Obscene Matters (3/...)

Skinner looked up from his pitiful meditation with a pained expression. "We have to get out of here," he muttered to no one in particular and pulled out his cell phone to try once again.

Svensen paused in his perusal of records to watch Skinner use the cell phone. After a moment he looked at Scully quizzically, and asked, "Everyone has one of those thingy's now?"

"It seems like everyone has one," Scully told the man, who upon first seeing their cell phone thought they were cigarette cases. The cells might as well have been vintage cigarette cases since they were completely useless down in this concrete tomb.

Obscene Matter (3/5?)
--by PR
--Oct. 2005
--Cat: Sk/Sc, UST
--Contact: prchung18@gmail.com

--Note: This started out as my "summer" story, and now that I am finishing it up as Halloween approaches, I realize

it has taken on a decidedly eerie tone, as well as a bit of humor. There's some intentional references throughout the story that may be somewhat esoteric, but I hope will prove to be amusing in the end.
Enjoy.

Obscene Matter (3/5?)
--by prChung

Scully was at a complete loss for words.

This went beyond scandal and conspiracy; this was something of legend and gossip. Special Agent Bert Svensen was like some Japanese soldier who had no idea the Second World War had ended.

Skinner looked completely crestfallen. Sitting on the lounge, elbows resting on his thighs as he stared at the Persian rug under his feet; He looked like a man who was about to tell the Pope that God was a well constructed fictional character, and then show him the irrefutable proof.

Svensen made tea to try and help lift their mood, but it didn't do much to help. The delicate tea service Svensen used only seemed to reinforce the awful truth of the matter at hand.

Scully looked back at the photo Skinner had brought to her attention-- the photo she'd been forced to put face down on the table. Spacecrafts and alien bodies hidden on a secret airbase in the desert was not the best kept secret anymore.

Restless, Scully got from the overstuffed chair she'd commandeered and went to the table of framed photos. She stared at the photo in question for a moment, and then picked it up to look at more closely, perhaps this time she'd find some telltale sign of it being fake.

There was always the possibility the photo was doctored, but after Svensen had granted them access to some of the file cabinets she knew more than likely the photo was genuine. Still, she searched the image, and searched.

After an intolerably long moment Scully had to look away. She put down the picture, repulsed. A flouncy black dress, heels and a curly dark wig along with a lot of makeup had not been enough to disguise the unmistakable chiseled features of J. Edgar Hoover.

What were they to do? Did they take the responsibility of perpetuating this cover up? Was it even a cover up? Was this simply the facts that were kept out of the public eye for obvious reasons?

Scully glanced at Svensen, he was sitting on the floor in front of the Victrola going through records humming along to 'Doing What Comes Natur'lly.' She winced at the thought of what needed to be done for this poor man. His life was lost to a lie. Bert Svensen had no clue he had been protecting the secret and very personal files of someone now dead over thirty years.

Svensen's own file was back in the passageway. With something sandwiched between pride and shame he'd pointed it out to Scully and Skinner; 'Northstar' the file was labeled, and contained the court documents not only detailing the official change of his sexual identity but the final orders of the Bureau's Director that Svensen remain "undercover" and in seclusion for purposes of his own safety and that of national security.

The documents were convenient in their blatant placement; these served to convince Svensen that he had no choice but to stay here in this time capsule buried beneath the Capital. The cruel fact of the matter was Hoover wielded some insidious control from the grave with the help of his secretary and her family.

Arthur Gandy, the kindly store keeper who'd entombed Skinner and Scully, inherited from his dead sister, Helen Gandy, the task of perpetuating the lie Svensen lived. When Hoover died, his obsessively faithful secretary of fifty years had gather and stowed hundreds of Hoover's files. No one had known the extent of those files, only speculated when a handful would surface here and there; files on pinko commie gay radicals like Richard Nixon, Cary Grant, Albert Einstein and George Carlin.

After the McCarthy hearings and the blacklisting no one who paid attention to the contents of the surfacing files were surprised. It was old school bureaucratic bullshit that paled in comparison to the crap going on in the post cold war era. And all of it was here now, guarded like the Holy Grail, not by a Templar knight, but by a confused transexual.

"My tiny baby brother, who's never read a book," Svensen sang along with the record happily, "Knows one sex from the other. All he had to do was look..."

Svensen was going to need therapy for a long time, and even with therapy, Scully thought, there was no guarantee the man would have any type of normal life before he died.

Skinner looked up from his pitiful meditation with a pained expression. "We have to get out of here," he muttered to no one in particular and pulled out his cell phone to try once again.

Svensen paused in his perusal of records to watch Skinner use the cell phone. After a moment he looked at Scully quizzically, and asked, "Everyone has one of those thingy's now?"

"It seems like everyone has one," Scully told the man, who upon first seeing their cell phone thought they were cigarette cases. The cells might as well have been vintage cigarette cases since they were completely useless down in this concrete tomb.

Skinner hissed and flipped the phone shut, having no luck to get a signal. They suspected they were at least two stories underground, and was it was unlikely either his or Scully's phone would get a signal before the concrete drained their batteries entirely.

"Well, I don't know about you two, but I'd certainly get my money back on those gadgets," Svensen announced as he stood to put a different record on the turntable.

"I'll be sure to mention that when I get back to the Bureau," Skinner grumbled.

"Bert, are you certain there's no way of opening the door into the Gandy shop from this side?" Scully questioned him again.

"Without appealing to Arthur's good nature, which he doesn't possess in all truth, then no, there is no way of opening the door from inside."

Scully blew her breath out in frustration. "We have to figure out a way to get that door open."

Svensen let out a laugh. "Well, until you figure out just how to do that I recommend you just send a message the old fashioned way, that is if you still use pen and paper at the bureau."

As the melodious chords of 'Moonglow' began to play off of the phonograph Skinner and Scully looked at each other, heads cocked like the RCA dog. "Pen and paper?" They said together and then turned to Svensen.

"Of course," he said as if they should know better. "I guess you're just going to have to resort to writing a note to put in with my order since you can't make a phone call."

"Your order?" Scully repeated.

Skinner came up off the lounge. "Where do you send out your order? How do you get what it is you order?"

Svensen looked between the two of them, his eyes wide with innocence. "On the mail car of course."

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End - Part 3 of possibly 5... possibly... I'm having too much fun with this right now...

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