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Settling
by JiM


In retrospect, Skinner supposed he ought to have been expecting it. There he was, standing on a the rain-drenched sidewalk outside the Red Cross shelter, a check for two hundred thousand dollars in his pocket and a gym bag half-filled with what were now his only possessions in the world. The chaos theory that had governed his life since he had first heard of the X Files practically demanded the gleaming black SUV that skidded to a halt in front of him. He was almost unsurprised when the passenger door swung open and a high-caliber muzzle yawned at him from the depths. What rocked him was seeing whose hand actually held the pistol.

"Krycek?!"

"Get in."

"What the hell...? I saw you go down. You were dead!"

"Get in the car, Skinner. We're going to take a little ride."

"Of course we are. Shit," muttered Skinner, tossing his bag into the footwell of the vehicle and climbing in. Krycek kept the pistol trained on him as he pulled the big vehicle back into traffic. Without looking at his prisoner, he said, "Put your seat belt on."

Skinner complied with an oddly peaceful sense of inevitability. Of course he had lost his job, become homeless and now was being kidnapped, all within the space of one week. Oh, they had given him a very nice severance package as they eased him out the door, but the waters were now full of younger, hungrier sharks, and he had made too many enemies supporting Mulder's insanely right crusade. Success was no shield and he had left the Hoover building one empty week ago. Last evening, a neighbor had left a faulty coffee-pot on and now he was homeless, as well. One sleepless night spent in a shelter answering questions and filling out forms and here he was, on a rainy Friday, driving through the streets of Washington with a former dead man.

He started to laugh and he wondered if it were delayed reaction or the beginning of a comfortable slide into madness. Whichever it was, the noise was making Krycek nervous and Skinner liked that.

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

The crazy laughter subsided into rumbling snorts, allowing him to speak, eyes still on the muzzle of the gun pointed at his midsection. "You. You're what's wrong, Krycek. My entire life just crumbled around me in the space of a week and here you are. You're just the aftershocks, Krycek."

"Open the glove compartment, Skinner. There's a flask in there." Skinner complied, only vaguely interested. "Take a slug. You sound like you could use it."

"I'm not thirsty."

"Drink it, Skinner. It's Glenmorangie, 18 years of single malt perfection. Nothing else, I swear it."

Skinner didn't want to feel surprised at Krycek having a flask of his preferred brand. He didn't want to consider the note of concern in the former triple-agent's voice. He sure as hell didn't want to look at Washington in the rain any more, so he closed his eyes and took a deep draught. He felt the warmth pour smoothly through him, pooling in his gut, curling up there like a contented cat purring before a fire.

He capped the flask and put it back in the glove compartment. He felt enough curiosity to now notice that they were crossing over the M street bridge and heading out of the city. "Where are you taking me?"

"Somewhere quiet."

Somehow, those words should have sounded more menacing; instead, Skinner found them soothing.

"Where have you been for the past year?"

"Somewhere quiet."

When Skinner looked carefully at his captor, he thought he could see the effects of that quiet life on Alex Krycek. There were silver strands in the glossy dark hair now, but the bitter lines beside his mouth and at the corners of his eyes seemed to have been smoothed out. He had put on weight since Skinner had seen him last and he was dressed like any other fashionably idle man trying to look younger than forty on a day out in the city. He drove confidently, with his prosthetic hand gripping the wheel easily and his gun held in his right hand.

"What happens when we get there?"

"That depends on you," Krycek said, still not looking at Skinner. Rain-laden trees flashed by on both sides and they rode in silence for a time, the only sound the windshield wipers hissing and the tires humming. Then Krycek said, "Will you give me your parole?"

"What?!" He felt vaguely offended; this was not how a kidnapping was supposed to go.

"Swear to me that you won't attack me or try to escape for one week." The gun's muzzle punctuated the point, bobbing at each verb. Skinner felt the crazy laughter beginning to bubble up again.

"Sure. You've got my word, Krycek. Of course, you do have a gun," he pointed out helpfully.

Krycek took his eyes off the rain-slick road for a moment, glancing down at his right hand almost in surprise. He nodded, conceding the point to Skinner. Then he tossed the gun into Skinner's lap.

Skinner stared at it for a moment, then picked it up and pointed it at Krycek, who didn't look at him, although he was probably very aware of every breath of movement on Skinner's part. Then Skinner gave up and let his hand drop into his lap. He just stared at Krycek and wondered if he ought to take another belt of the scotch.

"Why are you doing this?"

Krycek shrugged, then asked, "Did you really have any plans for the weekend?"

"If I had, I can guarantee that they didn't include you."

Krycek shrugged again, then concentrated on the highway, the rain coming down more heavily now. Skinner noted that they were going south and tried to remember if his cell phone had survived the fire. It hadn't. They rode in silence for a while and Skinner stared mindlessly out at the gray day, some fragment of his subconscious worrying away at Krycek's atypical, if not aberrant behavior. It poked its way to the forefront of his mind finally and he popped the magazine out of the pistol. It was empty. So was the chamber.

"You kidnapped me with an empty gun?!" He was definitely offended now.

"I didn't want anyone getting hurt."

That did it. The crazy laughter spurted and shot sky-high and Skinner laughed until he gasped for breath. Krycek's worried glances only fueled his hysteria. "You didn't want me to get hurt?! You spend a year playing with my life like it's a video game, you killed me, for god's sake, and you didn't want me to get hurt?!"

"Well, I didn't want you to shoot me, either," Krycek pointed out reasonably.

Skinner's laughter bubbled down into snorts and chuckles again. What a mess to have to call a life. Divorced, fifty, bald, jobless, homeless and locked in a car with a known assassin and an empty pistol. His own was so much half-melted slag now, lost in the fire. He pitched Krycek's useless gun over his shoulder onto the back seat and took a deep breath. "So, where are we going?"

"You OK now?"

"I'm just tired, Krycek. Where are we going?"

"You'll see when we get there."

"That's a very annoying habit you have, not answering questions directly."

"I know," Krycek looked as if he were considering smirking.

Skinner leaned against the door and watched his kidnapper for a while. The dark hair was longer than he had kept it at the FBI and longer than the military-style hair cut he's worn when Skinner had him cuffed to his balcony or the handful of times they'd met since. His last view of Krycek had been watching the man disappear into a cloud of greenish smoke and hearing an explosion at a site that hadn't existed on any maps. They'd won and Krycek had been part of the reason; he'd dealt with that and shoved aside his own fury at the man for so long that the emotion was stone cold, just a numb spot inside him now.

There was a finger of scar running down the side of Krycek's throat, disappearing into the collar of his green sweater, where it showed over his tan field jacket. Crisp jeans and black boots completed the look. Prosperous and relaxed, that's how Krycek looked now. Skinner knew that if he looked in the mirror, he would see a middle-aged man with a desperately steady stare, unshaven and gray with exhaustion and defeat. He slipped into sleep without realizing it.

He was awakened four hours later by Krycek shaking his shoulder gently. "You want some lunch?" They were sitting in the parking lot of a Cracker Barrel restaurant by the side of some highway.

"Where are we?" Skinner sat up and rubbed his face, his whiskers rasping against his hands.

"Almost to North Carolina. Come on, I'm starving."

So Walter Skinner found himself eating a silent meal with a man he'd sworn to kill. In fact, he had sometimes beguiled sleepless nights by imagining how he would kill Krycek, how he'd make him suffer before snuffing out his life. When the waitress cleared their plates and promised to come back for a dessert order, Krycek handed him a bag.

"Go clean up." Oddly, it wasn't an order, but a gesture of concern. Skinner couldn't decide how to respond, so he went. In the men's room, he dug through the bag and found an electric razor, a towel and a fresh navy and red polo shirt in his size. He stripped and sponged off his torso, ignoring the stares he got from other patrons, preferring instead to get rid of the choking scent of smoke that clung to his skin. He shaved, then put on the shirt. When he looked in the mirror, he still saw a middle-aged man, but the desperate edge was gone, replaced by a weary kind of confusion. He shrugged at his own reflection, then left the men's room.

There was a pay phone outside the men's room. Krycek was nowhere in sight. He could make his escape now, he knew. He pulled out his calling card and reached for the phone, then stopped. His hand dropped and he shook his head at himself. When he turned, Krycek was there, just watching him. They stared at one another, then Krycek said only, "Your coffee's getting cold."

They went back and finished their meal in the same silence. When they got out to the car, Krycek asked, "Who were you going to call?"

Skinner saw no point in lying. "Mulder. He was supposed to pick me up at the shelter this morning. He's probably assumed the worst and pissed off at least three federal agencies by now."

"Probably," Krycek agreed, a hint of a smile in his voice. He put the key in the ignition and started the engine, then stopped. He pulled a cell phone from his pocket, looked at Skinner measuringly, then punched the star key and a two-digit number. Skinner heard the tinny ring as Krycek passed him the phone. His brain felt muffled in cotton as he heard Mulder's answering machine message begin. At the beep, he pulled himself together enough to say, "Mulder, it's me. I'm fine. A... friend surprised me and picked me up this morning. I'm not sure when I'll be back in town, but don't worry. I'm fine. I'll call again in a week." He disconnected and handed the phone back to Krycek, who said only, "Well, if that doesn't raise his suspicions, nothing will." But he grinned as he said it.

Skinner smiled, too. "That's Mulder."

"How is he?" Krycek asked carefully, staring at the dashboard.

"He's OK. He was riding high for a while on finally being proved right and bringing down the whole damned conspiracy. Then the bureaucratic shit started to pile up higher and deeper and I think he's ready to chuck it all. Scully already did. When they canned me, it really shook him."

"It was supposed to. They want him gone, but they can't very well cashier the Golden Boy, can they?"

It was no more than he'd suspected, really. The embarrassment went deep for the agency, they wanted everyone who knew the details gone. Then a thought struck Skinner. "You have Mulder's number on speed-dial."

Krycek only nodded, then put the car in gear. Skinner pondered for a while, then asked, "Why didn't you take Mulder instead of me?"

Krycek merged smoothly with traffic, then answered. "I don't think I have the right answers for him."

"Does anyone?"

Krycek shook his head. "No one still alive. Besides, he'd just find something else to ask."

"True. So you think you have answers for me?"

Krycek shrugged. "Maybe."

xx

Skinner must have slept again. He'd taken note of highway signs and realized they were on I-95 southbound, somewhere in North Carolina. But he found himself dangerously disinterested in their destination. He couldn't even begin to predict Krycek's motives or purpose here and he found that he simply didn't care. After everything they had done to one another, he felt oddly... well, if not safe, exactly, at least unthreatened.

He woke as the big SUV lurched around a switchback. They were on a dirt road and it was nearly dark underneath the evergreens. The dashboard clock read 6:04. Without much expectation of getting an answer, Skinner stretched and asked, "Where are we?"

"Boone, North Carolina."

Pleasantly surprised at the success of his first query, he tried another. "Why are we here?"

"It's quiet. No one bothers you here. It's pretty."

Pretty? He had been kidnapped at gunpoint and transported across state lines to someplace "pretty"? Skinner shook his head and wondered if he had hit his head somewhere along the way and was merely hallucinating this entire odd episode.

Krycek drove carefully up the road, apparently familiar with all of its pothole and twists. After a short time, the road simply ended in front of a cabin. When the car rolled to a stop, lights on the corners of the log cabin came on, flooding the entire clearing. Krycek turned off the engine and they sat for a moment. "We're here," he said unnecessarily.

"Ok," Skinner said, abruptly wary again. Krycek just sat and stared straight ahead. The he seemed to shake himself out of his reverie and he opened the car door.

"Come on. Watch your step, the grass is slippery when it's wet like this."

Feeling like a post-modern Alice in Wonderland, Skinner followed his captor across the grass, up a slight rise and up three wide, shallow steps to the front porch of the cabin. Krycek pointed his keyring at the front door and pressed several buttons on it. Skinner was almost disappointed when nothing especially exciting happened, except for the blinking of a tiny green light to the upper left of the front door. Then Krycek opened the door using a very ordinary housekey and ushered him inside, turning on lights as he went.

The cabin was spacious and warm inside. Golden wood gleamed beneath their feet. There were handmade rugs dotted around the large living area. A kitchen area was open to their left, a huge fieldstone fireplace to the right. There was a broad pine farm table with a couple of chairs around it, a pair of sofas in front of the fireplace and a desk area surrounded by tall bookcases in a back corner. Directly in front of them across the room from the front door were three doors. The furnishings were spare but comfortable. Huge windows and skylights, dark now, would flood this room with light in the daytime.

When Skinner turned to look at Krycek, the other man had a self-conscious look on his face and Skinner realized with a start that Krycek was waiting for his opinion. It was only getting weirder, he thought, and said "Nice place. Did you build it yourself?"

"Most of it. I had a mason and an electrician come in, but I did the rest from a kit."

Skinner's mind was bouncing off the idea of Alex Krycek building a log cabin during the year that they'd all thought him dead, an unlamented casualty of a shadow war. He slipped out of his leather jacket and handed it to Krycek when he held out a hand for it. Their jackets went onto wooden pegs beside the door, Krycek's keys on an iron hook in the doorframe. Catching Skinner's speculative glance at them, Krycek said quietly, "Don't go outside when the perimeter alarms are set." He touched a sequence of buttons on his keyring fob, too quickly for Skinner to see, then pointed above their heads. A little red light shone steadily in the crack of one beam. "Red means the alarms are set. Green means they're off."

"What happens if the alarms are tripped?"

"There's either a hell of a lot of noise... or none at all."

Skinner nodded shortly. So he was to be given run of the house. It beat being cuffed to a bed or locked in a basement. He tried to feel grateful, and, when that didn't work, tried resentful. Finally, he settled on too damned tired to care.

"You want a beer?" Krycek was rummaging in the gleaming steel refrigerator.

"Sure. I could use a beer." And possibly another dose of lithium, he thought, and grinned a little. Which seemed to startle Krycek, even as he handed over a bottle of some microbrew.

"Are you OK, Skinner?"

He twisted the cap off the beer and took a long swallow. It was dark and just the right amount of bitter. "You keep asking me that."

"Well, it's just that you're not reacting the way I'd expected, exactly."

"What did you expect?" He took another swallow and leaned his elbows on the kitchen island, across from where Krycek was leaning and looking at him speculatively.

"You know, the usual rage and resentment, maybe some body shots, handcuffs, chloroform, that kind of thing." Krycek gestured with his false hand.

"You were prepared for all of that?"

Krycek grinned, a sharp flash of fangs very out of place in the warm homely kitchen. "Oh yeah, I'd planned ahead."

"And you got me with an unloaded gun? What sort of planning was that, Krycek?"

Krycek shrugged and took another sip of beer. "It worked. Besides, I didn't say that all my guns were unloaded."

"Oh." He felt muzzy-headed and stupid. Why had he assumed that Krycek had only the one gun he'd showed him? Alex Krycek always had something else going on; hadn't the past taught him that, if nothing else?

"I'm sorry about your condo."

"Why? Did you torch the place?" Skinner wondered why he was baiting the man, then decided it was probably because he just plain didn't give a shit any more. He took another sip of beer.

But Krycek didn't even look needled. "No. But I'm guessing it sucks to have all your possessions fit inside a gym bag."

"I've got what I need." Skinner looked down at the counter top and traced a line of white quartz as it shot through the green marble.

"A wedding photo, an address book, a clock, a Vonnegut novel, a set of sweats, a towel and an emergency toiletries kit from the Red Cross," Krycek recited. "If that's all you need in life, your expectations are WAY too low, Mr. Skinner."

"You went through my bag?"

"You were sleeping pretty soundly when I stopped for gas." Krycek was completely unapologetic. Skinner was unsurprised; when was Krycek ever sorry? He just shook his head and finished his beer.

"You want another?" Skinner shook his head. "Hungry?" He shook his head again. Suddenly, he was terribly tired. He was tired of the world spinning out of control, looping around him; he just wanted something to make sense again.

"Why am I here?"

Krycek looked at him for a long moment, then said only, "Tomorrow. We'll talk about it tomorrow. Come on." He put his bottle down, then led the way to the bedrooms in the back of the cabin. He opened the middle door and pointed out the small bathroom with its doors opening into each bedroom. Then he opened the right hand door and flipped the light switch. He stood back and let Skinner enter.

The room was square and moderately sized, cool and impersonal. It was dominated by a queen-sized bed covered with a rich maroon patterned comforter. It looked both rich and seductive, calling to him even as he stood swaying in the middle of the room. There was a mission oak bedside table with a brass reading light on it, a clock radio and no phone.

"You'll find everything you need in the bathroom; toothbrush, towels, razor, whatever. If you don't see it, let me know. I'll get it."

Skinner blinked, opened his mouth to say... what? Then he closed his mouth and nodded.

"Good night, Skinner. Don't forget about the alarm." Krycek turned and left, closing the door behind him.

Feeling like his brain was in neutral, Skinner went into the bathroom and stripped off his sooty jeans and the new shirt Krycek had given him. He hadn't even had time to find underwear when the fire alarm had gone off, just rolled into some clothes he had left on top of the laundry hamper, grabbed the photo and a random handful of useful items, tossed them into the gym bag he'd left beside the door and gotten out. He'd spent the next ten minutes helping the young family across the hall shepherd their four kids and two dogs down the smoky hallway and then it was too late to go back for anything at all.

He turned the shower on and waited for the water to run hot. He stepped under the pounding stream and almost moaned in approval as it hit tense muscles. A smoky scent rose from his skin and he grabbed at the brand new bar of sport-scented soap and began scrubbing it away, hating that smell of destruction, so like the sooty aroma of failure and despair. He preferred not to think about why there was a fresh bar of the soap he always bought in Krycek's shower.

His car had been parked in by the fire trucks, so he had gone back to his young neighbors and allowed himself to be taken to the shelter with them, watching over their two oldest little girls, cuddling and soothing them, keeping them warm and smiling reassuringly at the overwhelmed parents. The shelter had been a welter of distraught people, jagged colors, garish lights. He had sat on the edge of a hard cot, feeling the scratch of wool blankets under his hands, and read Winnie the Pooh tales to the little girls until they had finally passed out from sheer exhaustion.

Four am, then five am had passed with him just sitting, watching the children and their parents sleep, on self-imposed guard duty. At six am, the young family's relatives had claimed them and he finally called the only person he could think of to come and pick him up. At 7 am, while waiting for Mulder, Alex Krycek had intersected his life again. And here he was, twelve hours later, in another state, the pampered prisoner of a man he'd thought dead and beyond revenge.

He got out of the shower and wrapped a huge cobalt bath sheet around himself, appreciating the luxury. He brushed his teeth using a fresh brush and a new tube of his own brand of toothpaste, debated shaving again and decided he wasn't up to it. His hands were shaking as he finished drying himself off and he wondered briefly at his own exhaustion. Then he reminded himself that he had had a hell of a couple of weeks; first, fighting the powers above him for full disclosure of the conspiracy, then losing his job, and spending much of the following week drunken and raging, then losing his home and a night's sleep. So far, he was finding being kidnapped the most restful event of the past month.

He wandered back into his bedroom, the towel wrapped once again around his waist. He debated putting on the sweats, then decided that being clean felt too good to put on his stale workout clothes, even when weighed against the psychological disadvantage of nudity. He eased himself into bed, finding the sheets were a rich, soft maroon flannel that nicely countered the chill of the room. Sleep claimed him before he could reach to turn out the light.

When he woke, it was to a thin line of gray showing beneath the curtain across the window to his left. The bedside light was now off and he thought he had the memory of a sound heard just before waking. The clock told him it was barely 6 am. He rose, used the bathroom, then dressed in his clothes from yesterday, trying not to cringe at the greasy feel of his jeans. He padded out into the living area of the cabin and found it empty, the predawn gloom softening the lines of everything.

Suddenly, he felt cramped and breathless. Looking up at the beam over the door, he saw the tiny green light flashing. He flipped the deadbolt on the door and stepped out onto the porch in his bare feet. The autumn air was cold up here in the mountains, with a sharp bite that promised winter with every crystal-flavored breath. The cabin faced east, and Skinner found himself sitting on the top step with a clear view of the valley below and the mountains from which the sun would climb. He sat and watched the gray lighten and rouge and become golden and orange, seeing shades of flame and peach and even a flash of green as the sun rose. It was cold and his feet and butt became numb, but he was distracted by watching his breath steam and rise in the golden dawn. A breeze rattled away at the last dead leaves on trees all around and an eagle cried out, once, far away down the valley.

After a time, he heard the door behind him open and close, then boot heels on the boards of the porch. A new scent came to him in the dawn and a mug of coffee was put down by his right hand. Krycek said nothing, just stood behind him. Skinner heard him taking long, deep breaths of frost-scented air. He picked up his coffee and wrapped chilled hands around it, relishing the warmth. It was hot and rich and tasted wonderful, here in the crisp morning. Halfway through the mug of coffee, he said, "I haven't watched the sun rise in years."

"This is a good place for it. I get up most mornings to watch it."

Then Krycek said nothing more. They watched the light grow, the sole witnesses to a raccoon's homeward waddle and the breakfast browsing of a deer and fawn not ten steps from the SUV. Then Krycek said, "Breakfast?"

Skinner nodded and rose stiffly to his feet. He turned and met Krycek's gaze without expectation, but could not tell what expression was there. He followed the other man back into the cabin, relaxing into the warmth without regretting how chilled he had gotten.

Krycek cooked breakfast without speaking, refilling Skinner's cup silently before pulling bacon and eggs out of the refrigerator. Skinner sat on a stool at the kitchen island and watched his captor's efficient motions and did not offer to help. Within a short time, they were sitting side by side at the counter, eating, still without speaking. Skinner appreciated the silence and the complete lack of expectation on what he knew was both their parts. Who would have guessed that Alex Krycek would have been a restful breakfast companion. He grinned, then snickered quietly to himself; Mulder would appreciate the irony in this situation, he thought. Assuming he hadn't already just gone and shot Krycek. He snickered again.

"You're doing it again," Krycek said. "That 'I'm going slightly mad' chuckle is very disturbing."

"Sorry." He poured himself a third cup of coffee, then topped off Krycek's mug. "I was just thinking what Mulder would do in this situation."

"Beat the shit out of me," Krycek said without rancor.

"Yup."

"You gave me your parole."

"Yup."

Krycek pushed his plate away. Then he said, without preamble, "I have a lot of material to show you, Skinner. It'll take you days to go through it all, but it's important that you do."

"Why?"

"Because you're going to make the final decision about what we ought to do with it."

The world looped and dodged again and Walter Skinner wanted another cup of coffee, but the pot was empty. "Me?" he said stupidly. "Why me?"

"Because I'm tired of making all the tough decisions by myself," Krycek said quietly.

"I don't understand."

"You will. Just read the files I'm going to show you. You'll understand more than you've ever wanted to."

"Why me?" he asked again, a little plaintively. "Why not Mulder?"

"You'll see."

Krycek led him over to the pine table, arranged in a windowed corner of the room that overlooked the valley. It was a beautiful autumn day, full of sunlight and the browns and grays of oncoming winter. There was a laptop there, an expensive new model, Skinner noted. Krycek opened it, powered it up, then held up a finger. "Watch carefully," he instructed, then tapped a sequence of control and letter keys. "That'll allow you to open whatever applications and programs you want. If you get the sequence wrong, or if someone tries to use it without the pass code, it'll blow. And take everything in a three foot radius along with it. So get it right."

"Show it to me again." Skinner didn't even question Krycek's security precautions. He had seen men and women killed for touching only a fragment of the mystery. If Krycek was to be believed, here was the whole thing, beneath his fingertips. Krycek's hand moved in a slow graceful dance over the keys, tapping each one and reciting its name. "F8, Shift, Control, Shift, A, F2, Insert, Z, Shift." Then he took Skinner's hand in his and tapped out the sequence again using Skinner's index finger, reciting it once more.

"What happens if I get it wrong?"

"You'll know. There is no 'saving throw' here, Skinner. Don't screw up."

"Isn't that the rule?" he asked, suddenly bitter again. "Don't screw up or we won't promote you. Don't screw up or your wife will leave. Don't screw up or we'll kill your agents. Don't screw up or we'll kill you. Don't screw up or the world will end. Don't screw up or we'll 'retire' you." He was surprised to feel Krycek's fingers flex on his, still holding his hand above the keys. But Krycek said nothing and when Skinner turned to look at him, he released his grip, straightened and stepped away, saying over his shoulder, "Read the files with the red labels first. Then the blue, then the yellow labels."

Krycek crossed the room to the desk area and settled himself, flipping open another laptop. After another moment's observation, Skinner turned back to his own screen, called up the directory and opened the first red-labeled file. He sank quickly into a world fifty years gone, the official language not obscuring the panicky beginnings of the conspiracy he had been tormented and used by and had finally helped to destroy. He read the first- and second-hand accounts from Roswell, the first contacts, the devil's pact signed by representatives of the UN, the private plans hatched in secret places. The sunlight seemed cold on his back now and his right knee bounced in an idiot rhythm he had trained himself out of in high school.

Sometime in the middle of the morning, Krycek brought him another cup of coffee. He stood behind Skinner, reading over his right shoulder. Skinner was deep into the lab notes of the first abduction experiments and there was a roiling in his gut. He wondered if he would be ill. Then Krycek broke the pit and pendulum swing of his thoughts by asking, "What're your measurements?"

"What?" Skinner said stupidly.

"Waist, neckline? Sleeve? Shoe size?"

"You don't already know all that?" Skinner sneered, off-balance and nearly vibrating with his new knowledge. "You know what soap and scotch and toothpaste I use but not my waist measurement? I'm disappointed, Krycek."

But Alex Krycek just stared at him until he said disgustedly, "38" waist, 34" leg. Shirts are 18" collar, 36" sleeve. Shoe size—13 medium. I take a 46 long jacket. I prefer briefs and rarely wear patterns. I avoid yellow because it makes me look dead. Anything else?"

"Hat size?"

"I have no idea." He stared at the screen and wondered if this could get any more surreal. Krycek dropped a package of Oreo cookies on the table beside the coffee and went back to his desk across the room. Keys began clicking and Skinner let himself sink back into the mire of the past.

Tests, implants, women impregnated, fetuses aborted, monsters created and destroyed, genetic dead ends and sports studied then annihilated. There was an oily, bitter taste in his mouth as he read and imagined Dana Scully in the hands of the men and women who could write about such horrors dispassionately. They made Josef Mengele look like a basement hobbyist, these so-skilled scientists and geneticists.

Finally, he could take no more. He pushed away from the table and began pacing back and forth, staring out at the mountains sleeping in the sunlight and wondering how such peaceful beauty could exist in the same world with the hideous truths he'd just absorbed. Krycek watched him silently for a time, then seemed to make a decision. He shut down his computer, crossed to Skinner's laptop and shut it down, then grabbed Skinner's jacket off the wall and held it out, intercepting his next pacing ellipsis through the living room.

"Come on." It wasn't an invitation and it wasn't an order, exactly, but Skinner knew there weren't any options, either. He struggled to surface out of the past and slid into his smoky-scented jacket, wondering if he smelled the aroma of Morleys. Krycek put on his own jacket and led the way out of the cabin. He reset the alarms and went down the steps to the SUV. He unlocked the doors, got in and waited until Skinner was seated beside him before starting the engine.

They drove down the dirt road Skinner remembered from the evening before. There were drainage ditches on both sides, filled with sere reeds and cattails and twice deer scooted across the road before them. The radio played something light and classical and wholly forgettable as he stared out the window. Eventually, the road descended to meet a paved route and Krycek headed west. Soon, they began passing other cars and the occasional house as the road dipped and curved across hills. The road dropped down into a town, houses and shops suddenly sprouting up. Krycek braked and pulled into a parking space in front of a small cafe. Brightly-colored flags fluttered in the breeze, snapping and whispering. Shoppers, tourists and loiters passed around them as they stood on the sidewalk. Krycek jerked his chin toward the door. "Lunch?" Skinner shrugged, not caring, but following when Krycek stepped onto the porch and led the way inside.

They sat at a small table by the window, overlooking the street with its cheerful, uncaring normalcy. A pleasant-faced waitress came and offered them menus. Skinner stared stupidly at her until Krycek ordered the special for himself and a meatloaf plate for Skinner. She smiled brilliantly into Krycek's patented cheerful grin, then trotted off to get their food.

"Come on, Skinner, snap out of it."

Skinner just shook his head in amazement. How could Krycek just shrug off those images, the eyewitness accounts to atrocities written by the monsters themselves, the diaries of men and women who had no idea of how hideous they had made themselves in their quest for collaboration and survival?

"I know it's bad, but it's over now. You're here, now. You can't let it consume you." Somehow, it sounded like the voice of experience talking and Skinner heard it. He shook his head sharply and blinked several times, finally focusing on his surroundings and the man sitting across from him.

There were people sitting all around them, jabbering, eating, laughing, snarling at one another, living normal lives that now seemed hopelessly alien to him. He stared at a family lunching at the next table to theirs, the mother laughing as her small son stole french fries from her plate with her husband's connivance. Two women in their sixties, friends in jeans and flannel shirts, hay clinging to their work boots, talking briskly at another table. A suited man standing up, dropping bills and coins on the table before buttoning his trench coat and passing their table without a glance.

Skinner looked up quickly at Krycek, a question in his eyes. Krycek shook his head. "He's a local banker. No one to worry about."

Skinner thought that he ought to be worried about how quickly he seemed to have moved into collaboration with his captor, scouting out possible threats. He also wondered when a trench coat and suit had begun to spell 'danger' to him. He snorted with unamused laughter at that.

"You're doing it again," Krycek said, toying with his fork.

"I'm just considering the implications of Stockholm Syndrome." The waitress' arrival prevented him from saying more and Krycek said only, "Eat your lunch."

The food was hot and good and Skinner thought he could feel himself sliding back into synch with the world around him as he ate and watched the traffic in the street. The sense of horror receded and he watched the clouds scudding overhead, flickering shadows and sunlight on the pavement and buildings opposite.

They were nearly done with their meal when a the door opened and a voice boomed, "Alex Michaelson! How the hell are you?" and a man in a brown sheriff's uniform was striding over to them. He shook Alex Krycek's hand warmly, then yanked an empty chair over and sat down without waiting for an invitation. The man's ruddy face was lined, cheerful and open and Skinner watched Krycek, wondering how this situation would play out.

"Sheriff Dan Hunt," Krycek introduced him with the merest cocking of an eyebrow in warning, "this is Walt Skinner, an old friend from back north."

"Pleased to meet you, Mr. Skinner. Any friend of Alex's... Welcome to Banner Elk, NC." The sheriff's grip was strong, perhaps the merest bit too strong, testing. Skinner let his own grip tighten until he felt Hunt's loosen and saw his grin grow a fraction wider.

"So what are you doing in this neck of the woods? You missed foliage season by a good three weeks." Cheerful curiosity with a bright eye focused on him. Krycek's expression was determinedly neutral and it came to Skinner suddenly that Krycek was placing a hell of a lot of trust in that promise he'd made the day before with a gun pointed at his gut.

"I'm between jobs right now and Alex made me an offer I couldn't refuse." Krycek's eyes flickered with humor at that, but he said nothing.

Hunt's glance became assessing. He looked carefully at Skinner's hands and build, then stared into his eyes for a moment. "Let me guess—you were a lawman, right?"

Skinner was surprised by the man's insight. "Something like that."

"Well, if you're looking for a job, I might just have one for you."

"I don't think I'll be staying too long, thanks."

"Well, think about it. I could really use a decent deputy. The one I got right now, she's no damned good. What those fool selectmen thought they were doing, giving me a broad as a deputy, I don't know. Now I ask you, can a woman ever be as tough as a man in this job?" Hunt's gaze had become shrewd and exacting.

Dana Scully's face swam before his inner eye. He saw her glaring at him in a hospital corridor, smiling gently at him from her hospital bed, arguing politely, demanding his help, felt her delighted kiss when he came through, bled with pity when he could not, remembered the night she had held a gun on him in Mulder's apartment and he had known that he was going to die at her hand, felt her hand in his as he lay dying because of Alex Krycek and his toys. Suddenly, he needed to get away from this ignorant redneck asshole before he beat him for his innocent stupidity.

He decided to test the length of the leash. He stood and said into Krycek's instantly alert face, "I'll be across the street, getting a paper. Sheriff." He nodded coldly and slipped into his jacket as he strode to the door. "Touchy, isn't he?" he heard Hunt ask before the door closed behind him and he stood on the sidewalk, zipping his coat against the chill.

He crossed the street and went into the country store he'd seen from the cafe. Inside, it was warm and filled with the scents of cinnamon and coffee and the liquid chatter of some language he didn't understand. He wandered the wide aisles aimlessly picking up and putting down candles and cookie cutters, toy bears and wooden tops. His fingers felt unwieldy and everything seemed to have strange new textures, as if he were an invalid out for the first time after a long illness. Then Krycek was beside him, holding a paper bag of handmade peppermints. He fell into step without a word and followed Krycek to the cash register. The lady behind the register smiled at Krycek and said something unintelligible in a musical voice. Krycek laughed and replied in the same language. The woman smiled approvingly and said, "Your accent is getting better, Alex. Pretty soon we'll have you speaking Gaelic like a native." She handed him his change and smiled as they left.

"Gaelic?" Skinner asked as they crossed the empty street.

"The whole area was founded by Scottish settlers come to work the Duke of Avon's paper mills and forests here. The only Gaelic speaking high school and college in the country are here. Many of the natives still speak Gaelic at home."

Waiting for Krycek to unlock the SUV's doors, Skinner heard a car horn and watched as Sheriff Hunt's cruiser passed them by, the sheriff giving them a cheerful wave. "Asshole," Skinner muttered childishly.

"Dan's OK," Krycek said with a grin. "His niece is the deputy here. He was prouder than hell when she graduated from the Police Academy and he campaigned hard for her to be made his deputy. She's his little litmus test. If you had agreed with his macho bullshit, he'd have written you off."

Skinner stared at the dashboard. "And I fell for the redneck routine like any city rube."

"Nah, he still wants to hire you, actually. He realized he was playing with fire when your jaw started clenching. That's still a scary looking expression, Walt. Did you practice that in front of a mirror?"

Skinner resented Krycek's attempt to tease him back into a better mood. "So, now what, Alex, my 'old friend'?"

"A quick trip to the lumber yard," Krycek said calmly. "There's a cracked board on the front steps that needs to be replaced."

Skinner just fastened his seat belt and wondered when a trip to the lumber yard had begun to sound strange and out of place in his life.

The lumber yard was surprisingly calming. He had always liked the pine-scented order of such places, a nostalgic snapshot of doing Saturday morning errands with his father. He and Krycek both lingered over a hundred piece drill set and exchanged conspiratorial and longing looks over the titanium bits before remembering their actual errand. The board was inspected and purchased, then stored in the back of the SUV and they were back on the road, arguing amiably about the merits of pressure-treated woods versus untreated woods.

Somewhere past the center of town, Skinner realized that he was enjoying a friendly argument with a man who had kidnapped him, killed him, blackmailed him, beaten him up, robbed him and used him as an errand boy to half-destroy Fox Mulder's life, a man who was responsible for the death of Dana Scully's sister. That numbed corner of his emotions flash-thawed and the rage rose to choke him. He was shaking with the urge to slaughter, could feel his hands clenching, couldn't get enough air into his lungs, felt his skin grow icy and tight when he realized that Krycek had stopped speaking and was pulling the car to the shoulder of this deserted stretch of road. Krycek killed the engine and they sat for a time during which the only sound Skinner could hear was the harsh rasping of his own breath.

"Go ahead, Skinner, take your shot. It's not going to get any better until you do," Krycek said matter-of-factly. "I'm right here and I won't raise a hand to stop you."

Skinner shook his head, not trusting his voice. His hands clenched.

"Do it," Krycek ordered. Skinner could taste the coppery flavor of rage behind his teeth and he shook his head, refusing to give in to it.

"Coward!" Krycek took a clumsy, slow swing at him which he blocked easily, snatching Krycek's right hand out of the air and locking his wrist in an unbreakable grip. They glared at one another, breathing ragged, a desperate fury rising and swirling around them like a fog.

Finally, Walter Skinner could force a few coherent sentences out. "I don't need your cut-rate brand of home therapy, Krycek. I gave my word that I wouldn't attack you for a week. Nothing, nothing you do, ever again, will make me break my word. Is that clear?"

When Krycek didn't reply, Skinner dug his fingers in tighter and shook the arm in his grasp. "Is that clear, boy?"

Finally, Krycek nodded, eyes very dark and Skinner had to work at getting his hand to release its frozen grip. He saw Krycek flex and turn his freed wrist and saw the bloody welts and the beginnings of some spectacular bruising on the fair skin. The flash of guilt drained away Skinner's rage and left him bewildered and suddenly tired. He rolled down his window and took deep breaths of cold air, hoping it would clear his head.

"Damn it, Krycek, don't you even know how to kidnap someone?" he asked plaintively. "You sure as hell don't make them promise to behave for a week then goad them into beating the shit out of you."

Krycek shrugged, not looking at him. "So I don't get any points for consistency. I just thought it might help." He reached for the key in the ignition.

"You know, your life is pretty fucked up when you think that someone beating you half to death might actually help something."

"Skinner, you have no idea what an improvement this is." Krycek pulled back onto the road and Skinner let the wind roar in his face for long cold miles until tears streamed down his numb cheeks.

"Would it help if I told you I was sorry?" Krycek asked quietly, sometime later.

"No." But somewhere deep inside, Skinner thought that perhaps there might come a time when it might help, somewhat.

They said nothing more for the rest of the drive. When they reached the cabin, Skinner looked at the laptop waiting for him with real distaste. Then he went into his room and closed the door, needing to be alone. He stretched out on the bed and tried to focus on the Vonnegut novel he had been reading the evening his condo had burned. He fell asleep before he had even found his place again.

Dinner was silent, Skinner still too muzzy from his unexpected nap and the dregs of ugly emotions stirred from the depths of an unquiet soul. Krycek had dished up cold fried chicken and cole slaw and Skinner was surprised to find that his appetite had returned. He refused Krycek's offer of a beer, then stood up and put his plate in the sink before slowly going over to the laptop. He opened it, powered it up, then started to punch the keys, mumbling the security sequence under his breath when he realized that he was hearing Krycek recite it with him. "F8, Shift, Control, Shift, A, F2, Insert, Z, Shift."

The directory came up and he sighed before sitting down and choosing the next red-labeled file in the list. This file was all about animal experimentation and the intentional combining of alien DNA with animal DNA. He found this file easier to sort through, no disturbing images of people he knew suffering. At least, not until he reached the research regarding bees and the dissemination of smallpox using them as the carriers. He remembered that first slip into dishonor and lies, felt again the freezing dead weight of an innocent victim of careless accident on his shoulder, the result of an unscheduled test of the disease-carrying bees.

His knee was jerking and jibing again. Krycek had disappeared into the other bedroom, then he re-emerged and Skinner glanced up and did a double-take. Krycek was standing in front of one of the bookcases, sliding a CD into a mini stereo perched on one shelf. He had changed into ragged blue jeans and a faded black sweatshirt whose left sleeve hung empty below the elbow. Delta blues, played on a slide guitar, rich and deep, flooded the room. Krycek turned around and met Skinner's gaze firmly. "Where are you?"

"The bees."

Krycek nodded, a small frown on his face. "Keep reading. It gets worse."

"That's the one thing I was pretty sure of."

They were silent again and Skinner went back to his file reviews. The hollow sense of horror kept yawning wider and wider in the pit of his stomach. He moved through the bee files and on to the next set of human/animal experiments. There were photos attached to this file and he scrolled through them slowly, paying attention to every lurid detail, teeth tightly clenched.

He began to piece together which of the X Files Mulder and Scully had investigated which could be traced to Consortium- sponsored experiments. He remembered the reports on the human liver fluke, looked at some of its failed predecessors and felt his gut roiling again. He looked over and saw Krycek lying on one of the sofas, reading. The man looked reassuringly normal and Skinner was inclined to be grateful for that, no matter how much of an illusion it might be.

Finally, he was done with the animal experimentation files, chilled by the experimental cross-cloning of human and bee genetic material, designed to produce the drone-like children Mulder had seen in Canada. Solemn-faced little girls and boys stared at him in identical rows, picture after picture until he reached out and hit the emergency shut-down key, blacking out the faces.

"Why did the girl-drones resemble Samantha Mulder?" he asked the lounging man across the room.

Krycek just shook his head. "Tomorrow."

"Just answer the question, Krycek."

But Krycek shook his head again. "No, you've read enough for today. That whole story will take more than a day to piece together and it's definitely better learned in the daylight. Trust me."

Skinner sat up straight and realized how stiff he was. He stretched and then asked, "Is there any more of that scotch around?"

"In the cupboard." Krycek pointed to the last cupboard to the right but didn't get up. Skinner powered down the laptop, then got up and poured himself two generous fingers. After a moment's hesitation, he took down another glass and poured another two fingers into it. Then he corked the bottle again and picked up both glasses, crossing the room to stand over Krycek.

When the wary green gaze fastened on him over the book, he held out the glass. Krycek put down the book, then sat up slowly and took the glass, raising it very slightly in a toast before taking a sip. Skinner returned the gesture and let the silken warmth of the scotch unravel down his throat, hoping it would warm him.

"How did you get that material?" He jerked his chin back towards the laptop. Krycek took another sip, then said, not looking up at him, "My... mentor gave me some of it. Some of it I bought, some I stole. The rest, I scavenged. You might almost call it my inheritance."

"What are you going to do with it?"

"If I knew that, Skinner, you wouldn't be here."

"What..."

Krycek cut him off. "Just wait Skinner. Read everything, then ask as many damned questions as you want." Krycek rolled to his feet and stalked into his bedroom, leaving his book and glass behind.

There was nothing for Skinner to do but to listen to the disc play one more time, finish his scotch and Krycek's too, then turn off all the lights and go to bed.

xx

The next morning saw Skinner awake, showered and shaven by 6 am. He couldn't face his filthy blue jeans for another day and turned unhappily to pull on his old sweats. He needed some clothes; he'd have to ask Krycek for a loan.

He wandered out and found the living room empty again but the alarm light showed green, so he went out onto the porch. This morning, the dawn was a fuzzy gray that looked to remain that way. There was an unbroken ceiling of low clouds that seemed to fall into the mountains that swam in the mist. Skinner sat on the top step again, noting the new board that Krycek must have replaced sometime the afternoon before while Skinner slept. He sat and watched his breath steam and listened to the muffled sounds of the forest around him waking up. There was a watery scent to the air this morning, the tang of evergreens overriding the thicker aroma of decaying autumn leaves.

The cloud cover over the mountains gradually lightened and became pearlescent, but all color save the deepest greens and browns bled away. He knew it would be a day of rain, a perfect Greek chorus to the human tragedy that Krycek insisted he learn. He shivered in the clammy air.

He heard a sound from indoors and turned to look over his shoulder. Krycek had come out into the kitchen and was moving around making coffee. He had turned on the lights and the kitchen looked golden and welcoming, a single island of light in a sea of grays. Skinner clambered stiffly to his feet and went back inside, carefully shutting the door behind him.

Krycek looked up with an uncertain smile on his face. "How is it out there this morning?"

"Gray." Skinner accepted a mug of coffee and saw the bruising on Krycek's wrist, dark and angry. When he looked up into Krycek's eyes, the other man gave a single head shake, warning him to say nothing.

So they said nothing. Breakfast was another silent meal, then Skinner sighed, got up and went over to his laptop with its hateful red-labeled secrets. He punched in the security sequence with a sigh, knowing he had it memorized for life, then settled down to read the next file on the list. He dimly heard Krycek rinse out their cereal bowls then go outside.

Skinner spent the morning reading about the experimental farms, the drone children, the extreme ease and dependability of the Mulder gene as a clone basis. The material was all dry and rather factual and it only became horrible when he called to mind the faces of the very real people involved. Midmorning, Skinner got up from his chair and pawed through the refrigerator until he found a half-full quart of orange juice, which he drank straight from the carton.

The Consortium collaborators had done no more than many medieval vassal kings had had to do; they had sent their children to live in the homes of their conquerors, guarantors of good behavior on their father's parts. But Bill Mulder had been forced to endure what few others could even understand. His daughter's face, repeated again and again, in a number of forms, her very genetic material the sculpting medium for alien experimentation. She, the only child of the Project to be stolen rather than given away. Her disappearance had shaped her brother's life as no amount of genetic tampering could have.

She was dead. She had died very soon after her twelfth birthday, unable to withstand the stress of the tests her "hosts" put her through. But her DNA was still usable and use it they did. Samantha Mulder lived on, in bits and pieces, in over three hundred hybrid beings. But there was no one that Fox Mulder would ever be able to hold in his arms and call his sister again.

As the Project had sped up and the date came closer, it was determined that more and fresher Mulder genetic material would be useful; Fox Mulder himself had been taken. Which was when the aliens and their human collaborators got their next surprise. Bill Mulder's son bore none of his useful genetic anomalies. The reason was simple, so simple.

Skinner drained the orange juice carton and crushed it in one hand while he thought about the conclusions noted in the report on Mulder's blood work. He thought he was beginning to see why Krycek had brought him here to make the decisions about this information. Damn him.

Skinner realized that he had been hearing an irregular thumping from outside for quite a while now. As he listened more carefully, he thought it might be Krycek splitting wood. He wondered how the ex-assassin managed with one arm, then decided he didn't care. He managed, Skinner had seen that for himself.

He went back to the computer files and let the past reach out to seize him again, starting on the blue labeled files. He was halfway into the first few years of observation files on one Fox William Mulder, dating from age 12, when he heard an engine. He looked up to see a UPS van pulling into the clearing. Since when did UPS deliver on a Sunday? The driver did nothing more sinister than get out and go around the back of the truck and begin stacking cardboard boxes onto a mover's dolly, but Skinner closed all the files and powered down the laptop. The solid thunking of the axe had stopped at about the same time as he had noticed the truck. He was very aware that he was unarmed.

The UPS driver came up the steps, maneuvering a dolly with four boxes on it. He reached the front door and knocked, eyes meeting Skinner's through the glass of the window. Skinner didn't move and the man's brows drew together in a confused frown. Just then, Krycek came around the corner of the house, axe clamped casually in his prosthetic hand, his gun hand free and relaxed at his side.

Apparently the delivery was expected. Skinner relaxed fractionally when he saw Krycek sign for the boxes and tip the driver before watching him off the property. Krycek poked his head inside and said, "Give me a hand with these, will you?"

Skinner took a deep breath and wondered why this was his life. Then he went to help Alex Krycek maneuver the unwieldy boxes indoors. "What are they?"

"Open them and find out," Krycek said with elaborate casualness. He was flushed with working in the cold air but he wouldn't meet Skinner's glance. As soon as Skinner began ripping into the first box, Krycek disappeared. Just about the time Walter Skinner was pulling out a third pair of slacks in his size, he heard Krycek's axe falling again.

It was a full wardrobe, fashionably conservative and from a very good maker. Krycek hadn't forgotten a detail, including belts, socks, underwear, casual office wear and heavy duty work boots, leisure clothing, work clothes. There was far more clothing than Skinner could be reasonably expected to wear in seven days. The set of matched luggage in the fourth box explained it. He really did intend to release Skinner at the end of this, whatever this was. Looking at the piles of clothing spread around, Skinner wondered idly if Krycek really had burned down his condo complex and this was merely his way of apologizing.

He decided that he didn't care. He had gone for nearly three days looking like the refugee from a house fire and he was tired of it. If he was going to be a kidnapping victim, at least he could do it in style. He had to admit, as he shuffled through the clothing, it would definitely be in style. Krycek's taste was more daring than his own, so the clothing was tighter and brighter than he might have chosen for himself. The black jeans were almost a second skin, the black mock turtle neck stretched just a touch across his chest and the sleeves of the bright blue plaid flannel shirt rolled up comfortably over his forearms.

He returned to his reading, searching the file photos of a round faced boy looking for the sad-eyed brilliant man he would become. Bill Mulder's slide into alcoholism and its effect on the family and on the research subject was noted in detail. The foolish secrets of a normal kid's life were horribly exposed by the clinical dissection—his first kiss, friends he made carefully monitored, some even crafted for him, memories implanted or wiped as ordered... it was grotesque. Skinner thought back to his own childhood, knee jerking steadily as he stared out at the fog-wrapped hills. What would it be like to see your entire fucked up childhood laid out, the result of someone's behavioral science project?

Krycek came back inside around noon, raindrops beaded on his wool jacket. His quick admiring glance disturbed Skinner, an incongruous lick of human warmth as Skinner came near to drowning in cold facts. Krycek seemed to catch his mood and said nothing as he put a plate of lasagna in the microwave to heat. He still said nothing as he set two places and dished out steaming food. Skinner sat beside him and took two bites, chewing and swallowing mechanically before he said quickly, "Krycek, did you have a normal childhood?"

"What, you thought I was hatched? Yeah, Mom & Dad and a dog in the suburbs. About as boring and normal as it gets. Why?"

"Tell me."

Krycek put his fork down and glared. "What are you after, Skinner?"

"Just tell me about it," he said hoarsely. "Anything. Did you play sports?"

After a moment, Krycek's glare dimmed and went out. He nodded slowly and started talking in a low voice, about Little League and Saturday morning soccer, trips to the library and any boringly normal detail he could dredge up about growing up in a small east coast town in the 70's.

After a while, Skinner picked up his fork again. Krycek watched him take another bite, still talking about running the beach with his dog. When Skinner took another bite, Krycek let his voice run down and picked up his own fork again.

When the meal was done, Krycek got up and began to clear the table. Skinner sat and watched him for a while, then stood up and went over to the sink. He picked up a dish and began scrubbing it with meticulous care. Krycek wisely said nothing about the empty dishwasher to their left; he just picked up a dishtowel and began to dry the dishes Skinner washed. When all the dishes were washed and the counter tops wiped, Skinner said, "Thanks for the clothes." His voice sounded strained and hoarse in his own ears.

"No problem. They fit OK?"

"Yeah."

The two men stood and stared at one another, then Krycek offered, "I could use some help stacking the wood. It gets slick when it's wet and I can't get a grip on it with this," he gestured with his gloved left hand.

Skinner nodded and went to grab a jacket from the clothing that had arrived this morning. He needed to be doing something stupid and muscular and repetitive, something that would let the newest pieces of the puzzle settle into place in his head.

There was half a cord of wood stacked and seasoning between two birch saplings. Close beside it was an oak stump that Krycek used as a block. There was a nimbus of freshly split oak logs around it; their scent rose sharp and sweet in the cold rainwashed air. They worked in that same silence, efficiently stacking wood neatly on a new level, to age for some winter in the future. It began to rain again, softly, but neither of them stopped working.

"His whole life is there, in every fucked up detail, from the time he was 12," Skinner said suddenly.

"Now you know why I needed you to see those files. I couldn't ...I don't know what to do with them. If Mulder's ever going to know any more of the truth, he's going to want it all."

"You want me to make that decision?" But he knew that already, really. "Shit, Krycek. Why the hell couldn't you have kidnapped me for real?" The truth rattled around the little clearing as the rain pattered down on the dead leaves all around them.

Krycek made no reply and they went back to stacking wood.

xx

Eventually, the rain became stronger than their enthusiasm for work. It was cold enough that any exposed wet skin had begun to steam and Skinner wondered if the rain would turn to sleet before evening. Inside, Krycek lit a fire in the fireplace and Skinner went into his bedroom to strip off his damp clothing. It was an odd luxury, to choose fresh clothes from an entirely new wardrobe. He had never much cared about his clothing, preferring to look neat and appropriate in the office, comfortable and unfettered at home. Often he had let Sharon choose his clothing for him, dressing in whatever she deemed appropriate. Afterward, he had allowed sales assistants or catalogues to dictate what he wore in the office or at leisure.

Now he was neither in the office nor at home. In fact, he reminded himself, he had neither any more. The chill, both inside and out, made him choose a pair of fresh blue jeans with a maroon chamois shirt. It felt like armor, of an odd sort, but against what? When he wandered back out into the living room, he thought he might know.

Alex Krycek had changed, too. He had put on fresh jeans, acid-washed and worn until they were nearly white, and a forest green river driver's shirt. He had taken off his prosthetic and combed his damp hair back out of his eyes. He was kneeling in front of the fireplace, putting another log on, and he turned to look back over his shoulder when Skinner came into the room. The brief brush of his gaze was nearly a physical thing and Skinner stopped dead. Krycek was all sleek dangerous lines, wounded but all the more dangerous for that, his empty sleeve emphasizing the taut readiness of the rest of him. Skinner's throat felt dry and gripped by smoke again.

No, he thought with a touch of desperation. This is not a good idea, he instructed himself. It wasn't a good idea six years ago when you thought he was sweet and green and wanted nothing more than a daddy. You know what he is now. You ignored it then, you can ignore it now.

Krycek straightened up slowly, and stood for a moment, backlit by the fire, edged in flame. Then he came toward Skinner and the older man held his ground, but he could feel himself vibrating on the edge of motion. He wondered which direction he would break. Krycek passed by, right shoulder barely brushing his. The sorcerous moment passed as Skinner looked after him. Krycek went into the kitchen and put a kettle of water on to heat.

"You want some hot chocolate?"

Skinner stared at him, the entirely commonplace question hanging in the air like mist between them. Then he started to chuckle.

"Jesus, Walt, were you always this unstable? What is it this time?" The words were sharp but the tone was gentle. Skinner could only shake his head slowly, not sure how he could even begin to explain or conceal.

Krycek shook his own head. "Next time, you're gonna have to file an affidavit of mental competency before I kidnap you." He pulled down two mugs and a tin of Dutch cocoa powder and began to measure and stir. Skinner came to lean across the kitchen island and watched the movements of Krycek's hand, skillful and certain. He did not object when Krycek held up a bottle of brandy, stared at him assessingly, then added a measure to one steaming mug. A dollop of cream, then he handed the doctored mug to Skinner.

Rich and hot, it was another unusual luxury to him. He savored it, trying to fixate on those sensations to the exclusion of all others. The warmth spread outward from his gut and he wondered if he hadn't been just a touch shocky, the sugar bringing him back to himself.

"It's good," he said after a while

Krycek only nodded, careful eyes watching him. Finally, his gaze dropped to the counter top and he said, "I screwed up. I should have waited before having you read those files."

"Waited for what?" Skinner asked harshly. "It's not like I have anything better to do with my time, just now."

"It wasn't good timing on my part. I know what reading all that shit in one gulp is like," Krycek shrugged, not looking at him. "I should have waited a couple of months, let you get used to being retired..."

"I didn't retire. I was forced out."

"Why?"

"Because I didn't want to see another cover-up. The FBI and the NSA and FEMA and the president are just going to classify the whole fucking thing out of existence again. We won, but no one will ever know. And it could happen all over again, any time, because no one will ever suspect that it could. And I needed... never mind." Skinner drained his mug.

"You wanted redemption, right? To expose some of the conspiracy that you were forced to help?" Krycek asked quietly. Skinner shrugged, not wanting Krycek to understand him so well.

"But you resigned," Krycek continued, questioning.

"No choice. The bastards painted me into a corner. If I resigned, I got a nice severance package and sterling references. If I didn't," he shook his head, "there was enough in my file for summary dismissal and I could pretty much expect that the only job I'd ever be able to get would involve lifting heavy objects. And others would suffer, as well."

"Mulder." Krycek said it without a doubt in his voice.

"And Scully. Kimberly. A few others who have supported me over the years."

Krycek was silent for a long time and when Skinner finally looked up, he saw that dangerous blade of a man he'd seen earlier, in front of the fire. Krycek was running his thumb over the tips of his fingers again and again. When he looked at Skinner, there was a decision in his eyes. He spoke quickly.

"There's another locked directory of files. Orange labels. When you've finished with the others, I'll let you read those." A feral smile slunk its way onto his lips. "If you want revenge, you can have it. There's something about everyone in those files. Bureau upper echelons, FEMA, NSA folks, a few senators, a congressman or two, the vice president ...you can have them all, Skinner. You can hang them all out to dry... or force them to expose the entire mess; the Consortium, the proof of extraterrestrials, the collaborators and the tests, the abductions... whatever you want.

"Just help me figure out what to do about Mulder and those files, then you can do whatever you want with the rest. Is it a deal?"

It was hard not to be seduced by Krycek's wild grin; it made Skinner want to prowl and howl and turn and rend the people who had stolen his career from him. But native caution made him suspicious of gifts from such an unlikely source. "What do you get out of this, Krycek?"

The other man was silent for so long that Skinner thought he simply wasn't going to answer the question. Then he said, staring at his boots, "You think you're the only one looking for redemption, Skinner?"

xx

He woke very early the next morning, so early that Krycek wasn't up and the alarms were still set. So he stood before the huge windows and stared out into the predawn gloom, wondering why his life seemed to be one long series of deals with the Devil. Then he put a pot of coffee on to brew and started rummaging around for the makings of a western omelette. When Krycek wandered out half an hour late, he accepted his plate of breakfast without comment and Skinner began to wonder if they would ever speak over a meal.

The blue-labeled files bore the names of people he knew. Fowley, D.; Kersh, A.; Spender, J.; Blevins, R.; Mulder, T.; Scully, D. He spent the morning reading about Dana Scully's abduction and the procedures performed on her and the reasons why. He stumbled to the bathroom once and hung over the basin, saliva flowing and waiting for the bitter retching to begin, but it didn't. After a while, he went back and began reading again. Personal histories, pressure points, observations, weaknesses, useful factoids... they were all there.

Mid-morning, Krycek picked up the car keys and paused by the door. "I need to make a run to Asheville to pick up my mail. Is there anything you need... want?"

Still half-submerged in the unsuspected lives of men and women he had known only fractionally, Skinner merely shook his head, frowning at the screen, at his abysmal lack of understanding of the true nature of events years past now.

There was an unexpected sound behind him and Skinner froze before he'd even truly identified it. Krycek stepped up behind him slowly; his hand came into view and Skinner tried not to jerk. Then Krycek laid the pistol on the table. "Just in case," he said.

"Is this one loaded?"

Skinner could almost hear the grin in Krycek's voice as he turned and headed for the door. "Seven rounds in the magazine, one in the chamber. I won't be back until dinner time. The alarms are off." He paused at the door, holding it open and letting a gust of chill air in. "Don't read too much of that today, Skinner. It's... tough stuff."

"I've already read about what they did to Scully. And why," he said coldly.

"There's more. A lot more. Just take it slow."

And Alex Krycek left, leaving Walter Skinner in possession of his home, all his secrets, a loaded gun and a slowly blossoming rage as he learned exactly what pressures had been brought to bear upon formerly innocent men and women to force them to do unthinkable things.

Then he found his own file.

xx

Krycek didn't return until after dark. The outside floodlights clicked on when his SUV pulled up in front of the cabin but Skinner hadn't turned on any other lights. Krycek flowed up onto the porch, gun in hand, and was through the door without a sound. He stopped when he saw the bluish glow of the laptop's screen saver, then took a step toward the living room area where Skinner sat silently in front of the fire. There was a glass next to the bottle of scotch, but the level in the bottle was nearly the same as it had been the day before. The pistol Krycek had left was sitting on the table beside the bottle; the magazine was missing.

"How much did you read, Skinner?"

"All of it," he said hoarsely.

Krycek swore in what Skinner assumed was Russian. "I told you to take it slowly!"

"So I wouldn't blow your fucking head off when you came through the door?"

Krycek crossed the room slowly and sat on the couch directly across from Skinner. He put his own weapon on the table facing the one he'd given Skinner. "No," he said quietly. "So you wouldn't put a bullet in your own fucking head.

"Where's the magazine?"

Skinner gestured vaguely toward the kitchen, where he'd thrown it hours before. He kept staring into the fire, liking its simple purity. He sighed, then said, "It's OK, Krycek. You don't have to worry, I'm not in some kind of self- destructive fugue state."

'Any more,' he added to himself.

Seeing his entire fucking life laid out like that, sneering comments scribbled into the margins of his failed marriage, the truths behind the couple of stillborn romances he'd tried since, gloating speculations on his sexuality, health, appetites... it had been too much. They had tried seduction twice and he'd only fallen for the hooker. Hurrah for him.

Krycek had been too new, too subtle, Skinner too married, too conservative then, his days of wild experimentation under the gun long over. A long-ago Krycek's notes, curiously colorless, suggesting that Skinner's alleged bisexuality might have been a war-time stress anomaly and not an available handle for exploitation. His recommendation that the relationship between Skinner and Mulder be monitored for blackmail potential.

Well, he'd avoided that trap neatly by pushing Mulder away any time he got too close to anything that might be the real Walter Skinner. Then they'd forced him to betray Mulder and there went that angle. Even after he'd been freed of the nanocyte threat and could once again aid Mulder and Scully, he'd never allowed the younger man any closer. Slowly, they had begun to build something of a friendship, something that didn't put any pressure on the tenuous threads of trust that were being respun. At least, not until Skinner disappeared from the sidewalk in front of a Red Cross Shelter at 7 am one morning, leaving no more than a mumbling answering machine message in explanation.

His file had also contained contingency plans for pushing him into alcoholism, noting his own father's dissolution in middle age, assassination, then the final damning recommendation that he was no longer effective enough to even waste a bullet on. There was a scanned copy of a handwritten note in which Alexei Krycek suggested that he be used as a subject for the nanocyte project. The Tunisians were easily manipulated into agreeing to use their second- choice subject and Walter Skinner had played D.O.A. games with Krycek for a year before becoming free again.

The two men stared into the fire for a while. Then Skinner asked a question to which he was pretty sure he knew the answer. "Who was their first choice for the nanocytes?"

Krycek's eyes gleamed in the firelight, as they had one night in the greenish glare of his dashboard lights. "Mulder. They wanted Mulder."

"So you gave them me."

Krycek nodded, then stood up abruptly, gathered both weapons and walked away. Skinner heard him moving through the kitchen until he found the missing magazine. There was the clatter of hardware on the counter top, then Krycek went to hang up his jacket and Skinner heard the buttons of his keyring security system being punched. "The alarm's on," Krycek said tonelessly. He picked up the guns again and disappeared into his bedroom, closing the door.

Skinner watched the fire burn down to a bed of glowing coals, then he, too, got up and went to bed.

xx

But sleep didn't come. He lay there for two hours, staring at the ceiling, before finally giving up and getting up. He slid back into his jeans and shrugged into the flannel shirt he'd left draped over the foot of the bed. Then he wandered back out into the dark living room in search of the bottle of scotch. He stood and watched the stars burning, a million white and cold fires out over the dark mass of the mountains. It was cold and the coals burned a sullen orange, so he stirred them up and added kindling and a log until the fire burned golden and embraced him with warmth again.

He sat back down where he'd spent most of the evening and poured himself a carefully measured half inch of scotch. He had taken three sips, staring into the flames and thinking of nothing at all, when he looked up to find Krycek watching him. The other man stood just in the shadows beyond the half circle of fireglow. He was wearing black plaid flannel boxers and a black tee shirt which did nothing to disguise his maiming, his scars, or his beauty. Skinner took another sip and Krycek came a pace closer. He stood, painted out in flickering gold, eyes dark and deep as the forest outside the cabin. Skinner blinked and then Krycek was standing right in front of him. He stared up at Krycek and Krycek stared down at him and his glass stayed on his knee. He could feel some expression seeping onto his face but he didn't know what it might be. Then Krycek asked quietly, "What have you got to lose?"

That breathy whisper undid him. He reached out and took hold of Krycek's right hand, leaning forward and reaching around Krycek's thigh to put his glass on the coffee table. The glass thunked onto the wood and he looked up at Krycek, up the unimaginable length of his body, so close that he could smell the musk and sweetness of him, his chin almost touching the cotton of his tee shirt. Krycek's fingers twitched in his and his gaze was more remote than the coldfire stars. Skinner tugged on Krycek's hand, not knowing what he expected, only knowing surprise when Krycek slid to his knees, gaze still locked on his.

The warm fingers left his hand and then Krycek was sliding his hand down Skinner's chest, curving it beneath the open flannel shirt, skimming over his ribs and belly. Skinner didn't move when Krycek's hand unbuttoned his jeans, nor when it pulled open his fly. His own hands lay forgotten, palm up, on the couch to either side of him. Krycek's hand touched his cock and only then did he realize that he was hard and straining and that Krycek's touch would push him over some dark brink he hadn't ever suspected.

Krycek looked down then and shoved lightly at his knee, making a space for himself between Skinner's parted legs. His heat soaked into Skinner's thighs as Krycek leaned over him, the grim abbreviation of his left arm helping him keep his balance as his right hand scooped Skinner's cock into his mouth. Skinner jerked at the writhing warmth surrounding his cock, his hands balling up into fists. He was too close, it had been too long...

Krycek's voice sounded in his ears again, behind the wet sounds of sucking, the harsher sounds of his own breathing, 'What have you got to lose?' Nothing. He remembered his hands, suddenly, and reached out to cup Krycek's head. He let his fingers slide into the slick dark hair, let his palms ride over the beard-shadowed cheeks, full and flexing beneath his touch. Nothing to lose. That was what put him on this couch in the deep darkness with Alex Krycek kneeling between his knees. Nothing. That's all this was, as Krycek's skilled tongue demanded his response from some dark space he hadn't wanted to know he had within.

He was tired of nothing.

He flexed his hands, slid them back into Krycek's hair and tugged gently but irresistibly. Krycek's head came up slowly, lips wet and full, eyes wary and dark. "What?" he whispered.

"Nothing," Skinner said, then dragged Krycek's face toward his and kissed him. It was clumsy, Krycek was off-balance and surprised, Skinner unpracticed and no more than half-sure. But it was real, it felt like life and he relished it. Then Krycek began to kiss him back, skillful mouth taking over this field, too.

Skinner let his own hands wander down from Krycek's head, drifting down to ring his throat, finger finding and tracing the raised ridge of scar he had seen. Then his fingers combed down over Krycek's chest, feeling the tense heat beneath the cotton. He found the hem of the shirt and dragged it upwards, breaking the kiss only long enough to discard the shirt before leaning back in. He let himself slip to his own knees, trapping Krycek between the coffee table and his own body.

He put his arms around Krycek, palms flat against the muscled smoothness of his shoulder blades. He splayed his fingers wide, then flexed them, drawing them down like blunt-tipped claws, thrumming across the tense muscles until Krycek arched and moaned against him.

"Come to bed with me," he whispered against the other man's mouth.

Krycek drew back, caught in the circle of Skinner's arms. His gaze was hazy and nearly drugged, but some native suspicion flickered and darted in the firelight. Skinner knew then that the other man was no stranger to the quick blowjob and hadn't intended much more than that mock-intimacy, nothing more than a safety valve. But Skinner was feeling something dark and dangerously alive begin to prowl within him. He wanted more, wanted to taste sharp sweat and hear sobbing breaths and feel hot blood humming beneath his hands.

"What have you got to lose, Krycek?" he whispered, taunting a little, then lightly bit at the scar under his jaw. A nearly soundless moan answered him.

Then Krycek was lurching to his feet, dragging Skinner up by one hand. He started to lead him to his bedroom, but Skinner tugged firmly in the direction of his own room. The darkness was deep there, the starlight barely enough to frost them both with silver as they dropped their clothes to the floor.

Suddenly, Krycek was hesitant, touching shyly, a newness to his kisses that Skinner didn't know how to interpret. So he didn't bother—he simply took what was offered to him. He licked and tasted, nibbled and kissed. The hot salt scent of Krycek's skin had him humming as he rubbed his face against its fire-warmed silkiness. The cinnamon-sharpness of Krycek's cock in his mouth warmed him better than scotch, the half- strangled cries feeding the dark dangerous thing in him, making it howl with triumph when Krycek's release filled his mouth like hot blood.

They lay together a moment, Krycek's harsh panting filling the room. Then he jerked himself down the bed, roughly pushed Skinner flat and sucked Skinner's cock into his mouth. He sucked hard, his hand circling Skinner's cock and ripping his orgasm from him. The tremors had barely subsided before Krycek was swinging himself across Skinner's body, heading for the door, already in full retreat.

"No," Skinner whispered, grabbing hold of the bowtight shoulders and yanking him back down. They wrestled for a long minute, Krycek fighting with the same panting breaths with which he had come. His strength or anger gave out suddenly and he dropped half on top of Skinner. Skinner just pushed and shifted until the other man was comfortably arranged on his right shoulder, arm pulled across Skinner's chest and clamped beneath his other arm and against his ribs. Their sweat was chilling rapidly, so Skinner reached down and pulled up the comforter from the foot of the bed.

Then his energy was gone and he lay on his back in the dark, staring up and listening to Krycek's breath, feeling each exhalation across his chest. He tightened the arm around Krycek's shoulders and felt the other man shift a little in response. The terrible tension had left Krycek's body and it was now slack and warm against his. So Skinner turned his head just enough to feel the dark hair against his lips and went to sleep.

xx

It was, Skinner reflected, a good thing that they appeared to have developed a habit of eating without conversation. Otherwise, the arctic silence at breakfast might have fazed him. But he had expected this from the moment he had awakened alone, well past dawn.

At first, he had merely lain in bed and enjoyed the overall buzz of good humor and health that decent sex leaves in its wake. Then he had begun to actually remember some salient points, including the facts that he had invited Alex Krycek into his bed, and that he had silently insisted that Krycek spend the night beside him afterward.

It had not been a restful night. Krycek stirred often, sometimes mumbling, sometimes flailing. But he did not move away, pressing up against Skinner's warmth even in his sleep. He was easily soothed, though, sent back into deeper sleep by fingers stroking through his hair or quiet words whispered in his ear. But Skinner hadn't gotten more than an hour's sleep at a time.

So he lay in bed and watched the play of morning sunlight on the wall of his room and wondered which emotion he would settle on, of all those that strobed through him. Guilt, satisfaction, anger, sadness, regret, resignation, hatred, black humor, hunger. Deep down, there was a treacherous tickle of something too soft, too newborn to even be named. But, frail and tender as it was, he shied violently away from observing it too closely, not wanting to admit its very existence yet.

He settled on hunger, eventually, and staggered out of bed. He showered, shaved, and dressed in no more than twice the time it usually took him. Then he went out to confront the man who had beaten him, blackmailed him, killed him, kidnapped him, and nuzzled against him, murmuring in his arms the night before.

Krycek was frying sausages and did not look up as he handed Skinner a mug of coffee. He served breakfast with jerky movements and sat across from Skinner in the same wary silence. Skinner found himself more and more relaxed as the meal went on and as he realized how completely thrown Krycek was. It was nice not to be the confused one for a change. He thought he might have more familiarity with need than Krycek did.

They finished their meals in record time and Krycek was up and shoving dishes into the dishwasher before Skinner had swallowed his last mouthful. He sat and watched the younger man's quick, agitated gestures and felt a glimmer of humor. A snort escaped him before he could clamp down on it. Krycek's head jerked around and he stared at Skinner, a dangerous glint in his green eyes. Skinner met his glare frankly and it was Krycek who broke first. He turned and strode to the door, yanking his coat off the peg and slamming out without a word. Skinner shook his head, poured himself another mug of coffee and went over to open the directory of yellow-labeled files.

There were a lot of them, each file a complete thumbnail sketch of the businesses and organizations involved in the conspiracy. Biotech firms, pharmaceutical companies, DoD contractors, think tanks, nuclear laboratories, universities, various medical facilities, military installations... the list went on. Dimly, he registered the sound of an axe outside.

The past three days' reading had had a homeopathic effect on him; so much horror, pain, fear had numbed him eventually. He scrolled through these files with a growing sense of impatience. Finally, some time after noon, after five or six hours of mind numbing detail, he gave up. He could still hear the axe thunking solidly outside, a steady, thoughtless rhythm that drew him out and around the corner of the cabin. He stood and watched Krycek splitting wood in silence for a time.

Krycek had shed his coat and his shirt and was working in nothing but a tee shirt. There was a corona of split logs all around him, several feet deep in places, but he kept mechanically setting them up, swinging his axe in a perfect arc and cleaving each log before stooping and putting another on the block. His stance was a little overbalanced but Skinner figured that was due to the artificial arm. He watched the hypnotic ballet of blade and wood until the moment the rhythm broke and Krycek missed the block, nearly slicing into his own leg. Skinner was in motion before he even knew it.

He crossed to Krycek's side and took the axe out of his slack hand while he was still standing there staring at his leg. Skinner let the axe fall, lodging the head neatly in the block, then turned to Krycek. "Inside. Now." He tugged on Krycek's sweat-slicked arm and was a little worried when the man allowed himself to be tugged away. Skinner retrieved Krycek's coat and shirt from the low branch he'd hung them over; he handed Krycek his flannel shirt and glared at him until he put it on, then he pushed Krycek back into the cabin, directing him with a firm hand on his shoulder.

Inside, he made Krycek sit on a stool in the kitchen and he got him a large glass of orange juice. When Krycek had finished drinking it, he put down the glass and stared at his leg.

"What the hell were you trying to do out there?" Skinner growled.

"I was... cutting wood."

"You almost took your own leg off."

Krycek shrugged.

"It's not like you have that many extra limbs to lose, Krycek." At that, Krycek's head snapped up and his eyes blazed. Skinner saw his fist clench and was pleased that he had shaken Krycek from his fugue; he was also pretty sure that he was going to take a shot to his jaw.

Suddenly, Krycek was chuckling, a low unlikely sound, his hand falling open on his thigh. "Christ, Walt, that was a low blow."

"Whatever works," Skinner smiled. "What has you so spooked anyway?"

Krycek's face closed down again and he looked away. "Nothing."

"You're usually a much better liar than that, Krycek. Try again."

Krycek shrugged. Then Skinner noticed the palm of his hand. The flesh was blistered and raw. Clear fluid oozed from the blisters, mixed with blood and dirt. Skinner swore and grabbed Krycek's wrist, bringing the hand up to inspect it.

Krycek said nothing, not as Skinner stomped off to the bathroom for the first aid kit; not throughout the entire cleaning and disinfecting process, nor did he make a sound as Skinner bandaged and taped the hand.

"If I'd known one blow job would push you over the edge, Krycek, I would have made due with the scotch and my right hand."

"Fuck you," Krycek said between his teeth, flexing his fingers to test the give of the dressing.

"Sure," Skinner said amiably. Krycek's head jerked up and he snarled into Skinner's evil grin. He opened his mouth to say something and Skinner kissed him. It wasn't brutal, but it was undeniable, and Skinner made certain that Krycek was no longer fighting him before he drew back and broke the kiss.

"It's what it is, Krycek. Deal with it," Skinner said, then picked up the first aid kit and took it back to the bathroom. When he came back, Krycek was still sitting in the kitchen, watching him as if debating where to place his first shot. So Skinner grabbed his coat and left.

Winter was breathing down his neck as he strode down the dirt road. He thought about taking one of the paths into the woods, then realized he had no idea when hunting season began down here. So he scuffed along the road, hands in his pockets, breath steaming before him. There was a cold kind of peace to the early afternoon; the sky overhead was a crystalline blue and there was no breeze to stir the dead leaves on the trees or the dried reeds in the ditches. The road snaked down the mountain and he just kept following it, glad of the chance to simply be. No one was depending on him, no one expected anything from him, there were no life or death decisions to be made... hell, he didn't even have to worry about weatherproofing for winter. For the first time in five days, he'd finally found the positive side of having his house burn down.

He still felt the ego-gouge of having his job wrenched from him, though. He kicked at a stone and watched it skitter away, wondering if he would ever let himself accept Krycek's offer of ample blackmail material. The ethical part of him argued that he would be no better than those who had put him here. The logical part agreed, but pointed out how much fun it would be to make those smiling bastards squirm and wince.

He still hadn't reached a satisfactory answer when he stood on the asphalt of the county road. It wouldn't take much effort to escape, he knew. All he had to do was wait a few minutes, stick out his thumb and hitch into town. In an hour, he could have Alex Krycek in federal custody and he would be free. To do what?

He was still pondering the question as he turned and hiked back up the road to the cabin.

When he walked in the door, dusk was beginning to fall. The cabin was warm and he sighed gratefully as he shrugged out of the new wool jacket Krycek had bought him. The valley below was filling with blue mist and tongues of ground fog were beginning to lick out of the forest to surround the cabin. Krycek was sitting at his own computer, staring at the screen with questionable intensity, saying nothing. Skinner looked at him, then went into the kitchen area. He rummaged and poked and explored and finally produced two large plates of spaghetti and sauce.

"Come and eat." There was no room for demure in his voice and Krycek was up and halfway across the room before he himself had realized it. He stopped and his look at Skinner was venomous; Skinner ignored him in favor of opening the single bottle of red wine he'd found and pouring out two glasses. He calmly seated himself and waited for Krycek. Who finally shrugged, came over and sat down. They ate in their accustomed silence for a while, Krycek fumbling his fork a little as he tried to maneuver around the bandages. Then Krycek asked without preamble, "Where did you grow up?"

"Isn't it in the files?"

Krycek tipped his glass and stared at the wine as if wondering what might lurk in the glass. "Just tell me about it, Walt. Did you play sports?"

So Skinner found himself talking about playing high school tennis, growing up outside Houston, knowing early on that he wanted something more than to go into the oil business like his father. Krycek started to look at him, then began asking questions that no one had bothered to ask him in decades. Why wasn't the oil business enough? What would he have done if he hadn't been drafted? Why not stay in the Marines? What had he thought about the morning he'd first awakened after seeing his own corpse lying in a clearing? Krycek had swallowed, then asked if his thoughts had been the same the morning he'd awakened after being declared dead, blood sludgy with nanocytes and failures. And Skinner kept talking, answering every question asked, as honestly as he could, not always knowing the answer before he opened his mouth and heard the words spoken for the first time.

They cleared the table and did the few dishes and he was still talking, no longer even surprised at hearing so many private thoughts spilling out of him. He felt over-ripe with secrets and things unsaid and it had only taken the sweeping away of every single support system in his life to make it possible to speak them aloud.

The one thing he didn't speak of was Fox Mulder. He and Krycek both skirted that topic tonight, knowing that this was not the right time for either of them to breach the wall of thorns around the perplexity that was Mulder. Someday soon, they knew, he would have to be spoken of and decisions would have to be made. But not tonight. Tonight was for something else and Skinner didn't know what.

Not until it had become a velvety midnight and he was hoarse with candor. A silence fell, then Krycek got up. Skinner stood and stretched and yawned while Krycek began his nightly routine, checking doors and setting alarms. He nodded good night as he passed Skinner. He got one pace beyond when Skinner's hand on his wrist stopped him. Alex Krycek didn't look up as Walter Skinner gently tugged on his hand, patiently leading him back to his bed.

This time, they undressed in the light, watching one another. Krycek's kiss was far less uncertain this night and his hand moved with a sure glide, the gauze bandage scratching lightly across Skinner's chest and thighs. His eyes stayed open, watching everything Skinner did, watching the effect of everything he did to Skinner. Every movement, every moan and sigh seemed magnified and separated for Skinner, as if it were echoing in the spaces left by everything he'd spoken aloud tonight. There was no desperate edge this time, just a sure and steady building to a flashpoint that could be shared.

Afterward, they lay panting together, half-sprawled across one another. This time, Krycek didn't even bother trying to leave. He rolled off of Skinner's chest and dragged the comforter up over them. He flopped back next to Skinner, his arm covering his eyes until Skinner reached over and turned off the bedside lamp. They lay, side by side, not speaking as the night lightened to starlight and shadows.

"This is crazy."

"Yeah. So what's your point?"

"Shit. I think I liked it better when you were laughing maniacally at weird moments."

"Alex, in the past six years, I have dealt with everything from hauntings to telepaths to sea monsters, government conspiracies to alien invasions. I have been beat up, shot, deposed by Senate subcommittees, arrested, divorced, blackmailed. I have lied, stolen, destroyed evidence, burned a body, betrayed my friends, my country, my oaths and my faith. The good guys won anyway and I am out on my ass. I have no home, no job, no family and precious few friends left. And you want me to get all upset because I just had really good sex? I don't have the patience to pretend to be shocked any more." Skinner shifted a little and ruffled his fingers through Krycek's hair. "But you can be, if you want," he added kindly.

"Thanks." Krycek's tone could have stripped paint, but he shifted until his head was on Skinner's shoulder.

"It's what it is," Skinner said softly. He felt Krycek nod finally, then they were silent until they slept.

xx

Skinner woke up alone again, but he heard the shower running. He considered joining Krycek, then thought that it might be too early for that kind of intimacy. He smiled a little, when he considered that Krycek was used to the giving and receiving of blow jobs and other easy physical pleasures but that simple affections, unheated kisses, showers together, friendly hugs, seemed to be outside his stars.

He had slept curled against Skinner, jerking and twitching a little at times, but was easily soothed back into sleep with a soft word or a warm hand run down his back. Krycek had muttered once into the curve of Skinner's throat, something low and musical and Russian, then his eyes had snapped open and he'd stared at Skinner with a horror that dimmed and went out as he realized that Skinner spoke no Russian. Skinner had merely sighed, urged Krycek to lay back down, head pillowed on his chest, and then he had massaged the wire-tense shoulders until they relaxed into sleep.

Skinner got up and dressed in jeans and a thick blue sweater. The air in the cabin felt chill and when Skinner wandered out into the living room he saw the reason. Winter had come in the night and everything outside was frosted with snow. The valley was nothing more than a palette of grays that flowed into a snow sky. The snow was falling slowly, with the lazy lightness of floating dust, an uncommitted type of weather that promised nothing and delivered it.

He pulled the coffee out of the cabinet and filled the coffee maker, half-listening to its cheerful burble as he went back to stand at the windows and stare out at where the sun ought to be rising just over the edge of the mountains. The grays lightened, but there would be no sunlight today. He had missed these days of diffuse, kindly light. They had always seemed to hold a cheerfulness within their dimmed brightness. He realized, standing there, staring out at the snow, that it was because on days like this, there were no shadows.

Alex Krycek came and stood beside him, freshly dressed but with a sort of humid warmth cloaking him from his shower. Skinner smelled the sharp, fresh scent of his soap on Krycek's skin. They stared out at the snow together for a time, then Skinner tried to explain. "No shadows today."

Krycek's head cocked slightly at that and he misunderstood. "You want a break from the files? I figured. We need to stock up on groceries anyway."

"No, I know what to do with them now. I just meant—look. There are no shadows today."

Krycek looked out again at the falling snow, then he half-turned and looked at Skinner. He shook his head slowly. "This is not going the way I expected."

"Tell me about it," Skinner agreed, then went to get a cup of coffee.

xx

After considering the breakfast options available in the sadly- depleted refrigerator, Krycek looked at Skinner and jerked his thumb toward the SUV with a questioning look. Skinner nodded and grabbed his jacket. The drive to town was quiet, the snow blowing across the road like sand in the desert. They ate in the same cafe they had lunched in. Huge plates of fried eggs riding islands of buttered grits sopped up with a stack of toast helped to put the morning in perspective.

Somewhere into his third cup of coffee, Krycek said suddenly, "You figured out what to do with the files?"

Skinner grunted and nodded, watching the pretty waitress filling salt shakers decorated as little turkeys. "It's Thanksgiving tomorrow," he noted.

"What?" Krycek looked startled. "Oh yeah. I guess we should get something... you like turkey or ham?"

"Roast beef." Skinner drained his mug.

"Iconoclast," Krycek muttered and tossed down some bills beside their plates.

At the grocery store, elbowing their way through other late shoppers, he tried again. "The files—what are you going to do with them?"

"Give them to Mulder and Scully." Skinner hefted a quarter peck bag of apples, waited until Krycek nodded in agreement, then put them in the cart.

"All of them?" Krycek threw a head of red cabbage in as well.

"No."

"You're holding back his file?"

"Until he asks for it, yes. I'm also holding mine. And yours," he added, striding down the freezer aisle. Krycek watched him put a couple of half gallons of premium ice cream into the cart in silence.

"Alex!" The hail came from the sheriff, who was holding two kinds of frozen pie crust and staring at them both with bewildered suspicion. "The wife sent me out for pie crust and I have no clue which is better," he explained. He nodded to Skinner. "Hope your visit's going well, Mr. Skinner."

"It's been... informative, Sheriff. How's your deputy?"

Hunt's eyes narrowed, then he gave a bark of laughter. "She's up to her elbows in baking with the rest of the women in my house. She's already got cherry pie filling on her Sam Browne." He tossed both of the frozen pie crusts into his cart, then turned back. "I meant what I said, though. If you're looking for a job down here, I've got one for you."

Skinner shook his head. "My week is up on Friday and it'll be time for me to get back to D.C. and make some decisions."

"Traveling the day after Thanksgiving," the sheriff shook his head, "is crazy. I'd recommend you stay the weekend. More traffic fatalities on that day than any other in the year."

Krycek said abruptly, "Mulder can wait until Monday, can't he?"

"He's waited this long," Skinner said slowly. They stared at one another.

Hunt, oblivious to the tectonic shifts happening in front of him, said only, "Happy Thanksgiving, gents. See you around, Alex," and he left.

Skinner said, "I was supposed to be at the Scully's tomorrow for dinner. Give me your phone." He tried to ignore the curious lightening in his gut.

Krycek nodded and dug it out of his coat pocket. "With the weather the way it is, the reception will be better outside." His words were matter-of-fact, but Skinner thought he saw that same lightened look in Krycek's face. "I'll finish up here and meet you outside."

Skinner went out to the parking lot and took a deep breath of frosted air. He found a corner of the parking lot away from the constant ebb and flow of shoppers and he dialed Dana Scully's office number. She picked up on the third ring.

"Dana? It's Walter Skinner."

"Walter! Where are you?! Mulder's been tearing up the city looking for you!"

He sighed. "I told him I was fine. I still am."

"Well, your message was awfully mysterious. He was positive that you had someone holding a gun to your head when you made the call."

Damn Mulder. Skinner didn't want to think about how it was that Mulder knew him that well. "I'm fine, Dana, truly. I'm with a... friend. I've been invited to stay through Thanksgiving and I think I will. I'm just calling to cancel and to ask you to make my apologies to your mother."

"But you'll miss Bill and Mulder skirmishing again over my honor," Dana teased, relief clear in her voice. Skinner had as little love for Bill Scully as the next man, particularly when the next man was Fox Mulder. The Scully women merely suppressed Bill's more egregious rudenesses and Mulder ignored them. It had been Skinner who had gotten most annoyed last year.

"Heaven knows I'll miss the floor show, Scully," he said dryly.

There was a silence, then she said in a gentler voice, "You haven't called me 'Scully' in over a year."

He didn't know what to say. She filled in the silence for him, saying cheerfully, "You sound good, Walter. Relaxed. I guess your friend has been treating you well."

"Yeah, he has. Will you tell Mulder..." he stopped. She waited while he looked up at the falling snow, watched a crow flap lazily into the evergreens on the hill above him, took a deep breath. "Tell Mulder I'm fine. Tell him to stop trying to file a missing persons report and not to hassle his computer whizgeeks trying to find me. There's no mystery."

"You'll be glad to know there was no suggestion of arson about the fire. He's checked," Dana said. "It was just the timing of it all—you lost your job, wouldn't let any of us see you all week, then your place burned down and you up and disappear. There were a couple of odd eyewitness reports from the shelter that suggested that you'd been kidnapped at gunpoint. You can see how, after everything, he'd worry. We were worried." She sounded vaguely reproachful.

"I know. I'm sorry. I just wasn't thinking too clearly when I left that first message. And I don't have access to a phone most of the time up here."

"Where are you, Walter?"

He hesitated. "Some place quiet."

"Ok," she said eventually. "I remember when I needed that, right after everything went down. Mulder's going to hit the ceiling, but I'll tell him something. Just... call sometimes, all right? He's still holding the line but they're wearing him down. Cassidy has him supervising wiretaps."

"I will," he promised. "Tell him he'll be getting something in the mail very soon that will blow them all out of the water. Tell him to hold on until I can get it to him, then he can start messing with their heads as much as he likes."

"What the hell are you doing?" she breathed.

"Watching the snow," he told her, trying to be as honest as he could. "After that, I have no clue what I'm doing." He saw Krycek come out of the grocery store, pushing a cart, and he began walking to meet him at the SUV. "But I'm OK, you got that, Dana? Tell Mulder not to go off half-cocked. I'm fine." He got to the car just as Krycek opened the back. He tucked the phone under one ear and began helping to load the groceries.

"If you need anything..." she said.

"Could one of you go over and get my car?" he asked suddenly. "I'm not sure when I'll be back and they must need to clear the lot."

"What about your mail? Where shall I forward it?" He knew that she honestly wasn't fishing and he felt a warm rush of affection for her, gratitude that, after everything, she was still his friend.

"Can you keep it for me? I don't know when I'll pick it up."

"Are you coming back, Walter?" she asked softly.

"I don't know," he said slowly, realizing that it was true. "But I won't disappear. I just need to be... some place quiet for a while."

"OK," she said softly. "Take care of yourself, Walter. Happy Thanksgiving."

"You, too," he said and disconnected the call.

Krycek didn't ask. He merely unlocked the doors and accepted the phone back from Skinner. He started the engine and they pulled back onto the highway. Skinner stared out at the snowy evergreens for a while, thinking deep slow thoughts about friendships and alliances. Then he said, "Head for the lumber yard."

"Why?"

"That axe you're using is too light for the wood you're splitting. We need a better maul, too."

"You just want to drool over their power drills again," Krycek accused, but he made the u-turn, throwing up sandy slush. "If the ice cream melts, it's your fault."

xx

Book II: Settling Down

JimPage363@aol.com

CATEGORY: X Files, Sk/K/M (eventually)
RATING: R
SUMMARY: Skinner meets up with an old nemesis and discovers that being kidnapped can be both informative and restful.
THANKS: Leila, Karen, Merri Todd, Kass, Dawn and all those who periodically talk my ego off the ledge!
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Metro/4859/JiM.html (thanks Mona!)

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