Time And Distance

It started in his motel room. He came out of the bathroom. He had showered and put on underwear and jeans. His socks and shirt were waiting on the bed, his jacket on the chair, his backpack, prosthetic arm, and boots beside the chair.

He was a neat man, all the more so during this time of adjustment to life with one arm.

He wondered sometimes if adjusting to this had much in common with relearning how to cope in the world after being suddenly blinded.

As he stepped out of the bathroom, his good arm was grabbed and a needle quickly stung in the stump of his left arm. As he faded into unconsciousness, he realized he was surprised. He had truly not expected a physical assault here in Moscow. He did, of course, have enemies everywhere, but he hadn't, as yet, made a move toward anything, other than recovery from his injury. Thus, he posed no particular threat, at the moment, to anyone's plans.

He woke up naked. His right arm was shackled above his head and his feet were shackled about a yard apart. He could turn his head, flex his legs and right arm, but otherwise he was stuck. He wasn't terribly uncomfortable yet.

It was a bare, dimly lit room. The ambient temperature of the room was fine, although he knew from past experiences that once he stayed in this position for a long time or was subjected to pain or stress, the room would seem either very cold or way too warm.

He stayed in this position a long time.

Hours passed.

Eventually his bladder rebelled, and he urinated. He tried to twist this way and that, but most of the urine dribbled and splashed on his thighs and feet anyway.

Hours passed.

When thirst became intense he turned his head and raised his left shoulder and sucked on the upper part of his stump, hoping the activity would produce some saliva and fool his brain into thinking it had had a drink.

More hours passed.

The small motions he could make in his bonds no longer relieved the pain and cramping of being tethered. Tremors came and went along his arm, legs and spine.

The room seemed very cold.

Eventually, he broke into a sweat and defecated.

After that, all his half formed thoughts about possible escape or attempts to talk or bribe his way out of the room ceased. He didn't give up on life, exactly. He just realized that whatever rules were being followed were seriously severe ones, and until they were revealed to him, he had lost all basis for planning resistance.

Hours passed.

He woke from his dazed state to feel a hose spewing warm water, rinsing him off. When the hose was lifted and sprayed down from over his head, he drank from the excess.

He could not see who was executing the action. He attempted to see, but the person, a man, he thought, was dressed in a loose, long- sleeved shirt and wore gloves and a ski mask.

The water was turned off and the *man* took out a pair of scissors and cut off his hair almost to the skull. He was rinsed clean again.

No words were spoken.

The man brought in a step stool from behind him and, without releasing his right arm, added a circular link to the shackle so that he would be able to turn around in a wider circumference. Additional links were also added, so he could now drop his arm, almost all the way. He did so and the sharp pain of the renewed blood flow brought a hiss of pain to his lips.

The man knelt, adding more links to the shackles on each ankle as well.

The man pushed a table, taken from somewhere out of his sight, in front of him. The squeal of the table legs across the floor was loud and jarring. The man, himself, stayed mostly out of sight, doing all these tasks in silence. Doing them quickly and efficiently.

The man came up behind him and put a hood over his head.

With a hard push, the man touched him for the first time, and forced him flat on his face, bent over the table.

Alex knew the man was going to rape him.

He felt the hard, cold and plastic shape of a dildo force its way between his ass-cheeks, to his anus.

"Don't do this, Mulder," he said.

The dildo paused for a moment, then continued, inexorably, in silence.

Alex screamed once, as he was penetrated, and panted shallowly while the rest of the rape went on. It only lasted a few minutes and then the dildo was withdrawn. Alex felt a trickle of blood run slowly down his thighs.

The hood was removed. Once again the warm water bathed him. He stood up.

The man got a push broom and swept all the various soggy messes into the center of the room. He got out a janitorial type bucket and mop and cleaned up the waste of hair and filthy water. He pushed the bucket and mop out of the room, behind Alex. Alex heard the sound of the bucket being pored, and the flush of a toilet.

The ski mask and the gloves were gone when Mulder returned to the room. He stood on the other side of the table.

Alex saw that Mulder was calm, his face expressionless. His eyes were steady and sad when they met his own. Mulder did not speak. Neither did Alex. Alex did not wonder why he remained silent.

Mulder left, to what must be another room behind Alex. He returned with a plain wooden chair, which he placed behind Alex. He went and came, this time with an opened liter bottle of water, some bread, a small hunk of cheese and an apple, which he placed on the table. He went and returned, once more, with a tall bucket, which he also placed near enough for Alex to use.

Mulder left and did not return.

Time passed. Alex eventually tested his bonds and found that he could sit in the chair and that his arm could reach the contents on the table or he could lay his head on the table. He could stand and shuffle the few steps to the waste bucket.

He sat and drank some of the water and ate a few bites of the bread. Later, he rested his head on the table and slept.

A long time passed. Alex realized it might be days. And every day the same silent routine took place. He was washed, raped with the dildo, washed again, the room was swept and mopped, the waste bucket emptied, and food and water were brought to the table. Mulder did not speak. Neither did Alex.

Alex exercised as best he could and ate enough to stay alive. He did not think he was actually growing thinner, simply gaunter. The scars on his stump, which were supposed to be treated with emollients and hydrating creams, grew dry and tough and pulled painfully. He sometimes managed to leverage himself up on the table to stretch out his back, but he never stayed that way to rest or sleep.

Eventually Mulder came in and pointed for Alex to sit in the chair. Alex sat. Mulder brought a bowl of warm water, a can of shaving cream, and a plastic razor to the table. He held Alex's head against his chest and shaved him. After that, the daily routine was enforced and Alex was once again left alone.

Alex did not dwell on the psychology of the torture he was subjected to. Mulder was the psychologist. Alex was sure Mulder had all the bases covered in that regard. He did not dwell on when it would end or if he would be alive, when and if it ever ended.

He survived in the meantime.

Sometimes he woke from a daze and felt the stiff salt on his cheeks and realized he must have cried, unknowingly, in his sleep. He did not dwell on that fact either. Shame, such as it was as a societal norm, had no place here.

Sometimes he thought about his youth, but only in a vague way. He knew the seeds of his current predicament began there, but that had been a long time ago.

Occasionally he was bitter, but those thoughts did not last long either.

Once in a while, when he could not prevent it, he thought about his relationship with Mulder. He did not think about it in terms of pain, betrayal, or hate. Rather, his thoughts were amorphous, like cloudy reflections on a still pond. He had liked Mulder. They had bonded, despite their respective positions in the scheme of things. They were not lovers, had never been lovers, although perhaps they might have both been up to trying that out if their respective positions in the scheme of things had had a momentary respite. But there had been no such respite.

They had been warm, though. Not so much sexually, more from the need for human connection. They had often touched, sitting next to each other at tables and desks, upper arms brushing, occasionally thighs. They had leaned across one another to reach for things, rather than asking for the things to be passed, and lightly butted cheeks or noses or chins. They never kissed.

Once, when they were pouring over a large blueprint spread out across an architect's easel-desk, Mulder had put his arm around his shoulders, and he had leaned into Mulder, and been content.

Once when they had been waiting, endlessly, on a stake out, behind a tree between a building and a street, Mulder sat in the vee of his legs and rested his back and head against Alex's shoulder. Alex had put his arms around Mulder's chest. He had been so moved that he had had to bury his face in the back of Mulder's neck and take slow deep breaths until he could breathe evenly again. Mulder had put his hand on Alex's thigh and kneaded it firmly, until Alex had regained his composure.

They had never deliberately teased each other sexually. Alex had wanted to. Sometimes, he had thought back then, if he could only do it once, it would be worth it. He had never been sure, exactly, what had stopped him from being aggressive, although he had a notion it might have been respect.

He had not wondered back then if he loved Mulder. He did not wonder about it now.

He did think, in this hazy way, about the news he had heard recently about Mulder; Scully had cancer, Mulder had made and lost a friend in another alien abduction cover-up, been accused of a double murder and done some weird things with drugs and risky brain stimulation with a quack doctor.

Until the current events had begun, Alex had just assumed Mulder was coping, as usual, and perhaps even remotely grateful to have survived Tunguska at all, let alone with both arms intact.

He realized now that he had only been projecting his own concerns and hopes onto Mulder. He had hoped he was coping as well as usual and had been grateful to survive Tunguska, less than intact.

More and more he began to discern sounds from the room that Mulder occupied. The murmur of a TV, with the volume set too low to be interpreted. Regular thumps and bangs when Mulder was probably exercising, a shower running or a toilet flushing, or the beeping of a microwave oven. In the quiet of the night, he thought he heard Mulder sob, occasionally.

But perhaps he was just projecting again. He never heard another door open or close or another voice, so while master of the events being enacted between them, Mulder was also its prisoner, if only by choice, until it was over.

Alex lost track of time. The room, the rapes, the washing, the silence became his entire world.

One day, Mulder brought in another chair and placed it on the other side of the table. He went through the daily routine, but afterwards he also took a shower and shaved and returned to sit in the chair.

He folded his hands and spoke.

Alex could not understand Mulder's speech. He seemed to have lost the facility to understand words. He saw Mulder's mouth stop moving and Mulder got up and returned with a Styrofoam cup of very sweet and milky coffee. He gave the cup to him and Alex drank. The jolt of caffeine, sugar and bitterness went through Alex. He shuffled over to the pail and urinated. He sat down.

Mulder spoke again, and Alex could understand him this time.

"You are starving yourself to death," Mulder said. Alex started to shake his head in denial, but Mulder went on, "Yes, you are. You have become so distanced from yourself that you do not realize it."

Alex wanted to deny that assertion, but he could not wrap his mind around the thought with enough surety to really know. He just shook his head tentatively.

"I wanted to make you suffer," Mulder continued. "I needed to make you suffer. You have suffered. You already realize, or will eventually come to understand that I have taken everything away from you. Pride, modesty, independence, I have denied you all of these, and in return you have surrendered your sense of self. That was my aim, and I have done it."

Alex knew he was staring at Mulder. The remaining coffee was spilling over the top of the cup because his hand was trembling violently. He only became aware he was crying when he saw tears splash into the puddle of coffee.

"I don't know who you ever really were, Alex Krycek," Mulder said softly, "and I don't know who you will be after this. I know that I had hoped this terrible, warped way of punishing you for all the pain you have brought into my life would bring me a sense of revenge, perhaps distance as well." Mulder paused, he removed the cup of coffee, and taking a handkerchief out of his pocket he wiped Alex's face, then the spill of coffee and tears from the table.

Mulder got up and unlocked the shackles. "I am leaving you now," Mulder said, and he walked into the other room, put on a winter coat, gloves and picked up a suitcase. Alex saw him walk further into the room and heard a door open and close.

Time passed.

Alex got up and went into Mulder's room. He locked and bolted the door and lay down in Mulder's bed.

Eventually he slept.

When he awoke he felt stiff and brittle. He went into the bathroom and took a hot shower with the soap that Mulder had left behind. He dressed in his own clothes from his backpack that Mulder had also left in the room and put the prosthetic arm in the backpack. His leather coat and boots were by the chair. He put them on. He slung his backpack over his shoulder and unbolted and unlocked the door.

He left the door open and returned to the bare, dimly lit room. He picked up the stiff stained handkerchief and put it in his pocket.

Alex wondered, vaguely, how much time had passed since he had been brought to this place.

He walked through the dimly lit room. He walked through Mulder's room and out the open door.

The light outside, suddenly, blinded him.