Playing for Higher Stakes
Fandom: The X-Files
Category/Rated: Gen
Year/Length: ~1089
Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit, only having fun.
Author's Notes: This was written very quickly for the Fight Club "Fight Fright" challenge.
He walked, shrouded in the night, carrying the sack over his shoulder, bowed beneath its weight as though he were a refugee and all his worldly goods were encased within it.
In a way, that was the truth.
He strode out, long legs eating up the sidewallk as he moved, and though he kept to the shadows, the light of the full moon revealed a face that was sheened with sweat. He wore black, and his movements were at once fluid and competent, sensual as a promise of love.
He arrived at the apartment block he'd been making for, and found himself a place alongside the building in the shadow that the moon had cast. He studied his watch and sighed. There was still time. There had better be.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, closed his eyes and thumbed the number he knew off by heart. It rang.
"Mulder."
"Get down here, Mulder. We've got time, if you hurry." The rich, soft voice vibrated down the phone, and the man didn't wait for a response, he merely closed up the instrument, replaced it in his pocket and then leaned back against the building to wait.
Minutes past, and the moon floated low, its path almost run, a serene and unknowing eye to watch the world. The man began to fidget, hefting the sack he carried, and nervously checking his watch as though the act would slow down the flow of time and hold back the stars.
He was fumbling for his phone again when the other came through the door. Mulder was hollow eyed, and as he hurried out to the front of the building it was plain that he was afraid. The man in black stepped forward to lay his hand on Mulder's shoulder and Mulder jumped, a muffled exclamation sounding out as he swung around to face his assailant.
"Fuck it, Krycek, do you have to come like a thief in the night? Whatever it is, can't we settle it in daylight?" The voice was slow, laconic, and the words sounded sharp, but Mulder's eyes blazed adoration in the colorless wash of moonlight, and his face was soft as he spoke.
Krycek put out a hand to touch Mulder's cheek, a soft caress that gave him no time to turn his face in towards it. He gestured at the moon as it slowly dipped towards the horizon.
"If we hurry, we can make it. I've managed to locate where he sleeps, and we can get him at daybreak when he returns. If we don't manage to trap him tonight, they'll move him and it'll take forever to find him again."
Krycek turned and was moving even as he finished speaking. Mulder fell in beside him, jogging alongside as Krycek led; his lean, runner's body working easily.
The moon was almost gone when they reached the house that Krycek had discovered. It was 5am already, and there was a weight in the sky that felt like the ominous presaging of dawn. As they scurried around the house, there was a howling from somewhere close by, and the two of them exchanged a meaningful look while they sought their way inside.
It was Mulder who found the broken window that led into the basement, and who went first. When Krycek followed with the sack, he found himself pressed against the wall as a warm, lush mouth sought his.
"In case I never get to do that again," whispered Mulder, and he turned to lead the way into the dark fastness of the house.
They found the coffin on the first floor. Krycek, steeped in the history of Russia, knew what must be done. He dragged off the lid to reveal the earth that lay within, and fumbled inside his sack for the holy water he had brought. Mulder, never a Christian, knew enough to stay back, and not interfere with the ritual that Krycek was invoking.
He had finished, and the two of them were about to leave when there was a sudden scent of tobacco, and the presence they had been dreading was suddenly with them.
If they had thought to go unnoticed, they were sadly mistaken. The old man stood in the doorway and drew on his ever present cigarette; his eyes glowed red as he took in their presence between him and the casket he sought.
"Well, well, Mulder and Krycek together at last. Should I wring my hands?" The voice was dry as dust, and raised their hackles as he spoke. He began to walk towards them, and Mulder moved closer to Krycek, the pair of them backing up before the menacing presence . Krycek looked at his watch again, and a shiver ran through him. They needed to get this done. The others would be coming in a few more minutes, and all would be lost.
The old man reached his coffin, and hissed with fury.
"What did you do?" He snarled at Mulder, and then shook his head, turning to Krycek , who had again been fiddling with the fabric of his sack. "No, not him. I was always safe from him. He only ever wanted to believe, didn't he? It's you. You found out, didn't you? You did believe." The old man took a step towards Krycek, who raised the item he had been fumbing for inside the bag.
A smooth, sharply pointed wooden stake angled in the direction of the old man, as Mulder stepped in to push him forwards onto it.
There was a keening, and a curse as the stake bit home, and then the old man fell. Seconds later the sun rose to point dubious yellow fingers through the filthy windows. As the two men watched, the body oozed green foam and slowly melted away. Krycek turned at last to Mulder, dropping the sack he'd held onto all this time.
"We were always better together than apart." He stepped in to hold Mulder, who was still wide eyed and trembling, pulling him in against his chest and stroking him, crooning gently in some forgotten language. "Stay with me forever?"
Mulder lifted his face to Krycek, waiting for the kiss he was sure would come, knowing that he would welcome it, and Krycek, at last.
Krycek pulled Mulder deeper into the room, away from the fingers of sunlight that probed across the floor, then he opened his mouth wide to reveal the sharpest of fangs, and bit home.
Mulder was his now, for always.
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