From: neoxphile@aol.com Date: 17 Mar 2004 09:15:11 -0800 Subject: [atxc-pi] NEW: Mulder's Creek: 14 MiB (0/1) Source: atxc Title: Mulder's Creek: 14 MiB Author: Neoxphile Author Email: neoxphile@aol.com Status: NEW - Series Size: 32k Rating: PG-13 Archive at Gossamer: Yes to Gossamer/Ephemeral Category: Crossover Keywords: Alternate universe Crossover Info: X-Files/Dawson's Creek/MiB Spoilers: X-Files seasons 1-8 Dawson's Creek seasons 1-4 Men in Black movie (1st movie only) Summary: Frohike interviews Scully and Mulder about the "alien Santa Claus" and includes it on their e-zine. This prompts MiB agents Jay and Vee to come to Capeside with two goals: deport the alien Gremmlic for illicit activities, and to mind-wipe Mulder and Scully. Part 1 Please see part 0 (template) for warnings and summary. Title: Mulder's Creek: 13 MiB Series: Mulder's Creek Genre: Virtual series Crossover X-files/Dawson's Creek/Men In Black Rating: pg-13 Archive: www.geocities.com/mulderscreek (all completed stories) Please get written (e-mailed) permission before archiving them elsewhere. disclaimer: I'm borrowing these characters from 1310 and Warner Brothers, I do not own them Summary: Frohike interviews Scully and Mulder about the "alien Santa Claus" and includes it on their e-zine. This prompts MiB agents Jay and Vee to come to Capeside with two goals: deport the alien Gremmlic for illicit activities, and to mind-wipe Mulder and Scully. Feedback: feedback me, and I'll love you forever Neoxphile@aol.com *** Mulder's Creek: MiB Opening scene- Mulder lovingly examines the small quilt that Scully has handed him. " It's perfect!" He exclaims. " No, it's not close to done yet." Scully corrects. " I still think it's perfect." Mulder insists stubbornly, tracing his finger over one of the baby aliens. " Well, in that case you ought to thank Bessie for being a good teacher, then." " Oh, I will, next time I see her." " Maybe she could even try to teach you how to sew." " Are you mad at her for some reason?" Mulder asks, raising his eyebrows. " No, why..." It suddenly dawns on Scully what he's getting at, and she rolls her eyes." So, tell me about Boston." Mulder decides that he's going to keep the details of his adventure to himself, at least for now. " I never met Mr. Quinn." He tells her, which is the truth so he feels less guilty. " You didn't?" " No. Apparently he was there to give a talk on his book about endangered species, and he must have run out of time, because I waited for him as instructed, and he never showed. " " That sucks, Mulder. But you know, we can still look into what he said about those other missing kids, you know. " " I know. And I have the feeling that they were all kids of employees at my dad's company." " Why's that?" " I don't know. It just sort of makes sense some how." Mulder says, shrugging, and looking away so she can't see the expression on his face. ** Theme song- Stranded by Plumb ** Wednesday 2:10pm, Capeside high school- Mulder slams his locker shut with a sigh of relief. It has been a very long day, full of tests and quizes, and he's relieved that it's finally come to an end. Confident that he's done well on all of the exams, he whistles quietly to himself as he makes his way to the exit. So it's a surprise to him when he feels a hand on his shoulder. He wheels around and sees Frohike behind him. The older boy looks up at him and blinks, then grins. " Just the person I've been looking for." Frohike says. " What for?" Mulder asks, immediately suspicious. " Ah, I have a little favor to ask. " He holds up a hand to stop Mulder from replying. " Let me ask before you say no, ok? I want to do interviews with Capeside residents about the weird things that happen in this town. If you think about it, there are a lot of strange things that happen in such a small town-" " Frohike, can you speed it up a bit? This is like watching grass grow." Mulder gripes impatiently. " Oh! Anyway, I figure that if anyone has a finger on the pulse of Capeside weirdness, it'd be you." Frohike finishes. " I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be insulted or flattered." Mulder says, and Frohike shrugs. " As a matter of fact, Scully and I did see something quite 'weird' on Christmas eve." " Scully? My, my... So you'll do the interview? Both of you?" " Frohike, you're drooling. I will, but convincing Scully will be no small feat." " I'm sure you can do it." Frohike says. " She loves youuu." " Shut up, Frohike." ** Friday morning, Capeside High- Reed takes a deep breath and reminds himself of his conversation with Scully several days ago. It's not as thought I didn't want to try to talk to Skinner before this, he tells himself, but I couldn't. I'm a big boy, I can do this, Reed thinks as he nervously pushes his platinum blond hair out of his eyes. Skinner is a bit disarmed when he walks into class and sees Reed looking intently at him with a friendly expression on his face. He's even more surprised when Reed speaks to him. " 'morning, Skinner. Hey, um, the teacher said we need lab partners for this project, work with me?" Reed says a little too quickly to sound natural. Intrigued by Reed's seemingly newfound ability to speak, Skinner says, " Ok, sure. Why not?" The class breaks out into conversation as the teacher hands out large dead frogs. Reed decides the best way to get to know Skinner is by questioning him about his life. " So, have you lived in Capeside your whole life?" Skinner shakes his head. " Nope. My dad, twin sister and I moved here about a year and a half ago. We used to live in Connecticut." " You have a twin? That's neat! I've always wished I had a sibling, and having a twin would be even better." Reed says, feeling more comfortable. " It's nice. She can be a pain sometimes, but I can't imagine what life would be like without Reyes. " " Reyes is your sister? I've seen her before. She's come by the Icehouse to talk to Scully before. She seems like a sweet person. " " Usually." Skinner says grinning, until the teacher hands him their dead frog. " Uh...say, you want to do the cutting? Since you work at the Icehouse you must be used to cutting things up." Skinner kids, sliding the animal over to Reed. ** Late afternoon, McPhee home- Reyes stares at her computer, frustrated. Fowley e-mailed her three days earlier, saying that she wasn't sure how much longer she was going to be able to sneak into the facility's library to break into the computer system. Though she knew it would only be a matter of time before Fowley got found out, it still comes as a shock that her last e-mail seems to have gone unread. Fowley, How much do you know about Spender? I've been talking to him a bit, and he seems a little...unstable. Should I be concerned? I hope you and the baby are doing well. Take care of yourself. Love, Reyes Re-reading the message just makes her more anxious, so she shuts off the computer. ** Saturday midmorning, Lone Gunmen HQ- Mulder tries to hide his nervousness as he leads Scully up the path to Langley's house. Rather than try to convince Scully to cooperate with the interview, Mulder decided to just bring her there. The wisdom of which he now finds himself doubting as they pass a sweet-looking old woman on the walkway. " Mulder, if you don't tell me where we are-" Scully begins, but stops as Frohike pops out of the front door. " Why do I suddenly have the feeling that I'm going to kill you?" Choosing to pretend he didn't hear her he points his thumb over his shoulder and says, " Hi Frohike. Who was that woman?" " Gladace Smith. She had a fantastic story about a dancing turkey." Frohike says, leading them to the basement. " Someone tell me why I'm here!" Scully demands. " You didn't tell her? This is no way to conduct an interview." Frohike chides. " Don't give me that 'holier than thou crap' Frohike." Mulder growls. Frohike gives Scully a smile, as well as a leering look before saying, " I'm writing about strange things that have happened in Capeside, and Mulder volunteered to share something that happened to the two of you on Christmas Eve." Scully starts to blush and blurts, " It wasn't that strange...wait, are you talking about the thing we saw?" she asks, regaining her composure. " Yeah, the alien. What did you think I meant?" Mulder asks, giving her a look that suggests he knows exactly what she thought of first. Scully punches him in the arm. " Give me one good reason I should agree to talk to this idiot about what we saw." She demands. Mulder gives her a slow smile. " If you don't, I tell Frohike what you were talking about a minute ago." Scully's eyes widen for a second, and she thinks it over. " So, Frohike, did you want to start that interview now?" She asks. Though Frohike desperately wants to know what on earth they're talking about, he isn't a fool, nor is he about to give up his chance at getting a good interview. " Sure, why don't we go on down to the basement and set up?" " The basement?" Scully asks, sounding a bit worried. Mulder takes her arm. " Don't worry, there aren't any clowns lurking down there." He reassures her. " I told you not to read IT..." Frohike tries to act professional, and sets up a reel to reel tape recorder so he can capture their words. Mulder gives it an approving look. " Pretty professional." " Yeah. I bought it off of an ex-cop who wasn't supposed to have it." Scully doesn't like the way her body sinks into the beanbag chair that she's forced to sit in because there aren't any other type of chairs in the basement. " Does anyone else feel totally undignified when they sit in these things?" She asks no one in particular. Frohike gives her a puzzled look and shrugs. " So, Mulder, Scully. Tell me about Christmas Eve." " We saw Santa Claus." Mulder says. " There isn't a Santa Claus." Frohike objects. " I used to say the same thing..." Scully mumbles under her breath, but Frohike has good hearing so he catches it. " Actually there is. But Santa isn't a human being." Mulder elaborates. Scully rolls her eyes, but Frohike rubs his hands together in anticipation. " Come again?" " Ok, so, Scully and I stayed up late on Christmas Eve, after we got back from a late mass. We hid in the living room and waited for Santa to appear." " Did he?" " Sure did." Mulder says happily. " Something did, but I don't know for sure that it was Santa Claus." Scully objects. " What did you see?" Frohike asks. " We saw a jolly fat...creature, all dressed in red and covered from head to toe in soot. He even had some right on his gray cheek." Mulder explains. " Gray??" " Yeah, gray. He was a gray, you know the type, tall, long fingers, gray skin, big almond eyes...the whole nine yards." " What did you see, Scully?" Frohike asks. " I, um...don't know. There was definitely something. And it did fit Mulder's description, but..." " You don't think it was an alien." Frohike prompts. " I figure that it was someone who knew Mulder's interest in aliens playing a cruel trick on us." Scully says. " Even if that was the case, it wouldn't explain the reindeer creatures." Mulder objects. " Reindeer creatures?" Frohike asks, thinking that this interview is even better than he hoped. " Yup, little glowy green reindeer-shaped beings pulled the sleigh away." " That part was strange." Scully admits. " But I'm sure there's some logical explanation..." " You have both been wonderful. I only have one more question." " What's that?" Scully asks. " What were you talking about earlier?" " This interview is over." Scully says coldly, getting to her feet. " Can't blame a reporter for trying." Frohike sighs." Thanks you both, I'll send you a copy of the newsletter when it comes out." " I thought it was an e-zine." Mulder comments. " Well, it is. I mean I'll send you a link." Mulder mouths "If she's mad at me you're in for it" at Frohike as he leaves, and tries to catch up with Scully. Frohike watches him go, and hopes he's not in trouble. " Scully." Mulder says in a wheedling tone as he catches up to her outside. " Please don't be mad at me." " Why shouldn't I be?" Scully asks. He gives her puppy-dog eyes and she sighs in defeat. Mulder throws his arms around her. " Did I ever tell you how much I love you?" " Not nearly often enough." Scully tells him, smiling in spite of herself. ** Wednesday night, LGM HQ- Langely shakes his head as he reads through the latest issue of the LGM e-zine. Frohike insisted that they couldn't go wrong by using stories of Capeside paranormal as the basis for an issue, but the story about the dancing turkeys was too much for even him to swallow. As he types up the html codes, which he is inordinately proud of having memorized, he sighs deeply, and hopes that readers will forgive them. At least, he thinks, Mulder's story is entertaining, if not at all believable. He pushes save on the html editor and hopes for the best. ** 15 minutes later, a nondescript office- A man dressed in a suit stares at his computer screen and gives a look of disgust. He picks up the phone and asks for his supervisor. " Sir, I think you ought to come up here and have a look. There's been an apparent sighting..." The man hangs up the phone and waits for his supervisor's arrival. He re-reads the screen, thankful that the situation isn't his to deal with; all he's supposed to do is monitor the internet. ** Late Thursday afternoon, Capeside Library- Mulder sighs, and surreptitiously eats another sunflower seed while keeping an eye out for the librarian. The stacks are dimly lit, and the microfiche machine in jammed in the back corner of the room. All of this adds up to an atmosphere that is much less than inviting, and Mulder hopes that he can get out of the room quickly. As the pages zoom by he feels a bit dizzy and slows down his scrolling. That there is so much to go through makes him impatient, and he mentally curses the local paper for not putting their back issues on the internet like a normal paper would. Finally, he comes across an article that's promising- one that mentions Sam's kidnapping and that there were four others; which means the paranoid Mr. Quinn wasn't feeding him a line after all. Mulder decides that he must have hit the jackpot, because not only does the article mention that at least one parent of the each of the children worked at Candling labs, it also gives locations of which branch. Mulder jots them down and decides to look up the other kidnappings later, particularly interested in the only other one that occurred in New England. He's stuffing his notebook back into his bag when the haggard looking librarian comes down to tell him that the library will soon be closing. Mulder thanks her and gets out before he finds himself on her bad side. *** Later that day, MiB headquarters- Though there are aliens wandering by the conference room while the trio talks, it's so ordinary to them that they don't even notice that it's odd anymore. Agent Jay scowls at the others as they talk excitedly about the necessity to investigate a supposed sighting of a gray. MiB Chief Zed is adamant that the witness has his mind wiped, and Agent Vee is less sure. Jay himself is against mind wipes unless they're absolutely necessary, hence his distaste. Finally he can't take it any more and snaps at his partners. " They're just a couple of teenagers, and the girl doesn't even believe. What harm can there be in letting them retain the memories?" " They may just be kids now, Tiger, but they're going to grow up at some point, and since they're intelligent, they might make something of themselves. If they attain positions of power one day, they might be in the position to have people believe what they say. And what if one of those little nuggets the press likes so much is their reminiscing about a long ago Christmas?" Zed asks. " Christ, Zed, why don't we just shoot them instead? I think you're reaching a bit here." " It's best to ere on the side of caution." Zed insists. Jay can barely contain his frustration. Since Zed is his boss, he has to do what the man says. Or at least appear to, he amends mentally. " I expect you to pay them a visit tomorrow." Zed says firmly. " Replace their memory with a false one about playing a practical joke on their writer friend. The story was all a hoax to play on the guy's gullibility. " " Of course, sir." Vee says. Jay sighs. " Yes, sir." ** Friday morning, Capeside high school- Scully looks out the window in boredom; another rousing game of "como se dices" isn't holding her interest at all. Reyes notices that their Spanish teacher has been casting annoyed glances Scully's way, so she pokes Scully to get her attention. Scully pulls her eyes away from the window, and joins in the chorus of voices answering their teacher's questions. " Como se dices the bathroom?" " El bano." "Como se dices bread?" " El pan." " Como se dices my brother?" " Mi hermano." Scully says, yawning. Soon after the teacher mercifully let them switch to English to work on their group projects, but reminded them for the 100th time that they'd have to speak in Spanish only the next year. Thankful for the chance to speak English, Scully doesn't feel guilty about chatting idly since their project is nearly done. She turns to Reyes and asks " Speaking of brothers...Has he said anything to you about Reed lately?" Reyes shakes her head. " No, why?" " It's weird. They went from not speaking at all to speaking frequently. Not that I'm complaining, it's far nicer than the hostile silence that had been the hallmark of almost all shifts with the two of them working at the same time." " Well, he hasn't said anything to me..." " You've got to promise me you won't say anything to anyone, especially Skinner, but...I have this feeling that Reed has a little crush on him. He said he's cute, anyway." Reyes smiles at the thought of someone finding her brother cute. "Don't you think he's cute?" Scully laughs instead of answering, making Reyes roll her eyes. ** Midmorning- Vee drives their large black, rather nondescript, car while Jay looks out the window. Vee hums along to the song on the radio, but Jay is so lost in thought he doesn't realize that she's made a sound. While he doesn't actively dislike Vee, he doesn't know the woman well. She's only been on the project for two months, which hasn't given Jay much of a chance to get to know her, not that he's made much of an effort towards that end. Instead he mourns the loss of his former partners. First there was Kay, who recruited him. Kay didn't tell him that he was making Jay his replacement, not his partner, until the last minute and Jay found himself liking the older man a great deal in a short time. After 35 years with the agency, Kay decided to toss in the towel, and was gone, just like that. Then there was Elle, who was his partner for most of his time with MiB. She'd been pretty special, and he had admitted to himself even before she became his partner that he was attracted to her. Nothing serious ever happened between them, but they worked well together. Until Elle had fallen victim to a freak accident two and a half months ago, things had been going smoothly. She isn't dead, at least Jay doesn't think so, but they'd been involved with tracking down an alien who'd been violating treaties with his planet, and he had a nasty surprise for them- a dimensional relocator device, which the alien used on Elle, then itself. There is no way of knowing where Elle ended up after that, so she's a good as permanently lost. Jay is startled out of his depressing musings when Vee pulls into the driveway of a pretty two story home. Vee pats her sandy blond hair before proceeding up the driveway. Jay rolls his eyes and trails behind her, not eager to be there. Vee is already knocking on the front door by the time he joins her on the stoop. Jay is somewhat surprised that the woman who answers the door is heavily pregnant; it never occurred to him that the mother of a teenager might not have finished having children. The woman gives them a quizzical look, so Jay quickly says, " Hello ma'am, my name is agent Jay, and this is my associate, agent Vee. We were hoping to talk to Mulder Leary." " Are you FBI agents?" Mrs. Leary asks them. " Yes, ma'am." Vee says with a smile. Mrs. Leary invites them in. " I'm sorry, but my son is in school today. He should be home around three if you'd like to come back then. Unless it's an emergency and you need to get him out of class..." " No, that's all right. We can wait to speak to him." Jay assures her. " I don't know if this is something you can disclose, but is this about those elementary kids being kidnapped back in the fall? I was told that none of the older children were going to have to testify at the trial." Mrs. Leary says, sounding weary. Jay internally shrugs and decides to go with it, even though he has no idea what she's talking about. " You're correct, ma'am, they won't need to testify. However, kidnapping is a federal offense, so we're gathering statements." " Well, ok then. If you give me a phone number, I'll have my son call you as soon as he gets home, would that be ok?" Jay pulls out a pad of paper and scribbles down his cellphone number. " That'd be wonderful. Thank you." Back in the car Vee gives him a questioning look. " What do we do until the kids get out of school?" Jay smiles grimly. " I think we ought to pay the alien in question a little visit to find out his motive for showing himself to those kids, don't you?" Vee nods, and Jay begins to give her directions. ** Capeside high, 5th period- Doggett deftly passes the basketball to Mulder, who sinks the shot. The gym teacher, who insists to deaf ears that he's the physical education teacher, blows the whistle, signaling that it's the girls' turn for a scrimmage. Doggett and Mulder gratefully shuffle off the court and collapse against the wall. Doggett seems to be admiring more than the girls' skills, which earns him a glare from Mulder. " What? I'm just looking." " Yeah, whatever." Mulder says, still giving him a disapproving look. " You're saying you never...admire, other girls?" Doggett asks. " Nope, never." Mulder says, feeling loyal. " So no one could turn your head, not even for a second?" " Not a millisecond." " Not even when Fowley comes back this summer?" Doggett challenges. Mulder hesitates for a millisecond. " Of course not. She doesn't mean anything to me now." " Good. I didn't spend all that time trying to get you to date Scully only to have you blow it this summer." " Doggett, you're a little mentally ill, you know?" Mulder asks. " I know." Doggett says, smiling beatifically. ** Gremmlic's house- Instead of knocking politely, agent Vee opts instead to kick the door down. Jay finds himself admiring the woman's can-do attitude when it comes to alien-human interactions. Gremmlic gave them a look, which coming from a human probably would have seemed startled. Gremmlic dropped the issue of Popular Mechanic that was in his hand, and asked " What are you doing here?" " Why don't you tell us." Jay say evenly. " If I knew, I wouldn't have asked you." Gremmlic protests mildly. " Cut the crap, Gremmlic." Vee says in a considerably less mild tone. Gremmlic turns to Jay, with a twinkling in his huge almond eyes. " Hey, who's the new chick? She's not a pretty as the other one, but I like her fire." Jay doesn't allow himself to be baited. " Gremmlic, you are in violation of the interplanetary treaty, specifically statue number 311-" " Hey, I've been fully clothed my entire visit!" Gremmlic exclaims. " Interplanetary statues, not police codes, pay attention. By violating statue 311, via showing yourself to humans, you have forfeited your right to stay on this planet-" " Come on Jay, it was a joke! I show myself, as a little joke, to a couple of idiot kids, and now you want to throw me off the planet? That ain't right, man!" Gremmlic says, completely unconscious of how odd " man" sounded coming from him. " A couple of 'idiot kids' who have told their story to a magazine." Jay states. " Cool! Do I get any kickbacks from that?" Gremmlic asks eagerly. " No, but I can kick your butt if you'd like." Vee tells him. Gremmlic does a catcall, and Jay finds himself needing to physically restrain Vee. " Easy, kiddo. " Vee opens her mouth to protest, but thinks better of it and composes herself. Before they leave Jay tells Gremmlic to gather his things and be ready for a ship out that night. "And before you even think of running, remember that we can track you." Gremmlic watches them go and sighs. Then he grabs some suitcases out of the closet and begins packing, telling himself that Earth wasn't that fun, anyway. Feeling morose, he goes into the cellar to tell the reindeer to pack too. ** 2pm Leary house- After the first knock Mrs Leary sighs loudly to herself and goes to open the door. She stayed home from work because she wasn't feeling well, so constantly getting visitors wasn't making her feel any better. She shuffles to the door and opens it, only to find that there's no one there. She catches a glimpse of a man wearing a bowler and trench coat scurrying past the house and out of sight. He's gone so quickly that she can only assume that she imagined that the vulnerably exposed nape of his neck was a silver-gray color. Shaking her head, she waddles out to the kitchen and rummages through the everything drawer until she finds what she was looking for: a novelty door sign that Mulder once gave her in a fit of childish generosity. A couple of minutes later, the cast of Dinosaurs admonished visitors not to disturb. Gremmlic pulls up the collar of his coat when the heat of the sun beating down on the back of his neck tells him that he might not be as covered up as he thought. He frets for a moment that the exposure might result in a tan, which shows up as an unattractive sooty color on beings of his complexion. It was stupid, he thinks, to believe even for a second that the idiot kid could help him. For a moment, though, it seemed reasonable to think that he could get the human boy to advocate on his behalf, and attempt to convince Jay to allow him to keep his interplanetary visa. Jay's probably flashy-thinged the kid by now, anyway, Gremmlic thinks ruefully. When he gets home the reindeer tell him that they have a confession to make: they never liked Earth in the first place. They cheer him up a bit when they suggest a visit to Pluto, since the planet is so far from a sun Gremmlic wouldn't even need sunscreen there. ** 3pm Capeside Library- Mulder puts a couple of quarters into the microfiche machine and waits for it to print out the copies of the article for him. He can't believe that they actually make models of the machine that are designed to charge for copies, but then, people will do anything for money, he thinks. The copies drop into the tray, warm and smelling of toner. He picks them up and ruffles through them, making sure that the article was printed in its entirety. The other child missing from New England was the one that Thaddeus Quinn had alluded to- the only child besides Sam that had not been returned to their family. Mulder had carefully looked into all four kidnappings, and in every other case there was an article about the child's miraculous recovery. Not so in this case. According to the article the missing child, a four-year-old boy from Maine, had been named Scott Martin. He was last seen in his yard, playing on a tire swing. His mother reported that she brought some clothes in from the line, and when she got back outside, he was gone. And no sign of him has ever been found. This especially grieves his parents as he was their only child, and they were never able to have another, though they'd been trying for a baby around the time of the boy's disappearance. Mulder shivers a little bit when he thinks about how the boy was his own age, would be his age now if he were still alive. He wonders if it was merely chance that whoever stole his sister took her instead of him. His head suddenly pounding, Mulder escapes the library and goes to look for comfort from his girlfriend, who can always cheer him up. ** 4pm- Agent Vee's fingers grip the steering wheel a little too hard for most people to have considered her to seem calm, though by all other outward appearances she looked like she was. She resisted the urge to look away from the road to glare at her partner. It isn't as though she doesn't respect Jay, because she does, or that she thinks that he is a poor agent, because he's not, but he's the most disorganized person she's ever worked with. What they should have done, and would if she was senior agent, was go down to the high school and demand to speak to both of the students, probably using the in that the boy's mother gave them- the kidnapping case. But instead it's two hours after school let out for the day, and they still can't track either of them down. The boy still hasn't called, and the efforts to find the girl are proving equally futile. They stopped by her home and were greeted by a woman in her mid-twenties who took a moment away from chasing after a toddler to tell them they might try the restaurant the family owns. At the Ice House, which Vee wondered if was so named to poke fun at the climate this far north, there was no one there but a few customers and a pair of teenage boys, neither of which was Mulder Leary. The boys were far more intent on each other, not that there's anything wrong with that, Vee thinks, than giving them any suggestions where to find them. Vee sighs and hopes Zed won't have a fit if this turns into a multi-day assignment. Jay glances at Vee, and is hoping that she won't scream at him or throw things at him before they complete the assignment. Though he doesn't know her overly well, he knows she has a temper, and the white knuckles clutching the steering wheel tell him that he might be approaching the limit of what he can get away with. Good thing she doesn't know what he was doing while she was inside the Ice House... ** 5pm Leary house- Scully lets go of Mulder's hand as they approach his front door. Though she knows that it's irrational, she's still a little shy about being affectionate towards him in his parents' view. She looks at him out of the corner of her eye, and wonders why he had seemed so needy when he came by to get her earlier in the afternoon. She could tell that he was upset by something, but he never told her what, and instead just demanded a hug; not that she begrudged him one. Whatever it was, it didn't seem to be on his mind now, because he was looking quite happy. Turning to her, he says " They'll be here any minute. Why don't we sit on the steps and wait for them?" Scully shrugs and sits down beside them. They don't have long to wait. Within a couple of minutes they spot a sleek black car driving down the street, and it pulls into the driveway. A man and a woman both dressed in black suits and wearing ray ban sunglasses climb out of the car and walk towards them. " Hi." Mulder says with a friendly smile. " Are you the FBI agents that mom said wanted to talk to us?" The woman nods and says, " Yes, we are." " I thought the case was closed." Scully comments. " It was, but something has come up that caused us to need to reopen it temporarily. We have something to show you, and would like a statement from each of you about what you remember about the night of the kidnappings." Jay says, reaching into his pocket. " What was it that you wanted us to look at?" Mulder asks curiously. " This." Jay say, pulling out the silver instrument out, and quickly pushes a button that flashes a red light while they look at it. Scully and Mulder's eyes glaze over and they stare dumbly at the MiB agents. Vee says, " You didn't actually see an alien the night of Christmas Eve. You concocted the story to play on the gullibility of young Frohike. We've been talking about a kidnapping case since we got here, understand?" They both nod then shake their heads to clear them. Jays shakes their hands and thanks them for their statements. ** Jay tells Vee that he'll drive them to the airport, and she asks him if they should find Frohike first. Jay shakes his head. " I asked Zed, and he told me not to bother. He said that the boy was the type of person who was going to go through life lacking credibility with everyone but the paranoid schizophrenic." Vee shrugged her shoulders. She'd read the issue of the LGM newsletter so it made sense. " I think our work here is done." Jay concludes. Something nags at Vee, but she can't quite put her finger on what it might be. " I guess you're right, Jay. Let's go back to HQ." Jay smiles to himself, because Vee has no idea that right before they left for Capeside he disassembled his mind-wiper and replaced the insides with a harmless light bulb. He did, however bring a spare along, and used it to convince Vee that they'd seen Gremmlic off on his ship immediately before they went to the Learys' house. Jay supposes he ought not have, but he's always had a soft spot for the reindeer creatures. ** " Mulder, those people were pretty strange." " I know. But it was sort of fun to play along, wasn't it?" " Yeah...do you think that the woman was fooled, though?" " Totally. I still wonder why the guy called us and told us to play act. What do you think was supposed to happen when he showed us the 'magic flashlight'?" Mulder asks. " Beats me. Was the woman threatening us?" " I guess." " Mulder...have you ever thought about joining the FBI? They were nuts, so I think you'd fit right in." Scully says playfully, then squeals as Mulder tackles her. Neither of them notice the gray figure, nor the green glowy ones, that are spying on them and smiling. ** Credits Produced by CC, KW and Neoxphile < Voice Over> This episode of Mulder's Creek featured music from: Will Smith (" Men in Black") Jets to Brazil ("Resistance is Futile ") And The Notwist ("The Incredible Change of our Alien") Stay tuned for scenes from the next Mulder's Creek ### The End ###