fic: Wotan's Day 14/16
Title: Wotan's Day
Fandoms: Highlander, X-files, Invisible Man
Rating:NC-17 overall, PG-13 this chapter.
Disclaimer: Don't own 'em.
Background:The year is 2023. Methos, the oldest of the Immortals in Highlander, was living as a corporate lawyer in Denver. Alexander Krycek, the double-dealing ratboy of the X-Files, was living there as an art dealer, running a gallery in Aurora, Colorado. Mulder was retired, somewhere suburban.
Summary: Epiphanies, revelations, and short, sharp shocks.
Chapter 1
(Chapters link sequentially from there.)
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Sorry, dear. But there is always a last mistake.
Time Enough For Love
Krycek would be out of it for several hours, given the drugs I had put in him. I took a deep breath, then let out the tension surgery always brought. I could have that confidence, that disconnected certainty that surgery requires, but today it was not easy for me to maintain. Plus, I had decisions to make.
I called MacLeod, got his phone mail, and left no message. Then I thought for a long time, and called Betty.
"Oh. My. God. Mr. Bierce is that you? You look deranged. I thought you were dead. Everyone thinks that you're dead, except for that obnoxious woman from the DCI, and why in the world are they asking questions about where you went to high school?"
"Nice to see you too, Betty," I said. "What obnoxious woman from the DCI?"
"An agent Nield. She's called about six times in the last few days, asking questions, all the same questions about you and where you're from, and all that." Betty interrupted herself. "What in the world are you thinking with those lip rings? They're no disguise, you know, not from anyone who knows you."
"Sasha liked them," I said, and resisted the urge to run my tongue across them. Betty might read pornography about television characters on her lunch hour, but the real thing might cause her embarrassment.
"Sasha! Are you with him? Are you two back together?"
"We got married."
"Oh, how romantic!"
"Betty," I said, in my best lawyer voice to forestall any further enthusiasm, and to avoid telling her that it wasn't Matty and Sasha that got married.
"Mr. Bierce," she answered, pulling herself back into the role of my good right arm.
"What has happened in the Olympian Chemical case? All I know is what was on the news."
"Oh, well, it seemed that when they discovered you wouldn't be representing them personally, they decided not to fight it. I must say that Heyn wasn't best pleased, but he's handled the press well, I think."
I puzzled over the news. What did I have to do with their legal stance? "Did they give any detailed information about their change of heart?"
Betty shook her head. "They seemed to know you were out of the picture before the story hit the news feeds. Are you going to tell me what happened?"
"I was kidnapped," I said, feeling as if a long time had passed between then and now, but it had only been four days.
"Oh, Mr. Bierce! Do you think it had something to do with the case?"
It was only when she asked the question that I wondered if that were true. From what Krycek had told me, Olympian was central to the plans of the Consortium, and that there had been disagreements within the group of codgers before. But as their attorney, I could have taken any change of legal approach in stride. Perhaps the kidnapping was a show, and perhaps it had to do with Krycek, as the old man had told me. Maybe the two were tied together.
"You may have something there," I answered Betty.
"How did you get away?"
"I had help. If someone named Bobby Hobbes comes looking for me, help him out in any way you can."
"Yes, sir. I can't wait to hear the story, and I can't wait to go into the office and tell them you're alive."
"Don't do that," I said, harsher than intended, then softened my voice. "If I'm going to get to the bottom of this, I'll need to stay dead for a while."
"All right."
"But I'll need your help."
"Anything you need."
"Don't we have a complete set of information on Olympian from cases over the years? I need a list of all of their physical facilities."
"What are you looking for?"
"An army."
She blinked at me for a moment and then said, "You're not joking."
"It's a small army. Just under a thousand men. They may have been scattered or they may be in one place, but I'm guessing the location is somewhat remote. It could be an agricultural processing plant or even a mine from the materials company."
"I'll look to see if I can find anything on recent shipments to the areas, purchases of food and clothing," she said.
"Good idea. When do you think you'll have this?"
"Late tomorrow for some of it. There won't be anyone in tomorrow, so it should go faster."
Tomorrow was Sunday. "I'll need it by Monday morning. I've got an idea."
"For what?"
"Betty, you probably shouldn't know. It could be dangerous."
"Well, at least this is more exciting than most corporate litigation."
I looked affronted, and wondered whether it worked with my new hair and piercings. "I thought you liked your job."
"I liked you. The work was okay." She looked at me for a moment. "You're not coming back, are you?"
"I don't think so. At best, I'll end up in the Witness Protection Program." As the words came out, I finalized an exit strategy. "Let's try to keep Mathias Bierce dead."
She nodded. "This number comes up as Matthew Mason."
"Yes. Matthew Mason married Sasha, only under another name. Don't worry, my Last Will and Testament will stay intact."
"What do you mean? Sasha has a different name, too? Are you two in hiding? What will?"
"Sasha was in hiding, it turns out." I let her make of that what she would. No doubt some scenario of his escape from something sordid and Russian was already spinning in her head. "Look, I have to go now. Call this number as soon as you have something."
"All right," she said. "I'm glad you're not dead, Mr. B-- Er, Matthew."
"I picked it so you could still call me Matty," I smiled and added, "to my face."
She pinked, and I said good-bye, then closed the phone. Krycek slept in a drugged stupor, leaning back in the seat with the headrest nearly in the lap of Kaos's corpse. He would need someone to care for him, I thought, until his right hand healed. I was tempted to let him fend for himself, but that wouldn't do. Now was not the time to resolve it, though. I had to flesh out one plan before launching another.
This time MacLeod answered his phone.
"Methos."
He used my name, so I knew he was alone.
"Where have you been?" I asked.
"More important, where are you. What's going on? Mulder and Johnson can't raise Gantt."
"He's dead."
"How?"
"A neat bullet hole in the middle of the forehead, courtesy of my husband."
He looked pained. "You could have less murderous taste in men. Kronos, and now Krycek. I wonder what came in between."
"Alexa," I answered. I hadn't thought about that delicate and doomed beauty in too long, about the one year we had before illness took her. Less than two ten-thousandths of a percent of my life, and it still hurt.
MacLeod closed his eyes, nearly wincing, then recovered himself. "We all have it in us, blah, blah, blah, good and evil, yeah, yeah, I get it. What about Corrivubias? And what happened with Kaos?"
"He shot Corrivubias, too. She's probably dead. Hobbes should have survived, though."
"Who's Hobbes, and what about Kaos?"
"I killed Kaos." I held up the phone so MacLeod could see the corpse. "Hobbes is a long story. He's in his seventies, talks a mile a minute, and I think he works for me. I left him back at the compound, but I think he'll be okay. He was wearing body armor."
"And how is your husband?" MacLeod asked.
"Out cold. I sliced open the back of his hand, and had to stitch it back together."
To my surprise, MacLeod took it in stride. "You didn't kill him?"
"It wasn't like he'd broken a leg," I said, joking, yet not, and he knew it. "Look, I have an idea about what to do about the clones."
"Do you know where they are?"
"No, but I have my secretary working on it."
"You have a secretary?"
"Bierce does, and before you ask, yes I trust her to keep quiet about the fact that I'm alive. Point being, Olympian Chemical was one of my clients, and I would guess they have the clones at one of their more remote facilities. She's checking locations, and seeing if she can track food and clothing shipments that would indicate a large group of people."
"And then what? You wouldn't believe how hard it was with just twenty of them, and only Mulder and I to take the Quickenings."
That was a bit of news. "So he's one of us now, is he?"
"Aye."
"How's he taking it?"
"Hard to say yet."
I swallowed, and asked, "You shared Quickenings? Do you feel a connection to him, like we did after Bordeaux?"
"Yes. I don't think he knows that it's not normal for us."
"You going to take him as a student?"
"Good God, no." He shook his head. "No students. Not now, not ever."
"Never is a long time, MacLeod. Besides, doesn't he wake up your protective urges?"
The answer to my sarcasm was wordless, but even through the screen resolution of the phone, I could see the sour expression.
"Krycek is in love with him," I said.
"They deserve each other," MacLeod said, then added in feigned apology, "Not to criticize your husband, of course."
I half shrugged. "I just criticized him with a knife down the back of his hand. He won't be able to hold a gun or put on his own prosthesis for several weeks."
"Right," he said. He did not have to say more. He knew I had done it so Krycek couldn't do anything more that would make me have to kill him. "So, what's your plan?"
"We find the clones, we get the government to do our dirty work."
"What?"
"Think about it. We can't manage almost thousand Immortals. Let them do it. I turn state's evidence against Olympian Chemical with everything I have on them, which starts with illegal cloning and continues with some dirty business secrets I have in the files of my law office."
"And revealing the existence of Immortals when they try to kill the clones," MacLeod said.
"I don't think so. I think the Watchers can handle that aspect of it. Why don't you run the idea by Agent Johnson."
"And tell her that her partner is dead," he added
"I'm sorry about that. There was nothing I could do."
"Right."
In almost every language there's a way for a one-word agreement to mean the opposite. "MacLeod, I am not heartless. I am sorry. For what it's worth, I liked him."
"Too bad it didn't happen the other way around. From what Mulder has told me, your husband is a complete rat."
"You have no idea," I said, glancing over and remembering. "Besides, ask Mulder what happened last time someone shot Krycek in the head. He's tougher than he looks."
We rang off, and I sat back to think. Instead of concentrating on how to get the government and the Watchers to solve our clone problem, I found myself remembering Alexa. She was far tougher than she looked, as well, but in her spirit and not, sadly, her body.
But that, I realized, was part of why I loved her. Even five thousand years of life leaves room for epiphanies. I loved her more because she was broken, incurably ill, yet full of life and unbowed. Was choosing Krycek a reversion to the patterns that kept me with a mad killer like Kronos for so many centuries?
No. He was broken, too. I looked over, and looked at how the lines on his face and the hard expression that had come with the name Krycek had smoothed in sleep. There I saw Sasha, the skin Krycek had worn that covered his essential isolation, and the person Krycek could have been. Sasha had a flawed body, but he lived with it like Alexa had lived with her illness: ignore it when possible, and never let it interfere with living. Krycek was something different, angrier.
I remembered how he reacted when I told him I thought of him as my husband, and I realized my missed opportunity. That would have been the moment to crack him open at that broken flaw of loneliness. It would not have been hard.
In the last few centuries, it seemed I loved fragile things.
I reached over and ran a finger down his sleeping cheek. I had to be honest. Many of the things I had liked about Sasha were elements of Krycek showing through the mask. I had liked the mystery of why he went armed. I liked the cruelty, in a way, although as Matty and Sasha we had contained it to commentary on the world around us. Sasha was amusing, sometimes intriguing, but Krycek was an invigorating challenge, and so very delicate in his way. Sex with Krycek had fulfilled the promise of Sasha's restraint.
Yes, well, none of that again any time soon. I pushed the threatening emotions back down.
I stepped out of the car to void my bladder, then settled in to wait until the coast was clear.
~~~~~
Mulder opened the door to MacLeod's knock. "What is it?" he asked, opening to let both MacLeod and Johnson in.
"Gantt's dead."
He looked at Johnson, and her lips were tight.
"How? Krycek?"
MacLeod nodded. "We have an idea. Well, Matt has an idea."
Mulder held up a hand and turned to Johnson. "Has anyone found anything on Nield?"
"She went to Florida. Some secretary finally turned up a voicemail that said she was going to take care of something with her elderly parents. She took a flight to Tampa, and rented a car."
"Is she leading us to the clones, or away from them?"
Johnson shrugged. She was too professional to cave in. "I suppose we need to book tickets, then."
MacLeod shook his head. "Hear us out, first. There may be a way to take out Olympian Chemical through the DCI. Matt was one of their outside attorneys, and he can bring in additional dirt to illegal cloning."
"What does he want for this help?" Mulder had no love for lawyers, but one who could marry Krycek gained a whole new layer of manipulative bastard. "What's in it for him?"
"Witness protection program. A new identity."
"He's pulled that off already, He went from Mathias Bierce to Paul Adamson to Matthew Mason in less than three days."
"Yes, but this would be cleaner for him, give him a chance to start over without having to die."
Mulder considered, then asked, "What about Krycek?"
Johnson looked up. "What?"
"You heard me. What happens to him? We were set up on this from the beginning. Or were you in on it, too?"
MacLeod cut in. "Matthew has Krycek and Kaos. Kaos is dead. Krycek has lost the use of his right hand."
"How did that happen?"
"Matthew did it. Seemed Krycek tried to kill him."
"I can't say I'm surprised," Mulder said
"What's that?" asked Johnson.
"Did you know he was working for Skinner?"
From the look on her face, Mulder had his answer. She hadn't known.
~~~~~
Krycek's moans woke me. I hadn't intended to doze off, but he'd given me very little sleep last night. The sun was low, and there was quiet, not even the noise of tires on the distant road. It might be time to head back to town, although I would need to do something about the corpse. Better to burn it, I thought, but couldn't see how to do it without making matters worse with the authorities. DCI would have enough trouble covering my tail without making it worse. I moved the branches that blocked in the car, pushed Kaos's body to lie in the seat and covered it as well as I could with the tarp, then started the engine. By the time we got back to the hotel, it was almost dark, and I was hungry.
"Wake up."
Krycek stirred, but he was more awake than he let on.
"Come on, sleeping beauty, let's get you up to the room."
"You're a cheerful bastard," he groaned. "Are you always like this when you maim your lovers?"
"Yes," My smile couldn't have been more cold. "Up we go." I helped him out of the car and up the stairs.
I fished his key card out of my pocket, and led him inside. He was passive as I took off his leather jacket and shirt, then unhooked his prosthetic. He tried to flex his fingers.
"Give that a week or three," I said, as he hissed in pain. I handed him a Tylenol. It was all the painkiller left in the med kit. He took it from me and put it in his pocket, hissing at the pain of moving his hand.
"What are you going to do to me?"
"Nothing, dear boy."
"What, no rape? No pity fuck? No leaving me helpless for housekeeping to find?"
"I suppose there's long legal precedence that you can rape your lawful wedded spouse, isn't there? But I do find it interesting that you present me only with the extremes of options. Either I'll force you against your will, or offer some sort of greeting card solace with condoms?"
He was fighting the last of the Oxycontin, and with the drug wearing off, the pain had to be as distracting as the opiates had been. He tried, though. I suppose he felt he had to.
"I'm sorry, Matt," he began.
I waited, watching his face. As yet, he hadn't met my eyes. When he did not continue, I asked, "Sorry for what?"
"For what I tried to pull. With Kaos. I wanted--" He couldn't find a way to say that he wanted to live forever.
"Everyone does," I said.
He looked up then, hopeful that he might be forgiven. I don't know what he heard in my tone to make him think that could be possible. I kept my face smooth, but he knew me enough to guess that he was wrong.
"Well, fuck," he said. "It's not like you were completely honest with me."
"Mathias Bierce was what he said he was, Sasha. I am Bierce, and I am many other things as well."
"Immortal, or multiple personality syndrome?" He tried to joke, but it fell flat.
I merely smiled, like a snake, like a tiger.
"Are you going to kill me?"
"And waste all that effort sewing up your hand?" I could feel no colder than I did at that moment. I loved him, and I could not let that fact change what I had to do to protect myself. My instinct was to walk out the door and never turn back, but there were things left to be done. "I could simply let Mulder have you. From what I can tell, he'd love to get you into the legal system for past crimes."
"No, please, please don't do that."
"Oh, come on. Current prison conditions aren't so bad, and the medical care is a lot better than it once was. I'm sure you'd get physical therapy for your hand in a year or so."
He looked at me with his eyes wide, whether feigned or real, I did not care. If he'd come back at me, if he'd challenged me, I might have found a way to stay with him. Instead, he surprised me.
He begged.
I turned to leave, thinking at first in disgust that I had broken him. Then I looked at him again. "Please don't throw me in that briar patch," I quoted.
He looked confused. "What are you talking about?"
"The Uncle Remus stories, although they're retellings of older African folk tales. Most Americans your age would know the story of B'rer Rabbit and the briar patch."
"I was raised in Russia." His demeanor changed. "I trip on these things now and then. What's the connection?"
"You're trying to get me to do something by claiming you don't want me to do it."
He tried to demur, but I shook my head and walked out, heading back to the crappy hotel room I had rented as Matthew Mason, but not yet slept in.
I'd seen too many tar babies in my time to take a swing at the one he was setting up for me.
~~~~~
Mulder looked at the room phone after MacLeod and Johnson were gone. Time to try again. This time when the voice message started, he stayed on the line and left the number of the hotel. He waited, then, not turning on the TV for a momentary distraction. The phone rang within a minute.
"Mulder."
"Dana," he said, as if hoping he would feel something more at the sound of her name.
"What is it? What's wrong?"
"I don't think I'm coming home from this."
"Krycek. Did you find him?"
Mulder nodded. His wife's face had permanent creases between the brow, ones he felt he had put there, and they deepened now as she tried to decipher him yet again.
"Mulder, drop it. Whatever this case is, just drop it. Let those two other agents handle it. Come home."
"I can't."
He knew what his tone of voice must be telling her, and he hoped there was enough regret in it, and to be sure, he added, "I'm sorry, Dana. Agent Gantt has been killed, and I can't leave Johnson alone."
"Then send that Nield woman. You said she needed more field experience."
"She's gone. I think she was the insider."
"For a bunch of art world murders?"
"It's much more than that. That was just a red herring to get me in, but I don't know why they bothered. Krycek alone would have done it, and it turns out they have Krycek on a leash."
"You know better than that. Krycek doesn't stay on anyone's leash."
He considered her words. Skinner had said that Krycek was working for them for the moment, whoever they were, and that implied they still did not trust him.
"Mulder? Talk to me."
"I don't know what to think. I think the goal is to bring down Olympian Chemical."
"The company that just open-sourced their miracle corn? What's wrong with them?"
"They own Zeus Diagnostics, for one."
It was her turn to be silent.
"This involves an army of clones, and there's more to it than that. It has to be stopped. It's them, Dana, the old Syndicate."
"Do what you have to, love," she said, her voice fearful and resigned. "Shall I come, too?"
"No." He knew he said it too fast.
"What else is there? What's going on?"
He wished he hadn't called her. Too many years of a comfortable life had made him forget how clearly she saw through him.
"I am not our children's biological father," he said, and from her expression the fact was not news to her. "Who is?"
She hesitated, looking away before answering. "Walter. When the first IVFs didn't work, they called and said there was something wrong with your sperm, something strange that they couldn't diagnose. I wondered if it had to do with... experiments you've undergone, and I didn't want to drag you through that. I didn't want you to be hurt."
"So you asked our dear friend Director Skinner."
"Mulder--"
He hung up the phone, and pulled the cord out of the wall.
Chapter 15
Fandoms: Highlander, X-files, Invisible Man
Rating:NC-17 overall, PG-13 this chapter.
Disclaimer: Don't own 'em.
Background:The year is 2023. Methos, the oldest of the Immortals in Highlander, was living as a corporate lawyer in Denver. Alexander Krycek, the double-dealing ratboy of the X-Files, was living there as an art dealer, running a gallery in Aurora, Colorado. Mulder was retired, somewhere suburban.
Summary: Epiphanies, revelations, and short, sharp shocks.
Chapter 1
(Chapters link sequentially from there.)
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Sorry, dear. But there is always a last mistake.
Time Enough For Love
Krycek would be out of it for several hours, given the drugs I had put in him. I took a deep breath, then let out the tension surgery always brought. I could have that confidence, that disconnected certainty that surgery requires, but today it was not easy for me to maintain. Plus, I had decisions to make.
I called MacLeod, got his phone mail, and left no message. Then I thought for a long time, and called Betty.
"Oh. My. God. Mr. Bierce is that you? You look deranged. I thought you were dead. Everyone thinks that you're dead, except for that obnoxious woman from the DCI, and why in the world are they asking questions about where you went to high school?"
"Nice to see you too, Betty," I said. "What obnoxious woman from the DCI?"
"An agent Nield. She's called about six times in the last few days, asking questions, all the same questions about you and where you're from, and all that." Betty interrupted herself. "What in the world are you thinking with those lip rings? They're no disguise, you know, not from anyone who knows you."
"Sasha liked them," I said, and resisted the urge to run my tongue across them. Betty might read pornography about television characters on her lunch hour, but the real thing might cause her embarrassment.
"Sasha! Are you with him? Are you two back together?"
"We got married."
"Oh, how romantic!"
"Betty," I said, in my best lawyer voice to forestall any further enthusiasm, and to avoid telling her that it wasn't Matty and Sasha that got married.
"Mr. Bierce," she answered, pulling herself back into the role of my good right arm.
"What has happened in the Olympian Chemical case? All I know is what was on the news."
"Oh, well, it seemed that when they discovered you wouldn't be representing them personally, they decided not to fight it. I must say that Heyn wasn't best pleased, but he's handled the press well, I think."
I puzzled over the news. What did I have to do with their legal stance? "Did they give any detailed information about their change of heart?"
Betty shook her head. "They seemed to know you were out of the picture before the story hit the news feeds. Are you going to tell me what happened?"
"I was kidnapped," I said, feeling as if a long time had passed between then and now, but it had only been four days.
"Oh, Mr. Bierce! Do you think it had something to do with the case?"
It was only when she asked the question that I wondered if that were true. From what Krycek had told me, Olympian was central to the plans of the Consortium, and that there had been disagreements within the group of codgers before. But as their attorney, I could have taken any change of legal approach in stride. Perhaps the kidnapping was a show, and perhaps it had to do with Krycek, as the old man had told me. Maybe the two were tied together.
"You may have something there," I answered Betty.
"How did you get away?"
"I had help. If someone named Bobby Hobbes comes looking for me, help him out in any way you can."
"Yes, sir. I can't wait to hear the story, and I can't wait to go into the office and tell them you're alive."
"Don't do that," I said, harsher than intended, then softened my voice. "If I'm going to get to the bottom of this, I'll need to stay dead for a while."
"All right."
"But I'll need your help."
"Anything you need."
"Don't we have a complete set of information on Olympian from cases over the years? I need a list of all of their physical facilities."
"What are you looking for?"
"An army."
She blinked at me for a moment and then said, "You're not joking."
"It's a small army. Just under a thousand men. They may have been scattered or they may be in one place, but I'm guessing the location is somewhat remote. It could be an agricultural processing plant or even a mine from the materials company."
"I'll look to see if I can find anything on recent shipments to the areas, purchases of food and clothing," she said.
"Good idea. When do you think you'll have this?"
"Late tomorrow for some of it. There won't be anyone in tomorrow, so it should go faster."
Tomorrow was Sunday. "I'll need it by Monday morning. I've got an idea."
"For what?"
"Betty, you probably shouldn't know. It could be dangerous."
"Well, at least this is more exciting than most corporate litigation."
I looked affronted, and wondered whether it worked with my new hair and piercings. "I thought you liked your job."
"I liked you. The work was okay." She looked at me for a moment. "You're not coming back, are you?"
"I don't think so. At best, I'll end up in the Witness Protection Program." As the words came out, I finalized an exit strategy. "Let's try to keep Mathias Bierce dead."
She nodded. "This number comes up as Matthew Mason."
"Yes. Matthew Mason married Sasha, only under another name. Don't worry, my Last Will and Testament will stay intact."
"What do you mean? Sasha has a different name, too? Are you two in hiding? What will?"
"Sasha was in hiding, it turns out." I let her make of that what she would. No doubt some scenario of his escape from something sordid and Russian was already spinning in her head. "Look, I have to go now. Call this number as soon as you have something."
"All right," she said. "I'm glad you're not dead, Mr. B-- Er, Matthew."
"I picked it so you could still call me Matty," I smiled and added, "to my face."
She pinked, and I said good-bye, then closed the phone. Krycek slept in a drugged stupor, leaning back in the seat with the headrest nearly in the lap of Kaos's corpse. He would need someone to care for him, I thought, until his right hand healed. I was tempted to let him fend for himself, but that wouldn't do. Now was not the time to resolve it, though. I had to flesh out one plan before launching another.
This time MacLeod answered his phone.
"Methos."
He used my name, so I knew he was alone.
"Where have you been?" I asked.
"More important, where are you. What's going on? Mulder and Johnson can't raise Gantt."
"He's dead."
"How?"
"A neat bullet hole in the middle of the forehead, courtesy of my husband."
He looked pained. "You could have less murderous taste in men. Kronos, and now Krycek. I wonder what came in between."
"Alexa," I answered. I hadn't thought about that delicate and doomed beauty in too long, about the one year we had before illness took her. Less than two ten-thousandths of a percent of my life, and it still hurt.
MacLeod closed his eyes, nearly wincing, then recovered himself. "We all have it in us, blah, blah, blah, good and evil, yeah, yeah, I get it. What about Corrivubias? And what happened with Kaos?"
"He shot Corrivubias, too. She's probably dead. Hobbes should have survived, though."
"Who's Hobbes, and what about Kaos?"
"I killed Kaos." I held up the phone so MacLeod could see the corpse. "Hobbes is a long story. He's in his seventies, talks a mile a minute, and I think he works for me. I left him back at the compound, but I think he'll be okay. He was wearing body armor."
"And how is your husband?" MacLeod asked.
"Out cold. I sliced open the back of his hand, and had to stitch it back together."
To my surprise, MacLeod took it in stride. "You didn't kill him?"
"It wasn't like he'd broken a leg," I said, joking, yet not, and he knew it. "Look, I have an idea about what to do about the clones."
"Do you know where they are?"
"No, but I have my secretary working on it."
"You have a secretary?"
"Bierce does, and before you ask, yes I trust her to keep quiet about the fact that I'm alive. Point being, Olympian Chemical was one of my clients, and I would guess they have the clones at one of their more remote facilities. She's checking locations, and seeing if she can track food and clothing shipments that would indicate a large group of people."
"And then what? You wouldn't believe how hard it was with just twenty of them, and only Mulder and I to take the Quickenings."
That was a bit of news. "So he's one of us now, is he?"
"Aye."
"How's he taking it?"
"Hard to say yet."
I swallowed, and asked, "You shared Quickenings? Do you feel a connection to him, like we did after Bordeaux?"
"Yes. I don't think he knows that it's not normal for us."
"You going to take him as a student?"
"Good God, no." He shook his head. "No students. Not now, not ever."
"Never is a long time, MacLeod. Besides, doesn't he wake up your protective urges?"
The answer to my sarcasm was wordless, but even through the screen resolution of the phone, I could see the sour expression.
"Krycek is in love with him," I said.
"They deserve each other," MacLeod said, then added in feigned apology, "Not to criticize your husband, of course."
I half shrugged. "I just criticized him with a knife down the back of his hand. He won't be able to hold a gun or put on his own prosthesis for several weeks."
"Right," he said. He did not have to say more. He knew I had done it so Krycek couldn't do anything more that would make me have to kill him. "So, what's your plan?"
"We find the clones, we get the government to do our dirty work."
"What?"
"Think about it. We can't manage almost thousand Immortals. Let them do it. I turn state's evidence against Olympian Chemical with everything I have on them, which starts with illegal cloning and continues with some dirty business secrets I have in the files of my law office."
"And revealing the existence of Immortals when they try to kill the clones," MacLeod said.
"I don't think so. I think the Watchers can handle that aspect of it. Why don't you run the idea by Agent Johnson."
"And tell her that her partner is dead," he added
"I'm sorry about that. There was nothing I could do."
"Right."
In almost every language there's a way for a one-word agreement to mean the opposite. "MacLeod, I am not heartless. I am sorry. For what it's worth, I liked him."
"Too bad it didn't happen the other way around. From what Mulder has told me, your husband is a complete rat."
"You have no idea," I said, glancing over and remembering. "Besides, ask Mulder what happened last time someone shot Krycek in the head. He's tougher than he looks."
We rang off, and I sat back to think. Instead of concentrating on how to get the government and the Watchers to solve our clone problem, I found myself remembering Alexa. She was far tougher than she looked, as well, but in her spirit and not, sadly, her body.
But that, I realized, was part of why I loved her. Even five thousand years of life leaves room for epiphanies. I loved her more because she was broken, incurably ill, yet full of life and unbowed. Was choosing Krycek a reversion to the patterns that kept me with a mad killer like Kronos for so many centuries?
No. He was broken, too. I looked over, and looked at how the lines on his face and the hard expression that had come with the name Krycek had smoothed in sleep. There I saw Sasha, the skin Krycek had worn that covered his essential isolation, and the person Krycek could have been. Sasha had a flawed body, but he lived with it like Alexa had lived with her illness: ignore it when possible, and never let it interfere with living. Krycek was something different, angrier.
I remembered how he reacted when I told him I thought of him as my husband, and I realized my missed opportunity. That would have been the moment to crack him open at that broken flaw of loneliness. It would not have been hard.
In the last few centuries, it seemed I loved fragile things.
I reached over and ran a finger down his sleeping cheek. I had to be honest. Many of the things I had liked about Sasha were elements of Krycek showing through the mask. I had liked the mystery of why he went armed. I liked the cruelty, in a way, although as Matty and Sasha we had contained it to commentary on the world around us. Sasha was amusing, sometimes intriguing, but Krycek was an invigorating challenge, and so very delicate in his way. Sex with Krycek had fulfilled the promise of Sasha's restraint.
Yes, well, none of that again any time soon. I pushed the threatening emotions back down.
I stepped out of the car to void my bladder, then settled in to wait until the coast was clear.
~~~~~
Mulder opened the door to MacLeod's knock. "What is it?" he asked, opening to let both MacLeod and Johnson in.
"Gantt's dead."
He looked at Johnson, and her lips were tight.
"How? Krycek?"
MacLeod nodded. "We have an idea. Well, Matt has an idea."
Mulder held up a hand and turned to Johnson. "Has anyone found anything on Nield?"
"She went to Florida. Some secretary finally turned up a voicemail that said she was going to take care of something with her elderly parents. She took a flight to Tampa, and rented a car."
"Is she leading us to the clones, or away from them?"
Johnson shrugged. She was too professional to cave in. "I suppose we need to book tickets, then."
MacLeod shook his head. "Hear us out, first. There may be a way to take out Olympian Chemical through the DCI. Matt was one of their outside attorneys, and he can bring in additional dirt to illegal cloning."
"What does he want for this help?" Mulder had no love for lawyers, but one who could marry Krycek gained a whole new layer of manipulative bastard. "What's in it for him?"
"Witness protection program. A new identity."
"He's pulled that off already, He went from Mathias Bierce to Paul Adamson to Matthew Mason in less than three days."
"Yes, but this would be cleaner for him, give him a chance to start over without having to die."
Mulder considered, then asked, "What about Krycek?"
Johnson looked up. "What?"
"You heard me. What happens to him? We were set up on this from the beginning. Or were you in on it, too?"
MacLeod cut in. "Matthew has Krycek and Kaos. Kaos is dead. Krycek has lost the use of his right hand."
"How did that happen?"
"Matthew did it. Seemed Krycek tried to kill him."
"I can't say I'm surprised," Mulder said
"What's that?" asked Johnson.
"Did you know he was working for Skinner?"
From the look on her face, Mulder had his answer. She hadn't known.
~~~~~
Krycek's moans woke me. I hadn't intended to doze off, but he'd given me very little sleep last night. The sun was low, and there was quiet, not even the noise of tires on the distant road. It might be time to head back to town, although I would need to do something about the corpse. Better to burn it, I thought, but couldn't see how to do it without making matters worse with the authorities. DCI would have enough trouble covering my tail without making it worse. I moved the branches that blocked in the car, pushed Kaos's body to lie in the seat and covered it as well as I could with the tarp, then started the engine. By the time we got back to the hotel, it was almost dark, and I was hungry.
"Wake up."
Krycek stirred, but he was more awake than he let on.
"Come on, sleeping beauty, let's get you up to the room."
"You're a cheerful bastard," he groaned. "Are you always like this when you maim your lovers?"
"Yes," My smile couldn't have been more cold. "Up we go." I helped him out of the car and up the stairs.
I fished his key card out of my pocket, and led him inside. He was passive as I took off his leather jacket and shirt, then unhooked his prosthetic. He tried to flex his fingers.
"Give that a week or three," I said, as he hissed in pain. I handed him a Tylenol. It was all the painkiller left in the med kit. He took it from me and put it in his pocket, hissing at the pain of moving his hand.
"What are you going to do to me?"
"Nothing, dear boy."
"What, no rape? No pity fuck? No leaving me helpless for housekeeping to find?"
"I suppose there's long legal precedence that you can rape your lawful wedded spouse, isn't there? But I do find it interesting that you present me only with the extremes of options. Either I'll force you against your will, or offer some sort of greeting card solace with condoms?"
He was fighting the last of the Oxycontin, and with the drug wearing off, the pain had to be as distracting as the opiates had been. He tried, though. I suppose he felt he had to.
"I'm sorry, Matt," he began.
I waited, watching his face. As yet, he hadn't met my eyes. When he did not continue, I asked, "Sorry for what?"
"For what I tried to pull. With Kaos. I wanted--" He couldn't find a way to say that he wanted to live forever.
"Everyone does," I said.
He looked up then, hopeful that he might be forgiven. I don't know what he heard in my tone to make him think that could be possible. I kept my face smooth, but he knew me enough to guess that he was wrong.
"Well, fuck," he said. "It's not like you were completely honest with me."
"Mathias Bierce was what he said he was, Sasha. I am Bierce, and I am many other things as well."
"Immortal, or multiple personality syndrome?" He tried to joke, but it fell flat.
I merely smiled, like a snake, like a tiger.
"Are you going to kill me?"
"And waste all that effort sewing up your hand?" I could feel no colder than I did at that moment. I loved him, and I could not let that fact change what I had to do to protect myself. My instinct was to walk out the door and never turn back, but there were things left to be done. "I could simply let Mulder have you. From what I can tell, he'd love to get you into the legal system for past crimes."
"No, please, please don't do that."
"Oh, come on. Current prison conditions aren't so bad, and the medical care is a lot better than it once was. I'm sure you'd get physical therapy for your hand in a year or so."
He looked at me with his eyes wide, whether feigned or real, I did not care. If he'd come back at me, if he'd challenged me, I might have found a way to stay with him. Instead, he surprised me.
He begged.
I turned to leave, thinking at first in disgust that I had broken him. Then I looked at him again. "Please don't throw me in that briar patch," I quoted.
He looked confused. "What are you talking about?"
"The Uncle Remus stories, although they're retellings of older African folk tales. Most Americans your age would know the story of B'rer Rabbit and the briar patch."
"I was raised in Russia." His demeanor changed. "I trip on these things now and then. What's the connection?"
"You're trying to get me to do something by claiming you don't want me to do it."
He tried to demur, but I shook my head and walked out, heading back to the crappy hotel room I had rented as Matthew Mason, but not yet slept in.
I'd seen too many tar babies in my time to take a swing at the one he was setting up for me.
~~~~~
Mulder looked at the room phone after MacLeod and Johnson were gone. Time to try again. This time when the voice message started, he stayed on the line and left the number of the hotel. He waited, then, not turning on the TV for a momentary distraction. The phone rang within a minute.
"Mulder."
"Dana," he said, as if hoping he would feel something more at the sound of her name.
"What is it? What's wrong?"
"I don't think I'm coming home from this."
"Krycek. Did you find him?"
Mulder nodded. His wife's face had permanent creases between the brow, ones he felt he had put there, and they deepened now as she tried to decipher him yet again.
"Mulder, drop it. Whatever this case is, just drop it. Let those two other agents handle it. Come home."
"I can't."
He knew what his tone of voice must be telling her, and he hoped there was enough regret in it, and to be sure, he added, "I'm sorry, Dana. Agent Gantt has been killed, and I can't leave Johnson alone."
"Then send that Nield woman. You said she needed more field experience."
"She's gone. I think she was the insider."
"For a bunch of art world murders?"
"It's much more than that. That was just a red herring to get me in, but I don't know why they bothered. Krycek alone would have done it, and it turns out they have Krycek on a leash."
"You know better than that. Krycek doesn't stay on anyone's leash."
He considered her words. Skinner had said that Krycek was working for them for the moment, whoever they were, and that implied they still did not trust him.
"Mulder? Talk to me."
"I don't know what to think. I think the goal is to bring down Olympian Chemical."
"The company that just open-sourced their miracle corn? What's wrong with them?"
"They own Zeus Diagnostics, for one."
It was her turn to be silent.
"This involves an army of clones, and there's more to it than that. It has to be stopped. It's them, Dana, the old Syndicate."
"Do what you have to, love," she said, her voice fearful and resigned. "Shall I come, too?"
"No." He knew he said it too fast.
"What else is there? What's going on?"
He wished he hadn't called her. Too many years of a comfortable life had made him forget how clearly she saw through him.
"I am not our children's biological father," he said, and from her expression the fact was not news to her. "Who is?"
She hesitated, looking away before answering. "Walter. When the first IVFs didn't work, they called and said there was something wrong with your sperm, something strange that they couldn't diagnose. I wondered if it had to do with... experiments you've undergone, and I didn't want to drag you through that. I didn't want you to be hurt."
"So you asked our dear friend Director Skinner."
"Mulder--"
He hung up the phone, and pulled the cord out of the wall.
Chapter 15