From snsa@ix.netcom.com Wed Oct 30 13:05:57 1996
Here's a little trifle for the Halloween Mask Challenge. I
haven't had time to read every entry yet, more's the pity
(the ones I HAVE read have been fine indeed - kudos!), so I
hope this idea hasn't already been used. Maybe it shouldn't
have been used at all, by anyone...

DISCLAIMER: If I get too detailed with this disclaimer, I'll
give away all my jokes. Suffice it to say that everyone in
the following sketch is someone else's, and is being used
without permission or any intention of copyright
infringement.

TO ARCHIVISTS (you wonderful people): File this one under
Humor and Crossover. Rated G. Hope you like it.

All comments to snsa@ix.netcom.com, please.

And now, on with the show!

DON'T MASK, DON'T TELL
by Nina Smith

     Special Agent Fox Mulder of the FBI paused for a moment
before the door to appraise himself. The blue hospital
scrubs fit perfectly, the old sneakers he'd chosen looked
appropriately beat up for an operating room (or a morgue),
and the paper cap covered his brown hair completely. He
smiled at the costume, sure - well, almost sure - that
Scully would take his choice in the proper spirit. Taking
the surgical mask hanging around his neck, Mulder raised it
to cover the smile, then withdrew a pair of thin rubber
gloves from a pocket. Thinking both sardonically and fondly
of his partner, he snapped on the latex, then went to the
door and pushed his way into the Director's Halloween
masquerade party.
     Taking a moment to let eyes adjust to the low, lurid
lighting and letting ears adapt to the cheerful thunder of
some great old Stones hit on the sound system, Mulder swept
his gaze across the room. His hidden grin widened as he
realized he could recognize just about everyone. Of course
the Director himself hadn't come to his own party - no one
had expected him to - but there, _mirabile dictu_, was the
Assistant Director. Walter Skinner looked even more massive
than usual in the shoulder pads, helmet and brick-red jersey
of a Washington Redskins player. The red helmet turned in
Mulder's direction, and a smile blinked behind its
faceguard. "Good evening, Agent Mulder. Glad you could make
it."
     "Wouldn't miss the sight of you in that get-up for the
world, sir," the agent replied as he approached his
superior.
     The smile turned wry. "Go with what you know, as they
say. But I can see you had something else in mind."
     "Go ahead and say it, sir!"
     Skinner chuckled. "Okay, I will. Planning on playing
doctor tonight, Special Agent?"
     But before Mulder could riposte, another voice cut
through the music. "Mulder! You're here!"
     Both men turned, eyes widening at the approaching
sight. Big-heeled, elaborately stitched boots; fringed
buckskin skirt and vest; silver-buckled embossed leather
belt with holstered Colt Peacemaker; gaily embroidered blue
shirt; jaunty white ten-gallon hat crowning sunset-glorious
hair and the bluest eyes in creation. "Yee-ha, Scully,"
Mulder observed calmly yet appreciatively.
     "You could give Reba MacIntire a run for her money
tonight, Agent Scully." The Assistant Director sounded
sincere. "But I hope that .45's a dummy."
     "My nephew's," Agent Dana Scully answered. "Here, I'll
show you the plug." Out came the gun, now easily
identifiable as a toy, with a bright orange plug in the
plastic barrel. "Did you bring your plastic scalpel, Doctor
Mulder?"
     Again he was about to reply, when a sudden distraction
cropped up. Seeing a bright flash of motion at the corner of
his eye, Mulder turned to identify it, but ended up staring
blankly. "Who on earth is THAT?"
     The others turned to stare just as blankly. "I have no
idea," Skinner confessed. Scully only shook her head.
     "That's one hell of a mask he's got on," Mulder
continued, half to himself. "It can't be comfortable."
     "It doesn't seem to be slowing him down any," observed
Scully.
     Indeed it didn't. The man was practically trembling
with energy, his big yellow zoot suit flapping on slender
limbs and his matching yellow hat stabbing the air like a
nervous searchlight. Under the wide brim, huge round eyes
rolled left and right in a bony face seemingly sealed in
bright green latex - or latex paint, even. Paper-white teeth
the size of nickels almost glowed in a near-psychotic grin.
     Suddenly the big bulging eyes stopped their restless
motion and locked on Scully's - then literally shot out of
their sockets over a foot away like flung baseballs. Beneath
them the green chin dropped open and then all the way down
to the floor, striking the boards with an audible thump, and
a tongue like red rope shot out like a frog's, even further
than the eyes.
     Before anyone in the room could react to the incredible
display, there was a blur of green and yellow motion as the
man flashed across the room too fast for eyes to follow. He
slammed to a halt with a loud "BOINNNG!" sound not six
inches in front of Scully and suddenly squealed, "YIPPEE!
RIDE 'EM COWBOY!" With a huge flourish, he flung away his
yellow hat; with a twist of the wrist, he suddenly came up
with an enormous black velvet Mexican sombrero, its wide
band thick with a rainbow of sequins and pom-poms dangling
all the way around its brim, and slammed it onto his head.
"LET'S DAAAANNCE!" Neither Scully nor her colleagues had
taken a chance to move before he pinned her in a grip half
folk-dancing Varsouvienne position and half hammerlock.
     Suddenly the music changed from comfortable Seventies
oldies to a weird blend of incongruously frenzied _merengue_
rhythm and what sounded like the Beach Boys' classic sound
as remastered by Giorgio Moroder. FBI agents and their
guests practically stampeded out of the way as the
outlandish man pulled Scully onto the dance floor.
     Shaking off his astonishment, Mulder cried, "Let go of
her!" and pawed under his surgeon's costume for his weapon,
plunging forward after the couple. But Skinner's hand fell
on his shoulder, gripping firmly and drawing him back.
     "Relax, Agent Mulder," the A.D. said confidently. "I'd
say Agent Scully has things well in hand."
     Indeed she did. Once they hit the dance floor, the
green-faced maniac released his hold on her arms to seize
her left hand and fling his own left arm out wide, roaring,
"TAKE IT AWAY, BOYS! SOMEBODY STOP ME...!"
     "With pleasure," Scully snarled, low and hot, as she
balled her right hand into a fist and sent it smashing
across the angular green face.
     "WAAAH!" Costumed couples stumbled away to both sides
as the fantastic creature spun in another green-and-yellow
blur, whirling like a giant's gyroscope out of control
across the party room until hitting the wall - and smashing
through, leaving in the wall an outline of the zoot-suited
figure as perfect as any chalk tracing at any murder scene.
A couple of shaken masqueraders peered out into the night
through the absurd opening, but the thing that had made it
had vanished utterly.
     As Scully was brushing herself off, Mulder and Skinner
came quickly to her side. "Scully! Are you all right?" her
partner asked breathlessly.
     "Yes, Mulder, I'm fine," she assured him. "But what WAS
that thing?"
     Assistant Director Skinner stared at the man-in-zoot-
suit-shaped hole in the wall. "Your next assignment," he
said.

THE END