Work Text
Charlotte Edison turned her attention to the automated inbox for today’s alerts, the emails of the system notifying her of the various forms that had been completed since she looked yesterday, mostly leave requests or court duty summons, occasionally change of circumstances. It was so much easier nowadays, when she had first started at the bureau too many years ago then she cared to admit it had all been paper based and there would be a queue of agents and secretaries at her desk every morning with stacks of papers that she would duly process. Now with a click of a button it was all done all munched down into a system that spat out a weekly report for her to action as she needed. Back then she had been part of a team of 5 who had supported AD Skinner’s directorate, now it was just her and the computer. They didn’t even have filing cabinet’s anymore, the HR office relocated numerous times into smaller and smaller accommodations as the team shrank and the physical paperwork decreased.Charlotte processed the first few automations and then frowned as she hit a batch submitted by the same agent. Not unusual in the grand scheme of things, often agents would sit and process their personal admin in one batch but it was the name and agent number Dana Scully 2317-616, 6 alerts in total. That was never a good sign. The first one Charlotte clicked into was a Return to Work After Sickness form, dutifully filled out with the appropriate boxes checked and as it was from Dana Scully a detailed medical report in the other information free text field. Charlotte skimmed and gave a soft sigh of relief at the words MRI clear, no cancer detected. Paperwork for Cancer diagnosis was the worst. She remembered filling out the paperwork by hand with Dana Scully the first time around, it had been in the late 90s the first time she had ever had to complete it with someone. Worst of all Dana Scully was only 3 months older than her. By that point she had seen countless of completed paperwork from Agent Scully but it had been the first time she had ever met her, whoever she had been expecting it had not been a diminutive red headed woman with blues eyes that burnt like fire. Charlotte had cried in the toilets for 20 minutes after that meeting. Charlotte checked the coding on the computer filled form and approved it through the HR workflow, in a computer system somewhere HR and Health Insurance records joined up and a charge was agreed, incrementally increasing the FBI’s premium for next year. But thankfully there was no further action.The next form filed under Agent Scully’s ID was an Incidence of Violence Report, required when an agent encounters violence in their line of duty, they were becoming so standard these days as to be a formality, typically reports of threatening behaviour with a weapon, or a fist fight, unfortunately all par for the course in many agents’ day to day. Charlotte merely glanced at it the form before her eyebrows rose a fraction at the description of the violence categorised as Other – with the free text box reading ‘Attempted strangulation with an animal control pole’. As no reported injury was logged there was little Charlotte could do though it didn’t stop her wondering what on earth Agent Scully had been doing to get in to that situation. It had been like that on many of the hand written forms. Incidences categorised as Other with hand written descriptions which while provided the detail provided none of the context and frequently left her and her superiors scratching their heads over how to make these outliers fit into bureau metrics. In the end they had given up.The third alert was a change of address notification, which required actioning in the sense of checking the new address had been appropriately recorded. The system did on occasion dislike addresses especially if they were new builds. However, there was no issue with the address from this perspective. There was an issue in the sense that the address now matched that of another agent and had flagged the system to request investigation. Charlotte didn’t need to look at the other agent’s name to know that it would be Fox Mulder 2219-526 and she approved the address. She knew without looking that the fourth alert would be Agent Scully filling in the relationship form without request. Agent Scully was nothing if not thorough and Charlotte had received such a form on several occasions from her. Curiously she opened the fourth alert to read the very simple sentence, “Agent Mulder and I have reestablished our relationship please see file reference (2317-616-473-D & 2219-526 -485-C)” Charlotte was impressed that the agent could remember the case notifications from events 20 years ago though not wholly surprised.She wondered briefly if she should instigate a pool again, she’d done quite well in the various pools that had run on the topic of Agents Mulder and Scully, she’d nearly won on the baby pool seventeen years ago being only 2 ounces under on the birth weight but it had been the syndicate of former Deputy Director Kersh’s secretaries who had won the nearly $500 prize when they guessed the birth date, gender and weight right. She brushed the notion aside and assigned the ticket to no further action. One could only hope to have a relationship like theirs, or maybe not considering all the ups and downs they had been through.The fifth alert was another Incidence of Violence report this one also categorised as Other with the description as ‘Pushed down a trash chute, 3 story fall, no injury due to trash beneath (tetanus vaccination currently up to date so no further action required)’ Charlotte shook her head in bemusement.The sixth alert confused her, a Mat1-A or more to the point a Mat1-A help alert. Mat1-A was the form that pregnant agents had to complete to alert the bureau of their pregnancy so they could receive maternity health benefits. She clicked into the alert expecting to find that Agent Scully had filled in the incorrect form and had instead been trying to complete the menopause notification alert so she could access hormone replacement treatment, something which Charlotte herself was using. She blinked in surprise as she read the free text in the help request form. ‘Unable to complete form as date range on mother’s date of birth stops at 1968’.Charlotte frowned and quickly accessed Agent Scully’s file noting her date of birth was the same as her own 1964 making her 54 as she was. She quickly opened the Mat1-A form and confirmed that the date of birth range did in fact stop in 1968, someone evidently making the decision that 50 years old was a sensible age to stop a maternity benefit form. Charlotte lifted her receiver and called the form owner in IT who after a moment’s confusion updated the default to 65 years old along with confirmation that they would update all the Maternity forms to have a similar default. She ended the call and then dialled the number she had on file for Agent Scully.“Scully,” a brusque voice sounded down the phone.“Agent Scully, it’s Charlotte Edison the HR Business Partner for Agent Skinner’s division. A courtesy call to let you know that the date range on the form that you were having issues with has been updated.”There was a long pause at the end of the line before a very soft. “Thank you.”“I’ve asked them to update all the other forms in that group so you shouldn’t have further problems but if you get any issues do reach out and I will work to rectify them.”“Thank you.”“So go ahead and submit and I will get the ball rolling on that process for you.”“I appreciate that.”Just as she felt Agent Scully was about to end the call Charlotte spoke once more. “And Agent Scully? Congratulations!” She could hear the smile coming down the line. “You have a good day now and please, no more going down trash chutes.”A snort of laughter. “Thank you. I will absolutely do my best on that front.”