Chapter Text
Dana Scully pushed back from the small motel room desk, where she had laid out all her notes, and ran a hand down her face. She didn't care if the make up she had put on that morning, with meticulous swipes of lipstick, was smudged. She was bone tired and wished there was a bathtub in this crappy motel. She looked over her shoulder at Mulder who was sitting on the floor against the foot of the bed, with maps and pages strewn all around him and it pissed her off more than a little that he looked just as fresh as he did when he met her at Dulles airport that morning.
Men had it easy. A quick shower, shake like a dog and they were done. No wonder he kept picking these motels that barely had indoor plumbing. He didn't have to crouch in the bushes when he needed to pee, he didn't need to stay in the shower washing and conditioning his hair. She’d been in his shower. He was a one bottle in the shower kind of guy.
“Mulder, this is the wildest of goose chases we’ve been on in the five years since I joined the X-files,” she said as she tossed her pen onto the desk and swivelled on her seat to drape her arm over the back of the chair and look at him more directly.
He didn't even budge when she spoke but she saw his lips close together a little tighter and knew he was holding back a smile which annoyed her. He hadn't bothered to change when they got back to the motel and was still wearing his shirt, tie, and trousers. The only concession he had made for comfort was toeing off his shoes at the heel just inside the door.
She had taken the time to shower and change into a pair of leggings and a sweater while he grabbed food from the diner across the street. But somehow he still looked fresher than she felt.
“We follow the clues, Scully,” he said without looking up.
“Yeah, well these clues are bringing us round in circles.”
Mulder looked up and she frowned at his easy smile. He picked up the map on his lap and wafted it towards her then laid it out on the bed as he turned on his knees to smooth it out.
“Come look at this, I think I have something,” he said and he beckoned her over with a wave of his hand, but his eyes were on the map.
Reluctantly she pushed off her chair and moved over to the floor beside him. She tried to stand next to where he was kneeling with her hands on her hips, but she couldn't make out what he was pointing out, so she ended up having to kneel down and rest on her elbows on the edge of the bed.
“What am I seeing?” she asked as he smoothed out the map again. “It just looks like a regular old map of Arizona.”
Mulder huffed a laugh and looked at her sideways, then pointed out a small cluster of circles he had drawn in a spiral shape around the small town of Hillbrook they were currently in.
“I’ve dated these events that Robbie told us about.”
“Wait, Robbie?” she asked and looked at him with an arched brow. “The drunk guy you met at the diner last night?”
“He wasn't drunk, he was buzzed,” Mulder said with one side glance in her direction. “And what he told us about the cave panned out.”
“Panned out?”
“The petroglyphs were there, exactly where he said they would be,” he argued.
“Mulder!” she said with a disbelieving laugh. “Those petroglyphs have been there for thousands of years! Everyone in this town knows they are there!”
“Yeah, well it was Robbie who told us, and he told us about these other events.”
“Mulder…”
Scully dropped onto her haunches and her hands fell to her lap with a heavy slap. He turned his head to look at her over his shoulder.
“What?”
“I don't know how you got Skinner to approve this investigation.”
“A murder suicide is worthy of investigation, and that the assailant transported the body across states lines made it a federal crime hence our involvement.”
“Okay, but how is it an X-File?” she argued.
“How about the autopsy results you yourself said were unexplainable?”
“That was…” She popped up onto her knees. “I mean it was that the…”
“Yeah?” he prompted when her voice faded out.
“Her ear drum was burst because of the ice pick that her husband had stabbed her with, but there were no defensive wounds, despite her heart beating when she was stabbed. The acid in her stomach was way above normal, indicating she was violently ill, the same levels of acid were in his stomach too.”
“So they were both sick, and he put her out of her misery, before he slit his own throat.”
“Thats what appears to have happened.”
“Same as the couple in Riverside,” he said and he pointed at one of the map markers he had drawn, and the couples in Sierra Nevada, River gorge, and Hill valley.”
He pointed out each of the markers in order and she followed his fingers in the circular pattern until he tapped the map at an empty spot.
“What's there?” she asked as she leaned in to see the map more closely.
Mulder leaned in too and tipped his head towards her. They were both kneeling on the ground at the foot of the bed, leaning forward on their elbows, over their arms with their heads bent low closer to the map.
“Thats where Robbie told us we needed to go.”
“Robbie again?” she asked with a glance out the corner of her eye towards him.
“Right here,” he said and tapped the map again. “Is a pueblo and I want to see what we can find there.”
“Dust and dirt and ancient cliff dwellings?” Scully said and Mulder chuckled.
“Maybe nothing, maybe something,” he said and bumped his shoulder against hers. “Aren't you curious?”
“Curious?” she said and she pulled back from the bed and landed her ass on her heels again. “Yeah, Mulder. I am.”
He looked at her over his shoulder and smiled then turned back to the map. “There’s something there, Scully. All the couples had been to similar sites in the weeks leading up to their demise.”
“Right, we should rush out there blindly immediately!" she deadpanned and he chuckled again.
“That's why they put the I-”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said and swatted his arm as she rolled back on her feet and stood up with a slight groan. “I already know that one.”
Mulder smiled and leaned back to look at her as she walked towards the door to her adjoining room.
“Robbie said the best time to go there is at sunrise,” he called after her.
“Of course he does,” she muttered as she opened the door and with one hand on the jamb leaned back in to look at him. “Goodnight Mulder.”
“Goodnight.”
Scully stepped through and closed the door then walked over to the bathroom in slow, tired steps to grab her toothbrush and quickly finish her bedtime routine. She wished she could read his mind. Wished she could look into his thoughts, his process, and really understand what got him into conversations with every wacko within a ten mile radius.
Once she finished brushing her teeth she rinsed the brush under the running tap then undressed on her way back to her bed. She could hear Mulder turning on the TV in his room and knew he would be up for a few hours more. With a soft chuckle, she lifted the corner of the duvet and climbed in then leaned out and turned off the lamp. He might be able to run on fumes day in day out, she mused, but she needed to sleep so she curled up tight and tried to quieten all the noise.