|
Chapter 1 I have been one acquainted with the night. Acquainted with the night - by Robert Frost "What's the date?" Alex Krycek asked the man next to him on the park bench. "What am I," The man replied, "A fuckin' calendar?" Krycek rolled his eyes, if a park bench bum didn't see him as a threat; his life was over for sure. He wanted to sit up, hiss the words again and make the bum turn white, but he didn't have the energy and remained slumped against the bench rails. The bum gave him a `what a loser' look and stalked off, only swaying a little bit from last night's bottle of cheap wine. Krycek fought a battle with himself so he would not lie down on the bench and stay until he died or a cop rousted him and made him move. He had no worries that any cop would recognize him, he was hardly himself these days; dirty t-shirt, ripped leather jacket, mud caked boots and a weirdly tufted beard. Once, he had hated his sparse, uneven bead. It had bothered him that he did not have full-faced dark stubble to add to his disreputable and menacing exterior. Now, he shrugged and tried to remain upright. It was a bright day; the sun shone down between the fresh spring leaves on the trees, the ground was covered with Bradford-Pear and crab-apple petals. A few feet away another tree's roots were buried in Dogwood petals. The whole scene was like something out of a fairy tale or a romance novel; Paris in Springtime, only it was DC. Office workers sat in patches of sunlight eating lunch, several pretty women were giggling and eating from cups of yogurt, their winter black left at home and spring dresses in pastel prints taking their place. Spring in Washington DC, Krycek sighed. Once upon a time he had walked the spring streets in a clean if very conservative suit, with clean socks, underwear and plenty of money in his pocket for lunch anywhere he wanted. Of course, once upon a time these same office workers had been imperiled by an alien threat, which they knew nothing about although it had been real. There were only a very few people in Washington DC who could look at the appealing day and think the same thoughts. Krycek thought about only one of these men. He thought about him a great deal as his descent into a homeless, crippled bum had happened. True, Spender and the rest of the cabal were gone, but their dark deeds lived on and Krycek was a recipient of some of their final spite. His personal information, including his DNA and a manufactured criminal record had been released to the ears and eyes that would remain on the scene if the debacle of an invasion failed. He'd used what was left of his cash and whatever he could steal and sell, trying to find a city or a country, anywhere, in which he could begin again, but the smear campaign had been very thorough and no one employed him for long, whether they were legal or illegal enterprises. He'd had money secreted away too, but someone, unconvinced that he was dead after his body disappeared from the garage, had notified the international bankers too, and he had not been able to make withdrawals without giving away his location or the make it a fact that he was alive. In the end, and this `was' the end, he made it back to DC and the city where it all began a decade ago. About to shake his head, Krycek thought better of it and remained slumped against the railings of the bench. At this point almost any small action would make him dizzy and nauseous; three days without a meal did that to a man, especially when that man had not had a square meal in a long, long time and he really didn't want to add bile to the greasy stains on his dirty jeans. He wondered what the city morgue would do when they checked his fingerprints. If Mulder's name was the contact on the FBI's suspect's list, he was in for a nasty surprise when he came to identify the body. Mulder thought Krycek had already died several years ago. Well, Krycek grinned, he'd managed to pull that one over on Mulder. He sobered immediately and rather wished it had been true; a bullet between the eyes was a much faster death than what he was experiencing. A group of young men in summer weight suits walked quickly by, the aroma of their carry-out containers of hamburgers and chili dogs made Krycek's mouth water. None of them had actually looked at him, city people learned young when not to look lest they were forced to do something about the homeless or worse, feel they had to fish in their pockets and hand over a dollar. Krycek had not descended into begging, he would never beg; his last line in the sand. He sat as the day grew warmer and the afternoon sunshine turned the park into a study in dark and bright. It was fitting that his bench remained in the shadow. He licked his lips and wished he'd kept a water bottle; he'd passed them up in the last dumpster he'd looked in. Hunger and dehydration would kill him faster than hunger alone, but it was a very painful way to go and needing water would send him crawling through the park to find a drink. His survival instinct would kick in no matter how much he wanted it over. His eyes were getting too heavy to keep open and he strained his neck to see past the park and down the street, he imagined rather than actually saw the side entrance of the Hoover Building, but it was enough and he smiled to himself as he passed out. His last thought was how he had come so far to get nowhere at all. "What's wrong with him," Mulder demanded when Scully exited the City Hospital ER and came towards him in the waiting room. Scully blew the hair out of her eyes and tossed her gloves into the biohazard garbage can by the door. She picked up the warming Diet Pepsi, which she had left on the chair next to Mulder along with her briefcase and trench coat. They had been on their way out of town to investigate an abduction in southern Maryland. As usual, the lack of an alien presence had not discouraged Mulder from believing THEY were back, because it was always abduction and never kidnapping. Warm or not, the soda soothed her throat, she'd had argued with the ER doctors about treating Krycek. Until she had the results of a blood test, run in secret with the help of the Gunmen, she wasn't about to let the docs in on a possible alien tainted sample. She knew the aliens were gone, but why was Krycek still hanging on to life? So, she had called up her FBI credentials and swore that it was National Security and the Patriot Act, which mandated that this particular patient be given saline, period, and await her results. No one in DC doubted that it was possible that even a crippled bum could be a terrorist, so they were going to wash him and keep him on saline and cuffed to the bed until they heard back from the FBI. After she swallowed, she replied, "He's emaciated and probably malnourished, as well as dehydrated, although there was no odor of alcohol, I'm going to run the toxicology screen and blood work myself, just in case there are anomalies that would alarm the ER staff. The end of his stump is inflamed, most likely because he hasn't bathed in at least a couple of weeks. He was unarmed, but who knows where he has his stash hidden. He remained unconscious, so we didn't have a conversation." Mulder pursed his lips and Scully knew he was going to argue about waiting to talk to Krycek. "He's unconscious, Mulder. He isn't going to talk to anyone before the test results are back." Mulder subsided; he wasn't happy, but there was no way to overrule Scully at the moment. "Get me in the ER," Mulder demanded. "I'll keep watch until you get back." Scully sighed, she didn't like it, but it was better not to argue and go run her tests. "Fine," she said shortly and got back on her feet. She led Mulder into the cubicle at the end where they had put Krycek. They were giving him a bed bath and a part of her cringed at the sight of so many filth encrusted scars. He was a mess, she thought, but if anyone deserved to suffer it was the man on the bed. Mulder nodded, already concentrating on Alex Krycek. Scully said, "I'll be back in a few hours Mulder." He didn't look up and she marched out. It had always been this way, Krycek causing Mulder to disregard anything or anyone else. She hated the bastard and hoped the blood work would tell her that he was terminal and beyond help. Mulder would never move on until he was sure Krycek was dead. She had not believed him when he had confided that he instinctually believed Krycek had lived through the shooting in the garage. She thought about the separate apartments they maintained, Mulder had moved closer after he had returned from his trek, right after Will was born, to discover what Gibson Praise had wanted, but he had not moved in with her. She spent more time at Quantico than in the X Files these days. Riding the moment of relief from the current presidential administration, who didn't have to deal with an alien threat as well as Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, and which had finally justified Skinner's belief in Mulder's alien theories, Mulder had gotten a larger office and several assistants with various degrees in anthropology, sciences as well as para-science. Unlike her, these assistants thought Mulder was last word in cool. She worked at Quantico in order to have more regular hours, her mother watched Will, but Scully didn't want to take even more advantage of her than she must. She got out of the taxi in front of the Gunmen's building. To be fair, Mulder took Will home several nights a week, and he and the baby seemed to have a special relationship, which grew stronger with every passing month. She waited impatiently while the Gunmen went through their paranoid security measures. These days, they tested everyone at the door to a retinal scan and matched it to what they had on file. Along with green blood, the aliens had fixed retinas and couldn't fool the machine. If only Mulder had known that a few decades ago, he might have been able to convince her and the world sooner. Inside the overcrowded apartment, she made her way to the second bathroom; it was the Gunmen's defacto laboratory and began to run her tests. She refused food and drink and turned a deaf ear to their talk. After a few minutes they all subsided, which she knew they would. She worked without speaking for over an hour and the Gunmen had gone back to their usual activities. Into the silence she said, "Alex Krycek is alive." The men came to attention, they all knew about Krycek's many crimes and Mulder's unending blame and hate. They shared in Mulder's opinion, after all, Krycek had helped in Scully's abduction and had murdered Mulder's father. They also knew he had supposedly been killed in the FBI garage a little over two years ago. For all that, they evinced no surprise, after more than a decade of knowing Mulder, they knew better than to assume anyone was really dead until Scully had done the autopsy. Scully, knowing she had their attention, continued. "He is in bad shape at City Hospital; malnourished and dehydrated. I thought it was safer to run the tests myself, just in case there were any anomalies. His blood is red though, so that's a good sign." The Gunmen did not laugh; they would never go another day as long as they lived without looking at the stars and wondering when THEY would return. Instead, Frohike said, "I have several poisons which might interest you." Scully didn't pause in her work, but she did tilt her head as if she were considering the idea. She would be the medical examiner and could easily get away with it. After everything, she no longer viewed the world and her medial oaths with through rose colored spectacles. She remained silent and Frohike merely opened a small locked box and left it on the table. She consented to a cup of tea while the final tests were being run in the small medical centrifuge. She looked, but did not touch the poisons. Frohike joined her at the table, the small man was grayer and more rotund than when she first met him in 1993, but otherwise he was the same. His humor had grown on her, as the other Gunmen had also become close. Their help had been invaluable along the way and neither she nor Mulder would be alive if they hadn't been around. They accepted no thanks from her, preferring to rib Mulder continuously about relying on them when he had the whole of the FBI available. Mulder, once the invasion had failed and the papers and files that were rescued from Spender's and Headquarters' offices had been examined, felt he could use his inheritance from his father and mother without guilt. He had transferred all kinds of bizarre stocks, bonds and shares into the Gunmen's names, but they had refused to use it to move to a better and more comfortable location. They had rented the apartment adjoining their own, and turned it into a place where each had a larger bedroom, but that was all. She took her cup to the sink; it was clean enough for her not to make a comment. The men did fine and were a family, sans any permanent female presence. She and Mulder, on the other hand, were neither part of this family nor had made one of their own. Dysfunctional, the whole bunch of us, she thought and smiled when Langly fielded a call from Mulder demanding her return to City Hospital. When he hung up, she thanked him for retrieving her car from Georgetown so she could get back to the hospital on her own. As so often happened when Scully was zooming somewhere in her car or on a plane or train to meet Mulder, she thought about Skinner's quiet invitations. Over the years, she had refused all of them, but he had grown more insistent after Mulder had returned and not moved in with her and Will. She had grown to trust him and respect him, over time; she had grown fond of him too. He would be a wonderful step-father to Will and a dedicated husband for her. For all that the aliens were gone and Mulder had become respectable in the FBI, he remained steadfast to the X Files over anything or anyone else. They were not even lovers anymore, and she missed the closeness, although she suspected that Mulder's infinite gentleness was something of a sham and he wanted to get down and dirty, but didn't dare subject her to it. She stepped on the gas, and she resented Mulder for leaving her house and her bed empty. Oh, she loved him, she thought as she tore around Dupont Circle, oblivious to the car horns and the curses which came her way. She had loved him for a long, long time. Honestly though, she had loved the idea of him too. He had been romantic as the brilliant loner, the insane believer in wild theories and the joker who tempted her to leave her science and religion and fly free. But, he kept his sorrows close, and while she knew he suffered, he never really included her unless he was forced into it. His soulful glances and lean body had made her itchy with love and desire, but he had never really been as engaged as she had been. He loved the idea of her too, and she had provided the stability and certainty, he had never really wanted her passion to focus on him, his body. He had wanted her passion to be the same as his and it was not in her, not even after all these years. She waited impatiently at a red light a block from the hospital; maybe Krycek's resurrection could be helpful after all. Certainly, he would distract Mulder for a while and, if he could become well enough to go to trial, Mulder would want him to answer every question, reiterate every crime and rehash every moment of his time as Spender's attack dog. Scully nodded to herself as she parked the car and grabbed her briefcase. She could let Skinner know she was finally interested and Mulder would not notice for ages. And then, she pushed through the crowded bottleneck at the ER's desk, it would be too late. She and Skinner could try out a relationship without Mulder's interference, because while Mulder might not want her for himself, he did not want her to be with anyone else either. Mulder looked up from his study of Krycek's vital signs on the monitor. The heartbeat remained steady and the blood pressure normal without his scrutiny. He had been obsessively watching the screens as if he could will them to keep Krycek alive. Strange, Mulder thought as he absently crushed hospital ice between his teeth, he had wanted Krycek dead for a long time. He had dreamed about it, banishing him in a plain pine coffin into an unmarked grave at Potter's Field and thinking that was too good for the bastard. His `Krycek dies at sea' dreams had been better; Krycek could rot with the fishes unlamented. But, in every dream, Mulder would know when Krycek died, would have witnessed it and been glad. This reality was as unwelcome as it was surprising. Somehow, he had never expected to see an ill Krycek tucked up in a clean bed, looking like he was perfectly content and about twenty years old under his scruffy bead. With his crippled side beneath the covers, it was impossible to tell that the man was imperfect. That had been part of his original dislike, before he knew what Krycek was. The young man who approached him had been perfect, every hair in place, pressed shirt and polished shoes. Krycek had looked at him as if he had found the Holy Grail and the answer to everything. Mulder's cheeks burned now, a decade and a lot of water under burned bridges, later. He had liked it, and that was what haunted him. After so much FBI and peer ridicule and Scully's scientific disparagements, a young enthusiast had been welcome and a balm to his ego. Krycek coughed a little in his deep sleep. It was a wet congested cough and seemed to be painful. Mulder tried to smile and found he was concerned instead. Nothing Krycek had ever done had been straightforward, either as a charade of a friend and colleague or an impersonal murdering bastard. How had he survived the garage assassination? What had he meant by the stream of words and pleas before he'd died, or supposedly died? Why hadn't he strangled Scully in the elevator and run away, solving the problem of the baby's birth as well as eliminating a long time adversary? Mulder knew he could have done it, had known at the time that trusting Krycek to get Scully out of the Hoover Building safely was insane, but he had trusted him anyway. What did that say about Mulder's certainty that Krycek was irredeemable? Mulder sighed, the machine kept track of Krycek unwatched and the smells and sights of the rest of the busy ER went by Mulder's eyes unseen. `Krycek', Mulder agonized over the man's name, what were his secrets, what did he know that could make Mulder's heart rest easier and fulfill the log jam of questions in his mind? Why did he believe Krycek had those answers? Scully was beside him in a rush of wind and trench coat. She came to a stop and stared at him as if they had never met. Part of Mulder's mind knew she had been thinking of something else entirely, but he wanted to know about Krycek's condition more. "What did you find out?" Scully stared at Mulder for another minute before answering; she could see he was already deep into obsession mode about Krycek. He had that abstracted look which made him seem painfully transparent when he was nothing of the sort. "He has a lot of problems," She answered shortly. "Nothing fatal, unfortunately," She added chagrined. Mulder shot her a wry grin, but she could see he also sighed with relief. Maybe they deserved each other, she thought; both of them inscrutably private and seemingly obvious. She knew she must not be the first to think they were two sides of the same coin, or mirrored reflections. She shrugged; trite, pedantic and obvious though it may be, it was also true. She surrendered then, letting her shoulders sag. No matter which way she tried, Mulder was beyond the reach of her version of Happy Family and Suburban Chic. He `was' the Monster Boy, he had once called himself. No monster too terrible or convoluted for him to discover, no-siree. Let him toy with Krycek for a while, things had been slow since the invasion had been averted and he had never really wanted a staff of believers, so he was bored. She decided. She had a life to live, a child to raise and love and happiness to discover for herself. A decade of self denial and loneliness was enough. *** Chapter 2 So I live, that's about all I can say; I breathe nearly every day. I Live - The Fixx Mulder sat at Krycek's bedside once he was moved to the non-surgical wards. The docs had set up an intravenous line and were feeding Krycek high nutrient liquids and blasts of antibiotics and had him on oxygen. After only a day, Mulder could see the difference. Krycek's skin had regained some of its firmness and had filled out a little. Occasionally, he coughed the wretched wet cough, but not as often as before and it did not seem to pain him as much. Krycek's arms were under the covers, but the nurses came every six hours to change the dressing and manipulate the stump, rubbing it with emollients and softening the ridges of scars so they no longer pulled so tight or were enflamed. Krycek had not awakened, but the medical staff said it could happen anytime. Mulder had a large pile of pistachio husks in a paper cup. The gift shop in the lobby didn't have sunflower seeds and he needed something to chew on instead of gnashing his teeth. He wanted to have a plan ready when Krycek woke up, something that would convince the man that he needed to talk sooner rather than later. Mulder knew a lot of details, once the invasion had been foiled; he had the first look at the documents from the conspiracy. He knew his father had been one of the initial members and that the pressure had turned him into a drunk. In Mulder's opinion, it wasn't guilt or morality that had changed the elder Mulder's mind from continuing to assist the conspiracy, but basic jealousy. He had thought he was smarter than Spencer and that he should have risen faster in the organization. Added to his suspicions about his wife having an affair with Spender, William Mulder had gone over the edge and opted out through alcohol. Spender had given the order for the hit on William Mulder and as far as he could determine, his initial conviction that Krycek had been the assassin had not been wrong. Now, he knew that the conspiracy had played in the major leagues and assassinations were the least of their sins. To a certain extent, he could understand that Krycek had to follow orders or die, but Krycek had not had to join them in the first place. The files on Krycek had been specifically designed to force the man into an untenable position should the invasion fail and he survive. No one could ever call Spender sentimental; he went for the jugular and bathed himself in blood whenever he could, in this life or the next. There was a total absence of particulars about Krycek's youth or country of origin or anything approaching something Mulder could use to profile the bastard. He had decided to stick with his initial assessment. Krycek was a stone cold killer, period. How he had become that way no longer interested Mulder, or so he told himself repeatedly. Mulder thought about many things while he waited. He thought about Scully and how he loved her, but was constitutionally unable to become husband material. He loved Will, although he wished Scully had chosen a different name. He and Will were very alike, they both preferred solitary pursuits. Scully was already fighting the battle to socialize Will with play-dates and baby-bonding exercises. When Will was at his place, they spread themselves out on the floor, each surrounded with items they found interesting. If Will whimpered or toddled over to him, Mulder stopped what he was doing and played or comforted the baby. There was no lack of creature comforts; Mulder fed him when he was hungry and cuddled him as much as the baby wanted to be cuddled. He read to him and told him about whatever he was working on. He did not change his speech to baby talk and thought Will understood a hell of a lot of what he said. They got along fine. Then, there were the other things. The way Mulder could get actual flashes of what Will was thinking about, or feeling. He knew when Will was hungry a moment before the kid felt it himself. He knew when Will was hot or cold or did not like the feel of something rough in his hands or under his knees. Mulder thought it was all rather primitive impulses that he was picking up, complex as the human brain was even at Will's age, most of what the baby was thinking or feeling were simple ideas and feelings. What was more fascinating was when he knew Will was picking up on his thoughts. Will would stare at him, unblinking and suddenly grin or pout, depending on Mulder's state of mind. When Mulder got angry, Will would flush and make his hands into fists. Mulder had already learned to be careful not to upset the baby. When Will was able to talk in sentences, he was going to take the baby to several specialists in ESP and paranormal connectivity, and arrange to spend a summer with Gibson Praise. There was something very unique going on and Mulder wanted to quantify it, he was already sure there had been genetic modifications to Will, and probably to Mulder when he was a fetus as well. Scully, who had come a long way in her beliefs about impossible things, refused to acknowledge Will's peculiarities and any possibility that there was anything different about her son. She explained everything by insisting the baby was a prodigy and had bought a piano for her apartment; she also played endless games with Will that targeted early reading and mathematical skills. The small paranormal events she witnessed, she explained away and she got angry if Mulder or for that matter, Skinner, tried to get her to see how strange the things actually were. Mulder wished he had the ability to read Krycek's mind. Now, that would be a complicate maze to figure out. Mulder tossed the contents of his cup into the trashcan and started on another handful of pistachios; his fingers had turned red from the dye on the nuts, but it looked like blood in the dim hospital light. Krycek opened his eyes and licked his lips. He had not yet focused on Mulder, merely looked around. He grabbed his stump and Mulder could see he was rubbing at the end of the stub under the sheet. Krycek saw the carafe of water on the table and the cup, which Mulder was using for his shells, and reached for it, overturning the cup and spilling the shells onto the floor. Startled, Krycek looked directly at Mulder. Instead of commenting, or exclaiming in surprise, Krycek put his arm back under the sheet and closed his eyes. Mulder could see Krycek's blood pressure was rising and his heart beat was speeding up. Glad that he had such a scientific way to measure Krycek, he cracked another nut and picked up the cup, spitting the shells into it. Krycek sighed impatiently and Mulder began to enjoy himself. "Should I call you Lazarus?" Mulder asked snidely. Krycek did not respond, but the monitors showed he had heard what Mulder asked. "You're a mess, Krycek." Mulder went on conversationally. "You'll live to face judgment after all." Krycek opened his eyes, only to roll them in Mulder's direction as if the threat was too stupid to comment on. Mulder felt the familiar rush of anger at Krycek's nonchalant response. This time the bastard would pay, there was no more conspiracy to protect him and they were the ones who had provided all the hard evidence. Mulder grinned, no wonder they didn't have a retirement package, the best you got from those guys was a kick in the ass and life in prison for living long enough to try and collect. "You aren't going anywhere ever again of your own free will," Mulder went on, relishing the moment. You are in FBI custody on more than a dozen counts of murder and treason. There will be no trial, you know. There is a small committee from Justice who know the whole story and they have been given presidential and judicial power to assign punishment, including prison and the death penalty, to those who worked with the aliens and the members of the conspiracy. You have done both and with the evidence I have, you're dead meat." Krycek snorted, but didn't talk. He licked his lips again and Mulder enjoyed a short moment of vicious pleasure in denying the bastard a drink. Under the covers, Krycek managed to push the buzzer for the nurses and Mulder's pleasure was curtailed when they arrived and began to fuss over the sick man. They took all his vitals, gave him a cup of ice, plumped his pillow and raised the bed to a more comfortable position. They reminded him to keep the oxygen feed in his nose, smoothed a tuft of hair on his head, and tucked another blanket around him. Despite his pistachios, Mulder gnashed his teeth until his jaw ached. Comfortable and more awake, Krycek stared at Mulder. It wasn't an aggressive stare or a challenging stare. It was almost blank, but concentrated on Mulder. Mulder grew a little uncomfortable and spat out, "I guess you didn't do so well without your bank accounts?" But, it wasn't really a question. Krycek's face became more bland and blank; the monitor however, beeped fasted and Mulder smiled. "So," Mulder said, "Here's the deal. You confess everything and give detailed accounts to all of your involvement with Spender and the rest of them and you avoid the death penalty." Krycek stared at the monitor, he resented that it gave away his real responses to Mulder's questions. The other man was in full attack mode and Krycek knew Mulder would increase his vitriol as much as he could in front of the hospital personnel. But, Krycek also knew Mulder did not want to hand him over to Justice. There, he would be out of Mulder's hands and he would have to wait his turn to question him. Krycek did not want to be in Justice's hands either. They had a special prison for conspiracy era prisoners and it was a good one. So far, no one had escaped. Krycek was surprised he wasn't in that infirmary already. Mulder was looking good, Krycek noticed. He had gained a little weight and was wearing a better than usual suit. His tie was first class too, which must be something that Scully had given him. And, where was Scully anyway? Usually she would be with Mulder and Krycek thought, more since they were finally together as more than collogues. The monitor beeped along at a steady pace and Krycek took a deep breath, "I don't what you think I know that isn't already a matter of record." Mulder smiled thinly, "Ah, Krycek, maybe you don't have anymore real secrets, but it's all in the telling, don't you think; putting a face on the evil? Most of the older bastards died by their own or an alien's hand before we got to them. You, on the other hand, are currently between a rock and a hard place, and I know just how much you hate that kind of pressure." Krycek sighed and laid his head back on the wonderfully clean pillow. "You don't have any idea how I handle pressure, Mulder. All along you've only seen what you want to see and disregard the rest." "Let's see now," Mulder said shortly, biting off each word. "You run from danger, you lie to everyone about everything; you change sides and loyalty to stay alive and sell what you've stolen to the highest bidder, regardless of affiliation. Sounds like you're a coward at best and an opportunist as well." Krycek rolled his eyes again and heard Mulder's jaw pop. "You have to admit it's a useful skill, staying alive." "Is it?" Mulder said angrily. "You save your own life at the cost of the rest of the world, uncaring who suffers for your crimes?" Krycek hissed out a breath, "Yeah, that's right and just how is that any better than you? You've killed more people through your tunnel vision that I ever have with a gun. You blame me for your troubles, for Scully and your father? Tell me how you aren't as much to blame or more? You think I'm bad, because I didn't join you? Well, fuck that shit, I had my own agenda that was every bit as important to me as yours was to you and I don't have to apologize for it to you or anyone." Mulder fisted his hands, he could feel the rage building and he wanted to smash Krycek into the pristine pillow until it was soaked in blood. How dare he blame him for what happened to Scully and his father? How dare he compare their life's work? He took a deep breath and was glad he wasn't the one on the monitor, "You're a piece of work aren't you Krycek? You turn everything around until it is unrecognizable, as if that makes sense or reason out of it. You're the criminal Krycek, not me. You sold out for profit and power, not me." Krycek could feel his blood pressure rising along with the faster tempo on the monitor. "I am not going to argue with you Mulder. Zealots are always blind to everyone and everything else. Do what you have to do, I'll take it one day at a time." Mulder stood up, knocking the cup of shells onto the floor, "That's the way you want it, fine. I'll be in the front row at your execution; I'll go out for a celebratory drink afterwards." He turned on his heel and left the cubicle and the ER. *** Chapter 3 Am I the witness or am I the crime, Woman Be My Country - Johnny Clegg Krycek let out the breath he'd been holding and watched Mulder's stiff back as he walked away. Fuck, he always lost his temper and sense when Mulder was around. He knew it was better to deal with Mulder than Justice; Mulder could be distracted, beguiled, maybe even seduced into letting him go or he could get away when Mulder was in a funk. He'd cut off his nose to spite his face and all because of his pride; his hurt pride. Damn Mulder for being perpetually unwilling to understand there actually were other sides in this conflict, other than good or bad or black and white; other families torn apart and ruined, other children who had suffered and been displaced, subject to their father's, ambition. Damn it! Mulder thought as he slammed the car door shut, barely missing the fingers on his left hand. He always lost his temper around Krycek. He knew it was better to be cool and sarcastic, subtly letting Krycek believe he believed some of what he said. Krycek always got off when he shared scraps and remnants of information with him. He'd cut off his nose to spite his face; he'd wanted Krycek to open up to him, to spill his guts trying to impress him. Instead, he'd goaded Krycek too far, although until just now, he hadn't really known what Krycek's breaking point was. Really, Mulder sighed, in almost a decade, how much time had he actually spent talking to Krycek? Sure, they'd be ersatz partners for a couple of months, but he'd shut him out then too. The long trip to Russia had been spent baiting him, abusing him, getting off on punishing the man and punishing himself for thinking Krycek might actually be on his side for once. Since then, almost five years ago, he'd seen Krycek in snatches of dark light, floating like the shadow behind his eyes after a flash bulb went off. The real man, whoever he was, obscured by Mulder's hate and anger. Not that he didn't have the right to anger and hate, Mulder told himself, whatever Krycek tried to say to exculpate himself, the bastard had committed the crimes. Now, if Mulder had anything to do about it, Krycek would do the time. The dawn was breaking, as Mulder drove northeast toward Georgetown and a few hours rest. He hadn't realized how long he'd been at Krycek's bedside. His apartment was larger and brighter than the one in Alexandria and it had two bedrooms, one set up for when Will spent the night or needed a nap. It cost more, but was worth it, the only drawback was trying to find street parking before people left to drive to work. Even at dawn or the middle of the night, Mulder had to park on a street several blocks away and hope his car wasn't towed; the Georgetown police were always putting up timed parking notices so that some bigwig or another, who wanted to see Georgetown from the back of a limo, got an open view. Clinton had come through more often than Bush and his guests; Georgetown was an odd collection of people both day and night. Not weirder than the Village in New York City, but strange enough to shock the Midwestern hacks Bush entertained. Finding out that the conspiracy had reached into the Executive Branch had been a surprise. Administration after administration, since FDR, had known about the threats and the conspiracy. Not that they had made any effort to tell the public, oh no, Mulder thought bitterly. They'd held on to it as if it were some kind of ace in the hole and allowed the FBI to bully him when he'd been right all along. Mulder drummed his fingers on the steering wheel at a particularly long light, morning traffic was already heavy. Sometimes he really didn't know if he had been the rebel or the manipulated child running in circles for the benefit of those higher up the food chain. As the light turned green, he wondered if he did in fact, have more in common with the rat than he was willing to acknowledge. Krycek had been running around in a maze for years, getting his arm bitten off for his trouble. It took Mulder that whole day and the next, spent by a silent Krycek's bed, before he noticed Scully wasn't checking in on him. His staff of bright researchers called often, but her number had not appeared on his cell phone display. He knew she hated Krycek as much as he did, but she also thought he listened to the man despite himself and all good sense. He called her at home and Margaret Scully answered, he could hear Will's happy baby chatter in the background. They had a politely warm conversation; Mrs. Scully had always liked him. Will was fine and babbled on the phone for a few minutes and he said goodbye promising to come and visit soon. Scully was on her way to Quantico and she answered the cell phone with a brisk "Hello, Mulder." "I'm going to be home for a while this morning," He told her. "Then, I'll check in at the office before I go back to the hospital. He seems to be getting better, but he hasn't cooperated at all." Scully sighed; she could tell Mulder was pissed and trying to hide it from her. Krycek must have been giving Mulder a hard time. He always had a knack for getting under Mulder's skin. She gave it one more try, "Don't you think it would be better to let Justice interrogate him? He might begin to talk if he sees he has no other option." Mulder was silent, and when he spoke it was deliberately toneless and enunciated, "He has the answers I want. He knows things I need to know before I can tie up everything and move on. Justice could care less about personal information or how Spender had my father gunned down or how poor Samantha was treated on that Military Base. He knows Gibson too, and Gibson told me a few things that might help me get to the truth." "Nothing I can say will change your mind, Mulder. I know that. Just keep in mind that he is a killer, a thief and a spy with no loyalty to anyone or anything. Whatever he tells you will be in his own self- interest." Mulder almost spit out, "I don't forget what he is for a second, Scully." He hung up the phone and Scully listened to the silent air for a few seconds before she snapped her phone off and concentrated on the road once more. *** Chapter 3 Words are just another violence, Sorry - English Beat Mulder had a nap, took care of business and returned to the hospital. There was an FBI guard unit assigned to make sure Krycek stayed where he was and talked to no one but the medics on his case or Mulder. The guards had nothing to of note to report; Krycek had slept most of the morning, eaten his lunch, made it to the bathroom under his own steam and went back to bed. He had not turned on the TV or asked for reading materials, a phone or a newspaper. Although cloaked under a respectful mien, the agent really wanted Mulder to tell him what was so important about Krycek. Like many before him, the guard thought that a youthful cripple with a broad white smile could not really be much of a threat. Mulder did not take the time to disabuse him, all that mattered was the guard did his job. Mulder, armed with a large bag of seeds and a large coffee, took his seat beside Krycek's bed. Krycek didn't look up and silently, Mulder swore he would make the man pay for every slight before he was done. And so they sat in silence for the rest of the day. Krycek dozed off and on, continued to ask for nothing and Mulder made no threats and no offers. It wasn't precisely an armed truce or a truce of any kind, merely a sort of time out between the past and the future. Just as the smell and clang of dinner service came down the hall, Krycek groaned and passed out. Mulder grabbed the buzzer and rang for the nurses. One rushed in, tried to take Krycek's pulse which was rapidly uneven on the monitor. She told another nurse to get a doctor, and before the other nurse made it to the door, the heart monitor went straight-lined and she called a Code Blue immediately. They tried to shove Mulder out the door, in their hurry forgetting he was an FBI agent and not a family member. He balked and went to the corner of the room and watched the frantic activity which ensued. The first doctor to respond grabbed the paddles called "clear" and zapped Krycek's bare chest. Krycek's body arced, but the heartbeat did not resume. It took three more tries before a beat and a blood pressure returned to normal. Krycek was out cold, and Mulder wondered if there had been enough dead time to cause brain damage. It would be just his luck for something like that to happen now that he finally had the source of his answers close at hand. The nurses and doctors fussed around Krycek for another ten minutes before they were satisfied he was sleeping normally. Ordering Mulder to keep a close watch, they left the room. Mulder threw the sheet over Krycek's chest and resumed his seat. The last thing he wanted was to feel pity or a corresponding humanness to Krycek's plight and his bruised, scarred chest was an open invitation to pity him. Krycek woke to a world of pain and the remnants of fear from a terrible dream. He lay gasping for a few moments until he oriented himself back into the hospital room and the reasons which had brought him there. He raised his eyes to find Mulder staring at him. For a nano-second, Krycek thought he saw a light in Mulder's eyes instead of the usual flat and angry stare. But, Mulder blinked and it was gone. Krycek wasn't sure if had been real or he had imagined it. "You had a heart attack," Mulder said. "Something to do with the long history of abuse your body has suffered. The docs say it weakened your heart and you'll need to be careful from now on." Krycek blinked in surprise, since he'd lost his arm, he had lost any residual vanity that survived from his few years of happiness at college. He'd been successful there, both in his academic subjects and his social life. The toll his life had taken on his body had become something he ignored. The rare occasions in which he looked at himself in a mirror brought him neither satisfaction nor regrets for the handsome youth he had been. The visible and painful state of his physical self had been a reflection of his state of mind. He was someone he didn't recognize and by distancing himself, he had been able to carry out the things he had done, long after his initial motivation had died, unlamented. Mulder smirked; you're already an old man, Krycek. You're going to have to take blood pressure medicine and blood thinners and watch what you eat. Prison is probably the best place for you at this point. At least there you will get three square a day and exercise time in the yard. Tired and downhearted Krycek said, "You enjoying yourself Mulder? Be careful your amusement doesn't come back to bite you in the ass." Mulder eyed Krycek closely, he'd sounded defeated for the first time. Having a heart attack at 34 or whatever Krycek's age was, must be shocking even if you're a murderer, a thief and treasonous. Mulder gentled his voice, "Talk to me Krycek. I can help you if you'll cooperate. The Justice Committee's blood lust has calmed down a little bit and if there was ever a time to get a deal it's now." Krycek closed his eyes and let out a long breath, trying to feel inside if he could summon up any strength. Equally gentle he asked, "What about your vengeful temper Mulder? Has that cooled down too?" Mulder eyed Krycek carefully, this was just the kind of exchange which the bastard always won, worming in and making Mulder feel something for him. "I know you think I see myself as the wrath of God or something, but I am not that far out of touch with reality. I know it's over, the aliens are gone, ninety-nine percent of the conspirators are either dead or locked up and Scully is finally cancer free for good, unless some natural illness occurs. I know that almost everyone I ever trusted was in on it one way or another and that my father was probably one of the worst of them, but he was my father and you chose to gun him down like a dog. Earlier, you compared casualty statistics. I know many have died over the past ten years. Whatever else you believe, I was on the side of the angels and you were not. I was trying to get my answers and save the world, you had the opposite agenda. That is what makes one of a criminal and that one is you not me." "Ah," says Krycek in a whisper, "The side of the angels. Did you know God punished all his angels when they danced for joy after Moses and the Jews crossed the Red Sea? He thundered that the Pharaoh and Egyptians were also his creations and that there should be mourning, not joy over their deaths." Mulder frowned at Krycek, wondering how in the world he had picked up on Passover litany. He hadn't thought about what was said on Passover since Samantha disappeared when he was twelve and there were no more Seder dinners with reams of relatives at the table after that. He used to be jealous, he remembered, once Samantha had begun to talk, she was the one to start off the Seder song about the four questions. The youngest at the table had that honor and it had been his until then. The childlike son, he remembered, asked what it was all about, this Seder business. The reply had been to tell him the story and teach him as much as he could understand. The evil son was selfish, he applied everything to himself and did not see the reason to be part of the tribe of Israel and remember the miracle year after year. The eldest was the wise son; he knew why it was important, why being part of the tribe brought safety, grace and understanding. *** Mulder eyed Krycek. Krycek had his eyes closed and there were large dark bruises beneath his eyes, he looked pale, exhausted and ruined. Was it possible Krycek knew about the lessons because they had some kind of meaning for him? Mulder shook his head; it was a mind game of course. Krycek was no Jew, either now or in his childhood. But, Krycek was smart enough to try and find a weak spot in Mulder's defenses by calling up childhood's good days when his family was intact and Mulder believed them to be innocent of treason and intrigue. "There are angels and answers in every dilemma." Mulder answered, distancing himself from the question. "There are devils too," He said pointedly. Krycek allowed a smile to ghost his lips; Mulder was in full black vs. white mode. There was no use trying to reason with him. Krycek did not open his eyes, "And there are the regular people in the middle, they are the ones to suffer from angels' or devils' interference. I am not the devil, although I got to know some who would claim that title and be proud. After all, the devil has a great deal of power and power was everything to those men. I was in it for justice and revenge, just like you." Mulder tried to swallow a seed and choked. He coughed until tears came to his eyes. "Justice my ass," Mulder spluttered. "What'd Spender owe you, how many millions did it take for you to sell out humanity?" Krycek kept his eyes closed. He was very tired; tired of Mulder's questions, of being on the run and homeless, of being himself. He'd been ready to die on the park bench; he was more than ready now. There was no future, only a past that had soured almost as soon as he embarked on it. "No millions, Mulder," He whispered. Somehow approaching the end called for a quiet voice. "I was going to prove that they decimated my family, kidnapped my brother, and denied medical care for my mother when she developed a rare cancer and had my father killed in a planned car accident. My father, by accident or design, left a file hidden behind the bathroom ceiling fan. He knew I would find it after he was gone and I would have to help maintain the house while my mother still lived. It revealed nothing about aliens, but it did identify a circle of powerful men. My father worked for those men, merely as a chauffer, nothing diabolical or anything. The file stipulated that they used various illegal and possibly, military connections, to bring in many undesirables after WWII. They posed these men as Europeans who were tired of war and wanted to settle in the USA. In reality, their names read like the `Who's Who' of the Nuremburg trials. My mother and father escaped from behind the iron curtain in the early fifties and they knew those names well. They had survived the seize of Stalingrad and during those months of freezing starvation, word of who was in charge of the SS and what they were doing in Poland and Germany was discussed continuously. They had Jewish colleagues who had starved with them and who helped them plan their escape as long as they took their youngest son with them. They did and tried to raise him with knowledge of the Jewish faith. I wasn't born until sixty-six and by then he was an adult. After my little brother was `kidnapped' in seventy-three, I stayed with him and his wife when my mother was in the hospital for long stretches. She died when I was fourteen and I went into foster care until I was sixteen." Krycek stopped, pausing for breath. He wanted to finish his confession, as it were, "I thought if I was on the inside of those men's organization, I could trip it up somehow and reveal them for what they were. In reality, I had no idea how far and wide their influence was spread. I was way out of my league and after I met you and figured out who you were, there was no way to trust anybody. I could only presume you were a plant of theirs in the FBI. Certainly, you were antagonistic enough to be doing their bidding behind the cover of wayward son." Mulder clenched his jaw until it ached, he had no idea if what Krycek was saying was true in any way, shape or kind, but it was a compelling narrative nevertheless. About to speak, Krycek went on in a breathless voice. "The aliens came later; the whole thing was unbelievable and I wanted out. There was no `out', Mulder. I was presented with a whole new past; name, age, education, everything, including a criminal record, which would put me in prison for the rest of my life. I was twenty-five and I was not going to go to prison just to prove I was incorruptible. So, Mulder, corruption came fast and hard and I did what I was told and tried to put together enough evidence to bury them. I never did; of course, I became `them', a monster in my mirror." He said, gasping. "I don't regret not trusting you were the real thing, a rebel committed to destroying them too. The assignment to you was all too neat and I saw it as a plan to reveal my loyalties and give them a reason to kill me. I wasn't sacrificing myself for the son of one of their higher level people." Krycek husked out a breathless chuckle, "Bites to be you, doesn't it?" *** Chapter 4 Come as you are, as you were, as I want you to be, Come as You Are - Nirvana Mulder fell asleep in the hard chair, one ear tuned to the other man's steady heartbeat; his breathing was muted by an oxygen mask. He had dreams in which he became a snake and chased his own tail, like the ovorburos on Scully's tailbone. He always wanted to bite her right there, but he never did. He saw himself in mirrors that flashed by like strobe lights, each one showing him as if he were a Dorian Gray clone, growing more and more obscene with each flash. Against his will, against his better sense of just about everything, Krycek's story seeped into his subconscious and by the time he woke, his first worry was to see if the man was breathing. Krycek looked a little bit better for having slept through the night, His faced was tinged with delicate color and the sharp cheekbones were softened a little as he had re-hydrated during the last 36 hours. The crummy beard was a distraction and Mulder itched to shave it off and have Krycek unmasked. Still, Krycek's long, dark eyelashes gave him an ethereal appearance, like he was an innocent child or an oriental courtesan who kept secrets in her poison rings. The question of the day, as Mulder saw it, was determining if any of what Krycek had said the previous night was true and if it was true, did it excuse any of the things he had done. Like Scully, Mulder had lost a great deal of his hopes and beliefs in the goodness of man. The past ten years had shown him that everyone had an agenda and most of them were a matter of self-interest. His own bloodline was a legacy of lies, machinations and false love. Hell, he thought as he sipped terrible instant coffee, his father wasn't his father, his mother had been unfaithful, his biological father was a demon from Hades and his former lover was a turncoat and a spy. And, he reminded himself, they were all dead as the proverbial doornails. Maybe Krycek was the last man standing, besides himself. The thought scared him to his marrow. Krycek woke bleary eyed and dry-mouthed. The back of his throat hurt from the oxygen intake. Without a word, Mulder handed him a Styrofoam cup of tepid water, left over from his nighttime jug. He smelled Mulder's coffee and his stomach rumbled loud enough for the morning nurse to say, "Breakfast in a few minutes, Mr. Krycek. I just have to take your vitals and another tube or two of blood." While she was at it, Mulder went into the bathroom at the end of the ward and washed his face, trying to wake up and think straight. The outside guard of agents met Mulder by Krycek's bed. The doctor was there too, about to go off duty after a 20 hour stretch, "He's well enough to move to a more secure room, Agent Mulder, where he won't get in the way of the day's intake of patients into the ER." Mulder nodded and with the team, walked Krycek in his bed into a small private room further down the hallway. It had a small window which overlooked an enclosed courtyard. It would be easier to guard him here as well as quieter. There were also two reasonably comfortable chairs, one a recliner and the other a rocker with felt on its rungs so it would be silent when in use. Mulder realized this must be where they put the terminal patients who came to the ER too late for any medical intervention, except perhaps, pain meds. He looked carefully into the corners of the room, prepared to see ghosts or other spirits of the dead waiting there. The walls were pale green and the corners were empty. Krycek was given a breakfast tray filled to overflowing with watery scrambled eggs and pale toast. There were two pats of margarine and a small pot of very weak tea, with lemon, a packet of sugar substitute. Regardless, Krycek picked up a fork and began to eat. Mulder told the other agents to watch the door and went out of the hospital. He walked to the fast food restaurant across the street and bought a grease laden, but delicious, breakfast and an extra large coffee. He ate his first breakfast muffin on the walk back. Licking his lips and trying to wipe his hand as he reentered the hospital. He told himself he was motivated to stay near Krycek as long as there was a chance he would answer questions. As soon as the Justice committee learned of Krycek's survival, they would barge in, demand and get custody. He was motivated, Mulder reassured himself, because of the advantage to get Krycek to spill the beans based on their long history. He disregarded the fact that the shared history had little room for truth, respect or mutual regard. He decided Krycek's litany of the previous evening was only wooziness talking. Krycek would break down and confess, because he had always Mulder drawn into his orbit and wanted to keep him there. Mulder's temperament, which was to give the extra mile to anyone in pain or need, no matter what evil they had perpetrated, in order to get to the truth, he brushed aside. Krycek was a special case, always had been. Now that the threat of an invasion was gone, Krycek held no advantage. He would cave, Mulder was sure, when he was feeling better and farther from starvation and death. Krycek would do what was the best thing for self interest, just like always and Mulder intended that what was best was to confess to him. Mulder watched him polish off the eggs and toast. He ate with his mouth closed and didn't lick his fingers. Unwillingly, but unstoppably, Mulder realized Krycek was just another man who had learned table manners, who automatically put down his fork on the side of his plate and took a final sip of the tea before wiping his mouth with the thin hospital napkin. Somehow, the realization that Krycek was simply another mortal, banging his head against the wall, just like Mulder did, struck him as incredibly sad. Mulder stared into the dregs of his coffee. He had wasted so much of his life chasing phantoms, chasing what was already lost and finding, in the end, things that were even worse than he'd imagined. Had Krycek wasted his life too, chasing some kind of goal, which was forever unattainable? Had Krycek measured out much of his youth waiting in hotel rooms for crooked sources, waiting in cars and needing to pee, just in case something, anything happened of interest; wiping blood off his hands? Had he wished the night would not end on the rare occasions when he was not in bed alone? Had he cried into the darkness, cursing his own name and foolishness? Had he looked in a mirror and realized he was crippled by much more than the loss of his left arm? Mulder swallowed the last of his coffee and tossed the empty cup into the waste basket with suppressed rage. Krycek looked at him and Mulder was sure he saw the same hopeless sorrow in those wide green eyes. Then, Krycek blinked and Mulder's moment of epiphany was lost and Krycek was a roadblock in an ill- fitting hospital gown with an overgrown beard and an attitude. Krycek smiled wryly, as if he guessed the content of Mulder's thoughts. Mulder bristled, he wasn't going to let him in, and he wasn't that idiotic at least, he hoped so. *** Chapter 5 We cross our bridges when we come to them and burn them behind us, with nothing to show for our progress except a memory of the smell of smoke, and a presumption that once our eyes watered. Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead It should have be considered a wasted day, Mulder mused as he headed for his apartment, a shower and picking up Will for the night. Krycek had barely spoken a word all day and Mulder had been equally silent. Something did go on, although Mulder had no word for it. It reminded him of long damp evenings with his Oxford roommate, the very British Phillip Bennett; they would study quietly, something soft and jazzy on the radio and endless cups of Earl Grey, whenever one or the other would get up and refill the cups. Mulder believed Phillip wasn't interested in being friends, but he had misunderstood Brit reticence. Phillip had been the one to help him stay sane after Phoebe had screwed him over for an associate professor. He'd taken him out to the best pubs and made him learn and play Lacrosse, sweating the pain and heartbreak out on the field. But, it had remained a quiet friendship, it seemed Phillip and he did not have to talk much to understand one another. His friend had died in a plane crash and Mulder still missed him. Today, Mulder thought as he got out of the shower, had felt similar to those school days. Why Krycek, of all people, should share in a silent understanding was beyond Mulder's ken. Mulder resented it, but could hardly rant at the man for being quietly warm. Will was happy to see him and Scully declined to rail at him for spending his time at Krycek's bedside. She had a large office in the X Files too, but she was seldom there. The science side of the X Files was her prevue and she ruled the young assistants with a firm hand, making them better at looking for the strange, weird and implausible. Once he and Will were back at his apartment, Mulder let Will ride on his shoulders as they walked to the confectioners down the street. They had a chestnut gelato, served in a little cup, which both of them loved and what Scully didn't know couldn't bother her. The night passed peacefully, Mulder only called the guards at the hospital three times. Will gabbled unstoppably, having found speech to be a delightful way to get his father's attention and that he would answer question until way passed bedtime. Mulder watched William sleep; it was something that brought him joy and joy was a hard commodity to come by in his life. The child was untroubled and his cheeks grew pink as his sleep deepened. Mulder carefully brushed a lock of hair off the child's smooth forehead and wondered if these parental acts of love, unknown, but surely not unfelt, are what made a person strong and confident. Knowing what his parents had done, or in his mother's case, not done to stop the madness, he wondered if he had ever been watched over or brought joy to either of them. He was sure Samantha had been the apple of their eyes, but that had not prevented her from becoming a statistic anyway. He shrugged, tired of the same litany of dark and sour thoughts. Surely, now that it was over, he could lighten up? As he lay upon his own bed, one ear attuned to Will's small snores and breaths, he wondered if Krycek was sleeping. Despite everything, Krycek had looked so young when he was asleep. It wasn't fair; Mulder turned and bunched up his pillows. What wasn't fair never got answered, he fell asleep and dreamed of running away from horses which blew hot air on his neck and never tired of the chase. *** Chapter 6 "If we knew each other's secrets, what comforts we should find." John Churton Collins In the end, it was neither Mulder's haranguing nor the Justice Committee's demands that made Alex Krycek talk. It was the discovery of one more laboratory hideout. Ignored almost since the beginning, because of a mistake early in the investigations and the official who signed off on it was long lost in the wind, a few acres in the Vermont woods was looked at once again. Inured as all the officials were to war crimes, this place made everyone reconsider what it meant to be human all over again. At first, it was one article in the Montpelier Star; a horribly disfigured child, a red-haired boy of about twelve or thirteen, was found wandering the highway. He was half-starved, suffering from exposure and barefoot. He did not speak any language that the Vermont Highway Patrol could understand and when he was taken to the hospital, the medical staff immediately contained him, declaring that something about him was a biohazard, because when they attempted to perform a blood test, everyone suffered from a toxic burst which left them blind and in pain for several weeks. In his bubble prison, the boy was silent, although he ate and drank and eliminated in a perfectly human way. There was nothing in the test of that material which was not typical. They studied his naked body, through the glass, and he looked entirely human too, if underfed. The extraordinary aspects of the child became apparent when he rifled through the medical equipment in the room and fashioned whole new instruments. He connected an electric feed into the monitors and the medical staff was able to see images of the boy's internal organs displayed clearly. When, in proper gear, they entered the room, they were hard put to understand what the child had done. Once he had created the new imaging device he seemed to relax and began to speak, he spoke in English but what he said was the surprising part. The article about him, however, tried to make sense of this child's immeasurable intelligence, and possibly, if one believed it existed, in his paranormal abilities of ESP, since the only time he talked was to say aloud what was on the minds of the people investigating him. The committee and Mulder came hotfoot to the hospital, using all of its governmental powers, declared the boy to be a threat to Homeland Security and cordoned off the entire wing of the building. The boy was hostile until Mulder entered the room. He stared at Mulder, walked to the glass and put his hand against it in an obvious wish to communicate. Everyone stepped back while Mulder put his hand against the other side of the glass. The boy visibly relaxed when the contact was made. After a few minutes, he asked to speak to Alex Krycek and went and sat on the side of his bed, in a waiting pose. Mulder, who thought nothing to do with the aliens would ever surprise him again, clamped his mouth shut and shouted all kinds' denials at the child in his head. The child, his head titled in a listening pose, said, "Agent Mulder, you have a varied vocabulary, but I know what you are really feeling. Send Alex Krycek to talk to me and you will get your answers." Mulder stalked off, the head of the Justice Committee on his tail, demanding to know what the boy meant and how the hell Alex Krycek was alive and what did he have to do with the situation. In the meantime, Army Special Forces investigated the area where the boy was found. In turn, they found the buildings in a forest glen where no buildings were listed on any map. The buildings were abandoned, but a few of the unit had been on other investigations for the Committee, noted that the buildings had been inhabited recently. Rather than ordering his men to look further, he called headquarters, used a code that was supposedly no longer viable and made contact with Assistant Director Skinner of the FBI, who had served as liaison between the agencies involved in the original search and seizure of the Alien Occupation. Just as Mulder was flying back to DC and City Hospital, Skinner was boarding a small, fast Cessna which would take him to Vermont. He had not contacted Mulder, although he knew where Krycek was and what Mulder was trying to accomplish. He had no doubt Mulder would bring Krycek to Vermont, and possibly, Krycek and the alien hybrid boy would finagle some way to bemuse and confuse Mulder, the guards, hell - the entire Justice Committee and ride off into the sunset, leaving Mulder angry, betrayed and ready to murder Krycek once again. Skinner had no problem with murdering Krycek; after all, he had tried to do that very thing years ago and never lost a moment's sleep as long as he thought he had actually done it. Krycek's return was the reason he had a sharp pain behind his eyebrows. Scully had been to see him and, for the first time, he saw she was actually beginning to let Mulder go. This gave him hope, he had loved her a long time, but Mulder was always in the way. It was the Krycek factor that made his head ache. As he drank a cup of coffee, he remembered thinking things about Krycek when he had been a new agent and before he had been outed as a spy and a mole. He had thought how Mulder had seemed to bloom with the other young man as his ersatz partner, smiling more easily and becoming less hostile because he had backup who `believed' at last. Seeing Mulder and Krycek arguing amiably about who was going to drive the Bureau car, as he went down the steps into the garage, Skinner had thought how well they were matched and had even begun to plot a way Scully could remain in the X Files part-time, but get to advance her career at Quantico too. Skinner rubbed his forehead; it had all gone to hell, of course. On the other hand, Mulder, with the unhappy proof of Krycek's infamy, also focused on Krycek because as the inside man, Krycek would have answers to question that Mulder longed to know. As far as Skinner could tell, Mulder's convictions had never changed; no matter how much he hated the other man or how little he had reacted when he thought Krycek was dead. Skinner landed and immediately met with the more experienced investigators. He listened to them describe the hideaway in the mountains and agreed more hybrids probably occupied the place along with the boy. He felt his blood pressure rising, keeping the existence of aliens from the general public and the rest of the world had been difficult before. How this situation was going to be controlled caused a whole new set of problems. Without the alien leaders, the hybrids, knowing the occupation had failed and they were virtually alone on Planet Earth, would not share in the human agenda to keep them a secret. It wasn't as if they could increase their population through births, but they certainly could teach unscrupulous humans how to set up the vats again and go into production again. There were always more corrupt and devious people around who would go into partnership with them; Krycek's image appeared in his minds as well as the vicious look on his face when he had slugged him in the stairwell a decade ago. Krycek probably had hoped to be number one from the beginning with immeasurable power and wealth at his command. Skinner set his jaw in a hard line, if he had to; he would exterminate every hybrid without a shred of guilt and wipe Krycek off the face of the earth once and for all time. *** Chapter 7 HE WANTED TO SAY Ragtime - the musical Mulder made it to the hospital from the airport in record time. He practically ran to Krycek's room and grabbed the surprised man off his mattress and up against the headboard before he stopped. "What do you know about them?" Mulder spit out, shaking Krycek and bouncing his head off the metal bed frame. "How many are there? Are they all children? Why were they left behind?" Krycek shook his head and tried to pry Mulder off of him. He was gasping for breath and began to cough. Mulder shook him for another few moments and would have gone on longer, but two nurses ran in and pulled him off. Quickly, they reattached the oxygen feed to Krycek's nose and sat him up on the pillows. "Mr. Mulder!" Nurse number one shouted in his face, "You'll kill him if you don't back off!" Mulder grimaced and wished, for the thousandth time, that Krycek had really died in the garage two plus years ago. He hadn't lost his temper this way since the last time he wanted beat Krycek up. "Answers!" He commanded, without giving any attention to the nurses who were still fluffing and fluttering around Krycek's bed. Krycek didn't reply, he was breathless and shaken. "That's enough!" Mulder said sharply to the nurses. They glared at him, but they went. Mulder thrust the drawing of the hideout, which one of the scouts had given him. "Vermont," Mulder growled. "Hybrids, all children! Where are they?" Krycek opened his eyes, "What is this," He panted. Mulder cursed him under his breath, and then, cursed himself. Even at this late date, he had no idea if Krycek was putting him on or was genuinely ignorant. Krycek could lie during the most extreme conditions, Tunguska had taught him that. A doctor came into the room, "What's all this about?" He asked Mulder while he checked Krycek's head. "He's my prisoner," Mulder replied shortly. "He's withholding important and timely information." The doctor turned from Krycek and looked at Mulder, "Prisoner he may be, but right now he is my patient and if you won't honor his Civil Rights, I will, Agent." Mulder made a move toward the doctor; he stopped before he reached him as the thought of how crazy it would be to hit the doctor and end up in jail. To give him credit, the doctor had not moved or flinched. ERs were tough places these days, especially in DC. Mulder put his hands up in a conciliatory manner, "I won't touch him," He said. The doctor looked undecided, and then his beeper went off and he glared at Mulder, "Touch him again and I'll have you arrested." He said and hurried from the room. "You are one lucky son of a bitch," Mulder whispered into Krycek's ear as he took his seat by the bed. Krycek rolled his eyes and shut them again. Hoarsely he said, "The facility in Vermont was supposedly cleared before the exodus. It was a hybrid center, but some of the experiments went further and when a few of the clones seemed to become self-aware and were no longer one hundred percent drones, Spender got excited. He wanted the scientists to try experiments on wounded military personnel in the Gulf War, just to see if they could be made into better fighting machines. You remember Cole, don't you Mulder? Did you think they would stop there?" Krycek stopped talking. Mulder spoke softly, once again under control. "A child was found the other day. He is a clone, but not a drone; he is very advanced in many ways. He is a lot like Gibson Praise, but not as civilized. The task force believes there were more in the facility recently and that they are hiding somewhere. We need to find them." "You're protection will get them killed," Krycek whispered. "You know that. The Justice Committee is afraid of what can happen if any alien linked information gets out. They are under orders from the President to make sure that doesn't happen." "Oh, and you `care' if they live or die?" Mulder asked, his voice laden with irony. Krycek sighed, and without opening his eyes answered, "I never found any of them." He mused, "My brother, your sister or any of the missing people taken in the first round in 1973. Whatever happened to them, Spender kept close to the vest. I don't know if any of the others knew either. It was the most secret topic of all. All I could ever trace was that some of them, mostly children, were taken to a military base out west and most of them died during further testing there." Mulder rubbed his forehead. He had not believed what Krycek had said about his family the day before. Maybe it was true. He was tired of trying to second guess what was real and what was more Krycek propaganda, and he had never been any good at guessing anyway. "Samantha died there," Mulder said quietly. "I found out several years ago. She was there with Jeffrey Spender and his mother. There were clues that many others were there too." Mulder said, thinking that by clues, he meant spirits and ghosts, but he wasn't going to say that aloud. Krycek opened his eyes and stared green laser beams at Mulder, "He was six," Krycek said, "blonde curly hair, green eyes and missing his two front teeth. He was chubby too. Did you see anyone like him?" Mulder chewed his lip, this was the key, something, finally something to hold over Krycek's head. He had something Krycek wanted. He had no idea about the kid, but Krycek didn't know that. Mulder sneered, "You want answers Krycek? I want answers." Krycek closed his eyes again, "Fuck you Mulder." He whispered tiredly, "Fuck you." Mulder's excitement faded, had he come so far that he would hold this weapon over Krycek? It seemed as if this was the holiest of holies; the truth about family. He would have killed anyone who he knew who consciously withheld information about Samantha. Then, the thought came to him; Krycek `had' killed people who withheld it, William Mulder being one of them. He sighed. Too tired, he thought and too old. He had spent more than twenty years on his mission, his grail. Was it ever going to end? "These hybrids," Krycek aid solemnly, "They've got to be the last on earth and the last who could possibly know about their prototypes. The red-haired ones have Scully DNA in them and you've seen the ones of your sister. I don't know who else was used along the way and I have never been in on who was chosen or why. All I can tell you is that it was a large facility, with a wing dedicated to a group of particularly mad scientists who thought they could create super- soldier clones who could kick both human and alien ass. Of course, thought they could control them. Spender thought he would be in charge. If it went sour or some of them were saved for further experiments, I do not know where else they could have been taken. I've seen most of the Justice Committee documents, maps and causality counts. They looked complete to me, if there are more labs or facilities, I don't know where they could be or what they were doing there." Mulder rubbed his chin, "The scouts only found one underground level and proof of approximately seventy others there. They counted beds and food supplies." Krycek frowned, "There are several levels there, extending under the mountain. It was a big place with stores and provisions for hundreds." Mulder stared at Krycek until the man opened his eyes and met his gaze. He picked up the phone and dialed Skinner's number. "Krycek says there is a lot more to the lab. The scouts need to go back and look again. Someone is holding out." He hung up the phone, sat back in his chair and closed his eyes. After a few minutes, into the silence Krycek said, "I wonder who the new megalomaniac is this time." Mulder grunted, but otherwise did not reply. *** Chapter 8 You're so nice. The Last Midnight "When will he be well enough to be in protective custody?" Mulder asked the doctor who chastised him the day before. Mulder could see the doctor was reluctant to tell him, no doubt unsure if his patient would live through protective custody in Mulder's hands. "He needs a lot of care, medication and as little stress as possible. His body has been trough a tremendous upheaval, starting, I would say, when his arm was butchered. It's amazing that he is sane and able to reason. This kind of toll is as hard on the brain as it is on the rest of the body." Mulder chewed the inside of his cheek. He let the doctor get all his concerns off his chest, hoping to be able to take Krycek with him to Vermont later today. If Krycek was listening, he gave no sign. Perhaps, Mulder thought, he was simply waiting to be alone with him so he could be killed. Mulder had no intention of killing Krycek just yet. He wanted to now what was in Vermont and then he would need to know how to deal with what they found. Answers, answers, Mulder repeated it as a mantra in his head. Krycek had answers and some of the same questions too. Vermont was the new Promised Land of answers. At length, the doctor told Mulder to go to the pharmacy and pick up Krycek's medications. He emphasized that Krycek must take them as prescribed or be more likely to suffer another heart attack and die. Krycek was to stay warm and dry, get lots of sleep and low fat, low cholesterol meals at frequent intervals. He made Mulder repeat all of this back to him before he wrote the orders and handed them to a nurse to make copies for Mulder to keep and the hospital to have on record. Mulder agreed with alacrity and as soon as the doctor was out of the room he asked Krycek what sizes of clothes and shoes he needed. Mulder left Krycek and the hospital and went to a nearby mall, there hadn't been time to get Krycek fitted with a new prosthetic arm, however, the measurements had been taken and one could be ordered if Krycek lived through the trip to Vermont. Mulder went into a department store and headed for the men's department. He picked up packs of underwear, T shirts, socks and a warm robe. He asked for help in the clothing department, detailing what he wanted the clerk to chose while he went to get shoes and a suitcase. When he returned, the clerk had a small, but complete, wardrobe assembled. Mulder approved, he had told the clerk he wanted colors as well as all black ensembles. The leather jacket the clerk had chosen was as soft as butter and Mulder debated getting one for him as well. He paid with the Bureau Credit Card and made one more stop at the drugstore on his way to his own apartment and a shower, a meal and some packing of his own. He got back to the hospital to find Krycek and his guards were in the lobby barbershop and Krycek was in the chair. Mulder was too late to prevent another short, short haircut, but he approved of the rapidly disappearing beard. They traveled without trouble; there were always quick jumps from National or Dulles to points north. Krycek slept on the plane, and in the rental car. Mulder stopped at a roadside diner where Krycek could eat something appropriate; although on his own he would have gone through a take-out place. He stashed Krycek in a motel room not far from where the Justice Committee had set up a temporary headquarters. Mulder knew this time, Krycek wasn't going to run or disappear. Family was they key and Krycek didn't have any more debts owing that he could cash in for information. He was persona-non-gratis to all sides, besides, he was already asleep again. He asked for Skinner and was taken inside. Skinner was standing by a long table covered in maps and charts. There was a bank of computers set up on the other side of the room. Military uniforms were everywhere and Mulder was hard put to want to insist they all go before he talked to Skinner. He had never trusted the military. He and Skinner peered at the maps and Mulder realized that they were incomplete. The symbols which lined up from one map to another had been altered. True it was hard to tell, but Mulder spotted it. Someone was trying to control access to the entire lab. He looked around and saw some of the Committee approaching. They greeted Skinner respectfully, ignored Mulder and pointed out where the scouts were trying to get in on the maps. They were smooth, seemed concerned and honest, but Mulder wasn't fooled. Skinner, a little shocked and disturbed that Mulder was being so polite, caught his eye and realized Mulder didn't believe a word the men were saying. Saying, "Keep me in the loop," He led Mulder away to the coffee machine and into his small cupboard-like office. Mulder grabbed a pad and pencil and in a familiar paranoid style wrote his concerns and shoved the note into Skinner's hand. The top line was in Mulder's slanted capital letters, `BUGGED!" Skinner sighed, he had hoped the paranoia was over, the conspiracies put to bed and clear sailing ahead. He harrumphed and read the rest of the note. Mulder had scribbled a probable layout of the lab, which did not appear on the maps. Nevertheless, he was prepared and Skinner unlocked the bottom drawer of his desk, checked his weapon and hiding his hands as he bent over the drawer, stuffed his pockets with various other helpful devices and items; a couple of grenades, plastic explosives and a set of lock picking tools, to name a few. When he met Mulder's eyes, he saw the old fire burning in them and took a little bit of the old energy for himself, nodded in acknowledgement. He and Mulder left headquarters together. They saw a tail-car pull out right behind them, not bothering to hide its mission. Since it was unprofitable to try and hide from the tail, Mulder directed Skinner to the motel where he had Krycek. With his perception functioning after his recent illnesses, Krycek was waiting, dressed and sitting in a chair by the door, his crippled side pressed into the chair so it looked like he was fine. Skinner and Krycek did not address each other. Mulder was not surprised, when Krycek's body disappeared, Skinner had been sure he would be charged with murder. The end of his career, much more than Krycek's supposed demise, had haunted him as long as Kersh was assigned to the X Files. Fortunately, Kersh was sent to oversee the African side of the clean up and was gone. Mulder explained what Skinner had seen on the maps and what was missing. Krycek pressed his lips into a hard line, while the aftermath of the conspiracy and the alien's departure had meant the end of his work, money and contacts; he had been sincerely relieved it was over. He had always wanted to get his brother back, to avenge his family's hardships and have control and power in his hand. He had not wanted the world enslaved. But, he could live with the outcome, his lips twisted in a parody of a smile, or at least, he could have died knowing it was over. He spoke, "It is possible that there is no traitor." Mulder exclaimed, "What?" "If some of the clones have become advanced super-soldiers, they would want to be independent. After all, they would not have been welcome to go with the aliens and probably face elimination by them if they had tried to evacuate too. They would know everything, Mulder." Krycek said with the emphasis he hoped Mulder would catch and understand. "Nothing was ever hidden from the drones on the certainty that they could never do anything with the information. This doesn't mean that it wasn't stored in their brains, all ready and waiting for the intelligence to activate it. They are virtually unstoppable, as you saw two years ago and if they have had use of this facility, who knows what other advances they have made in the interim. They would have reason to hide the rest of the lab and opportunity to infiltrate the ranks of the Justice Committee to know what was going on as soon or sooner than the you and the FBI." Mulder sat on the nearest bed with a plop. Skinner took the other chair by the desk. The room was silent until Krycek reluctantly said, "There may be a way to stop them or at least, expose them." Skinner growled and rose with his hands in fists and for once, it was Mulder who held him off Krycek instead of the other way around. "What do you know?" Mulder asked angrily. "For fuck's sake," Krycek barked, finally out of patience with Mulder's and now Skinner's attitudes. "I am trying to help, whatever you want to believe, but being forthcoming to the two of you has never gone my way, has it?" He stopped; breathing hard and wheezing, "All I know is that Spender had a bolt-hole in the mountains of Nevada. It was primitive, but stocked. And," He said spitting out the words, "It was discovered when the Justice Committee made raids out there, raids that were triggered by an anonymous tip, by the way." Skinner resettled in his chair and Mulder raked his hands through his hair, "What's special about Nevada?" "Nevada, New Mexico, and no doubt the Pacific Rim and Japan, China, India and North Korea as well," Krycek waved his hand as if encompassing the whole area. "It is irradiated ground, A-Bomb tests were there before the war and since then. To make the super-soldier's more grounded to earth rather than whatever the aliens are made of, the scientists used magnetite as a property of their `blood' when they found copper, like in human blood, didn't work." Mulder and Skinner, drawn in to the explanation against his will, leaned forward. Krycek sighed impatiently, "Like metal in an MRI machine," he said, "Irradiation would pull the element right out of their systems, making them inoperable." Mulder thought hard for a few moments and then, began to smile. "Son of a bitch, Krycek, I know better than to ever trust you, but you sure lay down all the bread crumbs for me to follow, don't you?" For a second, Krycek grinned back, looking as he did when he was excited a decade ago, and clean and on Mulder's side. Mulder felt a pain in his chest and realized it was regret and remembrance. He had really wanted Krycek on his side and had never forgotten that he had. "Maybe being good has nothing to do with it Mulder," Krycek continued seriously. "Maybe it's surviving to make things right which is more important." Neither Mulder nor Skinner offered an alternate theory of Krycek's meaning of life. *** Chapter 9 A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history. Mohandas Gandhi Skinner flew back to DC, leaving everything behind him, as he planned to turn around and come back the same night. It was imperative that he see the Gunmen and Scully. He, Mulder and Krycek, what a trio! Skinner doubted that any music they made would be harmonic. Nevertheless, they needed the Gunmen for security and Scully for the science and together they would form a band; merry did not come into it. He was getting too old for all of this, he thought as he rented one more rental car after standing in line at National Airport. He hoped the super-soldiers or the Justice Committee or whoever the hell was in on another bid to take over the planet, had not penetrated the Gunmen's security. Certainly, at the door they searched him thoroughly and scanned him several times before they let him in. Scully showed up soon after. Skinner explained everything; he drew maps and detailed descriptions and although it wasn't necessary, gave the Gunmen his authority code for the FBI computer system. They ran as many names as Skinner could identify and came up with nothing. No one, so far, came up dirty, crazy or questionable. The Gunmen decided to drive to Vermont and loaded the van to the max with equipment and comforts. Scully went home to pack and see to Will and then join Skinner at the airport for a very late flight to NYC, which was as close as they could get that time of night. They would rent a car and drive the rest of the way. Krycek took his meds, ate another small meal and went back to bed. Mulder ate a rather larger meal, turned on the TV and fell asleep. He was waiting for a safe cell phone from the Gunmen to contact Gibson Praise. It turned out he didn't have to wait, at five in the morning, there was a knock on the door; Mulder and Krycek went into defensive postures, but it was Gibson and another young man. In his twenties, he was a dirty blonde with green eyes and straight front teeth. He smiled, showing all his teeth and Krycek gasped. Mulder looked at him, startled, and saw Alex Fucking Krycek about to faint. He pushed his head down and rubbed the back of his neck. After a few moments, Krycek sat up and through his tears held out his hand to the young man. The young man was staring at Krycek as if he had turned to stone. Gibson was grinning and had happy tears in his eyes. Even Mulder could feel the atmosphere in the room, something extraordinary was happening and the very air sparkled with it. "Joey?" Krycek said in an awed voice. "Alex?" The young man answered. Neither man moved; it was if having come this far, after this long, had stunned them into immobility. Mulder bridged the gap, forgetting he hated Krycek and hadn't believed a word he said about his family, forgetting everything about the past except that there was joy at last and perhaps, answers as well. Mulder opened his arms and crushed the young man to his chest, a sibling, found at last! Mulder felt all the joy and all the relief that had been owed in his life for decades come to rest at last. Krycek laughed, at first choked with tears, but becoming clear and fine and sounding as young as a child and as relieved as an emancipated victim of Auschwitz when the allies arrived in 1945. Gibson pried Mulder away and clumsily shoved Joey towards Krycek. The brothers met forehead to forehead, exactly the same height and profile. They were trembling and Mulder turned his eyes to Gibson, this was not his moment and the intimacy was overwhelming. Gibson grinned and offered Mulder a high-five. Mulder laughed and slapped Gibson's hand. "Got anything to eat in here?" Gibson asked. And Mulder sat on his bed and laughed until his diaphragm ached. They made a morning of it; the younger men were hungry and they all headed for the nearest pancake house. Champagne and dancing could come later, scrambled eggs and orange juice tasted like ambrosia. Joey sat on the same side of the booth with his brother, fitting, as if it had been measured, into the space Krycek's left arm had once occupied. Mulder thought Krycek must feel complete at last and for a moment he was jealous, but the joy was too real and infectious to feel left out for long. Krycek raised his eyes to meet Mulder's and in them Mulder read Krycek's whole story, his hopes; failures, heartbreak and dreams and loves. How had he missed all that? And Mulder, paling with shock of his own, realized he knew it all, and possibly had known it for a long, long time. Involuntarily, he put out his hand across the table and Krycek took it and held on. If Krycek's eyes had been revealing before, now they glowed with green fire and the fire was directed at him and it wasn't meant to burn, but to warm, to include and keep safe. On the walk back to the motel, they stopped at a bench in a small urban park and Mulder, with Krycek adding colorful commentary, brought the two younger men up to date. Gibson and Joey frowned and got far away looks on their faces. "I don't sense a large presence." Joey said and Gibson nodded. "I can feel something, but it might just be the kid you have in custody." Mulder and Krycek waited, looking first at Gibson and then at Joey. Joey sighed, "I was with them a long time, you know, and whatever had been added to me in-utero, like with your sister and you," he said as an aside to Mulder, "well, it activated and I was attuned to them and their non-vocal communication. Gibson has more of it, because he is a later model, as it were." But no one smiled. "Why didn't you find me?" Krycek asked. "I thought you were dead. Gibson found me first and explained everything about the conspiracy and who Mulder was and what you had to do with it. Unless we were closer geographically, I wouldn't be able to sense you. Those of us who were alive when the exodus began were dumped in Area 51. After everything, most of us were killed by military security until someone figured out who we were. After that, the Spender guy had us put into quarantine. We couldn't sense anything at all while we were in there. For a brief few hours after Spender died the security failed and Gibson was there to help us get out. He knew you Alex, so I stayed with him, hoping the next time he saw Mulder, there would be news if you were really dead or alive somewhere else." Joey smiled diffidently, "And here I am." Krycek sat down, the emotion and the walk catching up with him. He hated that he was so weak, but this was infinitely better than the last time he was on a park bench. Mulder sat down too, hesitantly he asked, "Did you know my sister, Samantha?" Joey closed his eyes, and Mulder noted his lashes were just as thick and lush as Krycek's although they were seal brown and not black. "In the beginning, in 1973 and `74, all the children were kept together. The aliens weren't quite sure what to do with us. We were only supposed to be captives until the human conspirators taught them how to infiltrate world governments and begin the road to invasion. In exchange, the aliens were willing to appoint those men to high positions in the new order. When it was clear that the humans had not kept the agreement, the experiments started and we were separated. They didn't really need to experiment on us, they'd been coming to earth for ages and taken many people along the way. They knew most human qualities, what they weren't good at was motivation. It took them a long time to realize that ultimately, the conspirators would sacrifice us for power. The aliens live a long, long time and children are not usual, but a special event. The ones that have children are elevated to high positions. Although they had observed earthlings for a long time, they couldn't comprehend sacrificing children." Gibson spoke, "After a while, when the humans were using human fetuses to go further than before. The aliens decided that they wanted to be in on it, figuring up close and personal might make them understand better. I was a product of that round of experiments. You and Alex are very early examples and most did not live." Gibson smiled grimly and Mulder realized, not for the first time, that this young man had had no childhood at all. "It came down to specific DNA abnormalities. Nothing that would be apparent, but specialized genes the human genome project has yet to identify. The aliens knew it very quickly; the conspirators found out and started using all those related to the ones who had survived. They were careless and power- mad and also sure that it was their `special genes' which would gain them power and rule in the new order." Krycek added, "Spender claimed he'd fathered a tribe and that they were all destined to serve him and the goals of the conspiracy. However, he was sure you and Samantha were his, and she wasn't. You lived because the amount of alien DNA added to you, like me, didn't substantially change much. You have a touch of ESP and empathetic certainty and I'm very good at mathematics and spatial relationships, like directions and geography." He smiled as if to say a lot of good those gifts had done for him. He continued, "By the time Samantha and Joey were in-uterus, more was known and consequentially additional genes were added. It didn't show much when they were very young and they were taken before they could reveal themselves and attract questions." Joey, his voice rough velvet like Krycek's said, "Samantha and the other female abductees were `harvested' for their ova almost as soon as we were taken. The alien tools and the human disregard somehow caused this action to trigger a terminal cancerous condition. They died within a few years. I'm sorry; I don't know where she was taken or what happened to her." Mulder nodded, he knew what had happened and come to a sort of resting place about it. He wasn't satisfied, but she had been gone a very long time and his sense of loss had also mellowed, especially since Will was born. He studied Joey, he was a paler, slimmer version of Alex; they shared the same shadows however, and what Mulder recognized as great sadness. Maybe he hadn't had the worst, Mulder mused. He had at least more of a youth when he believed in his parents, which alone had given him some kind of center that Alex and his brother did not have. Mulder finally asked the most important question, "In the Vermont lab, have the beings, whatever they are, human or other, become advanced enough to pose a new risk to the planet?" "If they have fulfilled the programming Spender ordered and planned and if they were able to survive alone since the exodus, probably. A super-soldier was designed to take the place of a small unit. Together, their powers multiply by proximity. They have no ideology, only survival instincts. Without a human leader, it is probable that they have simply been waiting for one to arrive. If they think the Justice contingent mean them harm, they will kill them all and keep going. Since it is likely that all the older conspirators have died and taken their alien implants with them, the super-soldiers won't ever stop looking until they are all killed. They don't `learn'," Gibson said strongly. "Their mission programming was kept simple. Obey Spender or his appointees and survive, period." "Alien implants?" Mulder asked and met Krycek's eyes. He knew they were both thinking the same thing. Get to one of the graves and dig up the corpse and use the implant. On the other hand, there was no way to let anyone else suspect that such enormous power was possible to resurrect. Gibson smiled grimly, "They all had them. Well," he said modifying the `all'. "The top guns had them, Spender, the Brit, William Mulder and a few others. It wasn't as if any of them wanted to share power more than they had to, you know. I'm sure they had plans to eliminate their rivals as soon as the project was complete and the invasion began." Mulder nodded and Krycek said, "Yeah." Power sharing was not high on the conspirator's list of priorities. Joey clapped his hands, breaking the silent brown study the group had fallen into, "So, what's the plan." Krycek sat up straight, all weakness forgotten, "You," he said, pointing at Joey and Gibson. "Go back where it's safe." *** Chapter 10 I saw a man pursuing the horizon; I Saw a Man by They youngsters walked back to the motel in offended silence. Gibson stopped from time to time to try and reason with Krycek. For once, Mulder was in complete agreement with his long lived rival. Mulder rented the room next door to where he and Krycek were staying. Heretofore unnoticed, Mulder realized the boys had come in a rental car and had a small rucksack apiece. Mulder asked if Krycek wanted to change rooms as he would be willing to bunk with Gibson. Krycek said, "No," and nothing else. Mulder realized why as soon as they had settled the boys, Krycek went in, washed up and went to bed. Mulder made him take his meds and use a blanket to keep warm. To needle him as well as being totally uncomfortable with the bizarre idea of Mulder being a fussbudget, Krycek said, "Yes, mom." Mulder grabbed a pillow and hit Krycek on the head. Krycek laughed until he began to wheeze again. Mulder practically threw a glass of water at him, and Krycek shut up and took small sips until he could breathe again. Mulder settled on his bed, the TV remote in his hand. "If my life weren't already a series of impossible and implausible events, I would surely be in shock tonight." "He's alive," Krycek said softly. "I know," Mulder replied and turned on the TV. When he was sure Krycek was asleep, he said it again, "I know." They woke to loud insistent knocking on the door. Mulder had his gun out and Krycek looked through the peephole. "It's Scully," He said tonelessly. Mulder put his gun away, rubbed his face and said, "Let her in." Scully entered, ignored Krycek and started to talk to Mulder, "Everyone at HQ is waiting for you, Mulder." She began. "Skinner has held off any more investigation of the lab until you arrive." Altering her tone she asked, "Are you sure there are more hybrids? I mean, beside the boy?" Krycek went into the bathroom. Mulder flipped the switch on the in-room coffee maker. "Yes, Scully. The super-soldier ones were bred here. Like Billy Miles after he shed his more human aspects. There might be as many as seventy or so and they can do a lot of damage." "The boy doesn't have a knob at the base of his scull," She said pugnaciously. "And his blood is red." Mulder sighed, and saw that was the wrong thing to do, because he saw she bristled at the sound. "The best information says he is." Mulder said. "There might be a way to stop all of them, but the Justice Committee personnel should be kept out of it until we are sure they can be trusted. Having even one of these as a servant means having a whole lot of power at one's command, and we don't want that to start all over again." Krycek came out of the bathroom; hair slicked back, only a faint shadow of beard on his cheeks and a knot tied in the sleeve of his shirt. Scully curled her lip, "He's the best information?" She said. "What's the deal this time?" Krycek ignored their conversation and Mulder wished he could too. Quietly, trying to have patience, he said, "Gibson arrived last night with... with a friend. They know about the super-soldiers and can sense if they are nearby. I don't want to put him in any danger, just get near enough to the facility for Gibson to tell me what's in there." It was Scully's turn to sigh. "I thought it was over." She said tiredly. "Me too," Mulder said, pouring coffee and artificial cream into a cup. Scully helped herself to coffee. "He looks better," she said, meaning Krycek. "I'm fine," Krycek growled and refilled the small two cup coffee reservoir with water and the top with another packet of coffee. "I don't trust you, Krycek." She said coolly. "Once you're in the picture, Mulder ends up running after his own tail and getting nowhere." Krycek simply stared at her and Mulder saw how that blank look was the false face and not the real one. He shook his head, had he really decided to trust Krycek, to know Krycek? "Ooookay!" Mulder said brightly. "We'll meet you and Skinner on the ridge by the lab in a couple of hours. I'll call with coordinates when we're on the way." Scully stood her ground, "I'm not going on any mission with Krycek! How many times does he have to screw with you before you learn he is bad news?" "Go with me on this Scully," Mulder said quietly, but firmly. "Krycek is here to help this time." Scully turned from Krycek, "Oh, Mulder, how many times have you asked that of me? It's not as if I don't, haven't done a million things for you against my better judgment already. Krycek is a murderer and a lot of other things and he has shown his true colors in the past. If you think he has changed, you are wrong and I won't be coerced into pretending some kind of détente for the sake of this job. The Justice Committee has proved they are honest and open minded, surely you haven't forgotten? Their teams of scouts and investigators are all qualified to search for potential hybrids and `they' can be trusted not to shoot us in the back and make off with whatever we find." At that moment, when Mulder was searching for something to say, there was a knock on the door and since it hadn't been closed all the way, they came in. Gibson stood between Mulder and Scully and smiled at her. Joes immediately went to Krycek's side and stood with. Scully greeted Gibson and turned toward Joey. She gasped. "What is this?" She asked aggressively. Joey quirked an identical eyebrow to match Scully's, "I am Joseph Krycek." He said. "I was taken in 1973 along with many other relations to the original conspirators. Unlike most of them, I survived and have been staying with Gibson, off and on, since the aliens left. I'd been hoping to meet Agent Mulder to get news about my brother and now I have found both of them." Scully was speechless. "He is human," Gibson said, answering the question in Scully's mind. "Krycek started off years ago, like Mulder, to find Joey, only he took the inside track was overwhelmed trying to stay alive." "So the means justify the end?" Scully asked rhetorically. Gibson stared at the assembled company, "This is why I prefer being alone," He said wryly, as an aside to Joey. Joey smiled briefly. "There is a lot of water under the bridge after all these years, and there is no going back and making things different or right, Agent Scully. Alex Krycek is and was, many times in the past, on Mulder's side of things. He is on your side now, if the hybrids can be found safely, they can provide all the missing bits and pieces and fill in the gaps in the documentation the conspiracy left behind." Scully sniffed. "The information is important, Scully," Gibson reproved her. She looked away and saw herself in the mirror, Krycek and his brother were reflected also, and Mulder, looking tired. For a moment she didn't recognize the reflected Mulder, he was thin and had a few silver flecks in his hair. But it was his expression which gave her pause. There was no febrile energy, no excitement, he was listening to Gibson and she could see the pulse beat in his neck. She had the strange feeling that it was beating slower than normal and was weak too. How had Mulder become so ordinary? She thought he looked like a regular guy, no longer young, but not middle-aged; worn, that was the word. He looked worn as if he were trying to get it up one more time for the team and was having a hard time doing it. Why, Scully thought in wonderment, he had gravitas. He had become a respectable, responsible man while she wasn't paying attention. He looked like a father, Will's father and not someone playing at being a Dad. She smiled at herself in the mirror, he was trustworthy, this time he could let Krycek tag along, but he was no longer subject to Krycek leading him astray by appealing to an obsession. The romantic, adventurous Peter Pan of Paranoia had grown up. She spent a moment mourning the boy who was gone and another moment considering if the man was the man for her. She looked at Krycek; he was not looking at her or Gibson or his brother. He was staring at Mulder and there was a wealth of an emotion she could not name in his eyes and on his face. In that second, she understood. She turned towards the door, "Okay, Gibson." She said. Gibson, with a small smile, nodded. Capitulating she said, "Whatever is best; Skinner and I will meet you on the ridge Mulder, when you give us the coordinates." She opened the door; Mulder was pouring another cup of coffee and handing the cup to Krycek. As she left the room, Gibson followed her outside. "Is it that much of a surprise?" He asked her. She shook her head and squinted at the dawning sun, "He always wanted me to consider implausible ideas." She said and walked to her car. *** Chapter 11 Scholars look upon our journey and muse Adventuring Credo by John Willey After a long argument, Mulder and Krycek agreed to let the boys go to the ridge with them. Only to identify what they sensed, the men said. After that, the younger men would leave, they could wait in motel or go home and be contacted later. Joey and Gibson wore identical sulky expressions, but Mulder and Krycek were not moved to reconsider. After a stop at a local Army-Navy Supply store, where Krycek quickly picked out supplies, flashlights, climbing gear and canteens, they finally headed for the ridge; the boys following in their rental car. As they came over a stone bridge and saw the summit ahead, Mulder pulled over and signaled for the boys to stop their car. They got out and stood together under the protection of the trees. Everything was very green and quiet. The sunlight filtered through the tree branches and Mulder thought how familiar the trees looked, although it had been a very long time, decades, since he stood in the copse at the back of his father's property. "Doesn't it always seem impossible?" Krycek murmured. "What is impossible?" Mulder asked. Krycek smiled as if he were being maudlin and was embarrassed. "How such terrible things happen in pretty, innocent places? These venerable trees have stood and outlived generations of men and now they are merely camouflage for dirty deeds and maniacal evil." Mulder smiled, "They've seen it before." He said and Krycek quirked an eyebrow. "The Green Mountain Boys, remember them from American history? They defended this land from Colonial powers and fought to keep this entire Eden free." Krycek patted a trunk of a huge tree, "See that old man," he said to the tree. "You've had a long rest and now it's time to serve your country again." A crow cawed nearby and all the men jumped. "What do you know?" Mulder asked the younger men. "They're below us. They can sense us too, Mulder. We should get out of here before they come looking for Joey and me." "Do they know I am here?" Mulder asked. Gibson cocked his head, "They are always tracking you Mulder and Alex too. They know when you are nearby they are about to be in the midst of trouble. We should all go." "How many?" Krycek asked urgently. "Can't tell for sure," Joey answered, "But there are enough of them to confuse me, so I would say there are many." "We don't have a weapon, Mulder." Krycek said and started to steer Mulder back to the car. "There's no way to get them to talk to us at this point, until we have leverage." Mulder balked and Krycek let out a soundless sigh and thought about how he really needed his remaining arm. "Gibson," Mulder said, "Are they going to attack?" Gibson scratched his ear, "I don't think so, not if they are not threatened. If everyone goes away, I think they will stay here for a while longer. They seem to be planning where to go and what to do now that they are alone on the planet. They have no attachment to men anymore. But, they are not sure what kind of power base they need to stay safe." "It's all they want," Joey added. "They want to be able to roam freely and not be hunted." Mulder let his shoulder's relax, "I don't think the Justice Committee is going to let that happen." "No," Said Gibson, "They need to be disarmed of their powers. Without morality or leadership, they will simply eliminate anything or anyone that gets in their way. They are disorganized right now; if they discover the plans Spender had in mind, they will go ahead and try to carry them out, regardless." Gibson got a frightened look on his face, "Shhh!" he said to Krycek. Mulder was confused; Krycek had not said anything out loud. Then, he realized it was something he must have been thinking about. They got back in their cars. They saw Scully and Skinner in a SVU parked a short way down the mountain. They reversed and joined the queue down the mountain. They stopped at a restaurant with outdoor seating. Mulder went inside and ordered coffees for everyone. They sat at a round picnic table and waited until the waitress served the coffee and went back inside. There was no one else outdoors, it was too early in the season to count on spring this far north. One by one, they told the morning's happenings to Scully and Skinner. "The plan is to leave them alone?" Skinner said. "Only for the moment," Krycek replied, which surprised everyone. He had not spoken to directly to either of them so far. "We need a weapon. They have no reason to trust anyone and lots of reasons to see all humans as the enemy." "What weapon, Krycek." Skinner said gruffly and it was obvious he did not trust Krycek an inch. Krycek sat back in his seat and Mulder had a sharp memory of another, younger and more elegant pose from when Krycek was, briefly, his partner and the younger man had leaned back at another table where they once shared a meal. "Magnetite," Krycek said. `The super-soldiers break down when exposed to it. I told you that. There is plenty in these mountains as there is in most places on earth, but it has not been exposed to radiation here. We need to get the element and figure out a dispersal system." Mulder looked at Scully; she had forgotten her hostility long enough to consider the idea of dispersal systems. She raised her eyes, "The Gunmen," she said. "The Gunmen," Mulder echoed and they smiled at each other for the first time in a long time. "Use the government credit card to fly back. I'm going to go tell lies to the Justice Committee." Skinner groused. "I thought those days were over," He looked at Mulder reprovingly. Mulder smiled. Skinner left the table, "What about us?" Gibson asked. "Oh," Mulder said airily, one eye still on Scully. "You come with us." The party broke up, Scully chose to go in the younger men's car and Krycek and Mulder got into their vehicle. The flight back to DC was uneventful, if expensive. Krycek sat with his brother and Scully sat between Mulder and Gibson. Whatever Gibson was sensing from the company aboard the plane must have been amusing, because he wore a small, satisfied smile on his face the entire journey. They agreed that only Mulder and Scully should make first contact with the Gunmen, all of them would have been too much for them to allow into their apartment all at one time. Mulder dropped Krycek and the boys at his apartment, telling them to order something to be delivered for dinner and to save him some. Once Mulder left the apartment and the boys immediately turned on the huge surround sound TV, Krycek wandered from room to room. He was familiar with many of Mulder's possessions from Hegal Place, but this place was larger, airier and cleaner. There were three bedrooms, one for the baby, one as an office, which also contained the old black futon and Krycek thought Mulder must still use it from time to time as a bed. The third bedroom was furnished with good taste and it only took Krycek a minute to realize the antique furniture must have belonged to Mulder's mother. He approved of the room, the cherry bureau and nightstands were elegant and Mulder had chosen a green bedspread with freestyle flying geese going across it. The curtains were the same design and it was picked up in the wallpaper too. The bathroom was neat too, dark green towels and a green and white shower curtain in a geometric design. Krycek sat on the edge of the bed, using his hand to smooth the pillows. Mulder as a dad, Krycek had never spent time thinking about how that might change him. The apartment was proof of some kind of an epiphany though, it looked like Mulder had decided to actually live here instead of merely board between X Files. Krycek wanted to lie down on the bed and wait for Mulder. He wanted to signal his feelings and intentions, but although he'd faced all kinds of danger, coming on to Mulder sexually made him quail. Even if Mulder walked on that side of the street once in a while, why would he choose an old enemy and a cripple? Krycek stood up; he'd lived on dreams before, it would be nothing new to go on that way. He chivied the boys into deciding what they wanted for dinner and used the phone to order it. It came with great timeliness, and he made them sit at the table to eat, claiming the TV could wait. He felt terribly old when they obeyed him and Joey met his eyes and shrugged. "It's almost like home." He said and Krycek felt his throat tighten. This was something he had dreamed for a very long time and it had come true. He ruffled Joey's hair and then Gibson's as he went in the kitchen to find glasses and something to drink. Mulder came in after the eleven o'clock news had started; Krycek was watching it on the small old TV set in the office, sitting on the old couch and feeling as if he were in a dream, because Mulder came through the door without his gun at the ready. Mulder had filled a plate and nuked it in the microwave. He sat beside Krycek on the old couch and began shoveling food into his mouth. After a few minutes, Gibson came to the door with a bottle of iced tea and put it down next to Mulder's plate. He said, "Joey and I are gonna hit the sack. We'll bunk in the kid's room. We found blankets and pillows in the closet." Mulder nodded and said "good night". Krycek got up and waited for Joey to get out of the bathroom. He hugged the boy tightly, resting his cheek on the boy's soft hair. "Sleep well." He said. Joey hugged him back wordlessly, but Krycek felt a great calm and certainty emanating from his brother. Mulder had switched the TV to the Sci-Fi channel and was absorbed watching a great squid devouring half the navy. Krycek grinned and sat down. "Don't you ever get tired of the bizarre, Mulder?" Mulder leaned back and smiled sheepishly, "It puts everything into perspective, I've yet to see a movie that comes close to the real horror I've seen, and it's kind of nice to see mankind remains naļve about monsters." After another encounter with a nuclear sub, which only slowed the squid down for a few minutes, Mulder said, "You can have my room, I'm comfortable here." "It's been a long day," Krycek said tiredly. He put his hand on Mulder's arm, "My brother has been found." He said. Mulder covered his hand with one of his own. "And to think," Mulder said, "I'd given up on miracles." Krycek smiled and it seemed as natural as if they had done it a million times when Mulder encircled his shoulder and they leaned into one another and sighed. "I don't think I can hate you anymore," Mulder murmured. "I don't think I really have for a long time." He paused and took a deep breath, "My father really was the enemy and my mother kept her secrets until the end. I thought Scully was my other half, but she has never really shared the same sense of zeal or need to know what is out there. I'm almost forty-four years old and all I have is my son two or three times a week. I've paid a large price for my obsessions." Krycek remained silent; this was Mulder's moment of revelation. At length, Mulder said quietly, "So have you." Krycek's breath caught in his throat; was Mulder actually comparing them? That was new and a huge leap considering his anger towards him in just the past few days. "I've never wanted to see it, you know." Mulder went on, "But I always knew you were out there digging around, even after you had supposedly died. The whys and the wherefores hardly matter anymore. It's been a long, long road and it isn't over quite yet." He pulled Krycek tighter to his side, "and here we are." "Here we are," Krycek whispered and dared to brush Mulder's cheek with the ghost of a kiss. Mulder sighed deeply and the two men, who'd long left their private dreams unfulfilled, fell asleep leaning into one another on an old worn couch. *** Chapter 11 This is our moment 2000 Years by Billy Joel The Gunmen came to Mulder's apartment after a considered conversation in which Mulder swore that Joey, Gibson and Krycek were not aliens or black ops. They'd stayed up all night tracking radiation patterns and reports of UFOs, weather balloons or other unexplained sightings or landings over the past fifty years. The cautiously agreed that radiation of the metallic elements in the earth's crust might affect machines that ran on magnetized power. They had also checked reports by some of leading experts on refining and purifying metals and said there were ways to extract magnetite, but how to do so and not attract notice was something they didn't think was possible. It would have to be a mining operation and there was no way the government was going to sanction any such thing. Krycek listened silently, as was his wont when not invited to participate. He spoke, however, when the others seemed to run out of ideas. "If we can catch the hybrids before they leave the lab in Vermont, it wouldn't take a lot of magnetite to disable all of them. How hard can it be to go Nevada or New Mexico with a pickaxe or two and bring back a carton full of rocks?" Gibson stared at Krycek, but he spoke to Mulder, "It would mean there would be no interrogation afterwards and it's highly improbable they would talk to you if you went and knocked on their door. Whatever unfinished business you have with the conspiracy's secret plans would remain unanswered." Mulder chewed his lip and tried to think exactly what had been so important to him just a week or so ago. He had simply wanted to understand these hybrids and if he were honest, try to find a way to convince the Justice Committee to let at least some of the alien technology become public? He knew what he needed to know now that it was over. The truth about his family, the aliens, the fate of the planet, and the weight of his responsibility for full disclosure had all been answered. There would be no full disclosure, not anytime in a future he could see either. The people of earth would go on under the assumption that they were the only beings in the universe. He could still push the committee to appropriate resources to keep an eye on potential alien visitations and not go back to skeptical innocence. It was the best he could do, however unsatisfying it was to live with from now on. He looked at Joey; Joey could answer in more detail about the years he was a prisoner, maybe he could lead Mulder to other survivors and help their families to find closure. The bigger issue was closure of his own. Could he let his obsession end? Could he let go? He thought he had already been through this process, but he had never really let go. He had believed Krycek was still out there alive and knowing things he didn't know. He had still believed that it was possible to revive the conspiracy if Krycek had wanted to do it. He looked at Alex Krycek sitting at his dining room table, invited for once, and openly contributing his thoughts. And Joey and Gibson and his son, didn't they deserve a life without constantly looking over their shoulders, or waiting for the next ship? There would be no more ships; these particular aliens were gone for good, off to try to reclaim the purity of their own genome. They'd abandoned the hybrids because that was why they had left and taking them was counterproductive. Every hybrid would not die. The ones like him and Krycek, Joey, Gibson and Will would go on, their lives intersecting with everyone else on the planet and some of them passing on their mutated genes to the next generations. But, hadn't that always been the way of evolution? The best, strongest, and smartest survived and the rest fell by the wayside. If their genes produced healthy offspring, eventually they would triumph. When that day came, he and all his concerns would be gone for tens of thousands of years, and who was there to say this wasn't the way it was supposed to be anyhow? Mulder slowly looked around his table once more. He felt something in his heart let go. This was his family, he thought. He belonged and they belonged to him. Byers, Langly, Frohike, blood brothers in thoughts and deeds, loyal no matter what. Gibson, Joey and his small son were the bounty and blessings of the future. And Krycek, Alex Krycek who had been there through it all too. Mulder searched for the hate in his heart and found only a pale echo. He looked for his loneliness and found that it no longer mocked him as a failure. Family, he'd been searching since childhood for a family and here it was. Mulder got up and went to the framed poster of the vintage typewriter he had brought with him from Hegal Place. He took it down, opened the safe behind it and took out several thick piles of fifty and hundred dollar bills. He put it on the table, Gibson and Joey started to smile and nudged each other. "How about a caravan of rental SUV's going cross country? Who is up for that?" Mulder asked and then he smiled and put a hand on Krycek's shoulder. Krycek leaned back against the hand and said, "I get to drive, Mulder. You get to ride shotgun!" Everyone at the table laughed and began to make plans. Mulder thought that maybe when it was all really over for the second time, he would write a book. *** Chapter 12 In the fell clutch of circumstance Invictus by William Ernest Henley; 1849-1903 It wasn't hard to arrange. Neither Mulder nor Krycek rented a vehicle in their own names and had it done by proxy using one of a very few acquaintances, which Mulder had managed to cultivate over the years. Joey and Gibson had managed to rent a rent-a-wreck outside National Airport, but were too uninsured to rent a fully loaded SUV. The Gunmen rented the rest. They also bought the supplies and since it was a large cache of snacks and sodas, the younger men were happy. It took a few days for the Gunmen to assemble the minimum of camping and mining gear they had agreed upon, but within the week and without informing either Scully or Skinner, they met in the Pentagon City Mall underground parking lot and began the journey. Krycek drove the SUV while Mulder got to choose the music and when to stop for food and drinks. They planned on a four to five day journey to Nevada, depending on the weather and how the vehicles stood up to the long distance. In accord, they hit Route 66 West and a steady sixty-five miles an hour, once they were passed the DC suburbs. It was comfortable, thought Mulder. Not at all like other roads taken with Krycek by his side or leading him on. He didn't intend to let Krycek drive all day, the man was still weak and needed rest. He'd drug him if he had too, he patted his pocket; he had the drugs to do it. It was a clear morning, but the further west they went, they saw the clouds cover the sky and lake effect rain and sleet from Cleveland and Detroit was filtering down to meet them. Krycek finally surrendered the wheel in Kentucky, where they had all stopped for a very late lunch and to agree when they would stop for the night. The boys were in tearing spirits and having a blast in the SUV which Langly was driving. They had talked tech to their ballpoint pens leaked in their pockets. That they had eaten way, way too much sugar was not mentioned. At least, Mulder reasoned, they weren't stoned. Using one of the many clean, no-name cell phones the Gunmen had with them, Mulder called Scully and let her know he was on a trip with the Gunmen for company, figuring she would not call out the cavalry like should would have done if he were on the road with only Krycek. He apologized for the short warning and said he would take Will for as long as she wanted when he returned. Satisfied that he had covered his bases, he relaxed and as evening fell Krycek and he began to talk. At first it was ordinary enough subjects; things that did not touch on their past or the present mission. They compared sporting favorites and Mulder wasn't surprised to find Krycek was up on World Cup Soccer and into Thoroughbred Racing. In his mind he could see an ethnic Krycek among fellow east Europeans and an elegantly turned out Krycek, all in black, at the races, a flute of champagne and a plate of caviar by his hand in the millionaire's box. "I never knew you were so versatile, Krycek." Mulder said. Krycek looked at him sharply, "It's nothing," He said. "I've spent a lot of the last decade traveling and when there has been a moment away from what I had to do, I tried to be in the company of strangers having a good time. That way, I could be part of it without endangering it or anyone there." Mulder went to the bone by asking, "And friends and lovers, Krycek?" Krycek smiled wryly, "As if," he answered. Mulder shook his head, "Not good enough," he said, "Come on, full disclosure now." "I didn't want to be anybody's friend," Krycek answered soberly. Mulder thought about the phrase, `I didn't want to be anyone's friend,' Krycek had not phrased it `I don't want friends or I didn't want anyone to befriend me. "Alone was safest?" Mulder replied. Krycek laughed under his breath, "For them and me, both." Mulder nodded, took his eyes off the road to glance quickly at the man by his side. "Was it so dangerous to know you?" "They," Krycek said bitterly with the emphasis on `they', "never left me alone. It was their particular pleasure to spoil intimate moments or any attempts to know someone outside the cabal. It was the unwritten rule, you see. If they isolated you, it made you completely dependent. They weren't above trumping up some kind of trap for a friend outside the group and forcing you to pick sides or their life or death over your own." "Must have been tough to get laid," Mulder said, trying for light, but blundering badly. Krycek stared out the window; how to answer this question was a problem. He knew how much and for how long Mulder had avoided intimacy because of his obsession with finding the `truth." And, he knew how much and how long he had not wanted anyone else but Mulder. All his other attempts had come to nothing but betrayal and humiliation. Since he lost the arm, it had been worse. "I wouldn't say it was anything approaching normal," he said, trying to be wry and not pathetic. Abruptly Mulder said, "It was never meant to be." After a pause he went on, "Scully and me. It didn't work." "You love her," Krycek said, not asking a question. "Yeah," Mulder answered, "I do love her, but I can't live with her and work with her and without the work, well we don't have anything in common." Krycek was silent, he wanted to say, "I know your soul," but he didn't dare. Mulder needed to give him more of an opening. It was full dark and their headlights and those of the two vans behind them was all that lit the long stretch of road before them. "We need to stop soon," Krycek said. "I know," Mulder said. "What are we doing, Krycek?" "I think we're getting to know one another," He replied. The time for coyness was over. "We never had the chance before." "How well are we going to know each other?" Mulder asked, only the tiniest quaver revealing how much he cared about the answer. Krycek sighed, "I think," he said carefully. "That it is up to us. Neither of us knows a whole hell of a lot about intimacy and trust. The past decade, hell, since 1973, all we have concentrated on was finding what we had lost. Now we know and as for me, I haven't a clue what comes next." "I know," Mulder said warmly, letting down his guard as he approached an exit alight with several hotel and motel flashing neon, "we do what we have always done, Alex. We go for it and damn the consequences." "I guess that means we have something in common," Krycek said. "Yeah, we do." Mulder answered and pulled into the Motel 6 parking lot. "I think we may have the same agenda after all." But instead of a voice full of smart-ass, it had the same little quiver in it. *** Chapter 13 I got the fever The Young Rascals Everyone ate hugely at the diner across the street, this kind of BBQ was simply too hard to refuse. If Krycek had a hard time handling sauce soaked ribs and over-large sandwiches, he didn't say anything and no one noticed. After dinner, Joey and Krycek took a walk down the main street of the small town. They were a striking pair and locals stopped to watch where they were going. "You don't need to worry, Alex." Joey was saying. "I've been okay the past couple of years on my own. I won't say adjusting to the world after being out of it for almost twenty-five years was easy, but I did remember stuff from when I was little and I had the advantage of knowing immediately if I made someone uncomfortable or was acting in a weird way. I am on vacation from my job as a medical tech, which I get to do on night shift in the lab and I am almost always alone. The doctors and pathologists are always too busy that time of night to bother overmuch with the kid in the lab. I watch and learn behavior and since Gibson found me, I have not been too lonely or defeated." Alex grunted, but Joey went on, "I am not at a loss for normal education either. Granted, I had to learn to read and write and all that, but I am incredibly quicker than normal people, so it never showed." "Where do you live?" Krycek asked. "I'm in Secaucus, NJ. But I can move anywhere you like if you need to be somewhere specific. I'd like us to be near each other." Krycek sighed, "I have no idea where I want to be, Joey. I have never settled anywhere. I think Mulder will arrange for a general pardon for me after this is over. As a free man, I will have to figure my life out from the beginning; the past decades have not been a sterling example of normal living." Joey smiled, "I think you want to be near Mulder." He stated. Alex startled a little bit, smiling crookedly he replied, "There's dreams which remain unmet, Joey." "But he feels..." Joey stopped abruptly. One of the most important things he had discovered about how people felt was that they did not want or appreciate his insights. It had taken him a long time to not be surprised at how much of the population thought one way, but acted another. His brother and Mulder would figure it out, they'd come such a long way already. "Why didn't you let one of the aliens fix your arm?" Joey asked. Alex stood stock still at eleven PM, in the middle of the street of Smalltown, Anywhere, USA and stared at his long lost brother. "I had one in me for a few weeks," He said bitterly, "and I never wanted another one to touch me." "It's been a high price to pay, Alex." Joey said mildly, understanding Alex remained traumatized after all this time. Krycek shrugged. He said, "I hated it you know? Hated the aliens, hated what they had tantalized mankind with and how they planned never to deliver." He looked at Joey full in the face, "And I knew, Joey, I knew I would have been just as tempted as Spender or Old Mulder or any of those bastards. I could have sold out for the prize too." "Never!" Joey exclaimed. "If you had stumbled onto the whole conspiracy with no knowledge of missing a brother or a ruined family behind you, you still would have never become one of them." "I don't know that," Krycek said soberly, "and that's why Mulder keeps his distance. He knows that I am weak and he despises me for it." "Alex," Joey said despairingly, wanting so much to tell his brother what Mulder really thought and felt, but, if he did, he would be no better than the alien who stole his brother's body and will so long ago, he remained silent on the subject. "Let's go back and get some sleep," Krycek said roughly. Joey put his arm around his brother's waist and they walked, connected, to the motel and parted at the door of the room Joey was sharing with Gibson. "Don't worry about me, kid." Alex said with an attempt at enlivening the somber mood, "I know how to take care of myself; I've been doing it for damn near ever." Joey shook his head. "Give Mulder a chance, Alex. Give him a chance." Joey unlocked the door and slipped inside, leaving Alex on the outside in a dim pool of yellow light from the corridor door-lights. "Sure, kid." Alex whispered, "But will he give me one too?" Krycek went down the hall to his room; he didn't need his key to get in. Mulder was on the bed and Frohike and Byers were arguing with him about just who was going to collect the rocks when they got to Nevada. Krycek, assuming his most intimidating manner, lounged against the door frame; the three men looked up and Krycek could swear a flash of laughter crossed Mulder's face. "You call yourselves paranoid?" He said in his best drawl. "Half the world could be listening to this ruckus without a bug anywhere nearby." He raised an eyebrow, "Amateurs," he said blightingly. Frohike began to bluster, but Mulder interrupted, "Give it up, man. Everybody will get to be a hero in the next few days. Go to bed." They glared at Krycek as they left the room; Krycek wasn't moved and closed the door silently just to make a point. Mulder laughed, "You scared them," He said, trying to be reproving. "Then they scare pretty easy," Krycek said wearily and sat on his bed. "No," Mulder answered seriously, "They don't, really." Krycek lay back on the bed and smiled, "Ha!" He said. "I don't frighten anybody these days, just the other day, a bum was sorry for me." Mulder harrumphed, "As if, Krycek. You know you light a fire of fear when you lounge around looking all dark and sinister. I bet you practice it in front of a mirror." Krycek chuckled, "You sure have some strange ideas, Mulder. A mirror," He laughed some more. "Strange ideas are my forte, asshole." Mulder said in a fond voice. Abruptly Krycek changed his tone, "I'll keep lookout, if it's all right with you. I'm not much good at digging these days." He said and waved the tied end of his shirt in front of his face. "That means I'll have to give you a gun." Mulder said. "Well," Krycek said, his heart beating hard in his throat, "I think that would be best." Mulder stood up and part of Krycek died; he knew Mulder didn't really trust him. To have thought so was ridiculous. Mulder unhooked the weapon on his left ankle; he wiped it off with his T-shirt, leaned over and put it on the edge of the bed closest to Krycek's right hand. "Shit!" Krycek sat up and looked at Mulder wonderingly. Mulder smiled and Krycek was damned if it wasn't the most flirtatious smile he'd ever seen. "You might need some more ammo," Mulder said blinking quickly as if he were a courtesan. "It's over here," He said, pointing to the night table by his side of the bed. Krycek laughed freely, maybe he wasn't crazy, maybe the moon really was made of green cheese and maybe, once in a great while, dreams came true. He shrugged out of his jacket, peeled off his boots and socks and got up. He didn't bother to walk around Mulder's bed to the night table. He got on Mulder's bed and crawled over him, still laughing and when Mulder grabbed him, he was laughing too. *** Chapter 14 Creep into thy narrow bed, The Last Word, by Malcolm Arnold They laughed as they kissed and Mulder said, "Impossible, impossible," Between kisses and getting Krycek's shirt off. Naked to the waist, they paused and the touches became more reverential; first time touching without inflicting harm or pain deserved reverence. Mulder ran the side of his thumb down Krycek's chest, from the notch in his throat to his belt buckle. He looked into Krycek's eyes and said again, "Impossible." Krycek leaned towards Mulder and this kiss was different than the laugh filled coming together. He kissed him with sweet purposefulness and Mulder opened his lips under the delightful assault and Krycek took his turn to whisper, "Impossible," Before he deepened the kiss and his desire became clear. There was no hurry, they were alone together and this was all Krycek had ever wanted. The best moment in his life and he spared a thought for the other best moment, when his brother was returned to him and knew it for the cornerstone between his past and his future. Here they finally merged and he was whole. "Mulder," he whispered the name as a prayer and kissed Mulder's strong cool throat and promised himself Mulder would be sweating before much longer. Mulder leaned his head back, supporting himself on his elbows and let Alex Krycek seduce him and all the time he marveled that he hadn't known and now he did. He was incredulous; he, who had used pointed homophobic jibes when he incarcerated prisoners, who had laughed at the drag queens and the boy toys that had come his way through the years. How could he have not known? There was nothing feminine in this meeting as lovers. Alex might be urging him on with kisses and licks and small, pinpricking bites, but this kind of lovemaking was neither the sole property of men nor women. How had he never known that kisses were as sweet, as hot, as meltingly perfect, when they came from Alex's mouth as they had always been in his dreams? After a lot of kissing and touching, the two men rolled around on the bed, rubbing against each other and growing more and more wildly aroused. It wasn't as if they weren't grown up experienced men, but this first time felt like being sixteen again and out of control. As they tugged off pants and underwear, the laughter returned, partly because it was so awkward and partly because they were giddy with passion and something else they did not name. Krycek reached for Mulder's cock and Mulder cried out at the contact. He saw Krycek was just as aroused as he was, but he hesitated. Touching Krycek's cock meant accepting what this was and what he had become. It wasn't as if he weren't terribly aroused, it wasn't as if he didn't want this to go on, but committing seemed another thing entirely. So, he hesitated, his mind going a million miles an hour along with his heart. During his distraction, which his body had not paid any attention to whatsoever, Krycek had twisted around and licked the head of Mulder's cock, Mulder cried out again. Krycek didn't seem to notice his distraction or lack or reciprocation, he simply went on and began the blow job from, well, Mulder thought, before his brain fried; the best blow job in the history of mankind. Krycek, using his forearm to keep Mulder as still as he could, and his hand on Mulder's dick, found the taste and texture of Mulder the aphrodisiac of a lifetime. God! How had he lived without this man? He was drunk and he was giddy and the world was spinning and Alex Krycek, without a hand on him, brought Mulder off and followed him down. The smell of sex and the sound of panting were loud and fragrant. Mulder spread his arms out and Krycek lay next to him, winded as if he had run a marathon. Mulder patted Krycek's thigh, "Impossible," He said. "Extreme, for sure," Krycek said and sighed with gusto. After a few minutes, Krycek said, "If were sharing the bed, I need some of the blankets." Mulder chuckled, caught the blanket with a toe and dragged it up to grabbing range. They bumped each other during the quest to share the blanket and once covered and warm, Mulder said dreamily, "I didn't know." "Know what?" Krycek asked sleepily. "About this, about us," He answered. "I always knew," Krycek said clearly. And, Mulder let him have the last word and the satisfaction of saying it. Because, Mulder thought as his eyelids fell closed for the last time, Alex Krycek `had' known all along. Surprisingly, morning did not bring with it a host of new problems. Mulder rose first, laid a kiss on Krycek's shoulder and went into the bathroom. Krycek had murmured and fallen back asleep. Dressed in clean boxers and a t-shirt, Mulder snapped his damp towel on Krycek's back and laughed when Krycek came up searching for his weapon. "Don't you know not to wake the sleeping tiger?" Krycek said grumpily as he swung his legs over the side of the bed. "What time is it anyway?" "It's a little before seven, but we need to get organized, eat and hit the road. Go west young man, that's what we're doing today." "I had no idea you were a morning person, Mulder." Krycek groused as he grabbed clean things from his pack and headed for the shower. "I had no idea you were a sourpuss," Mulder replied and called Gibson's room to wake them up too. "Tiger," Krycek said as he closed the bathroom door, "Tiger, not a sourpuss, you remember that in the future and show some respect." Mulder laughed and dialed the Gunmen. *** Chapter 15 Go West, Young Man! Horace Greeley is often credited with a famous quote actually made by John B. L. Soule. The quote first appeared as the title to the 1851, Terre Haute Express editorial written by Mr. Soule. Along with being wrongly credited to Mr. Greeley, it has also often been misquoted. It was originally written as: "Go West, young man, and grow up with the country." In less than an hour, shaved, packed, full and toting large coffees, the men went to their respective vehicles and started out. They would get most of the way there, another night on the road and then by midday, they would be scrounging around the desert for irradiated rocks. The Gunmen had packed detectors enough for everyone. How they were going to get close to a very secret military base undetected was something that had been assigned to Krycek, and he wasn't talking. The Gunmen trusted him only because if he got caught, it was likely he would be shot on sight. So they knew he must have a good plan. The day was hot, arid and the tarmac glistened with mirages of oil, which looked like multicolored ponds up the road. Mulder and Krycek did not talk much. Krycek drove for the first five hours and after lunch, Mulder drove. The sun was setting due west, the same way they were traveling and the glare was terrific. Seeing a town with a variety of motels and restaurants to choose from, the caravan pulled into another Motel 6 and got rooms. They decided to go their own ways for dinner, Joey and Gibson went to a game arcade that sold pizza and other junk, the gunmen headed for a western steak chain and Mulder and Krycek went to an upscale shopping center to eat Thai. The place was cool, serene and decorated with green bamboo wallpaper, green glass table tops and some soft lute music in the background. They ordered widely and shared the various dishes, preferring to wash the hot spices down with Sake instead of tea. Eating a soft succulent bite of white fish in chili sauce, Krycek remembered he once dreamed of such a meal with Mulder as his companion on the other side of the small table. In his dream, they were much older and talked about their long life together. Without a chance of it being possible, when he was alone or in pain or alone and in pain, it brought him comfort. Calm, loving older Mulder who had realized where his heart really lay, had made Krycek happy, even if it was later rather than sooner. The reality of it, took his breath away. "Do your eyes match the glass table?" Mulder asked. "I know it's green because it looks grayish brown and dull to me." Krycek stared at Mulder, a smile pulling at his lips, "Oh, no Mulder." He replied, "My eyes are like emeralds, the table top is pale and glassy." "Emeralds, huh?" Mulder answered with a smile. "Has someone, besides you, written poetry about them?" He asked cockily. "Yes," Krycek answered, trying to keep a superior expression on his face. He flipped his had as if encompassing the masses, "Too many to count." "Ah," Mulder said wisely. "I'm competing against an army and I can't even see the color. Not fair at all, Krycek." Krycek damped down a grin, "Well, it's taken you a long time to notice and I couldn't be bored in the meantime, could I?" Mulder tapped his chopsticks against his lips, "Bored? Is that what accounts for all the things you did? You were bored and looking for something exciting?" Krycek looked down at his food, both to consider how far to play along and because he wanted Mulder to notice his other best facial feature; knowing he was acting like a lovesick teenager with a bad case of narcissism. "Exciting isn't the correct word. What one does while terrified, under pressure or blackmailed always has extenuating circumstances. There were certainly a whole lot of adrenalin rushes and my heartbeat was very fast much of the time, but it wasn't really excitement. I am not asking you to understand or forgive me, Mulder. I did what I had to do." He looked back up and met Mulder's eyes without any pretences, "It's always been up to you to choose to hate me or not. I never blamed you when you chose hate. It went hand in hand with the rest of the shit. I didn't like it and yes, it hurt and made me angry, but I would never deny you the right to it." Mulder glanced away, staring at the pale green walls, which looked sort of pale gray to him, but he could see the detail in the print and it was pretty, regardless of color. "I don't know if I can see things in such absolutes. I know that sounds mad coming from me, the leader of the fringe element, but I can't. Some of what you did hurt me personally, and hurt those I care about. Maybe my father was an evil bastard, I hardly dispute it now, but you were the one to shoot him in the head and no matter what DNA reveals or not, he was my father. I didn't have the chance to learn it for myself, to wish him dead enough times to make what you did understandable or acceptable." Mulder picked up his sake and drank it down like a straight shot of whiskey. "I need time to decide what triumphs, Alex. Whether it is my past and your past or a future, possibly together; just know that it is the hardest internal battle of my life and I am giving it every bit of my emotional and intellectual consideration. Even ending the last of the aliens' leftovers hardly registers." Krycek leaned back in his chair and sipped his sake, "I trust you Mulder. If I know anything at all about you, it is your ability to think about an issue and decide what you want to do. You must have had to decide every damn day for the past twenty years whether or not you were going to continue looking for Samantha or remained committed to exposing the bastards." He smiled self-deprecatingly, "Oh, how I hope you will chose a future with me, never doubt that, Mulder. I live on the hope." "I don't mean to imply that we have to stay apart from one another in the meantime, you know." Mulder said with the same flirtatious coyness from the previous night. "I think the more interaction we have, the better." Krycek laughed and to Mulder it sounded like a young man's laughter; like the sound of someone with a great deal of hope. "I agree." Krycek said around another sip of sake. "I agree wholeheartedly." They drove late into the night, preferring it to the hot, dusty day. On the outskirts of Carson City, they found a motel made up of a series of rundown cabins. Inside it was better, the A/C worked in each room, the shower stalls were circa 1960's wide and there was plenty of ice in the machine. Without a word, once in their cabin, Krycek headed for the shower and Mulder dropped everything and joined him. It was a tight squeeze, but neither man notice and in the kissing, touching and rubbing, Mulder found it was at all as difficult as he thought to take hold of Krycek's cock and pump it teasingly. "Know what you're doing there, Mulder?" Krycek gasped, sputtering water. "I am the most practiced person on the planet," Mulder replied, but it wasn't a joke for long, as Krycek gave into it and leaned on Mulder with one shoulder and the other against the green tiled wall. Mulder watched his hand and Krycek's face and loved it. He grinned; this was power of a kind he had never experienced. Oh, he'd pleased women and had enjoyed it and enjoyed them too, with their soft bodies and tantalizing moans and wet silky places. But this was exciting in a bold way, with no hidden agenda or possible misinterpretation. All of Krycek was right there in the moment, in his hand and breathless. Mulder liked it a lot and felt his own body react. Not caring where he put it or how he got off, he pumped Krycek and bumped into Krycek's hip with his own cock. Krycek was leaning heavily and lost the strength in his knees when he orgasmed, but Mulder was there to help him, increasing the pressure against Krycek's hip, he came at almost the same moment. They soaped off, washing whatever body part was nearby and dried off the same way. They were kissing again when they hit the bed and ended up face to face on their sides, penis against penis and Mulder with Krycek's hand on his butt, pulling him closer; he went and Krycek wrapped his hand around them both. This was not a quickie like before. For one thing, they had already taken the edge off and for another, Mulder wanted it to last, to become intimate and to that end, he put his hand in Krycek's hair and kissed him again. Time slowed down, Krycek let go and petted Mulder's arm, shoulder, chest and hip. They writhed together and Krycek turned onto his stomach. Without a pause, Mulder ran his hand down Krycek's back and over his buttocks and thighs. Mulder leaned on an arm and kissed the back of Krycek's neck, blowing on the short hairs at the trim line and watched Krycek's back become covered in Goosebumps. Krycek turned over, "Mulder" he said calmly, although his heartbeat was very fast and he was flushed. "You can fuck me if you want. I have some stuff in my case." Mulder stopped breathing; he hadn't progressed that far in his thoughts and to have Krycek offer this heretofore unimaginable act was amazing. He sobered and looked Krycek square in the eyes. Before he could speak, Krycek pulled him into a kiss. "It's okay," Krycek whispered. "Don't freak out, it's not what I do with any frequency, but with you it will be all pleasure. I want you; I feel the need inside me." He chuckled softly, "In my dreams we've already done it a million or more times." Mulder was shaken, did Krycek love him? It was ridiculous, but maybe it wasn't impossible. He kissed Krycek back and spoke into the side of his neck, "Have you dreamed it the other way too?" He felt Krycek's chest vibrate and knew he was laughing. "You have no idea." Krycek said. He pushed Mulder back so he could see in his eyes again, "Everywhere, in all weather, all time zones and on just about every surface imaginable," He took a breath, "You only have to say yes, I'll tell you what to do." Mulder laid his head on Krycek's chest and listened to the rapid beat of his heart, "you better stay alive, and you better stay." Mulder announced and Krycek took it for what Mulder meant. "I will," Krycek said and knew it for the lover's vow he had wanted to make for almost a decade. He'd wanted to through sickness and health, life and death, and loneliness too vast to describe. "I'll stay." Mulder got up and went to Krycek's case, there was no need for coyness or shame, he and Krycek didn't need any more foreplay. Mulder decided, as he looked for the small pouch in Krycek's case where he kept condoms, a tube of lubrication, several hundred dollar bills, a tiny purse filled with uncut diamonds, and two safety deposit box keys. Mulder wondered if this wasn't really the most intimate moment with Krycek so far, being allowed into the private stash that had probably kept the man alive long enough for them to finally get together. It was a measure of his growing trust and passion that he didn't think about what was in those safety deposit boxes, the strong, pale man on the bed was much more mysterious. He dropped the stuff on the bed, "You're my most impossible X-File, Alex." Krycek smiled broadly, "I love you too." He said. *** Chapter 16 I'd like to get away from earth awhile Birches, by Robert Frost They went out in the desert sun, the Gunmen in a variety of hats and long sleeved T-shirts. They tied a white t-shirt over Gibson's head and neck to try to prevent him from burning like a piece of white toast. Krycek and Joey refused covering, both becoming golden brown within a half an hour. Such a contrast was Alex's eyes, Mulder thought he could actually see their color and it was emerald. Their miniature Geiger Counters in hand, the Gunmen pointed out the rocks and sand which registered the higher numbers. "It's not enough radiation to hurt us," Byers said seriously, "But when it was first unleashed, it penetrated the heck out of the landscape." They lugged basketfuls of rocks to the SUVs and filled several pillow cases with sand before they were satisfied. Gibson had retired after the first basket and was happily playing on Joey's handheld game, while he sat in the shade of the vehicles. They stopped on the way back to the motel for long, cool drinks and to plan the trip home. Gibson put down the game and said, "Believe it or not, it only takes a few grams of magnetite to cause the hybrids to melt, kinda like the Wicked Witch and water." He went back to the game, leaning over to sip through his straw so he didn't have to take his hands off the game. The Gunmen started to laugh, "You ever need a place to stay kid we can put you up, anytime, really." They chorused. Gibson smiled, but didn't look away from the game. Mulder and Krycek made the most of the motel stops on the way back to Vermont. In reality, although neither had ever thought to think so before, it was the perfect honeymoon time, on the road, on a mission and about to confront significant danger; what more could they want? They'd decided to raid the last lab without warning, or as much as they could; knowing the hybrids were attuned to them and could actually hear Gibson and Joey miles away. They dismissed the Justice Committee Entourage, knowing they would be bored and sloppy after this many days without any danger. The plan was for Joey and Gibson to try and plead with the hybrids to let them in and convince them that Mulder and Krycek were genuinely angry with them for wanting to go inside. Gibson was betting, all their lives, that the hybrids could not tell the difference in the emotions as long as everyone played their part to the hilt. Since the hybrids were convinced that Joey and Gibson were more like them than humans, they would let them in. As soon as the doors opened, Mulder, Krycek and the Gunmen, using a variety of launchers and projectiles, would begin shooting the irradiated materials inside the door. The closest hybrids would die and the team would encroach further and further until they had killed all of them. By the time they reached New England, Mulder had no leftover need to ask the hybrids more questions. He knew what he needed to know and with Krycek beside him, he had all that he needed to leave the past and begin the rest of his life. Everything almost went to hell when, at a small family owned lodge serving as a B&B for the team, Skinner showed up with a very angry and neglected Scully. Mulder didn't ask how they had figured out the fact that he would come back and where he would likely stay once he had. They did know him very well, and Scully knew exactly which kind of place he liked to spend his nights on the road in. With a silent Krycek sitting a little behind and to the left of Mulder, Skinner and Scully heard the plan. At once, she wanted to examine the magnetite and Skinner wanted to go over the tactical plan. The Gunmen were more than happy to cooperate; finding the newcomers much more interested and appreciative of their efforts than Mulder had been and Joey and Gibson who already knew everything. Assiduously ignoring Krycek, Skinner and Scully offered up their own interpretations of how things should go. Mulder found it interesting to see how often either Joey or Gibson curbed the two adults without being rude or aggressive. Skinner and Scully had no idea how to argue or override the youngsters, while they had always been perfectly comfortable overriding him, the Gunmen and at various times, attempting to kill Krycek. They booked rooms in the lodge too and the landlady insisted everyone stay for supper. It was marvelous, served family style; it was a New England feast at its best; chowder, glazed ham with roasted potatoes and homemade ice cream with walnuts and hazel nuts and coffee so fragrant and darkly bittersweet that Mulder and Krycek each had three cups. The kids, Byers and Langly went to their rooms and the remaining company had French Brandy in balloon glasses two hundred years old. Contrary to his usual insistence that everyone pay attention to what he thought was important, with a touch to the shoulder, Krycek and him went out onto the wide porch, shared a rocking bench and drank their Brandy in peace. Mulder walked to the edge of the porch and stared up at the stars, "Tomorrow is it." He stated calmly. "You okay with that, Mulder?" Krycek asked, coming up behind Mulder and resting his chin on Mulder's shoulder. Mulder smiled, "You know Alex I think I am. Someday the population will know about all this, and I mean the whole truth. The X Files and the Gunmen's cyber records, as well as Gibson's notoriety will come together and inform everyone. I don't think it will be anytime soon, but science will move on, both terrestrial intellect and the alien technology. Those who know about the science will not be able to keep it a secret. Someone's mother will have terminal cancer; someone else will think they are entitled to a boy child no matter what or who they have to sell out to get one. By their very nature, a governmental group as large as the Justice Committee will have those few who will not keep their secrets. I doubt we'll be around to know, but I am sure it will happen." "And that brings you enough satisfaction?" Krycek asked. Mulder turned and hugged Krycek tight, "I would have said no as recently as the night you were found on a park bench and came back to haunt me. But now, I think I understand better how so many people are protective of the status-quo. I tried to protect the ones I loved and failed every time, but everyone fails. I know that now. I wasn't a bad son and I wasn't a bad brother and I am a great FBI agent. Skinner and Scully and a few other, not to be mentioned persons, will know my truth and more importantly believe it. I can accept that, besides" Mulder held Krycek tighter, "I won't be alone to doubt myself any more. You'll be there and you can verify and validate the truth." Krycek hugged Mulder back and began to laugh, "The irony, Mulder, the irony," He said through his laughter, never letting go of Mulder. "Alex Krycek, oracle of truth and verifier of the past." Abruptly he sobered. "I can live with that if you can." He said seriously. "Oh, Alex," Mulder whispered against Krycek's lips, "I can and I want to." "Good," Alex Krycek said and returned the kiss. "Good," Said Mulder and they stood with arms around one another and stared through the long dark night at the stars. The End *** The story of the Four Sons is also read at the Passover Seder table. Each of the four sons symbolizes a different type of Jewish person. One son is wise, another is simple (this son is regarded as simple because of his indifference and unconcern), still another is wicked, and the final one is very young in age, too young to inquire about Passover, and therefore silent. The wise son inquires about why the Jews practice the customs of Passover. Those assembled at the Passover Seder table respond in unison, describing this son as wise, since he wants to know more about the Passover traditions of his people. The simple and indifferent son asks in more general terms what is all this he sees at the Passover Seder table. Those at the Passover Seder table respond by educating and reminding the simple and indifferent son about God's favors toward the Hebrews during the time of slavery in Egypt, and the importance of remembering and observing them, and remembering them with gratitude. The wicked son wants no part of the Passover traditions and asks why the Jewish people - other than him - practice the customs of Passover. Those at the Passover Seder table respond by describing this son as wicked, since he thinks Passover customs are meant to be practiced by other Jews, but not him. Finally, the young and silent son who does not know enough to inquire is simply told about the Passover story in accordance with the biblical command: "And thou shalt tell thy son in that day, saying: it is because of that which the Lord did for me when I came forth out of Egypt". |
Let Them Have It How They Willby Flutesong |