TITLE: A Spelling Issue (1 of 1)
AUTHOR: Rhetta
RATING: PG-13
CLASSIFICATION: Vignette
DISTRIBUTION: Anywhere, just let me know.
FEEDBACK: pindaran@hotmail.com
SPOILERS: 'Small Potatoes'
DISCLAIMER: Mulder, Scully, and the rest of "The X-Files"
belong to Chris Carter, 1013, and FOX. Just taking them out for
a little test drive.
SUMMARY: Misspellings, mistaken identities, and just plain bad
ideas. Then a nice lunch. Well, moderately nice.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: Written for the After The Fact 'Small Potatoes'
Episode Challenge.

**********

She's staring at me again. She thinks I'm too engrossed in the
report to notice.

She's mistaken.

What I am is ticked-off. Van Blundht misspelled the Federal
Bureau of Investigation. Twice. I can't believe no one caught
that.

I can't believe that no one caught that it wasn't me.

Now I know that I’m not what anyone would consider the most
emotionally stable person in the world and some of my theories,
while usually correct, aren't exactly mainstream, but damn it,
it's right there on the letterhead! And on my ID card. And on
practically every other free space anywhere in this building.

"And if all else fails - spell check." I mutter under my breath.

"Got to that part, huh?" Scully says quietly. "Or should I say
one of those parts?"

I forgot about Scully's uncanny ability to hear everything I
don't want her to. It's downright annoying. Takes all the fun
out of muttering. And what adds insult to injury is that I can
tell she’s trying not to smile.

She’s failing miserably.

I can see the beginnings of a small smile starting to break
out at the corners of her mouth. Normally I would find it
charming. Right now it’s ticking me off almost as much as
the misspellings, but something tells me I should just keep
my mouth shut and finish reading the report.

She catches my eye and the smile grows. I'm not going to say
anything. I'm just going to nod and start reading again. No
talking. Just reading. "So everyone noticed it?" Never was
one to follow orders. Scully can attest to that.

That earns me a look of annoyance. Nothing irritates her faster
than stupid questions. A fact I always seem to remember after
I've asked one.

Usually she's the one that reminds me.

"Yeah Mulder, we passed it around at the water cooler. I think
it's even going in the newsletter."

We have a newsletter? When did that happen?

"I didn't mean that, I meant...you know what I meant Scully."

She shakes her head then sighs dramatically. A little too
dramatically if you ask me. The woman's up to something.

"You mean why didn't anyone, meaning me, catch on that you would
never have misspelled 'bureau' which obviously means that the
only logical alternative left was that the Mulder who wrote this
had to be a person who had the ability to physically transform
himself into you and had taken your place through some nefarious
means, possibly involving the government, and was now bent on
defeating you through bad spelling?"

"Nefarious means?" I think Scully’s been reading too many
mystery novels.

"You prefer knocked you senseless and left you locked up with
only one balanced meal to sustain you?"

I knew I should have left that little fact out. "Nefarious means
works for me. And it wasn't that balanced, he took my sunflower
seeds."

"You've been through a lot Mulder."

I sigh and run my hands down my face. It's so great to see
Scully’s having a good time here. Just shows what muttering gets
you.

Scully pulls her chair over beside me and takes my hand.
"Mulder..."

I pull my hand out of her grasp. "I thought that at least you, of
all people, would have been able to tell the difference."

"He looked exactly like you! How was I supposed to figure out it
wasn't you? Use my Spidey Sense?"

"It's not the fact that you were fooled by his looks. I could
understand that. It's that you were fooled for over a day." I
stand up abruptly and start to pace. "A day Scully! What did he
do that made him so plausible as me? Because in case you missed it
Van Blundht and I don't really have a lot in common." I stop and
look at her intently. "So what did he do Scully? Talk about
aliens? Mention his search for his sister? Buy a bag of seeds?
What?"

"You know, there was that one time he blurted out he'd seen 'Star
Wars' 246 times, but I just chalked that up to jet lag," She says
darkly.

She's on the edge of losing her temper. I can either shut up and
let it go, or continue on blindly with the knowledge that she'll
probably make me regret this later.

I continue on blindly.

Hey, I never claimed I was a genius.

"Are you honestly trying to tell me that Eddie Van Blundht, not
the smartest person on the face of the earth, was clever enough
to fool everyone into thinking he was an FBI agent without
making more than that one tiny mistake?" I say with a scowl.

"So this is about more than just the misspellings, right?"

"You're damn right it's about more than the misspellings Scully."
I make sure to enunciate each word clearly. "This man pretends to
be me for over a day and apparently he must have done a great job
since the one person who I always thought knew me better than
anyone else was so completely convinced."

Scully stands up and crosses her arms in front of her. "Fine,
you tell me. What should have clued me in? The fact that he
looked like you, dressed like you and sounded like you? Or the
fact that he wrote the report without me having to remind him
several times?"

I grimace. And people say I have a good memory. "One time you had
to remind me to write it and you just keep rolling it out every
time paperwork is discussed."

She looks at me with disbelief. "I reminded you three times
Mulder."

"Yeah, but it was for the same report so technically they all
count as one time."

She puts her hands on her hips and glares at me. "Still, I had to
remind you THREE times. That's more than one Mulder."

"I'm looking at the big picture Scully. If it had been three
different reports I could see where..."

"Mulder!" She takes a deep breath and glances over at the clock.
"Look, I'm hungry. I haven't eaten all day and I'm this close to
grabbing that bag of sunflower seeds. Can't we just admit I'm
right here and go get lunch?"

"Right about what? The reminders?"

"You know what I'm talking about."

"Oh. You mean your 'A few misspellings doesn't make you a
shapeshifter' theory?"

Scully nods. Well, glares and nods. It's a interesting effect
actually. Endearing and irritating at the same time.

OK, mostly irritating.

"You're not right Scully. It was 'bureau' for crying out loud."
I point a finger at her. "You were just sloppy."

"I figured it was a typo," She says through clenched teeth.

"Twice? On the same word?"

Scully rubs her eyes. "Why am I flashing back to Skinner’s
office?" She mutters.

I smirk. "Maybe because you’re wrong and you’re trying to
distract me." I know, I'm not helping things. I can't seem
to stop talking.

"All right, that’s it Mulder, you're paying for lunch. Someplace
expensive too."

I wonder if she's referring to her expensive or my expensive?

She frowns. "That does not mean super sizing."

Crap. The woman can read minds. "I could see paying if you were
right, but clearly you're not."

Her frown deepens. That's good Mulder. Really make her angry.
"We're not having this argument now." She says calmly. Oh yeah,
she's angry.

"We're not arguing. We're discussing," I say with a weak smile.
Clearly some backpedaling is in order.

"No, I was trying to discuss. You were arguing. And I refuse to
argue on an empty stomach. If fact, maybe the whole topic should
wait until after you talk with Van Blundht. He might be able to
put things in perspective."

I groan and look up at the ceiling. Yeah, and maybe he really is
Luke Skywalker.

"Mulder?"

I glance back over at her. "Tell me something Scully, then we'll
go, why did you all believe so easily that he was me despite
glaring evidence to the contrary?"

"A few misspellings is not 'glaring' evidence. It's not even
evidence. I've misspelled things before Mulder, does that mean
I'm really someone else?"

"Depends on what you're misspelling." I say with a reluctant
smile.

"Why, do you have a list of words that my misspelling of would
mean something grave and tragic has happened to me?" There's
a ghost of a grin on her face as she leans close to me. "One of
them is exsanguination, isn't it?"

"Are you kidding? I can't even spell that one right all the
time."

She rolls her eyes. "Oh well, if you can't spell it then it must
be impossible."

I swear, sometimes keeping up with Scully's moods tires me out.
"Just answer the question, then we'll eat."

"Somewhere expensive?"

"Somewhere moderately expensive. That's the best deal you're
going to get G-Woman."

Scully looks at me intently, weighing her options. Trying to
decide how much to say and how much to keep to herself.

Have I mentioned how much I hate it when she does that?

"The truth Scully." I say quietly. "The whole truth. We both
need it here."

This earns me another eyebrow raise. "We both need the whole
truth on why I didn't realize you would never misspell the word
'bureau'?"

She glares at me. I glare back. I'm prepared to stand here until
she answers, no matter how long it takes. I had breakfast and
enough coffee to temporarily render me unable to blink. I'm good
to go.

Finally she closes her eyes and sighs.

Yes. Victory is mine.

"Mulder, if the question was why didn’t I catch the spelling
error, the answer is I just didn’t. If the question was why
didn’t I catch that it wasn’t you, the answer’s the same. I
just didn’t. Looking back I see so many instances that should
have made me wonder or given me cause to doubt, but I just
didn’t." She takes my hand and squeezes it. "And I do
know you Mulder. I know you almost as well as I know myself.
But can you honestly say that if someone came in here looking
exactly like me that you would instantly be able to tell that
they were an impostor?"

"Yes." I've never been more certain of anything. Some things
can't be duplicated. She's one of them. "And I wouldn't even need
a Spidey Sense."

"How? Secret handshake?"

I graze her knuckles with my thumb and flash her a mischievous
grin. "We have a secret handshake? Wow. I really should keep up
to date on those memos."

"I don't think anybody keeps up to date on those memos. And you
haven't answered my question."

"How I could tell it wasn't you?" I squeeze her hand and then
let go.

"Yes," She says quietly.

"That's easy Scully." I lean into her space with an smug smile.
"No one can copy that eye roll thing you do, it's practically a
trademark." I add with a whisper and a small chuckle.

"You're just not in the mood to get on my good side today, are
you?"

"Not if I'm paying for lunch. If I'm going into debt I should be
allowed to tick you off some."

I can tell she’s visibly trying not to roll her eyes. It’s a
valiant effort. It almost works too. "You know Mulder, I'm
tempted to bump it up to very expensive."

I cringe. I know what she considers very expensive. "Point
taken."

I reach behind her for our coats and hold hers out. She does this
neat little turn thing as she puts her arms in that leaves her
facing me. She's done it countless times before, but I can't
resist a smile.

She grins back as she fixes the collar. "Good plan." She buttons
up her jacket. "Oh, and just so you know, I think this
misspelling thing is just a way for you to skirt around the whole
issue of what happened on the couch. Which for now is fine,
but don't think I'm going to completely forget about it." She
walks past me to the door. "Now come on Mulder, you said
moderately expensive and I'm holding you to it."

I watch her go for a moment, too stunned for action. She'd been
waiting all morning for an opportunity to throw that at me, I
just know it.

I knew I should have kept my mouth shut.