From: WCKV82C@prodigy.com (Mary Abel) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: New: The Drive 1/2 Date: 9 Jul 1995 21:21:54 GMT THE DRIVE by Mary Abel Author's note CONTENT WARNING: This has no plot beyond getting from Point A to Point B. The story is loosely based on a drive that I have had to make with a friend of mine many many times. Too many times to count, in fact. There is a little teeny tiny bit of mushy stuff, so forewarned is forearmed. This is a first posting so any comments are appreciated. I would hope for CONSTRUCTIVE comments but if you feel absolutely compelled to flame this honest effort of writing, go ahead... I reserve the right to ignore you in that case though. COPYRIGHT/LEGAL STUFF: As if you haven't heard this one before: Mulder, Scully, The X-files, etc, belong to Chris Carter and 10/13 Productions. The plot belongs to me. Feel free to distribute, WITHOUT accumlation of profit or taking credit where credit is not due. You can reach me with comments at either WCKV82C@prodigy.com or STRBCK@aol.com Enjoy! P.S. The lyrics to the songs don't belong to me either, but you probably already knew that. (boy, I talk a lot.... but here it is, finally) The 1st Hour It was a five hour drive from Sacramento to Eureka. The only reason Fox Mulder knew that was because he had to drive there. Why anyone would want to go to Eureka of his own free, uninfluenced by aliens, will was beyond the considerable scope of Agent Mulder's intelligence. But then, he was also a federal agent. If they told him to go somewhere, he had to go. It was the law. He was only sorry he had to drag Scully along. Well, he was sort of sorry. Mostly, he was glad because he wanted the company. There wasn't anything else to look at. Scully yawned and watched a few hundred yards of scrub scattered dirt pass by. Then she turned and looked at the black top. She yawned again and looked out the window again. Up ahead she could see a rice milling plant. Scully gave it all the attention that the Eiffel tower would have received. It was the first structure taller than two stories they had passed all afternoon. She wondered what idiot had decided that Eureka, California didn't deserve an airport that was serviced by eastern connected flights, then decided it had something to do with the fact that Eureka's population was around fifty thousand. "You want to turn on the radio?" Mulder asked, glancing over at her. Scully held back a sigh. He had that "please don't hit me" puppy dog tone that drove her crazy and perversely, made her want to beat him up. "All right." She flipped on the switch and turned the knob enough times to be sure that the only stations they were able to receive were heavily interlaced with static. Not worth the effort of tuning in other words. She jerked the knob, silencing the noise. Mulder shifted in his seat uncomfortably and turned the air conditioning up. They passed a sign which told them that the city of Zamora was 15 miles up the road. "Weird name, huh?" Mulder said, straining as if trying to see the towers of the city. "Heard stranger." Scully answered. She reached down and slipped out a file folder. "Tell me again why we're going to Eureka?" she asked, flipping it open. Mulder could have sworn he smelt the too-sweet odor of those perfume inserts that came in women's magazines, then dismissed it as his imagination. "We're following up a lead. Since we were in San Francisco, and for some reason, the AIC thinks highly of me, he wanted me to interview Jane Danler." "Ah." Scully answered absentmindedly, reading all about the summer's new make up colors. She decided the next time she was at a makeup counter, she was going to try Pink Beige Desert. And maybe Cocoa Foam. She turned the page as quietly as possible and wished the pages of women's magazines weren't so crisp and liable to make noise. Mulder tapped the steering wheel, in time with the tunes that were playing in his head. As usual, the song that had blared from the radio/alarm to wake him up was the one playing in his head. "You are the dancing queen, young and sweet," he muttered softly under his breath, trying desperately to remember the tune to another song. Any other song. "What was that?" Scully asked sharply, her cheeks coloring with guilt. She started to close the folder. "Uh, nothing. Never mind." Mulder answered, shifting in his seat again. "Look- Williams, 20 miles. Isn't that where we turn off?" Scully asked, who had peeked at the map before they had left the airport. Mulder caught a glimpse of a green road sign. "Yeah, I think so." he answered with confidence. Like an insane radio station, another song started to play in his head. "Do the hustle... do do do do do dododo..." he hummed. "What?" Scully asked, looking up from an article on how to remove lipstick stains from business shirts. Not that she'd ever have the chance to practice it. "Sorry, nothing." "It's okay. You want me to drive?" she asked. "No, that's okay. I've got it covered." "All right. Well, if you get tired..." "You'll be the first to know." A tumble weed blew across the road right in front of them. Mulder slowed eighty to seventy and got into the right lane in preparation for getting off at the William's exit. "Mulder, where are you going?" Scully asked, holding her place in a short short romance story with her finger. "This is Williams." he answered. "Don't we get off here?" "The second exit, Mulder. The one that says Junction 20, West?" she said, pointing. "Oh yeah. I knew that. Just seeing if you were paying attention." Mulder covered. "Hmm hmm." Scully answered. She was a paragraph away from happily ever after and didn't want to be interrupted, not even for a chance to shoot down the male ego concerning driving. They made the turn onto a long stretch of road that ran straight into low golden hills. For a moment Mulder admired the glow of the sun as it reflected off the hills and road. It was going to be a beautiful sunset. In four hours. Four hours of the sun glaring straight into his eyes. He felt in his pocket for his sunglasses, then sighed as he remembered he had left them in his car at the airport in Washington DC They passed another road sign. "Clearlake: 35 miles. Eureka: 225 miles." Oh goody, only 225 miles to go. Then a thought hit him. "Hey Scully, wasn't Clearlake where that guy, you know, machetied all those people?" he asked, torn between wanting to investigate and their mission. Scully didn't bother to look up from an article on new summer fashion styles. "That was Crystal Lake. In New York. And it was a movie." she said, trying to decide if she liked the short straight skirt or the long, pleated skirt better. "Oh yeah, well the story had to come from somewhere." Mulder retorted. "I'm sure." was Scully's conversation stopping answer. Now it was a tossup between the tank top and thin linen shirt or scoop necked tee with the silk cardigan. The 2nd Hour The scenery that surrounded them was a mixture of scrubby trees, sculpted by the wind, dry yellow grass that made Mulder's nose itch just to look at it, and occasional groups of purple and yellow wild flowers. It was nice enough to look at, especially from behind the safe protection of the glass, breathing the filtered air conditioned air that flowed over them. The problem was the scenery looked like it went on forever, endlessly stretching. No end to it, as far as Mulder could see. He glanced back at the flat black road that curved out in front of them. A car passed them, heading east. Mulder counted it, adding it to the list of the other cars they had passed. It was number two. One long finger began to tap out a rhythm on the steering wheel. "Macho macho macho man..." Scully, leaning back against the head rest, her eyes closed, tried not to grimace. Mulder could not seem to stop singing seventies disco songs today. Maybe it was brainwashing. Maybe she should start an X-file about it. She considered the option for a full two seconds, the dismissed it with a purely mental grimace. Nah, too easy. =========================================================================== From: WCKV82C@prodigy.com (Mary Abel) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: New: The Drive 2/2 Date: 9 Jul 1995 21:55:51 GMT The Drive by Mary Abel Author's note, the condensed version: Thanks for sticking it out this long, I promise it will be over soon. The X-files, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, etc, belong to 10/13 Productions, Chris Carter, etc. Send mail, I'd love to hear from you people. The 3rd Hour Finally, finally, they saw the sign that indicated the turn off for the last leg of their trip. Mulder almost felt like whistling when the he guided the car around the curve of the road. The road that stretched in front of them was long and clay red, the same color of the soil that peeked through the growth on the fields on either side of the road. Far off in the distance, Scully could see a barn, halfway to ancientness, home, apparently, to a peacefully grazing cow. Mulder was squinting, looking over the steering wheel as if he couldn't believe his eyes. "You know Scully, when the sun hits the road just right, it almost looks like alien space ships are hovering out there... waiting for me to drive through." Dana sighed. She knew that it would come to this, sooner or later. "Pull over Mulder." she commanded gently, using the kind of voice that mental health care professionals used at work. Mulder raised his eyebrows. "What for Scully? If you have to visit the rest room, I'm sure we'll find one at a gas station or something... you don't have to go au natural." "No, Mulder. I don't have to visit the rest room. Please, just pull over." "Okay." "Get out Mulder. I'm driving." Scully informed him, preparing to move into his seat. He complied willingly enough. He had been getting a little tired. Scully used the few moments Mulder took to get in on the passenger side to adjust the seat. Damned cars... make it so hard to move around... Finally, when she was a comfortable position , she looked over at Mulder to see that he was buckled in. He had his head against the window, his mouth open, and was snoring softly. She almost laughed. Given the rhythmic movement and noise created by nearly any moving vehicle, excepting boats of course, Mulder could sleep any time and anywhere. Too bad there wasn't a way to create it at his home. Maybe then, he'd come in to work with a few less bags underneath his eyes. She moved the car back into drive and pulled out onto to the road. A few seconds later she frowned. Mulder was right. With the setting sun hitting the road, it did look like little UFO's were waiting for her to drive through them. Long shafts of sunlight were making a last stand on the western edge of the world when Scully and Mulder pulled into the parking lot of a fast food restaurant. Golden arches shone in competition with the lingering afternoon light and the smell of fried carbohydrates drifted on the pine scented breeze. Punctual as Pavlov's dogs, their stomachs started to growl. Scully locked the car and joined Mulder at the door. The line was six deep at the two registers open. Mulder glanced at Scully, then reflected on the fullness of his bladder. "Hey, Scully, why don't you hold our place in line and I'll go to the restroom. Then I can do the same for you." Scully, just glad to be standing, nodded. "Just hurry up." Mulder smiled as he disappeared in the direction of the bathrooms. "Guys always do." Approximately a half an hour later, replete with grease, carbohydrates and a healthy dose of caffeine in the form of diet sodas, the agents returned to the car. The evening was a step away from full dark. The agents got into the car with the weariness of an escaped animal returned to it's cage. Mulder, in the passenger seat once more, thought maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to take up yoga. Then, perhaps he could fold himself into small spaces without cramping up. He sighed and considered asking Scully to trade with him again then decided against it. The 4th hour The trees lining the sides of the road grew taller and taller, sentential of pine and fir. The road was crowded with shadows and dark, with only the occasional car passing in the opposite direction to relieve the monotonous black. They passed one little truck stop, marked by the garish lights of gas stations and fast food restaurants. They passed another, this time, the lights were significantly fewer than before. The line on the speedometer caressed eighty, dropping now and then to linger at seventy five. Mulder stared at the darkness outside and wished they were home. Scully must be wishing it as much as he, for usually it was her job to uneasily notice the speed and tap the non-existent brake on the passenger side. A road sign glowed ever so briefly in the headlights, then was snatched back into the dark. Scully frowned. She hadn't been able to read it, her concentration on driving. "Mulder, did you read that?" she asked hopefully. He closed his eyes briefly as if looking at a picture in his mind. "Eureka- 95 miles," he said, then grinned and continued. "A brief synopsis but really all that mattered Scully." They passed another sign, this one also lit by a single sodium vapor lamp attached to a gas station canopy. Scully saw it's silver faced back glow briefly, redly in the taillights. "What'd that one say?" she asked, hoping Mulder had also seen it. Thank god for partners with photographic memories. "Last gas, services for thirty miles. But we should be okay, since we filled up when we ate, right?" The last word of his sentence hung in the air as full memory hit them. Scully voiced his thoughts. "We didn't fill up when we ate, Mulder? Remember that?" Really, Mulder thought, the sarcasm edging Dana Scully, AKA Ms. Perfect, was just a tad much. After all, she was supposed to be the practical one. The one that shot down his wild theories, debunked his evidence, wrote down all the phone messages AND remembered to fill up the tank. Especially when they were on long car trips that required them to drive through unpopulated DARK expanses of big DARK forests lining a small, two lane, DARK highway. They weren't on a UFO search, a little green bug hunt, or on safari for evidence of modern Neanderthal. He had nothing to do with this assignment... whatsoever. At all. Nada. This was NOT his fault. And he wasn't going to take the blame for it, no matter what his partner thought. He looked at the fuel gauge and gulped. The little red line was caressing the white E with more familiarity than he liked. Shit. Mulder wiped his brow. Scully was going to find a way to blame him for this. He just knew it. And would that be so far off the mark? After all, this may not be an X-file, but couldn't he even run a regular case without requiring baby-sitting services from his partner? This wasn't even a real case. They were only going to question a witness. It wasn't like they couldn't have stayed at the Sacramento's airport hotel for one night, then driven up in the morning... He resisted the urge to bang his head on the dashboard. Once more he had gotten Scully into trouble. God damn it. Some of his self deprecating thoughts must have emanated forcefully enough to capture Scully's attention. She looked over at him for a minute, then smiled. "Don't worry Mulder. We'll find a gas station." "Sure. In thirty miles. I don't think this car will run on fumes for too long." "As usual, my dear partner, you worry far too much. There has to be another town between here and Eureka. This is California, not Montana. It isn't that sparsely populated. Towns, logically, mean gas stations. We'll find one, we'll fill up, we'll get to Eureka. And you, dear partner will buy me a lovely breakfast before you go off to question your witness, while I spend the day shopping at the local mall." "What if the gas stations are all closed?" Mulder asked, reluctant to voice the thought but unable not to, once it had been formed. "Then we'll camp out in the car until morning. And you will buy me breakfast and lunch." Really, she didn't think Mulder needed to buy her anything... it wasn't like bugs were swarming as they spoke, ready to suck the life out of them, or that they were danger of silicon based spores infecting them. But Mulder, guilt hound and over protective partner that he was, felt that he owed her something for his nonexistent transgression. She had learned early in the partnership that Mulder functioned far better if he felt that all debts had been paid. Free breakfast and lunch were a small thing to give in to as compared to bouts of suffocating coddling. They rode in silence for a few moments, each tuned to the sound of the engine as if will alone would keep it running in the absence of fuel. They'd only gone a hundred yards or so when the headlights picked out another road sign, this indicating the presence of a town. Underneath, dismally, it said in block letters NO SERVICES. "Relax Mulder. It's a town. There has to be a gas station somewhere." Scully made the turn off with ease and they descended into darkness that was increased by the presence of the trees that loomed up into the night on either side. Soon the only illumination came from the dash board. In the protective dimness, Mulder allowed himself to really watch his partner for a minute. He was reminded, for some reason, maybe it was the presence of the forest, of their first case, and he saw with the eyes of a stranger just how much Scully had changed in the intervening two and half years. Or maybe it was just that he knew her better now than before. Mulder swallowed and pushed away those dangerous, dangerous thoughts. There should be a little sign in his mind that popped up whenever he started to think in this direction. Here there be Dragons, or something like that. The scenery flashing outside was positively eerie and somehow familiar. Mulder, grateful for the distraction, searched the files of his mind for a match. Then he had it. "Hey, Scully, the scenery remind you of anything?" he asked with a grin. She glanced over at him for a second, glad that he was over his guilt fest. "Not particularly. Why, should it?" "Just think for a second?" "We're not talking nice little trips to the forest are we?" she asked suspiciously. "No, I just think that this whole setting is just like one of those horror movies. You know, the stranded couple, the entire theatre screaming at them to turn around and get the hell out of Dodge." Scully looked around reluctantly, then she grinned. Mulder did have a point. "You think that music is playing somewhere? The music that says no matter what we do we're both going to end up dead and dismembered by the morning light?" she asked jovially, playing along. "I can just see the guy with a machete jump out of the shadows..." "You think I'd stop?" Scully asked incredulously. "A guy with a machete jumps out of the shadows in front of my car and you think I'd stop." "They did in Children of the Corn." "That was different. It was kid they stopped for and the guy thought they hit him." "Human reaction dictates you would stop." Mulder said, playing all- knowing psychologist. "I'd swerve." Scully said firmly. "Great. Then we'd hit a tree and be killed before the wheels had stopped spinning. I can just see the shot. Close-up on wheels as they slowly come to a stop. Voice over of two screams, one masculine, one feminine, both abruptly cut off. Then a receding full view of some hulking guy with maggots crawling out of his head... carrying a machete dripping a dark liquid as he lurches up the road to wreak havoc on the small and innocent town that was the cause of his death twenty years ago." Mulder's voice trailed off, low and full of portent. "What was that?!" Scully asked suddenly. Mulder jumped and hit his head on the ceiling. "What was what, Scully?" he asked irritatiably. "I thought I saw the credits for the movie rolling past." she said, chuckling. "Geez, Mulder no wonder people think you're spooky." "Thanks a lot, partner." "You're welcome. How's this for a scene? Dolly shot of two running figures, heading for the woods ahead. Point of view the killer... the couple turns and goes into the woods. Voice over of heavy breathing. Sounds of twigs snapping, branches hitting bodies. Then- a cry of a pain. A masculine cry of pain. The man has twisted his ankle and is now easy prey for the fast advancing killer. We see the machete swing, hear a wet thump. The woman looks back, screams, then continues running to the nearest Holiday Inn for a hot shower and a cup of cocoa. She does NOT return to the spooky old house and/or stretch of woods where all the killing began. She lets the police handle it, which is what she should have done in the first place." Scully grinned as she finished it, and Mulder laughed at the look on her face. Talk about diabolical... "Well, now I know what we can do if we survive long enough to retire. Write horror movies." "As long as I get top billing." Scully said with a laugh. "Always, Scully, always." "Look Mulder, up ahead it's a UFO, it's a Jersey devil, no it's a gas station and it's open!" Scully laughed and looked liked she'd placed it there herself. "See Mulder, you could start an X-file- people who go into the woods and come out intact. And don't have to visit quarantine. " Mulder knew when he was defeated. When Scully pulled beneath the lights, he got out of the car, filled the tank and paid the grandmotherly lady who came to take his money. "Good thing you stopped when you did dear. I was just about to close up. And you don't want to be stuck in these woods overnight, without protection. There are stories, you know." she told him with a smile. Mulder felt like laughing. Politely, he kept the urge down to a small smile. "So I've heard. Thanks. You have a good night." "You too dear. You too" He got back into the car, still shaking his head. "What was that all about?" Scully asked curiously. "Believe me, you don't need to know." =========================================================================== From: WCKV82C@prodigy.com (Mary Abel) Newsgroups: alt.tv.x-files.creative Subject: New: The Drive Epilog Date: 9 Jul 1995 21:44:18 GMT The Drive, Epilog by Mary Abel The 5th Hour Eureka's Best Western was clean and well lighted. Mulder signed them in, handing one of the keys to Scully, who stood behind him. "You two look sort of travel weary." the clerk observed over wire rimmed glasses. "You come here from Sacramento?" "Yeah, we did." The clerk nodded. "So, how was the drive?" he asked, smoothing back sparse strands of grey hair. Scully looked at Mulder. Mulder looked at Scully. "It was..." "I guess you could say it was..." They spoke at the same time. "Normal." they answered firmly. Mulder smiled. "Thanks. We'll be checking out tomorrow." "Good night." the clerk answered, a puzzled frown on his face. The agents walked out the door, both smiling in contemplation of the clean warm beds that awaited. When it came down to woods and long car drives the agents would take Normal any day of the week and twice on Sunday. The End