exsiliumlogs | waiting for the world to stop

Date & Time: September 1st, mid-day
Location: The Hold
Characters: Fox Mulder and YOU!
Summary: Now arriving: One Very Uncooperative Transport
Warnings: Language might get mild, anyone who chooses Option A will probably have to deal with violence, but overall it's just another day.

When the lights in his apartment building's elevator go out, he's unimpressed, but unsurprised. When he starts falling instead of rising, then there's cause for alarm. But when he opens his eyes and he's in a white room, well. Mulder's lip curls in disgust. Really? he thinks. Out of the frying pan and into the abduction. Fantastic.

But what he's expecting isn't what he gets - he gets the same thing every new Transport gets, of course: The Speech. But he doesn't even let her sweep him along into the armory - he stands his ground as firmly as he can and demands answers. He only gets as good as any other new arrival does, and that's not good enough.

Soon enough he's raising his voice:

"I don't care WHAT you're trying to sell me, I want to know who put you up to this! Was it the Cancer Man? Was it someone else? Whoever it was, I want answers. And I'm going to get them. Because I've been through ENOUGH the last couple of days."

She tries to assuage him, and he reaches out and shoves her, by both shoulders. "I didn't even get to help bury my father. You people are scum, you know that? You'll do anything to keep the public at large in line, to keep the world the way you want it. And if you really think that dragging me here - however you did it - is gonna stop me? You have so many more thinks coming that it's not even funny."

With that, he reaches for his gun ... and security arrives. At this point, anyone wishing to actually have something to do with this kamikaze ball of crazy has two options...

[A:] You're part of the security detail. Congratulations, it's now your job to try and rein Mulder in and get him to the holding cells where he can cool his heels for a couple of days and Think About His Life Decisions.

[B:] Post-containment Option 1: Once security threw Mulder into his cell, they gave him his tablet, since he might as well have something to do with his time. Anyone looking through the feeds will see him scowling down into the screen and sullenly poking at the controls, but not saying anything. He won't speak until spoken to: he doesn't trust the thing yet, after all.

[C:] Post-containment Option 2: You came to see the new nutjob in person. You'll probably have a better chance of having a rational conversation with him than anyone in Option 1. (NOTE: This can either be in jail or outside the Hold, because I forgot to be specific and flexibility is a good thing. :D)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

She watched his movements carefully, trying to see if he was, indeed, a danger to himself or anyone else. She highly doubted it but she supposed anything might be possible, especially in a place like this. Stepping closer to the bars of the cell she crossed her arms and tilted her head to regard him.

"At least I believe it's safe to say that extraterrestrials had nothing to do with it." i.e. IT'S NOT ALIENS, MULDER.

He certainly wasn't a danger to himself, or to her - he'd be a danger to himself before he was a danger to her, in his own opinion. He knew that look, though, knew she was sizing him up just as steadily as he was doing the same. She didn't look drugged, or hurt ... didn't look as though they'd gotten their claws into her yet. He still had plenty of room for suspicion and concern, though.

"Absolutely nothing? Scully, I was in a boxcar full of them buried in the ground, five days ago. I'm pretty sure they're at least tangentially related."

She couldn't help but cringe at the mention of that boxcar, "I'm well aware of the events in New Mexico, Mulder. I also know that there had been an explosion and you were presumed dead."

She doesn't even try to stop the concern that fills her eyes. She had been worried, you idiot! She looked away, gaze turning to their surroundings as she tried to slow down her suddenly racing mind. "I was back in DC. I was leaving my apartment and Skinner pulled up, saying he had to talk to me." She tensed visibly, remembering the warning she'd been given about someone close to her coming to kill her. "Then I was here. You're telling me that somehow Assistant Director Skinner is, what? In cahoots with extraterrestrials?"

"What can I say?" He shrugged affably. "Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated." He got up from the cot and moved to the cell door as she spoke, listening intently. "No. At least, I wouldn't think so. I think he might be having his strings pulled just as much as you and I. Otherwise they wouldn't have let him re-open the files after you came back..."

He put his hand back into his pocket and came up with a sunflower seed, cracking it pensively between his teeth. "This is coming from higher up than Skinner. Whatever I found in that canyon, it goes deep. The fact that they'd pull both of us here is proof enough, wouldn't you say?"

She shook her head, as much to clear her own mind as it was to disagree with her partner. "Skinner may be connected to someone but I don't think he had anything to do with this. They want us dead, Mulder. Why concoct this elaborate scenario just to imprison us? What purpose would that serve other than to further convince you of their culpability?"

Pausing in her rebuttal she sighed, letting her arms drop to her side in a gesture that was equal parts defeatism and exasperation. Turning, she paced to one side of Mulder's cell before turning and retracing her steps to the door. "The government or whoever's behind the boxcar in New Mexico have nothing to gain by putting us here. In fact they have more to lose by doing so. If they did this and we escaped we would just have more evidence against them" She faced Mulder, eyes meeting his as she reached out to take hold of one of the bars. Please tell her you believe her, Mulder.

Yet again, she had an uncanny way of finding just the right piece of logic to unlock his mind, to cool him down. At the same time, though, Mulder reached up and put his hand over hers, his concern shifting into something less angry and more unsettled. "So you believe them? That we really have been drafted in some interdimensional war?"

If she did, either she'd found proof, or they'd gotten to her already. He practically held his breath as he waited for her to answer.

Scully couldn't help the smile that tugged at the corners of her lips as his hand touched hers. It was such a familiar gesture in this completely unfamiliar situation. Something simultaneously incredibly comforting and yet entirely worrisome. There were still so many unknown variables she had yet to encounter and quantify. So many questions left unanswered, or where the answers provided had been completely unsatisfactory and just begged more questions.

She minutely shifted her hand on the bars, feeling the friction of his fingers against hers as they moved. It drew her back to reality - to the core of their situation. It now fell, as it did so often, on the one question: Did she believe?

"I don't know, yet. It seems plausible but I'm not entirely convinced one way or the other. There are still too many other possibilities that can't be ruled out, either."

Doubt - the ultimate reassurance that Scully was still herself. Mulder let out the breath he'd been holding, slowly and silently. Good. "I feel the same way. I've been reading this ... tablet thing ... which, honestly, I think Gene Roddenberry's prop crew would cream their pants to get a hold of ..." He took the tablet out of his pocket and waved it at her. "There are a lot of first-hand accounts, and it looks like they're being recorded in real-time. There are plenty of eyewitnesses we can question, it's ... just a case of how valid their statements are going to be. Whether or not they've been tampered with, manipulated ..."

He stopped, mid rant, as if he'd just realized that there was a barred door between him and proper investigative research.

"... Then again, usually the interrogator isn't the one in the holding cell."

Now there's the Mulder she'd been waiting for. She'd been just waiting for things to sink in so they could get back to work the way they should have been from the get go.

She nodded, "I've spent some time learning my way around some of the streets here and speaking to a number of people. There's an," She paused, debating on what word she wanted to use, "interesting assortment of people here."

A smirk pulled at her lips and she lifted one eyebrow to look at him, "Is that your way of saying you're going to play well with others so they can let you out, now?"

"For the sake of information? For the truth?" He frowned. He didn't like having to play nice, but honestly, if it got him even a little closer to finding out what was really going on ...

With a heavy sigh, Mulder nodded, tucking the tablet back into his pocket. "Yeah. Where's the contract and the knife, so I can sign my life away in blood?"

She sighed, herself, fixing him a look that just screamed 'did you really just say that, Mulder?' "Somehow I don't think it will be anything that dramatic. I'd ask you to wait here but..." Her voice trailed off and she smirked.

She turned on her heel and went to find someone who could give her the key to the cell or at least come with her to let him out. She returned in a few moments with someone who simply unlocked his cell and left, a warning look on his face at Scully. She smiled and nodded, "We'll be fine. Thank you." As the man retreated she turned to Mulder, "are you coming?"

Rolling his shoulders, Mulder shot the guard one of his patented hairy eyeball looks as he stepped out of the cell.

"Well, that was nice and anticlimactic, compared to when I got dragged in here by a cyborg."

A cyborg? Scully put a hand on her hip, tilting her head to look at him with her patented 'Really, Mulder?' looks when she realized that she actually had something that might shut him up.

She smirked, "Yes, well that may be true but while you were being dragged around by cyborgs I met James Bond."

With that she turned on her heel and started out the door.

waiting for the world to stop

Fancy meeting you here

IKR

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