Chapter Text
It’s been a perfectly uneventful morning of paperwork when Mulder suddenly launches out of his chair with a strangled yelp.
Seated across the desk from him, Scully startles, her pen jerking across the page and leaving a dark blot of ink across her neat rows of writing.
“Mulder,” she gasps, “What—what was that?”
“Nothing,” he blurts out, too quickly, his voice pitched oddly high. He clears his throat and tries again, deeper. “It’s…uh, nothing.”
“Well, your nothing just ruined my nearly-completed form."
Mulder swallows hard, squirming slightly in his chair.
“Sorry, Scully. I didn’t mean to…startle you.”
“Well you did,” she says flatly. She glares at him. “Seriously, Mulder, what the hell’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing,” he tries again. Scully peers at him, her eyes narrowing slightly. His posture is rigid, his eyes wide, his breaths coming in rapid little puffs. His gaze keeps darting from her towards the ground across the room, then back to her – as if looking directly at whatever he’s trying not to look at might invite certain death.
She’s seen this look before.
Scully sets her pen down and leans back in her chair.
“Mulder,” she says patiently, “Where did you see the spider?”
“Whaaaat?” he exclaims, aiming for casual. “I didn’t—it’s not—”
Scully exhales slowly, an exhausted sound. “Mulder,” she repeats, and the exasperation is woven into both syllables of his name, “if you’re quite finished hyperventilating, either tell me where you saw it, or you’re on your own.”
He blinks at her. Swallows hard. Scratches his jaw. Then very slowly, lifts one hand and points it across the room at the base of a filing cabinet in the corner.
Scully rolls her eyes and pushes her chair back, unhurried. “Stay there,” she commands.
Mulder nods and swallows hard again.
“I was planning on it,” he admits.
She rolls her eyes again, grabs a handful of Kleenex from the box on his desk, and makes her way across the room. She doesn’t even bother looking back at him to know he’s lifted both feet off the floor.
“Just…be careful.”
At this, she glances back at him with a pointed look.
“Really, Mulder? It’s an arachnid, not an undefused bomb.”
“It’s a dangerous animal,” he tries, his voice thin and high again.
“The dangerous animal is in fact, a small spider minding its own business on the other side of the room,” she points out.
“Still could be dangerous,” he mutters.
Scully crouches near the cabinet, locates the spider, and snorts.
“Mulder,” she exclaims, “it’s no bigger than a nickel.”
He doesn’t reply.
With a shake of her head, she brings the tissues down over the spider, and mutters something Mulder can’t quite make out from across the room. With a swift pinch and a twist, and the threat is contained. Scully stands, folds the Kleenex over on itself and turns back to face him, holding it out like evidence.
“Is it still moving?” he asks, leaning slightly back in his chair.
“Would you like me to show it to you so you can be sure?” she asks, entirely too polite.
He shakes his head quickly. He’s still sitting ramrod straight, breathing like he’s just sprinted a mile
“I’ll…take your word for it.”
He does his best to assume a casual position, only truly relaxing when she makes a show of dropping the crumpled tissue – spider corpse and all – into the wastebasket.
“All done,” announces. “Happy?”
He grins sheepishly as she settles back into her chair and attempts to salvage her ink-covered paperwork.
Mulder’s breathing slowly returns to a normal rhythm. Scully glances up at him, and he clears his throat, trying for nonchalant.
“Mulder.”
“Hmm?”
“You overreacted. Again.”
"Did not."
"You screamed."
"I did not."
“It was no bigger than a nickel,” she repeats.
“Seemed bigger from over here,” he mutters.
“Oh, did it now?”
“Sure did.”
“And I suppose you’d classify that size discrepancy as, what…unexplained phenomena?”
Mulder shrugs and returns to poring over a stack of file folders, not quite meeting her gaze.
“You’re welcome by the way,” Scully adds pointedly, with a tilt of her head.
“...Thanks,” he grumbles.
She’s briefly tempted to ask him how the hell he managed to survive working down here this long on his own, but thinks thinks better of it. She has a form to rewrite.
Not a minute later, Scully hears his breathing change again. She glances up to see Mulder’s eyes darting across the room nervously.
“What now?” she sighs.
“I just had a thought, Scully,” he gulps. “What if...what if there’s a whole family of them?”