow from his pants.

And that’s when everything happens at once.

First, the penguins begin to scatter. They haven’t done anything like this before, and like any good camera operator would, Will heaves the machine back onto his shoulder and points it at the birds. But Delilah senses something else is up… is it an earthquake? Some kind of tectonic activity?

There’s an enormous thrumming sound coming from behind her, and when she whips around, she sees something she will never forget for the rest of her life.

It's a spaceship. An honest-to-god fucking spaceship, straight out of Star Trek or something, gliding over the tundra as smoothly as a hawk.

Delilah’s throat goes dry. She can’t even speak, much less turn her eyes away to see if Will has seen it, too.

“W… Will ,” she croaks. What the fuck are words?

“Are you seeing this?” Will says, still riveted by the frenzy of birds.

“Do you see that ?” Delilah spits. It’s the only time in her documentary career that she’s known without a doubt she is looking at the more interesting subject. But before Will even has the chance to spin around, the craft —or whatever it was— is gone.

“See what?”

Delilah doesn’t know what else to do. She tears off towards where the retreating shape went, running as hard and fast as her legs can carry her. “Come on! ” she shouts at Will, and her partner follows. “Bring the camera!” She appreciates his obedience in a time when explanations are less than convenient.

They run, as far as they’re able. Will lags behind, struggling with the heavy camera, and it feels like miles but can certainly only have been a few hundred meters when Delilah spots something ahead, what appears to be a dark figure, a clear contrast to the stark white of the snow. Is it some of the Emperors, separated from the huddle?

Will sees them too, and they both slow. Delilah’s insides are burning and she doubles over.

“We ran all this way for a couple rogue penguins?” Will gripes.

“No,” Delilah pants. He’s never going to believe me. “It was… did you see…”

“Wait,” Will suddenly says. “Those aren’t penguins.”

And as Delilah squints to see, her partner is right. It’s a person, a human person… no, it’s two people huddled together. “Who are they? How the hell did they get here?” And no sooner do the words escape her mouth does Delilah think… what if …?

No. That would be ridiculous.

They creep closer to the pair, their shoes crunching across the snow. It’s a woman clinging to a man, keeping him warm.

“H-hello?” Delilah calls. “Do you need help?”

The woman turns her head, catches Delilah’s eye. Her face appears frostbitten, her auburn hair wet and windswept. “He needs to get warm,” she says, her teeth chattering. “Please.”

“Scully,” comes a second voice. The man, whom Delilah had presumed was passed out, is actually awake. “Don’t be a hero. You’re the one who needs to get warm.”

Will sets the camera down and pulls out one of the trusty emergency blankets he keeps on him at all times, rushing over to the duo and covering the woman, its metallic crinkly surface reflecting the sun. He goes for a second blanket, but the woman declines.

“No,” she says. “I’ve got him.” She wraps herself together with him, not letting him go. “I’ve got you, Mulder,” she whispers.

“How the hell did the two of you get all the way out here?” Delilah asks the woman incredulously, her inquisitive nature failing to waver.

But the redhead doesn’t answer. She doesn’t seem to care that there are others here, that rescue is imminent. She doesn’t seem to care about anything other than the immediate warmth of her companion.

Delilah can tell it’s taking everything inside Will not to pick the camera and point it at these two, at this demonstration of human resilience and connection far more interesting than a flock of birds. It’s not like they would even notice, much less care. But he doesn’t. So they watch instead, what they’ve come here to do.

It’s even better than Galapagos.

OFFICE OF PROFESSIONAL REVIEW

WASHINGTON, DC

(@fridaysat9)

“... the other events you’ve laid down here are too incredible on their own, and quite frankly implausible in their connections.”

Agent Scully sat in front of the table of senior staff, looking worse for the wear after her recent escapades. Jana took in her appearance– the dry skin, chapped lips, little to no makeup– and noticed that the agent’s poise hadn’t faltered in the slightest since their last meeting. Even though, since that time, she had gone back to Texas (and apparently taken a trip to Antarctica). She and her partner, the ever-discussed Agent Mulder, had spent thousands of dollars at the FBI’s expense. Jana had no doubt all of this could have been prevented had it not been for the incredibly rash and irresponsible choices she and her partner had made.

“What is it you find incredible?” Agent Scully asked, as if it weren’t obvious.

There was a disregard for the authority of OPR in the agent’s voice, which would have given Jana pause, had Agent Scully’s reputation not preceded her. Jana was aware that she was tough, calculated, and professional nearly to a fault, and while she had been assigned to the X-Files to disprove the validity of the department, she had become a staunch defender of her partner’s work. Loyalty and dedication were things that were usually respected at the bureau. So long as that loyalty wasn’t their downfall.

They all had their roles at the FBI. Agent Scully’s, though she seemed incapable of accomplishing it, was to provide a scientific eye in her department and stop the hemorrhaging of funds that was coming from the pursuit of cases of an “unexplained” nature. Jana’s job, which was one she took very seriously, was to evaluate the agents in her division, corralling any lost sheep. Her job was to reign in those who had taken advantage of their badge, traveling around the world in the pursuit of answers to questions that went beyond the bureau’s scope or interest.

“Well, where would you like me to start?” Jana asked, matching Agent Scully’s nonplussed tone that barely covered the disdain she felt for this meeting. “So many of the events described in your report defy belief. Antarctica is a long way from Dallas, Agent Scully. I can't very well submit a report to the Attorney General that alleges the links you've made here. Bees and corn crops do not quite fall under the rubric of domestic terrorism.”

“No, they don't.”

“Most of what I find in here is lacking a coherent picture of any organization with an attributable motive,” Jana continued. She’d waded through Agent Scully’s report– the first person account, the “findings,” and frankly, lack of reputable proof. It read more like a science fiction novel than a government-sanctioned operation. “I realize the ordeal you've endured has clearly affected you. But the holes in your account leave this panel with little choice but to delete these references to our final report to the Justice Department, until which time hard evidence becomes available that would give us cause to pursue such an investigation.”

There was a moment of silence before Agent Scully stood from her seat and walked around the table. She was slight, but walked with purpose, approaching the bench as if she were the one who had called this meeting to order.

At first, Jana was unsure of her purpose, until she removed a small vial from her pocket and presented it to her.

A bee.

Agent Scully stood before her, unyielding and unaffected by what had been said about her report. Jana tilted the vial, wondering if the insect between her fingers could really be proof of the things she’d read or if it was in fact, nothing more than a garden variety honey bee, plucked from the flower beds out front of the Hoover building.

Agent Scully spoke, then, with conviction that matched her demeanor. “I don't believe the FBI currently has an investigative unit qualified to pursue the evidence in hand.”

All at once, Jana realized that she had lost. As Agent Scully left the room, leaving the men at the table talking amongst themselves while Jana held the bee in her hand, she could see the outcome as clear as day. This bee would have to be investigated. Agent Scully’s claims would have to be investigated.

And Agent Scully was correct: there was only one department capable of doing so.

She adjourned, and tucking the bee into her pocket. She had other meetings today, more important meetings, and she had spent enough time on this already. Jana gathered her things, slipping out of the room without further discussion.

A bee. Thousands of dollars and a plethora of outlandish claims came down to a single bee. As she waited for the elevator, Jana removed the vial from her pocket and held it up for a closer look. She hadn’t heard any footsteps, but the strong smell of cigarette smoke caught her attention as a man came to stand at her side.

“Miss Cassidy,” he said with a sense of authority she wasn’t sure he deserved. Jana didn’t know what his role was in the bureau, but she did know he had tight connections with her bosses. “What do you have there?”

A prickly feeling crawled across her skin as she realized he would get the answer whether it came from her or from someone higher up. What she didn’t know is what he would do with the information.

“It’s from Agent Scully,” she said calmly. “A bee. From Texas.”

The man whose name she had never gotten pursed his lips and held out his palm in front of her. “Allow me to take that off your hands.”

He didn’t say why, or what he would do with the small insect, but Jana was aware there was no room for discussion. She placed it in his hand as the elevator arrived. She stepped inside, but he remained still, watching her as the doors slid shut.

Read the rest of All Eyes Lead to the Truth on Archive of Our Own!

#all eyes lead to the truth #fight the future #movie #1998 #stevie #bronshweig #military guard #michaud #conrad strughold #mulder's neighbor #jana #mulder and scully's rescuers #mulder #fanfic #scully #x files fanfic #x files #msr #the x files

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