Title: I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues

Author: MJ

Category: Slash

Pairing: Mulder/Skinner

Rating: PG-13

Previous story: Hoochie Coochie Man

Disclaimer: Not my characters; no profit made or infringement intended.

Feedback: Yes, please. My email address is to the left, or again at the bottom of the story. All flames will be giggled over and added to our "Spam-Wrath of God" list.

Archive: Ask first.

Summary: Another cheerful "Mexico" prequel. Rampant silliness possibly ahead. Something to read while JiM and I edit (interminably...) the full-length sequel to "I Still Have Plans to Go to Mexico."

MJ :: I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues

"To: Assistant Director Walter Skinner

From: Special Agent Fox Mulder, Division Head, X-Files Unit

Re: Permission to Investigate

"AD Skinner, sir:

"Although I recognize that this memorandum which I am e-mailing as an attachment is not, strictly speaking, of course, the appropriate form for a 302, I am hoping that you will consider my request to investigate an unusual phenomenon whose occurrence has just been made known to me."

Walter Skinner merely shook his head. The thought of Fox Mulder driving into a small town in the middle of nowhere and discovering an unusual phenomenon was, to put it mildly, a routine occurrence. Mulder could find an unusual phenomenon in the middle of the park on a sunny June Sunday. As, indeed, his lover had proven two months before, when they'd been walking through Rock Creek Park minding their own business.

"When I arrived at Clarksville, a small town about three-quarters of the way to my conference destination yesterday morning, I pulled in at a local convenience store to fill up my rental car and to get a cup of coffee. Upon entering the building, however, I had the chance to hear the locals engaged in a conversation about apparent events of the previous night. These events included the sighting of strange lights in the sky, unidentified aircraft, and the possible ejection from the craft and parachuting down of some unidentified person or being who was not found in the most likely landing area after due searching.

"Recognizing, naturally, the signs of a possible UFO sighting"

-- oh, naturally, Skinner reminded himself,

"and assuring myself through a quick check of my speed dial numbers that there was no immediately available MUFON representative to call in to investigate the matter under MUFON's strict investigation standards, I realized that I would have to conduct the investigation myself."

Skinner put the faxed memorandum down on his desk. For one brief moment, he considered crying.

"I called the conference organizers and apologized for my having to miss the meeting due to an investigation, and then presented myself to the local constabulary, here consisting of one Sheriff Albert Pike and his assistant, Deputy Leo Taxil.

"I was informed that there had been a series of sightings over the past week, primarily near the fields of a local farmer, one Jonathan Yarker. Most had followed roughly the same pattern as the one about which I had heard at the convenience store. Therefore, I determined that the best procedure was to obtain necessary supplies and prepare to investigate the matter myself through a stakeout in Mr. Yarker's back 40.

"After catching a nap in my car for a couple of hours and making a reservation at the local motel for an overnight stay if necessary (the Stellar Motel, Room 8, has lousy water pressure, and I know because I wound up showering there afterwards -- the hot water isn't all that hot, either), I proceeded to Mr. Yarker's rear acreage with my telescope, binoculars, video camera, Polaroid, and other necessities available at the local Wal-Mart. The charge slips are attached for reimbursement."

Skinner flipped to the back of the document, looking at the faxed receipt slips which Kimberly had stapled to the memorandum. There they were. Power telescope. Top-of-the-line video camera -- nothing less, obviously, would be able to capture the appearance of the Mother Ship of All Mother Ships. At least Mulder hadn't purchased another cellular telephone while he was at it. The man killed cellular telephones the way a barn cat killed field mice. Now, there was what Skinner called an unexplained phenomenon.

"According to the local paper, The Plantation and Gazette, sundown was at 8:53 p.m., which accords with my own observations give or take a minute (my Omega watch isn't what it used to be since it underwent some sort of temporal distortion on one airline flight, you understand). For the next two hours or so, I observed nothing unusual, although I did discover that the range on the telescope I had procured was more than adequate to check on the Yarker household, and it's true what they say about farmers' daughters. However, several locals began to arrive in said field in order to look for the unexplained event, causing me to have to stop doing a full sighting adjustment to the scope while targeting the daughter's window. I observe that her window is, however, a popular spot for focusing long-range viewing equipment for many men in the area.

"About forty-five minutes later, after midnight, both I and the locals observed some form of flying craft becoming visible in the night sky. In my astonishment, I failed to obtain a photographic record of the event, but you will find a description and sketch attached to this memorandum for reference."

No. Skinner bit his lip, restraining himself. He was not going to look. He did not want to know. He could never be that curious in his whole life, no matter how badly his lover tried to bait him. He simply was not going to look, he was not going to look, he was....

He loosened his tie, opened a desk drawer, and shook out two aspirin. He was going to find a map, find Clarksville, and go rescue Mulder himself. If Fox Mulder thought he'd sighted an honest-to-God UFO for himself, nothing in heaven or earth was going to make him leave that spot without intervention.

Where had he read that married men lived longer than single men? He presumed that being in any kind of relationship counted for that study. No one had asked him what living with Fox Mulder did to your life expectancy. If he'd had hair left when they'd begun their relationship, he'd be completely gray now; he was sure of it. One Fox Mulder adventure probably took a year and a half off of his life, no doubt about it. And Mulder had only two kinds of adventures: exhilarating or exasperating. Weekends and vacations tended to fall in the first category. But work-related, or allegedly work-related, Fox Mulder wild goose chases were decidedly in the latter.

Oh, God, there was still more memorandum to this memorandum. Faxed in off of the laptop, no doubt, it as usual failed to conform to anything even vaguely resembling a 302. How an Oxford graduate could fail at something as simple as filling out a standard 302... Skinner tried imagining his lover's elementary school report cards. "Works and plays well with invisible others. Insists that visible others are alien hybrids." "Marches to the beat of a different drum. We use a snare for marching play, he insists on Caribbean voodoo." "Runs with scissors. Drops scissors." "Eats paste. Feeds it to others." "Attacks smokers." "Fox shows great imagination. Usually when asked to account for his behavior."

"Apparently, the craft was flying low enough for it to be exited safely by its occupants because, whether through an ejection mechanism or other means, one occupant departed the craft heading at a trajectory which meant that it would reach Earth somewhere in the vicinity of Mr. Yarker's field. Although I was not able, as noted, to obtain photographs of said being, I can attest that it was in form decidedly non-human. As it fell through the atmosphere, I observed that it was somewhat unicorn-like in that its head was surmounted by a horn of some sort which was fairly straight, perhaps a meter in length, and not shaped like a rhinoceros horn which has some degree of curvature as I recall. Also, it was Cyclopean -- I think that's the term Scully would use, having as it did only one large eye centered somewhat below the horn and above the nasal (?) region of the face."

Skinner hit the reply button on his mail.

"To: Special Agent Fox Mulder

"From: AD Walter Skinner

"Re: Re: Permission to Investigate

"You insufferable idiot, I haven't even read all the way through that infernal e-mail of yours. As far as I've gotten, you saw a thing coming out of the sky. It had one long horn and one big eye. Was it also purple and with a desperate yen to play sax with the Dave Clark Five?"

He clicked on "send" with an air of general relief.

Ten minutes later, his incoming mail sound went off. Praying that it was a message from Kersh, Cassidy, Alex Krycek, or even his ex -mother-in-law, Skinner opened his inbox.

"To: AD Walter Skinner

From: Special Agent Fox Mulder

Re: Re: Re: Permission to Investigate

"Damn, busted. I guess I can't ask you to take the last train to Clarksville? I'll meet you at the station...."

No, he could not. Skinner gritted his teeth and prayed for strength.

"To: Fox Mulder

From: Walter Skinner

Re: Impending doom (yours)

"You wasted the travel for the conference on this? Death isn't good enough. I haven't decided what I'm doing, but I'm doing it. Are we clear on this?"

He hit "send" and scrounged his memory for another prayer to get him through the rest of the day.

The incoming mail chime rang promptly. He had no illusion that it was anything other than a response from his criminally insane lover.

"To: Walter Skinner

From: Who else

Re: Impending doom (mine)

"Spank me? Pretty please? <g>"

Hair. Walter Skinner prayed for hair. He had nothing to rip from his head otherwise. He'd been right before -- death simply wasn't good enough. Spanking was way too good -- hell, Mulder would enjoy that. Maybe that was it; maybe Mulder was deliberately trying to provoke him into a scene by having gone gallivanting off and driving him crazy. Mulder had obviously concluded that running off from the conference and staging a fake alien sighting would push him over the edge, would drive him into throwing Mulder down on the bed, ripping off Mulder's expensively tailored wool serge trousers, and flagellating those two gorgeous globes of swimmer's ass into submission with his belt... no, come to think of it, Skinner decided, the problem wasn't that Mulder would enjoy that too much, it was that he'd enjoy it too much himself. He steadied his palms against the edge of his desk, willing down the erection that had accompanied the thought.

Blessedly, the intercom beeped. "Yes, Kim?" Thank God, he could focus on business for a minute.

"Assistant Director Levinson calling for you from Richmond, sir."

Richmond. The conference. Oh, no, this wasn't about Mulder's not being there, was it? The slight remaining hardness inside his trousers wilted instantly. At the rate things were going, it might never return. He picked up the receiver and groaned. "Yeah, Fred?"

"Things are going great down here, Walt. Your boy Mulder's the hit of this damn thing. With that rep he'd gotten from the UFO's and that suspension and shit, a couple of our organizers were a little doubtful, you gotta understand, but let me tell you, you put that guy behind a podium with a set of slides and he's got the room eating out of his hand. We had to schedule a second session on profiles of child murderers; we couldn't get everyone into the room the first time. And his session on interrogation techniques really went over big. Dawes wants to know if he can do a training workshop in Seattle next month."

Mulder was there? Mulder was where he was supposed to be, doing what he was supposed to do? What the--? Skinner took a deep breath. "That's great, Fred. I'm glad to hear it. I'll call Allen when the conference is over and see what we can work out."

He hung up the receiver slowly. After all that bullshit, Mulder was doing his work all along? How many years had Mulder knocked off of Skinner's life this morning?

So Mulder wanted to get spanked, huh?

Oh, was Fox Mulder gonna get spanked.

And Walter Skinner was going to enjoy every second of it.

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Background graphic courtesy of
Boogie Jack.