The Alex Mystique

The shard of glass was jagged. It jutted toward the sky as if trying to pierce it, to cut away the boundary between heaven and earth. Or maybe slice off a piece of hell. So thought the lanky figure who stared into the broken mirror. He was handsome; the distorted reflection of the shattered glass could not hide his good looks. His hair was long and hung over the collar of his white T-shirt. His skin was pale and his face looked even younger than his twenty-two years. There was softness to him, gentleness, and an almost seductive quality. His face was more than handsome, it was pretty; and the way he cocked his head slightly, exposing his alabaster neck, displayed a vulnerability that most men would be afraid to reveal. But he was not feminine. In his eyes something definitely masculine burned. More than masculine even. Something dangerous.

Alex Krycek peered closely at his image in the mirror. He looked so different than he had a year and a half ago when he'd arrived in New York. The chubbiness was completely gone. The last few weeks of near starvation had taken away the last of it. His eyes were more penetrating; his cheeks hollow and slightly sunken like a fashion models. The easygoing strut that had looked clumsy when he was a kid at college had taken on sleekness. He looked graceful now.

Krycek ran his fingers over the sharp edge of the glass. He hadn't eaten a decent meal in over a week. For a while it had bothered him, but this past day had been easiest of all. Since the can of beans he had eaten noon yesterday, nothing but water had entered his system. Well, of course, there was the acid. For an instant he wondered if there was any nutritional value to acid. Since nutrients gave one energy and helped the body function correctly and acid enabled him to feel he could do the same things by using mind over matter, perhaps qualified. His mind easily made the jump in logic and he knew that if he wanted to he could explore this concept and all its ramifications for hours. He looked at the finger he had been rubbing over the sharp glass. It was bleeding. Good. The acid was kicking in.

But tonight was not for exploring the mundane until it became magnificent. Nor was this the night to dissect details. It was not like the time he had observed how the melting drops of wax from his candle solidified themselves to the coffee can next to his sleeping bag. Eventually they had become not a minute detail of the burning candle, but the dominant theme, the very purpose of the candle's existence. Before that night had ended he had even been able to hear the drops bond with the aluminum of the coffee can. Feel the alloys of the metal break down to the point where they fused slightly with the wax. But not tonight. Tonight was for something special. He had saved the lion's share of the acid for this night and already he knew that it was not going to be wasted.

The sun was dropping. Soon it would be time. From his position on the rooftop he could watch the sun descend into the water. Fire melting into the sea. That was how he thought of it. Alex liked the water, but it was the sun that fascinated him. Actually, more than that, it was the disappearance of the sun. Watching something so bright and so powerful vanish without a trace excited him. It was the onset of the night, the rising of the moon and the appearance of the stars that spoke to his inner being.

Outwardly it appeared that he was failing miserably at life. Here he was living on the roof of an abandoned office building in New York. Having graduated from college a month ago, he thought so little of his degree that he hadn't even bothered to pick it up. School was a thousand miles away; here was where the real issues of his life would be determined. He knew that now. The roof was barren except for his little corner near the chimney. There he had a sleeping bag, an orange crate housing a few books covered with a towel to keep out the moisture, the coffee can and the candle. But those things weren't what mattered. Next to them, lying open on the cement floor, was something more valuable than anything in the finest house in Beverly Hills. A tattered black scholastic notebook filled with his poetry. He had been writing poetry for most of his life and he felt that his words were powerful.

He stared out at the descending sun and his gaze dropped to the collage of t.v. antennas on the houses below. Words poured into his mind. It had been like that for the past few days; that's how he knew he was getting closer. It had something to do with the isolation, he knew that for sure. He was in a different world up on the roof. Just him and his mind. Sometimes, late at night, when he heard sounds in the abandoned building below, he liked to imagine they were spirits. Restless souls who had crossed over to the other side too soon, without saying what they had to say. And lately he had been hearing sounds on the roof itself, late at night when it was pitch-black. Darker than dark. It was above the streetlights and the reflections of the city below. It was really midnight here.

For a brief instant a slight stab of hunger hit his stomach, but he concentrated and drove it out. He knew that the lack of food was having an effect on him. He'd read about Indian braves using food and sleep deprivation to put themselves in a trance state and he knew it was an important key for many shamans. And though he'd intentionally kept himself awake all through the night before, Alex Krycek was not the least bit tired this night. He was too excited to be tired. This was the night he'd been waiting for. He might not learn the answer as to why he was so different from everyone else, but he would surely learn to stop asking the question.

A chill rose up as soon as the darkness came. But it soon passed and with it went the last semblance of what most people would call reality. The normal physical sensations of life, heat, cold, hunger, thirst, pain and pleasure vanished into the night, replaced by sensations purely mental. In his mind he could hear the rhythmic drumming now. A steady throbbing, hypnotic in its rhythm, compelling in its relentlessness. Alex honed in on it like following a beacon guiding him to the netherworld of the shaman. He tried to open himself to it; he wanted to absorb it, to inhale it if possible. He would not draw back this time. This time he was ready.

Soon there came a soft haze near the edge of the roof, an eerie sort of glow. It seemed to pulsate ever so slightly with the rhythm of a drum. It seemed to draw him. Further and further in. Alex Krycek stared hard at the glow, not to determine if it was real, but to see inside it because he was convinced that was were the truth he had been seeking lived. He felt a slight quiver, a small hesitation, which reminded him for the last time that once he crossed into this world he might never be able to return. But there was no real doubt for Alex. He had long ago determined that this is where he was meant to be. He did not want the inner peace that so many of his generation were seeking. He wanted something more, and this was the only way he knew how to get it. He focused on the glow, throwing himself into it, not caring what the consequences were, only caring that he did it completely.