5/22/96

I wrote a little piece of this story on the X Files bulletin boards
at America Online a long time ago, and just remembered it.  I've
added a story around the piece I wrote, and it has some PG rated
scenes.  I realize that the plot device is a cliche, but I've
always liked this one.

Summary:  Mulder and Scully must go 'undercover' in Kipler,
Pennsylvania, to solve the disappearance of honeymoon couples.
Category:  X, H, MSR.  

Disclaimer:  This story is based on the characters and situations
created by Chris Carter, Ten Thirteen Productions and Fox
Broadcasting.  As such, the characters of Fox Mulder, Dana Scully,
AD Skinner, the Lone Gunmen, etc., are the property of those
entities and are used without permission, although no copyright
infringement is intended.  The following work is for the
distribution and entertainment of EMXC members only.  Any further
distribution of this work without the author's consent is in
violation of federal law.

HONEYMOON FROM HELL
By Gerry Hill (fox42@ix.netcom.com)
Peni's Inn, Kipler, PA
6:00 pm

Mulder pulled up in front of the Inn's office, killed the ignition,
and looked over at Scully.

"It doesn't look too bad for a small town.  There are worse places
for a honeymoon.  Wink, wink, nudge, nudge."

Scully just gave him a long-suffering look and started to open her
door.

"Wait!  Let me get the door.  Appearances, remember?"

He was out of the car and opening her door before she had a chance
to reply.  As she stood, he gathered her into his arms and kissed
her tenderly on her forehead.

"Let's go check in, darling."  Mulder was enjoying this way too
much.

He took her hand and they went into the office, with Scully looking
like she might live to regret this whole thing.

Later, after they got the room keys and hauled the luggage inside,
Mulder flopped down onto the lone queen-sized bed and mourned, "Only married one 
day and I'm already getting the cold shoulder. 
Is it something I said?"

Scully gave him a little smile, then said, "Mulder, I don't think
our every move is going to be monitored - I doubt that anyone has
even noticed our arrival yet.  And get off my bed."

Mulder looked hurt.  "YOUR bed?!  Oh, no, you don't.  This has to
look real, there's no sofa or comfortable chair, so I'm sleeping
with you tonight."  He hastily added, "On my own side of the bed,
of course."

Scully stood with hands on hips, considering the situation, then
sighed, capitulating, "If you keep your word to stay on your
side...well, it's against my better judgment, but we'll give it a
try."

Mulder looked pleased that his proposal had gone over so easily
with Scully.  He got off the bed and, humming happily to himself,
went into the bathroom.

Scully just shook her head, and began hanging her clothes in the
closet.

By the time Mulder emerged from the bathroom, he saw that she had
already removed the case file from the baggage and was sitting at
the small table going through paperwork.

"This is sure a romantic honeymoon we're having, Scully."  He sat
in the other chair and asked, "Find anything interesting?"

She looked up at him, brow furrowed in thought.  "Mulder, did you
realize that witness accounts in two of these disappearance cases
related that both couples had engaged in a public argument just
before they vanished?"

"Yes.  That's why, while we're out having dinner, we are going to
pick a fight."  He added sarcastically under his breath, "That'll
be hard to do."

Studying the page before her, Scully said, "I heard that."
She flipped a few more pages over and then closed the file.  "Three
honeymooning couples have disappeared in this general area in the
past four months.  Since one of the missing couples happened to be
the children of the Governor and the State Attorney General,
strings have been quietly pulled, and two FBI agents were assigned
to the case."

"That's us," Mulder mentioned helpfully.

She raised an eyebrow at him.

"Not the eyebrow, Scully, please!" Mulder joked as he threw his
hand up in mock horror.

Scully wondered what had gotten into her partner.  She was used to
his joking around occasionally, but he had really been
uncharacteristically incorrigible since they had been on this case. 
It could be the enforced close proximity they were anticipating;
they very seldom had to go undercover on any of their cases.  Maybe
he was just embarrassed, and this was they way he coped.

"Mulder, why haven't we told the local authorities about our
setting ourselves up in hope of luring the bad guys?  You know how
territorial they can be, especially where the FBI is concerned."

"That's why it's called 'going undercover,' Scully.  Seriously,
Skinner said that he has a few doubts about the integrity of some
of those 'authorities' judging from the bits and pieces he picked
up from connections out this way.  He said that he would take the
heat when they found out what was going on in this operation."

"Well, it's nice to know where we stand in all this; sorry I napped
in the car on the way down when we could have discussed this setup,
but, as I said, Queequeg was sick and I was cleaning up doggy
accidents most of the night."

"And on that note, It's time to go get something to eat," Mulder
said heartily as he got up, grabbed his coat, and headed for the
door.

Scully hastily retrieved her coat from the bed and followed him out
to the car.  As they got in and were strapping on the belts, she
asked whether he had a restaurant in mind.

Backing out of the parking lot, he said, "Saw a big, and probably
the only, restaurant as we drove into town.  It's one of those
family-style things where everybody goes."

It only took a couple of minutes to reach their destination, and
the place looked fairly busy.  They were shown to a booth by a
harassed-looking elderly gentleman who managed to smile a lot. 
While crossing the room, they noticed the diners were mostly
families, with some blue collar local types and business people
traveling through town.

When they reached the booth at the far side of the large dining
room, Mulder, in a smooth move, let Scully slide onto the seat,
then slid in after her on the same side.  He sat close and gave her
a smug look.  She gave him a "let's humor him for now" smile and
studied the menu.

"I'm hungry," she announced.

"Let me guess:  Chef's salad."

Her eyes warned him.  "Most of the other stuff in this type of
place is bad for you."

"Try the famous cheese steak."

"YOU try it."

"Aw, come on Karen."

"It's Kathy," she whispered.  "Get our cover names right, OK?"

"How about 'love muffin?'," he whispered back.

"How about Kathy," she said through clenched teeth.
Suddenly the waitress stopped at their booth and looked expectantly
at them.

"Have you decided yet, folks?"

Mulder looked up and his eyes got rounder.  Their waitress was a
knockout.  Jet black curly long hair, gorgeous dark eyes, a sweet
heart-shaped face, generous chest, slender body, and long exquisite
legs.  He registered all this in an instant, expert that he was. 
The waitress had a name tag with "Tina" on her right pocket.
The attraction appeared to be mutual, since Tina was eyeing Mulder
in an unmistakably interested way.

Scully took all this in, and thought, "OK, you want a public fight,
buddy; you've got one."

When Tina left with their orders, Scully commented rather loudly,
"So what were you staring at?  She's not on the menu."  Her voice
dropped slightly, "Or maybe she is."

Mulder's mouth dropped open and he stared at her in astonishment. 

Then he recovered and responded, "So what?  I can look, can't I?"

"It's rude to your wife, me, to leer at someone like that," she
stated primly, then added, "and it pisses me off."

"Oh, so 95 percent of all married men who glance at a pretty woman
are being rude to their wives?"

"Glance!!  Hah!"

"So who made you the one-who-determines-all-morality?"  His snide
voice made Scully furious, even though she knew in the back of her
mind that this was all just role-playing.

"SOMEONE has to do it, and it sure isn't you."

"What does THAT mean?"

"Figure it out."

They both sat and glared at each other for a minute.

The waitress came back with their drinks and salads, giving Mulder
a wink, unaware of any tension.

He grinned at her and winked back.

Scully lost her cool and gave him an open-handed smack against the
left side of his face.  It sounded terribly loud in the dining
room, and most everyone turned to see what was happening.
The blow was enough to rock Mulder's head to the side.  He put his
hand to his reddening cheek and looked at Scully in awe.

"You hit me!"

"Please take me back to the motel, or I'll call a cab," she said,
her voice still loud, and now with a catch in it.

Mulder threw a twenty onto the table as he slid out of the booth.
"That's cab fare."  He was clenching his jaw and stood with his
arms folded across his chest as he waited for her to get out of the
seat.

She didn't say another word as she ignored him and the money he had
thrown on the table.  She just stalked through a very quiet room
toward the front door.

Mulder defiantly sat down again and began eating his salad, wryly
thinking, "Well, at least everyone knows we're here."

When Tina brought the rest of the meal, she quickly put it down and
fled, leaving the check.

"This case is going to really undermine my self-esteem," Mulder
mused to himself.  "Not that it was all that high to start with."

Relieved to get the meal over with, he managed to get the old guy
with the menus to wrap up Scully's untouched food and took it with
him, knowing that she wouldn't have had anything to eat yet.
He found Scully in her robe back at the room; she had just washed
her hair and was drying it, sitting cross-legged on the bed.

As he walked in, she asked, "Did you see the guy in the red shirt
who kept watching us at the restaurant?  He seemed more interested
than normal, to me."

"I doubt we'll catch our culprit all that easily, Scully.  It would
be nice, but I doubt it.  We'll put out some feelers tomorrow; for now, I'm 
going to watch the football game on TV while I nurse my
wounded pride."  He ostentatiously rubbed his cheek.

"Aw, poor baby.  I didn't hit you very hard, Mulder."

"I'd hate to be around when you really swung at me, Scully.  Oh,
yeah, here's your dinner."

She grabbed the bag and dug into it immediately.  "Food!"

He snatched his hand back still intact and rummaged around for the
remote control.

Realizing what Mulder had said, Scully commented, with her mouth
full, "Football?  Oh, it's Monday night.  I'll take the Cowboys;
you take Philadelphia and I'll give you six points."  She didn't
mention that the Vegas line gave the Cowboys ten points.

Mulder looked surprised, and said suspiciously, "Five dollars OK?"

"Sure, if you're afraid."  She smiled sweetly and turned on the TV
with the remote that had been lying by her side the whole time.

The football game went down in history as the highest score ever
racked up by a team in a single regular season game, and Mulder
glumly handed Scully her five dollars as he muttered about the
evils of gambling.

Scully grabbed the bathroom first so she could get into her
nightgown, but came out in a few seconds still in her robe.

"Mulder, I'm sorry, but I must have forgotten my nightgown in the
rush to pack and leave this morning."

"Why are you sorry?  I'm not."  And he leered annoyingly at her.
She took a deep breath and said, "May I borrow a t-shirt or
something from you just for tonight?"  Until she got what she
needed, she refrained from reacting to his idiocy.

"Sure."  He bounced off the bed and pulled a t-shirt out of the
bureau drawer where he had tossed his clothes earlier.  "It's big
enough to reach your knees, at least."

She caught it in mid-air when he tossed it to her, and opened it up
so she could read the front of the shirt.  It had a large arrow
pointing to the side, with "I'm with Spooky" inscribed next to it. 
She could only look at him in surprise.

"I've carried that damn thing around with me for years, hoping you
would someday need to borrow a shirt.  It was worth it just for the
look on your face."  He was chuckling.

Scully was still astounded that he would go to such lengths for
such a lame joke, and finally managed to comment, "To quote Wallace
Shawn in 'Princess Bride', 'Inconceivable'", and then she turned
and disappeared into the bathroom.

When she emerged, Mulder bit his lip to keep from saying anything
about her interesting outfit.  After she was in bed, he started
pulling his shirt off, and she turned to face the other way.

His voice sounded amused as he commented, "All the times you've
seen me semi- and totally nude, Scully, and you're still bashful?"

Silence.

She felt the bed dip as he climbed under the covers.  "This is
cozy."  He looked over at the mound on the far edge of the bed. 
"Remember, now, Scully, if you even so much as touch me with the
tip of your little toe, I'll scream."

He saw the covers shaking with silent laughter.  He said, "Nite."
A muffled "nite" responded.  Mulder switched the lamp off, turned
over with a smile and closed his eyes to try to sleep.  His mind
was working much too actively, however, to sleep right away, so he
spent the first few hours thinking.  And the subject of his
thoughts was just a foot away from him.

"Scully," he thought.  "I love her.  What the hell am I going to do
about that?  I could tell her now, but what if the feeling isn't
mutual?"  He felt his heart skip a beat at the thought of Scully
not loving him back.  He didn't think he could bear it, if he were
to declare himself and she turned away from him.  For another hour
his mind continued to mull over the situation until, exhausted, he
slept.

Sometime during the night, Scully found herself snuggling against
a very long and lanky body, her arm around his shoulder, her legs
against the back of his legs, her head nestled against his back. 
She was so sleepy, though, that she just decided to enjoy it, and
drifted off again.

Mulder swam up out of a deep sleep, sliding his hand under his
pillow for his gun before being fully awake.  Then he realized
where he was, and who seemed to be wrapped around his body.  He
relaxed, then started to become VERY aware of the sensation Scully
aroused in him.  Her fragrant, soft, warm body was pressed against
his, and he groaned aloud.  He turned gently onto his back, and
Scully restlessly put her leg over his legs, with a knee in quite
a sensitive area.  Her breasts nuzzled his shoulder.  He was going
crazy.

"Calm down.  She's your friend.  Don't do anything to lose that." 
He took a deep breath, trying to control his rampaging hormones.
Suddenly, a muffled noise from somewhere outside their window
caught his attention.  He cautiously slid away from Scully and sat
up on the side of the bed.  Mulder noticed that the time on the
glowing digital clock was 2:58 as he pulled his gun from under the
pillow and crept to the front of the room.  He heard another noise,
but couldn't identify it.

Standing between the window and the door, he used his gun to move
the curtain slightly to the side so he could peer out.  Nothing. 
He moved to the door and peered through the peephole.  Nothing.
A murmur from the bed distracted him for a moment, but Scully had
only turned over in her sleep.  He debated going outside alone, but
knew that Scully would kill him if she woke to find him gone with
no sign as to where he had disappeared.  And besides, he needed to
have her secure the door when he went out.

Sitting on the bed, he nudged Scully's shoulder, then Leaned over
her and put his mouth near her ear.  "Scully.  Wake up."  More
murmuring and snuggling deeper into the covers was her only
reaction.  "Scully."  This time, she sleepily wrapped her arm
around Mulder's neck and began nuzzling his ear.  "Mmmmmm," she
sighed.

Her perfect mouth was just too close and desirable for comfort, and
Mulder was only human.  His lips covered hers, and the feeling of
intense desire swept over him.  But the little nagging problem that
someone could be lurking outside who had evil designs on them
enabled him to push himself away from Scully.

"I'm going outside; you need to lock up behind me and watch through
the window for trouble.  I heard some noises out there.  OK?  You
awake now?"

Scully nodded, more confused than anything.  She was still rummy
from sleep, with a languid, unfulfilled longing thrumming along her
nerves.  She shook off most of the dreamy fog and slipped out of
bed to locate her gun.  Mulder had already pulled on his pants and
shoes and was unfastening safety locks on the door.

She blinked sleepily and he was gone.  Hurriedly, she re-locked the
door, then peered out of the window.  She saw Mulder checking
behind and between parked cars and then he disappeared to her left,
down the sidewalk that ran in front of the motel rooms.  A minute
went by; two; three.  Finally, she heard a tapping on the door and
a quiet, "It's me.  Didn't see anything."

She quickly let him in, re-locked everything, then turned to him
and said, "Did you kiss me?"

He grinned and said, "Don't tell me that you're dreaming about me,
now, Scully."


She looked confused again for a moment, then said, "No, you can't
weasel out of this.  I caught you.  You *did* kiss me."  She moved
to within an inch of him and gazed up into his eyes.

She had an unreadable expression on her face, and Mulder was
getting very nervous.

Scully suddenly turned her face toward the window, as she thought
she heard a sound nearby.  She looked up at Mulder again, and said,

"Hold that thought," with a finger to his lips.

He was totally at a loss with this new situation, and
apprehensively eyed Scully as she went to the window and peered
out.  After a minute went by, she came back toward him with a
purposeful look in her eye.  What Mulder didn't know was that
Scully had seen two police officers headed toward their door with
a very set look to their faces.  Their police car was near the
street, blue and white bubble lights flashing on the roof.  She had
decided to carry on with their undercover personas so the cops
might be fooled when they took in the motel room scene.  Besides,
she loved pulling Mulder's chain.

(Continued in Part II)                                              



(Disclaimer in Part I)
HONEYMOON FROM HELL
by Gerry Hill (fox42@ix.netcom.com)

Part II

She reached him and stood closer than before, so that their bodies
touched.  A sheen of sweat broke out on his forehead.  Then his
eyes widened as he felt her fingers on his pants zipper, tugging it
down.

"Scully?" he thickly asked.  "What..."

"Shhhh," she said.  "I want you to make love to me."

His arousal was instantaneous at her words and he pulled her up
against his body.  He bent his head and kissed her, but this time
he found it mutual, and she was more aggressive.  Her tongue probed
his mouth, exciting him even more.  She was impatiently trying to
push his pants down past his hips, but everything froze when
someone knocked on the door.  Loudly.

"What the hell!" he exclaimed.

"Police!  Open up!"  More pounding.

Mulder took one look down at the agonizingly desirable and rumpled
Scully, shook his head, and muttered, "Great timing."  He headed
for the door trying with difficulty to re-adjust and fasten his
pants.  Before he could do so, however, the door burst inward,
ripping the safety chain's screws entirely free.  The door hit
Mulder a glancing blow, then it bounced against the wall.

Both Mulder and Scully held their hands out from their bodies in
clear view, knowing the cops had a lot of adrenalin racing through
their systems right now.

"On the floor!"  The older officer gestured with his gun.
Mulder figured that this wasn't the time to point out that a motel
carpet is not something he wanted to be lying on, so he did as they
told him.  He noticed that his left forearm hurt where the door's
edge had caught him.  He felt handcuffs snap onto his wrists behind
his back, and heard the same sound repeated in Scully's direction.
While one held a gun on them, the other leaned over each in turn
and patted them down.

Because Mulder and Scully were working undercover, they couldn't
announce who they were and show ID, not in the middle of a case. 
Now what?

The older cop seemed to relax a little when the prisoners were
secured and he didn't have to worry about getting shot anymore.  He
made the requisite Miranda statement, then said, "I'm Officer Phil
Hansen and this is Officer Jeff Clement.  We have a search warrant
for drugs and firearms, and intend to thoroughly check out these
premises.  Get up."  He motioned with his gun for them to stand.
It wasn't easy to get to their feet with hands bound behind them,
and Mulder noticed Officer Clement giving Scully some extra help.
Since there was a convenient radiator running along the front wall
under the window, they were both cuffed to it while the officers
went about their business.  Scully's left wrist was secured, and
Mulder's right, and the radiator was low enough on the wall that
sitting on the floor was more comfortable than trying to stand,
especially for Mulder.

Mulder asked Officer Hansen, who was proceeding to take the bed
apart, "Can you tell us what this is all about?  We were on our
honeymoon, on our way to Niagara Falls.  You're kinda putting a
crimp in it."

Officer Hansen said, "Sure," without pausing in his work.  "Two
well-dressed people were seen around town, packing weapons.  That
made certain authorities curious, so they were followed to see if
they were a threat to the community."  He turned then to look at
them.  "We spotted you running around the motel parking lot with a
gun this morning, so we radioed Judge Cantwell, he gave us the go-
ahead, and here we are."

Mulder and Scully looked at one another, and Scully said to Hansen,
"So, just because we had guns, and without checking to see whether
or not we had permits, you decided we had to be big-time drug
dealers?"
"Not big-time," was the reply.

They thought about that for a moment.

Hansen continued his search, and Mulder whispered, "So, what the
hell do we do now?  We can't call Skinner and blow our covers, and
we damn sure can't do our job from a jail cell.  Maybe Skinner
should have cleared this thing with the local authorities after
all."

Scully replied, "When they don't find anything, they'll have to let
us go, Mulder."

"Normally, but they could hold us for not having permits, and in
this town, that could mean 72 hours."

"No whispering," Hansen commented, looking pointedly at the pair
bound to the radiator.

Then Mulder asked, "Hey, since you look as though you're going to
be awhile, would you mind turning on TV?  I'm missing 'Cycle
Chicks-a-Rama.'"

To his astonishment, the cop found the remote and switched the TV
on.  "Always like to work with some noise in the background.  I
raised eight children and if it gets too quiet, it makes me
nervous."

And to Scully's astonishment, there actually was some awful
motorcycle movie in progress, with some siliconed beauties astride
the bikes; leave it to Mulder to know when something like this was
running in a one-horse town in Pennsylvania.

Scully ignored the television and watched Clement's and Hansen's
search techniques with a critical eye.  Mulder, on the other hand,
was engrossed in the movie, at least this part, where the babes
were jumping up and down and yelling at some guy for denting one of
their bikes.

During the commercial, his attention was drawn to Scully, who
looked so sexy in the t-shirt.  It had ridden higher when she sat
on the floor with her arm extended up to where it was cuffed, and
it stretched across her chest.  "I'm with Spooky" was readable,
lending a weird accent to the picture.  A mixture of love and
desire swept over him, and he closed his eyes for a second.  Why
had they waited so long to express what they had both apparently
been feeling?

When he opened his eyes again, he saw Officer Clement eyeing Scully
a little too enthusiastically for his taste.  Mulder's glare would
have reduced the cop to a puddle of goo if he had looked his way,
but he was too enraptured with the lovely view of Scully he was
admiring.

Finally, credits rolled on the TV movie, and then some early
morning news came on.  Something caught Scully's attention.
"Did they just say that someone had been arrested for those
honeymoon disappearances?" she asked.

Officer Clement eagerly spoke up.  "Yeah.  One of the victims
managed to escape around suppertime yesterday from the cellar where
all the others were being held.  We heard at the station that
they've arrested an old lady and her son.  No one got killed."  He
seemed a little let down by this.

Mulder eagerly said, "If that case has been solved, then we can
tell you the truth and get out of here."

Hansen and Clement looked interested.

Scully continued where Mulder left off.  "This is Special Agent Fox
Mulder and I'm Special Agent Dana Scully.  We're FBI agents from
Washington, and were sent here in an undercover capacity on the
disappearing honeymooners case."
Clement snickered and went into the bathroom to continue his
search.

"It's true," Mulder insisted, to an amused Hansen. "Call Assistant
Director Walter Skinner at FBI Headquarters and he'll explain
everything.  I'll give you the phone number, and you can check it
out.

Officer Hansen snorted, and said, "It's 3:55am.  No one will be
around to back up a stupid story like that, and you know it."
Scully said, "There will be someone on duty and they can contact AD
Skinner at his home in an emergency."

Clement stuck his head out of the bathroom and loudly commented,
"And besides, government agents aren't allowed to 'fraternize' on
the job, are they?  Remember, we caught you with your pants down." 
Snickering again at his cleverness and sense of humor, he
disappeared back into the bathroom.

Scully blushed, and admitted, "I saw you approaching our room when
I looked out the window, and I...we were just trying to maintain
our cover.  Right, Mulder?"  She looked at him with wide innocent
eyes.

He was flabbergasted.  Did this mean that she was pretending all
that passion and that she didn't really love or want him in that
way at all?  God, what should he do now?  Surely she knew that he
wasn't role-playing when they were in that body lock.  He hadn't
known that the cops were out there.  He nervously swallowed, then
said, "Uh, right."

Hansen surprised himself by asking for the phone number and writing
it down, along with AD Skinner's name.  No way these two were FBI
agents, but there was something about the woman's authoritative
manner and dignity she projected even in that ridiculous t-shirt...
He went out to use the radio in the car for a patch-through and
some help on making the connections.

Officer Clement had pretty much finished the search of their motel
room, and had thrown the mattress back in place so he could sit
back and keep a comfortable eye on the prisoners.  At least one of
them, anyway.  "The woman sure is a pretty little thing, but that
guy is a mean-looking sonofabitch," he mused to himself.

Trying to make small talk, he asked Scully, "Can I get you anything
to make you more comfortable, m'am?"

She just shook her head tiredly.  "The only thing I want right now
is to get some sleep.  Hope that call doesn't take too long."

A few minutes later they could hear the car door slamming outside,
and Mulder raised his eyebrows at Scully.  "Shit.  That was either
an incredibly fast connection, or he couldn't stir up anyone with
any answers.  Want to make a bet on which one?"

"I thought you weren't going to bet anymore, Mulder.  I just take
your money all the time."

Officer Hansen's expression was stony when he returned to the room. 
He looked at Officer Clement and said, "Get the cuffs off of them. 
They're FBI agents."  Clement looked frozen in surprise, then
hurriedly got off the bed.  He poked around in his pocket for the
key, then unlocked Scully's handcuffs.  He gently pulled them from
her wrist and helped her to her feet (again).

Mulder took all this in with a scowl.

"Here, give the key to me.  I'll do it."  Mulder snatched the key
from Clement and freed himself, then tossed the key and handcuffs
onto the bed, barely missing Clement as they whizzed by his ear.
Officer Hansen apologized to the agents and said, "Whew.  I thought
that boss of yours was gonna melt the paint off my car when I got
hold of him.  He wants to talk with you," he inclined his head
toward Mulder.

"Great.  Can you get the call routed to this phone?"  He picked the
instrument off the floor and put it back on the nightstand.

"Already being done."  The phone rang at that point, and Mulder
picked up the receiver.

"Mulder."

He stood with his head bent, listening intently for at least a
couple of minutes without saying a word.  Then he tried getting in
a word or two.  "Sir...yes, sir...NO!  Absolutely not!...well, it
was supposed to look like that, you know...Sir, I resent the
implication on behalf of Scully and myself...Yes, sir.  First
thing."

He hung up, looking more peeved than ever.

Officer Hansen said, "Your hide still attached, son?"  He laughed,
then added, "We're off duty; actually we should have been off duty
twenty minutes ago.  Could we buy you folks breakfast by way of
apology?  And I won't even bring up once the fact that you should
have informed us that you would be in our territory undercover, so
to speak."

Mulder and Scully both declined politely, saying they were really
tired and just wanted to catch a few more hours of sleep before
heading back to Washington.  They kept the innocent, weary act up
until they finally shut the door on the cops (Mulder propping a
chair under the doorknob because the locks were broken), and turned
to each other.

Scully asked, "First things first.  What did Skinner say to you?"

Mulder winced and said, "Officer Hansen told him what was going on,
but indelicately described what it looked like we had been doing
when they broke the door down."

"Skinner thinks we were sleeping together?"

"Yup.  I tried to explain that it was supposed to look that way,
being on a honeymoon and all as part of our cover, but he wasn't
listening.  He wants us in his office as soon as we can get a
flight back in the morning."

Scully closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and said,
"Oh, great.  We do such a good undercover job that even our
supervisor falls for it, and now we're in trouble."

Mulder put his hands on her shoulders and said, "Scully, what we've
got to do is pack, catch the next flight out to D.C., go directly
to the office from the airport, and see Skinner.  We'll be tired
and dragging our asses, which may garner some sympathy, and it will
impress on him how seriously we are taking the accusation he's
throwing at us."

Scully was gazing in awe at this master of manipulation.  She was
seeing a side of Mulder heretofore hidden.
Mulder went on with his master plan.  "We need to make Skinner feel
guilty that he would think us culpable of such unprofessional
conduct; put him on the defensive when we remind him that *he* made
the decision to not notify the local authorities that we were in
the area.  Play up our suffering at the shake-down we got from
Hansen and Clement."  He gingerly touched his forearm where he
could feel a tender lump forming.

"Then what?" Scully said admiringly, enchanted with this
Machiavellian scenario.

"Why, then go home and screw like rabbits."
He barely ducked in time to avoid the small, hard fist coming like
a missile toward his head.