Title: The Caveat Emporium - Parts 1 & 2 by Red Valerian R/NC17
Author: hg83@dial.pipex.com (Red Valerian)
Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 01:31:14 GMT~
Title - THE CAVEAT EMPORIUM
Author - Red Valerian
E-Mail address - hg83@dial.pipex.com
Rating - PG/R/NC 17 - a bit of everything eventually
Category - MSR plus mabye Scully/Skinner - I haven't decided
Spoilers - minor mention of Syzygy
Keywords - UST City
Summary - For reasons of her own, Scully insists on going undercover
at a telephone sex establishment. In the process, she drives the
surveillance team to distraction - said 'team' consisting of her
partner and a certain Assistant Director. She also manages to
exorcise some ghosts and to catch a serial killer at the same time.
All with one hand tied behind her back.
Hey - this is the story where I prove that I can write something with
a plot and dialogue. Granted, the plot revolves around sex and lies
and the way our present can be over-shadowed by the past (and I'm not
talking Mulder and Samantha here) but hey - a plot's a plot. Usual
drill - they're not mine, wish they were - especially Skinner. They
belong to CC or Fox or 10-13 or someone. I promise to return them
undamaged. Well - Skinner might be a little disheveled, but I'm only
human after all.
And of course I want feedback please - did you really need you ask?
Ooh - nearly forgot. A prize for the first person to guess from
whence I stole the title.
Caveat Emporium - Part One
By Red Valerian
"Lasciate Ogni Speranza Voi Ch'entrate"
In which Italian Graffiti means more than it might first seem
The street was seedily nondescript, like so many in the inner-city. It
could have been in Baltimore, Jersey City, or Chicago - there was
nothing specific to pinpoint it geographically. Streets exactly like
it could be found everywhere, from coast to coast with the same
boarded up stores, the same graffiti-covered walls and the same trash
blowing in the same gutters. There was no neighbourhood candy store
here, no Laundromat, no Five and Dime, no Corner Grocery. There was no
need for them. Because people didn't actually *live* on streets like
this. Men visited them furtively, looking over their shoulders and
scuttling like cockroaches into dimly lit doorways stinking of urine -
doorways that promised "Beautiful Nude Girls" and "Hot Hot Sex" and
delivered neither.
Special Agents Dana Katherine Scully and Fox Mulder stood out like
angels on a sight-seeing trip to Hell, as they walked purposefully
down this street. They were so beautiful on the eye; beautiful to look
at and beautifully dressed. Not like mere mortals. They contrasted
starkly with the human detritus temporarily inhabiting the rooms they
were passing - rooms with suspiciously sticky carpets and very little
furniture. Ignoring the fetid interiors, they focused instead on
the numbers written over each doorway. The female agent looked
almost angry when she finally found the right address. She stopped in
front of it and glared her displeasure at what she saw.
The narrow door stood out from the others in the street. It had been
freshly painted and newly glazed. On the pristine glass, the words
"The Caveat Emporium" had been painted in green, outlined in gold.
There was a bell, inviting them to ring for assistance and through the
glass they could see a steep flight of stairs going up to the premises
above. As she began jabbing the bell impatiently, Scully turned to
her partner and snapped out a question.
"Do you think you could tell me what we're doing here now, Mulder,"
she asked as she continued jabbing the bell. "If it isn't *too* much
trouble."
Mulder had never seen her in such a filthy mood. Ever since they'd
arrived at this God-forsaken place, she'd been behaving oddly. She'd
been ruder to him in the last few minutes than she had in all of the
years he'd known her. And he couldn't get to the bottom of it. She'd
consistently refused to answer any questions, no matter how tactfully
they were phrased. In the end he'd given up trying to talk to her.
Now he watched perplexed as Scully continued to assault the doorbell.
"I think you've taught that bell a lesson it will never forget," he
said mildly, pulling her hand away at last. Then, pointing to the door
of the Caveat Emporium, he answered her question about why they were
there. "This place is used for phone sex. They employ twenty-five
girls. Or at least they did. Over the last six months there have been
several suspicious deaths among the girls working here."
"*Women*, Mulder. They're *women* - not girls," Scully interjected
automatically. Then she continued with a string of questions, not
allowing him time to answer. She used the bell for punctuation.
"What sort of deaths are you talking about anyway?...jab.... Why
aren't the police involved? ...jab...And what's all this got to do
with the X-files anyway?"...jab...jab....jab.... She then covered the
bell with her whole hand, pushing her aggression into the mechanism.
The intermittent buzzing was now replaced with one long angry
incessant drone. It did the trick. They both heard footsteps pounding
down the stairs, and then the door was flung open by a man built like
a Green Bay linebacker.
"Christ - take it easy lady. I'm here, aren't I?" Then looking them up
and down, he added suspiciously. "What do you two want, anyway? You
cops?"
Both agents had reached into their pockets and they now held out
their FBI identification cards.
"Close - but no cigar. We're FBI - Agents Mulder and Scully, to see
Ms. Wiseman." Mulder flashed one of his most winning smiles.
Scully snorted in his direction, then without ceremony, she pushed
past the two men and quickly started for the stairs. Boy - something
was very very wrong. What in the hell was the matter with her today?
He didn't think he could take any more of her awful mood. It pushed
him into saying something out of character.
"What's your problem, Scully?" He shouted out the question at her
disappearing back. "Is it the wrong time of the month or something?"
He regretted it as soon as the words left his mouth.
Scully stopped on the stairs and turned slowly to stare back down at
him. Her face was an angry mask.
"You know what Mulder?" she said at last. "You can really be a
patronising bastard sometimes."
Then she turned and continued up the stairs.
Her words were like a slap on the face. He'd never seen Scully acting
like this - never heard her using language like this either, for that
matter. At least not to him.
"You kiss your mother with that mouth, Scully?" he shouted back
lamely, but she had already disappeared from view.
The linebacker was grinning broadly at Mulder's discomfiture. The
agent scowled at him, before gloomily following Scully up the
stairs. At the moment he felt like he'd rather be dining with
Hannibal Lecter than investigating a case with this new Jekyll and
Hyde version of his partner. He got to the top and looked around, his
interest pricking up at what he saw. Things were looking up.
The Caveat Emporium had taken over the entire second floor of the
building. The large rectangular space had been carefully organised
for convenience rather than aesthetics. A deep shelf positioned at
desk height ran along one of the long and both of the short walls.
Privacy screens partitioned this 'counter-top' up into twenty-five
individually numbered cubicles, each with its own telephone. At every
cubicle but one, young women sat hunched forward and murmured
huskily into their phones. Their voices cajoled, gasped, pleaded,
crooned, and whimpered - the sobbing tones blending together until
the room itself seemed almost swollen; almost ready to explode into a
cataclysmic orgasm.
Cubicle Thirteen was the single exception. The empty chair there was
pushed tidily under the counter. The phone there rested sedately in
its cradle. No-one cajoled, gasped, pleaded, crooned or whimpered in
cubicle thirteen. No-one at all. But the eye was drawn there first on
entering the room, for a very specific reason. On the wall over that
phone, someone had scrawled a graffiti message in blood red paint. The
words were in Italian. They read: "Lasciate Ogni Speranza Voi
Ch'entrate!"
Scully was already standing in the middle of the room, staring fixedly
at the bloody message on the wall. Her face was an impassive mask.
Without even looking to see if Mulder had followed her, she began to
speak to him.
"How's your Italian, Mulder? Do you have any idea what *that* says?"
She indicated the message with a small nod of her head. He stepped
forward and stood beside her, glancing from the wall to her and back
again. Like her face, Scully's voice betrayed almost no emotion but
Mulder could sense that her odd aggressive behaviour was simmering
just below the surface.
He turned back to the message. "Speranza is probably 'hope'" he
answered cautiously. "Am I right?"
"Yeah - you are." Flatly. Still no emotion.
Mulder waited for her to tell him the answer, but she just kept gazing
steadfastly at the message.
"Um...Scully - are you going to share with me or not? I presume it
something important?" He chanced another look at her stony face.
"You could say it's kind of important, yes," Scully answered at last,
still in that oddly neutral tone of voice. A long pause, and then she
finally spoke again.
"It's from the Divine Comedy - Dante's vision of Hell? It's the
warning which hangs over the gates. You know the one I mean?" She
turned to look at him.
Mulder's eyes went wide for an instant. The light had dawned. Scully
saw it, and nodded to him as if to say - 'yes - that's right.' Then
turning back to the message she translated it aloud.
"Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here."
At that moment the phone in cubicle number thirteen began to ring.
Everyone in the room froze and all conversation ceased for an
instant. The only movement in the room came from Agent Scully as she
calmly walked over to the phone and picked up the receiver. Then she
sat down and began to speak. Within a few minutes, her whispering
voice was joining the others as she too cajoled, gasped, pleaded,
crooned, and whimpered to the demanding male voice on the other end
of the line.
................................................................................
.................................
The Caveat Emporium - NC 17
By Red Valerian
Part 2
A short but necessary chapter in which the plot thickens
Disclaimers/warnings as in Part 1
Scully screeched out into the traffic, narrowly missing a nervous
Volkswagon, which luckily managed to break in time to avoid disaster.
She then accelerated, crossing across several lanes of traffic before
shooting onto the entrance ramp and finally settling down on the
inside lane of the four lane highway. Mulder chanced one nervous
look at the speedometer and then ostentatiously fastened his
seatbelt.
"Don't start, Mulder," Scully hissed, without even turning her head.
She downshifted and swerved into another lane to pass a plodding
station wagon. Then she shot back into the first lane, nearly cutting
the wagon off.
"I haven't said a word, Scully. Not...a...single...word." His voice
was tight. Strained.
She threw a quick glance at his face. "Yeah - well you were thinking
too loud, OK? Knock it off."
Mulder stared out of the window and began to talk, as if to himself.
"I'm not even going to *ask* you what in the Hell you were doing back
at that sleaze pit, Scully. I don't even want to *know* why you
picked up that phone and started giving that guy a very explicit
verbal blow job. Right in front of God and everyone. So don't even
*try* to explain."
He meant the exact opposite of course. He was ordering her to try to
explain. Daring her to.
Mulder looked her way, waiting for her to start. He was willing to be
fair. He'd hear her out. Then he'd wash her mouth out with soap.
Scully said nothing, however. She ignored his words completely and
kept her eyes fixed on the road. At least she was driving a little
less dangerously now. Mulder bore the silence for a few minutes, but
then he finally gave in.
"Well Scully?" He was almost shouting. "What the Hell was going on in
there? Are you going to tell me or not?"
"I thought you weren't going to ask Mulder. I thought you didn't even
want to *know* why I picked up the phone.
The car in front braked unexpectedly, and Scully swerved out of its
way, cursing under her breath. Then she continued where she had left
off.
"You really need to work on being more consistent, Mulder. A
vacillating mind is a mark of a weak character."
Her aggressive driving returned with the snide tone. She changed
lanes unexpectedly, repeating the performance of a few minutes
before. The tires squealed a warning as Mulder tried and failed to
brace himself more firmly. His knuckles were white where they were
gripping the dashboard.
"Are you trying to kill us both, Scully? Because if you are, why not
just get out your gun. It would be a lot quicker, and that way at
least other innocent motorists wouldn't have to die as well."
Just as she had before, Scully ignored the outburst. Completely. She
acted as if Mulder wasn't even in the car.
He had initially been hurt and confused by his partner's odd
behaviour that afternoon. Then later, after the incident with the
telephone, he had been worried and concerned. And, if truth be told,
a little intrigued. Not now, however. Now he was just downright
angry. Spit in your eye, angry. Totally and completely pissed off
angry. Her silence had as much as told him that she didn't trust him.
Couldn't confide in him. Saw *him* as an enemy. And on top of that,
she really was putting their lives at risk with her dangerous driving.
Memories of a small town called Comity flashed into his mind. That had
been another tense car journey reflecting another potential rift. He
wasn't about to let her get away with it again.
Mulder glared in her direction, ready to continue telling her exactly
what he thought of her. He had actually opened his mouth and already
planned the next cutting remark when he was stopped in his tracks by
what he saw. It was Scully's face. She was crying - crying hard. And
the tears ran unchecked down her face and fell in her lap, making dark
spots appear on the pale green wool.
His mood softened in an instant. The anger and aggression disappeared
like tears in rain. Scully was hurting and she couldn't even tell him
what was wrong. It must be something important. He was a bastard for
not understanding. She'd tell him when she was ready, and not before.
He wouldn't push it. He should consider it a compliment that she could
show this much anger to him. Looked at in a certain light, it was a
sort of gift.
Where had that thought come from?
Mulder suddenly remembered. It was back yard psychology. Not the
textbook stuff with a capital 'P' that he'd studied as an
undergraduate, but the commonsense sort that ordinary people believed
and passed on to each other over the garden fence. The gospel
according to Doctor Spock. His parents' bible. They used to quote it
to him when he was misbehaving. And he *did* used to misbehave
sometimes - before Samantha was taken. When they were still a normal
family and he knew how to act like a normal kid. Rude. Hurtful. Making
unfair demands. Screaming at his parents that he hated them when they
refused to comply.
They would listen to him patiently and then look at each other and
smile. Then they'd pat him on the head and tell him that they knew he
didn't mean it. Only secure and loved children, they would explain,
could afford to be that awful to their parents. Why? Because they were
the only ones who understood that whatever they did, they'd be
forgiven. The parents of badly misbehaving children were to be
congratulated. They were doing their job successfully. Their children
had to be secure and happy deep down - otherwise they wouldn't dare to
misbehave.
Of course afterwards - after Samantha - Fox Mulder never misbehaved
again. And he never felt loved again either.
Now as he looked at Scully's tears, he remembered the Doctor Spock
logic, and he felt comforted. Oxford educated though he was, he could
see the truth of the homespun argument. Scully was paying him a
compliment by using him as a punching bag. She was taking a chance -
risking pushing him away by her behaviour. She needed to know that he
understood. That whatever she did or said now, whatever she'd done or
said in the past - he would still be there for her. He couldn't *not*
care for her. And she needed to know that right now, because he
didn't think he could bear to see her crying for another moment.
"Hey Scully," he said softly, knowing that she was listening. Being
able to sense it, although she made no acknowledgement. Didn't so much
as glance his direction.
"Hey... " he repeated gently. "When you're ready to talk to me -
I'll still be here, OK?"
He saw her nod slightly, and then he left her in peace. Mission
accomplished. The rest of the journey was uneventful and they arrived
back in DC without incident. Mulder waited for her to come to him, but
he was doomed to disappointment. Scully had not felt ready to talk
for the rest of that day. Nor the next day. Nor the day after that.
And Mulder was getting more and more worried about her.
To be continued soon - I promise. Just give me a few more days.
Sorry everyone - I'd no sooner posted the first version of Part 3,
when I remembered something crucial that I'd left out.
Archivists - please use this one and ignore all earlier versions.
Apologies for the inconvenience.
The Caveat Emporium - NC 17
By Red Valerian
Part Three
In which Skinner and Mulder get a BIG surprise
Disclaimers/warnings as in Part One
The two agents stood outside Skinner's office, having been summoned
into his presence by a curt telephone call a few minutes before. The
Assistant Director was letting them stew outside. As Mulder rapped on
the door for a second time, he turned and spoke to Scully, keeping
his tone deliberately neutral.
"I don't suppose you'd happen to know what this is all about? Or that
you'd be willing to share the information with your partner?" He was
trying desperately to hide the exasperation he actually felt at
Scully's continued silence. He couldn't believe that she still hadn't
taken him into her confidence. In fact, Scully had said almost nothing
to him for over a week now - and he hadn't dared to bring up the
incident at The Caveat Emporium. He still had no idea why she'd picked
up that telephone, or why she'd been crying in the car later. At work
it was 'business as usual' and every time Mulder had rung her at home
he just got her answering machine.
Meanwhile, Skinner's voice had sounded like the wrath of God. Mulder
sensed that Scully knew what it was about but still she said nothing.
And her partner felt like he was being sent to do battle without
armour or a sword. Buck naked in fact.
The neutral tones approach seemed to be working with Scully, though.
She looked like she was about to give in and give him some sort of an
explanation. But when she finally spoke, it didn't throw much light on
the mystery.
"Look Mulder, it isn't about you - OK? That's all you need to
remember. It's about me and something I needed to do. Or rather,
something I still need to do." She sighed and then looked down at her
feet, before continuing, almost under her breath.
"I must admit though - I meant to get around to talking to you
first, just in case Skinner found out."
Mulder was taken aback. 'Just in case Skinner found out? In case he
found out what?' This was beginning to sound ominous. He was about
to insist that she explain herself when the AD suddenly shouted for
them to come in. Scully mouthed 'Just back me up, Mulder - please'
and then she opened the door, took a deep breath and walked in. He
followed her with a sinking heart.
One glance at the mahogany desk and the glowering figure sitting
behind it, told Mulder that Skinner was not a happy Assistant
Director. In fact, he looked even more pissed off than usual, although
it was kind of hard to tell. The man had made an art of hiding his
emotions behind that granite faŘade. The faŘade looked a little shaky
today, though. Which wasn't good news.
They both sat down and waited for him to make the first move. They
didn't have to wait long.
"Agent Scully," he began, in a voice of barely repressed anger. "
Would you be good enough to tell me why I had a telephone call today
from some god-forsaken police department somewhere, asking me why they
hadn't been informed that one of my agents was working undercover as
an operative at ......" He paused to look down at a piece of paper in his
hand. "At the.......The Caveat Emporium. Apparently it's a telephone
*sex* establishment." He spat out the word "sex" as if it were an
unpleasant taste in his mouth.
With a tremendous effort of will, Mulder managed *not* to spin around
and stare at his partner in disbelief. But only just. Meanwhile,
Scully sat composedly in her chair and met the AD's flinty gaze with
her unruffled one. And when she did answer him, her voice was under
complete control.
"I didn't tell you sir, because I suspected that you wouldn't
authorize my transfer." The tone was polite and reasonable. It was if
she were explaining something patently obvious to someone very
obtuse. Skinner's restraint slipped a little more.
He stood up, bracing his hands on his desk, and leaned towards
Scully. Mulder knew it was a clich,, but he actually thought that the
AD's eyes were flashing fire.
"You would have been perfectly correct in that assumption, Agent
Scully," he hissed. "In fact I am cancelling your transfer orders
right now."
Scully didn't even flinch. She continued to meet his eyes, and if
anything she sat up even straigher in her seat as she looked up to
answer him. And this time there was the ring of steel under the
silky polite surface of her voice.
"With respect sir," she said " I won't allow you to do that."
Mulder had watched the interchange with his mind racing - trying to
take it all in. Scully had been working undercover at the Caveat?
There was no doubt about it - that could be useful. And she'd asked
him to back her up, so she needed some support here. But Scully
confronting Skinner and telling him she wouldn't *allow* him to do
something? That was just plain insanity. He needed to intercede,
before Skinner self-destructed and took Scully with him.
"Sir - if I could interject something at this point?"
Skinner dragged his outraged eyes off of Scully and looked at Mulder
as if he'd forgotten he was in the room. Then, visibly making an
effort to regain some control of his voice, he sat down again and
spoke.
"Interject away, Agent Mulder. It's clear that your partner has taken
leave of her senses. "
Mulder didn't react to the AD's words. Instead, keeping his face
non-committal, he began to mount a perfectly reasoned argument as to
why Scully should be allowed to continue working undercover at the
Caveat Emporium. Everything he said implied that it had been a joint
decision which the two of them had reached together. Everything
implied that it was the most natural and necessary thing in the world
for her to have done so. He hoped it didn't show that he was
improvising like mad - but if Scully *would* push him 'onstage'
without a script, what choice did he have?
One thing was working to Mulder's advantage, however. He was familiar
with all of the details of the case. After all, it had been at his
instigation that they'd found themselves there in the first place.
For Skinner's benefit, he summarized the main points now.
In the last five months of operation there had been five inexplicable
employee deaths among staff at the Caveat Emporium. Each dead operator
had worked from Station 13 and just prior to her death, each had
spoken to the same client for over two hours. However, when the tapes
had been listened to afterwards, they were found to contain just the
female halves of the conversation.
Aside from this anomaly, there was no real evidence to suggest that
the deaths had been suspicious. There had been one hit-and-run, one
apparent suicide, one car crash and two drownings. But despite the
statistical unlikelihood of these all being accidental, the police
were not convinced that murder had taken place. And if no crime had
been committed, then no investigation was necessary. They washed their
hands of case.
Naturally enough, Mulder disagreed. He was genuinely convinced that
the five women had in fact been murdered and by the same man. The
blank sections of tape suggested that the man was either technically
adept or else he had unusual paranormal powers. Moreover, Mulder was
certain that whoever had committed these murders would do so again
as soon as the opportunity availed itself. All it needed to spark
him off was for another operator to answer the phone at Station 13.
But that was not going to happen. Not if the employees at The Caveat
had any say in the matter.
"Since the last death, none of the women has been willing to work at
Station 13. Not that you can blame them." The sympathy in his tone was
evident.
Then came the final improvisation.
"That's why Agent Scully and I decided that the only way we'd get to
the bottom of it would be to put a trained agent behind the phone in
an attempt to lure the killer out into the open once more. " Mulder
sat back in his chair and waited for the cross-examination which he
knew was bound to follow.
Skinner pounced immediately on the obvious weak point in Mulder's
explanation.
"You say you decided that you needed a trained agent? Trained in what
exactly, Agent Mulder? Are you suggesting that Agent Scully has
experience in providing telephone sex? Because that's the only
training which would be useful in an operation such as the one you are
describing. And I think you'll agree that in this particular arena,
Agent Scully would find herself rather out of her depth."
He crossed his arms over his broad chest and also leant back in his
chair. Waiting. Daring Mulder to answer him.
For a moment there was silence in the room, while Mulder tried to
come up with a convincing counter argument. But before he could say a
word, it was Scully herself who spoke.
"As a matter of fact, Sir," she said. "I have a great deal of
experience in precisely that field."
Two male heads spun in her direction. Two pairs of eyes were riveted
to her face as she continued.
"The fees for attending medical school are astronomical, you know. And
my parents had four children to provide for and very little money. I
very soon discovered that I had a ...."
She paused for a moment and chose her words carefully.
"A particular....talent.....for providing certain services over the
telephone. And the remuneration was quite exceptional."
She maintained eye-contact with a mesmerised Skinner as she finished
speaking.
"I will admit that I thought I had put all that behind me, Sir. I had
always worked under an assumed name. I was paid in cash. I thought
no-one could ever find out about it. Truthfully, I wanted to forget
about it myself. And I had almost succeeded too."
She paused for a moment and quickly glanced at Mulder. Then smiling
ruefully, she continued.
"Then last week Agent Mulder unintentionally brought it all out into
the open again when he took me on a little trip down memory lane. Oh -
they may have put in a new door, and slapped on a coat of paint - but
the place hasn't changed at all. Not a bit. You see sir, the Caveat
Emporium is the name of the establishment where I worked part-time
for four years. For the entire time I was a medical school, in
fact. And I always worked out of Station 13."
Skinner and Mulder were both now staring at Scully in patent
disbelief. She looked from one to the other, and almost felt sorry for
them. They were obviously having real trouble accepting what she had
said. And she couldn't blame them really.
Hadn't she spent a great many years trying to erase her past? Trying
to re-invent the Catholic schoolgirl she had been before she's gone to
work at the Caveat. Convincing everyone - even herself - that she was
the lady-like Dr. Scully. The wearer of gold crosses and demure
blouses. A woman who epitomized refinement and gentility.
Practically an Ice Queen.
No-one knew how much she actually liked that epithet. It meant she
had succeeded in burying the past.
But she should have known better. Some things refuse to stay
underground, no matter how deeply you try to bury them. She'd found
that out as soon as Mulder had told her where they'd be going to
conduct their next investigation. And she'd known then - without
understanding quite how she knew, that there'd be no escape for her.
She'd walked through that familiar door and up those well-remembered
stairs and seen the empty cubicle - Number 13. It was as if it had
been waiting for her to come back.
And on the wall had been Dante's message, seemingly mocking her:
"Abandon hope all ye who enter here".
And then the telephone had started ringing and she'd known that she
had no choice. She'd known without a shadow of a doubt, that it was
ringing for her.
The silence in the AD's office was growing uncomfortably long. Mulder
and Skinner seemed to have lost the power of speech. Again, it was
Scully who broke the silence at last.
"What's the matter gentleman?" she asked almost gently. "Cat got your
tongues?"
- end of Part three
The final bit is coming soon to a computer screen near you. I really
really really really promise it is. By Sunday at the absolute latest!
Red V
The Caveat Emporium - NC 17 By Red Valerian
Part Four
In which Mulder and Skinner begin to see the disadvantages of having
male anatomy
Disclaimers/warnings as in Part One
(Answer to quiz question about the story title at the end of this
post!)
As Mulder sat in the small surveillance van with his boss, he
reflected not for the first time, that this was probably the worst
idea he had ever had. And yet Skinner had approved of it. Not only
approved of it, but insisted on coming along as well. And now here
they both were, trapped together. Nothing to look at but a bank of
recording equipment with the enormous tape reels slowly revolving at a
rate of precisely seventeen times per minute. He knew. He'd counted.
Several times over.
And nothing to listen to but Scully's voice. Christ - her voice. He
had tried to tune it out. He really had. He'd used all of the ploys
that were supposed to work - all that mathematical computation stuff.
The times tables had been no help whatsoever. Nor had quadratic
equations. Nor had counting the number of revolutions a tape reel
could make in one minute. And he was running out of ideas.
There was just no escape from the effects of Scully's voice as it
echoed in the hollow confines of the van. Her insidious whispering
tones had overcome his defences - snaking into his ears from first
one side and then the other. Coiling and sliding their way around his
neck, skittering over his chest and then finally lapping warmly
against his pulsating groin.
"Oh baby," he could hear her sighing. "Oh baby, you're making me so
hot. I'm so wet. For you. Just for you. I've got to touch myself now."
Silence, apart from the rustling of silky clothing and then a faint
gasp and sigh.
"I'm doing it, baby. I'm sliding my hands into my panties and touching
myself. Oh God - I'm so swollen - so wet. Just for you. I'm rubbing
myelf now. It feels *so* good. I wish it was you doing it. I wish it
was your tongue. Your lips. I want you so much. " Her words dissolved
then into gasps and moans which rose in intensity as the minutes went
by.
Mulder strangled an answering groan. He didn't dare look in Skinner's
direction, but he had a pretty good idea what was going on over on his
side of the van. Despite his attempts to hide the fact, Skinner was in
fact human. And he was most decidedly male. Mulder had no doubt that
the AD had been fighting a similar battle between quadratic equations
and his own anatomy. And if Mulder's spectacular erection was anything
to go by, Skinner had probably also been losing the same battle.
Bigtime.
Bigtime. The word itself was an uncomfortable reminder of Mulder's
predicament. He couldn't resist a quick look at his boss after all.
One glance was enough. Skinner's face was frozen into its usual
immobility, but there was a film of sweat on his brow and an almost
preternatural tension in his muscles. But still - the man was
obviously coping better than Mulder himself was. God - he was so
close to losing it.
Mulder's hard-on had reached painful proportions. Why, he asked
himself for the hundredth time, hadn't he worn loose sweat pants - or
even suit trousers? The tight fitting jeans were allowing him no room
to escape. No room to maneuver. There was just nowhere for his anatomy
to go.
And what was Scully saying now? She was describing slipping her
fingers inside of herself. Moaning that they weren't enough. Begging
for 'him' to fill her. To satisfy her, as only 'he' could.
Christ. If only.
Mulder fidgeted uncomfortably in his seat and tried to find a position
which would allow him some relief. None was forthcoming. He heard
Skinner making similar movements with a similar lack of success. Then
Suclly's voice demanded his attention again.
Was that suppressed laughter he could hear lurking just underneath
the surface of her murmuring tones? He wouldn't have been at all
surprised. Because she knew perfectly well who was listening to her.
She was perfectly aware that she had an audience of three not an
audience of one. She had agreed to it all. And she knew what effect
her voice had on *anyone* listening to her.
In a desperate effort to gain even momentary relief, Mulder traced in
his mind the steps that had brought him here sitting in a van across
from Skinner, listening to the litany of filth which was flowing out
of Scully's mouth like warmed syrup and dripping right down to
encircle his crotch in its throbbing heat.
They'd been in Skinner's office, right? And after Scully had made her
startling revelation, he and Skinner had eventually recovered the
powers of speech and questioned her about the details of the case and
its possible links to her past. It couldn't be a coincidence that the
killer was targeting only operators at Scully's old station - number
13. Until very recently, that station had not been in use. Not for
over five years which was when Scully had last been employed at the
Caveat.
But were the calls actually aimed specifically at Scully? If so,
where had the killer been in the intervening years?They knew it was
painful for her, but she needed to remember. Had there ever been
anyone who seemed obsessive enough to carry out this sort of long term
vendetta? Had there ever been anyone who had threatened her life?
Yes. Apparently there had.
After talking to her, they came up with most obvious suspect. They
had been working on the assumption that murderer might be an old
'regular' of Scully's who was killing anyone who dared to answer what
he saw as *her* phone. She'd certainly *had* regulars, all of the
operators did. And the regulars would ask for the operators by
number - not by name. In fact, it was because of one regular that
Scully had finally quit for good, she'd told them. She just couldn't
take his sick calls any more.
"After listening to him I felt filthy - unclean. And no matter how
long you showered, you couldn't blot out his voice. You couldn't
forget the things he said he was going to do to you. And he made you
say that you wanted them."
She shuddered and closed her eyes for a moment before continuing. "It
made it even more awful that he was an educated man. He had an
English accent and he spoke several languages. Every phone call began
with him quoting three lines of Dante's from the Divina Commedia:
Per me si va nella citta dolente - This way for the sorrowful city.
Per me si va nell' eterno dolore - This way for eternal suffering.
Per me si va tra la perduta gente - This way to join the lost people.
Again, she paused for a moment before continuing.
"He said he'd kill me if I ever stopped taking his calls. And that
he'd kill anyone else who touched my phone. No-one else would use it
after that, naturally. But just in case, I painted the warning that
you saw on the wall over the phone on the day I left. It was
melodramatic I know, but I was so young then."
Then, as if remembering the five recent murders, she made a final
point. "The new owners must have insisted that all of the stations get
used again - even mine. I wonder if they realise what they've done?"
Mulder had been listening intently as she spoke. But now he
interrupted her, his voice sympathetic but urgent.
"Who was this guy, Scully? Did you ever find out? What happened to
him?"
Skinner too leaned forward to hear her answer. His gaze was locked on
hers.
"It can't be him," she replied in a tone of finality.
Mulder's eyes asked her why. So did Skinner's. Scully finally
answered them both.
"Because he's dead. He was executed five years ago for the torture,
rape and murder of ...." She hesitated for a moment and then
continued. "....of a telephone sex operator with another service."
Mulder - that believer in extreme possiblities - didn't think that a
little thing like death necessarily eliminated the man from the list
of probable suspects, and he said so at once. In fact he insisted on
getting all of the details out of he, so that he could follow them up.
Sighing, Scully gave him what he needed and Mulder immediately set a
train of phone calls in motion, to verify and update their
information on the man.
Meanwhile, Skinner agreed with Scully, that a ghost was unlikely to
be the perpetrator. The AD did feel that Scully's staying under cover
at the Caveat was their best bet at catching whoever *had* been
killing the operators, however. They worked out the details of a plan
of action, while Mulder finished his calls. He then joined in the
conversation, and helped fill in the 'what, where, when, why and how'
of the plan.
Mulder also pointed out that they should think very carefully about
the 'who'. Who would monitor Scully's calls from the surveillance
van, for instance?
"I'm sure she wouldn't want just anyone listening in, Sir. It could be
highly embarrassing if word got out generally about what she was
doing. Or indeed, about what she used to do in the past."
Mulder glanced at Scully for confirmation. He thought he saw the hint
of a smile on her lips as she listened to him volunteering for the
job. But she merely nodded her agreement. To Mulder's surprise,
Skinner acquiesced at once to the plan. He not only agreed, he
insisted on being there too as a back-up.
Just in case there was any trouble, he added. The light flashing off
the lenses of his steel-rims made it impossible to read his expression
as he spoke.
But Scully's mouth twitched again at his offer. Beither of the men
noticed it.
And now here Mulder was, with Skinner - and he was being driven out
of his mind by Scully's voice as she drove caller after caller to the
brink of orgasm and beyond. There'd been no sign of any crazed
psychotics, but there had been an incessant stream of telephone
requests - one after the other after the other. Mulder listened as
each of them in turn got the relief they craved, and in the process
he felt his own erection growing to gargantuan proportions. There
was no way he could get any relief, either. Not with Skinner sitting
right across from him. It was like being in the deepest circle of
Dante's Hell - the Inferno itself. He tried not to listen, but it was
impossible.
Scully would tell the callers to unzip themselves and they would.
Mulder would hear the zips going down. And then she'd tell them to
touch themselves. And they would. Mulder would hear the unmistakable
sounds of flesh slapping on flesh; of slick palm running down
sensitive erectile tissue. Then Scully would croon to them and use
her voice to push them and push them, until they finally spurted over
that edge. He knew just which edge it was too. The hell with Mount
Everest - this was the peak everyone really wanted to climb - the
wave everyone really wanted to crest - the abyss everyone really
wanted to leap over.
Only for Mulder there was to be no edge, no peak, no crest, no abyss.
Not now, anyway. There was just misery. Did someone say misery loves
company?
Mulder couldn't help it - he glanced over at Skinner again, just to
see how he was dealing with the situation now. Hoping for some mutual
sympathy. Hoping that the AD would let his guard down just this once,
and admit to being human too.
Mulder looked, and his heart sank. Skinner was clearly coping far
better than he was. True, the Assistant Director had loosened his tie
and undone the top few buttons of his shirt, but that was his only
concession to the strain Scully had been subjecting him to. The
earlier symptoms of arousal which Mulder thought he had spotted, had
cleary been locked back up again. Skinners brow was now clear of
perspiration. His body was relaxed and watchful.
Mulder must have been wrong. Skinner wasn't human after all. A human
would have been bathed in sweat, would have had disheveled hair and
would have been unable to articulate more than three consecutive
sentences in a row. Which was a reasonable description of Mulder
right now, after having listened to Scully for four hours straight.
Ther'd be no point in trying to engage Skinner in conversation about
it. He might as well check out the equipment instead.
Mulder had determined to do just that, when he heard Scully's phone
ring yet again. He listened with only half an ear as she picked up
the phone and identified herself as Operator 13.
And then he heard the voice. *The* voice. The one Scully had described
so well to them. All polite English accent on the surface, and
unbelievable malice underneath. It was a voice that crawled into your
innermost secret places and defiled them, leaving slug trails behind
it that couldn't be washed away. To listen to it was to let your body
be invaded by things vile and unclean.
"Hello cunt," it said. "Did you think you could get away from me? Did
you think I'd ever let you go?"
The soft voice continued. Malevolent. Insidious. Promising pain.
Guaranteeing it.
" I'm going to make you very sorry you ever left me, cunt. And even
sorrier that you ever came back here. Are you listening? Pay
attention, there may be a quiz afterwards. Per me si valnella citta
dolente - this way to the sorrowful city. Per me si va nell' eterno
dolore - This way for eternal suffering."
Mulder and Skinner were both standing now, guns in hand, although they
knew that killer could be anywhere. Could be far beyond the range of
man-made bullets. But still they kept their weapons at the ready, as
the voice continued its sickening diatribe. Previous discomfort was
forgotten now. Scully might be in danger and that took precedence
over everything else.
As he stood in a half crouch, listening intently, Mulder
automatically took a quick look at the recording monitor on the high
tech machinery crammed into the van. It was second nature to make
sure that everything was working. Everything was - at first glance.
Then he froze in his tracks as he examined the dials more closely.
The monitor was registering Scully's frightened breathing clearly.
The luminous shifting Rorschach patterns appeared and disappeared
in tandem with the level of sounds she was making.
But the other monitor - the one which should have been showing the
caller's speech patterns - that one was blank. There was nothing to
see in the window. Nothing was being recorded on that tape at all,
although they could still hear him clearly enough - were still being
sickened by the threats he was making.
Then just before he hung up the phone, the final almost jaunty
invitation was issued.
"Still there cunt? Good. Per me si va tra la perduta gente. Well?
What does it mean? Have you forgotten your basic Italian. You're
really a stupid cunt, aren't you?"
And then they heard Scully answering him for the first time - in a
voice as calm as his was calm. As controlled as his was controlled.
"This way," she murmured in resignation, "This way to join the lost
people."
- End of Part 4 -
One more bit to go guys. Hang in there. Please!
Oh - my quiz question has been answered by the well-read, and
appropriately named, JohnieRed. I asked from whence I had stolen the
title of my story. Many people guessed that it was from the Latin tag
- Caveat Emptor - meaning, 'let the buyer beware' - which is a
warning against buying from unscrupulous traders.
Not quite, I answered. It was indeed a pun based on that expression,
but I had actually stolen the name 'Caveat Emporium' from a famous
American novel. Most people claimed that it was probably some obscure
novel they'd never heard of.
Humph! As if I'd be that sneaky. Nope - it was from a VERY well known
novel ineed.
Anyway, JohnieRed got it without the clue. Here's her answer, for
which she was given a virtual rose and a virtual congratulations card.
I hope she got them! She said:
>I believe I know where the quote comes from. Isn't that what Rhett Butler
>suggests Scarlett call the general store she inherits and she likes it
>because it's Latin so she has the whole sign painted up before someone tells
>her what it means?
I couldn't have put it better myself! So - did anyone else get it? No
- huh? I think JohnieRed and I must be the only two people in the
world to have actually read 'Gone With The Wind'.
The Caveat Emporium - NC 17
By Red Valerian
Part Five
In which Scully and Alexander-the-Great turn out to have a great deal
in common
Disclaimers/warnings as in Part One
(There will be an optional NC 17 Part 6 - but this bit is pretty tame
- for me anyway!)
Scully sat shaken and miserable at her place in front of cubicle 13
and berated herself over and over again for ever returning to this
place. No - that was wrong. She blamed herself for ever getting
involved with it in the first place. She felt like she was being
punished for it, and that .that abomination was the instrument being
used to punish her. And there could be no escape. How could you escape
from a dead man?
She had meant well when she'd decided to come back here. Going
undercover at The Caveat was going to be her penance and her
absolution. It would give her the chance to make up for those aspects
of her past which she cringed to remember. She would help trap this
monster, and at the same time cleanse her own soul a little. Catholic
guilt was a heavy burden to carry around on your back for years at a
time. She needed to ease the burden just a little.
But she'd got carried away when she'd found the telephone in her hand
again , and heard - not a terrifying maniac on the other end of the
line - but merely the anxious voices of a succession of inadequate
sounding little men. And it took so very little to please them. A few
breathy promises. A little whispered filth. A gasp or two and some
heavy breathing. That was all. Then they'd explode all over
themselves, calling on God or Jesus or sometimes all of the saints.
And as the evening had progressed and still no call came from *him*,
Scully had begun to relax. She was lulled into a false sense of
security. After all - this wasn't real, was it? She was just doing an
undercover job and tomorrow she could go back to being a respected
forensic pathologist; a crack federal agent; G-woman extraordinaire.
The Ice Queen of Washington DC.
Why not enjoy this chance to break out of the mould? Why not take
advantage of the dangerous possibilities? Why not see how far she
could push the boundaries?
And so she'd let her mind wander to the van parked outside. And to the
two men sitting in that van supervising her calls. And the next time
the phone rang, she'd aimed her whispering voice, not at the needy
little individual on the line, but at the two agents outside
monitoring it. At Skinner. At Mulder. Her mind shied away from
examining which of the two she most wanted to affect. If she thought
too carefully about it, she'd chicken out altogether.
Instead she'd turned up the volume. Stepped on the gas. Pulled out
all the stops. You choose the metaphor, and she'd done it. She knew
it was hitting below the belt, quite literally in this case, but she
just couldn't resist using her long-dormant skills. Which were not
inconsiderable, she knew.
Although Scully had almost no personal vanity she had no false modesty
either. Experience had repeatedly shown her that her voice had a
powerful effect on men. Not her everyday voice, but the one she was
using on the phone now. The one that had just made her last caller
scream a high-pitched girly scream as he ejaculated all over himself.
As she whispered a fond farewell to that caller, she couldn't help
wondering what Mulder was feeling right now? What Skinner was
feeling? It didn't bear thinking about, but she could think of nothing
else. It was making her squirm in her seat. Actually making her hot.
God - that had never happened before. What was different?
Work it out, Dr. Scully. The difference was that she knew the
audience this time. And she had....feelings....for the audience. She
couldn't come up with a better word, but that one sounded so
Oprah-esque. She practiced saying the line mentally. 'I have
'feelings' for my partner. I have 'feelings' for my boss'.
Yeah. Right. But what does that *mean* exactly? What sort of feelings
are you talking about Dana? Scully sighed, unable to make up her mind.
She'd seen both men get settled into the van before she'd come up to
the Caveat. She knew Mulder was in tight jeans. Even then she'd
wondered if she could make him regret his choice of clothing. And
Skinner - he'd been his usual reserved self. No relaxation of
'uniform' or demeanor. How many starched white shirts did the man own?
How many regulation blue ties? How many suit jackets? It would be so
tempting to try to get him to loosen up - just a little. To undo just
a few buttons. Remove just that tie, at least.
She smiled a little, just contemplating it.
At that moment, the phone had rung and she'd picked it up almost
happily - looking forward to the challenge she'd set herself. And then
she'd heard his voice. *That* voice. Dripping into her ear, as slick
and poisonous as cobra venom.
And at once the light had gone out in her face. The smile had slipped
into a frozen grimace and then faded altogether. She'd listened to
that voice calling her a "cunt", telling her that there was no escape,
and she'd felt eighteen and powerless all over again.
Now she looked up at the words she had written on the wall all those
years ago - "Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here" and she stared at
them intently for a minute. And then something rather amazing
started to happen. She got to thinking. Thinking hard. And as she
thought, she reflected that she wasn't the same girl who had written
those words five years before. She was a woman now - independent,
capable and strong. No-one, living or dead, was going to intimidate or
frighten her again. Not if she could do anything about it.
The rational scientist suddenly started functioning. Think about it
logically, Dr. Scully. The solution is out there if you just hunt for
it hard enough. There has to be a way to get rid of this monster.
And now that Scully had banished the fog of terror from her mind,
it came to her - how to get rid of the sick son-of-a-bitch once and
for all. She hadn't been thinking clearly lately, or she would have
thought to try it earlier. It was so beautifully simple. And it would
be *so* satisfying. But she'd have to wait for Skinner and Mulder to
arrive before she could put her plan into effect.
Where had they got to, anyway?
Right on cue, the two male agents burst into the room with their
guns still drawn. They ran crouched, clasping their weapons with both
hands, while with arms outstretched, they swept the room.
Scully couldn't help smiling at the melodrama but she grinned
outright at what happened next. It was straight out of the Keystone
Cops.
Seeing only *GUNS*, one of the operators suddenly began to scream
hysterically. The cry was immediately taken up by several others as
they turned and saw Mulder and Skinner. Panic telegraphed its way
around the room within seconds, and women threw themselves on the
floor left, right and center.
A highly amused Scully watched Mulder and Skinner do a double take as
they finally realised that *they* were the cause of the general
pandemonium. Mulder looked down at his gun, and quickly dropped his
hand so that his weapon pointed at the floor. Then he reached for his
ID with his left hand and held *it* out at arms' length. He swept
his hand in a slow arc so that they could all see it.
"FBI ladies. Don't panic. Everything's under control."
By now Skinner was satisfied that there was no dangerous maniac in the
room, so he had joined Scully at her station.
"Are you all right, Agent Scully?" he asked in concerned tones, as he
holstered his pistol. Scully grinned up at him and assured him that
she was just fine. Surprisingly, she sounded like she actually meant
it.
A worried frown wrinkled Skinner's brow. He thought she must either be
in denial or in shock. He'd heard the vile things that monster had
said to Scully just a few minutes before. And he'd heard her
frightened response to him. Yet now she was acting relaxed and happy -
and she was clearly amused by the floorshow that he and Mulder had
unintentionally put on for her benefit. Skinner turned and joined
Scully in a quick survey of the room. And suddenly he found his own
lips twitching.
The floor was littered with weeping women. Terror had caused them to
abandon their phones, which dangled forlornly by their springy cords -
bouncing in time to the sobs which rang in the open space. Tinny
indignant voices squeaked from the handsets - demanding to know what
had happened. Some of the women were beginning to rise hesitatingly
now as they registered that Mulder and Skinner were probably not
hitmen after all, but others still cowered on the floor, hiding their
faces.
Mulder looked rather exasperated. And rather silly.
He glanced over and saw a grinning Scully watching his predicament so
he marched over to join her.
"What have you got to smile at?" he began, slightly aggrieved that
Scully didn't seem to need rescuing after all. "That was some weird
motherfucker you had on the phone, by the way."
Scully was shocked. "Puh -leeze Mulder!" she admonished. "Watch your
language."
"Watch my language?! Watch *MY* language?!" Mulder's tone was one of
outraged innocence. "You're telling *me* to watch *my* language, after
what I've heard coming out of your mouth for the last four hours." He
was too indignant to continue, so Scully took the opportunity to
interrupt.
"Nice to know you were listening, Mulder. But can we change the
subject, please? I need to borrow something from you."
Now Mulder's expression mirrored the concern on Skinner's face.
Scully could tell that they both thought she had lost it. So she
condescended to try to explain matters.
"Look you two," she began, patiently enough. "Have you heard the
story of Alexander-the-Great and the Gordian knot?"
Not bothering to wait for an answer, she continued her explanation.
"Alexander was faced with the task of untying a knot of the greatest
complexity in order to prove his right to reign. Instead of attempting
to untie it in the traditional way, he decided to take a short cut. He
simply took out his sword and cut the knot in two."
Mulder and Skinner looked even more worried about her now and Scully
was getting exasperated with their obtuseness.
"Look - it's obvious," she continued. "By severing the knot instead of
wasting time trying to unravel it, Alexander got out of a difficult
situation by the quickest possible route. He took one decisive step
and solved all his problems. It's what I intend to do."
The two men still looked at her blankly. Scully sighed and tried one
last time.
"This maniac - he's only ever contacted me by telephone, right? And
when the phone wasn't used for five years, no-one heard from him at
all. Not once. Not until the phone was used again a few months ago."
Skinner joined in at this point.
"So you think that he can *only* reach you by using the telephone? But
you know this man died in the electric chair. Where exactly do you
think he's calling you from now, Agent Scully? Hell?" His tone of
voice was slightly satirical.
"Yes - that's right" Scully answered seriously. "That's what I
believe, anyway. And I also believe that the police were correct.
There were no murders here. Those five women just allowed themselves
to get freaked out by him, like I nearly did. Or else he made them
suicidal. Or fear made them careless. Maybe some really did die in
accidents. I can't be sure. But one thing I *am* sure of - he couldn't
have killed any of them. He's only a voice on the phone."
Now Mulder joined the conversation.
"And you're going get rid of him....how? By cutting him in half with
your sword like Alexander-the-Great - is that the idea?"
"Oh Mulder, don't be silly. I would have thought that it was perfectly
obvious how I'm going to get rid of him. I'm going to disconnect his
line. With a little help from my friends, of course."
With that she reached out and took Mulder's gun from his unresisting
hands. Then spinning around towards the phone on the counter behind
her, she took careful aim.
"Make my day," she murmured, as she pulled the trigger.
The telephone exploded. Into about fifty-million pieces. When the dust
finally settled, Mulder and Skinner saw Scully gazing coolly at the
remains of a smoking touch-tone pad. Then, picking a piece of plastic
out of her hair, she smiled, and turned to face the two men.
"Gentlemen," she said, as she held the still smoking gun in her small
capable hands, "I think my work here is done now - don't you?"
- end part five -
Right guys - you can either quit here or you can come searching the
archives after the weekend, by which time I will have written the
OPTIONAL part six - the gratuitous sex scene that I've been dying to
write since I started this. Who knew it would take so long to get the
plot out of the way. I mean - the plot boiled down to Scully getting
a phone call from a dead pervert and proceeding to get rid of him by
shooting the telephone. Tell me why that took me 10,551 words to
explain?
Red Valerian
The Caveat Emporium - NC 17
By Red Valerian
Part Six
In which Scully is given an opportunity to find out the difference
between virtual sex and the other kind.
Disclaimers/warnings: This is the gratutitous sex scene which is
eagerly awaited by millions - well, by at least five people anyway. It
is as NC 17 as it can possibly be, and it does nothing to further the
plot of the rest of the story - so if it's plot you want, read Part
Five again. (Actually - I really wish you *would* read Part Five
again, once I re-post it, as I've altered the ending a bit.)
And hey - if you want more stories like this, please provide as much
sycophantic feedback as you can possibly manage. It's the only thing
that really keeps me at this computer. And it's the only thing that
really keeps me sane, if you want to know the truth.
On with the show
................................................................................
...............
Scully was still in the Caveat although she now had the large room to
herself. She'd insisted that Mulder and Skinner go home. She'd be
fine, she had assured them both. And anyway, there was something she
needed to do before she left.
She didn't elucidate, but in fact Scully wanted to remove the warning
which she'd painted on that wall so many years before. She'd had a
private word with the proprietor who had shrugged his shoulders, but
agreed to her request readily enough. He'd not only showed her the
cupboard where the paint was kept, he'd actually trusted her with
the keys to the place - just asking her to lock up and put them under
the door when she left.
So now she was about to cleanse her past in a quite literal way and
she was looking forward to it.
She stood and gazed speculatively at the message one last time and
reflected that never again would she voluntarily have to read Dante.
The man was definitely over-rated. If she *had* abandoned hope, she'd
probably be dead now.
Scully opened the pot of paint, dipped in the brush and with a few
deft strokes, she obliterated the now unnecessary warning. Exactly at
that point, the silence in the room was broken by a phone ringing.
It took the startled agent a moment to realise that the ringing was
coming from her own cell phone and not from the one she had blasted
into a million pieces. She took her phone out of her pocket and stared
at it uneasily as it vibrated in her hand. There were several
possibilities here and she wasn't sure which one was the most likely
or the most desirable.
Mulder? Maybe. She suspected that he thought they had some unfinished
business after he'd sat in that van and listened to her for four
hours.
Skinner? She didn't dare to think about that, but a part of her hoped
that he might think they had some unfinished business too.
Dead serial killer? He'd come back from hell once, maybe he'd got her
unlisted number now.
Her mother? Inviting her to a family dinner? God - she hoped not.
The practical part of Scully's mind told her to answer the phone and
find out. But still she hesitated while the phone rang on.
Finally, Scully sat down stiffly at her old place. The remains of the
dead phone were still scattered in front of her, a reminder of who
her last caller had been. The smell of fresh paint stung her eyes, and
made her feel close to tears. She hesitated for a moment more and then
finally she decided to put an end to the ringing and to her curiosity
at the same time.
"Scully here," she said into the mouthpiece. Her tone sounded calm and
composed - but her rigid body language told another story.
There was silence for a moment, and then finally she heard a voice
begin to speak. Her whole body relaxed at once and she sighed in
relief. It was Mulder and he proceeded to ask her a question which
she'd heard a million times before. Once even from his own lips,
although that had been in jest. This time, though, he was in earnest
as he spoke the familiar words.
"What are you wearing Scully?" His tone was husky and a little
desperate. He was asking to be tortured again. Asking to be driven
wild. Asking for a repeat performance of what he'd been forced to
listen to in that claustrophobic van earlier in the day.
There was the slightest hesitation before Scully answered her partner
- a split second where she tried to tell herself that she wasn't
disappointed at who was on the other end of the phone. Then she
realised that she'd have to reach another decision - whether or not
to play this enticing game with Mulder, or to tell him to go home and
have a cold shower.
It would be easy to humiliate him. She could just say in pretended
innocence, "You know perfectly well what I'm wearing, Mulder - a
cream silk blouse and a black skirt and matching jacket. Why do you
ask?"
She could just say that - and he'd feel like an absolute idiot and
slink away with his tail between his legs. Or she could say what she
knew he wanted to hear.
It didn't take long to weigh it up.
"What do you *want* me to be wearing, Mulder?" she whispered at last,
her voice throaty and rich with lewd promise.
As she settled back down in her chair and waited for his next gambit,
she shrugged her suit jacket off, allowing it to slide down her arms
and settle in an untidy heap behind the small of her back. The short
sleeved silk blouse now left her bare arms exposed to the slightly
chilly air of the room, and as a consequence the skin was instantly
covered in goosebumps. They started at her wrists, and then shot up
to her upper arms in an instant, causing her to shiver involuntarily.
"Take off your suit jacket." Mulder's voice was suddenly decisive. A
spoiled child who knew he could get whatever he wanted. "Now."
"It's already off," Scully answered in soothing tones. She held the
phone in her left hand, elbow balanced on the counter in front of her,
which left her right hand free to obey Mulder's orders. While she
waited, she began to run the tips of her fingernails across the front
of her blouse, circling her nipples lightly on each side until she
felt them tauten uncomfortably against the lace of her bra. There was
an immediate answering throb from between her legs. At once she
crossed her upper thighs together tightly and then began to squirm
her bottom in slow sensuous circles on the seat. Occasionally she
quickly rocked forward and back for two or three stokes, stimulating
already over-stimulated flesh, before returning to the slow circling
motions which was less intense. Her breathing was becoming laboured
and she made no effort to control it, even allowing a small moan to
escape from her moist lips.
"What do you think you're doing, Scully?" Mulder's voice was suddenly
indignant. Like someone had stolen his new toy. "I didn't tell you
you could touch yourself." She was frozen for a moment with Catholic
guilt remembering other times when she'd been caught doing something
unspeakably pleasant which she knew was a sin. Something which would
have to be confessed in whispers into the exasperated ear of Father
Riley next Sunday. Forgive me father for I have sinned. Forgive me
Mulder for I have sinned?
But before Scully could say anything in response, she suddenly gasped
again, but this time for an entirely different reason. A warm
muscular hand had threaded itself though the tangled curls at the
nape of her neck. The fingers then closed together and her head was
jerked back until she found herself staring up into the eyes of
Assistant Director Walter Skinner. His glasses were nowhere to be seen
- and his eyes unmediated by lenses, almost burnt her skin. The
intense look on his face warned her to be silent and she chose to obey
it. He saw her silent acquiescence and nodded.
Skinner let go of her hair then and crouched down by her side. One
hand rested lightly on her thigh to help him balance, while with the
other he slowly began to unbutton Scully's blouse.
She was having difficulty thinking. What had Mulder last said? Oh yes
- he'd said she didn't have permission to touch herself. She needed to
speak him to him again. He was waiting, his breath harsh in her ear.
"What do you *want* me to do?" Scully spoke into the phone
breathlessly, but her eyes were locked on Skinner's. She waited to see
which man would answer first. The one on the phone or the one kneeling
by her side.
It was Mulder who spoke. "You tell me. You tell me what you wish I was
doing right now."
Scully looked down mesmerised both by the voice in her ear and the man
at her feet. Her tone was languid, and as thick as warm honey when she
finally answered.
"You've come into the Caveat and found me here by myself," she said
softly. "I haven't seen you, so you watch me from behind for a moment,
imagining what you're going to do to me. Then finally you can't wait
any longer. You're too aroused."
Skinner had by now undone all of her buttons, and he slipped the
blouse off Scully's unresisting arms, thoughtfully holding the phone
to her ear for her, so that she could navigate the blouse over her
left and then her right wrist. Scully now sat there in just her cream
lace bra and skirt. She had taken the phone back and now continued
speaking into the receiver, but all the while her eyes stayed locked
on Skinner's.
"You come silently up to me - still from behind. And suddenly you
thread your hand in the back of my hair and you yank my head backwards
until I am forced to look up at your face. I am not afraid. I know
exactly why you've come. I've been expecting you. I've been wanting
you to come to me. Longing for you."
In front of her Scully watched some fleeting emotion skitter over
Skinner's face. Whatever it was, it disappeared as quickly as it had
come. But he suddenly stood up and stared down at her with his
piercing eyes. Then, as if his control had finally broken, he gripped
her painfully by her upper arms, immediately yanking her into a
standing position.
They were now barely inches apart - but Scully's shorter stature
meant that Skinner was looking down at the top of her head. She stood
meekly in front of him still with the cellphone clutched in her left
hand. Waiting.
He slowly reached out and ran his fingers down her bare arms, only
just touching the flesh. Again the goosebumps appeared - all over
Scully's body this time. Her head fell back slightly so that she could
see his face and what she saw there caused her to gasp. It was as if
the sensation were almost painful, almost too much to bear. Then his
hands slipped all the way up her arms again until they rested on
either side of her neck - the thumbs forcing her chin further upward,
fingers meeting at the nape - so that she had no choice but to look
straight up into his face. Into his searing eyes.
They both knew that he could choose to close his grip and end her life
with one violent motion. He had that power if he so desired. He could
do anything he wanted - anything. Suddenly he lowered his hard mouth
onto her soft lips, kissing her almost brutally, thrusting his tongue
into her moist warmth just once then twice, before pulling out quickly
and stepping back out of her body space.
Scully was breathing heavily now. Her breasts were swollen, while the
nipples had contracted to hardened points which ached to be touched.
To be licked. She still clutched the phone spasmodically to her left
ear, but she had forgotten Mulder's existence. She couldn't take her
eyes off of the man in front of her.
As his gazed burned over her flesh, she felt her whole body become
sensitised - until it became one huge erogenous zone which was begging
to be stimulated. Skinner did nothing but look at her, however.
Mulder's voice suddenly intruded again , awakening her from the ragged
trance into which she had fallen.
"Then what Scully? What do I do then?"
Still staring at Skinner, she answered him. There was a subtle change
in her tone now. Her eyes had narrowed and her voice suggested that
she was tired of taking orders. She wanted to give some.
"You begin to undress me, Mulder. Until I'm completely naked in front
of you - except for my garter belt and my white stockings." Her eyes
challenged Skinner, and perhaps they both remembered her confrontation
with him a few days before, when she'd told him she couldn't "allow"
him to do what he wanted to do. This was just such another battle of
wills.
Skinner's lips tightened for a moment while he decided if he was
willing for the tables to be turned. Then the decision was made - all
in a breathless minute, because without ceremony he stepped forward
and proceeded to strip her a she had requested. First he unbuttoned
her skirt and then yanked it down so that it rested on the floor,
shackling her. Scully stepped out of it, impatiently.
He then reached up and behind her and undid her bra, easily slipping
it down her arms and over the hand holding the phone, before allowing
it too to drop on the floor with her skirt. Only her panties were
left to remove now.
Skinner knelt in front of her and watched her face, as he slowly slid
the drenched scraps of lace down to her ankles. Again she stepped out
of them, brushing them aside. She was naked now, apart from the garter
belt and stockings. Her skin was as flushed and rosy as a Titian
beauty's. The darker auburn curls in front of Skinner's face were damp
with need and Scully spread her legs slightly and arched her pelvis
closer to his mouth.
Skinner ignored her action, but kept his eyes glued to her face.
Another battle of wills was in progress.
Scully broke eye contact then and began to talk to Mulder in earnest.
She described exactly what she was wearing to him. Exactly how she
was standing. Exactly how she was feeling. Exactly where he was
kneeling. And then she started to describe something which hadn't
happened yet. And she looked back down at Skinner as she did so.
"And now you are picking up my panties and I'm embarrassed, because I
know how wet they are. But you don't seem to mind. You bury your face
in them, licking the damp cloth and rubbing it over your hot skin.
Surrounding yourself with my smell - with my desire for you. "
Skinner's eyes were dangerous but again there was the moment's
hesitation while he reached for a decision and again he decided to
obey her orders. He picked up the panties and rubbed them all around
his face and mouth, gazing at her the whole time.
"And my scent, my need for you is so obvious now - there's no hiding
it. You're driving me crazy crouched in front of me - looking up at
me, but not touching me. I'm losing my self control. I'm arching my
body towards your mouth, bucking gently and rhythmically. I'm
silently begging you to relieve the ache which is driving me to
distraction."
Scully was issuing her next set of orders. But Skinner had had
enough. He had other ideas.
Throwing her panties down, he stood up quickly and looked down at her
with an unreadable smile on his face. Scully's eyes widened in a
mixture of surprise, fear and heightened arousal. Then, so quickly
that she didn't even register his intentions, he grabbed her shoulders
and spun her away from him so that she was facing the countertop where
she'd been sitting all afternoon. Her right hand automatically reached
out to brace her weight, while somehow she still held onto the
cellphone with her left.
Then, in a manner as practiced as a member of NYPD blue, Skinner
shoved his right leg between hers and forced her to "spread 'em". She
was now in perfect frisk position, with a very aroused Assistant
Director standing behind her. A very aroused Assistant Director who
wanted to start giving orders again.
"Don't turn around," he hissed, speaking for the first time. And then
leaning into her he whispered in her ear.
"Tell him! Tell him what I've done. Describe your position and tell
him what you look like from behind."
Scully became even more aroused as she imagined how she must look to
Skinner. She was bent over the counter, naked apart from her garter
belt and white stockings - legs now spread far apart. In her mind's
eye, she saw her narrow waist and rounded bottom, and she knew that
he would also be looking at the moist folds between her legs which
were dripping honey down her inner thighs, liquid that was being
stopped only by the lacy top of her stockings.
Scully did as she was told. And as she described her position to
Mulder, she could hear Skinner finally beginning to undress behind
her. There was the rustle of cotton shirt and silk tie falling to the
floor. The sound of shoes being toed off, and impatiently kicked
aside. Finally the sound she had been waiting for most - a zip slowly
being slid down and then more rustling as trousers and shorts were
dropped and summarily discarded.
Suddenly a completely naked Skinner was sliding himself up and down
against her bottom and then leaning forward and rubbing his chest over
her bare back. His hands then snaked around her waist and he pulled
her bottom more tightly into his groin, so that for the first time she
could feel his erection. Its weight and size made her squirm back
against him, her throbbing need for him almost painful.
Too low for Mulder to hear, Skinner whispered in her ear again.
"You liked torturing us this afternoon in the van - didn't you? Well
- it's payback time now. If you want me - you're going to have to
beg."
Scully didn't need asking a second time. She began to whisper into the
phone, but her words were an answer to Skinner.
"God - I want you - I want you inside me now. I want you to *fuck*
me. Is that what you want to hear?" She sounded almost desperate as
she gasped out the last question.
"No," Skinner hissed, in a voice barely above a whisper. "There's no
need to talk dirty. I only wanted you to say please."
As he taunted her, he took his cock and slid it slowly between her
legs - through the moist throbbing lips - backwards and forwards in
long slow lunges. Over and over he repeated this motion, until she was
moaning and panting - unable to speak coherently. But never once did
he penetrate her, where her body was screaming to be pentrated. And
though she was now squirming against him madly and trying to position
herself so that he would have to slip into her, still he denied her
penetration.
"Say please," he demanded, more roughly this time. And in a voice
which he was no longer trying very hard to subdue.
When he had first started to torment Scully with his incomplete
caresses, she had abandoned trying to hold onto the phone, and instead
lay her hot cheek down on the cool formica, arms spread out on the
counter. But the phone still lay just next to her mouth - so her
every word was still audible to Mulder.
"Please - all right? Please. Please. Please.
Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease......." And she repeated the single
word over and over in a voice growing more and more desperate. Skinner
gave up trying for control. He positioned the head of his massive cock
just at her throbbing entrance, and without any other warning, he
slammed into her - so deeply that she thought she'd been damaged
internally. She almost screamed his name out loud then, but a part of
her remembered that Mulder was listening. And that she didn't want him
to know what was really happening here.
Skinner moved his hands to her hips and tilted her so that he could
penetrate her even more easily. Now she heard herself making almost
animalistic sounds of pleasure and pain combined. She spread her legs
further apart, trying to take him even more deeply into her. Begging
him to go further. Deeper. Harder.
Skinner decided to reward her good behaviour. He slid his right hand
around her waist and then down until his fingers encountered her
matted pubic hair. Then he slid them lower still, until he found what
he was looking for. As he continued to jackhammer into Scully from
behind, he used his fingers to massage her swollen clit in time to his
desperate thrusting. She had never felt so hot and slick. Had never
been so filled. Scully started making a high-pitched keening sound
that rose in intensity until finally it turned into a guttural scream
of absolute, total, complete and mindless pleasure. Then with one
final almighty lunge from him and one last almost surreal scream from
her, she came. And then right after that, Skinner came. And then, if
the noises coming out of the abandoned cell phone were anything to go
by, Mulder joined them both. The walls of the Caveat had never heard
anything quite like this before. And they never would again.
...............................................................
Scully recovered first. She needed to get rid of Mulder and fast.
Groping for the phone, she held it to her ear and listened. She could
hear that Mulder was still gasping desperately for breath but he was
gradually regaining control. For the first time she wondered just
where he was ringing her from. Had he made it home or was he still in
a car somewhere - pulled over at the side of the road and desperately
trying clean up the evidence of this encounter so that he could drive
home.
"Mulder," she hissed. "Are you there? Answer me."
A grunt was her only response, but it was enough to tell her that he
could hear her.
"OK. Listen to me carefully. This never happened, right? This was just
a fevered daydream you had on the way home from the Caveat. My little
show this afternoon got you all hot and bothered, and your psyche
decided to do something about it. Do you understand?"
There was a moment's hesitation, before an unconvinced Mulder spoke.
"It never happened, Scully. Right. The best sex I've had in five years
- no, make that the *only* sex I've had in five years, never happened.
OK."
There was an even longer pause, and then he spoke again.
"But it *did* happen - Scully. And it was great. You can't deny it."
Skinner had not withdrawn from Scully, and at Mulder's words he gently
began to thrust into her again, his still tumescent cock wanting more
stimulation. Scully tried to ignore him, and to concentrate on Mulder
instead. It was difficult.
"I *can* deny it Mulder. I *do* deny it. You aren't here, remember.
I'm here but you're......" She stopped altogether for a second, and
then continued in an almost amused voice. "Actually, Mudler - where
are you exactly? I've been meaning to ask."
Mulder laughed raggedly. "You don't want to know, Scully. Listen - are
you sure about this "it never happened" stuff, cuz it sure seemed like
something happened to me."
"Sorry Mulder - what we just had was *it*, as far as I'm concerned.
Tomorrow we go back to being partners. Agree or I'm going to ask
Skinner for a transfer." As she said Skinner's name, she unconsciously
pressed herself back against him, and was rewarded with an answering
thrust from him.
She waited impatiently for her partner to answer. Skinner was a rather
delicious distraction that she was dying to return to.
Mulder spoke at last.
"Ok - agreed." There was another slight pause before his plaintive
voice was heard asking a final question. "Hey Scully - can you just
answer me one more thing?"
"Go for it Mulder."
"Was it good for you too? I mean, it sure sounded like it, but then I
know you're good at faking. I've been listening to you do it all
afternoon, remember."
Scully began to giggle at that point, although she risked dislodging
Skinner in the process. He was still thrusting into her gently, and in
between thrusts, he was kissing the flushed skin on her back.
But she just couldn't help it. "Oh Mulder," she gasped between bouts
of muffled laughter. "You have absolutely no idea how good it was for
me. Honest. Now go home and get some sleep."
Mulder gave it up. He said goodbye and she heard the click of the
connection being severed. And now she and Skinner were alone, and she
was suddenly - oddly - a little nervous and a little afraid. As he
slowly withdrew from her, she found her heart starting to beat
unpleasantly fast.
"Turn around now, Scully," his voice whispered gently.
Almost....tenderly, she thought to herself in surprise. So she did.
And without being asked, she looked up to gauge his expression. And
there she saw that same look which had flickered over his face earlier
- but this time it stayed in place. And it seemed to soften him. To
round the granite edges of his lips, gentle the sharpness of his
jawline and mellow the fire in his eyes.
'It looked awfully like....there was no other word for it...it looked
awfully like.....love', she found herself thinking as she let herself
dissolve into him, body, mind and soul. In the dimly lit room of the
Caveat Emporium they wound themselves around each other, and their
entwined bodies represented as much a new beginning for Scully, as
the fresh paint on the wall behind them.
At that moment, somewhere, in another state, in another grim city, in
another room crowded with gasping women offering sexual salvation for
forty-nine cents a minute, a phone began to ring. But Scully didn't
care. She couldn't hear it. She could hear nothing - nothing at all
but Skinner's heartbeat as it pounded rhythmically into her own. And
at that moment there was nothing in this wide world that she
wanted to hear more.
- the end - finally! -