Exorcism, an X Files fix-it by Glacis. Rated R for violence. Severe
alteration of the events of Essence and Existence. After all, if TPTB
can toss character and continuity out the window with impunity, I can surely do
no worse.
Outside
"What is it?" Krycek turned the
metal fragment over in his hands, staring at the symbols. They resonated deep
within him, a not-unpleasant hum that radiated from his palms through his arms
and along his bones until his entire body was thrumming. His contact looked up
at him fearfully.
But then, Tam Ki looked at everyone fearfully.
It was one of the few ways an international smuggler could deal with everyone
from ex-Consortium agents to the Mafia and live through it. Fear,
and an uncanny knack for finding things to sell that no one else could or would
handle. The man muttered something about
"What the fuck are you babbling about?" he asked. At least,
that was his intent.
Instead, the world went black.
When he came back to himself, there was a stinking smoky scorch mark
where his source used to be. His head hurt. He tasted oil on his tongue.
"Son of a fucking bitch," he whispered.
This time, something answered back.
Ours, it whispered. In his brain. In his bones.
In his blood.
He thought about throwing up, but the impulse to puke was missing in
action, scared out of him by the realization that he was once again a carrier
of the Black Oil. He stared around the burnt-out remains of what had once been
the hallway of an apartment building, and started to shake. Not for Tam. It was
much too late to feel anything for the smuggler.
For himself.
There had to be a way to get himself out of this. He simply had to find
it. It wouldn't be the first time he'd saved himself from hell. With his luck,
it wouldn't be the last.
"Our current strategy will lead us to annihilation." Ink-black
eyes stared from a handsome, even-featured face. They looked alien against the
soft cream skin. Equally black eyes stared back at him from the weathered face
of a Tunisian man. Both faces were eerily expressionless.
"Your plan will not work. There are too many participants on the
canvas already."
"It must work," a third voice, coming from an Indian woman of
indeterminate years and pure black eyes, over-rode the two men. "Our mules
are no longer trustworthy. They place themselves in league with the Earth
hosts. Dissension in their ranks leave us
vulnerable."
"That is why I propose introducing a new element." Calmly,
eyes never leaving his compatriots, the man picked up a long, wickedly sharp
knife from the table. Placing his right hand flat on the tabletop, fingers
spread, he drew the blade quickly across it, severing all four fingers.
No one blinked.
Blood spurted from the site of the amputation. As they watched, the
maimed hand extruded a nearly invisible film of black oil, until the blood
slowed to a stop, impeded from its flow by the black barrier that matched the
black of their eyes.
Within moments, stumps began to grow. Shortly thereafter, four perfectly
formed fingers had replaced those the man had cut off. Flexing them slowly, he
reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew a thick rubber glove. Sliding his
now-whole right hand into it, he smiled serenely at the other two.
"Eventually we will have no need of the shifters, and we can purge
them. With regenerative hosts, we need no longer rely on the unreliable in our
battle for territory with our Enemy. There will be no further windows of
opportunity for our Enemy to destroy us when we are vulnerable, moving from a
damaged host to a new host. These hosts will allow us to remain indefinitely.
They're virtually indestructible."
Silent communication flowed between them, as arguments were brought to
bear from the collective mind to turn the few dissenters toward an agreement.
In very little time, the Oil Aliens had a new weapon.
"Your first assignment in your new host," the woman told him
quietly. "Make them believe it. Our future depends on it."
Krycek smiled again. The serenity gave way to pure
ice. "I live to serve." The jet black coating his eyes shifted,
becoming striations, then fading to allow the clear
green beneath to shine through. He turned on his heel and left the little
group, along with the weight of the hive mind they represented, behind him as
he returned to his human life with what was left of the Consortium. As he slid
into his car and pulled away from the curb, he smiled a third time. It was
almost a merry expression, if one didn't look into his eyes.
What they didn't know wouldn't kill him.
East of
The vaccine worked.
It just didn't work on him.
He scowled out into the distance. Spender was back in power in the
Consortium, and Krycek was being the good little
errand boy his alien masters demanded. He didn't know how much longer he could
stand this without going off the deep end.
Although truth be told, he had the feeling he'd
gone off that end, and drowned, right about the time his arm grew back.
Curling his fingers imperceptibly inside the thick rubber glove that
continued to fool those around him into believing he was crippled, he took a
deep breath and fought to control his impatience. He didn't know why Marita was free of the Oil Aliens while he continued in
their thrall. It pissed him off, but he hadn't yet found a way to exorcise the
demon inside him. Until he did, he'd bide his time and wait for his chance.
His efforts at containing the parasite within him hadn't been completely
successful, but they hadn't been a total failure, either. He had to work
carefully, moving forward in small steps, watching his back as he went.
Story of his life.
He could feel the alien parasite growing less aware of him, in ignorance
of his independent actions. It still controlled him, but the blankness was less
complete with each possession. Now he remembered the people he killed. It was a
good beginning. Eventually, he believed he would be able to consciously contain
the alien without alerting the rest of the hive mind.
Until that happened, he would continue to fight his
battle on all fronts. His battle
... and theirs.
"This gives us the edge we need!" A short skinny man in a big
hat stared earnestly up at Cancerman's face and
chopped his hands up and down. As if gesticulation could
carry him through where words had failed him.
"Enlighten me," Cancerman told him
dryly. Krycek, listening with apparent disinterest,
winced internally. The little scientist had no idea how close he was to dead.
"We have determined that the Oil Aliens and the Grey Aliens are two
distinct species, no?"
"Yes," Cancerman nodded with
exaggerated patience. The geneticist plowed on, oblivious to the warning signs.
"And they are in conflict over the usage of our planet. Our peoples. The Greys, they wish
to use us for foodstuff. The Oils, for carriers. They
do not coexist well, these two."
"I would imagine the Oil could cause the Grey embryos
indigestion."
Even the scientist heard the cutting edge in Cancerman's
words. His shoulders rose defensively up to his ears. Krycek
moved closer, left hand going to the butt of his gun in preparation for the
word to pop the little whiner.
"With this virus, we can approach the Grey Aliens! Broker a deal!
In exchange for control, for power, we offer the weapon that can kill their
rival!"
Krycek stilled, the alien
presence within him shivering. Cancerman stared down
at the geneticist. He looked thoughtful, as if he was actually considering the
offer. Krycek's hand curved more tightly around the
stock of his pistol. He might not have to pop the scientist. The alien inside
him might take care of both the other men at the same time.
Unfortunately, it didn't come to that. Krycek
sighed as Cancerman placed a hand on the scientist's
shoulder and led him off, the little man's hands flapping constantly as he
jabbered. Too damned bad the Oil Alien couldn't be turned on and off like a
portable thermonuclear strobe light. It would be a hell of a weapon.
The soft, distinct crack of bone breaking brought his attention back to
the present. There was a soft thud deep in the corn, and only one man returned
from the field, wiping corn dust off his pants with a handkerchief.
"Back to the hotel, Alex," Cancerman
told him jovially.
Krycek raised an eyebrow
at him and glanced once toward the field that now held the well-hidden body of
the scientist. He didn't say a word. Cancerman
frowned at him.
"Even collaborators don't show all their cards, Alex. Surely you
know that."
As the old man ducked into the back of the car, Krycek
walked toward the driver's seat. Black ink shot through his eyes when he was
face front, not noticeable by anyone else. Holding a trump card up his sleeve?
He smiled and the ink shifted.
Yes. He certainly knew about that. Even if he was the
card, not the one holding it.
Concentrating fiercely, he forced the stray manifestations of the Oil
Alien back below the surface. Over the months, it had gotten easier. Easier to
manipulate when it was hibernating within him; easier to maintain contact with
reality while it was awake, even if he had no say over his actions. As time
went by, the Oil Alien became comfortable in his body, certain it had complete
control over him and that he, as a mere drone, would do as it commanded. It
grew complacent.
He didn't.
Outside Villa Ojo de Agua,
Paraguay
Hector Rojas looked like he'd been chewed up and spat out by a pack of
hyena. Flesh hung off his frame, muscles and ligaments torn from the bones. His
eyes were missing, his scalp was shredded, and the chewed remains of his
swollen tongue protruded from between his gaping jaws. Krycek
had seen a lot of disgusting corpses, created more than a few himself. This one had him clenching his jaw to keep from
losing his lunch.
Then the Oil Alien took over, and he took a mental step back, watching
curiously, his parasite completely unaware of his interest. Rojas' body
twitched. Krycek waited.
He couldn't do anything else at this point. He was just along for the
ride.
The twitch grew until it was a continuous writhing, the destroyed limbs
flailing in the dirt. Krycek looked more closely,
trying to ignore the out-of-body feeling he always got when he was hitchhiking
on the Oil Alien's consciousness. Rojas' skin, what was left of it, was now
falling off his arms and legs in chunks. His torso was shuddering, and a lot of
flesh along with a little blood peeled away in layers. When the shaking
stopped, Rojas looked very different than he had when it had begun.
For one thing, he wasn't falling to pieces anymore. He was one piece. One perfectly healthy, perfectly whole human specimen with smooth
dark brown skin and a full head of shiny black hair. Bright black eyes,
brighter and blacker than humanly possible, shone out of what had been empty
sockets.
Krycek was impressed.
He'd felt the regeneration from the inside, but he'd never seen it from
the perspective of a bystander. It was incredible, if gruesome. He wondered
what it looked like when his arm grew back. He'd been subsumed at the time and
missed the show.
He hadn't figured out, then, how to look out through the alien's eyes.
The group-voice whispered through his head and he eavesdropped.
Work continued against the rebels. Further work was needed to disrupt
the Enemy's plans for colonization. The tingle along the knobs lining the top
of his spine clued Krycek in that he was the center
of the group-mind's attention. With that warning, he did everything he could to
stay mentally still. He didn't want them to know he was there.
From what he'd been able to gather, he was the only human host who'd
been able to pull this off. He didn't want them to discover it. He'd died
before. It sucked. He didn't want to die again.
He had the feeling it might be permanent if he did, if the Oil Aliens
had anything to do with it.
The tingling grew until his entire neck itched. He squashed the impulse
to scratch. The mind-voice droned on. There were times when they were even more
impressed with the sound of their voice than the windbags in the Consortium.
There was another threat, they whispered. Human/Grey
hybrids. The Enemy's version of the future, one which would eradicate
the Oil Aliens with the vaccine, then pave the way for the Enemy's crèche ships
to land en masse. The Oil Aliens would cease to exist.
As good as this sounded to Krycek,
it didn't make his alien parasite happy at all. Another assignment was given. Find the abominations.
Destroy them.
The Oil Aliens were scavengers. Krycek stared
at the degenerating corpse that would eventually peel off and waken as another
host, and had to give them marks for ingenuity. By using the Greys' castoffs, they not only got usable bodies to turn
into regenerative hosts, but they also retrieved a mass of information from the
former hostages. Intelligence gathering at its finest.
As one of the best, he could appreciate stellar work, even if it was done by
alien body-snatchers.
Once the flesh and blood stopped falling away, Krycek
perched on the grass next to the newest member of his little fraternity and
felt the alien take surface control of his mind. The world went inky-tinged,
and the familiar sensation of floating outside his body hit him.
Images formed in his mind. The new host's memories of
her time on the Greys' ship. A young male,
aged approximately twenty five, Hispanic, long black hair, metal rods piercing
his abdomen, shoulders, knees, feet and face. An older woman, mid-forties,
African, flat on a table with a tube running through her uterus, another up her
nose into her brain, a third into the base of her spine. Another man, late
thirties, brown hair, Caucasian, held in place with metal bands at forehead,
wrists, ankles and waist. Probes entered through the sides of his torso, his
cheeks, the roof of his mouth. Hazel eyes screamed
silently in agony. Krycek would have screamed in
concert if he'd had the ability.
Mulder.
The Greys had Mulder.
For the first time since he'd begun his stealth infiltration of the Oil
Alien's consciousness, Krycek lost control. Memories
deluged him. Fighting not to give himself away and
risk losing himself forever, fighting equally hard to separate the woman's
memories from his own, he was at the mercy of his memory.
It hurt.
Images flashed over his mind's eye, so fast they blurred, not fast
enough to dim the pain. Standing with his hand outstretched, playing the role
of his life but still ridiculously hurt when Mulder turned away from him. The
muffled pfft of the silencer as it took Bill Mulder's life before he could place his son in mortal
jeopardy with the truth. The heat of Mulder's body
stretched over his own across the top of a car. Pressed
against a bank of telephones. Scraping across the
rough stone wall of a gulag cell. The scent of his skin as Krycek kissed him the first time.
And the second.
The unexpected strength of Mulder's
arms as they fought. Fucked.
Fought again. The morbid black humor
that so perfectly matched his own.
And the second.
His own words flowed back to haunt him. "Listen very carefully,
because what I'm telling you is deadly serious. There's a war raging, and
unless you pull your head out of the sand you and I and about five billion
other people are going to go the way of the dinosaur. There is one law: Fight
or die. One rule: Resist or serve."
What did a man do when he could do neither? Pushing
past the gut-deep fear beating through him at the realization that the Enemy
had Mulder, his concerns melding with the Oil Aliens for the first time,
although not with the same emphasis, a single thought bubbled through his
confusion.
Figured. The X File to end
all X Files, and Mulder goes walkabout with the Greys.
Federal Penitentiary,
Finally in control of his faculties again, Krycek
stole away from his duties to the Oil Aliens and made contact with the man who
would help him save Mulder.
"Absalom," he said quietly. The prisoner looked back at him
calmly. Krycek felt the shift in pressure as the oil
flowed over the surface of his eyes. Absalom's eyes
rounded in response. "We fight the same enemy."
Absalom shuddered. "You're just as much a threat as they are!"
he hissed in response. Krycek smiled, showing his
teeth.
"The enemy of your enemy is your friend. We don't abduct humans. We
don't feed off them. We don't," he dropped his voice to a near-whisper,
"conduct experiments on them then throw them away to die."
He waited while Absalom thought it over. What he'd said was the literal
truth. No need for the man to know what the Oil Aliens did do with
humans. Eventually, the man nodded.
"What do you want from me?"
Krycek recited a number
and watched while Absalom committed it to memory, lips moving as he repeated it
over and over.
"When you're free." He made it a command. Absalom nodded. Krycek
pressed the remnants of parasite back below the surface, unseen again.
For the moment, it was the best he could do.
Once caught, forever enslaved, regardless of his
brief forays into independence. At least he'd been
able to spare Mulder the same fate. Even if he had been forced to lie to and
manipulate Skinner to do it.
He was used to that. It was kind of fun, actually. Especially when he
broke out the nanobot box.
Pain ripped through his spine, causing his fingers and toes to curl as
his muscles spasmed again. It was different than
death, but it hurt almost as much. The more control he managed to steal, the
worse the pain became. The other drones felt none, because it was absorbed by
the group. He didn't have that luxury, but he gladly gave it up in return for
the control he was winning, day by day, over his parasite. It was worth the
pain; he was used to pain.
The voices sang through him, whispering more in his blood than his mind,
and he gave himself over to them. For the brief periods when the alien within
him still required complete control Krycek was forced
into an uneasy dual existence. An eavesdropper on his own life.
It was better than being a prisoner of the Greys.
Not by much, but at least he had a chance to survive. He hadn't been able to
spare Mulder from that.
Not at first, anyway.
The mind-voice intensified. An abomination survived. It would have to be
terminated. The parasite inhabiting the drone who had been Billy Miles had been
dispatched to ensure successful completion of the termination. An image formed.
The target. Krycek blinked.
Scully. What had
she been up to? She was big as a house and ready to burst. With a demon seed,
if their intelligence was to be believed. Krycek
could buy it. Weirder things had happened, and probably would again. Now he had
to see what he could do with the information. Not that he gave a flying fuck
about Scully. He never had.
But Mulder ... Mulder was at risk, and this could be his opportunity to
make damned sure the man survived.
The trip to the hospital was a blur. Once there, he looked into
Skinner's desperate dark eyes and smiled, thumb hovering over the kill-switch
on the nanotechnology control box.
"Kill Scully's baby."
The second level of his plan went as smoothly as the first. Doggett was
as easy to manipulate as Mulder, if not nearly as enjoyable. Krycek dropped the information that Mulder was suffering
from a virus to clue Scully in to the benefits of anti-viral medications, even
if she didn't know what she was fighting. Then he waved a nicely-colored bottle
of bright red fluid, scavenged from a drone body as it was regenerating, in
front of Doggett's face. Dropped it to a satisfying crash on the cement, then did his best to run over the agent, just for the
verisimilitude of the scenario, of course. Well, that, plus a guy had to have
some fun somewhere along the line.
It was a fool-proof plan. If Skinner caved in to the pain and pressure,
the fetus would die, the abomination would be gone, and he would have leverage
to bring to negotiations with the Oil Aliens should they ever discover his
ability to coexist with his parasite. If Skinner took
the noble route, saved the child and sacrificed the man, then the newly active
Oil Alien wouldn't take over Mulder's regenerated
body and turn him into a drone. Everyone won.
Given Skinner's propensity to go out on a limb for Mulder, Krycek wasn't completely convinced the man's better nature
would prevail. In the end, though, he read Skinner right, as he usually had.
The mad scramble to 'kill' Mulder, Scully's equally mad scramble to get him on
IV drugs, and Doggett's time-eating failure to stop Krycek
himself put Mulder out of danger from the Oil Aliens.
It made Mulder something of a wonder, Krycek
mused. He'd escaped the virus, the rebels, the clones, the bees, the
Consortium, his own father, the Oil Aliens, and the Greys.
It was a good thing he was thinking about retirement, while he still had one of
his nine lives left.
Before Krycek found time to dwell on the
interesting possibilities of he and Mulder not being on opposite sides for a
change, pain struck again. His blood hummed and the knobs along the top of his
spine burned.
The next twenty four hours were a race against time, playing all sides
against the middle and trying to keep his head above water. The urgency rang
through him to come to the place where the abomination was and kill it. His
rational mind, what was left of it outside the cone of intense pressure from
the presence of the Oil Alien, was focused on Mulder. He found himself lying to
Skinner, lying to Doggett, staring at Mulder like a dying man staring at
salvation, and fighting the almost overpowering urge to shoot Scully.
Then Billy Miles showed up.
Skinner told him to sit down. Krycek ignored
him, heading directly out the door for the elevator. Skinner yelled at him to
hold the door. Krycek continued to ignore him.
Skinner made it anyway.
Damn. Killing Skinner would've slowed Miles down enough to give Krycek a head start.
Miles' hand came through the door, nearly taking Skinner's head off. Krycek swallowed hard and looked on impassively.
Conflicting urges were paralyzing him. Making him spout
nonsense about new breeds of aliens and second coming babies that would have
made him puke, if he'd been paying any attention to it. As it was, he could
only hold on to his self-control with his fingertips and wait for the hell he
could feel was coming to erupt. When it didn't, he took matters into his own
hands.
It was either that, or cede control of his body
to the Oil Alien. And if he did that, Mulder would have no chance. They would
all be pummeled or crisped out of existence. He wasn't quite ready for that
yet.
He had plans for Mulder.
So he played good little host drone for Doggett's ex-friend, long enough
to get everyone out of the way so he could have a clear shot at Mulder. If he
could get the man's attention in private, Krycek
could spill the events of the past several months to him. Maybe get him away
from his Scully fixation long enough to save his life.
As he should have expected, it didn't go quite the way he planned.
Oh, he got Mulder's attention, all right. Even managed to hold on to it, with the help of a gun aimed at Mulder's head. But Krycek
was losing his battle to retain control. At any moment, the Oil Alien could
assert itself, and Mulder would die. Then movement at the corner of his eye
caught his attention. Skinner had arrived.
Time for plan B.
Doing his best impersonation of a psychotic driven over the edge into
lunacy, or perhaps stupidity run rampant, Krycek
began to babble death threats at Mulder. From the look in the calm hazel eyes
staring back at him, he knew Mulder wasn't buying it. Skinner, happily, was.
The sniveling had been hard enough. Trying to convince Mulder that he
really, really had to kill him when he really, really didn't want to was tough.
Stalling so damned long was always a bitch.
Getting Skinner to pull the fucking trigger already, without benefit of
his little magic box, was a major pain in the ass. Leave it to the AD to want
his pound of flesh before he finally ended it.
Or thought he did.
Krycek didn't bother
trying to hold back the whine of pain when the first bullet shattered his
wrist. The second one going through his elbow bumped the whine up to a couple
strangled yelps. For a moment, he forgot that he was supposed to still be
maimed, and nearly gave the game away by picking up the gun with his
plastic-gloved hand.
Old instincts died hard.
At the last second he remembered his role, and stiffened his fingers,
managing to shove the pistol away an inch instead of picking it up and blowing
Walter Skinner's bruised bald dome all over the goddamned parking lot. Instead,
he made yet another bargain he knew Skinner wouldn't take. In a choice for
Skinner between Mulder and an unborn baby, the outcome was a risk. Between
Mulder and Krycek, it was a no-brainer.
The bullet between his eyes was a relief.
There was a flare of light followed by nearly unbearable pressure in his
skull. He felt himself fall, but autonomous reaction was all he was capable of
in his current condition. Curled up in a fetal ball staring at the cement of
the parking garage over his head, he felt the last of the air leave his lungs.
Felt his heart still. Heard, dimly, as Mulder reacted exactly
as expected, stepping around him like last week's garbage and heading for the
car to go protect Scully.
She needed it.
Krycek didn't.
Mulder didn't know that.
It hurt his feelings, a little. There he was, tortured, murdered for
Christ's sake, because shouldn't a law-abiding official of the FBI have
contented himself with arresting a wanted felon, without delivering the coup d'grace between the fucking eyes? Whatever happened to
minimal necessary force? And Mulder! A catch in his voice would have been nice.
A moment's hesitation as he stepped over Krycek's
rapidly-cooling body would have been appreciated.
Of course, the completely dead tone of Mulder's
voice made it pretty clear he wasn't happy with the way things had played out.
And he had called Krycek 'Alex.' Since they never
called one another by their first names, even in the middle of hot monkey sex,
it was pretty obvious he was doing what he had to do.
Weren't they all.
Wasn't it a bitch.
After Mulder left, Skinner came over and kicked him in the side. Not
hard, had to give him that. But firm enough to tell if Krycek
was faking.
So Skinner thought.
But then, Skinner never had known the whole story. For the 'big picture
guy' he was pretty clueless. Good thing, too. That was the only reason he was still
alive.
The kick didn't hurt. Physical function was down to baseline for the
adjustments that had been made to his body, so for all intents and purposes Krycek was dead. Of course, that just meant the bruise
would ache later.
Skinner did like to get his kicks in, any way he could. Punching a handcuffed man in the gut, shooting an unarmed --
literally -- man in the head, kicking a dead man in the ribs. All from a man who used to be such an idealist.
Wasn't it interesting what life in the trenches could do to a man? Not
in the trenches of war, for Skinner had survived those with his soul intact. But the trenches of the battle for the future of the Earth.
No one survived intact in that war.
Krycek certainly hadn't.
An hour later, the bullet extruded from his skull as the wound healed
from the deepest recesses of his brain outward, pushing the intruder out as it
closed. The severed veins and muscles, shattered bones and ripped skin of his
arm had long since repaired itself. The head wound, being the most severe, took
the longest to heal.
Hurt like a son of a bitch, too.
Rolling gracefully over, body already working smoothly again, Krycek came to his knees then pushed himself to his feet.
He shrugged to release the tension with which violent death had seized his
muscles. The lingering cramping would soon fade. His left hand itched under its
heavy plastic covering, and he absently pulled the glove off.
No further need for that particular charade, now. As far as the FBI was
concerned, he was well and truly dead. Skinner had killed him with his own gun.
It was a good thing Mulder was no longer with the FBI. Some things were
too much trouble to admit to knowing. As for Scully, they'd know soon enough
what would have to be done about her. And Doggett? Negligible threat. He hadn't known a damned thing from the
get-go, and regardless of his excellence as an agent, there were some things he
was simply never going to understand.
Although it might be fun to watch him try.
Stifling his smirk, Krycek disappeared into
the shadows of the parking garage, moving carefully between the cars so that
the surveillance cameras wouldn't see more than they already had. He'd have
Marlon in Communications take care of the tape of his return from the dead.
Then, like his two cohorts, his 'body' would inexplicably vanish. Alex Krycek would return to the place where he felt most
comfortable for as long as his parasite would allow.
The shadows made for good cover.
Not far from FBI headquarters, on the banks of the
He really hated this part.
His blood was screaming at him to go to Butt's
Mulder would have a hard time getting past that.
So suddenly he nearly got mental whiplash, the urging stopped. His
entire body, tensed for as long as the voice had been whispering, collapsed
against the mattress, which squeaked a protest. His eyes opened and he rolled
over to stare up at the ceiling. The voice was whispering again, and it sounded
... vaguely embarrassed. Concentrating, it took him a few moments to decipher
what it was muttering.
It sounded a lot like 'oops.'
Before he could figure out what was going on, sleep ambushed him.
Sixteen hours later he finally surfaced.
With daylight came clarification. An image flickered in his mind, seen
through several sets of eyes. Scully, hair plastered to her skull with sweat;
Reyes, looking pie-eyed and excited; and a red-fuzz-topped, tip-nosed,
squinty-eyed human baby.
No Grey anywhere.
Months of build-up, for that? Krycek grinned. He wasn't the only one to
pull one over on the hive mind. The Oil Aliens were scary, but they weren't
particularly swift. There was a good reason the Greys
were winning the battle. The thought killed his grin. Shrugging off depression
over a battle he'd been fighting for years and would continue to fight, he
climbed out of bed.
Pulling on jeans, tee shirt, boots, and leather jacket, he headed off to
verify his vision with his own two eyes. It was early evening by the time he
arrived outside the duplex Scully now shared with her mother.
Mulder pulled up to the curb a few feet in front of him.
Going on instinct, not wanting to get into his resurrection in the
middle of the street within earshot of Scully, Krycek
curled down in his seat and made himself as invisible
as possible. Mulder walked obliviously past him and bounded up the stairs. Krycek sighed.
It really was a wonder Mulder had lived as long as he had. For a man
with as many targets painted on him as Mulder had, he was amazingly clueless.
Slinking out of his car and following on Mulder's
heels, Krycek kept himself just out of sight. Tailing
Mulder had always been one of his favorite activities. Mulder never caught on,
so Krycek didn't have to be afraid of getting caught,
and the rear view was incredible. He indulged himself all the way up the
stairs, then ducked around the corner as Mulder went
in. Once the door was shut behind him, Krycek pulled
out his tool kit and let himself into Scully's apartment.
Murmurs from the direction of her bedroom lured him further in. Keeping
out of sight, he peered around the corner. Mulder was holding Scully's baby,
looking like he was afraid it would explode if he held on too tightly. Scully
was looking mushy. Mulder muttered something about fear and possibilities and
truth, making about as much sense to Scully as he did to Krycek
from the look on her face. Approximately none. Then
they hugged around the baby and Mulder leaned down to kiss her.
Krycek watched
critically. Love, yeah. Caring, sure. Passion? Not that he could see. He heard Scully tell Mulder
that she'd named the baby after Mulder's father and
nearly gave away his position by laughing out loud. Honor Mulder by naming the
baby after the father who'd made his life completely miserable? Tried to give
him up for alien experimentation? Collaborated with the enemies of his world?
Gave his little sister away to a life of unadulterated hell?
Perhaps in the excitement of the bizarre birth, she'd forgotten her own
father was named William. Naming the brat after him would make a hell of
a lot more sense. The fact that Mulder stood there and let her say it told Krycek everything he needed to know about Mulder's frame of mind.
Feeling unbearably smug, Krycek stepped out as
silently as he'd entered. Mulder might think he wanted Scully and domestic
bliss now that he could no longer have the X Files and the chase after the
elusive Truth. Krycek knew better.
Mulder wanted what he thought he couldn't have. He always had. It was hardwired.
Krycek was looking
forward to giving Mulder what he thought he'd never have again. As soon as he
cleaned up some unfinished business. Prioritizing tasks in his mind, he climbed
into his car and reached for the key.
The sound of the front door slamming shut stopped him before he could
turn the ignition. Mulder, looking at peace if a little sad, had nearly stepped
on Krycek's heels coming down the stairs. Krycek gulped.
Looked like Mulder wasn't the only one who could be
oblivious. Distraction was dangerous. He'd've
had hell to pay if Mulder had caught him skulking around Scully's place. He
ducked down as Mulder drove past, then cautiously pulled out and followed.
Mulder went straight home. Took the elevator up to his
floor while Krycek took the stairs. Krycek watched from the end of the hall as Mulder, grinning
softly at nothing in particular, let himself into his apartment. By the time Krycek had waited for sounds of movement inside to abate,
slipped the lock and let himself in, Mulder was in bed.
Not on the couch. In bed.
Asleep.
No nightmares, just sleep. One hand lay on the pillow, curled into a
loose fist beside his cheek, the other spread across the sheets. Sprawled half
on his side, half on his back, the position should have been damned uncomfortable
but looked inviting enough that Krycek took two steps
forward to join him before catching himself. He still had that unfinished
business to attend to, and if he didn't leave that moment, he never would.
He was mentally pulling the sheet away from Mulder's
naked body when he arrived at Doggett's house. Putting vivid fantasies on hold,
Krycek broke out his tools for the third time that
night. Shaking his head over how easy it was to get into the private retreats
of supposedly professional federal agents, he stalked through the ordered mess
of Doggett's domain and into the bedroom. Prepared for the reception he got, he
had his own gun out and trained on Doggett before he reached out and shook one
bare shoulder.
It turned out to be a good thing. Doggett slept with a gun under his
pillow.
Before he could pull it out, Krycek leaned
forward and shoved the muzzle of his own under Doggett's ear. Doggett froze.
"Good doggy," Krycek purred. Doggett
tensed and glared up at him. Krycek grinned back.
"You're dead," Doggett informed him. Krycek's
smile widened.
"Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated," he
paraphrased. Doggett's glare intensified. "But that's not important right
now. What I have to tell you goes further than my ability to handle AD
Skinner's murderous rage. You need to know this."
"Know what?" Doggett growled.
Krycek had to admit to a
certain reluctant admiration. Doggett didn't give up, and he didn't show fear
easily. That would come in handy, given what he'd have to face as he continued
on in the X Files.
"There are more angles to the conspiracy than there appear to be.
This is a warning. Cast your net wider than Kirsch. He's just a front man. Important to you, but expendable in the bigger picture."
"What is this bigger picture you're talkin'
about?" Doggett looked skeptical. Krycek was
used to it.
"You'll see. Be ready to use it when you see it." Driven by a
whim, Krycek leaned over, ghosting a kiss over
Doggett's cheek. The man tensed until he practically quivered, but he didn't
move. "Watch your back," Krycek whispered.
Then he flipped his gun over and cracked Doggett over the ear with the grip.
The lights went out in the bright blue eyes and Krycek
backed away from the bed. Doggett would have a hell of a headache in the
morning, but at least Krycek would escape without
getting shot. Hopefully Doggett would remember and heed Krycek's
warning.
It was the least Krycek could do to protect Mulder's legacy. God knew no one else seemed to care.
The next stop on Krycek's tour of FBI hot
spots was one he'd really been looking forward to making. The security system
at the high rise apartment took a little work, but not much. A
well-timed entry through the delivery door, rigging the wires on a surveillance
camera, hijacking and re-routing the motion alarm; child's play. There
were three locks on the door, but he had them open in under a minute.
The occupant wasn't home yet, so Krycek helped
himself to a glass of orange juice and settled into a dark corner to wait. He
took the nanobot control box from his pocket, drained
the last of the juice and licked his lips clean. He tossed the glass carelessly
on the carpet. Less than fifteen minutes later, the door opened. Skinner closed
and carefully locked the door behind him, then walked to the wall pad to key in
his alarm combination. As he noticed that it was disabled and reached for his
gun, Krycek hit the lever.
Skinner gave an altogether satisfying cry as he bent double and fell to
the floor. It almost made up for the agony Krycek had
gone through as he healed from the bullets to his arm and skull. Of course, to
be fair, he had put Skinner through it first. But if they were playing 'who's
on first,' well, Skinner had asked for it by punching Krycek
when he had his hand cuffed and couldn't fight back. Not to mention tossing his
ass out on the balcony to freeze all fucking night.
A muffled squeal from the man huddled in a fetal ball along the
sideboard brought his wandering memories back to the present. Krycek took his time as he rose from his seat and walked
across the floor to stand over Skinner. After staring down at his twitching,
grimacing victim for a little while, Krycek knelt
next to him. Skinner stared up at him with a horrified look in his eyes. Krycek took his face in both hands and kissed him hard, on the
forehead directly over the cut.
The taste of blood made him smile all over again.
Dropping Skinner back to the floor, Krycek
asked him quietly, "You didn't think it would be that easy to get rid of
me, did you? To put an end to all this?"
Skinner tried to open his mouth to answer him, but his jaw was clenched
too tightly to pry it open. Krycek put on an
appropriately solemn expression, then deliberately
cranked the nanobots up several notches. This time it
wasn't a squeal. Skinner gave a full-throated, if strangled, scream. As he
began to lose consciousness, Krycek leaned over
again. Pitching his voice so that Skinner could hear him over his own pained
groans, Krycek promised, "I'll be
watching."
He stepped over Skinner's spasming body and methodically unlocked the
door, taking care with all three locks. Closing the door behind him, he paused
outside, head cocked, listening. The thrashing noises and thumps combined with
the cut-off gasps of pain caused him to give a happy sigh.
He didn't turn the nanobots off until he was
in his car, driving away from the apartment. There was a definite sense of
satisfaction in his night's work. Skinner had given him nightmares for a long
time. It felt fitting that now it would be Krycek's
turn to give Skinner a few.
Mulder looked ridiculously innocent, lying sleeping in his bed. The
sheets weren't wound around him, the pillow wasn't wet with sweat, his hands weren't bunched into fists against the linens. Krycek grinned. Those symptoms were bad when they were
caused by nightmares. But there were other ways to get Mulder wound up, and he
was looking forward to doing all of them. One after another.
For days.
It had taken Krycek weeks to slip away from
the group-mind, after the confusion with the not-hybrid-after-all baby. Now
that he was finally with Mulder again he planned to make the best of it.
"You gonna sit there forever or say
something?" Mulder didn't open his eyes. Krycek
leaned forward and brushed his hair off his forehead.
"How'd you know it was me?"
One sleepy hazel eye peeped open. "Contrary to popular opinion,
there really aren't that many people who come into my bedroom in the middle of
the night. And you're wearing too many clothes. Or are you playing hard to get
now?" The smirk on his face made it clear he didn't believe it. Krycek shrugged and glared down at him.
"I don't know. You were pretty damned cold about my presumed
death."
The second eye opened, and Mulder rolled over, propping his head on his
hand and slanting Krycek an openly inviting look.
"Oh, I knew you weren't dead."
This was too much. "Mulder! I took a
fucking bullet between the eyes!"
"But I knew it wasn't you."
Such smug surety. Krycek growled at him. "And how did you
know that?"
Mulder preened. "You were babbling like an asshole. You let Skinner
sneak up on you. You were totally out of control. You whined. And you let me
call you Alex, without laughing in my face. Ergo, it couldn't be you."
Krycek didn't know
whether to laugh or smack him. "Who did you think it was?"
It was tricky to shrug in that position and not fall over, but Mulder
managed. "A clone, a shape-shifter, a ringer, a robot, your long-lost twin
brother --"
Needing to stop him before he could turn them into a soap opera, Krycek leaned forward and covered Mulder's
mouth with his own. It tasted as sweet, and was taken advantage of as quickly,
as ever. He smiled into the kiss. It was good to be home. He gave himself up to
the deep pleasure for awhile, then reluctantly pulled
away.
"It was me," he said quietly. Mulder opened his mouth to make
a smart come-back, then looked into Krycek's eyes and
froze.
"Shit," he breathed. "How?"
Krycek took a deep breath
and allowed a trace of the Oil Alien to show in his eyes. Mulder sat bolt
upright, grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him bodily onto the bed.
"Son of a bitch." Mulder searched his face. Krycek sat still
for the scrutiny for a few moments, then pulled the
slivers of parasite back into hiding. "You can control it?"
There was a healthy dose of excitement in Mulder's
voice that was echoed in his body. It gave Krycek the
shivers. He shook his head. "Not completely, and not when it's active,
only when it's hibernating."
"It hibernates?" Mulder's voice rose
at the end, almost into an embarrassing squeak, but he was too excited to
notice. Krycek sighed.
"Yeah, and when it wakes up, I turn into a zombie."
The excitement bled away immediately, leaving concern and determination
behind. "What can we do about it?"
Krycek leaned closer
until his mouth was next to Mulder's ear. "How
do you feel about performing a little exorcism?"
Mulder laughed. His breath puffing past Krycek's
cheek felt good. Krycek shifted forward until their
bodies were touching all along the front. That felt even better. He raised his
right hand, freed from the imprisoning rubber glove, and stroked Mulder's mouth, lingering on his lower lip. Mulder's eyes widened. His mouth opened and he nipped
lightly at the fingers. Krycek shivered again.
"Miracle?" Mulder sounded serious, if a little muffled, talking around the
fingertips. Krycek shook his head.
"One of the few perks of being possessed." He brought both
hands up to cup Mulder's face and leaned in for a
long, slow kiss. By the time they finally pulled apart, Krycek
realized that somewhere along the line they'd ended up flat on the bed, with himself draped over Mulder. Neither was in a hurry to move.
"I knew it wasn't over. Not with you." Mulder's
voice made it clear he was satisfied with that. Krycek
couldn't help but agree.
"It never will be. Not with us. Now about that exorcism ..."
Mulder was the one to shut him up, then. When they broke for air, he
assured Krycek, "We'll work on it." And
they did. Later.
Much later.
THE END