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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 17, 2008 13:09:31 GMT -5
Alex Krycek was still wary and unused to this bizarre amalgam of centuries - seemingly situated more fully in the 19th, which meant that Socialism and Communism were still the same thing, all of the aristocrats still lived in Russia, and there were no plans as of yet to colonize the earth, at least not with the help of the humans inhabiting it - but it had given him a lot of freedom. Despite the discomfort that came with that, it was, nonetheless, empowering. If very guarded, and occasionally Krycek was convinced he were going mad, or in the process of it - partly because some of the things he'd seen seemed that he had to be mad to see them, and partly because his world was very internalized. If he had met someone else, it might have been different. But several months now, and nothing.
The inn was good, though. He had been staying there for two weeks, and chances were good he'd stay that way. He had managed to survive doing odd jobs in the 19th century, disabled or no, and it was less unpleasant than he would have imagined it to be. The trouble of his own identity, even aside from possible - probable - insanity, was becoming a greater issue, though, the more fallow time he had. Who was Alex Krycek if he could not be defined in terms of opposites and alignments? He'd never had to wonder about it before. It was uncomfortable. And Krycek was not panicked in discomfort, though, only very calm and confused, but it still gave rise to wonder.
As he mounted the stairway to return to his room, he took vague notice of the only other person in the hallway, but not to the degree of looking up at them - though something clicked in the back of his mind, the unused, dusty, former-Krycek parts of it, that there was something suspiciously familiar in the gait and posture, the body movements, that he would have recognized immediately in the 20th century and barely registered now.
((tag you. XD You know who you are.))
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 17, 2008 14:31:04 GMT -5
Mulder lingered outside Emilie's door, not for any nefarious purpose but just to pause and hope she'd be all right. It had been an interesting evening. For both of them, he thought. He could only imagine--
His head shot up at the intrusion, slightly startled by the new presence. Or perhaps part of him knew, vaguely, that he needed to pay attention to this one.
In the space of a heartbeat he had crossed the hall and had Krycek against the wall, his mild features suddenly intense.
"What are you doing here?" he growled, shoving the arm he had across the other man's chest harder into him. "Why are you following me?"
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 17, 2008 15:41:33 GMT -5
In Krycek's chest was suddenly a mass of conflicting feelings and a surging heartbeat, none of which was helped by being crushed by Mulder. Perhaps, a while ago, Krycek might have been able to anticipate this - although he got his ass kicked pretty regularly by Mulder, give or take a few encounters, so it was not very easy to predict who might have the upper hand - but very recently, Krycek had grown to think he would never again be crushed by Mulder into the wall, floor, or passenger's seat, depending on where they happened to be brawling.
Krycek was unsure of what to make of this. Danger, said one voice, which was the response he would normally have in this situation. But Krycek's problem with Mulder had never been so fundamental as Mulder's with Krycek; it had always been contextual, and this context was entirely different. No Syndicate, no colonists, and none for another half-century - it changed things. These days, Krycek was buying his groceries without doing double-duty staking out an operative or a future target. There was no one holding his leash; maybe there wasn't any leash anymore. What was he supposed to think of this? And hard on the heels of the wariness and tension was a strange feeling - almost relief. And they both persisted, serving to further confuse the man. Certainly he had much to beware of in Mulder, but they weren't fighting for ideals, anymore - there were no consequences for what happened between them. Krycek no longer had to watch his back - there was only looking forward, and looking forward, there only appeared to be Mulder.
And, historically speaking, this relief had some vague precedents. In a strange place, with no one else to turn to, Krycek had once before allied with Mulder. But he had certainly not been free then, and had jumped ship as soon as possible. There was none of that now. And Krycek was surprised, although not quite conscious of any of how he felt, that he should be so relieved. Here he'd been completely alone in a bizarre version of the 19th century, and here was someone not only from his time, but from his time. He'd worked with the man, driven for him, tried to kill him. Either he really was going insane, or here was proof that he wasn't.
"Following you?" he replied, almost incredulously, although with a touch of what might have been humor, both sentiments obscured by the sudden quickening of his breath in adrenaline and slight pain. His own relief and surprise at that relief certainly played a part in his reaction, which was less guarded than, perhaps, it ought to have been, although certainly not open, at least not obviously. "I didn't - what are you doing here? I - " He licked his lips, trying to grasp what he was trying to articulate, as obviously Mulder probably had as blurred a concept of "here" as Krycek did. "I live here. My room - is two doors down," he said, somewhat breathlessly, getting the words out as quickly as he could before Mulder responded as Mulder was wont - irrationally - and punched him when the words got too confusing. "What are you doing here? I've never seen you here before."
And they were valid questions, but held a certain meaninglessness that implied that the general idea of what Krycek was asking was beyond the sum of its parts. He stared at him, mouth open in an expression that was halfway between ponderment and a smile without achieving either even remotely.
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 17, 2008 16:46:32 GMT -5
He didn't believe him, because Krycek was untrustable, and it didn't help that he was just staring at Mulder with that open-mouthed fishy thing he did that reminded him forcibly of being kissed last time they met, which was odd even apart from it including a gun. He'd conveniently forgotten that bit, while he'd been here, and he resented thinking about it now. It was just some stupid Eurotrash thing Krycek had picked up along with the leather and ability to continually have five-days'-worth of stubble without ever shaving.
"You're always following me," he shot back irrationally, and leaned back to punch him in the face. "Who sent you here? Huh? Answer me, Krycek!" For surely, if Krycek was here it was no coincidence. And it meant someone else knew he, Mulder, was here too. It meant he was being watch. And it meant this was far more than an accident.
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 17, 2008 17:10:48 GMT -5
Krycek laughed, a release of tension for him that was probably not very wise in light of Mulder's fondness for hitting him very hard and the fact that he looked very prepared to do it now. "Always? Always? They put me onto bigger things than you, Mulder. And I'm not on you now." The smile faded somewhat from his face. He had been about to turn conversation onto a different topic, one involving protesting his innocence, and it reminded him of the strangeness of it, that odd in-between feeling that he didn't know what to do with.
"I wasn't sent," said Krycek, looking back at him. "Or I can't remember it. I can't even remember what I was doing when I came here, or what I was doing to begin with. It's all something of a blur." And this was true. He had tried, but he could remember vague little things about what he must have been doing in the 20th century before he wound up here, but nothing specific, certainly not how it had happened. And he couldn't remember the early days here very well, either, nothing specific. He could recall wandering around a bit, and that was it. It was ridiculous - nowadays, as he knew, Russians all spoke French, but he only spoke Russian, and what the hell good was it?
But he smiled again, still rather incongruously. The fact that Mulder was shouting at him as always was weirdly comforting. "And do you even know where here is? Everyone I ask seems to have a different answer. Generally they agree it's somewhere in the 1880s mark, but I ran into a dishy blond who said it was Valentine's Day, 1900. I mean... what is this, some kind of gopher hole in the world I happened to have the bad luck to trip in?" And it went unsaid that Mulder had also tripped in that gopher hole. He was wondering if it was not accidental that they were both here, although he was certain that while they might be there for the same reason, it hadn't been planned by anyone they knew back home. No one could plan this madhouse.
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 17, 2008 17:41:07 GMT -5
Mulder hit him anyway, for good measure and because he was asking reasonable questions. Krycek had exactly two functions, which were related: to betray him, and then to be Mulder's punching bag when he couldn't reach the people actually pulling the strings. He had no call to be asking Mulder anything or expecting him to be helpful.
The truth was, he didn't remember why or how he got here, either. The idea that Krycek, of all people, had landed here in the same exact manner--any entirely innocent--was offensive to him.
"I don't trust you," he said, managing to be succinct and obvious at once.
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 17, 2008 18:19:02 GMT -5
Krycek muffled a groan - or a grunt, or any of those other comic-book reactions expected of him which he duly gave, Alex Krycek not being one to disappoint in those matters - at the punch, but it didn't seem that Mulder quite had the heart to now drag him over by the collar and throw him down the stairs, and if he was just going to hit him now it was not nearly so bad as how things could go.
And, after all, Krycek was not, for all his survival instincts, very good at saving his skin when it came to bantering with Mulder. "How many options do you have? There isn't anyone else you know here, is there? As far as this context goes..." He sniffed from the punching, but managed a lopsided and somewhat know-it-all smile, and lifted his right hand in the air to show he had no intentions to do anything shady with it. "I trust you, don't I?"
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 17, 2008 18:47:26 GMT -5
"That's both unlikely, irrelevant, and stupid of you," Mulder countered. Not to mention arrogant, none of which was out of character for Alex Krycek. He really didn't feel like throwing him down the stairs, though; he had enough presence of mind to remember they were in an inn in the 1800's and that he was in danger of being carted away. Plus, it might wake Emilie up. "As to my options, I don't see how including you in them broadens my chances for success. In any endeavor."
How he hated this man. His skin itched with it. Watching from afar, in another man's skin, he might have had his suspicions about two good-looking and slightly androgynous manly-men who needed to make some sort of contact whenever they met. But he hated Krycek too much to think about motives.
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 18, 2008 17:47:13 GMT -5
Of course, Mulder's antagonism for him was almost making the air heavier, but Krycek seemed to be in indeterminably good spirits at his presence, and by this point of his life, he had managed to overcome the naive demand that Mulder approve of him even when he was doing things the man was bound to hate. Once upon a time, he might have lingered on this, just as hostile as Mulder was at the injustices of the universe, but that, he liked to think, belonged to his Black Period, which he was over now. He took almost a Buddhist view towards life these days, moral ambiguities aside; he was detached enough to appreciate Mulder without needing to be appreciated back. Not that it wouldn't stop him from trying to persuade Mulder in another direction - detached by no means meant resigned.
"Sticking together, you don't see how that helps? Think about it. You're here and I'm here and we're from the same place. Aren't the chances good we got here the same way? If we ever get back, it would be the same way, too, wouldn't it," said Krycek, his own relief at seeing Mulder starting to settle. "God, I thought I was going crazy before. But now this...now you...I finally start to realize I'm sane."
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 18, 2008 18:10:13 GMT -5
Mulder, of course, just thought Krycek was cocky. Which meant that his opinion of him hadn't changed all that much, except in intensity.
"The last time I agree to that, you betrayed me. Again," Mulder said. "Seeing you doesn't prove anything at all to me. Except I might be in Hell. Either that, or it's just a worse-than-usual day ending in 'y.'"
He wondered if the man would go away if he punched him again. Probably not. Krycek never knew what was good for him. Probably wouldn't have lost that arm, if he'd listened to him before...
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 18, 2008 18:23:15 GMT -5
"The last time you agreed to that," said Krycek, countering, although not with the defensive attitude normally associated with the action, "we were in a Russian gulag run by men from the project, trying to come up with a vaccine for the black oil." That this would make all the world of difference to Krycek and not to Mulder did not occur to him; he was thoroughly convinced of the importance of context in ethics and in his relationship with Mulder, an idea so deeply entrenched that it never consciously occurred to him that things could go otherwise. When he said this, it had the air of one waiting for the other to epiphany. "Anyway, then as now, you need me more than you're willing to say. Maybe I betrayed you, but how far would you have gotten in Russia without me?"
As far as Krycek was concerned, this was entirely correct. Besides, he would probably not have let Mulder stay in Tunguska forever. He'd have arranged some kind of transfer before the man died. It also did not occur to Krycek that there would have ever been, under any circumstances, any more that he could do, or any more that he should do. And this also seemed very charitable to Krycek, considering how Mulder and A. D. Skinner had treated him before they'd gone on the little vacation in the first place. Perhaps, had Krycek been of a past mind, he might have brooded on that and Mulder's treatment. He didn't now. He only pressed further, attempting to persuade. "And the last time we met... Mulder... I could have killed you." He tilted his head, almost imploringly looking back at him. "Don't you remember? Gun pointed at your face? I even gave the gun back."
Yes, didn't Mulder remember, the European kiss on the cheek, the information, Krycek's rather enlightened behavior for a cripple? Krycek also never considered the possibility that this would seem more like cowardice than charity to Mulder, as Krycek had never thought of himself as a coward, not even during the throes of an inferiority complex.
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 18, 2008 19:02:16 GMT -5
"I remember you being a complete pansy," Mulder said. "And some clever banter, on my part, at least." He had no idea what Krycek now wanted from him, what ridiculous farce he wanted to draw Mulder into this time. Naturally his own code wouldn't allow him to comprehend Krycek's suggestion that things were different now. He might have understood it, intellectually, given time; but he didn't want time, he just wanted Krycek out of his life. Why was the man always pouting so earnestly at him? He had to assume that it was some sort of masochism.
"Nothing to suggest I should actually trust you, you bastard. How do you suppose things are supposed to work now, huh? I'm supposed to just walk into your little trap again? Do you ever stop scheming?"
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 19, 2008 12:44:57 GMT -5
The insults flew right over his head, or perhaps saying he brushed them off was a better metaphor, for he certainly heard and understood them, but did not take them to heart. He had learned not to struggle to defend himself to Mulder. Beyond not having any reaction, it was as true of persuasion as it was of training dogs that giving any strong reaction at all only encouraged unwanted behavior.
"You say such dirty things," said Krycek with a shrug. "That's just it. I don't know how things are going to work out. I'm in the 19th century." He looked at him, eyes rather bright, as he tried, guilelessly, to communicate with him. "Do you understand that? Everything is gone. There is no project. There is nothing to protect, and nothing to protect myself from." He raised his eyebrows, almost expectantly, although without any sort of sauciness. Well, mostly. "Unless you're planning on hitting me again. Honestly, though, if that's the worst that could happen, my luck has changed."
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Post by Fox Mulder on Nov 19, 2008 13:24:40 GMT -5
Krycek had, at first, reminded Mulder forcibly of a puppy. A gangling, if attractive puppy, panting after him eagerly without truly knowing what he wanted. Of course, that was before he'd been exposed as a rat bastard, but he found himself reminded of this again now. There was something so earnest in the man's expression--not that Mulder could trust it, but he was working it.
"You just want to survive," Mulder stated flatly, not believing or disbelieving him. "And you think I'm a better bet than nothing." He could hit him again, he considered, but it never seemed to have much effect. Though it made him feel a little better, for a short while. "Or maybe you just want me to hit you again. It's more action than you usually get, I'd bet."
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Post by Alex Krycek on Nov 19, 2008 15:37:40 GMT -5
Krycek didn't argue the point. Mulder failed to realize that it was more than just surviving - Krycek had been surviving without Mulder, and had he never known Mulder was in this place with him he would have continued to survive all the same - but he was close enough. But from that standpoint, Krycek did not consciously delve into his reasons. He could logically say his relief was due to simply seeing someone he knew, proof that he was not going insane, perhaps he could even have said someone he respected. (Though Mulder'd probably whack him for it.) But it did not seem to relate back to his - almost eagerness - to communicate with Mulder. He didn't give it much thought.
He smiled, almost unguardedly, but not, as the statement brought up a number of memories that Krycek was not interested in going into, and certainly was going to keep secret from Mulder. And he also felt more secure with Mulder cracking jokes, even bad-humored ones. "From you, anyway. Are you coming onto me, Mulder?"
Which was not really the wisest thing to say to someone who was likely to hit him.
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