From: lizardchyck@my-deja.com
Date: Sun, 07 Nov 1999 22:15:09 GMT
Subject: NEW: Deny Everything (1/1) by LizardChyck

Title: Deny Everything
Author: LizardChyck < lizardchyck@yahoo.com >
Category: Vignette, Humor
Rating: PG (for a few cuss words)
Spoilers: The series finale??
Archive: Gossamer, Ephemeral; all others please
ask first.

Disclaimers: The men and women of the X-Files
universe belong to Chris Carter, unless they
decide to revolt and strike out on their own!

Acknowledgements: Thanks to JadedCat and
JourneyToX for their power-betas and to Kristi for
the title! And many thanks to "theCAT" for posting
the inspirational CC quote to the Scuttlebutts
list in the first place!

Deny Everything
by LizardChyck

QUOTE OF THE DAY:

    "One thing for sure, our characters will not
end up in a jail cell, talking among themselves."

    -- "X-Files" creator CHRIS CARTER, in a thinly
veiled swipe at the "Seinfeld" finale, when asked
about how his Fox series will end, to the Los
Angeles Times.

*****

"It's not my fault," the gangly man said,
interrupting the long, cold silence of the others
as he shifted uncomfortably on the metal bench.

A short, surly snort erupted from the bald man
slumped next to him, and six other pairs of eyes
either shot daggers at him or rolled upward in
disgust.

"Well, it's not," he whined. His normally sensual
pout deepened until his bottom lip almost curled
under itself. He was ever the ham, even in the
most serious of situations.

"No, of course not. Nothing's ever your fault."
The woman's silky voice dripped with sarcasm.

"'Deny Everything.' Wasn't that the motto?" said
the grey-haired fellow in one corner, and he blew
a fine stream of smoke out through his nostrils.
The woman watched the cloud drift out through the
thick iron bars of the jail cell and wondered idly
if he could manage to send a smoke-signal SOS to
The Powers That Be.

"If only he had," mumbled the hippy through the
mask of blond hair dangling in his face.

"How was I supposed to know!" the first man cried.

Oh, that was the last straw. The woman turned on
her colleague, sparks flying from her icy blue
eyes.

"Six years. Six long, carefully crafted years!"
she raised her voice, her face turning only a
shade or two lighter than her fiery hair. "All we
had to do was get through another six goddamn
months, and we would have been home free! We could
have had Emmy's, maybe even an Oscar."

"More money," the hippy quipped.

She was standing now, pulling herself up to her
full five feet, two inches and bearing down in a
most intimidating fashion on her current nemesis.
"But nooo. *You* had to get into the role, didn't
you?  *You* had to let your hormones rule the day,
didn't you? You couldn't just *act* like you were
sleeping with her, could you? But oh no, it's not
*your* fault."

A squirrely looking man in a leather vest and
glasses stepped bravely in front of the woman,
cutting off her advances and wrapping his arm
around her shoulder. "Now sweetie, take it easy.
You know how your stomach gets upset when you're
aggravated." He guided her gently back to the
narrow cot and held her, stroking her hair and
murmuring calming words, until the petite woman's
breathing steadied. She laid her head on his
shoulder and fought back the tears.

"I repeat, how the hell was I supposed to know
that she was a reporter?" the lean man protested.
He looked from one cellmate to the next, making
his case. "She auditioned just like all of us did.
He checked her background that same way he did
ours. There was no reason not to trust her."

"Trust no one." The quiet man lurking in the
corner blinked his long eyelashes and adjusted his
prosthetic left arm. He repeated the phrase.
"Trust. No. One."

"We trusted *him*," the defendant jerked his thumb
at the big man sitting next to him and regretted
it when his benchmate glared angrily through his
wirerims.

"Like hell you trusted me," the man growled.

"*She* didn't, but I did," the younger man
protested, nodding in the direction of the woman.

"We could afford to trust him. He had the most to
lose of any of us," a bearded man in suit and tie
said from his seat on the floor.

"Yeah, and now I've lost it all, thanks to you,"
the balding man said without taking his eyes off
the loose limbed man next to him.

"We've all lost everything," the greying man said
dramatically as he lit another cigarette.

"Not that any of you had anything to begin with,"
a scratchy female voice said from outside the
cell. The prisoners jumped at the sound, staring
uncomprehendingly at the tall, dark woman who
smiled slyly back at them.

"You've got a lot of nerve coming here," the big,
surly one spat out. Several other voices chimed
in. "How dare you come here." "Get the fuck out of
here." The lean man slunk quietly back on his
bench, relieved to no longer be the sole focus of
their anger.

"You've ruined us!" the squirrel began to lament
until the redhead shut him up with a glance.

"You're fools, all of you," the dark woman said.
"Washed up civil servants--" she waved away a puff
of cigarette smoke--"and pot-fried hippy drop
outs." The shaggy blond said, "Hey!"

"Don't you get it?" she continued,  "You were
nobodies, of no consequence. Little boys and girls
playing dress up. Just puppets on his string
before I came along."

"I am not a nobody. I have a good career, dammit,
unlike the rest of these dolts" the bald man said,
the muscles of his chin twitching in anger. "At
least I did until you came along."

"You had a good career? Is that what you call it?
You, Assistant Director Skinner, were a boring
desk jockey with a bad marriage and a worse
temper. You were disliked by your coworkers and
distrusted by your superiors. I know; I saw your
personnel files."

A barely suppressed laugh escaped from behind the
shocked Skinner. The woman looked past the silver
smoke drifting into her face and caught the eyes
of the lean man still huddled in the corner. In a
low, dangerous voice, she said, "And you, Mulder?
Who were you? What were you accomplishing?
Languishing in Behavioral Sciences, longing for
all the adventure of the FBI. So for six years you
got to swagger around, flashing your badge and
pointing your big gun, making up stories of alien
invasions and government conspiracies, and for
what? So some Hollywood producer could make a
fortune from your pouty good looks and ability to
cry on cue?"

 The redhead woman stood up unobserved by the men
and marched over to the other woman, standing toe
to toe with her rival. She looked up at her
through the metal bars and said, "And what about
you, Diana, or whatever your name is? What are you
doing here? Have you just come to gloat and insult
us?"

"I've come to offer you a deal, Agent Scully," she
replied, "one you'd all be well advised to take."

"No fuckin' way...," Mulder began, but Scully
silenced him with a look.

 "What kind of deal?" Scully asked the other
woman.

"It's simple, really. You give me and my paper an
exclusive detailing the entire hoax for the last
six years. Come clean. Tell me who was involved,
who knew, who was fooled. How much did it cost the
FBI? How high up did the *real* conspiracy go? How
did he convince everyone that this was real?
Everything."

"In exchange for what?" Scully asked.

"Credit," Fowley replied. "You did the work, you
put yourselves on the line, risked your careers,
to pull of what could potentially be the biggest
hoax in the history of the country. The Blair
Witch Project was children's make believe compared
to this. Hell, this makes Wells' War of the Worlds
look like community theatre. You conned the entire
FBI. All *he* did was give you the cameras. Why
should he get all the credit. I'll even the score,
and whatever the FBI does to you, you'll come out
of this very, very rich people."

"What makes you think you can pull this off?"
Scully asked, skepticism warring with the first
hope she'd felt in days.

"He's vulnerable. His last project flopped
dismally. The one before that never generated the
excitement it promised. Fox put a lot of money
into him, and he's disappointed them. This was his
last chance. And I'll admit, it's a brilliant
idea: using real FBI agents to 'prove' that the
government is hiding the existence of alien
colonizers. Get it all on film -- seven years
worth -- and show it all as a big expose. But he
would have hogged all the credit, and you would
have been exposed anyway. This way, at least you
can turn the tables on him and benefit from your
efforts."

She paused, locking her gaze with Scully's,
challenging her to see the logic of the plan.

"And if we refuse?" Scully asked.

"Then the government lowers the boom on all of
you, and I make my exclusive deal with *him*,"
came the answer back.

A murmur began from the men, mumbles of protest.
Mulder opened his mouth to speak, but Scully beat
him to it. "We accept."

***

"CUT!" The surfer leaned back in his chair, a
smile plastered over his face. "That's a wrap! And
quite a piece of work, if I do say so myself."

The End

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