Kryciet Skidding to a halt as he reached the general vicinity of
Mulder's rental car—according to the grunts, and anything they
discovered was to be taken with a grain of salt—Krycek blinked
rapidly as his eyes adjusted to the lack of functioning lights in
this section of the lot. Squinting and muttering an oath, he tried
to make out the shapes and models of the nearby vehicles; no luck.
Then he stared in consternation and disbelief.
A faint hissing sound had issued from the car directly beside
him, and he could see the faint, shady outline of limbs in the veil
of darkness, splayed bonelessly along the seat. In a rush of terror
he tried to yank the door open and discovered that it was locked, the
dark, scuffed boots pressed against the glass taunting him, begging
him to gain entry. They were Mulder's shoes.
Precious time slipped by as he tugged on the handle with
growing desperation, the pervasive murkiness of fear clouding his
judgment. Then, suddenly, he remembered—he had a flashlight.
It was tiny, fitting perfectly into a belt loop, and it
shone into the car's interior with a flick of the finger. First on
the splatters that coated the window, and then Krycek shifted his
grip so that the narrow beam traveled slowly up the length of the
long leg to the flat, unmoving chest and the gun that rested upon
it, clutched tightly in the hand that had spasmed shut around it in
death. The light moved again to focus on what lay beneath Mulder's
body, and Krycek found himself facing a disintegrating version of..
himself.
Sunken into the seat and covered in green goo as it was, Krycek
could still recognize his clone. The same clothes, the same slightly
recessive chin—he found that he couldn't bring himself to gaze into
his own eyes. They were probably liquid by now, anyway. Neither
could he raise the beam to witness Mulder's expression in death, for
he knew what he would see. It was better to remember the hazel eyes,
bright with fervor, and the full lips moving as he spoke—even in
anger—rather than to see the crack in his skull and the congealed
blood marring his features. It hadn't even been the real Krycek; why
had Mulder killed himself over a clone? It made no sense—as soon
as he saw the green blood he should've..
Oh, thought Krycek. Mulder was red-green color blind.
He slid to the ground, back grinding painfully against the car
door, watching as the flashlight tumbled out of his hand and rolled
into the darkness. Turned his gun over in his hands, unable to look
at it in detail, but able to feel the impression of it against his
flesh. Krycek could recall the first time he'd held one of these
with perfect clarity; he'd been struck by how smooth and cold it was,
deadly, like a snake. He had named his first gun Cobra.
You know what you have to do said the voice inside his
head, beckoning to him.
But Krycek wasn't sure, pressing fingers against the icy barrel
of his weapon, testing its weight. He wanted to touch Mulder; he
could, if he broke the glass and unlocked the door. It wouldn't be
difficult, and then he could say goodbye.
Mulder is dead. What's in the car is a husk said the
voice. It was authoritative enough, sounding vaguely like one of
his employers. There's nothing left.
His eyes squeezed shut, but there were no tears. The last
time he'd cried, he had been eight; the smoking man had ordered a
grunt to pummel and torture him until he could stand the blows
without breaking. It had taken three days.
You know what you have to do whispered the voice in
its most enticing incarnation; Mulder's voice. Follow in my
footsteps.
Graveyard II
by Meri Lomelindi
The shot sang through the chill of the air, causing Krycek to
increase his pace by a factor of ten as he navigated the narrow
aisles between the cars in the airport parking lot. He'd just
received word from one of his fellow informants of gunfire near
Mulder's last reported location, and evidently that hadn't been the
last of it. Fuck—he never should've allowed anyone else to watch
over Mulder, not even for an instant. The hired grunts seemed to be
incapable of grasping the concept that Mulder lived in constant
danger, though from his actions, he wasn't aware of it either. Only
Krycek had done the research, figured out the differences between the
Consortium's factions; now he knew who would benefit from Mulder's
untimely demise. Who wanted him alive, the resources of each brief
alliance, and the precarious threads that tied him to life. Those
resources were far from few; anything Mulder touched was a risk to
him, these days. And no one but Krycek cared enough about the
seemingly oblivious FBI agent to look out for his welfare, although
Krycek had never exactly told him so. Not that it mattered what
Mulder knew if something had happened to him during Krycek's stroll
through the Defense archives. Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck. He never
should have taken the damned job; Mulder was the priority. Some
other idiot could have erased the evidence with just as much ease.
