All good things must come to an end... wasn't that the saying? And what about
the bad things? Did the same apply? Perhaps the saying ought to be just 'all
things come to an end'.
I look across the room, waiting patiently as they lead Mulder down the long
corridor to where the 'guests' sit ready to witness the end. It was a foregone
conclusion that they'd give him the death penalty now that there was no one left
to protect him or to bear witness in his defense. Of course, moving the trial
here was a giveaway to their true intentions for they could just as easily tried
him in West Virginia, but that state has no power to pass the death penalty.
Nevertheless, his record of insanity ought to have saved him but they decided he
was sane enough to have understood that it was against the law to kill a man in
cold blood, even if he did think Rohrer was not a man... least not a HU-man.
He seemed very subdued as the guard indicated the chair, though I could see
the fine tremor in his lanky frame as he took, then let out, a deep breath. He
sat down, not flinching as they strapped his arms and legs, quietly facing the
men and women who had come to watch him die. I glanced around at their faces,
seeing a myriad of expressions from unholy glee to despair. Surprisingly, Walter
Skinner was one of those who despaired.
Maybe he feels guilty for getting away with cold-blooded murder... mine, I
thought viciously
I touched the centre of my forehead, rubbing the unmarked skin absent-mindedly
as I recalled that moment when my whole life flashed across my eyes at the speed
of a striking bullet. I'd done so much that I regretted, but I had many more
regrets for actions I hadn't taken, and for tasks I'd left undone.
Is that why I'm still here?
I always figured that I was due an eternity of fire and brimstone and,
certainly, there was no bright light waiting for me on the day I died; no
beloved standing at the edge of death to greet me, to help me cross over; not
even one of my victims waiting to give me a brutal push over the edge of the
abyss to fall into the fiery depths of hell.
I suppose I could understand the lack of loved ones. I didn't really know my
parents, and I had no siblings. I spent my childhood passed around relatives and
foster families that wanted the money rather than me, until the State gave me to
Spender... and, though dead, he was no beloved.
What about friends?
I was always a loner though I made a few acquaintances that could, laughingly,
be called friends until our life paths went in different directions. I tried not
to keep in touch with the decent people, not wanting to taint them with the
shadowy world in which I lived. In my world of conspiracies a true friend was a
liability; someone who could be used to bring you to your knees, to force you
into doing something against your desires or wishes. I had no intention of
letting anyone get close enough to me for that to happen.
Good intentions... the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Another of those damn sayings. I'm beginning to feel like a cliché for spouting
them but in his case it is the truth. His good intentions, my good
intentions... and where in hell did it lead us?
I watched the doctor raise the needle, inspecting it solemnly. What was he
looking for? Was he checking it was sharp enough? Was he checking it was clean?
That thought made me laugh. The injection was supposed to be lethal anyway,
wasn't it? So Mulder was unlikely to be hanging around long enough to die of
AIDS or any number of other diseases that could be caused by dirty needles. I
suppose he just wants to make sure he's being as humane as possible so no one
could ever accuse the State of making someone suffer unduly while they killed
them.
Yeah, more good intentions.
Not long now. I can see the vein bulging as it is brought to the surface with a
few taps. Mulder doesn't look down. Is he afraid of needles? Or has his
curiosity finally deserted him, no longer interested in committing every single
detail to that beautiful, eidetic memory?
Or perhaps he just doesn't want the sight of that needle to be the last thing he
sees.
I follow the direction of his eyes to see if he is looking at anyone in
particular. Scully, perhaps? But no, his eyes are on the plain wall above the
heads of the witnesses, focussed on no one, and then I see that they are not
focussed at all. Fox William Mulder has already left this room far behind.
What—or who—are you thinking of, Mulder?
The needle slides into the prominent vein and is taped down as a lethal quantity
of a short-acting barbiturate, in combination with a chemical paralytic agent,
is fed into him.
It acts quickly, though violently, and a collective sigh escapes the witnesses
as the doctor pronounces him dead, but I already knew that. I saw the very
moment that he died; saw the bright aura glowing around his body as his soul
surrendered his physical form.
I smiled but it wasn't enough. I started to grin as he floated from his body,
recalling my own amazement as I turned to look down on the empty husk that had
once housed my spirit. He was no different in that respect. He looked down at
himself, eyes wide in horror and amazement as he discovered the answer to one of
his damned X-Files... what happens when you die.
He was beautiful; his hair shimmering in all shades of gold and brown; his
chameleon eyes glittering with a vitality that had been missing over these last
few years of his corporal existence. His lips were a dusky rose, full and
inviting; his cheeks stained with a warm pink flush. His long limbs no longer
seemed lanky; the strong fingers no longer clawed by tensed muscles. The edges
of his naked body were hazy, incorporeal... but I knew every line by sight
though not by touch.
He sensed me, and he turned away from the unreality of his death scene; from the
movement of the doctor and guards, and from the murmuring and sobbing of the
witnesses. It all faded until there was only him and me on a vast plain of
emptiness.
"Krycek."
My grin faded to a wry smile as the first sign of ugliness entered this
beautiful moment; my name falling from those generous lips as a curse. Moments
later he was upon me; those wonderful hands bundled into fists that struck at
me; his lips pulled back in a snarl of rage and his eyes were almost as black as
his emotions.
Damn, but I didn't think I could hurt... not anymore... but the blows sent
spikes of pain lancing through to the core of my being. I shoved back hard and
sent his spirit form tumbling away from me. He came to rest, crouching low as he
turned and glared at me... and then he frowned as the realisation set in.
"Am I dead?"
"We both are, Mulder."
He closed his eyes. "So this is my hell... doomed to spend eternity here with
you."
Strange how one man's hell is another man's heaven; at least this would have
been my idea of heaven if... There I go again, spouting clichés.
"What were you expecting? A bright light at the end of a long, dark tunnel? Your
mother floating just above you with a warm, loving smile on her face... and a
beckoning finger? 'Let me lead you to the light' and all that crap?" I sighed
deeply.
"Sorry, Mulder. There's just me here."
"Sorry, Mulder, there's just me here."
I couldn't believe it. How many times had I sought answers to this particular
question: Is there life after death?
I'd spoken to so many people during my life and I'd formed some kind of scenario
in my head of what to expect when the end of my life came... but this was not
it. Perhaps this was some kind of waiting place, and I'd zip away any moment to
be reborn in a new body, quickly forgetting that I was once Fox William Mulder.
If that was the case, though, then why was he here? Why hadn't he been...
recycled? He'd died over two years ago... a full year before I was incarcerated
in prison, living out my existence as appeal after appeal was denied for a
murder where they couldn't even produce a credible body.
Or maybe time has no meaning here in this... this greyness.
I stared at him, and noticed that he was clothed while I was crouching here
naked. He was dressed as I remembered him most; a pale tee-shirt, those tight
black jeans, black boots and the ever-present leather jacket. Funny, but I could
smell the leather; so warm and worn, it was a scent I always associated with
him.
I noticed other things about him too; the left hand was, once more, a perfect
match to the right. Hmmm... so it didn't matter if you died with missing
pieces... but when I looked into his face I felt a pain shoot right through me.
I'd never truly noticed how beautiful he was until this moment. His hair was a
deep mahogany, glinting with strands of fiery red; dark lashes framed his clear
green eyes; his pink lips glistened as he licked them delicately, and his nose
twitched as he sniffed lightly, crinkling at the bridge when he frowned.
With his dark eyebrows and almost elfin ears I was hard-pressed to decide if he
was an angel or a demon. Whichever... he was a torment; almost too beautiful to
behold. How had I missed this while we were alive?
I frowned... suddenly recalling how I had stood there, hard and unyielding,
while Skinner murdered him.
"Is that why we're here? Because I stood by and did nothing to save you?"
"A ghost haunting a ghost? Now there's a thought. Don't recall that in any of
your X-Files."
I watched as Alex brushed the back of his hand across his bruised lip, smearing
a vibrant red that almost could have been blood... but that wouldn't make any
sense as, if we were ghosts then we didn't have a body that could hurt or
bleed.
I pinched my own flesh—hard—and the expected pain came to me; radiating
out from the self-inflicted injury.
"I can't be dead and still feel. Therefore... I'm not dead. I'm not dead."
"Could be worse."
"What?"
"Could be in a worse place than here with me."
I ignored him. "I'm not dead so you're just a figment of my imagination—"
"What's the point of hell if you cannot feel it? What's the point of eternal
suffering without pain, Mulder?"
"I wasn't supposed to die like that." I whispered the words, recalling how I was
once told that I would die from auto-erotic asphyxiation... and I saw him frown,
then grin as if he had heard all of my words, even the ones unspoken.
"Clyde Bruckman died that way."
My eyebrows rose in shock, mostly because he had heard those words but also
because I'd always assumed Bruckman had aimed those fatalistic words at me. I'd
been so wrapped up in this particular vision of my own death that it had never
occurred to me to associate Bruckman's death on that same level. Had Bruckman
seen my death but had been too caught up in the sudden image of his own to tell
me mine?
"Probably," Alex replied.
I sat down and faced this demon disguised as an angel. He seemed to glide across
the distance separating us, floating to the ground in a graceful heap beside me.
"If you have all the answers, Alex, then why do you think we're here?"
"Unfinished business."
I grinned. During my years investigating the paranormal I'd come to the
conclusion that the spirits of the departed hung around because they had
'unfinished business' with the living... but we were both dead... and I could
not see a living soul around here... literally. There was just the two of us in
this grey, misty world where it was almost impossible to tell up from down.
I paused on that thought. Was this why we were here in this nowhere place?
Because once we had concluded our unfinished business then we'd be heading in
different directions? I smirked. I knew which way Krycek was headed, so that
meant I'd be...
I felt a shiver of dismay race through me. He was a liar, a cheat and a
murderer. As far as I was concerned, he had been heading for the great fall long
before we first met so why did I feel bad about the thought of him going to
hell?
"We all lie, Mulder. To others, to ourselves... and we all cheat too."
"We don't all go around murdering—"
"Don't we?"
I swallowed hard, recalling why I had died, and then I remembered that Rohrer
wasn't human and, probably, wasn't dead. After all, Billy Miles had come back
several times, even after being crushed in a garbage truck. Still, Alex had a
point, so if we were both destined for hell then what were we doing here in this
grey wasteland? Perhaps I'd been right in the first place. Perhaps this was
hell, though the thought of being stuck here for all eternity with Alex Krycek
no longer seemed such a terrible punishment for my transgressions in life. I
asked him again, hoping he wouldn't go all obtuse on me and respond to my
questions with cryptic ones of his own.
"Why am I here, Alex? Why are you here?"
"I... I don't know. Just get the feeling that we have unfinished business."
"And then what will happen? Will we go our separate ways?"
"I don't know."
He leaned forward suddenly, and kissed me. Just the slightest brush of his lips
against mine but it left them tingling. I licked my lips, surprised that I could
taste him upon them; something alien and yet something so wonderfully familiar.
"That's where I should have kissed you that day."
My hand rose to touch my right cheek, recalling the feel of his dry lips upon my
flesh all those years ago. Long forgotten desire swept through me, rekindling a
flame of passion that I thought had burned out many years ago. How could I have
forgotten the way he made me feel with just a look? There was a time when I
burned for his touch but the pain of the intervening years had doused the fire
until I truly believed there was nothing left. How long had I been fooling
myself?
Old hurts reared up; visions of my father lying on his bathroom floor, a trickle
of blood falling from his slack mouth as the life flowed out of him. But Alex
had not done this... and how I knew was a mystery but it paved the way for me to
accept the feelings growing within me as I looked upon the angelic face. There
were other hurts; of betrayal, of frustration... both his and mine... and guilt
too as I recalled the way I did nothing while Walter Skinner put a single bullet
through the smooth forehead.
The urge to touch him became overpowering. I ran my hand down his flank from
waist to thigh, enjoying the tactile sensation of silken skin beneath the pads
of my fingers, not concerned that he had been clothed only moments earlier. It
wasn't important, and it had no meaning in this grey realm that lay beyond life.
I took him in my arms and kissed him, feeling a sense of homecoming as I
possessed his mouth; arrogantly claiming him as I forced him back to the soft,
almost-insubstantial ground. He wrapped his arms around me, holding me to him
with equal ferocity; his long legs curling around mine, holding me tightly
pressed against his yearning body. I could feel the heat of his passion searing
me; warming parts of my soul that I thought would never feel anything but the
coldness of my lonely existence.
Part of me always believed that earthly pleasures would be lost when death
claimed the body; that carnality of the flesh had no place in heaven or hell.
I was wrong. Oh, I was so wrong.
I was so wrong.
I was so wrong to believe that I had no beloved to lead me to the light. As
Mulder lay claim to me I gave myself with equal passion; hungry for his touch,
yearning for the heat of his love to fill me. He plundered my mouth with his;
his hands arrogantly holding me, stroking me, caressing me. His fingers opened
me to him and I sighed in completion as he possessed me, deeply, fully, feeling
all the love I had held onto so tightly released in one transcendental moment of
blinding passion as I gave myself to him completely.
A white light surrounded me; surrounded him, engulfing us in its brilliance; so
strong I could not look into it but neither could I look away. We were
falling... falling... but all my fears of hell and eternal damnation were gone.
I knew eternity was beckoning to us, but we were going into the light—
together.
Yes. I was wrong. I was wrong to believe that all good things came to an end.
How could they when they started on the very edge of eternity?
THE END
All Things Must End
by Tarlan
