Title: Scully’s Journey 2: Mrs. Spooky
Author: ML
Originally posted 7/17/01
Distribution: Ephemeral, Gossamer, IWTB, or if you’ve archived my work before, yes; if you haven’t, all you have to do is ask, and keep my headers & email attached. Thanks!
Spoilers: Squeeze, Deep Throat
Rating: PG-13 for language
Classification: Vignette
Keywords: Scully POV
Disclaimer: These characters are not mine, they belong to Chris Carter, TenThirteen, and Fox Broadcasting. I am using them only for recreational purposes, mean no infringement, making no money.
Summary: Sticks and stones…This is the second in a series of Scully’s private journal entries, as she gets to know the X-Files and her new partner.
——————-
New Case (UNSUB; Organ Extraction)-Day One
I had lunch with Tom Colton today. I suspected from the beginning he wanted something; I’ve hardly heard from him since he left Quantico and I stayed there to teach. But despite my suspicions, I like Tom: he’s acerbic and ambitious, certainly, but he’s always good for a laugh, and he can dish the dirt with the best of them.
After we spent a little time gossiping about old classmates, and comparing their progress with our own, Tom got down to business. At first I was flattered, thinking he wanted my expertise on a case he was working on, but it turns out it’s not me he wants at all.
He wants my new partner, but he doesn’t want to be seen asking for him. He wants “Spooky” Mulder’s talents, but not the baggage that he thinks comes with him.
Mulder and I have only gone on a few cases together so far. But I’ve already noticed a change toward me since I’ve become his partner. I ignore it, mostly. As a woman in the FBI, I’ve had to contend with all kinds of innuendo and downright hostile behavior. I’ve even had nicknames over the years, but today Tom gave me one that I hadn’t yet heard:
Mrs. Spooky.
It wouldn’t surprise me if Tom came up with it himself. He’s always been good at coining nicknames that somehow stick with you. Sometimes they’re good-natured ones, but not usually.
I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean this one kindly. Maybe as a warning. I just didn’t see that right away.
Tom wanted help on a case that he thought would be the making of him. He wanted Mulder, and/or me, to help him with the profile. He didn’t expect any paranormal overtones.
Too bad he doesn’t know Mulder as well as I’m getting to know him. Mulder could find paranormal overtones in almost any case, given half a chance. I spend half my time with Mulder trying to rein him in.
Mulder was pleased to be asked but at the same time I think, a little hurt that he wasn’t asked directly. But as usual, he’s pretty quick on the uptake. He knows about his nickname, of course. I don’t think he knows about mine yet, but it’s only a matter of time. I won’t be the one to tell him, though.
“Do you think I’m spooky?” he asked me with a touch of plaintiveness in his tone. He had a half-smile on his face, but I could see the hurt in his eyes.
What’s funny, is that his nickname actually started out as a compliment. It comes from his days with Violent Crimes. His profiles were so good, he nailed the UNSUBs so well, that it was spooky. I’m sure people also found his intensity unsettling, but they admired him for it at the same time. There’s not so much admiration now, with his new obsession. Now his nickname has taken on a whole new, less flattering, meaning.
They asked me to write the profile. It surprised me that they didn’t ask Mulder to do it, but maybe his comments about little gray men and their love of liver decided them against it. Or, maybe they figured I’d get Mulder to help me anyway, and they’d be spared the humiliation of asking Spooky for help.
I just finished it a bit ago. It’s pretty late now, and I have to present this to Tom’s team in the morning. Tom seemed to think that if I do a good job with this, I can write my own ticket out of the X-Files office.
I don’t know if that’s what I want or not.
XxXxX
Liver Extraction Case (aka Tooms)-Day Two
Tonight, we caught Eugene Victor Tooms. I’m proud to say it was due, in no small part, to my profile.
I was pleased to be asked to join the stakeout team, even though the compliment was undermined by a smartass remark about my day job.
But I could have killed Mulder when he showed up at the stakeout, especially when he only seemed to show up to criticize my profile. He scoffed at me, and then had to eat his words when Eugene Victor Tooms crawled out of the vent.
I have to admit, I liked that. Not that I’m going to make a big deal out of it, or rub it in, but I liked that he admitted that I was right. I don’t think Tom would have done that.
I have to be at the Baltimore field office first thing in the morning. They’ve arranged for a lie detector test for Tooms. But I feel so wired right now, I’m not sure I can sleep. I wish Mulder hadn’t just walked away after the arrest was made. It would have been nice to debrief a little, and frankly, to hear him say that he thought I did a good job on the profile. I’d call him, but it’s so late, and what would I say to him? It would sound like gloating, and he already admitted that I was right. What more do I want?
I keep thinking about the moments before the arrest. I was so afraid when I could see the movement down the air vent. I haven’t had to pull a gun on a suspect that many times, and until Tooms appeared, I wasn’t sure what to expect. That’s Mulder’s influence; I suppose I was expecting some kind of monster, not a slight, bewildered-looking young man. It is a little hard to believe that he actually committed the acts we suspect him of.
I guess we’ll find out more about him tomorrow, during the interrogation.
XxXxX
Tooms Case-Day Three
They let Tooms go. They fucking let him go.
And Tom Colton has shown me what he’s really made of.
It’s true, it appears that the lie detector test was not conclusive, but it seemed to me that there was enough evidence to at least hold Tooms until we could investigate his background a little further. But Tom and his ASAC didn’t see it that way.
I was angry and I protested to Tom. His reaction was to reassure me, as if I was concerned only that my profile would be called into question. I stood there while Tom and his superior practically accused Mulder of making them make a bad bust.
I think their attitude toward Mulder had something to do with it, and the fact that they were annoyed that Mulder insisted upon sitting in on the interrogation. And also, that Mulder inserted his own theories into the investigation, and a couple of bizarre questions into the lie detector test.
The whole time I’ve been working with Violent Crimes, I’ve been getting this really weird vibe from Mulder. At first I thought it had to do with a case he thought was, by rights, an X-File. To be honest, when Tom first told me about it, I said as much myself.
There were moments today, though, when the territorial behavior on Mulder’s part seemed more…well, more personal. I finally called him on it. He did actually admit that he felt sort of territorial toward me. Because I respected “the journey,” as he called it. Because I respected him.
That’s quite possibly one of the nicest compliments I’ve ever been paid. And this from the man who, just a few scant weeks before, accused me of being a spy.
Of course, that was before I rescued him from Ellens Air Base, and probably saved his life.
Hearing that from Mulder also made me a little sad. Hasn’t anyone ever taken the time to listen to what he says? Do they all dismiss him out of hand? I think I know the answer to that. I had just seen Mulder dressed down by the ASAC on the case, and Tom Colton called him crazy practically to his face. They wouldn’t admit to the slightest possibility that anything Mulder had to say had even a little credibility.
It really pissed me off. And when Tom tried to get me to leave with him, to leave Mulder on his own in the interrogation room and by extension, alone on the X-Files, I let him know in no uncertain terms that I knew where I belonged.
With Mulder. Working on the X-Files.
I may have burned a few bridges there, but the funny thing is, I don’t care. I can now see Tom Colton for what he is, and I don’t want to be like him. I have my ambitions, but I won’t realize them by stepping on others around me. I will get there on my own merits, or not at all.
XxXxX
Tooms Case-Days Four and Five
Another run-in with Tom, this time at a new crime scene. I finally agreed with Mulder that we should conduct our own investigation into Tooms. Tom tried to block us from the scene, which happened the night Tooms was released. I threatened him, told him that obstructing us might look bad on his record. I could see Mulder’s amusement when I spoke to Tom so sweetly, but with such obvious threat.
On our own, Mulder and I found an address and discovered something that might prove Tooms did in fact have something to do with the murders. I’m still not sure what to think of Mulder’s outrageous claims of Tooms’ involvement in the previous unsolved murder cases, but strangely, the theory he is touting might be borne out by the evidence we found today.
Mulder stayed alone at Exeter Street to keep an eye out for Tooms’ return. Tonight I went behind Tom’s back to request a stakeout team to replace Mulder in the morning. I should be back there with him tonight. The regulations state that no one should be on stakeout detail alone. But if I can’t get replacements approved in the morning, I will have to do the same thing while Mulder gets some rest. It’s contrary to regs, but I believe that Mulder is right, and it may be the only way we can prove it, before Tooms murders again.
I should be with Mulder. I might as well be, for all the rest I’m getting tonight.
XxXxX
Tooms Case-Days Six and Seven
Tooms is finally behind bars again, no thanks to Tom Colton and his task force.
Yesterday, Tom did his best to sabotage our stakeout. He got the team called off, and insisted that he be the one to call Mulder about it. What a petty idiot Tom is. Mulder doesn’t have the market cornered on territoriality. I asked Tom sarcastically if his behavior was what it took to get ahead. Obviously, for Tom, it is. I told him I hoped he would land on his ass.
This has absolutely nothing to do with anything, but I couldn’t help noticing that Tom’s ties are even uglier than some of Mulder’s. I certainly can’t compare him in any other way to Mulder, and I wouldn’t want to. I told Tom at the outset that despite Mulder’s “out there” theories, he is a great agent, and I meant it sincerely. It was not just partner loyalty. It’s Tom’s misfortune that he chose to ignore that, and let his own ambition get in the way of the work.
I’m lucky that Mulder is the man he is, and the conscientious investigator he is, or I might have been Tooms’ next victim. Mulder’s timely arrival at my apartment caught Tooms in the act, as it were. I couldn’t have fought him off alone. But Mulder couldn’t have fought him off alone, either. In the end, it took the two of us, working together as partners should, to subdue him.
I guess that means I owe Tom some thanks for helping me to truly think about what my partnership with Mulder means. When I was initially assigned to the X-Files, I thought it might be for the short term. I would stay there just long enough for me to do what was required, and then I’d be able to get another field assignment. Maybe, when Tom first approached me about this case, I thought that it might be my ticket out, as he suggested. But it worked in the opposite way. It has hardened my resolve to validate the work. I may never get all the way there, but I’m beginning to see that not everything can be explained in black and white. There are infinite shades of gray in between, and that’s where Mulder is operating. I’m trying to understand that. I’m willing to try, which is more than can be said for Tom’s bunch.
That was last night. The whole case still seems surreal to me, though as I told Mulder, I did find some interesting physiological anomalies about Tooms that bears out Mulder’s theory of Tooms using the livers as sustenance for a prolonged hibernation period. Farfetched, yes. But not impossible.
It’s not going to be easy. Although there have been times when I’ve felt I had to work twice as hard to be taken seriously, the burden of ridicule is a new one for me. I have never had my work questioned, and now it seems I’m in a position where it’s going to happen as a matter of course. I can’t wait to hear what Blevins has to say about this case.
It just means that I will have to work harder to make sure that the work we do is sound, and that there is scientific support for it. As I said, I’m used to working twice as hard as, for example, the Tom Coltons of the world.
I’m also going to have to develop a thick skin about nicknames, it seems. Maybe I could learn something from Mulder in that regard. He seems to be able to joke about his, most of the time.
After Mulder’s theories had been shot down by Tom and his ASAC, I asked him why he’d even bothered to put them forward, when he knew they wouldn’t listen. He explained to me that sometimes he just had to mess with people’s heads, even if it meant humiliation for him. I guess that’s one way he copes with it.
I don’t think I can do that. I’ll have to learn to live with my nickname in my own way.
And I’d rather be “Mrs. Spooky” than to be like Tom Colton.
end.