I love your thoughts on the cancer arc and your second post reminded me that Mulder straight up murders the guy who was surveilling him. Now it's been a minute but were there ever any consequences for that? Like officially or otherwise? Like on his soul? Or was it just a case of ooooh it's Blevins and the FBI was so embarrassed that they just gave him a lil freebie?
oh i love this question. i think he got a freebie 🤣 like blevins oversaw the x files for a while, he had a decent amount of power within the fbi. to out a man in blevins' position and being right is actually pretty insane. it was illegal surveillance, scully was dying because of what blevins did/was part of. like they were investigating her cancer, an approved investigation. whether there was any real proof tying blevins to it barely matters because he ran (and then was killed, made to look like a suicide?) all the marks of a guilty man, even though i'm sure he was a small player, most likely a pawn, the perfect fall man. in the end, even though mulder killed a man and broke into a government facility...this time he was right and kind of saved the fbi's asses. (and arguably, possibly helped cover up the bigger conspiracy for the moment. but what mattered then was scully so.) AND if they tried, mulder+scully would have dug up more, and bringing that to the fbi's attention, into a court of law would have been very bad. so like other times, i'm sure csm was pulling some strings. and skinner 100% would have been backing them (even without csm pulling his strings).
i also don't think this was a kill that weighed on his conscience at all. the man he killed, while also probably a pawn, had to know enough about the syndicate. he was part of the conspiracy, undergoing illegal surveillance, at the least keeping tabs on their progress and at worst helping hinder it. which is why he started burning the files when he realized mulder found him out. he didn't simply run, he was protecting his investigation and the men behind it.
it always comes down to how mulder will do anything for scully, and that very much includes killing people endangering her, hurting her, trying to kill her. like in unruhe, he wanted to know more about gerry schnauzer but he didn't hesitate to kill him and he didn't feel any guilt over it. (mulder would do this for anyone being victimized, he regrets not killing the man in young at heart idr his name rn lol and he doesn't hesitate to shoot him when he's holding that woman hostage. but scully is of personal priority, and after everything she's been through, i think he's quicker to react & go to extremes.) like somewhere recently, i mentioned fight the future, which is only a year after this. he gets shot in the head and finds his way to antarctica to save her. he doesn't for a moment question if he can, or should, or what scully would do for him. he just does it. and thankfully, well manicured man hands him the cure. (WHICH i love that wmm does this, because the syndicate knows the best way to take mulder is out is by eliminating scully. but what they did doesn't eliminate her. wmm recognizes this is only going to hurt them. very much like what could have happened in reduxes. antarctica is what solidified that killing either of them, or splitting them up, was not an option. at least that's the way i see it haha)
