Real Truth, The
by Jeylan

Part 2
See part 0 for header information.


"So do I, and I wanted to keep it that way."

"So you told him ... what exactly?"

"Whatever I thought I could get him to swallow.  The more I 
flipped the shit, the happier he was.  Saved us both time.  We 
started kind of getting into a routine with it, oh, three, four 
years back.  At first it was just throw-away stuff, you know, a 
bit here a bit there, an aside, a few gags, but then as time went 
on, every now and then when I was bored I'd feed him a whole 
complicated story.  Some of them were good, too." 

Thoughtfully Krycek nodded.  "Sounds like a plan.  So where'd it 
fuck up?"

"I got tired of him taking all the credit.  Tired of being half-
strangled by tentacled sea-monsters with nothing better than a 
*cat* to guide me, tired of having my jaw wired shut and bugs 
vacuumed out of my lungs.  *Tired.*  There just came a point when 
enough was enough already.  It's not like I don't have real work 
to do, you know.  The X-files are not a joke."

On the other side of the room someone stuck some money in a 
jukebox, and Elvis started singing "Suspicious Minds."  Something 
registered in Mulder's eyes, but he kept talking. 

"So then one day the old man just called me on the job once too 
often, and I just said to him, hey, Daddy-O, can't chit-chat 
right now, I'm being abducted by aliens."

"And he *bought* it!"  The realization hit, and Krycek started to 
grin.

"Yeah.  Simple as that.  All he was worried about was what to do 
with Scully while I was gone.  I said, hell, you can think of 
something.  And he said he was up for that.  But then the thing 
is he kept calling me anyway to check up on how the abduction was 
going.  The guy just couldn't catch a clue with both hands.  I 
finally said, look, I'm being tortured, OK?  Can we talk about 
this later?  Now I'm *dead,* *OK?*  I'm buried.  Yeah, I'm in a 
coffin.  OK, yeah, right, I know, I answered my cell.  I admit 
that's kind of weird for a dead guy.  Well, yeah, I'm buried, but 
I was never embalmed because ... uh, well, you figure it out, but 
anyway I wasn't, and so I'm kind of just rotting down here 
shooting the shit with you because I have nothing better to do in 
my whole miserable failure of a non-life."  

"And he bought *that?*" Krycek gasped, holding back silent 
laughter.  

"I'm telling you, he ate it up!"

"You should've told him--" he wavered, "--told him--"  Searching 
for inspiration, Krycek's eyes skipped around the room and came 
to rest on their mousy little server.  A nasty idea took shape.  
"You should have told him you were taking a new job at an 
advertising agency, and--"

Mulder was ahead of him.  "God no!"  He looked really stricken.  
"You trying to marry me off to *Samantha Stevens?!*" 

"Yeah, you're right," Krycek conceded with a sly smile.  "I guess 
in your case that'd be out of the frying pan into the fire, 
wouldn't it?  But as ball-busters go, but you gotta admit that 
was one sexy witch."

"*Sexy?*"  Mulder's eyes bugged, and he made a show of dropping 
his jaw.  Then, nodding thoughtfully, he sat back in his seat.  
"OK," he agreed.  "I can see it.  There are possibilities."  

"*Hell* yes!  She'd've been a blast in the sack!"

Mulder tipped his head, and regarded him quizzically.  "You have 
a very strange mind, you know that, Krycek?"

"Why do you think we click?"  

"Click?  Are we clicking?"

"Cha-cha-cha."  Krycek made castanet gestures, and winked.

Mulder frowned.

"Come on, Mulder, where's your sense of humor?  Here you had this 
golden opportunity to jerk the old man's chain, you could've told 
him you were going to go live in sin with Samantha Stevens--"

"--in the Brady Bunch house--" Mulder put in--

"Yeah!  That's it!  That's so perfect!  The Brady Bunch house!"  

They were both shaking with stifled, uncomfortable laughter that 
wouldn't quite break free.  

"No!  No!  Wait!  I've got it!" Krycek choked, brushing away a 
tear.  "You should've told him Elvis came and resurrected you--"

"Yeah!  And we were jamming blues on the Mothership!"

All at once the agony of laughter cracked open, and they were 
bent double with it.  Laughing so hard they were crying.  Both of 
them.  "Would he have bought it?"  Krycek could barely get the 
words out between gasps.

"He'd have bought it!"  Mulder slapped the table.  "Hell, we 
could've done a musical!"

"You and Elvis, singing duets!"

"Hey, even the old man himself wouldn't 'dis' *The King!*"

They were both howling, and *damn* it felt good!  The little 
witch barmaid was eyeing them distastefully, and the bartender 
was sliding glances across the room like she thought it might be 
time to cut them off.  Krycek didn't care.  

But the magic moment broke, and they looked at each other warily 
again from the corners of their eyes.  Only, the questions in 
their eyes were a little different, now. 

After a while Mulder went on with his story, and his mirth faded.

"Well, anyhow," he said heavily, "so then last year I finally 
just faced up to the fact that I was never gonna get to the Truth 
as long as he was in the way.  So I gave up, tossed my cell in 
the Potomac, and told him I was on the run and I'd call him from 
a pay phone when I got the chance.  Then I didn't call."  Mulder 
shrugged.  "He tracked me down eventually, of course, and by that 
time he was desperate.  I barely recognized him.  He was a 
changed man.  He said he wanted to end it, but he didn't know 
how.  He kept saying, 'It's gotta be *deep,* the end has gotta be 
*deep,* you've gotta help me make it *deep.*'"

Mulder raised his brows at the barmaid, smiled sweetly, and 
tapped his empty beer mug.  "Two more?"

She hesitated, frowning.  Unfazed, Mulder went right on looking 
innocent until the 'Bewitched' girl, with a sigh, acquiesced.

Mulder gave Krycek a cool 'thumb's up' behind her back.

"Does the old man know 'deep' from flimflam?" Krycek asked.

"You mean Truth from fiction?  Hell no.  I suggested a summit 
meeting with the aliens, but he wouldn't go for it.  I asked to 
expose the Consortium.  No go.  I begged for just one little UFO.  
Nada.  '*Deeper,*' he kept saying, 'this is the end of the whole 
shebang, the whole ball of wax, the whole house of cards, and 
it's gotta be *deeper.*'  Finally I said, well, why don't you 
just explain the mytharc?"

"Yeah *right.*"  Krycek snorted rudely.  "Like *that* was ever 
gonna happen."

"Seemed like an obvious choice to *me.*  But we went around in 
circles for *hours,* *days,* with him hounding me, not letting me 
sleep, it was torture.  It took me a long time to figure out what 
he wanted to hear, because he wasn't being very articulate.  
Lot's of 'you know's' and deep sighs, and garbled anecdotes about 
past glory and the ocean.  But at the end I finally understood 
that the only thing he was going to go for, the only thing other 
than the ocean that he could comprehend as 'deep' was, well..."

"Let me guess," Krycek said.  "That Jesus stuff, right?  Christ 
on a cross!"

"Bloody damned right.  How'd you know?"

"A deal he tried to cut me, once," said Krycek, seeing Mulder's 
eyebrows start to climb.  "Hey, you're not the only one he tried 
it on."

"Oh?"

"Listen," Krycek said, "I don't think he really wanted it known, 
but even back when he was, well, back in the days when I almost  
-- admired -- him, even then he kind of had this *thing* about, 
you know, 'sin' ... bullshit like that."

"He really had that whole god-daddy thing goin' on, didn't he?"  
Mulder's remarked dryly.

"By-the-Book big time," Krycek agreed.  "As long as it was *his* 
book.  He was very literal-minded."

"Yeah, and after all who needs continuity when you've got big 
hair and the wrath of 'god' on your side?"

"Exactly."  Krycek raised a toast.  "Rules, regimen, and one 
right answer!  Even if it's wrong."  

Mulder was starting to smile again.  "Hellfire and damnation!"  
He clinked his glass against Krycek's.

"Gimme that old time religion!"  Krycek grinned.

"Yep."  Mulder grinned back.  "It's good enough for him!"

They both drank, eyeing each other over their beer mugs.

"You should have told him you were being abducted by angels," 
Krycek said, putting his mug on the table.  "And you'd flutter 
down to earth again when you were damn good and ready."

Mulder sighed.  "He wanted to end it; I wanted it over.  It 
mostly came down to negotiating terms.  He, uh," Mulder's voice 
dropped lower, and he looked down into the dregs of his beer.  
"He had this thing about how he wanted me and Scully together at 
the end.  Something about 'numbers.'  He wouldn't budge."

"Shit, man.  I'm sorry."

"Well, yeah.  Anyway.  Finally I was like, dude, dig it!  Me and 
the pod-Scully are in bed, I have this religious conversion 
you're so hot for, I'll say anything you want me to say, I'll 
even say I'm a failure if that's what it takes to get you to just 
leave me the fuck alone for a while."

Mulder's voice had gone like broken glass, and it hurt to listen.  
He wanted to reach out his one good hand and put it on Mulder's 
hand, but he didn't dare.  He just listened.  And drank.

"I could tell he wanted it bad, he was practically salivating, 
but even at that late stage he had just enough sense left to 
realize that maybe it, like, wasn't going to be very believable."

"That never slowed him down before," Krycek pointed out.

Another shrug.  "He promised me if I'd do this one last thing for 
him, it would be over for real and he'd never bother me again.  
But he didn't know how to pull it off.  He wanted *me* to figure 
out how to make it believable.  So I ... told him."

"You...?"

Mulder raised his eyes from his beer.  Haunted eyes.  "I told him 
how to sell it.  Simple hypnotic suggestion.  Oldest carnival 
trick in the book. You lead the subject by a process of 
emotionally charged images and associations, a sort of 
misdirection that gets past their rational defenses.  Then, when 
they're open and ready for it, you slip in whatever content you 
want.  Stuff they never would've bought if they were thinking 
clearly.  It's a sugar-coated pill.  Simple."

"Mulder!"  Krycek's mouth fell open.  "That's unethical!"

"Your point being?"

Krycek grinned so hard he didn't know if he'd be able to stop.  
"My *man!*" he crowed, and thrust up his hand for a high-five.

With quiet humor in his eyes, Mulder reached up and slapped his 
palm.  A quick smile flashed and faded.  "Well, it may be True 
that there are many universes," he said, "but we still have to 
live in this one.  When it came right down to it, it was him or 
me."  His lips curved wryly.  "And knowledge is power."

So much lost time, Krycek thought dazedly.  He had a panicky lump 
in his throat and it hit him he might be in love, but staring 
into Mulder's eyes his spirits lifted.  Mulder was still smiling.  
At *him.*  Smiling at Alex Krycek.  "We'd've made a good team, 
you know that?" he said very fast, hoping he wasn't blushing.

"Think so, huh?"

At a complete loss for words, Krycek found himself unconsciously 
echoing Elvis.  "We can't go on together with suspicious minds." 
The words blurted out, and he felt like a fool. 

"Well, we're out of the trap."  Mulder's eyes started to sparkle. 
He jerked his head towards the door.  "Come on.  Let's walk." 

They paid up, and cut out.

As they stepped out of "illiway's" together into the bracing, 
sweet night, where fidgety wind combed through the glittering 
stars that spangled the face of the sky, and the city lights 
glimmered more temptingly than they had a couple of drinks ago, 
Vishnu, the sleeping god who dreams the universe, smiled and 
shifted in his dream, tickling Brahma in his lotus, and Krycek 
very unexpectedly got the rushing, world-without-end sensation of 
fresh, unhoped for possibilities unfurling at his feet. 

Taking a chance, he clapped his hand onto Mulder's shoulder, and, 
after a half-beat pause, he was gratified to feel the weight of 
Mulder's hand on his own neck.  

Arm in arm they walked together out into the night, completely 
free agents for the first time in years.  Ever.

"Don't tell me you're seriously going to work tomorrow?" 

"Tomorrow's Monday," Mulder said.  "Of course I'm going to work.  
The world wasn't saved tonight."

"Or lost," Krycek reminded him.

"I have a hot tip from a high level government insider, that 
could really..."

They walked, and talked, and Krycek didn't care very much where 
they went, or what Mulder said... 

So long as it was really Mulder, and so long as Mulder kept 
talking...

//**Just keep talking to me, Mulder.**//

=================================================

END NOTE: LYRICS
SUSPICIOUS MINDS

We're caught in a trap
I can't walk out
Because I love you too much baby
Why can't you see
What you're doing to me
When you don't believe a word I say?
We can't go on together
With suspicious minds
And we can't build our dreams
On suspicious minds

So, if an old friend I know
  Drops by to say hello
  Would I still see suspicion in your eyes?
  Here we go again
  Asking where I've been
  You can't see the tears are real I'm crying
  We can't go on together
  With suspicious minds
  And we can't build our dreams
  On suspicious minds

Oh let our love survive
Or dry the tears from your eyes
Let's don't let a good thing die
When honey, you know I've never
Lied to you
Mmmm-mmm.....




### The End ###