Title: Truth and Consequences
Authors: Marianne Zalesak and Jennifer Mauricio
E-mail: MareZX@aol.com ; AngelFoood@aol.com
Category: SRA
Rating: R (overall) Some parts will be NC-17
Spoilers: Up to and including Apocrypha. Sorry, no one-armed Russian spies here. Deal with it.
Summary: Mulder and Scully reunite with an old nemesis who holds the key to bringing down the Consortium. Secrets come to light, answers are revealed... and a soul just might be saved.
Disclaimer: Characters you recognize are property of Fox, Ten Thirteen, etc., etc. We’re only borrowing them; no copyright infringement intended. Characters you don’t recognize are ours.

TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES
by Mare & Jen
3/8/96 -

Black Crow, North Dakota
September 1995

He was fairly sure he’d never see the light of day again.

What he wasn’t sure about was how long it had been since he had seen it.

He had absolutely no idea how long he’d been trapped here, in his own personal prison, but it didn’t seem to matter much anymore. Very soon now, he thought, this prison was going to be his tomb.

In moments of full consciousness, which were now very few and very far between, he almost welcomed the idea of death, if only as a release from the torture he was now enduring. He didn’t even remember how he got into this situation. His last coherent memory was of an airport bathroom in Hong Kong. The next thing he knew, he found himself in a cavernous, dimly-lit room, on his hands and knees on top of a strange craft that couldn’t possibly be of this earth, with an oily substance dripping from his mouth and eyes.

That experience left him exhausted and drained; so much so that he didn’t even realize for a while that he was locked in with this spacecraft, a vaguely menacing shape that scared the hell out of him. Once he’d discovered this, he spent most of his time banging on the door and screaming for somebody to let him out. By the time it finally sank into his desperate mind that there was nobody there, his voice was gone and both hands were cut, bruised, and painfully swollen. That was when he noticed the complete absence of food and water from this hellhole.

His intense hunger had actually passed rather quickly, but as time passed every cell in his body started to cry out for water, and the craving got worse and worse as he grew weaker and weaker. The urgent need for water overshadowed everything else; all the confusion, the fear, and the pain.

He’d almost given up then, pretty much resigned to his fate. He sat by the door, leaning against the cool metal wall of the dimly-lit chamber, and let images from his life cascade through his brain. That life, he had to admit, wasn’t pretty. So many lies, so many people he’d hurt, so many things he’d done that he wasn’t proud of... and so much pain that he’d suffered as a result. He understood now the full consequences of the things he’d done. As if you could really make up for any of it, he told himself. Like anybody’d even let you try.

Faced with that truth, he slowly became aware of a fierce desire to stay alive. To get out of this hellhole. And to exact revenge on the puppeteer who’d been pulling his strings all along; the one who’d forced him into the role he’d never wanted and wasn’t cut out to play. Maybe I’ll burn in hell forever, he thought, but I’m not ready to go yet and when I do, I’m not going alone. His voice somewhat restored, he began pounding and yelling at the door with renewed vigor, still clinging to a faint hope that somebody might be there. After another couple of hours doing this, though, nobody had come... and his voice was gone completely, and for a good long time this time.

Partly to keep his mind off the terrible burning in his throat -- and in an (ultimately futile) attempt to ward off the lapses of consciousness that would inevitably arise from his growing weakness -- he continued intermittently pounding on the huge steel door. This continued, as consciousness allowed... until he felt something snap in his left hand and wrist. Searing, white-hot pain shot up his arm; his world grayed out for a moment and he collapsed against the wall, cradling the injured limb. When his vision cleared, he found himself sliding slowly down the wall, staring at a hand with a jagged edge of bone protruding from its base, just above the wrist. Blood seeped slowly from the wound, moving sluggishly as though there wasn’t enough fluid in his body for it to run as quickly as it should have.

That’s it, he told himself, tying a strip torn from his shirt around his hand and pulling it tight. The agony this action caused almost made him pass out again, but his vision slowly returned before everything could fade completely to black. You’re done, his mind went on. If you don’t starve to death or die of dehydration, you’ll bleed to death.

He lay down on the floor of the room, just inside the door. Fitting end for a guy like you, he told himself. Not a soul on the planet gives a shit if you live or die anyway, so you might as well just give up. A worthless end to a worthless life.

He closed his eyes and surrendered to the welcoming blackness.

*************************************

Near Black Crow, North Dakota

Dana Scully watched the utterly unremarkable landscape of North Dakota roll by outside the car window, and sent up her hundredth silent prayer that her partner would finally turn off the Beach Boys tape and put on something else. When the last song on the tape ended and nothing followed, she silently gave thanks and turned her attention to her partner. "So, Mulder, you want to tell me now what we’re doing back here?" she asked.

Fox Mulder didn’t answer right away. When he did, his voice was very soft, suggesting that he’d been thinking deep and private thoughts for the last hundred miles or so. "I’ve been thinking about what you said about the dead speaking to the living from beyond the grave, about crying out for justice," he finally said. "About all the things my father never told me... the things I think he was going to tell me just before..."

His voice trailed off. Scully knew it was difficult for him to talk about his father’s death, because he still hadn’t fully come to terms with it. "What does that have to do with this place?" she asked quietly.

Again his answer came at length. "There’s only one voice my father can speak through now."

"Krycek’s." Scully voiced what was on both their minds.

When Mulder didn’t elaborate, Scully pressed on cautiously. "Mulder, what makes you think Krycek is here?"

"He was here, Scully. You saw the radiation burns too." His voice was flat, emotionless.

"But that doesn’t mean he is anymore," Scully protested. "We don’t have any idea where he is. He could be anywhere. He could be dead, for all we know —"

"He’s not."

Scully looked at her partner thoughtfully. He seemed so sure, so positive... Did he know something... or was it only wishful thinking? "Mulder, how can you be so sure?"

"He has to be alive. He’s the only one left." Mulder was gripping the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles were white, and Scully could only guess at the complex mix of emotions swirling in his troubled hazel eyes.

"I want answers too," she said gently, "but I don’t think this is the way —"

"Then maybe you can tell me what is the right way to explain this." Mulder dug in the inside pocket of his coat and tossed a photograph at her.

Scully turned the photo over and studied it. She recognized it instantly -- it was the one taken outside the Strughold Mining Company in West Virginia; outside the mountain vault filled with secret files. She studied the faces again. There was a young Bill Mulder, and Deep Throat... Victor Klemper... that cigarette-smoking bastard... the man they’d met in Klemper’s greenhouse... She tapped the photo. "This is the man who warned me that they’d try to kill me."

Mulder glanced over. "That’s the same guy I met in New York," he said. "The one who said he’d give me Krycek."

Scully looked up from the photo. "Do you think he knows where Krycek is?"

"No, but I know they want him. Which means he knows something they don’t want anybody else to know..."

Scully sighed patiently. "And what makes you think they haven’t already found him and killed him?"

"Why’d they lose him in the first place?" Mulder countered. "He was working for them. They should know his every move, and they don’t... at least most of them don’t. That means something happened; something big enough to push him into deep cover on the other side of the world for the last five months. If he was cunning enough to get away from them and stay alive for that long, he’s probably cunning enough to do it again."

"That doesn’t mean he’s still in the silo," Scully reminded him quietly.

"Maybe not, but at least it’s a place to start." Mulder fixed a steady gaze on her. "The chinks in their armor are starting to show, Scully," he said. "That I was even able to meet with one of them and get the information I got shows that. Their organization’s almost ready to blow up; I can feel it. And Krycek is the one we need to light the fuse."

"Wait a minute. I thought this was about answers. When did it turn into revenge?"

Mulder’s gaze never wavered. "The answers are the revenge, Scully."

She dropped her eyes and sighed heavily. "I hope you’re right, Mulder," she said softly. "I just hope we won’t be the ones to blow up."

*************************************

"Okay, Mulder, this is it," Scully said. "The last chamber. If we don’t find anything, we go home, right?"

Mulder didn’t answer as he studied the door with the number 1013 painted on it. The Consortium’s cleanup crew had done a remarkable job with this place; they’d found nothing so far. No bodies, no trace evidence, nothing. The walls had even been stripped of any and all evidence of the intense heat that had killed the guards they’d seen on their last trip here. There was absolutely nothing to show that this place had seen a human being in the last twenty years.

"Mulder?"

"They’re good, Scully," he said, a touch of wonder in his voice. "There’s no evidence that we were even here recently."

Scully stepped away from the door to Silo 1013 as Mulder peered through the door’s small window. "Still think you can track Krycek from here?"

He hadn’t been able to see anything through the windows of any of the other silos, and this one was no different. "This has to be it," he murmured softly, more to himself than to Scully. "He said it was here..."

Scully’s voice cut through his thoughts. "Sometime today, Mulder?"

He shook his head, as if clearing away the last threads of a daydream. "Yeah, okay," he said, turning the wheel and pulling the huge door open. "After you, Dr. Scully."

Scully stepped inside and allowed a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim light. She heard Mulder move around her, further into the chamber... and heard his sharp intake of breath. "Mulder what is it?" she asked... then looked up and gasped softly herself.

Never in her wildest dreams could Dana Scully have imagined that one day she’d stand in the same room with a UFO, but here she was, in the room with one. The craft before her had to be alien; everything about it spoke of technology far beyond human capabilities. It was oddly beautiful, with its symmetrical triangular shape; the very soft glow that seemed to come from deep within it both accentuated that beauty and made it vaguely frightening. This is what the alien was looking for, she thought. It wanted to go home. Is it still here? Is it inside that ship?

She found herself circling it, following Mulder on his silent, awestruck journey around it. Closer in, she could see the barnacles that covered its smooth, gray skin; evidence of its fifty years on the ocean floor. Almost without thinking, she reached out to touch it, but the sudden deep revulsion she felt when she realized what she was doing stayed her hand. She wondered idly what the French were going to do with it if they had been the ones to raise it. Does their government cover these things up like ours does? How many other countries have silos like this, full of salvaged UFOs?

She stepped back away from the ship, mentally chastising herself for those very Mulderesque thoughts. It’s not a UFO, she told herself. It can’t be. It’s... something else. Prototype Stealth aircraft or something... She moved backwards closer to the door... until her foot caught on something and she had to brace her arm against the wall to keep herself from falling. She looked down to find out what had tripped her, and was shocked to see a human form lying just inside the doorway.

"Mulder!" she cried, and bent down to examine the form. She rolled it over from its side onto its back... and found herself looking at a face she hadn’t seen in over a year. "Krycek," she breathed softly, hardly believing what she was seeing.

It took her a moment to slip back into professional mode. "Mulder, over here!" she called again, and hardly noticed that she got no reply. She pressed her fingers to Alex Krycek’s neck, not expecting to feel anything, but she did find a pulse. It was weak and erratic, but it was there.

Her fingers came away from his neck stained with what she suspected was fifty-year-old diesel oil, and she noted that his skin was coated with a thin film of the stuff. So Mulder had been right after all. That theory of his that she’d laughed at back in DC turned out to be right.

Pushing that thought out of her mind, she took stock of her patient’s condition. He exhibited symptoms of severe dehydration. His breathing was slow, so shallow as to be almost nonexistent, and about as erratic as his heartbeat. He was radiating heat, and she couldn’t tell if it was because of fever or erratic body temperature brought on by the dehydration. She turned her attention to his left hand, which was bound up in a blood-soaked strip torn from his shirt and rested in a puddle of what had to be dried blood. If any part of his body could be called swollen, that hand was. She unwrapped it and noted the compound fracture. Bet that’s not the only broken bone in that hand, she said to herself. The wound was very obviously infected, and the red lines snaking their way up his arm showed that the infection was spreading. The hand itself had turned a sickly grayish color. Diminished circulation, she noted. Infection and fever. He needs a hospital now. "Mulder! Come over here right now!"

Her partner finally obeyed, still looking over his shoulder at the spacecraft as he walked over to her. "Scully, did you see —" He stopped short in front of her. "Krycek?"

"We need to get him to a hospital right now, Mulder. Come on."

Mulder didn’t move. "He’s alive?"

"For now. He won’t be for much longer if he doesn’t get medical attention."

Mulder shook his head. "I came about this close to killing him in Hong Kong," he said softly, "and now you want me to save his life."

"You’re the one who wanted to find him," Scully reminded him, a touch of exasperation creeping into her voice. "And if we don’t get moving right now, you’ll never be able to get what you want from him. I guess you have to decide just how badly you want those answers."

Mulder met her steady gaze for a full minute, then picked up Krycek’s limp form and headed out to the car.

*************************************

Seven Hours Later

Scully’s eyes followed Mulder as he paced around the hospital room, and she found herself saying what had been on her mind for the last three hours. "Mulder, would you please sit down? You’re driving me nuts."

He came to rest by the window and stared out. "How long till he wakes up, anyway?"

Scully rose from her chair and moved over to sit on the edge of the bed, picking up Krycek’s chart along the way. "Might be any time now."

"’Bout time," Mulder snorted.

"Then again, it might be a while," Scully continued quietly. "It’s hard to tell."

Mulder sucked in his bottom lip and said nothing.

Scully’s perusal of the chart and the various machines around the bed told her that Krycek was responding well to treatment. The intravenous fluids he was receiving seemed to have his body temperature back under control, and Scully could now say for sure that the low-grade fever he still had was from the infection in his hand, for which he was on IV antibiotics. The dehydration-induced electrolyte imbalance that had caused his cardiac arrhythmia had also been corrected — the steady, reassuring beeps of the heart monitor told that story.

Surgeons had also repaired the shattered bones in his hand and wrist, using some permanent metal plates and pins to hold some of the bones together. The limb was now encased in a knuckles-to-elbow cast and rested across his abdomen. The surgeon had told Scully that he would probably regain up to 90% use of the hand, but she suspected that was the least of the problems Alex Krycek would have to deal with in the coming weeks.

The biggest one of those problems had moved away from the window, and dropped into a chair across the room with a sigh of annoyance.

"You know, Mulder, even if he regains consciousness soon, he’s definitely not in any shape to go through the Inquisition," Scully reminded him.

"Well, then, do I at least have permission to go back and get a closer look at that spacecraft?" he fumed.

"It’s been there this long," Scully said quietly. "It’s not going anywhere."

"So I’m supposed to just sit here watching him sleep?"

Scully put the chart down and turned her full attention to her partner. "Well, there is something else you can do."

When she didn’t elaborate, he sighed and asked wearily, "What?"

"Tell me what we’re really doing here."

He just looked at her. "Scully, you know why we’re here —"

"I know what you hope to gain with this. What I don’t know is why you were so sure we’d find what we were looking for. How did you know Krycek would be in that silo?"

Mulder didn’t move for what seemed like a long time. Finally he dug into the inside pocket of his coat and drew out an envelope, which he tossed to Scully.

She picked it up and leveled a stern gaze at him. "What else do you have in there that you haven’t sprung on me yet?"

He spread his hands. "I’m clean, Scully. Scout’s honor."

"Mm-hmm." She opened the envelope and unfolded the sheet of paper inside. It was a photocopied map of North Dakota, with the area around Black Crow circled. A small green Post-It next to the circle bore the words, "The truth is in here," with an arrow pointing to the circle. "Mulder, where did you get this?"

"Found it in my morning paper yesterday."

"And you believed it?"

"We found what we came for, didn’t we? And more."

Scully threw the envelope and its contents back at him. "Mulder, are you so desperate to find the so-called truth that you’d follow any wild lead that gets thrown in your path?"

"Moot point, Scully. We found —"

"Well, what if we didn’t?" she interrupted. "What if there was nothing in that silo? What would you do then?"

"Scully, he killed my father!" Mulder shouted, gesturing toward Krycek. "I’d go to the ends of the earth to find him! Don’t you know that?"

"How do you know?"

Her quiet question caught him off guard. "What?"

"How do you know Krycek killed your father? You didn’t see him, did you?"

"Well, no, but —"

"He didn’t leave any evidence, did he?"

"No —"

"He said he didn’t do it, right?"

"Right, but... if he didn’t do it, what was he doing at my apartment the next night? He was there to kill me next!"

"You don’t know that either. The bullet that killed your father didn’t come from the gun you took from him."

"Maybe he switched guns."

"Given the time frame, that hardly seems likely." Scully crossed to Mulder’s side of the bed. "Face it, Mulder, you have absolutely no evidence to base that claim on. Do you really hate him that much? Do you really want that much for him to be guilty?"

Mulder couldn’t meet her eyes. "Scully, I —"

His reply was cut off by the sound of Krycek stirring in the bed, and a soft moan.

Scully was immediately at his side, gently shaking his shoulder. "Alex, can you hear me?"

His eyes opened halfway, closed again, then snapped wide open. Terrified green eyes darted around the room, finally coming to rest on Mulder’s face, and Krycek scrambled toward Scully’s side of the bed in a desperate attempt to escape Mulder.

Scully took his hand and tried to soothe him. "You’re safe here; we’re not going to hurt you. You’re out of the silo, and you’re okay. Everything’s okay." Her eyes strayed to the machines on the other side of the bed. His heart was racing and he was absolutely terrified; that was not good. "Calm down, okay? Everything’s fine. Mulder won’t hurt you; they made him check his weapon at the desk. Okay?"

After a long moment, she finally felt the tension start to drain from his body, and he settled back in the center of the bed. He was calmer now, but his wary eyes kept flicking in Mulder’s direction, and she could still read fear in them.

"Don’t worry about him," Scully said, drawing Krycek’s attention back to her. She ignored Mulder’s snort. "He promised me he’d behave." Krycek started to say something, but Scully held up her hand, stopping him. "Better not. The doctor said you really did a number on your vocal cords. They need complete rest for a while if you ever want to be able to use them again." She offered him the glass of water that was on the bedside table, and held it for him as he gratefully took a drink. "Can you do that for a while?"

He leaned back against the pillow again, shrugged, nodded. He caught sight of the cast on his left arm and lifted it slightly, raising a questioning eyebrow at Scully.

"You apparently did quite a job on that, too," Scully told him. "You managed to break quite a few bones in your wrist and hand — the doctors aren’t even sure you’ll get full mobility back when the cast comes off." She paused. "Does it hurt much?"

Krycek shook his head, then gestured toward his throat. That obviously hurt. Scully reached into her pocket and took out a lozenge, which she held out to him. "Try this; it should help."

Krycek reached for it, but then hesitated and dropped his hand. His eyes flicked in Mulder’s direction again, then quickly back to the lozenge in Scully’s hand.

Mulder gave an exaggerated sigh. "Oh, just take it, will you? If she wants to poison you, you really think she’d do it in a hospital?"

Krycek’s green eyes met Scully’s blue ones for a moment. Apparently deciding he could trust her, he took the lozenge. He leaned back and closed his eyes, and after a moment, relief flooded his features. His eyes met Scully’s again and he mouthed, ‘Thank you.’

She smiled and patted his hand. "Don’t mention it." She got up and checked the various machines again, making sure everything was okay, then settled back on the edge of the bed. "Feel up to a little chat? Nothing major; just a few simple questions."

He shrugged, nodded, then motioned with his good hand, generally conveying the idea that he had no means of communication. Scully turned and looked expectantly at Mulder, until he produced a legal pad and pen and tossed them toward the bed. She shot him a glare as she retrieved them and placed them by Krycek’s right hand.

"Okay," Scully said, "first question —"

"First question’s an oldie but goodie," Mulder interrupted, moving toward the bed, "and I want the truth this time. Did you kill my father?"

Scully glared at Mulder and meant to override the question, but she could see that Krycek had been expecting it. At the very least, he didn’t seem surprised to hear it. So she held her tongue, waiting to see what would happen.

Krycek tapped pen on pad for a moment, then began writing. Scully could see it took quite an effort — he was almost too weak to even hold the pen. When he was finished he turned the pad in her direction, and Mulder moved in closer so he could read it too. Krycek’s handwriting was more of a scrawl than anything else, but it was readable, and what he wrote definitely didn’t do anything for Mulder’s temper.

‘Does it matter what I say? You think I did it. Can’t change your mind, no matter what the truth is.’

Mulder raised his eyes from the pad to meet Krycek’s, and they were dark with anger. "You son of a bitch, what the hell kind of answer is that? We saved your miserable life; at least you owe us a straight answer!"

"Mulder..." Scully’s voice held a tone of warning.

Krycek defiantly held Mulder’s gaze for a minute, then wrote again. ‘Think whatever you want -- won’t believe me anyway.’

"Why?" Mulder demanded, taking that as a confession. "Why my father? How could you just gun a man down in cold blood like that?"

‘You would’ve -- Hong Kong’

"Just answer the goddam question!"

Krycek thought for a moment, then started writing again. It occurred to Scully that this whole thing was probably a bad idea. The necessity of having to write gave Krycek time to think, and if he had time to think, he had time to come up with plausible lies, or at least put a spin on the truth. At the very least, it gave him the opportunity to pull Mulder’s chain, which Scully knew he could do very easily. She also knew Mulder wouldn’t allow him to do it if this were one of their usual meetings — Mulder would more than likely have Krycek in handcuffs or at gunpoint.

No, this setup was definitely to Krycek’s advantage. He had time to think, and Mulder wasn’t thinking. Anything he said came from anger, emotion, hatred. He wanted so much to believe that Krycek had killed his father that he’d believe almost anything now. Even though Krycek’s mind was clouded by exhaustion and fever, she was pretty sure he would take advantage of that. She had to level the playing field a little bit.

Hoping that the kindness she’d shown him merited some sort of loyalty, she touched Krycek’s hand, stopping him in mid-word. "I think you should know that this isn’t an official inquiry, and anything said here is off the record. So some semblance of the truth, please?" she said softly.

His eyes met hers briefly, then he continued writing. Mulder paced impatiently around the room — Scully could see he didn’t much like this setup either — and raced back to the bed when he heard the sound of a sheet being torn off the pad. Scully scanned it and passed it to Mulder.

‘Why your father? You know — don’t you know what he was involved in? If somebody held a gun to your head & told you to kill somebody or you’d get killed, what would you do?’

Mulder wrinkled up the sheet and pitched it into the garbage pail. "Why don’t you tell me what my father was involved in?" he fumed.

‘You don’t know?’

Mulder’s anger abated a bit. "Not exactly, no," he admitted. "But you do, so spill it."

‘All in good time.’

"Now," Mulder said.

‘When I can talk -- writer’s cramp.’

"I really couldn’t care less if your goddam arm fell off!"

"Mulder..." Scully warned.

Mulder sighed. "You said they told you to kill or be killed. Who told you that? Who was going to kill you?"

More scribbling. ‘Them, the group. Bastard with cigarettes.’

"Your boss."

Krycek glared at him.

"So you killed my father and tried to kill me just because they said they were going to kill you?"

‘I never tried to kill you...’

Mulder, reading over Krycek’s shoulder as he wrote, interrupted. "The hell you never tried to kill me! What was that with the tram at Skyland Mountain?"

Krycek ignored his interruption. ‘They don’t make idle threats. What if they did that to you? Principles - you’d let them kill you, wouldn’t you?’

Mulder snorted. "At least I have principles to compromise."

Scully gently tapped Krycek’s hand. "Will you answer a question for me?"

‘Do I have a choice?’

Great, he was getting defensive now. Scully took a deep breath and concentrated on not making her question sound like an accusation. "Did you shoot my sister?"

Krycek studied her face for a moment, and she got the uncomfortable feeling that he was almost trying to read her mind. Finally he wrote, ‘Cardinal tell you that?’

That reply surprised her a bit. Well, he definitely knows who did it... "Yes, he did."

‘Forensic evidence...?’

No confirmation, but no denial either. A typical Krycek answer. "The forensic evidence points to Cardinal," she said slowly.

‘So why ask?’

"Because you were there. Maybe you didn’t fire, but you were there." It wasn’t a question; Scully was suddenly very sure.

Again he studied her face, trying to read her emotions. That look was uncannily familiar... Scully realized with a jolt that she’d gotten the very same look from Mulder more than once when he was trying to hide something from her. She shook the thought from her head and looked down at the pad, where Krycek had written, ‘Who do you think called 911?’

"Oh, you called 911 so that makes it okay?" Mulder interrupted, fuming. "That lets you off the hook? What would’ve happened if it was Scully who walked through that door?" He leaned in closer, and Krycek cringed away from him. "Would you be off the hook for that too because of that kill or be killed order? And what about her abduction? You knew where they took her, didn’t you? You helped them take her. You know what they did to her. You killed Duane Barry so he wouldn’t talk, didn’t you?" He kept leaning in closer until his face was inches away from Krycek’s, and Krycek continued to shrink away, fear and anger filling his eyes. "Didn’t you? Damn you, answer me!"

Ominous beeps were coming from the heart monitor, and Scully knew she had to stop this now, just in case Krycek’s cardiac function wasn’t quite stabilized yet... "Mulder, back off!" she commanded, pulling at his shoulder. He wrenched away from her grasp and leaned back over the bed.

Krycek’s breathing was now rapid and shallow; not a good sign, but Mulder didn’t seem to notice. "I should’ve killed you when I had the chance!" he yelled, even as Scully grabbed his arm again and dragged him away from the bed.

"Mulder, I said back off!" Scully cried, and something in her voice and her eyes made Mulder actually decide to obey. He dropped into the chair on the other side of the room, glaring at Scully as she went back to the bed to calm Krycek down.

Very slowly, she was able to soothe him, to the point where his breathing was normal and the heart monitor was beeping normally again. By that time Mulder had cooled down somewhat, but his hazel eyes were still dark with anger when she came around the bed to talk to him.

"Scully, what the hell are you defending him for?" he demanded. "After all the things he’s done?"

"Shh, Mulder, keep it down," she said quietly, drawing him further away from the bed and closer to the door. "Didn’t you ever hear that old saying about catching more flies with honey?"

Mulder just looked at her. "You really think he’ll tell us the truth if we’re nice to him?"

"It’s worth a try. It’ll never work with you; he’s scared to death of you and besides, he’d never believe it. But I don’t really have a history with him. Maybe I can get him to trust me, but you have to back me up and stop attacking him all the time."

"Attacking? Scully, I was just asking questions --"

"You were attacking him, Mulder; you always do." She glanced back toward Krycek, who had leaned back against the pillow and closed his eyes. "And I told you he’s not physically able to handle that right now. That’s why he’s being evasive, you know —"

Mulder almost laughed. "Scully, being evasive is second nature to him."

"Whatever. The fact remains; he’s sick, he’s weak, he’s in pain, and we need to give him time to recover."

"How the hell long will that be?"

"Depends. What kind of shape was he in when you found him in Hong Kong?"

"Not great. Looked like he hadn’t been taking care of himself... Scully, what does that have to do with anything?"

Scully fixed a steady gaze on him. "That adds to the time he’ll need to recover. Do you think we can all handle this like civilized, rational adults for a while?"

Mulder sighed. "Okay, okay, I promise I’ll try to be good. I don’t know how long I can do it, though."

"I guess I can’t ask for any more than that. Just let me do the talking, okay?" Mulder nodded, and Scully went back to the bed and sat down on it.

Krycek’s eyes opened again when she sat down, but the deep weariness she saw in them made Scully rethink her decision to continue the interview. "Feeling pretty lousy, aren’t you? We can finish this later if you want."

"We’ll finish this now," Mulder said, coming up to the bed. Scully turned around and shot him a warning glance, but he ignored her. "The tape. Where’s the tape?"

Krycek looked to Scully, and she could clearly read the question in his eyes: Do we really have to do this? She glanced over at Mulder, knew he wasn’t going to give up. Must be a record for breaking a promise, she thought. Thirty seconds. She nodded at Krycek.

With great effort, Krycek took pen in hand again and scrawled, ‘Safe place.’

"If you mean the locker at Capitol Ice, it wasn’t there," Mulder informed him. "You took it, didn’t you?"

Krycek thought about that for a moment. ‘How’d you know?’

"What, that you took it? Where else could it be?" Scully could tell from Mulder’s voice that he was trying to keep his anger in check.

‘No, that it wasn’t there. I have key.’

"You gave me the key when we got back to DC, remember?"

Krycek shook his head, a touch of anxiety coming into his eyes now.

"You don’t remember that?"

Another head shake.

"What about the accident? Do you remember that?"

Another few moments of frantic writing. ‘Last thing I remember -- airport bathroom. Next thing, I’m on top of that thing, coughing up oily stuff. What happened?’

"You don’t remember any of it?" Scully asked.

Krycek shook his head again, clearly nervous now. ‘What happened?’ he wrote again, almost frantic.

Mulder and Scully exchanged glances, then Mulder took a deep breath and said, "You were possessed by an alien force."

Krycek didn’t bat an eye at that news. He knew about it, Scully thought. He knew it existed. ‘So what happened to the tape?’ he wrote.

"Damn thing could be anywhere," Mulder said, getting up to pace around the room. Suddenly he stopped and whirled around. "Scully, who threw us out of the silo the first time?"

"The man with the cigarettes."

"Right, Cancerman. He had the UFO that the alien wanted. The alien, in Krycek, had the tape he wanted." He turned back to Krycek. "You gave that bastard the tape! How could you do that?"

‘Not me.’ The words were underlined vehemently.

"Mulder, if that’s true, it wasn’t Krycek who gave it to him," Scully said quietly.

Mulder didn’t appear to have heard her. "We had the proof almost in our hands! Now we have nothing. Nothing! We can’t prove any of it!" He shot a venomous glance at Krycek. "And we saved your miserable life for nothing!"

Krycek shot an equally poisonous glance back, then shoved the pad at Scully. After reading what was on it, she said, "Mulder, if you’re done ranting and raving now, could you please get his jacket?"

Mulder went to the closet and brought out the leather jacket. "What for? Something in here we should know about?" He started digging through the pockets.

Scully sighed patiently as she read Krycek’s next frantically-scribbled note. "Over here, please?"

Mulder came back to the bed, still digging through the jacket. "Why, so he can hide whatev —" He stopped in mid word, drawing his hand out of an inside pocket. "So he can hide this?" he asked, letting the key he’d found dangle from his fingers.

Krycek lunged for it, but Mulder snatched it away before he could reach it. "What’s this for, Krycek?" he asked. "What secrets will this open up?"

Mulder let it dangle again, holding the chain it was on as Scully examined the key. It was a pretty generic key; could’ve opened any one of a million locks. No identifying marks at all other than a seven-digit number.

Mulder dangled the key just out of Krycek’s reach. "What’s it for, Krycek?" he demanded. "What are you hiding behind this?"

With concerted effort and desperation in his eyes, Krycek lunged for the key again, this time catching Mulder off guard. He snatched it out of Mulder’s hand and closed his own tightly, possessively over it.

"Give me that key!" Mulder reached for Krycek’s hand.

Glaring defiantly at Mulder, Krycek slipped the chain around his neck.

"Damn you, Krycek..." Mulder reached for the key again, leaning across Scully to do so, but Scully held him back.

"Mulder, stop it," she hissed through clenched teeth.

Swearing under his breath, Mulder got up and stalked toward the door, Scully’s eyes following him. "I think we’ve all had enough," she said, getting up herself. "We’ll finish this tomorrow."

Krycek tore a sheet off the pad and handed it to her. She read, ‘Is all that stuff really necessary? The beeping’s driving me crazy.’

Scully checked the machines again, noting that everything looked normal. "There’s probably no reason to keep most of this hooked up," she agreed. "I’ll mention it to the nurses and somebody will take care of it." She patted his hand and offered a small smile. "Get some rest, okay?"

*************************************

The door had barely closed behind her when Mulder turned on her, fire blazing in his hazel eyes. "What the hell was that?" he demanded.

"I thought you were going to let me handle it!" she shot back.

"Encouraging him to keep secrets? Nice way to handle it, Scully!"

"Keep your voice down! This is a hospital!" She drew him further down the hall and closer to the wall. "You know, Mulder, letting him keep that key will probably help us in the long run."

Mulder started to say something, but thought better of it and chewed his lower lip instead.

"You have to look at it from his point of view," Scully continued. "Since he doesn’t have the tape anymore, he feels he has no leverage. That he’s useless to us now. There’s nothing stopping you from throwing him in jail or putting a bullet in his brain right now. That key, and whatever he’s hiding behind it, gives him something else to make a deal with."

Mulder just looked at her. "And when did you get your psychology degree, Dr. Scully?"

"Mulder, when did you lose your professional detachment? If you ever want to get any information from him, you have got to stop antagonizing him!" She paused, laid a gentle hand on his arm. "Look, I know this isn’t easy for you. It’s not easy for me either. He... he watched my sister die, and sometimes... sometimes the only thing I want is to watch him die..." Her voice trailed off and a tear formed at the corner of her eye, but she brushed it away before it could fall. "But we can’t let our personal feelings get in the way of the overall objective. You’re not having much success with that. I’m sorry, but unless you do that, you’re just too close to this situation. You’re too personally involved and you’ve lost your objectivity. You really do have to back off and let me handle this, at least for a while."

Mulder closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall. "He doesn’t need the tape or that key," he said softly. "He knows enough just from his own experience to blow up that organization. That’s all I want; just what he knows. It’s all we need."

"I know, Mulder. And we’ll get it; I promise." She squeezed his arm. "Come on, let’s go find a hotel. I don’t know about you, but I’m beat."

He slowly dug the car keys out of his pocket as they walked toward the elevator. "I’ll drop you somewhere, okay? Just make sure the rooms have cable."

Scully stopped. "Where are you going?"

Mulder’s eyes met hers, and she found herself confronted with a look uncannily similar to the one she’d gotten from Krycek. That is just too weird, she thought.

"I have something to do, okay?"

She sighed. "Mulder, you need some rest too. Can’t that ship wait?"

"Not anymore. I might’ve waited too long already."

Scully sighed again. "Sure. Fine. Whatever."

*************************************

Alex Krycek leaned back against the pillow and drank in the comfortable quiet of the room. A nurse had come in and unhooked most of the machines, cutting off that infernal beeping and leaving the room blessedly silent.

Not that there was total silence, of course. The usual assortment of hospital sounds filtered in from the hall, and he found these comforting. The sounds, and the occasional appearance of a nurse in the doorway, let him know that he wasn’t alone. That there were other people around who could let him out if he should happen to be locked in the room...

He hadn’t let the nurse close the door, and he wasn’t sure if he’d ever be able to sit in a closed room again. Certainly not any time soon, at least. And, although he knew for a fact that the door was still open, he couldn’t fight the overpowering urge to check every so often to make sure it was. If it closes I’m dead, he thought. Can’t let them close it...

He closed his eyes in the hope that sleep would come, but it didn’t. Tired as he was, he still felt completely, totally awake. He thought he knew why, too. Drug-tired, he thought. Anesthesia hangover. The kind of tired it’s impossible to sleep off.

It didn’t take long for him to realize that the sleep thing just wasn’t going to work.

At least the disconnection of the machines gave him some sort of mobility, and it occurred to him that a trip to the bathroom might be in order. Boy, never thought I’d be so glad to see a bathroom again, he thought, pushing himself up to a sitting position. He was instantly overcome by a wave of dizziness and had to lie down again, but once his head cleared, he sat up again. Fighting back the dizziness this time, he worked the IV pole around the bed until it was on the right side, the side closer to the bathroom. Good thing I have that, he thought. Need something to hold myself up.

Moving very slowly, stopping when necessary to allow any motion-induced dizziness to subside, he carefully sat upright at the edge of the bed. Then he slid forward a bit and slowly stood up.

Big mistake. A powerful wave of dizziness overcame him, causing his vision to gray out and making him stumble. He would’ve crashed to the floor if the bedside table hadn’t been there. He stumbled into that instead, and the impact knocked him backwards, back onto the bed, where he lay on his side, silently praying that the dizziness-induced nausea would just go away. After a long few minutes it did, and his head was a little clearer. Real bright, he chided himself. What would Scully say if she saw that?

Scully. Krycek knew that she was only playing good cop to Mulder’s bad cop (he wondered briefly if Mulder knew this), but it had been so long since anybody had treated him with anything other than hatred and contempt that he was almost inclined to trust her. Almost. He knew he couldn’t, not completely, because she was still Mulder’s partner and she had a personal stake in this whole mess too.

That personal stake was evidenced by her question about her sister. His own question about Cardinal had been a calculated risk; he had no way of knowing what, if anything, the Feds knew about his former partner in crime. Scully’s answer, unless she was bluffing (and he didn’t think she was), told him that they had Cardinal in custody. Of course, Krycek knew that meant that Cardinal was probably dead. After all, the Consortium couldn’t and wouldn’t allow anyone to remain in a position where they might reveal certain things, and Cardinal had been known to say practically anything to save his own skin. He wondered briefly what his former associate had done that led him into FBI custody. Oh, Scully, if you only knew what else that scumbag did...

He let his mind drift back to his first encounters with Dana Scully. It was pretty amazing, really, how she’d managed to completely blow him off or humiliate him every time they’d met when he was Mulder’s partner. And now here she was making nice and pretending she cared what happened to him. Well, he had needed the help. Whatever that was that she’d given him had quenched the almost unbearable fire in his throat, for which he was very grateful. And he really didn’t feel up to that scene with Mulder, so he was glad to have her running interference for him. Trouble was, eventually he would have to pay the price for her kindness.

The price Mulder and Scully had set was the DAT tape with the MJ-12 files on it. If what they said was true, Krycek knew he was no longer in possession of that tape; a fact which worried him, but not as much as his Fibbie friends might have thought. He fingered the key that hung around his neck. One thing his association with both the Bureau and the man Mulder called Cancerman had taught him was to always have backup. And since he was a good little soldier, of course he had backup in this case. Mulder and Scully would get their answers, all right. They just might not get them on the terms they wanted.

Mulder, Krycek thought, just didn’t understand the situation. He acted like the whole government alien coverup was his personal crusade, like he was the only person ever hurt by it. What he didn’t understand was that it was intensely personal for Krycek too. Not, of course, in the way Mulder would’ve assumed it was. Contrary to Mulder’s belief, Krycek really had nothing against him. No, he had a much more personal stake in the whole matter, and any and all information he had would be used to settle that score before it went toward settling Mulder’s. He would do anything he had to do to make sure he was able to exact his own revenge, and if that meant staying with Mulder and Scully until he recovered enough to do that, then so be it.

His head much clearer now, he hauled himself to his feet again, this time able to fight off the dizziness and nausea and actually stagger across the few feet between the bed and the bathroom.

Once there, it became crystal clear to him just how difficult life with one hand was going to be. How the hell am I supposed to do this, he asked himself, when I have to use my good hand to brace against something to hold myself up? Well, they say necessity is the mother of invention...

He found washing one hand (without getting the cast on the other wet) only slightly less difficult. Only after he accomplished this did he allow himself to look in the mirror and assess his appearance.

He was shocked at what he saw. He almost didn’t recognize the face in the mirror as his own. Red-rimmed, sunken eyes, hollow cheeks, deathly pale face, looked like he hadn’t slept in a year... Geez, pal, you really look like hell, he thought. You look about as good as you feel. Between Hong Kong and that silo, he had lost a good ten to fifteen pounds; weight he had to put back on in a hurry if he meant to carry out his plan of revenge. He fingered the key again. Oh, yes, you bastard, you will pay for this, he thought. You will pay dearly. It won’t be as quick and easy as a car bomb, either. Maybe you’d like to go on the Missile Silo Diet too, hmm? Or maybe you’d like to experience firsthand what you put Dana Scully through? Or maybe I ought to just choke you with those damn cigarettes...

He studied his reflection again. At least the nurses had managed to clean him up. The thin film of oily residue was gone from his skin, and somebody had even shaved him. Sure, all that did was accentuate how thin his face was now, but it was a nice gesture anyway.

As he made his way back to the bed, he became aware of a deep, dull throbbing in his wrist and a quickly escalating headache. Fever’s turning up a notch, he thought, and the painkillers just wore off. Great. How am I supposed to sleep now?

But when he got himself settled back in the bed, he found he was tired enough to sleep now. Not just tired, but deep-down-to-the-bone exhausted.

Krycek’s last coherent thoughts were of Dana Scully before he drifted off into a deep, dreamless sleep.

*************************************

It wasn’t until he was almost halfway back to the missile silo that Mulder felt some of his anger start to dissipate and he was able to think clearly again. It was only then that he was able to think about Alex Krycek and this whole messy situation without practically ripping the steering wheel in half.

Deep down, he knew that Scully was right about how to handle Krycek. Knew it, and tried to practice it, but had failed miserably. Something about Krycek flipped some kind of switch in Mulder’s mind, filling him with an incredibly intense, murderous rage he didn’t even know he was capable of. It wasn’t just because of his father’s death, either. There were so many other things, like Scully’s abduction, but Mulder had to admit to himself that it was probably the betrayal that hurt the worst.

Krycek’s betrayal had cut like a knife for a lot of reasons, but primarily because he was Mulder’s partner, and partners just don’t behave like that. A partner was somebody you were supposed to be able to trust with your life, as he trusted Scully with his. No matter how much they might disagree about a case, Mulder knew that Scully would always back him up. He had thought Krycek would too, especially when he insisted on coming along on Mulder’s unauthorized search for Scully...

Well, at least now he knew why Krycek had insisted on coming. Part of his mind wondered why it had taken him so long to see his new partner’s true colors, but deep down he really knew the answer. He had actually started to like Krycek, and almost consider him a friend. That had to be why his betrayal had hurt so much.

Of course, none of that mattered anymore. They were all playing under a new set of rules now, and Mulder knew he had to keep his temper in check when dealing with Krycek if they were ever going to get anywhere. It wouldn’t be easy, and he would absolutely loathe doing it, but he had no choice. He had to think not about his own personal grudges, as Scully had said, but about their current situation. However, if he didn’t get sufficient answers, there would be hell to pay.

Fact: he and Scully were dependent on Krycek for the answers they needed and to help bring down that smoking bastard.

Fact: Krycek was dependent on them for the care he needed to recover.

Fact: somebody wanted Krycek dead. Locking him in that silo was clearly meant to kill him, in a particularly cruel and sadistic manner. Who had done that? Who had he given the tape to? Cancerman. Another fact.

Mulder turned that over in his mind for a few minutes. It certainly appeared that Krycek had fallen out of favor with his boss, and Mulder wondered why. He also wondered what implications that would have on Krycek’s state of mind. Were they now united against a common enemy? Was it in fact possible for them to work together to everyone’s satisfaction?

The more he thought about it, the more he thought it might just be possible. They had one big advantage on their side: Cancerman’s little group didn’t know Krycek was alive. And what they didn’t know could very definitely hurt them.

Mulder’s spirits were much improved when he pulled up outside the bunker housing Silo 1013 once again. The good mood continued, and plans were starting to form in his mind, as he made his way to the door of the storage chamber. It wasn’t until he actually opened the door that everything fell apart again.

The chamber which had previously housed the alien ship was absolutely, utterly empty.

*************************************

Scully settled the warm comforter over herself and allowed her body to relax completely. She hadn’t even realized how tired she was, but after the long hot bath and light supper, she was so drowsy she could barely keep her eyes open. She had intended to wait for Mulder to return, to get the report of whatever he might find out about the ship, but the bed looked much too inviting. Knowing that Mulder would probably wake her up when he got back anyway, she accepted that invitation and slid under the covers.

Once settled, though, she was dismayed to discover that sleep wouldn’t come. Her body was relaxed, but there were just too many things spinning through her mind to allow her to sleep. Chief among those thoughts was Alex Krycek.

She had never quite known what to think of Krycek. When she’d first met him, she had pretty much dismissed him -- she certainly hadn’t treated him like he was part of the case Mulder had been working on. It was pretty easy to see where that attitude stemmed from too, and Scully readily admitted it, if only to herself. It came from jealousy, that childish green-eyed monster. Krycek was Mulder’s partner and she wasn’t, and she was jealous.

That jealousy had prevented her from even attempting to find out what Krycek was like. Even after Mulder had said he was okay and had started to trust him, she had stubbornly refused to accept him and continued to act like she was still Mulder’s partner. She remembered how she had gone charging in during the Duane Barry incident; taking over like it had been her case from the beginning. Maybe if I hadn’t done that, she thought, I might not have lost three months of my life...

When she’d finally gotten the full story of her disappearance from Mulder, what really struck her about the whole thing was the intense hatred Mulder had developed for Krycek. Scully supposed that was understandable. Krycek’s alleged betrayal had hurt Mulder deeply, but because of that fact, she knew she had to take anything Mulder said about Krycek with a grain of salt. There was no proof of anything, even that Krycek had betrayed him, but Mulder took all the circumstantial evidence as indisputable fact. Scully had to admit, though, that the cigarettes found in the car and the fact that Krycek took a powder just after her own disappearance and Duane Barry’s death was pretty damning circumstantial evidence.

Even so, Scully just couldn’t agree with Mulder’s viewpoint regarding his former partner. Maybe there was enough evidence to say he was involved with Cancerman’s group, but nothing gave any indication to what degree he was involved. He may have helped whoever took her, but she didn’t know for sure. He may have tried to kill Mulder on the tram, but there was no proof. There was nothing linking him to the tram operator’s mysterious disappearance, either. If he did kill Bill Mulder (and he had all but admitted that he had), they’d never be able to bring him to trial for it. And Scully just didn’t believe that Krycek was at Mulder’s apartment to kill him. She would never, ever let Mulder know she thought that, but the setup was all wrong. If he had been there to kill him, wouldn’t he have been in the apartment already? Wouldn’t he try to kill Mulder the same way he and his buddy Cardinal killed Missy?

None of that mattered anymore, though. Not even the fact that he had confessed to being an accessory to Missy’s murder. She had to forget she’d ever heard that, because she knew she’d never see him brought to justice for it. Everything was different now. Cancerman had obviously tried to kill Krycek by locking him in that silo. He had been on the run before that — why? The Consortium wanted him eliminated — again, why? He seemed to be the key to unlocking this whole mess — just what did he know that was so dangerous?

Scully couldn’t help but feel sorry for him now. He had to be feeling pretty miserable right about now, and it wasn’t just because of his physical condition. Caught between a government that wanted him in jail and a shadow organization that wanted him dead, his present position was a very precarious one. And it was up to Mulder and herself to get him out of that position if they wanted to get any information from him.

Ironic how things work out, isn’t it, Dana? she asked herself. You and Mulder have to put your careers, maybe lives, on the line for a man you considered a nonentity and Mulder loathes. You actually have to help someone who was sent to kill you...

She wasn’t even aware that she had fallen asleep until the shrill ringing of her cell phone woke her. She picked it up and sighed sleepily into it, "Scully."

Mulder’s voice. "Scully, it’s gone!"

She was instantly awake. "Mulder, is that you? Where are you?"

"I’m at the missile silo. It’s gone, Scully! They took it!"

"What, the ship?"

"Yeah. You know what that means, don’t you?"

Scully sighed. "They know Krycek’s alive."

"They were watching. They know he’s alive and they know we have him. They probably know where he is, too. Scully, you have to get to the hospital now. He could be in real danger."

She was already sliding out of bed. "I’m on my way, Mulder."

"I’ll meet you there as soon as I can," he said, and broke the connection.

*************************************

It was a good thing the hotel was close to the hospital. Mulder had the car, and Scully didn’t want to waste time with a cab or bus. She practically ran the whole way to the hospital, mentally kicking herself with every stride for not thinking to post a guard on Krycek’s room. Oh, stop it, she finally told herself as she got to the hospital doors. Where did you think you were going to find guards that Mulder would trust, anyway?

Everything looked normal on the floor where Krycek’s room was. Nothing but the normal quiet activity that usually goes on in a hospital late at night. Nobody acted like anything was out of the ordinary, and when Scully quizzed the nurses at the desk about any visitors to Krycek’s room, they all said they hadn’t seen anybody.

Scully crept down the hall toward the room, and was instantly on alert. The door, which the nurses had been instructed to leave open, was closed. Pulling her gun from its holster, she eased the door open and crept inside.

It only took a second for her to take in the scene inside the room. Krycek asleep. Dim light on over the bed. And a person not dressed in hospital garb poised at the side of the bed, a syringe in his hand.

"Federal agent!" Scully yelled, taking aim. "Drop it!"

The man beside the bed turned and looked at her... and then calmly injected the contents of the syringe into Krycek’s IV line.

End Part 1

Go to Part 2