From jhumby@ctv.es

Tue Oct 29 1996
Management Training
R
S A

Patterson gives FM a little job to do while the X-Files are closed at
the end of season one. Mostly Mulder gets moody. R rating - subject
matter includes child victims

Legally:
The interesting characters in this story belong to Chris Carter,
1013 and Fox as brought to life by DD, GA and the XFiles
writers. I've borrowed them for fun not profit.

This story:
I'm happy for the story to be circulated uncommercially, intact
and with my name still attached.

Violence and language level about comparable with the show. But
some of the subject matter is nasty (child victims).
R rating.

Thanks to Vickie for acting as guinea pig / UKism translator for
this story; and for pointing out which bits of the story I
forgot to write down; and for egging me on to post it; and for
putting up with me whingeing about it.

Joann - jhumby@iee.org

--------------

Essential Background Info:

This story takes place between the end of season one, when the
X-Files gets closed down and the start of season two. Mulder has
been reassigned to some extremely dumb wiretap job, Scully is
back at Quantico.

Mulder is in pretty poor state. This story is about him and
Patterson, his old boss from Behavioural / ISU - the one who has
gargoyle problems a couple of years later. It's also about
Mulder and Skinner. Remember this is a long time ago. It's about
an incident that happens between the closure of the X-Files and
the time when Skinner starts to let Mulder work on cases like
Flukeman etc.

Ok. Let's go....

============

MANAGEMENT TRAINING - Part 1 of 3

--------

Patterson tapped restlessly at the files on the edge of his
desk. He wanted a second opinion, a fresh pair of eyes, a dose
of lateral thinking. He stopped the tapping and stopped his
attempt to delude himself, what he wanted was Mulder.

Not because Mulder was a better psychologist than his other
people, he wasn't. Not because when faced with a crime scene he
was markedly sharper or more observant than the his other
analysts, though he was. Not even because he was able to tune
out his own personality to see more clearly what was going on
the minds of the killers, Patterson had others who could match
Mulder on that. Of course all of those things rolled together
were worth a percentage point or two and on a case like this
that could make all the difference.

No. He needed Mulder because Mulder never ignored evidence,
never had to twist things to make them fit. However ludicrous,
however bizarre the explanations the man came up with, they
worked. Well enough to catch the perpetrators, even if not
always well enough to hang together in a court of law.

And right now Paterson was looking at the photographs of four
women and looking at them with a certainty that unless a break
came soon, he would be seeing more pictures like these. More
photographs of artistically painted, but very dead young women.
Maybe now would be a good moment to bring his lost sheep back
into the fold.

--------------

Mulder looked at the headset and the tape machine and tried to
think positive thoughts. Maybe if he thought hard enough, the
phone lines he was monitoring would fail and he wouldn't have to
listen to the banality today. Even as the thought took shape he
laughed at its implicit self pity. Wire tap surveillance. If
they'd fired him he could have appealed, he'd have lost of
course but that would have forced him to do something rather
than just wallow.

He heard footsteps on the stairs and the door open. Agent
Lawrence had arrived with instructions to take over the shift.
Mulder headed back to the office as ordered. Somehow he doubted
that it would be good news.

-------------------

Patterson studied Mulder across the desk. Mulder loved this
office, he always viewed it with the same respect as he felt the
white mice should give those special mazes in research labs.
Patterson's chair was a little higher than his visitors' chairs.
The windows were straight behind Patterson's head so that anyone
talking to him would either have to squint or look away. A great
place for mind games. Mulder put on his sunglasses. Patterson
nodded in acknowledgement, memories of previous encounters
filtering through.

Patterson considered how to play it. The direct approach
perhaps. "So Mulder. Had enough play time yet? Ready to come
back to work?"

"I made a promise, why would I come back?"

Patterson thought back. All those requests for a leave of
absence, then the requests for a transfer. Then a Monday morning
and Mulder telling him where to stick his job and promising
Patterson that if he didn't let him go he'd stick it there
personally. Of course, Mulder could have been handled. But
Blevins. Blevins had been greedy, he'd wanted the whizz kid for
himself without the buffer Patterson supplied. An impulsive
reaction on Blevins part. Acting in haste, Blevins had certainly
had the opportunity to repent that decision at leisure.

Patterson intensified his gaze. "You should come back because
you have a skill that can save lives."

Mulder shrank back into the seat. An angry Patterson would have
been better from Mulder's perspective, but Patterson had always
known that even the simplest emotional and moral blackmail
worked better on Mulder than any amount of shouting or threats.
Mulder chose not to play. "If that was true, I'd still be in the
field, not stuck on surveillance."

"No." Patterson attempted to make his voice as sympathetic as
possible. "People just don't see you harnessing the skill
yourself. You need to direct it at the right things."

"That was what I was doing."

Patterson hadn't actually expected the direct method to work.
"Ok Mulder. I have a proposition for you. An opportunity. It's
not as though you'll be missed from your present assignment. And
maybe it will get you into someone's good books. You look like
you could do with a friend."

Mulder said nothing so Patterson continued. "I have a four day
training course to run this week at Quantico, starts tomorrow.
It took too much arranging to cancel at this stage. But I can't
afford the time. You could give the course on my behalf. You'll
recognise the notes. The case studies won't give you a problem.
In fact one of them's an old one of yours."

Patterson paused but Mulder didn't reply and his facial
expression gave nothing away, so Patterson offered a sardonic
smile to go with his words. "Or you could go out in the field in
my place, I could run the course as planned. You could do the
thing you were trained to do. Save lives."

Mulder hesitated. Anything to get off the wire tap. Almost
anything to get off the wire tap. If Patterson got what he
wanted this time, then he'd be back again with another
'opportunity'. Each case darker than the last until it was too
dark to find a way out. "I'll give the course for you." He half
smiled. "Aren't you worried that I'll screw it up?"

"No. I don't doubt you can say the words even if you haven't got
the guts to do the job."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"Any time."

Mulder picked up the course notes and headed out. As he drove
over to Quantico, he puzzled over Patterson's motives. The
obvious conclusion was that Patterson was baiting the water,
hoping that Mulder would get hooked. Waiting for him to reel
himself in. But Patterson had to know that it wasn't like that.
Patterson knew how hard walking away from the profiling work had
been. What was Patterson really up to?

-------------------

Only as he settled into the rooms in the training area that
Patterson's course had been assigned did Mulder give any serious
thought to the course itself. He'd assumed they were just
standard training sessions. A stupid assumption Mulder now
realised. If it was one of the standard courses, Patterson
wouldn't have planned to run it in the first place. And even if
he had intended to do it then he would just have given it to one
of the regular Quantico lecturers to handle as soon as he knew
it was a problem.

Mulder reread the introduction. A course for FBI management on
the handling of evidence prior to use by analysts and on the
interaction between analysts and the investigating team. He read
the list of attendees. A couple of heads of Bureau regional
offices. And everyone else a Special Agent in Charge or higher.
And the cherry on the top, Assistant Director Walter Skinner.

Mulder almost laughed. He'd never rated Patterson's sense of
humour. At least not until now. He reread the names. Better and
better. Ten trainees and he'd been on the wrong side of
disciplinary tribunals in front of six of them.

He read the notes and prepared for the first day.

-----------

NEXT MORNING - DAY ONE OF THE COURSE

Walter Skinner sat in silence and watched Mulder scan his notes,
recheck the sequence of the slides and line up the start of the
video clips. Skinner had had a call the night before from
Patterson, confirming that he would be using a substitute
lecturer. None of the other trainees had been warned. So as they
drifted in with coffee cups in hand in anticipation of the 8:30
start they found it hard to play it quite as cool as their
Assistant Director had apparently decided to do. Nonetheless
they took their lead from him, if he wasn't walking out offended
it was hard for them to kick up a fuss.

Mulder checked the clock and started the show. He suspected this
was harder on the group in front of him than it was on him. He
had a script. He knew how to behave, the role of trainer was
well defined. They were unprepared. All he had to do was get
them talking to each other and the rest would be easy.

By mid morning, Mulder's trainees had decided to give him the
benefit of the doubt. At least during the formal sessions. At
lunchtime they couldn't get out of the room quick enough. They
all needed a bit of time and space to debate their substitute
trainer and to decide what they could do about this insult from
Patterson.

Mulder sorted the slides for the afternoon sessions. He looked
up to find Skinner watching him intently.

"Good session Mulder." Skinner watched as Mulder shrugged
nervously. "You know I can see you as a College Professor."

Mulder stopped playing with the paperwork and looked back at the
AD. "Should I take that as a threat or just as a piece of
careers advice, Sir?"

Skinner frowned. "Or you could take it as a compliment. I
suspect that there are a lot of things you could do if you
wanted to."

"Even be a Federal Agent?"

"Even that."

Mulder turned back to the slides. Skinner walked to join his
colleagues for lunch.

----------------

Dana Scully spotted Mulder across the cafeteria. Her hybrid job
of trainer and post mortem specialist keeping her busy though
unsatisfied. She resented the way she'd been treated. She didn't
get the choice about what to do, no option to stay in the field,
join VCS or any of the other things she was qualified for. No
they'd shipped her back to Quantico. Of course they'd left
Mulder to work on the dumbest wiretap job they could find and
she knew that was just spite. Officially she wasn't being
punished, her smart office testified to that.

Mulder didn't like to talk to her. 'Too risky,' he'd said. She
couldn't even make him stick around long enough to tell her what
he meant. He'd looked such a mess when she spotted him in the
J.Edgar building last week that she'd scarcely even recognised
him. She recognised him today. Tired and jumpy, as if he
expected everyone he met to slap him down, but at least
impeccably dressed.

He stood with her for long enough to drink a cup of coffee. He
told her about Patterson's little practical joke and his
'students' who looked an awful lot like an inquisition jury that
had already found him guilty. When he noticed the people from
his course settling themselves at a table, he quickly left.

---------------------

The afternoon session ran even more smoothly than the morning.
They dealt with the first and simplest of the case studies.

As long as the sessions were running the managers had resigned
themselves to playing along. They all had plenty of doubts about
admitting any lack of knowledge or understanding in front of an
Agent who would have been out of the Bureau by now if it wasn't
for his political contacts. But, once the discussions started
up, they still felt obliged to show their Assistant Director
that they could make a contribution.

But as soon as the sessions were complete they cut their
lecturer dead. In fact they were able to ignore him so
effectively that Mulder found himself wondering why they
bothered to leave the lights on when they left the room. Mulder
was grateful for it, a forced show of good humour or even good
manners from them would have been too much.

The lack of preparation time hadn't upset day one. Day two would
be easy as well. Day three would use one of his own cases as the
role model and if he couldn't get through that then he really
had deteriorated more than he thought.

But, day four. Day four was a worry. He'd not had that much time
to look at it or think about it, but what little time he'd spent
had set the early warning systems running. He liked to talk from
a position of strength and he needed time to review the
evidence. He could pretend of course, pretend that it was just a
training exercise and that the anomalies were just mistakes on
the part of the writer of the case study. Except the notes made
it clear that all the cases were real. And he actually
recognised the other three cases they were using. This final one
was too recent for him to have read about, but this one was
supposed to be real as well.

-------------

They got through the next day with minimal trouble. Though
Mulder did at one stage find himself idly wondering if he was
going to make it through the week without needing attention for
multiple personality disorder.

He'd scarcely spoken to anyone since the X-Files had been closed
down, permitting himself only an occasional bout of escapism
with a stranger. Mostly though, he preferred silence to the
alternatives that were on offer. Alternatives that ran from pity
through to scorn, but all laced with their owners own particular
brands of good advice. He was still surprised that he had been
able to turn down Patterson's offer of a real case. Maybe
Patterson was right about him, maybe he didn't have the guts.

And so here he was, the centre of attention, running the
training course. Putting on the right tie, the right shirt, the
right suit. He felt like a circus performer. Putting on the
makeup. Putting on the smile. Performing.

>From the start of the formal sessions to their close, Mulder was
the model training professional. Serious when the occasion
demanded, lighthearted when the group needed lifting. Generous
in praise when a role play or other exercise went well.
Encouraging and positive, but definite, when he needed to
criticise. If the jury of the inquisition noticed that they were
getting trained by the FBI's most unwanted then they gave
nothing away.

But as soon as the training session broke for lunch or closed in
the evening, it was like a switch got flipped. Mulder avoided
eye contact, his shoulders drooped, and the six foot frame
suddenly looked very small. He spoke only when spoken to. It
suited his audience, they took it as a mark of respect.

It didn't suit Skinner. Disciplinary action was one thing. But
the last couple of days had been a reminder of the sharp
incisive mind that had brought early praise and fame to Mulder.
And a reminder of the ferocity of the forces that had been
turned on Mulder to break his spirit. It disturbed Skinner, more
than he liked to think about, to see it succeeding.

Ironically, Skinner mused, it probably wasn't the threats of the
shadow figures and the harshness of the disciplinary proceedings
that were getting to Mulder. More likely it was the mind numbing
tedium of the work he was being given. That was why Skinner had
given Patterson the green light to approach Mulder about a job
that had come up. It had never occurred to Skinner it would be
this one.

END of Part 1 of 3

=========

MANAGEMENT TRAINING - Part 2 of 3

END OF DAY 2 OF THE COURSE

Skinner wasn't sure if it was childish or just vicious.
Patterson's little game in putting Mulder in this position was
sick enough. But he wasn't too pleased about the way his
management colleagues had fitted into their roles as tormentors
of his talented but troubled Agent. If Mulder was in purgatory
on the wiretap then at least Skinner hadn't had to sit and
witness it. Some of it was Mulder's own fault, he fell into the
role of scapegoat waiting to be kicked a little too readily.

The man could breeze his way through the course all day. Sharp,
polite, funny. But always respectful, of the dead, of their
families, of the Agents and others who'd tried to help. Always
aware that the people were real, not just a collection of
evidence to be picked over. Some of it almost hurt, as if Mulder
had tapped into a vein in Skinner's body that reminded him of
why he'd joined the Bureau in the first place. Bizarrely Skinner
reckoned he'd be going back from the training course refreshed,
not so much with new knowledge, most of the words were familiar,
but with a top up on his spirits. Bizarre because Skinner was
pretty sure that was not the effect the course was having on
Mulder.

Some of it was Mulder's own fault, he let them do it. Shying
away from looking at people. Skinner had tried to talk to him,
but Mulder was defensive, humour as the first line of defence.
Skinner could understand it, after all, even he, as Assistant
Director couldn't say anything positive, couldn't give a date
when the punishment would be over, couldn't offer a light at the
end of the tunnel.

The managers sat at the dinner table and talk drifted to the
course but quickly moved to their tutor.

"You know from the rumours, I thought he'd flipped, one too many
rides with the little green men. But he's still sharp."

"He's easy to listen to. A lot less annoying than Patterson."

"Yeah, gives me the creeps though. Red hot while he's running
the course. Then he puts the last slide away and it's like
someone throws the power switch and the lights go out."

"Not that different to how he was when he was working."

That got a quick laugh from the group.

"So you've actually tried talking to him then have you?"

"What can you say? Hi Mulder, surprised to see you here, in fact
I'm surprised you're still on the payroll."

A peel of laughter from around the table.

Skinner couldn't get involved in the discussion, couldn't
afford to explain, didn't have explanations for a lot of it. But
he didn't have to listen to this. His voice was dark and low,
"so you have a problem with how I discipline my staff?"

The laughter stopped.

They changed the subject.

-------------

Mulder checked the training room for one last time. He'd
carefully gathered together the notes, the autopsy reports, the
photographs, the slides from the day's training and filed them
back into Patterson's folders. He wasn't naturally tidy. He
didn't even have a desire to make Patterson's life easier next
time he came to run the course. It just seemed like the right
thing to do.

They weren't the real evidence files of course. The real ones
were all neatly stored in the records office or in filing
cabinets in VCS. But they were real enough that the autopilot in
Mulder's head knew how to pack them properly away. And he didn't
want to leave behind evidence of the horror stories they'd spent
the day discussing somewhere that an innocent, an outsider,
someone who didn't have to look at them, might pick them up. It
had always been one of the things that sickened him about VCS.
Photos of the dead left on desks or thrown in the garbage cans.
Disrespectful. Not that the dead cared.

He turned his thoughts to the next day and the day after that.

Day three would focus on one of Mulder's own old cases. Kids.
Mulder hated the cases about kids. Everybody did of course. But
he was known to throw himself into those cases with a
determination and an energy that even colleagues found
frightening. That was why Patterson had kept on giving them to
him. It was also one of the reasons why he'd had to get out.

Day four was the mystery. A case too recent for Mulder to have
read about and he'd been out of the office listening to stupid
wire tap conversations for too long to have heard about it as
part of the office gossip. The day four course notes contained
evidence and an analysis that just didn't gel. Not to Mulder
anyway. He'd read the notes a couple of times but hadn't had
much time to get into it. The training day ran from 8:30 in the
morning to 7 in the evening. Longer than that for the trainer
because of the time spent setting up and putting away. He needed
to study it in detail. He needed to let his mind freewheel.

But his mind was not going to let him think about day four. Not
until he'd sorted himself out for day three.

He went back to his room and steadied his thoughts. He was so
tired, his body was shouting to go to sleep. He ignored it. He
didn't need to go sleep. Sleeping was a defence mechanism
designed to let him stop thinking. Even if he succumbed to it,
the sleep would be restless, unsatisfying, worthless. He knew
the score, lying to other people about the way he felt was one
thing, there were times when he couldn't afford to lie to
himself, that was the route to just stopping, just giving up.
'If the shark stops swimming, it dies.' Deep Throat told him
that. Deep Throat was dead now.

So he let his mind drift back to an old forgotten case, he let
the old images roll. All kids. A pattern of deaths that now he
knew what to look for, ran back ten years. The escalation had
been steady, progressive. Four dead in the last three months and
a child missing. It would have been a lot in a city but the
latest batch of murders had taken place in a small town. The
Bureau had been asked for assistance after the second death.
Mulder had joined the team after the third.

Joined the team. The team? The phrase was a joke. Zero down time
from the last case. "Don't worry Mulder, I'll get someone else
to write up the report and do your expenses for you." Mulder
could hear Patterson as clearly now. And Patterson always kept
his word, the report would be written, the expenses would get
paid.

The Agents already on the case looked at him as if he was some
sort of alien who'd just been beamed in. He had often wondered
why they had such a problem with the concept of extraterrestrial
visitors when they seemed perfectly happy to treat him like he'd
landed from Mars.

It hadn't always been like that. Some people, Reggie Pardue for
one, others, just thought he was unusually sharp, unusually
observant. But Patterson had known better. Patterson knew that
Mulder was Spooky. That he had an insight that some people might
think was a gift.

The fourth child was found dead six hours after Mulder arrived.
When the Agent In Charge asked Mulder what he'd like announced
at the news conference, Mulder found himself wondering if they
were the martians or whether they'd just fallen a little too
heavily for the Spooky reputation.

Mulder let his mind drift back to the way it felt, the way he
had slowly let the case take over until the only thoughts in his
head were of dead children and a predator who was stalking them,
feeding on them. The other Agents, nervous of him from the
outset, retreated further. He hated it when they got scared of
him. Some were respectful of his reputation. Others assumed that
they were watching the VCS rising star burn himself out. Hard
working honest Agents. They just kept working and hoped that
Mulder would come up with something, but meanwhile they built up
the kind of solid body of evidence and information that any sane
police team would want to crack a case like this.

Another child was missing, a nine year old boy. Blond, blue
eyed, perfect, an adolescence of breaking young girls' hearts
had been stretching out in front of him. But not now.

The Agent In Charge returned home, the needs of his sick wife
overriding the demands of the job for once. Mulder remembered
coming out of the fog for long enough to think what a brave
decision that had been. The Bureau could be pretty ruthless to
people who showed weakness. Mulder regretted his original
reaction to the man's hopeful request that he might have already
had something, three days earlier, six hours into the job, in
time for the press conference. Not foolishness, just a little
prayer from the AIC that a miracle might crop up that would let
him avoid making a choice between his wife and his work.

The new AIC was a traditionalist. He'd heard of Mulder. Hadn't
everyone? But he wasn't going to rely on someone who aside from
producing steadily more detailed profiles of the man they were
chasing appeared to have stopped communicating with the rest of
the team. In fact it was the details that made it seem unlikely.
There was no way for Mulder to have picked up that much data.

So they closed in on their prey. And the AIC was happy to give
credit to Mulder for that, they were closing in, they'd even
found the places where a couple of the earlier victims had been
held waiting for their deaths. But Mulder's profile was only one
input. There was the evidence about the cars seen near the
sites. The search of the purchase records at the shops that
could have supplied the ropes that tied the children to their
prisons.

They worked diligently. But resources were always limited, even
on a sensitive case like this. So they had to be selective about
their surveillance of the sites that could become the murder
scenes. And in any case, if the numbers of people involved went
up too much and things became too heavy handed then their killer
would just move out of town. And that could make it even
tougher. Even Mulder agreed with that.

So they never did come to a consensus on the sites to be
monitored. The AIC had to take a decision. He had to guess and
he guessed wrong. One of Mulder's priority sites had a dead
child the following morning.

Mulder remembered the look of horror in the AIC's eyes when they
heard. It mirrored the look in his own.

They agreed on places to search for the perpetrator and struck
lucky. They took away the killer before he had time to move on
to the next town.

Mulder shook his head to bring himself round. A long time ago.
Another lifetime. He'd had better cases and worse ones. Before
and since. If this was Patterson's way of getting him to work
for him again, it had backfired. He remembered only too clearly
why he hadn't taken up Patterson's latest offer of a case to
solve.

Sanity depended on being able to forget. Being able to box
things up and store them away. Compartmentalise thoughts, words,
behaviour so that the right things happened at the right time.
Mulder shook that thought away as well. Sanity was not an exact
science. What was exact was the need to function. Whatever it
took. He knew how to act.

He thought for an instant about the other case, the women. Dead
bodies presented as works of art. His body reminded him it was
tired. He'd go to sleep, he'd been doing a lot of that recently.

--------------

DAY THREE

Mulder woke up, brain still restless, still racing with unwanted
and useless thoughts. He switched them off. They weren't needed.
Today's job was well defined. Analyse the case, learn the
lessons. Let his students see a little of the world that they
normally would have preferred to see left swept under the
carpet.

He showered and dressed. A fleeting smile as he walked past the
mirror, he wondered if they knew how often he thought of himself
in the third person? So analysing the work as if it was an
academic exercise done by someone else, done a long time ago, a
long distance away, that wasn't so very difficult.

He looked through the slides. Carefully scrutinised every photo
to make sure that there were no details he'd forgotten. No
details that he was suddenly going to see again and that would
break through the protective walls he'd carefully constructed.
He checked the notes.

Skinner watched his young Agent intently studying the photos for
the day's session. Skinner wondered about the intensity. Mulder
probably had them memorised by now. Presumably it helped him
focus.

Mulder surveyed his audience. Vultures. Vultures assembled to
pick over the corpse of the old case. He was safe from them, he
was still alive. Even so, it might be safest if he kept moving.
The image made him smile. He looked down to recheck his watch,
it was time to start talking.

The session rolled, Mulder presented the outline of the case.
Kids. Everybody hated the cases about kids. Skinner remembered
that Patterson often gave those cases to Mulder. Knowing what he
now knew about the disappearance of Mulder's sister and the
profound impact it had had on the man, Skinner wondered if that
wasn't one of the reasons Mulder had insisted on getting out.

Some of the names and places had been changed to protect Agents
who might be offended or damaged by their performance and
fallabilities being exposed so directly. But Skinner started to
recognise the scenes. When they reached the description of the
fifth death he got it confirmed.

One of the regional bosses pointed out that at least one of the
children could have been saved if the investigating team had
gone with the profiler's choice of stakeout locations as they
closed in on the killer. Mulder simply insisted that it was the
responsibility of the profiler to justify theories and to
convince other people of the accuracy of a prediction.

Mulder remembered walking for miles on that case. A winding,
meandering route that connected the places the children were
taken from and the places their bodies were found. And when
walking the route in the morning had given him nothing, he had
repeated it in the dark of the night and again in the twilight.
The Agent In Charge had asked him to explain why he wanted the
locations he'd listed staked out. But telling him it was because
of the way the evening sun fell on the windows hadn't been
enough. The AIC had more reasonable, practical advice to go on
than that.

Mulder felt the wave of nausea rise in his throat. He stopped
it, froze it back. There would be none of that. It was a case.
It was over and done with. He'd learnt his lessons. He'd try and
express what he'd learnt, what they needed to know.

Skinner listened as blame or at least responsibility was placed
firmly on the profiler. Most people in the room would have
questioned the judgement of an AIC in ignoring an analyst who'd
already given them two of the places where the kidnap victims
had been held. But not Mulder, the trainer who understood
everyone's difficult decisions, who never blamed anyone for
trying to do their jobs to the best of their ability. Mulder
pinned the charge fairly and squarely on the profiler. Skinner
thought he knew why. He was sure that he recognised the case.

The cool, impersonal, professional trainer ran the show.

Skinner asked the obvious question. "Mulder, is this one of your
cases?"

Nothing more than a yes came back from their lecturer. A slight
shudder then he moved on.

-----------

At the end of the day's sessions Mulder sorted the slides and
started to think some more about day four and the 'painted lady'
case study.

Skinner approached him. "That was remarkable work."

Mulder lifted his head. "I'll relay your congratulations to
Patterson. He wrote the script."

Skinner glared at him, momentarily annoyed at the blocking and
the evasion. "I was referring to your work on that case. I
remember it clearly. And if Patterson did write the script for
the training that you used today, then I'll have a word with
him. He really didn't do you justice. Though I expect I'll find
the ifs and buts you threw into the discussion were your own
doses of self criticism rather than anything Patterson would
say."

"Sorry if I spoiled the fairy story. I don't have Patterson's
polish. Or is it gloss?"

Skinner wasn't sure if he was annoyed or sickened by the reply.
"Come and get some food."

"Thanks but I think that I'll pass. Wouldn't want to put your
colleagues off their dinners." Mulder looked at the annoyance in
Skinner's eyes and decided to stop before he hit another
insubordination charge. He adopted a less confrontational tone.
"Thanks, but I've got to prepare for tomorrow's sessions."

Skinner nodded and moved away feeling uncomfortable. Mulder had
been right the first time, he would not have been a welcome
guest, not as far as some of his colleagues were concerned. That
had annoyed Skinner, but Mulder had interpreted it as anger at
him and had backed away. Understandable.

------------------

Mulder looked around the empty room and set the video tapes of
the crime scene to play, got out the photos and notes from the
evidence file and tried to see what was wrong.

The more he looked, the worse it got. It was obvious. He
wondered if he should call Scully and ask for her opinion, but
it was 9 O'Clock at night. She'd have already driven home by
now. She wasn't going to appreciate a call to come back out here
to Quantico just to back him up on something he already knew. It
wouldn't have been her opinion or her skills he was seeking,
just her reassurance. And he was sure she had better things to
do with her time than give him reassurance.

He called Patterson. Patterson's tone of voice told him
everything he needed to know. He'd been set up. When he'd told
Patterson that he wouldn't go out in the field on that case
Patterson hadn't really argued all that hard. Now Mulder
understood why. Patterson had given him the case, but he'd just
surrounded it with such a smokescreen that Mulder hadn't spotted
it.

Patterson had this habit of playing to win. Mulder almost
admired it. Mulder did what he had to do. And by the morning he
had finished his tasks.

------------
END of Part 2 of 3

========

MANAGEMENT TRAINING - Part 3 of 3

Skinner had been for an early morning run. He had been tempted
to drive home after the evening sessions and in the morning do a
couple of hours at his desk before driving back in time for the
course. But that would have given the wrong impression. It was
important that senior management had a commitment to training.
And officially this was a residential course, the evening
discussions of the participants viewed as being as important as
the formal sessions. So he had contented himself with bringing
half his office with him. He walked back to his room via the
training area, planning on picking up a couple of notes from the
day before.

Mulder was in almost exactly the same position he'd left him
twelve hours earlier. And with the exception of the tie, which
Skinner assumed had been discarded shortly after they had left
the previous night, Mulder hadn't changed at all.

Mulder hit the pause button on the VCR again and turned towards
the noise in the doorway. It was 7am, too early for his people
to be filtering back to the room. He saw Walter Skinner, he'd
obviously been running. Mulder wished he could go for a run but
it would be cutting it too fine now.

"Agent Mulder?"

"Inconsiderate of the Bureau not to put VCR's in the bedrooms,
Sir."

"You've not been here all night." Skinner's tone put it
somewhere between a statement and a question.

"Wouldn't want to argue with a superior."

"Have you had any sleep at all?"

Mulder had another flip answer lined up but looked at the grim
expression on Skinner's face and decided it really wasn't worth
it, it probably wouldn't get a laugh. "I remember finding myself
watching a couple of blank TV screens so I guess so."

The words were all self defence. Skinner wanted to get past the
barrier. "What's this about? And don't tell me it's prep for
today."

Mulder looked at the Assistant Director and hesitated. But it
was a bit late to hesitate now, he'd already been caught. Was it
worse to say nothing or worse to say something, he wasn't sure.
"Have you heard of the Painted Lady case?

That threw Skinner for a moment. It was a current case, still
active and a long way from being solved. Why would Mulder have
today's training case study open and be talking about the
painted lady case?

Mulder continued. "I hadn't heard of it but then I'm a bit out
of touch."

Skinner winced a little at the remark about being out of touch.
The wire tap assignment was part of the disciplinary package.
Not only a job designed to keep him out of trouble, it was also
a boring and lonely job. He knew that to Mulder the assignment
was a kind of sensory deprivation. Nothing to tax him,
physically or mentally. And as an added twist, no contact with
other people, a kind of solitary confinement. And for someone
like Mulder whose life revolved around his work and whose brain
demanded constant stimulus it was a harsh punishment.

Mulder thought he saw Skinner flinch slightly. Out of touch? Out
of sight, out of mind. Mulder had wondered if that was what the
assignments were about. No contact with other people, no thought
required, almost complete physical inactivity. A surer way of
driving him out of his mind than even Patterson's little games.

After a moment's hesitation, Skinner replied. "Yes, Mulder, I
know the case."

Mulder breathed a little more deeply.

Skinner spoke again. "You've found a problem with the case?"

Mulder nodded. Skinner waited for Mulder to speak. Mulder handed
the photo pack to Skinner.

Mulder cleared his throat and his tone of voice moved to the
formal presentation style of an experienced Agent used to
arguing his case. "Several key things in the profile hinge on
the second victim. The imagery in the pictures that were painted
on the body. The time of death. The location the victim was
taken from. All key data."

Mulder was embarrassed about talking about it, as if he'd been
caught reading someone else's diary. Mulder noticed that he'd
switched to the voice he always used when he was trying to
describe a difficult case to someone else, taking the personal
out of the investigation.

Skinner noted the change in posture and the new intonation in
the voice. Skinner almost smiled. 'FBI mode engaged.'

Skinner suspected he knew where the conversation was heading and
was determined to keep Mulder talking. "So? You said it's the
slip ups and the deviations from the pattern that can be crucial
to the analyst."

"Not when the deviations are due to it being a different
killer."

There had been four victims so far, all women in their late
twenties, early thirties. Their bodies found decorated with
ornate and carefully worked paintings.

Mulder walked over to where Skinner sat looking at the photos.
"The second woman was painted after she died, the others were
alive when the painting was done. You can tell from the way the
paint follows the lines of the muscles. It's fundamental. Number
two was an opportunistic copycat of number one and so the whole
profile is based on the wrong assumption."

Skinner looked for uncertainty in Mulder's face and saw none.
Skinner hoped that he could give Mulder the confidence to follow
it through. Skinner spoke smoothly. "It's Patterson's profile.
He's still out there working on the case. It's why he dropped
out of giving this course. You'd better tell him."

Mulder looked back, his voice lapsing from its crisp formal tone
to one that contained a nervous and apologetic edge, things were
getting a little personal now. "I already have."

Skinner was surprised. That must have been a difficult
conversation. Maybe Mulder wasn't as defeated as he looked.
"What did Patterson say?"

"That if I was still any good it wouldn't have taken me four
days to spot an error like that."

Skinner wasn't sure whether to be shocked or just angry. He
started to stay something then stopped abruptly.

Mulder almost laughed at Skinner's response, what did Skinner
expect Patterson to say - 'Congratulations' ?

Mulder started talking again. "Patterson's right, four days is a
long time." He paused, "I had him fax me through the latest
version of the profile." He paused again. "Profiles."

"And are the new ones right?"

Mulder looked at Skinner then at a point on the wall somewhere
behind Skinner. He didn't want to look at anyone, the case was
still too fresh. "No."

Skinner puzzled over the nervousness, he thought they'd got past
that. "What's the problem?"

"They ignore those parts of the evidence found uncomfortable or
inconvenient."

Mulder had no desire to explain what had happened. It wasn't his
case, Patterson had tried to make it his. And Mulder had done
what he had to. But it still wasn't his. He had handed it back
now. He didn't want it.

Skinner studied his Agent. Getting information out of Mulder was
like pulling teeth. Skinner corrected himself, pulling teeth was
probably less painful, for both parties.

Skinner tried to get things moving. "You make it sound like one
of your X-Files."

"The FBI's X-Files." Mulder said lightly, then hesitated.

Mulder recognised the look of impatience and frustration in
Skinner's eyes and told his boss what he needed to know. He
outlined the facts and his opinions. Mulder's voice had changed
back again, it was the cool, experienced FBI Agent that was
explaining the uncomfortable and inconvenient evidence. "The
profile that covers the killer of the second woman ignores the
most basic facts of all. The people best placed to copycat the
first killing were the investigating team. The most important
relationships to consider in a murder are always the closest
ones."

"You're saying the woman's husband is a police officer or
something?"

"No, her husband had left her a few months ago and wasn't in the
area and certainly had no knowledge of the investigation. But
her lover did have access to the photographs."

Skinner acknowledged the words with a nod of the head.
"Uncomfortable."

"Uncomfortable because she is the District Attorney."

"She?" Skinner leant back in his seat. "The DA? You certainly
have a knack for uncomfortable. Any evidence?"

"She matches the profile I wrote last night before I knew that
they were lovers. And before I knew that there was an anomalous
DNA match at the crime scene. They'll have to work to get
something to go to court with. But it's a match."

"So I'll hand you that's uncomfortable. What's inconvenient?"

"The other victims were painted while they were alive. The paint
job could have taken an hour to do and some time to dry.
Different images on different bodies, artistically done and no
smudges. Over an hour is a long time to stand still and naked
while a stranger you are frightened of paints you."

Skinner agreed, "not a stranger then?"

"Not someone they were afraid of."

Skinner almost didn't want to ask but had to. "So do you have a
name in the frame for this one as well?"

Mulder pulled out a couple of the photos and pointed at bottles
and jars in the background. "Same bottle shapes, same kinds of
brands, probably some king of wholistic medicine thing. You know
aromatherapy, crystals, that kind of stuff. At a guess they may
even have paid to be painted and photographed, it's quite
fashionable. But we decided not to release the fact that the
victims had been painted to the press. Fear of a copycat amongst
other reasons. So no one got a warning."

Skinner felt uncomfortable. "So you're saying we didn't give
those women the warning that might have prevented them from
falling victim. Our fault then. Inconvenient is a rather mild
word."

Mulder blamed the killer not the Agents, he knew the words, he
was never sure if they applied to himself, but he was confident
they applied to other people. The voice that replied was quiet
and had lost its formality. The voice of experience, a voice
that had been there too often to criticise. "We guess the best
thing to do. Sometimes we guess wrong."

Skinner couldn't stop himself from feeling a sudden, fleeting
respect for Patterson. Not many men could have pulled a fast one
on Mulder. Patterson had made Mulder teach the course, probably
opening a few old wounds in the process. He'd certainly exposed
Mulder to a level of hostility and scorn that would have buckled
most Agents even if they weren't already waiting for a
disciplinary axe that might fall at any time. And Patterson had
done it as a cover for getting Mulder to solve one of his own
cases. Two birds with one stone. Three if you counted the
ability to score a couple of points off the disconsolate Agent
as another prize in the game.

Skinner was struck by Mulder's conciliatory tone, he wondered if
he could keep it up through one last question, Skinner spoke
with a slight edge to his voice. "So I should expect Patterson
to come through with another home run this week?"

Mulder noted the cynicism in Skinner's voice. "Bet on it."
Mulder paused, a flicker of humour in his own voice. "He should
be able to spice up the training course as well."

"So when are you going to talk to Patterson?"

"I faxed it all through to him just after one this morning. I've
been rewriting the course since then."

Skinner had almost agreed to a suggestion that Mulder return to
work for Patterson as a way of rehabilitating him for the
Bureau. Not now. If Mulder asked for it as a way back into the
field then Skinner would consider it but he wouldn't be the one
to suggest it. Skinner asked about that rewrite of the course.
"Telling it like it is?"

Mulder looked at Skinner and wondered if he was right to have
told him about the night's work. He wouldn't, couldn't work for
Patterson again. Mulder half smiled as he replied. "Telling it
like it appears to be."

Skinner looked at his watch. Mulder looked around the room and
found his tie. Skinner watched him, "Agent Mulder. You had
better go and get cleaned up, you look like crap."

Mulder couldn't resist the setup that Skinner had fed him.
"Telling it like it is, Sir?"

Skinner noted the resilience in the humour. He acknowledged the
remark with a shrug "Telling it like it appears to be, Mulder."

-------------

Mulder returned to the room five minutes before the start of the
session. Avoiding eye contact. Switching on abruptly as the
clock hit 8:30.

Skinner watched him. Nothing to give away that their trainer had
spent the previous night, first solving the case, then rewriting
the course. Skinner was pretty sure that if he hadn't walked in
on Mulder, then only Patterson would have known anything about
what had happened. He had to get him off that wire tap stuff
soon. Nothing too obvious, the powers in the shadows wouldn't
allow that. But something to stretch the mind, use the skills
and lift the spirits of his jumpy young Agent.

Skinner would look for opportunities.

END
Thanks for reading it - hope you enjoyed my dip into X-Files
ancient history - Joann - jhumby@iee.org