TITLE: Approaching Concinnity
AUTHOR: Verily
EMAIL: verilyverily314@hotmail.com
DISTRIBUTION: Archive Freely

RATING: R
CATEGORIES: SA
KEYWORDS: M/K
SPOILERS: season seven and season eight

SUMMARY: Mulder and Krycek begin to fight the future.

Disclaimers: The X-files, Mulder, and Krycek belong to FOX and 1013 Productions. I do not own them. It's probably a good thing. I also quoted some dialogue from Pusher, Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose, and Closure. I also snuck one from Detour in there. Those lines don't belong to me either.

Author's Notes: This piece is a colonization fic, and it splits from the canon right after Mulder gets exhumed. So of course, Krycek isn't dead. Oh, and in my story, Scully never had that pointless kid.

Dedication: This piece is for Marcia Elena, a fantastic writer and my amazing beta reader, who put in a lot of work to fix all my mistakes. Most importantly, however, she inspired me to keep writing. I'm sure that this would never have been finished if it weren't for her. This is also my thank you to all the amazing writers out there, who have shared so much of themselves. This is my attempt to give something back.

---

APPROACHING CONCINNITY (Part 1)

11:21 AM
13 November 2000
Washington D.C.

Time stretched as he fell. He relaxed into the motion, registering snapshots of perception--the way gray sky and rain-glazed cement twisted crazily around him as he dived, the way the straps of his prosthetic bit into his skin, the sound of a 9mm slug whistling past his left ear. Flowing gracefully out of the roll with a soft scrape of leather on pavement, he found his gun already in his hand and extended, pointed directly at his assailant. He adjusted his aim, and fired. Once.

The other man went down without a sound. Krycek took a moment to scan the alley before walking over. No one was in sight. He noticed the man reaching convulsively for the weapon he had dropped when he'd been hit. Krycek kicked it away before putting a booted foot down on the assassin's larynx, cutting off his air.

"Who sent you?" He looked down into glassy blue eyes before letting up on the pressure.

"Don't kill me."

Krycek stepped down again, staring straight into the kid's eyes. "Tell me who you work for."

"Covarrubias." The kid gasped and coughed. Krycek watched a thin trail of blood seep from the corner of his mouth.

"Why does she want me dead?"

"I don't know."

Krycek stepped down harder, cocking his head in silent disbelief.

"You-" It was a strangled gasp. Krycek let up on the pressure.

"You picked the wrong side." The kid was turning blue. "Please-"

Krycek nodded, taking his foot off the younger man's throat. He wasn't a kid, not really. He was older than Krycek had been when Spender had made him a consortium errand boy. Kryeck pulled off his glove with his teeth and reached out to brush blonde hair back from skin that already felt cool. He said a few words in Russian--maybe an apology--before bringing his gun up to the man's temple. With a clenched jaw and a steady gaze, he pulled the trigger.

He left the body in a dumpster.

He stopped by the parking garage where he kept a car with fake plates for emergencies and shoved the kid's gun into the glove compartment. After that little detour, he spent the day waiting in various back alleys, picking up a small fortune's worth of surveillance equipment to supplement what he'd scavenged from previous jobs and from the shambles of superannuated syndicate operations.

While he was making the rounds to his various suppliers, his thoughts kept returning to Marita. With glacial eyes and a voice to match, she was the new face of colonist collaboration. Originally, it had been both of them, dutifully carrying on the consortium tradition of double-dealing and soul selling. They became the darker doppelgangers of Mulder and Scully and, ironically, they had put aside their differences and come together just in time to inadvertently destroy their morally scrupulous counterparts.

He and Marita weren't to last. When they had first met, five years ago, they had immediately formed a twisted kinship, but it was a fragile thing and warped into hatred after she walked off with the card he needed to finally back out of the consortium's game. Since that time, he'd worked with her when he had to, but his resentment ran deep.

Two weeks ago, he'd told her to fuck off, and walked away from his expensive car, his tailored wardrobe, and his gourmet coffee like it was so much trash. They meant nothing to him. She meant nothing to him. The closest thing to regard he'd felt for her came in the last ten seconds of their final conversation when he'd looked into her eyes, which somehow were full of fear, as she'd snapped that it was his own grave he was digging.

Right now she was probably still sitting in her office of glass and mahogany, trying to figure him out, trying to pin him down, trying to distill his motivations into something that would fit in a file folder. He wondered whether she had lost any sleep trying to discover if he was working an angle he hadn't told her about. That was probably why she hadn't made a real attempt to kill him. Yet.

The November sun was sinking behind the low clouds at the horizon when Krycek let himself into apartment fifty-two. He'd been in and out all day, bringing an eclectic assortment of boxes and bags in at random intervals, managing to meet none of the other tenants on the stairs. Fortunately, it wasn't a very friendly building. Alone, he used the remains of the day to assemble a collection of wires, switchboards and cables. The only sounds that broke the silence were the odd snaps and clicks as he connected leads. He'd been here two days ago to drill through the floor in three places and he already had tiny fiber optic cables in place. Yesterday he'd had video monitors delivered, ordered off the net in a cyber cafe with a credit card that wouldn't exist anymore in two weeks.

A few minutes before it became too dark to continue working, Krycek hit a button, watching the three monitors spring to life. He looked at the images critically. They were better than expected but not as good as he'd hoped, considering what he'd paid for the cables. He was afforded a black and white view of the corridor outside apartment forty-two, as well as his target's living room and anteroom. No audio yet, but he could wait a few days and bug the apartment and phone when the man was at work. He sat back, leaning against the wall.

He fixed his eyes on the window. He had missed the sunset, absorbed in his work, but he watched the twilight deepen until a thick blackness pressed against the pane. Finally, he stood, pulled down the shade, and dropped into a chair opposite the screens that perched atop a desk.

Other than the chair, desk, and nexus of hardware, the apartment was completely unfurnished. Krycek didn't mind the Spartan character of his new accommodation. He found luxury to be a distraction rather than an asset.

He surfed the net while waiting for his target to show. He cancelled two credit cards belonging to one of his obsolete identities, then spent a few minutes scanning the headlines. He was in the middle of checking his email when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. He looked up at the monitors.

Thoughts on the implications of political insurrection in Tunisia ground to a screeching halt as he watched Mulder walk down the hall on monitor one, seeing the other man for the first time since he'd paid a visit to the hospital, fifteen days ago.

Krycek had lurked in the corridors of Georgetown Memorial until Scully finally left her former partner's bedside. He had stolen into the room, and spent a good thirty seconds standing there in stunned disbelief. Then he'd pulled himself together, completed the job he'd come to do and, to cheer himself up, spent half an hour mercilessly tormenting Skinner and Doggett. A small, cruel smile touched his lips at the memory.

He watched Mulder key into his apartment, moving from the first monitor to the second. Krycek looked at his watch. 5:48 PM, much earlier than he'd expected the agent to show. He frowned, watching monitor two, as Mulder dumped a pile of files onto the floor.

//He's still a slob. Nice to know that some things never change.//

The man walked onto monitor three, throwing himself down on the couch. Krycek leaned forward, moving closer to look at the files on the floor.

His eyes narrowed. They definitely weren't X-files. It was hard to tell from the picture quality, but Krycek thought they looked remarkably like personnel files. Five personnel files. He turned back to his laptop, tapping keys quickly with his right hand. In a matter of minutes he had Mulder's file open. He scrolled down, already suspecting what he'd find.

7:24 PM
13 November 2000
Alexandria, Virginia

Mulder picked up the files he had dumped on the floor, walked over to the desk, and slammed them down. He got a lungful of dust in exchange for his spite and retreated to the kitchen searching for a paper towel to obliterate yet another reminder of the time he'd lost. He finally found an old roll after opening several empty cupboards. He ripped a sheet away from its flat, blue compatriots and stuck it under a stream of cold water, wringing it out savagely.

Angry. He absolutely had to stay angry.

Almost frantic, he wiped down the desk, shoving books and papers out into midair where they hung for a split second before crashing to the floor. His phone followed suit with a clatter, until he was standing above a completely clear and dust-free wooden surface. He hurled the used paper towel at the trashcan, and started pulling books off the floor where they'd fallen and stacking them haphazardly in precarious piles.

Inevitably, the energy drained out of him and his movements slowed. When he had gathered the last of the loose papers into a disorganized bundle, he dropped into his chair, resting his head in his hands. He was exhausted, totally incapable of holding onto the receding wisps of his transient fury.

After a few moments, he reached down, retrieving the phone from where it had fallen. He set it carefully back on the desk, and ran his fingers over the black plastic of the handset as if he were contemplating picking it up. Brutally deracinating any thoughts of self-pity that had begun to flower in his mind, he pulled his fingers away and, curling them into a fist that made his knuckles crack, he thought sarcastically of those old phone company commercials that he used to hate.

//Reach out and touch someone. Right.//

She knew already, and there wasn't any more to say. His thoughts slid over the events of the afternoon, and his mind, treacherous as always, forced him to relive the pained conversations again and again.

It had begun in Skinner's office.

Skinner had looked down at his hands when Mulder entered the familiar room. In the distance, Mulder could hear thunder. As soon as he had seen the paper beneath the AD's hands, he knew.

Orders, passed down from on high, no doubt. His time was up.

"Sir?" It sounded respectful enough, he supposed.

"Mulder. Come in." He watched Skinner watching him. He doubted that the AD could see the fading scars in the dim light.

Mulder thought about asking why Skinner hadn't turned the lights on, but changed his mind. The dark suited both of them.

"This morning-" Skinner lost momentum as he looked directly into Mulder's eyes. Very few people seemed to be able to meet them anymore. He wondered why. The AD looked down before trying again.

"This morning I received some disturbing information regarding your career path."

"I think I can guess." His voice was quiet and measured, almost soothing. "I've been reassigned." He remembered sitting in this office, hearing those words before. He remembered the anger that had run like fire through his body, the way it had felt when it blazed in his eyes and in his voice.

There was nothing now, except the cold memory of former passion.

"You're being given a choice," Skinner clarified, still not looking at him. "You can either accept the assignment they're offering, or you can resign." There was a brief pause.

"What's the assignment?"

"They want you to head the ISU." The offer hung between them in the air for a moment. A promotion. He didn't trust it.

"What about the X-files?"

"They stay open," Skinner said, "Run by Scully and Agent Doggett." Mulder nodded slowly. "Mulder, I should tell you, the ISU is-"

"A hellhole." Mulder said dryly. "I know. Though I have been out of touch for a while." Skinner flinched slightly as Mulder continued. "I thought Michaelson would be head of it by now."

"That's the bitch of it," Skinner said. "He's supposed to be next in line. And he wants it, I think."

Mulder bit the inside of his lip.

"Do you see what's happening here?" Skinner asked him, standing up and moving to the window, looking out into the maze of marble buildings.

"It's a setup. They'll fire me for incompetence if I don't turn the ISU around." It was an elegant plan, really. He was impressed.

"If, on the off-chance, you succeed, then they'll still have won. They'll have you where they want you."

//Working myself to death, boosting solve rates and insurance premiums.//

"Who sent the orders?"

"The Director, supposedly," Skinner said darkly, watching the rain approach from the west. "But it came down through Kersh's office. He hates you, Mulder." Skinner glanced over at him with a hint of a smile on his face, suggesting that being hated by the new deputy director didn't lose him any points in Skinner's book.

"But I'm not sure-" Skinner broke off and his smile faded into nothing. "I think it might be more complicated than that."

Mulder waited for him to continue, not in a mood to be helpful by jumping to conclusions.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Skinner said, settling for vague, as usual. He looked down, and took off his glasses. Mulder cocked his head, two fingers resting lightly against his jaw, lips twitching, fighting a losing battle against the macabre smile and the hysterical laughter that rose out of the emptiness beneath his ribs.

"Well," Mulder said, not totally successful in keeping the grim amusement out of his voice, "I think, comparatively speaking, I've been in worse places than the ISU."

Skinner flinched as if he had been slapped, still not raising his eyes.

Amusement morphed into fury in the space of a heartbeat, but whether it was at himself or at Skinner he didn't know. The grave had obscured his identity, had turned his colleagues and friends into strangers and, as if death somehow hadn't been enough, Mulder had been medically resurrected only to witness the staggering scope of his own defeat, the loss of his life's work.

As quickly as it had come, his anger faded to dull acceptance. He stared at the defeated set of Skinner's shoulders, at the lines of guilt engraved into the other man's forehead.

He let his eyelids slip closed in a long blink, wanting to direct Skinner away from the road he himself had walked down too many times. He took a moment to settle on an approach, then opened his eyes and began to speak.

"I used to think that everything was just chance. That nothing happened for a reason. That all this," Mulder made a small gesture encompassing the surrounding walls with their flags and pictures, "was just the sum of millions of variables. No pattern."

"And now?" Skinner asked, looking up at him. Finally looking.

"I believe that all this is happening for a reason." With an easy, natural delivery sugarcoating his lie, his sin of omission, Mulder felt the silence grow less heavy, and saw Skinner relax under his gaze.

"You're going to take the job."

"Yes."

"I think that's best. If you can turn the ISU around," Skinner's voice was hopeful, "Then maybe there's a shot at getting you back on the X-files."

"Maybe," Mulder echoed.

"I'll do what I can," Skinner promised.

"I know you will."

The conversation then moved to particulars. He received the names and personnel files of the five agents in the ISU. He was ordered to move into his new office over the coming weekend, so the last fuck-up who'd made a mess of the unit could move his shit out in peace.

He stepped out into the hallway, where it was brighter. His face was schooled into impassivity, his stride relaxed, projecting nonchalance. It was the best defense against the stares, the whispers about coffins and torture.

He couldn't go home without telling Scully. He was tempted to just leave and call her later, but somehow that seemed like running. Mercilessly, he forced himself to walk down the familiar stairs to the basement office.

"Look Dana, I don't have anything against the guy, I'm just saying that maybe he was a little too close to the work to begin with. And considering that he- I just think maybe this is for the best." It was Doggett's buddy-buddy drawl. Mulder stepped forward, leaning casually against the doorframe. They weren't looking at him.

"This is Mulder's work." Scully's response was automatic, reassuring.

"Not entirely," Mulder said from the doorway. They both started guiltily at the sound of his voice.

"Mulder." It was strange, the way she could say so much in just one word. As Skinner's had earlier, her eyes dropped away from his face after a few seconds. He didn't blame them. The reality of what had happened to him was etched into his skin in graphic detail. He felt like a walking accusation.

"It's true though. It's not just mine." He gave her an empty smile, trying to make this as painless as possible, trying to avoid a repeat of his conversation with Skinner.

"But you live for this job." She sounded uncertain.

Something broke loose deep in his chest.

"I died for this job."

She flinched and then clenched her shoulders, drawing into herself. When she looked back up, her expression was closed, her eyes giving no more away than blue shutters.

"It's never stopped you before." Her words were dry, cutting.

"Scully," he said softly, trying to pull her back from her anger. "Scully, I can't think of anyone I'd rather have holding down the fort. I just have to play nice for a little while. Keep the ISU from going down in flames." He smiled at her, but his heart wasn't in it.

She watched him, waiting for something. He didn't know what. He wanted to give it to her, whatever it was, but he had nothing left.

"I trust you to keep things on track." It wasn't the right thing to say, because she crossed her arms, looking down. "I trust both of you."

He was almost convinced it was true.

Doggett nodded, and stuck his hand out, trying to diffuse the awkwardness. The gesture seemed helpless and desperate, as Doggett had no reason to trust that Mulder wouldn't just leave him hanging. He reached out and clasped Doggett's hand, giving him a faint smile.

"I'd better go," Mulder said quietly.

"Mulder-"

He cut her off with a shake of his head, and turned away from his old office. "Keep me posted," he said over his shoulder.

He wasn't sure if she had heard him.

Mulder dragged his mind away from his encounter with Scully, forcing his attention back to the five files in front of him. The ISU had ushered him into the Bureau back when he had come out of Quantico, never innocent, but somehow less tarnished. Now it looked like it would be ushering him out as well.

The unit had been Patterson's pet project, and Mulder doubted that his influence would ever be truly gone from the organization. After Mulder had put his former mentor away, leadership fell to Erik Morris, a devoted follower of Patterson. Mulder had never had the pleasure of working with him first hand, but if rumors could be believed, Morris had Patterson's propensity for brutal work regimens with none of Bill's finesse. Patterson had been a master manipulator, and while he'd worked under him, Mulder had resented the man. To be fair though, Bill had only lost one agent. In his first eight months, Morris had a staggering four agents leave the unit. Coming so hard upon the heels of the double loss of Patterson and Nemhauser, the unit buckled. Its solve rate plummeted, its funding was cut. Morris had held on to the job for years--maybe out of some misguided devotion to Patterson, until ten days ago, when two of his agents had been murdered in the field by a killer they were profiling.

In the firestorm that followed, Morris had been demoted and shipped to Reno, and there had been talk of reassigning all the remaining agents, restructuring the whole unit. Michaelson, the senior agent remaining, protested, but the top brass wanted to transfuse some new blood into Patterson's broken legacy. The problem was that no one really wanted the dubious honor of heading the damn thing. Whoever took the job was likely to be fired at the first minor mishap, the five agents railroaded, and the whole unit replaced with the top ten kids from Quantico.

He pressed his fingers gently against a sudden stab of pain that throbbed through his left temple, distracted by the familiar ache.

Scully had told him a few days ago that the condition he'd lived with for a year had been miraculously cured during his stay aboard the ship. She had wanted to do tests, wanted to explain what had happened to him in the multicolored transparencies of electroencephalograms and the glorious complexity of medical jargon.

//No thanks.//

He preferred not to know what sinister secrets lurked behind this latest violation. He shut his eyes, wanting to sleep, wanting to cut off the gray monologue of his own thoughts. Dreams carried their own dangers, of course--the terror of waking in the dark, certain he'd been buried alive, the times he woke screaming himself hoarse reliving the pain of torture, or any one of a dozen older nightmares that still plagued him.

The dreams were hard to bear, disturbing his sleep as frequently as they did, but he hated the nights when he didn't dream even more. They passed in forgiving oblivion, until he opened his eyes to let in the merciless dawn, and wished that Skinner had left him in the ground.

1:32 AM
14 November 2000
Alexandria, Virginia

Krycek knelt amidst a sea of loose paper, courtesy of his hack into the FBI mainframe. It had seemed at first glance that Mulder's appointment to the ISU was just a fast track to getting fired. In the past half hour, however, he had begun to suspect something a bit more sinister.

His first tip-off was the paper trail. The story he was supposed to be buying was that the orders for Mulder's transfer had come straight from the Director. It seemed, however, that Kersh, being the neurotic bastard that he was, saved copies of every memo he wrote. It turned out that the brilliant idea for Mulder's reassignment had originally come out of Kersh's office in the form of a cryptically worded request, which, unless Krycek missed his guess, was actually a veiled threat aimed straight at the Director.

After that memo, things had proceeded according to Kersh's plan, and the orders slid down the chain of command to land on Skinner's desk.

He had no doubt that there was some sort of double-dealing going on. Kersh was someone's pawn. Most likely, he was in Covarrubias' pocket. And her reasons for wanting Mulder off the X-files weren't hard to fathom. She was a collaborator and Mulder was an asset for the "resist" half of "Resist or Serve."

He turned back to the personnel files. Five names. Only two caught his attention.

Janet Stewart. An average looking brunette. Hardly the top of her class at Quanitco, but she had an excellent solve rate. Divorced, twice. No children. Currently single. Bitter, then, he supposed. Her file contained four commendations, two reprimands--both for verbal abuse of another agent. She had a temper, apparently. Stewart had done a stint in the army to pay for college. Majored in criminal justice. From what Krycek could tell, she was somewhat at odds with the rest of the unit. Several of her evaluations were in the "not a team player" vein.

Adam Michaelson. He was the only other agent with a decent solve rate. It was an excellent solve rate really, if you didn't compare him to Mulder or Frank Black. Nine commendations and eight reprimands, most for not playing nice with the local law enforcement. Psych evaluation showed one dead brother, a victim of a serial killer back in the early eighties. Michaelson was another that performance reviews deemed "not a team player," but he was next in line to head the team.

These two were the cornerstones of the unit, and from their case histories, he concluded that they were the ones who got the tough serials. If Mulder could win them over, the other three, Edwards, McKeon, and Featherstone, would follow. Ultimately, it was difficult to predict how easy a time Mulder would have trying to turn these five back into a unit. Not that Krycek was unduly concerned with the politics of the ISU. His job was to keep Mulder alive.

His thoughts were interrupted by the low buzz of his cell phone against his hip.

"Yes?" his voice was quiet.

"Mall. Southside." He recognized Jack's voice instantly.

"When?"

"I'm already there." The line went dead.

Jack, another consortium operative, had been Krycek's partner ten years ago. They had gone their separate ways after only three months, when Krycek had been assigned to Mulder and Jack was ordered to New Orleans. The three months that they had worked together hadn't been long enough for either one to betray the other, so they had stayed in touch, more out of mutual self-interest than any ties of amity.

Jack was a master at staying on top of the ever-shifting power struggles within the consortium, which meant that he'd been with them longer than any other operative. It also meant, that right now, he was working for Marita.

It never hurt to keep one's options open though, and Jack had offered to serve as Krycek's informant. That was why the other man was the only person with Krycek's cell number. He knew better than to call unless it was important. Krycek turned an unreadable gaze on the surveillance monitors, then, grabbing his keys, he walked out the door.

He felt the frosted grass crunch under his boots as he crossed the mall. Even when he could see Jack, waiting at their prearranged meeting spot, he didn't take his hand off his gun.

"Alex. Buddy. Long time no see." Jack's friendly faade had smoothed over many a past dispute, but tonight, it only irritated Krycek. Whatever face he might choose to put forward, the man was still working for Marita.

"I'm not your buddy." Krycek's words condensed into icy white streams in the night air. "I met someone this morning. Maybe you know him. Blonde hair, blue eyes. Nice kid. Tried to off me."

"Did you kill him?" There was no false goodwill in Jack's voice now.

"Yes."

"She expected you to."

"Does she know you're here?" There was a hard edge to Krycek's voice.

"No." Jack looked at him. Face open. Krycek relaxed marginally.

"Why the hell didn't you warn me she was sending someone?" He allowed a hint of anger to seep into his voice.

"I didn't know. I didn't know until this afternoon. I called as soon as I could. I didn't know if he might've-"

"Please," Krycek said, affronted.

"Sorry." Jack sounded amused.

"What do you want, Jack?" Krycek said, sitting down beside his former partner.

"I thought you would want to know. You, of all people, deserve to know." Jack looked nervously into the night, running a hand through dark hair.

"Deserve to know what?" Krycek prompted.

"Covarrubias is going to hand over the vaccine." Jack's voice was quiet. Afraid.

"How much of it?"

"I don't know, Alex. A lot."

Krycek was silent for a full minute, contemplating the magnitude of Marita's betrayal. He forced down a slow tide of panic that rose from deep in his chest. When he finally spoke, his control was perfect; his words slid into the air, smooth and cold as ice. "What about the plan to distribute it as a flu shot this winter?"

"They found out, and they asked her to hand the stockpiles over. In return, they've offered positions of power to her and her circle when they start to colonize. And a guarantee that anyone she names will be protected." Jack's voice had dropped to a hollow whisper. "She fucking sold out, Alex. And unless you're on the inside you don't have a chance in hell of surviving."

"I'd rather die than crawl back to that bitch." It was an understandable sentiment, but it was a lie. He didn't want Jack to know the real reason. Jack, of course, guessed anyway.

"What the hell are you thinking? If you believe that Spooky Mulder is the key to surviving this thing, then think again." Krycek's face remained totally impassive as Jack continued. "You realize what's going to happen if they ask for him, don't you?"

Krycek's jaw clenched involuntarily.

"And they will, Alex. They will ask for him. It's only a matter of time."

"She wouldn't turn him over. He's too important."

"Is he?"

"He's the key to her project." Krycek persisted, stubbornly.

"Not anymore, Alex. I know we all thought so, a year back, when he reacted to the artifact, but if he really were a hybrid, if he really was a success, then why would the colonists have given him back? Have you asked yourself that?"

Krycek swallowed his response. He had already given too much away.

"When is she handing the vaccine over?" Krycek asked, bringing them both back to the subject they'd come to discuss.

"December twenty-forth. Christmas Eve." Jack's voice was the barest whisper. "They're going to destroy everything on the twenty-fifth."

"So soon." Krycek breathed. It was an incredibly short timetable by colonist standards.

"Yeah." Jack sounded unsettled. "Look, I should go. If anyone suspects I'm here-"

"I know. Call if you get any more information."

They parted, moving silently into the darkness of the mall. Krycek's steps were quick, and there was a coiled urgency about his gait. He walked like a man who had somewhere to be. Traffic wasn't too heavy, and he liberally broke the speed limit on his way back to Alexandria. He made good time.

Not bothering to turn on a light, he quickly scanned the apartment out of habit, then turned to the surveillance monitors. Mulder was slumped over his desk. Krycek frowned.

Pulling out his cell phone, he punched in a series of numbers. He watched Mulder jerk awake at the first ring. Satisfied, he disconnected before the agent had a chance to pick up.

10:07 AM
16 November 2000
Washington D.C.

He was late, which of course had its disadvantages, namely that he hadn't been able to see the five enter the room, hadn't been able to monitor their interactions. On the other hand, they had probably expected him to watch them file in like suspects in a lineup. Late meant no awkward silences that people felt compelled to fill with meaningless small talk.

Ten minutes after the scheduled briefing time, he walked into the room. Michaelson and Featherstone were sitting together, talking in low tones. McKeon was sitting back, staring into space. Stewart was wearing street clothes and had her feet on the table, her arms crossed defensively over her chest. She was glaring at Michaelson. Edwards was looking down at a file. Mulder took them in at a glance, letting their hostility and curiosity sweep over him as he took his seat.

They looked like shit. Mulder knew they couldn't have had any real counseling after the deaths of their colleagues. The Bureau shrinks had sworn off the ISU, and the ISU, as it had always done, treated them with barely veiled contempt.

He looked at them, seeing guilt behind their eyes and in the demoralized lines of their bodies. They froze under his gaze. The restless angles and lines of their clenched muscles transformed the conference room into a crammed and sunless sculpture garden, full of knotted tension, which zeroed in on the spot where he was sitting. Their anger and suspicion broke on the impenetrable stone of his carefully controlled countenance.

"You must be Spooky Mulder." Michaelson's baiting drawl broke the silence and the agents in front of him rearranged, pressing imperceptibly forward, watching for an opening, for any kind of weakness.

"In the flesh." His words were wry, chosen to purposefully open the door for the subject that was on everyone's mind.

"The last we heard," Michaelson said, almost casually, "you were dead."

Mulder looked at him, raising his eyebrows. "I got better."

The comment earned him a few smiles, and an amused sounding snort from Stewart. Michaelson, however, pressed on.

"We heard," He continued leisurely, "That you actually believe you were abducted by aliens." The words hit the table, incredulous and challenging, and the room went silent, like a glove had been thrown down.

He felt their stares pressing in around him as he struggled to keep his breathing even, struggled to repress the sound of the saw slicing through bone and the way the warm mist of his own blood hit his face as he screamed for Scully-

"I don't remember anything from the time I was missing," Mulder lied, knowing Michaelson would move in on the obvious weakness. The other man looked at him, letting the silence hang over their heads for a moment.

"Apparently you have a problem with these periodic memory lapses," Michaelson continued. "Isn't that what you said about your sister? That you couldn't remember what happened the night she was taken?"

Mulder didn't trust himself to say anything.

"Do you know what they say about you?" Michaelson's voice was low now, and Mulder realized he was on the receiving end of the other man's best interrogation technique.

"They say that you're insane. That you should be locked up, just like you locked up Patterson." Michaelson leaned forward just a little farther. "They say that you're unstable. That even the Ice Queen thinks you've gone around the bend."

The situation was sliding out of his control, and he fought the impulse to let his fingers touch still healing scars. He fought to remain impassive, to give away nothing. Michaelson curled his lips into a pained semblance of a smile--certain of his victory. There was no real satisfaction in the other man's eyes, only pain buried behind remorseless aggression. Mulder recognized something of himself in those eyes, and knew that there would be no quarter asked or given in this contest of wills. Knew there was only one way to beat Michaelson at his own game.

"They say," Mulder said, his voice low and deadly, "That I killed my sister and my father, and lied about it to cover my own ass." He leaned forward. "They say that the only reason I've kept my job is because I let the top brass fuck me in exchange for every paycheck." His voice was brutal, and Michaelson leaned back slightly, too well trained to let the surprise flicker across his face.

"They say," Mulder continued ruthlessly, "That I disappeared of my own volition and kidnapped Gibson Praise out of some deluded search for the truth about aliens." He smiled bitterly. "They also say," he said softly, letting his eyes blaze at Michaelson, "That I was buried alive."

He leaned back into the shocked silence he had created, taking them all in with a sweeping glance. Then, Spooky Mulder, at the top of his game again, looked back at Michaelson.

"Yes, Michaelson. I know what they say."

No one spoke.

"Why do you think they gave me this job?" He raised his voice slightly, looking around the room. No one met his eyes. "They gave it to me because they want to fire me." He waited a moment before driving his point home. "But it's not just me they want to get rid of."

"It's all of us," Stewart said. "They want to can all of us."

"Yes." Mulder said shortly. "And we can make it easy for them, or we can make it hard. It's your choice." He got a few small smiles in return.

"I think," Stewart said, "That if there's anything we all have in common, it's a talent for making things hard." Mulder gave her a wry, satisfied smile.

"I'm inclined to agree." He had won a minor victory, and it was time for everyone to retreat to their respective corners, and start sorting through the work.

"As of this morning," Mulder said, "The ISU had nine open cases. I want to know who's been working on what." His words were clipped, self-assured, and he looked directly at Michaelson.

Crossing his arms, the other man looked at him with something that resembled guarded respect. "Three are research jobs--just confirmation that old sets of bones are from serials back in the 70s and 80s. We've got two bodies in Philly that may or may not be the work of one killer. We've got a fetishist in Sacramento that's not escalating. We've got a fetishist in Detroit that IS escalating. We've got a ritualistic killing in Tulsa. We've got a murder that might be ritualistic just outside Seattle. We've got two victims with ligature marks in Bismark. Statistically that one's probably a serial."

"Pitch the three research jobs. Send them back to the local offices. We don't need that shit."

"That's gonna piss of the regional headquarters-" Stewart began testily.

"Tell them to call me, if they have a problem." The room was silent. "I want progress reports from everyone." He waited.

"Right now," he snapped. "You can start us off, Stewart."

Mulder leaned back, listening as they briefed him on the details of the six remaining cases, watching their closed expressions, their defensive movements. When the meeting was over, he stood, taking the escalating fetishist file from Michaelson.

"I want everything on my desk before you leave tonight." It was a harsh deadline, and he knew it. He wanted them to have nothing to do tomorrow. He wanted to shake them out of their old routine. He wanted them to take a break--play some basketball--do something that would get that guilt out of their eyes.

"Tonight?" The word exploded angrily out of Stewart.

"Yes. If you can't finish just give me your notes. I want to look over everything."

"Why?" It was Michaelson. "Checking up on us?" Mulder considered lying, but knew he wouldn't be able to pull it off.

"Yes," he said, inviting another confrontation.

"And what makes you qualified to review our work? I was under the impression," Michaelson said, his words designed to cut, "that you were the only profiler who couldn't hack it under Patterson."

"It's true. Isn't irony a bitch sometimes?" He gave Michaelson the same smirk that used to turn Bill an interesting shade of red. Then he turned and walked back to Patterson's old office. He called the switchboard operator and asked her to direct all consulting calls from local offices to his phone for the day, rather than to the ISU phones. He was going to give those five a break, whether they knew they wanted one or not.

After he'd slogged through the morning's requisite paperwork, he let the file he'd taken from Michaelson absorb him. He allowed his thoughts and fingers to slide over the crime scene photographs as his eyes drifted over autopsy reports and written testimonies. The work was familiar, and the profile flowed naturally from the tableau of evidence spread before him. Two hours later, he faxed his file to the Detroit office. He returned to his office just in time to snag his ringing phone off the hook, and fielded a consult call from Nevada.

Slightly bored, waiting for his agents to show up with their work, he stared into space, wondering what Scully was working on at the moment. He could almost see her-

The noise hit him like a physical blow. Pain lashed through his temples, coming with the familiar shrill dissonance. Below the sound, he heard the unmistakable flow of her thoughts.

//Ishouldstopbyandseehowhe--no.no.// Her thoughts rushed together, half words, half pictures. She was close, very close, standing in the hallway outside. He could feel the ache in her feet from walking too far in the ridiculous four-inch heels she was wearing.

Mulder pulled back, wrenching himself out of Scully's mind. The room was silent again, the only sound his shaky breathing. He forced himself to relax, pulling his hand away from his head. Slowly, the feeling of vertigo passed. He shut his eyes against the pain that had curled into two symmetrical bands running from his temples back behind his ears, just below the temporal plates of his skull.

Maybe he should have let Scully run some of those tests after all.

10:45 AM
17 November 2000
Alexandria, Virginia

Krycek frowned as he unscrewed the receiver of Mulder's phone. This job, which had started out as a low profile surveillance gig, had recently become quite a bit more expensive. After talking to Jack, it had become obvious that he couldn't afford to take any chances.

So here he was, bugging Mulder's phone, wiring his apartment for sound, installing motion detectors in the parts of the apartment he couldn't see, and putting a GPS tracking device on his car. And that was just to keep tabs on his not-so-personal life. Krycek had a feeling that it might be a bit more difficult to set up surveillance at the Bureau.

Ideally, he wanted to bug Mulder's office phone, set up video and audio surveillance in his office, and maybe the briefing room. And while he was at it, he wouldn't mind bugging Skinner's office, the X-files office, and maybe Scully's apartment.

//Dream on.//

Even if he'd had the time to set it all up, there weren't enough hours in the day for him to keep tabs on everyone. Plus, there was the financial aspect to consider. The state of the art stuff he was using certainly didn't come cheap, and he was footing the bill for this entire operation. He did not want to risk boosting a few cars to pay off debts incurred while infiltrating the FBI. There were just too many ways for that to get ugly.

He turned his thoughts back to the task at hand and moved quickly through Mulder's apartment. Periodically he glanced at his palm pilot, making sure Mulder's car, to which he had affixed a GPS locator this morning, was still at the Bureau.

Less than fifteen minutes after he had broken into Mulder's apartment, he was back upstairs, configuring software. He plugged headphones into the audio feed, and then pulled out his phone, dialing Mulder's number.

The incredibly loud scream of the phone shot painfully into his ears, startling a short string of Russian curses out of him as he tore the headphones off. Irritated, he turned down the volume.

Satisfied with the setup, he went over to the closet and yanked out a suit. He changed quickly, wanting to arrive at the Bureau just before the lunch hour ended, when the secretaries would be back at their desks. He looked at himself critically. Shiny shoes, conservative tie. His hair had the short, gel-encrusted look he'd cultivated back when he'd actually worked at the Bureau. He'd gotten it cut yesterday morning while Mulder was doing his briefing with the ISU boys. He had his old ID badge in his pocket. It wouldn't hold up if someone really looked at it, but it was good enough from a distance. His standard issue 9mm Sig Sauer was in a holster under his left arm.

Prosthetic. Shit. In a building full of Fibbies, someone was sure to notice the hand. He pulled a glove on over the prosthetic, then used his teeth to get one over his right hand. He looked at himself again. His appearance was respectable, but something was definitely missing.

He flashed his reflection an evil grin and headed downstairs. Keying into Mulder's apartment one more time, he went over to the closet and grabbed the agent's spare trench.

//It's for my cover. It's not that I want to wear his clothes.//

Dressed like this, he could probably waltz through the front door. But that seemed like asking for trouble, so he entered via his usual route--the service doors in the basement. It used to be convenient, since the X-files office was already down there. Now, it was just a hassle, since he'd have to pass the office and go up the stairs to get to the bullpen hallway. There was a distinct danger of running into Doggett, or worse, Scully.

He approached the office cautiously, and heard the sound of fingernails clicking against keys from behind the closed door that no longer said Fox Mulder. Scully was in there, at least. He started up the stairs, relieved.

He heard feet on the steps as he turned the corner and felt a flash of panic as Doggett practically ran into him.

"Sorry," Doggett said automatically, almost dropping the two sandwiches and drinks he was carrying.

"No problem." Krycek looked up, giving Doggett a friendly smile. The other man had seen him a grand total of once, and he hoped that the ex-cop wouldn't associate Alex, the clean-cut Bureau agent, with Krycek, the one-armed, murderous rat-bastard.

Doggett smiled back. They passed each other awkwardly on the stairs.

Krycek kept walking.

"Hey, wait just a second." Doggett called from a few steps below him. Krycek turned toward him, shielding his left side from view. He let his right hand rest on the railing, deceptively still, mere inches from his gun.

"Yeah?" he asked, tone still friendly.

"You just look familiar for some reason. Do I know you?" Doggett had that look--like he was trying to put the pieces together.

Krycek shrugged. "Maybe we met at a training session somewhere. I've been in the Nebraska field office for the last seven years. Just got reassigned to DC." The lie rolled easily off his tongue, and Krycek smiled again.

"Nebraska?"

"Yeah. Very boring stuff. I'm sure you wouldn't be interested."

"Ah," Doggett said, as Krycek nodded at him shortly and turned, continuing up the stairs.

"Jerk," the other man muttered behind him. Krycek smiled faintly.

//You have no idea.//

He continued down the hall, letting the anonymous black trench obscure his identity. He walked straight to the VCU's central office, which was mostly empty. The secretaries were back, but gathered around the coffee machine. There was a young agent Krycek didn't recognize making a photocopy of a file in a corner. The women looked over when he came in. He got a coy smile from a young blonde. He returned it blandly. He didn't want to be remembered, either as particularly charming or rude.

"Can I help you?" An older brunette woman with short curly hair came forward.

"Hi." He smiled again. "I think I left my briefcase in the third floor conference room. Do you think you could let me in so I can check?"

"Just a minute, Honey. Let me find out if anyone's in there." She sat down, turning away, and reached for a black binder. Krycek glanced around and, finding no one watching, unobtrusively slid her coffee mug so that it was balanced delicately on the edge of the desk.

The secretary turned, letting the thick binder fall to the desk as she opened it. As it hit, her coffee fell into her lap.

"Oh Lord," she said, jumping to her feet.

"Are you OK?" Krycek said, schooling his features into a mask of concern.

"Yes. Yes, I'm fine. It wasn't too hot." She smiled, her cheeks slightly flushed. "Lord, but I'm a klutz. I'm just going to go wash up."

"Do you think anyone would mind if I went up and checked myself? I've got a briefing this afternoon, and I really need my notes." He did his best to look earnest and just a touch desperate.

She looked at him for a moment, then handed him the keys. "I don't think anyone should be in there. Just hurry right back with these. The SACs have their meeting in twenty minutes."

"I'll be right back." Krycek said, giving her a genuine smile, trying not to let too much triumph shine through. "Thanks."

//Damn, I'm good.//

Normally the secretary would have insisted on accompanying him. The conference rooms were always locked when they weren't in use for exactly this reason. It took him three and a half minutes to unscrew the frame around the electrical outlet, insert the device, and activate it. It was unlikely that it would be found in the event that the Bureau ever swept the conference room.

Five minutes later he was handing the keys back to the brunette.

"Did you find it?" she asked.

"No," Krycek said, pushing his eyebrows together.

"I'm sure it will turn up, Dear. I'll keep an eye out."

"Thanks." He turned away.

He was on his way out, through the front door this time, when a group of agents passed him. They were talking excitedly.

"Hey!" One of them called out to him. Krycek turned, pasting a look of bored curiosity on his face. "You've gotta get over to the gym. It's Spooky Mulder vs. Adam Michaelson."

"No way," Krycek said.

"Yes way. Come on!" Krycek considered for a moment, then followed, nerves screaming that it was probably a mistake. He had no idea what he was going to do when he got there. There was a throng of agents inside the door already. He melted into anonymity again, and edged his way forward to see what the hell the fuss was all about.

He looked across the gym floor, then ducked his head to hide a grin he couldn't suppress completely.

The whole ISU was out on the basketball court, playing a game of three on three, shirts versus skins. Mulder, Stewart, and McKeon were the shirts, Michaelson, Edwards, and Featherstone the skins. It was a risky idea for an icebreaker, as it could have easily turned ugly. But as Krycek watched them play, it became obvious that Mulder had complete control of both teams. Sometimes using physical contact, sometimes his voice, he was forestalling disputes, soothing feelings, controlling and directing the pent up aggression in the ISU.

Krycek wondered if the idiots surrounding him had any idea what they were witnessing. He was pretty sure the ISU knew exactly what was going on. He watched as Michaelson plowed Mulder over, then helped him up, pulling him to his feet without a hitch in the play. Mulder clapped him on the back as they both went their separate ways.

"Ten bucks says they kill each other before the week is out." The voice came from Krycek's left. Deciding he had stayed long enough, he started to weave his way back through the crowd. As he turned, he caught sight of Skinner, standing on the fringes of the spectators. The AD was watching the play with raised eyebrows, lips curled up at the corners.

Since it looked like the game was far from over, Krycek spent three minutes bugging Mulder's office on the way out. Back in the confines of his non-descript Ford Taurus, he allowed himself to relax for just a few seconds.

It was the smell of the damn hair gel that really got to him. He knew that smell was the most potent trigger for buried memories. He understood the biology, understood that the nerves carrying signals from his olfactory receptors went straight into his brain rather than being routed through the thalamus, so he couldn't filter out the tang of the hair gel, not like he could become habituated to sights or sounds, touches or tastes.

The mechanics of neural networks made sense to him, but that didn't make it any easier to deal with the memories that the smell uncovered, to remember how much he had liked working at the Bureau for that short time, seven years ago. He had believed in his job back then, blindly accepting assertions that were cryptically muttered in smoke filled rooms.

Because he believed in his work, he'd felt guilty for liking his target, guilty for entertaining notions of switching sides, of selling out his bosses, of becoming another convert to Mulder's crusade. Becoming another Scully.

That was why they'd picked him, because he wouldn't be susceptible to Mulder's addictive quest for the truth. He'd been chosen because he was their best operative, with the closest ties to the consortium's interest. He was the man least likely to defect, and he'd done his job.

He'd paid the price.

For the space of one slow blink he imagined what it would be like to have Mulder as a partner again. The way it would feel to slam a gun into the other man's hand, knowing it wouldn't be shoved in his face; the way it would feel to speed away from a job in a boosted car, radio cranked up-

He opened his eyes again. Mechanically, he stuck the key in the ignition, banishing regrets to the back of his mind. He had done what he had to do. Now he had a new job. Keep Mulder alive, and give the man a chance to fight the future before everything went to hell.

2:16 PM
1 December 2000
Washington D.C.

Time stretched as he fell. The fluorescent lights streaked across his field of vision as he twisted to avoid landing on Stewart. As the waxed wood of the floor raced toward him, he heard the brief but unmistakable hollow scream of his thoughts connecting with Stewart's mind. And then he wasn't moving anymore. He mentally pulled away from the noise as he and Stewart lay tangled on the floor.

"Holy shit!" he heard Michaelson yell.

His ears were ringing. Nothing looked quite right. He let his eyes fall closed.

"Whoa. Whoa! Just stay still." Featherstone was kneeling, talking to Stewart. Keeping her from moving too much.

"Quit with the doctor bullshit. I'm fine." It was Stewart. "Fuck. I think I kicked the Spook in the head though."

"Hey boss?" It was McKeon. He knew he should definitely say something.

"If you wouldn't wear those goddamn boots all the time," Michaelson said to Stewart, exasperation covering the worry in his voice.

"I think he's concussed." Edwards said.

"No. I'm OK," Mulder managed.

"You don't look OK. You look kinda pale, Spook." Mulder opened his eyes to see Michaelson kneeling next to Stewart. "That was some fall," Michaelson added.

"I didn't want to land on Stewart." His words sounded a little thick.

"We noticed," Michaelson said dryly. "You got a boot to your head for your trouble." Michaelson squeezed Stewart's shoulder slightly, and she leaned back into his grip.

Mulder smiled faintly, watching them. Unless he seriously missed his guess, he had a budding interoffice romance on his hands. When he'd first begun working with them, Michaelson and Stewart had been so obviously at odds, so inexplicably antagonistic towards one another, that Mulder had suspected that something besides anger was simmering beneath the surface of their relationship.

Some of that anger had cooled in the past two weeks. The unit was slowly becoming a more civilized place to work. Their solve rate and morale were rising, as Kersh and his cronies were becoming increasingly irritated. Mulder didn't know what else they had expected. They had thrown him into the mix with five bitter, under-appreciated agents, and been surprised when instead of destroying each other, the six of them had pulled together into a decent team.

//I've become a subversive.//

"Do you feel nauseous at all?" Featherstone asked him.

"No. I'm fine. Let me up."

"I think that's enough basketball for the day," Featherstone said, helping Mulder sit.

"Who's gonna work the phones next week then?" McKeon asked, already suspecting the answer.

"We are." Stewart said it with a groan, and Mulder nodded.

"'Bout damn time," Edwards said. "We've been working them for two weeks running now."

"You'd be working them again if we didn't have to forfeit," McKeon said, sounding slightly resentful.

"I don't know," Stewart said. "Michaelson wants it bad."

"Damn right I do," Michaelson said, clasping her hand and hauling her to her feet. Featherstone slipped a steadying hand under Mulder's elbow as he stood.

"Thanks," Mulder said as they headed back to the locker room.

Later, enshrined in the quiet of his office, he took a few moments to consider the incident on the basketball court. Since the first attack, when he had overheard Scully's thoughts, the hollow noise had returned three times. Two of those times had been unguarded moments when he accidentally found himself in someone's head. They only lasted a few seconds, and he had been able to block out the sensation almost instantly.

Six days ago, however, as he had been unlocking his car door, he'd felt a strong presence in the back of his mind. It was distant, but clear, unaccompanied by noise or pain. He had been confused at first, not sure why he didn't hear the distracting dissonance. As the seconds ticked by, however, he had come to a slow realization.

The mind he could hear, so very clearly, wasn't human.

He had sat frozen in his car for half an hour after it vanished from the reaches of his thoughts, trying to summon the nerve to move, to make the drive home.

There was a time when such an event would have excited him, a time when proof of his own psychic ability would have filled him with a sense of righteous vindication. He remembered telling Clyde Bruckman a lifetime ago that he was envious of the other man's precognitive gift. Bruckman had just smiled, pity in his eyes.

Mulder wondered if the man had seen everything; if he'd seen that Mulder would get the talent he claimed to want, if he'd seen how it was born of infection and experimentation, seen how it had nearly taken his life when it first appeared, and how it had spent a year killing him slowly, secretly. He wondered if Bruckman had seen the torture that followed from it, or the three months spent in his coffin on its account. Maybe that was why he'd smiled--because he appreciated the irony.

Mulder gave the empty air a twisted grin.

He wondered what else the psychic had seen. How many of Mulder's deaths had been written in his fate for the other man to read? Mulder wished he could ask him how many more lay waiting for him.

He felt the gnawing urge to tell someone about these recent episodes, but there was no way in hell that that was going to happen. Not unless he wanted to spend the rest of his life in the psychiatric ward of Georgetown Memorial undergoing test after test.

//Sane people don't hear voices in their heads.//

Scully had always been his sanity, his firm tether to reason. Unsurprisingly, he found that he missed her. After chewing his lip for a few moments, he pushed to his feet, resolved to pay the X-files division a brief visit. Scully and Doggett had been in California last week, but he was fairly sure he'd seen Doggett in the bullpen hallway at the end of the day yesterday. He took the stairs down to the basement, not willing to wait for the elevator.

He shivered as the colder air hit him. He could hear Scully laughing from the open doorway. He stopped.

How long had it been since he'd heard her laugh? Had he EVER heard her laugh like that? He didn't think so. He forced himself not to think of it as a betrayal. She had a right to be happy. He wanted this for her. He'd always wanted it for her.

He knocked on the doorframe.

"Mulder. Hey." They both smiled in greeting.

"Hi," he said, sounding passably chipper. "How was California?"

"Nice," Scully said, still smiling. "Warm."

"Find anything interesting?"

"You checkin' up on us?" Doggett was still smiling, but Mulder could feel the serious undertone in the question. The temperature seemed to chill a few degrees.

"John," Scully said, a subtle warning in her voice.

So they were on a first name basis now. Well, she had tried to call him Fox once.

"It's fine, Scully." There was an uncomfortable silence, in which nothing was "fine."

"How are you doing, Mulder?" Scully's voice was quiet and slightly suspicious. Mulder could feel she was a heartbeat away from asking him if anything was wrong.

"I'm fine, Scully. Everything's going smoothly," he said, "More or less." He gave her another fake smile. It never would have fooled her in the past, but she was out of practice when it came to reading him. And there were no chinks in his faade. Not today.

"So I hear," she said. "I always knew you were a great agent, Mulder."

And that was supposed to mean what, exactly? That you couldn't be a great agent and work in the basement? That she always knew that he'd fall in line at the end?

"Thanks, Scully." It was so hard to make it not sound as flat and empty as he felt.

"We should probably get back to work," Scully said, looking at her watch.

"We have a progress report at three o'clock with AD Skinner," Doggett chimed in.

"Yeah. Well, good talking to you, Scully. Doggett."

"You too, Mulder."

He waited until he'd climbed the stairs to let the friendly mask slip from his features. It was so easy to fall out of someone's life.

4:42 PM
2 December 2000
Washington D.C.

Krycek had gotten himself a nine to five job swabbing the floors of the FBI building. His boss was pretty lenient, and let him listen to the radio on his walkman. Of course, it wasn't actually a walkman. Nor was he listening to the radio.

Depending on the day and how paranoid he was feeling, he would either leave at five and beat Mulder back to his apartment, or wait for the agent to finish up, and tail him home. Lately he'd been letting Mulder make his own way back. Things seemed to be pretty quiet on Marita's side of the fence. No one had tried to kill him this week.

When five o'clock rolled around, he headed out of the building, pausing to quickly inspect Mulder's car for any tampering. Finding none, he pulled his Taurus out of its place and headed home. Today was Friday, which meant Chinese takeout and reviewing the audiotapes of the bug he'd put in the X-files office a week ago. He didn't bother to monitor Scully and Doggett real time, but he figured it was worth listening in on their conversations, just to keep himself in the loop. Because they sure as hell weren't keeping Mulder informed.

Krycek squinted into the setting sun on his way home, sure that Doggett was somehow behind the rift that seemed to have developed between Mulder and Scully.

Doggett really pissed him off.

Krycek had always respected Scully, however, for sticking by her partner, putting up with the shit that the consortium threw her way, and doing the job that needed to be done.

Sometimes, he even admitted to himself that he envied her.

Krycek parked in his usual spot, and trudged back to Mulder's building, contemplating the costs and benefits of sweet and sour chicken versus vegetable lo mein. He rode the elevator up to the fifth floor, working out a few kinks in his shoulders as the doors opened to reveal the deserted hallway.

He stood inside the elevator, reluctant for some reason to step into the corridor. As the doors began to close, his hand shot out, holding them open.

He waited.

Cautiously, he stepped forward, checking his weapon, loosening it in its holster. He walked down the hall, feet making no noise as he moved forward. He stopped in front of his door, scanning for the signs he had left this morning that would warn him of an intruder. The loose paint chip he had angled across the crack between door and frame was on the floor.

He licked his lips, debating his next course of action.

He unlocked the door with a decisive flick of his wrist then exchanged the keys for his gun. He turned the knob, readjusted his grip on his silencer, kicked the door open, and moved quickly into the room.

He found himself staring down the barrel of an FBI-issue Sig Sauer.

"Mulder."

Shock didn't begin to describe what he felt. He had checked Mulder's car not more than thirty minutes ago. He couldn't have beaten him home.

"Shut the fuck up, Krycek!" Mulder yelled, removing the safety from his weapon with an audible click.

"I--I thought you were at work," he stammered, eyebrows coming together. It was inconceivable that his surveillance target could get the jump on him.

//I can't believe this. I must really be slipping.//

"I guess you would know, wouldn't you?" Mulder was yelling at the top of his voice.

The elevated volume seemed slightly odd to Krycek. Their confrontations were usually quieter, bloodier than this.

"What the hell is going on here?" Mulder's eyes flicked to the surveillance equipment.

//This is impossible. This is NOT happening.//

"Answer me, damn you!" Mulder yelled.

Krycek stayed quiet, determined to give nothing away until he had gathered his wits, until he lost the feeling that he'd been had, that he'd been made, that he was sitting in a sweltering rental car again watching the clock on the dashboard blink the same number over and over and over again. His eyes swept nervously over the agent, taking in the dark trench, the elegant suit, the conservative tie.

He definitely didn't recognize that tie.

The truth hit him like a physical blow. This. Was. NOT. Mulder. His mouth went dry and he fought to keep his hand from shaking. He took a deep breath, then another, letting a deadly calm replace his fear.

//Two can play this game, you green-blooded piece of shit.//

"Answer me!" the thing screamed for a third time.

"Put the gun down, and we'll talk about it," Krycek snapped, desperate for an excuse to get rid of his useless weapon.

The shapeshifter glared at him, doing an eerily accurate impersonation of Mulder. Krycek didn't want to know how it had learned the agent's face and mannerisms so well.

"Fine." They both slowly holstered their weapons.

"So talk," the thing spat at him.

"What do you want to know?" He looked at it evenly.

"Don't fuck around with me, Krycek. Why do you have me under surveillance?" Krycek's thoughts blurred as he speedily came up with a plan. He needed something believable, something that gave nothing away, and, most importantly, something that would get him close enough to reach the back of its neck.

He held the thing's gaze for just a moment longer than necessary before looking away, blinking rapidly. He ran a hand through his hair.

"You really don't know, Mulder?" He looked up at the shapeshifter through veiled lashes. "After all this time-" He broke off, compressing his lips, "you haven't figured it out?"

Somehow, the act was much easier than he'd thought it would be.

The thing stepped closer. Krycek wasn't sure what its expression was supposed to be. Maybe it was trying for compassion.

"Krycek, I don't understand."

"Damn it, Mulder!" His voice broke as he turned away, quickly reaching inside a slender pocket in the depths of his leather jacket and flicking a thin metal tube up into his sleeve.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and had to suppress a shudder.

"Tell me, please." The thing turned him around almost gently. He shivered as he felt its fingers graze his cheek.

"I'll tell you, Mulder," he breathed softly, moving in, angling his head slightly. He thought his heart was going to pound its way out of his chest as he slipped his right hand through silky hair.

With a flick of his wrist, the small silver spike was in his hand. He jammed it down.

Not fast enough.

The familiar face went blank as the shapeshifter grabbed his hand in a vise-like grip. He hit the wall and dropped to the floor, landing on his left side, his prosthetic digging into his ribs.

"Why are you watching him?" The thing still wore Mulder's face, but there was nothing reminiscent of Mulder in that flat, dead voice.

"Kiss my ass, you green-blooded son of a bitch," he gasped. Krycek felt himself yanked up by his collar and slammed down into the middle of the room. He hit the floor again, and bit back a cry as he felt something dig into his spine. After a few tortured breaths, he realized what it was: a thin metal tube.

"What is he?" the shape-shifter demanded.

Krycek just stared at Mulder's profile, thoughts reeling, trying to sort through the implications of the question.

"What is he?" it demanded again.

"How the hell should I know?" As he was lifted again, he threw his hand behind him, grabbing the weapon as he left the floor. He nearly dropped it as he was slammed down again.

"Then you are worthless." Krycek felt himself detach, his muscles relaxing, preparing for the sudden burst of speed he would need. He looked into the thing's eyes one final time. It was nothing like Mulder, really.

His arm arced up in a blur. The grip on his shirt relaxed as the shapeshifter fell forward. Krycek rolled out of the way, pulling out the weapon in a smooth motion. He backed off immediately as the body began to corrode.

He didn't wait around to watch it stain his floor. Thirty seconds after stabbing the thing he was back on the road, speeding toward the J. Edgar Hoover Building. He parked his Taurus in the space next to Mulder's car and flipped on his "walkman."

Dead silence.

He wasn't about to run through the entrance the agents used, even though he wanted to. He took his time and picked the lock to the service door. Getting himself killed or arrested at this point wouldn't do Mulder a damn bit of good.

There weren't many people in the bullpen hallway at half past five on a Friday, but there were a few. Fortunately, he was still wearing his janitor's uniform, and he grabbed a trashcan from an open office, carrying it as he made his way to the ISU. Shit. At least one member of the unit was bound to still be there.

He was right. Michaelson and Stewart were talking about a file, standing just inside the door of the office that Michaelson and Featherstone shared. He walked past them and ducked into a doorway, fading into the shadows. From his vantage point, he could see into Mulder's office. The door was open, and the agent appeared to be reading over a file.

Krycek narrowed his eyes, looking for any deception. Mulder's designer suit jacket was hanging precariously off the back of his chair, and he had removed his tie, letting the fabric hang down in a ribbon of garish color. The tie was hideous, and definitely the same one he'd been wearing that morning. Krycek felt himself relax marginally.

As he came down off the adrenaline high and listened to the normal sounds of Michaelson and Stewart getting ready to leave for the night, he felt strained muscles start to shake. The left side of his rib cage burned with each breath from where he had fallen on his prosthetic.

He relaxed further as he heard the two agents in the office to his right locking the door. HE certainly wasn't planning to leave anytime soon. Mulder looked like he was going to be reading for quite some time.

Krycek needed to sit. Emptying the metal trashcan he was still carrying, he turned it over, placing it just inside the dark doorway of the room two doors down from Mulder's office. The navy blue of the janitor's uniform made him nearly invisible in the shadows. He leaned his head against the inside of the doorframe, curling into himself protectively.

//God. One microsecond slower with the weapon, and I'd be dead by now.//

It was nice to watch his target in color. He had forgotten how much those surveillance monitors leeched from a scene. Dark brown hair, pale skin with a golden undertone, changeable, gray-green eyes that always gave too much away. He looked much better than he had a month ago. Krycek could barely see the small scars on his face anymore. His hair had regained its normal healthy shine and he wasn't so deadly pale.

Mulder started making notes, longhand, with a red pen on a yellow legal pad. As he listened to the quick rhythms of the ink over the paper, he tried to sort through what the shapeshifter had wanted.

//What is he?//

The words rang in Krycek's ears. So the colonists didn't know either. And hell, they'd had three months to split the guy open and mess with his head. If THEY didn't know, Krycek certainly didn't have a clue. All he had was a feeling--an instinct, really, that Mulder was important.

Just as he was beginning to relax a bit further, Mulder stopped writing. The agent was frozen, staring fixedly at the page. Without lifting his gaze, he capped the pen carefully, placing it, with exaggerated care, on the desk. His eyes were vacant, elsewhere. Krycek felt icy fingers run down his spine.

As if responding to something Krycek couldn't hear, Mulder stood, his head whipping around to stare out into the hall.

The other man's features had a strange cast, a twisted readiness that was all too familiar to Krycek. He'd seen it on scores of faces, as he looked into the eyes of the men and women he'd killed.

Krycek pushed himself to his feet, still shrouded in darkness.

Mulder waited by his desk.

To his right, Krycek heard the even tread of someone coming down the hall. He closed his fist around the thin metal tube that rested in his pocket.

The figure walked past him and into the light spilling from the office. Krycek recognized the outline of Michaelson's brown hair and long trench. The agent stopped a few feet in front of Mulder, standing with his back to Krycek.

"Mulder. Hey. Is anything wrong?" Michaelson asked.

Mulder's eyes blazed.

"I can hear you." His words were measured, and as he said them, he drew his gun, aiming it directly at Michaelson. "Show yourself."

Krycek wasn't surprised as he watched Michaelson's hair and physique change.

"Your weapons have no effect on us." The shapeshifter stepped forward.

"I know that." Mulder's voice was quiet as he brought the gun up to his own temple. The colonist froze, raising a hand.

Krycek was up in an instant, flowing through the dark to drive the spike into the back of the shapeshifter's neck. As the second body of the night dropped at his feet, he looked up at Mulder. The agent was staring at him, lips parted, eyes slightly widened. He still held the gun to his head.

"Put that away before you hurt yourself."

Predictably, Mulder trained his weapon on Krycek, releasing the safety. Krycek fought down a disturbing wave of dj vu.

"What are you doing here, Krycek?" The agent's voice was steely.

//It's going to be a long night.//

"Saving your miserable life." Krycek stepped over the corroding green mess at his feet. "Nice office," he said, looking around, ignoring the Sig Sauer that tracked his movements.

"Shouldn't you be lurking in the basement? Bothering Doggett?"

Krycek smirked, ignoring him. He walked around Mulder's desk to sit in his chair, keeping an eye on the open doorway.

"So you can hear them?" Krycek asked tilting his head toward the bubbling green puddle across the room. "Neat trick."

Mulder still hadn't put the gun down.

"Aren't you getting tired of holding that thing?" Krycek asked him, leaning back in Mulder's chair. The agent finally lowered his weapon, dropping his arm, defeated, as if Krycek had won a game he hadn't even known he was playing.

"What do you want from me?" The words were dull, and matched the disconcerting flat gray-green of Mulder's eyes. He held that gaze, although it was hard, refusing to drop his eyes and look away. Something had been cut away from the other man. He felt as if he were staring at a horrible disfigurement, and remembered the feeling of looking at himself in a mirror shortly after his left arm had been brutally sawed off in the cold Russian woods. Only, this time, the injury was mental.

//Oh, Tovarich. I know. I see it. You need more than you would ever let me give you.//

"I don't want anything from you, Mulder." He almost winced as he said it, because it wasn't true.

"I don't believe you."

"There's a surprise." His eyes flicked to the doorway, alert for any movement.

"Go to hell, Krycek." Mulder crossed his arms.

"We need to get out of here." His words were sharp with exasperation.

"No. Get out of my chair."

"Mulder, we need to talk."

"I said no. I'm not your errand boy any more, Krycek. If you have rebels to save, ships to find, or any other missions that require my unique combination of gullibility and astronomical stupidity, save it for another time. Or better yet, find someone else to do your bidding. Like I said before, Agent Doggett is downstairs. But he's probably not stupid enough to fall for your act."

"Act? I was almost killed less than an hour ago taking down another shapeshifter in your apartment building."

Mulder didn't look impressed.

"I'm trying to help you."

He got a skeptical look in return.

"You can drive," he offered, playing his last card. The office was silent for a moment.

"All right."

Mulder holstered his gun, and they both stepped gingerly over the gently smoking stain on the floor. As they walked down silently down the nearly deserted bullpen hallway, Krycek's eyes scanned the corridor restlessly. As they waited for the elevator, Mulder glanced at him, his face unreadable.

"What the hell are you wearing, Krycek?"

He didn't answer, looking down at the blue janitor's uniform, stoically suppressing any hint of a smile. A few seconds later, the elevator opened with the soft sound of sliding doors, and they stepped through together.

7:12 PM
2 December 2000
George Washington Parkway

Mulder relaxed into the drive, watching the dark outlines of naked trees on the borders of the road, watching the endless yellow and white of the reflective lines on the asphalt, watching anything but his passenger. The whole night had a flavor of unreality about it. He couldn't seem to forget the way that Krycek had flowed out of the dark.

"Mulder." His voice was dark too. Had Krycek always been like this? Had the Junior G-man persona been nothing more than a disguise, like those cheap suits, to hide the leather and steel underneath? Or had Krycek lost as much as Mulder had? Was the darkness all that was left?

"Yeah." Mulder's voice was soft, but something burned through his chest that he couldn't explain. It was a slow fire that had been missing twenty minutes ago in his office when the aftermath of his encounter with the shapeshifter had left him numb and full of horror. The burn that built silently within him now was the same insensible anger he always felt around Krycek. It might be brutal, but it was righteous. Just.

"We need to talk." Krycek's voice had shifted slightly. It was more guarded. Mulder hated that the other man could read him so well.

"Yeah, Krycek, we do." Mulder spit out the words, involuntarily pressing down on the gas. "What were you doing at my office tonight? And what the hell were you doing at my apartment building?"

"Just passing through the neighborhood." The words were fast, acidic.

"Bullshit. I want an answer."

"What good would it do you? You never believe anything I say."

"And whose fault is THAT?" He felt like the words had been ripped from him. As soon as they were out, hanging tortured in the air between them, he wanted to take them back. He hadn't meant to give so much away. Krycek said nothing.

Mulder swallowed and slowed the car down, forcing his breathing into a controlled rhythm. The silence between them thickened and stretched into five minutes. Ten.

"Mulder." Krycek was trying again. Mulder said nothing. He was in no mood to be helpful.

"Would it make any difference if I told you that I was sorry?" Krycek asked. Mulder glanced over, to see the other man's eyes fixed on the dark, bare trees.

"It depends on what you're sorry for." He was back in control, and his voice had a hard edge.

"I've had a long time to think about it." Krycek's voice was quiet.

"And?"

"I'm sorry I didn't let you save me."

"What?" He was startled.

"Scully. Skinner. I could have been like them. I could have let you drag me out of the lies. You wanted to, I think." Mulder said nothing. There was a short silence. Then Krycek spoke again, slowly, as if he knew he was treading on dangerous ground.

"Maybe it's why you hate me so much. Because every time you look at me, you think that you failed, somehow."

"And you think that makes you special? I've failed a lot of people." Mulder refused to look too closely at Krycek's analysis.

The car was silent.

"I was trying to find you," Krycek said. "I thought you might be in danger." Mulder recognized it for the peace offering it was.

"How did you know?"

"I was attacked by a shapeshifter as well, earlier in the day."

Something sounded slightly off in Krycek's tone. Mulder didn't think he was lying, not exactly, but he was certainly holding something back. Before he had a chance to follow up on his hunch, Krycek continued.

"It was asking me questions about you."

"What kind of questions?"

There was a pause and Mulder waited impatiently for Krycek to speak.

"What kind of questions, Krycek?"

"It asked me what you are." Krycek's tone was unexpectedly gentle.

"WHAT I am? What did you tell it?"

"That I had no idea."

"Was that the truth?"

"Yes."

Mulder slammed on the breaks, pulling the car over to the shoulder of the road.

Mulder heard Krycek say something in Russian as he was thrown forward against his seatbelt at the abrupt deceleration. He ignored the other man, flipping on the overhead light.

"Do you have a knife?" He didn't do a very good job disguising the panic in his voice.

"What!?"

"Do. You. Have. A knife."

"What the hell are you going to do with it?" Krycek's voice was suspicious.

"I need to check something." Mulder watched comprehension dawn in Krycek's eyes as the other man dug the blade out of his pocket.

"Don't go overboard."

Wasting no time, Mulder flicked the switchblade open, then stopped, looking at Krycek.

"You might want to go outside for this." Mulder said, remembering the destructive effects of hybrid blood on human physiology.

Krycek met his eyes. "I'll take my chances."

Mulder said nothing, just slashed the blade across his palm. He watched as a thin line appeared, then widened. Uncertain, he looked up at Krycek.

"It's red?" he asked.

"You're colorblind." Krycek sounded like he was reminding himself, and Mulder narrowed his eyes. "Yes. It's red."

He released a shaky sigh, watching the blood start to run over his palm.

"I thought I told you not to overdo it." Krycek sounded testy. "You're going to get blood everywhere."

"What are you so worried about? It's MY car," Mulder said mildly, watching the blood drip down the side of his hand and onto his coat. He stared at the cut, unable to pull his eyes away. The blood felt hot over his cool skin, and satisfyingly normal. As the adrenaline left him, he felt the warm burn of singing nerves. His hand felt strangely heavy, and he let it fall to his lap. The relief was so intense that he felt lightheaded.

"Jesus. You're a fucking train wreck. You know that, right?" Mulder watched as Krycek got out and walked around the front of the car. He opened the driver's side door, reaching in to unbuckle Mulder's seatbelt. Even though he was dressed in the ridiculous janitor's outfit, he still smelled of blood and leather, Mulder noted absently.

//Or maybe it's just leather. Maybe I'm the one who smells like blood.//

"Here, turn this way. And give me your damn hand." Mulder felt a gentle pressure on the back of his neck, and he dropped his head, feeling the dizziness recede. He watched Krycek fold a square of white cloth.

"Is that a handkerchief?"

"They make good tourniquets in a pinch. Or bandages."

"Right. Of course." He hissed as Krycek pressed the cloth tightly against the cut.

"I think you might need stitches."

"I'm fine."

"Hold this here, then. I'm driving." Mulder nodded in acquiescence and stood, letting Krycek take his place behind the wheel. He walked around to the passenger's side and got in. Krycek reached over to help him with his seatbelt.

"Back off," he said, unreasonably irritated as he buckled the belt himself.

"Fine," Krycek snapped, pulling back onto the empty road.

They spent another few moments in silence, and Mulder let the sudden tension that had come between them bleed away before he spoke again.

"So are you on the alien 'shit list' now that you've killed two of them? Or was it three?" He had the urge to interrogate Krycek, talk him in circles until the other man had backed himself into a corner, and had no choice but to tell Mulder the truth.

But he was so tired.

"Maybe they'll blame the last one on you. You never know." Krycek neatly sidestepped his question. Mulder let it slide.

"Oh good. Too bad the bodies won't ever stick around."

"Why? Haven't you had enough 'evidence' rammed down your throat by now?"

"I was just thinking that I could start mounting their heads on the wall of my office. It would really add to the dcor." He surprised a grim smile out of Krycek.

"If I were you, I'd put them outside, as a deterrent." The words were amused, but there was a serious undertone.

"Do you think it's OK to go back?" Mulder let his eyes fall closed.

"Probably," he heard Krycek say from a distance. "Just stay alert."

"Mmm hmm."

6:46 PM
4 December 2000
Delta Flight 877

He hated flying. It hadn't used to be so bad, but with the heightened safety measures in place nowadays it was nearly impossible to get a gun through airport security unless you were cleared to carry one. And he most definitely wasn't. He'd toyed with the idea of disassembling his Sig and trying to hide it in his prosthetic, but ultimately had to reject the idea. Altering the weight of the arm would throw his balance off.

Now he was going to have to buy a gun in Missouri. This was all Mulder's fault. Two days after the ISU had been cleared to start fieldwork again, Mulder had grabbed a file, left Michaelson in charge, and booked himself a ticket to the "Show Me" State. Krycek had gotten forty minutes of warning before Mulder left for Jefferson City. He'd had to feign sickness to leave work, go back to Mulder's apartment, pack a bag, change his clothes, and finally book himself a plane ticket.

Before he dashed out the door, he spent twenty minutes hacking into the Bureau mainframe to pull the case Mulder was consulting for. He read it on the flight out.

No wonder Mulder hadn't sent any of the other agents out on this one. Even Krycek, who had been witness to countless acts of brutality and perpetrated a few of his own, felt vaguely sick looking at the photos. The UNSUB handcuffed his victims to a table and hacked them into pieces, saving the muscle and blood. The pathologist's report showed extensive bruising around the wrists and ankles of the--remains of the remains. Indicating that there had been a struggle before death. Indicating that the victims had been conscious while they were-

He closed the file, breathing deeply. He looked out the window, seeing the flat, snow-covered plains below him. Ever since that incident in North Dakota, he'd hated the Midwest. Krycek had almost decided not to come. It wasn't standard operating procedure as far as syndicate sponsored surveillance went. Even when they had gone to elaborate lengths to keep tabs on Mulder, Scott Ostelhoff had never followed him on one of his cases. Mostly because it was useless--even when Krycek had been Mulder's assigned partner, the man had shown a preternatural ability to ditch him whenever it suited his purposes.

This time he was determined to stick to him. The stakes were significantly higher, as he had learned last week. He pulled out of the Jefferson City airport in his black rental car, letting his thoughts slip back to the bizarre evening he'd spent with Mulder. Despite his plans, they hadn't really discussed anything that Krycek would call significant.

He had wanted to tell Mulder about everything: Marita's treachery, the vaccine that was going to be handed over in a few weeks, the surveillance. Most of all, he had wanted to grill him about how he had known the shapeshifter was coming.

Instead, he had apologized for six years worth of mindfucks, given the agent a knife to cut his own hand, and finally driven him home. Nothing had really changed.

He should have interrogated Mulder. He should have taken him home, made him a nice warm glass of sodium pentathol and asked him questions until the sun came up. He should have. But he didn't. He had driven around aimlessly while Mulder slept in the passenger seat. After a few hours, he had headed back to Alexandria, dropped Mulder off, driven around the block, and walked back to Hegal Place.

Krycek let the events of that night turn over in his mind, idly trying to pinpoint what it was that had stopped him from questioning Mulder. Over and over again his thoughts returned to the slash of his knife into Mulder's palm. It had been so quick; so casually brutal. And he'd seen no hesitation on Mulder's face. No caution. Something had told him to back off. That Mulder shouldn't be pushed.

It was that same something that had brought him here, to a Motel 6 in the middle of this godforsaken country. And as he sat in his black rental car, watching a light snow flurry begin to dust the motel parking lot, he started to wonder about his own motives. For the last three years, beginning on the night that he had kissed Mulder as a show of good faith, he had been working for the Resistance. It had been grinding, dangerous work. Now, it seemed, he was the last man standing. He was one of a handful of people who knew that the date was set. And instead of working to stop the colonizers, here he was, sitting in the dark, protecting a man who hated him.

He needed a fucking army. Hell, two hands would be a help. When Jack had first told him about the Christmas Eve deadline, he had toyed with the idea of trying to entice some of Marita's people away from her. He'd made some preliminary inquiries, and figured at max, he could get three or four that he'd trust not to shoot him when he turned his back. Not nearly enough.

He couldn't go to the FBI. He had no proof and they'd slap him behind bars before he could say his full name. Which left him with an intermediate option. If he could convince Mulder that he was telling the truth, then maybe the agent could talk Scully and Skinner into helping him. And maybe he could get his three paranoid friends to join the party. God, but that had the makings of a decent team. If they could steal part of the stockpiles, maybe substituting a faux vaccine for the real deal, then Scully could take a look at it.

Maybe they could still get it out before Memorial Day weekend.

He felt an ache of hope in his chest, and tried not to encourage it too much. The vaccine was his life's work. He'd killed for it. He'd betrayed and lied for it. He'd lost an arm for it. He'd traded his soul for it, with the hope that in the end, he could curl the fingers of his one remaining hand around a glass vial of amber liquid and hand it over to someone who could make a difference.

It hadn't worked out that way. Not yet.

There were a lot of big holes in this, his last-ditch, desperate plan, not least of which was convincing Mulder to help him. He knew if he could only get the agent to take him seriously, then things would fall into place.

He got out of the car and checked into a room, leaving Mulder to write his profile two doors down. He wandered around the room, went out to find Mulder's rental car and plant a spare GPS locator on it, and got himself some ice. Around three AM he stood in front of Mulder's door, listening. He heard the soft clicking of laptop keys, and Mulder's light was on. He was still working then. Krycek went back to his room.

Exhausted, he fell into a fitful sleep. Black oil slithered through his dreams, causing him to wake before the sunrise. He donned running clothes, carefully slipping already tied Nikes over his feet.

He was waiting in the cold silence of his rental as Mulder emerged for his morning run. After fifty seconds he stepped out of the car and started pacing the agent. In the early morning, there were no sounds of traffic to disguise the slap of shoes on pavement that echoed tellingly off the buildings that lined the street. With an ease that spoke of long practice, Krycek matched his stride to Mulder's. He'd never really been much of a runner before this job, but now he was starting to see the appeal. He let his concerns fade to the back of his mind, let his eyes become passive, noticing everything, looking at nothing, always tracking the figure two blocks in front of him. The satisfying feeling of cement under sneakers and Mulder's steady rhythm beat away the vestiges of his nightmares.

He spent a boring half-day, trailing Mulder as an agent with the local bureau office gave Mulder the guided tour from the first crime scene to the last. Around two PM he took a ten-minute surveillance break to buy himself a late lunch. He returned to his parking spot in front of the Bureau office, and sat. And sat. And sat.

He was beginning to think this whole idea of trailing Mulder in the field had been just a little too paranoid, when the agent stormed out of the building, followed by Henderson, the local SAC. Krycek watched with interest as they had a heated discussion. Hoping to catch some of it, he cracked his window open.

"-just RIDICULOUS," he heard Henderson shout.

"-tonight." A gust of wind whined through the gap between glass and plastic, so Krycek only caught Mulder's last word. Apparently Henderson didn't find whatever Mulder had said particularly persuasive, and Krycek watched him throw up his hands. Mulder turned on his heel and got in his rental car, wheels screeching as he sped away.

//Ti shto dalish, Tovarich? What are you doing?//

4:12 PM
5 December 2000
Jefferson City, Missouri

He regained consciousness to the sound of someone slitting his dress shirt with a knife. He felt a gentle flutter against his skin as the fabric was drawn away. He was face down, on a very cold metal table. Mulder had enough time to register that his hands were cuffed above his head before he felt the unmistakable sensation of a cold blade slicing easily into his back.

A year ago, he would have found this pain unbearable. Three months of continuous torture, however, tended to put things in perspective. Maybe, if he lived through this, he should quit his day job and open a school of alternative medicine specializing in a post-modernist approach to pain management, where everyone was expected to abstract sensation into neat, subjective categories for comparison and analysis. Just like there was no objective truth in the world, maybe there was no pain either. No absolutes at all. Just continual shades of gray, no white or black anywhere.

Was that how Krycek saw things?

It was hard to breathe.

Mulder had seen the autopsy reports. He had seen the case files. He knew just how long it took Finch's victims to die. The thought didn't frighten him. Not anymore.

//Two warriors of equal skill fight to the death.//

Modell's voice spoke perversely out of his memory.

//One is a student of Japanese Budo.//

Mulder tensed against the ropes binding his legs to the table. He folded his left thumb into his palm, bringing his hand against the cool metal of the cuff. No, dying didn't frighten him, but there were less gruesome ways to go. And he wasn't leaving Finch alive to kill again.

//Budo teaches the warrior to leave himself outside the battle.//

He didn't scream as he heard a metacarpal crack, as the skin on his thumb and on the back of his hand was torn away. It was over in a few seconds, and he heard Finch gasp.

//In other words, to disregard his own death.//

Mulder didn't wait. He levered himself up on his right elbow, using all his strength to throw Finch off balance. He knew the gift of adrenaline would last only long enough for one motion. He wouldn't be able to wrest the knife away from Finch. Instead, he grabbed the other man's wrist, and forced the killer's hand up into his own face. Whether by accident, or some subconscious skill on Mulder's part, the knife found Finch's eye.

The man died silently. It was a long knife.

Blood flowed down over his injured hand, dripped onto the remains of his dress shirt. Before all his strength left him, Mulder tried to use the momentum of his thrust to force the body onto the floor. The pain in his left hand was excruciating, and a strangled scream of pure determination tore its way into the air from between his clenched teeth as he fought against the dead weight of the corpse.

Finally successful, he collapsed back against the table, drawing unsteady gasps of air. He lay motionless for a moment, rallying himself for one last effort. Gritting his teeth, he twisted slightly, sliding his broken hand into his pocket, and pulled out his cell phone.

He looked at it for a moment, wondering whom to call. Suddenly, listening to the 911 operator talking him through staying alive didn't seem very appealing.

Mulder let his head sink back to the table's surface. He noticed vaguely that the metal was angled downward slightly. Blood was flowing away from his head. It would speed up the inevitable. Already he could feel the familiar dazed chill of shock.

There were worse ways to go.

Gently, slowly, he pushed the phone toward the edge of the table. It was better not to leave any unanswered questions. The phone made a dull crack as it landed on the cement floor.

He could feel his heart beating hard against the table. He felt each contraction slam through his body, through his chest and back. Each pound of his pulse ripped through his hand. He felt almost sorry for his heart, fighting the inevitable. Always fighting. His thoughts flashed to Sam.

//I think I had a brother.//

He was seven again, watching Bobby Kennedy on TV. Watching as the candidate was gunned down in the Ambassador Hotel. Later, sitting on the front porch in the June sun, he'd tried to explain to his sister why everyone was so sad. She was only three, and he hadn't told her everything. He didn't think she needed to know.

She had found out in the end.

The cold was intense, numbing. His breaths became shallower as he started to shiver, only the thin, sliced fabric of his shirt protecting him against the icy air. The dull grays of the room began to fade as his vision started to blur. It was then that he saw her. She was standing close. He tried to reach out to her, but his body wouldn't respond.

"Sam." No sound passed his lips. She smiled at him.

"It's all right." Her voice was more mature than he remembered it. Her lips didn't move when she spoke to him. "He's coming."

4:14 PM
5 December 2000
Jefferson City, Missouri

Krycek walked quickly through the labyrinthine building. Living in DC made you forget there were places like this, the children of a more economically productive era, left abandoned to fall into dilapidation. He wondered if Mulder had known exactly where he was going when he had stopped at this place, or if he was just following another one of those spooky hunches that had earned him that damned nickname.

When he had pulled up to the building, Krycek had vowed to give Mulder five minutes to be in and out. It wouldn't do to run into him inside for no reason and needlessly blow the extent of his surveillance. He had managed to skirt around it last time he had saved Mulder's life, but he didn't think Mulder would believe that he just happened to be passing through an abandoned grain processing plant on the outskirts of Jefferson City.

He had waited four minutes and twenty seconds before crossing the parking lot and following Mulder through the doors. And now, he was kicking himself for not going straight in. The building was massive. He'd been wandering around for fifteen minutes in the lower levels, and he was feeling turned around, and slightly claustrophobic. This place reminded him of the silo. The memory blindsided him and, for a moment, he couldn't tell whether the muted echoes of a scream were reverberating inside or outside his head.

He sped up, and came to the end of the hall he had been following, wondering if he should turn right or left. He scanned both corridors.

//If you were Mulder, what would you do?//

//The stupidest thing possible.//

//But if you were Mulder, what would you see?//

He looked right, trying to get inside the agent's head.

He looked left, and felt the hairs stand up on the back of his neck. There, waiting in the middle of the corridor was a little girl. Red hair. Blue eyes. She was wearing blue overalls, and the darkness didn't seem to touch her. He had seen her twice before.

The first time had been when he'd seen her corpse on a lab table, shortly after joining the Brit in his resistance campaign. She was stiff and cold, and they'd been moments away from pitching her into an incinerator, another failure of the project. Acting on some human impulse that he had thought long gone, Krycek had stolen her body, and buried it in the woods of Western Massachusetts.

The second time had been in a Tunisian prison, when he'd fallen crumpled to the packed dirt of the floor, pulling in pained gasps of dust and blood. The moonlight had streamed in through the bars of the cell, and he had dragged himself into it, away from the shadowy forms of the men who had tried and failed, for the third time, to rape him.

He had looked up and seen her, sitting cross-legged in the moonlight, watching him. He wondered if she haunted his steps because he hadn't saved her. She didn't seem vengeful though, just observant. She had the look he had seen in so many eyes; the too-shiny, too-wide gaze that spoke of volumes to express, but no means to communicate the secrets of a soul forced into silence.

Apparently, she was with him still.

The girl smiled shyly, and began to walk down the corridor. He followed her, becoming more entangled in the maze-like building as she speeded up. He was taking corners at a run as she stayed forever out of reach, always a dart of color ahead of him.

Suddenly, he skidded to a stop. She was gone. In the total silence that surrounded him, he heard a sharp crack from the room to his left. As if something small and hard had impacted with cement.

Gun raised in front of him, he pushed the door open. His eyes scanned the room in one sharp sweep.

Wasting no time, he slid forward, returning his gun to its holster.

"Mulder." His mouth moved, but sound wouldn't come. The agent's head was turned away from him, but he had a spectacular view of the mess that the fucker on the floor had made of the agent's back.

Krycek bent down quickly to check the pulse of the man on the floor. He dropped to one knee, the act causing just the barest pause in the fluidity of his motion. It was in that moment of stillness that he saw it. Mulder's phone.

He was up in an instant, and walking quickly around the table. Mulder's left hand was a mess. Krycek could see the blood stains around the pocket of his pants. He took in the smear on the metal table directly above Mulder's cracked and useless cell phone.

Jesus. Had he meant to do it?

It didn't matter. Not now. He pulled out his own cell phone, the one he kept for throwaway calls. Looking down at the unconscious agent, he punched 911.

"911 Operator, how may I direct your call?"

"This is Special Agent Fox Mulder." His voice came out breathy, just a little panicked. "My badge number is JTT047101111. I need police backup and medical assistance." Krycek inserted a ragged breath.

"What is your current location, Agent Mulder?"

"South Clerk Street. The grain processing plant. Second level." He forced his voice to get tighter.

"Agent Mulder, I need you to stay on the line." Krycek was silent. "Agent Mulder? Are you with me?"

"Yes." He let his voice fade a little more.

"Agent Mulder, we have two units closing on your location right now, with an ETA of four minutes. Any information you can give me about your current situation would be helpful."

"I was attacked by a suspect in the current murder investigation. I disabled-" Krycek trailed off.

"You disabled the suspect?"

"He's dead." He drew a shaky breath.

"Agent Mulder, what is your current condition?"

"I- I can't-" With that, he put his phone gently in Mulder's broken hand. He bent down, carefully picking up Mulder's cell off the floor and pocketing it.

He hesitated for fifteen seconds, standing above the federal agent, looking him over with a practiced eye. The bleeding had already slowed. Krycek didn't uncuff him, didn't staunch the now sluggish flow from the long cut along his back, didn't touch the man at all, knowing that any tampering with the scene could put the police on his track.

//I should go before they get here.//

He watched Mulder, still unconscious, shiver against the metal table. He had slipped into compensated shock, but he would be fine, as long as the police arrived on time.

//I REALLY should go.//

He stood unmoving, watching Mulder's breathing speed up, counting the agent's increasingly labored respirations. Then, knowing he could wait no longer, and mindful of the open phone line, he placed his lips directly next to Mulder's ear.

"Shast." He whispered. Hold on.

9:51 AM
6 December 2000
Jefferson City, Missouri

He woke up.

He shut his eyes against the rush of disappointment.

"Agent Mulder?" It was a nurse. He hoped she would go away.

"Agent Mulder, can you open your eyes for me?" He hated hospitals.

"Yeah." He looked at her, and she gave him one of those big, fake, dime-a-dozen smiles. "I know my name, it's probably the sixth of December, and I appear to be in a hospital." His voice was hoarse.

"Great!" She needed to lay off the coffee.

Over the course of the next hour, they made him get up, walk around and eat lunch. Fucking green Jello. Just the sight of the stuff made him want to throw up.

He hoped he'd get released before the day was through. No one from the Missouri office had shown up to see if he was dead or not. He suspected that they hadn't notified anyone in DC either, since he had expected to at least hear from Skinner by now. That was fine with Mulder.

He saw the doctor around three o'clock. The cut in his back hadn't been deep enough or long enough to do any significant damage to nerves. It was going to hurt like hell for a while, as was his hand, but he'd be fine. In light of that news, he'd secured a promise for release tomorrow morning, presuming his blood work came back OK. He'd had to agree to schedule a follow-up appointment in DC the day after he got back. Mulder consented blindly to everything, forced his dinner down, and let the nurses knock him out for the night.

The cab ride to the airport cost an arm and a leg, and waiting at the blasted terminal was hell. He hadn't taken the analgesic the doctor had prescribed and he felt shaky, periodic waves of pain sending shivers across his shoulders when he stretched the newly stitched flesh of his back or unconsciously moved the fingers of his left hand. But he refused to take any meds except for the antibiotic.

Ultimately, it came down to an issue of control. He was hanging onto "Spooky" Mulder with the tips of his fingers. He knew he was close to losing it--whatever that indefinable "it" was. He felt so fragile, like a creation of brittle glass, liable to shatter under the slightest stress.

"Good afternoon, and welcome to Delta flight 729 to Dulles International Airport. We are ready to begin boarding the cabin with our first class and medallion level passengers. Please proceed through the doorway marked C10. First class and Medallion only, at this time." Mulder stood slowly, accepting the wave of pain that accompanied the movement. Thank God he was a medallion level flyer and could board early--he didn't think he could deal with maneuvering for overhead bin space. It was going to be fun enough trying to get his laptop stowed with a broken hand and an injured back.

He also had a fucking window seat. The universe really did hate him.

He'd spent half an hour trying to get the damn seat assignment changed to an aisle, but the woman who'd been working the counter hadn't been able to make the change for some unknown reason. Apparently there were available seats at the time, but the system wasn't cooperating. Then he'd tried to upgrade to first class, but again, no luck. Three supervisors and half an hour later, he'd been forced to admit defeat.

He walked past the first class passengers.

//Lucky bastards.//

He found his seat, then, steeling himself, he lifted his laptop. He could tell halfway through the motion that it wasn't going to work. The pain ripped down his back in a wave.

"Bloody FUCKING Hell!" He'd meant to yell, but it came out as more of a choked whisper.

"Can I help you, sir?" It was a flight attendant, looking vaguely annoyed at his quiet outburst.

"Umm," Mulder said, intelligently, as she took his laptop and easily lifted it into an overhead bin. "Thanks."

His back was screaming at him, and he had broken out in a cold sweat. He was starting to reconsider his moratorium on medication. He leaned back into his seat, eyes closed, trying to breathe deeply, trying to think of anything other than the pain.

He heard passengers file by him, heard kids stomping down the aisle. Tuesdays in December weren't the most popular time to fly from Jefferson City to DC, and he hoped the flight wouldn't be full. Maybe no one would sit in his row. He always felt trapped sitting in the window.

No such luck. He heard someone stowing a bag in the bin above his head and settling into the aisle seat. He kept his eyes shut. Kept them shut through the welcome given by the first officer, kept them shut through the de-icing of the plane, kept them shut through the Delta Horizons safety video with the blonde woman who looked disturbingly like Marita Covarrubias, kept them shut through take-off, squeezed them shut hard against the jarring ride through turbulent winter air. Finally, the ride became smoother as they gained altitude, and Mulder opened his eyes, blinking back a thin sheen of moisture.

He found himself confronted with the sight of Alex Krycek, sitting in the aisle seat, calmly doing the crossword puzzle on page 57 of Sky Magazine. He looked over at Mulder, as if on cue.

"You left your prescription in the Men's room, you know."

It was too much. He stared at Krycek, positive now that the man was following him, positive that he had made the mysterious 911 call. He was simultaneously relieved and terrified, and he wasn't sure if Krycek was there to pin him in the narrow airline seats or to keep the world at bay.

It was too much, and he felt his sanity shredding under the pressure. He was going to have a nervous breakdown. Right here on this plane. He couldn't breathe. The seats seemed to close in on him. Color leeched from the cabin of the 737. He felt like screaming. He felt like laughing. Crying.

Krycek closed the distance between them, his real hand gripping Mulder's left shoulder. He was saying something.

//You're pathetic. Get a hold of yourself.//

After a few seconds he fought the wave of hysteria down and looked over at Krycek.

"I didn't mean to startle you like that," the other man said.

Startle. It was a nice gloss on what had nearly happened. Back in control, Mulder started to feel resentful.

"It's ok. I'm fine." He was staring fixedly at the seats in front of them. He needed the lie, and Krycek, generously, let him have it.

"Mulder, you're shaking."

"It'll pass."

"Hey. Lean forward for a minute." Krycek produced one of the small airline pillows, placing it against the seat behind Mulder's back.

"Thanks."

"You really did leave your prescription in the bathroom," Krycek said, leaning back, but not moving over to the aisle seat. He pulled a brown paper bag from the depths of a pocket in his leather jacket. Mulder didn't say anything.

"Do you want to take anything?"

//God, yes.//

"No."

"Mulder-"

"You trying to sedate me, Krycek? Afraid I'll lose it?" He could hear the panic in his own voice, and he hated himself for it.

"No. I'm not."

"I don't believe you."

"So, what else is new?"

Mulder turned his head away, staring at the clouds outside his window. He couldn't control the shudders that rippled through him. He wanted Krycek to go away.

"Why are you here?"

"I can't answer that right now."

"Don't give me that bullshit," Mulder said, whipping his head around.

"Fine. I WON'T answer that right now." Krycek looked maddeningly calm.

"Get the hell away from me," Mulder hissed.

"Where am I supposed to go? We're on a plane."

Mulder didn't really have an adequate response to that, so he returned to staring out the window.

"If you take your painkillers and go to sleep," Krycek said, "it will be like I don't exist."

"I'll never get rid of you," Mulder whispered.

"You could always kill me." Krycek's voice had a soft bleakness that Mulder had never heard from him before. He looked over at him then, as the sun illuminated the other man. It was strange, seeing him in the light. Krycek's eyes were a bright, indefinable color. Green, he supposed.

"I think that even if you were dead, you would find a way to haunt me."

That seemed to cheer Krycek up slightly, though that had not been Mulder's intention. The other man lost the brooding, faraway expression, and looked over at Mulder.

"I'll go find you some water," he said.

"What?" Mulder snapped. "Why?"

Krycek didn't answer him, just disappeared with a quiet swish of leather.

//Mysterious son of a bitch.//

Mulder tried to stay completely still, taking even, shallow breaths to minimize the tearing sensation across his shoulders. He let his eyes drift to the inflight movie playing out over screens all over the cabin. It appeared to be the latest Bond film.

//Krycek. Alex Krycek.//

"Sir, could you please lower your window shade?" It was the flight attendant again.

He didn't respond.

"It cuts down on the glare. For the movie." She was starting to look impatient. He looked uncertainly back out at the clouds, not wanting to relinquish the sunlight.

"Sir?" She was definitely annoyed now.

"Did you need something?" Krycek's voice was ice. Mulder hadn't even noticed him coming up the aisle.

"I was just trying to explain that we'd appreciate it if all passengers would lower their window shades for the duration of the inflight movie."

Krycek said nothing, giving her a cold, appraising look, stepping between her and Mulder.

"Thank you," he said, sounding dangerous. "We'll take that under advisement." She left.

"Was that really necessary?" Mulder asked as Krycek sat down again.

"No, probably not," Krycek said, shrugging. Krycek offered no further comment as he opened the small water bottle and handed it to Mulder. He then opened the brown prescription bottle with a deft combination of one-handed torque and pressure.

"Hold out your hand." Krycek's tone brooked no argument, and with his back screaming every time he attempted to take a breath, Mulder wasn't in the mood to start another fight. Yet.

He swallowed the medication and raised his eyebrows, as Krycek seemed to produce one of the blue airline blankets out of nowhere.

"I stole this off a sleeping guy," he said, helping Mulder drape it across himself.

"I don't doubt it." They both smiled a little at that. Mulder felt himself relax as the drugs began to kick in. He lay his head back against the seat.

"You do your crosswords in pen?" Krycek had started back on the Sky Magazine puzzle.

"Don't profile me, Mulder."

"Okay." Something about the way he said it made Krycek look over at him.

"Holy shit," Krycek said, smiling faintly. "Your eyes are already dilated."

"I hate taking it. That stuff."

"I know." Krycek went back to his crossword.

"Krycek, what are you doing here?"

"What's a six letter nickname for Montana?"

"Big Sky." He watched Krycek write it neatly into a row of small white boxes. "You didn't answer my question."

"You noticed that, huh?"

"Yes. I'm not THAT stoned." His tongue was being very uncooperative.

"You sound pretty stoned," Krycek said mildly, not looking up from the magazine. "Besides, I think we both might get more out of that conversation if you're not drugged when we have it."

"Probably true." He said it softly and precisely, watching Krycek neatly print the word "Philadelphia" down the page.

"Sixteen down is New Mexico," Mulder said helpfully.

"Do you want to finish this?" Krycek asked, looking over at him.

"No." He sighed softly. "Your handwriting is much nicer."

"Thank you." Krycek bit his lip, and looked like he was trying very hard not to smile. "I think maybe you should try and get some sleep."

Mulder let his eyes slip shut.

7:42 AM
8 December 2000
Alexandria, Virginia

Mulder, Krycek had learned, did not wake up pretty. Halfway though the flight into DC, when the agent had appropriated his right shoulder as a pillow, Krycek had been thinking charitable thoughts, like 'Mulder's really not so bad when he's not pointing a gun at me.' Those thoughts had gone up in smoke when Krycek had tried to wake him up upon landing. It had taken a good three minutes before he got anything coherent out of the man, and that, not-so-charmingly, had been:

"Go to hell, you fucking rat-bastard."

"Eventually, Mulder, eventually," he'd said, trying to sound more soothing than bitter.

Mulder had settled down relatively quickly and let Krycek drive him home. And so here he was, ten hours later, watching the sun slowly lift above the urbanized horizon, waiting for the agent to wake up again so that they could have their scheduled chat. As if on cue, the object of his attention stirred slightly, and Krycek got up to make tea. Call it a peace offering, though he didn't know how it would be received.

He didn't need to look through Mulder's cabinets to know where the English Breakfast tea was located. He heated the water, consciously making some noise, hoping that Mulder would remember who brought him home last night and he wouldn't get a bullet in the back of the head when the agent woke up.

He walked back into Mulder's living room and found himself staring into Mulder's open eyes.

"You made me tea." All systems were go, apparently.

"Last time I checked, it wasn't a felony."

"Why?"

"Why did I make you tea, or why isn't it a felony?"

"Do you have to answer every question with a question?"

"Look who's talking. Just drink the goddamned tea, Mulder." Krycek waited, but Mulder didn't move, and let his eyes fall shut again. "Fine. Don't drink it. I don't care. Stubborn bastard."

"Krycek." Mulder sounded tired rather than angry. "I will drink your fucking tea, but you're going to have to help me sit up."

Krycek blinked rapidly.

"Sure," he said casually, setting the tea down on the coffee table and sliding his right hand around the small of Mulder's back, then up towards his uninjured shoulder. Mulder clamped his right hand around the back of his neck. Carefully, Krycek pulled him up into a sitting position.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome."

//Those could be the most civil three words we've exchanged in years.//

"So," Mulder said conversationally, "How long have you been surveilling me?"

"About a month."

"Why?" The word was sharp.

"I quit my old job."

"And that was?"

"Working with Covarrubias, carrying on the consortium's collaboration project."

"Why'd you stop? Get tired of experimenting on innocent civilians?"

"Fuck you, Mulder." He stood up, prowling across the room. "You don't know me. You never have."

"Exactly." Mulder's reply was ice.

"I don't know why I bother. You're never going to-"

"I'm never going to know if I'm being played. If you're just using me, like you've used me so many times in the past, to further your own selfish agenda!" Mulder's voice had escalated into a shout.

"I saved your life!"

"To what end? So I can be USED in the coming war by whichever side gets their hands on me?"

Krycek could feel the shock on his own face, and he watched, unsettled, as the fight seemed to drain out of Mulder.

"I'm tired of this, Krycek. So fucking tired." Mulder let his head drop into his right hand, the anger leaving him abruptly.

"I know, Mulder." He tried to keep the sympathy out of his voice, sensing that Mulder would distrust it, as it didn't fit with the leather and steel image he had cultivated so religiously for so long.

"I know," he said again, turning to face the other man. "And God knows I'm the last person you should trust to tell you the truth. But things are coming to a head, and I need your help. So I'm ASKING you to trust me, this one, last time. Because everything depends on it."

"You're serious." Mulder's voice was flat, uninflected, giving nothing away.

"Yes."

"There is a way," Mulder paused, looking away, "that you could convince me. But I don't think you're going to like it."

"What is it?" Krycek's response was guarded.

"You let me read your thoughts while I question you." Mulder's head was still turned away, his voice low.

"You can still do that?" Krycek asked, startled.

Mulder nodded.

Krycek's eyes narrowed.

"Why haven't you done it before now?"

"Not everyone shares your abysmal code of ethics, Krycek."

"Oh come off it," he snarled.

"It's not something I enjoy doing," Mulder snapped back and then looked away. "Since I-" Mulder broke off and Krycek waited, careful not to push.

"Since I came back to work," Mulder said carefully, "I can sometimes hear people. Usually I can block them out, but sometimes, when I'm not expecting it, I find myself in someone else's head."

"Have you ever tried to do it on purpose before?"

"No." Mulder was still staring fixedly at his hands.

"All right," Krycek said. "What do you want me to do?"

"You're agreeing?" Mulder sounded surprised.

"I don't see that there's much choice."

"OK. Come here, then. I think we should both be sitting, and it will be easier for me if I can touch you."

Krycek walked over, and sat on the edge of the coffee table, opposite Mulder.

"OK. This shouldn't hurt you." Krycek didn't miss the subtle emphasis on the last word, but Mulder continued, all business, before he could call him on it. "I'm going to ask you questions out loud, and you can either answer verbally, or just think in pictures, whatever works the best for you."

Krycek frowned. "So, you can't influence other people's thoughts at all? This is totally passive on your part?" He didn't bother to hide the suspicion in his voice.

"Actually, Krycek, I've never tried." It was almost a threat, and it hung in the air for a moment between them until Mulder gave in, breaking the tension. "I doubt I could. It's difficult enough just processing everything, let alone acting on it."

"Is it as bad as it was when you-"

Mulder cut him off with a shrug. "It's hard to quantify."

"Should you be doing this? Medically?" Krycek said, frowning at Mulder.

"What do you care?"

"I'm the guy who's been protecting you for a month. Obviously I have at least a passing interest in your well being." Krycek felt Mulder's fingers curl lightly into his own. They were sitting very close, and Krycek inhaled the scent of Mulder's skin, which mingled with the sanitized tang of hospital soap and antiseptics.

//He's going to read your mind. Get a hold of yourself.//

"Close your eyes."

"Why?"

"Seeing myself is very distracting."

//I suppose it would be.//

He closed his eyes.

"Why did you stop working for Marita?"

He couldn't tamp down on the flash of anger that caused.

//I was never working FOR Marita.// He saw blue eyes in the dingy hold of a ship that had just arrived from Vladivostok. //We were supposed to be working together.//

"Why did you split up?"

//He sounds strange, is he-//

"I'm fine. Why did you split up?"

//She's changed so much. Look at what she's become.// He focused on their last argument. The flash of her eyes as she'd told him that collaboration was their only option, and that Mulder was their best bargaining chip. //She doesn't care about winning the