Krycek's Game

The Wulfskeller. Scully knew the bar well. It was a popular place for impromptu college reunions and on more than one night she'd met friends from Johns Hopkins there to engage in the establishment's specialty: rare and unique beers from around the world. Scully wasn't much of a beer drinker, but somehow sipping an over-priced amber from the Czech Republic or some such place made it seem more elegant. As Scully surveyed the bar now, she couldn't help but feel a bit of remorse. How long had it been since her last drunken evening? How many friends had she lost touch with since joining the X-Files?

Scully winced. Lost friends. Wasn't that what brought her here tonight? Mulder had been missing for over five days now, having seemingly disappeared without a trace. No alien abduction. No signs of kidnapping. Just gone. Scully had driven herself mad trying to find some clue, some lead to follow. But in the end, there'd been none.

Until an hour ago. She'd just returned home from work when she got the call: be at the Wulfskeller in one hour. Come unarmed. Leave your cell phone at home. Call no one or the meeting will be aborted.

"Come alone and I'll tell you where Mulder is."

It had been her final instruction, conveyed via a digital voice scrambler.

The Wulfskeller was only ten minutes from Scully's apartment in Georgetown, which left her half an hour to agonize over the decision. Call Skinner? Or the Lone Gunmen? She would need some kind of back up, wouldn't she? No, she couldn't risk it, she decided.

A dozen half-baked ideas floated through her mind next. Could she conceal a tape recorder? Maybe hide a small weapon somewhere on her body. She cursed herself for never having procured a small-caliber Beretta like Mulder.

In the end, she resigned herself to do exactly as instructed. She needed Mulder back. What else could she do?

The Wulfskeller was located beneath a posh hotel, just off Dupont Circle. It would be fairly crowded at this time of night and Scully didn't particularly fear for her own safety. Still, under the circumstances, she felt more than uneasy as she sat down at the main bar. Immediately, she slipped a pack of sealed playing cards out of her coat pocket. She'd been instructed to purchase them in the hotel gift shop first, then to set them on the bar, presumably, Scully reasoned, as some sort of sign to her contact. She had tried to read into the significance of this act. Did that mean that whomever she was to meet had never seen her?

She ordered the first beer that came to mind. She wasn't planning on drinking it. She just didn't want to look conspicuous.

A tap on her shoulder startled her. How the hell had she let someone sneak up on her? Turning around, she saw a young blonde woman, maybe twenty-two or twenty-three at most, Scully decided. She wore a loose apron over jeans and a black t-shirt. It took Scully a second to understand: the woman worked here.

"Are you Ms. Scully?" she said pleasantly enough.

A little unsure, Scully nodded. "Yes."

The waitress smiled innocently. "He's waiting for you in a private room in the back. If you'll follow me?"

Scully rose to leave when the waitress raised a hand. "He said you should bring the cards."

A little uncertain, Scully picked up the deck and began weaving through the labyrinth of tables and brick columns that ran the length of the establishment. The Wulfskeller was narrow, with only room for two rows of tables across, but stretched back nearly half a city block.

When they'd finally reached the back, the waitress stood to one side, motioning Scully through a simple dark wooden door. Eyeing her uncertainly, Scully put a hand on the door knob. The young woman smiled back. "Go on in, I'll bring your beer back."

Scully twisted the door and stepped inside. The walls were brick like the rest of the bar. A pool table was set off to the right. To the left was a large booth, decked out in green velvet benches. Comfortably sipping a Scotch, sat Alex Krycek.

The door close behind her. Scully let her hatred fume. She wondered if Krycek knew how lucky he was that she'd decided against bringing a weapon. Crossing her arms, she stared death at him. And waited.

Krycek smiled the rat's smile. "Good evening, Agent Scully."

Scully glowered. Barely audible, she whispered, "Krycek, what the fuck do you want?" It was the nicest thing she could think to say.

"Want? Why I don't want anything." He paused to take a drag of the Scotch and Scully sensed he might be a little drunk. "If anything, I believe it's you who are in need."

Scully closed her eyes, willing herself under control. She let out a deep breath. A slight smile crossed her face as something occurred to her: he's been taking diction lessons from the Smoking Man.

Letting out another slow breath, she asked bluntly, "Where's Mulder?" Her tone was a notch gentler than her opening comment.

"The Syndicate's taken him. Well, what's left of the Syndicate has."

Scully looked up wide-eyed. She hadn't expected a straight answer. Still caution got the better of her. "Why? Why take him now?"

Krycek took another draw from his Scotch and shook his head. "What's left of the conspiracy is cleaning up after itself. Our smoking friend has been eliminated. Without his protection, Mulder was a natural target. They're holding him for now, to see how much he knows. But soon, well..." Krycek drained the last of the Scotch, grimacing as he did.

Scully felt something well up inside her: a sad sensation that accompanied her instincts that Krycek was telling the truth. She swallowed hard. "But you know where he is?"

Krycek nodded absently, meditating on the bottom of his glass. "And I'm going to tell you." He paused. "In time."

Scully planted herself firmly in front of the booth. Breathing steadily she tried to put on the most even handed voice she could. "Krycek, I know you have no love for the Syndicate. Tell me where Mulder is and I let you walk out that door. No questions asked. You were never here."

The rat's smile flashed again. "Of course I was never here. But I don't need your consent for that."

Instinctively Scully reached for her phone. She would have every federal officer and DC patrolman here in seconds. Belatedly, it hit her: *leave your cell phone at home* the voice had said.

Krycek tried to refrain from outright laughter. "I can be two states away before you even make it to the pay phone."

Scully let her hands drop to her sides loosely. No weapon. No phone. For a second she contemplated whether she could beat the information out of Krycek. No, she decided, even with one arm he was still far too dangerous.

Again willing herself under control, Scully flexed her fists open and shut. "Okay, Krycek, when do I get the information?"

"Did you bring the cards?"

"Yes..." Utterly confused, Scully produced them from her coat pocket.

The rat smile reached full bloom. "Excellent. We're going to play for it."

Krycek was standing by the pool table now, lazily bouncing a cue ball off the bumpers. Scully had been silent for minutes, still letting the proposition sink in. She held a cell phone now, albeit one with the battery pack removed. It wasn't hers, but she knew it well enough that it might have been. As soon as Krycek had pulled the device from his pocket she recognized it as Mulder's. Not just on the basis of the brand. No, this was more than simply the right make and model. Every minute scratch was the same as her partner's phone. The worn spot where he gripped it. The smudges on the numbers. Something so cold and inanimate, yet she knew undeniably that it was his. Whatever else he might be up to, she no longer doubted that Krycek knew where Mulder was. And increasingly she feared, there might be no way to get him back other than to play Krycek's twisted little game.

Finally, she turned towards him. "You're a sick fuck." Distantly she realized the remark had the sound of a concession, rather than an affront.

As a smirk crossed his face, Krycek tossed the cue ball into the air with his good hand. "Yes, I am. And more. But I'm the sick fuck who has the information you need. And," he turned to meet her gaze, "I'm offering it at a fairly low premium when you think about it."

Scully put her hands on her hips and stared intently at the floor. There had to be some other way.

"C'mon, Scully, before medical school weren't you a mathematics major? Or was it physics? Either way, you must know about probability. The odds would be more than in your favor."

Scully bit her lip. It had been physics but she saw no need to further enlighten Krycek about her past. Silently, she reviewed his proposition, vulgar as it was. Krycek had said he wanted four challenges or bets. They would cut the cards once per challenge. If Scully drew the high card at any time, he would give her Mulder's whereabouts immediately and the competition would end then and there. If Scully lost, she had to carry out the challenge and draw on the next one. Krycek had made no pretense of the fact that the payoffs would be of an extremely personal nature.

Fingering the sealed deck, she wondered if this was all a set up. Could Krycek somehow have planted a trick deck on her? It seemed unlikely. She'd selected the pack at random from more than two dozen on display in the gift store. Could he have somehow replaced them all? Even if he did, what advantage could be gained from something like a marked deck? This wasn't poker, just a straight high-low card draw.

And the odds *were* in her favor. Krycek's little game would end as soon as she won a single draw. She would have a fifty-fifty chance in each draw. That meant there was a one in two chance that she would have to perform the first challenge, but only a one in four chance that she would also have to undertake the second pay-off. Thereafter the odds got even better: Only one in eight that she would have to go through on the third challenge as well and one in sixteen that she would have to undertake all four pay-offs.

Scully exhaled her resignation. "Why?"

Krycek looked at the far wall distantly. Scully actually thought his eyes might be misting. After a fashion, he shook his head. "No reason really, Dana." He looked up at Scully. "May I call you Dana?"

A vicious scowl answered him.

He chuckled softly.

"No reason, Scully. Other than that's there's not much else left to do. The conspiracy's gone. The Syndicate's feeding on itself. And humanity...well, humanity's had its day."

He paused and Scully again had the unsettling feeling that Krycek was telling her the truth, ugly as it was.

"There's really nothing left for me Scully other than to indulge in earthly pleasures." He turned the rat smile full on her and it sent a shiver down Scully's spine. "And for me, pleasure involves dominating. Do you know the thrill of knowing what it's like to own another human being utterly and completely?"

Scully hardened her gaze. Dismissing the question, she moved on to one of her own. "Why me?"

Now Krycek laughed out loud. "Do you really need to ask that?"

Anger finally boiled over in Scully. "Yes I do! What is it about me that makes you want to play this sick little game?" Krycek paused mid-laugh, suddenly surprised. Could it be that she really didn't know? "Scully, you were the pin-up girl of the Syndicate."

Dana took a step back, letting the information sink in.

Krycek explained. "Hell, this isn't exactly a field rife with intelligent, young beauties who actually are open to the possibility of extraterrestrial life. Half the Syndicate seriously thought about cloning you for harem girls. In the end, Smokie had to hire a digital artist to generate pornographic pictures of you, just to satiate the old perverts. He was afraid if they didn't get some satisfaction, they'd take you away from Mulder for good." Krycek stared intensely at Scully. "Dana, your calendar was my Christmas bonus for the last three years."

Scully felt something sickening in the pit of her stomach. Dear God, were there really men out there who had nothing better to do with their time than manufacture fake nude photos of her?

An awkward silence hung between them.

Finally, Scully asked the question she'd most feared, in part because of what Krycek might answer, but more because she realized that asking it was one step closer to playing his game. "What are the specifics of the challenges?"

Krycek grinned. At last, he was getting somewhere.

"I said I wanted to own you."

Quietly Scully responded, "You did."

"The first pay off is fairly simple. You lose, I get your clothes. All of them."

Scully felt her cheeks flush. She'd expected something like that for starters, possibly even worse. Still, hearing it out loud only heightened her rage.

She bit back her anger, not wanting to give Krycek the satisfaction. "And then?"

Krycek moved to the side of the pool table and pulled up a leather sack. Matter-of-factly he dumped the contents out onto the green felt. Scully's eyes widened. She saw a large dog collar. And a leash.

Krycek picked up the dog collar and examined it thoughtfully. "Challenges two and three will involve humiliation. First, private, for my enjoyment." He locked eyes with Scully. "You have to put this on, get down on all fours, and bark for me."

Scully bit her lip, almost too angry to talk. She knew Krycek was twisted, but this...

"The third challenge involves public humiliation." He held up the leash now. "I take you for a short walk through the bar outside."

Scully uttered a simple word. "Why?"

Krycek looked at the implements thoughtfully. "Because collaring and leashing you are ways I can feel ownership," he said matter-of-factly. "Almost as much as I'll feel if you lose the last challenge as well."

"Which is?" Scully forced the words out of her mouth, rethinking her plan about beating the information out of him.

"Lastly," Krycek said nonchalantly, "I want to do what your partner should have done long ago."

A volcano seethed behind Scully's eyes. Her voice measured, she asked, "And *that* would be?"

Krycek stared straight at her, "Why fuck that magnificent ass of yours, of course."

Involuntarily, Scully took a violent step towards him. For a second, fear might have actually flashed in Krycek's eyes. Scully held his gaze and slowly mouthed the words, "You son of a bitch."

Krycek smiled a mock apology. "I'm sorry Scully, were my answers too straight forward for you? Hmmm, maybe you'd prefer if I hid my true desires and talked abstractly around them so that neither of us knows what the hell I want? Would that be better?" He watched the anger build in her eyes. Then he pulled the trigger: "Or at least more like what you're used to?"

"You're an evil bastard." Scully spit the words at him.

Krycek chuckled coldly. "I may be an SOB and a bastard." He let his eyes run up and down Scully's body. "But you're a piece of ass."

He let the words hang in the air as she fumed.

Then he continued, "You're also running out of time. And so is Mulder. What's your answer?"

Taking a penultimate deep breath, Scully looked at the now useless phone in her hand. Mulder's phone. Then she threw the deck down on the pool table. "I get to shuffle."

And shuffled she did. For almost ten full minutes, to Krycek's amusement. Finally, when she was content that there could be no discernable order to the cards, she set them down apprehensively on the pool table.

Krycek hadn't hesitated. He reached out immediately, cut the deck midway and turned up a card. A Queen. He placed it down silently next to the deck, waiting for Scully to make her selection.

Scully calmed her nerves. She was prepared to lose one or even two challenges if necessary. She would do what she had to if it meant finding Mulder. She took a deep breath and reached for the deck. How bad could it be to be naked in front of Krycek? She looked down. The ten of diamonds. She was about to find out.

"Would you like some music, Dana?"

Scully closed her eyes, doing her best to ignore Krycek's taunting. She tried to focus on the sensation in her hands, the feel of her clothes as she removed them. Just pretend you're at the doctor's office, she told herself. Ignore him, ignore him, ignore --

Krycek's stream of low whistling made her commands to herself impossible to follow. Scully had her sweater and jeans off now and Krycek was not being shy in his approval. A second later she had removed her bra and panty set. Defying all logic, Dana Scully found herself nude in the backroom of a bar with Alex Krycek.

He clapped sarcastically. "I'm impressed Dana. Most girls don't wax this late into the season."

Scully felt her cheeks flush once more. In anger she acted rashly: she reached out and drew a card, moving immediately on to the next challenge. Scully gulped. A seven.

Silently, she prayed as Krycek dallied by the table, showing no signs of being in any hurry to select a card. Finally, he did. He flipped it across to her. An eight.

Shit. Scully's shoulder's sank.

It was then that the door opened. The waitress who had first led her to the back walked in carrying Scully's long-forgotten beer. Instinctively Scully covered her face with one hand and tried to contain her breasts with the other. Good, Scully berated herself, so that way they only have your bush to stare at.

The young woman stopped in her tracks clearly amused. "Whoa! Didn't realize this party was *that* private." She set the beer on the sideboard and made a hasty exit, already giggling to one of her compatriots.

Scully closed her eyes. Could this get any worse? She opened them to see Krycek approaching her with the dog collar. The answer, apparently, was yes.

Inclining her chin upwards, she let him fix the collar around her neck. It hung loose as she brought her eyes down to meet his gaze. She saw pure rat smile.

"Dana, I believe you owe me a few barks."

Almost as if watching another person, Scully sank to her knees. Then gingerly she leaned forward onto her hands. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Krycek reposition himself behind her, clearly not wanting to miss any angle.

Setting her chin straight ahead, Scully cleared her throat. Trying to sound as dispassionate as possible, she simply said, "Ruff. Ruff. Ruff."

Krycek exploded into a chorus of hearty laughter.

The next hand wasn't even close. Scully's head swam as she saw the four of clubs come up in her palm. Krycek easily beat it with a nine. She'd stood stock still then, uncertain what to do. Krycek had actually been fairly gentle. He'd gingerly picked up the leash and quietly fastened it to Scully's collar. He could read the terror in her face. He stroked her cheek.

"Don't be afraid," he whispered. "How bad can it be?"

Then slowly he began walking towards the door, letting the leash drift over his shoulder. When the slack drew taut, Scully started following behind him.

What happened next surpassed the surreal. Scully felt her heart tighten then leap as Krycek opened the door. Fear, exhilaration, and humiliation all jumbled together. How strange the air felt on her body as she moved nude through this public place.

She started out the door with short baby steps, Krycek slowing slightly to let her ease out at her own pace. Then she'd taken two, maybe three strides before anyone had noticed. That was perhaps the strangest feeling of all, those first few seconds when the crowd was still occupied with their conversation and their beer.

It had been a young woman who had spotted her first. She let out a loud cat-call and a "whoo-hoo." The girl was the female equivalent of a drunken frat boy and clearly wanted to make sure no one in the house missed this rare treat.

From that point on, there had been all manner of reactions ranging from blushed faces to lewd hooting. The worst part was seeing the look in the faces of people in advance. Scully tried not to meet anyone's gaze but she couldn't help it. She locked eyes with one woman, perhaps her own age, dressed in a smart business suit. She saw her look of curiosity and amusement from a distance. Then Scully had to endure her deep gaze up and down her body as Krycek led her slowly down the aisle past her.

At one point Scully's heart nearly stopped: did that man in the corner have a camcorder?

Scully's ears were assaulted as well. People commented freely on her body from just a few feet away. She heard everything from "great ass" to "buy a Stairmaster." There were plenty of "nice's" too: nice butt, nice tits, nice knobs, nice bush, etc. And, of course, more than one, "All right, the carpet matches the curtains."

When they reached the midway point, Krycek mercifully turned around and began leading her back to their private room. Then, just as Scully thought she could endure no more, an overweight, middle-aged man reached out and swatted her hard on the ass, forcing her to yelp and skip forward. The act drew a bawdy round of laughter from the crowd.

Scully closed her eyes, trying to make herself disappear. Then she was just steps away. Krycek tugged Scully back into the private room with a hard jerk of the leash that sent her stumbling through the doorway. Behind her the patrons rose to a standing ovation.

Beyond dejection, Scully leaned against the pool table, no longer caring that her breasts were hanging plainly in view. After what she'd just experienced, private humiliation was almost welcome. She still wore the collar and the leash hung loosely down her back for the moment, though, Krycek had made it abundantly clear that it would see more use if Scully lost the final draw.

She buried her face in one hand. What the hell had she been thinking?

*You were thinking about getting your best friend back,* a voice inside her answered.

*You were thinking about getting back the man who never gave up on you when you disappeared. The man who freely risked his life plowing through the Antarctic waste to find you, to save you. So some drunken strangers saw you naked. Big deal. So this pig of a Krycek has something to masturbate about tonight. Big deal. You can still win. Beat him.*

Scully stared at Mulder's phone lying on the green felt. Then she stared at the deck which had now mocked her three times.

She set her jaw. Points to the internal monologue for the pep talk, she thought.

"Draw, Krycek."

Her comment startled Alex out of his leer. Scully might have grown tired of covering up, but her adversary clearly had not lost interest in gawking.

He smiled menacingly. "Are you sure Scully? You could always walk away. You get your clothes back. No hard feelings." His grinned broadened, clearly proud of his attempt at a pun.

Scully set her posture in stone. "I came for Mulder. I'm not leaving without your information."

Much to her chagrin, her defiance only seemed to feed Krycek. Calmly he reached down and drew a card. Smugly he showed it to her. A jack.

"Dana, do you prefer Vaseline or KY?"

Scully closed her eyes. Please God, she thought. She drew a card and held it face down, almost unable to look at it. Reluctantly, she brought it up to her face.

Oh Christ, she thought! It's an eight. Scully felt her body go numb as the realization set in.

Then the impossible happened. Mulder's useless phone began ringing. It *must* be ringing she thought. Something is.

She looked up at Krycek and he smiled sadly. "Shit," he said, "just when it was about to get good."

Then he and the rest of the room faded away.

Scully snapped awake, her heart thumping. It took a few seconds for it to hit her: A dream! Thank God! None of it had happened! And Mulder was back! More accurately he had never gone. She felt endorphins of relief rush through her body.

Dimly she became aware of the fact that the ringing was continuing. Frantically she scrambled to the phone, realizing only then that she had stripped her pajamas off in her sleep.

She managed an awkward, "Hello."

"Scully?"

Her heart leapt. "Mulder!"

On the other end, her partner hesitated. "Everything okay?"

She tried to sound composed. "Yes, um, fine Mulder."

"Did I wake you?"

Scully looked around for a clock, "Yeah, I guess you did. What time is it?"

"Scully, it's almost noon."

Scully thought for a moment. She must have slept for nearly fifteen hours.

Unsure, Mulder continued. "Anyway, Scully I wanted to let you know they found Raglan. He's dead. He was fatally wounded by a Tennessee state trooper while trying to run a roadblock outside of Memphis." Scully sighed. Even though the man had nearly killed her, Scully had hoped he could be taken alive, if only to clear up some of the mystery surrounding Virginia Penn's death.

"Are you okay Scully?"

Somewhere a voice inside her said, "No, Mulder. I'm not. Come over and take care of me. Please." But that voice remained silent.

"I'm fine. Just still feeling the side effects of the anti-serum," she said into the receiver. Mulder paused on the other end. "Okay, well, I'll let you rest and check in with you tomorrow."

"Thanks Mulder." Scully hung up the phone. Looking around she realized that her bed clothes were also strewn across the room along with her pajamas. A sudden thought occurred to her and she glanced down nervously. Relieved, she thought: at least my nipples aren't green this time.

Scully let her head sink into her hands. This type of dream had become a nightly occurrence over the past week. Each time it was a different man from her past dominating and humiliating her in some way.

Last night it had been, Robert Modell, "the Pusher." She'd imagined going in to a hostage situation to negotiate with him only to have him send her back out to her colleagues nude, save for heels. She swallowed. And a fox tail.

Another night she'd been a French maid at a dinner party hosted by AD Kersh. She'd spilled the cocktail weenies and he'd stripped her in front of half her academy class.

Fantasies and erotic dreams were one thing, but Scully sensed that things were getting out of control. Each morning was the same: a heart-pounding awakening from the most humiliating situations imaginable.

For a moment she thought about making an appointment with Karen Kosseff, the Bureau social worker she sometimes saw for counseling. Scully felt a flash of guilt. Could she bring herself to discuss such things with a therapist at her work? She shook her head. No. *You are too uptight for your own good, Dana.*

Pausing for a moment, Scully made a decision. She reached into her night table and drew out a thick black business card.

*Are you sure about this?* she asked herself.

Picking up the phone, Dana decided that she wasn't. But she also knew she had to do something.

A polite voice answered on the other end.

Scully hesitated for a moment, then said. "Yes, this is Dana Scully. I'd like to speak with Lydia Carnivale."