2-24-95
Hi--just another something I've been obsessing over.  There's some
bad language and a really upsetting character in this one, so
consider yourself. . .er. . .cautioned.  Writer's note at the end.

Letterbox
by Amp.




     Marise Engersol had no photos on her desk.  There were no
mementos in her office.  She kept her personal things--extra
deodorant, make-up and hair spray, three or four tampons, spare
hose, and needle and thread, in a small drawer in her desk that
locked.  Those were the only things in the office that were not
issued by the government.  Marise herself was even government
issue.  
     A year ago, her father had been alive. It was not common
knowledge that they were father and daughter, but it was known.  It
was also known that her father had been killed, and rightly so, for
leaking information.  Marise would tell you that herself, with a
quiver.  He tried to help a small pain in the butt named Fox
Mulder, whom most thought should have been killed a long time ago. 
     But Fox was had protected status.  Marise Engersol's father
had no such status, only a little bit of power.  It was what
everyone played for underneath the spouting lines about patriotism
and doing what they believed in. Bullshit.  They did it because
they were powerful.  Even Marise, who though still in her twenties,
was a force to be reckoned with.  
     
     Every once in a while, Marise would take a day off.  No one
questioned it because she had trained them not too.  She went to a
small, private cemetary in Virginia and put daisies on the grave of
"The infant daughter of John and Marise Alexander.  Born 1722, Died
1723."  No one knew why, but with Marise Engersol you didn't ask. 
At the cemetary, she sat on a small bench, pulled out a laptop and
typed something.  
     Or that had been the routine.  Until August when her father
died. Then several months had passed before she'd gone to the
cemetary.  But today she had called in on her way to work.  Won't
be there.  Have my reasons.  She'd taken an off-ramp, gotten coffee
at a Quickie Mart and gone down to the cemetary.


     December 5, 1994
     Kallie--

     Busy at Spy Central.  Sorry I haven't written here for a since
April. After Poppa died last May, I've mostly been trying to make
it from one day to the next.  It hurts so bad.  Some days I just
want to die, but I keep smiling, keep doing my work.  The little
ice bitch, that's me.
     I suppose you are entitled to the truth about his death, not
the offical obituary, which of course made no mention of either of
us.  He died helping a man in my baliwick, not his.  I've always
known Poppa had an interest in Fox Mulder.  I didn't know how long
he'd been following one of my more exasperating cases.  
     Since before my time, apparently.  I was only 15 when Fox
joined the Bureau.  15.  Awkward, young.  I was 15 when I found out
Uncle Rand was our father and that our mother died soon after I was
born and was buried out in a field somewhere in Czechoslavkia, that
We had been concieved in the Italian hill country when a condom
popped.  Never trust anything but good old American know how when
it's important.  We may fuck it up, but usually our rubbers don't
break when we do.  I was 15 when I found out Uncle Rand wasn't just
some stuffy beaurcrat in the government but a real live spy.  I
remember writing you that Uncle Rand looked more like Colonel
Potter than James Bond.  I was 15 then and stupid as hell.  15 when
I killed my first man.  15 when I was first shot at.  15 when I
read my first classified document.  15 when I first seduced
someone, and still 15 when I blackmailed her.  15 and eager.  I
lapped it up the way a thirsty horse laps up water.  
     When I was beginning my training Fox was beginning his.  But
it's my life.  Fox's life is in my files.  My files.  Not Poppa's. 
I'm the one who decides Fox's fate.  Not Poppa.
     Matt killed Poppa.  I know who killed Poppa and sometimes he
comes into the office and I have to pretend everything's okay, that
I don't hope he dies someday.  Matt killed Poppa.  I read the
reports, because a file has to go into Fox's file.  Fox got himself
involved in an unfortunate incident when a scientist let himself
get carried away in an excess of humanitarianism.  Not my problem
there, except for finding some plausible way to extract the Fox. 
None of the people I ever cleared when I was an underling ever
fucked up.  Of course if they had I would have dispatched them
myself, which is why Lawren Tull will never be anything more than
an underling, but she doesn't understand that and probably never
will.  Of course Lawren Tull's genes weren't screwed around with
when she was an embreyo either, but that's a moot point. 
     Poppa didn't know my standing orders--how could he?  Not his
baliwick.  And I didn't know he was involved with Fox.  I didn't
realize he would identify with Fox, though I should have.  Poppa
was once like Fox, a seeker after the truth, though that was a long
time ago and you would think he'd have gotten it out of his system,
just like you'd think he'd have gotten Catholicism out of his
system, but a priest did the funeral, after all.
     Poppa decided to get Fox out of the situation.  He liberated
the Purity Control source (a little alien embryo--I've heard of it,
but it isn't my baliwick--you must get tired of that, dear Kallie. 
Every entry so many `baliwicks'.) and used it as a bargaining tool
to get Fox back.  Matt killed Poppa under orders to eliminate the
senior person at the site.

     Kallie, sometimes I lie awake at night thinking up ways to
kill Matt.  I want Fox to do it for me though.  I would enjoy
sending a bullet into Matt's brain, but--well, it wouldn't be
prudent.  I don't think there's a file anywhere that says that
"Marise Engersol must be kept alive at all costs" like there is on
Fox Mulder.  They'll suspect me, but I can plan it so they'll never
be able to link it to me.  This will, of course, make me more of
someone to be feared as well as giving myself (and Fox) a great
deal of personal satisfaction.  I like fear; it's a powerful
motivator.  
     This fall we took his partner, Dana Scully.  Sweet child,
little irish redheaded doctor, she thinks of herself as a skeptic. 
She bought into the program so well it was pitiful.  I ranted and
raved when the MedOPs took her.  (Let's not waste anyone we could
use.  After all, that's how we got born instead of aborted.)  
     "He'll get it over it."  I heard over and over again.  "It
won't hurt him that much."  Even Marlowe Rutgers, my old boss, 
agreed.  "He'll go on."
     Screw that.  Yeah, Mulder would've gone on a year, maybe a
little more, a little less.  And one bright morning he wouldn't
have made it into the office.  In a couple of days someone would
have thought about checking up on him, maybe Skinner.  The police
or whoever would have found him on his old leather couch, his gun
where it fell, the back of his brains splattered across the walls. 
I didn't like it when they saddled him with a partner, but I
couldn't say anything, could I?  Keeping Mulder alive is one thing,
having him damage the program is quite another.  
     But then they saddled him with someone he came to trust.  To
like.  Someone to whom he could tell his wildest theories and not
have her dialing the phone for emergency comittal.  Damn it.  They
opened up his emotions.  They don't credit, or don't care enough to
credit, that for my little Fox it amounts to a crutch.  He'll never
be able to walk without it.  He staggered along the emotional road
for years, dragging one leg behind him.  And so then they gave him
a crutch.  They thought it was a stick to stumble over, but Fox
picked it up and began using it hobble faster and isn't it
wonderful?  It no longer hurts so much.  But take the crutch away
and now he falls. 
     Shit.  I have to protect his partner now.  And they're in a
dangerous profession.  I've written before about my biggest
headache's little death wish, which hardly makes my job easier. 
The complication of Dana Scully is something I really didn't need
factored into the equation.  Davidson, in his reports, was so hyper
to discover that Dana Scully was supporting Fox.  Oh please.  Been
in my folder for months.  Nobody asked me.  Not that I would have
told them if they asked.  My baliwick is sacrossant.
     They returned her when they were through as a small favor to
me.  Let her die near him.  Hah.  I have a few tricks up my sleeve.
Get her body back and I can pull a little magic on my own.  I know
Kallie, people have been removed for such as that, but oh well. Ce
la' Vive.  Life's a short shit so you better make it flame. 
Besides my file is justification.
     

     

     Kallie, I think I feel you sometimes.  You're the better part
of me and you're dead.   I'm so lonely and there will never be
anyone I can trust.  I'll wind up a higher level version of
Davidson, puffing on cancer sticks and spouting off about the
sanctity of our work.  Our work isn't sacred.  
     We're keeping the truth to ourselves because . . .oh shit, I
used to understand, or think I did.  Some things don't need to be
told.  As far as personal lives go, I think that's true.  I would
never want Fox Mulder to see the whole story of his life laid out
in black and white.  I'm supposed to protect him for heaven's sake.

But for a nation?  So many of the truths we "protect people from"
are really truths that would destroy someone's career or some such.
Embarrasing truths.    Truths that would make people mad.  Some
mad enough to begin a revolution.  
     I'm in a dirty little profession that masquarades itself as
having honor.  This place smells like a sewer would in hell, full
of rotting corpses, crusty with the layers of drying, purple blood.
     
     Do you know how bad I've gotten, Kallie?  I killed the kid. 
Mulder calls him Krychek.  I took him out to eat, made him think he
was going to get lucky with one of the top bosses and then shot
him, one neat bullet to the back of the neck, easily cleaned up,
easily quisinarted and buried in the woods somewhere.
     Little straightlaced asshole looked surprised.  I get a nice
little glow when I think about it.  I make myself sick.
     If my baliwick didn't include protecting people like Mulder,
people who are important, for one reason or another, to the
Visitors, I think I would kill myself.  I know I would.   
       
     Until next time I need to unload a pile of crap on a laptop
that's not connected to anybody's system.

Merry Christmas from your beloved sis

Marise.
  

Marise flipped through the t.v. channels absently, finally deciding
that Married with Children was her fate for the evening.  She felt
like a woman who has had a really good orgasm.  Worn out, tingly,
at peace, every cell relaxed.  She wished she had the ability to
purr.  
     There were a couple of things that marred the perfection of
her comfort of course, but there always are:
      1. First off Fox *hadn't* killed Matt, someone else had.  Fox
had wanted to "question" the suspect.  Yeah right.  Get a life Fox,
think he's going to tell you anything?  Don't waste good
opportunities, especially when I work so hard to provide you with
them.
     2.  Matt had died quickly.
     3.  Marise hadn't been there to watch.

     Still, that wasn't enough to really bother her.  Matt was
dead.  Dead deader deadest.  They were going to bury him in a
pauper's grave.  Matt always had been a hard ass, reveling in the
power given to him as a bus-boy for the dirty little power lunches
that never quite went down the gullet right.
     Marise opened the newspaper wrapping on her tamale and sat a
moment, revelling in the homemade smell.  Mama Rosa's was a
wonderful restaurant.  Marise was glad she kept the health
department at bay.  What was a little leftover grease between
friends?  She opened the small plastic container of beans. 
Absolute heaven.  
     She had a tall glass of tea, Mama Rosa's food, and the fact
that Matt was dead.  Life could be good sometimes, it really could.







February 23, 1995


Dear Kallie--

Well, Fox Mulder nearly got himself killed.  AGAIN.  

From the reports it looks as if the Visitors want him alive too.  

He's currently up in Alaska wondering if he'll ever get warm.  

I am going to have Ian Lucas drawn and quartered and then have the
naked parts of his remains hung from a flag pole to warn other
people about the dangers of disobeying orders.  

Ian Lucas has been feeding Fox information.  I am so pissed at him
that I nearly took him out.  I sent my fist plunging into a wall
instead and broke two fingers, so this letter will be short.  They
hurt.  The doctor was all smug and told me this would teach me a
lesson about keeping my temper.  

Okay, Ian Lucas has been feeding Fox info since a couple months
after Poppa died.  In fact, he's the one who nearly got my favorite
baliwick killed, so if I had killed Ian I would have gotten a
little disciplinary notice in my folder and maybe a week's
suspension.  Not something I need, but something I could live with.

I know what Ian's plan was.  Mulder, for all his many flaws, does
have the ability to make plenty of people uncomfortable.  So if you
were to say, feed Mulder the right sorts of information, he could
make plenty of lives. . .well, not as happy.  And Ian knew that
Mulder is to be kept alive, no matter what, so he didn't have to
worry about an arranged suicide or a nice accident involving a Mack
truck.

Mulder met one of the CoVisitors.  One like his sister.  In fact
she pretended to BE his sister.  He also met a visitor assassin,
which would be kind of cool.  I mean I've seen some dead bodies,
read the profiles on some hybrids we created, but nothing more
interesting than that.  

Okay, so Fox finds out that his "sister" is really an alien.  Finds
out that the assassin is a morphing alien. . .is this sounding like
really bad science fiction or what. . .but the alien is hotfooting
it back to his ship.  That's cool.  We've got the navy on his tail
to convince him to either leave or get his ass (or whatever they
have instead of asses) blown off.  

But then Lucas tells Fox where our happy little homicidal Visitor's
ship is (Alaska, under some ice).  And then tells him not to go
there.

Right.  I put a piece of candy in front of a three year old and
tell the three year old not to eat it.  Then I go into another
room.  Want to put odds on the candy being there when I get back? 
I don't know what Ian wants, exactly, though I can make some damn
good guesses.  At least Poppa leaked to Fox out of guilt for
shooting an alien in cold blood.  Ian's doing it to extend his
power base.  

Well, upshot is that Fox nearly got himself killed.  His partner
saved his butt and he'll be back to work in a couple more weeks.  

More when I have fingers.

I hate my life.



Marise.




     Anyone could see she was mad, from the guard stationed outside
the offices she worked in, to the little data entry soldiers in the
workroom, to her secretary.  Marise Engersol took her steps today
with an angry determination that predicted ill fortune to whomever
the recipient of her rage was going to be.  She slammed her door,
a heavy metal door, bullet proof even if the attacker had rhinos,
with such force that the frame actually shuddered for a moment. 
The sound echoed throughout the room and people looked up,
wondering what had happened, who was going to die.

     Marise sat fuming in her office chair, folders spread around
her.  It did not happen very often that Marise Engersol got mad,
but when she did, down in the pits of hell the devil shook. 
Finally she trusted herself enough to press the call button on her
phone.
     "Get Ian Lucas."  She told her secretary in a frozen steel
voice.  "Get him *now*."
     Lucas stepped nervously into the room.  "You've been feeding
Fox Mulder information."  Marise told the tall balding, fortyish
man.  "Why?"
     Lucas stared at the lithe figure who stood, back to him,
contemplating a row of leatherbound political works.  She wore a
brief skirt under the smooth lines of her jacket.  Almost too
brief: another half inch and her crotch would have been visible.
High heels today.  Two inch dark red numbers.     
     "I felt. . ." Lucas trailed uncomfortably.  "There were cases
where Fox Mulder was a valuable tool."
     Marise turned around, black hair swinging in a sheik smooth
bob.  Ian saw her that two of her fingers were in splints.  Rumour
had it that when Marise Engersol got really mad she took out things
like walls.
       Her lips, made elegant and sharp with slashes of vivid red
lipstick formed the words.  "Tool?"  She stared at Lucas.  "Tool
implies that you fed him information that would benefit your work."
     "Yes.  I. . ."He began.  Marise cut him off.
     "Your work is of no consquence. Not compared with Fox Mulder's
life.  Do you know exactly what Ultraviolet Able means?"
     "Ultraviolet is a classification assigned to private persons
who for various reasons are considered nessessary.  Their lives are
to be sustained using any and all resources available to the United
States Government."
     "Very good.  Now what is the Able?"
     "Able is an endorsement used to refer to the fact that the
person has been assigned high importance by Extraterrestrial forces
and is therefore to be closely monitered and watched, and to be
kept alive."
     "Very good. Who has the responsibility for Ultraviolets and
Ables and Ultraviolet Ables?"
     "Responsibility for the management of such persons is
distributed among those department personnel who are ranked above
the stated distribution and form.
     "Congratulations, you know the manual.  Fox Mulder is an
Ultrafuckingviolet shiteating Able and has been since he was
eight."  Marise stared hard at Lucas, who was growing pale with
this news.  "Care to guess what department person has
responsibility for maintaining Fox Mulder."
     Lucas swallowed nervously.  Shifted, tried to maintain a
dignified look.  
     "Cor-fucking-rect."  Marise turned her head aslant for a
moment, straightened it again.  "Let me lay out the recent scenario
concerning you and my favorite little Ultra A as I know it.  First,
you go and tell my deathwish on wheels where our little Predator
reject has his ship."
     "I warned him against going."
     "Yeah.  You expect him not to go.  Uh-huh."  Marise shook her
head.  "Can we say STUPID?"  She paced in front of her desk.  "Fox
Mulder was nearly killed.  If his partner hadn't found out and come
to his rescue he would be dead.  Dead.  As in doornail."
     Lucas swallowed, looked at the carpetting.  Yeah.  Stain
resistant.  He'd been afraid of that.
     "And when she tried to get you to tell her, you wouldn't.  It
took Assistant Director Skinner a good five minute fight with you
before he drug it out of you, during which time you threatened
Walter Skinner with a gun."  Marise threw up her hands.  "I don't
really think there is an arguable defense for any of your actions
Mr. Lucas.  I really don't."
     Lucas said nothing.
     "Now.  I know you're wondering if I'm going to kill you.  Uh-
uh.  Thought about it.  Thought very seriously about it.  Decided
against it.  I wouldn't have called you in here if that were the
case."  Marise shrugged.  "I'm going to hit the big three-oh in a
few years, I don't know, maybe I'm getting soft.  That'd be a
pisser, wouldn't it?  The perfect genetic expirament gets soft
after it hits thirty. 
     "I'm not going to do anything.  You just keep on feeding Fox
Mulder information.  Feed him information that won't get him
killed.  Feed him information that *will* keep him alive. 
     "If you pull any more shit like this, I will give you over to
MedOPs and I guarantee you won't like the last five months of your
life very damn fucking much.  Capesh?"
     "Understood."
     "Good.  Now get the hell out of my office before I change my
mind."






Feb 24

I'm letting Ian live.  And I'm going to let him keep on leaking to
Fox, which means that I can't tattle on the SOB.  But Mulder needs
some help because: A. Fox is going to try to find the truth.  B. 
Blue Berets use the manual I wrote.  If he doesn't have a pipeline
he's dead.  I hate this fucking place. I hate the life I was given
to.

Poppa knew what he was letting me into.  He knew what this world
was and yet he willingly, knowingly, introduced me.  Maybe that was
part of the appeal that helping Fox had for him; he sold me out the
same year Fox Mulder joined the FBI. But what did I ever do that it
was all right to have betrayed me?  Besides being born and not
dying I mean.  


Marise.





Hi Kallie.

March Reviews of all my personel files.  Had Kane do a full psych
eval of Fox, first I've done in two years--his having Scully
improved things so much that I kind of let it slide.  No big news. 
The meetings with his *wonderful* parents just *really* helped him
emotionally, but for whatever reason, he's back to square one in
some departments, which is two steps forward from where ever he was
when Poppa died.  

I got a file on his partner yesterday.  Big news there.  I just
xeroxed some things from Mulder's file.  There's nothing in her
life that isn't peripheral to Mulder's life.  Still, my
observations of her now have a seperate spot and my being a bitch
when someone tries to mess with her has a little more validity,
even if she doesn't have an ultraviolet rating like a certain Fox.

In other news, Justin Kale, a nice little file in Phoenix that
never gives me any problems, was abducted last week and returned
within four hours.  He has no memory of the event, still doesn't
believe in UFOS, even though he has scars on his arms.

I'm going to do a short edit of Chapter 12 of my info retrieval
manual to include a couple of new drugs the boys are going to be
using.  Mainly, at my request, they speeded up the processing of a
new wiper.  I really wasn't too concerned for a long time because
most of the time when we use a memory-loss drug we can keep the
patient at least overnight.  But that wonderful case where I had
calls on BOTH lines, one from security forces to authorize an
"intruder's" presence and one from Poppa asking me if I had
anything to do with a Fox Mulder and if so, Mulder's butt was in
deep shit out at Ellens, convinced me otherwise.  

I was running all over creation: keeping Dana Scully alive after
she pulled a gun on a low level operative; making sure that
everyone involved knew that if they were the one who screwed up
Mulder's brain or killed him that they would find their cahones
shoved up their anal passage.  And I couldn't authorize them
keeping him overnight, because it was hard enough keeping Dana
alive as it was.  I just wanted them to send him back and be done
with it, hope they stopped screwing around before I had to take
major steps.

So Mulder suffered major disorientation, and his memory wipe is not
complete because he has nightmares relating to the incident.

Forgive me if I want a better drug.

But this is becoming another "Mulder is pain in the butt, but he's
cute" letter.

I got a cat from the pound, a used-to-be-functioning-male, sweet
and orange, whom I named Keats.  I bring him to the office when I
feel like it.  After Poppa died and I went around growling evil
things for so long, I trained people not to fuck with me, so no one
says anything about bringing a cat into the Pentagon building.

Write when I can.

Marise.






Author's Note--I wrote the first letter in this thing back at
Christmas when I was going absolutely nuts with all the holiday
stuff.  (Husbands are so worthless when it comes to Christmas
shopping.  Mine can barely buy me my Christmas; I have to give him
a list.)  I wrote the rest in a rush.  When Crewcut man was killed
I just went back and added a couple of lines to the first letter.
The rest I wrote as the episodes came on.  Now if you've read Lia,
good.  You get it?  If not.  Go read Lia.